[illustration: cover art] [frontispiece: 'there is something in the man's appearance which seems familiar to me.' _page _] the adventure league by hilda t. skae thomas nelson and sons, ltd. london, edinburgh, new york toronto, and paris contents chap. i. what happened in erricha ii. 'the pirates' den' iii. a surprise iv. the compact v. suspense vi. a discovery vii. the siege viii. a cruise in the 'heroic' ix. disappointment x. in which allan is very wise xi. a near shave xii. surrounded xiii. andrew macpeters xiv. caught xv. hamish to the rescue [illustration: map of erricha island] the adventure league chapter i what happened in erricha. it was very early on a bright summer morning. rocks and heather and green fields lay bathed in sunshine; and round the shores of a small island on the west coast of scotland the sea was dancing and splashing, while in the distance the highland hills raised their bare crests towards a cloudless sky. the sun had not long risen, and it seemed as though no one could be stirring at this early hour; yet there was an unusual commotion among the birds nesting on the ledges of a high cliff. the funny little puffins, with their red, parrot-like bills, were peering anxiously out of the crevices; while the curious little auks, standing erect in rows like black and white mannikins, were exceedingly perturbed; and the kittiwakes flew screaming from the rocky shelves, joining their voices to the hoarser cries of the guillemots and the booming of the waves among walls and pillars of rock. the cause of the birds' agitation was not far to seek. some figures, looking very small upon the huge cliff, were crawling on their hands and knees upon the ledges, gathering eggs. two were boys; and the red cap and serge frock of another proclaimed her to be a girl. about fifty feet below, with nothing between him and the waves which looked small in the distance, a lad hung suspended by a rope, while the birds circled and screamed around him. one of the boys came to where the ledge ended in a sheer drop down to the sea; and putting something very carefully in his pocket, he rose to his feet and began to climb upward. catching hold of the tufts of heather on the verge of the cliff, he swung himself on to firm ground, and proved to be a boy of about ten years of age; thin and wiry, with a dark face and bright twinkling eyes. his thin brown wrists had grown a long way out of the sleeves of his jacket; and he had torn a hole in the knee of each knicker. after rubbing his elbows, which he had grazed against the rocks, he turned to speak to a little girl who was sitting on a tuft of heather, looking somewhat forlorn. a handsome collie dog, yellow-brown with a white ruffle round his neck, was lying impatiently at her feet, every now and again glancing up at his mistress with bright, inquiring eyes. 'well, tricksy,' said the boy; 'tired of waiting, eh?' 'yes,' replied his sister, 'you've been a long time, and i'm cold. i don't see why i shouldn't go down the cliffs with the rest of you. laddie's tired of waiting too.' the collie rose upon hearing his name mentioned, and thrust his nose into the boy's hand, wagging his tail and looking as though he would say, 'come along now, do; and tell the others to come; you've played at that dangerous game long enough; let's all have a jolly scamper after rabbits!' a red cap appeared over the edge of the cliff, followed immediately by a laughing face framed in a crop of fair curly hair; then a girl scrambled on to firm ground. 'hulloa, reggie! are you there already?' she said. 'how many have you got?' 'five,' said reggie, displaying the contents of his pockets; 'an auk's, two puffin's, and two kittiwake's. aren't they prettily marked?' 'beauties,' replied the girl, examining the eggs. 'better get neil to blow them for you; he always does it the best. i have only two, and another broke as i was getting it out; but oh, it was glorious down on these ledges! i'd like to have a scramble like this every morning!' 'i daresay,' broke in an exasperated little voice; 'fine fun for you others to get up at four in the morning when the steamer isn't expected until six, and go scrambling about on the rocks, getting sea-birds' eggs, saying that you'll only be five minutes, and then stay an hour!' the child spoke in little rushes and gushes, and her eyes twinkled and looked pathetic by turns in her little dark, round face. 'an hour, tricksy! it can't have been so long as that!' 'indeed it was, marjorie, because i have reggie's watch; he left it with me, and it has been rather tiresome waiting here, when you know i mayn't climb the rocks as you do.' 'poor tricksy, what a shame! it's too bad of us, leaving you alone all that time. just wait until you are a year or two older, and then your mother will let you climb like the rest of us. who would have thought that we had been away so long! time _does_ go so quickly when you're scrambling about for eggs!' she looked around with bright, fearless blue eyes; a tall, slight girl of fifteen, with a face so tanned by sun and wind as almost to have lost its extreme fairness, and with the quick, free movements which speak of perfect health and an open-air life. 'hulloa,' said reggie suddenly; 'there's the steamer!' 'where?' asked both the girls eagerly. 'over there, just rounding the headland, quite in the distance; you can see the trail of smoke, she won't be in for some time yet.' for a minute or two the young people stood watching the grey line upon the horizon; then marjorie said-- 'she's coming along pretty quickly. hadn't we better call the others and let them know?' 'yes, do,' said reggie; and hollowing their hands, they shouted, 'neil!--hamish!--hulloa!--the steamer!' their voices were blown back to them by the wind; but the lad on the rope happening to look up, the others pointed energetically out to sea, where the hull of the steamer was now becoming visible. the boy glanced round; then climbed quickly hand over hand up the rope, and joined the others. 'the steamer at last,' said reggie. 'see, she is just rounding erricha point now; she won't be long in coming in. isn't it jolly about the measles, neil?' 'jolly for those who didn't happen to take them,' suggested marjorie. 'allan's holidays began six weeks sooner than they would have done if the boys hadn't all been sent home,' continued reggie. 'he is coming just when we're having the best fun,' said marjorie, watching the steamer with thoughtful eyes; 'what jolly times we'll have now. that was an awfully good idea of yours, neil.' the tall lad looked gratified. he was a handsome youth of about seventeen, dressed in the rough clothes of a fisherman, but refined in appearance, with a straight nose, dark blue eyes, and curly black hair. 'i will be thinking that you and the others had as much to do with it as i had, miss marjorie,' he replied. 'not at all, old fellow,' said reggie, who always spoke to his friend as though he were a boy of his own age; 'not at all; we never could have made the place what it is if it hadn't been for you. hulloa, hamish, old chap,' he added good-humouredly, as a somewhat sleepy-looking, fair-haired boy joined the group--'reached the top?' marjorie looked angry, as she always did when reggie stewart assumed patronising airs towards her brother. 'yes,' replied hamish simply; 'i thought there was no hurry, as the steamer won't be in for a while, and i was trying to reach down for these little things. look, tricksy, i thought you might like to have them--two young puffins, not long hatched.' 'o hamish, what _lovely_ little things!' cried tricksy, her eyes growing large and her little round face dimpling with pleasure; 'it _was_ good of you to get them for me.' at this moment laddie, who had been standing impatiently beside the group, pricked up his ears with a growl, looking at something a short distance away. 'what's the matter with you, laddie?' said reggie. 'he's looking at that man over there,' said marjorie; 'who is it? he seems to want to speak to you, neil.' neil looked round and then reddened slightly. 'it will be that poor fellow gibbie mackerrach, one of the band of gipsies who are staying here just now,' he said. 'go away, gibbie,' he added in gaelic, shaking his head, since it was unlikely that the gipsy would be able to hear distinctly where he stood; 'i can't come.' 'it's the lad who isn't quite right in his mind, isn't it?' said marjorie; 'the one whom you helped when his boat was upset on the loch?' 'yes, it will be the poor fellow who had the ducking,' replied neil. 'he will be quite harmless, only a little odd. you will nefer be seeing him with the others; he will always be wandering about by himself, and sleeping in all kinds of places. och! but this will not do though; he is meddling with our coats that we took off when we were going to climb. hi, gibbie! you must not be touching these things.' the lad's handsome, foolish face became overspread with a smile as neil came towards him. 'good neil--kind neil,' he said, patting him on the arm. 'now go away, gibbie; there's a good lad,' said neil. 'i will have no time to be talking to you just now, and you must not be touching our things. you had better go home, gibbie; they will be looking for you.' 'be quiet, laddie,' said reggie authoritatively to the dog, who was still growling; 'he is not doing any harm.' laddie's remonstrances died away in a disapproving grumble, as though he were saying that he wasn't satisfied yet, and would renew the subject upon some future occasion. 'if you don't mind,' said neil, who had been watching the retreating form of the gipsy, 'i will be going a bit of the way with him. he iss trying to cross the shaking bog now, and he might be coming to harm in it.' 'all right, neil; see you again later,' said the others. 'tricksy, what's the matter with you?' cried marjorie; 'you are trembling like anything, and your teeth are chattering in your head.' 'cold,' said the little girl, whose small dark face was beginning to look pinched and unhappy; 'and i'm a little hungry too; we hadn't time to get anything to eat when you and hamish came for us so early.' 'comes of leaving you up there so long,' said marjorie; 'how careless we were. whatever will your mother say if you get ill.' 'here, tricksy,' said hamish, 'take this coat, i don't want it; and look, the steamer is not far from the pier; she is coming in at a rate. we'll have to run if we want to get in as soon as she does. take my hand, and i'll help you along, and you'll be warm in half a jiff.' tricksy smiled in a consoled way as she put her hand into the big outstretched one of the boy; and the whole party set off to race along the top of the cliff and down to where the pier jutted out from a small village nestled in a low part of the shore. laddie gave an excited bark and scampered beside the others, wondering what was going to happen. the steamer was coming in pretty fast, and the pier being encumbered with nets and with crans of newly caught fish, they reached the mooring-place just as the hawser was being thrown ashore. a bright-looking boy of about fourteen years of age was standing on deck with his hands in his pockets and a tweed cap on the back of his head, and a tall, sunburnt gentleman was beside him. 'hulloa, father! hulloa, allan!' said tricksy, dimpling and smiling. laddie looked up for a minute; then burst into a joyous barking, and sprang several feet off the ground, turning round in the air before once more alighting upon his paws; then he tore up and down the pier like a dog out of his senses. in the midst of his excitement the gangway was thrown across, and the sailors stood aside to let the laird and his son leave the vessel. immediately laddie bounded forward and danced around them, barking until the rocks echoed, and waving his bushy tail in an ecstasy of welcome. 'down, laddie, down,' said mr. stewart sternly; and laddie, after looking up pathetically for a minute or two, contented himself with following allan as closely as he could. 'how do you do, marjorie?' said allan. 'hulloa, hamish; glad to see you! hulloa, reggie!--tricksy, why don't you keep your dog in better order?' tricksy looked hurt. 'he's a very well-trained dog,' she declared. 'he only barks because he is glad to see you.' 'tricksy thinks she owns a dog,' said her father, smiling down at the little girl, 'but in reality the dog owns her.' 'daddy, you are always teasing me,' said laddie's eight-year-old mistress; 'he's a _most_ obedient dog.--laddie, come here.' laddie glanced at her and then looked up adoringly at allan without stirring from his side. 'that is so like a dog,' observed marjorie; 'they always make more fuss about a boy, even if he hardly notices them, than over a girl who is always petting them. it's too bad.' tricksy looked mortified. 'it's because he's so glad that allan has come home,' she said. 'just wait, daddy; he'll obey me sometime.' mr. stewart and hamish smiled; but the others were clustering round allan, asking questions. 'had you a good journey, allan? the steamer's very late. how are the measles? are many of the boys ill? lucky you didn't take it.' 'it's very jolly that you've got such long holidays, allan,' said tricksy, who was walking on her tip-toes with pleasurable anticipation. 'we've got such a jolly game at present; and neil's helping us.' 'how is old neil?' asked allan. 'first-rate,' said reggie. 'he was with us this morning, gathering eggs.' 'gathering eggs!' said allan; 'you've been up very early.' 'yes,' replied marjorie; 'reggie and tricksy heard that you were expected at six in the morning, so they rode over to ask us to be sure to come and meet you at the steamer. we got up ever so early--i don't know when; and what do you think? after we'd come all that long way those lazy people were still asleep!' 'yes,' piped tricksy; 'at four in the morning we were wakened by having pebbles thrown up at our windows, and we had to get up and dress in a brace of shakes.' (reggie's face darkened. tricksy was fond of using slang picked up from her brothers, and he felt it his duty to disapprove.) 'then we didn't know what to do to fill up the time, so we went to neil's mother's cottage, and reggie knocked at neil's window, so that he came out to see what was the matter; and we all went egg-gathering on the rocks.' 'where's father?' said allan suddenly; he has been left behind.' 'go on--all of you!' called mr. stewart, who was engaged in talking to a respectably dressed man on the pier; 'don't wait for me.--take hamish and marjorie home, allan, and give them some breakfast, and tell your mother i shan't be long.' 'i wonder who that is with father,' said reggie; 'i can't see his face. he looks like a stranger. father is always having people coming to talk to him now that he has been made a j.p.' 'allan,' said marjorie, 'before we go to your house, i think we had better go into mrs. macalister's and get a scone or a piece of oat-cake for tricksy. she has gone far too long without food. you're hungry, aren't you, tricksy?' tricksy nodded. her little dark face was very pale, and she was struggling with a vexatious desire to cry. 'she always _will_ insist upon doing what the rest of us do, that child,' said marjorie in an undertone to hamish; and hamish looked kindly at the youngest member of the band. 'she has no end of pluck, the little kid,' he aid. 'we'll go to mrs. macalister's shop,' said marjorie. 'i am sure she must be up by now, and we'll be able to get something.' the young folks pattered along the unevenly paved streets of the little village, which had the sea on one side and grassy cliffs on the other. 'it's curious what a lot of people are about so early,' said marjorie, as they passed some knots of men and women standing in corners and talking. 'i wonder whether there is anything unusual going on.' the party stopped at the door of a small shop which had some cakes and jars of sweets in the window, and a post-box let into the wall. 'here's mrs. macalister's,' said marjorie; 'she has her shop open very early.' the little place was in confusion. the shutters were down, but the shop had not been tidied, and mrs. macalister herself, when she came forward to serve her customers, was pale and had red eyes. 'is anything the matter, mrs. macalister?' asked marjorie, while the others looked at the untidy shop in surprise. 'indeed, miss marjorie, i will just be having my shop broken into this night; and they will be opening the post-box and taking away a lot of the letters,' and the woman threw herself into a chair and began talking and lamenting in gaelic, while the children crowded together open-eyed. 'no, master reggie--no, miss marjorie; do not be touching anything,' said mrs. macalister hurriedly, as they approached the shattered letter-box; 'it hass all to remain as it iss until the chief constable and the laird hev seen it; and they will be bringing the sheriff from stornwell; it iss an unlucky day for a poor woman like me, whateffer.' 'it's a dreadful thing,' said marjorie; 'i hope they'll catch the thief, mrs. macalister.' mr. stewart, accompanied by the stranger and the island constable, was approaching the door, so the young people trooped out into the street, feeling greatly excited. 'who do you think has done it, allan?' asked tricksy in an awestruck voice. allan did not answer, and reggie said, 'how can he tell, tricksy?' somewhat curtly. tricksy subsided, and a cart laden with peats coming by, allan stopped the driver and asked him to give them a 'lift.' the man helped tricksy into the cart, and the others scrambled in the best way they could, and settled themselves among the peats. 'it's a dreadful business this,' said marjorie, her eyes shining brighter and bluer with excitement. 'i don't believe such a thing has ever happened with us before,' said allan; 'our people have always had the credit of being very honest.' 'who can it have been?' said hamish, after considering for a minute. 'i can't believe that any of our people would have done it.' 'there will be no end of a row,' said reggie, speaking for the first time. 'father will have his work cut out for him, as he is a j.p. now.' 'yes, and the sheriff coming here, and everything,' said marjorie. 'how will you like to meet your friend the sheriff again, tricksy?' there was no reply. tricksy had fallen asleep among the peats, her head pillowed upon her arm, and her soft, dark waves of hair falling over her face. the others began to realise how sleepy they were, after having risen before sunrise and spent several hours in the strong sea air, and in spite of excitement, conversation languished while the cart jolted along and finally halted at the gates of ardnavoir, the manor-house of the island of inchkerra. chapter ii the pirates' den 'neil, old fellow,' allan was saying, 'i wonder how much longer these people are going to keep us waiting.' the two were in a boat that was bobbing up and down upon the waves. the shore close by was low and sandy, with some seaweed-covered stones forming a convenient landing-place. on one side the bay swept round in a curve ending in a rocky headland; and on the other arose low cliffs with brambles and sea-pinks growing in the crevices. a breeze was blowing shoreward; and the waves curled and broke upon the beach with a pleasant sound. 'nothing more found out about the robbery yet, i suppose?' said allan, after they had waited a little longer. 'nothing at all,' said neil. 'it iss a most extraordinary affair, for there iss not a man on the island one could effer be suspecting of doing such a thing; and if it wass a stranger, the wonder iss how he will be managing to come and go without being seen. the letter-box wass broken into from inside the house, and whoever will be doing it must have got in after macalister and his wife wass gone to bed. it iss a wonder they will not have been hearing anything.' 'there's the macgregors' pony-cart at last,' said allan, 'with marjorie and hamish in it. let's bring the boat to the landing-stones. they will leave the trap at mrs. macmurdoch's cottage until we come back.' a man came out of the cottage and held the little shaggy pony while marjorie and her brother took a variety of miscellaneous articles out of the cart. 'hulloa, allan! hulloa, neil!' they cried; 'where are the others?' 'don't know,' said allan, 'they are dawdling somewhere, and we'll never get off at this rate. what's all this that you've got with you?' 'things for the hiding-place,' said marjorie; 'and a nice lot of trouble we've had to bring them all this way without breaking any of them. the pony was particularly tricky, not having been exercised. you'll get a basket of crockery, allan, if you'll go and take it out of the trap. hamish is carrying some provisions and a tablecloth, and i've got some knives and forks, and just look at this!--it's a girdle for making scones with.' 'all right,' said allan; 'chuck them into the boat, and get in yourself. but won't it be a little too civilised, bringing all these things with you?' 'not at all,' said marjorie; 'wait till we show you what a jolly place we're making. we can spend whole days there without ever coming home, and we must be able to cook dinner and tea for ourselves. we've had no end of trouble to get all these things out of the kitchen without elspeth seeing us. she's so mean, you know, about letting us carry away anything that doesn't belong to us.' 'all right,' said allan; 'but when are reggie and tricksy going to turn up? it would serve them jolly well right if we went off without them.' 'there they are in the distance,' said hamish; 'at least, these seem to be the dogs.' 'that's certainly laddie,' said allan, standing up and looking, 'and that little black speck seems to be carlo; but surely those can't be reggie and tricksy with them?' all stared at two curious figures that looked like animated bundles of hay coming along the road. 'it is reggie and tricksy,' said neil, whose sailor's sight enabled him to see farthest; 'and they're carrying something.' 'carrying _what_?' said allan, more and more puzzled. 'perhaps they're bringing straw for bedding,' suggested marjorie. 'then if they are, they're not going to fill up the boat with it on this trip,' said allan decidedly. 'we shall be heavily enough loaded already, with all of ourselves; and they're bringing both the dogs.' as they came nearer the two walking bundles proved to be indeed reggie and tricksy, carrying enormous bundles of ferns. reggie's face peeped, hot and perspiring, round one side of his bundle, which he clasped with the utmost extent of his arms; and tricksy, with a smaller burden, looked with a long-suffering expression over the fronds which tickled her little nose. beside them laddie stepped lightly along, his tail curling over his back; while in the rear a small king charles spaniel waddled painfully along upon his little short legs; his tongue hanging out, and his long ears sweeping the dust of the road. 'well,' said allan; 'whatever are they up to now?' reggie came down to the shore, picking his way cautiously over the stepping-stones. 'you might hold the boat steady for me,' he said in a half-stifled voice; then, stepping on to the thwarts, he lost his footing and fell forward, load and all, into the boat. promptly he struggled to his feet and wiped his forehead, looking around with a self-congratulatory smile. 'there,' he said, 'these will be a great improvement to the place. got them up, roots and all.' meanwhile hamish had relieved tricksy of her load, and neil was helping the little girl over the stones. 'why, tricksy,' said marjorie, as the little girl took her seat, 'you _have_ got yourself into a state!' 'i know, but i couldn't help it,' said tricksy, looking ruefully down at her little black hands and muddy frock. 'reggie wanted the ferns for our garden, and we've been digging away with pieces of wood in the banks of the burn. some of them had roots ever so deep down, and we couldn't help making ourselves muddy. i'll wash my face and hands in the sea.' 'why ever did you bring _that_ thing with you?' said allan in disgust, pointing to the little dog who was standing on the shore. already laddie had sprung on board and was lying curled up on the stern seat, confident of his welcome. 'we'll have to leave him in one of the cottages until we come back.' 'no, no!' cried marjorie and tricksy; 'carlo must come too.' 'let him come,' said hamish; 'he won't be in the way.' the little dog, who had been frisking about and wagging his tail, sat up and begged, looking from one to the other of the young people with a beseeching whine. 'you darling,' cried both the girls; and tricksy sprang out of the boat and lifted him in. allan looked contemptuous as he pushed off; but laddie gave a little yelp of satisfaction, and the little spaniel curled himself cosily in tricksy's lap, while marjorie leaned over and petted him when the boys were not looking. the steady strokes of the rowers brought the boat rapidly through the water, while the herring gulls flew screaming around, and a small island in the middle of the firth came nearer and nearer. presently the sea became shallower, and the boat shot up on the beach. 'here we are,' said marjorie, springing out first; 'now you must see what we've made of the place, allan. haul up the boat, hamish; and reggie, you might hand out some of these things. take care you don't drop any of them. every one take something, and let's come.' laddie waited impatiently while the articles were distributed among the party, and then followed his young friends with an anticipatory bark. carlo was lifted out by hamish, and immediately set off to chase a gull which sailed majestically out to sea, and left him barking on the shore. 'now, allan,' said reggie, his dark eyes twinkling; 'you are going to see what we've been about.' the island consisted of a beach, rocky on the one side, sandy on the other, enclosing a stretch of grass and heather. a tiny hill rose by a deserted shepherd's hut, and a miniature burn trickled down to the sea. the place had once been used as a grazing ground for a few sheep, but of late years had been entirely uninhabited. 'now look, allan,' said reggie, as they stood by the bit of dyke which protected the windy side of the cottage. 'wh-e-ew,' said allan; 'you have made a jolly place of it!' 'rebuilt the cottage, which had been falling to ruins,' said reggie. 'that was mostly neil's doing, and hamish and i helped. filled up the holes in the thatch with fresh heather. we all worked at that part of it. then you see we've made a bit of a garden and thrown up the turf for a dyke on the side where the stone one was broken down. the shells on the path were brought up from the beach of this very island. isn't it jolly?' 'awfully fine,' said allan. 'have you given the place a name yet?' 'why,' said marjorie, 'it's our pirates' den, and we mean to have all kinds of fun in it all through the summer. the boat is called the _pirates' craft_ now, and we are going to have no end of fine doings, particularly if neil has time to join us.' allan shoved his cap to the back of his head, and looked about him again with brightening eyes. 'awfully jolly,' was all that he could say. 'neil, you _are_ a fellow for hitting upon good ideas.' 'now come along and see the inside,' said reggie, leading the way. 'this fine strong door was made by neil,' said marjorie; 'a fine time we had getting it over in the boat. we haven't got glass for the windows yet, and i don't suppose we ever shall; but it doesn't matter. what do you think of our kitchen?' hamish pushed open the door, and they all crowded in to see how allan would look. 'well,' said allan, 'you _have_ done a lot to the place!' the clay floor had been swept dean and had been repaired in places; the hearth had been cleared out, and a kettle hung from a hook in the wide chimney. some gaily-coloured pictures had been nailed up over the damp stains on the walls, and there were some rough chairs and a somewhat rickety table. altogether it was a fairly comfortable little cottage. 'you must have worked very hard at this,' said allan. 'indeed we have,' said marjorie. 'we've been gardening, and hammering, and carpentering all our spare time since you left; tricksy and all of us. we'd never have stuck to it as we did if it hadn't been for neil.' 'good old neil,' said allan, giving the elder lad a friendly pat on the shoulder. 'well, i must say it's an awfully jolly place, and i wish i'd been here while you were working on it.' 'there's plenty to do yet,' said marjorie; 'we are going to make all kinds of improvements. mother and mrs. stewart can't make out how we manage to spend so much time by ourselves and never come to any harm.' they stood looking around for a few minutes and then tricksy's voice broke in, with a little laugh in it, 'yes, these are very nice chairs, and it's a very nice table; but are we going to get anything to put on it?' all the others laughed. 'well,' said allan, 'now i come to think of it, i _am_ a bit peckish. what do you say, hamish?' 'yes,' said marjorie energetically; 'bustle about, all of you, and we'll have some dinner before we do anything else. get some peats, will you, reggie; some of the shepherd's peat-stack is still there, and it comes in very usefully for us.' a fire was soon burning on the hearth, and marjorie suggested that the boys should go to the rocks on the farther side of the island and try to catch a few fish while she and tricksy made scones and boiled the kettle. the boys scrambled out as far as they could and threw out their lines; and when half-a-dozen rock-cod had been caught they returned to find marjorie and tricksy very busy over the fire, while a pile of hot bannocks smoked beside them. 'take the dishes and set the table,' said marjorie, rubbing her eyes, which smarted a little with 'peat reek,' for the chimney did not vent very well. 'where shall we set it?' asked reggie. 'outside, of course; what's the good of being in a house when it isn't raining? besides, it's smoky here.' a tablecloth was spread on a sheltered piece of turf, and secured at the corners with stones to keep it from blowing away; then the dishes were set out upon it. 'what are the dogs about?' asked marjorie, coming out of the cottage with a plate of smoking fish. 'rabbiting, i bet,' said reggie, and began shouting, 'laddie! carlo!' in a few minutes there was a scamper, and laddie's head appeared above a ridge, waiting with pricked-up ears to know what was required of him. 'dinner, lad!' said reggie. laddie gave a yelp, sprang up and turned a somersault in the air and came running, followed by carlo, who yapped with excitement, his ears flying behind him and his curly black coat covered with earth and stalks from burrowing in the rabbit-holes. 'trust, laddie,' said tricksy; and the collie lay down obediently with his nose on his paws. carlo stretched himself beside him, but was unable to restrain his impatience, and sat up more than once and begged, undeterred by warnings from laddie, who feared that his little friend's disobedience might get him into trouble. 'isn't it awfully jolly having dinner out-of-doors?' said marjorie, whose short curly hair was blowing about her face and glistening in the sun, while her blue eyes danced with merriment. 'much nicer than indoors,' said tricksy. 'i wish we could live here altogether.' 'jolly tired you'd get of it,' growled reggie; 'wait till it rains, and you find yourself shut up with half-a-dozen other people, and both the dogs, in one little smoky room. you'd tell another tale then.' 'what i will be wondering, miss marjorie,' said neil; 'iss why you will all be taking so much trouble to keep every one but ourselves from knowing that you have this place?' 'it is only for a little while,' replied marjorie. 'of course we will bring father and mother over here for a picnic some day and give them a surprise.' 'and _my_ father and mother too,' piped tricksy; 'we wouldn't want to keep a thing from mummie, except just for a little while, for fun.' 'then how iss it that you will be finding so much pleasure in having a secret just now?' marjorie looked out to sea with a puzzled expression. 'i don't know,' she said at last, with a little laugh; 'except that it's such fun knowing that we've got a secret!' 'i've been thinking,' said allan, who was lying full length upon a ridge and looking towards inchkerra, 'while we are having such a jolly time of it over here, what must be the feelings of the man who stole those letters, now he knows that the police are after him!' the others all looked towards the island, where they could see the low, grey cottages of the little village. 'it seems strange that they haven't got him yet,' observed marjorie. 'i met maclean the constable from stornwell this morning,' said hamish, 'and he told me that they had no trace as yet, and that they believed it must have been done by some stranger who came over from the mainland, and got away immediately after the robbery.' 'i hope so,' said allan; 'it isn't nice to think of any of our people being dishonest.' 'if it was a stranger,' said reggie; 'they may never catch him.' 'i heard father say that he would be traced by the money-orders,' replied allan. 'it seems that there were several post-office orders in a registered letter addressed to father, and that is one of the letters that is missing. father says that the thief is sure to try to make use of the orders sooner or later, and they have sent the numbers to every post-office in the kingdom.' 'and then the man will be caught!' said tricksy in an awestruck tone. 'that will be the best chance of getting him,' replied allan. 'the fellow will find himself in the wrong box then, won't he, neil?' 'i suppose he will,' replied neil, rather absently. 'i hope it won't turn out to have been some one on the island,' said reggie. 'i hope not,' said marjorie, looking over to the green fields and brown heather moors of inchkerra. 'isn't it dreadful to think that it may have been some one whom we know; some one we have spoken to quite lately?' 'well, miss marjorie,' said neil, 'do you not think we had better be getting the table cleared and the things put away? we have plenty of work before us, if we are to plant all reggie's ferns; and we must not stay too late, for it iss anxious about you that mrs. stewart and mrs. macgregor will be.' 'not they,' said tricksy; 'no one is anxious when they know that you are with us, neil.' neil looked gratified, and the young people began to collect the dishes. 'now, don't you bother about this piece of work,' said marjorie, when the boys had carried the plates into the cottage; 'you go and amuse yourselves out-of-doors while tricksy and i wash the dishes.' 'i wonder why you don't let them do their share of the disagreeable work, marjorie,' said tricksy a little discontentedly, when the boys had vanished. 'pooh,' said marjorie, with her arms in the hot water; 'what's the good? they'd only hate it, and besides, boys always do these things badly.' when the dishes and cooking utensils had been arranged upon the shelves, marjorie and tricksy went out into the garden, their eyes somewhat dim with peat smoke. 'come along and help, you two,' cried reggie; 'must get these things in this afternoon, or they'll be dead before we come back again. bother it, though; we haven't enough tools to go round.' 'here, miss tricksy,' interposed neil; 'you take this little spade. this sharp piece of wood will be doing just as well for me.' 'and i've got a pointed piece of slate; i can scrape holes with that,' said allan. 'take this old trowel, marjorie; it hasn't a handle, but i don't suppose you'll mind.' for a long time the young people worked with a will. the sun beat down upon the unshaded island, and the breeze blew in from the sea, bringing a salt taste to the lips and blowing the girls' hair about. the waves babbled round the shore, and the gulls sailed overhead and screamed. when the sun's rays began to slant, and the pile of ferns was diminishing, neil kept glancing over his shoulder to watch the tide. 'there now, that's done,' said reggie, pressing the earth round the roots of the last fern and then rising; 'it's a jolly long time it has taken us. what shall we do next?' 'i think we ought to go now,' said hamish. 'what do you say, neil?' 'it is high time we wass making a start,' said neil. 'the tide iss rising fast, and the beach iss half covered already.' 'what a pity,' said tricksy regretfully; 'we've had such a jolly day of it, haven't we, marjorie?' 'awfully jolly,' replied marjorie; 'but we'll come again soon.--you'll come too, won't you, neil?' 'i will be coming as soon as i can be sparing the time, you may be sure of that, miss marjorie,' replied the lad with a smile. the dogs were recalled from the rabbit-holes and came, their faces covered with sand, and the boat was pushed off from the shore. half-way across the firth, marjorie turned and looked back regretfully. 'what a pity we have to go home,' she said. 'it would be awfully jolly to spend all night in the cottage.' 'look to your oar, marjorie,' sang out allan, for the boat was beginning to turn round. in a short time they reached the landing-stones, of which the lower ones were already submerged. 'won't you all look in and see mother before you go home?' suggested neil, after the boat had been drawn up and secured to the mooring-chain. 'she'd be pleased if you'd come and say good evening to her; and miss tricksy, you would be seeing the little puffins that hamish gave you; mother tells me that they're coming along finely.' mrs. macdonnell's cottage was not far distant, and the young people accepted neil's invitation. 'i'll just tell mother that you're here,' said neil, lifting the latch and vanishing in the interior of the cottage. 'i wonder who mrs. macdonnell has with her,' said allan, in an undertone. 'i hear voices inside. perhaps we had better not go in this evening.' they waited for some time; but still no one came to bid them enter. 'this is strange,' said marjorie. 'i wonder whether neil has forgotten us.' the door was pushed half open, and neil's face looked out of the aperture, with his mother's behind him. both appeared agitated, and neil looked at the others as though he did not see them. chapter iii a surprise 'allan,' said mrs. stewart, coming downstairs, 'your father has to go to stornwell and will not be back until to-morrow, so there will be no cricket match this afternoon. i have a note from mrs. macgregor, asking you all to spend the day at corranmore instead.' 'all right, mother,' replied allan; 'when are we to be there?' 'mrs. macgregor asks you to come early,' said mrs. stewart, consulting the letter; 'i had better send you in the dog-cart, as it's rather far to walk. duncan is driving your father to the steamer, but he won't be long.' 'don't bother about the dog-cart, mother,' said allan; 'it would be much jollier to walk; and we'd like to look in at mrs. macdonnell's cottage on the way and ask what's the matter with neil. we haven't seen him for a day or two.' 'i wouldn't go there to-day, i think,' interposed mrs. stewart hurriedly. 'i don't think neil will be at home. i'm afraid the walk would be too much for tricksy,' she went on quickly, for the young people were looking surprised. 'not if we start now, i think, mother, and give tricksy a rest now and again. what do you say, tricksy?' 'of course i can walk,' said tricksy. 'i shan't be a bit tired, mother.' mrs. stewart looked at her little daughter with a smile. 'i am afraid of your overdoing it, tricksy; she said. 'you are always trying to do as much as the others, who are so much older than yourself. well, do as you like; i leave you in allan's charge, and he will see that you are not made to walk too fast.' 'all right, mother,' said reggie; 'but won't you come a bit of the way with us?' 'not this morning, dear. i will come with you some other time.' 'all right, mother,' said reggie; 'but it's a long time since you've gone anywhere with us. cut away upstairs, tricksy, and get your hat; it's time we started if we are to take rests on the way.' 'don't you think mother is very quiet?' observed tricksy, as the three young people, accompanied by laddie, were crossing the moor. 'i wonder whether she's sorry about something?' 'i did not notice anything,' said allan. tricksy had almost said, 'no, boys never do, but checked herself in time. the road between ardnavoir and corranmore led across the northern part of the island, through fields and moorland. all the turnings of the way brought into view fascinating glimpses of the sea, running inland between brown rocks. fishing-boats with white and russet sails lay upon water turned to a sheet of silver by the sunlight, and grey and white gulls floated about and screamed. the breeze was blowing shoreward, tempering the warmth of the sun and bringing brine and the odour of seaweed to mingle with the perfume of bell-heather from the moors. laddie stepped lightly beside his young friends, waving his tail in the air, and now and again pausing to investigate a rabbit-burrow or an interesting tuft of heather or cotton-grass. 'well, tricksy, getting tired yet?' said allan to his little sister after they had walked between three and four miles. 'not a bit,' replied tricksy, trudging along determinedly, but with a little roll in her gait which betrayed that she _was_. 'i think we'll rest awhile,' said allan, and the three young folk sat down upon a patch of fragrant, springy heather, while laddie, after looking at them for a minute, surprised at such an early halt, curled himself up beside them. 'i wish father would get the yacht out soon,' said allan, watching the sea and the fishing-boats. 'yes,' said reggie; 'he is very late this year.' 'he won't be long now,' said allan. 'we are going to have visitors soon. father has written to ask graham major and graham minor and their pater to come and stay with us as they have such long holidays this year, owing to the measles.' 'who are they?' inquired reggie. 'fellows from my school. did you never hear me speak of them?' '_i_ didn't,' said tricksy. 'are they nice boys?' 'decent enough.' 'big or little?' 'one's a small fellow; only been at school one term. the other's bigger; not more than eleven, though; more of an age for reggie than for me.' reggie looked indignant, but said nothing. there was nothing that annoyed him so much as to be reminded that he was not yet a very big boy. 'well,' said allan, 'perhaps we had better be going, if you have rested enough, tricksy. hulloa, there's euan macdonnell, the coastguard, neil's cousin; we'll stop and ask him if he can come out fishing with us some day soon.' 'good day, euan,' said the young people, pausing to speak, but the coastguard only saluted and passed on as though he were in a hurry. reggie looked at allan in surprise. 'been sent on a message, i suppose,' said allan, 'and hasn't time to talk. the whole island seems to be upset by this affair at the post-office. i wish they'd hurry up and catch the fellow and be done with it. what's the matter with laddie now?' the collie, who had been sniffing about, following up a scent, had suddenly given a bark and sprang over a dyke, and was now yelping and baying excitedly as he jumped about on the other side. 'hamish and marjorie, i bet,' said allan; and sure enough, two heads appeared above the dyke, a good-natured one and a mischievous one, the latter crowned by a scarlet cap on the top of a mass of fair curly hair. 'we thought we'd give you a surprise,' they said, 'but laddie spoilt it for us. good dog, laddie, lie down,' for laddie's manifestations of delight were taking the form of a loud baying which drowned all attempts at conversation. 'trust, laddie!' said tricksy in her little soft voice; but laddie took no notice. 'laddie, trust!' said reggie severely; and laddie subsided at once, surprised that his attentions should be so little appreciated. tricksy uttered a reproachful sigh, caused by her dog's inattention to her commands. 'when does your mother expect us?' inquired allan. 'any time before dinner,' said hamish. 'that's half-past one, and it's only eleven now. we've got any amount of time. what do you say to coming and looking at the gipsy encampment in the corrie wood? they're breaking up camp and leaving the island to-morrow, so we may not have another chance of seeing them.' 'all right,' said the others, and they trooped off to the tiny wood nestling in a hollow through which a burn trickled, and from whence a trail of smoke came blowing across the fresh green foliage of the trees. all was bustle and stir in the gipsy encampment. two carts were standing at the entrance to the hollow, and upon these the gipsies were piling their household goods--iron pots and kettles, bundles of rags, some gaudy crockery, and a variety of miscellaneous articles whose use it would be hard to determine. at the sight of the young people the gipsies smiled a welcome, and the men took off their hats. some small black-eyed children toddled forward, and stood staring, with their fingers in their mouths. 'trust, laddie!' said allan; for two mongrel curs had rushed out and barked, whereupon laddie had stiffened his back and was growling defiance. laddie was obliged to content himself with glaring at the other dogs and making a few remarks to express his contempt for gipsy dogs, and his view of their impertinence in presuming to look at his young ladies and gentlemen. 'tell your fortune, pretty lady,' said a woman to marjorie, with a smile which displayed her white teeth; but marjorie shook her head. 'you are leaving inchkerra?' said allan to one of the men. 'yes, sir. we start for ireland to-morrow, in a sailing boat.' 'you haven't stayed very long,' observed marjorie. 'three months, lady. a long time for the gipsies.' 'will you ever come back again?' inquired marjorie. the man shook his head. 'can't say, lady. maybe yes, maybe no. we never can tell. thanks, master; good luck to you,' he said, touching his straggling forelock as allan slipped a few coins into his hand. 'good-bye, masters; good-bye, pretty ladies,' cried the gipsies in farewell. some distance from the hollow, a tall, loosely-made youth rose unexpectedly from where he had been basking in the sun, by the side of a dyke which screened him from the cold wind. in the weak, handsome face and roving eyes the young people recognised gibbie, the half-witted gipsy lad. an expression of disappointment crossed his face as he looked over the group and seemed to miss some one. 'neil no with you,' he murmured. 'want to see neil. was not at home.' 'can we give him any message from you?' inquired allan. 'tell neil, gibbie go away. long way; want to see neil to say good-bye.' 'very well,' said allan. 'when we see him, we'll tell him.' a crafty smile flitted over the lad's face, and he lowered his voice to a mysterious whisper. 'neil will be pleased soon,' he said. 'good neil, good neil. neil will be very rich, richer than the gorjos; has a piece of paper worth hundreds of pounds. tell him to look for it. gibbie go long way off.' 'poor fellow,' observed allan to hamish, as the gipsy returned to his lazy basking on the heather; 'he is quite crazy; can't speak connectedly for two minutes at a time.' 'there is one good point in gibbie's character,' said hamish; 'he knows that neil saved his life, and he is grateful. i think the island won't be sorry to see the last of him, though. he hasn't lived with his tribe for weeks. he had a den of his own in the banks of the burn that flows past our house; a queer place, far up in the hills.' 'look,' said reggie, 'that must be the gipsies' boat over there, off the south side of the island; and a little boat is going out to it with some of their things.' 'and there are the carts going down,' said allan; 'it won't be long before the camp is broken up.' 'pity we couldn't go gipsying for a little while,' observed marjorie; 'just for the summer. it would be such fun wandering about from place to place. but look at the tide coming up in cateran bay; the waves are dashing on the shore and making the most beautiful foam. would there be time for us to go down to the beach for a little while?' 'plenty,' said hamish; 'mother doesn't expect us before one o'clock.' 'come along, then,' said marjorie; 'let's run;' and they all raced down to the shore, laddie with them, the dog jumping with all four paws off the ground, and barking in anticipation of sport. breeze and tide together were flinging up little breakers which curled on the shore and then retreated, only to be sent up again by the next roller. a fascinating game was to run down to the very edge of a retreating wave, with one's toes almost within the line of foam; to wait until it gathered itself up again, and then fly to avoid being overtaken by the water which came hissing and bubbling over the pebbles. laddie, after watching the fun for a minute or two, suddenly rushed off with a bark, and returned dragging a huge flat stone which he deposited at allan's feet; then he stood eagerly waiting, making a variety of signs to show allan that he expected him to do something with it. 'fetch, laddie!' said allan, throwing the stone as far as he could. laddie uttered a joyful yelp and sprang after it, returning with it in his mouth to ask allan to throw it again. 'laddie, fetch!' cried allan, throwing it into the sea this time, and laddie plunged into the water and came back dripping. he laid down the stone and shook himself, to the great inconvenience of marjorie; then he jumped about, baying for allan to throw the stone once more. the shouts and laughter and laddie's barking were making a tumult which vied with the noise of wind and waves, when hamish touched allan's arm and pointed to the sky. 'oh, i say,' said allan, 'we really ought to go; it's going to pour like anything, and the girls will get wet.' 'i'm wet enough already, i think, especially about the feet,' murmured tricksy; while marjorie's lips tightened. she did not like the boys to show that they thought her less hardy than themselves. some large drops on the stones warned them to hasten; and they reached the doctor's house just as the storm burst. mrs. macgregor, a pretty, young-looking lady, ran down into the hall to meet them. 'my dear tricksy,' she cried, as she took the little girl's wet, cold hand, 'you are soaking! your feet are drenched!' 'it's all right, mrs. macgregor,' piped tricksy; 'we've been having a fine game. hamish, you've let laddie in, and his feet are making wet marks all over the floor!' 'never mind laddie,' said mrs. macgregor; 'take her upstairs and give her dry shoes and stockings, marjorie, and then come to dinner, all of you.' 'you know, marjorie,' observed tricksy, as the elder girl somewhat anxiously assisted her to pull off her wet stockings; 'you know you are always telling me that we must be plucky and do all the things they want us to do when we play with boys, or else they think we're a bore.' 'that's all very well, tricksy,' replied marjorie, 'but what shall we do if you get ill? your mother would stop your playing with us altogether if that happened.' '_i_ get ill with playing out of doors and having fun,' returned tricksy scornfully; 'i'm not such a duffer, marjorie.' just before dinner dr. macgregor came in, 'such a dear of a man,' as tricksy had once described him, with bright blue eyes and curly hair like marjorie, and a kind expression like hamish. 'how do you do, reggie?' he said. 'how do you do, allan? do you like school as much as ever? my dear,' turning to his wife, 'i shall have to start immediately after lunch, and here is a note asking you to----' the remainder of the sentence was lost, but the boys could see that both dr. and mrs. macgregor were looking very grave. 'i am sorry that mrs. macgregor and i must leave you,' said the doctor while the meal was in progress, 'but i daresay you will manage to amuse yourselves without getting into mischief; eh, marjorie?' smiling at his daughter, whose eyes flashed a saucy answer. 'you can have the boat down if the rain keeps off.' but the rain showed no disposition to keep off, despite the anxious glances which were directed towards the window. when the clouds gathered once more in threatening masses, and the rain came lashing the panes, dr. and mrs. macgregor took their departure in a closed carriage, warning hamish that the boat was not to be used unless the sea went down. 'bother!' said tricksy, looking at the waves, which were tumbling over each other and whitening with foam; 'what are we to do while it rains?' 'sit round the nursery fire, of course, and talk,' said marjorie. an immense pile of peats was built up on the hearth of the cosy, untidy room which had been the macgregors' nursery; and the young folk sat round the 'ingle-neuk' and discussed matters dear to the heart of gamesome youth. suddenly marjorie looked up and said, 'hurrah! the rain's stopped. what shall we do?' 'too stormy to get the boat out,' said hamish, rising and going to the window; 'it's still very rough, and there will be another squall soon.' '_i_ know,' said marjorie; 'let's play hide-and-seek. no, not a rubbishy game in the house,' she said, meeting allan's look of disapproval; 'a real good game out of doors, in the garden and the sheds and the ruins. the rain will only make it jollier, and those who mind getting wet are funks.' with the wind blowing in gusts, and sudden showers splashing down from all the roofs, the game promised some fun. dr. macgregor's was a first-rate place for hide-and-seek, with a number of outhouses built round a paved court, and the ruins of an old castle overlooking the garden. marjorie and reggie stayed at 'home' in the front lobby, where they could hear calls both from out of doors or within; and the hiders dispersed themselves quickly. soon three shouts were heard, coming from different directions; and the pursuers ran out into the rain, which was beginning to fall again. hamish was quickly discovered in a window of the old ruin, for he could not resist the temptation of grinning good-naturedly down from his perch; but he escaped along the broken flooring while they were waiting at the foot of a stairway, and reached 'home' before they were aware. 'you didn't give us enough of a chase,' cried marjorie to him through the streaming pane; then she went off, rather annoyed, to look for the others. they hunted for some time among the outhouses, getting shower-baths of drops from the eaves; but no one was to be found. at last they saw a movement among some straw in the byre, and marjorie made a dash forward, just too late to catch allan, who slipped out and made for the door. reggie barred his passage. 'unfair--different directions!' cried allan; for it was the rule among the stewarts and macgregors that when two were chasing one they must both keep to the same route; and reggie stood aside. they were pretty fairly matched, pursuers and pursued; and for a long time allan led the two others a chase among the maze of buildings; but at last, his foot slipping upon the wet paving-stones, he was captured by a bold dash from marjorie. 'only tricksy now,' gasped marjorie, pushing back her wet hair, which was clinging about her face; 'we haven't seen a sign of her; where can she be?' 'you have run enough,' suggested allan; 'go in and let one of us take your place.' marjorie flashed a glance of indignation at him, annoyed that he should suppose that she was not going to see the thing out, and after drawing a few long breaths she and reggie started off again. by this time the rain had ceased, and a pleasant smell was rising from the damp earth and dripping trees. no little footprints were to be seen in the garden; and it was impossible that tricksy could have escaped observation had she been in the ruins or in any of the outhouses. they hunted all over the house, then went into the field, and even climbed the dyke which separated the doctor's grounds from the moorland; but no tricksy was to be seen. 'i believe she has gone beyond bounds,' said allan, who, with hamish, had grown tired of waiting and had wandered out to see what was going on; 'we said the garden and the field, you know.' 'not she,' declared reggie, perched outside upon the dyke, with the wind drying his wet face and clothing; 'we have taught her to play fair. she is only lying low in some place that we haven't thought of. let's shout to her to call "cuckoo."' they raised their voices and cried, 'call cuckoo, tricksy;' and laddie, who had been shut in the house to keep him from spoiling sport, but who had made good his escape behind the boys, pricked up his ears and resolved to be useful. a muffled voice was heard in response, and laddie, with a bark, sprang towards the peat-stack and stood before it, wagging his tail and trying to make an entrance with nose and paws. some of the peats were tumbled aside, and tricksy emerged, looking very indignant. 'a nice way to play,' she said, 'setting laddie on to me when you couldn't find me yourselves.' they tried to explain, but tricksy's eyes were full of contempt, and her small figure seemed to grow taller with offended dignity. 'such a nice hiding-place,' she said; 'and now you've gone and spoilt it all.' 'don't be a little silly, tricksy,' said reggie to her in an undertone; and tricksy allowed her dignity to subside. fresh hiding-places were chosen; and when at last the young people were so tired as to be disinclined to run any more, marjorie suggested going indoors to see whether tea were ready. the dining-room table was bare, and all faces fell. 'i'll just go into the kitchen and see what elspeth is about,' said marjorie; 'perhaps the servants are forgetting us.' in the stone-floored kitchen, whither they all trooped after marjorie, elspeth was sitting knitting by the fireside. 'elspeth, when is tea going to be ready?' inquired marjorie, rather impatiently. the girl looked up at her, then down again at her knitting with pretended indifference. 'tea, miss marjorie? i wass thinking you would not be wanting any tea to-day.' marjorie's lips tightened, but she kept down the rising temper with an effort. 'why not?' she asked. 'here are allan and reggie and tricksy from ardnavoir; and we want our tea, please.' elspeth looked up, and seemed to see the others for the first time. 'would you ask the young ladies and gentle men to wipe their feet on the rug, miss marjorie if you please? they are spoiling my kitchen floor.' this request made the whole troop feel uncomfortable, and they began shifting from one foot to the other, conscious that they must have brought more mud into the house than the authorities were at all likely to approve of. 'all right,' said marjorie impatiently; 'we are not coming in any further; but will you please get tea ready for us as soon as you can?' 'get tea ready! and how am i to do that, miss marjorie, if you please, when the girdle hass been taken away out of the kitchen? i cannot be making scones on the open fire.' marjorie turned red and bit her lip. 'oh, never mind the girdle,' she said. 'we'll do without scones for one day.' 'indeed, miss marjorie, i never saw tea without scones. that may be the way in foreign parts, but there never wass tea in the west highlands without scones; and i will be thinking you will have to wait till the girdle comes home again.' a flash darted out of marjorie's eyes; and she remained rooted to the spot for a minute. then she took a sudden resolve and turned away, elbowing the others out of the room. 'cat!' she muttered; 'i'll be even with her yet. never mind, people; if she won't give us our tea we can get it for ourselves. get cups and things out of the pantry, hamish; and reggie, you come with me.' the larder window was rather high up from the ground and was secured by several iron bars. with some difficulty they pushed up the lower sash a little way; and through the opening thus made reggie contrived to wriggle his slight, thin body. 'is there anything there worth carrying away?' said marjorie, standing on tip-toe and peering in. 'here's a cake,' said reggie; 'and there are several pots of jam.' 'all right, hand them out. there's a pie; we might as well have that; serve elspeth right for getting into a temper. now let's come in with what we've got.' reggie squeezed himself through the opening, feet foremost, and dropped to the ground. 'here--hamish--allan;' said marjorie, entering the house; 'take these things to the dining-room. have you any plates? no. i'll get them out of the pantry; and knives and spoons too. bother, she's got the teapot in the kitchen; i'll have to go in and get it.' she strode into the kitchen with flashing eyes and a haughty step; then stopped short in amazement. 'elspeth!' she exclaimed; 'whatever are you crying for?' there was no answer. 'is it because of the girdle?' the girl shook her head; the tears falling upon the knitting which she was holding with trembling hands. 'is it because we are taking the things out of the larder?' 'not that, miss marjorie.' 'then whatever is the matter?' by this time all the others had crowded in, looking very much astonished. 'elspeth, are you ill?' asked tricksy, her large dark eyes growing very round in her little face. 'no, miss tricksy; no, miss marjorie; it will be none of that; it will be neil.' 'neil!' exclaimed marjorie, while the others looked more and more amazed. 'what's the matter with him? neil is elspeth's cousin, you know,' she explained. 'neil, poor lad; he will hev been arrested, miss marjorie. they will hev taken him up for robbing the post-office! eh, miss marjorie, your mother said you weren't to know, and it iss me that will hev been telling you. och! the disgrace to an honest family!' and the girl threw her apron over her head and moaned and lamented to herself in gaelic, while they all stood around her, speechless. chapter iv the compact 'neil!' said reggie; 'it's impossible.' marjorie had become deadly white, and allan pushed the hair back from his forehead and stood staring, his hands in his pockets. reggie pranced backwards and forwards, in uncontrollable excitement, while tricksy's dark eyes were growing as large as saucers in her little face. 'elspeth,' said marjorie sharply; 'you're talking nonsense, it can't be true.' 'indeed, miss marjorie, it's the truth i will be telling you; the police came and arrested him before his mother's eyes that very day just after he had been out with you on the boat, and he's before the sheriff in stornwell this very day!' 'but, elspeth, he did not do it! nobody could believe that old neil would do such a thing!' 'indeed, master allan, there are those that do, although neil, poor laddie, would no more do such a thing than the laird himsel, or the king upon his throne! appearances are against him, poor lad; and it's for appearances that they've arrested him.' 'what appearances, elspeth? tell us about it?' 'well, miss marjorie, it's just this; one of the money orders that was stolen was sent back from edinburgh post office; and it was neil who had sent it away in a letter. it's from that they make out that it was neil who stole it.' 'neil couldn't have done such a thing,' broke in reggie, with signs of a storm in his voice. 'does mother know? and father?' asked tricksy breathlessly. 'indeed, miss tricksy, the laird's away at the trial, and mrs. stewart too, to be with mrs. macdonnell, poor soul; and dr. and mrs. macgregor went away this afternoon. the whole island's away, except just those whose work obliges them to stay; and it's a sore disgrace to a respectable family, whateffer.' 'that's all right then, if father's there,' said reggie confidently. 'he knows neil far too well to believe such a thing of him, no matter what may have happened.' 'the laird can't help him much if the case goes against him, master reggie. it's an awful thing that the money order should have come out of the poor lad's letter; and it looks very bad.' 'but neil couldn't have taken it,' protested reggie; 'no matter where the order came from, it wasn't neil who stole it.' 'well, anyhow,' said tricksy, 'i'll never speak to the sheriff again, no matter what he does, if he lets neil be put in prison.' 'the sheriff only has to do his duty, miss tricksy; and if things go against poor neil he can't help him.' 'well, we'll stand up for him, no matter who doesn't,' declared allan; 'and we'll write and tell him so.' 'of course we shall,' joined in the others. 'it's very kind of you, i'm sure,' said elspeth, wiping her eyes; 'we must just hope for the best. and now, young ladies and gentlemen, you must have your tea and not think too much about it; and miss marjorie, i'm thinking i must just make you a few scones!' little appetite was left to the young folks for the meal; and the half-hearted clatter of knives and plates soon died away. 'we'll stand up for old neil, no matter what happens,' was the upshot of their deliberations; and elspeth, coming in and out, dried her tears furtively with the corner of her apron. later in the evening a dog-cart drove up; and dr. and mrs. macgregor alighted. marjorie ran down into the hall, while the others all clustered about the banisters and looked down. 'mother,' said marjorie, with a set face, 'we know about neil; tell us how things have gone for him to-day.' 'the case is against him, so far,' replied mrs. macgregor. a groan burst from upstairs, and marjorie set her lips tightly. 'what will be done to him?' inquired tricksy piteously. 'nothing yet, dear; the case is not finished. he has to go to edinburgh to be tried; and we hope that something else may be found out before that time.' 'shall we see him before he goes?' 'no, he will not come back before then.' 'where is he?' demanded allan. 'at present he is in the--in the county jail,' faltered mrs. macgregor. 'poor neil,' burst from the children. 'he will be kindly treated,' interposed the doctor; 'and it is only until the case comes up in edinburgh.' the tears rolled over tricksy's cheeks; and marjorie turned away and looked out of the window. 'and now,' said the doctor cheerily, 'you must not take the matter tragically yet. we must hope for the best. neil must stand his trial like a man, and it isn't often that a miscarriage of justice takes place. he will have the very best advice, your father and i will see to that; and you may depend upon it that some fresh evidence will turn up before then, which will show matters in an altogether different light. in the meanwhile you must not go about looking doleful, as though you had made up your minds already that neil would not be able to show a good case for himself.' it was hard to be cheerful; and the young folk clustered about in melancholy groups until the dog-cart arrived, when the stewarts unwillingly took their leave, with many promises on both sides to communicate whatever might come to light in the meanwhile. 'now, duncan,' said allan, after the dog-cart had started; 'tell us what has happened?' 'indeed, master allan; it iss ahl ferry unlucky indeed; and it iss ferry sorry i will be for puir neil and for mrs. macdonnell. you will be knowing the night before the robbery wass committed neil will have been spending the evening with the macalisters. he wass expecting a letter; and it will be a stormy evening and the mail steamer will not be coming in till ferry late so that the letters wass not sent away that night, but neil wass allowed to look among them for his own. there wass a registered letter for the laird; and it come out in the evidence that neil would see it, and that no one else but only mr. and mrs. macalister and neil himself could have peen knowing that it wass there.' 'but what could make them think that neil would break into the post-office and steal a letter? neil, of all people!' 'well then, the ferry next day neil will pe sending away a letter, and in that letter wass one of the ferry orders that had been in the laird's letter.' 'but how do they know that it was the same order; and how can they be certain that it was neil who sent it away. there must have been a great many orders presented in the edinburgh post office that day.' 'they know that it wass the laird's order, master allan, because the gentleman who had sent away the orders had kept the number of them all; and they know that neil had sent it away because the man he sent it to took it out of the envelope in ta post-office, and there wass a letter with it signed clearly in his own handwriting; "neil macdonnell."' allan sat up and pushed his cap to the back of his head. 'it's very strange,' he said; 'there must be some mistake!' 'how did poor old neil take it, when he was arrested and all that?' asked reggie. 'neil wass ferry much astonished, master reggie, and could not pelieve it at ahl. he said the order he had sent away wass not the laird's but another one ahltogether. afterwards he wass ferry angry; and in court he stood up as prave as a lion and said he had neffer seen the order and that he had neffer sent it away whateffer, and that it wass all lies. they will be showing him his name written on the order; and he had to own that it wass his handwriting, but he will not be knowing how it had come on the order. then when some of the people didn't seem to pelieve him, he wass ferry angry again, wass neil; and when the sheriff said he wass to go and pe tried at edinburgh he went out of the court in a terrible rage and a fury; and he said to us ahl that he would not go to edinburgh, because if ta people here who wass his friends didn't peliefe him, they would not pe peliefing him neither in edinburgh where they wass ahl strangers to him, and that he would be finding some way of escaping pefore he wass sent there and not be pringing disgrace upon an honest family. he will be saying a lot of foolish things, will neil, puir lad.' mr. and mrs. stewart were in the hall when their children arrived. tricksy flew into her mother's arms and burst into tears; allan turned a grave, concerned face towards his parents; and reggie looked inquiringly at his father without speaking. 'i see that you have been told about neil,' said the laird in his kind voice. 'we had been hoping that the matter might have been cleared up without delay, and that it would be unnecessary that you should be informed of it. however, you need not despair; neil is not the lad to have committed a dishonest action, and i am convinced that we shall find some evidence that will clear him.' 'and now,' said mrs. stewart, 'you must all go to bed, allan as well as the others. it is late, and tricksy is quite exhausted. sleep well; you don't know what news may come in the morning! something may be found out by that time.' 'i am sure,' said tricksy still tearfully to reggie as he said good-night to her in her little bed; 'i don't know what i should do if i hadn't a mother! it's great fun running about with you and the others, and staying out-of-doors for whole days at a time; but when we get hurt or sorry, it's mummie that we want!' little sleep came to the boys that night. each turned and tossed uneasily upon his bed, trying not to disturb the other; falling into broken dreams of being with neil on the rocks in their own island, and awakening to a sense of the reality. early in the morning it became useless to keep up the pretence any longer. they rose and dressed and went out-of-doors. by the garden gate two shaggy ponies were standing; and the boys were not at all surprised to see marjorie and hamish, who turned anxious faces towards them. 'well,' said marjorie, 'anything new?' 'nothing since we saw you.' 'there hasn't been time, of course,' said marjorie. 'we couldn't rest, so we came along to see you.' 'let's go down to the shore,' said allan. 'can't talk here.' a window was thrown open on the upper story of the house, and a little voice cried, 'wait a minute, people! don't go away! i'm coming too.' 'tricksy awake already!' said marjorie; 'that child will make herself ill.' in a few minutes a little figure emerged from the front door, and tricksy ran towards them. 'what are you going to do?' she said. 'is there any news?' 'nothing at all, tricksy,' said marjorie; 'we were only going down to the shore to talk.' the little girl slipped her hand confidingly into allan's and walked beside him, trying to accommodate her steps to his long stride. 'hullo, there's euan macdonnell,' said allan. 'he was at the trial yesterday; let's ask him about it.' the fine frank-faced young coastguard touched his cap to the girls and waited to be spoken to. 'euan,' said allan abruptly; speaking in gaelic, which was always most convenient for the islanders if a conversation was likely to be long; 'we know about neil. you were there; tell us about the trial.' 'well, mr. allan, it was a very bad business, and we none of us expected it to go as it did. poor neil was most frightfully cut up about it, and no wonder, poor fellow. what he felt most was that some of the people were against him when he thought they would be quite sure to believe in his honesty, no matter what might have happened.' 'so they ought,' declared allan. 'any one who knows neil in the least would know that whether he sent away that order or not, he would never have stolen it, and that there must have been a mistake.' 'of course there must have been,' said euan, 'and i'm glad to hear you say so, mr. allan.' 'suppose things were to go wrongly,' said marjorie; 'i mean, supposing that nothing is found out that will help to clear neil when he comes before the edinburgh court, what will he have to expect?' tricksy's eyes were growing wider, and the pink in marjorie's cheeks became deeper. 'i am afraid the penalty for the poor lad would be two or three years in prison, miss marjorie. it's a serious crime, you know; house-breaking, and robbing his majesty's mails. we can only hope it won't come to that.' the hearers all drew a long breath, like a gasp. 'let's go down and sit on the rocks,' said marjorie abruptly. 'now, euan, tell us how you think it happened.' 'well,' said euan, 'the only explanation is, that that order came into neil's possession without his knowing it.' allan nodded. 'you see, miss marjorie,' continued euan, 'neil made no secret of having sent off a post-office order that day. he had got one on the evening before, when he was at the macalisters', and he put it in the pocket of his reefer jacket. you know that new churn he got for his mother? well, he was paying for that by instalments and this was one of the payments. the day after the robbery, he went into the post-office, got the order, put it into an envelope containing a note to say that he hoped to send the last instalment next week, and sent it away. but the order that came out of the letter was not the one that he bought at mrs. macalister's that night; and the curious thing is, that he found the order that he believed he had sent away, still in his coat pocket when he went to look. at least that's the story he tells, poor lad.' 'then,' said allan, 'how do you account for the wrong order being in the letter?' euan pondered a minute, and then said, 'mr. allan, there's only one explanation of it, so far as i can see. some person must have been trying to screen himself by throwing suspicion on to neil. you say that there was more than one order in the laird's letter?' 'yes,' replied allan, 'and they don't seem to have heard anything about the others yet.' 'they will turn up some day, no doubt, and then the whole matter may be cleared up; but in the meanwhile there's nothing to go by to help the poor lad. perhaps they may be traced before the case comes up in edinburgh. 'oh, i hope so,' cried the girls, 'and then they'll get their finger on the real culprit?' 'the person who did it must have put the order into neil's pocket,' said allan. 'how could they have managed it and what would make them think of neil?' 'well, mr. allan; you know how these country post-offices are kept. the letter-box is in the macalisters' kitchen, which is at the same time their shop, and where every one goes in and out. the box is never locked; and after the letters are sorted they often lie on the table for hours, waiting until the postman comes to take them away. any one who was not honest could easily slip into the kitchen when mrs. macalister's back was turned and do what they liked with the letters; but such a thing has never happened before. now, whoever committed the robbery has seen that neil was in the post-office that evening, turning over the letters; and he saw that neil got a money order to send away. all this made him think that neil was the one to fasten the guilt on to, so after breaking into the post-office that night he slipped into the house, unknown to neil or his mother, and put the order where neil was likely to take it for his own.' allan nodded approvingly when the coastguard paused in what was an unusually long effort for him. there's something in that,' he said. 'but who would have done such a thing?' 'there is one man on the island who might have done it, and that man has had every opportunity.' 'who is that?' 'do you know a lad called andrew macpeters? he works for the macalisters sometimes.' 'i know him,' said reggie, who had been listening but saying little. 'a red-headed man with foxy eyes.' 'the same,' said euan. 'he is always in and out of the house; and most likely he was there that night and saw everything that went on. he has always hated neil since he was a lad, and got a beating from neil, who was much smaller than himself. he would only be too pleased to do him an ill turn. it shows a nasty, mean disposition that he should have taken the trouble to break open the box and throw the letters all about the shop when he only had to open it and take out what he wanted. keep a look-out on that man, young ladies and gentlemen, if you want to find out what is at the bottom of the whole affair.' 'we will,' they all said. 'and if you could find out anything before the case comes up,' said euan, 'you might be the means of saving the lad and his mother too; for she will be heart-broken if her son is not cleared, and that quickly.' 'we'll do all we can,' said marjorie. 'yes,' said allan slowly and deliberately; 'i vote we all make up our minds not to rest until we find out who did it and get neil cleared.' 'we will, we will,' cried all the others in a chorus. 'how are we going to manage it?' asked tricksy, with eyes and mouth open. the others did not reply. 'we will make a compact,' cried marjorie, rising with sparkling eyes, 'and we'll all sign an agreement; something like this: "we hereby promise never to rest until we find out who committed the robbery and show that neil didn't do it."' 'yes,' said tricksy; 'let's write it at once.' 'no pens or paper here,' said marjorie; 'we'll write it down when we get into the house. euan, you must join the compact too; we'll send you a copy for yourself. each of us shall have his or her own copy to carry about wherever we go; and each copy shall be signed by every member of the compact. we'll form ourselves into a society to prove that neil is innocent.' 'so we shall,' said allan; 'good idea that of yours, marjorie.' 'that's all right,' said the youngest member of the society; 'now, when are we going to begin?' 'you must give us time, tricksy,' said allan; 'it won't be so very easy;' but all the faces wore a more cheerful expression. 'there's a telegraph boy,' said marjorie suddenly, 'do you see him?--just going in at the gates of ardnavoir. perhaps it's some news of neil.' 'run, reggie,' said allan, 'you are the best runner; and see whether it's anything of that kind.' reggie started off, and after an interval he came speeding back again. it's something to do with neil,' he said; 'come quickly.' chapter v suspense all crowded into the hall, where mr. stewart was standing with an open telegram in his hand. the laird was looking very grave. 'most unfortunate,' he said. 'neil has done a very foolish thing. he has broken out of the county gaol and disappeared. i regret extremely that it should have happened. it will prejudice many people against him.' mrs. stewart was looking extremely concerned; and the young people crowded together in speechless dismay. 'puir neil,' said duncan in the background, 'he said he would not go to edinburgh to pring disgrace on his family whateffer.' 'he would have done far better to have gone up for his trial,' said mr. stewart.--'good morning, dr. macgregor'--for the doctor had come in to hear the news, having been summoned from a visit in the neighbourhood--'unfortunate affair this; it's a pity neil couldn't have been more patient.' the doctor read the telegram and looked extremely disappointed. 'foolish fellow!' he exclaimed. 'if the lad was innocent he should have stayed to see the thing out; he has only made things a dozen times worse for himself by doing this.' 'but, father,' said marjorie, 'neil couldn't have taken the letters; they are sure to find out that he is innocent.' the doctor was looking angry. 'he has made it far more difficult for his friends to see him through,' he declared. 'foolish, foolish lad; i have no patience with him;' and the doctor strode out of the hall and away to his gig with a disappointed expression of countenance. mrs. stewart looked kindly at the dismayed faces of the young people. 'i am sure,' she said, 'that neil did not realise what he was doing,' and here she looked at her husband; 'he was hurt and disappointed at finding that some of the people were able to believe that he could have done such a thing, and that made him think that he might not get justice. it is a great pity, but those who have known neil all his life would never believe him capable of dishonesty.' 'of course not,' said the laird kindly, 'and i only regret that neil did not wait to see the thing out, as i am convinced that some evidence would have turned up which would have { } enabled us to prove his innocence. as it is, he remains under a cloud, and it will be a great grief to his mother.' the young people went out, feeling very much discouraged, and wandered down to the seashore, laddie following with drooping ears and tail. mechanically they seated themselves upon the beach to discuss the position of affairs, but no one seemed to have anything to suggest. 'well,' said marjorie at last, digging holes in the sand with a sharp-pointed shell; 'what are we to do now?' allan pushed his cap on to the back of his head, and reggie looked thoughtful; but they did not reply. it was a beautiful morning, and the distant hills showed the first flush of heather where the light fell upon them. right in front the waves were glancing like silver, and beyond the ripples the island of the den stood out invitingly clear. tricksy, who had been gazing wistfully across the water, suddenly melted into tears. 'all our fun spoilt,' she said, with the big drops rolling down her face; 'what a horrid, horrid summer we are going to have, and poor neil---- 'buck up, tricksy,' said allan; 'the bottom hasn't tumbled out of the universe yet.' laddie, who had been looking with a concerned expression at his young friends, rose up and thrust his nose under tricksy's hand, wagging his tail in an encouraging manner. 'good old dog, good laddie,' said allan, patting the dog's rough coat; 'he is telling us that we must not give in.' laddie pricked up his ears, and went from one to another of the group, endeavouring to rouse them from their despondency. 'poor laddie, good laddie,' said marjorie, caressing him and feeling a lump in her throat. 'laddie, dear, don't lick me in the face--you're knocking me over, laddie!' cried tricksy, as her big pet became more demonstrative. when laddie had been induced to sit down, which he did with the expression of a dog convinced that his endeavours had been crowned with success, allan resumed: 'well, we must remember that we've made a compact, and we've got to stick to it and help neil somehow, although it looks pretty difficult at present.' a murmur of approval went round the group. 'yes,' said tricksy, sitting with knitted brows; 'but we don't seem to be doing anything.' the others were silent. 'what would you have us do, tricksy?' inquired allan. 'do? i'd do something.' 'well?' tricksy's face puckered again. 'i'd catch some of the people.' 'well, tricksy, and how?' 'i'd dig holes for them to fall into.' reggie uttered a contemptuous 'humph.' 'you'd dig holes for them, would you, tricksy, said allan; 'how could you tell whether you had caught the right one?' 'i'd catch them all until i came to the right one. i'd make them tell me what they'd been doing, and then let the wrong one go.' no one had any reply to make. tricksy looked extremely mortified. 'well, anyhow,' said allan, springing to his feet, 'we aren't doing neil any good by sitting here; let's go to rob maclean's cottage and see whether he can help us.' rob maclean was neil's second cousin, and the proposition met with approval. the short, black-haired highlander was working in his garden, and came forward to greet his visitors with true gaelic courtesy. 'how do you do, young ladies and gentlemen?' he said; 'it iss ferry proud to see you that i am. come in, and it is ferry pleased that mistress maclean will pe.' in the dark, smoky hut the party were accommodated with seats, and mrs. maclean went to fetch milk and oat-cakes according to highland ideas of hospitality. 'you will pe out early,' said rob maclean. 'ferry fine day this, and exercise iss good for the health.' 'yes, mr. maclean,' said allan abruptly; 'we came to speak to you about neil.' instantly the highlander's countenance underwent a change. 'you hev?' he said. 'poor neil, it iss a ferry bad business whateffer; a ferry bad business for the puir lad.' 'yes,' replied allan, 'of course we don't believe that neil had anything to do with robbing the post-office.' 'that iss right, master allan; that is right,' said the highlander. 'no, puir lad; no one who will pe knowing him will hev been pelieving that of him; and it wass ferry hard that efferything went against him at the trial, whateffer.' 'well, mr. maclean, we came to see whether you could help us,' said allan; 'we have made a compact, and promised not to rest until we have found out that neil didn't really do it, and have him brought home again.' 'proud to hear you say so, mr. allan;' broke out the highlander; 'and hev you ahl made a compact, the young ladies too?' 'yes,' replied tricksy, dimpling; 'we are all in it; marjorie and i, and even laddie.--down, laddie; don't jump up on me,' as the collie, who had been sitting with an amiable expression in the centre of the group, sprang up and put one paw on her knee. 'ferry proud indeed that you should hev done so,' repeated mr. maclean.--'my tear,' he added, turning to his wife, who had re-entered the cottage with a pitcher of milk; 'these young ladies and gentlemen will hev been making a compact that they will help neil, and prove that he hass not committed the robbery.' the woman, who knew very little english, replied in gaelic, and the young folk took up that language, somewhat to the relief of maclean, who prided himself on his knowledge of the saxon tongue but found it easier to sustain a conversation in his own. 'that would be a great comfort to neil, did he only know of it, and to his mother too,' he said. 'poor lad, i wish we could send him a message.' 'does any one know where he has gone?' inquired reggie. 'some one must know, master reggie, since he could hardly have got clear away without help; but we do not know how he managed his escape. some say that he went away with the gipsies that left inchkerra the day of the trial, for they put in at stornwell harbour that same night; and others think that it was smugglers who helped him. he will no doubt try to escape to america; but the poor lad stands a thousand chances of being caught before he gets there.' 'oh, i hope not,' cried the girls. 'i don't know, young ladies. if there was any chance of his being cleared, it might be better for him to stand his trial. it is a very strange thing indeed, how everything seemed to point to his being guilty.' 'then do you think some one has been trying to make him appear so?' 'i don't know, master reggie. it is very mysterious indeed who can have done it. the police made an inspection of the gipsy camp, but there seemed to be no evidence against them. well, we are all very pleased that you are so kindly disposed towards neil, and we can only hope that you or some one else may be able to find out who really did it. if you must go, young ladies and gentlemen, will you not look in at mrs. macdonnell's cottage and tell her that you have resolved to help neil? poor soul, she is very sorrowful, and it might comfort her to know what true friends her son has.' 'do you think she would care to be disturbed to-day?' said marjorie, somewhat doubtfully. 'i think she would be very glad to see you, miss marjorie, when you come on such an errand.' mrs. maclean said nothing; but she filled the young people's pockets with oat-cakes, and stood watching them as they walked soberly along the path. 'it's too late to go to mrs. macdonnell before dinner-time,' said allan, who seemed to be glad of an excuse to postpone so trying an interview. 'you'd better come with us, hamish and marjorie; it's half-past twelve now; much too late for you to go home.' places were found for the macgregors at the hospitable table of ardnavoir; and after dinner, tricksy drew her mother aside, while marjorie lingered to hear what mrs. stewart would say. 'mummie,' said tricksy, 'rob maclean wants us to go and see mrs. macdonnell and tell her that we don't believe that neil stole the letters. do you think we can go?' 'perhaps you might, as rob wishes you to do so,' replied her mother. 'don't stay long, and don't talk much, for, poor woman, this has been a terrible blow to her. give her your message, and then say good-bye.' 'do you think we need to go too?' said allan, as the young people were discussing their intention. 'of course we must all be there,' declared marjorie; 'it will encourage her when she sees that we have all joined the compact.' 'whatever are you doing that for?' asked allan, when he saw his little sister gathering flowers in the garden. 'they are for mrs. macdonnell,' said tricksy, looking up with her soft, dark eyes; 'i think she would be glad if we brought her some.' allan said nothing, and reggie's dark face looked approving. a walk of a mile or two brought the young folk to the heather-roofed cottage where mrs. macdonnell lived. a dog rushed out and barked, but wagged his tail when he saw who the visitors were. 'neil's dog,' said allan; 'look how he speaks to laddie. poor jock; poor old fellow; come here.' 'where's your master, jock; where's neil?' said reggie in a low voice, as the dog came up to be petted. they knocked at the outer door, but there was no answer. after a moment's hesitation, they pushed it open and knocked at the door of the kitchen. 'come in,' said a faint voice; and they entered. a woman was sitting by the peat fire, with her neglected spinning-wheel beside her. she was strikingly handsome, in spite of her mournful expression and dejected attitude. her black hair, as yet only slightly touched with grey waved on either side of a broad low forehead, and she had a straight nose like neil's and a beautifully shaped face; but the eyes which she raised at the children's entrance were full of sorrow. the boys hung about the doorway, and marjorie felt a lump in her throat; but tricksy advanced courageously. 'how do you do, mrs. macdonnell?' she said, with a little gurgle in her voice, that expressed more than she had the power to say in words. 'mother said we might come and see you; and we thought you might like some flowers.' 'eh, miss tricksy, what a pretty posy! it wass ferry good of you to come. tek a seat, miss marjorie. will you be finding places, young gentlemen?' 'i hope you are pretty well, mrs. macdonnell?' said marjorie, in a voice which she could not keep from trembling a little. 'pretty fair, thank you, miss marjorie,' replied mrs. macdonnell, while reggie and hamish sat very stiffly upon their chairs, and allan had much ado to keep from fidgeting. 'we thought you would like to know, mrs. macdonnell,' began tricksy; 'bob maclean said we might tell you; we wanted to say--allan does, and we all do--that we _know_ neil couldn't have done such a thing, and we have made a compact, all of us--marjorie and hamish and euan macdonnell too--that we will never rest until we find out that he didn't do it, and bring him home again. i thought you would be glad, mrs. macdonnell; for allan and hamish are going to try very hard, and euan will do his best to help us.' mrs. macdonnell's eyes glistened. 'it iss ferry good of you ahl, i am sure,' she said; then after a pause she added, 'indeed it is proud i am to know that my puir laddie----' her voice became husky and then failed; and feeling that the interview had lasted long enough, the girls kissed her and they all took leave, wondering whether they had done harm or good by their visit. 'one thing we might do,' said allan, after they had trudged for awhile in a somewhat uncomfortable silence, 'we might take a look at andrew macpeters.' 'yes, let's get something done,' said reggie; 'where do you think we shall find him?' 'i heard that he was cutting peats on the hillside,' said allan; 'isn't that a cart over there, and two men stacking peats?' 'yes, that is andrew macpeters,' said reggie, when they had advanced a little nearer; 'the red-headed man on this side.' 'fine day, young ladies and gentlemen,' said the farther-away man; but andrew only gave them a sidelong look out of his red-lidded eyes. 'fine day,' replied allan civilly; then they all stood still and looked at andrew, who went on stolidly with his work. 'let's come to the post-office now,' said allan, and they all trudged away. 'eh, young ladies and gentlemen, pleased to see you,' said mrs. macalister in her lilting gaelic; 'eh, but it's been a weary business since you were here last! poor neil, poor laddie!' 'yes, mrs. macalister,' said marjorie; 'and of course we are all quite sure that neil had nothing to do with it.' 'so are we all, miss marjorie; but the hard thing is to prove it. things looked very black against him when the order came out of the poor lad's very letter, and he the only person who had been in the house that night. wait a bit, young ladies and gentlemen, and i'll fetch my husband; he's been bad with the rheumatism but he's working in the garden now,' and the good woman departed, leaving the field clear for the young people. 'look,' said allan, 'there are the letters lying on the table. they've been taken out of the box, and they're waiting now until mrs. macalister is ready to stamp them. the door's open, and any one can come in and out. it wouldn't be difficult to rob a post-office like this!' just then the door opened, and andrew macpeters came slouching in, looking very awkward when he saw who were in the shop. the visitors all watched him as he made his way clumsily across the room to fetch something that he wanted; and when he came near the table reggie said suddenly, 'been taking anything from here lately, andrew?' the man looked at him with a surly gleam in his eyes but did not answer. after a minute or two he went out, all eyes following him curiously. 'there,' said reggie triumphantly, 'did you see what a bad conscience he has?' and they all looked at each other in silent assent. declining mrs. macalister's invitation to stay to tea, they trooped out of the post-office. 'we'll watch that man,' said reggie, and tricksy began to walk on the tips of her toes in anticipation. 'hulloa, young people, glad i've overtaken you,' said the doctor's voice behind them. 'it's just going to pour with rain, and you're due at my house to tea, i believe. it's lucky i have the closed carriage; jump in as many of you as it will hold, and the rest of you can sit on the box.' by the time the doctor's house was reached the rain had stopped, and the sun was peeping out again. a scrap of white paper fluttering on the ruins attracted reggie's attention, and he ran across the garden, climbed the wall, and captured it. after looking at it he gave a violent start, then ran towards the house. 'it's a postal order,' he said, giving it to the doctor; 'what's the meaning of this?' all clustered round, and the doctor took the piece of paper and examined it. 'strange thing,' he exclaimed; 'this order bears the number of one of those that went missing on the night of the robbery. how did it come there? it's wet with the rain, but not very dirty; probably hasn't been there long. this ought to shed some fresh light upon the case. i'll have the police to make a thorough search of the ruins.' chapter vi a discovery 'reggie,' said allan, 'there they are at last.' reggie slid down from the garden wall, looked towards the road, and said, 'where?' 'they're behind that hill now. they'll be here in no time. you'd better call tricksy, and tell her to be ready.' reggie went into the house, and called, standing at the foot of the staircase, 'tricksy, it's graham major and graham minor with their pater; and they're almost here.' tricksy came downstairs and waited in the hall, somewhat shyly, beside her brothers. 'oh, i do hope they will be nice,' she whispered apprehensively to reggie, as the dog-cart drew up at the door. a tall pleasant-faced gentleman was beside the driver, and two boys were on the back seat wrapped in inverness capes, and with caps drawn over their brows as a protection against the wind. as mr. and mrs. stewart were receiving their guests in the hall, reggie and tricksy had an opportunity of observing the boys. one was dark, about twelve years of age; thin, alert, with bright, restless hazel eyes; and the other was about as old as reggie, with blue eyes and reddish-golden hair; almost too pretty to be a boy, reggie thought; while tricksy said to herself that he looked rather "nice."' after greeting the grown-up folk, the new-comers turned to encounter tricksy's solemn, dark eyes and reggie's bright, twinkling ones. tricksy shook hands very shyly, and reggie a little stiffly; then the visitors were taken upstairs to prepare for lunch. tricksy turned to reggie, whose countenance wore a non-committal expression; then she looked at allan and heaved a little sigh. 'what do you think of them, tricksy?' inquired allan. 'well, i think the little one looks rather nice, but the other is a little proud.' 'do you think they'd care about our pirates' island, and all that?' asked reggie doubtfully. 'of course they would. they're no end of a good sort. hush, they're coming downstairs again.' 'are you tired after the steamer?' allan asked his guest during lunch. 'a bit, not very,' replied the elder lad, whose name was harry. 'feel a bit as though the floor was rocking.' 'you'll feel like that until you've had a night's rest, anyway,' said allan. 'are you too tired to do anything this afternoon?' 'not at all,' answered his friend. 'gerald, you're game to do something after lunch, aren't you?' his brother, who had been trying to make a conversation with reggie, while tricksy sat shyly on his other side, looked up with a smile. 'the steamer went close under some fine rocks, not far from the village,' he said; 'very high ones, with birds sitting in rows, all the way up, and making an awful screaming.' 'yes,' said allan, 'those are the skegness cliffs, a great nesting-place of the birds. we'll take you there after lunch, if it's not too far.' the boys looked pleased, and as soon as freed from the restraint of their elders' presence they ran to fetch their caps and demanded to be taken to the rocks. 'we had better not go so soon, i think,' said allan. 'we are expecting hamish and marjorie, our friends from corranmore, and we'll ask them to go with us. there's a jolly burn that runs quite near the house; suppose we go and fish in it until they come.' fishing-tackle was found for the entire party, and they proceeded to the banks of the burn, which trickled down the hill-side and across a meadow, widening into little pools fringed with ragged-robin and queen o' the meadow; and finally falling in a little cascade down to the shore. 'what a fine dog this is of yours,' observed gerald, caressing laddie, who had been fawning upon the new-comers, and now ended by sitting down between gerald and tricksy. tricksy looked gratified. 'he's my dog,' she said. 'he likes you, i think.' gerald stroked laddie's head and his white ruffle, and the dog made a little sound to express gratification. 'tricksy, keep your dog quiet, he'll frighten away the trout,' sang out allan warningly; and tricksy requested laddie to 'trust.' the sun shone down upon green grass and brown pools, and drew out the perfume of the flowers and heather. not far distant was the pleasant noise of the sea, and the calling of the gulls answered the plaintive cry of the plovers which fluttered about the moor and the meadows. the day was too bright, and the trout which could be seen at the bottom of the pools refused to take. after a little while the strong fresh air and sun began to have a drowsy effect upon the anglers. gerald rubbed his eyes once or twice, and stifled a yawn; and tricksy found that he was disinclined for conversation. 'hulloa!' cried a voice from the top of a ridge; and marjorie and hamish came racing down. laddie's welcoming bark roused gerald, who jumped into a sitting posture, and looked about him in a surprised way. 'hulloa, marjorie,' said allan; 'glad you've come. this is harry graham, and this is gerald.' marjorie looked at the new-comers with approval, and hamish shook hands good-naturedly. 'are we going to fish all afternoon,' said marjorie, 'or shall we take a scramble?' 'a scramble,' replied reggie; 'they want to see the rocks.' 'if gerald isn't too tired,' put in tricksy considerately; 'he was asleep a minute ago.' 'no,' protested gerald, flushing and looking very much vexed; 'i wasn't. i'm quite ready for a walk.' 'suppose we take them to the smugglers' caves,' suggested marjorie. 'they're the finest sight in the island, i think.' at the mention of smugglers harry's eyes began to sparkle, and gerald's blue ones opened very wide. 'are there--are there any smugglers there now?' asked harry. 'sometimes there are,' replied marjorie, 'but i don't expect we shall meet any. smuggling isn't what it used to be,' she added somewhat regretfully. 'what luck if we could only come across some,' said harry. 'let's go and see the caves anyhow.' 'it's a long walk, across moors and bogs, and steep hills,' said marjorie; 'but if you're game, come along.' harry, walking beside reggie, looked at the girl's slight, erect figure as she went in front with gerald. 'does she always do what you fellows do?' he inquired, rather doubtfully. 'of course she does,' replied reggie; 'she's fifteen years old, you know; a year older than allan.' harry looked at her again, and considered. 'bit of a tomboy, isn't she?' he inquired again. 'an awful tomboy. we've got her into the way of doing all kinds of things. she couldn't be much jollier if she was a boy.' harry took another look at her. 'has she a bit of a temper?' he asked unexpectedly. 'a bit,' acknowledged reggie, somewhat disconcerted, 'when she's roused, you know. she's fond of her own way; and she and allan used to quarrel a good deal at one time; but they seem to have made it up now.' reggie added to himself that there was no time to quarrel, now that every one's thoughts were occupied with neil. harry looked at marjorie again. 'does she ever quarrel with you?' he asked. 'n--no, not much,' he replied, his face darkening slightly. harry looked at marjorie's tall young figure, and then at reggie's smaller and slighter one, and arrived at the conclusion which particularly annoyed reggie; that the girl disdained to quarrel with a boy so much younger than herself. marjorie turned her bright face towards them. 'find it tiring, walking on the heather?' she said. 'it's very fatiguing when you're not accustomed to it. we might take a rest after we've climbed this hill; there's a beautiful view from the top.' it was a steep climb, and when they reached the summit, all the young folk were glad to fling themselves down on the short, fragrant heather. the breeze came laden with the scent of wild thyme and heather and salt from the sea; and the only live creatures save themselves were the mountain sheep and the crested plovers, and grey gulls which wheeled above the heads of the wayfarers. harry looked about him with brightening eyes. 'what an awfully jolly place this is of yours,' he said. 'i say, you _do_ see a lot from the top of this hill.' he was right. the hill crest commanded a view of nearly the whole island, with green fields and moors, and the white roads stretching across them; houses and cottages in their little gardens; and the village with the pier jutting out into the sea. one or two larger islands were in the distance; brown rocks and skerries lying like dots upon the blue water; and away to the east the highland hills rose among the clouds. 'it must be awfully jolly, having an island all to yourselves,' continued harry. 'yes,' replied marjorie, perched on a boulder, 'and it's jollier still to have an island of your very own, where no one comes but ourselves, and we can do exactly as we like.' 'where's that?' inquired harry. 'i may tell them, mayn't i?' asked marjorie of the others. 'of course you may,' replied allan; 'we must take them there some day soon.' marjorie slipped down from her perch. 'do you see the little island over there?' she said, pointing southwards; 'a little black dot on the water, with some bright green in the middle of it? well, that's our _own_ island which we have all to ourselves, and we've made a place in it that we call our secret hiding-place or pirates' den. we must show it to you some day.' the boys stood up and gazed out to sea, their eyes widening and brightening. 'i say, this is jolly,' they murmured, rather than said to any one in particular. 'hamish,' said allan, who had been looking at some object on the southern side of the island; 'is that your father's gig, that has just stopped before mrs. macdonnell's cottage?' hamish looked in the direction indicated. 'yes, i believe it is,' he said. 'it must be true then, what we heard duncan say, that mrs. macdonnell is very ill.' such a grieved silence fell upon the island young people that the grahams looked at them inquiringly. 'they said that she would fall ill,' said marjorie in a low voice, 'if--if she continued to fret so about----' allan pushed his cap to the back of his head, and reggie looked hard in the direction of the cottage, where the black dot was still standing by the gate. 'nothing else found in the ruins?' said allan in an undertone. 'nothing yet,' replied hamish; 'the police are still trying to follow up the clue----' marjorie's eyes encountered those of the guests, and she looked at allan and reggie. 'are you going to let them know about it?' she asked. 'might as well, you know; for they are sure to hear of it before long.' allan put his hands in his pockets and reflected; then he consulted reggie with a look, after which he turned to hamish. 'perhaps we might as well tell them,' he said, and the others consented. 'well, graham major and graham minor,' he began, to the boys who were waiting expectantly; 'we are very much bothered about a friend of ours;' and he told them about the robbery of the post-office and neil's flight, while the boys listened with wide-open mouths, throwing themselves about and uttering exclamations of interest. 'you say that you are quite sure he couldn't have taken the letters?' asked harry, drawing himself into an upright position on the heather. 'perfectly certain,' replied allan. 'he would no more have done it than you or i. no one who knows him would believe such a thing of neil.' 'oh!' interposed tricksy, in a shocked tone, 'i think dr. macgregor believed it.' hamish became very red and marjorie's lips tightened. 'and he's so awfully, awfully jolly,' pursued harry. 'one of the very jolliest people we know,' answered marjorie. 'father doesn't really believe it of him. he did everything for us, and was up to all kinds of inventions. we don't seem to have any fun at all without him.' 'it's a most extraordinary story,' said harry, jerking himself into a fresh attitude; and both the new boys sat and pondered. 'what do you say to letting them both join the compact?' suggested reggie. marjorie's eyes said yes; and hamish, whom allan consulted with a look, gave a nod. 'what's that; a compact?' inquired harry eagerly. 'it's an agreement that we've all made,' said allan, 'that we'll back neil up, and show that he didn't commit the robbery.' 'hooray, what fun,' said harry; 'i'm game.' 'you might let gerald join too,' cried tricksy from where she sat beside her new friend; 'he's quite the right sort, and he only wants to learn a thing or two to be equal to any of us.' gerald wriggled, and blushed to the roots of his golden hair. 'well, then, you must do all you can to help us,' said allan, 'and see whether you can find out who really did it.' 'all right,' said harry; 'i'll help you to catch the thief.' 'and you must sign an agreement like the rest of us, and you can each have a copy to carry about with you always, as we do. see, this is the principal copy, that i have to take care of.' 'you can write it out now, with allan's new fountain pen,' cried tricksy; 'this flat stone will do for a desk, and i've got some pieces of paper that i've been carrying in my pocket in case we might find any new people to join our compact;' and she produced with great gravity some crumpled sheets of note-paper, much soiled at the edges. 'all right,' said allan, 'this is the agreement; "we hereby promise never to rest until we show that neil is innocent and have him brought home again."' reggie held the papers down to keep them from blowing away, while allan made out fresh copies of the agreement; then all the documents received the signature of harry, who wrote his name with much ceremony and handed the pen to gerald. 'what an awful lark,' said harry, who had clambered on to the boulder and sat swinging his legs; 'it will be fine fun tracking the thief.' allan began to whistle. 'we haven't found much to track yet,' he said; 'neither have the police, who have been at it nearly three weeks. the less you talk about it the better, except among ourselves, for it isn't a game, this.' 'come along,' said marjorie, springing up, as harry looked somewhat crestfallen, 'we've dawdled long enough; let's run down the side of the hill, and then we shan't take long to get to the cliffs.' 'all right,' said harry briskly, 'let's go to the smugglers' caves; oh, i say, what a jolly island this is!' all started to run down the steep descent, bounding from one tuft of heather to the other, their speed increasing as they neared the bottom. allan, marjorie, and reggie reached level ground at about the same time; then they turned to look at harry and gerald, who arrived next, looking somewhat shaken, and hamish, who had stopped to help tricksy. 'not far now to the caves,' said marjorie encouragingly. 'do you see that headland, stretching far out into the sea? they are on the side farthest away from us. tired, tricksy?' 'not at all,' protested the child, stepping alone and trying to hide a little roll in her gait, although her small face was beginning to look pale. reggie glanced at her approvingly as tricksy toiled along beside hamish, hoping that no one observed that she was hanging on to big hand. 'oh, what a height from the ground,' said gerald in an awed tone of voice, as the moor ended abruptly and they found themselves gazing down from the crest of what seemed a sheer precipice, with long lines of breakers falling upon the strip of sand at the foot. 'what a disturbance the birds are making, and what strange noises there are.' 'it's the waves echoing among the rocks,' said marjorie. 'you must come here some stormy day when the tide is up; the caves get flooded and the noise is just like thunder.' 'if you'll come a little further along,' said allan, 'there's a break in the cliffs where we can get down pretty easily. the tide is out, so we have lots of time.' 'can we really climb down there,' said harry, as they came to where a chasm opened in the line of cliff, with rough steps and ledges of rock standing out in the riven walls. not a bird was to be seen in the gloomy crevasse; although the skuas and black-backed gulls were flying about and clamouring before the face of the cliff. 'come along,' said allan on the first step. 'are you a good climber, harry?' 'pretty fair,' replied harry, with a rather wild look in his eyes. gerald said nothing, but swung himself down with a serious countenance. 'if any one wants help, just sing out,' cried allan, descending by the rocky steps. 'don't look down, and you'll be all right.' 'take my hand, gerald,' said tricksy graciously to gerald, who hesitated at a perilous-looking gap. gerald flushed pink, and pretended not to have heard the offer of assistance; and the two strangers braced themselves to their unaccustomed feat. the way led round the chasm and downward, sometimes approaching the face of the cliff, where the inquisitive eyes and red bills of the puffins peered out of the crevices, and whole rows of auks and kittiwakes were thrown into violent agitation by the sight of the intruders; and sometimes leading back to the dark interior of the chasm. the place was full of echoes; the hollow boom of the breakers, the swirling of water round half-submerged rocks, the hoarse cries of the gulls and the shrill scream of the smaller sea-birds joining in an uproar which made the air tremble. many a time, during the descent, it cost the new-comers an effort to avoid being overcome by dizziness. at last allan reached the last ledge, and swung himself to the ground; reggie and marjorie followed; tricksy came last, and the grahams dropped down with an air of relief. 'well done for you,' said allan approvingly; 'it's your first climb of the kind, and you haven't shown an atom of funk.' gerald's cheeks became a little redder, and harry bore himself with greater self-consciousness. 'only hamish now,' said allan, looking up at the cliff; 'how cautiously the old fellow is coming down; he has the steadiest head of the lot of us although he is so slow.' '"sleepy hamish,"' remarked harry to gerald in an aside, repeating a nickname which he had heard allan use. low as the words were spoken, marjorie heard them, and turned upon the boy like a flash. 'some people have more in them than they make a show of,' she said. 'perhaps you don't understand that kind of thing, though.' harry did not chance to have a reply ready, but he observed to reggie afterwards that it was a pity marjorie seemed to be a quick-tempered kind of a girl. 'here we are,' said allan, pausing beneath a great overhanging archway, and speaking loudly so as to be heard above the din; for the waves and the clamouring of the birds made a noise which was almost deafening. 'can we go in?' asked gerald. 'of course we can. there's no danger except in a westerly gale. it's dark after you get in a little way.' the young people scrambled and slipped over the sea-weed at the mouth of the cave, and presently found themselves standing on a floor of light-coloured sand, strewn with shells and sea-drift. the sides of the cave were black and shiny with wet, and water dripped slowly from the roof. 'is this where the smugglers used to come?' asked gerald in an awed tone. 'yes,' replied allan; 'the schooners used to sail under the rocks on moonlight nights when the tide was high, and the cargo was stored in the caves until the people came secretly to take it away. it was very dangerous work sometimes, for if a storm comes from the west the caves are often flooded.' the light which glimmered under the archway did not penetrate far, and the young people were soon in total darkness. the air was damp and chilly. strange draughts crossed each other from unexpected quarters, and the water dripping from overhead, awoke weird echoes which seemed to be repeated among far-reaching clefts and passages. 'strike a light, hamish,' said allan, 'and let them see what kind of a place they're in.' the match spluttered and blazed, revealing dark rocks gleaming with wet and the black openings to what appeared to be a series of underground passages branching off from the main one. 'the caves are all connected with one another,' explained allan, 'and have separate openings to the sea. light up again, hamish; strike two this time, and they'll get a better idea.' again there was a splutter, and the flare revealed strange shifting shadows among the rocks, and a circle of faces that looked unnaturally white in the surrounding darkness. reggie's eyes were the sharpest. 'hullo!' he exclaimed, 'there's something in that passage. what can it be?' all crowded to examine the mysterious object, and the light flickered upon a pile of kegs and bales lying half-concealed behind a corner of rock. 'smugglers!' declared marjorie. 'looks like it,' said allan, as hamish struck fresh matches and the others crowded round, giving utterance to ohs! and ahs! of excitement. 'they're at their old trade again,' said allan, examining the barrels; 'i wonder what pater will say to this?' 'that's the last match, allan,' said hamish, as the light flickered out. the darkness seemed to come down like a weight, and the young people found themselves groping for each other's hands. 'we had better make the best of our way out of this,' said allan. 'try to move quietly, for we don't know who might be about. help tricksy, hamish; i think she's by you, and here, tricksy, give me your other hand.' they groped their way towards the entrance, and soon were in the strong sunshine at the mouth of the caves. 'well,' said allan, 'that was an adventure;' and they looked at one another with varying expressions. 'do you think they may have had anything to do with the robbery?' said marjorie. 'shouldn't wonder,' replied allan. 'anyhow, we'll see what pater says.' 'in the meanwhile,' said marjorie, 'we had better be quick; the breakers are close under the rocks, and we're almost cut off already.' a stream of foaming, angry-looking water was running up into a hollow on the shore, and the young folk could only escape by jumping on to a stone in the middle of the flood, and from thence to the other side. 'jump, tricksy,' cried reggie half impatiently, as his little sister hesitated. tricksy, who was pale and overwrought, sprang, but fell short and plunged overhead in the water. instantly two or three were in the flood, trying to prevent her being swept out to sea. allan secured her; and gasping, struggling, with water running over her face, tricksy was pulled on to dry land. 'it isn't so very bad, is it, tricksy?' inquired reggie, in a tone of somewhat forced cheerfulness; 'what a thing to do, to jump in when you're told to jump over!' tricksy tried to smile; a miserable attempt, for her teeth chattered and her lips were blue with the cold. 'run to rob maclean's cottage, reggie,' said hamish, throwing off his coat and wrapping it round tricksy; 'ask him to lend us his pony, and we'll take tricksy to corranmore; it's nearer than your house.' with hamish running by her side and holding her on to the pony, tricksy was not long in reaching corranmore, and when the others arrived she was already in bed, with mrs. macgregor beside her; the little girl drinking hot milk and trying to restrain the tears that _would_ roll down her cheeks, even when she forced herself to laugh. 'feeling better, tricksy?' asked reggie apprehensively. 'she has had a nasty fall,' said mrs. macgregor somewhat reproachfully, 'and we may be thankful it is not any worse. she can't possibly go home to-night; you had better tell your parents that she is safe with us.' a look of relief overspread tricksy's tired features. 'oh, you _are_ a dear,' she exclaimed, springing up and throwing her arms round mrs. macgregor's neck, forgetting that the lady had once said that tricksy stewart was a spoilt little girl. 'hooray, i'll sleep with marjorie and we can talk about what we have seen to-day!' chapter vii the siege 'no, mr. allan,' duncan was declaring, 'if i wass you, i would not pe telling the laird whateffer; it can do no good pringing honest folk into trouble.' 'but they are not honest folk if they're smugglers,' interposed reggie, who had been listening to the conversation without joining in. a peculiar expression flitted across duncan's face. 'well, but, mr. allan,' he maintained; 'i'm just telling you, that it will pe petter if you will not pe telling the laird; you will only pe meking trouble in the island and will pe doing no good at ahl, at ahl.' 'but what if it was they who robbed the post-office?' said allan. 'robbed the post-office, mr. allan!' cried duncan; 'what will they pe doing that for? not them, mr. allan! so do not pe meking trouble by telling the laird----' 'but we _have_ told him,' said reggie. 'dear, dear, mr. allan and master reggie,' said duncan with a vexed face; 'what will you haf peen doing that for? that wass a treatful thing to do, to pe tale-bearers. tear me; and what iss to pe done now?' 'but, duncan, smuggling is against the law, and it will be their own fault----' 'well, but, mr. allan, you will pe for punishing folks that iss not deserving to pe punished if you do such a foolish thing ass to pring the police to them, and--och! mr. allan, mr. allan, why can't young folks hev some sense! what iss to pe done now, after all you young ladies and gentlemen hev tone such a senseless thing!' duncan's evident excitement showed that argument was in vain; and there was something in his manner that tended to convince the boys, against their better judgment, that they had done wrong in speaking of their discovery. they wandered down to the cricket-field, where the grahams were indulging in a solitary practice. 'we'd better go and play with these fellows,' said allan; 'we can't leave them to amuse themselves all the time.' presently the sound of wheels caused them to look round, and they saw the doctor's gig turning in at the gate, with tricksy on the front seat beside dr. macgregor, and marjorie and hamish behind. 'brought you back the missing one,' cried the doctor to mrs. stewart, who had come to the door to meet them; 'none the worse for her bath;' and tricksy jumped down and ran into the playing field followed more slowly by the other two. 'come along and have a game,' cried reggie; but the new-comers appeared to have something on their minds. they stood eyeing one another in an embarrassed way; hamish looking sheepish and marjorie mischievous; while tricksy's little flushed face was breaking into dimples, and both girls displayed an inclination to giggle. 'wait a minute,' whispered tricksy, as allan came towards them, and marjorie said to her in a sharp undertone, 'go on, can't you, and don't be silly.' thus admonished, tricksy composed herself into gravity and produced a large piece of cardboard with ornamental lettering from which she read the following:-- proclamation to the boys op ardnavoir we, the undersigned, hereby declare war against you. we challenge you to open combat at our fort. you must give us warning at what date and time you will attack us. any advantage gained in not attending to these rules will be considered unfair. any weapons allowed except stones. (_signed_) 'hamish macgregor, 'marjorie, 'tricksy.' 'our fort is the hut, of course, in you-know-where,' added marjorie; 'and the challenging party have the right to choose whether they will be besiegers or defenders, advantages to be as equal as possible. that's all,' she concluded, with a sudden lapse into her usual manner. the two new boys had been listening with all their might. 'whatever does she mean?' they asked in an aside, turning to reggie. 'it's a challenge,' said reggie. 'let's hear what allan says.' allan was considering. 'shall we accept now, reggie?' he asked. reggie thought the combat might as well take place without delay; and allan replied to the proclamation in these terms: 'the challenge is accepted. we will meet you at the fort. you will be the garrison, as there are fewer of you, and we'll attack.--come along.' 'call the dogs, reggie,' said marjorie. 'do you like sieges?' she asked gerald, as they were on their way to the shore. 'awful fun,' replied the fair-haired boy, whose pink and white face was fast becoming tanned by wind and sun. 'what weapons are to be used?' asked marjorie, turning quickly to the others. 'turfs,' replied allan, 'and lumps of wet sea-weed if you like.' marjorie gave a little jump as though she were pleased. the boat was launched, and cut swiftly through the transparent water, while the new boys looked around with expectant faces. 'what an awfully jolly place,' they said, as they sprang out on the beach. 'awful fun, having an island of your own to do as you like with.' 'half-an-hour allowed for gathering ammunition,' called out marjorie. 'we'll show harry and gerald over the place when we've had our fight. we had better defend from the roof of the cottage, for we might pull down the walls if we defended from the inside.' some time was spent in digging clods of turf, a quantity of which was piled on the roof of the hut for the defenders, while the attackers disposed theirs in little heaps at a short distance from the fort. 'now for the sea-weed,' cried marjorie; 'nothing like getting a heap of wet tang thrown in your face when you're fighting.' the tide was far out, and quantities of wet sea-weed lay exposed on the rocks. 'no stones to be taken,' said allan, sawing through the tough, thick stalks with a large pocket-knife. 'how do you like our way of playing?' asked marjorie of harry, as she passed him, grasping in each hand a mass of wet sea-weed which dripped down on her frock and shoes. 'awful fun,' replied the boy, his eyes sparkling with excitement. 'come along then, i think we've got enough.' she swung herself nimbly on to the roof, followed by hamish and tricksy. the wind was freshening, and sang in their ears, making them feel excited and eager for the fray. 'it's rather stormy,' said harry; 'do you think we'll get back?' 'of course,' said marjorie; 'why, this is nothing! we like it to be a little stormy, it's better fun. call the others,' and they shouted for the rest of the attacking party, who came hurrying, armed with missiles. laddie and carlo followed in the rear, suspending their operations among the rabbit burrows to see what was going to happen. 'to your post, gerald,' shouted allan; and gerald made a dart towards the besiegers, just in time to avoid being caught in a rain of clods which hurtled through the air. allan and reggie showed great dexterity in avoiding the missiles, but harry and gerald, not having had so much practice in this kind of warfare, acted the part of unwilling targets, and their neat suits were soon bespattered with mud. 'all in the day's work, eh?' said allan, as he hurried past gerald, who was somewhat ruefully wiping the dirt off his cheek with one hand; 'awful fun, isn't it?' 'awfully jolly,' assented gerald, trying not to think that in the bottom of his heart there was a doubt. a fresh shower of sods came from the cottage, accompanied by shouts both from besiegers and besieged; and laddie, who had been looking on with a puzzled face and trying to make out what was the matter, came to the conclusion that his young friends were engaged in deadly warfare, and rushed between the opposing sides with a bark and a wagging tail, bent upon making peace. 'down, laddie, down,' shouted allan, as the dog jumped up to lick his face, after running frenziedly from one side to the other; 'trust, sir! go and lie down;' and laddie, looking heart-broken, retired to the turf dyke and lay watching the fray in consternation. the battle raged long and furiously, neither side appearing to gain the advantage. the attacking party pressed round the walls of the cottage, only to be beaten back by the projectiles which were showered upon them. nerving themselves to fresh efforts, they rushed to the attack, allan calm, reggie intrepid, and the two grahams animated by the wildest excitement. seeing one spot undefended, gerald made a dash for it, and had already one foot on the wall, preparatory to scaling the cottage, when 'swish' came a lump of sea-weed in his face; and before he had recovered from the shock a pair of strong hands seized him and marjorie's voice shouted, 'a prisoner!' a wild rush was made to effect a rescue, but hamish came to marjorie's assistance, and gerald was pulled kicking and struggling up on the roof. 'now you had better sit down quietly,' said hamish; 'you can watch the fight from behind the chimney,' and gerald was reluctantly obliged to remain inactive. furious at the loss of one of their number, the attacking party precipitated themselves against the walls of the fort and the battle became fiercer than ever. for some time the issue appeared doubtful, but gradually the besiegers gained a footing on the walls from which they could not be dislodged. panting, buffeted, they forced their way upwards, while the defenders rained blows and clods upon them. with a shout of victory, allan had swung himself on to the roof, when a cry of dismay was raised. 'the roof is giving way!' hastily they all jumped, and not a minute too soon, for some gaping holes appeared in the thatch, and there was a rumble of falling stones. 'it's all right,' panted marjorie; 'we can put that right in a morning's work. oh, wasn't it a first-rate fight!' 'capital,' agreed the others, and tricksy's voice piped in. 'i fought very well too, didn't i, marjorie?' 'oh, very well,' replied marjorie, who had been greatly hampered by tricksy getting in her way at critical moments. 'but i think we all need a rest now, don't we?' no second suggestion was needed; and they all flung themselves on the ground and lay where they were, letting the sea-breeze blow upon their heated faces. 'awfully jolly,' murmured gerald; 'i should like to have a fight like that every day.' harry lay stretched out with a restless face looking about him with eyes that sparkled notwithstanding his fatigue, and kicking his heels when he had the energy to do so. had he been less completely exhausted, he would have got up and explored the island, taking gerald with him, but a cricket match and a siege in one afternoon, following a long walk in the morning, are as much as most boys are capable of. presently reggie jumped up. 'allan,' he said, 'don't you think we ought to be going?' allan looked at the waves which were beginning to jostle one another in mid-channel. 'just about time,' he said. 'couldn't we show them the inside of the house first,' said marjorie; 'it won't take a minute.' 'all right,' said allan, 'but we must be quick.' 'is this where you stay when it is wet,' said harry, as they pushed open the door of the cottage. 'what a jolly place. can you light fires on the hearth?' 'of course we can,' said marjorie, 'and bake bannocks--why, allan; some one has been here since we left!' 'nonsense,' said allan, looking about him. 'why, i declare, some one has!' 'there has been a fresh fire lighted on the hearth,' said marjorie, 'and the things are not as we left them. there are marks like footprints on the floor too.' 'what impudence,' said reggie, with a darkening face. 'we must put up a notice board. no one has any business to come here except ourselves.' allan had been looking about him, and he suddenly darted forward and took possession of some object lying upon the floor. after a glance at it he turned white, gave an odd little gasp and slipped it into his pocket. 'what is it, allan?' asked the others, crowding around. 'nothing,' he said; 'nothing at all. i don't think any one has been here; it's all fancy.' reggie's eyes looked very much astonished at this change of front. 'come along,' said allan impatiently; 'it's time we went home,' and he swept them out of the cottage with so much decision that they obeyed, looking at him with puzzled faces. 'hulloa!' cried hamish; 'we had better be going.' 'going?' echoed allan; 'why, yes, we have no time to lose. come along, all of you.' 'what's the matter?' asked harry of marjorie as they hurried towards the boat. 'it's a very high tide,' she said. 'soon there will be a dangerous current flowing between the two islands, and if we get into it we might be swept out to sea. we are allowed to have the boat on condition that we watch the tide-ways; so we have to be careful.' it took some hard rowing to gain the opposite shore; and when they had landed, reggie turned to hamish. 'a near thing that, eh, hamish?' he said; and they all looked at the dark swift current which filled the channel. 'ten minutes later, and we couldn't have crossed,' said marjorie. 'what do you think, allan?' despite the danger so recently escaped, allan's thoughts were wandering. he looked round abstractedly, and slid into his pocket some object which he had been turning over unobserved; and reggie fancied he caught a glimpse of a sailor's knife with some elaborate carving on the handle. reggie looked at his brother with a gleam of curiosity in his eyes. 'come along,' said allan authoritatively; 'don't let's stand dawdling about.' chapter viii a cruise in the 'heroic' 'i can't understand allan at all,' declared marjorie. she and reggie, armed with large pocket-knives, were engaged in cutting heather on the moor, which stretched, a mass of purple, to the verge of the cliffs. a pile of heather lay beside them, the result of an hour's hard sawing of the wiry stems. marjorie's remark had interrupted a busy silence. reggie looked up with a twinkle in his eyes. he had been growing thinner and browner during the summer, and his wrists came further beyond the sleeves of his jacket. 'what's the matter with allan?' he asked. 'why,' said marjorie impatiently, 'he is going on so oddly. first of all, he wasn't to be found when we came here this morning--had been away for hours--and he isn't usually in such a hurry to get up in the holidays. then when he comes back we all have to go off and get heather to patch up the roof of the pirates' den. i can't make out why he has grown so particular all of a sudden.' reggie looked at her with a provoking smile. 'i thought it was you who wanted the place kept water-tight,' he suggested, 'in case we might be storm-stayed some evening and have to spend the night there----' 'that's all very well,' interrupted marjorie, 'but that's not what's making you and allan so busy just now. why did you go off together yesterday, and stay away for such a time, leaving us to entertain your guests? you're busy with something that you don't want us to know about and i'd just like to find out what it is. it always irritates me when people make mysteries out of nothing.' reggie was looking grave, and his dark eyes studied marjorie intently. 'hullo, you two,' said allan, coming up; 'how are you getting on?' marjorie rose up from the ground, and seated herself upon the pile of cut heather. 'i've just been telling reggie that i know that you and he have a secret between you,' she said, looking boldly at allan. 'i'd just like to know what it is. hardly fair, i call it; keeping something from the other members of the compact----' she broke off upon seeing the grave, concerned expression in allan's eyes. 'it's all right,' she said, looking fixedly out to sea; 'it's something that you know you ought to keep from me, and i'm not going to find out what it is.' she had become flushed, and her heart was beating fast as a suspicion forced itself upon her. she turned, and stooping down, took up her armful of heather. 'i'm going to carry this to the boat,' she remarked, without looking round. the boys looked after her retreating figure. 'h'm,' said allan, 'not bad for a girl.' marjorie's reflections were interrupted by a about, and harry came running down the hill and caught her by the arm. 'well, what's the matter?' she asked irritably. 'look!' he panted, pulling her round. 'look at that! well, if you're so cross you needn't, but you must be a duffer if you don't care to see what's coming round that headland----' marjorie's eyes followed in the direction pointed out by his shaking finger, and her face cleared. a large vessel was gliding into view. tricksy came running as fast as her little short legs would carry her, the two dogs barking in her wake. 'marjorie,' she gasped, it's a man-o'-war; oh, don't you hope it's that nice one that came last year!' by this time the vessel had been sighted by the others, who came down to discuss the situation. 'perhaps she's a stranger,' suggested hamish, feeling that it might be better to prepare for a disappointment. 'she's a fine big vessel, whatever she is,' said harry. 'she's like the one that was here last year,' said marjorie. 'oh, don't you hope she's the same,' sighed tricksy. 'you are right, marjorie,' said reggie, whose eyes were the best; 'i'm certain it's the old _heroic_.' 'what fun!' said marjorie; while tricksy sighed 'oh, how nice!' 'i wonder whether the same men are on board,' said reggie, whose serious expression had changed. 'don't know,' said allan briefly, looking out to sea with his hands in his pockets and a thoughtful face. his lack of enthusiasm caused all the others to look at him, and marjorie felt her fears revive. the man-of-war came to a standstill in ardnavoir bay and a boat put off from her side. 'look, oh look,' cried tricksy, 'they're coming on shore.' 'do you think they'll speak to us if they meet us?' inquired harry, whose eyes had never ceased to sparkle since the first discovery of the vessel. 'we'll go down to the landing-place as soon as the boat comes in,' said allan. 'can i go too?' asked tricksy. allan looked at her. 'i think you two girls had better stay up here,' he said; and tricksy's face showed her disappointment. the boat was rapidly coming nearer, and soon she grounded near the spot where the pirate craft lay beached. 'there,' said allan; 'there are three officers in the boat, and they're getting out.' the young people clustered at the edge of the rocks and looked down. 'we had better wait until they are gone,' said allan; 'don't let them see that we are watching them.' 'they are going in the direction of ardnavoir,' said marjorie; 'i believe they are going to call for your father and mother!' 'oh,' sighed tricksy after the breathless pause during which they were uncertain whether the officers were really going to enter the gate or would pass by; 'they've gone in. i saw that nice one who came here last year. do you think they can be going to invite us to come on board?' this question being rather difficult to answer, allan suggested that the boys should go down to the shore and see if any of their old friends were in the boat. 'marjorie,' said tricksy, as the two girls remained looking down from above; 'do you think we should have better fun if we were boys?' marjorie's reply was forestalled by a shout from below; and the girls scrambled down to the beach. 'come along, you two,' said allan; 'here's jim macdonnell, euan's twin brother, and a lot of the men who were here last year.' greetings were exchanged with the pleasant-faced young blue-jacket and his companions; and then the boys and girls sat down on the stones to talk with their friends. the men could not come on shore, as no leave had yet been given, but they hoped to be allowed to land on the following day. 'you will be glad to see euan,' said marjorie to jim macdonnell. 'yes, miss marjorie,' replied the lad, but his handsome face clouded; and marjorie knew that he was thinking of his cousin neil, once the favourite of the island. 'we were going to ask you, mr. allan,' he said, 'whether you young gentlemen would come and have tea on board this afternoon; just with us men, you know, sir.' 'thank you very much,' replied allan, while all the boys looked gratified; 'it would be no end jolly, and we'll come if father will let us. i'm sure he will. may we bring our friends too, harry and gerald graham?' 'to be sure, sir,' replied jim; 'we'll be glad to see the young gentlemen. are you fond of the sea, sir?' he inquired, turning to harry. yes,' replied harry, 'and i'm going into the navy.' 'that's good,' said jim. 'perhaps i'll see you as a midshipman next time we meet.' 'perhaps,' said harry; 'and i hope i'll be a captain before very long.' 'i hope you will be an admiral some day, sir, i'm sure,' answered jim gravely. 'thank you,' said harry; 'yes, i daresay i shall be.' allan turned his head away, and a smile gleamed out for an instant upon marjorie's face. harry saw it and did not feel pleased, and he remarked to gerald afterwards that he was afraid marjorie thought a great deal too much of herself. 'and what are you going to be, air?' inquired another of the men, turning to gerald, who was sitting by with a thoughtful face. 'i'm going into the army, i think,' answered gerald; 'but i don't know if i can pass the exams. they're very difficult, but i'm going to try.' 'here are the gentlemen coming back again,' said jim. 'then we'll leave you now,' said allan; 'but we'll see you again in the afternoon.' 'right you are, sir,' replied jim; 'we'll send a boat to fetch you.' 'you are lucky,' said marjorie to the boys. 'how i wish we could go too. do you think they meant to invite us?' allan looked doubtful. 'i don't know,' he said. 'i don't think they thought of it. but i daresay they would be glad to see you if you came.' 'it's no good, i'm afraid,' answered marjorie; 'i'd have to ask mother and she'd be sure to say no. but there is the boat going away, and listen, isn't that the horn?' they hearkened for a moment, and it was unmistakably the old ram's horn which was sounded at ardnavoir to summon those at a distance when any notable event was about to take place. 'i wonder what it can be,' said tricksy, as they scampered in the direction of the mansion-house; 'do you think it can have anything to do with the _heroic_, allan?' mrs. stewart was in the doorway. 'we are invited to luncheon on board the _heroic_,' she announced. 'the officers have signalled to ask dr. and mrs. macgregor to come too, and we have telephoned to say that marjorie can get ready here, if mrs. macgregor will bring her things with her.' the young people did not look so pleased as mrs. stewart had anticipated. 'how many of us are asked, mummie?' inquired tricksy. 'as many as care to come,' answered mrs. stewart. 'the boys may come too if they like.' all the boys looked unwilling. 'don't you want to go?' asked mrs. stewart in surprise. 'yes, mother,' answered allan; 'but the men have invited us already.' 'and would you rather go with them?' the boys' faces showed that they would, and mrs. stewart gave permission with a laugh. tricksy sidled up to her mother. 'mummie, don't you think that marjorie and i could go too?' she asked. 'no, i am quite sure that it wouldn't do,' replied mrs. stewart; and the girls looked disappointed. 'you had better go upstairs and begin to get ready,' said mrs. stewart. 'marjorie can brush her hair'--looking dubiously at the tangled mass of curls, in which bits of grass and heather had become intermixed, 'and perhaps by that time her other frock and her hat will have arrived.' the girls turned to go upstairs, but paused to look at carlo, who came running down the steps, wriggling his small body, and whining as though he were in pain. 'what's the matter with the poor little dog?' they cried. every one turned round as carlo landed on the rug, and stood yelping distressfully. 'whatever is the little brute going on about?' said reggie, looking at him with curiosity. 'something is hurting him,' said hamish. 'i never saw him go on like that before,' remarked allan. laddie sprang forward, wagging his tail and running to every one in turn, trying to explain that his little friend needed help. 'look how he bites his tail,' cried mrs. stewart, 'why do you do that, carlo?' 'hydrophobia, perhaps,' suggested allan; and some of the bystanders edged a little farther away. 'poor little dog,' said gerald soothingly; 'tell us what's the matter with you.' at the sound of the pitying voice the little dog gathered up his ears, then sat up and uttered a doleful howl, accompanied by agitated movements of his fore-paws. 'there's something clinging to his tail,' cried reggie suddenly, pouncing upon him. 'why, just look at this; it's a couple of small crabs!' 'where can he have got them from?' asked mrs. stewart, looking bewildered; 'he came from upstairs.' 'oh, it's--it's--_i_ know,' stuttered gerald, flushing deeply. 'it's--i'll put it all right, you needn't come.' the remainder of the sentence was lost as he hurried upstairs. 'whatever is he about?' said marjorie; 'let's go and see.' gerald became very red again as he was discovered in the room which he shared with harry, collecting some small objects from the floor. you needn't have come,' he said. 'it's--it's only my collection, and they've been escaping----' 'ha, ha!' laughed harry; 'it's those snails and things that he has been gathering on the beach, and they've crawled all over the place!' gerald stood, flushing to the roots of his hair, and shrinking from the mirth of the others. his treasures had been trying to make themselves at home in their new quarters. the little crabs and lobsters had scattered in search of water, and the shell-fish had crawled over the floor or attached themselves to the wall, where they waited with tilted shells for the tide that failed to come. 'never mind, gerald,' said marjorie, as tears began to start in the boy's eyes; 'it's very nice making a collection, and i've got a nice pail with a lid that i'll give you to keep the things in.' 'and now,' said mrs. stewart, 'i see the pony cart coming up the drive, with mrs. macgregor in it; run and get ready, girls, or we shall be late.' after about a quarter of an hour's tidying, marjorie was released from her mother's hands, dressed in a cream serge frock and a large hat, and with her hair brushed out and neatly arranged. feeling unlike herself and hardly satisfied with the change, she peeped in the glass as soon as her mother's back was turned. her own reflection caused her to start and colour with surprise. blue eyes, bright with suppressed excitement, a wild rose face framed in short fair curls and set off by the light colours of her attire, slender hands and neat ankles--'and that's me,' said marjorie to herself in bewilderment. tricksy came into the room, wearing a white hanging frock with a big floppy white hat. 'dear me,' said marjorie to herself, taking another glance in the mirror, after the eyes of the two girls had met in silent approval of one another; 'curious that we've never thought of it before--perhaps it's because we so seldom have bothered to look in the glass--but it strikes me that we're actually a pair of very pretty girls--with our hair brushed and our faces washed!' they went downstairs without speaking, and encountered the boys in the hall. all eyes were attracted to them; then an approving expression came into the boys' faces, and as the girls passed they moved somewhat aside to look at them from another point of view. despite the anxiety which had brooded over her since morning, marjorie began to feel her spirits rise. 'marjorie,' said tricksy solemnly, as duncan was driving them to the landing-stage, 'which do you think is the best fun, being a boy or being a girl?' marjorie had been lost in thought, but at tricksy's question her eyes began to dance. 'i think it's best of all to be a tomboy,' she said, 'and then you can be a bit of both!' when the sailors had shipped their oars, and the boat glided under the side of the great war-vessel, first the ladies, and then the girls were assisted on deck and greeted by the captain, erect and broad-shouldered, and by the officers, the youngest of whom was tricksy's friend of the year before. dr. macgregor and the laird and mr. graham were already on board. 'hullo, miss tricksy, how do you do?' said a voice, and tricksy looked up to see the sheriff, who was smiling at her with outstretched hand. tricksy looked solemnly up in his face. 'well, aren't you going to shake hands, tricksy?' said the sheriff. 'no,' said tricksy deliberately. the sheriff's expression altered. 'and why not, miss tricksy, if i might inquire?' he said. tricksy met his grim smile with a solemn stare of disapproval. 'because you let a great friend of ours be put in prison when he didn't deserve it,' she replied. 'that was why i sent back the big box of chocolates that you sent me by post. mother did not know that it had come. we can't be friends until you've owned yourself in the wrong. we've all joined a compact to get our friend back again and to show that it wasn't he who did it. i've got it with me,' and tricksy began to fumble in her pocket. the smile was beginning to twitch at the corners of the sheriff's lips again when he was addressed by one of the officers. the little scene had passed unobserved by all save marjorie, as the captain suggested that, the weather being fine and time at their disposal, the _heroic_ should take their visitors on a tour round inchkerra. 'certainly, certainly,' said the sheriff at haphazard, and tricksy slipped away. 'in the meanwhile i think lunch is ready,' said captain redwood, and each of the officers took a lady downstairs, tricksy falling to the share of the youngest. 'dear me, this isn't half so exciting as i expected,' said marjorie to herself. 'what stupid grown-up things they are talking about; i am sure they wouldn't be interested if i were to tell them about the things we do, riding bare-backed ponies, and about the craft and the den, and finding the smugglers; and i have nothing else to talk to them about. they haven't taken much notice of tricksy and me after all; they weren't a bit surprised when they saw us; we're pretty, but not any prettier than lots of other girls, and it isn't enough to make a fuss about.' she wondered what tricksy was finding to say to lieutenant jones, the young officer by whose side she was sitting, and who appeared to be greatly entertained by the little girl. after lunch they returned on deck to see a boat bring the boys on board; then the screw was set in motion and the water began to churn itself into foam round the vessel's sides. 'it isn't bad,' said marjorie to herself as the _heroic_ ploughed her way past the well-known shores, 'but it's a bother not having anything to do. i've seen all this before, and it isn't as though we were rowing for all we were worth in the old _mermaid_--i mean, the _craft_--and in danger of getting into currents and being swept away to i don't know where. now i have no doubt the boys are having no end of a good time, going into the engine-room and getting themselves dirty, and climbing all over the place, and listening to the sailors' yarns. once i get out of this, catch me bother any more about looking nice, and being grown-up, and all the rest of it--it will be time enough when i'm so old that i get no fun out of being a tomboy any more.' lieutenant jones left tricksy and came to sit beside marjorie for a turn. 'i suppose you are quite accustomed to sailing as you live in an island, miss macgregor?' he said. 'yes,' replied marjorie, 'we are all very fond of boating, the boys and tricksy and i,' and after talking for a little while she began to think that a grown-up man was nearly as good company as a boy once you got him upon the right subject. 'now,' said the sheriff, coming up with his spy-glass, 'we are coming near the finest bit of rock scenery on the island; one of the finest, in my opinion, on this part of the west coast.' the _heroic_ was just rounding the point which concealed the smugglers' caves from view. 'the corrachin crags,' continued the sheriff; 'the caves are remarkably fine; interesting, too, as in former times they are said to have been used for smuggling purposes, and as hiding-places for pirates and other lawless characters----' 'now!' burst from the lips of the gazers as the lofty cliffs came in view, with the waves tumbling at their base. captain redwood had issued orders to slacken speed, and as the vessel steamed slowly past, a fine view was obtained of bold masses of rock and the black openings to the caves, with the startled birds rising in clouds and screaming. 'if all stories are true, the caves are still sometimes put to their old uses,' observed mrs. macgregor as the _heroic's_ engines throbbed through the smooth swell of the water; 'for all we know, the most thrilling adventures may be taking place there.' 'a score of men might lie in hiding without discovering one another's presence,' said the laird; 'the caves form a regular network, and stretch a long way underground. the entire headland is said to be honeycombed with them----' 'hullo, good people!' cried a soft little voice from overhead, followed by a triumphant laugh. every one looked round, and half-way up the mast tricksy was discovered, who having become annoyed at her desertion by lieutenant jones, was indulging in an exploring expedition on her own account. her little round face smiled mischievously from between a large white hat and tumbled frock, and she sat swinging her heels in perfect contentment. jim macdonnell's duties having brought him to the quarter-deck at this moment, the captain made him a sign almost without pausing in the sentence which he was addressing to mrs. stewart. the sailor climbed into the rigging and removed tricksy very gently from her perch, tucked her under one arm with her head hanging in front and her heels behind, slid down the ropes and deposited the little girl on the deck. tricksy stood and looked at every one in speechless wrath. her dignity, being as great as her anger, prevented her from giving way to an outburst before she should have discovered who deserved it most. lieutenant jones crossed over to her. 'i suppose you have been round all this place before, miss tricksy,' he said in a conversational tone. tricksy looked at him with mistrust. 'i believe you are great explorers and rock-climbers, you and your brothers, miss tricksy,' continued the officer, as though being carried down from a mast before a crowd of people were a matter of everyday occurrence; 'i envy you your opportunities----' this sounded quite like the way the other officers had been talking to the grown-up ladies, and tricksy found her stiffness begin to forsake her. the most important point was to discover whether the sheriff had seen what had occurred. if he had not been a witness, tricksy felt that she might allow herself to get over it. her eyes sought her enemy, but that magistrate was, or affected to be, engrossed in trying to bring his telescope to bear upon the caves, and the episode had apparently escaped him. 'talking of people hiding in the caves,' he said suddenly; 'mrs. macgregor, do you see the figure of a man at the mouth of the one which we are now opposite? from his attitude he might be a fugitive from justice or any other of these interesting desperadoes about whom we have been talking----' marjorie's face flushed, and she began to tremble from head to foot. 'wait a minute, mrs. macgregor,' said the sheriff, 'i will get my glasses adjusted. curious; there is something in the man's appearance which seems familiar to me----' he was about to take another look when the air was rent by the shrill whistle of a siren. they all turned round in astonishment, and when they looked towards the rocks again the figure had disappeared. the captain's face had become stern, but the culprit proved to be only a small boy in a jacket whose sleeves were too short for him. marjorie had seen more, however; she had seen that it was jim macdonnell who had made reggie blow the siren. during the rest of the afternoon things seemed to be swimming before marjorie's eyes, and she heard only a confused murmur of voices. when the voyage was over she went straight to allan. 'allan,' she said abruptly, 'i may as well tell you that i know your secret. neil is in inchkerra--and he is in hiding.' chapter ix disappointment allan looked at marjorie with his hands in his pockets. 'it's all right,' said marjorie hastily; 'i won't tell any one, but i couldn't help finding it out, for i saw neil. anyhow, i know so much already that i might as well know the rest. to begin with, it was neil's knife that you picked up in the den; i saw the letters on the handle.' allan watched marjorie narrowly for a minute, and then he seemed to become reassured. 'listen, marjorie,' he said; 'mind you don't let out a word of this to any one. it would be an awful thing if neil were taken now. he came back a few days ago, in a smuggling vessel, to see his mother. mrs. macdonnell is very ill, as you know'--marjorie nodded, a lump being in her throat--'and she thinks she can't live long. some one who knew where neil was wrote and told him that she was always saying how much she wished she could see him before she died, and he came back at once, although the police may get him at any minute and he knows it. in the meanwhile she is much worse, and he refuses to go away until he sees whether she is going to recover. mrs. macdonnell keeps asking him to clear out, but he always says there is no hurry, and that he will wait until she is better. it's awfully senseless of him, for he might be seen any day; but neil always was a bit obstinate once he takes a thing into his head. he hides most of the day and comes out when there isn't much chance of his meeting any one. but if he were found out he would be taken and sent to prison as sure as fate, so you must tell no one, marjorie, not a soul. reggie knows, but none of the others.' every particle of colour had left marjorie's face, but her lips set themselves firmly. 'you needn't be afraid of me, allan,' she said. 'we must get him persuaded to go away at once, for his mother would never get over it if he were caught.' 'can't do anything just now,' said allan; 'there is no way of getting him out of the island while the _heroic_ is here, and this afternoon the men were declaring that as soon as they got shore leave they would search the island for the man who they say is "skulking round." we can only hope that they won't go very far into the caves, or that the ship will soon be ordered north. but, marjorie, don't go about with a face like that, whatever you do, or you'll show people that something's the matter. remember that if either the pater or your father were to find out that neil is here, it would be their duty to let the police know, and they wouldn't like to have to do that.' marjorie drew herself together. 'you needn't be afraid of me, allan,' she said, as she turned away. 'i can keep a secret as well as you and reggie, and you know it.' on the following morning allan was hardly surprised to encounter marjorie upon the little hill which commanded a view of the sea near ardnavoir. her pony was beside her, and she had evidently risen with the dawn and ridden over the moors. 'any news?' she inquired anxiously. 'nothing at all,' he replied. 'the _heroic_ is quite quiet yet, as you see.' they looked at the dark hull which was lying motionless upon the water. 'duncan rode over to the caves last night to tell neil to keep out of sight while the _heroic_ is here,' said allan. 'the only fear is if the men should try exploring with torches. there are openings from the caves on to the moors, but if the island is swarming with men it wouldn't be much good trying to escape by them.' 'oh,' cried marjorie, looking at the _heroic_, 'if only they would go away. couldn't we invent some excuse for getting them out of the way while we get neil into safety.' 'no good, i'm afraid,' said allan. 'they have their orders from the admiralty, and they wouldn't attend to anything else.' marjorie looked hopeless. 'i shall have to go home now,' she said; 'there's some one moving about in your garden, so it must be nearly breakfast-time. let me know if there's any news.' 'don't go yet,' said allan decidedly. 'you must stay and have breakfast with us. i bet you didn't have anything before you left?' 'i had a crust of bread,' said marjorie reluctantly. 'elspeth keeps everything locked up at night, and i couldn't wait.' 'come along,' said allan. 'you'll be in the best place for seeing what the _heroic_ is about.' the argument was irresistible and marjorie yielded. 'never mind cheeky,' said allan; 'he won't wander far.' the bridle was taken off the shaggy little pony whom marjorie had not waited to saddle, and marjorie and allan went down the hill. reggie and harry were already out of doors, harry addressing himself with sparkling eyes to reggie, who was unusually silent. when allan came in view together with marjorie, reggie studied the pair inquiringly and received a reassuring nod from allan. 'seen the _heroic_?' began harry; 'i say, if the men get their leave to-day do you think they will let us come with them?' 'we might show them the interesting places on the island,' said reggie, with a sidelong glance at allan. 'oh, i say, what fun,' exclaimed harry; 'i'd take them to the smugglers' caves and let them explore.' reggie looked at allan again. 'i wouldn't do that, if i were you, harry,' said allan. 'you don't know much about the caves yourself yet, you know, and they're most awfully dangerous; great holes full of water where you don't expect them, and rocks that might fall on the top of you and crush you to pieces; and then the smugglers might be lying in ambush round the corners, you know.' tricksy, who had come out to join the others, opened her eyes very widely at this account of the hidden perils of the caves. 'look,' cried reggie, 'they're signalling something from the _heroic_.' a string of flags had suddenly floated out from the _heroic's_ masthead. 'wait, and i'll fetch a spy-glass,' said allan, running towards the house. 'something about telling something to father,' he said, after studying the signals for awhile; 'i can't make out the rest.' they looked at each other with frightened eyes. 'here, reggie,' said allan, handing him the glass, 'you try.' reggie looked, then shook his head. 'can't make anything of it,' he said. 'perhaps they want us to come on board again,' said harry. 'you might give me the glass for a minute, reggie.' 'they can't have been exploring already?' suggested marjorie, in a voice designed only for allan's and reggie's ears. 'don't know,' said allan. 'if only they hadn't gone and made father a j.p.!' he added, with a judiciously suppressed groan. 'they're signalling from the coastguard station, do you see?' cried tricksy. 'where's gerald?' said harry; 'he ought to be here to see this. lazy beggar, if i don't remember to wake him at four in the morning he always oversleeps.' he flew into the house, and returned shortly, followed by gerald, who came rubbing his eyes and trying to seem grateful to his brother for having roused him out of the first good sleep he had enjoyed for weeks. 'there's a coastguard just coming up the drive,' said reggie. 'perhaps all the men are going to ask us to a picnic or something,' suggested harry; while marjorie, allan, and reggie watched the messenger. nothing was to be gathered from the demeanour of the coastguard, and after he had gone down the avenue all the young people crowded into the hall. 'a letter,' said allan, looking at an envelope lying on the hall table; 'allan stewart, esq. that doesn't tell us much, and father has gone out.' 'perhaps it's for you,' suggested tricksy. 'not it,' said allan unwillingly; 'they'd never address me as esquire, especially as father is allan too. can't do anything until he comes back.' 'what do you think he can have gone out for?' inquired marjorie, and the faces of the others were as anxious as her own. 'now, young people,' cried mrs. stewart's voice, 'come to breakfast; the _heroic_ will wait while you have some food.' marjorie, allan, and reggie tore themselves unwillingly away from the letter. 'mother,' said allan persuasively, 'there's a letter for father out there on the hall table; it's some message from the _heroic_; don't you think you might open it and see what they say?' mrs. stewart looked surprised. 'i can't open a letter addressed to your father,' she said. 'have patience a little while; he may not be long.' 'but, mother, perhaps it's something very important,' persisted allan; 'they may be waiting for an answer, you know.' 'i don't think it can be so important as all that,' said mrs. stewart. 'take your places, allan and reggie, everything is getting cold.' the young people felt that their patience would give way in another minute. 'come here, gerald,' said mrs. stewart, 'beside tricksy; and harry, you can sit by marjorie.' harry looked unwilling. 'oh, mother,' cried tricksy, 'you are putting him with his back to the window!' mrs. stewart looked mystified. 'he wants to see the _heroic_,' explained tricksy; 'we are watching to see when the boats leave.' mrs. stewart gave harry a seat on the other side of the table, an arrangement which placed allan where he could not see what was going on. he and marjorie and reggie had to rest satisfied with the discovery that they were able to communicate by means of kicking one another's shins under the table, although this method of intelligence made them feel if possible more distracted than before. 'look how the men are running about on board,' said tricksy. 'they look like little black ants! they must be going to launch the boats now.' harry's bright eyes did not leave the vessel for an instant. of a sudden his jaw dropped and his face became blank. 'what's the matter?' cried every one. 'they're going away,' cried harry. every one sprang from table and looked. 'they can't be going round to the caves,' said marjorie. 'oh, dear, how can we stop them. i'll take cheeky and go and warn him.' fortunately this remark passed unnoticed amid the hubbub. 'they aren't going away altogether, are they?' asked tricksy, her eyes becoming large with dismay. allan made a rush for the door, and ran up against his father, who was coming in. 'hard luck,' said mr. stewart, holding out the letter; 'the _heroic_ has received unexpected orders, and they have to sail northward without delay. no shore leave, so they take this opportunity of saying good-bye.' 'aw--w--w,' said harry, gerald, and tricksy, while the others had difficulty in repressing an inclination to cheer. 'when are they coming back again?' asked gerald. 'next year, perhaps,' said mr. stewart, smiling. the faces became if possible more blank than before. 'she's out of sight,' said harry in a dejected tone, going to the window. 'is she?' said gerald, looking out too; 'why, so she is.' 'if you fellows want to see her,' said allan, 'why don't you go to the top of the hill? you'll get a first-class view from there.' without a word the boys darted from the room and out at the front door, harry with his bootlaces untied and flapping about his ankles, and gerald without a hat. in scrambling over the wall harry became caught, and fell sprawling on the ground, but picked himself up and ran on as if nothing had happened. 'come, you two,' said allan, 'now that we've got them safely out of the way we've got to do something.' marjorie ran for her bridle and put it on cheeky, who was cropping grass by the stream. 'go on,' shouted allan; 'don't wait for us, we'll soon catch you up. let's go and catch dewdrop and daisy, reggie; bicycles are no good for the moors.' in a short time marjorie was overtaken by the two boys, perched upon bridleless, bare-backed ponies. the wind whistled past as they galloped over the level ground, and they were almost too breathless to speak as they urged their ponies up the slopes of the hill. 'oh, gee up, daisy; gee-up!' cried allan, 'we have no time to lose to-day!' 'glad we got away all right,' he panted as they stood breathing their ponies on the summit; 'it would never do to have these two dragging about and asking questions. we've just got to get neil out of there before anything more happens,' he continued. 'the boat is waiting about, watching for an opportunity to leave as soon as the _heroic_ goes; and we must make neil promise to leave with her.' the sturdy little ponies descended the slopes with the sure-footedness of cats; then sprang pluckily over the moss-hags which covered the greater part of the peninsula. suddenly, without warning, they became entangled in a treacherous piece of bog, from which they did not struggle into safety until marjorie's pony had lost a shoe. 'look out,' cried allan, as they were about to spring forward once more; 'it's here that there are those holes that go down into the caves, and you don't see them until you've nearly fallen into them.' curbing their impatience, they dismounted and walked, leading the ponies by the bridle. 'there,' said marjorie as they neared the cliff, 'the tide's rising, and they're shaking out the sails on the smugglers' vessel.' 'shall we all go down?' asked reggie. 'no,' said allan, 'the fewer the better. you stay here with the ponies, and i'll go down with marjorie.' 'me?' said marjorie, surprised. 'yes, you. you've got to speak to him and get him to leave. come along.' they lowered themselves over the edge of the cliff, and clambered to the beach. two faces scowled at them over the bulwarks of the boat, and the captain waiting on the shore, a man of foreign appearance, with a shaggy black beard and a sou'-wester, glanced disapprovingly at marjorie. somewhat alarmed, she turned and discovered duncan standing beside her. the butler was more disturbed at the encounter than seemed to marjorie at all necessary, and her astonishment was completed when rob maclean and the lighthouse-keeper appeared, rolling a heavy barrel between them. 'here, lend a hand,' they cried to duncan; then they stopped short on observing allan and marjorie. 'why, they are _all_ smugglers!' marjorie was on the point of exclaiming; but allan seized her arm and gripped it warningly. 'we've come to see neil, and to try to make him go with you,' he said, addressing himself to the men in a body. immediately the faces became less grim. 'that iss ahl right, mr. allan,' said rob maclean; 'you will pe finding him in a cave right opposite. speak to him, miss marjorie; he iss ferry foolish and he will not pe wanting to come.' marjorie was still looking in a surprised way at duncan, whom she hardly seemed to recognise in his new character of a smuggler; but allan renewed his pressure upon her arm. 'tell him he must go, mr. allan and miss marjorie,' said duncan, 'and he must not be long, ta captain cannot be waiting or he will miss the tide. he iss a ferry impatient man iss ta captain, whateffer.' all right,' said allan; 'we'll talk to him. you go in first, marjorie.' a short way from the entrance marjorie came upon neil; but what a change in her old playmate! pale, and looking still paler in the dim light; with worn and soiled clothing, and his former bright, pleasant expression changed into sullen despair. marjorie's heart sank. 'neil,' she began, 'we've come to see you, allan and i.' 'indeed, miss marjorie, it is ferry good of you,' said the lad, rising and looking down upon her with a grateful expression, 'but wass it not ferry unwise of you to come? that sea-captain iss a rough character and he might----' 'never mind us, neil,' said marjorie, 'we're all right. we only wanted to say that we are your friends, whatever happens, and we hope that things will come right for you. and now, neil, you will go away for a little while, will you not? don't stay here while you are in such danger of being found.' neil looked down upon her, and his face darkened again. 'i cannot be leaving inchkerra just now, miss marjorie,' he said. 'oh, neil, do go away. think what it would be to your mother if you were found--think what it would be to _all_ of us, neil----' 'schooner's beginning to weigh anchor,' cried a gruff voice outside. 'come, neil, don't waste time,' said marjorie. neil seated himself determinedly upon a fragment of rock. 'i will not be leaving the island just now, miss marjorie,' he said. marjorie looked at him, and noted the dulness of his eyes and the obstinate lines round his mouth. 'neil, do, do go,' she said, clutching him by the arm. 'come with me, neil, and don't be foolish.' 'are you ready, neil?' said allan, appearing inside the cave; 'the schooner can't wait much longer.' marjorie turned round in despair. 'oh, this will never do,' said allan. 'come along, neil, there's a good fellow, and don't keep them waiting.' neil remained firm and marjorie felt that it was hopeless. 'are you not for coming, neil?' said duncan, standing in the mouth of the cave; 'ta captain says he iss in a hurry to be gone.' 'come, neil,' said rob maclean persuasively, 'it will not pe meking mistress macdonnell any better, puir soul, for you to be waiting here with ta police, silly bodies, at your heels.' neil came forward, marjorie and allan following him anxiously. 'i will not pe going,' he said briefly. 'of all ta fulish gomerals!' burst out duncan, and clenched his fists and stormed in gaelic to the lad, who remained unmoved. 'that will be a ferry foolish thing, neil; gang wi ta captain,' said bob soothingly. 'go on board, neil; it isn't too late yet,' implored allan. 'tide's on the turn,' shouted the gruff voice of the captain. 'come if you're coming, and if not, don't keep honest folks waiting.' neil leaned against the cliff and looked stubbornly into vacancy. from his attitude it was plain that he was inflexible. 'yo-ho!' sang out the sailors; 'heave-ho!' and the sails of the little vessel slowly filled as her bows swung round to the sea. marjorie made a bolt towards the cliff, and began to climb. on the top she turned and looked at allan, whose face was as white as her own. 'can't be helped,' he said in a hard voice. 'some ass went and told him that mrs. macdonnell was worse.' 'hullo,' called out reggie as they came within hearing, 'is he gone?' 'gone!' echoed the others, and marjorie sank down on the heather and gasped. when she looked up the boys were sitting beside her. 'well?' began reggie sympathetically. 'he wouldn't go,' said allan; 'we did all we could. duncan and rob are still storming at him down there.' there was nothing to be said, and they all sat and reflected. 'the worst of it is,' said marjorie in a trembling tearless voice, 'that in spite of our compact and everything else, we haven't been able to do him a bit of good!' the others assented by their silence. 'and i don't believe we ever shall,' continued marjorie, 'we don't seem to have set about it the right way, somehow.' the boys looked so downcast that marjorie judged it inadvisable to pursue the subject further and they mounted their ponies and rode slowly in the direction of ardnavoir. half-way down the hill they discovered tricksy sitting on a clump of heather, with hamish beside her and laddie curled at her feet. 'you are nice, kind people,' said tricksy reproachfully, 'going away like that and leaving me all alone!' 'why, tricksy,' began marjorie, 'why didn't you go with the others?' 'go with the others!' echoed tricksy, 'do you think i could run up the hill as they did? if it hadn't been for hamish i shouldn't have seen anything. then leaving me all alone too.' 'but, tricksy, where are harry and gerald?' 'i don't know, i'm sure. gone off somewhere by themselves, and i came to meet you with hamish. i think you might have let me come with you.' 'don't be a little silly, tricksy,' said reggie irritably; 'you are too little to go all that distance.' 'too little!' cried tricksy, exasperated; 'i'm not too little to be sent messages for the others, and i'm not too little to dig in the garden and carry stones for the pirates' den; i'm only too little when it's a jolly piece of fun that you want to keep to yourselves. oh, laddie, dear,' to the dog who had jumped up and was licking her face, 'you are the only nice ones, you and hamish'--and she threw her arms round the collie's neck to hide a tear. 'don't lick my face though,' she added, with a change of manner that forced a laugh even from the tired and weary adventurers. 'you haven't shown them what you found, tricksy,' said hamish. 'no,' said tricksy, 'neither i have,' and she fumbled in her pocket and drew out a crumpled paper which she gave to allan. her brother looked at it. 'what's this?' he said. 'i don't understand.' 'look at the number, allan, and the date,' said hamish. allan examined the paper; then flushed to the ears. 'tricksy, you little owl,' he burst out; 'to think of you going on about your potty little feelings and wounded dignity and all that when you had _this_ to show us.' chapter x in which allan is very wise 'i--i--i didn't know,' stammered poor tricksy. 'what is it?' cried the others, pressing round to look. 'it's one of the orders that were stolen,' said allan. 'tell them where you found it, tricksy,' said hamish. 'it was in the box-room, where the spare coats and the fishing baskets are kept,' said tricksy. 'i went to see if reggie's knife was in the pocket of his old great-coat, and when i pulled it off the shelf this fluttered down.' 'well,' said allan, while the others were dumb with astonishment, 'this beats me altogether. it wasn't _we_ who were the thieves!' every one looked at the order, and turned it round, and examined the back of it, but there was no clue to the mystery. 'let's go and have a thorough search of the box-room,' said marjorie; 'who knows what we may bring to light.' 'take my pony, tricksy,' said reggie considerately. 'those who haven't ponies will have to walk. don't begin the search until we are all there!' when the walkers reached ardnavoir they found the others standing guard at the door of the box-room. 'now!' said marjorie, throwing open the door; and they all burst in. all the garments were taken down from the shelves and unfolded and shaken, but nothing was to be found. every pocket was turned out; but the contents were only pebbles, and bits of string, and pieces of dried seaweed. all the fishing baskets were opened and peeped into, and turned upside down and shaken, but without result. afterwards they pulled out the boxes that were ranged against the wall, and looked behind them, but no postal orders were found. 'this box is unfastened,' cried tricksy; 'let's look inside it.' 'do you think we should do that,' demurred hamish; 'mrs. stewart might object.' 'can't stop to think of that in a case of necessity,' replied reggie, and marjorie's hands were soon in the trunk. furs smelling strongly of camphor, some old chair covers, then a quantity of frocks and boys' suits grown too small, and a layer of boots at the bottom. 'nothing there,' said marjorie, cramming the things into the box again. 'these other trunks are all locked,' said reggie, trying them one after the other. 'they'll have to be opened when the police come,' observed hamish. marjorie and allan looked at each other. 'do you think we ought to bring the police back at this time?' asked marjorie in an undertone. allan sat down on a box, and the others all followed his example. 'we've got to consider what's to be done about this discovery,' began allan. 'the first question is, have you showed the order to pater or mother already, hamish?' 'not yet,' said hamish. 'well, then,' said allan, 'we've got to make up our minds whether we'd better do it or not.' hamish looked astonished. 'i don't see how there can be any doubt about that,' he began. 'surely it's the very first----' marjorie, allan, and reggie were all looking at each other. 'we couldn't possibly keep back evidence like this,' pursued hamish. marjorie's and reggie's eyes were saying 'don't tell them.' allan pushed his hair back from his forehead, thrust his hands into his pockets, and then turned to hamish again. 'we've got to think of a lot of things in an affair like this,' he said. 'for instance----' 'it seems to me there's only one way of looking at it,' replied hamish, his slow voice becoming steadier. 'you've got an important piece of evidence which may prove the turning-point of the case, and you don't even tell your father and mother.' '_i_ think hamish is in the right,' broke in tricksy's little voice. a glance from reggie caused her to quail and allan turned upon hamish. 'now, hamish, old fellow, don't you jolly well make an ass of yourself. we find ourselves in this predic.; either we've got to shut up about this valuable find, or have the police poking about the island when they're not wanted.' 'we've all three voted against you, so you are in a minority, hamish,' broke in marjorie, her voice sharp with vexation. hamish became very red, and looked at them steadily. 'i can't act contrary to the wishes of the majority,' he said, since we've made a compact; but i wish to say that i think you are making a great mistake and that i think we shall all have cause to regret what you are doing.' there was no reply since none could be made, and the meeting closed in an uncomfortable silence. 'tear, tear,' they heard duncan's voice saying in irritable tones outside the door; 'what will hev become of ahl ta young ladies and gentlemen? they will ahl pe away just at ta ferry time when they will be wanted. they will pe after some nonsense. i will ahlways pe the mosst afraid when they are ferry quiet when mr. allan will pe with them. he iss so sensible and wiselike, iss mr. allan, that when he finds mischiefs for them to do they will ahlways pe the ferry worst kinds of mischief, whateffer.' chapter xi a near shave they all trooped out, and followed duncan's retreating figure. 'here we are, duncan, what do you want us for?' 'tear me, young ladies and gentlemen,' said duncan, 'we will hev peen looking for you ahl over the house and grounds. the sheriff iss here from stornwell and the minister iss come to call, and the laird says as it iss such a ferry fine day he iss going to take effery one out for a sail in the yacht, and dr. and mrs. macgregor iss come, and we are to hev lunch on board and go over to alvasay, and afterwards if there iss time we will pe stopping at the corrachin caves, for mr. graham says he will pe liking to explore them; and here we will ahl pe waiting for you, young ladies and chentlemen.' marjorie's lips tightened. 'look here, duncan,' she said, after hamish, followed consolingly by tricksy, had passed out of hearing, 'we must make them too late for the caves.' 'indeed, miss marjorie, we will hev to keep them out whateffer,' said duncan, 'mr. graham's eyes will pe ferry sharp, he iss as bad as mr. harry, who is notticing efferything. but there iss ta laird, miss marjorie, he will pe calling to me to come with ta lunch baskets, i will hev to go.' the hall was a scene of animation. the sheriff was standing talking to mrs. macgregor and receiving defiant glances from tricksy; the minister, an elderly man with white hair and stooping shoulders, stood somewhat apart; the other gentlemen were collecting rugs and fishing tackle, and harry and gerald were jumping about, asking questions and getting in every one's way. 'rob maclean has come to say that the _kelpie_ iss all ready, sir,' said duncan, who among his other avocations sailed his master's yacht. 'don't let us wait any longer then,' said the laird; 'we shall not have time to visit the caves this evening if we miss the tide.' two trips of the _mermaid_--the craft only when her young owners were by themselves--conveyed the entire party on board the _kelpie_, whose crew, consisting of rob maclean and another crofter, were in readiness. 'we must manage not to go to the caves, rob,' said marjorie as she passed. 'aye, miss marjorie, she will not pe going to the caves to-day,' said the highlander grimly. it was a glorious day for a sail, and the young people's spirits rose in spite of themselves. there was enough wind to fill out the sails and make the vessel skim swiftly over the water, but not enough to make any one in the least uncomfortable, and the waves were dancing in the sunlight. 'do you see that island over there?' said marjorie to harry, who was looking about him with sparkling eyes; 'that high one beyond all the little skerries? that's where we're going; it's an awfully jolly place, there's a fine loch with sea trout in it and a capital beach.' harry looked at the island, and then at the water tumbling and foaming in the vessel's wake; and then he began to look about for some more active occupation. the ladies were talking to their guests and pointing out the interesting places as they passed, and gerald and tricksy were sitting soberly in a corner by themselves. mr. stewart and dr. macgregor were busy with the sailing of the vessel, which seemed to require a great deal of management at this stage; and harry's soul became filled with envy as he saw the other boys helping them dexterously as though they had passed their lives on board a ship. seeing reggie perched half-way up the mast, helping to shake out a sail, harry tried to scramble up after him, but hamish ordered him down. harry turned and looked up with an indignant stare. the elder boy, who seemed almost grown-up in his yachting suit, met the look with his usual good-natured smile, but did not seem disposed to be trifled with. 'you had better begin when the vessel's steady,' he said; 'it would never do to fall overboard while she's going along at this rate.' 'why,' said harry; 'couldn't you lower a boat?' 'it would not do you much good,' said hamish. 'the current's flowing pretty rapidly one way, and the wind's driving us along at a fair speed in exactly the opposite direction; you might be carried miles out into the open before we could get a boat out.' harry went to the side and looked down at the water that was eddying past. 'it wouldn't be at all nice to fall overboard here, would it?' said marjorie, who seemed to be blown along the deck, her hair flying in the wind. 'it will soon be over now, and see how near the island has been getting; we'll be there in no time.' she hurried off to help in the coiling of the ropes, and in about half-an-hour the _kelpie_ was brought alongside the rude stone pier of alvasay. first came a walk to a wonderful rocky fiord, where the stones that were thrown down rebounded from side to side, and finally landed with a dull thud in some stagnant-looking water at the bottom. afterwards, the day being hot, boys and girls scattered for a bathe. 'i can swim twice across the school swimming-bath,' said harry, picking his way barefoot over the rocks and shivering a little, for although the sun was hot, the wind seemed cold when one had nothing on. 'you'll find it a bit rough with these waves against you,' said reggie briefly. 'far jollier,' said harry, looking at the pebbles underneath the bright waves and the masses of seaweed swaying to and fro--'ugh, it is cold though!' when his splash had subsided he saw the island boys swimming far ahead of him. in a little while he began to feel tired, and the waves seemed to be growing bigger and bigger, and stronger and stronger. when he was able to see over their crests he could make out the other two sitting upon a rock which raised its head out of the water, and waiting for him. after considerable efforts he reached the islet, grasped a point of rock, and drew himself on to dry land. the others looked at him approvingly. gerald was still splashing in shallow water near the shore. 'good for you,' said reggie; 'it's a pretty stiff sea for a fellow who has only practised in a swimming-bath.' harry did not look quite pleased. 'i say,' began allan, 'look at gerald, he's actually trying to come out to us. he is a plucky little chap.' 'that he is,' said hamish. 'i'll swim back and see if i can help him.' he dropped into the water and swam to meet gerald, who was struggling gallantly along, making very wry faces, and swallowing quantities of water. with the bigger boy swimming by his side and occasionally helping him gerald got along fairly well, and in a little while clambered on to the rocks, looking exceedingly happy. diving from steep places and swimming until they were tired, then getting out and sunning themselves on the warm rocks or sand of the little islets, running races and pushing each other into the water, the time passed quickly, and they were all surprised when duncan came in view signalling that tea was ready. they had been in the water long enough, for their teeth were chattering and they could hardly get into their clothes for trembling. 'i say,' began harry with chattering teeth, 'you fellows ought to learn to tread water and to swim on the side. they teach these things at the swimming-baths. the ordinary kind of swimming does well enough in a place like this----' 'it's the best way of getting along, i should say,' suggested reggie. 'yes,' said harry rather contemptuously; 'getting along is all very well; but when you're swimming where a lot of people see you, you like to be able to do the fancy strokes. you need to have lessons for these things though.' reggie's dark, serious eyes exchanged a glance with allan's amused ones. 'good thing marjorie isn't here,' observed allan in an aside; and the other boys grinned as they thought of the way in which marjorie always had a reply ready for harry when he was caught boasting. 'what's that?' said harry, his head popping out of the opening of his shirt. allan was saved from the necessity of replying by the reappearance of duncan, to say that 'the young gentlemen wass to please mek haste and come at once, as effery one wass waiting for them.' during the walk from the bathing-place allan was very silent, and all tea-time he watched reggie and harry thoughtfully, and was evidently revolving something in his mind. after tea he took an opportunity of saying to marjorie, 'now, marjorie, remember that we've got to make the _kelpie_ late.' 'i'll try to get lost,' said marjorie. 'i hope they won't go off without me though. you'd better lose yourself too, with one or two of the others; and they'll notice if so many are absent.' 'i'll do my best,' said allan. 'i think we'll manage to keep them back an hour or so. you might come this way, reggie, will you?' allan walked for some distance in silence, and reggie began to wonder what was coming. 'reggie,' began allan, rather absently, 'have you been thinking that you're going to school next term?' 'yes,' answered reggie, wondering what this was going to lead to. 'well,' resumed allan, 'you'll need to have some fights, you know, almost as soon as you get there.' 'i suppose so,' said reggie. 'i mean,' said allan, 'even supposing that no one challenges you, you'll have to fight some of the fellows at the very commencement, don't you see, just to show that you're not the sort to be put upon.' reggie listened attentively, but said nothing. 'you haven't had much opportunity of practising yet, of course, and it won't do, if you want to make a position for yourself in the school, just to begin upon some of the new fellows, kids of your own size or a little bigger; any one can do that. what you want is to challenge some of the older fellows at the very beginning, and then, no one will try humbugging you, as they do with the new fellows.' reggie looked doubtful. the idea of making a position for himself was tempting, but if it was only to be carried into effect by fighting bigger boys he felt that the result might be failure. 'what you want is practice,' resumed allan. 'now it's no use your trying to fight me--i'm much too big and strong for you; nor hamish, for he's far too good-natured and would never hit out at you enough; so it's awfully lucky we've got harry here just now--he's just the very fellow.' reggie looked up in perplexity. 'but how can i fight harry?' he said; 'i've never quarrelled with him.' 'you young duffer,' said allan, 'you don't need to fight about anything in particular. it's only for practice. then we've got to make the yacht late, you know, and this is no end of a good opportunity, as we can't be expected to stay where the grown-ups are likely to find us when we've got a fight on hand. here's a nice quiet place, just behind these rocks, and there's harry wading in that pool; you can just fight him at once, or i'll punch both your heads for you. hullo, harry! come along! reggie wants to fight you. now, go it, you two, and i'll be umpire;' and before the younger boys knew what they were about they were sparring at each other like a couple of angry cocks. 'straight, reggie, you young duffer,' said allan, settling himself to give professional advice. 'give it to him from the shoulder.' 'i say, what's the row?' asked hamish, who came strolling down to the scene; 'so these two have come to loggerheads, have they?' 'not they,' replied allan carelessly; 'it's only practice.' marjorie's curly head rose above a rock behind which she had been lying _perdu_; and when she saw what was going on she jumped up and scrambled to the other side. 'whatever is the matter?' she cried. 'can't you make them stop, allan?' 'practice-fight,' replied allan; 'don't call out, marjorie; you'll distract their attention.' reggie, unused to fighting, soon began to have the worst of it, but he struggled manfully until a well-planted blow from harry knocked the breath out of him. 'that's enough for a beginning,' said allan. 'you've done not so badly, reggie, for the first time, and you'll get into it all right by practice.' 'but what did he go at me for?' cried harry, with a blank expression of countenance. 'i didn't do anything to him.' 'nobody said you did, you duffer,' replied allan; 'reggie only wants to be able to fight the fellows at school; and you and he can have a go at each other every day if you like.' 'dear me,' said mr. matthews the minister, coming towards the group with a concerned face; 'i am sorry to see that some of you have been quarrelling. pray, what has been the subject of dispute?' 'it's nothing,' said allan, 'only practice. there's no quarrel at all.' 'what's this? what's this?' broke in the somewhat rasping voice of the sheriff, who had followed mr. matthews, unobserved by the young people; 'it seems that half-a-dozen boys cannot be together without coming to blows.' 'they're not fighting seriously,' cried marjorie; 'it's only fun.' mr. matthews was looking both grieved and puzzled. 'dear me,' he said, shaking his head, 'this is most distressing. to fight when you have not any ground for quarrelling. why did you not endeavour to dissuade them, miss marjorie?' 'it's all right,' said marjorie. 'what would be the good of interfering?' the sheriff said nothing, but he was looking so grimly amused that marjorie added hastily, 'why, it doesn't matter! why shouldn't they fight if it amuses them? when once you learn to understand boys you know that it's no use being surprised at anything they do!' 'allan! reggie!' mr. stewart's voice was calling somewhat impatiently. 'go and look for the young ladies and gentlemen, duncan; quick, don't lose time, we're late already.' 'tear me,' observed duncan, looking at harry's and reggie's somewhat battered faces as they passed; 'so there hass peen a fight between you two young gentlemen, and mr. allan hass been helping you. i wass thinking from mr. allan's looks these last days tat there would pe some mischief pefore ferry long! it iss ahl right, miss marjorie, it iss ahl right,' he said soothingly, in response to her glance; 'we hev made the _kelpie_ an hour and a quarter late, whateffer. that iss ferry good, although rob says he will pe thinking it iss a pity that the sea will not pe going to pe at ahl rough.' there was only enough breeze to fill the sails as the _kelpie_ glided gently towards the island of erricha. the gulls sat balancing themselves on the smooth swell of the waves; and as the vessel passed a low rocky islet a number of seals flopped into the water and swam in her wake. 'it's awfully nice,' observed gerald, his blue eyes shining with enjoyment. 'yes,' replied tricksy; 'we've had an awfully jolly day, but i've been thinking, that all this time we've been doing nothing for neil. we ought to, you know, as we've made a compact.' allan produced a bit of stick and began whittling it. 'it would be nice if we could begin now,' observed gerald. 'it's all very well,' said harry disgustedly, 'but there seems to be nothing to do.' 'i heard the sheriff saying to mother that the gipsies had come back again,' said tricksy. reggie's dark eyes looked at allan, who stopped his whittling. 'look!' said marjorie abruptly, 'we're just rounding the headland.' the grahams wondered at the sudden silence which fell upon the group. 'we'll tack shore wards, duncan,' announced mr. stewart. we would like to spend an hour or two at the caves.' 'aye, aye, sir,' replied duncan stiffly. allan and reggie began to look intent. 'there's rob coming forward,' said marjorie softly. the highlander touched his cap respectfully. 'i do not think we can pe landing at ta corrachin caves to-night, sir,' he said civilly but firmly; 'ta wind iss north-west and ta current iss running ferry strong, sir. we wass thinking it would pe too dangerous.' 'tut, tut,' said mr. stewart; 'we're not going to be so timid as all that, rob. just think of some of the days when we have landed, man.' 'but duncan and i was thinking that it wass a ferry tangerous sea to-day, sir, ferry tangerous indeed, and we will pe afraid for ta ladies, sir, and for ta young ladies and gentlemen.' 'nonsense, man,' returned mr. stewart; 'call this a heavy sea? i never saw a better sea in my life. tell duncan to put her head south-east by south.' but duncan had taken the helm, and the vessel lay unexpectedly against the wind. 'it iss ta cross currents, sir,' said rob. 'yo-ho there! slack the main-sheet!' and the boys were easing off the rope before they had realised what they were about. the vessel gave a plunge or two and then steadied herself, duncan standing with a grim face at the wheel. 'it iss ahl right now, sir,' said rob composedly; 'but we cannot pe teking her back to catch a wind tat will tek her to corrachin after this.' dr. macgregor was looking surprised. 'i can't think what ails the men,' fumed mr. stewart. 'there is nothing unusual in the appearance of the sea so far as i can make out, and i ought to know as well as they can.' 'successful mutiny,' muttered marjorie; and the boys grinned. mr. graham walked to the side and looked down at the water, but did not take it upon himself to express an opinion. 'it looks as though the fellows were keeping something back,' continued mr. stewart. 'perhaps it's one of their highland superstitions,' suggested mrs. stewart. 'i wouldn't take any more notice if i were you.' silence fell as the _kelpie_ glided past the caves. the vessel passed near enough for those on board to look into the yawning hollows beneath the overhanging cliffs, and to hear the thunder of the angry sea which always beat upon that shore. marjorie and the boys felt a lump rise in their throats as they thought of the comrade driven to seek refuge in that desolate spot. chapter xii surrounded 'twelfth of august,' said allan; 'pater's out on the moors with mr. graham, slow day for us; suppose we take the boat and go fishing for crabs!' 'all right, let's,' said marjorie; 'harry's in a fidgety mood and will be quarrelling with some one presently if he has nothing to do.' 'i say, you fellows,' cried allan, 'we're going crab fishing. come along and let's rummage out the lines, reggie. we must be sure and get enough for all. tricksy, you might ask duncan to put some provisions in a basket for us, as we shan't be home for tea or supper. let's hurry up or we'll lose the best of the afternoon.' the various belongings having been collected, the boys and girls trooped down to the cove and began loosening the craft. laddie and carlo, who had followed uninvited, came and stood by the boat, pricking up their ears. 'can't take you, laddie,' said allan; 'we're going a long way and there's no room for you in the boat.' laddie smiled an intelligent dog smile and wagged his tail as though to say, 'i'll wait and see whether you won't change your mind, young sir.' 'come now, a good shove all together,' said allan; and the boat ran down to the water. 'all right; chuck in the things, reggie; and now, girls, will you take your places.' they all seated themselves and the craft was pushed off. 'go home, laddie,' called out reggie to the two dogs, who were standing side by side on the shore, looking pitifully disappointed. the dogs remained looking after the boat for a minute or two; then they gave each other a resigned glance and turned tail and trotted off, having evidently made up their minds to seek consolation in some other form of amusement. the boat was rowed to where a bottom of weedy stones showed through the water, then allan began to explain to his guests the method of fishing. 'you see this weight on the end of the line,' he said, 'and there's a bit of scarlet cloth attached; well, you let down the line to the stones and then draw it up again like this, and keep doing so until the crabs come out to see what's the matter; then you dance it up and down in front of them until they get into a rage, and catch hold of it; then you draw it up on board and the silly asses are too angry to let go and you catch them, don't you see?' 'jolly fun,' said harry, and a smile overspread gerald's features. 'i suppose you get a lot of them that way?' 'yes,' said marjorie, 'but don't jump about so, harry; you're making the boat bob from side to side.' harry muttered something and drew back into the boat. all the lines were flung out, and every now and again an irate crab was drawn up, clinging obstinately to the string. the sport proved most absorbing, but after a little, tricksy happening to look towards the shore drew marjorie's attention to two figures standing on the hillside. 'what's the matter, marjorie?' said reggie, as the girl changed colour. following the direction of her eyes his attitude stiffened, and allan and hamish looked to see what was the matter. 'it's gibbie mackerrach,' said reggie, 'and he's talking to andrew macpeters.' the combination had an ominous sound, and they all looked extremely concerned. 'what's the matter?' asked harry. 'it's that gipsy lad who used to like neil so much,' said allan; 'the other is the fellow who we suspect may have been the thief. it's to be hoped that he is not making gibbie tell him things that will do harm to neil.' 'which one is the gipsy?' asked harry. 'i heard father say that they were camping on the moor not far from the corrachin caves.' marjorie, allan, and reggie looked at each other with startled eyes. then allan said, 'pull away from here, will you, reggie, and don't let them see us if you can help it. it would be better that andrew should not know that we saw him with gibbie.' 'now,' said allan, after the boat had been rowed out of sight. 'we can try some deep-sea fishing.' reggie caught a small haddock which was divided among the party for bait, and the lines were thrown out again. in a little while reggie drew in a small cod, and a minute afterwards a good-sized haddock was found to be on harry's line. 'gently, harry, gently, you'll get the line broken,' said hamish warningly as harry sprang up and gerald danced about in his seat, to the great discomfort of tricksy. 'there you are!' cried marjorie, as the fish was drawn leaping and struggling into the boat. 'hullo!' said harry triumphantly; 'it's a fine big one and no mistake!' 'it's a good size,' said marjorie, 'but, harry, _would_ you mind not kicking my feet as you jump about.' harry muttered an apology, and just at that moment hamish drew in a big cod, then two little haddocks were pulled up by tricksy. 'gerald, look at your line,' cried harry, springing forward, and gerald pulled in a haddock, while allan and hamish steadied the boat, which had been set rocking by harry's sudden movement. it was a beautiful evening, and the fish were taking well, but sport was spoiled by the incapacity of the grahams to keep still. if harry hooked a fish gerald sprang up to look, and if any one else had a take harry pranced backwards and forwards until it was drawn on board. at last hamish suggested that it was time to row to the pirates' island and have tea in the den. 'yes, i think so,' said marjorie, somewhat irritably. 'i've had my ankles tripped over quite often enough as it is.' 'and i've been _trying_ to keep my feet out of the way,' said tricksy, rather dolefully, 'but one has to put them somewhere, you know.' 'have you been so uncomfortable?' said harry, looking round with serene unconsciousness; 'hamish's boots _are_ rather big.' a smile travelled round the group as the lines were hastily wound up. 'you'll feel better after tea,' said hamish soothingly. the sun was already low when they landed, and marjorie and tricksy went into the cottage at once to get tea ready while reggie fetched peats, and allan and hamish lingered behind to secure the craft. the grahams, finding themselves with no special duties, wandered aimlessly about, getting into the way of the busy people. 'we've had a jolly fine take, haven't we?' said harry, sauntering up to reggie, who was busy at the peat-stack. 'not bad,' said reggie briefly. 'here, take an armful of these, will you, and carry them into the house.' harry carried in the peats and set them down by the fire-place, where marjorie was busy frying fish, while tricksy was making bannocks at the table. 'i say, marjorie,' began harry, 'we've had fine sport, haven't we?' 'yes,' replied marjorie absently. harry looked at the two girls, who went on quietly and busily with their work. 'i caught as many as allan, didn't i?' he began again. 'i'm sure i don't know,' said marjorie indifferently. she was tired and the peat smoke was making her eyes smart, and it irritated her to see harry doing nothing. 'but surely you kept count,' persisted harry; 'i caught more than hamish, anyhow.' 'i wasn't looking,' said marjorie. 'if you caught more than hamish to-day it was more than you do when you go trout fishing. i wish you would go away now, harry, and not talk to me until tea is ready.' 'let her alone, harry,' remonstrated gerald, who had followed his brother into the hut; but harry was in a teasing mood and marjorie's reply had stung him. 'cross patch!' he muttered, giving her elbow a shove. marjorie had not been prepared for the movement, which jerked some of the fish into the fire. in an instant she turned round and pinned harry against the wall, while her eyes blazed. 'harry! you struck a lady!--apologise!' 'no, i won't,' muttered harry, struggling to free himself. his arms were held as in a vice. 'are you going to apologise for having hit a lady?' reiterated marjorie. 'no,' replied harry, trying desperately to free himself, and becoming aware that the other boys were nearing the door of the hut. the struggle was prolonged for a minute or two, and then, just as the boys, to harry's unspeakable confusion, were on the point of coming in, marjorie slowly relaxed her hold and let him go. harry left the cottage, followed by gerald, and seated himself on the turf dyke with his chin resting on his hands. for a long time he gazed blankly in front of him, and neither boy spoke. at last harry began, 'i say, gerald, do you think they saw?' 'yes,' answered gerald; 'i'm afraid they did.' harry dropped his chin on his hands again and reflected. 'do you think it was because of that that they didn't come in at first?' he queried after awhile. 'i think so,' said gerald; 'they didn't want to have to interfere.' a long pause followed. harry gazed seawards, absorbed in gloomy reflections. 'it was awfully stupid of you to go on teasing her,' said gerald; 'any one could have seen that she was going to lose her temper. she's so strong too; always rowing and climbing, and doing things like a boy.' 'don't tell the boys at school,' said harry, after a long time; then he relapsed into silence again. suddenly he pulled himself together, and jumped off the dyke just as marjorie was coming out of the hut. 'look here,' he began, planting himself in front of her, with a flush rising to his face; 'i apologise! but it's because i shouldn't have hit you and not because you held me.' 'it's all right,' said marjorie, who was sorry that she had lost her temper; 'don't let's think of it any more but come and have tea.' the other boys tried to drown any lingering embarrassment by talking very fast, and the meal became an animated, if not a merry one. 'hark,' said reggie suddenly, 'what's that?' they all became silent and listened, allan standing up. a deep rushing noise was filling the cottage, and rapidly increasing in volume. 'it's the tide-way,' said reggie; 'we've forgotten to keep a look-out.' all trooped out of the cottage and looked at the angry current which was sweeping past both shores of the island. 'here's a jolly go,' said allan; 'we shan't get home to-night.' tricksy looked frightened and harry amazed, but marjorie's face cleared and she jumped up and clapped her hands with glee. 'oh, hooray, hooray,' she said; 'just what i always wanted. we'll have to spend the night in the cottage. oh, what fun!' 'but won't mrs. stewart be frightened?' suggested gerald, the thoughtful boy. 'not she,' said marjorie; 'she knows that we can take care of ourselves; besides, father and mr. stewart made us promise that if we were surrounded by a tide-way we were not to try to come home, however long we might have to wait. it would be quite impossible for us to row across. we must make up our minds to spend the night here.' they remained out of doors a little longer, discussing the situation, while the red turned to grey beyond the far-off islands; then they went indoors to make preparations for the night. fresh peats were cast on the fire, and the stores of cut heather were brought out and laid on the floor to serve as beds. marjorie lighted the lamp which hung from the ceiling, and its smoky glare lighted up a circle of eager, wakeful faces. the novelty of their surroundings, together with the voice of the current, which was running deep and swift round their tiny strip of an island, took from them all disposition to sleep during the early part of the night. it was not until the lamp had burnt out, and tricksy's head had sunk heavily against marjorie's knee that the rushing became fainter and finally died away, and one by one the listeners dropped to sleep upon their heather couches. it was about midnight when marjorie awoke, aroused by a slight noise, and the flames from the peats showed her allan staring in front of him with wakeful eyes, and listening. 'what is it?' she asked. 'hush, don't wake the others. there it is again--now, hark.' marjorie listened, and in the calm night she distinctly heard the grating of oars in rowlocks and the sound of a boat's bows dividing the water. 'it's some one coming for us,' she said. 'no, for they would have called out before they got so near.' marjorie jumped into a sitting posture and her eyes gleamed. 'what if it should be the smugglers?' she suggested. she was not frightened, only excited, for the situation promised some adventure. 'it's more likely to be neil,' said allan. 'he comes here sometimes. let's go out and see, but tread softly and don't disturb the youngsters.' they threaded their way cautiously among the sleepers, shivering a little with the chilliness of the air and with excitement, and stood out of doors in the cool quiet night. 'crouch down, marjorie, and keep behind the dyke,' said allan. 'let's make certain that it _is_ neil before we show ourselves.' by this time the boat was close to the shore, and its occupant sprang out. the cloudy moonlight showed the face and figure to be those of neil. 'stand up, marjorie; let him see it's a girl,' said allan, 'and he'll know that he's safe.' marjorie stood up, and called 'neil! hist! neil!' the figure turned round. 'who is that?' asked a voice in gaelic. 'it's marjorie, neil; and allan.' neil carefully secured the boat and came forward. 'what are you doing here, miss marjorie, at this time of night? and allan too? has anything happened?' 'we're shipwrecked, neil; or rather we've been cut off by the tide-way,' said marjorie. 'the others are here,' said allan, 'in the cottage; you're quite safe. come along.' they entered very softly, neil dragging his limbs as though he were fatigued. 'what's the row?' inquired reggie, opening his eyes. 'hush, don't wake the others,' said marjorie; but already harry had stirred on his heather couch. 'it's neil,' said allan, as the boy sprang up, wide awake. 'he's going to stay here till morning.' 'neil?' repeated harry. 'oh, i say, what a lark. gerald, wake up, you lazy beggar, here's neil at last--neil, i tell you; get up,' and he administered a shove to his sleeping brother. by this time all the inmates of the cottage were awake, hamish being the last to open a pair of bewildered, sleepy eyes. room was made for neil at the fire, the smouldering peats were roused to life, and the boys and girls clustered round, staring and asking questions, much too excited to think of sleep. 'how is your mother, neil?' asked tricksy, whose dark eyes looked bigger and darker than ever between surprise and sleepiness. 'she iss better, thank you, miss tricksy. i will have left her sleeping quietly, and i will pe coming here so that i can be going back early to see how she iss in the morning.' then after a little hesitation he added, 'she has made me promise that i'll go away now. rob maclean's boat goes to-morrow evening.' 'oh, what a sell!' exclaimed harry, who had been sitting cross-legged by his hero and looking up in his face with sparkling eyes. 'i mean,' he added, somewhat confusedly, as he saw the faces of the others, 'i'm sorry you have to go; it would have been such fun if you could have stayed.' they conversed a little longer, but quietly, for the darkness and silence which reigned outside their little shelter, and the monotonous lapping of the waves made them drowsy; and one by one they dropped to sleep. marjorie was the first to awaken. the clear morning light was already filling the hut, and the others were lying around and breathing heavily. she rose and went out of doors. the sun had not yet risen, but the clouds in the east were red. some gulls were rising languidly above the shimmering water. marjorie stood looking about her for a minute or two; then she ran into the cottage. 'allan,' she cried, 'wake up! there are some people standing on the shore; your father and mr. graham and some others and laddie is with them. they are just going to launch the boat. get up, quick; there's no time to lose!' neil was already on his feet, the events of the past few months having taught him to keep on the alert; and the others had begun to open their eyes and stretch themselves. 'hullo,' said reggie, grasping the situation, 'boat coming over here; that will never do.' 'hurry up,' said allan, 'or they'll be across before you know where you are.' 'you had better wait until we've gone,' said marjorie to neil. 'stay in the cottage, or they may see you.' hastily saying good-bye they ran down to the shore, but stopped short in dismay. the boat was gone. 'comes of not having fastened her securely,'. said allan; 'the current has carried her away.' 'what shall we do?' said marjorie. 'we'll have every one coming to the island. hide neil; let's pile all the heather on the top of him----' 'what's the matter?' cried neil from the hut. 'why are you waiting?' 'the boat's gone,' they cried. neil came out. 'mine's still there, on the other side,' he said. 'take her, and some of you can come back for me.' 'oh, neil, we couldn't do that! what if any one were to come in the meanwhile?' 'we must risk it. it will be better than bringing the whole boat-load upon us. quick, get in; they will be shoving down the boat.' in another minute they had pushed off, leaving neil behind. when the boat left the island the figures on shore stood still and waited; and half-way across marjorie waved her handkerchief. 'it's father,' said tricksy, 'with mr. graham and duncan and a lot of others; and there's laddie jumping about and barking.' 'allan,' said marjorie, touching his arm, 'there's andrew macpeters, do you see him? standing behind the others.' the boat glided in beside the landing stones, while a row of anxious faces watched and waited. 'down, laddie,' said mr. stewart, as the collie rushed forward with a joyful welcome. 'so there you are,' he said to the young people. 'you are not cold, are you?' 'we're all right, father,' said allan. 'we landed on that island yesterday evening and we were surrounded by the tide-way so we could not return. i hope mother was not anxious. we thought you would rather we stayed there than tried to cross when the current was flowing.' 'you were quite right not to try to get back under these circumstances,' said mr. stewart gravely; and the young people knew that he had been anxious, although he did not wish to blame them. mr. graham said nothing, but after his eyes had travelled over the group, and he had, as tricksy afterwards expressed it, 'counted his boys,' he placed himself between them and set off in the direction of ardnavoir, still without speaking except to ask them whether they had wet feet. reggie, as the quickest runner, was sent on ahead to tell his mother that they had returned, and a brisk walk brought them all to the house. 'by the way,' said mr. stewart as the young people were refreshing themselves with a good breakfast; 'what man was that who was with you on the island?' a startled movement went round the group, and allan looked at his father without replying. 'that man who helped you with the boat,' said mr. stewart; 'he stayed behind after you left; who was he?' chapter xiii andrew macpeters for a moment no one stirred; then allan braced himself to meet the difficulty. 'i'm sorry, father; but i can't tell you that,' he said. mr. stewart looked at him in astonishment. 'you can't tell me? you mean you don't know?' allan was silent. mr. stewart waited. tricksy crept closer to marjorie and trembled with dismay. 'you associate with people that you cannot tell your parents about,' said mr. stewart in great displeasure; 'and you allow him to associate with your little sister and with marjorie. i am sorry that i must forbid the use of the boat until you tell me who was with you this morning.' allan waited with a white face until his father had left the room; then he turned to the others. 'no one is to let out who it was,' he said. 'you have all signed the compact, and any one breaking it will have me to reckon with.' reggie's brown face wore an expression which showed that he, at least, meant to be trustworthy; and marjorie's lips set themselves firmly. the grahams, major and minor, had said little, but now harry's eyes sparkled, and gerald flushed, as he always did when he was trying to be brave. 'but, allan,' said tricksy in a trembling voice, 'wouldn't it be better to tell father about it and ask him to let us have the boat for neil? we must get him away from the island, you know.' 'can't tell pater, tricksy,' replied allan. 'it would be all right if they hadn't made him a justice of the peace; that's some kind of a judge, you know. he couldn't help any one like neil; indeed i'm not sure that he wouldn't have to telegraph for the sheriff and let him know that neil is here, and it would be a dreadful thing for father to have to do that.' 'then how are we going to get neil away from the den,' said tricksy. 'they'll find him if he stays there.' 'allan,' said marjorie firmly, 'hamish and i will go. we haven't been forbidden the use of the boat.' 'we'll go too,' said harry. 'we aren't his children, and mr. stewart didn't say anything to us.' 'all right, marjorie,' said allan; 'you'd better all go, for neil's old boat is pretty heavy to get through the water. quick, there isn't a minute to lose.' little was said as the old herring-boat was pushed off and manned, for even harry was feeling subdued. 'it's all right, neil,' said marjorie as the boat landed and neil looked inquiringly for the others; 'they've been kept at home by their father. we'll land you at the skegness cliffs as there's least chance of being seen there.' the passage was accomplished without incident, but as neil stood up to spring ashore hamish uttered an exclamation and pointed to the top of the cliff. all looked up. a man was standing on the verge, and looking down. 'it's andrew macpeters again,' said hamish. 'let's land somewhere else,' said marjorie. 'no use, miss marjorie,' said neil. 'if he means ill by me he will give the alarm; it will be better for me to be landing while there iss still a chance. i'm not afraid if i only have him to deal with.' he stood up once more, then turned to the others. 'remember,' he said, 'whatever happens, my mother iss to be told that i haf left the island. miss marjorie, you promise?' 'i promise,' answered marjorie; then neil sprang on shore and vanished behind a mass of rock. for a minute or two they remained looking up at the cliff, but nothing was to be seen of andrew macpeters; then they rowed slowly back to the place where the craft had been moored. 'well?' said allan and reggie, who met them half-way on the road to ardnavoir. the others gave a brief account of what had taken place. 'bad luck,' said allan when they had described the encounter with andrew macpeters. 'i'd back neil against andrew any day; he won't interfere with neil himself, but then the fellow's quite capable of giving the alarm to the police.' they wandered disconsolately a little farther. 'it seems horrid to have to give mrs. macdonnell that message,' said marjorie; 'but it will have to be done, i suppose, since we promised.' 'yes, marjorie,' said hamish, 'it will have to be done. it would be enough to kill her if she knew that neil was in danger.' who was to be entrusted with the message? every one looked at marjorie, who became red and looked unhappy as she realised what was expected of her. 'you will have to do it,' said allan. 'me?' said marjorie; 'no, you go, allan.' 'no,' said allan decidedly; 'it's not the kind of thing for a fellow. it needs a girl, so it will have to be you.' 'allan is quite right, marjorie,' joined in hamish; 'there is no one but you who can do it. mind you don't let her see that you are not telling the truth.' marjorie looked very distressed, but saw she must make up her mind. 'well, you come with me as far as the cottage,' she said; and the entire party set off. arrived at the gate, allan threw it open, and marjorie walked up the path and disappeared inside the cottage. the others sat down on the heather and waited. a long time seemed to pass, and then marjorie reappeared looking very subdued. 'all right, marjorie?' inquired allan. marjorie nodded without speaking, and others judged it best to refrain from asking questions. for some time they walked in silence, and then tricksy quietly slipped into the place next to marjorie. after a while, finding that the boys were out of earshot. tricksy sidled closer, and ventured to ask marjorie very gently how mrs. macdonnell had received the message. 'i--i--i--she was in bed,' said marjorie, 'and i went to her, and it was rather dark, and after i had asked how she was and all that, i--i--i just told her. she never thought i was saying what wasn't true, for she said "thank god for that."' marjorie ended with a little tearless sob, and neither of the girls could find anything to say for a little while. when the boys came beside them again tricksy walked on silently for a little way, then she suddenly burst out-- 'i don't care, but what's the use of a compact if we can't do anything to help neil? there he is, in great danger, and mrs. macdonnell may hear of it any day, and if she does it will kill her; and we haven't done anything that's of any use.' 'what do you think we can do?' replied reggie gruffly. 'why, bustle about until we find out who stole the letters. here we are, and we find little bits of paper which ought to tell us something if we had any sense, but we don't get further. seven of us and we can't help poor neil when he is in trouble.' nobody seemed to have anything to say, and tricksy burst out again-- 'you say you know who was the real thief?' 'we think we do, tricksy,' interposed hamish; 'but we don't know for certain.' 'then why don't we make sure?' 'how would you do it, tricksy?' asked allan, while the others trudged steadily onwards. 'why, watch him wherever he goes; and we'd soon find out where he kept the papers if he had taken them.' there was no answer for a moment. then allan said gravely, 'that wouldn't be honourable, tricksy. we must play fair, you know.' 'honourable! honourable to a thief!--but yes, of course we must. well, i don't know what's to be done then,' and tricksy concluded by a big sigh. when the coastguard station came in view a man was standing at the gate, scanning the road with a telescope. upon catching sight of the young people he lowered the glass and came forward. 'euan macdonnell,' said reggie, quickening his pace; 'let's hear whether he has any news.' 'i was on the lookout for you, young ladies and gentlemen,' said euan. 'we've just got a telephone message from the corrachin lighthouse sent by rob maclean. we were to tell you that neil has reached the caves and is safe for the meanwhile, and he supposes that you, young ladies and gentlemen, have remembered the message to his mother.' 'if only andrew hasn't seen him,' said marjorie after the first exclamations of thankfulness. euan looked grave as he heard how andrew had witnessed the landing. 'i don't trust that fellow for an instant,' he said. 'he would think nothing of putting the police on the alert if he had a mind to. we can only hope that he hasn't recognised neil, or that rob will find a way of getting the poor lad out of the island before any harm comes.' when the young people had reached ardnavoir, weary and discouraged, mr. stewart was in the hall. 'i know who was with you this morning,' he said abruptly. 'was it by accident that you met?' 'yes,' said allan. 'your boat was stranded on the reachin skerry,' went on mr. stewart, 'and the men have brought her home. you may have the use of her again.' 'thank you, father,' said allan. they all scanned mr. stewart's face to read, if possible, his intentions regarding neil; but nothing was to be gathered. 'isn't father a dear?' said tricksy, when they had wandered out to the cricket-ground. 'he knows we couldn't betray our friend, not even for him.' 'yes,' said reggie; 'but the question is whether he will have to do something himself, since he's a j.p.' the question was not answered that day, and during the next they were still in ignorance. on the third day it was discovered that detectives were in the island again, and euan brought the news that every boat was watched both coming and going. the days dragged on in suspense, and still neil was in the caves. rob maclean had a plan for conveying him away by night and landing him somewhere on the coast of scotland, from whence the lad was to tramp to some large town and stow himself away on a vessel bound for america; but the bright, full moon rendered any such attempts impossible for the meanwhile. 'isn't it too bad?' broke out marjorie one day; 'i think the law is cruel if it forces mr. stewart to have neil arrested. i wonder how he could do it. he knows as well as we do that neil isn't a thief.' 'it wasn't father,' said allan. 'i happen know that he's lying low and won't take any notice. all our people are bound together not to betray neil, but some one has been a traitor; they don't know who. neil has a secret enemy in the place.' they all thought they knew who this was, but no one could bring the deed home to the culprit. all desire for fun and adventure seemed to have left them, and the boys and girls wandered about disconsolately or sat in groups talking about plans which they were unable to carry out; or later, ceased to find anything at all to suggest. even the dogs seemed to know that something was the matter, for they would lie quietly beside the children for hours, and sometimes laddie would thrust his nose into some one's hand and look up with his honest, affectionate eyes full of sympathy. the weather became more broken, and sometimes all intercourse between ardnavoir and corranmore was cut off during the greater part of a day. when the rain ceased, andrew macpeters, looking up from his work, would find reggie's dark eyes contemplating him as their owner sat astride upon a dyke, or allan considering him with hands in his pockets, and a thoughtful countenance; or else it was the grahams who regarded him with a mixture of interest and aversion, or tricksy with her great eyes resting upon him with an expression of sorrow that any one could be so dreadfully wicked. the lad would look up with a surly expression in his red-lidded eyes; but watch as they might, they never detected in him any expression of guilt or embarrassment. chapter xiv caught the evening had closed in heavy rain, and towards morning a gusty wind arose, buffeting the walls of corranmore and making wild noises in the ruin. marjorie awoke and sat up in bed. a moment's hearkening convinced her that what the islanders most dreaded had become reality; a westerly gale had arisen while neil was still in the caves. she sprang to the window; and the grey light showed her an angry sea, with the white horses leaping and hurrying towards the corrachin headland. the tide was rising, and was being driven eastward with terrific force by the gale. marjorie ran to her brother's room; but a glance showed her an empty bed. 'no time to lose,' said marjorie to herself; 'perhaps he has gone to warn neil, and perhaps he hasn't; in any case i'd better go too.' she hurried on some clothing and ran out of doors. the wind had swept the clouds towards the east, and an angry dawn was breaking above the hills. marjorie sped over the drenched grass and heather, the wind was lifting her nearly off her feet, and blowing her frock in front of her like a sail. there were more than three miles of rugged country between corranmore and the headland. it was a race between herself and the tide; and the tide seemed to be gaining. marjorie ran on and on. neither hamish nor any other living creature was in sight. the sheep had left the moors and the gulls were taking refuge inland. at last the headland came in view. a glance showed marjorie that the waves had not yet reached high-water mark. mechanically she chose the road by the shore. now the wind was partly against her, and at times threatened to pin her against the cliff; but marjorie struggled forward. soon the rocks were frowning above her head, while the breakers were coming closer, rising in solid walls which thundered as they fell. showers of spray were flung shoreward; and looking up at the wet glistening cliffs marjorie wondered whether foothold would be possible upon them, and what her feelings would be were she to find herself caged between the cliffs and the breakers. yet she did not feel frightened, only excited. at the caves she had only time to make a dash before a huge breaker fell; and some of the water swirled after her into the opening. 'neil!' she cried; 'neil!' neil was lying watching the flood quite calmly, as though it did not concern him in the least. catching sight of marjorie he looked up in amazement; then sprang to his feet. 'is hamish here?' shouted marjorie. her voice was drowned in the thunder of waves and wind. neil led her to a small chamber in the rocks, lighted from above, and where the tumult was softened into a dull roar; and she repeated her question. 'no, miss marjorie, i hef not seen him,' answered neil. their voices sounded strangely muffled, the force of the breakers making the walls of the little cavern tremble. 'then, neil, you must leave this at once; the caves will be flooded in another minute, and i've come all this way to warn you.' 'did you, miss marjorie? did you indeed? you came to warn me. no, indeed; i cannot let you stay here.' 'how are we to get out, neil? i think the tide is at the foot of the cliffs now?' as she spoke a stream of water broke in and ran along the floor of their little shelter. 'it iss too late to get out that way now, miss marjorie,' said neil; 'and in any case it would be too slippery that the cliffs would be. i will pe knowing an opening leading to the moor, where it's not difficult to climb up. come this way.' he helped her along the passages. soon they were in total darkness. the flood was gaining upon them, and the noise rendered it impossible to exchange a word. sometimes the water hissed and gurgled at their heels, and sometimes they plunged ankle-deep into pools. they slipped and scrambled along, marjorie clinging to her guide; and presently a glimmer of light came from above. 'here we are, miss marjorie,' said neil. 'if you could be managing to climb up here we would come out on the moor.' the ascent was broken and dangerous, and was in some places only very imperfectly lighted. neil, with his sailor's training, swung himself from point to point, sometimes drawing marjorie up to a ledge, and sometimes instructing her where to set her feet. at last the welcome daylight burst upon them, and grasping the tufts of heather, they drew themselves on to firm ground. 'at last,' said marjorie, throwing herself down on the heather, and blinking in the sun. 'now you can go to the lighthouse, neil.' 'hullo,' said a voice; and marjorie looked up to see the laird and mr. graham, who had come all this way to watch the storm at the corrachin caves, and were very much astonished at this sudden encounter. 'run, neil,' gasped marjorie; but neil drew himself together. 'it iss no use,' he said; 'they will be watching wherever i will go, and i hev not a chance.' then to mr. stewart he said, 'i am not for trying to escape. i know i shall be taken. i'd rather give myself up to you than to any one else. if you wass not to be letting my mother know it iss grateful to you i will be, sir.' the laird looked greatly distressed. 'neil, my lad,' he said, 'i have no warrant for arresting you. it's none of my business. you may go away if you like; i shall not try to prevent you.' neil shook his head. 'it iss no use, sir,' he said; 'i would rather yield of my own accord than be taken, and i have no chance of escaping now. i had nothing to do with the theft of the letters, but it iss no matter. my mother hass not long to live, and she need neffer know if things go against me. keep it from her if you can.' marjorie stood by, white and trembling, and nearer to shedding tears than she could have believed possible. 'you can come with me for the present, neil,' said the laird; 'we'll see what can be done.' a pony cart was chartered from the nearest farmhouse. marjorie got in with the others and a sorrowful party set out across the moors. when they reached ardnavoir, the ill news seemed to have preceded them, for reggie looked stormily from an upper window and then came into the hall where allan and the grahams were already waiting, and mrs. stewart came downstairs accompanied by tricksy, whose eyes were very big and dark with dismay. neil dropped into the chair that was offered him, and leant his head on his hand, while the others gathered silently around him. allan and reggie were nearest, one on either side, and reggie put his hand protectingly on his friend's shoulder. in the background, mr. stewart fidgeted with the things that had been carried in from the pony cart, and tricksy was silently shedding tears, poor little girl, leaning against her mother. the only one who could think of anything to do was laddie, who came in, planted himself in front of neil, and endeavoured to express his sympathy by slipping his nose under the lad's disengaged hand. almost without knowing that he was doing it, neil put out his hand and caressed the dog's smooth head, and the two remained thus in a silent understanding. every one was feeling very miserable when there came a sound of wheels; a gig drew up at the door, and several persons sprang down and burst into the hall. chapter xv hamish to the rescue the storm which awakened marjorie had also roused hamish. he awoke to hear the rain pouring down, and the burn rushing along in heavy spate. 'fine fishing, to-morrow,' said hamish to himself, 'but, whew! how the wind's rising. the rain can't last long at this rate.' he lay a little longer, listening to the rushing of the burn; then he began to think of the people who might be without shelter that night; neil (who he hoped would take shelter in one of the cottages if the gale continued) and the gipsies, and gibbie mackerrach. at the thought of gibbie a sudden recollection came into his sleepy brain. he remembered the lad's lair in the hills, above his father's house, and that the wind had been blowing from that direction on the day when a paper had been found fluttering in the ruins. had no one ever connected the crazy lad with the robbery? the idea seemed fanciful, but still it would do no harm to go and examine gibbie's curious little cave on the hillside. hamish thought he would set out at once, before daylight came and made him feel how ridiculous it was to think of such a thing. the dawn was hardly making any headway through the clouds and the rain, and hamish pulled up the collar of his coat and pushed forward in the darkness. as he toiled up the hill the wind was rising in angry squalls and after awhile the rain ceased and a large break began to open in the clouds, letting the grey light through. the burn, along whose banks hamish was making his way, was coming down tumultuously, bearing with it bits of stick, clods of earth, and other rubbish. once or twice hamish fancied he saw a bit of white paper whirl past, but it was carried down stream before he could reach it. at last he reached the hollow where gibbie's little dwelling was situated. just above there was a little cascade, and the swollen waters, coming down with a rush, overflowed their banks and flooded the lair, sweeping out a quantity of straw mixed with scraps of paper. hamish plunged into the stream and caught straw, papers and all in his arms. a shout from the lair made him look round, and there stood gibbie, soaked with wet, and plastered with mud from head to foot. 'you must not be touching these,' cried the lad; 'they're for neil, all for neil!' 'all right, gibbie,' said hamish tranquilly; 'you can give them to neil as soon as you like, i was only keeping them from being carried away.' 'who told you i had seen neil?' asked the lad craftily; 'andrew said i was not to tell any one, and i'm not going to say he is here; only the nice gorjo in dark blue clothes asked me and i told him.' 'ah, did you tell him?' said hamish, speaking quietly, but trembling between the fear of asking too much or too little; 'and when did you see mrs. macalister last?' a sly expression passed over the lad's face. 'me and mrs. macalister not friends,' he said. 'play her tricks.' suddenly he began to laugh. 'played her a fine trick, though; she never find out! gibbie steal her letters when she and her husband had gone out to see neil home. door left open, no one see gibbie--clever gibbie!' 'wait, gibbie,' interrupted hamish; 'i'm going to fetch something for you,' and he made off downhill with all speed. dr. macgregor was just driving home from a night visit to a patient when his son dashed into the road, spattered with mud and with the water squelching from his boots. 'father,' said hamish, 'come with me; i've found out who robbed the post-office,' and throwing the reins to his groom, the astonished doctor was dragged all the way to the gipsy's burrow. 'hullo, gibbie, you look cold,' said the doctor, taking in the situation with great presence of mind; 'come with me and have a glass of something hot.' sitting by the fire in the nearest cottage, with a glass of steaming toddy in his hand, gibbie became communicative, and the doctor soon drew from him the rest of the story. 'neil's a good lad,' said the gipsy. 'neil knows how to behave to a romany chel; drives away bad boys when they laugh and throw stones. gibbie gave neil a present; two presents; something out of the letters. neil will find it in his coat pocket some day. papers worth a hundred pound.' 'all right, gibbie,' said the doctor craftily; 'suppose we go and tell neil that you put them there. he may not have been able to find them yet.' dr. macgregor's tired horse was withdrawn from its feed, and hamish, his father, and gibbie set out for ardnavoir. 'neil's cleared,' announced hamish; and every one turned round to encounter the strange-looking figure of the gipsy. finding himself among so many people, gibbie became suspicious and refused to speak, but the faces of his companions rendered all explanation unnecessary. 'i am glad to say that your innocence is established beyond a doubt, neil,' said dr. macgregor beaming upon him; 'and i am glad to shake hands with you.' 'oh, hooray, hooray,' shouted the boys. 'neil, old boy, you're cleared,' and they capered round him, patting him on the back and cheering until the lad was quite bewildered. laddie, after looking puzzled for a moment, burst into a joyous barking and leaped up three times and turned round in the air; then ran to neil and jumped up again, trying to lick his face. an indescribable tumult reigned, and neil extricated himself with difficulty. 'excuse me,' he said; 'you are all ferry kind, but i must pe going and telling my mother.' 'wait a bit, neil,' said the doctor, laying a detaining hand upon the lad's shoulder; 'not so suddenly, if you please; i will go with you and prepare her,' and the two left the house together. 'but mrs. macdonnell, mummie,' said tricksy, with a quivering lip, 'do you--do you think she'll die?' 'not she,' said the laird, coming forward; 'happiness has never killed any one yet, and a little of that is what mrs. macdonnell was wanting. but where is the hero of the day; the one who found out what no one else has been able to discover! we have not congratulated him yet.' 'we do, we do,' they all cried; and they laid forcible hands upon hamish, who had retired into the background with a very red face, carried him out of doors and chaired him triumphantly round the courtyard. 'but _hamish_,' said harry later in the day, his eyes bright with astonishment; 'to think that after all it was hamish who did it!' 'why not?' inquired allan gruffly. 'why, he's such a quiet fellow, one never thinks of his doing anything. if it had been you or me now, or reggie, or even marjorie (although marjorie's far too conceited for a girl); but hamish!' marjorie had caught some of the last words, and she turned upon the boy like lightning. 'ever heard the fable of the hare and the tortoise?' she queried. 'if not you'll find it in the third reading book. perhaps you're not as far as that yet though.' still harry found the matter hard to understand, and during several days, he was frequently to be observed sitting on dykes and contemplating hamish, who shared the honours of the time with neil. 'only a few days now,' observed tricksy regretfully, 'and there will be an end of all the fun. every one's going to school except me, and there will be no boating or fishing or playing at pirates any more.' 'what about next year, tricksy?' said marjorie. 'next year! why, you'll be grown-up by then. your mother said you must be sent to school to learn to be less of a tomboy.' 'i won't be less of a tomboy,' declared marjorie. 'i'm going to fish, and climb rocks and ride ponies bare-backed, and do all those kinds of things until i'm ever so old. we'll have better fun than ever, now we have neil back again. i vote we make a compact----' 'we've made one already,' interposed tricksy. 'well, a new one then. we'll call it a league;--the adventure league--and we'll promise to come back every year. harry and gerald too, and we'll have the pirates' den for our house; and we'll never bother about being grown-up until we're too old to get any fun out of being tomboys any more.' 'agreed,' said the others. 'neil, you shall be captain of our league.' printed in great britain at the press of the publishers. note from electronic text creator: i have compiled a word list with definitions of most of the scottish words found in this work at the end of the book. this list does not belong to the original work, but is designed to help with the conversations in broad scots found in this work. a further explanation of this list can be found towards the end of this document, preceding the word list. there are three footnotes in this book which have been renumbered and placed at the end of the work. any notes that i have made within the text (e.g. relating to greek words in the text) have been enclosed in {} brackets. sir gibbie. by george macdonald, ll.d. contents i. the earring. ii. sir george. iii. mistress croale. iv. the parlour. v. gibbie's calling. vi. a sunday at home. vii. the town-sparrow. viii. sambo. ix. adrift. x. the barn. xi. janet. xii. glashgar. xiii. the ceiling. xiv. hornie. xv. donal grant. xvi. apprenticeship. xvii. secret service. xviii. the broonie. xix. the laird. xx. the ambush. xxi. the punishment. xxii. refuge. xxiii. more schooling. xxiv. the slate. xxv. rumours. xxvi. the gamekeeper xxvii. a voice. xxviii. the wisdom of the wise. xxix. the beast-boy. xxx. the lorrie meadow. xxxi. their reward. xxxii. prologue. xxxiii. the mains. xxxiv. glashruach. xxxv. the whelp. xxxvi. the brander. xxxvii. mr. sclater. xxxviii. the muckle hoose. xxxix. daur street. xl. mrs. sclater. xli. initiation. xlii. donal's lodging. xliii. the minister's defeat. xliv. the sinner. xlv. shoals ahead. xlvi. the girls. xlvii. a lesson of wisdom. xlviii. needfull odds and ends. xlix. the houseless. l. a walk. li. the north church. lii. the quarry. liii. a night-watch. liv. of age. lv. ten auld hoose o' galbraith. lvi. the laird and the preacher. lvii. a hiding-place from the wind. lviii. the confession. lix. catastrophe. lx. arrangement and preparation. lxi. the wedding. lxii. the burn. chapter i. the earring. "come oot o' the gutter, ye nickum!" cried, in harsh, half-masculine voice, a woman standing on the curbstone of a short, narrow, dirty lane, at right angles to an important thoroughfare, itself none of the widest or cleanest. she was dressed in dark petticoat and print wrapper. one of her shoes was down at the heel, and discovered a great hole in her stocking. had her black hair been brushed and displayed, it would have revealed a thready glitter of grey, but all that was now visible of it was only two or three untidy tresses that dropped from under a cap of black net and green ribbons, which looked as if she had slept in it. her face must have been handsome when it was young and fresh; but was now beginning to look tattooed, though whether the colour was from without or from within, it would have been hard to determine. her black eyes looked resolute, almost fierce, above her straight, well-formed nose. yet evidently circumstance clave fast to her. she had never risen above it, and was now plainly subjected to it. about thirty yards from her, on the farther side of the main street, and just opposite the mouth of the lane, a child, apparently about six, but in reality about eight, was down on his knees raking with both hands in the grey dirt of the kennel. at the woman's cry he lifted his head, ceased his search, raised himself, but without getting up, and looked at her. they were notable eyes out of which he looked--of such a deep blue were they, and having such long lashes; but more notable far from their expression, the nature of which, although a certain witchery of confidence was at once discoverable, was not to be determined without the help of the whole face, whose diffused meaning seemed in them to deepen almost to speech. whatever was at the heart of that expression, it was something that enticed question and might want investigation. the face as well as the eyes was lovely--not very clean, and not too regular for hope of a fine development, but chiefly remarkable from a general effect of something i can only call luminosity. the hair, which stuck out from his head in every direction, like a round fur cap, would have been of the red-gold kind, had it not been sunburned into a sort of human hay. an odd creature altogether the child appeared, as, shaking the gutter-drops from his little dirty hands, he gazed from his bare knees on the curbstone at the woman of rebuke. it was but for a moment. the next he was down, raking in the gutter again. the woman looked angry, and took a step forward; but the sound of a sharp imperative little bell behind her, made her turn at once, and re-enter the shop from which she had just issued, following a man whose pushing the door wider had set the bell ringing. above the door was a small board, nearly square, upon which was painted in lead-colour on a black ground the words, "licensed to sell beer, spirits, and tobacco to be drunk on the premises." there was no other sign. "them 'at likes my whusky 'ill no aye be speerin' my name," said mistress croale. as the day went on she would have more and more customers, and in the evening on to midnight, her parlour would be well filled. then she would be always at hand, and the spring of the bell would be turned aside from the impact of the opening door. now the bell was needful to recall her from house affairs. "the likin' 'at craturs his for clean dirt! he's been at it this hale half-hoor!" she murmured to herself as she poured from a black bottle into a pewter measure a gill of whisky for the pale-faced toper who stood on the other side of the counter: far gone in consumption, he could not get through the forenoon without his morning. "i wad like," she went on, as she replaced the bottle without having spoken a word to her customer, whose departure was now announced with the same boisterous alacrity as his arrival by the shrill-toned bell--"i wad like, for's father's sake, honest man! to thraw gibbie's lug. that likin' for dirt i canna fathom nor bide." meantime the boys attention seemed entirely absorbed in the gutter. whatever vehicle passed before him, whatever footsteps behind, he never lifted his head, but went creeping slowly on his knees along the curb still searching down the flow of the sluggish, nearly motionless current. it was a grey morning towards the close of autumn. the days began and ended with a fog, but often between, as golden a sunshine glorified the streets of the grey city as any that ripened purple grapes. to-day the mist had lasted longer than usual--had risen instead of dispersing; but now it was thinning, and at length, like a slow blossoming of the sky-flower, the sun came melting through the cloud. between the gables of two houses, a ray fell upon the pavement and the gutter. it lay there a very type of purity, so pure that, rest where it might, it destroyed every shadow of defilement that sought to mingle with it. suddenly the boy made a dart upon all fours, and pounced like a creature of prey upon something in the kennel. he had found what he had been looking for so long. he sprang to his feet and bounded with it into the sun, rubbing it as he ran upon what he had for trousers, of which there was nothing below the knees but a few streamers, and nothing above the knees but the body of the garment, which had been--i will not say made for, but last worn by a boy three times his size. his feet, of course, were bare as well as his knees and legs. but though they were dirty, red, and rough, they were nicely shaped little legs, and the feet were dainty. the sunbeams he sought came down through the smoky air like a jacob's ladder, and he stood at the foot of it like a little prodigal angel that wanted to go home again, but feared it was too much inclined for him to manage the ascent in the present condition of his wings. but all he did want was to see in the light of heaven what the gutter had yielded him. he held up his find in the radiance and regarded it admiringly. it was a little earring of amethyst-coloured glass, and in the sun looked lovely. the boy was in an ecstasy over it. he rubbed it on his sleeve, sucked it to clear it from the last of the gutter, and held it up once more in the sun, where, for a few blissful moments, he contemplated it speechless. he then caused it to disappear somewhere about his garments--i will not venture to say in a pocket--and ran off, his little bare feet sounding thud, thud, thud on the pavement, and the collar of his jacket sticking halfway up the back of his head, and threatening to rub it bare as he ran. through street after street he sped--all built of granite, all with flagged footways, and all paved with granite blocks--a hard, severe city, not beautiful or stately with its thick, grey, sparkling walls, for the houses were not high, and the windows were small, yet in the better parts, nevertheless, handsome as well as massive and strong. to the boy the great city was but a house of many rooms, all for his use, his sport, his life. he did not know much of what lay within the houses; but that only added the joy of mystery to possession: they were jewel-closets, treasure-caves, indeed, with secret fountains of life; and every street was a channel into which they overflowed. it was in one of quite a third-rate sort that the urchin at length ceased his trot, and drew up at the door of a baker's shop--a divided door, opening in the middle by a latch of bright brass. but the child did not lift the latch--only raised himself on tiptoe by the help of its handle, to look through the upper half of the door, which was of glass, into the beautiful shop. the floor was of flags, fresh sanded; the counter was of deal, scrubbed as white almost as flour; on the shelves were heaped the loaves of the morning's baking, along with a large store of scones and rolls and baps--the last, the best bread in the world--biscuits hard and soft, and those brown discs of delicate flaky piecrust, known as buns. and the smell that came through the very glass, it seemed to the child, was as that of the tree of life in the paradise of which he had never heard. but most enticing of all to the eyes of the little wanderer of the street were the penny-loaves, hot smoking from the oven--which fact is our first window into the ordered nature of the child. for the main point which made them more attractive than all the rest to him was, that sometimes he did have a penny, and that a penny loaf was the largest thing that could be had for a penny in the shop. so that, lawless as he looked, the desires of the child were moderate, and his imagination wrought within the bounds of reason. but no one who has never been blessed with only a penny to spend and a mighty hunger behind it, can understand the interest with which he stood there and through the glass watched the bread, having no penny and only the hunger. there is at least one powerful bond, though it may not always awake sympathy, between mudlark and monarch--that of hunger. no one has yet written the poetry of hunger--has built up in verse its stairs of grand ascent--from such hunger as gibbie's for a penny-loaf up--no, no, not to an alderman's feast; that is the way down the mouldy cellar-stair--but up the white marble scale to the hunger after righteousness whose very longings are bliss. behind the counter sat the baker's wife, a stout, fresh-coloured woman, looking rather dull, but simple and honest. she was knitting, and if not dreaming, at least dozing over her work, for she never saw the forehead and eyes which, like a young ascending moon, gazed at her over the horizon of the opaque half of her door. there was no greed in those eyes--only much quiet interest. he did not want to get in; had to wait, and while waiting beguiled the time by beholding. he knew that mysie, the baker's daughter, was at school, and that she would be home within half an hour. he had seen her with tear-filled eyes as she went, had learned from her the cause, and had in consequence unwittingly roused mrs. croale's anger, and braved it when aroused. but though he was waiting for her, such was the absorbing power of the spectacle before him that he never heard her approaching footsteps. "lat me in," said mysie, with conscious dignity and a touch of indignation at being impeded on the very threshold of her father's shop. the boy started and turned, but instead of moving out of the way, began searching in some mysterious receptacle hid in the recesses of his rags. a look of anxiety once appeared, but the same moment it vanished, and he held out in his hand the little drop of amethystine splendour. mysie's face changed, and she clutched it eagerly. "that's rale guid o' ye, wee gibbie!" she cried. "whaur did ye get it?" he pointed to the kennel, and drew back from the door. "i thank ye," she said heartily, and pressing down the thumbstall of the latch, went in. "wha's that ye're colloguin' wi', mysie?" asked her mother, somewhat severely, but without lifting her eyes from her wires. "ye maunna be speykin' to loons i' the street." "it's only wee gibbie, mither," answered the girl in a tone of confidence. "ou weel!" returned the mother, "he's no like the lave o' loons." "but what had ye to say till him?" she resumed, as if afraid her leniency might be taken advantage of. "he's no fit company for the likes o' you, 'at his a father an' mither, an' a chop (shop). ye maun hae little to say to sic rintheroot laddies." "gibbie has a father, though they say he never hid nae mither," said the child. "troth, a fine father!" rejoined the mother, with a small scornful laugh. "na, but he's something to mak mention o'! sic a father, lassie, as it wad be tellin' him he had nane! what said ye till 'im?" "i bit thankit 'im, 'cause i tint my drop as i gaed to the schuil i' the mornin', an' he fan't till me, an' was at the chopdoor waitin' to gie me't back. they say he's aye fin'in' things." "he's a guid-hertit cratur!" said the mother,--"for ane, that is, 'at's been sae ill broucht up." she rose, took from the shelf a large piece of bread, composed of many adhering penny-loaves, detached one, and went to the door. "here, gibbie!" she cried as she opened it; "here's a fine piece to ye." but no gibbie was there. up and down the street not a child was to be seen. a sandboy with a donkey cart was the sole human arrangement in it. the baker's wife drew back, shut the door and resumed her knitting. chapter ii. sir george. the sun was hot for an hour or two in the middle of the day, but even then in the shadow dwelt a cold breath--of the winter, or of death--of something that humanity felt unfriendly. to gibbie, however, bare-legged, bare-footed, almost bare-bodied as he was, sun or shadow made small difference, except as one of the musical intervals of life that make the melody of existence. his bare feet knew the difference on the flags, and his heart recognized unconsciously the secret as it were of a meaning and a symbol, in the change from the one to the other, but he was almost as happy in the dull as in the bright day. hardy through hardship, he knew nothing better than a constant good-humoured sparring with nature and circumstance for the privilege of being, enjoyed what came to him thoroughly, never mourned over what he had not, and, like the animals, was at peace. for the bliss of the animals lies in this, that, on their lower level, they shadow the bliss of those--few at any moment on the earth--who do not "look before and after, and pine for what is not," but live in the holy carelessness of the eternal now. gibbie by no means belonged to the higher order, was as yet, indeed, not much better than a very blessed little animal. to him the city was all a show. he knew many of the people--some of them who thought no small things of themselves--better than they would have chosen he or any one else should know them. he knew all the peripatetic vendors, most of the bakers, most of the small grocers and tradespeople. animal as he was, he was laying in a great stock for the time when he would be something more, for the time of reflection, whenever that might come. chiefly, his experience was a wonderful provision for the future perception of character; for now he knew to a nicety how any one of his large acquaintance would behave to him in circumstances within the scope of that experience. if any such little vagabond rises in the scale of creation, he carries with him from the street an amount of material serving to the knowledge of human nature, human need, human aims, human relations in the business of life, such as hardly another can possess. even the poet, greatly wise in virtue of his sympathy, will scarcely understand a given human condition so well as the man whose vital tentacles have been in contact with it for years. when gibbie was not looking in at a shop-window, or turning on one heel to take in all at a sweep, he was oftenest seen trotting. seldom he walked. a gentle trot was one of his natural modes of being. and though this day he had been on the trot all the sunshine through, nevertheless, when the sun was going down there was wee gibbie upon the trot in the chilling and darkening streets. he had not had much to eat. he had been very near having a penny loaf. half a cookie, which a stormy child had thrown away to ease his temper, had done further and perhaps better service in easing gibbie's hunger. the green-grocer woman at the entrance of the court where his father lived, a good way down the same street in which he had found the lost earring, had given him a small yellow turnip--to gibbie nearly as welcome as an apple. a fishwife from finstone with a creel on her back, had given him all his hands could hold of the sea-weed called dulse, presumably not from its sweetness, although it is good eating. she had added to the gift a small crab, but that he had carried to the seashore and set free, because it was alive. these, the half-cookie, the turnip, and the dulse, with the smell of the baker's bread, was all he had had. it had been rather one of his meagre days. but it is wonderful upon how little those rare natures capable of making the most of things will live and thrive. there is a great deal more to be got out of things than is generally got out of them, whether the thing be a chapter of the bible or a yellow turnip, and the marvel is that those who use the most material should so often be those that show the least result in strength or character. a superstitious priest-ridden catholic may, in the kingdom of heaven, be high beyond sight of one who counts himself the broadest of english churchmen. truly gibbie got no fat out of his food, but he got what was far better. what he carried--i can hardly say under or in, but along with those rags of his, was all muscle--small, but hard, and healthy, and knotting up like whipcord. there are all degrees of health in poverty as well as in riches, and gibbie's health was splendid. his senses also were marvellously acute. i have already hinted at his gift for finding things. his eyes were sharp, quick, and roving, and then they went near the ground, he was such a little fellow. his success, however, not all these considerations could well account for, and he was regarded as born with a special luck in finding. i doubt if sufficient weight was given to the fact that, even when he was not so turning his mind it strayed in that direction, whence, if any object cast its reflected rays on his retina, those rays never failed to reach his mind also. on one occasion he picked up the pocket-book a gentleman had just dropped, and, in mingled fun and delight, was trying to put it in its owner's pocket unseen, when he collared him, and, had it not been for the testimony of a young woman who, coming behind, had seen the whole, would have handed him over to the police. after all, he remained in doubt, the thing seemed so incredible. he did give him a penny, however, which gibbie at once spent upon a loaf. it was not from any notions of honesty--he knew nothing about it--that he always did what he could to restore the things he found; the habit came from quite another cause. when he had no clue to the owner, he carried the thing found to his father, who generally let it lie a while, and at length, if it was of nature convertible, turned it into drink. while gibbie thus lived in the streets like a townsparrow--as like a human bird without storehouse or barn as boy could well be--the human father of him would all day be sitting in a certain dark court, as hard at work as an aching head and a bloodless system would afford. the said court was off the narrowest part of a long, poverty-stricken street, bearing a name of evil omen, for it was called the widdiehill--the place of the gallows. it was entered by a low archway in the middle of an old house, around which yet clung a musty fame of departed grandeur and ancient note. in the court, against a wing of the same house, rose an outside stair, leading to the first floor; under the stair was a rickety wooden shed; and in the shed sat the father of gibbie, and cobbled boots and shoes as long as, at this time of the year, the light lasted. up that stair, and two more inside the house, he went to his lodging, for he slept in the garret. but when or how he got to bed, george galbraith never knew, for then, invariably, he was drunk. in the morning, however, he always found himself in it--generally with an aching head, and always with a mingled disgust at and desire for drink. during the day, alas! the disgust departed, while the desire remained, and strengthened with the approach of evening. all day he worked with might and main, such might and main as he had--worked as if for his life, and all to procure the means of death. no one ever sought to treat him, and from no one would he accept drink. he was a man of such inborn honesty, that the usurping demon of a vile thirst had not even yet, at the age of forty, been able to cast it out. the last little glory-cloud of his origin was trailing behind him--but yet it trailed. doubtless it needs but time to make of a drunkard a thief, but not yet, even when longing was at the highest, would he have stolen a forgotten glass of whisky; and still, often in spite of sickness and aches innumerable, george laboured that he might have wherewith to make himself drunk honestly. strange honesty! wee gibbie was his only child, but about him or his well-being he gave himself almost as little trouble as gibbie caused him! not that he was hard-hearted; if he had seen the child in want, he would, at the drunkest, have shared his whisky with him; if he had fancied him cold, he would have put his last garment upon him; but to his whisky-dimmed eyes the child scarcely seemed to want anything, and the thought never entered his mind that, while gibbie always looked smiling and contented, his father did so little to make him so. he had at the same time a very low opinion of himself and his deservings, and justly, for his consciousness had dwindled into little more than a live thirst. he did not do well for himself, neither did men praise him; and he shamefully neglected his child; but in one respect, and that a most important one, he did well by his neighbours: he gave the best of work, and made the lowest of charges. in no other way was he for much good. and yet i would rather be that drunken cobbler than many a "fair professor," as bunyan calls him. a grasping merchant ranks infinitely lower than such a drunken cobbler. thank god, the son of man is the judge, and to him will we plead the cause of such--yea, and of worse than they--for he will do right. it may be well for drunkards that they are social outcasts, but is there no intercession to be made for them--no excuse to be pleaded? alas! the poor wretches would storm the kingdom of peace by the inspiration of the enemy. let us try to understand george galbraith. his very existence the sense of a sunless, dreary, cold-winded desert, he was evermore confronted, in all his resolves after betterment, by the knowledge that with the first eager mouthful of the strange element, a rosy dawn would begin to flush the sky, a mist of green to cover the arid waste, a wind of song to ripple the air, and at length the misery of the day would vanish utterly, and the night throb with dreams. for george was by nature no common man. at heart he was a poet--weak enough, but capable of endless delight. the time had been when now and then he read a good book and dreamed noble dreams. even yet the stuff of which such dreams are made, fluttered in particoloured rags about his life; and colour is colour even on a scarecrow. he had had a good mother, and his father was a man of some character, both intellectually and socially. now and then, it is too true, he had terrible bouts of drinking; but all the time between he was perfectly sober. he had given his son more than a fair education; and george, for his part, had trotted through the curriculum of elphinstone college not altogether without distinction. but beyond this his father had entirely neglected his future, not even revealing to him the fact--of which, indeed, he was himself but dimly aware--that from wilful oversight on his part and design on that of others, his property had all but entirely slipped from his possession. while his father was yet alive, george married the daughter of a small laird in a neighbouring county--a woman of some education, and great natural refinement. he took her home to the ancient family house in the city--the same in which he now occupied a garret, and under whose outer stair he now cobbled shoes. there, during his father's life, they lived in peace and tolerable comfort, though in a poor enough way. it was all, even then, that the wife could do to make both ends meet; nor would her relations, whom she had grievously offended by her marriage, afford her the smallest assistance. even then, too, her husband was on the slippery incline; but as long as she lived she managed to keep him within the bounds of what is called respectability. she died, however, soon after gibbie was born; and then george began to lose himself altogether. the next year his father died, and creditors appeared who claimed everything. mortgaged land and houses, with all upon and in them, were sold, and george left without a penny or any means of winning a livelihood, while already he had lost the reputation that might have introduced him to employment. for heavy work he was altogether unfit; and had it not been for a bottle companion--a merry, hard-drinking shoemaker--he would have died of starvation or sunk into beggary. this man taught him his trade, and george was glad enough to work at it, both to deaden the stings of conscience and memory, and to procure the means of deadening them still further. but even here was something in the way of improvement, for hitherto he had applied himself to nothing, his being one of those dreamful natures capable of busy exertion for a time, but ready to collapse into disgust with every kind of effort. how gibbie had got thus far alive was a puzzle not a creature could have solved. it must have been by charity and ministration of more than one humble woman, but no one now claimed any particular interest in him--except mrs. croale, and hers was not very tender. it was a sad sight to some eyes to see him roving the streets, but an infinitely sadder sight was his father, even when bent over his work, with his hands and arms and knees going as if for very salvation. what thoughts might then be visiting his poor worn-out brain i cannot tell; but he looked the pale picture of misery. doing his best to restore to service the nearly shapeless boots of carter or beggar, he was himself fast losing the very idea of his making, consumed heart and soul with a hellish thirst. for the thirst of the drunkard is even more of the soul than of the body. when the poor fellow sat with his drinking companions in mistress croale's parlour, seldom a flash broke from the reverie in which he seemed sunk, to show in what region of fancy his spirit wandered, or to lighten the dulness that would not unfrequently invade that forecourt of hell. for even the damned must at times become aware of what they are, and then surely a terrible though momentary hush must fall upon the forsaken region. yet those drinking companions would have missed george galbraith, silent as he was, and but poorly responsive to the wit and humour of the rest; for he was always courteous, always ready to share what he had, never looking beyond the present tumbler--altogether a genial, kindly, honest nature. sometimes, when two or three of them happened to meet elsewhere, they would fall to wondering why the silent man sought their company, seeing he both contributed so little to the hilarity of the evening, and seemed to derive so little enjoyment from it. but i believe their company was necessary as well as the drink to enable him to elude his conscience and feast with his imagination. was it that he knew they also fought misery by investments in her bonds--that they also were of those who by beelzebub would cast out beelzebub--therefore felt at home, and with his own? chapter iii. mistress croale. the house at which they met had yet not a little character remaining. mistress croale had come in for a derived worthiness, in the memory, yet lingering about the place, of a worthy aunt deceased, and always encouraged in herself a vague idea of obligation to live up to it. hence she had made it a rule to supply drink only so long as her customers kept decent--that is, so long as they did not quarrel aloud, and put her in danger of a visit from the police; tell such tales as offended her modesty; utter oaths of any peculiarly atrocious quality; or defame the sabbath day, the kirk, or the bible. on these terms, and so long as they paid for what they had, they might get as drunk as they pleased, without the smallest offence to mistress croale. but if the least unquestionable infringement of her rules occurred, she would pounce upon the shameless one with sudden and sharp reproof. i doubt not that, so doing, she cherished a hope of recommending herself above, and making deposits in view of a coming balance-sheet. the result for this life so far was, that, by these claims to respectability, she had gathered a clientele of douce, well-disposed drunkards, who rarely gave her any trouble so long as they were in the house though sometimes she had reason to be anxious about the fate of individuals of them after they left it. another peculiarity in her government was that she would rarely give drink to a woman. "na, na," she would say, "what has a wuman to dee wi' strong drink! lat the men dee as they like, we canna help them." she made exception in behalf of her personal friends; and, for herself, was in the way of sipping--only sipping, privately, on account of her "trouble," she said--by which she meant some complaint, speaking of it as if it were generally known, although of the nature of it nobody had an idea. the truth was that, like her customers, she also was going down the hill, justifying to herself every step of her descent. until lately, she had been in the way of going regularly to church, and she did go occasionally yet, and always took the yearly sacrament; but the only result seemed to be that she abounded the more in finding justifications, or, where they were not to be had, excuses, for all she did. probably the stirring of her conscience made this the more necessary to her peace. if the lord were to appear in person amongst us, how much would the sight of him do for the sinners of our day? i am not sure that many like mistress croale would not go to him. she was not a bad woman, but slowly and surely growing worse. that morning, as soon as the customer whose entrance had withdrawn her from her descent on gibbie, had gulped down his dram, wiped his mouth with his blue cotton handkerchief, settled his face into the expression of a drink of water, gone demurely out, and crossed to the other side of the street, she would have returned to the charge, but was prevented by the immediately following entrance of the rev. clement sclater--the minister of her parish, recently appointed. he was a man between young and middle-aged, an honest fellow, zealous to perform the duties of his office, but with notions of religion very beggarly. how could it be otherwise when he knew far more of what he called the divine decrees than he did of his own heart, or the needs and miseries of human nature? at the moment, mistress croale was standing with her back to the door, reaching up to replace the black bottle on its shelf, and did not see the man she heard enter. "what's yer wull?" she said indifferently. mr. sclater made no answer, waiting for her to turn and face him, which she did the sooner for his silence. then she saw a man unknown to her, evidently, from his white neckcloth and funereal garments, a minister, standing solemn, with wide-spread legs, and round eyes of displeasure, expecting her attention. "what's yer wull, sir?" she repeated, with more respect, but less cordiality than at first. "if you ask my will," he replied, with some pomposity, for who that has just gained an object of ambition can be humble?--"it is that you shut up this whisky shop, and betake yourself to a more decent way of life in my parish." "my certie! but ye're no blate (over-modest) to craw sae lood i' my hoose, an' that's a nearer fit nor a perris!" she cried, flaring up in wrath both at the nature and rudeness of the address. "alloo me to tell ye, sir, ye're the first 'at ever daured threep my hoose was no a dacent ane." "i said nothing about your house. it was your shop i spoke of," said the minister, not guiltless of subterfuge. "an' what's my chop but my hoose? haith! my hoose wad be o' fell sma' consideration wantin' the chop. tak ye heed o' beirin' fause witness, sir." "i said nothing, and know nothing, against yours more than any other shop for the sale of drink in my parish." "the lord's my shepherd! wad ye even (compare) my hoose to jock thamson's or jeemie deuk's, baith i' this perris?" "my good woman,--" "naither better nor waur nor my neepers," interrupted mistress croale, forgetting what she had just implied: "a body maun live." "there are limits even to that most generally accepted of all principles," returned mr. sclater; "and i give you fair warning that i mean to do what i can to shut up all such houses as yours in my parish. i tell you of it, not from the least hope that you will anticipate me by closing, but merely that no one may say i did anything in an underhand fashion." the calmness with which he uttered the threat alarmed mistress croale. he might rouse unmerited suspicion, and cause her much trouble by vexatious complaint, even to the peril of her license. she must take heed, and not irritate her enemy. instantly, therefore, she changed her tone to one of expostulation. "it's a sair peety, doobtless," she said, "'at there sud be sae mony drouthie thrapples i' the kingdom, sir; but drouth maun drink, an' ye ken, sir, gien it war hauden frae them, they wad but see deils an' cut their throts." "they're like to see deils ony gait er' lang," retorted the minister, relapsing into the vernacular for a moment. "ow, deed maybe, sir! but e'en the deils themsels war justifeed i' their objection to bein' committed to their ain company afore their time." mr. sclater could not help smiling at the woman's readiness, and that was a point gained by her. an acquaintance with scripture goes far with a scotch ecclesiastic. besides, the man had a redeeming sense of humour, though he did not know how to prize it, not believing it a gift of god. "it's true, my woman," he answered. "ay! it said something for them, deils 'at they war, 'at they preferred the swine. but even the swine cudna bide them!" encouraged by the condescension of the remark, but disinclined to follow the path of reflection it indicated, mistress croale ventured a little farther upon her own. "ye see, sir," she said, "as lang's there's whusky, it wull tak the throt-ro'd. it's the naitral w'y o' 't, ye see, to rin doon, an' it's no mainner o' use gangin' again natur. sae, allooin' the thing maun be, ye'll hae till alloo likewise, an' it's a trouth i'm tellin' ye, sir, 'at it's o' nae sma' consequence to the toon 'at the drucken craturs sud fill themsels wi' dacency--an' that's what i see till. gang na to the magistrate, sir; but as sune's ye hae gotten testimony--guid testimony though, sir--'at there's been disorder or immorawlity i' my hoose, come ye to me, an' i'll gie ye my han' to paper on't this meenute, 'at i'll gie up my chop, an' lea' yer perris--an' may ye sune get a better i' my place. sir, i'm like a mither to the puir bodies! an' gin ye drive them to jock thamson's, or jeemie deuk's, it'll be just like--savin' the word, i dinna inten' 't for sweirin', guid kens!--i say it'll just be dammin' them afore their time, like the puir deils. hech! but it'll come sune eneuch, an' they're muckle to be peetied!" "and when those victims of your vile ministrations," said the clergyman, again mounting his wooden horse, and setting it rocking, "find themselves where there will be no whisky to refresh them, where do you think you will be, mistress croale?" "whaur the lord wulls," answered the woman. "whaur that may be, i confess i'm whiles laith to think. only gien i was you, maister sclater, i wad think twise afore i made ill waur." "but hear me, mistress croale: it's not your besotted customers only i have to care for. your soul is as precious in my sight as any of which i shall have to render an account." "as mistress bonniman's, for enstance?" suggested mrs. croale, interrogatively, and with just the least trace of pawkiness in the tone. the city, large as it was, was yet not large enough to prevent a portion of the private affairs of individuals from coming to be treated as public property, and mrs. bonniman was a handsome and rich young widow, the rumour of whose acceptableness to mr. sclater had reached mistress croale's ear before ever she had seen the minister himself. an unmistakable shadow of confusion crossed his countenance; whereupon with consideration both for herself and him, the woman made haste to go on, as if she had but chosen her instance at merest random. "na, na, sir! what my sowl may be in the eyes o' my maker, i hae ill tellin'," she said, "but dinna ye threip upo' me 'at it's o' the same vailue i' your eyes as the sowl o' sic a fine bonny, winsome leddy as yon. in trouth," she added, and shook her head mournfully, "i haena had sae mony preevileeges; an' maybe it'll be seen till, an' me passed ower a wheen easier nor some fowk." "i wouldn't have you build too much upon that, mistress croale," said mr. sclater, glad to follow the talk down another turning, but considerably more afraid of rousing the woman than he had been before. the remark drove her behind the categorical stockade of her religious merits. "i pey my w'y," she said, with modest firmness. "i put my penny, and whiles my saxpence, intil the plate at the door when i gang to the kirk--an' i was jist thinkin' i wad win there the morn's nicht at farest, whan i turnt an' saw ye stan'in there, sir; an' little i thoucht--but that's neither here nor there, i'm thinkin'. i tell as feow lees as i can; i never sweir, nor tak the name o' the lord in vain, anger me 'at likes; i sell naething but the best whusky; i never hae but broth to my denner upo' the lord's day, an' broth canna brak the sawbath, simmerin' awa' upo' the bar o' the grate, an' haudin' no lass frae the kirk; i confess, gien ye wull be speirin', 'at i dinna read my buik sae aften as maybe i sud; but, 'deed, sir, tho' i says't 'at sud haud my tongue, ye hae waur folk i' yer perris nor benjie croale's widow; an' gien ye wunna hae a drap to weet yer ain whustle for the holy wark ye hae afore ye the morn's mornin', i maun gang an' mak my bed, for the lass is laid up wi' a bealt thoom, an' i maunna lat a' thing gang to dirt an' green bree; though i'm sure it's rale kin' o' ye to come to luik efter me, an' that's mair nor maister rennie, honest gentleman, ever did me the fawvour o', a' the time he ministered the perris. i haena an ill name wi' them 'at kens me, sir; that i can say wi' a clean conscience; an' ye may ken me weel gien ye wull. an' there's jist ae thing mair, sir: i gie ye my bible-word, 'at never, gien i saw sign o' repentance or turnin' upo' ane o' them 'at pits their legs 'aneth my table--wad ye luik intil the parlour, sir? no!--as i was sayin', never did i, sin' i keepit hoose, an' never wad i set mysel' to quench the smokin' flax; i wad hae no man's deith, sowl or body, lie at my door." "well, well, mistress croale," said the minister, somewhat dazed by the cataract he had brought upon his brain, and rather perplexed what to say in reply with any hope of reaching her, "i don't doubt a word of what you tell me; but you know works cannot save us; our best righteousness is but as filthy rags." "it's weel i ken that, mr. sclater. an' i'm sure i'll be glaid to see ye, sir, ony time ye wad dee me the fawvour to luik in as ye're passin' by. it'll be none to yer shame, sir, for mine's an honest hoose." "i'll do that, mistress croale," answered the minister, glad to escape. "but mind," he added, "i don't give up my point for all that; and i hope you will think over what i have been saying to you--and that seriously." with these words he left the shop rather hurriedly, in evident dread of a reply. mistress croale turned to the shelves behind her, took again the bottle she had replaced, poured out a large half-glass of whisky, and tossed it off. she had been compelled to think and talk of things unpleasant, and it had put her, as she said, a' in a trim'le. she was but one of the many who get the fuel of their life in at the wrong door, their comfort from the world-side of the universe. i cannot tell whether mr. sclater or she was the farther from the central heat. the woman had the advantage in this, that she had to expend all her force on mere self-justification, and had no energy left for vain-glory. it was with a sad sigh she set about the work of the house. nor would it have comforted her much to assure her that hers was a better defence than any distiller in the country could make. even the whisky itself gave her little relief; it seemed to scald both stomach and conscience, and she vowed never to take it again. but alas! this time is never the time for self-denial; it is always the next time. abstinence is so much more pleasant to contemplate upon the other side of indulgence! yet the struggles after betterment that many a drunkard has made in vain, would, had his aim been high enough, have saved his soul from death, and turned the charnel of his life into a temple. abject as he is, foiled and despised, such a one may not yet be half so contemptible as many a so-counted respectable member of society, who looks down on him from a height too lofty even for scorn. it is not the first and the last only, of whom many will have to change places; but those as well that come everywhere between. chapter iv. the parlour. the day went on, and went out, its short autumnal brightness quenched in a chilly fog. all along the widdiehill, the gas was alight in the low-browed dingy shops. to the well-to-do citizen hastening home to the topmost business of the day, his dinner, these looked the abodes of unlovely poverty and mean struggle. even to those behind their counters, in their back parlours, and in their rooms above, everything about them looked common, to most of them, save the owners, wearisome. but to yon pale-faced student, gliding in the glow of his red gown, through the grey mist back to his lodging, and peeping in at every open door as he passes, they are so full of mystery, that gladly would he yield all he has gathered from books, for one genuine glance of insight into the vital movement of the hearts and households of which those open shops are the sole outward and visible signs. each house is to him a nest of human birds, over which brood the eternal wings of love and purpose. only such different birds are hatched from the same nest! and what a nest was then the city itself!--with its university, its schools, its churches, its hospitals, its missions; its homes, its lodging-houses, its hotels, its drinking shops, its houses viler still; its factories, its ships, its great steamers; and the same humanity busy in all!--here the sickly lady walking in the panoply of love unharmed through the horrors of vicious suffering; there the strong mother cursing her own child along half a street with an intensity and vileness of execration unheard elsewhere! the will of the brooding spirit must be a grand one, indeed, to enclose so much of what cannot be its will, and turn all to its purpose of eternal good! our knowledge of humanity, how much more our knowledge of the father of it, is moving as yet but in the first elements. in his shed under the stair it had been dark for some time--too dark for work, that is, and george galbraith had lighted a candle: he never felt at liberty to leave off so long as a man was recognizable in the street by daylight. but now at last, with a sigh of relief, he rose. the hour of his redemption was come, the moment of it at hand. outwardly calm, he was within eager as a lover to reach lucky croale's back parlour. his hand trembled with expectation as he laid from it the awl, took from between his knees the great boot on the toe of which he had been stitching a patch, lifted the yoke of his leather apron over his head, and threw it aside. with one hasty glance around, as if he feared some enemy lurking near to prevent his escape, he caught up a hat which looked as if it had been brushed with grease, pulled it on his head with both hands, stepped out quickly, closed the door behind him, turned the key, left it in the lock, and made straight for his earthly paradise--but with chastened step. all mistress croale's customers made a point of looking decent in the street--strove, in their very consciousness, to carry the expression of being on their way to their tea, not their toddy--or if their toddy, then not that they desired it, but merely that it was their custom always of an afternoon: man had no choice--he must fill space, he must occupy himself; and if so, why not mistress croale's the place, and the consumption of whisky the occupation? but alas for their would-be seeming indifference! everybody in the lane, almost in the widdiehill, knew every one of them, and knew him for what he was; knew that every drop of toddy he drank was to him as to a miser his counted sovereign; knew that, as the hart for the water-brooks, so thirsted his soul ever after another tumbler; that he made haste to swallow the last drops of the present, that he might behold the plenitude of the next steaming before him; that, like the miser, he always understated the amount of the treasure he had secured, because the less he acknowledged, the more he thought he could claim. george was a tall man, of good figure, loosened and bowed. his face was well favoured, but not a little wronged by the beard and dirt of a week, through which it gloomed haggard and white. beneath his projecting black brows, his eyes gleamed doubtful, as a wood-fire where white ash dims the glow. he looked neither to right nor left, but walked on with moveless dull gaze, noting nothing. "yon's his ain warst enemy," said the kindly grocer-wife, as he passed her door. "ay," responded her customer, who kept a shop near by for old furniture, or anything that had been already once possessed--"ay, i daursay. but eh! to see that puir negleckit bairn o' his rin scoorin' aboot the toon yon gait--wi' little o' a jacket but the collar, an' naething o' the breeks but the doup--eh, wuman! it maks a mither's hert sair to luik upo' 't. it's a providence 'at his mither's weel awa' an' canna see't; it wad gar her turn in her grave." george was the first arrival at mistress croale's that night. he opened the door of the shop like a thief, and glided softly into the dim parlour, where the candles were not yet lit. there was light enough, however, from the busy little fire in the grate to show the clean sanded floor which it crossed with flickering shadows, the coloured prints and cases of stuffed birds on the walls, the full-rigged barque suspended from the centre of the ceiling, and, chief of all shows of heaven or earth, the black bottle on the table, with the tumblers, each holding its ladle, and its wine glass turned bottom upwards. nor must i omit a part without which the rest could not have been a whole--the kettle of water that sat on the hob, softly crooning. compared with the place where george had been at work all day, this was indeed an earthly paradise. nor was the presence and appearance of mistress croale an insignificant element in the paradisial character of the place. she was now in a clean white cap with blue ribbons. her hair was neatly divided, and drawn back from her forehead. every trace of dirt and untidiness had disappeared from her person, which was one of importance both in size and in bearing. she wore a gown of some dark stuff with bright flowers on it, and a black silk apron. her face was composed, almost to sadness, and throughout the evening, during which she waited in person upon her customers, she comported herself with such dignity, that her slow step and stately carriage seemed rather to belong to the assistant at some religious ceremony than to one who ministered at the orgies of a few drunken tradespeople. she was seated on the horsehair sofa in the fire-twilight, waiting for customers, when the face of galbraith came peering round the door-cheek. "come awa' ben," she said, hospitably, and rose. but as she did so, she added with a little change of tone, "but i'm thinkin' ye maun hae forgotten, sir george. this is setterday nicht, ye ken; an' gien it war to be sunday mornin' afore ye wan to yer bed, it wadna be the first time, an' ye michtna be up ear eneuch to get yersel shaved afore kirk time." she knew as well as george himself that never by any chance did he go to church; but it was her custom, as i fancy it is that of some other bulwarks of society and pillars of the church, "for the sake of example," i presume, to make not unfrequent allusion to certain observances, moral, religious, or sanatory as if they were laws that everybody kept. galbraith lifted his hand, black, and embossed with cobbler's wax, and rubbed it thoughtfully over his chin: he accepted the fiction offered him; it was but the well-known prologue to a hebdomadal passage between them. what if he did not intend going to church the next day? was that any reason why he should not look a little tidier when his hard week's-work was over, and his nightly habit was turned into the comparatively harmless indulgence of a saturday, in sure hope of the day of rest behind. "troth, i didna min' 'at it was setterday," he answered. "i wuss i had pitten on a clean sark, an' washen my face. but i s' jist gang ower to the barber's an' get a scrape, an' maybe some o' them 'ill be here or i come back." mistress croale knew perfectly that there was no clean shirt in george's garret. she knew also that the shirt he then wore, which probably, in consideration of her maid's festered hand, she would wash for him herself, was one of her late husband's which she had given him. but george's speech was one of those forms of sound words held fast by all who frequented mistress croale's parlour, and by herself estimated at more than their worth. the woman had a genuine regard for galbraith. neither the character nor fate of one of the rest gave her a moment's trouble; but in her secret mind she deplored that george should drink so inordinately, and so utterly neglect his child as to let him spend his life in the streets. she comforted herself, however, with the reflection, that seeing he would drink, he drank with no bad companions--drank at all events where what natural wickedness might be in them, was suppressed by the sternness of her rule. were he to leave her fold--for a fold in very truth, and not a sty, it appeared to her--and wander away to jock thamson's or jeemie deuk's, he would be drawn into loud and indecorous talk, probably into quarrel and uproar. in a few minutes george returned, an odd contrast visible between the upper and lower halves of his face. hearing his approach she met him at the door. "noo, sir george," she said, "jist gang up to my room an' hae a wash, an' pit on the sark ye'll see lyin' upo' the bed; syne come doon an' hae yer tum'ler comfortable." george's whole soul was bent upon his drink, but he obeyed as if she had been twice his mother. by the time he had finished his toilet, the usual company was assembled, and he appeared amongst them in all the respectability of a clean shirt and what purity besides the general adhesiveness of his trade-material would yield to a single ablution long delayed. they welcomed him all, with nod, or grin, or merry word, in individual fashion, as each sat measuring out his whisky, or pounding at the slow-dissolving sugar, or tasting the mixture with critical soul seated between tongue and palate. the conversation was for some time very dull, with a strong tendency to the censorious. for in their circle, not only were the claims of respectability silently admitted, but the conduct of this and that man of their acquaintance, or of public note, was pronounced upon with understood reference to those claims--now with smile of incredulity or pity, now with headshake regretful or condemnatory--and this all the time that each was doing his best to reduce himself to a condition in which the word conduct could no longer have meaning in reference to him. all of them, as did their hostess, addressed galbraith as sir george, and he accepted the title with a certain unassuming dignity. for, if it was not universally known in the city, it was known to the best lawyers in it, that he was a baronet by direct derivation from the hand of king james the sixth. the fire burned cheerfully, and the kettle making many journeys between it and the table, things gradually grew more lively. stories were told, often without any point, but not therefore without effect; reminiscences, sorely pulpy and broken at the edges, were offered and accepted with a laughter in which sober ears might have detected a strangely alien sound; and adventures were related in which truth was no necessary element to reception. in the case of the postman, for instance, who had been dismissed for losing a bag of letters the week before, not one of those present believed a word he said; yet as he happened to be endowed with a small stock of genuine humour, his stories were regarded with much the same favour as if they had been authentic. but the revival scarcely reached sir george. he said little or nothing, but, between his slow gulps of toddy, sat looking vacantly into his glass. it is true he smiled absently now and then when the others laughed, but that was only for manners. doubtless he was seeing somewhere the saddest of all visions--the things that might have been. the wretched craving of the lower organs stilled, and something spared for his brain, i believe the chief joy his drink gave him lay in the power once more to feel himself a gentleman. the washed hands, the shaven face, the clean shirt, had something to do with it, no doubt, but the necromantic whisky had far more. what faded ghosts of ancestral dignity and worth and story the evil potion called up in the mind of sir george!--who himself hung ready to fall, the last, or all but the last, mildewed fruit of the tree of galbraith! ah! if this one and that of his ancestors had but lived to his conscience, and with some thought of those that were to come after him, he would not have transmitted to poor sir george, in horrible addition to moral weakness, that physical proclivity which had now grown to such a hideous craving. to the miserable wretch himself it seemed that he could no more keep from drinking whisky than he could from breathing air. chapter v. gibbie's calling. i am not sure that his father's neglect was not on the whole better for gibbie than would have been the kindness of such a father persistently embodying itself. but the picture of sir george, by the help of whisky and the mild hatching oven of mistress croale's parlour, softly breaking from the shell of the cobbler, and floating a mild gentleman in the air of his lukewarm imagination, and poor wee gibbie trotting outside in the frosty dark of the autumn night, through which the moon keeps staring down, vague and disconsolate, is hardly therefore the less pathetic. under the window of the parlour where the light of revel shone radiant through a red curtain, he would stand listening for a moment, then, darting off a few yards suddenly and swiftly like a scared bird, fall at once into his own steady trot--up the lane and down, till he reached the window again, where again he would stand and listen. whether he made this departure and return twenty or a hundred times in a night, he nor any one else could have told. sometimes he would for a change extend his trot along the widdiehill, sometimes along the parallel vennel, but never far from jink lane and its glowing window. never moth haunted lamp so persistently. ever as he ran, up this pavement and down that, on the soft-sounding soles of his bare feet, the smile on the boy's face grew more and more sleepy, but still he smiled and still he trotted, still paused at the window, and still started afresh. he was not so much to be pitied as my reader may think. never in his life had he yet pitied himself. the thought of hardship or wrong had not occurred to him. it would have been difficult--impossible, i believe--to get the idea into his head that existence bore to him any other shape than it ought. things were with him as they had always been, and whence was he to take a fresh start, and question what had been from the beginning? had any authority interfered, with a decree that gibbie should no more scour the midnight streets, no more pass and repass that far-shining splendour of red, then indeed would bitter, though inarticulate, complaint have burst from his bosom. but there was no evil power to issue such a command, and gibbie's peace was not invaded. it was now late, and those streets were empty; neither carriage nor cart, wheelbarrow nor truck, went any more bumping and clattering over their stones. they were well lighted with gas, but most of the bordering houses were dark. now and then a single foot-farer passed with loud, hollow-sounding boots along the pavement; or two girls would come laughing along, their merriment echoing rude in the wide stillness. a cold wind, a small, forsaken, solitary wind, moist with a thin fog, seemed, as well as wee gibbie, to be roaming the night, for it met him at various corners, and from all directions. but it had nothing to do, and nowhere to go, and there it was not like gibbie, the business of whose life was even now upon him, the mightiest hope of whose conscious being was now awake. all he expected, or ever desired to discover, by listening at the window, was simply whether there were yet signs of the company's breaking up; and his conclusions on that point were never mistaken: how he arrived at them it would be hard to say. seldom had he there heard the voice of his father, still seldomer anything beyond its tone. this night, however, as the time drew near when they must go, lest the sabbath should be broken in mistress croale's decent house, and gibbie stood once more on tiptoe, with his head just on the level of the windowsill, he heard his father utter two words: "up daurside" came to him through the window, in the voice he loved, plain and distinct. the words conveyed to him nothing at all; the mere hearing of them made them memorable. for the time, however, he forgot them, for, by indications best known to himself, he perceived that the company was on the point of separating, and from that moment did not take his eyes off the door until he heard the first sounds of its opening. as, however, it was always hard for gibbie to stand still, and especially hard on a midnight so cold that his feet threatened to grow indistinguishable from the slabs of the pavement, he was driven, in order not to lose sight of it, to practise the art, already cultivated by him to a crab-like perfection, of running first backwards, then forwards with scarcely superior speed. but it was not long ere the much expected sound of mistress croale's voice heralded the hour for patience to blossom into possession. the voice was neither loud nor harsh, but clear and firm; the noise that followed was both loud and strident. voices had a part in it, but the movement of chairs and feet and the sudden contact of different portions of the body with walls and tables, had a larger. the guests were obeying the voice of their hostess all in one like a flock of sheep, but it was poor shepherd-work to turn them out of the fold at midnight. gibbie bounded up and stood still as a statue at the very door-cheek, until he heard mistress croale's hand upon the lock, when he bolted, trembling with eagerness, into the entry of a court a few houses nearer to the widdiehill. one after one the pitiable company issued from its paradise, and each stumbled away, too far gone for leave-taking. most of them passed gibbie where he stood, but he took no heed; his father was always the last--and the least capable. but, often as he left her door, never did it close behind him until with her own eyes mistress croale had seen gibbie dart like an imp out of the court--to take him in charge, and, all the weary way home, hover, not very like a guardian angel, but not the less one in truth, around the unstable equilibrium of his father's tall and swaying form. and thereupon commenced a series of marvellous gymnastics on the part of wee gibbie. imagine a small boy with a gigantic top, which, six times his own size, he keeps erect on its peg, not by whipping it round, but by running round it himself, unfailingly applying, at the very spot and at the very moment, the precise measure of impact necessary to counterbalance its perpetual tendency to fall in one direction or another, so that the two have all the air of a single invention--such an invention as one might meet with in an ancient clock, contrived when men had time to mingle play with earnest--and you will have in your mind's eye a real likeness of sir george attended, any midnight in the week, by his son gilbert. home the big one staggered, reeled, gyrated, and tumbled; round and round him went the little one, now behind, now before, now on this side, now on that, his feet never more than touching the ground but dancing about like those of a prize-fighter, his little arms up and his hands well forward, like flying buttresses. and such indeed they were--buttresses which flew and flew all about a universally leaning tower. they propped it here, they propped it there; with wonderful judgment and skill and graduation of force they applied themselves, and with perfect success. not once, for the last year and a half, during which time wee gibbie had been the nightly guide of sir george's homeward steps, had the self-disabled mass fallen prostrate in the gutter, there to snore out the night. the first special difficulty, that of turning the corner of jink lane and the widdiehill, successfully overcome, the twain went reeling and revolving along the street, much like a whirlwind that had half forgotten the laws of gyration, until at length it spun into the court, and up to the foot of the outside stair over the baronet's workshop. then commenced the real struggle of the evening for gibbie--and for his father too, though the latter was aware of it only in the momentary and evanescent flashes of such enlightenment as made him just capable of yielding to the pushes and pulls of the former. all up the outside and the two inside stairs, his waking and sleeping were as the alternate tictac of a pendulum; but gibbie stuck to his business like a man, and his resolution and perseverance were at length, as always, crowned with victory. the house in which lords and ladies had often reposed was now filled with very humble folk, who were all asleep when gibbie and his father entered; but the noise they made in ascending caused no great disturbance of their rest; for, if any of them were roused for a moment, it was but to recognize at once the cause of the tumult, and with the remark, "it's only wee gibbie luggin' hame sir george," to turn on the other side and fall asleep again. arrived at last at the garret door, which stood wide open, gibbie had small need of light in the nearly pitch darkness of the place, for there was positively nothing to stumble over or against between the door and the ancient four-post bed, which was all of his father's house that remained to sir george. with heavy shuffling feet the drunkard lumbered laboriously bedward; and the bare posts and crazy frame groaned and creaked as he fell upon the oat-chaff that lay waiting him in place of the vanished luxury of feathers. wee gibbie flew at his legs, nor rested until, the one after the other, he had got them on the bed; if then they were not very comfortably deposited, he knew that, in his first turn, their owner would get them all right. and now rose the culmen of gibbie's day! its cycle, rounded through regions of banishment, returned to its nodus of bliss. in triumph he spread over his sleeping father his dead mother's old plaid of gordon tartan, all the bedding they had, and without a moment's further delay--no shoes even to put off--crept under it, and nestled close upon the bosom of his unconscious parent. a victory more! another day ended with success! his father safe, and all his own! the canopy of the darkness and the plaid over them, as if they were the one only two in the universe! his father unable to leave him--his for whole dark hours to come! it was gibbie's paradise now! his heaven was his father's bosom, to which he clung as no infant yet ever clung to his mother's. he never thought to pity himself that the embrace was all on his side, that no answering pressure came back from the prostrate form. he never said to himself, "my father is a drunkard, but i must make the best of it; he is all i have!" he clung to his one possession--only clung: this was his father--all in all to him. what must be the bliss of such a heart--of any heart, when it comes to know that there is a father of fathers, yea, a father of fatherhood! a father who never slumbers nor sleeps, but holds all the sleeping in his ever waking bosom--a bosom whose wakefulness is the sole fountain of their slumber! the conscious bliss of the child was of short duration, for in a few minutes he was fast asleep; but for the gain of those few minutes only, the day had been well spent. chapter vi. a sunday at home. such were the events of every night, and such had they been since gibbie first assumed this office of guardian--a time so long in proportion to his life that it seemed to him as one of the laws of existence that fathers got drunk and gibbies took care of them. but saturday night was always one of special bliss; for then the joy to come spread its arms beneath and around the present delight: all sunday his father would be his. on that happiest day of all the week, he never set his foot out of doors, except to run twice to mistress croale's, once to fetch the dinner which she supplied from her own table, and for which sir george regularly paid in advance on saturday before commencing his potations. but indeed the streets were not attractive to the child on sundays: there were no shops open, and the people in their sunday clothes, many of them with their faces studiously settled into masks intended to express righteousness, were far less interesting, because less alive, than the same people in their work-day attire, in their shops, or seated at their stalls, or driving their carts, and looking thoroughly human. as to going to church himself, such an idea had never entered his head. he had not once for a moment imagined that anybody would like him to go to church, that such as he ever went to church, that church was at all a place to which gibbies with fathers to look after should have any desire to go. as to what church going meant, he had not the vaguest idea; it had not even waked the glimmer of a question in his mind. all he knew was that people went to church on sundays. it was another of the laws of existence, the reason of which he knew no more than why his father went every night to jink lane and got drunk. george, however, although he had taught his son nothing, was not without religion, and had notions of duty in respect of the sabbath. not even with the prize of whisky in view, would he have consented to earn a sovereign on that day by the lightest of work. gibbie was awake some time before his father, and lay revelling in love's bliss of proximity. at length sir george, the merest bubble of nature, awoke, and pushed him from him. the child got up at once, but only to stand by the bed-side. he said no word, did not even think an impatient thought, yet his father seemed to feel that he was waiting for him. after two or three huge yawns, he spread out his arms, but, unable to stretch himself, yawned again, rolled himself off the bed, and crept feebly across the room to an empty chest that stood under the skylight. there he seated himself, and for half an hour sat motionless, a perfect type of dilapidation, moral and physical, while a little way off stood gibbie, looking on, like one awaiting a resurrection. at length he seemed to come to himself--the expected sign of which was that he reached down his hand towards the meeting of roof and floor, and took up a tiny last with a half-made boot upon it. at sight of it in his father's hands, gibbie clapped his with delight--an old delight, renewed every sunday since he could remember. that boot was for him! and this being the second, the pair would be finished before night! by slow degrees of revival, with many pauses between, george got to work. he wanted no breakfast, and made no inquiry of gibbie whether he had had any. but what cared gibbie about breakfast! with his father all to himself, and that father working away at a new boot for him--for him who had never had a pair of any sort upon his feet since the woollen ones he wore in his mother's lap, breakfast or no breakfast was much the same to him. it could never have occurred to him that it was his father's part to provide him with breakfast. if he was to have none, it was sunday that was to blame: there was no use in going to look for any when the shops were all shut, and everybody either at church, or closed in domestic penetralia, or out for a walk. more than contented, therefore, while busily his father wedded welt and sole with stitches infrangible, gibbie sat on the floor, preparing waxed ends, carefully sticking in the hog's bristle, and rolling the combination, with quite professional aptitude, between the flat of his hand and what of trouser-leg he had left, gazing eagerly between at the advancing masterpiece. occasionally the triumph of expectation would exceed his control, when he would spring from the floor, and caper and strut about like a pigeon--soft as a shadow, for he knew his father could not bear noise in the morning--or behind his back execute a pantomimic dumb show of delight, in which he seemed with difficulty to restrain himself from jumping upon him, and hugging him in his ecstasy. oh, best of parents! working thus even on a sunday for his gibbie, when everybody else was at church enjoying himself! but gibbie never dared hug his father except when he was drunk--why, he could hardly have told. relieved by his dumb show, he would return, quite as an aged grimalkin, and again deposit himself on the floor near his father where he could see his busy hands. all this time sir george never spoke a word. incredible as it may seem, however, he was continually, off and on, trying his hardest to think of some sunday lesson to give his child. many of those that knew the boy, regarded him as a sort of idiot, drawing the conclusion from gibbie's practical honesty and his too evident love for his kind: it was incredible that a child should be poor, unselfish, loving, and not deficient in intellect! his father knew him better, yet he often quieted his conscience in regard to his education, with the reflection that not much could be done for him. still, every now and then he would think perhaps he ought to do something: who could tell but the child might be damned for not understanding the plan of salvation? and brooding over the matter this morning, as well as his headache would permit, he came to the resolution, as he had often done before, to buy a shorter catechism; the boy could not learn it, but he would keep reading it to him, and something might stick. even now perhaps he could begin the course by recalling some of the questions and answers that had been the plague of his life every saturday at school. he set his recollection to work, therefore, in the lumber-room of his memory, and again and again sent it back to the task, but could find nothing belonging to the catechism except the first question with its answer, and a few incoherent fragments of others. moreover, he found his mind so confused and incapable of continuous or concentrated effort, that he could not even keep "man's chief end" and the rosined end between his fingers from twisting up together in the most extraordinary manner. yet if the child but "had the question," he might get some good of it. the hour might come when he would say, "my father taught me that!"--who could tell? and he knew he had the words correct, wherever he had dropped their meaning. for the sake of gibbie's immortal part, therefore, he would repeat the answer to that first, most momentous of questions, over and over as he worked, in the hope of insinuating something--he could not say what--into the small mental pocket of the innocent. the first, therefore, and almost the only words which gibbie heard from his father's lips that morning, were these, dozens of times repeated--"man's chief end is to glorify god, and to enjoy him for ever." but so far was gibbie from perceiving in them any meaning, that even with his father's pronunciation of chief end as chifenn, they roused in his mind no sense or suspicion of obscurity. the word stuck there, notwithstanding; but gibbie was years a man before he found out what a chifenn was. where was the great matter? how many who have learned their catechism and deplore the ignorance of others, make the least effort to place their chief end even in the direction of that of their creation? is it not the constant thwarting of their aims, the rendering of their desires futile, and their ends a mockery, that alone prevents them and their lives from proving an absolute failure? sir george, with his inveterate, consuming thirst for whisky, was but the type of all who would gain their bliss after the scheme of their own fancies, instead of the scheme of their existence; who would build their house after their own childish wilfulness instead of the ground-plan of their being. how was sir george to glorify the god whom he could honestly thank for nothing but whisky, the sole of his gifts that he prized? over and over that day he repeated the words, "man's chief end is to glorify god, and to enjoy him for ever," and all the time his imagination, his desire, his hope, were centred on the bottle, which with his very back he felt where it stood behind him, away on the floor at the head of his bed. nevertheless when he had gone over them a score of times or so, and gibbie had begun, by a merry look and nodding of his head, to manifest that he knew what was coming next, the father felt more content with himself than for years past; and when he was satisfied that gibbie knew all the words, though, indeed, they were hardly more than sounds to him, he sent him, with a great sense of relief, to fetch the broth and beef and potatoes from mistress croale's. eating a real dinner in his father's house, though without a table to set it upon, gibbie felt himself a most privileged person. the only thing that troubled him was that his father ate so little. not until the twilight began to show did sir george really begin to revive, but the darker it grew without, the brighter his spirit burned. for, amongst not a few others, there was this strange remnant of righteousness in the man, that he never would taste drink before it was dark in winter, or in summer before the regular hour for ceasing work had arrived; and to this rule he kept, and that under far greater difficulties, on the sunday as well. for mistress croale would not sell a drop of drink, not even on the sly, on the sabbath-day: she would fain have some stake in the hidden kingdom; and george, who had not a sunday stomach he could assume for the day any more than a sunday coat, was thereby driven to provide his whisky and that day drink it at home; when, with the bottle so near him, and the sense that he had not to go out to find his relief, his resolution was indeed sorely tried; but he felt that to yield would be to cut his last cable and be swept on the lee-shore of utter ruin. breathless with eager interest, gibbie watched his father's hands, and just as the darkness closed in, the boot was finished. his father rose, and gibbie, glowing with delight, sprang upon the seat he had left, while his father knelt upon the floor to try upon the unaccustomed foot the result from which he had just drawn the last. ah, pity! pity! but even gibbie might by this time have learned to foresee it! three times already had the same thing happened: the boot would not go on the foot. the real cause of the failure it were useless to inquire. sir george said that, sunday being the only day he could give to the boots, before he could finish them, gibbie's feet had always outgrown the measure. but it may be sir george was not so good a maker as cobbler. that he meant honestly by the boy i am sure, and not the less sure for the confession i am forced to make, that on each occasion when he thus failed to fit him, he sold the boots the next day at a fair price to a ready-made shop, and drank the proceeds. a stranger thing still was, that, although gibbie had never yet worn boot or shoe, his father's conscience was greatly relieved by the knowledge that he spent his sundays in making boots for him. had he been an ordinary child, and given him trouble, he would possibly have hated him; as it was, he had a great though sadly inoperative affection for the boy, which was an endless good to them both. after many bootless trials, bootless the feet must remain, and george, laying the failure down in despair, rose from his knees, and left gibbie seated on the chest more like a king discrowned, than a beggar unshod. and like a king the little beggar bore his pain. he heaved one sigh, and a slow moisture gathered in his eyes, but it did not overflow. one minute only he sat and hugged his desolation--then, missing his father, jumped off the box to find him. he sat on the edge of the bed, looking infinitely more disconsolate than gibbie felt, his head and hands hanging down, a picture of utter dejection. gibbie bounded to him, climbed on the bed, and nearly strangled him in the sharp embrace of his little arms. sir george took him on his knees and kissed him, and the tears rose in his dull eyes. he got up with him, carried him to the box, placed him on it once more, and fetched a piece of brown paper from under the bed. from this he tore carefully several slips, with which he then proceeded to take a most thoughtful measurement of the baffling foot. he was far more to be pitied than gibbie, who would not have worn the boots an hour had they been the best fit in shoedom. the soles of his feet were very nearly equal in resistance to leather, and at least until the snow and hard frost came, he was better without boots. but now the darkness had fallen, and his joy was at the door. but he was always too much ashamed to begin to drink before the child: he hated to uncork the bottle before him. what followed was in regular sunday routine. "gang ower to mistress croale's, gibbie," he said, "wi' my compliments." away ran gibbie, nothing loath, and at his knock was admitted. mistress croale sat in the parlour, taking her tea, and expecting him. she was always kind to the child. she could not help feeling that no small part of what ought to be spent on him came to her; and on sundays, therefore, partly for his sake, partly for her own, she always gave him his tea--nominally tea, really blue city-milk--with as much dry bread as he could eat, and a bit of buttered toast from her plate to finish off with. as he ate, he stood at the other side of the table; he looked so miserable in her eyes that, even before her servant, she was ashamed to have him sit with her; but gibbie was quite content, never thought of sitting, and ate in gladness, every now and then looking up with loving, grateful eyes, which must have gone right to the woman's heart, had it not been for a vague sense she had of being all the time his enemy--and that although she spent much time in persuading herself that she did her best both for his father and him. when he returned, greatly refreshed, and the boots all but forgotten, he found his father, as he knew he would, already started on the business of the evening. he had drawn the chest, the only seat in the room, to the side of the bed, against which he leaned his back. a penny candle was burning in a stone blacking bottle on the chimney piece, and on the floor beside the chest stood the bottle of whisky, a jug of water, a stoneware mug, and a wineglass. there was no fire and no kettle, whence his drinking was sad, as became the scotch sabbath in distinction from the jewish. there, however, was the drink, and thereby his soul could live--yea, expand her mouldy wings! gibbie was far from shocked; it was all right, all in the order of things, and he went up to his father with radiant countenance. sir george put forth his hands and took him between his knees. an evil wind now swelled his sails, but the cargo of the crazy human hull was not therefore evil. "gibbie," he said, solemnly, "never ye drink a drap o' whusky. never ye rax oot the han' to the boatle. never ye drink anything but watter, caller watter, my man." as he said the words, he stretched out his own hand to the mug, lifted it to his lips, and swallowed a great gulp. "dinna do't, i tell ye, gibbie," he repeated. gibbie shook his head with positive repudiation. "that's richt, my man," responded his father with satisfaction. "gien ever i see ye pree (taste) the boatle, i'll warstle frae my grave an' fleg ye oot o' the sma' wuts ye hae, my man." here followed another gulp from the mug. the threat had conveyed nothing to gibbie. even had he understood, it would have carried anything but terror to his father-worshipping heart. "gibbie," resumed sir george, after a brief pause, "div ye ken what fowk'll ca' ye whan i'm deid?" gibbie again shook his head--with expression this time of mere ignorance. "they'll ca' ye sir gibbie galbraith, my man," said his father, "an' richtly, for it'll be no nickname, though some may lauch 'cause yer father was a sutor, an' mair 'at, for a' that, ye haena a shee to yer fut yersel', puir fallow! heedna ye what they say, gibbie. min' 'at ye're sir gibbie, an' hae the honour o' the faimily to haud up, my man--an' that ye can not dee an' drink. this cursit drink's been the ruin o' a' the galbraiths as far back as i ken. 'maist the only thing i can min' o' my gran'father--a big bonny man, wi' lang white hair--twise as big's me, gibbie--is seein' him deid drunk i' the gutter o' the pump. he drank 'maist a' thing there was, gibbie--lan's an' lordship, till there was hardly an accre left upo' haill daurside to come to my father--'maist naething but a wheen sma' hooses. he was a guid man, my father; but his father learnt him to drink afore he was 'maist oot o' 's coaties, an' gae him nae schuilin'; an' gien he red himsel' o' a' 'at was left, it was sma' won'er--only, ye see, gibbie, what was to come o' me? i pit it till ye, gibbie--what was to come o' me?--gien a kin' neiper, 'at kent what it was to drink, an' sae had a fallow-feelin', hadna ta'en an' learnt me my trade, the lord kens what wad hae come o' you an' me, gibbie, my man!--gang to yer bed, noo, an' lea' me to my ain thouchts; no' 'at they're aye the best o' company, laddie.--but whiles they're no that ill," he concluded, with a weak smile, as some reflex of himself not quite unsatisfactory gloomed faintly in the besmeared mirror of his uncertain consciousness. gibbie obeyed, and getting under the gordon tartan, lay and looked out, like a weasel from its hole, at his father's back. for half an hour or so sir george went on drinking. all at once he started to his feet, and turning towards the bed a white face distorted with agony, kneeled down on the box and groaned out: "o god, the pains o' hell hae gotten haud upo' me. o lord, i'm i' the grup o' sawtan. the deevil o' drink has me by the hause. i doobt, o lord, ye're gauin' to damn me dreidfu'. what guid that'll do ye, o lord, i dinna ken, but i doobtna ye'll dee what's richt, only i wuss i hed never crossed ye i' yer wull. i kenna what i'm to dee, or what's to be deene wi' me, or whaur ony help's to come frae. i hae tried an' tried to maister the drink, but i was aye whumled. for ye see, lord, kennin' a' thing as ye dee, 'at until i hae a drap i' my skin, i canna even think; i canna min' the sangs i used to sing, or the prayers my mither learnt me sittin' upo' her lap. till i hae swallowed a mou'fu' or twa, things luik sae awfu'-like 'at i'm fit to cut my thro't; an' syne ance i'm begun, there's nae mair thoucht o' endeevourin' to behaud (withhold) till i canna drink a drap mair. o god, what garred ye mak things 'at wad mak whusky, whan ye kenned it wad mak sic a beast o' me?" he paused, stretched down his hand to the floor, lifted the mug, and drank a huge mouthful; then with a cough that sounded apologetic, set it down, and recommenced: "o lord, i doobt there's nae houp for me, for the verra river o' the watter o' life wadna be guid to me wantin' a drap frae the boatle intil 't. it's the w'y wi' a' hiz 'at drinks. it's no 'at we're drunkards, lord--ow na! it's no that, lord; it's only 'at we canna dee wantin' the drink. we're sair drinkers, i maun confess, but no jist drunkards, lord. i'm no drunk the noo; i ken what i'm sayin', an' it's sair trowth, but i cudna hae prayt a word to yer lordship gien i hadna had a jooggy or twa first. o lord, deliver me frae the pooer o' sawtan.--o lord! o lord! i canna help mysel'. dinna sen' me to the ill place. ye loot the deils gang intil the swine, lat me tee." with this frightful petition, his utterance began to grow indistinct. then he fell forward upon the bed, groaning, and his voice died gradually away. gibbie had listened to all he said, but the awe of hearing his father talk to one unseen, made his soul very still, and when he ceased he fell asleep. alas for the human soul inhabiting a drink-fouled brain! it is a human soul still, and wretched in the midst of all that whisky can do for it. from the pit of hell it cries out. so long as there is that which can sin, it is a man. and the prayer of misery carries its own justification, when the sober petitions of the self-righteous and the unkind are rejected. he who forgives not is not forgiven, and the prayer of the pharisee is as the weary beating of the surf of hell, while the cry of a soul out of its fire sets the heart-strings of love trembling. there are sins which men must leave behind them, and sins which they must carry with them. society scouts the drunkard because he is loathsome, and it matters nothing whether society be right or wrong, while it cherishes in its very bosom vices which are, to the god-born thing we call the soul, yet worse poisons. drunkards and sinners, hard as it may be for them to enter into the kingdom of heaven, must yet be easier to save than the man whose position, reputation, money, engross his heart and his care, who seeks the praise of men and not the praise of god. when i am more of a christian, i shall have learnt to be sorrier for the man whose end is money or social standing than for the drunkard. but now my heart, recoiling from the one, is sore for the other--for the agony, the helplessness, the degradation, the nightmare struggle, the wrongs and cruelties committed, the duties neglected, the sickening ruin of mind and heart. so often, too, the drunkard is originally a style of man immeasurably nobler than the money-maker! compare a coleridge, samuel taylor or hartley, with--no; that man has not yet passed to his account. god has in his universe furnaces for the refining of gold, as well as for the burning of chaff and tares and fruitless branches; and, however they may have offended, it is the elder brother who is the judge of all the younger ones. gibbie slept some time. when he woke, it was pitch dark, and he was not lying on his father's bosom, he felt about with his hands till he found his father's head. then he got up and tried to rouse him, and failing to get him on to the bed. but in that too he was sadly unsuccessful: what with the darkness and the weight of him, the result of the boy's best endeavour was, that sir george half slipped, half rolled down upon the box, and from that to the floor. assured then of his own helplessness, wee gibbie dragged the miserable bolster from the bed, and got it under his father's head; then covered him with the plaid, and creeping under it, laid himself on his father's bosom, where soon he slept again. he woke very cold, and getting up, turned heels-over-head several times to warm himself, but quietly, for his father was still asleep. the room was no longer dark, for the moon was shining through the skylight. when he had got himself a little warmer, he turned to have a look at his father. the pale light shone full upon his face, and it was that, gibbie thought, which made him look so strange. he darted to him, and stared aghast: he had never seen him look like that before, even when most drunk! he threw himself upon him: his face was dreadfully cold. he pulled and shook him in fear--he could not have told of what, but he would not wake. he was gone to see what god could do for him there, for whom nothing more could be done here. but gibbie did not know anything about death, and went on trying to wake him. at last he observed that, although his mouth was wide open, the breath did not come from it. thereupon his heart began to fail him. but when he lifted an eyelid, and saw what was under it, the house rang with the despairing shriek of the little orphan. chapter vii. the town-sparrow. "this, too, will pass," is a persian word: i should like it better if it were "this, too, shall pass." gibbie's agony passed, for god is not the god of the dead but of the living. through the immortal essence in him, life became again life, and he ran about the streets as before. some may think that wee sir gibbie--as many now called him, some knowing the truth, and others in kindly mockery--would get on all the better for the loss of such a father; but it was not so. in his father he had lost his paradise, and was now a creature expelled. he was not so much to be pitied as many a child dismissed by sudden decree from a home to a school; but the streets and the people and the shops, the horses and the dogs, even the penny-loaves though he was hungry, had lost half their precious delight, when his father was no longer in the accessible background, the heart of the blissful city. as to food and clothing, he did neither much better nor any worse than before: people were kind as usual, and kindness was to gibbie the very milk of mother nature. whose the hand that proffered it, or what the form it took, he cared no more than a stray kitten cares whether the milk set down to it be in a blue saucer or a white. but he always made the right return. the first thing a kindness deserves is acceptance, the next is transmission: gibbie gave both, without thinking much about either. for he never had taken, and indeed never learned to take, a thought about what he should eat or what he should drink, or wherewithal he should be clothed--a fault rendering him, in the eyes of the economist of this world, utterly unworthy of a place in it. there is a world, however, and one pretty closely mixed up with this, though it never shows itself to one who has no place in it, the birds of whose air have neither storehouse nor barn, but are just such thoughtless cherubs--thoughtless for themselves, that is--as wee sir gibbie. it would be useless to attempt convincing the mere economist that this great city was a little better, a little happier, a little merrier, for the presence in it of the child, because he would not, even if convinced of the fact, recognize the gain; but i venture the assertion to him, that the conduct of not one of its inhabitants was the worse for the example of gibbie's apparent idleness; and that not one of the poor women who now and then presented the small baronet with a penny, or a bit of bread, or a scrap of meat, or a pair of old trousers--shoes nobody gave him, and he neither desired nor needed any--ever felt the poorer for the gift, or complained that she should be so taxed. positively or negatively, then, everybody was good to him, and gibbie felt it; but what could make up for the loss of his paradise, the bosom of a father? drunken father as he was, i know of nothing that can or ought to make up for such a loss, except that which can restore it--the bosom of the father of fathers. he roamed the streets, as all his life before, the whole of the day, and part of the night; he took what was given him, and picked up what he found. there were some who would gladly have brought him within the bounds of an ordered life; he soon drove them to despair, however, for the streets had been his nursery, and nothing could keep him out of them. but the sparrow and the rook are just as respectable in reality, though not in the eyes of the hen-wife, as the egg-laying fowl, or the dirt-gobbling duck; and, however gibbie's habits might shock the ladies of mr. sclater's congregation who sought to civilize him, the boy was no more about mischief in the streets at midnight, than they were in their beds. they collected enough for his behoof to board him for a year with an old woman who kept a school, and they did get him to sleep one night in her house. but in the morning, when she would not let him run out, brought him into the school-room, her kitchen, and began to teach him to write, gibbie failed to see the good of it. he must have space, change, adventure, air, or life was not worth the name to him. above all he must see friendly faces, and that of the old dame was not such. but he desired to be friendly with her, and once, as she leaned over him, put up his hand--not a very clean one, i am bound to give her the advantage of my confessing--to stroke her cheek: she pushed him roughly away, rose in indignation upon her crutch, and lifted her cane to chastise him for the insult. a class of urchins, to gibbie's eyes at least looking unhappy, were at the moment blundering through the twenty-third psalm. ever after, even when now sir gilbert more than understood the great song, the words, "thy rod and thy staff," like the spell of a necromancer would still call up the figure of the dame irate, in her horn spectacles and her black-ribboned cap, leaning with one arm on her crutch, and with the other uplifting what was with her no mere symbol of authority. like a shell from a mortar, he departed from the house. she hobbled to the door after him, but his diminutive figure many yards away, his little bare legs misty with swiftness as he ran, was the last she ever saw of him, and her pupils had a bad time of it the rest of the day. he never even entered the street again in which she lived. thus, after one night's brief interval of respectability, he was again a rover of the city, a flitting insect that lighted here and there, and spread wings of departure the moment a fresh desire awoke. it would be difficult to say where he slept. in summer anywhere; in winter where he could find warmth. like animals better clad than he, yet like him able to endure cold, he revelled in mere heat when he could come by it. sometimes he stood at the back of a baker's oven, for he knew all the haunts of heat about the city; sometimes he buried himself in the sids (husks of oats) lying ready to feed the kiln of a meal-mill; sometimes he lay by the furnace of the steam-engine of the water-works. one man employed there, when his time was at night, always made a bed for gibbie: he had lost his own only child, and this one of nobody's was a comfort to him. even those who looked upon wandering as wicked, only scolded into the sweet upturned face, pouring gall into a cup of wine too full to receive a drop of it--and did not hand him over to the police. useless verily that would have been, for the police would as soon have thought of taking up a town sparrow as gibbie, and would only have laughed at the idea. they knew gibbie's merits better than any of those good people imagined his faults. it requires either wisdom or large experience to know that a child is not necessarily wicked even if born and brought up in a far viler entourage than was gibbie. the merits the police recognized in him were mainly two--neither of small consequence in their eyes; the first, the negative, yet more important one, that of utter harmlessness; the second, and positive one--a passion and power for rendering help, taking notable shape chiefly in two ways, upon both of which i have already more than touched. the first was the peculiar faculty now pretty generally known--his great gift, some, his great luck, others called it--for finding things lost. it was no wonder the town crier had sought his acquaintance, and when secured, had cultivated it--neither a difficult task; for the boy, ever since he could remember, had been in the habit, as often as he saw the crier, or heard his tuck of drum in the distance, of joining him and following, until he had acquainted himself with all particulars concerning everything proclaimed as missing. the moment he had mastered the facts announced, he would dart away to search, and not unfrequently to return with the thing sought. but it was not by any means only things sought that he found. he continued to come upon things of which he had no simulacrum in his phantasy. these, having no longer a father to carry them to, he now, their owners unknown, took to the crier, who always pretended to receive them with a suspicion which gibbie understood as little as the other really felt, and at once advertised them by drum and cry. what became of them after that, gibbie never knew. if they did not find their owners, neither did they find their way back to gibbie; if their owners were found, the crier never communicated with him on the subject. plainly he regarded gibbie as the favoured jackal, whose privilege it was to hunt for the crier, the royal lion of the city forest. but he spoke kindly to him, as well he might, and now and then gave him a penny. the second of the positive merits by which gibbie found acceptance in the eyes of the police, was a yet more peculiar one, growing out of his love for his father, and his experience in the exercise of that love. it was, however, unintelligible to them, and so remained, except on the theory commonly adopted with regard to gibbie, namely, that he wasna a' there. not the less was it to them a satisfactory whim of his, seeing it mitigated their trouble as guardians of the nightly peace and safety. it was indeed the main cause of his being, like themselves, so much in the street at night: seldom did gibbie seek his lair--i cannot call it couch--before the lengthening hours of the morning. if the finding of things was a gift, this other peculiarity was a passion--and a right human passion--absolutely possessing the child: it was, to play the guardian angel to drunk folk. if such a distressed human craft hove in sight, he would instantly bear down upon and hover about him, until resolved as to his real condition. if he was in such distress as to require assistance, he never left him till he saw him safe within his own door. the police asserted that wee sir gibbie not only knew every drunkard in the city, and where he lived, but where he generally got drunk as well. that one was in no danger of taking the wrong turning, upon whom gibbie was in attendance, to determine, by a shove on this side or that, the direction in which the hesitating, uncertain mass of stultified humanity was to go. he seemed a visible embodiment of that special providence which is said to watch over drunk people and children, only here a child was the guardian of the drunkard, and in this branch of his mission, was well known to all who, without qualifying themselves for coming under his cherubic cognizance, were in the habit of now and then returning home late. he was least known to those to whom he rendered most assistance. rarely had he thanks for it, never halfpence, but not unfrequently blows and abuse. for the last he cared nothing; the former, owing to his great agility, seldom visited him with any directness. a certain reporter of humorous scandal, after his third tumbler, would occasionally give a graphic description of what, coming from a supper-party, he once saw about two o'clock in the morning. in the great street of the city, he overhauled a huge galleon, which proved, he declared, to be the provost himself, not exactly water-logged, and yet not very buoyant, but carrying a good deal of sail. he might possibly have escaped very particular notice, he said, but for the assiduous attendance upon him of an absurd little cock-boat, in the person of wee gibbie--the two reminding him right ludicrously of the story of the spanish armada. round and round the bulky provost gyrated the tiny baronet, like a little hero of the ring, pitching into him, only with open-handed pushes, not with blows, now on this side and now on that--not after such fashion of sustentation as might have sufficed with a man of ordinary size, but throwing all his force now against the provost's bulging bows, now against his over-leaning quarter, encountering him now as he lurched, now as he heeled, until at length he landed him high, though certainly not dry, on the top of his own steps. the moment the butler opened the door, and the heavy hulk rolled into dock, gibbie darted off as if he had been the wicked one tormenting the righteous, and in danger of being caught by a pair of holy tongs. whether the tale was true or not, i do not know: with after-dinner humourists there is reason for caution. gibbie was not offered the post of henchman to the provost, and rarely could have had the chance of claiming salvage for so distinguished a vessel, seeing he generally cruised in waters where such craft seldom sailed. though almost nothing could now have induced him to go down jink lane, yet about the time the company at mistress croale's would be breaking up, he would on most nights be lying in wait a short distance down the widdiehill, ready to minister to that one of his father's old comrades who might prove most in need of his assistance; and if he showed him no gratitude, gibbie had not been trained in a school where he was taught to expect or even to wish for any. i could now give a whole chapter to the setting forth of the pleasures the summer brought him, city summer as it was, but i must content myself with saying that first of these, and not least, was the mere absence of the cold of the other seasons, bringing with it many privileges. he could lie down anywhere and sleep when he would; or spend, if he pleased, whole nights awake, in a churchyard, or on the deck of some vessel discharging her cargo at the quay, or running about the still, sleeping streets. thus he got to know the shapes of some of the constellations, and not a few of the aspects of the heavens. but even then he never felt alone, for he gazed at the vista from the midst of a cityful of his fellows. then there were the scents of the laylocks and the roses and the carnations and the sweet-peas, that came floating out from the gardens, contending sometimes with those of the grocers' and chemists' shops. now and then too he came in for a small feed of strawberries, which were very plentiful in their season. sitting then on a hospitable doorstep, with the feet and faces of friends passing him in both directions, and love embodied in the warmth of summer all about him, he would eat his strawberries, and inherit the earth. chapter viii. sambo. no one was so sorry for the death of sir george, or had so many kind words to say in memory of him, as mistress croale. neither was her sorrow only because she had lost so good a customer, or even because she had liked the man: i believe it was much enhanced by a vague doubt that after all she was to blame for his death. in vain she said to herself, and said truly, that it would have been far worse for him, and gibbie too, had he gone elsewhere for his drink; she could not get the account settled with her conscience. she tried to relieve herself by being kinder than before to the boy; but she was greatly hindered in this by the fact that, after his father's death, she could not get him inside her door. that his father was not there--would not be there at night, made the place dreadful to him. this addition to the trouble of mind she already had on account of the nature of her business, was the cause, i believe, why, after sir george's death, she went down the hill with accelerated speed. she sipped more frequently from her own bottle, soon came to "tasting with" her customers, and after that her descent was rapid. she no longer refused drink to women, though for a time she always gave it under protest; she winked at card-playing; she grew generally more lax in her administration; and by degrees a mist of evil fame began to gather about her house. thereupon her enemy, as she considered him, the rev. clement sclater, felt himself justified in moving more energetically for the withdrawal of her license, which, with the support of outraged neighbours, he found no difficulty in effecting. she therefore flitted to another parish, and opened a worse house in a worse region of the city--on the river-bank, namely, some little distance above the quay, not too far to be within easy range of sailors, and the people employed about the vessels loading or discharging cargo. it pretended to be only a lodging-house, and had no license for the sale of strong drink, but nevertheless, one way and another, a great deal was drunk in the house, and, as always card-playing, and sometimes worse things were going on, getting more vigorous ever as the daylight waned, frequent quarrels and occasional bloodshed was the consequence. for some time, however, nothing very serious brought the place immediately within the conscious ken of the magistrates. in the second winter after his father's death, gibbie, wandering everywhere about the city, encountered lucky croale in the neighbourhood of her new abode; down there she was mistress no longer, but, with a familiarity scarcely removed from contempt, was both mentioned and addressed as lucky croale. the repugnance which had hitherto kept gibbie from her having been altogether to her place and not to herself, he at once accompanied her home, and after that went often to the house. he was considerably surprised when first he heard words from her mouth for using which she had formerly been in the habit of severely reproving her guests; but he always took things as he found them, and when ere long he had to hear such occasionally addressed to himself, when she happened to be more out of temper than usual, he never therefore questioned her friendship. what more than anything else attracted him to her house, however, was the jolly manners and open-hearted kindness of most of the sailors who frequented it, with almost all of whom he was a favourite; and it soon came about that, when his ministrations to the incapable were over, he would spend the rest of the night more frequently there than anywhere else; until at last he gave up, in a great measure, his guardianship of the drunk in the streets for that of those who were certainly in much more danger of mishap at lucky croale's. scarcely a night passed when he was not present at one or more of the quarrels of which the place was a hot-bed; and as he never by any chance took a part, or favoured one side more than another, but confined himself to an impartial distribution of such peace-making blandishments as the ever-springing fountain of his affection took instinctive shape in, the wee baronet came to be regarded, by the better sort of the rough fellows, almost as the very identical sweet little cherub, sitting perched up aloft, whose department in the saving business of the universe it was, to take care of the life of poor jack. i do not say that he was always successful in his endeavours at atonement, but beyond a doubt lucky croale's house was a good deal less of a hell through the haunting presence of the child. he was not shocked by the things he saw, even when he liked them least. he regarded the doing of them much as he had looked upon his father's drunkenness--as a pitiful necessity that overtook men--one from which there was no escape, and which caused a great need for gibbies. evil language and coarse behaviour alike passed over him, without leaving the smallest stain upon heart or conscience, desire or will. no one could doubt it who considered the clarity of his face and eyes, in which the occasional but not frequent expression of keenness and promptitude scarcely even ruffled the prevailing look of unclouded heavenly babyhood. if any one thinks i am unfaithful to human fact, and overcharge the description of this child, i on my side doubt the extent of the experience of that man or woman. i admit the child a rarity, but a rarity in the right direction, and therefore a being with whom humanity has the greater need to be made acquainted. i admit that the best things are the commonest, but the highest types and the best combinations of them are the rarest. there is more love in the world than anything else, for instance; but the best love and the individual in whom love is supreme are the rarest of all things. that for which humanity has the strongest claim upon its workmen, is the representation of its own best; but the loudest demand of the present day is for the representation of that grade of humanity of which men see the most--that type of things which could never have been but that it might pass. the demand marks the commonness, narrowness, low-levelled satisfaction of the age. it loves its own--not that which might be, and ought to be its own--not its better self, infinitely higher than its present, for the sake of whose approach it exists. i do not think that the age is worse in this respect than those which have preceded it, but that vulgarity, and a certain vile contentment swelling to self-admiration, have become more vocal than hitherto; just as unbelief, which i think in reality less prevailing than in former ages, has become largely more articulate, and thereby more loud and peremptory. but whatever the demand of the age, i insist that that which ought to be presented to its beholding, is the common good uncommonly developed, and that not because of its rarity, but because it is truer to humanity. shall i admit those conditions, those facts, to be true exponents of humanity, which, except they be changed, purified, or abandoned, must soon cause that humanity to cease from its very name, must destroy its very being? to make the admission would be to assert that a house may be divided against itself, and yet stand. it is the noble, not the failure from the noble, that is the true human; and if i must show the failure, let it ever be with an eye to the final possible, yea, imperative, success. but in our day, a man who will accept any oddity of idiosyncratic development in manners, tastes, or habits, will refuse, not only as improbable, but as inconsistent with human nature, the representation of a man trying to be merely as noble as is absolutely essential to his being--except, indeed, he be at the same time represented as failing utterly in the attempt, and compelled to fall back upon the imperfections of humanity, and acknowledge them as its laws. its improbability, judged by the experience of most men i admit; its unreality in fact i deny; and its absolute unity with the true idea of humanity, i believe and assert. it is hardly necessary for me now to remark, seeing my narrative must already have suggested it, that what kept gibbie pure and honest was the rarely-developed, ever-active love of his kind. the human face was the one attraction to him in the universe. in deep fact, it is so to everyone; i state but the commonest reality in creation; only in gibbie the fact had come to the surface; the common thing was his in uncommon degree and potency. gibbie knew no music except the voice of man and woman; at least no other had as yet affected him. to be sure he had never heard much. drunken sea-songs he heard every night almost; and now and then on sundays he ran through a zone of psalm-singing; but neither of those could well be called music. there hung a caged bird here and there at a door in the poorer streets; but gibbie's love embraced the lower creation also, and too tenderly for the enjoyment of its melody. the human bird loved liberty too dearly to gather anything but pain from the song of the little feathered brother who had lost it, and to whom he could not minister as to the drunkard. in general he ran from the presence of such a prisoner. but sometimes he would stop and try to comfort the naked little freedom, disrobed of its space; and on one occasion was caught in the very act of delivering a canary that hung outside a little shop. any other than wee gibbie would have been heartily cuffed for the offence, but the owner of the bird only smiled at the would-be liberator, and hung the cage a couple of feet higher on the wall. with such a passion of affection, then, finding vent in constant action, is it any wonder gibbie's heart and hands should be too full for evil to occupy them even a little? one night in the spring, entering lucky croale's common room, he saw there for the first time a negro sailor, whom the rest called sambo, and was at once taken with his big, dark, radiant eyes, and his white teeth continually uncovering themselves in good-humoured smiles. sambo had left the vessel in which he had arrived, was waiting for another, and had taken up his quarters at lucky croale's. gibbie's advances he met instantly, and in a few days a strong mutual affection had sprung up between them. to gibbie sambo speedily became absolutely loving and tender, and gibbie made him full return of devotion. the negro was a man of immense muscular power, like not a few of his race, and, like most of them, not easily provoked, inheriting not a little of their hard-learned long-suffering. he bore even with those who treated him with far worse than the ordinary superciliousness of white to black; and when the rudest of city boys mocked him, only showed his teeth by way of smile. the ill-conditioned among lucky croale's customers and lodgers were constantly taking advantage of his good nature, and presuming upon his forbearance; but so long as they confined themselves to mere insolence, or even bare-faced cheating, he endured with marvellous temper. it was possible, however, to go too far even with him. one night sambo was looking on at a game of cards, in which all the rest in the room were engaged. happening to laugh at some turn it took, one of them, a malay, who was losing, was offended, and abused him. others objected to his having fun without risking money, and required him to join in the game. this for some reason or other he declined, and when the whole party at length insisted, positively refused. thereupon they all took umbrage, nor did most of them make many steps of the ascent from displeasure to indignation, wrath, revenge; and then ensued a row. gibbie had been sitting all the time on his friend's knee, every now and then stroking his black face, in which, as insult followed insult, the sunny blood kept slowly rising, making the balls of his eyes and his teeth look still whiter. at length a savage from greenock threw a tumbler at him. sambo, quick as a lizard, covered his face with his arm. the tumbler falling from it, struck gibbie on the head--not severely, but hard enough to make him utter a little cry. at that sound, the latent fierceness came wide awake in sambo. gently as a nursing mother he set gibbie down in a corner behind him, then with one rush sent every jack of the company sprawling on the floor, with the table and bottles and glasses atop of them. at the vision of their plight his good humour instantly returned, he burst into a great hearty laugh, and proceeded at once to lift the table from off them. that effected, he caught up gibbie in his arms, and carried him with him to bed. in the middle of the night gibbie half woke, and, finding himself alone, sought his father's bosom; then, in the confusion between sleeping and waking, imagined his father's death come again. presently he remembered it was in sambo's arms he fell asleep, but where he was now he could not tell: certainly he was not in bed. groping, he pushed a door, and a glimmer of light came in. he was in a closet of the room in which sambo slept--and something was to do about his bed. he rose softly and peeped out, there stood several men, and a struggle was going on--nearly noiseless. gibbie was half-dazed, and could not understand; but he had little anxiety about sambo, in whose prowess he had a triumphant confidence. suddenly came the sound of a great gush, and the group parted from the bed and vanished. gibbie darted towards it. the words, "o lord jesus!" came to his ears, and he heard no more: they were poor sambo's last in this world. the light of a street lamp fell upon the bed: the blood was welling, in great thick throbs, out of his huge black throat. they had bent his head back, and the gash gaped wide. for some moments gibbie stood in ghastly terror. no sound except a low gurgle came to his ears, and the horror of the stillness overmastered him. he never could recall what came next. when he knew himself again, he was in the street, running like the wind, he knew not whither. it was not that he dreaded any hurt to himself; horror, not fear, was behind him. his next recollection of himself was in the first of the morning, on the lofty chain-bridge over the river daur. before him lay he knew not what, only escape from what was behind. his faith in men seemed ruined. the city, his home, was frightful to him. quarrels and curses and blows he had been used to, and amidst them life could be lived. if he did not consciously weave them into his theories, he unconsciously wrapped them up in his confidence, and was at peace. but the last night had revealed something unknown before. it was as if the darkness had been cloven, and through the cleft he saw into hell. a thing had been done that could not be undone, and he thought it must be what people called murder. and sambo was such a good man! he was almost as good a man as gibbie's father, and now he would not breathe any more! was he gone where gibbie's father was gone? was it the good men that stopped breathing and grew cold? but it was those wicked men that had deaded sambo! and with that his first vague perception of evil and wrong in the world began to dawn. he lifted his head from gazing down on the dark river. a man was approaching the bridge. he came from the awful city! perhaps he wanted him! he fled along the bridge like a low-flying water-bird. if another man had appeared at the other end, he would have got through between the rods, and thrown himself into the river. but there was no one to oppose his escape; and after following the road a little way up the river, he turned aside into a thicket of shrubs on the nearly precipitous bank, and sat down to recover the breath he had lost more from dismay than exertion. the light grew. all at once he descried, far down the river, the steeples of the city. alas! alas! there lay poor black sambo, so dear to wee sir gibbie, motionless and covered with blood! he had two red mouths now, but was not able to speak a word with either! they would carry him to a churchyard and lay him in a hole to lie there for ever and ever. would all the good people be laid into holes and leave gibbie quite alone? sitting and brooding thus, he fell into a dreamy state, in which, brokenly, from here and there, pictures of his former life grew out upon his memory. suddenly, plainer than all the rest, came the last time he stood under mistress croale's window, waiting to help his father home. the same instant, back to the ear of his mind came his father's two words, as he had heard them through the window--"up daurside." "up daurside!"--here he was upon daurside--a little way up too: he would go farther up. he rose and went on, while the great river kept flowing the other way, dark and terrible, down to the very door inside which lay sambo with the huge gape in his big throat. meantime the murder came to the knowledge of the police, mistress croale herself giving the information, and all in the house were arrested. in the course of their examination, it came out that wee sir gibbie had gone to bed with the murdered man, and was now nowhere to be found. either they had murdered him too, or carried him off. the news spread, and the whole city was in commotion about his fate. it was credible enough that persons capable of committing such a crime on such an inoffensive person as the testimony showed poor sambo, would be capable also of throwing the life of a child after that of the man to protect their own. the city was searched from end to end, from side to side, and from cellar to garret. not a trace of him was to be found--but indeed gibbie had always been easier to find than to trace, for he had no belongings of any sort to betray him. no one dreamed of his having fled straight to the country, and search was confined to the city. the murderers were at length discovered, tried, and executed. they protested their innocence with regard to the child, and therein nothing appeared against them beyond the fact that he was missing. the result, so far as concerned gibbie, was, that the talk of the city, where almost everyone knew him, was turned, in his absence, upon his history; and from the confused mass of hearsay that reached him, mr. sclater set himself to discover and verify the facts. for this purpose he burrowed about in the neighbourhoods gibbie had chiefly frequented, and was so far successful as to satisfy himself that gibbie, if he was alive, was sir gilbert galbraith, baronet; but his own lawyer was able to assure him that not an inch of property remained anywhere attached to the title. there were indeed relations of the boy's mother, who were of some small consequence in a neighbouring county, also one in business in glasgow, or its neighbourhood, reported wealthy; but these had entirely disowned her because of her marriage. all mr. sclater discovered besides was, in a lumber-room next the garret in which sir george died, a box of papers--a glance at whose contents showed that they must at least prove a great deal of which he was already certain from other sources. a few of them had to do with the house in which they were found, still known as the auld hoose o' galbraith; but most of them referred to property in land, and many were of ancient date. if the property were in the hands of descendants of the original stock, the papers would be of value in their eyes; and, in any case, it would be well to see to their safety. mr. sclater therefore had the chest removed to the garret of the manse, where it stood thereafter, little regarded, but able to answer for more than itself. chapter ix. adrift. gibbie was now without a home. he had had a whole city for his dwelling, every street of which had been to him as another hall in his own house, every lane as a passage from one set of rooms to another, every court as a closet, every house as a safe, guarding the only possessions he had, the only possessions he knew how to value--his fellow-mortals, radiant with faces, and friendly with hands and tongues. great as was his delight in freedom, a delight he revelled in from morning to night, and sometimes from night to morning, he had never had a notion of it that reached beyond the city, he never longed for larger space, for wider outlook. space and outlook he had skyward--and seaward when he would, but even into these regions he had never yet desired to go. his world was the world of men; the presence of many was his greater room; his people themselves were his world. he had no idea of freedom in dissociation with human faces and voices and eyes. but now he had left all these, and as he ran from them a red pall seemed settling down behind him, wrapping up and hiding away his country, his home. for the first time in his life, the fatherless, motherless, brotherless, sisterless stray of the streets felt himself alone. the sensation was an awful one. he had lost so many, and had not one left! that gash in sambo's black throat had slain "a whole cityful." his loneliness grew upon him, until again he darted aside from the road into the bush, this time to hide from the spectre of the desert--the no man. deprived of human countenances, the face of creation was a mask without eyes, and liberty a mere negation. not that gibbie had ever thought about liberty; he had only enjoyed: not that he had ever thought about human faces; he had only loved them, and lived upon their smiles. "gibbie wadna need to gang to h'aven," said mysie, the baker's daughter, to her mother, one night, as they walked home from a merry-making. "what for that, lassie?" returned her mother. "cause he wad be meeserable whaur there was nae drunk fowk," answered mysie. and now it seemed to the poor, shocked, heart-wounded creature, as if the human face were just the one thing he could no more look upon. one haunted him, the black one, with the white, staring eyes, the mouth in its throat, and the white grinning teeth. it was a cold, fresh morning, cloudy and changeful, towards the end of april. it had rained, and would rain again; it might snow. heavy undefined clouds, with saffron breaks and borders, hung about the east, but what was going to happen there--at least he did not think; he did not know east from west, and i doubt whether, although he had often seen the sun set, he had ever seen him rise. yet even to him, city-creature as he was, it was plain something was going to happen there. and happen it did presently, and that with a splendour that for a moment blinded gibbie. for just at the horizon there was a long horizontal slip of blue sky, and through that crack the topmost arc of the rising sun shot suddenly a thousand arrows of radiance into the brain of the boy. but the too-much light scorched there a blackness instantly; and to the soul of gibbie it was the blackness of the room from which he had fled, and upon it out came the white eyeballs and the brilliant teeth of his dead sambo, and the red burst from his throat that answered the knife of the malay. he shrieked, and struck with his hands against the sun from which came the terrible vision. had he been a common child, his reason would have given way; but one result of the overflow of his love was, that he had never yet known fear for himself. his sweet confident face, innocent eyes, and caressing ways, had almost always drawn a response more or less in kind; and that certain some should not repel him, was a fuller response from them than gifts from others. except now and then, rarely, a street boy a little bigger than himself, no one had ever hurt him, and the hurt upon these occasions had not gone very deep, for the child was brave and hardy. so now it was not fear, but the loss of old confidence, a sickness coming over the heart and brain of his love, that unnerved him. it was not the horrid cruelty to his friend, and his own grievous loss thereby, but the recoil of his loving endeavour that, jarring him out of every groove of thought, every socket of habit, every joint of action, cast him from the city, and made of him a wanderer indeed, not a wanderer in a strange country, but a wanderer in a strange world. to no traveller could one land well be so different from another, as to gibbie the country was from the town. he had seen bushes and trees before, but only over garden walls, or in one or two of the churchyards. he had looked from the quay across to the bare shore on the other side, with its sandy hills, and its tall lighthouse on the top of the great rocks that bordered the sea; but, so looking, he had beheld space as one looking from this world into the face of the moon, as a child looks upon vastness and possible dangers from his nurse's arms where it cannot come near him; for houses backed the quay all along; the city was behind him, and spread forth her protecting arms. he had, once or twice, run out along the pier, which shot far into the immensity of the sea, like a causeway to another world--a stormy thread of granite, beaten upon both sides by the waves of the german ocean; but it was with the sea and not the country he then made the small acquaintance--and that not without terror. the sea was as different from the city as the air into which he had looked up at night--too different to compare against it and feel the contrast; on neither could he set foot; in neither could he be required to live and act--as now in this waste of enterable and pervious extent. its own horror drove the vision away, and gibbie saw the world again--saw, but did not love it. the sun seemed but to have looked up to mock him and go down again, for he had crossed the crack, and was behind a thick mass of cloud; a cold damp wind, spotted with sparkles of rain, blew fitfully from the east; the low bushes among which he sat, sent forth a chill sighing all about him, as they sifted the wind into sound; the smell of the damp earth was strange to him--he did not know the freshness, the new birth of which it breathed; below him the gloomy river, here deep, smooth, moody, sullen, there puckered with the grey ripples of a shallow laughter under the cold breeze, went flowing heedless to the city. there only was--or had been, friendliness, comfort, home! this was emptiness--the abode of things, not beings. yet never once did gibbie think of returning to the city. he rose and wandered up the wide road along the river bank, farther and farther from it--his only guide the words of his father, "up daurside;" his sole comfort the feeling of having once more to do with his father so long departed, some relation still with the paradise of his old world. along cultivated fields and copses on the one side, and on the other a steep descent to the river, covered here and there with trees, but mostly with rough grass and bushes and stones, he followed the king's highway. there were buttercups and plenty of daisies within his sight--primroses, too, on the slope beneath; but he did not know flowers, and his was not now the mood for discovering what they were. the exercise revived him, and he began to be hungry. but how could there be anything to eat in the desert, inhospitable succession of trees and fields and hedges, through which the road wound endlessly along, like a dead street, having neither houses nor paving stones? hunger, however, was far less enfeebling to gibbie than to one accustomed to regular meals, and he was in no anxiety about either when or what he should eat. the morning advanced, and by-and-by he began to meet a fellow-creature now and then upon the road; but at sight of everyone a feeling rose in him such as he had never had towards human being before: they seemed somehow of a different kind from those in the town, and they did not look friendly as they passed. he did not know that he presented to them a very different countenance from that which his fellow-citizens had always seen him wear; for the mingled and conflicting emotions of his spirit had sent out upon it an expression which, accompanied by the misery of his garments, might well, to the superficial or inexperienced observer, convey the idea that he was a fugitive and guilty. he was so uncomfortable at length from the way the people he met scrutinized him that, when he saw anyone coming, he would instantly turn aside and take the covert of thicket, or hedge, or stone wall, until the bearer of eyes had passed. his accustomed trot, which he kept up for several hours, made him look the more suspicious; but his feet, hardened from very infancy as they were, soon found the difference between the smooth flags and the sharp stones of the road, and before noon he was walking at quite a sober, although still active, pace. doubtless it slackened the sooner that he knew no goal, no end to his wandering. up daurside was the one vague notion he had of his calling, his destiny, and with his short, quick step, his progress was considerable; he passed house after house, farm after farm; but, never in the way of asking for anything, though as little in the way of refusing, he went nearer none of them than the road led him. besides, the houses were very unlike those in the city, and not at all attractive to him. he came at length to a field, sloping to the road, which was covered with leaves like some he had often seen in the market. they drew him; and as there was but a low and imperfect hedge between, he got over, and found it was a crop of small yellow turnips. he gathered as many as he could carry, and ate them as he went along. happily no agricultural person encountered him for some distance, though gibbie knew no special cause to congratulate himself upon that, having not the slightest conscience of offence in what he did. his notions of property were all associated with well-known visible or neighbouring owners, and in the city he would never have dreamed of touching anything that was not given him, except it lay plainly a lost thing. but here, where everything was so different, and he saw none of the signs of ownership to which he was accustomed, the idea of property did not come to him; here everything looked lost, or on the same category with the chips and parings and crusts that were thrown out in the city, and became common property. besides, the love which had hitherto rendered covetousness impossible, had here no object whose presence might have suggested a doubt, to supply in a measure the lack of knowledge; hunger, instead, was busy in his world. i trust there were few farmers along the road who would have found fault with him for taking one or two; but none, i suspect, would have liked to see him with all the turnips he could carry, eating them like a very rabbit: they were too near a city to look upon such a spectacle with indifference. gibbie made no attempt to hide his spoil; whatever could have given birth to the sense that caution would be necessary, would have prevented him from taking it. while yet busy he came upon a little girl feeding a cow by the roadside. she saw how he ate the turnips, and offered him a bit of oatmeal bannock. he received it gladly, and with beaming eyes offered her a turnip. she refused it with some indignation. gibbie, disappointed, but not ungrateful, resumed his tramp, eating his bannock. he came soon after to a little stream that ran into the great river. for a few moments he eyed it very doubtfully, thinking it must, like the kennels along the sides of the streets, be far too dirty to drink of; but the way it sparkled and sang--most unscientific reasons--soon satisfied him, and he drank and was refreshed. he had still two turnips left, but, after the bannock, he did not seem to want them, and stowed them in the ends of the sleeves of his jacket, folded back into great cuffs. all day the cold spring weather continued, with more of the past winter in it than of the coming summer. the sun would shine out for a few moments, with a grey, weary, old light, then retreat as if he had tried, but really could not. once came a slight fall of snow, which, however, melted the moment it touched the earth. the wind kept blowing cheerlessly by fits, and the world seemed growing tired of the same thing over again so often. at length the air began to grow dusk: then, first, fears of the darkness, to gibbie utterly unknown before, and only born of the preceding night, began to make him aware of their existence in the human world. they seemed to rise up from his lonely heart; they seemed to descend upon him out of the thickening air; they seemed to catch at his breath, and gather behind him as he went. but, happily, before it was quite dark, and while yet he could distinguish between objects, he came to the gate of a farmyard; it waked in him the hope of finding some place where he could sleep warmer than in the road, and he clambered over it. nearest of the buildings to the gate, stood an open shed, and he could see the shafts of carts projecting from it: perhaps in one of those carts, or under it, he might find a place that would serve him to sleep in: he did not yet know what facilities for repose the country affords. but just as he entered the shed, he spied at the farther corner of it, outside, a wooden structure, like a small house, and through the arched door of it saw the floor covered with nice-looking straw. he suspected it to be a dog's kennel; and presently the chain lying beside it, with a collar at the end, satisfied him it was. the dog was absent, and it looked altogether enticing! he crept in, got under as much of the straw as he could heap over him, and fell fast asleep. in a few minutes, as it seemed to him, he was roused by the great voice of a dog in conversation with a boy: the boy seemed, by the sound of the chain, to be fastening the collar on the dog's neck, and presently left him. the dog, which had been on the rampage the whole afternoon, immediately turned to creep in and rest till supper time, presenting to gibbie, who had drawn himself up at the back of the kennel, the intelligent countenance of a large newfoundland. now gibbie had been honoured with the acquaintance of many dogs, and the friendship of most of them, for a lover of humanity can hardly fail to be a lover of caninity. even among dogs, however, there are ungracious individuals, and gibbie had once or twice been bitten by quadrupedal worshippers of the respectable. hence, with the sight of the owner of the dwelling, it dawned upon him that he must be startled to find a stranger in his house, and might, regarding him as an intruder rather than a guest, worry him before he had time to explain himself. he darted forward therefore to get out, but had scarcely reached the door, when the dog put in his nose, ready to follow with all he was and had. gibbie, thereupon, began a loud barking, as much as to say--"here i am: please do nothing without reflection." the dog started back in extreme astonishment, his ears erect, and a keen look of question on his sagacious visage: what strange animal, speaking like, and yet so unlike, an orthodox dog, could have got into his very chamber? gibbie, amused at the dog's fright, and assured by his looks that he was both a good-natured and reasonable animal, burst into a fit of merry laughter as loud as his previous barking, and a good deal more musical. the dog evidently liked it better, and took it as a challenge to play: after a series of sharp bursts of barking, his eyes flashing straight in at the door, and his ears lifted up like two plumes on the top of them, he darted into the kennel, and began poking his nose into his visitor. gibbie fell to patting and kissing and hugging him as if he had been a human--as who can tell but he was?--glad of any companion that belonged to the region of the light; and they were friends at once. mankind had disappointed him, but here was a dog! gibbie was not the one to refuse mercies which yet he would not have been content to pray for. both were tired, however, for both had been active that day, and a few minutes of mingled wrestling and endearment, to which, perhaps, the narrowness of their play-ground gave a speedier conclusion, contented both, after which they lay side by side in peace, gibbie with his head on the dog's back, and the dog every now and then turning his head over his shoulder to lick gibbie's face. again he was waked by approaching steps, and the same moment the dog darted from under him, and with much rattle out of the kennel, in front of which he stood and whined expectant. it was not quite dark, for the clouds had drifted away, and the stars were shining, so that, when he put out his head, he was able to see the dim form of a woman setting down something before the dog--into which he instantly plunged his nose, and began gobbling. the sound stirred up all the latent hunger in gibbie, and he leaped out, eager to have a share. a large wooden bowl was on the ground, and the half of its contents of porridge and milk was already gone; for the poor dog had not yet had experience enough to be perfect in hospitality, and had forgotten his guest's wants in his own: it was plain that, if gibbie was to have any, he must lose no time in considering the means. had he had a long nose and mouth all in one like him, he would have plunged them in beside the dog's; but the flatness of his mouth causing the necessity, in the case of such an attempt, of bringing the whole of his face into contact with the food, there was not room in the dish for the two to feed together after the same fashion, so that he was driven to the sole other possible expedient, that of making a spoon of his hand. the dog neither growled nor pushed away the spoon, but instantly began to gobble twice as fast as before, and presently was licking the bottom of the dish. gibbie's hand, therefore, made but few journeys to his mouth, but what it carried him was good food--better than any he had had that day. when all was gone he crept again into the kennel; the dog followed, and soon they were both fast asleep in each other's arms and legs. gibbie woke at sunrise and went out. his host came after him, and stood wagging his tail and looking wistfully up in his face. gibbie understood him, and, as the sole return he could make for his hospitality, undid his collar. instantly he rushed off, his back going like a serpent, cleared the gate at a bound, and scouring madly across a field, vanished from his sight; whereupon gibbie too set out to continue his journey up daurside. this day was warmer; the spring had come a step nearer; the dog had been a comforter to him, and the horror had begun to assuage; he began to grow aware of the things about him, and to open his eyes to them. once he saw a primrose in a little dell, and left the road to look at it. but as he went, he set his foot in the water of a chalybeate spring, which was trickling through the grass, and dyeing the ground red about it: filled with horror he fled, and for some time dared never go near a primrose. and still upon his right hand was the great river, flowing down towards the home he had left; now through low meadows, now through upshouldered fields of wheat and oats, now through rocky heights covered with the graceful silver-barked birch, the mountain ash, and the fir. every time gibbie, having lost sight of it by some turn of the road or some interposing eminence, caught its gleam afresh, his first feeling was that it was hurrying to the city, where the dead man lay, to tell where gibbie was. why he, who had from infancy done just as he pleased, should now have begun to dread interference with his liberty, he could not himself have told. perhaps the fear was but the shadow of his new-born aversion to the place where he had seen those best-loved countenances change so suddenly and terribly--cease to smile, but not cease to stare. that second day he fared better, too, than the first; for he came on a family of mongrel gipsies, who fed him well out of their kettle, and, taken with his looks, thought to keep him for begging purposes. but now that gibbie's confidence in human nature had been so rudely shaken, he had already begun, with analysis unconscious, to read the human countenance, questioning it; and he thought he saw something that would hurt, in the eyes of two of the men and one of the women. therefore, in the middle of the night, he slipped silently out of the tent of rags, in which he had lain down with the gipsy children, and ere the mothers woke, was a mile up the river. but i must not attempt the detail of this part of his journey. it is enough that he got through it. he met with some adventures, and suffered a good deal from hunger and cold. had he not been hardy as well as fearless he must have died. but, now from this quarter, now from that, he got all that was needful for one of god's birds. once he found in a hedge the nest of an errant and secretive hen, and recognizing the eggs as food authorized by the shop windows and market of the city, soon qualified himself to have an opinion of their worth. another time he came upon a girl milking a cow in a shed, and his astonishment at the marvels of the process was such, that he forgot even the hunger that was rendering him faint. he had often seen cows in the city, but had never suspected what they were capable of. when the girl caught sight of him, staring with open mouth, she was taken with such a fit of laughter, that the cow, which was ill-tempered, kicked out, and overturned the pail. now because of her troublesomeness this cow was not milked beside the rest, and the shed where she stood was used for farm-implements only. the floor of it was the earth, beaten hard, and worn into hollows. when the milk settled in one of these, gibbie saw that it was lost to the girl, and found to him: undeterred by the astounding nature of the spring from which he had just seen it flow, he threw himself down, and drank like a calf. her laughter ended, the girl was troubled: she would be scolded for her clumsiness in allowing hawkie to kick over the pail, but the eagerness of the boy after the milk troubled her more. she told him to wait, and running to the house, returned with two large pieces of oatcake, which she gave him. thus, one way and another, food came to gibbie. drink was to be had in almost any hollow. sleep was scattered everywhere over the world. for warmth, only motion and a seasoned skin were necessary: the latter gibbie had; the former, already a habit learned in the streets, had now become almost a passion. chapter x. the barn. by this time gibbie had got well up towards the roots of the hills of gormgarnet, and the river had dwindled greatly. he was no longer afraid of it, but would lie for hours listening to its murmurs over its pebbly bed, and sometimes even sleep in the hollows of its banks, or below the willows that overhung it. every here and there, a brown rivulet from some peat-bog on a hill--brown and clear, like smoke-crystals molten together, flowed into it, and when he had lost it, guided him back to his guide. farm after farm he passed, here one widely bordering a valley stream, there another stretching its skirts up the hillsides till they were lost in mere heather, where the sheep wandered about, cropping what stray grass-blades and other eatables they could find. lower down he had passed through small towns and large villages: here farms and cottages, with an occasional country-seat and little village of low thatched houses, made up the abodes of men. by this time he had become greatly reconciled to the loneliness of nature, and no more was afraid in her solitary presence. at the same time his heart had begun to ache and long after the communion of his kind. for not once since he set out--and that seemed months where it was only weeks, had he had an opportunity of doing anything for anybody--except, indeed, unfastening the dog's collar; and not to be able to help was to gibbie like being dead. everybody, down to the dogs, had been doing for him, and what was to become of him! it was a state altogether of servitude into which he had fallen. may had now set in, but up here among the hills she was may by courtesy only: or if she was may, she would never be might. she was, indeed, only april, with her showers and sunshine, her tearful, childish laughter, and again the frown, and the despair irremediable. nay, as if she still kept up a secret correspondence with her cousin march, banished for his rudeness, she would not very seldom shake from her skirts a snow storm, and oftener the dancing hail. then out would come the sun behind her, and laugh, and say--"i could not help that; but here i am all the same, coming to you as fast as i can!" the green crops were growing darker, and the trees were all getting out their nets to catch carbon. the lambs were frolicking, and in sheltered places the flowers were turning the earth into a firmament. and now a mere daisy was enough to delight the heart of gibbie. his joy in humanity so suddenly checked, and his thirst for it left unslaked, he had begun to see the human look in the face of the commonest flowers, to love the trusting stare of the daisy, that gold-hearted boy, and the gentle despondency of the girl harebell, dreaming of her mother, the azure. the wind, of which he had scarce thought as he met it roaming the streets like himself, was now a friend of his solitude, bringing him sweet odours, alive with the souls of bees, and cooling with bliss the heat of the long walk. even when it blew cold along the waste moss, waving the heads of the cotton-grass, the only live thing visible, it was a lover, and kissed him on the forehead. not that gibbie knew what a kiss was, any more than he knew about the souls of bees. he did not remember ever having been kissed. in that granite city, the women were not much given to kissing children, even their own, but if they had been, who of them would have thought of kissing gibbie! the baker's wife, kind as she always was to him, would have thought it defilement to press her lips to those of the beggar child. and how is any child to thrive without kisses! the first caresses gibbie ever knew as such, were given him by mother nature herself. it was only, however, by degrees, though indeed rapid degrees, that he became capable of them. in the first part of his journey he was stunned, stupid, lost in change, distracted between a suddenly vanished past, and a future slow dawning in the present. he felt little beyond hunger, and that vague urging up daurside, with occasional shoots of pleasure from kindness, mostly of woman and dog. he was less shy of the country people by this time, but he did not care to seek them. he thought them not nearly so friendly and good as the town-people, forgetting that these knew him and those did not. to gibbie an introduction was the last thing necessary for any one who wore a face, and he could not understand why they looked at him so. whatever is capable of aspiring, must be troubled that it may wake and aspire--then troubled still, that it may hold fast, be itself, and aspire still. one evening his path vanished between twilight and moonrise, and just as it became dark he found himself at a rough gate, through which he saw a field. there was a pretty tall hedge on each side of the gate, and he was now a sufficiently experienced traveller to conclude that he was not far from some human abode. he climbed the gate and found himself in a field of clover. it was a splendid big bed, and even had the night not been warm, he would not have hesitated to sleep in it. he had never had a cold, and had as little fear for his health as for his life. he was hungry, it is true; but although food was doubtless more delicious to such hunger as his--that of the whole body, than it can be to the mere palate and culinary imagination of an epicure, it was not so necessary to him that he could not go to sleep without it. so down he lay in the clover, and was at once unconscious. when he woke, the moon was high in the heavens, and had melted the veil of the darkness from the scene of still, well-ordered comfort. a short distance from his couch, stood a little army of ricks, between twenty and thirty of them, constructed perfectly--smooth and upright and round and large, each with its conical top netted in with straw-rope, and finished off with what the herd-boy called a toupican--a neatly tied and trim tuft of the straw with which it was thatched, answering to the stone-ball on the top of a gable. like triangles their summits stood out against the pale blue, moon-diluted air. they were treasure-caves, hollowed out of space, and stored with the best of ammunition against the armies of hunger and want; but gibbie, though he had seen many of them, did not know what they were. he had seen straw used for the bedding of cattle and horses, and supposed that the chief end of such ricks. nor had he any clear idea that the cattle themselves were kept for any other object than to make them comfortable and happy. he had stood behind their houses in the dark, and heard them munching and grinding away even in the night. probably the country was for the cattle, as the towns for the men; and that would explain why the country-people were so inferior. while he stood gazing, a wind arose behind the hills, and came blowing down some glen that opened northwards; gibbie felt it cold, and sought the shelter of the ricks. great and solemn they looked as he drew nigh--near each other, yet enough apart for plenty of air to flow and eddy between. over a low wall of unmortared stones, he entered their ranks: above him, as he looked up from their broad base, they ascended huge as pyramids, and peopled the waste air with giant forms. how warm it was in the round-winding paths amongst the fruitful piles--tombs these, no cenotaphs! he wandered about them, now in a dusky yellow gloom, and now in the cold blue moonlight, which they seemed to warm. at length he discovered that the huge things were flanked on one side by a long low house, in which there was a door, horizontally divided into two parts. gibbie would fain have got in, to try whether the place was good for sleep; but he found both halves fast. in the lower half, however, he spied a hole, which, though not so large, reminded him of the entrance to the kennel of his dog host; but alas! it had a door too, shut from the inside. there might be some way of opening it. he felt about, and soon discovered that it was a sliding valve, which he could push to either side. it was, in fact, the cat's door, specially constructed for her convenience of entrance and exit. for the cat is the guardian of the barn; the grain which tempts the rats and mice is no temptation to her; the rats and mice themselves are; upon them she executes justice, and remains herself an incorruptible, because untempted, therefore a respectable member of the farm-community--only the dairy door must be kept shut; that has no cat-wicket in it. the hole was a small one, but tempting to the wee baronet; he might perhaps be able to squeeze himself through. he tried and succeeded, though with some little difficulty. the moon was there before him, shining through a pane or two of glass over the door, and by her light on the hard brown clay floor, gibbie saw where he was, though if he had been told he was in the barn, he would neither have felt nor been at all the wiser. it was a very old-fashioned barn. about a third of it was floored with wood--dark with age--almost as brown as the clay--for threshing upon with flails. at that labour two men had been busy during the most of the preceding day, and that was how, in the same end of the barn, rose a great heap of oat-straw, showing in the light of the moon like a mound of pale gold. had gibbie had any education in the marvellous, he might now, in the midnight and moonlight, have well imagined himself in some treasure-house of the gnomes. what he saw in the other corner was still liker gold, and was indeed greater than gold, for it was life--the heap, namely, of corn threshed from the straw: gibbie recognized this as what he had seen given to horses. but now the temptation to sleep, with such facilities presented, was overpowering, and took from him all desire to examine further: he shot into the middle of the loose heap of straw, and vanished from the glimpses of the moon, burrowing like a mole. in the heart of the golden warmth, he lay so dry and comfortable that, notwithstanding his hunger had waked with him, he was presently in a faster sleep than before. and indeed what more luxurious bed, or what bed conducive to softer slumber was there in the world to find! "the moving moon went down the sky," the cold wind softened and grew still; the stars swelled out larger; the rats came, and then came puss, and the rats went with a scuffle and patter; the pagan grey came in like a sleep-walker, and made the barn dreary as a dull dream; then the horses began to fidget with their big feet, the cattle to low with their great trombone throats, and the cocks to crow as if to give warning for the last time against the devil, the world, and the flesh; the men in the adjoining chamber woke, yawned, stretched themselves mightily, and rose; the god-like sun rose after them, and, entering the barn with them, drove out the grey; and through it all the orphan lay warm in god's keeping and his nest of straw, like the butterfly of a huge chrysalis. when at length gibbie became once more aware of existence, it was through a stormy invasion of the still realm of sleep; the blows of two flails fell persistent and quick-following, first on the thick head of the sheaf of oats untied and cast down before them, then grew louder and more deafening as the oats flew and the chaff fluttered, and the straw flattened and broke and thinned and spread--until at last they thundered in great hard blows on the wooden floor. it was the first of these last blows that shook gibbie awake. what they were or indicated he could not tell. he wormed himself softly round in the straw to look out and see. now whether it was that sleep was yet heavy upon him, and bewildered his eyes, or that his imagination had in dreams been busy with foregone horrors, i cannot tell; but, as he peered through the meshes of the crossing and blinding straws, what he seemed to see was the body of an old man with dishevelled hair, whom, prostrate on the ground, they were beating to death with great sticks. his tongue clave to the roof of his mouth, not a sound could he utter, not a finger could he move; he had no choice but to lie still, and witness the fierce enormity. but it is good that we are compelled to see some things, life amongst the rest, to what we call the end of them. by degrees gibbie's sight cleared; the old man faded away; and what was left of him he could see to be only an armful of straw. the next sheaf they threw down, he perceived, under their blows, the corn flying out of it, and began to understand a little. when it was finished, the corn that had flown dancing from its home, like hail from its cloud, was swept aside to the common heap, and the straw tossed up on the mound that harboured gibbie. it was well that the man with the pitchfork did not spy his eyes peering out from the midst of the straw: he might have taken him for some wild creature, and driven the prongs into him. as it was, gibbie did not altogether like the look of him, and lay still as a stone. then another sheaf was unbound and cast on the floor, and the blows of the flails began again. it went on thus for an hour and a half, and gibbie although he dropped asleep several times, was nearly stupid with the noise. the men at length, however, swept up the corn and tossed up the straw for the last time, and went out. gibbie, judging by his own desires, thought they must have gone to eat, but did not follow them, having generally been ordered away the moment he was seen in a farmyard. he crept out, however, and began to look about him--first of all for something he could eat. the oats looked the most likely, and he took a mouthful for a trial. he ground at them severely, but, hungry as he was, he failed to find oats good for food. their hard husks, their dryness, their instability, all slipping past each other at every attempt to crush them with his teeth, together foiled him utterly. he must search farther. looking round him afresh, he saw an open loft, and climbing on the heap in which he had slept, managed to reach it. it was at the height of the walls, and the couples of the roof rose immediately from it. at the farther end was a heap of hay, which he took for another kind of straw. then he spied something he knew; a row of cheeses lay on a shelf suspended from the rafters, ripening. gibbie knew them well from the shop windows--knew they were cheeses, and good to eat, though whence and how they came he did not know, his impression being that they grew in the fields like the turnips. he had still the notion uncorrected, that things in the country belonged to nobody in particular, and were mostly for the use of animals, with which, since he became a wanderer, he had almost come to class himself. he was very hungry. he pounced upon a cheese and lifted it between his two hands; it smelled good, but felt very hard. that was no matter: what else were teeth made strong and sharp for? he tried them on one of the round edges, and, nibbling actively, soon got through to the softer body of the cheese. but he had not got much farther when he heard the men returning, and desisted, afraid of being discovered by the noise he made. the readiest way to conceal himself was to lie down flat on the loft, and he did so just where he could see the threshing-floor over the edge of it by lifting his head. this, however, he scarcely ventured to do; and all he could see as he lay was the tip of the swing-bar of one of the flails, ever as it reached the highest point of its ascent. but to watch for it very soon ceased to be interesting; and although he had eaten so little of the cheese, it had yet been enough to make him dreadfully thirsty, therefore he greatly desired to get away. but he dared not go down: with their sticks those men might knock him over in a moment! so he lay there thinking of the poor little hedgehog he had seen on the road as he came; how he stood watching it, and wishing he had a suit made all of great pins, which he could set up when he pleased; and how the driver of a cart, catching sight of him at the foot of the hedge, gave him a blow with his whip, and, poor fellow! notwithstanding his clothes of pins, that one blow of a whip was too much for him! there seemed nothing in the world but killing! at length he could, unoccupied with something else, bear his thirst no longer, and, squirming round on the floor, crept softly towards the other end of the loft, to see what was to be seen there. he found that the heap of hay was not in the loft at all. it filled a small chamber in the stable, in fact; and when gibbie clambered upon it, what should he see below him on the other side, but a beautiful white horse, eating some of the same sort of stuff he was now lying upon! beyond he could see the backs of more horses, but they were very different--big and clumsy, and not white. they were all eating, and this was their food on which he lay! he wished he too could eat it--and tried, but found it even less satisfactory than the oats, for it nearly choked him, and set him coughing so that he was in considerable danger of betraying his presence to the men in the barn. how did the horses manage to get such dry stuff down their throats? but the cheese was dry too, and he could eat that! no doubt the cheese, as well as the fine straw, was there for the horses! he would like to see the beautiful white creature down there eat a bit of it; but with all his big teeth he did not think he could manage a whole cheese, and how to get a piece broken off for him, with those men there, he could not devise. it would want a long-handled hammer like those with which he had seen men breaking stones on the road. a door opened beyond, and a man came in and led two of the horses out, leaving the door open. gibbie clambered down from the top of the hay into the stall beside the white horse, and ran out. he was almost in the fields, had not even a fence to cross. he cast a glance around, and went straight for a neighbouring hollow, where, taught by experience, he hoped to find water. chapter xi. janet. once away, gibbie had no thought of returning. up daurside was the sole propulsive force whose existence he recognized. but when he lifted his head from drinking at the stream, which was one of some size, and, greatly refreshed, looked up its channel, a longing seized him to know whence came the water of life which had thus restored him to bliss--how a burn first appears upon the earth. he thought it might come from the foot of a great conical mountain which seemed but a little way off. he would follow it up and see. so away he went, yielding at once, as was his wont, to the first desire that came. he had not trotted far along the bank, however, before, at a sharp turn it took, he saw that its course was a much longer one than he had imagined, for it turned from the mountain, and led up among the roots of other hills; while here in front of him, direct from the mountain, as it seemed, came down a smaller stream, and tumbled noisily into this. the larger burn would lead him too far from the daur; he would follow the smaller one. he found a wide shallow place, crossed the larger, and went up the side of the smaller. doubly free after his imprisonment of the morning, gibbie sped joyously along. already nature, her largeness, her openness, her loveliness, her changefulness, her oneness in change, had begun to heal the child's heart, and comfort him in his disappointment with his kind. the stream he was now ascending ran along a claw of the mountain, which claw was covered with almost a forest of pine, protecting little colonies of less hardy timber. its heavy green was varied with the pale delicate fringes of the fresh foliage of the larches, filling the air with aromatic breath. in the midst of their soft tufts, each tuft buttoned with a brown spot, hung the rich brown knobs and tassels of last year's cones. but the trees were all on the opposite side of the stream, and appeared to be mostly on the other side of a wall. where gibbie was, the mountain-root was chiefly of rock, interspersed with heather. a little way up the stream, he came to a bridge over it, closed at the farther end by iron gates between pillars, each surmounted by a wolf's head in stone. over the gate on each side leaned a rowan-tree, with trunk and branches aged and gnarled amidst their fresh foliage. he crossed the burn to look through the gate, and pressed his face between the bars to get a better sight of a tame rabbit that had got out of its hutch. it sat, like a druid white with age, in the midst of a gravel drive, much overgrown with moss, that led through a young larch wood, with here and there an ancient tree, lonely amidst the youth of its companions. suddenly from the wood a large spaniel came bounding upon the rabbit. gibbie gave a shriek, and the rabbit made one white flash into the wood, with the dog after him. he turned away sad at heart. "ilka cratur 'at can," he said to himself, "ates ilka cratur 'at canna!" it was his first generalization, but not many years passed before he supplemented it with a conclusion: "but the man 'at wad be a man, he maunna." resuming his journey of investigation, he trotted along the bank of the burn, farther and farther up, until he could trot no more, but must go clambering over great stones, or sinking to the knees in bog, patches of it red with iron, from which he would turn away with a shudder. sometimes he walked in the water, along the bed of the burn itself; sometimes he had to scramble up its steep side, to pass one of the many little cataracts of its descent. here and there a small silver birch, or a mountain-ash, or a stunted fir-tree, looking like a wizard child, hung over the stream. its banks were mainly of rock and heather, but now and then a small patch of cultivation intervened. gibbie had no thought that he was gradually leaving the abodes of men behind him; he knew no reason why in ascending things should change, and be no longer as in plainer ways. for what he knew, there might be farm after farm, up and up for ever, to the gates of heaven. but it would no longer have troubled him greatly to leave all houses behind him for a season. a great purple foxglove could do much now--just at this phase of his story, to make him forget--not the human face divine, but the loss of it. a lark aloft in the blue, from whose heart, as from a fountain whose roots were lost in the air, its natural source, issued, not a stream, but an ever spreading lake of song, was now more to him than the memory of any human voice he had ever heard, except his father's and sambo's. but he was not yet quite out and away from the dwellings of his kind. i may as well now make the attempt to give some idea of gibbie's appearance, as he showed after so long wandering. of dress he had hardly enough left to carry the name. shoes, of course, he had none. of the shape of trousers there remained nothing, except the division before and behind in the short petticoat to which they were reduced; and those rudimentary divisions were lost in the multitude of rents of equal apparent significance. he had never, so far as he knew, had a shirt upon his body; and his sole other garment was a jacket, so much too large for him, that to retain the use of his hands he had folded back the sleeves quite to his elbows. thus reversed they became pockets, the only ones he had, and in them he stowed whatever provisions were given him of which he could not make immediate use--porridge and sowens and mashed potatoes included: they served him, in fact, like the first of the stomachs of those animals which have more than one--concerning which animals, by the way, i should much like to know what they were in "pythagoras' time." his head had plentiful protection in his own natural crop--had never either had or required any other. that would have been of the gold order, had not a great part of its colour been sunburnt, rained, and frozen out of it. all ways it pointed, as if surcharged with electric fluid, crowning him with a wildness which was in amusing contrast with the placidity of his countenance. perhaps the resulting queerness in the expression of the little vagrant, a look as if he had been hunted till his body and soul were nearly ruffled asunder, and had already parted company in aim and interest, might have been the first thing to strike a careless observer. but if the heart was not a careless one, the eye would look again and discover a stronger stillness than mere placidity--a sort of live peace abiding in that weather-beaten little face under its wild crown of human herbage. the features of it were well-shaped, and not smaller than proportioned to the small whole of his person. his eyes--partly, perhaps, because there was so little flesh upon his bones--were large, and in repose had much of a soft animal expression: there was not in them the look of you and i know. frequently, too, when occasion roused the needful instinct, they had a sharp expression of outlook and readiness, which, without a trace of fierceness or greed, was yet equally animal. only all the time there was present something else, beyond characterization: behind them something seemed to lie asleep. his hands and feet were small and childishly dainty, his whole body well-shaped and well put together--of which the style of his dress rather quashed the evidence. such was gibbie to the eye, as he rose from daurside to the last cultivated ground on the borders of the burn, and the highest dwelling on the mountain. it was the abode of a cottar, and was a dependency of the farm he had just left. the cottar was an old man of seventy; his wife was nearly sixty. they had reared stalwart sons and shapely daughters, now at service here and there in the valleys below--all ready to see god in nature, and recognize him in providence. they belong to a class now, i fear, extinct, but once, if my love prejudice not my judgment too far, the glory and strength of scotland: their little acres are now swallowed up in the larger farms. it was a very humble dwelling, built of turf upon a foundation of stones, and roofed with turf and straw--warm, and nearly impervious to the searching airs of the mountain-side. one little window of a foot and a half square looked out on the universe. at one end stood a stack of peat, half as big as the cottage itself, all around it were huge rocks, some of them peaks whose masses went down to the very central fires, others only fragments that had rolled from above. here and there a thin crop was growing in patches amongst them, the red grey stone lifting its baldness in spots numberless through the soft waving green. a few of the commonest flowers grew about the door, but there was no garden. the door-step was live rock, and a huge projecting rock behind formed the back and a portion of one of the end walls. this latter rock had been the attraction to the site, because of a hollow in it, which now served as a dairy. for up there with them lived the last cow of the valley--the cow that breathed the loftiest air on all daurside--a good cow, and gifted in feeding well upon little. facing the broad south, and leaning against the hill, as against the bosom of god, sheltering it from the north and east, the cottage looked so high-humble, so still, so confident, that it drew gibbie with the spell of heart-likeness. he knocked at the old, weather-beaten, shrunk and rent, but well patched door. a voice, alive with the soft vibrations of thought and feeling, answered, "come yer wa's in, whae'er ye be." gibbie pulled the string that came through a hole in the door, so lifting the latch, and entered. a woman sat on a creepie, her face turned over her shoulder to see who came. it was a grey face, with good simple features and clear grey eyes. the plentiful hair that grew low on her forehead, was half grey, mostly covered by a white cap with frills. a clean wrapper and apron, both of blue print, over a blue winsey petticoat, blue stockings, and strong shoes completed her dress. a book lay on her lap: always when she had finished her morning's work, and made her house tidy, she sat down to have her comfort, as she called it. the moment she saw gibbie she rose. had he been the angel gabriel, come to tell her she was wanted at the throne, her attention could not have been more immediate or thorough. she was rather a little woman, and carried herself straight and light. "eh, ye puir ootcast!" she said, in the pitying voice of a mother, "hoo cam ye here sic a hicht? cratur, ye hae left the warl' ahin' ye. what wad ye hae here? i hae naething." receiving no answer but one of the child's betwitching smiles, she stood for a moment regarding him, not in mere silence, but with a look of dumbness. she was a mother. one who is mother only to her own children is not a mother; she is only a woman who has borne children. but here was one of god's mothers. loneliness and silence, and constant homely familiarity with the vast simplicities of nature, assist much in the development of the deeper and more wonderful faculties of perception. the perceptions themselves may take this or that shape according to the education--may even embody themselves fantastically, yet be no less perceptions. now the very moment before gibbie entered, she had been reading the words of the lord: "inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me"; and with her heart full of them, she lifted her eyes and saw gibbie. for one moment, with the quick flashing response of the childlike imagination of the celt, she fancied she saw the lord himself. another woman might have made a more serious mistake, and seen there only a child. often had janet pondered, as she sat alone on the great mountain, while robert was with the sheep, or she lay awake by his side at night, with the wind howling about the cottage, whether the lord might not sometimes take a lonely walk to look after such solitary sheep of his flock as they, and let them know he had not lost sight of them, for all the ups and downs of the hills. there stood the child, and whether he was the lord or not, he was evidently hungry. ah! who could tell but the lord was actually hungry in every one of his hungering little ones! in the mean time--only it was but thought-time, not clock-time--gibbie stood motionless in the middle of the floor, smiling his innocent smile, asking for nothing, hinting at nothing, but resting his wild calm eyes, with a sense of safety and mother-presence, upon the grey thoughtful face of the gazing woman. her awe deepened; it seemed to descend upon her and fold her in as with a mantle. involuntarily she bowed her head, and stepping to him took him by the hand, and led him to the stool she had left. there she made him sit, while she brought forward her table, white with scrubbing, took from a hole in the wall and set upon it a platter of oatcakes, carried a wooden bowl to her dairy in the rock through a whitewashed door, and bringing it back filled, half with cream half with milk, set that also on the table. then she placed a chair before it, and said-- "sit ye doon, an' tak. gin ye war the lord himsel', my bonny man, an' ye may be for oucht i ken, for ye luik puir an' despised eneuch, i cud gie nae better, for it's a' i hae to offer ye--'cep it micht be an egg," she added, correcting herself, and turned and went out. presently she came back with a look of success, carrying two eggs, which, having raked out a quantity, she buried in the hot ashes of the peats, and left in front of the hearth to roast, while gibbie went on eating the thick oatcake, sweet and substantial, and drinking such milk as the wildest imagination of town-boy could never suggest. it was indeed angels' food--food such as would have pleased the lord himself after a hard day with axe and saw and plane, so good and simple and strong was it. janet resumed her seat on the low three-legged stool, and took her knitting that he might feel neither that he was watched as he ate, nor that she was waiting for him to finish. every other moment she gave a glance at the stranger she had taken in; but never a word he spoke, and the sense of mystery grew upon her. presently came a great bounce and scramble; the latch jumped up, the door flew open, and after a moment's pause, in came a sheep dog--a splendid thorough-bred collie, carrying in his mouth a tiny, long-legged lamb, which he dropped half dead in the woman's lap. it was a late lamb, born of a mother which had been sold from the hill, but had found her way back from a great distance, in order that her coming young one might have the privilege of being yeaned on the same spot where she had herself awaked to existence. another moment, and her mba-a was heard approaching the door. she trotted in, and going up to janet, stood contemplating the consequences of her maternal ambition. her udder was full, but the lamb was too weak to suck. janet rose, and going to the side of the room, opened the door of what might have seemed an old press, but was a bed. folding back the counterpane, she laid the lamb in the bed, and covered it over. then she got a caup, a wooden dish like a large saucer, and into it milked the ewe. next she carried the caup to the bed; but what means she there used to enable the lamb to drink, the boy could not see, though his busy eyes and loving heart would gladly have taken in all. in the mean time the collie, having done his duty by the lamb, and perhaps forgotten it, sat on his tail, and stared with his two brave trusting eyes at the little beggar that sat in the master's chair, and ate of the fat of the land. oscar was a gentleman, and had never gone to school, therefore neither fancied nor had been taught that rags make an essential distinction, and ought to be barked at. gibbie was a stranger, and therefore as a stranger oscar gave him welcome--now and then stooping to lick the little brown feet that had wandered so far. like all wild creatures, gibbie ate fast, and had finished everything set before him ere the woman had done feeding the lamb. without a notion of the rudeness of it, his heart full of gentle gratitude, he rose and left the cottage. when janet turned from her shepherding, there sat oscar looking up at the empty chair. "what's come o' the laddie?" she said to the dog, who answered with a low whine, half-regretful, half-interrogative. it may be he was only asking, like esau, if there was no residuum of blessing for him also; but perhaps he too was puzzled what to conclude about the boy. janet hastened to the door, but already gibbie's nimble feet refreshed to the point of every toe with the food he had just swallowed, had borne him far up the hill, behind the cottage, so that she could not get a glimpse of him. thoughtfully she returned, and thoughtfully removed the remnants of the meal. she would then have resumed her bible, but her hospitality had rendered it necessary that she should put on her girdle--not a cincture of leather upon her body, but a disc of iron on the fire, to bake thereon cakes ere her husband's return. it was a simple enough process, for the oat-meal wanted nothing but water and fire; but her joints had not yet got rid of the winter's rheumatism, and the labour of the baking was the hardest part of the sacrifice of her hospitality. to many it is easy to give what they have, but the offering of weariness and pain is never easy. they are indeed a true salt to salt sacrifices withal. that it was the last of her meal till her youngest boy should bring her a bag on his back from the mill the next saturday, made no point in her trouble. when at last she had done, and put the things away, and swept up the hearth, she milked the ewe, sent her out to nibble, took her bible, and sat down once more to read. the lamb lay at her feet, with his little head projecting from the folds of her new flannel petticoat; and every time her eye fell from the book upon the lamb, she felt as if somehow the lamb was the boy that had eaten of her bread and drunk of her milk. after she had read a while, there came a change, and the lamb seemed the lord himself, both lamb and shepherd, who had come to claim her hospitality. then, divinely invaded with the dread lest in the fancy she should forget the reality, she kneeled down and prayed to the friend of martha and mary and lazarus, to come as he had said, and sup with her indeed. not for years and years had janet been to church; she had long been unable to walk so far; and having no book but the best, and no help to understand it but the highest, her faith was simple, strong, real, all-pervading. day by day she pored over the great gospel--i mean just the good news according to matthew and mark and luke and john--until she had grown to be one of the noble ladies of the kingdom of heaven--one of those who inherit the earth, and are ripening to see god. for the master, and his mind in hers, was her teacher. she had little or no theology save what he taught her, or rather, what he is. and of any other than that, the less the better; for no theology, except the theou logos, {compilers note: spelled in greek: theta, epsilon, omicron, upsilon; lambda, omicron with stress, gamma, omicron, sigma} is worth the learning, no other being true. to know him is to know god. and he only who obeys him, does or can know him; he who obeys him cannot fail to know him. to janet, jesus christ was no object of so-called theological speculation, but a living man, who somehow or other heard her when she called to him, and sent her the help she needed. chapter xii. glashgar. up and up the hill went gibbie. the path ceased altogether; but when up is the word in one's mind--and up had grown almost a fixed idea with gibbie--he can seldom be in doubt whether he is going right, even where there is no track. indeed in all more arduous ways, men leave no track behind them, no finger-post--there is always but the steepness. he climbed and climbed. the mountain grew steeper and barer as he went, and he became absorbed in his climbing. all at once he discovered that he had lost the stream, where or when he could not tell. all below and around him was red granite rock, scattered over with the chips and splinters detached by air and wind, water and stream, light and heat and cold. glashgar was only about three thousand feet in height, but it was the steepest of its group--a huge rock that, even in the midst of masses, suggested solidity. not once while he ascended had the idea come to him that by and by he should be able to climb no farther. for aught he knew there were oat-cakes and milk and sheep and collie dogs ever higher and higher still. not until he actually stood upon the peak did he know that there was the earthly hitherto--the final obstacle of unobstancy, the everywhere which, from excess of perviousness, was to human foot impervious. the sun was about two hours towards the west, when gibbie, his little legs almost as active as ever, surmounted the final slope. running up like a child that would scale heaven he stood on the bare round, the head of the mountain, and saw, with an invading shock of amazement, and at first of disappointment, that there was no going higher: in every direction the slope was downward. he had never been on the top of anything before. he had always been in the hollows of things. now the whole world lay beneath him. it was cold; in some of the shadows lay snow--weary exile from both the sky and the sea and the ways of them--captive in the fetters of the cold--prisoner to the mountain top; but gibbie felt no cold. in a glow with the climb, which at the last had been hard, his lungs filled with the heavenly air, and his soul with the feeling that he was above everything that was, uplifted on the very crown of the earth, he stood in his rags, a fluttering scarecrow, the conqueror of height, the discoverer of immensity, the monarch of space. nobody knew of such marvel but him! gibbie had never even heard the word poetry, but none the less was he the very stuff out of which poems grow, and now all the latent poetry in him was set a swaying and heaving--an ocean inarticulate because unobstructed--a might that could make no music, no thunder of waves, because it had no shore, no rocks of thought against which to break in speech. he sat down on the topmost point; and slowly, in the silence and the loneliness, from the unknown fountains of the eternal consciousness, the heart of the child filled. above him towered infinitude, immensity, potent on his mind through shape to his eye in a soaring dome of blue--the one visible symbol informed and insouled of the eternal, to reveal itself thereby. in it, centre and life, lorded the great sun, beginning to cast shadows to the south and east from the endless heaps of the world, that lifted themselves in all directions. down their sides ran the streams, down busily, hasting away through every valley to the daur, which bore them back to the ocean-heart--through woods and meadows, park and waste, rocks and willowy marsh. behind the valleys rose mountains; and behind the mountains, other mountains, more and more, each swathed in its own mystery; and beyond all hung the curtain-depth of the sky-gulf. gibbie sat and gazed, and dreamed and gazed. the mighty city that had been to him the universe, was dropped and lost, like a thing that was now nobody's, in far indistinguishable distance; and he who had lost it had climbed upon the throne of the world. the air was still; when a breath awoke, it but touched his cheek like the down of a feather, and the stillness was there again. the stillness grew great, and slowly descended upon him. it deepened and deepened. surely it would deepen to a voice!--it was about to speak! it was as if a great single thought was the substance of the silence, and was all over and around him, and closer to him than his clothes, than his body, than his hands. i am describing the indescribable, and compelled to make it too definite for belief. in colder speech, an experience had come to the child; a link in the chain of his development glided over the windlass of his uplifting; a change passed upon him. in after years, when gibbie had the idea of god, when he had learned to think about him, to desire his presence, to believe that a will of love enveloped his will, as the brooding hen spreads her wings over her eggs--as often as the thought of god came to him, it came in the shape of the silence on the top of glashgar. as he sat, with his eyes on the peak he had just chosen from the rest as the loftiest of all within his sight, he saw a cloud begin to grow upon it. the cloud grew, and gathered, and descended, covering its sides as it went, until the whole was hidden. then swiftly, as he gazed, the cloud opened as it were a round window in the heart of it, and through that he saw the peak again. the next moment a flash of blue lightning darted across the opening, and whether gibbie really saw what follows, he never could be sure, but always after, as often as the vision returned, in the flash he saw a rock rolling down the peak. the clouds swept together, and the window closed. the next thing which in after years he remembered was, that the earth, mountains, meadows, and streams, had vanished; everything was gone from his sight, except a few yards around him of the rock upon which he sat, and the cloud that hid world and heaven. then again burst forth the lightning. he saw no flash, but an intense cloud-illumination, accompanied by the deafening crack, and followed by the appalling roar and roll of the thunder. nor was it noise alone that surrounded him, for, as if he were in the heart and nest of the storm, the very wind-waves that made the thunder rushed in driven bellowing over him, and had nearly swept him away. he clung to the rock with hands and feet. the cloud writhed and wrought and billowed and eddied, with all the shapes of the wind, and seemed itself to be the furnace-womb in which the thunder was created. was this then the voice into which the silence had been all the time deepening?--had the presence thus taken form and declared itself? gibbie had yet to learn that there is a deeper voice still into which such a silence may grow--and the silence not be broken. he was not dismayed. he had no conscience of wrong, and scarcely knew fear. it was an awful delight that filled his spirit. mount sinai was not to him a terror. to him there was no wrath in the thunder any more than in the greeting of the dog that found him in his kennel. to him there was no being in the sky so righteous as to be more displeased than pitiful over the wrongness of the children whom he had not yet got taught their childhood. gibbie sat calm, awe-ful, but, i imagine, with a clear forehead and smile-haunted mouth, while the storm roared and beat and flashed and ran about him. it was the very fountain of tempest. from the bare crest of the mountain the water poured down its sides, as if its springs were in the rock itself, and not in the bosom of the cloud above. the tumult at last seized gibbie like an intoxication; he jumped to his feet, and danced and flung his arms about, as if he himself were the storm. but the uproar did not last long. almost suddenly it was gone, as if, like a bird that had been flapping the ground in agony, it had at last recovered itself, and taken to its great wings and flown. the sun shone out clear, and in all the blue abyss not a cloud was to be seen, except far away to leeward, where one was spread like a banner in the lonely air, fleeting away, the ensign of the charging storm--bearing for its device a segment of the many-coloured bow. and now that its fierceness was over, the jubilation in the softer voices of the storm became audible. as the soul gives thanks for the sufferings that are overpast, offering the love and faith and hope which the pain has stung into fresh life, so from the sides of the mountain ascended the noise of the waters the cloud had left behind. the sun had kept on his journey; the storm had been no disaster to him; and now he was a long way down the west, and twilight, in her grey cloak, would soon be tracking him from the east, like sorrow dogging delight. gibbie, wet and cold, began to think of the cottage where he had been so kindly received, of the friendly face of its mistress, and her care of the lamb. it was not that he wanted to eat. he did not even imagine more eating, for never in his life had he eaten twice of the same charity in the same day. what he wanted was to find some dry hole in the mountain, and sleep as near the cottage as he could. so he rose and set out. but he lost his way; came upon one precipice after another, down which only a creeping thing could have gone; was repeatedly turned aside by torrents and swampy places; and when the twilight came, was still wandering upon the mountain. at length he found, as he thought, the burn along whose bank he had ascended in the morning, and followed it towards the valley, looking out for the friendly cottage. but the first indication of abode he saw, was the wall of the grounds of the house through whose gate he had looked in the morning. he was then a long way from the cottage, and not far from the farm; and the best thing he could do was to find again the barn where he had slept so well the night before. this was not very difficult even in the dusky night. he skirted the wall, came to his first guide, found and crossed the valley-stream, and descended it until he thought he recognized the slope of clover down which he had run in the morning. he ran up the brae, and there were the solemn cones of the corn-ricks between him and the sky! a minute more and he had crept through the cat-hole, and was feeling about in the dark barn. happily the heap of straw was not yet removed. gibbie shot into it like a mole, and burrowed to the very centre, there coiled himself up, and imagined himself lying in the heart of the rock on which he sat during the storm, and listening to the thunder winds over his head. the fancy enticed the sleep which before was ready enough to come, and he was soon far stiller than ariel in the cloven pine of sycorax. chapter xiii. the ceiling. he might have slept longer the next morning, for there was no threshing to wake him, in spite of the cocks in the yard that made it their business to rouse sleepers to their work, had it not been for another kind of cock inside him, which bore the same relation to food that the others bore to light. he peeped first, then crept out. all was still except the voices of those same prophet cocks, crying in the wilderness of the yet sunless world; a moo now and then from the byres; and the occasional stamp of a great hoof in the stable. gibbie clambered up into the loft, and turning the cheeses about until he came upon the one he had gnawed before, again attacked it, and enlarged considerably the hole he had already made in it. rather dangerous food it was, perhaps, eaten in that unmitigated way, for it was made of skimmed milk, and was very dry and hard; but gibbie was a powerful little animal, all bones and sinews, small hard muscle, and faultless digestion. the next idea naturally rising was the burn; he tumbled down over the straw heap to the floor of the barn, and made for the cat-hole. but the moment he put his head out, he saw the legs of a man: the farmer was walking through his ricks, speculating on the money they held. he drew back, and looked round to see where best he could betake himself should he come in. he spied thereupon a ladder leaning against the end-wall of the barn, opposite the loft and the stables, and near it in the wall a wooden shutter, like the door of a little cupboard. he got up the ladder, and opening the shutter, which was fastened only with a button, found a hole in the wall, through which popping his head too carelessly, he knocked from a shelf some piece of pottery, which fell with a great crash on a paved floor. looking after it, gibbie beheld below him a rich prospect of yellow-white pools ranged in order on shelves. they reminded him of milk, but were of a different colour. as he gazed, a door opened hastily, with sharp clicking latch, and a woman entered, ejaculating, "care what set that cat!" gibbie drew back, lest in her search for the cat she might find the culprit. she looked all round, muttering such truncated imprecations as befitted the mouth of a scotchwoman; but as none of her milk was touched, her wrath gradually abated: she picked up the fragments and withdrew. thereupon gibbie ventured to reconnoitre a little farther, and popping in his head again, saw that the dairy was open to the roof, but the door was in a partition which did not run so high. the place from which the woman entered, was ceiled, and the ceiling rested on the partition between it and the dairy; so that, from a shelf level with the hole, he could easily enough get on the top of the ceiling. this, urged by the instinct of the homeless to understand their surroundings, he presently effected, by creeping like a cat along the top shelf. the ceiling was that of the kitchen, and was merely of boards, which, being old and shrunken, had here and there a considerable crack between two, and gibbie, peeping through one after another of these cracks, soon saw several things he did not understand. of such was a barrel-churn, which he took for a barrel-organ, and welcomed as a sign of civilization. the woman was sweeping the room towards the hearth, where the peat fire was already burning, with a great pot hanging over it, covered with a wooden lid. when the water in it was hot, she poured it into a large wooden dish, in which she began to wash other dishes, thus giving the observant gibbie his first notion of housekeeping. then she scoured the deal table, dusted the bench and the chairs, arranged the dishes on shelves and rack, except a few which she placed on the table, put more water on the fire, and disappeared in the dairy. thence presently she returned, carrying a great jar, which, to gibbie's astonishment, having lifted a lid in the top of the churn, she emptied into it; he was not, therefore, any farther astonished, when she began to turn the handle vigorously, that no music issued. as to what else might be expected, gibbie had not even a mistaken idea. but the butter came quickly that morning, and then he did have another astonishment, for he saw a great mass of something half-solid tumbled out where he had seen a liquid poured in--nor that alone, for the liquid came out again too! but when at length he saw the mass, after being well washed, moulded into certain shapes, he recognized it as butter, such as he had seen in the shops, and had now and then tasted on the piece given him by some more than usually generous housekeeper. surely he had wandered into a region of plenty! only now, when he saw the woman busy and careful, the idea of things in the country being a sort of common property began to fade from his mind, and the perception to wake that they were as the things in the shops, which must not be touched without first paying money for them over a counter. the butter-making, brought to a successful close, the woman proceeded to make porridge for the men's breakfast, and with hungry eyes gibbie watched that process next. the water in the great pot boiling like a wild volcano, she took handful after handful of meal from a great wooden dish, called a bossie, and threw it into the pot, stirring as she threw, until the mess was presently so thick that she could no more move the spurtle in it; and scarcely had she emptied it into another great wooden bowl, called a bicker, when gibbie heard the heavy tramp of the men crossing the yard to consume it. for the last few minutes, gibbie's nostrils--alas! not gibbie--had been regaled with the delicious odour of the boiling meal; and now his eyes had their turn--but still, alas, not gibbie! prostrate on the ceiling he lay and watched the splendid spoonfuls tumble out of sight into the capacious throats of four men; all took their spoonfuls from the same dish, but each dipped his spoonful into his private caup of milk, ere he carried it to his mouth. a little apart sat a boy, whom the woman seemed to favour, having provided him with a plateful of porridge by himself, but the fact was, four were as many as could bicker comfortably, or with any chance of fair play. the boy's countenance greatly attracted gibbie. it was a long, solemn face, but the eyes were bright-blue and sparkling; and when he smiled, which was not very often, it was a good and meaningful smile. when the meal was over, and he saw the little that was left, with all the drops of milk from the caups, tumbled into a common receptacle, to be kept, he thought, for the next meal, poor gibbie felt very empty and forsaken. he crawled away sad at heart, with nothing before him except a drink of water at the burn. he might have gone to the door of the house, in the hope of a bit of cake, but now that he had seen something of the doings in the house and of the people who lived in it--as soon, that is, as he had looked embodied ownership in the face--he began to be aware of its claims, and the cheese he had eaten to lie heavy upon his spiritual stomach; he had done that which he would not have done before leaving the city. carefully he crept across the ceiling, his head hanging, like a dog scolded of his master, carefully along the shelf of the dairy, and through the opening in the wall, quickly down the ladder, and through the cat-hole in the barn door. there was no one in the corn-yard now, and he wandered about among the ricks looking, with little hope, for something to eat. turning a corner he came upon a hen-house--and there was a crowd of hens and half-grown chickens about the very dish into which he had seen the remnants of the breakfast thrown, all pecking billfuls out of it. as i may have said before, he always felt at liberty to share with the animals, partly, i suppose, because he saw they had no scrupulosity or ceremony amongst themselves; so he dipped his hand into the dish: why should not the bird of the air now and then peck with the more respectable of the barn-door, if only to learn his inferiority? greatly refreshed, he got up from among the hens, scrambled over the dry stone-wall, and trotted away to the burn. chapter xiv. hornie. it was now time he should resume his journey up daurside, and he set out to follow the burn that he might regain the river. it led him into a fine meadow, where a number of cattle were feeding. the meadow was not fenced--little more than marked off, indeed, upon one side, from a field of growing corn, by a low wall of earth, covered with moss and grass and flowers. the cattle were therefore herded by a boy, whom gibbie recognized even in the distance as him by whose countenance he had been so much attracted when, like an old deity on a cloud, he lay spying through the crack in the ceiling. the boy was reading a book, from which every now and then he lifted his eyes to glance around him, and see whether any of the cows or heifers or stirks were wandering beyond their pasture of rye-grass and clover. having them all before him, therefore no occasion to look behind, he did not see gibbie approaching. but as soon as he seemed thoroughly occupied, a certain black cow, with short sharp horns and a wicked look, which had been gradually, as was her wont, edging nearer and nearer to the corn, turned suddenly and ran for it, jumped the dyke, and plunging into a mad revelry of greed, tore and devoured with all the haste not merely of one insecure, but of one that knew she was stealing. now gibbie had been observant enough during his travels to learn that this was against the law and custom of the country--that it was not permitted to a cow to go into a field where there were no others--and like a shot he was after the black marauder. the same instant the herd boy too, lifting his eyes from his book, saw her, and springing to his feet, caught up his great stick, and ran also: he had more than one reason to run, for he understood only too well the dangerous temper of the cow, and saw that gibbie was a mere child, and unarmed--an object most provocative of attack to hornie--so named, indeed, because of her readiness to use the weapons with which nature had provided her. she was in fact a malicious cow, and but that she was a splendid milker, would have been long ago fatted up and sent to the butcher. the boy as he ran full speed to the rescue, kept shouting to warn gibbie from his purpose, but gibbie was too intent to understand the sounds he uttered, and supposed them addressed to the cow. with the fearless service that belonged to his very being, he ran straight at hornie, and, having nothing to strike her with, flung himself against her with a great shove towards the dyke. hornie, absorbed in her delicious robbery, neither heard nor saw before she felt him, and, startled by the sudden attack, turned tail. it was but for a moment. in turning, she caught sight of her ruler, sceptre in hand, at some little distance, and turned again, either to have another mouthful, or in the mere instinct to escape him. then she caught sight of the insignificant object that had scared her, and in contemptuous indignation lowered her head between her forefeet, and was just making a rush at gibbie, when a stone struck her on a horn, and the next moment the herd came up, and with a storm of fiercest blows, delivered with the full might of his arm, drove her in absolute rout back into the meadow. drawing himself up in the unconscious majesty of success, donal grant looked down upon gibbie, but with eyes of admiration. "haith, cratur!" he said, "ye're mair o' a man nor ye'll luik this saven year! what garred ye rin upo' the deevil's verra horns that gait?" gibbie stood smiling. "gien't hadna been for my club we wad baith be owre the mune 'gain this time. what ca' they ye, man?" still gibbie only smiled. "whaur come ye frae?--wha's yer fowk?--whaur div ye bide?--haena ye a tongue i' yer heid, ye rascal?" gibbie burst out laughing, and his eyes sparkled and shone: he was delighted with the herd-boy, and it was so long since he had heard human speech addressed to himself! "the cratur's feel (foolish)!" concluded donal to himself pityingly. "puir thing! puir thing!" he added aloud, and laid his hand on gibbie's head. it was but the second touch of kindness gibbie had received since he was the dog's guest: had he been acquainted with the bastard emotion of self-pity, he would have wept; as he was unaware of hardship in his lot, discontent in his heart, or discord in his feeling, his emotion was one of unmingled delight, and embodied itself in a perfect smile. "come, cratur, an' i'll gie ye a piece: ye'll aiblins un'erstan' that!" said donal, as he turned to leave the corn for the grass, where hornie was eating with the rest like the most innocent of hum'le (hornless) animals. gibbie obeyed, and followed, as, with slow step and downbent face, donal led the way. for he had tucked his club under his arm, and already his greedy eyes were fixed on the book he had carried all the time, nor did he take them from it until, followed in full and patient content by gibbie, he had almost reached the middle of the field, some distance from hornie and her companions, when, stopping abruptly short, he began without lifting his head to cast glances on this side and that. "i houp nane o' them's swallowed my nepkin!" he said musingly. "i'm no sure whaur i was sittin'. i hae my place i' the beuk, but i doobt i hae tint my place i' the gerse." long before he had ended, for he spoke with utter deliberation, gibbie was yards away, flitting hither and thither like a butterfly. a minute more and donal saw him pounce upon his bundle, which he brought to him in triumph. "fegs! ye're no the gowk i took ye for," said donal meditatively. whether gibbie took the remark for a compliment, or merely was gratified that donal was pleased, the result was a merry laugh. the bundle had in it a piece of hard cheese, such as gibbie had already made acquaintance with, and a few quarters of cakes. one of these donal broke in two, gave gibbie the half, replaced the other, and sat down again to his book--this time with his back against the fell-dyke dividing the grass from the corn. gibbie seated himself, like a turk, with his bare legs crossed under him, a few yards off, where, in silence and absolute content, he ate his piece, and gravely regarded him. his human soul had of late been starved, even more than his body--and that from no fastidiousness; and it was paradise again to be in such company. never since his father's death had he looked on a face that drew him as donal's. it was fair of complexion by nature, but the sun had burned it brown, and it was covered with freckles. its forehead was high, with a mass of foxy hair over it, and under it two keen hazel eyes, in which the green predominated over the brown. its nose was long and solemn, over his well-made mouth, which rarely smiled, but not unfrequently trembled with emotion--over his book. for age, donal was getting towards fifteen, and was strongly built, and well grown. a general look of honesty, and an attractive expression of reposeful friendliness pervaded his whole appearance. conscientious in regard to his work, he was yet in danger of forgetting his duty for minutes together in his book. the chief evil that resulted from it was such an occasional inroad on the corn as had that morning taken place; and many were donal's self-reproaches ere he got to sleep when that had fallen out during the day. he knew his master would threaten him with dismissal if he came upon him reading in the field, but he knew also his master was well aware that he did read, and that it was possible to read and yet herd well. it was easy enough in this same meadow: on one side ran the lorrie; on another was a stone wall; and on the third a ditch; only the cornfield lay virtually unprotected, and there he had to be himself the boundary. and now he sat leaning against the dyke, as if he held so a position of special defence; but he knew well enough that the dullest calf could outflank him, and invade, for a few moments at the least, the forbidden pleasure-ground. he had gained an ally, however, whose faculty and faithfulness he little knew yet. for gibbie had begun to comprehend the situation. he could not comprehend why or how anyone should be absorbed in a book, for all he knew of books was from his one morning of dame-schooling; but he could comprehend that, if one's attention were so occupied, it must be a great vex to be interrupted continually by the ever-waking desires of his charge after dainties. therefore, as donal watched his book, gibbie for donal's sake watched the herd, and, as he did so, gently possessed himself of donal's club. nor had many minutes passed before donal, raising his head to look, saw the curst cow again in the green corn, and gibbie manfully encountering her with the club, hitting her hard upon head and horns, and deftly avoiding every rush she made at him. "gie her't upo' the nose," donal shouted in terror, as he ran full speed to his aid, abusing hornie in terms of fiercest vituperation. but he needed not have been so apprehensive. gibbie heard and obeyed, and the next moment hornie had turned tail and was fleeing back to the safety of the lawful meadow. "hech, cratur! but ye maun be come o' fechtin' fowk!" said donal, regarding him with fresh admiration. gibbie laughed; but he had been sorely put to it, and the big drops were coursing fast down his sweet face. donal took the club from him, and rushing at hornie, belaboured her well, and drove her quite to the other side of the field. he then returned and resumed his book, while gibbie again sat down near by, and watched both donal and his charge--the keeper of both herd and cattle. surely gibbie had at last found his vocation on daurside, with both man and beast for his special care! by and by donal raised his head once more, but this time it was to regard gibbie and not the nowt. it had gradually sunk into him that the appearance and character of the cratur were peculiar. he had regarded him as a little tramp, whose people were not far off, and who would soon get tired of herding and rejoin his companions; but while he read, a strange feeling of the presence of the boy had, in spite of the witchery of his book, been growing upon him. he seemed to feel his eyes without seeing them; and when gibbie rose to look how the cattle were distributed, he became vaguely uneasy lest the boy should be going away. for already he had begun to feel him a humble kind of guardian angel. he had already that day, through him, enjoyed a longer spell of his book, than any day since he had been herd at the mains of glashruach. and now the desire had come to regard him more closely. for a minute or two he sat and gazed at him. gibbie gazed at him in return, and in his eyes the herd-boy looked the very type of power and gentleness. how he admired even his suit of small-ribbed, greenish-coloured corduroy, the ribs much rubbed and obliterated! then his jacket had round brass buttons! his trousers had patches instead of holes at the knees! their short legs revealed warm woollen stockings! and his shoes had their soles full of great broad-headed iron tacks! while on his head he had a small round blue bonnet with a red tuft! the little outcast, on the other hand, with his loving face and pure clear eyes, bidding fair to be naked altogether before long, woke in donal a divine pity, a tenderness like that nestling at the heart of womanhood. the neglected creature could surely have no mother to shield him from frost and wind and rain. but a strange thing was, that out of this pitiful tenderness seemed to grow, like its blossom, another unlike feeling--namely, that he was in the presence of a being of some order superior to his own, one to whom he would have to listen if he spoke, who knew more than he would tell. but then donal was a celt, and might be a poet, and the sweet stillness of the child's atmosphere made things bud in his imagination. my reader must think how vastly, in all his poverty, donal was gibbie's superior in the social scale. he earned his own food and shelter, and nearly four pounds a year besides; lived as well as he could wish, dressed warm, was able for his work, and imagined it no hardship. then he had a father and mother whom he went to see every saturday, and of whom he was as proud as son could be--a father who was the priest of the family, and fed sheep; a mother who was the prophetess, and kept the house ever an open refuge for her children. poor gibbie earned nothing--never had earned more than a penny at a time in his life, and had never dreamed of having a claim to such penny. nobody seemed to care for him, give him anything, do anything for him. yet there he sat before donal's eyes, full of service, of smiles, of contentment. donal took up his book, but laid it down again and gazed at gibbie. several times he tried to return to his reading, but as often resumed his contemplation of the boy. at length it struck him as something more than shyness would account for, that he had not yet heard a word from the lips of the child, even when running after the cows. he must watch him more closely. by this it was his dinner time. again he untied his handkerchief, and gave gibbie what he judged a fair share for his bulk--namely about a third of the whole. philosopher as he was, however, he could not help sighing a little when he got to the end of his diminished portion. but he was better than comforted when gibbie offered him all that yet remained to him; and the smile with which he refused it made gibbie as happy as a prince would like to be. what a day it had been for gibbie! a whole human being, and some five and twenty four-legged creatures besides, to take care of! after their dinner, donal gravitated to his book, and gibbie resumed the executive. some time had passed when donal, glancing up, saw gibbie lying flat on his chest, staring at something in the grass. he slid himself quietly nearer, and discovered it was a daisy--one by itself alone; there were not many in the field. like a mother leaning over her child, he was gazing at it. the daisy was not a cold white one, neither was it a red one; it was just a perfect daisy: it looked as if some gentle hand had taken it, while it slept and its star points were all folded together, and dipped them--just a tiny touchy dip, in a molten ruby, so that, when it opened again, there was its crown of silver pointed with rubies all about its golden sun-heart. "he's been readin' burns!" said donal. he forgot that the daisies were before burns, and that he himself had loved them before ever he heard of him. now, he had not heard of chaucer, who made love to the daisies four hundred years before burns.--god only knows what gospellers they have been on his middle-earth. all its days his daisies have been coming and going, and they are not old yet, nor have worn out yet their lovely garments, though they patch and darn just as little as they toil and spin. "can ye read, cratur?" asked donal. gibbie shook his head. "canna ye speyk, man?" again gibbie shook his head. "can ye hear?" gibbie burst out laughing. he knew that he heard better than other people. "hearken till this than," said donal. he took his book from the grass, and read, in a chant, or rather in a lilt, the danish ballad of chyld dyring, as translated by sir walter scott. gibbie's eyes grew wider and wider as he listened; their pupils dilated, and his lips parted: it seemed as if his soul were looking out of door and windows at once--but a puzzled soul that understood nothing of what it saw. yet plainly, either the sounds, or the thought-matter vaguely operative beyond the line where intelligence begins, or, it may be, the sparkle of individual word or phrase islanded in a chaos of rhythmic motion, wrought somehow upon him, for his attention was fixed as by a spell. when donal ceased, he remained open-mouthed and motionless for a time; then, drawing himself slidingly over the grass to donal's feet, he raised his head and peeped above his knees at the book. a moment only he gazed, and drew back with a hungry sigh: he had seen nothing in the book like what donal had been drawing from it--as if one should look into the well of which he had just drunk, and see there nothing but dry pebbles and sand! the wind blew gentle, the sun shone bright, all nature closed softly round the two, and the soul whose children they were was nearer than the one to the other, nearer than sun or wind or daisy or chyld dyring. to his amazement, donal saw the tears gathering in gibbie's eyes. he was as one who gazes into the abyss of god's will--sees only the abyss, cannot see the will, and weeps. the child in whom neither cold nor hunger nor nakedness nor loneliness could move a throb of self-pity, was moved to tears that a loveliness, to him strange and unintelligible, had passed away, and he had no power to call it back. "wad ye like to hear't again?" asked donal, more than half understanding him instinctively. gibbie's face answered with a flash, and donal read the poem again, and gibbie's delight returned greater than before, for now something like a dawn began to appear among the cloudy words. donal read it a third time, and closed the book, for it was almost the hour for driving the cattle home. he had never yet seen, and perhaps never again did see, such a look of thankful devotion on human countenance as met his lifted eyes. how much gibbie even then understood of the lovely eerie old ballad, it is impossible for me to say. had he a glimmer of the return of the buried mother? did he think of his own? i doubt if he had ever thought that he had a mother; but he may have associated the tale with his father, and the boots he was always making for him. certainly it was the beginning of much. but the waking up of a human soul to know itself in the mirror of its thoughts and feelings, its loves and delights, oppresses me with so heavy a sense of marvel and inexplicable mystery, that when i imagine myself such as gibbie then was, i cannot imagine myself coming awake. i can hardly believe that, from being such as gibbie was the hour before he heard the ballad, i should ever have come awake. yet here i am, capable of pleasure unspeakable from that and many another ballad, old and new! somehow, at one time or another, or at many times in one, i have at last come awake! when, by slow filmy unveilings, life grew clearer to gibbie, and he not only knew, but knew that he knew, his thoughts always went back to that day in the meadow with donal grant as the beginning of his knowledge of beautiful things in the world of man. then first he saw nature reflected, narcissus-like, in the mirror of her humanity, her highest self. but when or how the change in him began, the turn of the balance, the first push towards life of the evermore invisible germ--of that he remained, much as he wondered, often as he searched his consciousness, as ignorant to the last as i am now. sometimes he was inclined to think the glory of the new experience must have struck him dazed, and that was why he could not recall what went on in him at the time. donal rose and went driving the cattle home, and gibbie lay where he had again thrown himself upon the grass. when he lifted his head, donal and the cows had vanished. donal had looked all round as he left the meadow, and seeing the boy nowhere, had concluded he had gone to his people. the impression he had made upon him faded a little during the evening. for when he reached home, and had watered them, he had to tie up the animals, each in its stall, and make it comfortable for the night; next, eat his own supper; then learn a proposition of euclid, and go to bed. chapter xv. donal grant. hungering minds come of peasant people as often as of any, and have appeared in scotland as often, i fancy, as in any nation; not every scotsman, therefore, who may not himself have known one like donal, will refuse to believe in such a herd-laddie. besides, there are still those in scotland, as well as in other nations, to whom the simple and noble, not the commonplace and selfish, is the true type of humanity. of such as donal, whether english or scotch, is the class coming up to preserve the honour and truth of our britain, to be the oil of the lamp of her life, when those who place her glory in knowledge, or in riches, shall have passed from her history as the smoke from her chimneys. cheap as education then was in scotland, the parents of donal grant had never dreamed of sending a son to college. it was difficult for them to save even the few quarterly shillings that paid the fees of the parish schoolmaster: for donal, indeed, they would have failed even in this, but for the help his brothers and sisters afforded. after he left school, however, and got a place as herd, he fared better than any of the rest, for at the mains he found a friend and helper in fergus duff, his master's second son, who was then at home from college, which he had now attended two winters. partly that he was delicate in health, partly that he was something of a fine gentleman, he took no share with his father and elder brother in the work of the farm, although he was at the mains from the beginning of april to the end of october. he was a human kind of soul notwithstanding, and would have been much more of a man if he had thought less of being a gentleman. he had taken a liking to donal, and having found in him a strong desire after every kind of knowledge of which he himself had any share, had sought to enliven the tedium of an existence rendered not a little flabby from want of sufficient work, by imparting to him of the treasures he had gathered. they were not great, and he could never have carried him far, for he was himself only a respectable student, not a little lacking in perseverance, and given to dreaming dreams of which he was himself the hero. happily, however, donal was of another sort, and from the first needed but to have the outermost shell of a thing broken for him, and that fergus could do: by and by donal would break a shell for himself. but perhaps the best thing fergus did for him was the lending him books. donal had an altogether unappeasable hunger after every form of literature with which he had as yet made acquaintance, and this hunger fergus fed with the books of the house, and many besides of such as he purchased or borrowed for his own reading--these last chiefly poetry. but fergus duff, while he revelled in the writings of certain of the poets of the age, was incapable of finding poetry for himself in the things around him: donal grant, on the other hand, while he seized on the poems fergus lent him, with an avidity even greater than his, received from the nature around him influences similar to those which exhaled from the words of the poet. in some sense, then, donal was original; that is, he received at first hand what fergus required to have "put on" him, to quote celia, in as you like it, "as pigeons feed their young." therefore, fiercely as it would have harrowed the pride of fergus to be informed of the fact, he was in the kingdom of art only as one who ate of what fell from the table, while his father's herd-boy was one of the family. this was as far from donal's thought, however, as from that of fergus; the condescension, therefore, of the latter did not impair the gratitude for which the former had such large reason; and donal looked up to fergus as to one of the lords of the world. to find himself now in the reversed relation of superior and teacher to the little outcast, whose whole worldly having might be summed in the statement that he was not absolutely naked, woke in donal an altogether new and strange feeling; yet gratitude to his master had but turned itself round, and become tenderness to his pupil. after donal left him in the field, and while he was ministering, first to his beasts and then to himself, gibbie lay on the grass, as happy as child could well be. a loving hand laid on his feet or legs would have found them like ice; but where was the matter so long as he never thought of them? he could have supped a huge bicker of sowens, and eaten a dozen potatoes; but of what mighty consequence is hunger, so long as it neither absorbs the thought, nor causes faintness? the sun, however, was going down behind a great mountain, and its huge shadow, made of darkness, and haunted with cold, came sliding across the river, and over valley and field, nothing staying its silent wave, until it covered gibbie with the blanket of the dark, under which he could not long forget that he was in a body to which cold is unfriendly. at the first breath of the night-wind that came after the shadow, he shivered, and starting to his feet, began to trot, increasing his speed until he was scudding up and down the field like a wild thing of the night, whose time was at hand, waiting until the world should lie open to him. suddenly he perceived that the daisies, which all day long had been full-facing the sun, like true souls confessing to the father of them, had folded their petals together to points, and held them like spear-heads tipped with threatening crimson, against the onset of the night and her shadows, while within its white cone each folded in the golden heart of its life, until the great father should return, and, shaking the wicked out of the folds of the night, render the world once more safe with another glorious day. gibbie gazed and wondered; and while he gazed--slowly, glidingly, back to his mind came the ghost-mother of the ballad, and in every daisy he saw her folding her neglected orphans to her bosom, while the darkness and the misery rolled by defeated. he wished he knew a ghost that would put her arms round him. he must have had a mother once, he supposed, but he could not remember her, and of course she must have forgotten him. he did not know that about him were folded the everlasting arms of the great, the one ghost, which is the death of death--the life and soul of all things and all thoughts. the presence, indeed, was with him, and he felt it, but he knew it only as the wind and shadow, the sky and closed daisies: in all these things and the rest it took shape that it might come near him. yea, the presence was in his very soul, else he could never have rejoiced in friend, or desired ghost to mother him: still he knew not the presence. but it was drawing nearer and nearer to his knowledge--even in sun and air and night and cloud, in beast and flower and herd-boy, until at last it would reveal itself to him, in him, as life himself. then the man would know that in which the child had rejoiced. the stars came out, to gibbie the heavenly herd, feeding at night, and gathering gold in the blue pastures. he saw them, looking up from the grass where he had thrown himself to gaze more closely at the daisies; and the sleep that pressed down his eyelids seemed to descend from the spaces between the stars. but it was too cold that night to sleep in the fields, when he knew where to find warmth. like a fox into his hole, the child would creep into the corner where god had stored sleep for him: back he went to the barn, gently trotting, and wormed himself through the cat-hole. the straw was gone! but he remembered the hay. and happily, for he was tired, there stood the ladder against the loft. up he went, nor turned aside to the cheese; but sleep was common property still. he groped his way forward through the dark loft until he found the hay, when at once he burrowed into it like a sand-fish into the wet sand. all night the white horse, a glory vanished in the dark, would be close to him, behind the thin partition of boards. he could hear his very breath as he slept, and to the music of it, audible sign of companionship, he fell fast asleep, and slept until the waking horses woke him. chapter xvi. apprenticeship. he scrambled out on the top of the hay, and looked down on the beautiful creature below him, dawning radiant again with the morning, as it issued undimmed from the black bosom of the night. he was not, perhaps, just so well groomed as white steed might be; it was not a stable where they kept a blue-bag for their grey horses; but to gibbie's eyes he was so pure, that he began, for the first time in his life, to doubt whether he was himself quite as clean as he ought to be. he did not know, but he would make an experiment for information when he got down to the burn. meantime was there nothing he could do for the splendid creature? from above, leaning over, he filled his rack with hay; but he had eaten so much grass the night before, that he would not look at it, and gibbie was disappointed. what should he do next? the thing he would like best would be to look through the ceiling again, and watch the woman at her work. then, too, he would again smell the boiling porridge, and the burning of the little sprinkles of meal that fell into the fire. he dragged, therefore, the ladder to the opposite end of the barn, and gradually, with no little effort, raised it against the wall. carefully he crept through the hole, and softly round the shelf, the dangerous part of the pass, and so on to the ceiling, whence he peeped once more down into the kitchen. his precautions had been so far unnecessary, for as yet it lay unvisited, as witnessed by its disorder. suddenly came to gibbie the thought that here was a chance for him--here a path back to the world. rendered daring by the eagerness of his hope, he got again upon the shelf, and with every precaution lest he should even touch a milkpan, descended by the lower shelves to the floor. there finding the door only latched, he entered the kitchen, and proceeded to do everything he had seen the woman do, as nearly in her style as he could. he swept the floor, and dusted the seats, the window sill, the table, with an apron he found left on a chair, then arranged everything tidily, roused the rested fire, and had just concluded that the only way to get the great pot full of water upon it, would be to hang first the pot on the chain, and then fill it with the water, when his sharp ears caught sounds and then heard approaching feet. he darted into the dairy, and in a few seconds, for he was getting used to the thing now, had clambered upon the ceiling, and was lying flat across the joists, with his eyes to the most commanding crack he had discovered: he was anxious to know how his service would be received. when jean mavor--she was the farmer's half-sister--opened the door, she stopped short and stared; the kitchen was not as she had left it the night before! she concluded she must be mistaken, for who could have touched it? and entered. then it became plain beyond dispute that the floor had been swept, the table wiped, the place redd up, and the fire roused. "hoot! i maun hae been walkin' i' my sleep!" said jean to herself aloud. "or maybe that guid laddie donal grant's been wullin' to gie me a helpin' han' for's mither's sake, honest wuman! the laddie's guid eneuch for onything!--ay, gien 'twar to mak' a minister o'!" eagerly, greedily, gibbie now watched her every motion, and, bent upon learning, nothing escaped him: he would do much better next morning!--at length the men came in to breakfast, and he thought to enjoy the sight; but, alas! it wrought so with his hunger as to make him feel sick, and he crept away to the barn. he would gladly have lain down in the hay for a while, but that would require the ladder, and he did not now feel able to move it. on the floor of the barn he was not safe, and he got out of it into the cornyard, where he sought the henhouse. but there was no food there yet, and he must not linger near; for, if he were discovered, they would drive him away, and he would lose donal grant. he had not seen him at breakfast, for indeed he seldom, during the summer, had a meal except supper in the house. gibbie, therefore, as he could not eat, ran to the burn and drank--but had no heart that morning for his projected inquiry into the state of his person. he must go to donal. the sight of him would help him to bear his hunger. the first indication donal had of his proximity was the rush of hornie past him in flight out of the corn. gibbie was pursuing her with stones for lack of a stick. thoroughly ashamed of himself, donal threw his book from him, and ran to meet gibbie. "ye maunna fling stanes, cratur," he said. "haith! it's no for me to fin' fau't, though," he added, "sittin' readin' buiks like a gowk 'at i am, an' lattin' the beasts rin wull amo' the corn, 'at's weel peyed to haud them oot o' 't! i'm clean affrontit wi' mysel', cratur." gibbie's response was to set off at full speed for the place where donal had been sitting. he was back in a moment with the book, which he pressed into donal's hand, while from the other he withdrew his club. this he brandished aloft once or twice, then starting at a steady trot, speedily circled the herd, and returned to his adopted master--only to start again, however, and attack hornie, whom he drove from the corn-side of the meadow right over to the other: she was already afraid of him. after watching him for a time, donal came to the conclusion that he could not do more than the cratur if he had as many eyes as argus, and gave not even one of them to his book. he therefore left all to gibbie, and did not once look up for a whole hour. everything went just as it should; and not once, all that day, did hornie again get a mouthful of the grain. it was rather a heavy morning for gibbie, though, who had eaten nothing, and every time he came near donal, saw the handkerchief bulging in the grass, which a little girl had brought and left for him. but he was a rare one both at waiting and at going without. at last, however, donal either grew hungry of himself, or was moved by certain understood relations between the sun and the necessities of his mortal frame; for he laid down his book, called out to gibbie, "cratur, it's denner-time," and took his bundle. gibbie drew near with sparkling eyes. there was no selfishness in his hunger, for, at the worst pass he had ever reached, he would have shared what he had with another, but he looked so eager, that donal, who himself knew nothing of want, perceived that he was ravenous, and made haste to undo the knots of the handkerchief, which mistress jean appeared that day to have tied with more than ordinary vigour, ere she intrusted the bundle to the foreman's daughter. when the last knot yielded, he gazed with astonishment at the amount and variety of provision disclosed. "losh!" he exclaimed, "the mistress maun hae kenned there was two o' 's." he little thought that what she had given him beyond the usual supply was an acknowledgment of services rendered by those same hands into which he now delivered a share, on the ground of other service altogether. it is not always, even where there is no mistake as to the person who has deserved it, that the reward reaches the doer so directly. before the day was over, donal gave his helper more and other pay for his service. choosing a fit time, when the cattle were well together and in good position, hornie away at the stone dyke, he took from his pocket a somewhat wasted volume of ballads--ballants, he called them--and said, "sit ye doon, cratur. never min' the nowt. i'm gaein' to read till ye." gibbie dropped on his crossed legs like a lark to the ground, and sat motionless. donal, after deliberate search, began to read, and gibbie to listen; and it would be hard to determine which found the more pleasure in his part. for donal had seldom had a listener--and never one so utterly absorbed. when the hour came for the cattle to go home, gibbie again remained behind, waiting until all should be still at the farm. he lay on the dyke, brooding over what he had heard, and wondering how it was that donal got all those strange beautiful words and sounds and stories out of the book. chapter xvii. secret service. i must not linger over degrees and phases. every morning, gibbie got into the kitchen in good time; and not only did more and more of the work, but did it more and more to the satisfaction of jean, until, short of the actual making of the porridge, he did everything antecedent to the men's breakfast. when jean came in, she had but to take the lid from the pot, put in the salt, assume the spurtle, and, grasping the first handful of the meal, which stood ready waiting in the bossie on the stone cheek of the fire, throw it in, thus commencing the simple cookery of the best of all dishes to a true-hearted and healthy scotsman. without further question she attributed all the aid she received to the goodness, "enough for anything," of donal grant, and continued to make acknowledgment of the same in both sort and quantity of victuals, whence, as has been shown, the real labourer received his due reward. until he had thoroughly mastered his work, gibbie persisted in regarding matters economic "from his loophole in the ceiling;" and having at length learned the art of making butter, soon arrived at some degree of perfection in it. but when at last one morning he not only churned, but washed and made it up entirely to jean's satisfaction, she did begin to wonder how a mere boy could both have such perseverance, and be so clever at a woman's work. for now she entered the kitchen every morning without a question of finding the fire burning, the water boiling, the place clean and tidy, the supper dishes well washed and disposed on shelf and rack: her own part was merely to see that proper cloths were handy to so thorough a user of them. she took no one into her confidence on the matter: it was enough, she judged, that she and donal understood each other. and now if gibbie had contented himself with rendering this house-service in return for the shelter of the barn and its hay, he might have enjoyed both longer; but from the position of his night-quarters, he came gradually to understand the work of the stable also; and before long, the men, who were quite ignorant of anything similar taking place in the house, began to observe, more to their wonder than satisfaction, that one or other of their horses was generally groomed before his man came to him; that often there was hay in their racks which they had not given them; and that the master's white horse every morning showed signs of having had some attention paid him that could not be accounted for. the result was much talk and speculation, suspicion and offence; for all were jealous of their rights, their duty, and their dignity, in relation to their horses: no man was at liberty to do a thing to or for any but his own pair. even the brightening of the harness-brass, in which gibbie sometimes indulged, was an offence; for did it not imply a reproach? many were the useless traps laid for the offender, many the futile attempts to surprise him: as gibbie never did anything except for half an hour or so while the men were sound asleep or at breakfast, he escaped discovery. but he could not hold continued intercourse with the splendour of the white horse, and neglect carrying out the experiment on which he had resolved with regard to the effect of water upon his own skin; and having found the result a little surprising, he soon got into the habit of daily and thorough ablution. but many animals that never wash are yet cleaner than some that do; and, what with the scantiness of his clothing, his constant exposure to the atmosphere, and his generally lying in a fresh lair, gibbie had always been comparatively clean. besides, being nice in his mind, he was naturally nice in his body. the new personal regard thus roused by the presence of snowball, had its development greatly assisted by the scrupulosity with which most things in the kitchen, and chief of all in this respect, the churn, were kept. it required much effort to come up to the nicety considered by jean indispensable in the churn; and the croucher on the ceiling, when he saw the long nose advance to prosecute inquiry into its condition, mentally trembled lest the next movement should condemn his endeavour as a failure. with his clothes he could do nothing, alas! but he bathed every night in the lorrie as soon as donal had gone home with the cattle. once he got into a deep hole, but managed to get out again, and so learned that he could swim. all day he was with donal, and took from him by much the greater part of his labour: donal had never had such time for reading. in return he gave him his dinner, and gibbie could do very well upon one meal a day. he paid him also in poetry. it never came into his head, seeing he never spoke, to teach him to read. he soon gave up attempting to learn anything from him as to his place or people or history, for to all questions in that direction gibbie only looked grave and shook his head. as often, on the other hand, as he tried to learn where he spent the night, he received for answer only one of his merriest laughs. nor was larger time for reading the sole benefit gibbie conferred upon donal. such was the avidity and growing intelligence with which the little naked town-savage listened to what donal read to him, that his presence was just so much added to donal's own live soul of thought and feeling. from listening to his own lips through gibbie's ears, he not only understood many things better, but, perceiving what things must puzzle gibbie, came sometimes, rather to his astonishment, to see that in fact he did not understand them himself. thus the bond between the boy and the child grew closer--far closer, indeed than donal imagined; for, although still, now and then, he had a return of the fancy that gibbie might be a creature of some speechless race other than human, of whom he was never to know whence he came or whither he went--a messenger, perhaps, come to unveil to him the depths of his own spirit, and make up for the human teaching denied him, this was only in his more poetic moods, and his ordinary mental position towards him was one of kind condescension. it was not all fine weather up there among the mountains in the beginning of summer. in the first week of june even, there was sleet and snow in the wind--the tears of the vanquished winter, blown, as he fled, across the sea, from norway or iceland. then would donal's heart be sore for gibbie, when he saw his poor rags blown about like streamers in the wind, and the white spots melting on his bare skin. his own condition would then to many have appeared pitiful enough, but such an idea donal would have laughed to scorn, and justly. then most, perhaps then only, does the truly generous nature feel poverty, when he sees another in need and can do little or nothing to help him. donal had neither greatcoat, plaid, nor umbrella, wherewith to shield gibbie's looped and windowed raggedness. once, in great pity, he pulled off his jacket, and threw it on gibbie's shoulders. but the shout of laughter that burst from the boy, as he flung the jacket from him, and rushed away into the middle of the feeding herd, a shout that came from no cave of rudeness, but from the very depths of delight, stirred by the loving kindness of the act, startled donal out of his pity into brief anger, and he rushed after him in indignation, with full purpose to teach him proper behaviour by a box on each ear. but gibbie dived under the belly of a favourite cow, and peering out sideways from under her neck and between her forelegs, his arms grasping each a leg, while the cow went on twisting her long tongue round the grass and plucking it undisturbed, showed such an innocent countenance of holy merriment, that the pride of donal's hurt benevolence melted away, and his laughter emulated gibbie's. that sort of day was in truth drearier for donal than for gibbie, for the books he had were not his own, and he dared not expose them to the rain; some of them indeed came from glashruach--the muckle hoose, they generally called it! when he left him, it was to wander disconsolately about the field; while gibbie, sheltered under a whole cow, defied the chill and the sleet, and had no books of which to miss the use. he could not, it is true, shield his legs from the insidious attacks of such sneaking blasts as will always find out the undefended spots; but his great heart was so well-to-do in the inside of him, that, unlike touchstone, his spirits not being weary, he cared not for his legs. the worst storm in the world could not have made that heart quail. for, think! there had just been the strong, the well-dressed, the learned, the wise, the altogether mighty and considerable donal, the cowherd, actually desiring him, wee sir gibbie galbraith, the cinder of the city furnace, the naked, and generally the hungry little tramp, to wear his jacket to cover him from the storm! the idea was one of eternal triumph; and gibbie, exulting in the unheard-of devotion and condescension of the thing, kept on laughing like a blessed cherub under the cow's belly. nor was there in his delight the smallest admixture of pride that he should have drawn forth such kindness; it was simple glorying in the beauteous fact. as to the cold and the sleet, so far as he knew they never hurt anybody. they were not altogether pleasant creatures, but they could not help themselves, and would soon give over their teasing. by to-morrow they would have wandered away into other fields, and left the sun free to come back to donal and the cattle, when gibbie, at present shielded like any lord by the friendliest of cows, would come in for a share of the light and the warmth. gibbie was so confident with the animals, that they were already even more friendly with him than with donal--all except hornie, who, being of a low spirit, therefore incapable of obedience, was friendliest with the one who gave her the hardest blows. chapter xviii. the broonie. things had gone on in this way for several weeks--if gibbie had not been such a small creature, i hardly see how they could for so long--when one morning the men came in to breakfast all out of temper together, complaining loudly of the person unknown who would persist in interfering with their work. they were the louder that their suspicions fluttered about fergus, who was rather overbearing with them, and therefore not a favourite. he was in reality not at all a likely person to bend back or defile hands over such labour, and their pitching upon him for the object of their suspicion, showed how much at a loss they were. their only ground for suspecting him, beyond the fact that there was no other whom by any violence of imagination they could suspect, was, that, whatever else was done or left undone in the stable, snowball, whom fergus was fond of, and rode almost every day, was, as already mentioned, sure to have something done for him. had he been in good odour with them, they would have thought no harm of most of the things they thought he did, especially as they eased their work; but he carried himself high, they said, doing nothing but ride over the farm and pick out every fault he could find--to show how sharp he was, and look as if he could do better than any of them; and they fancied that he carried their evil report to his father, and that this underhand work in the stable must be part of some sly scheme for bringing them into disgrace. and now at last had come the worst thing of all: gibbie had discovered the corn-bin, and having no notion but that everything in the stable was for the delectation of the horses, had been feeding them largely with oats--a delicacy with which, in the plenty of other provisions, they were very sparingly supplied; and the consequences had begun to show themselves in the increased unruliness of the more wayward amongst them. gibbie had long given up resorting to the ceiling, and remained in utter ignorance of the storm that was brewing because of him. the same day brought things nearly to a crisis; for the overfed snowball, proving too much for fergus's horsemanship, came rushing home at a fierce gallop without him, having indeed left him in a ditch by the roadside. the remark thereupon made by the men in his hearing, that it was his own fault, led him to ask questions, when he came gradually to know what they attributed to him, and was indignant at the imputation of such an employment of his mornings to one who had his studies to attend to--scarcely a wise line of defence where the truth would have been more credible as well as convincing--namely, that at the time when those works of supererogation could alone be effected, he lay as lost a creature as ever sleep could make of a man. in the evening, jean sought a word with donal, and expressed her surprise that he should be able to do everybody's work about the place, warning him it would be said he did it at the expense of his own. but what could he mean, she said, by wasting the good corn to put devilry into the horses? donal stared in utter bewilderment. he knew perfectly that to the men suspicion of him was as impossible as of one of themselves. did he not sleep in the same chamber with them? could it be allusion to the way he spent his time when out with the cattle that mistress jean intended? he was so confused, looked so guilty as well as astray, and answered so far from any point in jean's mind, that she at last became altogether bewildered also, out of which chaos of common void gradually dawned on her mind the conviction that she had been wasting both thanks and material recognition of service, where she was under no obligation. her first feeling thereupon was, not unnaturally however unreasonably, one of resentment--as if donal, in not doing her the kindness her fancy had been attributing to him, had all the time been doing her an injury; but the boy's honest bearing and her own good sense made her, almost at once, dismiss the absurdity. then came anew the question, utterly unanswerable now--who could it be that did not only all her morning work, but, with a passion for labour insatiable, part of that of the men also? she knew her nephew better than to imagine for a moment, with the men, it could be he. a good enough lad she judged him, but not good enough for that. he was too fond of his own comfort to dream of helping other people! but now, having betrayed herself to donal, she wisely went farther, and secured herself by placing full confidence in him. she laid open the whole matter, confessing that she had imagined her ministering angel to be donal himself: now she had not even a conjecture to throw at random after the person of her secret servant. donal, being a celt, and a poet, would have been a brute if he had failed of being a gentleman, and answered that he was ashamed it should be another and not himself who had been her servant and gained her commendation; but he feared, if he had made any such attempt, he would but have fared like the husband in the old ballad who insisted that his wife's work was much easier to do than his own. but as he spoke, he saw a sudden change come over jean's countenance. was it fear? or what was it? she gazed with big eyes fixed on his face, heeding neither him nor his words, and donal, struck silent, gazed in return. at length, after a pause of strange import, her soul seemed to return into her deep-set grey eyes, and in a broken voice, low, and solemn, and fraught with mystery, she said, "donal, it's the broonie!" donal's mouth opened wide at the word, but the tenor of his thought it would have been hard for him to determine. celtic in kindred and education, he had listened in his time to a multitude of strange tales, both indigenous and exotic, and, celtic in blood, had been inclined to believe every one of them for which he could find the least _raison d'être_. but at school he had been taught that such stories deserved nothing better than mockery, that to believe them was contrary to religion, and a mark of such weakness as involved blame. nevertheless, when he heard the word broonie issue from a face with such an expression as jean's then wore, his heart seemed to give a gape in his bosom, and it rushed back upon his memory how he had heard certain old people talk of the brownie that used, when their mothers and grandmothers were young, to haunt the mains of glashruach. his mother did not believe such things, but she believed nothing but her new testament!--and what if there should be something in them? the idea of service rendered by the hand of a being too clumsy, awkward, ugly, to consent to be seen by the more finished race of his fellow-creatures, whom yet he surpassed in strength and endurance and longevity, had at least in it for donal the attraction of a certain grotesque yet homely poetic element. he remembered too the honour such a type of creature had had in being lapt around for ever in the airy folds of l'allegro. and to think that mistress jean, for whom everybody had such a respect, should speak of the creature in such a tone!--it sent a thrill of horrific wonder and delight through the whole frame of the boy: might, could there be such creatures? and thereupon began to open to his imagination vista after vista into the realms of might-be possibility--where dwelt whole clans and kins of creatures, differing from us and our kin, yet occasionally, at the cross-roads of creation, coming into contact with us, and influencing us not greatly, perhaps, yet strangely and notably. not once did the real brownie occur to him--the small, naked gibbie, far more marvellous and admirable than any brownie of legendary fable or fact, whether celebrated in rude old scots ballad for his taeless feet, or designated in noble english poem of perfect art, as lubber fiend of hairy length. jean mavor came from a valley far withdrawn in the folds of the gormgarnet mountains, where in her youth she had heard yet stranger tales than had ever come to donal's ears, of which some had perhaps kept their hold the more firmly that she had never heard them even alluded to since she left her home. her brother, a hard-headed highlander, as canny as any lowland scot, would have laughed to scorn the most passing reference to such an existence; and fergus, who had had a lowland mother--and nowhere is there less of so-called superstition than in most parts of the lowlands of scotland--would have joined heartily in his mockery. for the cowherd, however, as i say, the idea had no small attraction, and his stare was the reflection of mistress jean's own--for the soul is a live mirror, at once receiving into its centre, and reflecting from its surface. "div ye railly think it, mem?" said donal at last. "think what?" retorted jean, sharply, jealous instantly of being compromised, and perhaps not certain that she had spoken aloud. "div ye railly think 'at there is sic craturs as broonies, mistress jean?" said donal. "wha kens what there is an' what there isna?" returned jean: she was not going to commit herself either way. even had she imagined herself above believing such things, she would not have dared to say so; for there was a time still near in her memory, though unknown to any now upon the farm except her brother, when the mains of glashruach was the talk of daurside because of certain inexplicable nightly disorders that fell out there; the slang rows, or the scotch remishs (a form of the english romage), would perhaps come nearest to a designation of them, consisting as they did of confused noises, rumblings, ejaculations; and the fact itself was a reason for silence, seeing a word might bring the place again into men's mouths in like fashion, and seriously affect the service of the farm; such a rumour would certainly be made in the market a ground for demanding more wages to fee to the mains. "ye haud yer tongue, laddie," she went on; "it's the least ye can efter a' 'at's come an' gane; an' least said's sunest mendit, gang to yer wark." but either mistress jean's influx of caution came too late, and someone had overheard her suggestion, or the idea was already abroad in the mind bucolic and georgic, for that very night it began to be reported upon the nearer farms, that the mains of glashruach was haunted by a brownie who did all the work for both men and maids--a circumstance productive of different opinions with regard to the desirableness of a situation there, some asserting they would not fee to it for any amount of wages, and others averring they could desire nothing better than a place where the work was all done for them. quick at disappearing as gibbie was, a very little cunning on the part of jean might soon have entrapped the brownie; but a considerable touch of fear was now added to her other motives for continuing to spend a couple of hours longer in bed than had formerly been her custom. so that for yet a few days things went on much as usual; gibbie saw no sign that his presence was suspected, or that his doings were offensive; and life being to him a constant present, he never troubled himself about anything before it was there to answer for itself. one morning the long thick mane of snowball was found carefully plaited up in innumerable locks. this was properly elf-work, but no fairies had been heard of on daurside for many a long year. the brownie, on the other hand, was already in every one's mouth--only a stray one, probably, that had wandered from some old valley away in the mountains, where they were still believed in--but not the less a brownie; and if it was not the brownie who plaited snowball's mane, who or what was it? a phenomenon must be accounted for, and he who will not accept a theory offered, or even a word applied, is indebted in a full explanation. the rumour spread in long slow ripples, till at last one of them struck the membrana tympani of the laird, where he sat at luncheon in the house of glashruach. chapter xix. the laird. thomas galbraith was by birth thomas durrant, but had married an heiress by whom he came into possession of glashruach, and had, according to previous agreement, taken her name. when she died he mourned her loss as well as he could, but was consoled by feeling himself now first master of both position and possession, when the ladder by which he had attained them was removed. it was not that she had ever given him occasion to feel that marriage and not inheritance was the source of his distinction in the land, but that having a soul as keenly sensitive to small material rights as it was obtuse to great spiritual ones, he never felt the property quite his own until his wife was no longer within sight. had he been a little more sensitive still, he would have felt that the property was then his daughter's, and his only through her; but this he failed to consider. mrs. galbraith was a gentle sweet woman, who loved her husband, but was capable of loving a greater man better. had she lived long enough to allow of their opinions confronting in the matter of their child's education, serious differences would probably have arisen between them; as it was, they had never quarrelled except about the name she should bear. the father, having for her sake--so he said to himself--sacrificed his patronymic, was anxious that in order to her retaining some rudimentary trace of himself in the ears of men, she should be overshadowed with his christian name, and called thomasina. but the mother was herein all the mother, and obdurate for her daughter's future; and, as was right between the two, she had her way, and her child a pretty name. being more sentimental than artistic, however, she did not perceive how imperfectly the sweet italian ginevra concorded with the strong scotch galbraith. her father hated the name, therefore invariably abbreviated it after such fashion as rendered it inoffensive to the most conservative of scotish ears; and for his own part, at length, never said ginny, without seeing and hearing and meaning jenny. as jenny, indeed, he addressed her in the one or two letters which were all he ever wrote to her; and thus he perpetuated the one matrimonial difference across the grave. having no natural bent to literature, but having in his youth studied for and practised at the scotish bar, he had brought with him into the country a taste for certain kinds of dry reading, judged pre-eminently respectable, and for its indulgence had brought also a not insufficient store of such provender as his soul mildly hungered after, in the shape of books bound mostly in yellow-calf--books of law, history, and divinity. what the books of law were, i would not foolhardily add to my many risks of blundering by presuming to recall; the history was mostly scotish, or connected with scotish affairs; the theology was entirely of the new england type of corrupted calvinism, with which in scotland they saddle the memory of great-souled, hard-hearted calvin himself. thoroughly respectable, and a little devout, mr. galbraith was a good deal more of a scotchman than a christian; growth was a doctrine unembodied in his creed; he turned from everything new, no matter how harmonious with the old, in freezing disapprobation; he recognized no element in god or nature which could not be reasoned about after the forms of the scotch philosophy. he would not have said an episcopalian could not be saved, for at the bar he had known more than one good lawyer of the episcopal party; but to say a roman catholic would not necessarily be damned, would to his judgment have revealed at once the impending fate of the rash asserter. in religion he regarded everything not only as settled but as understood; but seemed aware of no call in relation to truth, but to bark at anyone who showed the least anxiety to discover it. what truth he held himself, he held as a sack holds corn--not even as a worm holds earth. to his servants and tenants he was what he thought just--never condescending to talk over a thing with any of the former but the game-keeper, and never making any allowance to the latter for misfortune. in general expression he looked displeased, but meant to look dignified. no one had ever seen him wrathful; nor did he care enough for his fellow-mortals ever to be greatly vexed--at least he never manifested vexation otherwise than by a silence that showed more of contempt than suffering. in person, he was very tall and very thin, with a head much too small for his height; a narrow forehead, above which the brown hair looked like a wig; pale-blue, ill-set eyes, that seemed too large for their sockets, consequently tumbled about a little, and were never at once brought to focus; a large, but soft-looking nose; a loose-lipped mouth, and very little chin. he always looked as if consciously trying to keep himself together. he wore his shirt-collar unusually high, yet out of it far shot his long neck, notwithstanding the smallness of which, his words always seemed to come from a throat much too big for them. he had greatly the look of a hen, proud of her maternal experiences, and silent from conceit of what she could say if she would. so much better would he have done as an underling than as a ruler--as a journeyman even, than a master, that to know him was almost to disbelieve in the good of what is generally called education. his learning seemed to have taken the wrong fermentation, and turned to folly instead of wisdom. but he did not do much harm, for he had a great respect for his respectability. perhaps if he had been a craftsman, he might even have done more harm--making rickety wheelbarrows, asthmatic pumps, ill-fitting window-frames, or boots with a lurking divorce in each welt. he had no turn for farming, and therefore let all his land, yet liked to interfere, and as much as possible kept a personal jurisdiction. there was one thing, however, which, if it did not throw the laird into a passion--nothing, as i have said, did that--brought him nearer to the outer verge of displeasure than any other, and that was, anything whatever to which he could affix the name of superstition. the indignation of better men than the laird with even a confessedly harmless superstition, is sometimes very amusing; and it was a point of mr. galbraith's poverty-stricken religion to denounce all superstitions, however diverse in character, with equal severity. to believe in the second sight, for instance, or in any form of life as having the slightest relation to this world, except that of men, that of animals, and that of vegetables, was with him wicked, antagonistic to the church of scotland, and inconsistent with her perfect doctrine. the very word ghost would bring upon his face an expression he meant for withering scorn, and indeed it withered his face, rendering it yet more unpleasant to behold. coming to the benighted country, then, with all the gathered wisdom of edinburgh in his gallinaceous cranium, and what he counted a vast experience of worldly affairs besides, he brought with him also the firm resolve to be the death of superstition, at least upon his own property. he was not only unaware, but incapable of becoming aware, that he professed to believe a number of things, any one of which was infinitely more hostile to the truth of the universe, than all the fancies and fables of a countryside, handed down from grandmother to grandchild. when, therefore, within a year of his settling at glashruach, there arose a loud talk of the mains, his best farm, as haunted by presences making all kinds of tumultuous noises, and even throwing utensils bodily about, he was nearer the borders of a rage, although he kept, as became a gentleman, a calm exterior, than ever he had been in his life. for were not ignorant clodhoppers asserting as facts what he knew never could take place! at once he set himself, with all his experience as a lawyer to aid him, to discover the buffooning authors of the mischief; where there were deeds there were doers, and where there were doers they were discoverable. but his endeavours, uninterrmitted for the space of three weeks, after which the disturbances ceased, proved so utterly without result, that he could never bear the smallest allusion to the hateful business. for he had not only been unhorsed, but by his dearest hobby. he was seated with a game pie in front of him, over the top of which ginevra was visible. the girl never sat nearer her father at meals than the whole length of the table, where she occupied her mother's place. she was a solemn-looking child, of eight or nine, dressed in a brown merino frock of the plainest description. her hair, which was nearly of the same colour as her frock, was done up in two triple plaits, which hung down her back, and were tied at the tips with black ribbon. to the first glance she did not look a very interesting or attractive child; but looked at twice, she was sure to draw the eyes a third time. she was undeniably like her father, and that was much against her at first sight; but it required only a little acquaintance with her face to remove the prejudice; for in its composed, almost resigned expression, every feature of her father's seemed comparatively finished, and settled into harmony with the rest; its chaos was subdued, and not a little of the original underlying design brought out. the nose was firm, the mouth modelled, the chin larger, the eyes a little smaller, and full of life and feeling. the longer it was regarded by any seeing eye, the child's countenance showed fuller of promise, or at least of hope. gradually the look would appear in it of a latent sensitive anxiety--then would dawn a glimmer of longing question; and then, all at once, it would slip back into the original ordinary look, which, without seeming attractive, had yet attracted. her father was never harsh to her, yet she looked rather frightened at him; but then he was cold, very cold, and most children would rather be struck and kissed alternately than neither. and the bond cannot be very close between father and child, when the father has forsaken his childhood. the bond between any two is the one in the other; it is the father in the child, and the child in the father, that reach to each other eternal hands. it troubled ginevra greatly that, when she asked herself whether she loved her father better than anybody else, as she believed she ought, she became immediately doubtful whether she loved him at all. she was eating porridge and milk: with spoon arrested in mid-passage, she stopped suddenly, and said:-- "papa, what's a broonie?" "i have told you, jenny, that you are never to talk broad scotch in my presence," returned her father. "i would lay severer commands upon you, were it not that i fear tempting you to disobey me, but i will have no vulgarity in the dining-room." his words came out slowly, and sounded as if each was a bullet wrapped round with cotton wool to make it fit the barrel. ginevra looked perplexed for a moment. "should i say brownie, papa?" she asked. "how can i tell you what you should call a creature that has no existence?" rejoined her father. "if it be a creature, papa, it must have a name!" retorted the little logician, with great solemnity. mr. galbraith was not pleased, for although the logic was good, it was against him. "what foolish person has been insinuating such contemptible superstition into your silly head?" he asked. "tell me, child," he continued, "that i may put a stop to it at once." he was rising to ring the bell, that he might give the orders consequent on the information he expected: he would have asked mammon to dinner in black clothes and a white tie, but on superstition in the loveliest garb would have loosed all the dogs of glashruach, to hunt her from the property. her next words, however, arrested him, and just as she ended, the butler came in with fresh toast. "they say," said ginevra, anxious to avoid the forbidden scotch, therefore stumbling sadly in her utterance, "there's a broonie--brownie--at the mains, who dis a'--does all the work." "what is the meaning of this, joseph?" said mr. galbraith, turning from her to the butler, with the air of rebuke, which was almost habitual to him, a good deal heightened. "the meanin' o' what, sir?" returned joseph, nowise abashed, for to him his master was not the greatest man in the world, or even in the highlands. "he's no a galbraith," he used to say, when more than commonly provoked with him. "i ask you, joseph," answered the laird, "what this--this outbreak of superstition imports? you must be aware that nothing in the world could annoy me more than that miss galbraith should learn folly in her father's house. that staid servants, such as i had supposed mine to be, should use their tongues as if their heads had no more in them than so many bells hung in a steeple, is to me a mortifying reflection." "tongues as weel's clappers was made to wag, sir; an, wag they wull, sir, sae lang's the tow (string) hings oot at baith lugs," answered joseph. the forms of speech he employed were not unfrequently obscure to his master, and in that obscurity lay more of joseph's impunity than he knew. "forby (besides), sir," he went on, "gien tongues didna wag, what w'y wad you, 'at has to set a' thing richt, come to ken what was wrang?" "that is not a bad remark, joseph," replied the laird, with woolly condescension. "pray acquaint me with the whole matter." "i hae naething till acquaint yer honour wi', sir, but the ting-a-ling o' tongues," replied joseph; "an' ye'll hae till arreenge't like, till yer ain settisfaction." therewith he proceeded to report what he had heard reported, which was in the main the truth, considerably exaggerated--that the work of the house was done over night by invisible hands--and the work of the stables, too; but that in the latter, cantrips were played as well; that some of the men talked of leaving the place; and that mr. duff's own horse, snowball, was nearly out of his mind with fear. the laird clenched his teeth, and for a whole minute said nothing. here were either his old enemies again, or some who had heard the old story, and in their turn were beating the drum of consternation in the ears of superstition. "it is one of the men themselves," he said at last, with outward frigidity. "or some ill-designed neighbour," he added. "but i shall soon be at the bottom of it. go to the mains at once, joseph, and ask young fergus duff to be so good as step over, as soon as he conveniently can." fergus was pleased enough to be sent for by the laird, and soon told him all he knew from his aunt and the men, confessing that he had himself been too lazy of a morning to take any steps towards personal acquaintance with the facts, but adding that, as mr. galbraith took an interest in the matter, "he would be only too happy to carry out any suggestion he might think proper to make on the subject. "fergus," returned the laird, "do you imagine things inanimate can of themselves change their relations in space? in other words, are the utensils in your kitchen endowed with powers of locomotion? can they take to themselves wings and fly? or to use a figure more to the point, are they provided with members necessary to the washing of their own--persons, shall i say? answer me those points, fergus." "certainly not, sir," answered fergus solemnly, for the laird's face was solemn, and his speech was very solemn. "then, fergus, let me assure you, that to discover by what agency these apparent wonders are effected, you have merely to watch. if you fail, i will myself come to your assistance. depend upon it, the thing when explained will prove simplicity itself." fergus at once undertook to watch, but went home not quite so comfortable as he had gone; for he did not altogether, notwithstanding his unbelief in the so-called supernatural, relish the approaching situation. belief and unbelief are not always quite plainly distinguishable from each other, and fear is not always certain which of them is his mother. he was not the less resolved, however, to carry out what he had undertaken--that was, to sit up all night, if necessary, in order to have an interview with the extravagant and erring--spirit, surely, whether embodied or not, that dared thus wrong "domestic awe, night-rest, and neighbourhood," by doing people's work for them unbidden. not even to himself did he confess that he felt frightened, for he was a youth of nearly eighteen; but he could not quite hide from himself the fact that he anticipated no pleasure in the duty which lay before him. chapter xx. the ambush. for more reasons than one, fergus judged it prudent to tell not even auntie jean of his intention; but, waiting until the house was quiet, stole softly from his room and repaired to the kitchen--at the other end of the long straggling house, where he sat down, and taking his book, an annual of the beginning of the century, began to read the story of kathed and eurelia. having finished it, he read another. he read and read, but no brownie came. his candle burned into the socket. he lighted another, and read again. still no brownie appeared, and, hard and straight as was the wooden chair on which he sat, he began to doze. presently he started wide awake, fancying he heard a noise; but nothing was there. he raised his book once more, and read until he had finished the stories in it: for the verse he had no inclination that night. as soon as they were all consumed, he began to feel very eerie: his courage had been sheltering itself behind his thoughts, which the tales he had been reading had kept turned away from the object of dread. still deeper and deeper grew the night around him, until the bare, soulless waste of it came at last, when a brave man might welcome any ghost for the life it would bring. and ever as it came, the tide of fear flowed more rapidly, until at last it rose over his heart, and threatened to stifle him. the direst foe of courage is the fear itself, not the object of it; and the man who can overcome his own terror is a hero and more. in this fergus had not yet deserved to be successful. that kind of victory comes only of faith. still, he did not fly the field; he was no coward. at the same time, prizing courage, scorning fear, and indeed disbelieving in every nocturnal object of terror except robbers, he came at last to such an all but abandonment of dread, that he dared not look over his shoulder, lest he should see the brownie standing at his back; he would rather be seized from behind and strangled in his hairy grasp, than turn and die of the seeing. the night was dark--no moon and many clouds. not a sound came from the close. the cattle, the horses, the pigs, the cocks and hens, the very cats and rats seemed asleep. there was not a rustle in the thatch, a creak in the couples. it was well, for the slightest noise would have brought his heart into his mouth, and he would have been in great danger of scaring the household, and for ever disgracing himself, with a shriek. yet he longed to hear something stir. oh! for the stamp of a horse from the stable or the low of a cow from the byre! but they were all under the brownie's spell, and he was coming--toeless feet, and thumbed but fingerless hands! as if he was made with stockings, and hum'le mittens! was it the want of toes that made him able to come and go so quietly?--another hour crept by; when lo, a mighty sun-trumpet blew in the throat of the black cock! fergus sprang to his feet with the start it gave him--but the next moment gladness rushed up in his heart: the morning was on its way! and, foe to superstition as he was, and much as he had mocked at donal for what he counted some of his tendencies in that direction, he began instantly to comfort himself with the old belief that all things of the darkness flee from the crowing of the cock. the same moment his courage began to return, and the next he was laughing at his terrors, more foolish than when he felt them, seeing he was the same man of fear as before, and the same circumstances would wrap him in the same garment of dire apprehension. in his folly he imagined himself quite ready to watch the next night without even repugnance--for it was the morning, not the night, that came first! when the grey of the dawn appeared, he said to himself he would lie down on the bench a while, he was so tired of sitting; he would not sleep. he lay down, and in a moment was asleep. the light grew and grew, and the brownie came--a different brownie indeed from the one he had pictured--with the daintiest-shaped hands and feet coming out of the midst of rags, and with no hair except roughly parted curls over the face of a cherub--for the combing of snowball's mane and tail had taught gibbie to use the same comb upon his own thatch. but as soon as he opened the door of the dairy, he was warned by the loud breathing of the sleeper, and looking about, espied him on the bench behind the table, and swiftly retreated. the same instant fergus woke, stretched himself, saw it was broad daylight, and, with his brain muddled by fatigue and sleep combined, crawled shivering to bed. then in came the brownie again; and when jean mavor entered, there was her work done as usual. fergus was hours late for breakfast, and when he went into the common room, found his aunt alone there. "weel, auntie." he said, "i think i fleggit yer broonie!" "did ye that, man? ay!--an' syne ye set tee, an' did the wark yersel to save yer auntie jean's auld banes?" "na, na! i was o'er tiret for that. sae wad ye hae been yersel', gien ye had sitten up a' nicht." "wha did it, than?" "ow, jist yersel', i'm thinkin', auntie." "never a finger o' mine was laid till't, fergus. gien ye fleggit ae broonie, anither cam; for there's the wark done, the same's ever." "damn the cratur!" cried fergus. "whisht, whisht, laddie! he's maybe hearin' ye this meenute. an' gien he binna, there's ane 'at is, an' likesna sweirin'." "i beg yer pardon, auntie, but it's jist provokin'!" returned fergus, and therewith recounted the tale of his night's watch, omitting mention only of his feelings throughout the vigil. as soon as he had had his breakfast, he went to carry his report to glashruach. the laird was vexed, and told him he must sleep well before night, and watch to better purpose. the next night, fergus's terror returned in full force; but he watched thoroughly notwithstanding, and when his aunt entered, she found him there, and her kitchen in a mess. he had caught no brownie, it was true, but neither had a stroke of her work been done. the floor was unswept; not a dish had been washed; it was churning-day, but the cream stood in the jar in the dairy, not the butter in the pan on the kitchen-dresser. jean could not quite see the good or the gain of it. she had begun to feel like a lady, she said to herself, and now she must tuck up her sleeves and set to work as before. it was a come-down in the world, and she did not like it. she conned her nephew little thanks, and not being in the habit of dissembling, let him feel the same. he crept to bed rather mortified. when he woke from a long sleep, he found no meal waiting him, and had to content himself with cakes[ ] and milk before setting out for "the muckle hoose." "you must add cunning to courage, my young friend," said mr. galbraith; and the result of their conference was that fergus went home resolved on yet another attempt. he felt much inclined to associate donal with him in his watch this time, but was too desirous of proving his courage both to himself and to the world, to yield to the suggestion of his fear. he went to bed with a book immediately after the noon-day meal and rose in time for supper. there was a large wooden press in the kitchen, standing out from the wall; this with the next wall made a little recess, in which there was just room for a chair; and in that recess fergus seated himself, in the easiest chair he could get into it. he then opened wide the door of the press, and it covered him entirely. this night would have been the dreariest of all for him, the laird having insisted that he should watch in the dark, had he not speedily fallen fast asleep, and slept all night--so well that he woke at the first noise gibbie made. it was broad clear morning, but his heart beat so loud and fast with apprehension and curiosity mingled, that for a few moments fergus dare not stir, but sat listening breathless to the movement beside him, none the less appalling that it was so quiet. recovering himself a little he cautiously moved the door of the press, and peeped out. he saw nothing so frightful as he had, in spite of himself, anticipated, but was not therefore, perhaps, the less astonished. the dread brownie of his idea shrunk to a tiny ragged urchin, with a wonderful head of hair, azure eyes, and deft hands, noiselessly bustling about on bare feet. he watched him at his leisure, watched him keenly, assured that any moment he could spring upon him. as he watched, his wonder sank, and he grew disappointed at the collapsing of the lubber-fiend into a poor half-naked child upon whom both his courage and his fear had been wasted. as he continued to watch, an evil cloud of anger at the presumption of the unknown minimus began to gather in his mental atmosphere, and was probably the cause of some movement by which his chair gave a loud creak. without even looking round, gibbie darted into the dairy, and shut the door. instantly fergus was after him, but only in time to see the vanishing of his last heel through the hole in the wall, and that way fergus was much too large to follow him. he rushed from the house, and across the corner of the yard to the barn-door. gibbie, who did not believe he had been seen, stood laughing on the floor, when suddenly he heard the key entering the lock. he bolted through the cat-hole--but again just one moment too late, leaving behind him on fergus's retina the light from the soles of two bare feet. the key of the door to the rick-yard was inside, and fergus was after him in a moment, but the ricks came close to the barn-door, and the next he saw of him was the fluttering of his rags in the wind, and the flashing of his white skin in the sun, as he fled across the clover field; and before fergus was over the wall, gibbie was a good way ahead towards the lorrie. gibbie was a better runner for his size than fergus, and in better training too; but, alas! fergus's legs were nearly twice as long as gibbie's. the little one reached the lorrie, first, and dashing across it, ran up the side of the glashburn, with a vague idea of glashgar in his head. fergus behind him was growing more and more angry as he gained upon him but felt his breath failing him. just at the bridge to the iron gate to glashruach, he caught him at last, and sunk on the parapet exhausted. the smile with which gibbie, too much out of breath to laugh, confessed himself vanquished, would have disarmed one harder-hearted than fergus, had he not lost his temper in the dread of losing his labour; and the answer gibbie received to his smile was a box on the ear that bewildered him. he looked pitifully in his captor's face, the smile not yet faded from his, only to receive a box on the other ear, which, though a contrary and similar both at once, was not a cure, and the water gathered in his eyes. fergus, a little eased in his temper by the infliction, and in his breath by the wall of the bridge, began to ply him with questions; but no answer following, his wrath rose again, and again he boxed both his ears--without better result. then came the question what was he to do with the redoubted brownie, now that he had him. he was ashamed to show himself as the captor of such a miserable culprit, but the little rascal deserved punishment, and the laird would require him at his hands. he turned upon his prisoner and told him he was an impudent rascal. gibbie had recovered again, and was able once more to smile a little. he had been guilty of burglary, said fergus; and gibbie smiled. he could be sent to prison for it, said fergus; and gibbie smiled--but this time a very grave smile. fergus took him by the collar, which amounted to nearly a third part of the jacket, and shook him till he had half torn that third from the other two; then opened the gate, and, holding him by the back of the neck, walked him up the drive, every now and then giving him a fierce shake that jarred his teeth. thus, over the old gravel, mossy and damp and grassy, and cool to his little bare feet, between rowan and birk and pine and larch, like a malefactor, and looking every inch the outcast he was, did sir gilbert galbraith approach the house of his ancestors for the first time. individually, wee gibbie was anything but a prodigal; it had never been possible to him to be one; but none the less was he the type and result and representative of his prodigal race, in him now once more looking upon the house they had lost by their vices and weaknesses, and in him now beginning to reap the benefits of punishment. but of vice and loss, of house and fathers and punishment, gibbie had no smallest cognition. his history was about him and in him, yet of it all he suspected nothing. it would have made little difference to him if he had known it all; he would none the less have accepted everything that came, just as part of the story in which he found himself. chapter xxi. the punishment. the house he was approaching, had a little the look of a prison. of the more ancient portion the windows were very small, and every corner had a turret with a conical cap-roof. that part was all rough-cast, therefore grey, as if with age. the more modern part was built of all kinds of hard stone, roughly cloven or blasted from the mountain and its boulders. granite red and grey, blue whinstone, yellow ironstone, were all mingled anyhow, fitness of size and shape alone regarded in their conjunctions; but the result as to colour was rather pleasing than otherwise, and gibbie regarded it with some admiration. nor, although he had received from fergus such convincing proof that he was regarded as a culprit, had he any dread of evil awaiting him. the highest embodiment of the law with which he had acquaintance was the police, and from not one of them in all the city had he ever had a harsh word; his conscience was as void of offence as ever it had been, and the law consequently, notwithstanding the threats of fergus, had for him no terrors. the laird was an early riser, and therefore regarded the mere getting up early as a virtue, altogether irrespective of how the time, thus redeemed, as he called it, was spent. this morning, as it turned out, it would have been better spent in sleep. he was talking to his gamekeeper, a heavy-browed man, by the coach-house door, when fergus appeared holding the dwindled brownie by the huge collar of his tatters. a more innocent-looking malefactor sure never appeared before awful justice! only he was in rags, and there are others besides dogs whose judgments go by appearance. mr. galbraith was one of them, and smiled a grim, an ugly smile. "so this is your vaunted brownie, mr. duff!" he said, and stood looking down upon gibbie, as if in his small person he saw superstition at the point of death, mocked thither by the arrows of his contemptuous wit. "it's all the brownie i could lay hands on, sir," answered fergus. "i took him in the act." "boy," said the laird, rolling his eyes, more unsteady than usual with indignation, in the direction of gibbie, "what have you to say for yourself?" gibbie had no say--and nothing to say that his questioner could either have understood or believed; the truth from his lips would but have presented him a lying hypocrite to the wisdom of his judge. as it was, he smiled, looking up fearless in the face of the magistrate, so awful in his own esteem. "what is your name?" asked the laird, speaking yet more sternly. gibbie still smiled and was silent, looking straight in his questioner's eyes. he dreaded nothing from the laird. fergus had beaten him, but fergus he classed with the bigger boys who had occasionally treated him roughly; this was a man, and men, except they were foreign sailors, or drunk, were never unkind. he had no idea of his silence causing annoyance. everybody in the city had known he could not answer; and now when fergus and the laird persisted in questioning him, he thought they were making kindly game of him, and smiled the more. nor was there much about mr. galbraith to rouse a suspicion of the contrary; for he made a great virtue of keeping his temper when most he caused other people to lose theirs. "i see the young vagabond is as impertinent as he is vicious," he said at last, finding that to no interrogation could he draw forth any other response than a smile. "here angus,"--and he turned to the gamekeeper--"take him into the coach-house, and teach him a little behaviour. a touch or two of the whip will find his tongue for him." angus seized the little gentleman by the neck, as if he had been a polecat, and at arm's length walked him unresistingly into the coach-house. there, with one vigorous tug, he tore the jacket from his back, and his only other garment, dependent thereupon by some device known only to gibbie, fell from him, and he stood in helpless nakedness, smiling still: he had never done anything shameful, therefore had no acquaintance with shame. but when the scowling keeper, to whom poverty was first cousin to poaching, and who hated tramps as he hated vermin, approached him with a heavy cart whip in his hand, he cast his eyes down at his white sides, very white between his brown arms and brown legs, and then lifted them in a mute appeal, which somehow looked as if it were for somebody else, against what he could no longer fail to perceive the man's intent. but he had no notion of what the thing threatened amounted to. he had had few hard blows in his time, and had never felt a whip. "ye deil's glaur!" cried the fellow, clenching the cruel teeth of one who loved not his brother, "i s' lat ye ken what comes o' brakin' into honest hooses, an' takin' what's no yer ain!" a vision of the gnawed cheese, which he had never touched since the idea of its being property awoke in him, rose before gibbie's mental eyes, and inwardly he bowed to the punishment. but the look he had fixed on angus was not without effect, for the man was a father, though a severe one, and was not all a brute: he turned and changed the cart whip for a gig one with a broken shaft, which lay near. it was well for himself that he did so, for the other would probably have killed gibbie. when the blow fell the child shivered all over, his face turned white, and without uttering even a moan, he doubled up and dropped senseless. a swollen cincture, like a red snake, had risen all round his waist, and from one spot in it the blood was oozing. it looked as if the lash had cut him in two. the blow had stung his heart and it had ceased to beat. but the gamekeeper understood vagrants! the young blackguard was only shamming! "up wi' ye, ye deevil! or i s' gar ye," he said from between his teeth, lifting the whip for a second blow. just as the stroke fell, marking him from the nape all down the spine, so that he now bore upon his back in red the sign the ass carries in black, a piercing shriek assailed angus's ears, and his arm, which had mechanically raised itself for a third blow, hung arrested. the same moment, in at the coach-house door shot ginevra, as white as gibbie. she darted to where he lay, and there stood over him, arms rigid and hands clenched hard, shivering as he had shivered, and sending from her body shriek after shriek, as if her very soul were the breath of which her cries were fashioned. it was as if the woman's heart in her felt its roots torn from their home in the bosom of god, and quivering in agony, and confronted by the stare of an eternal impossibility, shrieked against satan. "gang awa, missie," cried angus, who had respect to this child, though he had not yet learned to respect childhood; "he's a coorse cratur, an' maun hae's whups." but ginevra was deaf to his evil charming. she stopped her cries, however, to help gibbie up, and took one of his hands to raise him. but his arm hung limp and motionless; she let it go; it dropped like a stick, and again she began to shriek. angus laid his hand on her shoulder. she turned on him, and opening her mouth wide, screamed at him like a wild animal, with all the hatred of mingled love and fear; then threw herself on the boy, and covered his body with her own. angus, stooping to remove her, saw gibbie's face, and became uncomfortable. "he's deid! he's deid! ye've killt him, angus! ye're an ill man!" she cried fiercely. "i hate ye. i'll tell on ye. i'll tell my papa." "hoot! whisht, missie!" said angus. "it was by yer papa's ain orders i gae him the whup, an' he weel deserved it forby. an' gien ye dinna gang awa, an' be a guid yoong leddy, i'll gie 'im mair yet." "i'll tell god," shrieked ginevra with fresh energy of defensive love and wrath. again he sought to remove her, but she clung so, with both legs and arms, to the insensible gibbie, that he could but lift both together, and had to leave her alone. "gien ye daur to touch 'im again, angus, i'll bite ye--bite ye--bite ye," she screamed, in a passage wildly crescendo. the laird and fergus had walked away together, perhaps neither of them quite comfortable at the orders given, but the one too self-sufficient to recall them, and the other too submissive to interfere. they heard the cries, nevertheless, and had they known them for ginevra's, would have rushed to the spot; but fierce emotion had so utterly changed her voice--and indeed she had never in her life cried out before--that they took them for gibbie's and supposed the whip had had the desired effect and loosed his tongue. as to the rest of the household, which would by this time have been all gathered in the coach-house, the laird had taken his stand where he could intercept them: he would not have the execution of the decrees of justice interfered with. but ginevra's shrieks brought gibbie to himself. faintly he opened his eyes, and stared, stupid with growing pain, at the tear-blurred face beside him. in the confusion of his thoughts he fancied the pain he felt was ginevra's, not his, and sought to comfort her, stroking her cheek with feeble hand, and putting up his mouth to kiss her. but angus, utterly scandalized at the proceeding, and restored to energy by seeing that the boy was alive, caught her up suddenly and carried her off--struggling, writhing, and scratching like a cat. indeed she bit his arm, and that severely, but the man never even told his wife. little missie was a queen, and little gibbie was a vermin, but he was ashamed to let the mother of his children know that the former had bitten him for the sake of the latter. the moment she thus disappeared, gibbie began to apprehend that she was suffering for him, not he for her. his whole body bore testimony to frightful abuse. this was some horrible place inhabited by men such as those that killed sambo! he must fly. but would they hurt the little girl? he thought not--she was at home. he started to spring to his feet, but fell back almost powerless; then tried more cautiously and got up wearily, for the pain and the terrible shock seemed to have taken the strength out of every limb. once on his feet, he could scarcely stoop to pick up his remnant of trowsers without again falling, and the effort made him groan with distress. he was in the act of trying in vain to stand on one foot, so as to get the other into the garment, when he fancied he heard the step of his executioner, returning doubtless to resume his torture. he dropped the rag, and darted out of the door, forgetting aches and stiffness and agony. all naked as he was, he fled like the wind, unseen, or at least unrecognized, of any eye. fergus did catch a glimpse of something white that flashed across a vista through the neighbouring wood, but he took it for a white peacock, of which there were two or three about the place. the three men were disgusted with the little wretch when they found that he had actually fled into the open day without his clothes. poor gibbie! it was such a small difference! it needed as little change to make a savage as an angel of him. all depended on the eyes that saw him. he ran he knew not whither, feeling nothing but the desire first to get into some covert, and then to run farther. his first rush was for the shubbery, his next across the little park to the wood beyond. he did not feel the wind of his running on his bare skin. he did not feel the hunger that had made him so unable to bear the lash. on and on he ran, fancying ever he heard the cruel angus behind him. if a dry twig snapped, he thought it was the crack of the whip; and a small wind that rose suddenly in the top of a pine, seemed the hiss with which it was about to descend upon him. he ran and ran, but still there seemed nothing between him and his persecutors. he felt no safety. at length he came where a high wall joining some water, formed a boundary. the water was a brook from the mountain, here widened and deepened into a still pool. he had been once out of his depth before: he threw himself in, and swam straight across: ever after that, swimming seemed to him as natural as walking. then first awoke a faint sense of safety; for on the other side he was knee deep in heather. he was on the wild hill, with miles on miles of cover! here the unman could not catch him. it must be the same that donal pointed out to him one day at a distance; he had a gun, and donal said he had once shot a poacher and killed him. he did not know what a poacher was: perhaps he was one himself, and the man would shoot him. they could see him quite well from the other side! he must cross the knoll first, and then he might lie down and rest. he would get right into the heather, and lie with it all around and over him till the night came. where he would go then, he did not know. but it was all one; he could go anywhere. donal must mind his cows, and the men must mind the horses, and mistress jean must mind her kitchen, but sir gibbie could go where he pleased. he would go up daurside; but he would not go just at once; that man might be on the outlook for him, and he wouldn't like to be shot. people who were shot lay still, and were put into holes in the earth, and covered up, and he would not like that. thus he communed with himself as he went over the knoll. on the other side he chose a tall patch of heather, and crept under. how nice and warm and kind the heather felt, though it did hurt the weals dreadfully sometimes. if he only had something to cover just them! there seemed to be one down his back as well as round his waist! and now sir gibbie, though not much poorer than he had been, really possessed nothing separable, except his hair and his nails--nothing therefore that he could call his, as distinguished from him. his sole other possession was a negative quantity--his hunger, namely, for he had not even a meal in his body: he had eaten nothing since the preceding noon. i am wrong--he had one possession besides, though hardly a separable one--a ballad about a fair lady and her page, which donal had taught him. that he now began to repeat to himself, but was disappointed to find it a good deal withered. he was not nearly reduced to extremity yet though--this little heir of the world: in his body he had splendid health, in his heart a great courage, and in his soul an ever-throbbing love. it was his love to the very image of man, that made the horror of the treatment he had received. angus was and was not a man! after all, gibbie was still one to be regarded with holy envy. poor ginny was sent to bed for interfering with her father's orders; and what with rage and horror and pity, an inexplicable feeling of hopelessness took possession of her, while her affection for her father was greatly, perhaps for this world irretrievably, injured by that morning's experience; a something remained that never passed from her, and that something, as often as it stirred, rose between him and her. fergus told his aunt what had taken place, and made much game of her brownie. but the more jean thought about the affair, the less she liked it. it was she upon whom it all came! what did it matter who or what her brownie was? and what had they whipped the creature for? what harm had he done? if indeed he was a little ragged urchin, the thing was only the more inexplicable! he had taken nothing! she had never missed so much as a barley scon! the cream had always brought her the right quantity of butter! not even a bannock, so far as she knew, was ever gone from the press, or an egg from the bossie where they lay heaped! there was more in it than she could understand! her nephew's mighty feat, so far from explaining anything, had only sealed up the mystery. she could not help cherishing a shadowy hope that, when things had grown quiet, he would again reveal his presence by his work, if not by his visible person. it was mortifying to think that he had gone as he came, and she had never set eyes upon him. but fergus's account of his disappearance had also, in her judgment, a decided element of the marvellous in it. she was strongly inclined to believe that the brownie had cast a glamour over him and the laird and angus, all three, and had been making game of them for his own amusement. indeed daurside generally refused the explanation of the brownie presented for its acceptance, and the laird scored nothing against the arch-enemy superstition. donal grant, missing his "cratur" that day for the first time, heard enough when he came home to satisfy him that he had been acting the brownie in the house and the stable as well as in the field, incredible as it might well appear that such a child should have had even mere strength for what he did. then first also, after he had thus lost him, he began to understand his worth, and to see how much he owed him. while he had imagined himself kind to the urchin, the urchin had been laying him under endless obligation. for he left him with ever so much more in his brains than when he came. this book and that, through his aid, he had read thoroughly; and a score or so of propositions had been added to his stock in euclid. his first feeling about the child revived as he pondered--namely, that he was not of this world. but even then donal did not know the best gibbie had done for him. he did not know of what far deeper and better things he had, through his gentleness, his trust, his loving service, his absolute unselfishness, sown the seeds in his mind. on the other hand, donal had in return done more for gibbie than he knew, though what he had done for him, namely, shared his dinners with him, had been less of a gift than he thought, and donal had rather been sharing in gibbie's dinner, than gibbie in donal's. chapter xxii. refuge. it was a lovely saturday evening on glashgar. the few flowers about the small turf cottage scented the air in the hot western sun. the heather was not in bloom yet, and there were no trees; but there were rocks, and stones, and a brawling burn that half surrounded a little field of oats, one of potatoes, and a small spot with a few stocks of cabbage and kail, on the borders of which grew some bushes of double daisies, and primroses, and carnations. these janet tended as part of her household, while her husband saw to the oats and potatoes. robert had charge of the few sheep on the mountain which belonged to the farmer at the mains, and for his trouble had the cottage and the land, most of which he had himself reclaimed. he had also a certain allowance of meal, which was paid in portions, as corn went from the farm to the mill. if they happened to fall short, the miller would always advance them as much as they needed, repaying himself--and not very strictly--the next time the corn was sent from the mains. they were never in any want, and never had any money, except what their children brought them out of their small wages. but that was plenty for their every need, nor had they the faintest feeling that they were persons to be pitied. it was very cold up there in winter, to be sure, and they both suffered from rheumatism; but they had no debt, no fear, much love, and between them, this being mostly janet's, a large hope for what lay on the other side of death: as to the rheumatism, that was necessary, janet said, to teach them patience, for they had no other trouble. they were indeed growing old, but neither had begun to feel age a burden yet, and when it should prove such, they had a daughter prepared to give up service and go home to help them. their thoughts about themselves were nearly lost in their thoughts about each other, their children, and their friends. janet's main care was her old man, and robert turned to janet as the one stay of his life, next to the god in whom he trusted. he did not think so much about god as she: he was not able; nor did he read so much of his bible; but she often read to him; and when any of his children were there of an evening, he always "took the book." while janet prayed at home, his closet was the mountain-side, where he would kneel in the heather, and pray to him who saw unseen, the king eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise god. the sheep took no heed of him, but sometimes when he rose from his knees and saw oscar gazing at him with deepest regard, he would feel a little as if he had not quite entered enough into his closet, and would wonder what the dog was thinking. all day, from the mountain and sky and preaching burns, from the sheep and his dog, from winter storms, spring sun and winds, or summer warmth and glow, but more than all, when he went home, from the presence and influence of his wife, came to him somehow--who can explain how!--spiritual nourishment and vital growth. one great thing in it was, that he kept growing wiser and better without knowing it. if st. paul had to give up judging his own self, perhaps robert grant might get through without ever beginning it. he loved life, but if he had been asked why, he might not have found a ready answer. he loved his wife--just because she was janet. blithely he left his cottage in the morning, deep breathing the mountain air, as if it were his first in the blissful world; and all day the essential bliss of being was his; but the immediate hope of his heart was not the heavenly city; it was his home and his old woman, and her talk of what she had found in her bible that day. strangely mingled--mingled even to confusion with his faith in god, was his absolute trust in his wife--a confidence not very different in kind from the faith which so many christians place in the mother of our lord. to robert, janet was one who knew--one who was far ben??? with the father of lights. she perceived his intentions, understood his words, did his will, dwelt in the secret place of the most high. when janet entered into the kingdom of her father, she would see that he was not left outside. he was as sure of her love to himself, as he was of god's love to her, and was certain she could never be content without her old man. he was himself a dull soul, he thought, and could not expect the great god to take much notice of him, but he would allow janet to look after him. he had a vague conviction that he would not be very hard to save, for he knew himself ready to do whatever was required of him. none of all this was plain to his consciousness, however, or i daresay he would have begun at once to combat the feeling. his sole anxiety, on the other hand, was neither about life nor death, about this world nor the next, but that his children should be honest and honourable, fear god and keep his commandments. around them, all and each, the thoughts of father and mother were constantly hovering--as if to watch them, and ward off evil. almost from the day, now many years ago, when, because of distance and difficulty, she ceased to go to church, janet had taken to her new testament in a new fashion. she possessed an instinctive power of discriminating character, which had its root and growth in the simplicity of her own; she had always been a student of those phases of humanity that came within her ken; she had a large share of that interest in her fellows and their affairs which is the very bloom upon ripe humanity: with these qualifications, and the interpretative light afforded by her own calm practical way of living, she came to understand men and their actions, especially where the latter differed from what might ordinarily have been expected, in a marvellous way: her faculty amounted almost to sympathetic contact with the very humanity. when, therefore, she found herself in this remote spot, where she could see so little of her kind, she began, she hardly knew by what initiation, to turn her study upon the story of our lord's life. nor was it long before it possessed her utterly, so that she concentrated upon it all the light and power of vision she had gathered from her experience of humanity. it ought not therefore to be wonderful how much she now understood of the true humanity--with what simple directness she knew what many of the words of the son of man meant, and perceived many of the germs of his individual actions. hence it followed naturally that the thought of him, and the hope of one day seeing him, became her one informing idea. she was now such another as those women who ministered to him on the earth. a certain gentle indifference she allowed to things considered important, the neighbours attributed to weakness of character, and called softness; while the honesty, energy, and directness with which she acted upon insights they did not possess, they attributed to intellectual derangement. she was "ower easy," they said, when the talk had been of prudence or worldly prospect; she was "ower hard," they said, when the question had been of right and wrong. the same afternoon, a neighbour, on her way over the shoulder of the hill to the next village, had called upon her and found her brushing the rafters of her cottage with a broom at the end of a long stick. "save 's a', janet! what are ye efter? i never saw sic a thing!" she exclaimed. "i kenna hoo i never thoucht o' sic a thing afore," answered janet, leaning her broom against the wall, and dusting a chair for her visitor; "but this mornin', whan my man an' me was sittin' at oor brakfast, there cam' sic a clap o' thunner, 'at it jist garred the bit hoosie trim'le; an' doon fell a snot o' soot intil the very spune 'at my man was cairryin' till's honest moo. that cudna be as things war inten'it, ye ken; sae what was to be said but set them richt?" "ow, weel! but ye micht hae waitit till donal cam' hame; he wad hae dune 't in half the time, an' no raxed his jints." "i cudna pit it aff," answered janet. "wha kenned whan the lord micht come?--he canna come at cock-crawin' the day, but he may be here afore nicht." "weel, i's awa," said her visitor rising. "i'm gauin' ower to the toon to buy a feow hanks o' worset to weyve a pair o' stockins to my man. guid day to ye, janet.--what neist, i won'er?" she added to herself as she left the house. "the wuman's clean dementit!" the moment she was gone, janet caught up her broom again, and went spying about over the roof--ceiling there was none--after long tangles of agglomerated cobweb and smoke. "ay!" she said to herself, "wha kens whan he may be at the door? an' i wadna like to hear him say--'janet, ye micht hae had yer hoose a bit cleaner, whan ye kenned i micht be at han'!'" with all the cleaning she could give it, her cottage would have looked but a place of misery to many a benevolent woman, who, if she had lived there, would not have been so benevolent as janet, or have kept the place half so clean. for her soul was alive and rich, and out of her soul, not education or habit, came the smallest of her virtues.--having finished at last, she took her besom to the door, and beat it against a stone. that done, she stood looking along the path down the hill. it was that by which her sons and daughters, every saturday, came climbing, one after the other, to her bosom, from their various labours in the valley below, through the sunset, through the long twilight, through the moonlight, each urged by a heart eager to look again upon father and mother. the sun was now far down his western arc, and nearly on a level with her eyes; and as she gazed into the darkness of the too much light, suddenly emerged from it, rose upward, staggered towards her--was it an angel? was it a spectre? did her old eyes deceive her? or was the second sight born in her now first in her old age?--it seemed a child--reeling, and spreading out hands that groped. she covered her eyes for a moment, for it might be a vision in the sun, not on the earth--and looked again. it was indeed a naked child! and--was she still so dazzled by the red sun as to see red where red was none?--or were those indeed blood-red streaks on his white skin? straight now, though slow, he came towards her. it was the same child who had come and gone so strangely before! he held out his hands to her, and fell on his face at her feet like one dead. then, with a horror of pitiful amazement, she saw a great cross marked in two cruel stripes on his back; and the thoughts that thereupon went coursing through her loving imagination, it would be hard to set forth. could it be that the lord was still, child and man, suffering for his race, to deliver his brothers and sisters from their sins?--wandering, enduring, beaten, blessing still? accepting the evil, slaying it, and returning none? his patience the one rock where the evil word finds no echo; his heart the one gulf into which the dead-sea wave rushes with no recoil--from which ever flows back only purest water, sweet and cool; the one abyss of destroying love, into which all wrong tumbles, and finding no reaction, is lost, ceases for evermore? there, in its own cradle, the primal order is still nursed, still restored; thence is still sent forth afresh, to leaven with new life the world ever ageing! shadowy and vague they were--but vaguely shadowed were thoughts like these in janet's mind, as she stood half-stunned, regarding for one moment motionless the prostrate child and his wrongs. the next she lifted him in her arms, and holding him tenderly to her mother-heart, carried him into the house, murmuring over him dove-like sounds of pity and endearment mingled with indignation. there she laid him on his side in her bed, covered him gently over, and hastened to the little byre at the end of the cottage, to get him some warm milk. when she returned, he had already lifted his heavy eyelids, and was looking wearily about the place. but when he saw her, did ever so bright a sun shine as that smile of his! eyes and mouth and whole face flashed upon janet! she set down the milk, and went to the bedside. gibbie put up his arms, threw them round her neck, and clung to her as if she had been his mother. and from that moment she was his mother: her heart was big enough to mother all the children of humanity. she was like charity herself, with her babes innumerable. "what have they done to ye, my bairn?" she said, in tones pitiful with the pity of the shepherd of the sheep himself. no reply came back--only another heavenly smile, a smile of absolute content. for what were stripes and nakedness and hunger to gibbie, now that he had a woman to love! gibbie's necessity was to love; but here was more; here was love offering herself to him! except in black sambo he had scarcely caught a good sight of her before. he had never before been kissed by that might of god's grace, a true woman. she was an old woman who kissed him; but none who have drunk of the old wine of love, straightway desire the new, for they know that the old is better. match such as hers with thy love, maiden of twenty, and where wilt thou find the man i say not worthy, but fit to mate with thee? for hers was love indeed--not the love of love--but the love of life. already gibbie's faintness was gone--and all his ills with it. she raised him with one arm, and held the bowl to his mouth, and he drank; but all the time he drank, his eyes were fixed upon hers. when she laid him down again, he turned on his side, off his scored back, and in a moment was fast asleep. she stood gazing at him. so still was he, that she began to fear he was dead, and laid her hand on his heart. it was beating steadily, and she left him, to make some gruel for him against his waking. her soul was glad, for she was ministering to her master, not the less in his own self, that it was in the person of one of his little ones. gruel, as such a one makes it, is no common fare, but delicate enough for a queen. she set it down by the fire, and proceeded to lay the supper for her expected children. the clean yellow-white table of soft smooth fir, needed no cloth--only horn spoons and wooden caups. at length a hand came to the latch, and mother and daughter greeted as mother and daughter only can; then came a son, and mother and son greeted as mother and son only can. they kept on arriving singly to the number of six--two daughters and four sons, the youngest some little time after the rest. each, as he or she came, janet took to the bed, and showed her seventh child where he slept. each time she showed him, to secure like pity with her own, she turned down the bedclothes, and revealed the little back, smitten with the eternal memorial of the divine perfection. the women wept. the young men were furious, each after his fashion. "god damn the rascal 'at did it!" cried one of them, clenching his teeth, and forgetting himself quite in the rage of the moment. "laddie, tak back the word," said his mother calmly. "gien ye dinna forgie yer enemies, ye'll no be forgi'en yersel'." "that's some hard, mither," answered the offender, with an attempted smile. "hard!" she echoed; "it may weel be hard, for it canna be helpit. what wad be the use o' forgiein' ye, or hoo cud it win at ye, or what wad ye care for't, or mak o't, cairryin' a hell o' hate i' yer verra hert? for gien god be love, hell maun be hate. my bairn, them 'at winna forgie their enemies, cairries sic a nest o' deevilry i' their ain boasoms, 'at the verra speerit o' god himsel' canna win in till't for bein' scomfished wi' smell an' reik. muckle guid wad ony pardon dee to sic! but ance lat them un'erstan' 'at he canna forgie them, an' maybe they'll be fleyt, an' turn again' the sawtan 'at's i' them." "weel, but he's no my enemy," said the youth. "no your enemy!" returned his mother; "--no your enemy, an' sair (serve) a bairn like that! my certy! but he's the enemy o' the haill race o' mankin'. he trespasses unco sair against me, i'm weel sure o' that! an' i'm glaid o' 't. i'm glaid 'at he has me for ane o' 's enemies, for i forgie him for ane; an' wuss him sae affrontit wi' himsel' er' a' be dune, 'at he wad fain hide his heid in a midden." "noo, noo, mither!" said the eldest son, who had not yet spoken, but whose countenance had been showing a mighty indignation, "that's surely as sair a bannin' as yon 'at jock said." "what, laddie! wad ye hae a fellow-cratur live to a' eternity ohn been ashamed o' sic a thing 's that? wad that be to wuss him weel? kenna ye 'at the mair shame the mair grace? my word was the best beginnin' o' better 'at i cud wuss him. na, na, laddie! frae my verra hert, i wuss he may be that affrontit wi' himsel' 'at he canna sae muckle as lift up's een to h'aven, but maun smite upo' 's breist an' say, 'god be mercifu' to me a sinner!' that's my curse upo' him, for i wadna hae 'im a deevil. whan he comes to think that shame o' himsel', i'll tak him to my hert, as i tak the bairn he misguidit. only i doobt i'll be lang awa afore that, for it taks time to fess a man like that till's holy senses." the sixth of the family now entered, and his mother led him up to the bed. "the lord preserve's!" cried donal grant, "it's the cratur!--an' is that the gait they hae guidit him! the quaietest cratur an' the willin'est!" donal began to choke. "ye ken him than, laddie?" said his mother. "weel that," answered donal. "he's been wi' me an' the nowt ilka day for weeks till the day." with that he hurried into the story of his acquaintance with gibbie; and the fable of the brownie would soon have disappeared from daurside, had it not been that janet desired them to say nothing about the boy, but let him be forgotten by his enemies, till he grew able to take care of himself. besides, she said, their father might get into trouble with the master and the laird, if it were known they had him. donal vowed to himself, that, if fergus had had a hand in the abuse, he would never speak civil word to him again. he turned towards the bed, and there were gibbie's azure eyes wide open and fixed upon him. "eh, ye cratur!" he cried; and darting to the bed, he took gibbie's face between his hands, and said, in a voice to which pity and sympathy gave a tone like his mother's, "whaten a deevil was't 'at lickit ye like that? eh! i wuss i had the trimmin' o' him!" gibbie smiled. "has the ill-guideship ta'en the tongue frae 'im, think ye?" asked the mother. "na, na," answered donal; "he's been like that sin' ever i kenned him. i never h'ard word frae the moo' o' 'im." "he'll be ane o' the deif an' dumb," said janet. "he's no deif, mither; that i ken weel; but dumb he maun be, i'm thinkin'.--cratur," he continued, stooping over the boy, "gien ye hear what i'm sayin', tak haud o' my nose." thereupon, with a laugh like that of an amused infant, gibbie raised his hand, and with thumb and forefinger gently pinched donal's large nose, at which they all burst out laughing with joy. it was as if they had found an angel's baby in the bushes, and been afraid he was an idiot, but were now relieved. away went janet, and brought him his gruel. it was with no small difficulty and not without a moan or two, that gibbie sat up in the bed to take it. there was something very pathetic in the full content with which he sat there in his nakedness, and looked smiling at them all. it was more than content--it was bliss that shone in his countenance. he took the wooden bowl, and began to eat; and the look he cast on janet seemed to say he had never tasted such delicious food. indeed he never had; and the poor cottage, where once more he was a stranger and taken in, appeared to gibbie a place of wondrous wealth. and so it was--not only in the best treasures, those of loving kindness, but in all homely plenty as well for the needs of the body--a very temple of the god of simplicity and comfort--rich in warmth and rest and food. janet went to her kist, whence she brought out a garment of her own, and aired it at the fire. it had no lace at the neck or cuffs, no embroidery down the front; but when she put it on him, amid the tearful laughter of the women, and had tied it round his waist with a piece of list that had served as a garter, it made a dress most becoming in their eyes, and gave gibbie indescribable pleasure from its whiteness, and its coolness to his inflamed skin. they had just finished clothing him thus, when the goodman came home, and the mother's narration had to be given afresh, with donal's notes explanatory and completive. as the latter reported the doings of the imagined brownie, and the commotion they had caused at the mains and along daurside, gibbie's countenance flashed with pleasure and fun; and at last he broke into such a peal of laughter as had never, for pure merriment, been heard before so high on glashgar. all joined involuntarily in the laugh--even the old man, who had been listening with his grey eyebrows knit, and hanging like bosky precipices over the tarns of his deepset eyes, taking in every word, but uttering not one. when at last his wife showed him the child's back, he lifted his two hands, and moved them slowly up and down, as in pitiful appeal for man against man to the sire of the race. but still he said not a word. as to utterance of what lay in the deep soul of him, the old man, except sometimes to his wife, was nearly as dumb as gibbie himself. they sat down to their homely meal. simplest things will carry the result of honest attention as plainly as more elaborate dishes; and, which it might be well to consider, they will carry no more than they are worth: of janet's supper it is enough to say that it was such as became her heart. in the judgment of all her guests, the porridge was such as none could make but mother, the milk such as none but mother's cow could yield, the cakes such as she only could bake. gibbie sat in the bed like a king on his throne, gazing on his kingdom. for he that loves has, as no one else has. it is the divine possession. picture the delight of the child, in his passion for his kind, looking out upon this company of true hearts, honest faces, human forms--all strong and healthy, loving each other and generous to the taking in of the world's outcast! gibbie could not, at that period of his history, have invented a heaven more to his mind, and as often as one of them turned eyes towards the bed, his face shone up with love and merry gratitude, like a better sun. it was now almost time for the sons and daughters to go down the hill again, and leave the cottage and the blessed old parents and the harboured child to the night, the mountain-silence, and the living god. the sun had long been down; but far away in the north, the faint thin fringe of his light-garment was still visible, moving with the unseen body of his glory softly eastward, dreaming along the horizon, growing fainter and fainter as it went, but at the faintest then beginning to revive and grow. of the northern lands in summer, it may be said, as of the heaven of heavens, that there is no night there. and by and by the moon also would attend the steps of the returning children of labour. "noo, lads an' lasses, afore we hae worship, rin, ilk ane o' ye," said the mother, "an' pu' heather to mak a bed to the wee man--i' the neuk there, at the heid o' oors. he'll sleep there bonny, an' no ill 'ill come near 'im." she was obeyed instantly. the heather was pulled, and set together upright as it grew, only much closer, so that the tops made a dense surface, and the many stalks, each weak, a strong upbearing whole. they boxed them in below with a board or two for the purpose, and bound them together above with a blanket over the top, and a white sheet over that--a linen sheet it was, and large enough to be doubled, and receive gibbie between its folds. then another blanket was added, and the bed, a perfect one, was ready. the eldest of the daughters took gibbie in her arms, and, tenderly careful over his hurts, lifted him from the old folks' bed, and placed him in his own--one more luxurious, for heather makes a still better stratum for repose than oat-chaff--and gibbie sank into it with a sigh that was but a smile grown vocal. then donal, as the youngest, got down the big bible, and having laid it before his father, lighted the rush-pith-wick projecting from the beak of the little iron lamp that hung against the wall, its shape descended from roman times. the old man put on his spectacles, took the book, and found the passage that fell, in continuous process, to that evening. now he was not a very good reader, and, what with blindness and spectacles, and poor light, would sometimes lose his place. but it never troubled him, for he always knew the sense of what was coming, and being no idolater of the letter, used the word that first suggested itself, and so recovered his place without pausing. it reminded his sons and daughters of the time when he used to tell them bible stories as they crowded about his knees; and sounding therefore merely like the substitution of a more familiar word to assist their comprehension, woke no surprise. and even now, the word supplied, being in the vernacular, was rather to the benefit than the disadvantage of his hearers. the word of christ is spirit and life, and where the heart is aglow, the tongue will follow that spirit and life fearlessly, and will not err. on this occasion he was reading of our lord's cure of the leper; and having read, "put forth his hand," lost his place, and went straight on without it, from his memory of the facts. "he put forth his han'--an' grippit him, and said, aw wull--be clean." after the reading followed a prayer, very solemn and devout. it was then only, when before god, with his wife by his side, and his family around him, that the old man became articulate. he would scarcely have been so then, and would have floundered greatly in the marshes of his mental chaos, but for the stepping-stones of certain theological forms and phrases, which were of endless service to him in that they helped him to utter what in him was far better, and so realise more to himself his own feelings. those forms and phrases would have shocked any devout christian who had not been brought up in the same school; but they did him little harm, for he saw only the good that was in them, and indeed did not understand them save in so far as they worded that lifting up of the heart after which he was ever striving. by the time the prayer was over, gibbie was fast asleep again. what it all meant he had not an idea; and the sound lulled him--a service often so rendered in lieu of that intended. when he woke next, from the aching of his stripes, the cottage was dark. the old people were fast asleep. a hairy thing lay by his side, which, without the least fear, he examined by palpation, and found to be a dog, whereupon he fell fast asleep again, if possible happier than ever. and while the cottage was thus quiet, the brothers and sisters were still tramping along the moonlight paths of daurside. they had all set out together, but at one point after another there had been a parting, and now they were on six different roads, each drawing nearer to the labour of the new week. chapter xxiii. more schooling. the first opportunity donal had, he questioned fergus as to his share in the ill-usage of gibbie. fergus treated the inquiry as an impertinent interference, and mounted his high horse at once. what right had his father's herd-boy to question him as to his conduct? he put it so to him and in nearly just as many words. thereupon answered donal-- "it's this, ye see, fergus: ye hae been unco guid to me, an' i'm mair obligatit till ye nor i can say. but it wad be a scunnerfu' thing to tak the len' o' buiks frae ye, an' spier quest'ons at ye 'at i canna mak oot mysel', an' syne gang awa despisin' ye i' my hert for cruelty an' wrang. what was the cratur punished for? tell me that. accordin' till yer aunt's ain accoont, he had taen naething, an' had dune naething but guid." "why didn't he speak up then, and defend himself, and not be so damned obstinate?" returned fergus. "he wouldn't open his mouth to tell his name, or where he came from even. i couldn't get him to utter a single word. as for his punishment, it was by the laird's orders that angus mac pholp took the whip to him. i had nothing to do with it.--" fergus did not consider the punishment he had himself given him as worth mentioning--as indeed, except for honesty's sake, it was not, beside the other. "weel, i'll be a man some day, an' angus 'll hae to sattle wi' me!" said donal through his clenched teeth. "man, fergus! the cratur's as dumb's a worum. i dinna believe 'at ever he spak a word in's life." this cut fergus to the heart, for he was far from being without generosity or pity. how many things a man who is not awake to side strenuously with the good in him against the evil, who is not on his guard lest himself should mislead himself, may do, of which he will one day be bitterly ashamed!--a trite remark, it may be, but, reader, that will make the thing itself no easier to bear, should you ever come to know you have done a thing of the sort. i fear, however, from what i know of fergus afterwards, that he now, instead of seeking about to make some amends, turned the strength that should have gone in that direction, to the justifying of himself to himself in what he had done. anyhow, he was far too proud to confess to donal that he had done wrong--too much offended at being rebuked by one he counted so immeasurably his inferior, to do the right thing his rebuke set before him. what did the mighty business matter! the little rascal was nothing but a tramp; and if he didn't deserve his punishment this time, he had deserved it a hundred times without having it, and would ten thousand times again. so reasoned fergus, while the feeling grew upon donal that the cratur was of some superior race--came from some other and nobler world. i would remind my reader that donal was a celt, with a nature open to every fancy of love or awe--one of the same breed with the foolish galatians, and like them ready to be bewitched; but bearing a heart that welcomed the light with glad rebound--loved the lovely, nor loved it only, but turned towards it with desire to become like it. fergus too was a celt in the main, but was spoiled by the paltry ambition of being distinguished. he was not in love with loveliness, but in love with praise. he saw not a little of what was good and noble, and would fain be such, but mainly that men might regard him for his goodness and nobility; hence his practical notion of the good was weak, and of the noble, paltry. his one desire in doing anything, was to be approved of or admired in the same--approved of in the opinions he held, in the plans he pursued, in the doctrines he taught; admired in the poems in which he went halting after byron, and in the eloquence with which he meant one day to astonish great congregations. there was nothing original as yet discoverable in him; nothing to deliver him from the poor imitative apery in which he imagined himself a poet. he did possess one invaluable gift--that of perceiving and admiring more than a little, certain forms of the beautiful; but it was rendered merely ridiculous by being conjoined with the miserable ambition--poor as that of any mountebank emperor--to be himself admired for that admiration. he mistook also sensibility for faculty, nor perceived that it was at best but a probable sign that he might be able to do something or other with pleasure, perhaps with success. if any one judge it hard that men should be made with ambitions to whose objects they can never attain, i answer, ambition is but the evil shadow of aspiration; and no man ever followed the truth, which is the one path of aspiration, and in the end complained that he had been made this way or that. man is made to be that which he is made most capable of desiring--but it goes without saying that he must desire the thing itself and not its shadow. man is of the truth, and while he follows a lie, no indication his nature yields will hold, except the fear, the discontent, the sickness of soul, that tell him he is wrong. if he say, "i care not for what you call the substance--it is to me the shadow; i want what you call the shadow," the only answer is, that, to all eternity, he can never have it: a shadow can never be had. ginevra was hardly the same child after the experience of that terrible morning. at no time very much at home with her father, something had now come between them, to remove which all her struggles to love him as before were unavailing. the father was too stupid, too unsympathetic, to take note of the look of fear that crossed her face if ever he addressed her suddenly; and when she was absorbed in fighting the thoughts that would come, he took her constraint for sullenness. with a cold spot in his heart where once had dwelt some genuine regard for donal, fergus went back to college. donal went on herding the cattle, cudgeling hornie, and reading what books he could lay his hands on: there was no supply through fergus any more, alas! the year before, ere he took his leave, he had been careful to see donal provided with at least books for study; but this time he left him to shift for himself. he was small because he was proud, spiteful because he was conceited. he would let donal know what it was to have lost his favour! but donal did not suffer much, except in the loss of the friendship itself. he managed to get the loan of a copy of burns--better meat for a strong spirit than the poetry of byron or even scott. an innate cleanliness of soul rendered the occasional coarseness to him harmless, and the mighty torrent of the man's life, broken by occasional pools reflecting the stars; its headlong hatred of hypocrisy and false religion; its generosity, and struggling conscientiousness; its failures and its repentances, roused much in the heart of donal. happily the copy he had borrowed, had in it a tolerable biography; and that, read along with the man's work, enabled him, young as he was, to see something of where and how he had failed, and to shadow out to himself, not altogether vaguely, the perils to which the greatest must be exposed who cannot rule his own spirit, but, like a mere child, reels from one mood into another--at the will of--what? from reading burns, donal learned also not a little of the capabilities of his own language; for, celt as he was by birth and country and mental character, he could not speak the gaelic: that language, soft as the speech of streams from rugged mountains, and wild as that of the wind in the tops of fir-trees, the language at once of bards and fighting men, had so far ebbed from the region, lingering only here and there in the hollow pools of old memories, that donal had never learned it; and the lowland scotch, an ancient branch of english, dry and gnarled, but still flourishing in its old age, had become instead, his mother-tongue; and the man who loves the antique speech, or even the mere patois, of his childhood, and knows how to use it, possesses therein a certain kind of power over the hearts of men, which the most refined and perfect of languages cannot give, inasmuch as it has travelled farther from the original sources of laughter and tears. but the old scotish itself is, alas! rapidly vanishing before a poor, shabby imitation of modern english--itself a weaker language in sound, however enriched in words, since the days of shakspere, when it was far more like scotch in its utterance than it is now. my mother-tongue, how sweet thy tone! how near to good allied! were even my heart of steel or stone, thou wouldst drive out the pride. so sings klaus groth, in and concerning his own plattdeutsch--so nearly akin to the english. to a poet especially is it an inestimable advantage to be able to employ such a language for his purposes. not only was it the speech of his childhood, when he saw everything with fresh, true eyes, but it is itself a child-speech; and the child way of saying must always lie nearer the child way of seeing, which is the poetic way. therefore, as the poetic faculty was now slowly asserting itself in donal, it was of vast importance that he should know what the genius of scotland had been able to do with his homely mother-tongue, for through that tongue alone, could what poetry he had in him have thoroughly fair play, and in turn do its best towards his development--which is the first and greatest use of poetry. it is a ruinous misjudgment--too contemptible to be asserted, but not too contemptible to be acted upon, that the end of poetry is publication. its true end is to help first the man who makes it along the path to the truth: help for other people may or may not be in it; that, if it become a question at all, must be an after one. to the man who has it, the gift is invaluable; and, in proportion as it helps him to be a better man, it is of value to the whole world; but it may, in itself, be so nearly worthless, that the publishing of it would be more for harm than good. ask any one who has had to perform the unenviable duty of editor to a magazine: he will corroborate what i say--that the quantity of verse good enough to be its own reward, but without the smallest claim to be uttered to the world, is enormous. not yet, however, had donal written a single stanza. a line, or at most two, would now and then come into his head with a buzz, like a wandering honey-bee that had mistaken its hive--generally in the shape of a humorous malediction on hornie--but that was all. in the mean time gibbie slept and waked and slept again, night after night--with the loveliest days between, at the cottage on glashgar. the morning after his arrival, the first thing he was aware of was janet's face beaming over him, with a look in its eyes more like worship then benevolence. her husband was gone, and she was about to milk the cow, and was anxious lest, while she was away, he should disappear as before. but the light that rushed into his eyes was in full response to that which kindled the light in hers, and her misgiving vanished; he could not love her like that and leave her. she gave him his breakfast of porridge and milk, and went to her cow. when she came back, she found everything tidy in the cottage, the floor swept, every dish washed and set aside; and gibbie was examining an old shoe of robert's, to see whether he could not mend it. janet, having therefore leisure, proceeded at once with joy to the construction of a garment she had been devising for him. the design was simple, and its execution easy. taking a blue winsey petticoat of her own, drawing it in round his waist, and tying it over the chemise which was his only garment, she found, as she had expected, that its hem reached his feet: she partly divided it up the middle, before and behind, and had but to backstitch two short seams, and there was a pair of sailor-like trousers, as tidy as comfortable! gibbie was delighted with them. true, they had no pockets, but then he had nothing to put in pockets, and one might come to think of that as an advantage. gibbie indeed had never had pockets, for the pockets of the garments he had had were always worn out before they reached him. then janet thought about a cap; but considering him a moment critically, and seeing how his hair stood out like thatch-eaves round his head, she concluded with herself "there maun be some men as weel's women fowk, i'm thinkin', whause hair's gien them for a coverin'," and betook herself instead to her new testament. gibbie stood by as she read in silence, gazing with delight, for he thought it must be a book of ballads like donal's that she was reading. but janet found his presence, his unresting attitude, and his gaze, discomposing. to worship freely, one must be alone, or else with fellow-worshippers. and reading and worshipping were often so mingled with janet, as to form but one mental consciousness. she looked up therefore from her book, and said-- "can ye read, laddie?" gibbie shook his head. "sit ye doon than, an' i s' read till ye." gibbie obeyed more than willingly, expecting to hear some ancient scots tale of love or chivalry. instead, it was one of those love-awful, glory-sad chapters in the end of the gospel of john, over which hangs the darkest cloud of human sorrow, shot through and through with the radiance of light eternal, essential, invincible. whether it was the uncertain response to janet's tone merely, or to truth too loud to be heard, save as a thrill, of some chord in his own spirit, having its one end indeed twisted around an earthly peg, but the other looped to a tail-piece far in the unknown--i cannot tell; it may have been that the name now and then recurring brought to his mind the last words of poor sambo; anyhow, when janet looked up, she saw the tears rolling down the child's face. at the same time, from the expression of his countenance, she judged that his understanding had grasped nothing. she turned therefore to the parable of the prodigal son, and read it. even that had not a few words and phrases unknown to gibbie, but he did not fail to catch the drift of the perfect story. for had not gibbie himself had a father, to whose bosom he went home every night? let but love be the interpreter, and what most wretched type will not serve the turn for the carriage of profoundest truth! the prodigal's lowest degradation, gibbie did not understand; but janet saw the expression of the boy's face alter with every tone of the tale, through all the gamut between the swine's trough and the arms of the father. then at last he burst--not into tears--gibbie was not much acquainted with weeping--but into a laugh of loud triumph. he clapped his hands, and in a shiver of ecstasy, stood like a stork upon one leg, as if so much of him was all that could be spared for this lower world, and screwed himself together. janet was well satisfied with her experiment. most scotch women, and more than most scotch men, would have rebuked him for laughing, but janet knew in herself a certain tension of delight which nothing served to relieve but a wild laughter of holiest gladness; and never in tears of deepest emotion did her heart appeal more directly to its god. it is the heart that is not yet sure of its god, that is afraid to laugh in his presence. thus had gibbie his first lesson in the only thing worth learning, in that which, to be learned at all, demands the united energy of heart and soul and strength and mind; and from that day he went on learning it. i cannot tell how, or what were the slow stages by which his mind budded and swelled until it burst into the flower of humanity, the knowledge of god. i cannot tell the shape of the door by which the lord entered into that house, and took everlasting possession of it. i cannot even tell in what shape he appeared himself in gibbie's thoughts--for the lord can take any shape that is human. i only know it was not any unhuman shape of earthly theology that he bore to gibbie, when he saw him with "that inward eye, which is the bliss of solitude." for happily janet never suspected how utter was gibbie's ignorance. she never dreamed that he did not know what was generally said about jesus christ. she thought he must know as well as she the outlines of his story, and the purpose of his life and death, as commonly taught, and therefore never attempted explanations for the sake of which she would probably have found herself driven to use terms and phrases which merely substitute that which is intelligible because it appeals to what in us is low, and is itself both low and false, for that which, if unintelligible, is so because of its grandeur and truth. gibbie's ideas of god he got all from the mouth of theology himself, the word of god; and to the theologian who will not be content with his teaching, the disciple of jesus must just turn his back, that his face may be to his master. so, teaching him only that which she loved, not that which she had been taught, janet read to gibbie of jesus, talked to him of jesus, dreamed to him about jesus; until at length--gibbie did not think to watch, and knew nothing of the process by which it came about--his whole soul was full of the man, of his doings, of his words, of his thoughts, of his life. jesus christ was in him--he was possessed by him. almost before he knew, he was trying to fashion his life after that of his master. between the two, it was a sweet teaching, a sweet learning. under janet, gibbie was saved the thousand agonies that befall the conscientious disciple, from the forcing upon him, as the thoughts and will of the eternal father of our spirits, of the ill expressed and worse understood experiences, the crude conjectures, the vulgar imaginations of would-be teachers of the multitude. containing truth enough to save those of sufficiently low development to receive such teaching without disgust, it contains falsehood enough, but for the spirit of god, to ruin all nobler--i mean all childlike natures, utterly; and many such it has gone far to ruin, driving them even to a madness in which they have died. jesus alone knows the father, and can reveal him. janet studied only jesus, and as a man knows his friend, so she, only infinitely better, knew her more than friend--her lord and her god. do i speak of a poor scotch peasant woman too largely for the reader whose test of truth is the notion of probability he draws from his own experience? let me put one question to make the real probability clearer. should it be any wonder, if christ be indeed the natural lord of every man, woman, and child, that a simple, capable nature, laying itself entirely open to him and his influences, should understand him? how should he be the lord of that nature if such a thing were not possible, or were at all improbable--nay, if such a thing did not necessarily follow? among women, was it not always to peasant women that heavenly messages came? see revelation culminate in elizabeth and mary, the mothers of john the baptist and jesus. think how much fitter that it should be so;--that they to whom the word of god comes should be women bred in the dignity of a natural life, and familiarity with the large ways of the earth; women of simple and few wants, without distraction, and with time for reflection--compelled to reflection, indeed, from the enduring presence of an unsullied consciousness: for wherever there is a humble, thoughtful nature, into that nature the divine consciousness, that is, the spirit of god, presses as into its own place. holy women are to be found everywhere, but the prophetess is not so likely to be found in the city as in the hill-country. whatever janet, then, might, perhaps--i do not know--have imagined it her duty to say to gibbie had she surmised his ignorance, having long ceased to trouble her own head, she had now no inclination to trouble gibbie's heart with what men call the plan of salvation. it was enough to her to find that he followed her master. being in the light she understood the light, and had no need of system, either true or false, to explain it to her. she lived by the word proceeding out of the mouth of god. when life begins to speculate upon itself, i suspect it has begun to die. and seldom has there been a fitter soul, one clearer from evil, from folly, from human device--a purer cistern for such water of life as rose in the heart of janet grant to pour itself into, than the soul of sir gibbie. but i must not call any true soul a cistern: wherever the water of life is received, it sinks and softens and hollows, until it reaches, far down, the springs of life there also, that come straight from the eternal hills, and thenceforth there is in that soul a well of water springing up into everlasting life. chapter xxiv. the slate. from that very next day, then, after he was received into the cottage on glashgar, gibbie, as a matter of course, took upon him the work his hand could find to do, and janet averred to her husband that never had any of her daughters been more useful to her. at the same time, however, she insisted that robert should take the boy out with him. she would not have him do woman's work, especially work for which she was herself perfectly able. she had not come to her years, she said, to learn idleset; and the boy would save robert many a weary step among the hills. "he canna speyk to the dog," objected robert, giving utterance to the first difficulty that suggested itself. "the dog canna speyk himsel'," returned janet, "an' the won'er is he can un'erstan': wha kens but he may come full nigher ane 'at's speechless like himsel'! ye gie the cratur the chance, an' i s' warran' he'll mak himsel' plain to the dog. ye jist try 'im. tell ye him to tell the dog sae and sae, an' see what 'll come o' 't." robert made the experiment, and it proved satisfactory. as soon as he had received robert's orders, gibbie claimed oscar's attention. the dog looked up in his face, noted every glance and gesture, and, partly from sympathetic instinct, that gift lying so near the very essence of life, partly from observation of the state of affairs in respect of the sheep, divined with certainty what the duty required of him was, and was off like a shot. "the twa dumb craturs un'erstan' ane anither better nor i un'erstan' aither o' them," said robert to his wife when they came home. and now indeed it was a blessed time for gibbie. it had been pleasant down in the valley, with the cattle and donal, and foul weather sometimes; but now it was the full glow of summer; the sweet keen air of the mountain bathed him as he ran, entered into him, filled him with life like the new wine of the kingdom of god, and the whole world rose in its glory around him. surely it is not the outspread sea, however the sight of its storms and its labouring ships may enhance the sense of safety to the onlooker, but the outspread land of peace and plenty, with its nestling houses, its well-stocked yards, its cattle feeding in the meadows, and its men and horses at labour in the fields, that gives the deepest delight to the heart of the poet! gibbie was one of the meek, and inherited the earth. throned on the mountain, he beheld the multiform "goings on of life," and in love possessed the whole. he was of the poet-kind also, and now that he was a shepherd, saw everything with shepherd-eyes. one moment, to his fancy, the great sun above played the shepherd to the world, the winds were the dogs, and the men and women the sheep. the next, in higher mood, he would remember the good shepherd of whom janet had read to him, and pat the head of the collie that lay beside him: oscar too was a shepherd and no hireling; he fed the sheep; he turned them from danger and barrenness; and he barked well. "i'm the dumb dog!" said gibbie to himself, not knowing that he was really a copy in small of the good shepherd; "but maybe there may be mair nor ae gait o' barkin'." then what a joy it was to the heaven-born obedience of the child, to hearken to every word, watch every look, divine every wish of the old man! child hercules could not have waited on mighty old saturn as gibbie waited on robert. for he was to him the embodiment of all that was reverend and worthy, a very gulf of wisdom, a mountain of rectitude. gibbie was one of those few elect natures to whom obedience is a delight--a creature so different from the vulgar that they have but one tentacle they can reach such with--that of contempt. "i jist lo'e the bairn as the verra aipple o' my ee." said robert. "i can scarce consaive a wuss, but there's the cratur wi' a grip o' 't! he seems to ken what's risin' i' my min', an' in a moment he's up like the dog to be ready, an' luiks at me waitin'." nor was it long before the town-bred child grew to love the heavens almost as dearly as the earth. he would gaze and gaze at the clouds as they came and went, and watching them and the wind, weighing the heat and the cold, and marking many indications, known some of them perhaps only to himself, understood the signs of the earthly times at length nearly as well as an insect or a swallow, and far better than long-experienced old robert. the mountain was gibbie's very home; yet to see him far up on it, in the red glow of the setting sun, with his dog, as obedient as himself, hanging upon his every signal, one could have fancied him a shepherd boy come down from the plains of heaven to look after a lost lamb. often, when the two old people were in bed and asleep, gibbie would be out watching the moon rise--seated, still as ruined god of egypt, on a stone of the mountain-side, islanded in space, nothing alive and visible near him, perhaps not even a solitary night-wind blowing and ceasing like the breath of a man's life, and the awfully silent moon sliding up from the hollow of a valley below. if there be indeed a one spirit, ever awake and aware, should it be hard to believe that that spirit should then hold common thought with a little spirit of its own? if the nightly mountain was the prayer-closet of him who said he would be with his disciples to the end of the world, can it be folly to think he would hold talk with such a child, alone under the heaven, in the presence of the father of both? gibbie never thought about himself, therefore was there wide room for the entrance of the spirit. does the questioning thought arise to any reader: how could a man be conscious of bliss without the thought of himself? i answer the doubt: when a man turns to look at himself, that moment the glow of the loftiest bliss begins to fade; the pulsing fire-flies throb paler in the passionate night; an unseen vapour steams up from the marsh and dims the star-crowded sky and the azure sea; and the next moment the very bliss itself looks as if it had never been more than a phosphorescent gleam--the summer lightning of the brain. for then the man sees himself but in his own dim mirror, whereas ere he turned to look in that, he knew himself in the absolute clarity of god's present thought out-bodying him. the shoots of glad consciousness that come to the obedient man, surpass in bliss whole days and years of such ravined rapture as he gains whose weariness is ever spurring the sides of his intent towards the ever retreating goal of his desires. i am a traitor even to myself if i would live without my life. but i withhold my pen; for vain were the fancy, by treatise or sermon or poem or tale, to persuade a man to forget himself. he cannot if he would. sooner will he forget the presence of a raging tooth. there is no forgetting of ourselves but in the finding of our deeper, our true self--god's idea of us when he devised us--the christ in us. nothing but that self can displace the false, greedy, whining self, of which, most of us are so fond and proud. and that self no man can find for himself; seeing of himself he does not even know what to search for. "but as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of god." then there was the delight, fresh every week, of the saturday gathering of the brothers and sisters, whom gibbie could hardly have loved more, had they been of his own immediate kin. dearest of all was donal, whose greeting--"weel, cratur," was heavenly in gibbie's ears. donal would have had him go down and spend a day, every now and then, with him and the nowt, as in old times--so soon the times grow old to the young!--but janet would not hear of it, until the foolish tale of the brownie should have quite blown over. "eh, but i wuss," she added, as she said so, "i cud win at something aboot his fowk, or aiven whaur he cam frae, or what they ca'd him! never ae word has the cratur spoken!" "ye sud learn him to read, mither," said donal. "hoo wad i du that, laddie? i wad hae to learn him to speyk first," returned janet. "lat him come doon to me, an' i'll try my han'," said donal. janet, notwithstanding, persisted in her refusal--for the present. by donal's words set thinking of the matter, however, she now pondered the question day after day, how she might teach him to read; and at last the idea dawned upon her to substitute writing for speech. she took the shorter catechism, which, in those days, had always an alphabet as janitor to the gates of its mysteries--who, with the catechism as a consequence even dimly foreboded, would even have learned it?--and showed gibbie the letters, naming each several times, and going over them repeatedly. then she gave him donal's school-slate, with a sklet-pike, and said, "noo, mak a muckle a, cratur." gibbie did so, and well too: she found that already he knew about half the letters. "he 's no fule!" she said to herself in triumph. the other half soon followed; and she then began to show him words--not in the catechism, but in the new testament. having told him what any word was, and led him to consider the letters composing it, she would desire him to make it on the slate, and he would do so with tolerable accuracy: she was not very severe about the spelling, if only it was plain he knew the word. ere long he began to devise short ways of making the letters, and soon wrote with remarkable facility in a character modified from the printed letters. when at length janet saw him take the book by himself, and sit pondering over it, she had not a doubt he was understanding it, and her heart leapt for joy. he had to ask her a good many words at first, and often the meaning of one and another; but he seldom asked a question twice; and as his understanding was far ahead of his reading, he was able to test a conjectured meaning by the sense or nonsense it made of the passage. one day she turned him to the paraphrases.[ ] at once, to his astonishment, he found there, all silent, yet still the same delight which donal used to divide to him from the book of ballants. his joy was unbounded. he jumped from his seat; he danced, and laughed, and finally stood upon one leg: no other mode of expression but this, the expression of utter failure to express, was of avail to the relief of his feeling. one day, a few weeks after gibbie had begun to read by himself, janet became aware that he was sitting on his stool, in what had come to be called the cratur's corner, more than usually absorbed in some attempt with slate and pencil--now ceasing, lost in thought, and now commencing anew. she went near and peeped over his shoulder. at the top of the slate he had written the word give, then the word giving, and below them, gib, then gibing; upon these followed gib again, and he was now plainly meditating something further. suddenly he seemed to find what he wanted, for in haste, almost as if he feared it might escape him, he added a y, making the word giby--then first lifted his head, and looked round, evidently seeking her. she laid her hand on his head. he jumped up with one of his most radiant smiles, and holding out the slate to her, pointed with his pencil to the word he had just completed. she did not know it for a word, but sounded it as it seemed to stand, making the g soft, as i daresay some of my readers, not recognizing in gibbie the diminutive of gilbert, may have treated its more accurate form. he shook his head sharply, and laid the point of his pencil upon the g of the give written above. janet had been his teacher too long not to see what he meant, and immediately pronounced the word as he would have it. upon this he began a wild dance, but sobering suddenly, sat down, and was instantly again absorbed in further attempt. it lasted so long that janet resumed her previous household occupation. at length he rose, and with thoughtful, doubtful contemplation of what he had done, brought her the slate. there, under the fore-gone success, he had written the words galatians and breath, and under them, galbreath. she read them all, and at the last, which, witnessing to his success, she pronounced to his satisfaction, he began another dance, which again he ended abruptly, to draw her attention once more to the slate. he pointed to the giby first, and the galbreath next, and she read them together. this time he did not dance, but seemed waiting some result. upon janet the idea was dawning that he meant himself, but she was thrown out by the cognomen's correspondence with that of the laird, which suggested that the boy had been merely attempting the name of the great man of the district. with this in her mind, and doubtfully feeling her way, she essayed the tentative of setting him right in the christian name, and said: "thomas--thomas galbraith." gibbie shook his head as before, and again resumed his seat. presently he brought her the slate, with all the rest rubbed out, and these words standing alone--sir giby galbreath. janet read them aloud, whereupon gibbie began stabbing his forehead with the point of his slate-pencil, and dancing once more in triumph: he had, he hoped, for the first time in his life, conveyed a fact through words. "that's what they ca' ye, is't?" said janet, looking motherly at him: "--sir gibbie galbraith?" gibbie nodded vehemently. "it'll be some nickname the bairns hae gien him," said janet to herself, but continued to gaze at him, in questioning doubt of her own solution. she could not recall having ever heard of a sir in the family; but ghosts of things forgotten kept rising formless and thin in the sky of her memory: had she never heard of a sir somebody galbraith somewhere? and still she stared at the child, trying to grasp what she could not even see. by this time gibbie was standing quite still, staring at her in return: he could not think what made her stare so at him. "wha ca'd ye that?" said janet at length, pointing to the slate. gibbie took the slate, dropped upon his seat, and after considerable cogitation and effort, brought her the words, gibyse fapher. janet for a moment was puzzled, but when she thought of correcting the p with a t, gibbie entirely approved. "what was yer father, cratur?" she asked. gibbie, after a longer pause, and more evident labour than hitherto, brought her the enigmatical word, asootr, which, the sir running about in her head, quite defeated janet. perceiving his failure, he jumped upon a chair, and reaching after one of robert's sunday shoes on the crap o' the wa', the natural shelf running all round the cottage, formed by the top of the wall where the rafters rested, caught hold of it, tumbled with it upon his creepie, took it between his knees, and began a pantomime of the making or mending of the same with such verisimilitude of imitation, that it was clear to janet he must have been familiar with the processes collectively called shoemaking; and therewith she recognized the word on the slate--a sutor. she smiled to herself at the association of name and trade, and concluded that the sir at least was a nickname. and yet--and yet--whether from the presence of some rudiment of an old memory, or from something about the boy that belonged to a higher style than his present showing, her mind kept swaying in an uncertainty whose very object eluded her. "what is 't yer wull 'at we ca' ye, than, cratur?" she asked, anxious to meet the child's own idea of himself. he pointed to the giby. "weel, gibbie," responded janet,--and at the word, now for the first time addressed by her to himself, he began dancing more wildly than ever, and ended with standing motionless on one leg: now first and at last he was fully recognized for what he was!--"weel, gibbie, i s' ca' ye what ye think fit," said janet. "an' noo gang yer wa's, gibbie, an' see 'at crummie's no ower far oot o' sicht." from that hour gibbie had his name from the whole family--his christian name only, however, robert and janet having agreed it would be wise to avoid whatever might possibly bring the boy again under the notice of the laird. the latter half of his name they laid aside for him, as parents do a dangerous or over-valuable gift to a child. chapter xxv. rumours. almost from the first moment of his being domiciled on glashgar, what with the good food, the fine exercise, the exquisite air, and his great happiness, gibbie began to grow; and he took to growing so fast that his legs soon shot far out of his winsey garment. but, of all places, that was a small matter in gormgarnet, where the kilt was as common as trowsers. his wiry limbs grew larger without losing their firmness or elasticity; his chest, the effort in running up hill constantly alternated with the relief of running, down, rapidly expanded, and his lungs grew hardy as well as powerful; till he became at length such in wind and muscle, that he could run down a wayward sheep almost as well as oscar. and his nerve grew also with his body and strength, till his coolness and courage were splendid. never, when the tide of his affairs ran most in the shallows, had gibbie had much acquaintance with fears, but now he had forgotten the taste of them, and would have encountered a wild highland bull alone on the mountain, as readily as tie crummie up in her byre. one afternoon, donal, having got a half-holiday, by the help of a friend and the favour of mistress jean, came home to see his mother, and having greeted her, set out to find gibbie. he had gone a long way, looking and calling without success, and had come in sight of a certain tiny loch, or tarn, that filled a hollow of the mountain. it was called the deid pot; and the old awe, amounting nearly to terror, with which in his childhood he had regarded it, returned upon him, the moment he saw the dark gleam of it, nearly as strong as ever--an awe indescribable, arising from mingled feelings of depth, and darkness, and lateral recesses, and unknown serpent-like fishes. the pot, though small in surface, was truly of unknown depth, and had elements of dread about it telling upon far less active imaginations than donal's. while he stood gazing at it, almost afraid to go nearer, a great splash that echoed from the steep rocks surrounding it, brought his heart into his mouth, and immediately followed a loud barking, in which he recognized the voice of oscar. before he had well begun to think what it could mean, gibbie appeared on the opposite side of the loch, high above its level, on the top of the rocks forming its basin. he began instantly a rapid descent towards the water, where the rocks were so steep, and the footing so precarious, that oscar wisely remained at the top, nor attempted to follow him. presently the dog caught sight of donal, where he stood on a lower level, whence the water was comparatively easy of access, and starting off at full speed, joined him, with much demonstration of welcome. but he received little notice from donal, whose gaze was fixed, with much wonder and more fear, on the descending gibbie. some twenty feet from the surface of the loch, he reached a point whence clearly, in donal's judgment, there was no possibility of farther descent. but donal was never more mistaken; for that instant gibbie flashed from the face of the rock head foremost, like a fishing bird, into the lake. donal gave a cry, and ran to the edge of the water, accompanied by oscar, who, all the time, had showed no anxiety, but had stood wagging his tail, and uttering now and then a little half-disappointed whine; neither now were his motions as he ran other than those of frolic and expectancy. when they reached the loch, there was gibbie already but a few yards from the only possible landing-place, swimming with one hand, while in the other arm he held a baby lamb, its head lying quite still on his shoulder: it had been stunned by the fall, but might come round again. then first donal began to perceive that the cratur was growing an athlete. when he landed, he gave donal a merry laugh of welcome, but without stopping flew up the hill to take the lamb to its mother. fresh from the icy water, he ran so fast that it was all donal could do to keep up with him. the deid pot, then, taught gibbie what swimming it could, which was not much, and what diving it could, which was more; but the nights of the following summer, when everybody on mountain and valley were asleep, and the moon shone, he would often go down to the daur, and throwing himself into its deepest reaches, spend hours in lonely sport with water and wind and moon. he had by that time learned things knowing which a man can never be lonesome. the few goats on the mountain were for a time very inimical to him. so often did they butt him over, causing him sometimes severe bruises, that at last he resolved to try conclusions with them; and when next a goat made a rush at him, he seized him by the horns and wrestled with him mightily. this exercise once begun, he provoked engagements, until his strength and aptitude were such and so well known, that not a billy-goat on glashgar would have to do with him. but when he saw that every one of them ran at his approach, gibbie, who could not bear to be in discord with any creature, changed his behaviour towards them, and took equal pains to reconcile them to him--nor rested before he had entirely succeeded. every time donal came home, he would bring some book of verse with him, and, leading gibbie to some hollow, shady or sheltered as the time required, would there read to him ballads, or songs, or verse more stately, as mood or provision might suggest. the music, the melody and the cadence and the harmony, the tone and the rhythm and the time and the rhyme, instead of growing common to him, rejoiced gibbie more and more every feast, and with ever-growing reverence he looked up to donal as a mighty master-magician. but if donal could have looked down into gibbie's bosom, he would have seen something there beyond his comprehension. for gibbie was already in the kingdom of heaven, and donal would have to suffer, before he would begin even to look about for the door by which a man may enter into it. i wonder how much gibbie was indebted to his constrained silence during all these years. that he lost by it, no one will doubt; that he gained also, a few will admit: though i should find it hard to say what and how great, i cannot doubt it bore an important part in the fostering of such thoughts and feelings and actions as were beyond the vision of donal, poet as he was growing to be. while donal read, rejoicing in the music both of sound and sense, gibbie was doing something besides: he was listening with the same ears, and trying to see with the same eyes, which he brought to bear upon the things janet taught him out of the book. already those first weekly issues, lately commenced, of a popular literature had penetrated into the mountains of gormgarnet; but whether donal read blind harry from a thumbed old modern edition, or some new tale or neat poem from the edinburgh press, gibbie was always placing what he heard by the side, as it were, of what he knew; asking himself, in this case and that, what jesus christ would have done, or what he would require of a disciple. there must be one right way, he argued. sometimes his innocence failed to see that no disciple of the son of man could, save by fearful failure, be in such circumstances as the tale or ballad represented. but, whether successful or not in the individual inquiry, the boy's mind and heart and spirit, in this silent, unembarrassed brooding, as energetic as it was peaceful, expanded upwards when it failed to widen, and the widening would come after. gifted, from the first of his being, with such a rare drawing to his kind, he saw his utmost affection dwarfed by the words and deeds of jesus--beheld more and more grand the requirements made of a man who would love his fellows as christ loved them. when he sank foiled from any endeavour to understand how a man was to behave in certain circumstances, these or those, he always took refuge in doing something--and doing it better than before; leaped the more eagerly if robert called him, spoke the more gently to oscar, turned the sheep more careful not to scare them--as if by instinct he perceived that the only hope of understanding lies in doing. he would cleave to the skirt when the hand seemed withdrawn; he would run to do the thing he had learned yesterday, when as yet he could find no answer to the question of to-day. thus, as the weeks of solitude and love and thought and obedience glided by, the reality of christ grew upon him, till he saw the very rocks and heather and the faces of the sheep like him, and felt his presence everywhere, and ever coming nearer. nor did his imagination aid only a little in the growth of his being. he would dream waking dreams about jesus, gloriously childlike. he fancied he came down every now and then to see how things were going in the lower part of his kingdom; and that when he did so, he made use of glashgar and its rocks for his stair, coming down its granite scale in the morning, and again, when he had ended his visit, going up in the evening by the same steps. then high and fast would his heart beat at the thought that some day he might come upon his path just when he had passed, see the heather lifting its head from the trail of his garment, or more slowly out of the prints left by his feet, as he walked up the stairs of heaven, going back to his father. sometimes, when a sheep stopped feeding and looked up suddenly, he would fancy that jesus had laid his hand on its head, and was now telling it that it must not mind being killed; for he had been killed, and it was all right. although he could read the new testament for himself now, he always preferred making acquaintance with any new portion of it first from the mouth of janet. her voice made the word more of a word to him. but the next time he read, it was sure to be what she had then read. she was his priestess; the opening of her bible was the opening of a window in heaven; her cottage was the porter's lodge to the temple; his very sheep were feeding on the temple-stairs. smile at such fancies if you will, but think also whether they may not be within sight of the greatest of facts. of all teachings that which presents a far distant god is the nearest to absurdity. either there is none, or he is nearer to every one of us than our nearest consciousness of self. an unapproachable divinity is the veriest of monsters, the most horrible of human imaginations. when the winter came, with its frost and snow, gibbie saved robert much suffering. at first robert was unwilling to let him go out alone in stormy weather; but janet believed that the child doing the old man's work would be specially protected. all through the hard time, therefore, gibbie went and came, and no evil befell him. neither did he suffer from the cold; for, a sheep having died towards the end of the first autumn, robert, in view of gibbie's coming necessity, had begged of his master the skin, and dressed it with the wool upon it; and of this, between the three of them, they made a coat for him; so that he roamed the hill like a savage, in a garment of skin. it became, of course, before very long, well known about the country that mr. duff's crofters upon glashgar had taken in and were bringing up a foundling--some said an innocent, some said a wild boy--who helped robert with his sheep, and janet with her cow, but could not speak a word of either gaelic or english. by and by, strange stories came to be told of his exploits, representing him as gifted with bodily powers as much surpassing the common, as his mental faculties were assumed to be under the ordinary standard. the rumour concerning him swelled as well as spread, mainly from the love of the marvellous common in the region, i suppose, until, towards the end of his second year on glashgar, the notion of gibbie in the imaginations of the children of daurside, was that of an almost supernatural being, who had dwelt upon, or rather who had haunted, glashgar from time immemorial, and of whom they had been hearing all their lives; and, although they had never heard anything bad of him--that he was wild, that he wore a hairy skin, that he could do more than any other boy dared attempt, that he was dumb, and that yet (for this also was said) sheep and dogs and cattle, and even the wild creatures of the mountain, could understand him perfectly--these statements were more than enough, acting on the suspicion and fear belonging to the savage in their own bosoms, to envelope the idea of him in a mist of dread, deepening to such horror in the case of the more timid and imaginative of them, that when the twilight began to gather about the cottages and farmhouses, the very mention of "the beast-loon o' glashgar" was enough, and that for miles up and down the river, to send many of the children scouring like startled hares into the house. gibbie, in his atmosphere of human grace and tenderness, little thought what clouds of foolish fancies, rising from the valleys below, had, by their distorting vapours, made of him an object of terror to those whom at the very first sight he would have loved and served. amongst these, perhaps the most afraid of him were the children of the gamekeeper, for they lived on the very foot of the haunted hill, near the bridge and gate of glashruach; and the laird himself happened one day to be witness of their fear. he inquired the cause, and yet again was his enlightened soul vexed by the persistency with which the shadows of superstition still hung about his lands. had he been half as philosophical as he fancied himself, he might have seen that there was not necessarily a single film of superstition involved in the belief that a savage roamed a mountain--which was all that mistress mac pholp, depriving the rumour of its richer colouring, ventured to impart as the cause of her children's perturbation; but anything a hair's-breadth out of the common, was a thing hated of thomas galbraith's soul, and whatever another believed which he did not choose to believe, he set down at once as superstition. he held therefore immediate communication with his gamekeeper on the subject, who in his turn was scandalized that his children should have thus proved themselves unworthy of the privileges of their position, and given annoyance to the liberal soul of their master, and took care that both they and his wife should suffer in consequence. the expression of the man's face as he listened to the laird's complaint, would not have been a pleasant sight to any lover of gibbie; but it had not occurred either to master or man that the offensive being whose doubtful existence caused the scandal, was the same towards whom they had once been guilty of such brutality; nor would their knowledge of the fact have been favourable to gibbie. the same afternoon, the laird questioned his tenant of the mains concerning his cottars; and was assured that better or more respectable people were not in all the region of gormgarnet. when robert became aware, chiefly through the representations of his wife and donal, of gibbie's gifts of other kinds than those revealed to himself by his good shepherding, he began to turn it over in his mind, and by and by referred the question to his wife whether they ought not to send the boy to school, that he might learn the things he was so much more than ordinarily capable of learning. janet would give no immediate opinion. she must think, she said; and she took three days to turn the matter over in her mind. her questioning cogitation was to this effect: "what need has a man to know anything but what the new testament teaches him? life was little to me before i began to understand its good news; now it is more than good--it is grand. but then, man is to live by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of god; and everything came out of his mouth, when he said, let there be this, and let there be that. whatever is true is his making, and the more we know of it the better. besides, how much less of the new testament would i understand now, if it were not for things i had gone through and learned before!" "ay, robert," she answered, without preface, the third day, "i'm thinkin' there's a heap o' things, gien i hed them, 'at wad help me to ken what the maister spak till. it wad be a sin no to lat the laddie learn. but wha'll tak the trible needfu' to the learnin' o' a puir dummie?" "lat him gang doon to the mains, an' herd wi' donal," answered robert. "he kens a hantle mair nor you or me or gibbie aither; an' whan he's learnt a' 'at donal can shaw him it'll be time to think what neist." "weel," answered janet, "nane can say but that's sense, robert; an' though i'm laith, for your sake mair nor my ain, to lat the laddie gang, let him gang to donal. i houp, atween the twa, they winna lat the nowt amo' the corn." "the corn's 'maist cuttit noo," replied robert; "an' for the maitter o' that, twa guid consciences winna blaw ane anither oot.--but he needna gang ilka day. he can gie ae day to the learnin', an' the neist to thinkin' aboot it amo' the sheep. an' ony day 'at ye want to keep him, ye can keep him; for it winna be as gien he gaed to the schuil." gibbie was delighted with the proposal. "only," said robert, in final warning, "dinna ye lat them tak ye, gibbie, an' score yer back again, my cratur; an' dinna ye answer naebody, whan they speir what ye're ca'd, onything mair nor jist gibbie." the boy laughed and nodded, and, as janet said, the bairn's nick was guid 's the best man's word. now came a happy time for the two boys. donal began at once to teach gibbie euclid and arithmetic. when they had had enough of that for a day, he read scotish history to him; and when they had done what seemed their duty by that, then came the best of the feast--whatever tales or poetry donal had laid his hands upon. somewhere about this time it was that he first got hold of a copy of the paradise lost. he found that he could not make much of it. but he found also that, as before with the ballads, when he read from it aloud to gibbie, his mere listening presence sent back a spiritual echo that helped him to the meaning; and when neither of them understood it, the grand organ roll of it, losing nothing in the scotch voweling, delighted them both. once they were startled by seeing the gamekeeper enter the field. the moment he saw him, gibbie laid himself flat on the ground, but ready to spring to his feet and run. the man, however, did not come near them. chapter xxvi. the gamekeeper the second winter came, and with the first frost gibbie resumed his sheepskin coat and the brogues and leggings which he had made for himself of deer-hide tanned with the hair. it pleased the two old people to see him so warmly clad. it pleased them also that, thus dressed, he always reminded them of some sacred personage undetermined--jacob, or john the baptist, or the man who went to meet the lion and be killed by him--in robert's big bible, that is, in one or other of the woodcuts of the same. very soon the stories about him were all stirred up afresh, and new rumours added. this one and that of the children declared they had caught sight of the beast-loon, running about the rocks like a goat; and one day a boy of angus's own, who had been a good way up the mountain, came home nearly dead with terror, saying the beast-loon had chased him a long way. he did not add that he had been throwing stones at the sheep, not perceiving any one in charge of them. so, one fine morning in december, having nothing particular to attend to, angus shouldered his double-barrelled gun, and set out for a walk over glashgar, in the hope of coming upon the savage that terrified the children. he must be off. that was settled. where angus was in authority, the outlandish was not to be suffered. the sun shone bright, and a keen wind was blowing. about noon he came in sight of a few sheep, in a sheltered spot, where were little patches of coarse grass among the heather. on a stone, a few yards above them, sat gibbie, not reading, as he would be half the time now, but busied with a pan's-pipes--which, under donal's direction, he had made for himself--drawing from them experimental sounds, and feeling after the possibility of a melody. he was so much occupied that he did not see angus approach, who now stood for a moment or two regarding him. he was hirsute as esau, his head crowned with its own plentiful crop--even in winter he wore no cap--his body covered with the wool of the sheep, and his legs and feet with the hide of the deer--the hair, as in nature, outward. the deer-skin angus knew for what it was from afar, and concluding it the spoil of the only crime of which he recognized the enormity, whereas it was in truth part of a skin he had himself sold to a saddler in the next village, to make sporrans of, boiled over with wrath, and strode nearer, grinding his teeth. gibbie looked up, knew him, and starting to his feet, turned to the hill. angus, levelling his gun, shouted to him to stop, but gibbie only ran the harder, nor once looked round. idiotic with rage, angus fired. one of his barrels was loaded with shot, the other with ball: meaning to use the shot barrel, he pulled the wrong trigger, and liberated the bullet. it went through the calf of gibbie's right leg, and he fell. it had, however, passed between two muscles without injuring either greatly, and had severed no artery. the next moment he was on his feet again and running, nor did he yet feel pain. happily he was not very far from home, and he made for it as fast as he could--preceded by oscar, who, having once by accident been shot himself, had a mortal terror of guns. maimed as gibbie was, he could yet run a good deal faster up hill than the rascal who followed him. but long before he reached the cottage, the pain had arrived, and the nearer he got to it the worse it grew. in spite of the anguish, however, he held on with determination; to be seized by angus and dragged down to glashruach, would be far worse. robert grant was at home that day, suffering from rheumatism. he was seated in the ingle-neuk, with his pipe in his mouth, and janet was just taking the potatoes for their dinner off the fire, when the door flew open, and in stumbled gibbie, and fell on the floor. the old man threw his pipe from him, and rose trembling, but janet was before him. she dropt down on her knees beside the boy, and put her arm under his head. he was white and motionless. "eh, robert grant!" she cried, "he's bleedin'." the same moment they heard quick yet heavy steps approaching. at once robert divined the truth, and a great wrath banished rheumatism and age together. like a boy he sprang to the crap o' the wa', whence his yet powerful hand came back armed with a huge rusty old broad-sword that had seen service in its day. two or three fierce tugs at the hilt proving the blade immovable in the sheath, and the steps being now almost at the door, he clubbed the weapon, grasping it by the sheathed blade, and holding it with the edge downward, so that the blow he meant to deal should fall from the round of the basket hilt. as he heaved it aloft, the gray old shepherd seemed inspired by the god of battles; the rage of a hundred ancestors was welling up in his peaceful breast. his red eye flashed, and the few hairs that were left him stood erect on his head like the mane of a roused lion. ere angus had his second foot over the threshold, down came the helmet-like hilt with a dull crash on his head, and he staggered against the wall. "tak ye that, angus mac pholp!" panted robert through his clenched teeth, following the blow with another from his fist, that prostrated the enemy. again he heaved his weapon, and standing over him where he lay, more than half-stunned, said in a hoarse voice, "by the great god my maker, angus mac pholp, gien ye seek to rise, i'll come doon on ye again as ye lie!--here, oscar!--he's no ane to haud ony fair play wi', mair nor a brute beast.--watch him, oscar, and tak him by the thro't gien he muv a finger." the gun had dropped from angus's hand, and robert, keeping his eye on him, secured it. "she's lodd," muttered angus. "lie still than," returned robert, pointing the weapon at his head. "it'll be murder," said angus, and made a movement to lay hold of the barrel. "haud him doon, oscar," cried robert. the dog's paws were instantly on his chest, and his teeth grinning within an inch of his face. angus vowed in his heart he would kill the beast on the first chance. "it wad be but blude for blude, angus mac pholp," he went on. "yer hoor's come, my man. that bairn's is no the first blude o' man ye hae shed, an' it's time the scripture was fulfillt, an' the han' o' man shed yours." "ye're no gauin to kill me, rob grant?" growled the fellow in growing fright. "i'm gauin to see whether the shirra winna be perswaudit to hang ye," answered the shepherd. "this maun be putten a stap till.--quaiet! or i'll brain ye, an' save him the trouble.--here, janet, fess yer pot o' pitawtas. i'm gauin to toom the man's gun. gien he daur to muv, jist gie him the haill bilin', bree an a', i' the ill face o' 'm; gien ye lat him up he'll kill's a'; only tak care an' haud aff o' the dog, puir fallow!--i wad lay the stock o' yer murderin' gun i' the fire gien 'twarna 'at i reckon it's the laird's an' no yours. ye're no fit to be trustit wi' a gun. ye're waur nor a weyver." so saying he carried the weapon to the door, and, in terror lest he might, through wrath or the pressure of dire necessity, use it against his foe, emptied its second barrel into the earth, and leaned it up against the wall outside. janet obeyed her husband so far as to stand over angus with the potato-pot: how far she would have carried her obedience had he attempted to rise may remain a question. doubtless a brave man doing his duty would have scorned to yield himself thus; but right and wrong had met face to face, and the wrong had a righteous traitor in his citadel. when robert returned and relieved her guard, janet went back to gibbie, whom she had drawn towards the fire. he lay almost insensible, but in vain janet attempted to get a teaspoonful of whisky between his lips. for as he grew older, his horror of it increased; and now, even when he was faint and but half conscious, his physical nature seemed to recoil from contact with it. it was with signs of disgust, rubbing his mouth with the back of each hand alternately, that he first showed returning vitality. in a minute or two more he was able to crawl to his bed in the corner, and then janet proceeded to examine his wound. by this time his leg was much swollen, but the wound had almost stopped bleeding, and it was plain there was no bullet in it, for there were the two orifices. she washed it carefully and bound it up. then gibbie raised his head and looked somewhat anxiously round the room. "ye're luikin' efter angus?" said janet; "he's yon'er upo' the flure, a twa yairds frae ye. dinna be fleyt; yer father an' oscar has him safe eneuch, i s' warran'." "here, janet!" cried her husband; "gien ye be throu' wi' the bairn, i maun be gauin'." "hoot, robert! ye're no surely gauin' to lea' me an' puir gibbie, 'at maunna stir, i' the hoose oor lanes wi' the murderin' man!" returned janet. "'deed am i, lass! jist rin and fess the bit tow 'at ye hing yer duds upo' at the washin', an' we'll bin' the feet an' the han's o' 'im." janet obeyed and went. angus, who had been quiet enough for the last ten minutes, meditating and watching, began to swear furiously, but robert paid no more heed than if he had not heard him--stood calm and grim at his head, with the clubbed sword heaved over his shoulder. when she came back, by her husband's directions, she passed the rope repeatedly round the keeper's ankles, then several times between them, drawing the bouts tightly together, so that, instead of the two sharing one ring, each ankle had now, as it were, a close-fitting one for itself. again and again, as she tied it, did angus meditate a sudden spring, but the determined look of robert, and his feeling memory of the blows he had so unsparingly delivered upon him, as well as the weakening effect of that he had received on his head, caused him to hesitate until it was altogether too late. when they began to bind his hands, however, he turned desperate, and struck at both, cursing and raging. "gien ye binna quaiet, ye s' taste the dog's teeth," said robert.--angus reflected that he would have a better chance when he was left alone with janet, and yielded.--"troth!" robert went on, as he continued his task, "i hae no pity left for ye, angus mac pholp; an' gien ye tyauve ony mair, i'll lat at ye. i wad care no more to caw oot yer harns nor i wad to kill a tod (fox). to be hangt for't, i wad be but prood. it's a fine thing to be hangt for a guid cause, but ye'll be hangt for an ill ane.--noo, janet, fess a bun'le o' brackens frae the byre, an' lay aneth's heid. we maunna be sairer upo' him, nor the needcessity laid upo' hiz. i s' jist trail him aff o' the door, an' a bit on to the fire, for he'll be cauld whan he's quaitet doon, an' syne i'll awa' an' get word o' the shirra'. scotlan's come till a pretty pass, whan they shot men wi' guns, as gien they war wull craturs to be peelt an' aiten. care what set him! he may weel be a keeper o' ghem, for he's as ill a keeper o' 's brither as auld cain himsel'. but," he concluded, tying the last knot hard, "we'll e'en dee what we can to keep the keeper." it was seldom robert spoke at such length, but the provocation, the wrath, the conflict, and the victory, had sent the blood rushing through his brain, and loosed his tongue like strong drink. "ye'll tak yer denner afore ye gang, robert," said his wife. "na, i can ait naething; i'll tak a bannock i' my pooch. ye can gie my denner to angus: he'll want hertenin' for the wuddie (gallows)." so saying he put the bannock in his pocket, flung his broad blue bonnet upon his head, took his stick, and ordering oscar to remain at home and watch the prisoner, set out for a walk of five miles, as if he had never known such a thing as rheumatism. he must find another magistrate than the laird; he would not trust him where his own gamekeeper, angus mac pholp, was concerned. "keep yer ee upon him, janet," he said, turning in the doorway. "dinna lowse sicht o' him afore i come back wi' the constable. dinna lippen. i s' be back in three hoors like." with these words he turned finally, and disappeared. the mortification of angus as he lay thus trapped in the den of the beast-loon, at being taken and bound by an old man, a woman, and a collie dog, was extreme. he went over the whole affair again and again in his mind, ever with a fresh burst of fury. it was in vain he excused himself on the ground that the attack had been so sudden and treacherous, and the precautions taken so complete. he had proved himself an ass, and the whole country would ring with mockery of him! he had sense enough, too, to know that he was in a serious as well as ludicrous predicament: he had scarcely courage enough to contemplate the possible result. if he could but get his hands free, it would be easy to kill oscar and disable janet. for the idiot, he counted him nothing. he had better wait, however, until there should be no boiling liquid ready to her hand. janet set out the dinner, peeled some potatoes, and approaching angus, would have fed him. in place of accepting her ministration, he fell to abusing her with the worst language he could find. she withdrew without a word, and sat down to her own dinner; but, finding the torrent of vituperation kept flowing, rose again, and going to the door, fetched a great jug of cold water from the pail that always stood there, and coming behind her prisoner, emptied it over his face. he gave a horrid yell taking the douche for a boiling one. "ye needna cry oot like that at guid cauld watter," said janet. "but ye'll jist absteen frae ony mair sic words i' my hearin', or ye s' get the like ilka time ye brak oot." as she spoke, she knelt, and wiped his face and head with her apron. a fresh oath rushed to angus's lips, but the fear of a second jugful made him suppress it, and janet sat down again to her dinner. she could scarcely eat a mouthful, however, for pity of the rascal beside her, at whom she kept looking wistfully without daring again to offer him anything. while she sat thus, she caught a swift investigating look he cast on the cords that bound his hands, and then at the fire. she perceived at once what was passing in his mind. rising, she went quickly to the byre, and returned immediately with a chain they used for tethering the cow. the end of it she slipt deftly round his neck, and made it fast, putting the little bar through a link. "ir ye gauin' to hang me, ye she-deevil?" he cried, making a futile attempt to grasp the chain with his bound hands. "ye'll be wantin' a drappy mair cauld watter, i'm thinkin'," said janet. she stretched the chain to its length, and with a great stone drove the sharp iron stake at the other end of it, into the clay-floor. fearing next that, bound as his hands were, he might get a hold of the chain and drag out the stake, or might even contrive to remove the rope from his feet with them, or that he might indeed with his teeth undo the knot that confined his hands themselves--she got a piece of rope, and made a loop at the end of it, then watching her opportunity passed the loop between his hands, noosed the other end through it, and drew the noose tight. the free end of the rope she put through the staple that received the bolt of the cottage-door, and gradually, as he grew weary in pulling against her, tightened the rope until she had his arms at their stretch beyond his head. not quite satisfied yet, she lastly contrived, in part by setting oscar to occupy his attention, to do the same with his feet, securing them to a heavy chest in the corner opposite the door, upon which chest she heaped a pile of stones. if it pleased the lord to deliver them from this man, she would have her honest part in the salvation! and now at last she believed she had him safe. gibbie had fallen asleep, but he now woke and she gave him his dinner; then redd up, and took her bible. gibbie had lain down again, and she thought he was asleep. angus grew more and more uncomfortable, both in body and in mind. he knew he was hated throughout the country, and had hitherto rather enjoyed the knowledge; but now he judged that the popular feeling, by no means a mere prejudice, would tell against him committed for trial. he knew also that the magistrate to whom robert had betaken himself, was not over friendly with his master, and certainly would not listen to any intercession from him. at length, what with pain, hunger, and fear, his pride began to yield, and, after an hour had passed in utter silence, he condescended to parley. "janet grant," he said, "lat me gang, an' i'll trouble you or yours no more." "wadna ye think me some fule to hearken till ye?" suggested janet. "i'll sweir ony lawfu' aith 'at ye like to lay upo' me," protested angus, "'at i'll dee whatever ye please to require o' me." "i dinna doobt ye wad sweir; but what neist?" said janet. "what neist but ye'll lowse my han's?" rejoined angus. "it's no mainner o' use mentionin' 't," replied janet; "for, as ye ken, i'm un'er authority, an' yersel' h'ard my man tell me to tak unco percaution no to lat ye gang; for verily, angus, ye hae conduckit yersel' this day more like ane possessed wi' a legion, than the douce faimily man 'at ye're supposit by the laird, yer maister, to be." "was ever man," protested angus "made sic a fule o', an' sae misguidit, by a pair o' auld cottars like you an' robert grant!" "wi' the help o' the lord, by means o' the dog," supplemented janet. "i wuss frae my hert i hed the great reid draigon i' yer place, an' i wad watch him bonny, i can tell ye, angus mac pholp. i wadna be clear aboot giein him his denner, angus." "let me gang, wuman, wi' yer reid draigons! i'll hairm naebody. the puir idiot's no muckle the waur, an' i'll tak mair tent whan i fire anither time." "wiser fowk nor me maun see to that," answered janet. "hoots, wuman! it was naething but an accident." "i kenna; but it'll be seen what gibbie says." "awva! his word's guid for naething." "for a penny, or a thoosan' poun'." "my wife 'll be oot o' her wuts," pleaded angus. "wad ye like a drink o' milk?" asked janet, rising. "i wad that," he answered. she filled her little teapot with milk, and he drank it from the spout, hoping she was on the point of giving way. "noo," she said, when he had finished his draught, "ye maun jist mak the best o' it, angus. ony gait, it's a guid lesson in patience to ye, an' that ye haena had ower aften, i'm thinkin'--robert'll be here er lang." with these words she set down the teapot, and went out: it was time to milk her cow. in a little while gibbie rose, tried to walk, but failed, and getting down on his hands and knees, crawled out after her. angus caught a glimpse of his face as he crept past him, and then first recognized the boy he had lashed. not compunction, but an occasional pang of dread lest he should have been the cause of his death, and might come upon his body in one of his walks, had served so to fix his face in his memory, that, now he had a near view of him, pale with suffering and loss of blood and therefore more like his former self, he knew him beyond a doubt. with a great shoot of terror he concluded that the idiot had been lying there silently gloating over his revenge, waiting only till janet should be out of sight, and was now gone after some instrument wherewith to take it. he pulled and tugged at his bonds, but only to find escape absolutely hopeless. in gathering horror, he lay moveless at last, but strained his hearing towards every sound. not only did janet often pray with gibbie, but sometimes as she read, her heart would grow so full, her soul be so pervaded with the conviction, perhaps the consciousness, of the presence of the man who had said he would be always with his friends, that, sitting there on her stool, she would begin talking to him out of the very depth of her life, just as if she saw him in robert's chair in the ingle-neuk, at home in her cottage as in the house where mary sat at his feet and heard his word. then would gibbie listen indeed, awed by very gladness. he never doubted that jesus was there, or that janet saw him all the time although he could not. this custom of praying aloud, she had grown into so long before gibbie came to her, and he was so much and such a child, that his presence was no check upon the habit. it came in part from the intense reality of her belief, and was in part a willed fostering of its intensity. she never imagined that words were necessary; she believed that god knew her every thought, and that the moment she lifted up her heart, it entered into communion with him; but the very sound of the words she spoke seemed to make her feel nearer to the man who, being the eternal son of the father, yet had ears to hear and lips to speak, like herself. to talk to him aloud, also kept her thoughts together, helped her to feel the fact of the things she contemplated, as well as the reality of his presence. now the byre was just on the other side of the turf wall against which was the head of gibbie's bed, and through the wall gibbie had heard her voice, with that something in the tone of it which let him understand she was not talking to crummie, but to crummie's maker; and it was therefore he had got up and gone after her. for there was no reason, so far as he knew or imagined, why he should not hear, as so many times before, what she was saying to the master. he supposed that as she could not well speak to him in the presence of a man like angus, she had gone out to the byre to have her talk with him there. he crawled to the end of the cottage so silently that she heard no sound of his approach. he would not go into the byre, for that might disturb her, for she would have to look up to know that it was only gibbie; he would listen at the door. he found it wide open, and peeping in, saw crummie chewing away, and janet on her knees with her forehead leaning against the cow and her hands thrown up over her shoulder. she spoke in such a voice of troubled entreaty as he had never heard from her before, but which yet woke a strange vibration of memory in his deepest heart.--yes, it was his father's voice it reminded him of! so had he cried in prayer the last time he ever heard him speak. what she said was nearly this: "o lord, gin ye wad but say what ye wad hae deen! whan a body disna ken yer wull, she's jist driven to distraction. thoo knows, my maister, as weel's i can tell ye, 'at gien ye said till me, 'that man's gauin' to cut yer thro't: tak the tows frae him, an' lat him up,' i wad rin to dee't. it's no revenge, lord; it's jist 'at i dinna ken. the man's dune me no ill, 'cep' as he's sair hurtit yer bonnie gibbie. it's gibbie 'at has to forgie 'im an' syne me. but my man tellt me no to lat him up, an' hoo am i to be a wife sic as ye wad hae, o lord, gien i dinna dee as my man tellt me! it wad ill befit me to lat my auld robert gang sae far wantin' his denner, a' for naething. what wad he think whan he cam hame! of coorse, lord, gien ye tellt me, that wad mak a' the differ, for ye're robert's maister as weel's mine, an' your wull wad saitisfee him jist as weel's me. i wad fain lat him gang, puir chiel! but i daurna. lord, convert him to the trowth. lord, lat him ken what hate is.--but eh, lord! i wuss ye wad tell me what to du. thy wull's the beginnin' an' mids an' en' o' a' thing to me. i'm wullin' eneuch to lat him gang, but he's robert's pris'ner an' gibbie's enemy; he's no my pris'ner an' no my enemy, an' i dinna think i hae the richt. an' wha kens but he micht gang shottin' mair fowk yet, 'cause i loot him gang!--but he canna shot a hare wantin' thy wull, o jesus, the saviour o' man an' beast; an' ill wad i like to hae a han' i' the hangin' o' 'm. he may deserve 't, lord, i dinna ken; but i'm thinkin' ye made him no sae weel tempered--as my robert, for enstance." here her voice ceased, and she fell a moaning. her trouble was echoed in dim pain from gibbie's soul. that the prophetess who knew everything, the priestess who was at home in the very treasure-house of the great king, should be thus abandoned to dire perplexity, was a dreadful, a bewildering fact. but now first he understood the real state of the affair in the purport of the old man's absence; also how he was himself potently concerned in the business: if the offence had been committed against gibbie, then with gibbie lay the power, therefore the duty of forgiveness. but verily gibbie's merit and his grace were in inverse ratio. few things were easier to him than to love his enemies, and his merit in obeying the commandment was small indeed. no enemy had as yet done him, in his immediate person, the wrong he could even imagine it hard to forgive. no sooner had janet ceased than he was on his way back to the cottage: on its floor lay one who had to be waited upon with forgiveness. wearied with futile struggles, angus found himself compelled to abide his fate, and was lying quite still when gibbie re-entered. the boy thought he was asleep, but on the contrary he was watching his every motion, full of dread. gibbie went hopping upon one foot to the hole in the wall where janet kept the only knife she had. it was not there. he glanced round, but could not see it. there was no time to lose. robert's returning steps might be heard any moment, and poor angus might be hanged--only for shooting gibbie! he hopped up to him and examined the knots that tied his hands: they were drawn so tight--in great measure by his own struggles--and so difficult to reach from their position, that he saw it would take him a long time to undo them. angus thought, with fresh horror, he was examining them to make sure they would hold, and was so absorbed in watching his movements that he even forgot to curse, which was the only thing left him. gibbie looked round again for a moment, as if in doubt, then darted upon the tongs--there was no poker--and thrust them into the fire, caught up the asthmatic old bellows, and began to blow the peats. angus saw the first action, heard the second, and a hideous dismay clutched his very heart: the savage fool was about to take his revenge in pinches with the red hot tongs! he looked for no mercy--perhaps felt that he deserved none. manhood held him silent until he saw him take the implement of torture from the fire, glowing, not red but white hot, when he uttered such a terrific yell, that gibbie dropped the tongs--happily not the hot ends--on his own bare foot, but caught them up again instantly, and made a great hop to angus: if janet had heard that yell and came in, all would be spoilt. but the faithless keeper began to struggle so fiercely, writhing with every contortion, and kicking with every inch, left possible to him, that gibbie hardly dared attempt anything for dread of burning him, while he sent yell after yell "as fast as mill-wheels strike." with a sudden thought gibbie sprang to the door and locked it, so that janet should not get in, and angus, hearing the bolt, was the more convinced that his purpose was cruel, and struggled and yelled, with his eyes fixed on the glowing tongs, now fast cooling in gibbie's hand. if instead of glowering at the tongs, he had but lent one steadfast regard to the face of the boy whom he took for a demoniacal idiot, he would have seen his supposed devil smile the sweetest of human, troubled, pitiful smiles. even then, i suspect, however, his eye being evil, he would have beheld in the smile only the joy of malice in the near prospect of a glut of revenge. in the mean time janet, in her perplexity, had, quite forgetful of the poor cow's necessities, abandoned crummie, and wandered down the path as far as the shoulder her husband must cross ascending from the other side: thither, a great rock intervening, so little of angus's cries reached, that she heard nothing through the deafness of her absorbing appeal for direction to her shepherd, the master of men. gibbie thrust the tongs again into the fire, and while blowing it, bethought him that it might give angus confidence if he removed the chain from his neck. he laid down the bellows, and did so. but to angus the action seemed only preparatory to taking him by the throat with the horrible implement. in his agony and wild endeavour to frustrate the supposed intent, he struggled harder than ever. but now gibbie was undoing the rope fastened round the chest. this angus did not perceive, and when it came suddenly loose in the midst of one of his fierce straining contortions, the result was that he threw his body right over his head, and lay on his face for a moment confused. gibbie saw his advantage. he snatched his clumsy tool out of the fire, seated himself on the corresponding part of angus's person, and seizing with the tongs the rope between his feet, held on to both, in spite of his heaves and kicks. in the few moments that passed while gibbie burned through a round of the rope, angus imagined a considerable number of pangs; but when gibbie rose and hopped away, he discovered that his feet were at liberty, and scrambled up, his head dizzy, and his body reeling. but such was then the sunshine of delight in gibbie's countenance that even angus stared at him for a moment--only, however, with a vague reflection on the inconsequentiality of idiots, to which succeeded the impulse to take vengeance upon him for his sufferings. but gibbie still had the tongs, and angus's hands were still tied. he held them out to him. gibbie pounced upon the knots with hands and teeth. they occupied him some little time, during which angus was almost compelled to take better cognizance of the face of the savage; and dull as he was to the good things of human nature, he was yet in a measure subdued by what he there looked upon rather than perceive; while he could scarcely mistake the hearty ministration of his teeth and nails! the moment his hands were free, gibbie looked up at him with a smile, and angus did not even box his ears. holding by the wall, gibbie limped to the door and opened it. with a nod meant for thanks, the gamekeeper stepped out, took up his gun from where it leaned against the wall, and hurried away down the hill. a moment sooner and he would have met janet; but she had just entered the byre again to milk poor crummie. when she came into the cottage, she stared with astonishment to see no angus on the floor. gibbie, who had lain down again in much pain, made signs that he had let him go: whereupon such a look of relief came over her countenance that he was filled with fresh gladness, and was if possible more satisfied still with what he had done. it was late before robert returned--alone, weary, and disappointed. the magistrate was from home; he had waited for him as long as he dared; but at length, both because of his wife's unpleasant position, and the danger to himself if he longer delayed his journey across the mountain, seeing it threatened a storm, and there was no moon, he set out. that he too was relieved to find no angus there, he did not attempt to conceal. the next day he went to see him, and told him that, to please gibbie, he had consented to say nothing more about the affair. angus could not help being sullen, but he judged it wise to behave as well as he could, kept his temper therefore, and said he was sorry he had been so hasty, but that robert had punished him pretty well, for it would be weeks before he recovered the blow on the head he had given him. so they parted on tolerable terms, and there was no further persecution of gibbie from that quarter. it was some time before he was able to be out again, but no hour spent with janet was lost. chapter xxvii. a voice. that winter the old people were greatly tried with rheumatism; for not only were the frosts severe, but there was much rain between. their children did all in their power to minister to their wants, and gibbie was nurse as well as shepherd. he who when a child had sought his place in the live universe by attending on drunk people and helping them home through the midnight streets, might have felt himself promoted considerably in having the necessities of such as robert and janet to minister to, but he never thought of that. it made him a little mournful sometimes to think that he could not read to them. janet, however, was generally able to read aloud. robert, being also asthmatic, suffered more than she, and was at times a little impatient. gibbie still occupied his heather-bed on the floor, and it was part of his business, as nurse, to keep up a good fire on the hearth: peats, happily, were plentiful. awake for this cause, he heard in the middle of one night, the following dialogue between the husband and wife. "i'm growin' terrible auld, janet," said robert. "it's a sair thing this auld age, an' i canna bring mysel' content wi' 't. ye see i haena been used till't." "that's true, robert," answered janet. "gien we had been born auld, we micht by this time hae been at hame wi't. but syne what wad hae come o' the gran' delicht o' seein' auld age rin hirplin awa' frae the face o' the auncient o' days?" "i wad fain be contentit wi' my lot, thouch," persisted robert; "but whan i fin' mysel' sae helpless like, i canna get it oot o' my heid 'at the lord has forsaken me, an' left me to mak an ill best o' 't wantin' him." "i wadna lat sic a thoucht come intil my heid, robert, sae lang as i kenned i cudna draw breath nor wag tongue wantin' him, for in him we leeve an' muv an' hae oor bein'. gien he be the life o' me, what for sud i trible mysel' aboot that life?" "ay, lass! but gien ye hed this ashmy, makin' a' yer breist as gien 'twar lined wi' the san' paper 'at they hed been lichtin' a thoosan' or twa lucifer spunks upo'--ye micht be driven to forget 'at the lord was yer life--for i can tell ye it's no like haein his breith i' yer nostrils." "eh, my bonny laad!" returned janet with infinite tenderness, "i micht weel forget it! i doobt i wadna be half sae patient as yersel'; but jist to help to haud ye up, i s' tell ye what i think i wad ettle efter. i wad say to mysel' gien he be the life o' me, i hae no business wi' ony mair o' 't nor he gies me. i hae but to tak ae breath, be 't hard, be 't easy, ane at a time, an' lat him see to the neist himsel'. here i am, an' here's him; an' 'at he winna lat's ain wark come to ill, that i'm weel sure o'. an' ye micht jist think to yersel', robert, 'at as ye are born intil the warl', an' here ye are auld intil't--ye may jist think, i say, 'at hoo ye're jist new-born an auld man, an' beginnin' to grow yoong, an' 'at that's yer business. for naither you nor me can be that far frae hame, robert, an' whan we win there we'll be yoong eneuch, i'm thinkin'; an' no ower yoong, for we'll hae what they say ye canna get doon here--a pair o' auld heids upo' yoong shoothers." "eh! but i wuss i may hae ye there, janet, for i kenna what i wad do wantin' ye. i wad be unco stray up yon'er, gien i had to gang my lane, an' no you to refar till, 'at kens the w'ys o' the place." "i ken no more about the w'ys o' the place nor yersel', robert, though i'm thinkin' they'll be unco quaiet an' sensible, seein' 'at a' there maun be gentle fowk. it's eneuch to me 'at i'll be i' the hoose o' my maister's father; an' my maister was weel content to gang to that hoose; an' it maun be something by ordinar' 'at was fit for him. but puir simple fowk like oorsel's 'ill hae no need to hing down the heid an' luik like gowks 'at disna ken mainners. bairns are no expeckit to ken a' the w'ys o' a muckle hoose 'at they hae never been intil i' their lives afore." "it's no that a'thegither 'at tribles me, janet; it's mair 'at i'll be expeckit to sing an' luik pleased-like, an' i div not ken hoo it'll be poassible, an' you naegait 'ithin my sicht or my cry, or the hearin' o' my ears." "div ye believe this, robert'--at we're a' ane, jist ane, in christ jesus?" "i canna weel say. i'm no denyin' naething 'at the buik tells me; ye ken me better nor that, janet; but there's mony a thing it says 'at i dinna ken whether i believe't 'at my ain han', or whether it be only at a' thing 'at ye believe, janet, 's jist to me as gien i believet it mysel'; an' that's a sair thought, for a man canna be savet e'en by the proxy o' 's ain wife." "weel, ye're just muckle whaur i fin' mysel' whiles, robert; an' i comfort mysel' wi' the houp 'at we'll ken the thing there, 'at maybe we're but tryin' to believe here. but ony gait ye hae pruv't weel 'at you an' me's ane, robert. noo we ken frae scriptur' 'at the maister cam to mak aye ane o' them 'at was at twa; an' we ken also 'at he conquered deith; sae he wad never lat deith mak the ane 'at he had made ane, intil twa again: it's no rizon to think it. for oucht i ken, what luiks like a gangin' awa may be a comin' nearer. an' there may be w'ys o' comin' nearer till ane anither up yon'er 'at we ken naething aboot doon here. there's that laddie, gibbie: i canna but think 'at gien he hed the tongue to speyk, or aiven gien he cud mak' ony soon' wi' sense intil't, like singin', say, he wad fin' himsel' nearer till's nor he can i' the noo. wha kens but them 'at's singin' up there afore the throne, may sing so bonny, 'at, i' the pooer o' their braw thouchts, their verra sangs may be like laidders for them to come doon upo', an' hing aboot them 'at they hae left ahin' them, till the time comes for them to gang an' jine them i' the green pasturs aboot the tree o' life." more of like talk followed, but these words concerning appropinquation in song, although their meaning was not very clear, took such a hold of gibbie that he heard nothing after, but fell asleep thinking about them. in the middle of the following night, janet woke her husband. "robert! robert!" she whispered in his ear, "hearken. i'm thinkin' yon maun be some wee angel come doon to say, 'i ken ye, puir fowk.'" robert, scarce daring to draw his breath listened with his heart in his mouth. from somewhere, apparently within the four walls of the cottage, came a low lovely sweet song--something like the piping of a big bird, something like a small human voice. "it canna be an angel," said robert at length, "for it's singin' 'my nannie's awa'.'" "an' what for no an angel?" returned janet. "isna that jist what ye micht be singin' yersel', efter what ye was sayin' last nicht? i'm thinkin' there maun be a heap o' yoong angels up there, new deid, singin', 'my nannie's awa'.'" "hoot, janet! ye ken there's naither merryin' nor giein' in merriage there." "wha was sayin' onything aboot merryin' or giein' in merriage, robert? is that to say 'at you an' me's to be no more to ane anither nor ither fowk? nor it's no to say 'at, 'cause merriage is no the w'y o' the country, 'at there's to be naething better i' the place o' 't." "what garred the maister say onything aboot it than?" "jist 'cause they plaguit him wi' speirin'. he wad never hae opened his moo' anent it--it wasna ane o' his subjec's--gien it hadna been 'at a wheen pride-prankit beuk-fowk 'at didna believe there was ony angels, or speerits o' ony kin', but said 'at a man ance deid was aye an' a'thegither deid, an' yet preten'it to believe in god himsel' for a' that, thoucht to bleck (nonplus) the maister wi' speirin' whilk o' saiven a puir body 'at had been garred merry them a', wad be the wife o' whan they gat up again." "a body micht think it wad be left to hersel' to say," suggested robert. "she had come throu' eneuch to hae some claim to be considert." "she maun hae been a richt guid ane," said janet, "gien ilk ane o' the saiven wad be wantin' her again. but i s' warran' she kenned weel eneuch whilk o' them was her ain. but, robert, man, this is jokin'--no 'at it's your wyte (blame)--an' it's no becomin', i doobt, upo' sic a sarious subjec'. an' i'm feart--ay! there!--i thoucht as muckle!--the wee sangie's drappit itsel' a'thegither, jist as gien the laverock had fa'ntit intil 'ts nest. i doobt we'll hear nae mair o' 't." as soon as he could hear what they were saying, gibbie had stopped to listen; and now they had stopped also, and there was an end. for weeks he had been picking out tunes on his pan's-pipes, also, he had lately discovered that, although he could not articulate, he could produce tones, and had taught himself to imitate the pipes. now, to his delight, he had found that the noises he made were recognized as song by his father and mother. from that time he was often heard crooning to himself. before long he began to look about the heavens for airs--to suit this or that song he came upon, or heard from donal. chapter xxviii. the wisdom of the wise. change, meantime, was in progress elsewhere, and as well upon the foot as high on the side of glashgar--change which seemed all important to those who felt the grind of the glacier as it slipped. thomas galbraith, of glashruach, esquire, whom no more than any other could negation save, was not enfranchised from folly, or lifted above belief in a lie, by his hatred to what he called superstition: he had long fallen into what will ultimately prove the most degrading superstition of all--the worship of mammon, and was rapidly sinking from deep to lower deep. first of all, this was the superstition of placing hope and trust in that which, from age to age, and on the testimony of all sorts of persons who have tried it, has been proved to fail utterly; next, such was the folly of the man whose wisdom was indignant with the harmless imagination of simple people for daring flutter its wings upon his land, that he risked what he loved best in the world, even better than mammon, the approbation of fellow worshippers, by investing in welsh gold mines. the property of glashruach was a good one, but not nearly so large as it had been, and he was anxious to restore it to its former dimensions. the rents were low, and it could but tardily widen its own borders, while of money he had little and no will to mortgage. to increase his money, that he might increase his property, he took to speculation, but had never had much success until that same year, when he disposed of certain shares at a large profit--nothing troubled by the conviction that the man who bought them--in ignorance of many a fact which the laird knew--must in all probability be ruined by them. he counted this success, and it gave him confidence to speculate further. in the mean time, with what he had thus secured, he reannexed to the property a small farm which had been for some time in the market, but whose sale he had managed to delay. the purchase gave him particular pleasure, because the farm not only marched with his home-grounds, but filled up a great notch in the map of the property between glashruach and the mains, with which also it marched. it was good land, and he let it at once, on his own terms, to mr. duff. in the spring, affairs looked rather bad for him, and in the month of may, he considered himself compelled to go to london: he had a faith in his own business-faculty quite as foolish as any superstition in gormgarnet. there he fell into the hands of a certain man, whose true place would have been in the swell mob, and not in the house of commons--a fellow who used his influence and facilities as member of parliament in promoting bubble companies. he was intimate with an elder brother of the laird, himself member for a not unimportant borough--a man, likewise, of principles that love the shade; and between them they had no difficulty in making a tool of thomas galbraith, as chairman of a certain aggregate of iniquity, whose designation will not, in some families, be forgotten for a century or so. during the summer, therefore, the laird was from home, working up the company, hoping much from it, and trying hard to believe in it--whipping up its cream, and perhaps himself taking the froth, certainly doing his best to make others take it, for an increase of genuine substance. he devoted the chamber of his imagination to the service of mammon, and the brownie he kept there played him fine pranks. a smaller change, though of really greater importance in the end, was, that in the course of the winter, one of donal's sisters was engaged by the housekeeper at glashruach, chiefly to wait upon miss galbraith. ginevra was still a silent, simple, unconsciously retiring, and therewith dignified girl, in whom childhood and womanhood had begun to interchange hues, as it were with the play of colours in a dove's neck. happy they in whom neither has a final victory! happy also all who have such women to love! at one moment ginevra would draw herself up--bridle her grandmother would have called it--with involuntary recoil from doubtful approach; the next, ginny would burst out in a merry laugh at something in which only a child could have perceived the mirth-causing element; then again the woman would seem suddenly to re-enter and rebuke the child, for the sparkle would fade from her eyes, and she would look solemn, and even a little sad. the people about the place loved her, but from the stillness on the general surface of her behaviour, the far away feeling she gave them, and the impossibility of divining how she was thinking except she chose to unbosom herself, they were all a little afraid of her as well. they did not acknowledge, even to themselves, that her evident conscientiousness bore no small part in causing that slight uneasiness of which they were aware in her presence. possibly it roused in some of them such a dissatisfaction with themselves as gave the initiative to dislike of her. in the mind of her new maid, however, there was no strife, therefore no tendency to dislike. she was thoroughly well-meaning, like the rest of her family, and finding her little mistress dwell in the same atmosphere, the desire to be acceptable to her awoke at once, and grew rapidly in her heart. she was the youngest of janet's girls, about four years older than donal, not clever, but as sweet as honest, and full of divine service. always ready to think others better than herself, the moment she saw the still face of ginevra, she took her for a little saint, and accepted her as a queen, whose will to her should be law. ginevra, on her part, was taken with the healthy hue and honest eyes of the girl, and neither felt any dislike to her touching her hair, nor lost her temper when she was awkward and pulled it. before the winter was over, the bond between them was strong. one principal duty required of nicie--her parents had named her after the mother of st. paul's timothy--was to accompany her mistress every fine day to the manse, a mile and a half from glashruach. for some time ginevra had been under the care of miss machar, the daughter of the parish clergyman, an old gentleman of sober aspirations, to whom the last century was the augustan age of english literature. he was genial, gentle, and a lover of his race, with much reverence for, and some faith in, a scotch god, whose nature was summed up in a series of words beginning with omni. partly that the living was a poor one, and her father old and infirm, miss marchar, herself middle-aged, had undertaken the instruction of the little heiress, never doubting herself mistress of all it was necessary a lady should know. by nature she was romantic, but her romance had faded a good deal. possibly had she read the new poets of her age, the vital flame of wonder and hope might have kept not a little of its original brightness in her heart; but under her father's guidance, she had never got beyond the night thoughts, and the course of time. both intellectually and emotionally, therefore, miss machar had withered instead of ripening. as to her spiritual carriage, she thought too much about being a lady to be thoroughly one. the utter graciousness of the ideal lady would blush to regard itself. she was both gentle and dignified; but would have done a nature inferior to ginevra's injury by the way she talked of things right and wrong as becoming or not becoming in a lady of position such as ginevra would one day find herself. what lessons she taught her she taught her well. her music was old-fashioned, of course; but i have a fancy that perhaps the older the music one learns first, the better; for the deeper is thereby the rooting of that which will have the atmosphere of the age to blossom in. but then to every lover of the truth, a true thing is dearer because it is old-fashioned, and dearer because it is new-fashioned: and true music, like true love, like all truth, laughs at the god fashion, because it knows him to be but an ape. every day, then, except saturday and sunday, miss machar had for two years been in the habit of walking or driving to glashruach, and there spending the morning hours; but of late her father had been ailing, and as he was so old that she could not without anxiety leave him when suffering from the smallest indisposition, she had found herself compelled either to give up teaching ginevra, or to ask mr. galbraith to allow her to go, when such occasion should render it necessary, to the manse. she did the latter; the laird had consented; and thence arose the duty required of nicie. mr. machar's health did not improve as the spring advanced, and by the time mr. galbraith left for london, he was confined to his room, and ginevra's walk to the manse for lessons had settled into a custom. chapter xxix. the beast-boy. one morning they found, on reaching the manse, that the minister was very unwell, and that in consequence miss machar could not attend to ginevra; they turned, therefore, to walk home again. now the manse, upon another root of glashgar, was nearer than glashruach to nicie's home, and many a time as she went and came, did she lift longing eyes to the ridge that hid it from her view. this morning, ginevra observed that, every other moment, nicie was looking up the side of the mountain, as if she saw something unusual upon it--occasionally, indeed, when the winding of the road turned their backs to it, stopping and turning round to gaze. "what is the matter with you, nicie?" she asked. "what are you looking at up there?" "i'm won'erin' what my mother'll be deein'," answered nicie: "she's up there." "up there!" exclaimed ginny, and, turning, stared at the mountain too, expecting to perceive nicie's mother somewhere upon the face of it. "na, na, missie! ye canna see her," said the girl; "she's no in sicht. she's ower ayont there. only gien we war up whaur ye see yon twa three sheep again' the lift (sky), we cud see the bit hoosie whaur her an' my father bides." "how i should like to see your father and mother, nicie!" exclaimed ginevra. "weel, i'm sure they wad be richt glaid to see yersel', missie, ony time 'at ye likit to gang an' see them." "why shouldn't we go now, nicie? it's not a dangerous place, is it?" "no, missie. glashgar's as quaiet an' weel-behaved a hill as ony in a' the cweentry," answered nicie, laughing. "she's some puir, like the lave o' 's, an' hasna muckle to spare, but the sheep get a feow nibbles upon her, here an' there; an' my mither manages to keep a coo, an' get plenty o' milk frae her tee." "come, then, nicie. we have plenty of time. nobody wants either you or me, and we shall get home before any one misses us." nicie was glad enough to consent; they turned at once to the hill, and began climbing. but nicie did not know this part of it nearly so well as that which lay between glashruach and the cottage, and after they had climbed some distance, often stopping and turning to look down on the valley below, the prospect of which, with its streams and river, kept still widening and changing as they ascended, they arrived at a place where the path grew very doubtful, and she could not tell in which of two directions they ought to go. "i'll take this way, and you take that, nicie," said ginevra, "and if i find there is no path my way, i will come back to yours; and if you find there is no path your way, you will come back to mine." it was a childish proposal, and one to which nicie should not have consented, but she was little more than a child herself. advancing a short distance in doubt, and the path re-appearing quite plainly, she sat down, expecting her little mistress to return directly. no thought of anxiety crossed her mind: how should one, in broad sunlight, on a mountain-side, in the first of summer, and with the long day before them? so, there sitting in peace, nicie fell into a maidenly reverie, and so there nicie sat for a long time, half dreaming in the great light, without once really thinking about anything. all at once she came to herself: some latent fear had exploded in her heart: yes! what could have become of her little mistress? she jumped to her feet, and shouted "missie! missie galbraith! ginny!" but no answer came back. the mountain was as still as at midnight. she ran to the spot where they had parted, and along the other path: it was plainer than that where she had been so idly forgetting herself. she hurried on, wildly calling as she ran. in the mean time ginevra, having found the path indubitable, and imagining it led straight to the door of nicie's mother's cottage, and that nicie would be after her in a moment, thinking also to have a bit of fun with her, set off dancing and running so fast, that by the time nicie came to herself, she was a good mile from her. what a delight it was to be thus alone upon the grand mountain! with the earth banished so far below, and the great rocky heap climbing and leading and climbing up and up towards the sky! ginny was not in the way of thinking much about god. little had been taught her concerning him, and nothing almost that was pleasant to meditate upon--nothing that she could hide in her heart, and be dreadfully glad about when she lay alone in her little bed, listening to the sound of the burn that ran under her window. but there was in her soul a large wilderness ready for the voice that should come crying to prepare the way of the king. the path was after all a mere sheep-track, and led her at length into a lonely hollow in the hill-side, with a swampy peat-bog at the bottom of it. she stopped. the place looked unpleasant, reminding her of how she always felt when she came unexpectedly upon angus mac pholp. she would go no further alone; she would wait till nicie overtook her. it must have been just in such places that the people possessed with devils--only miss machar always made her read the word, demons--ran about! as she thought thus, a lone-hearted bird uttered a single, wailing cry, strange to her ear. the cry remained solitary, unanswered, and then first suddenly she felt that there was nobody there but herself, and the feeling had in it a pang of uneasiness. but she was a brave child; nothing frightened her much except her father; she turned and went slowly back to the edge of the hollow: nicie must by this time be visible. in her haste and anxiety, however, nicie had struck into another sheep-track, and was now higher up the hill; so that ginny could see no living thing nearer than in the valley below: far down there--and it was some comfort, in the desolation that now began to invade her--she saw upon the road, so distant that it seemed motionless, a cart with a man in it, drawn by a white horse. never in her life before had she felt that she was alone. she had often felt lonely, but she had always known where to find the bodily presence of somebody. now she might cry and scream the whole day, and nobody answer! her heart swelled into her throat, then sank away, leaving a wide hollow. it was so eerie! but nicie would soon come, and then all would be well. she sat down on a stone, where she could see the path she had come a long way back. but "never and never" did any nicie appear. at last she began to cry. this process with ginny was a very slow one, and never brought her much relief. the tears would mount into her eyes, and remain there, little pools of baca, a long time before the crying went any further. but with time the pools would grow deeper, and swell larger, and at last, when they had become two huge little lakes, the larger from the slowness of their gathering, two mighty tears would tumble over the edges of their embankments, and roll down her white mournful cheeks. this time many more followed, and her eyes were fast becoming fountains, when all at once a verse she had heard the sunday before at church seemed to come of itself into her head: "call upon me in the time of trouble and i will answer thee." it must mean that she was to ask god to help her: was that the same as saying prayers? but she wasn't good, and he wouldn't hear anybody that wasn't good. then, if he was only the god of the good people, what was to become of the rest when they were lost on mountains? she had better try; it could not do much harm. even if he would not hear her, he would not surely be angry with her for calling upon him when she was in such trouble. so thinking, she began to pray to what dim distorted reflection of god there was in her mind. they alone pray to the real god, the maker of the heart that prays, who know his son jesus. if our prayers were heard only in accordance with the idea of god to which we seem to ourselves to pray, how miserably would our infinite wants be met! but every honest cry, even if sent into the deaf ear of an idol, passes on to the ears of the unknown god, the heart of the unknown father. "o god, help me home again," cried ginevra, and stood up in her great loneliness to return. the same instant she spied, seated upon a stone, a little way off, but close to her path, the beast-boy. there could be no mistake. he was just as she had heard him described by the children at the gamekeeper's cottage. that was his hair sticking all out from his head, though the sun in it made it look like a crown of gold or a shining mist. those were his bare arms, and that was dreadful indeed! bare legs and feet she was used to; but bare arms! worst of all, making it absolutely certain he was the beast-boy, he was playing upon a curious kind of whistling thing, making dreadfully sweet music to entice her nearer that he might catch her and tear her to pieces! was this the answer god sent to the prayer she had offered in her sore need--the beast-boy? she asked him for protection and deliverance, and here was the beast-boy! she asked him to help her home, and there, right in the middle of her path, sat the beast-boy, waiting for her! well, it was just like what they said about him on sundays in the churches, and in the books miss machar made her read! but the horrid creature's music should not have any power over her! she would rather run down to the black water, glooming in those holes, and be drowned, than the beast-boy should have her to eat! most girls would have screamed, but such was not ginny's natural mode of meeting a difficulty. with fear, she was far more likely to choke than to cry out. so she sat down again and stared at him. perhaps he would go away when he found he could not entice her. he did not move, but kept playing on his curious instrument. perhaps, by returning into the hollow, she could make a circuit, and so pass him, lower down the hill. she rose at once and ran. now gibbie had seen her long before she saw him, but, from experience, was afraid of frightening her. he had therefore drawn gradually near, and sat as if unaware of her presence. treating her as he would a bird with which he wanted to make better acquaintance, he would have her get accustomed to the look of him before he made advances. but when he saw her run in the direction of the swamp, knowing what a dangerous place it was, he was terrified, sprung to his feet, and darted off to get between her and the danger. she heard him coming like the wind at her back, and, whether from bewilderment, or that she did intend throwing herself into the water to escape him, instead of pursuing her former design, she made straight for the swamp. but was the beast-boy ubiquitous? as she approached the place, there he was, on the edge of a great hole half full of water, as if he had been sitting there for an hour! was he going to drown her in that hole? she turned again, and ran towards the descent of the mountain. but there gibbie feared a certain precipitous spot; and, besides, there was no path in that direction. so ginevra had not run far before again she saw him right in her way. she threw herself on the ground in despair, and hid her face. after thus hunting her as a cat might a mouse, or a lion a man, what could she look for but that he would pounce upon her, and tear her to pieces? fearfully expectant of the horrible grasp, she lay breathless. but nothing came. still she lay, and still nothing came. could it be that she was dreaming? in dreams generally the hideous thing never arrived. but she dared not look up. she lay and lay, weary and still, with the terror slowly ebbing away out of her. at length to her ears came a strange sweet voice of singing--such a sound as she had never heard before. it seemed to come from far away: what if it should be an angel god was sending, in answer after all to her prayer, to deliver her from the beast-boy! he would of course want some time to come, and certainly no harm had happened to her yet. the sound grew and grew, and came nearer and nearer. but although it was song, she could distinguish no vowel-melody in it, nothing but a tone-melody, a crooning, as it were, ever upon one vowel in a minor key. it came quite near at length, and yet even then had something of the far away sound left in it. it was like the wind of a summer night inside a great church bell in a deserted tower. it came close, and ceased suddenly, as if, like a lark, the angel ceased to sing the moment he lighted. she opened her eyes and looked up. over her stood the beast-boy, gazing down upon her! could it really be the beast-boy? if so, then he was fascinating her, to devour her the more easily, as she had read of snakes doing to birds; but she could not believe it. still--she could not take her eyes off him--that was certain. but no marvel! from under a great crown of reddish gold, looked out two eyes of heaven's own blue, and through the eyes looked out something that dwells behind the sky and every blue thing. what if the angel, to try her, had taken to himself the form of the beast-boy? no beast-boy could sing like what she had heard, or look like what she now saw! she lay motionless, flat on the ground, her face turned sideways upon her hands, and her eyes fixed on the heavenly vision. then a curious feeling began to wake in her of having seen him before--somewhere, ever so long ago--and that sight of him as well as this had to do with misery--with something that made a stain that would not come out. yes--it was the very face, only larger, and still sweeter, of the little naked child whom angus had so cruelly lashed! that was ages ago, but she had not forgotten, and never could forget either the child's back, or the lovely innocent white face that he turned round upon her. if it was indeed he, perhaps he would remember her. in any case, she was now certain he would not hurt her. while she looked at him thus, gibbie's face grew grave: seldom was his grave when fronting the face of a fellow-creature, but now he too was remembering, and trying to recollect; as through a dream of sickness and pain he saw a face like the one before him, yet not the same. ginevra recollected first, and a sweet slow diffident smile crept like a dawn up from the depth of her under-world to the sky of her face, but settled in her eyes, and made two stars of them. then rose the very sun himself in gibbie's, and flashed a full response of daylight--a smile that no woman, girl, or matron, could mistrust. from brow to chin his face was radiant. the sun of this world had made his nest in his hair, but the smile below it seemed to dim the aureole he wore. timidly yet trustingly ginevra took one hand from under her cheek, and stretched it up to him. he clasped it gently. she moved, and he helped her to rise. "i've lost nicie," she said. gibbie nodded, but did not look concerned, "nicie is my maid," said ginevra. gibbie nodded several times. he knew who nicie was rather better than her mistress. "i left her away back there, a long, long time ago, and she has never come to me," she said. gibbie gave a shrill loud whistle that startled her. in a few seconds, from somewhere unseen, a dog came bounding to him over stones and heather. how he spoke to the dog, or what he told him to do, she had not an idea; but the next instant oscar was rushing along the path she had come, and was presently out of sight. so full of life was gibbie, so quick and decided was his every motion, so full of expression his every glance and smile, that she had not yet begun to wonder he had not spoken; indeed she was hardly yet aware of the fact. she knew him now for a mortal, but, just as it had been with donal and his mother, he continued to affect her as a creature of some higher world, come down on a mission of good-will to men. at the same time she had, oddly enough, a feeling as if the beast-boy were still somewhere not far off, held aloof only by the presence of the angel who had assumed his shape. gibbie took her hand, and led her towards the path she had left; she yielded without a movement of question. but he did not lead her far in that direction; he turned to the left up the mountain. it grew wilder as they ascended. but the air was so thin and invigorating, the changes so curious and interesting, as now they skirted the edge of a precipitous rock, now scrambled up the steepest of paths by the help of the heather that nearly closed over it, and the reaction of relief from the terror she had suffered so exciting, that she never for a moment felt tired. then they went down the side of a little burn--a torrent when the snow was dissolving, and even now a good stream, whose dance and song delighted her: it was the same, as she learned afterwards, to whose song under her window she listened every night in bed, trying in vain to make out the melted tune. ever after she knew this, it seemed, as she listened, to come straight from the mountain to her window, with news of the stars and the heather and the sheep. they crossed the burn and climbed the opposite bank. then gibbie pointed, and there was the cottage, and there was nicie coming up the path to it, with oscar bounding before her! the dog was merry, but nicie was weeping bitterly. they were a good way off, with another larger burn between; but gibbie whistled, and oscar came flying to him. nicie looked up, gave a cry, and like a sheep to her lost lamb came running. "oh, missie!" she said, breathless, as she reached the opposite bank of the burn, and her tone had more than a touch of sorrowful reproach in it, "what garred ye rin awa'?" "there was a road, nicie, and i thought you would come after me." "i was a muckle geese, missie; but eh! i'm glaid i hae gotten ye. come awa' an' see my mother." "yes, nicie. we'll tell her all about it. you see i haven't got a mother to tell, so i will tell yours." from that hour nicie's mother was a mother to ginny as well. "anither o' 's lambs to feed!" she said to herself. if a woman be a mother she may have plenty of children. never before had ginny spent such a happy day, drunk such milk as crummie's, or eaten such cakes as janet's. she saw no more of gibbie: the moment she was safe, he and oscar were off again to the sheep, for robert was busy cutting peats that day, and gibbie was in sole charge. eager to know about him, ginevra gathered all that janet could tell of his story, and in return told the little she had seen of it, which was the one dreadful point. "is he a good boy, mistress grant?" she asked. "the best boy ever i kenned--better nor my ain donal, an' he was the best afore him," answered janet. ginny gave a little sigh, and wished she were good. "whan saw ye donal?" asked janet of nicie. "no this lang time--no sin' i was here last," answered nicie, who did not now get home so often as the rest. "i was thinkin'," returned her mother, "ye sud 'maist see him noo frae the back o' the muckle hoose; for he was tellin' me he was wi' the nowt' i' the new meadow upo' the lorrie bank, 'at missie's papa boucht frae jeames glass." "ow, is he there?" said nicie. "i'll maybe get sicht, gien i dinna get word o' him. he cam ance to the kitchen-door to see me, but mistress mac farlane wadna lat him in. she wad hae nae loons comin' aboot the place she said. i said 'at hoo he was my brither. she said, says she, that was naething to her, an' she wad hae no brithers. my sister micht come whiles, she said, gien she camna ower aften; but lasses had naething to dee wi' brithers. wha was to tell wha was or wha wasna my brither? i tellt her 'at a' my brithers was weel kenned for douce laads; an' she tellt me to haud my tongue, an' no speyk up; an' i cud hae jist gien her a guid cloot o' the lug--i was that angert wi' her." "she'll be soary for't some day," said janet, with a quiet smile; "an' what a body's sure to be soary for, ye may as weel forgie them at ance." "hoo ken ye, mither, she'll be soary for't?" asked nicie, not very willing to forgive mistress mac farlane. "'cause the maister says 'at we'll hae to pey the uttermost fardin'. there's naebody 'ill be latten aff. we maun dee oor neiper richt." "but michtna the maister himsel' forgie her?" suggested nicie, a little puzzled. "lassie," said her mother solemnly, "ye dinna surely think 'at the lord's forgifness is to lat fowk aff ohn repentit? that wad be a strange fawvour to grant them! he winna hurt mair nor he can help; but the grue (horror) maun mak w'y for the grace. i'm sure it was sae whan i gied you yer whups, lass. i'll no say aboot some o' the first o' ye, for at that time i didna ken sae weel what i was aboot, an' was mair angert whiles nor there was ony occasion for--tuik my beam to dang their motes. i hae been sair tribled aboot it, mony's the time." "eh, mither!" said nicie, shocked at the idea of her reproaching herself about anything concerning her children, "i'm weel sure there's no ane o' them wad think, no to say say, sic a thing." "i daursay ye're richt there, lass. i think whiles a woman's bairns are like the god they cam frae--aye ready to forgie her onything." ginevra went home with a good many things to think about. chapter xxx. the lorrie meadow. it was high time, according to agricultural economics, that donal grant should be promoted a step in the ranks of labour. a youth like him was fit for horses and their work, and looked idle in a field with cattle. but donal was not ambitious, at least in that direction. he was more and more in love with books, and learning and the music of thought and word; and he knew well that no one doing a man's work upon a farm could have much time left for study--certainly not a quarter of what the herd-boy could command. therefore, with his parents approval, he continued to fill the humbler office, and receive the scantier wages belonging to it. the day following their adventure on glashgar, in the afternoon, nicie being in the grounds with her little mistress, proposed that they should look whether they could see her brother down in the meadow of which her mother had spoken. ginevra willingly agreed, and they took their way through the shrubbery to a certain tall hedge which divided the grounds from a little grove of larches on the slope of a steep bank descending to the lorrie, on the other side of which lay the meadow. it was a hawthorn hedge, very old, and near the ground very thin, so that they easily found a place to creep through. but they were no better on the other side, for the larches hid the meadow. they went down through them, therefore, to the bank of the little river--the largest tributary of the daur from the roots of glashgar. "there he is!" cried nicie. "i see him," responded ginny, "--with his cows all about the meadow." donal sat a little way from the river, reading. "he's aye at 's buik!" said nicie. "i wonder what book it is," said ginny. "that wad be ill to say," answered nicie. "donal reads a hantle o' buiks--mair, his mither says, nor she doobts he can weel get the guid o'." "do you think it's latin, nicie?" "ow! i daursay. but no; it canna be laitin--for, leuk! he's lauchin', an' he cudna dee that gien 'twar laitin. i'm thinkin' it'll be a story: there's a heap o' them prentit noo, they tell me. or 'deed maybe it may be a sang. he thinks a heap o' sangs. i h'ard my mither ance say she was some feared donal micht hae ta'en to makin' sangs himsel'; no 'at there was ony ill i' that, she said, gien there wasna ony ill i' the sangs themsel's; but it was jist some trifflin' like, she said, an' they luikit for better frae donal, wi' a' his buik lear, an' his euclid--or what ca' they't?--nor makin' sangs." "what's euclid, nicie?" "ye may weel speir, missie! but i hae ill tellin' ye. it's a keerious name till a buik, an' min's me o' naething but whan the lid o' yer e'e yeuks (itches); an' as to what lies atween the twa brods o' 't, i ken no more nor the man i' the meen." "i should like to ask donal what book he has got," said ginny. "i'll cry till 'im, an' ye can speir," said nicie.--"donal!--donal!" donal looked up, and seeing his sister, came running to the bank of the stream. "canna ye come ower, donal?" said nicie. "here's miss galbraith wants to spier ye a question." donal was across in a moment, for here the water was nowhere over a foot or two in depth. "oh, donal! you've wet your feet!" cried ginevra. donal laughed. "what ill 'ill that dee me, mem?" "none, i hope," said ginny; "but it might, you know." "i micht hae been droont," said donal. "nicie," said ginny, with dignity, "your brother is laughing at me." "na, na, mem," said donal, apologetically. "i was only so glaid to see you an' nicie 'at i forgot my mainners." "then," returned ginny, quite satisfied, "would you mind telling me what book you were reading?" "it's a buik o' ballants," answered donal. "i'll read ane o' them till ye, gien ye like, mem." "i should like very much," responded ginny. "i've read all my own books till i'm tired of them, and i don't like papa's books.--and, do you know, donal!"--here the child-woman's voice grew solemn sad--"--i'm very sorry, and i'm frightened to say it; and if you weren't nicie's brother, i couldn't say it to you;--but i am very tired of the bible too." "that's a peety, mem," replied donal. "i wad hae ye no tell onybody that; for them 'at likes 't no a hair better themsel's, 'ill tak ye for waur nor a haithen for sayin' 't. jist gang ye up to my mither, an' tell her a' aboot it. she's aye fair to a' body, an' never thinks ill o' onybody 'at says the trowth--whan it's no for contrariness. she says 'at a heap o' ill comes o' fowk no speykin' oot what they ken, or what they're thinkin', but aye guissin' at what they dinna ken, an' what ither fowk's thinkin'." "ay!" said nicie, "it wad be a gey cheenged warl' gien fowk gaed to my mither, an' did as she wad hae them. she says fowk sud never tell but the ill they ken o' themsel's, an' the guid they ken o' ither fowk; an' that's jist the contrar', ye ken, missie, to what fowk maistly dis dee." a pause naturally followed, which ginny broke. "i don't think you told me the name of the book you were reading, donal," she said. "gien ye wad sit doon a meenute, mem," returned donal, "--here's a bonnie gowany spot--i wad read a bit till ye, an' see gien ye likit it, afore i tellt ye the name o' 't." she dropped at once on the little gowany bed, gathered her frock about her ankles, and said, "sit down, nicie. it's so kind of donal to read something to us! i wonder what it's going to be." she uttered everything in a deliberate, old-fashioned way, with precise articulation, and a certain manner that an english mother would have called priggish, but which was only the outcome of scotch stiffness, her father's rebukes, and her own sense of propriety. donal read the ballad of kemp owen. "i think--i think--i don't think i understand it," said ginevra. "it is very dreadful, and--and--i don't know what to think. tell me about it, donal.--do you know what it means, nicie?" "no ae glimp, missie," answered nicie. donal proceeded at once to an exposition. he told them that the serpent was a lady, enchanted by a wicked witch, who, after she had changed her, twisted her three times round the tree, so that she could not undo herself, and laid the spell upon her that she should never have the shape of a woman, until a knight kissed her as often as she was twisted round the tree. then, when the knight did come, at every kiss a coil of her body unwound itself, until, at the last kiss, she stood before him the beautiful lady she really was. "what a good, kind, brave knight!" said ginevra. "but it's no true, ye ken, missie," said nicie, anxious that she should not be misled. "it's naething but donal's nonsense." "nonsense here, nonsense there!" said donal, "i see a heap o' sense intil 't. but nonsense or no, nicie, its nane o' my nonsense: i wuss it war. it's hun'ers o' years auld, that ballant, i s' warran'." "it's beautiful," said ginevra, with decision and dignity. "i hope he married the lady, and they lived happy ever after." "i dinna ken, mem. the man 'at made the ballant, i daursay, thoucht him weel payed gien the bonny leddy said thank ye till him." "oh! but, donal, that wouldn't be enough!--would it, nicie?" "weel, ye see, missie," answered nicie, "he but gae her three kisses--that wasna sae muckle to wur (lay out) upon a body." "but a serpent!--a serpent's mouth, nicie!" here, unhappily, donal had to rush through the burn without leave-taking, for hornie was attempting a trespass; and the two girls, thinking it was time to go home, rose, and climbed to the house at their leisure. the rest of the day ginevra talked of little else than the serpent lady and the brave knight, saying now and then what a nice boy that donal of nicie's was. nor was more than the gentlest hint necessary to make nicie remark, the next morning, that perhaps, if they went down again to the lorrie, donal might come, and bring the book. but when they reached the bank and looked across, they saw him occupied with gibbie. they had their heads close together over a slate, upon which now the one, now the other, seemed to be drawing. this went on and on, and they never looked up. ginny would have gone home, and come again in the afternoon, but nicie instantly called donal. he sprang to his feet and came to them, followed by gibbie. donal crossed the burn, but gibbie remained on the other side, and when presently donal took his "buik o' ballants" from his pocket, and the little company seated themselves, stood with his back to them, and his eyes on the nowt. that morning they were not interrupted. donal read to them for a whole hour, concerning which reading, and ginevra's reception of it, nicie declared she could not see what for they made sic a wark aboot a wheen auld ballants, ane efter anither.--"they're no half sae bonnie as the paraphrases, donal," she said. after this, ginevra went frequently with nicie to see her mother, and learned much of the best from her. often also they went down to the lorrie, and had an interview with donal, which was longer or shorter as gibbie was there or not to release him. ginny's life was now far happier than it had ever been. new channels of thought and feeling were opened, new questions were started, new interests awaked; so that, instead of losing by miss machar's continued inability to teach her, she was learning far more than she could give her, learning it, too, with the pleasure which invariably accompanies true learning. little more than child as she was, donal felt from the first the charm of her society; and she by no means received without giving, for his mental development was greatly expedited thereby. few weeks passed before he was her humble squire, devoted to her with all the chivalry of a youth for a girl whom he supposes as much his superior in kind as she is in worldly position; his sole advantage, in his own judgment, and that which alone procured him the privilege of her society, being, that he was older, and therefore knew a little more. so potent and genial was her influence on his imagination, that, without once thinking of her as their object, he now first found himself capable of making verses--such as they were; and one day, with his book before him--it was burns, and he had been reading the gowan poem to ginevra and his sister--he ventured to repeat, as if he read them from the book, the following: they halted a little, no doubt, in rhythm, neither were perfectly rimed, but for a beginning, they had promise. gibbie, who had thrown himself down on the other bank, and lay listening, at once detected the change in the tone of his utterance, and before he ceased had concluded that he was not reading them, and that they were his own. rin, burnie! clatter; to the sea win: gien i was a watter, sae wad i rin. blaw, win', caller, clean! here an' hyne awa': gien i was a win', wadna i blaw! shine, auld sun, shine strang an' fine: gien i was the sun's son, herty i wad shine. hardly had he ended, when gibbie's pipes began from the opposite side of the water, and, true to time and cadence and feeling, followed with just the one air to suit the song--from which donal, to his no small comfort, understood that one at least of his audience had received his lilt. if the poorest nature in the world responds with the tune to the mightiest master's song, he knows, if not another echo should come back, that he has uttered a true cry. but ginevra had not received it, and being therefore of her own mind, and not of the song's, was critical. it is of the true things it does not, perhaps cannot receive, that human nature is most critical. "that one is nonsense, donal," she said. "isn't it now? how could a man be a burn, or a wind, or the sun? but poets are silly. papa says so." in his mind donal did not know which way to look; physically, he regarded the ground. happily at that very moment hornie caused a diversion, and gibbie understood what donal was feeling too well to make even a pretence of going after her. i must, to his praise, record the fact that, instead of wreaking his mortification upon the cow, donal spared her several blows out of gratitude for the deliverance her misbehaviour had wrought him. he was in no haste to return to his audience. to have his first poem thus rejected was killing. she was but a child who had so unkindly criticized it, but she was the child he wanted to please; and for a few moments life itself seemed scarcely worth having. he called himself a fool, and resolved never to read another poem to a girl so long as he lived. by the time he had again walked through the burn, however, he was calm and comparatively wise, and knew what to say. "div ye hear yon burn efter ye gang to yer bed, mem?" he asked genevra, as he climbed the bank, pointing a little lower down the stream to the mountain brook which there joined it. "always," she answered. "it runs right under my window." "what kin' o' a din dis't mak'?" he asked again. "it is different at different times," she answered. "it sings and chatters in summer, and growls and cries and grumbles in winter, or after rain up in glashgar." "div ye think the burn's ony happier i' the summer, mem?" "no, donal; the burn has no life in it, and therefore can't be happier one time than another." "weel, mem, i wad jist like to speir what waur it is to fancy yersel' a burn, than to fancy the burn a body, ae time singin' an' chatterin', an' the neist growlin' an' grum'lin'." "well, but, donal, can a man be a burn?" "weel, mem, no--at least no i' this warl', an' at 'is ain wull. but whan ye're lyin' hearkenin' to the burn, did ye never imagine yersel' rinnin' doon wi' 't--doon to the sea?" "no, donal; i always fancy myself going up the mountain where it comes from, and running about wild there in the wind, when all the time i know i'm safe and warm in bed." "weel, maybe that's better yet--i wadna say," answered donal; "but jist the nicht, for a cheenge like, ye turn an' gang doon wi' 't--i' yer thouchts, i mean. lie an' hearken he'rty till 't the nicht, whan ye're i' yer bed; hearken an' hearken till the soon' rins awa' wi' ye like, an' ye forget a' aboot yersel', an' think yersel' awa' wi' the burn, rinnin', rinnin', throu' this an' throu' that, throu' stanes an' birks an' bracken, throu' heather, an' plooed lan' an' corn, an' wuds an' gairdens, aye singin', an' aye cheengin' yer tune accordin', till it wins to the muckle roarin' sea, an' 's a' tint. an' the first nicht 'at the win' 's up an' awa', dee the same, mem, wi' the win'. get up upo' the back o' 't, like, as gien it was yer muckle horse, an' jist ride him to the deith; an' efter that, gien ye dinna maybe jist wuss 'at ye was a burn or a blawin' win'--aither wad be a sair loss to the universe--ye wunna, i'm thinkin', be sae ready to fin' fau't wi' the chield 'at made yon bit sangy." "are you vexed with me, donal?--i'm so sorry!" said ginevra, taking the earnestness of his tone for displeasure. "na, na, mem. ye're ower guid an' ower bonny," answered donal, "to be a vex to onybody; but it wad be a vex to hear sic a cratur as you speykin' like ane o' the fules o' the warl', 'at believe i' naething but what comes in at the holes i' their heid." ginevra was silent. she could not quite understand donal, but she felt she must be wrong somehow; and of this she was the more convinced when she saw the beautiful eyes of gibbie fixed in admiration, and brimful of love, upon donal. the way donal kept his vow never to read another poem of his own to a girl, was to proceed that very night to make another for the express purpose, as he lay awake in the darkness. the last one he ever read to her in that meadow was this: what gars ye sing, said the herd laddie, what gars ye sing sae lood? to tice them oot o' the yerd, laddie, the worms, for my daily food. an' aye he sang, an' better he sang, an' the worms creepit in an' oot; an' ane he tuik, an' twa he loot gang, but still he carolled stoot. it's no for the worms, sir, said the herd, they comena for yer sang. think ye sae, sir? answered the bird, maybe ye're no i' the wrang. but aye &c. sing ye yoong sorrow to beguile or to gie auld fear the flegs? na, quo' the mavis; it's but to wile my wee things oot o' her eggs. an' aye &c. the mistress is plenty for that same gear, though ye sangna ear' nor late. it's to draw the deid frae the moul' sae drear, an' open the kirkyard gate. an' aye &c. na, na; it's a better sang nor yer ain, though ye hae o' notes a feck, 'at wad mak auld barebanes there sae fain as to lift the muckle sneck! but aye &c. better ye sing nor a burn i' the mune, nor a wave ower san' that flows, nor a win' wi' the glintin' stars abune, an' aneth the roses in rows; an' aye &c. but i'll speir ye nae mair, sir, said the herd. i fear what ye micht say neist. ye wad but won'er the mair, said the bird, to see the thouchts i' my breist. and aye he sang, an' better he sang, an' the worms creepit in an' oot; an' ane he tuik, an' twa he loot gang, but still he carolled stoot. i doubt whether ginevra understood this song better than the first, but she was now more careful of criticizing; and when by degrees it dawned upon her that he was the maker of these and other verses he read, she grew half afraid of donal, and began to regard him with big eyes; he became, from a herd-boy, an unintelligible person, therefore a wonder. for, brought thus face to face with the maker of verses, she could not help trying to think how he did the thing; and as she felt no possibility of making verses herself, it remained a mystery and an astonishment, causing a great respect for the poet to mingle with the kindness she felt towards nicie's brother. chapter xxxi. their reward. by degrees gibbie had come to be well known about the mains and glashruach. angus's only recognition of him was a scowl in return for his smile; but, as i have said, he gave him no farther annoyance, and the tales about the beast-loon were dying out from daurside. jean mavor was a special friend to him: for she knew now well enough who had been her brownie, and made him welcome as often as he showed himself with donal. fergus was sometimes at home; sometimes away; but he was now quite a fine gentleman, a student of theology, and only condescendingly cognizant of the existence of donal grant. all he said to him when he came home a master of arts, was, that he had expected better of him: he ought to be something more than herd by this time. donal smiled and said nothing. he had just finished a little song that pleased him, and could afford to be patronized. i am afraid, however, he was not contented with that, but in his mind's eye measured fergus from top to toe. in the autumn, mr. galbraith returned to glashruach, but did not remain long. his schemes were promising well, and his self-importance was screwed yet a little higher in consequence. but he was kinder than usual to ginevra. before he went he said to her that, as mr. machar had sunk into a condition requiring his daughter's constant attention, he would find her an english governess as soon as he reached london; meantime she must keep up her studies by herself as well as she could. probably he forgot all about it, for the governess was not heard of at glashruach, and things fell into their old way. there was no spiritual traffic between the father and daughter, consequently ginevra never said anything about donal or gibbie, or her friendship for nicie. he had himself to blame altogether; he had made it impossible for her to talk to him. but it was well he remained in ignorance, and so did not put a stop to the best education she could at this time of her life have been having--such as neither he nor any friend of his could have given her. it was interrupted, however, by the arrival of the winter--a wild time in that region, fierce storm alternating with the calm of death. after howling nights, in which it seemed as if all the polter-geister of the universe must be out on a disembodied lark, the mountains stood there in the morning solemn still, each with his white turban of snow unrumpled on his head, in the profoundest silence of blue air, as if he had never in his life passed a more thoughtful, peaceful time than the very last night of all. to such feet as ginevra's the cottage on glashgar was for months almost as inaccessible as if it had been in sirius. more than once the daur was frozen thick; for weeks every beast was an absolute prisoner to the byre, and for months was fed with straw and turnips and potatoes and oilcake. then was the time for stories; and often in the long dark, while yet it was hours too early for bed, would ginevra go with nicie, who was not much of a raconteuse, to the kitchen, to get one of the other servants to tell her an old tale. for even in his own daughter and his own kitchen, the great laird could not extinguish the accursed superstition. not a glimpse did ginevra get all this time of donal or of gibbie. at last, like one of its own flowers in its own bosom, the spring began again to wake in god's thought of his world; and the snow, like all other deaths, had to melt and run, leaving room for hope; then the summer woke smiling, as if she knew she had been asleep; and the two youths and the two maidens met yet again on lorrie bank, with the brown water falling over the stones, the gold nuggets of the broom hanging over the water, and the young larch-wood scenting the air all up the brae side between them and the house, which the tall hedge hid from their view. the four were a year older, a year nearer trouble, and a year nearer getting out of it. ginevra was more of a woman, donal more of a poet, nicie as nice and much the same, and gibbie, if possible, more a foundling of the universe than ever. he was growing steadily, and showed such freedom and ease, and his motions were all so rapid and direct, that it was plain at a glance the beauty of his countenance was in no manner or measure associated with weakness. the mountain was a grand nursery for him, and the result, both physical and spiritual, corresponded. janet, who, better than anyone else, knew what was in the mind of the boy, revered him as much as he revered her; the first impression he made upon her had never worn off--had only changed its colour a little. more even than a knowledge of the truth, is a readiness to receive it; and janet saw from the first that gibbie's ignorance at its worst was but room vacant for the truth: when it came it found bolt nor bar on door or window, but had immediate entrance. the secret of this power of reception was, that to see a truth and to do it was one and the same thing with gibbie. to know and not do would have seemed to him an impossibility, as it is in vital idea a monstrosity. this unity of vision and action was the main cause also of a certain daring simplicity in the exercise of the imagination, which so far from misleading him reacted only in obedience--which is the truth of the will--the truth, therefore, of the whole being. he did not do the less well for his sheep, that he fancied they knew when jesus christ was on the mountain, and always at such times both fed better and were more frolicsome. he thought oscar knew it also, and interpreted a certain look of the dog by the supposition that he had caught a sign of the bodily presence of his maker. the direction in which his imagination ran forward, was always that in which his reason pointed; and so long as gibbie's fancies were bud-blooms upon his obedience, his imagination could not be otherwise than in harmony with his reason. imagination is a poor root, but a worthy blossom, and in a nature like gibbie's its flowers cannot fail to be lovely. for no outcome of a man's nature is so like himself as his imaginations, except it be his fancies, indeed. perhaps his imaginations show what he is meant to be, his fancies what he is making of himself. in the summer, mr. galbraith, all unannounced, reappeared at glashruach, but so changed that, startled at the sight of him, ginevra stopped midway in her advance to greet him. the long thin man was now haggard and worn; he looked sourer too, and more suspicious--either that experience had made him so, or that he was less equal to the veiling of his feelings in dignified indifference. he was annoyed that his daughter should recognize an alteration in him, and, turning away, leaned his head on the hand whose arm was already supported by the mantelpiece, and took no further notice of her presence; but perhaps conscience also had something to do with this behaviour. ginevra knew from experience that the sight of tears would enrage him, and with all her might repressed those she felt beginning to rise. she went up to him timidly, and took the hand that hung by his side. he did not repel her--that is, he did not push her away, or even withdraw his hand, but he left it hanging lifeless, and returned with it no pressure upon hers--which was much worse. "is anything the matter, papa?" she asked with trembling voice. "i am not aware that i have been in the habit of communicating with you on the subject of my affairs," he answered; "nor am i likely to begin to do so, where my return after so long an absence seems to give so little satisfaction." "oh, papa! i was frightened to see you looking so ill." "such a remark upon my personal appearance is but a poor recognition of my labours for your benefit, i venture to think, jenny," he said. he was at the moment contemplating, as a necessity, the sale of every foot of the property her mother had brought him. nothing less would serve to keep up his credit, and gain time to disguise more than one failing scheme. everything had of late been going so badly, that he had lost a good deal of his confidence and self-satisfaction; but he had gained no humility instead. it had not dawned upon him yet that he was not unfortunate, but unworthy. the gain of such a conviction is to a man enough to outweigh infinitely any loss that even his unworthiness can have caused him; for it involves some perception of the worthiness of the truth, and makes way for the utter consolation which the birth of that truth in himself will bring. as yet mr. galbraith was but overwhelmed with care for a self which, so far as he had to do with the making of it, was of small value indeed, although in the possibility, which is the birthright of every creature, it was, not less than that of the wretchedest of dog-licked lazaruses, of a value by himself unsuspected and inappreciable. that he should behave so cruelly to his one child, was not unnatural to that self with which he was so much occupied: failure had weakened that command of behaviour which so frequently gains the credit belonging only to justice and kindness, and a temper which never was good, but always feeling the chain, was ready at once to show its ugly teeth. he was a proud man, whose pride was always catching cold from his heart. he might have lived a hundred years in the same house with a child that was not his own, without feeling for her a single movement of affection. the servants found more change in him than ginevra did; his relations with them, if not better conceived than his paternal ones, had been less evidently defective. now he found fault with every one, so that even joseph dared hardly open his mouth, and said he must give warning. the day after his arrival, having spent the morning with angus walking over certain fields, much desired, he knew, of a neighbouring proprietor, inwardly calculating the utmost he could venture to ask for them with a chance of selling, he scolded ginevra severely on his return because she had not had lunch, but had waited for him; whereas a little reflection might have shown him she dared not take it without him. naturally, therefore, she could not now eat, because of a certain sensation in her throat. the instant he saw she was not eating, he ordered her out of the room: he would have no such airs in his family! by the end of the week--he arrived on the tuesday--such a sense of estrangement possessed ginevra, that she would turn on the stair and run up again, if she heard her father's voice below. her aversion to meeting him, he became aware of, and felt relieved in regard to the wrong he was doing his wife, by reflecting upon her daughter's behaviour towards him; for he had a strong constitutional sense of what was fair, and a conscience disobeyed becomes a cancer. in this evil mood he received from some one--all his life donal believed it was fergus--a hint concerning the relations between his daughter and his tenant's herd-boy. to describe his feelings at the bare fact that such a hint was possible, would be more labour than the result would repay.--what! his own flesh and blood, the heiress of glashruach, derive pleasure from the boorish talk of such a companion! it could not be true, when the mere thought, without the belief of it, filled him with such indignation! he was overwhelmed with a righteous disgust. he did himself the justice of making himself certain before he took measures; but he never thought of doing them the justice of acquainting himself first with the nature of the intercourse they held. but it mattered little; for he would have found nothing in that to give him satisfaction, even if the thing itself had not been outrageous. he watched and waited, and more than once pretended to go from home: at last one morning, from the larch-wood, he saw the unnatural girl seated with her maid on the bank of the river, the cow-herd reading to them, and on the other side the dumb idiot lying listening. he was almost beside himself--with what, i can hardly define. in a loud voice of bare command he called to her to come to him. with a glance of terror at nicie she rose, and they went up through the larches together. i will not spend my labour upon a reproduction of the verbal torrent of wrath, wounded dignity, disgust, and contempt, with which the father assailed his shrinking, delicate, honest-minded woman-child. for nicie, he dismissed her on the spot. not another night would he endure her in the house, after her abominable breach of confidence! she had to depart without even a good-bye from ginevra, and went home weeping in great dread of what her mother would say. "lassie," said janet, when she heard her story, "gien onybody be to blame it's mysel'; for ye loot me ken ye gaed whiles wi' yer bonnie missie to hae a news wi' donal, an' i saw an' see noucht 'at's wrang intill't. but the fowk o' this warl' has ither w'ys o' jeedgin' o' things, an' i maun bethink mysel' what lesson o' the serpent's wisdom i hae to learn frae 't. ye're walcome hame, my bonnie lass. ye ken i aye keep the wee closet ready for ony o' ye 'at micht come ohn expeckit." nicie, however, had not long to occupy the closet, for those of her breed were in demand in the country. chapter xxxii. prologue. ever since he became a dweller in the air of glashgar, gibbie, mindful of his first visit thereto, and of his grand experience on that occasion, had been in the habit, as often as he saw reason to expect a thunder-storm, and his duties would permit, of ascending the mountain, and there on the crest of the granite peak, awaiting the arrival of the tumult. everything antagonistic in the boy, everything that could naturally find relief, or pleasure, or simple outcome, in resistance or contention, debarred as it was by the exuberance of his loving kindness from obtaining satisfaction or alleviation in strife with his fellows, found it wherever he could encounter the forces of nature, in personal wrestle with them where possible, and always in wildest sympathy with any uproar of the elements. the absence of personality in them allowed the co-existence of sympathy and antagonism in respect of them. except those truths awaking delight at once calm and profound, of which so few know the power, and the direct influence of human relation, gibbie's emotional joy was more stirred by storm than by anything else; and with all forms of it he was so familiar that, young as he was, he had unconsciously begun to generalize on its phases. towards the evening of a wondrously fine day in the beginning of august--a perfect day of summer in her matronly beauty, it began to rain. all the next day the slopes and stairs of glashgar were alternately glowing in sunshine, and swept with heavy showers, driven slanting in strong gusts of wind from the northwest. how often he was wet through and dried again that day, gibbie could not have told. he wore so little that either took but a few moments, and he was always ready for a change. the wind and the rain together were cold, but that only served to let the sunshine deeper into him when it returned. in the afternoon there was less sun, more rain, and more wind; and at last the sun seemed to give it up; the wind grew to a hurricane, and the rain strove with it which should inhabit the space. the whole upper region was like a huge mortar, in which the wind was the pestle, and, with innumerable gyres, vainly ground at the rain. gibbie drove his sheep to the refuge of a pen on the lower slope of a valley that ran at right angles to the wind, where they were sheltered by a rock behind, forming one side of the enclosure, and dykes of loose stones, forming the others, at a height there was no tradition of any flood having reached. he then went home, and having told robert what he had done, and had his supper, set out in the early-failing light, to ascend the mountain. a great thunder-storm was at hand, and was calling him. it was almost dark before he reached the top, but he knew the surface of glashgar nearly as well as the floor of the cottage. just as he had fought his way to the crest of the peak in the face of one of the fiercest of the blasts abroad that night, a sudden rush of fire made the heavens like the smoke-filled vault of an oven, and at once the thunder followed, in a succession of single sharp explosions without any roll between. the mountain shook with the windy shocks, but the first of the thunder-storm was the worst, and it soon passed. the wind and the rain continued, and the darkness was filled with the rush of the water everywhere wildly tearing down the sides of the mountain. thus heaven and earth held communication in torrents all the night. down the steeps of the limpid air they ran to the hard sides of the hills, where at once, as if they were no longer at home, and did not like the change, they began to work mischief. to the ears and heart of gibbie their noises were a mass of broken music. every spring and autumn the floods came, and he knew them, and they were welcome to him in their seasons. it required some care to find his way down through the darkness and the waters to the cottage, but as he was neither in fear nor in haste, he was in little danger, and his hands and feet could pick out the path where his eyes were useless. when at length he reached his bed, it was not for a long time to sleep, but to lie awake and listen to the raging of the wind all about and above and below the cottage, and the rushing of the streams down past it on every side. to his imagination it was as if he lay in the very bed of the channel by which the waters of heaven were shooting to the valleys of the earth; and when he fell asleep at last, his dream was of the rush of the river of the water of life from under the throne of god; and he saw men drink thereof, and everyone as he drank straightway knew that he was one with the father, and one with every child of his throughout the infinite universe. he woke, and what remained of his dream was love in his heart, and in his ears the sound of many waters. it was morning. he rose, and, dressing hastily, opened the door. what a picture of grey storm rose outspread before him! the wind fiercely invaded the cottage, thick charged with water-drops, and stepping out he shut the door in haste, lest it should blow upon the old people in bed and wake them. he could not see far on any side, for the rain that fell, and the mist and steam that rose, upon which the wind seemed to have no power; but wherever he did see, there water was running down. up the mountain he went--he could hardly have told why. once, for a moment, as he ascended, the veil of the vapour either rose, or was torn asunder, and he saw the great wet gleam of the world below. by the time he reached the top, it was as light as it was all the day; but it was with a dull yellow glare, as if the sun were obscured by the smoke and vaporous fumes of a burning world which the rain had been sent to quench. it was a wild, hopeless scene--as if god had turned his face away from the world, and all nature was therefore drowned in tears--no rachel weeping for her children, but the whole creation crying for the father, and refusing to be comforted. gibbie stood gazing and thinking. did god like to look at the storm he made? if jesus did, would he have left it all and gone to sleep, when the wind and waves were howling, and flinging the boat about like a toy between them? he must have been tired, surely! with what? then first gibbie saw that perhaps it tired jesus to heal people; that every time what cured man or woman was life that went out of him, and that he missed it, perhaps--not from his heart, but from his body; and if it were so, then it was no wonder if he slept in the midst of a right splendid storm. and upon that gibbie remembered what st. matthew says just before he tells about the storm--that "he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by esaias the prophet, saying, himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses." that moment it seemed as if he must be himself in some wave-tossed boat, and not upon a mountain of stone, for glashgar gave a great heave under him, then rocked and shook from side to side a little, and settled down so still and steady, that motion and the mountain seemed again two ideas that never could be present together in any mind. the next instant came an explosion, followed by a frightful roaring and hurling, as of mingled water and stones; and on the side of the mountain beneath him he saw what, through the mist, looked like a cloud of smoke or dust rising to a height. he darted towards it. as he drew nearer, the cloud seemed to condense, and presently he saw plainly enough that it was a great column of water shooting up and out from the face of the mountain. it sank and rose again, with the alternation of a huge pulse: the mountain was cracked, and through the crack, with every throb of its heart, the life-blood of the great hull of the world seemed beating out. already it had scattered masses of gravel on all sides, and down the hill a river was shooting in sheer cataract, raving and tearing, and carrying stones and rocks with it like foam. still and still it pulsed and rushed and ran, born, like another xanthus, a river full-grown, from the heart of the mountain. suddenly gibbie, in the midst of his astonishment and awful delight, noted the path of the new stream, and from his knowledge of the face of the mountain, perceived that its course was direct for the cottage. down the hill he shot after it, as if it were a wild beast that his fault had freed from its cage. he was not terrified. one believing like him in the perfect love and perfect will of a father of men, as the fact of facts, fears nothing. fear is faithlessness. but there is so little that is worthy the name of faith, that such a confidence will appear to most not merely incredible but heartless. the lord himself seems not to have been very hopeful about us, for he said, when the son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth? a perfect faith would lift us absolutely above fear. it is in the cracks, crannies, and gulfy faults of our belief, the gaps that are not faith, that the snow of apprehension settles, and the ice of unkindness forms. the torrent had already worn for itself a channel: what earth there was, it had swept clean away to the rock, and the loose stones it had thrown up aside, or hurled with it in its headlong course. but as gibbie bounded along, following it with a speed almost equal to its own, he was checked in the midst of his hearty haste by the sight, a few yards away, of another like terror--another torrent issuing from the side of the hill, and rushing to swell the valley stream. another and another he saw, with growing wonder, as he ran; before he reached home he passed some six or eight, and had begun to think whether a second deluge of the whole world might not be at hand, commencing this time with scotland. two of them joined the one he was following, and he had to cross them as he could; the others he saw near and farther off--one foaming deliverance after another, issuing from the entrails of the mountain, like imprisoned demons, that, broken from their bonds, ran to ravage the world with the accumulated hate of dreariest centuries. now and then a huge boulder, loosened from its bed by the trail of this or that watery serpent, would go rolling, leaping, bounding down the hill before him, and just in time he escaped one that came springing after him as if it were a living thing that wanted to devour him. nor was glashgar the only torrent-bearing mountain of gormgarnet that day, though the rain prevented gibbie from seeing anything of what the rest of them were doing. the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and seemed rushing together to drown the world. and still the wind was raging, and the rain tumbling to the earth, rather in sheets than in streams. gibbie at length forsook the bank of the new torrent to take the nearest way home, and soon reached the point whence first, returning in that direction, he always looked to see the cottage. for a moment he was utterly bewildered: no cottage was to be seen. from the top of the rock against which it was built, shot the whole mass of the water he had been pursuing, now dark with stones and gravel, now grey with foam, or glassy in the lurid light. "o jesus christ!" he cried, and darted to the place. when he came near, to his amazement there stood the little house unharmed, the very centre of the cataract! for a few yards on the top of the rock, the torrent had a nearly horizontal channel, along which it rushed with unabated speed to the edge, and thence shot clean over the cottage, dropping only a dribble of rain on the roof from the underside of its half-arch. the garden ground was gone, swept clean from the bare rock, which made a fine smooth shoot for the water a long distance in front. he darted through the drizzle and spray, reached the door, and lifted the hatch. the same moment he heard janet's voice in joyful greeting. "noo, noo! come awa', laddie," she said. "wha wad hae thoucht we wad hae to lea' the rock to win oot o' the water? we're but waitin' you to gang.--come, robert, we'll awa' doon the hill." she stood in the middle of the room in her best gown, as if she had been going to church, her bible, a good-sized octavo, under her arm, with a white handkerchief folded round it, and her umbrella in her hand. "he that believeth shall not make haste," she said, "but he maunna tempt the lord, aither. drink that milk, gibbie, an' pit a bannock i' yer pooch, an' come awa'." robert rose from the edge of the bed, staff in hand, ready too. he also was in his sunday clothes. oscar, who could make no change of attire, but was always ready, and had been standing looking up in his face for the last ten minutes, wagged his tail when he saw him rise, and got out of his way. on the table were the remains of their breakfast of oat-cake and milk--the fire janet had left on the hearth was a spongy mass of peat, as wet as the winter before it was dug from the bog, so they had had no porridge. the water kept coming in splashes down the lum, the hillocks of the floor were slimy, and in the hollows little lakes were gathering: the lowest film of the torrent-water ran down the rock behind, and making its way between rock and roof, threatened soon to render the place uninhabitable. "what's the eese o' lo'denin' yersel' wi' the umbrell?" said robert. "ye'll get it a' drookit (drenched)." "ow, i'll jist tak it," replied janet, with a laugh in acknowledgment of her husband's fun; "it'll haud the rain ohn blin't me." "that's gien ye be able to haud it up. i doobt the win' 'll be ower sair upo' 't. i'm thinkin', though, it'll be mair to haud yer beuk dry!" janet smiled and made no denial. "noo, gibbie," she said, "ye gang an' lowse crummie. but ye'll hae to lead her. she winna be to caw in sic a win' 's this, an' no plain ro'd afore her." "whaur div ye think o' gauin'?" asked robert, who, satisfied as usual with whatever might be in his wife's mind, had not till this moment thought of asking her where she meant to take refuge. "ow, we'll jist mak for the mains, gien ye be agreeable, robert," she answered. "it's there we belang till, an' in wather like this naebody wad refeese bield till a beggar, no to say mistress jean till her ain fowk." with that she led the way to the door and opened it. "his v'ice was like the soon' o' mony watters," she said to herself softly, as the liquid thunder of the torrent came in the louder. gibbie shot round the corner to the byre, whence through all the roar, every now and then they had heard the cavernous mooing of crummie, piteous and low. he found a stream a foot deep running between her fore and hind legs, and did not wonder that she wanted to be on the move. speedily he loosed her, and fastening the chain-tether to her halter, led her out. she was terrified at sight of the falling water, and they had some trouble in getting her through behind it, but presently after, she was making the descent as carefully and successfully as any of them. it was a heavy undertaking for the two old folk to walk all the way to the mains, and in such a state of the elements; but where there is no choice, we do well to make no difficulty. janet was half troubled that her mountain, and her foundation on the rock, should have failed her; but consoled herself that they were but shadows of heavenly things and figures of the true; and that a mountain or a rock was in itself no more to be trusted than a horse or a prince or the legs of a man. robert plodded on in contented silence, and gibbie was in great glee, singing, after his fashion, all the way, though now and then half-choked by the fierceness of the wind round some corner of rock, filled with rain-drops that stung like hailstones. by and by janet stopped and began looking about her. this naturally seemed to her husband rather odd in the circumstances. "what are ye efter, janet?" he said, shouting through the wind from a few yards off, by no means sorry to stand for a moment, although any recovering of his breath seemed almost hopeless in such a tempest. "i want to lay my umbrell in safity," answered janet, "--gien i cud but perceive a shuitable spot. ye was richt, robert, it's mair w'alth nor i can get the guid o'." "hoots! fling't frae ye, than, lass," he returned. "is this a day to be thinkin' o' warl' 's gear?" "what for no, robert?" she rejoined. "ae day's as guid's anither for thinkin' aboot onything the richt gait." "what!" retorted robert, "--whan we hae ta'en oor lives in oor han', an' can no more than houp we may cairry them throu' safe!" "what's that 'at ye ca' oor lives, robert? the maister never made muckle o' the savin' o' sic like's them. it seems to me they're naething but a kin' o' warl' 's gear themsel's." "an' yet," argued robert, "ye'll tak thoucht aboot an auld umbrell? whaur's yer consistency, lass?" "gien i war tribled aboot my life," said janet, "i cud ill spare thoucht for an auld umbrell. but they baith trible me sae little, 'at i may jist as weel luik efter them baith. it's auld an' casten an' bow-ribbit, it's true, but it wad ill become me to drap it wi'oot a thoucht, whan him 'at could mak haill loaves, said, 'gether up the fragments 'at naething be lost.'--na," she continued, still looking about her, "i maun jist dee my duty by the auld umbrell; syne come o' 't 'at likes, i carena." so saying she walked to the lee side of a rock, and laid the umbrella close under it, then a few large stones upon it to keep it down. i may add, that the same umbrella, recovered, and with two new ribs, served janet to the day of her death. chapter xxxiii. the mains. they reached at length the valley road. the water that ran in the bottom was the lorrie. three days ago it was a lively little stream, winding and changing within its grassy banks--here resting silent in a deep pool, there running and singing over its pebbles. now it had filled and far overflowed its banks, and was a swift river. it had not yet, so far up the valley, encroached on the road; but the torrents on the mountain had already in places much injured it, and with considerable difficulty they crossed some of the new-made gullies. when they approached the bridge, however, by which they must cross the lorrie to reach the mains, their worst trouble lay before them. for the enemy, with whose reinforcements they had all the time been descending, showed himself ever in greater strength the farther they advanced; and here the road was flooded for a long way on both sides of the bridge. there was therefore a good deal of wading to be done; but the road was an embankment, there was little current, and in safety at last they ascended the rising ground on which the farm-building stood. when they reached the yard, they sent gibbie to find shelter for crummie, and themselves went up to the house. "the lord preserve 's!" cried jean mavor, with uplifted hands, when she saw them enter the kitchen. "he'll dee that, mem," returned janet, with a smile. "but what can he dee? gien ye be droont oot o' the hills, what's to come o' hiz i' the how? i wad ken that!" said jean. "the watter's no up to yer door yet," remarked janet. "god forbid!" retorted jean, as if the very mention of such a state of things was too dreadful to be polite. "--but, eh, ye're weet!" "weet's no the word," said robert, trying to laugh, but failing from sheer exhaustion, and the beginnings of an asthmatic attack. the farmer, hearing their voices, came into the kitchen--a middle-sized and middle-aged, rather coarse-looking man, with keen eyes, who took snuff amazingly. his manner was free, with a touch of satire. he was proud of driving a hard bargain, but was thoroughly hospitable. he had little respect for person or thing, but showed an occasional touch of tenderness. "hoot, rob!" he said roughly as he entered, "i thoucht ye had mair sense! what's broucht ye here at sic a time?" but as he spoke he held out his snuff-box to the old man. "fell needcessity, sir," answered robert, taking a good pinch. "necessity!" retorted the farmer. "was ye oot o' meal?" "oot o' dry meal, i doobt, by this time, sir," replied robert. "hoots! i wuss we war a' in like necessity--weel up upo' the hill i'stead o' doon here upo' the haugh (river-meadow). it's jist clean ridic'lous. ye sud hae kenned better at your age, rob. ye sud hae thoucht twise, man." "'deed, sir," answered robert, quietly finishing his pinch of snuff, "there was sma' need, an' less time to think, an' glashgar bursten, an' the watter comin' ower the tap o' the bit hoosie as gien 'twar a muckle owershot wheel, an' no a place for fowk to bide in. ye dinna think janet an' me wad be twa sic auld fules as pit on oor sunday claes to sweem in, gien we thoucht to see things as we left them whan we gaed back! ye see, sir, though the hoose be fun't upo' a rock, it's maist biggit o' fells, an' the foundation's a' i luik even to see o' 't again. whan the force o' the watter grows less, it'll come down upo' the riggin' wi' the haill weicht o' 't." "ay!" said janet, in a low voice, "the live stanes maun come to the live rock to bigg the hoose 'at'll stan." "what think ye, maister fergus, you 'at's gauin' to be a minister?" said robert, referring to his wife's words, as the young man looked in at the door of the kitchen. "lat him be," interposed his father, blowing his nose with unnecessary violence; "setna him preachin' afore's time. fess the whusky, fergus, an' gie auld robert a dram. haith! gien the watter be rinnin' ower the tap o' yer hoose, man, it was time to flit. fess twa or three glaisses, fergus; we hae a' need o' something 'at's no watter. it's perfeckly ridic'lous!" having taken a little of the whisky, the old people went to change their clothes for some jean had provided, and in the mean time she made up her fire, and prepared some breakfast for them. "an' whaur's yer dummie?" she asked, as they re-entered the kitchen. "he had puir crummie to luik efter," answered janet; "but he micht hae been in or this time." "he'll be wi' donal i' the byre, nae doobt," said jean: "he's aye some shy o' comin' in wantin' an inveet." she went to the door, and called with a loud voice across the yard, through the wind and the clashing torrents, "donal, sen' dummie in till's brakfast." "he's awa' till's sheep," cried donal in reply. "preserve 's!--the cratur 'll be lost!" said jean. "less likly nor ony man aboot the place," bawled donal, half angry with his mistress for calling his friend dummie. "gibbie kens better what he's aboot nor ony twa 'at thinks him a fule 'cause he canna lat oot sic stuff an' nonsense as they canna haud in." jean went back to the kitchen, only half reassured concerning her brownie, and far from contented with his absence. but she was glad to find that neither janet nor robert appeared alarmed at the news. "i wuss the cratur had had some brakfast," she said. "he has a piece in 's pooch," answered janet. "he's no oonprovidit wi' what can be made mair o'." "i dinna richtly un'erstan' ye there," said jean. "ye canna hae failt to remark, mem," answered janet, "'at whan the maister set himsel' to feed the hungerin' thoosan's, he teuk intil's han' what there was, an' vroucht upo' that to mak mair o' 't. i hae wussed sometimes 'at the laddie wi' the five barley loaves an' the twa sma' fishes, hadna been there that day. i wad fain ken hoo the maister wad hae managed wantin' onything to begin upo'. as it was, he aye hang what he did upo' something his father had dune afore him." "hoots!" returned jean, who looked upon janet as a lover of conundrums, "ye're aye warstlin' wi' run k-nots an' teuch moo'fu's." "ow na, no aye," answered janet; "--only whiles, whan the speerit o' speirin' gets the upper han' o' me for a sizon." "i doobt that same speerit 'll lead ye far frae the still watters some day, janet," said jean, stirring the porridge vehemently. "ow, i think not," answered janet very calmly. "whan the maister says--what's that to thee?--i tak care he hasna to say't twise, but jist get up an' follow him." this was beyond jean, but she held her peace, for, though she feared for janet's orthodoxy, and had a strong opinion of the superiority of her own common sense--in which, as in the case of all who pride themselves in the same, there was a good deal more of the common than of the sense--she had the deepest conviction of janet's goodness, and regarded her as a sort of heaven-favoured idiot, whose utterances were somewhat privileged. janet, for her part, looked upon jean as "an honest wuman, wha 'll get a heap o' licht some day." when they had eaten their breakfast, robert took his pipe to the barn, saying there was not much danger of fire that day; janet washed up the dishes, and sat down to her book; and jean went out and in, attending to many things. mean time the rain fell, the wind blew, the water rose. little could be done beyond feeding the animals, threshing a little corn in the barn, and twisting straw ropes for the thatch of the ricks of the coming harvest--if indeed there was a harvest on the road, for, as the day went on, it seemed almost to grow doubtful whether any ropes would be wanted; while already not a few of last year's ricks, from farther up the country, were floating past the mains, down the daur to the sea. the sight was a dreadful one--had an air of the day of judgment about it to farmers' eyes. from the mains, to right and left beyond the rising ground on which the farm buildings stood, everywhere as far as the bases of the hills, instead of fields was water, yellow brown, here in still expanse or slow progress, there sweeping along in fierce current. the quieter parts of it were dotted with trees, divided by hedges, shaded with ears of corn; upon the swifter parts floated objects of all kinds. mr. duff went wandering restlessly from one spot to another, finding nothing to do. in the gloaming, which fell the sooner that a rain-blanket miles thick wrapt the earth up from the sun, he came across from the barn, and, entering the kitchen, dropped, weary with hopelessness, on a chair. "i can weel un'erstan'," he said, "what for the lord sud set doon bony an' set up louy, but what for he sud gar corn grow, an' syne sen' a spate to sweem awa' wi' 't, that's mair nor mortal man can see the sense o'.--haud yer tongue, janet. i'm no sayin' there's onything wrang; i'm sayin' naething but the sair trowth, 'at i canna see the what-for o' 't. i canna see the guid o' 't till onybody. a'thing 's on the ro'd to the german ocean. the lan' 's jist miltin' awa' intill the sea!" janet sat silent, knitting hard at a stocking she had got hold of, that jean had begun for her brother. she knew argument concerning the uses of adversity was vain with a man who knew of no life but that which consisted in eating and drinking, sleeping and rising, working and getting on in the world: as to such things existing only that they may subserve a real life, he was almost as ignorant, notwithstanding he was an elder of the church, as any heathen. from being nearly in the centre of its own land, the farm-steading of the mains was at a considerable distance from any other; but there were two or three cottages upon the land, and as the evening drew on, another aged pair, who lived in one only a few hundred yards from the house, made their appearance, and were soon followed by the wife of the foreman with her children, who lived farther off. quickly the night closed in, and gibbie was not come. robert was growing very uneasy; janet kept comforting and reassuring him. "there's ae thing," said the old man: "oscar's wi' 'im." "ay," responded janet, unwilling, in the hearing of others, to say a word that might seem to savour of rebuke to her husband, yet pained that he should go to the dog for comfort--"ay; he's a well-made animal, oscar! there's been a fowth o' sheep-care pitten intil 'im. ye see him 'at made 'im, bein' a shepherd himsel', kens what's wantit o' the dog."--none but her husband understood what lay behind the words. "oscar's no wi' im," said donal. "the dog cam to me i' the byre, lang efter gibbie was awa', greitin' like, an' luikin' for 'im." robert gave a great sigh, but said nothing. janet did not sleep a wink that night: she had so many to pray for. not gibbie only, but every one of her family was in perils of waters, all being employed along the valley of the daur. it was not, she said, confessing to her husband her sleeplessness, that she was afraid. she was only "keepin' them company, an' haudin' the yett open," she said. the latter phrase was her picture-periphrase for praying. she never said she prayed; she held the gate open. the wonder is but small that donal should have turned out a poet. the dawn appeared--but the farm had vanished. not even heads of growing corn were anywhere more to be seen. the loss would be severe, and john duff's heart sank within him. the sheep which had been in the mown clover-field that sloped to the burn, were now all in the corn-yard, and the water was there with them. if the rise did not soon cease, every rick would be afloat. there was little current, however, and not half the danger there would have been had the houses stood a few hundred yards in any direction from where they were. "tak yer brakfast, john," said his sister. "lat them tak 'at hungers," he answered. "tak, or ye'll no hae the wut to save," said jean. thereupon he fell to, and ate, if not with appetite, then with a will that was wondrous. the flood still grew, and still the rain poured, and gibbie did not come. indeed no one any longer expected him, whatever might have become of him: except by boat the mains was inaccessible now, they thought. soon after breakfast, notwithstanding, a strange woman came to the door. jean, who opened it to her knock, stood and stared speechless. it was a greyhaired woman, with a more disreputable look than her weather-flouted condition would account for. "gran' wither for the deuks!" she said. "whaur come ye frae?" returned jean, who did not relish the freedom of her address. "frae ower by," she answered. "an' hoo wan ye here?" "upo' my twa legs." jean looked this way and that over the watery waste, and again stared at the woman in growing bewilderment.--they came afterwards to the conclusion that she had arrived, probably half-drunk, the night before, and passed it in one of the outhouses. "yer legs maun be langer nor they luik than, wuman," said jean, glancing at the lower part of the stranger's person. the woman only laughed--a laugh without any laughter in it. "what's yer wull, noo 'at ye are here?" continued jean with severity. "ye camna to the mains to tell them there what kin' o' wather it wis!" "i cam whaur i cud win," answered the woman; "an' for my wull, that's naething to naebody noo--it's no as it was ance--though, gien i cud get it, there micht be mair nor me the better for't. an' sae as ye wad gang the len'th o' a glaiss o' whusky--" "ye s' get nae whusky here," interrupted jean, with determination. the woman gave a sigh, and half turned away as if she would depart. but however she might have come, it was plainly impossible she should depart and live. "wuman," said jean, "ken an' i care naething aboot ye, an' mair, i dinna like ye, nor the luik o' ye; and gien 't war a fine simmer nicht 'at a body cud lie thereoot, or gang the farther, i wad steek the door i' yer face; but that i daurna dee the day again' my neebour's soo; sae ye can come in an' sit doon' an', my min' spoken, ye s' get what'll haud the life i' ye, an' a puckle strae i' the barn. only ye maun jist hae a quaiet sough, for the gudeman disna like tramps." "tramps here, tramps there!" exclaimed the woman, starting into high displeasure; "i wad hae ye ken i'm an honest wuman, an' no tramp!" "ye sudna luik sae like ane than," said jean coolly. "but come yer wa's in, an' i s' say naething sae lang as ye behave." the woman followed her, took the seat pointed out to her by the fire, and sullenly ate, without a word of thanks, the cakes and milk handed her, but seemed to grow better tempered as she ate, though her black eyes glowed at the food with something of disgust and more of contempt: she would rather have had a gill of whisky than all the milk on the mains. on the other side of the fire sat janet, knitting away busily, with a look of ease and leisure. she said nothing, but now and then cast a kindly glance out of her grey eyes at the woman: there was an air of the lost sheep about the stranger, which, in whomsoever she might see it, always drew her affection. "she maun be ane o' them the maister cam' to ca'," she said to herself. but she was careful to suggest no approach, for she knew the sheep that has left the flock has grown wild, and is more suspicious and easily startled than one in the midst of its brethren. with the first of the light, some of the men on the farm had set out to look for gibbie, well knowing it would be a hard matter to touch glashgar. about nine they returned, having found it impossible. one of them, caught in a current and swept into a hole, had barely escaped with his life. but they were unanimous that the dummie was better off in any cave on glashgar than he would be in the best bed-room at the mains, if things went on as they threatened. robert had kept on going to the barn, and back again to the kitchen, all the morning, consumed with anxiety about the son of his old age; but the barn began to be flooded, and he had to limit his prayer-walk to the space between the door of the house and the chair where janet sat--knitting busily, and praying with countenance untroubled, amidst the rush of the seaward torrents, the mad howling and screeching of the wind, and the lowing of the imprisoned cattle. "o lord," she said in her great trusting heart, "gien my bonny man be droonin' i' the watter, or deein' o' cauld on the hill-side, haud 's han'. binna far frae him, o lord; dinna lat him be fleyt." to janet, what we call life and death were comparatively small matters, but she was very tender over suffering and fear. she did not pray half so much for gibbie's life as for the presence with him of him who is at the deathbed of every sparrow. she went on waiting, and refused to be troubled. true, she was not his bodily mother, but she loved him far better than the mother who, in such a dread for her child, would have been mad with terror. the difference was, that janet loved up as well as down, loved down so widely, so intensely, because the lord of life, who gives his own to us, was more to her than any child can be to any mother, and she knew he could not forsake her gibbie, and that his presence was more and better than life. she was unnatural, was she?--inhuman?--yes, if there be no such heart and source of humanity as she believed in; if there be, then such calmness and courage and content as hers are the mere human and natural condition to be hungered after by every aspiring soul. not until such condition is mine shall i be able to regard life as a godlike gift, except in the hope that it is drawing nigh. let him who understands, understand better; let him not say the good is less than perfect, or excuse his supineness and spiritual sloth by saying to himself that a man can go too far in his search after the divine, can sell too much of what he has to buy the field of the treasure. either there is no christ of god, or my all is his. robert seemed at length to have ceased his caged wandering. for a quarter of an hour he had been sitting with his face buried in his hands. janet rose, went softly to him, and said in a whisper: "is gibbie waur aff, robert, i' this watter upo' glashgar, nor the dissiples i' the boat upo' yon loch o' galilee, an' the maister no come to them? robert, my ain man! dinna gar the maister say to you, o ye o' little faith! wharfor did ye doobt? tak hert, man; the maister wadna hae his men be cooards." "ye're richt, janet; ye're aye richt," answered robert, and rose. she followed him into the passage. "whaur are ye gauin', robert?" she said. "i wuss i cud tell ye," he answered. "i'm jist hungerin' to be my lane. i wuss i had never left glashgar. there's aye room there. or gien i cud win oot amo' the rigs! there's nane o' them left, but there's the rucks--they're no soomin' yet! i want to gang to the lord, but i maunna weet willie mackay's claes." "it's a sair peety," said janet, "'at the men fowk disna learn to weyve stockin's, or dee something or ither wi' their han's. mony's the time my stockin' 's been maist as guid's a cloaset to me, though i cudna jist gang intil't. but what maitters 't! a prayer i' the hert 's sure to fin' the ro'd oot. the hert's the last place 'at can haud ane in. a prayin' hert has nae reef (roof) till't." she turned and left him. comforted by her words, he followed her back into the kitchen, and sat down beside her. "gibbie 'ill be here mayhap whan least ye luik for him," said janet. neither of them caught the wild eager gleam that lighted the face of the strange woman at those last words of janet. she looked up at her with the sharpest of glances, but the same instant compelled her countenance to resume its former expression of fierce indifference, and under that became watchful of everything said and done. still the rain fell and the wind blew; the torrents came tearing down from the hills, and shot madly into the rivers; the rivers ran into the valleys, and deepened the lakes that filled them. on every side of the mains, from the foot of glashgar to gormdhu, all was one yellow and red sea, with roaring currents and vortices numberless. it burrowed holes, it opened long-deserted channels and water-courses; here it deposited inches of rich mould, there yards of sand and gravel; here it was carrying away fertile ground, leaving behind only bare rock or shingle where the corn had been waving; there it was scooping out the bed of a new lake. many a thick soft lawn, of loveliest grass, dotted with fragrant shrubs and rare trees, vanished, and nothing was there when the waters subsided but a stony waste, or a gravelly precipice. woods and copses were undermined, and trees and soil together swept into the wash: sometimes the very place was hardly there to say it knew its children no more. houses were torn to pieces, and their contents, as from broken boxes, sent wandering on the brown waste, through the grey air, to the discoloured sea, whose saltness for a long way out had vanished with its hue. haymows were buried to the very top in sand; others went sailing bodily down the mighty stream--some of them followed or surrounded, like big ducks, by a great brood of ricks for their ducklings. huge trees went past as if shot down an alpine slide, cottages, and bridges of stone, giving way before them. wooden mills, thatched roofs, great mill-wheels, went dipping and swaying and hobbling down. from the upper windows of the mains, looking towards the chief current, they saw a drift of everything belonging to farms and dwelling-houses that would float. chairs and tables, chests, carts, saddles, chests of drawers, tubs of linen, beds and blankets, workbenches, harrows, girnels, planes, cheeses, churns, spinning-wheels, cradles, iron pots, wheel-barrows--all these and many other things hurried past as they gazed. everybody was looking, and for a time all had been silent. "lord save us!" cried mr. duff, with a great start, and ran for his telescope. a four-post bed came rocking down the river, now shooting straight for a short distance, now slowly wheeling, now shivering, struck by some swifter thing, now whirling giddily round in some vortex. the soaked curtains were flacking and flying in the great wind--and--yes, the telescope revealed it!--there was a figure in it! dead or alive the farmer could not tell, but it lay still!--a cry burst from them all; but on swept the strange boat, bound for the world beyond the flood, and none could stay its course. the water was now in the stable and cow-houses and barn. a few minutes more and it would be creeping into the kitchen. the daur and its tributary the lorrie were about to merge their last difference on the floor of jean's parlour. worst of all, a rapid current had set in across the farther end of the stable, which no one had as yet observed. jean bustled about her work as usual, nor, although it was so much augmented, would accept help from any of her guests until it came to preparing dinner, when she allowed janet and the foreman's wife to lend her a hand. "the tramp-wife" she would not permit to touch plate or spoon, knife or potato. the woman rose in anger at her exclusion, and leaving the house waded to the barn. there she went up the ladder to the loft where she had slept, and threw herself on her straw-bed. as there was no doing any work, donal was out with two of the men, wading here and there where the water was not too deep, enjoying the wonder of the strange looks and curious conjunctions of things. none of them felt much of dismay at the havoc around them: beyond their chests with their sunday clothes and at most two clean shirts, neither of the men had anything to lose worth mentioning; and for donal, he would gladly have given even his books for such a ploy. "there's ae thing, mither," he said, entering the kitchen, covered with mud, a rabbit in one hand and a large salmon in the other, "we're no like to sterve, wi' sawmon i' the hedges, an' mappies i' the trees!" his master questioned him with no little incredulity. it was easy to believe in salmon anywhere, but rabbits in trees! "i catched it i' the brainches o' a lairick (larch)," donal answered, "easy eneuch, for it cudna rin far, an' was mair fleyt at the watter nor at me; but for the sawmon, haith i was ower an' ower wi' hit i' the watter, efter i gruppit it, er' i cud ca' 't my ain." before the flood subsided, not a few rabbits were caught in trees, mostly spruce-firs and larches. for salmon, they were taken everywhere--among grass, corn, and potatoes, in bushes, and hedges, and cottages. one was caught on a lawn with an umbrella; one was reported to have been found in a press-bed; another, coiled round in a pot hanging from the crook--ready to be boiled, only that he was alive and undressed. donal was still being cross-questioned by his master when the strange woman re-entered. lying upon her straw, she had seen, through the fanlight over the stable door, the swiftness of the current there passing, and understood the danger. "i doobt," she said, addressing no one in particular, "the ga'le o' the stable winna stan' abune anither half-hoor." "it maun fa' than," said the farmer, taking a pinch of snuff in hopeless serenity, and turning away. "hoots!" said the woman, "dinna speyk that gait, sir. it's no wice-like. tak a dram, an' tak hert, an' dinna fling the calf efter the coo. whaur's yer boatle, sir?" john paid no heed to her suggestion, but jean took it up. "the boatle's whaur ye s' no lay han' upo' 't," she said. "weel, gien ye hae nae mercy upo' yer whusky, ye sud hae some upo' yer horse-beasts, ony gait," said the woman indignantly. "what mean ye by that?" returned jean, with hard voice, and eye of blame. "ye might at the leest gie the puir things a chance," the woman rejoined. "hoo wad ye dee that?" said jean. "gien ye lowsed them they wad but tak to the watter wi' fear, an' droon the seener." "na, na, jean," interposed the farmer, "they wad tak care o' themsel's to the last, an' aye haud to the dryest, jist as ye wad yersel'." "allooin'," said the stranger, replying to jean, yet speaking rather as if to herself, while she thought about something else, "i wad raither droon soomin' nor tied by the heid.--but what's the guid o' doctrine whaur there's onything to be dune?--ye hae whaur to put them.--what kin' 's the fleers (floors) up the stair, sir?" she asked abruptly, turning full on her host, with a flash in her deep-set black eyes. "ow, guid dale fleers--what ither?" answered the farmer. "--it's the wa's, wuman, no the fleers we hae to be concernt aboot i' this wather." "gien the j'ists be strang, an' weel set intil the wa's, what for sudna ye tak the horse up the stair intil yer bedrooms? it'll be a' to the guid o' the wa's, for the weicht o' the beasts 'll be upo' them to haud them doon, an' the haill hoose again' the watter. an' gien i was you, i wad pit the best o' the kye an' the nowt intil the parlour an' the kitchen here. i'm thinkin' we'll lowse them a' else; for the byre wa's 'ill gang afore the hoose." mr. duff broke into a strange laughter. "wad ye no tak up the carpets first, wuman?" he said. "i wad," she answered; "that gangs ohn speirt--gien there was time; but i tell ye there's nane; an' ye'll buy twa or three carpets for the price o' ae horse." "haith! the wuman's i' the richt," he cried, suddenly waking up to the sense of the proposal, and shot from the house. all the women, jean making no exception to any help now, rushed to carry the beds and blankets to the garret. just as mr. duff entered the stable from the nearer end, the opposite gable fell out with a great splash, letting in the wide level vision of turbidly raging waters, fading into the obscurity of the wind-driven rain. while he stared aghast, a great tree struck the wall like a battering-ram, so that the stable shook. the horses, which had been for some time moving uneasily, were now quite scared. there was not a moment to be lost. duff shouted for his men; one or two came running; and in less than a minute more those in the house heard the iron-shod feet splashing and stamping through the water, as, one after another, the horses were brought across the yard to the door of the house. mr. duff led by the halter his favourite snowball, who was a good deal excited, plunging and rearing so that it was all he could do to hold him. he had ordered the men to take the others first, thinking he would follow more quietly. but the moment snowball heard the first thundering of hoofs on the stair, he went out of his senses with terror, broke from his master, and went plunging back to the stable. duff darted after him, but was only in time to see him rush from the further end into the swift current, where he was at once out of his depth, and was instantly caught and hurried, rolling over and over, from his master's sight. he ran back into the house, and up to the highest window. from that he caught sight of him a long way down, swimming. once or twice he saw him turned heels over head--only to get his neck up again presently, and swim as well as before. but alas! it was in the direction of the daur, which would soon, his master did not doubt, sweep his carcase into the north sea. with troubled heart he strained his sight after him as long as he could distinguish his lessening head, but it got amongst some wreck, and unable to tell any more whether he saw it or not, he returned to his men with his eyes full of tears. chapter xxxiv. glashruach. as soon as gibbie had found a stall for crummie, and thrown a great dinner before her, he turned and sped back the way he had come: there was no time to lose if he would have the bridge to cross the lorrie by; and his was indeed the last foot that ever touched it. guiding himself by well-known points yet salient, for he knew the country perhaps better than any man born and bred in it, he made straight for glashgar, itself hid in the rain. now wading, now swimming, now walking along the top of a wall, now caught and baffled in a hedge, gibbie held stoutly on. again and again he got into a current, and was swept from his direction, but he soon made his lee way good, and at length clear of the level water, and with only the torrents to mind, seated himself on a stone under a rock a little way up the mountain. there he drew from his pocket the putty-like mass to which the water had reduced the cakes with which it was filled, and ate it gladly, eyeing from his shelter the slanting lines of the rain, and the rushing sea from which he had just emerged. so lost was the land beneath the water, that he had to think to be certain under which of the roofs, looking like so many foundered noah's arks, he had left his father and mother. ah! yonder were cattle!--a score of heads, listlessly drifting down, all the swim out of them, their long horns, like bits of dry branches, knocking together! there was a pig, and there another! and, alas! yonder floated half a dozen helpless sponges of sheep! at sight of these last he started to his feet, and set off up the hill. it was not so hard a struggle as to cross the water, but he had still to get to the other side of several torrents far more dangerous than any current he had been in. again and again he had to ascend a long distance before he found a possible place to cross at; but he reached the fold at last. it was in a little valley opening on that where lay the tarn. swollen to a lake, the waters of it were now at the very gate of the pen. for a moment he regretted he had not brought oscar, but the next he saw that not much could with any help have been done for the sheep, beyond what they could, if at liberty, do for themselves. left where they were they would probably be drowned; if not they would be starved; but if he let them go, they would keep out of the water, and find for themselves what food and shelter were to be had. he opened the gate, drove them out, and a little way up the hill and left them. by this time it was about two o'clock, and gibbie was very hungry. he had had enough of the water for one day, however, and was not inclined to return to the mains. where could he get something to eat? if the cottage were still standing--and it might be--he would find plenty there. he turned towards it. great was his pleasure when, after another long struggle, he perceived that not only was the cottage there, but the torrent gone: either the flow from the mountain had ceased, or the course of the water had been diverted. when he reached the glashburn, which lay between him and the cottage, he saw that the torrent had found its way into it, probably along with others of the same brood, for it was frightfully swollen, and went shooting down to glashruach like one long cataract. he had to go a great way up before he could cross it. when at length he reached home, he discovered that the overshooting stream must have turned aside very soon after they left, for the place was not much worse than then. he swept out the water that lay on the floor, took the dryest peats he could find, succeeded with the tinder-box and sulphur-match at the first attempt, lighted a large fire, and made himself some water-brose--which is not only the most easily cooked of dishes, but is as good as any for a youth of capacity for strong food. his hunger appeased, he sat resting in robert's chair, gradually drying; and falling asleep, slept for an hour or so. when he woke, he took his new testament from the crap o' the wa', and began to read. of late he had made a few attempts upon one and another of the epistles, but, not understanding what he read, had not found profit, and was on the point of turning finally from them for the present, when his eye falling on some of the words of st. john, his attention was at once caught, and he had soon satisfied himself, to his wonder and gladness, that his first epistle was no sealed book any more than his gospel. to the third chapter of that epistle he now turned, and read until he came to these words: "hereby perceive we the love of god, because he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." "what learned him that?" said gibbie to himself; janet had taught him to search the teaching of the apostles for what the master had taught them. he thought and thought, and at last remembered "this is my commandment, that ye love one another as i have loved you." "and here am i," said gibbie to himself, "sittin' here in idleseat, wi' my fire, an' my brose, an' my bible, and a' the warl' aneath glashgar lyin' in a speat (flood)! i canna lay doon my life to save their sowls; i maun save for them what i can--it may be but a hen or a calf. i maun dee the warks o' him 'at sent me--he's aye savin' at men." the bible was back in its place, and gibbie out of the door the same moment. he had not an idea what he was going to do. all he yet understood was, that he must go down the hill, to be where things might have to be done--and that before the darkness fell. he must go where there were people. as he went his heart was full of joy, as if he had already achieved some deliverance. down the hill he went singing and dancing. if mere battle with storm was a delight to the boy, what would not a mortal tussle with the elements for the love of men be? the thought itself was a heavenly felicity, and made him "happy as a lover." his first definitely directive thought was, that his nearest neighbours were likely enough to be in trouble--"the fowk at the muckle hoose." he would go thither straight. glashruach, as i have already said, stood on one of the roots of glashgar, where the mountain settles down into the valley of the daur. immediately outside its principal gate ran the glashburn; on the other side of the house, within the grounds, ran a smaller hill-stream, already mentioned as passing close under ginevra's window. both these fell into the lorrie. between them the mountain sloped gently up for some little distance, clothed with forest. on the side of the smaller burn, however, the side opposite the house, the ground rose abruptly. there also grew firs, but the soil was shallow, with rock immediately below, and they had not come to much. straight from the mountain, between the two streams, gibbie approached the house, through larches and pines, raving and roaring in the wind. as he drew nearer, and saw how high the house stood above the valley and its waters, he began to think he had been foolish in coming there to find work; but when he reached a certain point whence the approach from the gate was visible, he started, stopped and stared. he rubbed his eyes. no; he was not asleep and dreaming by the cottage fire; the wind was about him, and the firs were howling and hissing; there was the cloudy mountain, with the glashburn, fifty times its usual size, darting like brown lightning from it; but where was the iron gate with its two stone pillars, crested with wolf's-heads? where was the bridge? where was the wall, and the gravelled road to the house? had he mistaken his bearings? was he looking in a wrong direction? below him was a wide, swift, fiercely rushing river, where water was none before! no; he made no mistake: there was the rest of the road, the end of it next the house! that was a great piece of it that fell frothing into the river and vanished! bridge and gate and wall were gone utterly. the burn had swallowed them, and now, foaming with madness, was roaring along, a great way within the grounds, and rapidly drawing nearer to the house, tearing to pieces and devouring all that defended it. there! what a mouthful of the shrubbery it gobbled up! slowly, graciously, the tall trees bowed their heads and sank into the torrent, but the moment they touched it, shot away like arrows. would the foundations of the house outstand it? were they as strong as the walls of babylon, yet if the water undermined them, down they must! did the laird know that the enemy was within his gates? not with all he had that day seen and gone through, had gibbie until now gathered any notion of the force of rushing water. rousing himself from his bewildered amazement, he darted down the hill. if the other burn was behaving in like fashion, then indeed the fate of the house was sealed. but no; huge and wild as that was also, it was not able to tear down its banks of rock. from that side the house did not seem in danger. mr. galbraith had gone again, leaving ginevra to the care of mistress mac farlane, with a strict order to both, and full authority to the latter to enforce it, that she should not set foot across the threshold on any pretext, or on the smallest expedition, without the housekeeper's attendance. he must take joseph with him, he said, as he was going to the duke's, but she could send for angus upon any emergency. the laird had of late been so little at home, that the establishment had been much reduced; mistress mac farlane did most of the cooking herself; had quarrelled with the housemaid and not yet got another; and, nicie dismissed, and the kitchen maid gone to visit her mother, was left alone in the house with her mistress, if such we can call her who was really her prisoner. at this moment, however, she was not alone, for on the other side of the fire sat angus, not thither attracted by any friendship for the housekeeper, but by the glass of whisky of which he sipped as he talked. many a flood had angus seen, and some that had done frightful damage, but never one that had caused him anxiety; and although this was worse than any of the rest, he had not yet a notion how bad it really was. for, as there was nothing to be done out of doors, and he was not fond of being idle, he had been busy all the morning in the woodhouse, sawing and splitting for the winter-store, and working the better that he knew what honorarium awaited his appearance in the kitchen. in the woodhouse he only heard the wind and the rain and the roar, he saw nothing of the flood; when he entered the kitchen, it was by the back door, and he sat there without the smallest suspicion of what was going on in front. ginevra had had no companion since nicie left her, and her days had been very dreary, but this day had been the dreariest in her life. mistress mac farlane made herself so disagreeable that she kept away from her as much as she could, spending most of her time in her own room, with her needlework and some books of poetry she had found in the library. but the poetry had turned out very dull--not at all like what donal read, and throwing one of them aside for the tenth time that day, she wandered listlessly to the window, and stood there gazing out on the wild confusion--the burn roaring below, the trees opposite ready to be torn to pieces by the wind, and the valley beneath covered with stormy water. the tumult was so loud, that she did not hear a gentle knock at her door: as she turned away, weary of everything, she saw it softly open--and there to her astonishment stood gibbie--come, she imagined, to seek shelter, because their cottage had been blown down.--calculating the position of her room from what he knew of its windows, he had, with the experienced judgment of a mountaineer, gone to it almost direct. "you mustn't come here, gibbie," she said, advancing. "go down to the kitchen, to mistress mac farlane. she will see to what you want." gibbie made eager signs to her to go with him. she concluded that he wanted her to accompany him to the kitchen and speak for him; but knowing that would only enrage her keeper with them both, she shook her head, and went back to the window. she thought, as she approached it, there seemed a lull in the storm, but the moment she looked out, she gave a cry of astonishment, and stood staring. gibbie had followed her as softly as swiftly, and looking out also, saw good cause indeed for her astonishment: the channel of the raging burn was all but dry! instantly he understood what it meant. in his impotence to persuade, he caught the girl in his arms, and rushed with her from the room. she had faith enough in him by this time not to struggle or scream. he shot down the stair with her, and out of the front door. her weight was nothing to his excited strength. the moment they issued, and she saw the glashburn raving along through the lawn, with little more than the breadth of the drive between it and the house, she saw the necessity of escape, though she did not perceive half the dire necessity for haste. every few moments, a great gush would dash out twelve or fifteen yards over the gravel and sink again, carrying many feet of the bank with it, and widening by so much the raging channel. "put me down, gibbie," she said; "i will run as fast as you like." he obeyed at once. "oh!" she cried, "mistress mac farlane!--i wonder if she knows. run and knock at the kitchen window." gibbie darted off, gave three loud hurried taps on the window, came flying back, took ginevra's hand in his, drew her on till she was at her full speed, turned sharp to the left round the corner of the house, and shot down to the empty channel of the burn. as they crossed it, even to the inexperienced eyes of the girl it was plain what had caused the phenomenon. a short distance up the stream, the whole facing of its lofty right bank had slipped down into its channel. not a tree, not a shrub, not a bed of moss was to be seen; all was bare wet rock. a confused heap of mould, with branches and roots sticking out of it in all directions, lay at its foot, closing the view upward. the other side of the heap was beaten by the raging burn. they could hear, though they could not see it. any moment the barrier might give way, and the water resume its course. they made haste, therefore, to climb the opposite bank. in places it was very steep, and the soil slipped so that often it seemed on its way with them to the bottom, while the wind threatened to uproot the trees to which they clung, and carry them off through the air. it was with a fierce scramble they gained the top. then the sight was a grand one. the arrested water swirled and beat and foamed against the landslip, then rushed to the left, through the wood, over bushes and stones, a ragging river, the wind tearing off the tops of its waves, to the glashburn, into which it plunged, swelling yet higher its huge volume. rapidly it cut for itself a new channel. every moment a tree fell and shot with it like a rocket. looking up its course, they saw it come down the hillside a white streak, and burst into boiling brown and roar at their feet. the wind nearly swept them from their place; but they clung to the great stones, and saw the airy torrent, as if emulating that below it, fill itself with branches and leaves and lumps of foam. then first ginevra became fully aware of the danger in which the house was, and from which gibbie had rescued her. augmented in volume and rapidity by the junction of its neighbour, the glashburn was now within a yard--so it seemed from that height at least--of the door. but they must not linger. the nearest accessible shelter was the cottage, and gibbie knew it would need all ginevra's strength to reach it. again he took her by the hand. "but where's mistress mac farlane?" she said. "oh, gibbie! we mustn't leave her." he replied by pointing down to the bed of the stream: there were she and angus crossing. ginevra, was satisfied when she saw the gamekeeper with her, and they set out, as fast as they could go, ascending the mountain, gibbie eager to have her in warmth and safety before it was dark. both burns were now between them and the cottage, which greatly added to their difficulties. the smaller burn came from the tarn, and round that they must go, else ginevra would never get to the other side of it; and then there was the glashburn to cross. it was an undertaking hard for any girl, especially such for one unaccustomed to exertion; and what made it far worse was that she had only house-shoes, which were continually coming off as she climbed. but the excitement of battling with the storm, the joy of adventure, and the pleasure of feeling her own strength, sustained her well for a long time; and in such wind and rain, the absence of bonnet and cloak was an advantage, so long as exertion kept her warm. gibbie did his best to tie her shoes on with strips of her pocket handkerchief; but when at last they were of no more use, he pulled off his corduroy jacket, tore out the sleeves, and with strips from the back tied them about her feet and ankles. her hair also was a trouble: it would keep blowing in her eyes, and in gibbie's too, and that sometimes with quite a sharp lash. but she never lost her courage, and gibbie, though he could not hearten her with words, was so ready with smile and laugh, was so cheerful--even merry, so fearless, so free from doubt and anxiety, while doing everything he could think of to lessen her toil and pain, that she hardly felt in his silence any lack; while often, to rest her body, and withdraw her mind from her sufferings, he made her stop and look back on the strange scene behind them. it was getting dark when they reached the only spot where he judged it possible to cross the glashburn. he carried her over, and then it was all down-hill to the cottage. once inside it, ginevra threw herself into robert's chair, and laughed, and cried, and laughed again. gibbie blew up the peats, made a good fire, and put on water to boil; then opened janet's drawers, and having signified to his companion to take what she could find, went to the cow house, threw himself on a heap of wet straw, worn out, and had enough to do to keep himself from falling asleep. a little rested, he rose and re-entered the cottage, when a merry laugh from both of them went ringing out into the storm: the little lady was dressed in janet's workday garments, and making porridge. she looked very funny. gibbie found plenty of milk in the dairy under the rock, and they ate their supper together in gladness. then gibbie prepared the bed in the little closet for his guest and she slept as if she had not slept for a week. gibbie woke with the first of the dawn. the rain still fell--descending in spoonfuls rather than drops; the wind kept shaping itself into long hopeless howls, rising to shrill yells that went drifting away over the land; and then the howling rose again. nature seemed in despair. there must be more for gibbie to do! he must go again to the foot of the mountain, and see if there was anybody to help. they might even be in trouble at the mains, who could tell! ginevra woke, rose, made herself as tidy as she could, and left her closet. gibbie was not in the cottage. she blew up the fire, and, finding the pot ready beside it, with clean water, set it on to boil. gibbie did not come. the water boiled. she took it off, but being hungry, put it on again. several times she took it off and put it on again. gibbie never came. she made herself some porridge at last. everything necessary was upon the table, and as she poured it into the wooden dish for the purpose, she took notice of a slate beside it, with something written upon it. the words were, "i will cum back as soon as i cann." she was alone, then! it was dreadful; but she was too hungry to think about it. she ate her porridge, and then began to cry. it was very unkind of gibbie to leave her, she said to herself, but then he was a sort of angel, and doubtless had to go and help somebody else. there was a little pile of books on the table, which he must have left for her. she began examining them, and soon found something to interest her, so that an hour or two passed quickly. but gibbie did not return, and the day went wearily. she cried now and then, made great efforts to be patient, succeeded pretty well for a while, and cried again. she read and grew tired a dozen times; ate cakes and milk, cried afresh, and ate again. still gibbie did not come. before the day was over, she had had a good lesson in praying. for here she was, one who had never yet acted on her own responsibility, alone on a bare mountain-side, in the heart of a storm which seemed as if it would never cease, and not a creature knew where she was but the dumb boy, and he had left her! if he should never come back, what would become of her? she could not find her way down the mountain; and if she could, where was she to go, with all daurside under water? she would soon have eaten up all the food in the cottage, and the storm might go on for ever, who could tell? or who could tell whether, when it was over, and she got down to the valley below, she should not find it a lifeless desert, everybody drowned, and herself the only person left alive in the world? then the noises were terrible. she seemed to inhabit noise. through the general roar of wind and water and rain every now then came a sharper sound, like a report or crack, followed by a strange low thunder, as it seemed. they were the noises of stones carried down by the streams, grinding against each other, and dashed stone against stone; and of rocks falling and rolling, and bounding against their fast-rooted neighbours. when it began to grow dark, her misery seemed more than she could bear; but then, happily, she grew sleepy, and slept the darkness away. with the new light came new promise and fresh hope. what should we poor humans do without our god's nights and mornings? our ills are all easier to help than we know--except the one ill of a central self, which god himself finds it hard to help.--it no longer rained so fiercely; the wind had fallen; and the streams did not run so furious a race down the sides of the mountain. she ran to the burn, got some water to wash herself--she could not spare the clear water, of which there was some still left in janet's pails--and put on her own clothes, which were now quite dry. then she got herself some breakfast, and after that tried to say her prayers, but found it very difficult, for, do what she might to model her slippery thoughts, she could not help, as often as she turned herself towards him, seeing god like her father, the laird. chapter xxxv. the whelp. gibbie sped down the hill through a worse rain than ever. the morning was close, and the vapours that filled it were like smoke burned to the hue of the flames whence it issued. many a man that morning believed another great deluge begun, and all measures relating to things of this world lost labour. going down his own side of the glashburn, the nearest path to the valley, the gamekeeper's cottage was the first dwelling on his way. it stood a little distance from the bank of the burn, opposite the bridge and gate, while such things were. it had been with great difficulty, for even angus did not know the mountain so well as gibbie, that the gamekeeper reached it with the housekeeper the night before. it was within two gunshots of the house of glashruach, yet to get to it they had to walk miles up and down glashgar. a mountain in storm is as hard to cross as a sea. arrived, they did not therefore feel safe. the tendency of the glashburn was indeed away from the cottage, as the grounds of glashruach sadly witnessed; but a torrent is double-edged, and who could tell? the yielding of one stone in its channel might send it to them. all night angus watched, peering out ever again into the darkness, but seeing nothing save three lights that burned above the water--one of them, he thought, at the mains. the other two went out in the darkness, but that only in the dawn. when the morning came, there was the glashburn meeting the lorrie in his garden. but the cottage was well built, and fit to stand a good siege, while any moment the waters might have reached their height. by breakfast time, however, they were round it from behind. there is nothing like a flood for revealing the variations of surface, the dips and swells of a country. in a few minutes they were isolated, with the current of the glashburn on one side, and that of the lorrie in front. when he saw the water come in at front and back doors at once, angus ordered his family up the stair: the cottage had a large attic, with dormer windows, where they slept. he himself remained below for some time longer, in that end of the house where he kept his guns and fishing-tackle; there he sat on a table, preparing nets for the fish that would be left in the pools; and not until he found himself afloat did he take his work to the attic. there the room was hot, and they had the window open. mistress mac pholp stood at it, looking out on the awful prospect, with her youngest child, a sickly boy, in her arms. he had in his a little terrier-pup, greatly valued of the gamekeeper. in a sudden outbreak of peevish wilfulness, he threw the creature out of the window. it fell on the slooping roof, and before it could recover itself, being too young to have the full command of four legs, rolled off. "eh! the doggie's i' the watter!" cried mistress mac pholp in dismay. angus threw down everything with an ugly oath, for he had given strict orders not one of the children should handle the whelp, jumped up, and got out on the roof. from there he might have managed to reach it, so high now was the water, had the little thing remained where it fell, but already it had swam a yard or two from the house. angus, who was a fair swimmer and an angry man, threw off his coat, and plunged after it, greatly to the delight of the little one, caught the pup with his teeth by the back of the neck, and turned to make for the house. just then a shrub, swept from the hill, caught him in the face, and so bewildered him, that, before he got rid of it, he had blundered into the edge of the current, which seized and bore him rapidly away. he dropped the pup, and struck out for home with all his strength. but he soon found the most he could do was to keep his head above water, and gave himself up for lost. his wife screamed in agony. gibbie heard her as he came down the hill, and ran at full speed towards the cottage. about a hundred yards from the house, the current bore angus straight into a large elder tree. he got into the middle of it, and there remained trembling, the weak branches breaking with every motion he made, while the stream worked at the roots, and the wind laid hold of him with fierce leverage. in terror, seeming still to sink as he sat, he watched the trees dart by like battering-rams in the swiftest of the current: the least of them diverging would tear the elder tree with it. brave enough in dealing with poachers, angus was not the man to gaze with composure in the face of a sure slow death, against which no assault could be made. many a man is courageous because he has not conscience enough to make a coward of him, but angus had not quite reached that condition, and from the branches of the elder tree showed a pale, terror-stricken visage. amidst the many objects on the face of the water, gibbie, however, did not distinguish it, and plunging in swam round to the front of the cottage to learn what was the matter. there the wife's gesticulations directed his eyes to her drowning husband. but what was he to do? he could swim to the tree well enough, and, he thought, back again, but how was that to be made of service to angus? he could not save him by main force--there was not enough of that between them. if he had a line, and there must be plenty of lines in the cottage, he would carry him the end of it to haul upon--that would do. if he could send it to him that would be better still, for then he could help at the other end, and would be in the right position, up stream, to help farther, if necessary, for down the current alone was the path of communication open. he caught hold of the eaves, and scrambled on to the roof. but in the folly and faithlessness of her despair, the woman would not let him enter. with a curse caught from her husband, she struck him from the window, crying, "ye s' no come in here, an' my man droonin' yon'er! gang till 'im, ye cooard!" never had poor gibbie so much missed the use of speech. on the slope of the roof he could do little to force an entrance, therefore threw himself off it to seek another, and betook himself to the windows below. through that of angus's room, he caught sight of a floating anker cask. it was the very thing!--and there on the walls hung a quantity of nets and cordage! but how to get in? it was a sash-window, and of course swollen with the wet, therefore not to be opened; and there was not a square in it large enough to let him through. he swam to the other side, and crept softly on to the roof, and over the ridge. but a broken slate betrayed him. the woman saw him, rushed to the fire-place, caught up the poker, and darted back to defend the window. "ye s' no come in here, i tell ye," she screeched, "an' my man stickin' i' yon boortree buss!" gibbie advanced. she made a blow at him with the poker. he caught it, wrenched it from her grasp, and threw himself from the roof. the next moment they heard the poker at work, smashing the window. "he'll be in an' murder's a'!" cried the mother, and ran to the stair, while the children screamed and danced with terror. but the water was far too deep for her, she returned to the attic, barricaded the door, and went again to the window to watch her drowning husband. gibbie was inside in a moment, and seizing the cask, proceeded to attach to it a strong line. he broke a bit from a fishing-rod, secured the line round the middle of it with a notch, put the stick through the bunghole in the bilge, and corked up the hole with a net-float. happily he had a knife in his pocket. he then joined strong lines together until he thought he had length enough, secured the last end to a bar of the grate, and knocked out both sashes of the window with an axe. a passage thus cleared, he floated out first a chair, then a creepie, and one thing after another, to learn from what point to start the barrel. seeing and recognizing them from above, mistress mac pholp raised a terrible outcry. in the very presence of her drowning husband, such a wanton dissipation of her property roused her to fiercest wrath, for she imagined gibbie was emptying her house with leisurely revenge. satisfied at length, he floated out his barrel, and followed with the line in his hand, to aid its direction if necessary. it struck the tree. with a yell of joy angus laid hold of it, and hauling the line taut, and feeling it secure, committed himself at once to the water, holding by the barrel, and swimming with his legs, while gibbie, away to the side with a hold of the rope, was swimming his hardest to draw him out of the current. but a weary man was angus, when at length he reached the house. it was all he could do to get himself in at the window, and crawl up the stair. at the top of it he fell benumbed on the floor. by the time that, repentant and grateful, mistress mac pholp bethought herself of gibbie, not a trace of him was to be seen; and angus, contemplating his present experience in connection with that of robert grant's cottage, came to the conclusion that he must be an emissary of satan who on two such occasions had so unexpectedly rescued him. perhaps the idea was not quite so illogical as it must seem; for how should such a man imagine any other sort of messenger taking an interest in his life? he was confirmed in the notion when he found that a yard of the line remained attached to the grate, but the rest of it with the anker was gone--fit bark for the angel he imagined gibbie, to ride the stormy waters withal. while they looked for him in the water and on the land, gibbie was again in the room below, carrying out a fresh thought. with the help of the table, he emptied the cask, into which a good deal of water had got. then he took out the stick, corked the bunghole tight, laced the cask up in a piece of net, attached the line to the net, and wound it about the cask by rolling the latter round and round, took the cask between his hands, and pushed from the window straight into the current of the glashburn. in a moment it had swept him to the lorrie. by the greater rapidity of the former he got easily across the heavier current of the latter, and was presently in water comparatively still, swimming quietly towards the mains, and enjoying his trip none the less that he had to keep a sharp look-out: if he should have to dive, to avoid any drifting object, he might lose his barrel. quickly now, had he been so minded, he could have returned to the city--changing vessel for vessel, as one after another went to pieces. many a house-roof offered itself for the voyage; now and then a great water-wheel, horizontal and helpless, devoured of its element. once he saw a cradle come gyrating along, and, urging all his might, intercepted it, but hardly knew whether he was more sorry or relieved to find it empty. when he was about half-way to the mains, a whole fleet of ricks bore down upon him. he boarded one, and scrambled to the top of it, keeping fast hold of the end of his line, which unrolled from the barrel as he ascended. from its peak he surveyed the wild scene. all was running water. not a human being was visible, and but a few house-roofs, of which for a moment it was hard to say whether or not they were of those that were afloat. here and there were the tops of trees, showing like low bushes. nothing was uplifted except the mountains. he drew near the mains. all the ricks in the yard were bobbing about, as if amusing themselves with a slow contradance; but they were as yet kept in by the barn, and a huge old hedge of hawthorn. what was that cry from far away? surely it was that of a horse in danger! it brought a lusty equine response from the farm. where could horses be with such a depth of water about the place? then began a great lowing of cattle. but again came the cry of the horse from afar, and gibbie, this time recognizing the voice as snowball's, forgot the rest. he stood up on the very top of the rick and sent his keen glance round on all sides. the cry came again and again, so that he was satisfied in what direction he must look. the rain had abated a little, but the air was so thick with vapour that he could not tell whether it was really an object he seemed to see white against the brown water, far away to the left, or a fancy of his excited hope: it might be snowball on the turn-pike road, which thereabout ran along the top of a high embankment. he tumbled from the rick, rolled the line about the barrel, and pushed vigorously for what might be the horse. it took him a weary hour--in so many currents was he caught, one after the other, all straining to carry him far below the object he wanted to reach: an object it plainly was before he had got half-way across, and by and by as plainly it was snowball--testified to ears and eyes together. when at length he scrambled on the embankment beside him, the poor, shivering, perishing creature gave a low neigh of delight: he did not know gibbie, but he was a human being. he was quite cowed and submissive, and gibbie at once set about his rescue. he had reasoned as he came along that, if there were beasts at the mains, there must be room for snowball, and thither he would endeavour to take him. he tied the end of the line to the remnant of the halter on his head, the other end being still fast to the barrel, and took to the water again. encouraged by the power upon his head, the pressure, namely, of the halter, the horse followed, and they made for the mains. it was a long journey, and gibbie had not breath enough to sing to snowball, but he made what noise he could, and they got slowly along. he found the difficulties far greater now that he had to look out for the horse as well as for himself. none but one much used to the water could have succeeded in the attempt, or could indeed have stood out against its weakening influence and the strain of the continued exertion together so long. at length his barrel got water-logged, and he sent it adrift. chapter xxxvi. the brander. mistress croale was not, after all, the last who arrived at the mains. but that the next arrival was accounted for, scarcely rendered it less marvellous than hers.--just after the loss of snowball, came floating into the farmyard, over the top of the gate, with such astonishment of all who beheld that each seemed to place more confidence in his neighbour's eyes than in his own, a woman on a raft, with her four little children seated around her, holding the skirt of her gown above her head and out between her hands for a sail. she had made the raft herself, by tying some bars of a paling together, and crossing them with what other bits of wood she could find--a brander she called it, which is scotch for a gridiron, and thence for a grating. nobody knew her. she had come down the lorrie. the farmer was so struck with admiration of her invention, daring, and success, that he vowed he would keep the brander as long as it would stick together; and as it could not be taken into the house, he secured it with a rope to one of the windows. when they had the horses safe on the first floor, they brought the cattle into the lower rooms; but it became evident that if they were to have a chance, they also must be got up to the same level. thereupon followed a greater tumult than before--such a banging of heads and hind quarters, of horns and shoulders, against walls and partitions, such a rushing and thundering, that the house seemed in more danger from within than from without; for the cattle were worse to manage than the horses, and one moment stubborn as a milestone, would the next moment start into a frantic rush. one poor wretch broke both her horns clean off against the wall, at a sharp turn of the passage; and after two or three more accidents, partly caused by over-haste in the human mortals, donal begged that the business should be left to him and his mother. his master consented, and it was wonderful what janet contrived to effect by gentleness, coaxing, and suggestion. when hornie's turn came, donal began to tie ropes to her hind hoofs. mr. duff objected. "ye dinna ken her sae weel as i dee, sir," answered donal. "she wad caw her horns intil a man-o-war 'at angert her. an' up yon'er ye cudna get a whack at her, for hurtin' ane 'at didna deserve 't. i s' dee her no mischeef, i s' warran'. ye jist lea' her to me, sir." his master yielded. donal tied a piece of rope round each hind pastern--if cows have pasterns--and made a loop at the end. the moment she was at the top of the stair, he and his mother dropped each a loop over a horn. "noo, she'll naither stick nor fling (gore nor kick)," said donal: she could but bellow, and paw with her fore-feet. the strangers were mostly in fergus's bedroom; the horses were all in their owner's; and the cattle were in the remaining rooms. bursts of talk amongst the women were followed by fits of silence: who could tell how long the flood might last!--or indeed whether the house might not be undermined before morning, or be struck by one of those big things of which so many floated by, and give way with one terrible crash! mr. duff, while preserving a tolerably calm exterior, was nearly at his wits' end. he would stand for half an hour together, with his hands in his pockets, looking motionless out of a window, murmuring now and then to himself, "this is clean ridic'lous!" but when anything had to be done he was active enough. mistress croale sat in a corner, very quiet, and looking not a little cowed. there was altogether more water than she liked. now and then she lifted her lurid black eyes to janet, who stood at one of the windows, knitting away at her master's stocking, and casting many a calm glance at the brown waters and the strange drift that covered them; but if janet turned her head and made a remark to her, she never gave back other than curt if not rude reply. in the afternoon jean brought the whisky bottle. at sight of it, mistress croale's eyes shot flame. jean poured out a glassful, took a sip, and offered it to janet. janet declining it, jean, invaded possibly by some pity of her miserable aspect, offered it to mistress croale. she took it with affected coolness, tossed it off at a gulp, and presented the glass--not to the hand from which she had taken it, but to jean's other hand, in which was the bottle. jean cast a piercing look into her greedy eyes, and taking the glass from her, filled it, and presented it to the woman who had built and navigated the brander. mistress croale muttered something that sounded like a curse upon scrimp measure, and drew herself farther back into the corner, where she had seated herself on fergus's portmanteau. "i doobt we hae an ahchan i' the camp--a jonah intil the ship!" said jean to janet, as she turned, bottle and glass in her hands, to carry them from the room. "na, na; naither sae guid nor sae ill," replied janet. "fowk 'at's been ill-guidit, no kennin' whaur their help lies, whiles taks to the boatle. but this is but a day o' punishment, no a day o' judgment yet, an' i'm thinkin' the warst's near han' ower.--gien only gibbie war here!" jean left the room, shaking her head, and janet stood alone at the window as before. a hand was laid on her arm. she looked up. the black eyes were close to hers, and the glow that was in them gave the lie to the tone of indifference with which mistress croale spoke. "ye hae mair nor ance made mention o' ane conneckit wi' ye, by the name o' gibbie," she said. "ay," answered janet, sending for the serpent to aid the dove; "an' what may be yer wull wi' him?" "ow, naething," returned mistress croale. "i kenned ane o' the name lang syne 'at was lost sicht o'." "there's gibbies here an' gibbies there," remarked janet, probing her. "weel i wat!" she answered peevishly, for she had had whisky enough only to make her cross, and turned away, muttering however in an undertone, but not too low for janet to hear, "but there's nae mony wee sir gibbies, or the warl' wadna be sae dooms like hell." janet was arrested in her turn: could the fierce, repellent, whisky-craving woman be the mother of her gracious gibbie? could she be, and look so lost? but the loss of him had lost her perhaps. anyhow god was his father, whoever was the mother of him. "hoo cam ye to tyne yer bairn, wuman?" she asked. but mistress croale was careful also, and had her reasons. "he ran frae the bluidy han'," she said enigmatically. janet recalled how gibbie came to her, scored by the hand of cruelty. were there always innocents in the world, who in their own persons, by the will of god, unknown to themselves, carried on the work of christ, filling up that which was left behind of the sufferings of their master--women, children, infants, idiots--creatures of sufferance, with souls open to the world to receive wrong, that it might pass and cease? little furnaces they, of the consuming fire, to swallow up and destroy by uncomplaining endurance--the divine destruction! "hoo cam he by the bonnie nickname?" she asked at length. "nickname!" retorted mistress croale fiercely; "i think i hear ye! his ain name an' teetle by law an' richt, as sure's ever there was a king jeames 'at first pat his han' to the makin' o' baronets!--as it's aften i hae h'ard sir george, the father o' 'im, tell the same." she ceased abruptly, annoyed with herself, as it seemed, for having said so much. "ye wadna be my lady yersel', wad ye, mem?" suggested janet in her gentlest voice. mistress croale made her no answer. perhaps she thought of the days when she alone of women did the simplest of woman's offices for sir george. anyhow, it was one thing to rush of herself to the verge of her secret, and quite another to be fooled over it. "is't lang sin' ye lost him?" asked janet, after a bootless pause. "ay," she answered, gruffly and discourteously, in a tone intended to quench interrogation. but janet persisted. "wad ye ken 'im again gien ye saw 'im?" "ken 'im? i wad ken 'im gien he had grown a gran'father. ken 'im, quo' she! wha ever kenned 'im as i did, bairn 'at he was, an' wadna ken 'im gien he war deid an' an angel made o' 'im!--but weel i wat, it's little differ that wad mak!" she rose in her excitement, and going to the other window, stood gazing vacantly out upon the rushing sea. to janet it was plain she knew more about gibbie than she was inclined to tell, and it gave her a momentary sting of apprehension. "what was aboot him ye wad ken sae weel?" she asked in a tone of indifference, as if speaking only through the meshes of her work. "i'll ken them 'at speirs afore i tell," she replied sullenly.--but the next instant she screamed aloud, "lord god almichty! yon's him! yon's himsel'!" and, stretching out her arms, dashed a hand through a pane, letting in an eddying swirl of wind and water, while the blood streamed unheeded from her wrist. the same moment jean entered the room. she heard both the cry and the sound of the breaking glass. "care what set the beggar-wife!" she exclaimed. "gang frae the window, ye randy." mistress croale took no heed. she stood now staring from the window still as a statue except for the panting motion of her sides. at the other window stood janet, gazing also, with blessed face. for there, like a triton on a sea-horse, came gibbie through the water on snowball, swimming wearily. he caught sight of janet at the window, and straightway his countenance was radiant with smiles. mistress croale gave a shuddering sigh, drew back from her window, and betook herself again to her dark corner. jean went to janet's window, and there beheld the triumphal approach of her brownie, saving from the waters the lost and lamented snowball. she shouted to her brother. "john! john! here's yer snawba'; here's yer snawba'." john ran to her call, and, beside himself with joy when he saw his favourite come swimming along, threw the window wide, and began to bawl the most unnecessary directions and encouragements, as if the exploit had been brought thus far towards a happy issue solely through him, while from all the windows gibbie was welcomed with shouts and cheers and congratulations. "lord preserve 's!" cried mr. duff, recognizing the rider at last, "it's rob grant's innocent! wha wad hae thoucht it?" "the lord's babes an' sucklin's are gey cawpable whiles," remarked janet to herself.--she believed gibbie had more faculty than any of her own, donal included, nor did she share the prevalent prejudice of the city that heart and brains are mutually antagonistic; for in her own case she had found that her brains were never worth much to her until her heart took up the education of them. but the intellect is, so much oftener than by love, seen and felt to be sharpened by necessity and greed, that it is not surprising such a prejudice should exist. "tak 'im roon' to the door."--"whaur got ye 'im?"--"ye wad best get 'im in at the window upo' the stair."--"he'll be maist hungert."--"ye'll be some weet, i'm thinkin'!"--"come awa' up the stair, an' tell's a' aboot it."--a score of such conflicting shouts assailed gibbie as he approached, and he replied to them all with the light of his countenance. when they arrived at the door, they found a difficulty waiting them: the water was now so high that snowball's head rose above the lintel; and, though all animals can swim, they do not all know how to dive. a tumult of suggestions immediately broke out. but donal had already thrown himself from a window with a rope, and swum to gibbie's assistance; the two understood each other, and heeding nothing the rest were saying, held their own communications. in a minute the rope was fastened round snow-ball's body, and the end of it drawn between his fore-legs and through the ring of his head-stall, when donal swam with it to his mother who stood on the stair, with the request that, as soon as she saw snowball's head under the water, she would pull with all her might, and draw him in at the door. donal then swam back, and threw his arms round snowball's neck from below, while the same moment gibbie cast his whole weight of it from above: the horse was over head and ears in an instant, and through the door in another. with snorting nostrils and blazing eyes his head rose in the passage, and in terror he struck out for the stair. as he scrambled heavily up from the water, his master and robert seized him, and with much petting and patting and gentling, though there was little enough difficulty in managing him now, conducted him into the bedroom to the rest of the horses. there he was welcomed by his companions, and immediately began devouring the hay upon his master's bedstead. gibbie came close behind him, was seized by janet at the top of the stair, embraced like one come alive from the grave, and led, all dripping as he was, into the room where the women were. the farmer followed soon after with the whisky, the universal medicine in those parts, of which he offered a glass to gibbie, but the innocent turned from it with a curious look of mingled disgust and gratefulness: his father's life had not been all a failure; he had done what parents so rarely effect--handed the general results of his experience to his son. the sight and smell of whisky were to gibbie a loathing flavoured with horror. the farmer looked back from the door as he was leaving the room: gibbie was performing a wild circular dance of which janet was the centre, throwing his limbs about like the toy the children call a jumping jack, which ended suddenly in a motionless ecstasy upon one leg. having regarded for a moment the rescuer of snowball with astonishment, john duff turned away with the reflection, how easy it was and natural for those who had nothing, and therefore could lose nothing, to make merry in others' adversity. it did not once occur to him that it was the joy of having saved that caused gibbie's merriment thus to overflow. "the cratur's a born idiot!" he said afterwards to jean; "an' it's jist a mervel what he's cawpable o'!--but, 'deed, there's little to cheese atween janet an' him! they're baith tarred wi' the same stick." he paused a moment, then added, "they'll dee weel eneuch i' the ither warl', i doobtna, whaur naebody has to haud aff o' themsel's." that day, however, gibbie had proved that a man may well afford both to have nothing, and to take no care of himself, seeing he had, since he rose in the morning, rescued a friend, a foe, and a beast of the earth. verily, he might stand on one leg! but when he told janet that he had been home, and had found the cottage uninjured and out of danger, she grew very sober in the midst of her gladness. she could say nothing there amongst strangers, but the dread arose in her bosom that, if indeed she had not like peter denied her master before men, she had like peter yielded homage to the might of the elements in his ruling presence; and she justly saw the same faithlessness in the two failures. "eh!" she said to herself, "gien only i had been prayin' i'stead o' rinnin' awa', i wad hae been there whan he turnt the watter aside! i wad hae seen the mirricle! o my maister! what think ye o' me noo?" for all the excitement mistress croale had shown at first view of gibbie, she sat still in her dusky corner, made no movement towards him, nor did anything to attract his attention, only kept her eyes fixed upon him; and janet in her mingled joy and pain forgot her altogether. when at length it recurred to her that she was in the room, she cast a somewhat anxious glance towards the place she had occupied all day. it was empty; and janet was perplexed to think how she had gone unseen. she had crept out after mr. duff, and probably janet saw her, but as one of those who seeing see not, and immediately forget. just as the farmer left the room, a great noise arose among the cattle in that adjoining; he set down the bottle on a chair that happened to be in the passage, and ran to protect the partitions. exultation would be a poor word wherewith to represent the madness of the delight that shot its fires into mistress croale's eyes when she saw the bottle actually abandoned within her reach. it was to her as the very key of the universe. she darted upon it, put it to her lips, and drank. yet she took heed, thought while she drank, and did not go beyond what she could carry. little time such an appropriation required. noiselessly she set the bottle down, darted into a closet containing a solitary calf, and there stood looking from the open window in right innocent fashion, curiously contemplating the raft attached to it, upon which she had seen the highland woman arrive with her children. at supper-time she was missing altogether. nobody could with certainty say when he had last seen her. the house was searched from top to bottom, and the conclusion arrived at was, that she must have fallen from some window and been drowned--only, surely she would at least have uttered one cry! examining certain of the windows to know whether she might not have left some sign of such an exit, the farmer discovered that the brander was gone. "losh!" cried the orra man, with a face bewildered to shapelessness, like that of an old moon rising in a fog, "yon'll be her i saw an hoor ago, hyne doon the water!" "ye muckle gowk!" said his master, "hoo cud she win sae far ohn gane to the boddom?" "upo' the bran'er, sir," answered the orra man. "i tuik her for a muckle dog upon a door. the wife maun be a witch!" john duff stared at the man with his mouth open, and for half a minute all were dumb. the thing was incredible, yet hardly to be controverted. the woman was gone, the raft was gone, and something strange that might be the two together had been observed about the time, as near as they could judge, when she ceased to be observed in the house. had the farmer noted the change in the level of the whisky in his bottle, he might have been surer of it--except indeed the doubt had then arisen whether they might not rather find her at the foot of the stair when the water subsided. mr. duff said the luck changed with the return of snowball; his sister said, with the departure of the beggar-wife. before dark the rain had ceased, and it became evident that the water had not risen for the last half-hour. in two hours more it had sunk a quarter of an inch. gibbie threw himself on the floor beside his mother's chair, she covered him with her grey cloak, and he fell fast asleep. at dawn, he woke with a start. he had dreamed that ginevra was in trouble. he made janet understand that he would return to guide them home as soon as the way was practicable, and set out at once. the water fell rapidly. almost as soon as it was morning, the people at the mains could begin doing a little towards restoration. but from that day forth, for about a year, instead of the waters of the daur and the lorrie, the house was filled with the gradually subsiding flood of jean's lamentations over her house-gear--one thing after another, and twenty things together. there was scarcely an article she did not, over and over, proclaim utterly ruined, in a tone apparently indicating ground of serious complaint against some one who did not appear, though most of the things, to other eyes than hers, remained seemingly about as useful as before. in vain her brother sought to comfort her with the assurance that there were worse losses at culloden; she answered, that if he had not himself been specially favoured in the recovery of snowball, he would have made a much worse complaint about him alone than she did about all her losses; whereupon, being an honest man, and not certain that she spoke other than the truth, he held his peace. but he never made the smallest acknowledgment to gibbie for the saving of the said snowball: what could an idiot understand about gratitude? and what use was money to a boy who did not set his life at a pin's fee? but he always spoke kindly to him thereafter, which was more to gibbie than anything he could have given him; and when a man is content, his friends may hold their peace. the next day jean had her dinner strangely provided. as her brother wrote to a friend in glasgow, she "found at the back of the house, and all lying in a heap, a handsome dish of trout, a pike, a hare, a partridge, and a turkey, with a dish of potatoes, and a dish of turnips, all brought down by the burn, and deposited there for the good of the house, except the turkey, which, alas! was one of her own favourite flock."[ ] in the afternoon, gibbie re-appeared at the mains, and robert and janet set out at once to go home with him. it was a long journey for them--he had to take them so many rounds. they rested at several houses, and saw much misery on their way. it was night before they arrived at the cottage. they found it warm and clean and tidy: ginevra had, like a true lady, swept the house that gave her shelter: that ladies often do; and perhaps it is yet more their work in the world than they fully understand. for ginevra, it was heavenly bliss to her to hear their approaching footsteps; and before she left them she had thoroughly learned that the poorest place where the atmosphere is love, is more homely, and by consequence more heavenly, than the most beautiful even, where law and order are elements supreme. "eh, gien i had only had faith an' bidden!" said janet to herself as she entered; and to the day of her death she never ceased to bemoan her too hasty desertion of "the wee hoosie upo' the muckle rock." as to the strange woman's evident knowledge concerning gibbie, she could do nothing but wait--fearing rather than hoping; but she had got so far above time and chance, that nothing really troubled her, and she could wait quietly. at the same time it did not seem likely they would hear anything more of the woman herself: no one believed she could have gone very far without being whelmed, or whumled as they said, in the fierce waters. chapter xxxvii. mr. sclater. it may be remembered that, upon gibbie's disappearance from the city, great interest was felt in his fate, and such questions started about the boy himself as moved the rev. clement sclater to gather all the information at which he could arrive concerning his family and history. that done, he proceeded to attempt interesting in his unknown fortunes those relatives of his mother whose existence and residences he had discovered. in this, however, he had met with no success. at the house where she was born, there was now no one but a second cousin, to whom her brother, dying unmarried, had left the small estate of the withrops, along with the family contempt for her husband, and for her because of him, inasmuch as, by marrying him, she had brought disgrace upon herself, and upon all her people. so said the cousin to mr. sclater, but seemed himself nowise humbled by the disgrace he recognized, indeed almost claimed. as to the orphan, he said, to speak honestly (as he did at least that once), the more entirely he disappeared, the better he would consider it--not that personally he was the least concerned in the matter; only if, according to the scripture, there were two more generations yet upon which had to be visited the sins of sir george and lady galbraith, the greater the obscurity in which they remained, the less would be the scandal. the brother who had taken to business, was the senior partner in a large ship-building firm at greenock. this man, william fuller withrop by name--wilful withrop the neighbours had nicknamed him--was a bachelor, and reputed rich. mr. sclater did not hear of him what roused very brilliant hopes. he was one who would demand more reason than reasonable for the most reasonable of actions that involved parting with money; yet he had been known to do a liberal thing for a public object. waste was so wicked that any other moral risk was preferable. of the three, he would waste mind and body rather than estate. man was made neither to rejoice nor to mourn, but to possess. to leave no stone unturned, however, mr. sclater wrote to mr. withrop. the answer he received was, that, as the sister, concerning whose child he had applied to him, had never been anything but a trouble to the family; as he had no associations with her memory save those of misery and disgrace; as, before he left home, her name had long ceased to be mentioned among them; and as her own father had deliberately and absolutely disowned her because of her obstinate disobedience and wilfulness, it could hardly be expected of him, and indeed would ill become him, to show any lively interest in her offspring. still, although he could not honestly pretend to the smallest concern about him, he had, from pure curiosity, made inquiry of correspondents with regard to the boy; from which the resulting, knowledge was, that he was little better than an idiot, whose character, education, and manners, had been picked up in the streets. nothing, he was satisfied, could be done for such a child, which would not make him more miserable, as well as more wicked, than he was already. therefore, &c., &c., &c. thus failing, mr. sclater said to himself he had done all that could be required of him--and he had indeed taken trouble. nor could anything be asserted, he said further to himself, as his duty in respect of this child, that was not equally his duty in respect of every little wanderer in the streets of his parish. that a child's ancestors had been favoured above others, and had so misused their advantages that their last representative was left in abject poverty, could hardly be a reason why that child, born, in more than probability, with the same evil propensities which had ruined them, should be made an elect object of favour. who was he, clement sclater, to intrude upon the divine prerogative, and presume to act on the doctrine of election! was a child with a sir to his name, anything more in the eyes of god than a child without a name at all? would any title--even that of earl or duke, be recognized in the kingdom of heaven? his relatives ought to do something: they failing, of whom could further requisition be made? there were vessels to honour and vessels to dishonour: to which class this one belonged, let god in his time reveal. a duty could not be passed on. it could not become the duty of the minister of a parish, just because those who ought and could, would not, to spend time and money, to the neglect of his calling, in hunting up a boy whom he would not know what to do with if he had him, a boy whose home had been with the dregs of society. in justice to mr. sclater, it must be mentioned that he did not know gibbie, even by sight. there remains room, however, for the question, whether, if mr. sclater had not been the man to change his course as he did afterwards, he would not have acted differently from the first. one morning, as he sat at breakfast with his wife, late mrs. bonniman, and cast, as is, i fear, the rude habit of not a few husbands, not a few stolen glances, as he ate, over the morning paper, his eye fell upon a paragraph announcing the sudden death of the well-known william fuller withrop, of the eminent ship-building firm of withrop and playtell, of greenock. until he came to the end of the paragraph, his cup of coffee hung suspended in mid air. then down it went untasted, he jumped from his seat, and hurried from the room. for the said paragraph ended with the remark, that the not unfrequent incapacity of the ablest of business men for looking the inevitable in the face with coolness sufficient to the making of a will, was not only a curious fact, but in the individual case a pity, where two hundred thousand pounds was concerned. had the writer been a little more philosophical still, he might have seen that the faculty for making money by no means involves judgment in the destination of it, and that the money may do its part for good and evil without, just as well as with, a will at the back of it. but though this was the occasion, it remains to ask what was the cause of the minister's precipitancy. why should clement sclater thereupon spring from his chair in such a state of excitement that he set his cup of coffee down upon its side instead of its bottom, to the detriment of the tablecloth, and of something besides, more unquestionably the personal property of his wife? why was it that, heedless of her questions, backed although they were both by just anger and lawful curiosity, he ran straight from the room and the house, nor stayed until, at one and the same moment, his foot was on the top step of his lawyer's door, and his hand upon its bell? no doubt it was somebody's business, and perhaps it might be mr. sclater's, to find the heirs of men who died intestate; but what made it so indubitably, so emphatically, so individually, so pressingly mr. sclater's, that he forgot breakfast, tablecloth, wife, and sermon, all together, that he might see to this boy's rights? surely if they were rights, they could be in no such imminent danger as this haste seemed to signify. was it only that he might be the first in the race to right him?--and if so, then again, why? was it a certainty indisputable, that any boy, whether such an idle tramp as the minister supposed this one to be or not, would be redeemed by the heirship to the hugest of fortunes? had it, some time before this, become at length easier for a rich boy to enter into the kingdom of heaven? or was it that, with all his honesty, all his religion, all his churchism, all his protestantism, and his habitual appeal to the word of god, the minister was yet a most reverential worshipper of mammon,--not the old god mentioned in the new testament, of course, but a thoroughly respectable modern mammon, decently dressed, perusing a subscription list! no doubt justice ought to be done, and the young man over at roughrigs was sure to be putting in a false claim, but where were the lawyers, whose business it was? there was no need of a clergyman to remind them of their duty where the picking of such a carcase was concerned. had mr. sclater ever conceived the smallest admiration or love for the boy, i would not have made these reflections; but, in his ignorance of him and indifference concerning him, he believed there would at least be trouble in proving him of approximately sound mind and decent intellect. what, then, i repeat and leave it, did all this excitement on the part of one of the iron pillars of the church indicate? from his lawyer he would have gone at once to mistress croale--indeed i think he would have gone to her first, to warn her against imparting what information concerning gibbie she might possess to any other than himself, but he had not an idea where she might even be heard of. he had cleansed his own parish, as he thought, by pulling up the tare, contrary to commandment, and throwing it into his neighbours, where it had taken root, and grown a worse tare than before; until at length, she who had been so careful over the manners and morals of her drunkards, was a drunkard herself and a wanderer, with the reputation of being a far worse woman than she really was. for some years now she had made her living, one poor enough, by hawking small household necessities; and not unfrequently where she appeared, the housewives bought of her because her eyes, and her nose, and an undefined sense of evil in her presence, made them shrink from the danger of offending her. but the real cause of the bad impression she made was, that she was sorely troubled with what is, by huge discourtesy, called a bad conscience--being in reality a conscience doing its duty so well that it makes the whole house uncomfortable. on her next return to the daurfoot, as the part of the city was called where now she was most at home, she heard the astounding and welcome news that gibbie had fallen heir to a large property, and that the reward of one hundred pounds--a modest sum indeed, but where was the good of wasting money, thought mr. sclater--had been proclaimed by tuck of drum, to any one giving such information as should lead to the discovery of sir gilbert galbraith, commonly known as wee sir gibbie. a description of him was added, and the stray was so kenspeckle, that mistress croale saw the necessity of haste to any hope of advantage. she had nothing to guide her beyond the fact of sir george's habit, in his cups, of referring to the property on daurside, and the assurance that with the said habit gibbie must have been as familiar as herself. with this initiative, as she must begin somewhere, and could prosecute her business anywhere, she filled her basket and set out at once for daurside. there, after a good deal of wandering hither and thither, and a search whose fruitlessness she probably owed to too great caution, she made the desired discovery unexpectedly and marvellously, and left behind her in the valley the reputation of having been on more familiar terms with the flood and the causes of it, than was possible to any but one who kept company worse than human. chapter xxxviii. the muckle hoose. the next morning, janet felt herself in duty bound to make inquiry concerning those interested in miss galbraith. she made, therefore, the best of her way with gibbie to the muckle hoose, but, as the latter expected, found it a ruin in a wilderness. acres of trees and shrubbery had disappeared, and a hollow waste of sand and gravel was in their place. what was left of the house stood on the edge of a red gravelly precipice of fifty feet in height, at whose foot lay the stones of the kitchen-wing, in which had been the room whence gibbie carried ginevra. the newer part of the house was gone from its very roots; the ancient portion, all innovation wiped from it, stood grim, desolated, marred, and defiant as of old. not a sign of life was about the place; the very birds had fled. angus had been there that same morning, and had locked or nailed up every possible entrance: the place looked like a ruin of centuries. with difficulty they got down into the gulf, with more difficulty crossed the burn, clambered up the rocky bank on the opposite side, and knocked at the door of the gamekeeper's cottage. but they saw only a little girl, who told them her father had gone to find the laird, that her mother was ill in bed, and mistress mac farlane on her way to her own people. it came out afterwards that when angus and the housekeeper heard gibbie's taps at the window, and, looking out, saw nobody there, but the burn within a few yards of the house, they took the warning for a supernatural interference to the preservation of their lives, and fled at once. passing the foot of the stair, mistress mac farlane shrieked to ginevra to come, but ran on without waiting a reply. they told afterwards that she left the house with them, and that, suddenly missing her, they went back to look for her, but could find her nowhere, and were just able to make their second escape with their lives, hearing the house fall into the burn behind them. mistress mac farlane had been severe as the law itself against lying among the maids, but now, when it came to her own defence where she knew her self wrong, she lied just like one of the wicked. "my dear missie," said janet, when they got home, "ye maun write to yer father, or he'll be oot o' 's wuts aboot ye." ginevra wrote therefore to the duke's, and to the laird's usual address in london as well; but he was on his way from the one place to the other when angus overtook him, and received neither letter. now came to the girl a few such days of delight, of freedom, of life, as she had never even dreamed of. she roamed glashgar with gibbie, the gentlest, kindest, most interesting of companions. wherever his sheep went, she went too, and to many places besides--some of them such strange, wild, terrible places, as would have terrified her without him. how he startled her once by darting off a rock like a seagull, straight, head-foremost, into the death-pot! she screamed with horror, but he had done it only to amuse her; for, after what seemed to her a fearful time, he came smiling up out of the terrible darkness. what a brave, beautiful boy he was! he never hurt anything, and nothing ever seemed to hurt him. and what a number of things he knew! he showed her things on the mountain, things in the sky, things in the pools and streams wherever they went. he did better than tell her about them; he made her see them, and then the things themselves told her. she was not always certain she saw just what he wanted her to see, but she always saw something that made her glad with knowledge. he had a new testament janet had given him, which he carried in his pocket, and when she joined him, for he was always out with his sheep hours before she was up, she would generally find him seated on a stone, or lying in the heather, with the little book in his hand, looking solemn and sweet. but the moment he saw her, he would spring merrily up to welcome her. it were indeed an argument against religion as strong as sad, if one of the children the kingdom specially claims, could not be possessed by the life of the son of god without losing his simplicity and joyousness. those of my readers will be the least inclined to doubt the boy, who, by obedience, have come to know its reward. for obedience alone holds wide the door for the entrance of the spirit of wisdom. there was as little to wonder at in gibbie as there was much to love and admire, for from the moment when, yet a mere child, he heard there was such a one claiming his obedience, he began to turn to him the hearing ear, the willing heart, the ready hand. the main thing which rendered this devotion more easy and natural to him than to others was, that, more than in most, the love of man had in him prepared the way of the lord. he who so loved the sons of men was ready to love the son of man the moment he heard of him; love makes obedience a joy; and of him who obeys all heaven is the patrimony--he is fellow-heir with christ. on the fourth day, the rain, which had been coming and going, finally cleared off, the sun was again glorious, and the farmers began to hope a little for the drying and ripening of some portion of their crops. then first ginevra asked gibbie to take her down to glashruach; she wanted to see the ruin they had described to her. when she came near, and notions changed into visible facts, she neither wept nor wailed. she felt very miserable, it is true, but it was at finding that the evident impossibility of returning thither for a long time, woke in her pleasure and not pain. so utterly altered was the look of everything, that had she come upon it unexpectedly, she would not have recognized either place or house. they went up to a door. she seemed never to have seen it; but when they entered, she knew it as one from the hall into a passage, which, with what it led to, being gone, the inner had become an outer door. a quantity of sand was heaped up in the hall, and the wainscot was wet and swelled and bulging. they went into the dining-room. it was a miserable sight--the very picture of the soul of a drunkard. the thick carpet was sodden--spongy like a bed of moss after heavy rains; the leather chairs looked diseased; the colour was all gone from the table; the paper hung loose from the walls; and everything lay where the water, after floating it about, had let it drop as it ebbed. she ascended the old stone stair which led to her father's rooms above, went into his study, in which not a hair was out of its place, and walked towards the window to look across to where once had been her own chamber. but as she approached it, there, behind the curtain, she saw her father, motionless, looking out. she turned pale, and stood. even at such a time, had she known he was in the house, she would not have dared set her foot in that room. gibbie, who had followed and entered behind her, preceived her hesitation, saw and recognized the back of the laird, knew that she was afraid of her father, and stood also waiting he know not what. "eh!" he said to himself, "hers is no like mine! nae mony has had fathers sae guid's mine." becoming aware of a presence, the laird half turned, and seeing gibbie, imagined he had entered in a prowling way, supposing the place deserted. with stately offence he asked him what he wanted there, and waved his dismissal. then first he saw another, standing white-faced, with eyes fixed upon him. he turned pale also, and stood staring at her. the memory of that moment ever after disgraced him in his own eyes: for one instant of unreasoning weakness, he imagined he saw a ghost--believed what he said he knew to be impossible. it was but one moment but it might have been more, had not ginevra walked slowly up to him, saying in a trembling voice, as if she expected the blame of all that had happened, "i couldn't help it, papa." he took her in his arms, and, for the first time since the discovery of her atrocious familiarity with donal, kissed her. she clung to him, trembling now with pleasure as well as apprehension. but, alas! there was no impiety in the faithlessness that pronounced such a joy too good to endure, and the end came yet sooner than she feared. for, when the father rose erect from her embrace, and was again the laird, there, to his amazement, still stood the odd-looking, outlandish intruder, smiling with the most impertinent interest! gibbie had forgotten himself altogether, beholding what he took for a thorough reconciliation. "go away, boy. you have nothing to do here," said the laird, anger almost overwhelming his precious dignity. "oh, papa!" cried ginevra, clasping her hands, "that's gibbie! he saved my life. i should have been drowned but for him." the laird was both proud and stupid, therefore more than ordinarily slow to understand what he was unprepared to hear. "i am much obliged to him," he said haughtily; "but there is no occasion for him to wait." at this point his sluggish mind began to recall something:--why, this was the very boy he saw in the meadow with her that morning!--he turned fiercely upon him where he lingered, either hoping for a word of adieu from ginevra, or unwilling to go while she was uncomfortable. "leave the house instantly," he said, "or i will knock you down." "o papa!" moaned ginevra wildly--it was the braver of her that she was trembling from head to foot--"don't speak so to gibbie. he is a good boy. it was he that angus whipped so cruelly--long ago: i have never been able to forget it." her father was confounded at her presumption: how dared she expostulate with him! she had grown a bold, bad girl! good heavens! evil communications! "if he does not get out of this directly," he cried, "i will have him whipped again. angus." he shouted the name, and its echo came back in a wild tone, altogether strange to ginevra. she seemed struggling in the meshes of an evil dream. involuntarily she uttered a cry of terror and distress. gibbie was at her side instantly, putting out his hand to comfort her. she was just laying hers on his arm, scarcely knowing what she did, when her father seized him, and dashed him to the other side of the room. he went staggering backwards, vainly trying to recover himself, and fell, his head striking against the wall. the same instant angus entered, saw nothing of gibbie where he lay, and approached his master. but when he caught sight of ginevra, he gave a gasp of terror that ended in a broken yell, and stared as if he had come suddenly on the verge of the bottomless pit, while all round his head his hair stood out as if he had been electrified. before he came to himself, gibbie had recovered and risen. he saw now that he could be of no service to ginevra, and that his presence only made things worse for her. but he saw also that she was unhappy about him, and that must not be. he broke into such a merry laugh--and it had need to be merry, for it had to do the work of many words of reassurance--that she could scarcely refrain from a half-hysterical response as he walked from the room. the moment he was out of the house, he began to sing; and for many minutes, as he walked up the gulf hollowed by the glashburn, ginevra could hear the strange, other-world voice, and knew it was meant to hold communion with her and comfort her. "what do you know of that fellow, angus!" asked his master. "he's the verra deevil himsel', sir," muttered angus, whom gibbie's laughter had in a measure brought to his senses. "you will see that he is sent off the property at once--and for good, angus," said the laird. "his insolence is insufferable. the scoundrel!" on the pretext of following gibbie, angus was only too glad to leave the room. then mr. galbraith upon his daughter. "so, jenny!" he said, with, his loose lips pulled out straight, "that is the sort of companion you choose when left to yourself!--a low, beggarly, insolent scamp!--scarcely the equal of the brutes he has the charge of!" "they're sheep, papa!" pleaded ginevra, in a wail that rose almost to a scream. "i do believe the girl is an idiot!" said her father, and turned from her contemptuously. "i think i am, papa," she sobbed. "don't mind me. let me go away, and i will never trouble you any more." she would go to the mountain, she thought, and be a shepherdess with gibbie. her father took her roughly by the arm, pushed her into a closet, locked the door, went and had his luncheon, and in the afternoon, having borrowed snowball, took her just as she was, drove to meet the mail coach, and in the middle of the night was set down with her at the principal hotel in the city, whence the next morning he set out early to find a school where he might leave her and his responsibility with her. when gibbie knew himself beyond the hearing of ginevra, his song died away, and he went home sad. the gentle girl had stepped at once from the day into the dark, and he was troubled for her. but he remembered that she had another father besides the laird, and comforted himself. when he reached home, he found his mother in serious talk with a stranger. the tears were in her eyes, and had been running down her cheeks, but she was calm and dignified as usual. "here he comes!" she said as he entered. "the will o' the lord be dene--noo an' for ever-mair! i'm at his biddin'.--an' sae's gibbie." it was mr. sclater. the witch had sailed her brander well. chapter xxxix. daur street. one bright afternoon, towards the close of the autumn, the sun shining straight down one of the wide clean stony streets of the city, with a warmth which he had not been able to impart to the air, a company of school-girls, two and two in long file, mostly with innocent, and, for human beings, rather uninteresting faces, was walking in orderly manner, a female grenadier at its head, along the pavement, more than usually composed, from having the sun in their eyes. amongst the faces was one very different from the rest, a countenance almost solemn and a little sad, of still, regular features, in the eyes of which by loving eyes might have been read uneasy thought patiently carried, and the lack of some essential to conscious well-being. the other girls were looking on this side and that, eager to catch sight of anything to trouble the monotony of the daily walk; but the eyes of this one were cast down, except when occasionally lifted in answer to words of the schoolmistress, the grenadier, by whose side she was walking. they were lovely brown eyes, trustful and sweet, and although, as i have said, a little sad, they never rose, even in reply to the commonest remark, without shining a little. though younger than not a few of them, and very plainly dressed, like all the others--i have a suspicion that scotch mothers dress their girls rather too plainly, which tends to the growth of an undue and degrading love of dress--she was not so girlish, was indeed, in some respects, more of a young woman than even the governess who walked by the side of them. suddenly came a rush, a confusion, a fluttering of the doves, whence or how none seemed to know, a gentle shriek from several of the girls, a general sense of question and no answer; but, as their ruffled nerves composed themselves a little, there was the vision of the schoolmistress poking the point of her parasol at a heedless face, radiant with smiles, that of an odd-looking lad, as they thought, who had got hold of one of the daintily gloved hands of her companion, laid a hand which, considered conventionally, was not that of a gentleman, upon her shoulder, and stood, without a word, gazing in rapturous delight. "go away, boy! what do you mean by such impertinence?" cried the outraged miss kimble, changing her thrust, and poking in his chest the parasol with which she had found it impossible actually to assail his smiling countenance.--such a strange looking creature! he could not be in his sound senses, she thought. in the momentary mean time, however, she had failed to observe that, after the first start and following tremor, her companion stood quite still, and was now looking in the lad's face with roseate cheeks and tear-filled eyes, apparently forgetting to draw her hand from his, or to move her shoulder from under his caress. the next moment, up, with hasty yet dignified step, came the familiar form of their own minister, the rev. clement sclater, who, with reproof in his countenance, which was red with annoyance and haste, laid his hands on the lad's shoulders to draw him from the prey on which he had pounced. "remember, you are not on a hill-side, but in a respectable street," said the reverend gentleman, a little foolishly. the youth turned his head over his shoulder, not otherwise changing his attitude, and looked at him with some bewilderment. then, not he, but the young lady spoke. "gibbie and i are old friends," she said, and reaching up laid her free hand in turn on his shoulder, as if to protect him--for, needlessly, with such grace and strength before her, the vision of an old horror came rushing back on the mind of ginevra. gibbie had darted from his companion's side some hundred yards off. the cap which mr. sclater had insisted on his wearing had fallen as he ran, and he had never missed it; his hair stood out on all sides of his head, and the sun behind him shone in it like a glory, just as when first he appeared to ginevra in the peat-moss, like an angel standing over her. indeed, while to miss kimble and the girls he was "a mad-like object" in his awkward ill-fitting clothes, made by a village tailor in the height of the village fashion, to ginevra he looked hardly less angelic now than he did then. his appearance, judged without prejudice, was rather that of a sailor boy on shore than a shepherd boy from the hills. "miss galbraith!" said miss kimble, in the tone that indicates nostrils distended, "i am astonished at you! what an example to the school! i never knew you misbehave yourself before! take your hand from this--this--very strange looking person's shoulder directly." ginevra obeyed, but gibbie stood as before. "remove your hand, boy, instantly," cried miss kimble, growing more and more angry, and began knocking the hand on the girl's shoulder with her parasol, which apparently gibbie took for a joke, for he laughed aloud. "pray do not alarm yourself, ma'am," said mr. sclater, slowly recovering his breath: he was not yet quite sure of gibbie, or confident how best he was to be managed; "this young--gentleman is sir gilbert galbraith, my ward.--sir gilbert, this lady is miss kimble. you must have known her father well--the rev. matthew kimble of the next parish to your own?" gibbie smiled. he did not nod, for that would have meant that he did know him, and he did not remember having ever even heard the name of the rev. matthew kimble. "oh!" said the lady, who had ceased her battery, and stood bewildered and embarrassed--the more that by this time the girls had all gathered round, staring and wondering. ginevra's eyes too had filled with wonder; she cast them down, and a strange smile began to play about her sweet strong mouth. all at once she was in the middle of a fairy tale, and had not a notion what was coming next. her dumb shepherd boy a baronet!--and, more wonderful still, a galbraith! she must be dreaming in the wide street! the last she had seen of him was as he was driven from the house by her father, when he had just saved her life. that was but a few weeks ago, and here he was, called sir gilbert galbraith! it was a delicious bit of wonderment. "oh!" said miss kimble a second time, recovering herself a little, "i see! a relative, miss galbraith! i did not understand. that of course sets everything right--at least--even then--the open street, you know!--you will understand, mr. sclater.--i beg your pardon, sir gilbert. i hope i did not hurt you with my parasol!" gibbie again laughed aloud. "thank you," said miss kimble confused, and annoyed with herself for being so, especially before her girls. "i should be sorry to have hurt you.--going to college, i presume, sir gilbert?" gibbie looked at mr. sclater. "he is going to study with me for a while first," answered the minister. "i am glad to hear it, he could not do better," said miss kimble. "come, girls." and with friendly farewells, she moved on, her train after her, thinking with herself what a boor the young fellow was--the young--baronet?--yes, he must be a baronet; he was too young to have been knighted already. but where ever could he have been brought up? mr. sclater had behaved judiciously, and taken gentle pains to satisfy the old couple that they must part with gibbie. one of the neighbouring clergy knew mr. sclater well, and with him paid the old people a visit, to help them to dismiss any lingering doubt that he was the boy's guardian legally appointed. to their own common sense indeed it became plain that, except some such story was true, there could be nothing to induce him to come after gibbie, or desire to take charge of the outcast; but they did not feel thoroughly satisfied until mr. sclater brought fergus duff to the cottage, to testify to him as being what he pretended. it was a sore trial, but amongst the griefs of losing him, no fear of his forgetting them was included. mr. sclater's main difficulty was with gibbie himself. at first he laughed at the absurdity of his going away from his father and mother and the sheep. they told him he was sir gilbert galbraith. he answered on his slate, as well as by signs which janet at least understood perfectly, that he had told them so, and had been so all the time, "and what differ dos that mak?" he added. mr. sclater told him he was--or would be, at least, he took care to add, when he came of age--a rich man as well as a baronet. "writch men," wrote gibbie, "dee as they like, and ise bide." mr. sclater told him it was only poor boys who could do as they pleased, for the law looked after boys like him, so that, when it came into their hands, they might be capable of using their money properly. almost persuaded at length that he had no choice, that he could no longer be his own master, until he was one and twenty, he turned and looked at janet, his eyes brimful of tears. she gave him a little nod. he rose and went out, climbed the crest of glashgar, and did not return to the cottage till midnight. in the morning appeared on his countenance signs of unusual resolve. amid the many thoughts he had had the night before, had come the question--what he would do with the money when he had it--first of all what he could do for janet and robert and everyone of their family; and naturally enough to a scotch boy, the first thing that occurred to him was, to give donal money to go to college like fergus duff. in that he know he made no mistake. it was not so easy to think of things for the rest, but that was safe. had not donal said twenty times he would not mind being a herd all his life, if only he could go to college first? but then he began to think what a long time it was before he would be one and twenty, and what a number of things might come and go before then: donal might by that time have a wife and children, and he could not leave them to go to college! why should not mr. sclater manage somehow that donal should go at once? it was now the end almost of october, and the college opened in november. some other rich person would lend them the money, and he would pay it, with compound interest, when he got his. before he went to bed, he got his slate, and wrote as follows: "my dear minister, if you will teak donal too, and lett him go to the kolledg, i will go with you as seens ye like; butt if ye will not, i will runn away." when mr. sclater, who had a bed at the gamekeeper's, appeared the next morning, anxious to conclude the business, and get things in motion for their departure, gibbie handed him the slate the moment he entered the cottage, and while he read, stood watching him. now mr. sclater was a prudent man, and always looked ahead, therefore apparently took a long time to read gibbie's very clear, although unscholarly communication; before answering it, he must settle the probability of what mrs. sclater would think of the proposal to take two savages into her house together, where also doubtless the presence of this donal would greatly interfere with the process of making a gentleman of gibbie. unable to satisfy himself, he raised his head at length, unconsciously shaking it as he did so. that instant gibbie was out of the house. mr. sclater, perceiving the blunder he had made, hurried after him, but he was already out of sight. returning in some dismay, he handed the slate to janet, who, with sad, resigned countenance, was baking. she rubbed the oatmeal dough from her hands, took the slate, and read with a smile. "ye maunna tak gibbie for a young cowt, maister sclater, an' think to brak him in," she said, after a thoughtful pause, "or ye'll hae to learn yer mistak. there's no eneuch o' himsel' in him for ye to get a grip o' 'm by that han'le. he aye kens what he wad hae, an' he'll aye get it, as sure's it'll aye be richt. as anent donal, donal's my ain, an' i s' say naething. sit ye doon, sir; ye'll no see gibbie the day again." "is there no means of getting at him, my good woman?" said mr. sclater, miserable at the prospect of a day utterly wasted. "i cud gie ye sicht o' 'im, i daursay, but what better wad ye be for that? gien ye hed a' the lawyers o' embrough at yer back, ye wadna touch gibbie upo' glashgar." "but you could persuade him, i am sure, mistress grant. you have only to call him in your own way, and he will come at once." "what wad ye hae me perswaud him till, sir? to onything 'at's richt, gibbie wants nae perswaudin'; an' for this 'at's atween ye, the laddies are jist verra brithers, an' i hae no richt to interfere wi' what the tane wad for the tither, the thing seemin' to me rizon eneuch." "what sort of lad is this son of yours? the boy seems much attached to him!" "he's a laddie 'at's been gien ower till's buik sin' ever i learnt him to read mysel'," janet answered. "but he'll be here the nicht, i'm thinkin', to see the last o' puir gibbie, an' ye can jeedge for yersel'." it required but a brief examination of donal to satisfy mr. sclater that he was more than prepared for the university. but i fear me greatly the time is at hand when such as donal will no more be able to enter her courts. unwise and unpatriotic are any who would rather have a few prime scholars sitting about the wells of learning, than see those fountains flow freely for the poor, who are yet the strength of a country. it is better to have many upon the high road of learning, than a few even at its goal, if that were possible. as to donal's going to mr. sclater's house, janet soon relieved him. "na, na, sir," she said; "it wad be to learn w'ys 'at wadna be fittin' a puir lad like him." "it would be much safer for him." said mr. sclater, but incidentally. "gien i cudna lippen my donal till's ain company an' the hunger for better, i wad begin to doobt wha made the warl'," said his mother; and donal's face flushed with pleasure at her confidence. "na, he maun get a garret roomie some gait i' the toon, an' there haud till's buik; an ye'll lat gibbie gang an' see him whiles whan he can be spared. there maun be many a dacent wuman 'at wad be pleased to tak him in." mr. sclater seemed to himself to foresee no little trouble in his new responsibility, but consoled himself that he would have more money at his command, and in the end would sit, as it were, at the fountain-head of large wealth. already, with his wife's property, he was a man of consideration; but he had a great respect for money, and much overrated its value as a means of doing even what he called good: religious people generally do--with a most unchristian dulness. we are not told that the master made the smallest use of money for his end. when he paid the temple-rate, he did it to avoid giving offence; and he defended the woman who divinely wasted it. ten times more grace and magnanimity would be needed, wisely and lovingly to avoid making a fortune, than it takes to spend one for what are called good objects when it is made. when they met miss kimble and her "young ladies," they were on their way from the coach-office to the minister's house in daur street. gibbie knew every corner, and strange was the swift variety of thoughts and sensations that went filing through his mind. up this same street he had tended the wavering steps of a well-known if not highly respected town-councillor! that was the door, where, one cold morning of winter, the cook gave him a cup of hot coffee and a roll! what happy days they were, with their hunger and adventure! there had always been food and warmth about the city, and he had come in for his share! the master was in its streets as certainly as on the rocks of glashgar. not one sheep did he lose sight of, though he could not do so much for those that would not follow, and had to have the dog sent after them! chapter xl mrs. sclater. gibbie was in a dream of mingled past and future delights, when his conductor stopped at a large and important-looking house, with a flight of granite steps up to the door. gibbie had never been inside such a house in his life, but when they entered, he was not much impressed. he did look with a little surprise, it is true, but it was down, not up: he felt his feet walking soft, and wondered for a moment that there should be a field of grass in a house. then he gave a glance round, thought it was a big place, and followed mr. sclater up the stair with the free mounting step of the glashgar shepherd. forgetful and unconscious, he walked into the drawing-room with his bonnet on his head. mrs. sclater rose when they entered, and he approached her with a smile of welcome to the house which he carried, always full of guests, in his bosom. he never thought of looking to her to welcome him. she shook hands with him in a doubtful kind of way. "how do you do, sir gilbert?" she said. "only ladies are allowed to wear their caps in the drawing-room, you know," she added, in a tone of courteous and half-rallying rebuke, speaking from a flowery height of conscious superiority. what she meant by the drawing-room, gibbie had not an idea. he looked at her head, and saw no cap; she had nothing upon it but a quantity of beautiful black hair; then suddenly remembered his bonnet; he knew well enough bonnets had to be taken off in house or cottage: he had never done so because he never had worn a bonnet. but it was with a smile of amusement only that he now took it off. he was so free from selfishness that he knew nothing of shame. never a shadow of blush at his bad manners tinged his cheek. he put the cap in his pocket, and catching sight of a footstool by the corner of the chimney-piece, was so strongly reminded of his creepie by the cottage-hearth, which, big lad as he now was, he had still haunted, that he went at once and seated himself upon it. from this coign of vantage he looked round the room with a gentle curiosity, casting a glance of pleasure every now and then at mrs. sclater, to whom her husband, in a manner somewhat constrained because of his presence, was recounting some of the incidents of his journey, making choice, after the manner of many, of the most commonplace and uninteresting. gibbie had not been educated in the relative grandeur of things of this world, and he regarded the things he now saw just as things, without the smallest notion of any power in them to confer superiority by being possessed: can a slave knight his master? the reverend but poor mr. sclater was not above the foolish consciousness of importance accruing from the refined adjuncts of a more needy corporeal existence; his wife would have felt out of her proper sphere had she ceased to see them around her, and would have lost some of her aplomb; but the divine idiot gibbie was incapable even of the notion that they mattered a straw to the life of any man. indeed, to compare man with man was no habit of his; hence it cannot be wonderful that stone hearth and steel grate, clay floor and brussels carpet were much the same to him. man was the one sacred thing. gibbie's unconscious creed was a powerful leveller, but it was a leveller up, not down. the heart that revered the beggar could afford to be incapable of homage to position. his was not one of those contemptible natures which have no reverence because they have no aspiration, which think themselves fine because they acknowledge nothing superior to their own essential baseness. to gibbie every man was better than himself. it was for him a sudden and strange descent--from the region of poetry and closest intercourse with the strong and gracious and vital simplicities of nature, human and other, to the rich commonplaces, amongst them not a few fashionable vulgarities, of an ordinary well-appointed house, and ordinary well-appointed people; but, however bedizened, humanity was there; and he who does not love human more than any other nature has not life in himself, does not carry his poetry in him, as gibbie did, therefore cannot find it except where it has been shown to him. neither was a common house like this by any means devoid of any things to please him. if there was not the lovely homeliness of the cottage which at once gave all it had, there was a certain stateliness which afforded its own reception; if there was little harmony, there were individual colours that afforded him delight--as for instance, afterwards, the crimson covering the walls of the dining-room, whose colour was of that soft deep-penetrable character which a flock paper alone can carry. then there were pictures, bad enough most of them, no doubt, in the eyes of the critic, but endlessly suggestive, therefore endlessly delightful to gibbie. it is not the man who knows most about nature that is hardest to please, however he may be hardest to satisfy, with the attempt to follow her. the accomplished poet will derive pleasure from verses which are a mockery to the soul of the unhappy mortal whose business is judgment--the most thankless of all labours, and justly so. certain fruits one is unable to like until he has eaten them in their perfection; after that, the reminder in them of the perfect will enable him to enjoy even the inferior a little, recognizing their kind--always provided he be not one given to judgment--a connoisseur, that is, one who cares less for the truth than for the knowing comparison of one embodiment of it with another. gibbie's regard then, as it wandered round the room, lighting on this colour, and that texture, in curtain, or carpet, or worked screen, found interest and pleasure. amidst the mere upholstery of houses and hearts, amidst the common life of the common crowd, he was, and had to be, what he had learned to be amongst the nobility and in the palace of glashgar. mrs. sclater, late mrs. bonniman, was the widow of a merchant who had made his money in foreign trade, and to her house mr. sclater had flitted when he married her. she was a well-bred woman, much the superior of her second husband in the small duties and graces of social life, and, already a sufferer in some of his not very serious _grossièretés_, regarded with no small apprehension the arrival of one in whom she expected the same kind of thing in largely exaggerated degree. she did not much care to play the mother to a bear cub, she said to her friends, with a good-humoured laugh. "just think," she added, "with such a childhood as the poor boy had, what a mass of vulgarity must be lying in that uncultivated brain of his! it is no small mercy, as mr. sclater says, that our ears at least are safe. poor boy!"--she was a woman of about forty, rather tall, of good complexion tending to the ruddy, with black smooth shining hair parted over a white forehead, black eyes, nose a little aquiline, good mouth, and fine white teeth--altogether a handsome woman--some notion of whose style may be gathered from the fact that, upon the testimony of her cheval glass, she preferred satin to the richest of silks, and almost always wore it. now and then she would attempt a change, but was always defeated and driven back into satin. she was precise in her personal rules, but not stiff in the manners wherein she embodied them: these were indeed just a little florid and wavy, a trifle profuse in their grace. she kept an excellent table, and every appointment about the house was in good style--a favourite phrase with her. she was her own housekeeper, an exact mistress, but considerate, so that her servants had no bad time of it. she was sensible, kind, always responsive to appeal, had scarcely a thread of poetry or art in her upper texture, loved fair play, was seldom in the wrong, and never confessed it when she was. but when she saw it, she took some pains to avoid being so in a similar way again. she held hard by her own opinion; was capable of a mild admiration of truth and righteousness in another; had one or two pet commandments to which she paid more attention than to the rest; was a safe member of society, never carrying tales; was kind with condescension to the poor, and altogether a good wife for a minister of mr. sclater's sort. she knew how to hold her own with any who would have established superiority. a little more coldness, pride, indifference, and careless restraint, with just a touch of rudeness, would have given her the freedom of the best society, if she could have got into it. altogether it would not have been easy to find one who could do more for gibbie in respect for the social rapports that seemed to await him. even some who would gladly themselves have undertaken the task, admitted that he might have fallen into much less qualified hands. her husband was confident that, if anybody could, his wife would make a gentleman of sir gilbert; and he ought to know, for she had done a good deal of polishing upon him. she was now seated on a low chair at the other side of the fire, leaning back at a large angle, slowly contemplating out of her black eyes the lad on the footstool, whose blue eyes she saw wandering about the room, in a manner neither vague nor unintelligent, but showing more of interest than of either surprise or admiration. suddenly he turned them full upon her; they met hers, and the light rushed into them like a torrent, breaking forth after its way in a soulful smile. i hope my readers are not tired of the mention of gibbie's smiles: i can hardly avoid it; they were all gibbie had for the small coin of intercourse; and if my readers care to be just, they will please to remember that they have been spared many a he said and she said. unhappily for me there is no way of giving the delicate differences of those smiles. much of what gibbie perhaps felt the more that he could not say it, had got into the place where the smiles are made, and, like a variety of pollens, had impregnated them with all shades and colours of expression, whose varied significance those who had known him longest, dividing and distinguishing, had gone far towards being able to interpret. in that which now shone on mrs. sclater, there was something, she said the next day to a friend, which no woman could resist, and which must come of his gentle blood. if she could have seen a few of his later ancestors at least, she would have doubted if they had anything to do with that smile beyond its mere transmission from "the first stock-father of gentleness." she responded, and from that moment the lady and the shepherd lad were friends. now that a real introduction had taken place between them, and in her answering smile gibbie had met the lady herself, he proceeded, in most natural sequence, without the smallest shyness or suspicion of rudeness, to make himself acquainted with the phenomena presenting her. as he would have gazed upon a rainbow, trying perhaps to distinguish the undistinguishable in the meeting and parting of its colours, only that here behind was the all-powerful love of his own, he began to examine the lady's face and form, dwelling and contemplating with eyes innocent as any baby's. this lasted; but did not last long before it began to produce in the lady a certain uncertain embarrassment, a something she did not quite understand, therefore could not account for, and did not like. why should she mind eyes such as those making acquaintance with what a whole congregation might see any sunday at church, or for that matter, the whole city on monday, if it pleased to look upon her as she walked shopping in pearl-street? why indeed? yet she began to grow restless, and feel as if she wanted to let down her veil. she could have risen and left the room, but she had "no notion" of being thus put to flight by her bear-cub; she was ashamed that a woman of her age and experience should be so foolish; and besides, she wanted to come to an understanding with herself as to what herself meant by it. she did not feel that the boy was rude; she was not angry with him as with one taking a liberty; yet she did wish he would not look at her like that; and presently she was relieved. her hands, which had been lying all the time in her lap, white upon black, had at length drawn and fixed gibbie's attention. they were very lady-like hands, long-fingered, and with the orthodox long-oval nails, each with a quarter segment of a pale rising moon at the root--hands nearly faultless, and, i suspect, considered by their owner entirely such--but a really faultless hand, who has ever seen?--to gibbie's eyes they were such beautiful things, that, after a moment or two spent in regarding them across the length of the hairy hearthrug, he got up, took his footstool, crossed with it to the other side of the fire, set it down by mrs. sclater, and reseated himself. without moving more than her fine neck, she looked down on him curiously, wondering what would come next; and what did come next was, that he laid one of his hands on one of those that lay in the satin lap; then, struck with the contrast between them, burst out laughing. but he neither withdrew his hand, nor showed the least shame of the hard, brown, tarry-seamed, strong, though rather small prehensile member, with its worn and blackened nails, but let it calmly remain outspread, side by side with the white, shapely, spotless, gracious and graceful thing, adorned, in sign of the honour it possessed in being the hand of mrs. sclater,--it was her favourite hand,--with a half hoop of fine blue-green turkises, and a limpid activity of many diamonds. she laughed also--who could have helped it? that laugh would have set silver bells ringing in responsive sympathy!--and patted the lumpy thing which, odd as the fact might be, was also called a hand, with short little pecking pats; she did not altogether like touching so painful a degeneracy from the ideal. but his very evident admiration of hers, went far to reconcile her to his,--as was but right, seeing a man's admirations go farther to denote him truly, than the sort of hands or feet either he may happen to have received from this or that vanished ancestor. still she found his presence--more than his proximity--discomposing, and was glad when mr. sclater, who, i forgot to mention, had left the room, returned and took gibbie away to show him his, and instruct him what changes he must make upon his person in preparation for dinner. when mrs. sclater went to bed that night she lay awake a good while thinking, and her main thought was--what could be the nature of the peculiar feeling which the stare of the boy had roused in her? nor was it long before she began to suspect that, unlike her hand beside his, she showed to some kind of disadvantage beside the shepherd lad. was it dissatisfaction then with herself that his look had waked? she was aware of nothing in which she had failed or been in the wrong of late. she never did anything to be called wrong--by herself, that is, or indeed by her neighbours. she had never done anything very wrong, she thought; and anything wrong she had done, was now a far away and so nearly forgotten, that it seemed to have left her almost quite innocent; yet the look of those blue eyes, searching, searching, without seeming to know it, made her feel something like the discomfort of a dream of expected visitors, with her house not quite in a condition to receive them. she must see to her hidden house. she must take dust-pan and broom and go about a little. for there are purifications in which king and cowboy must each serve himself. the things that come out of a man are they that defile him, and to get rid of them, a man must go into himself, be a convict, and scrub the floor of his cell. mrs. sclater's cell was very tidy and respectable for a cell, but no human consciousness can be clean, until it lies wide open to the eternal sun, and the all-potent wind; until, from a dim-lighted cellar it becomes a mountain-top. chapter xli. initiation. mrs. sclater's first piece of business the following morning was to take gibbie to the most fashionable tailor in the city, and have him measured for such clothes as she judged suitable for a gentleman's son. as they went through the streets, going and returning, the handsome lady walking with the youth in the queer country-made clothes, attracted no little attention, and most of the inhabitants who saw them, having by this time heard of the sudden importance of their old acquaintance, wee sir gibbie, and the search after him, were not long in divining the secret of the strange conjunction. but although gibbie seemed as much at home with the handsome lady as if she had been his own mother, and walked by her side with a step and air as free as the wind from glashgar, he felt anything but comfortable in his person. for here and there tammy breeks's seams came too close to his skin, and there are certain kinds of hardship which, though the sufferer be capable of the patience of job, will yet fret. gibbie could endure cold or wet or hunger, and sing like a mavis; he had borne pain upon occasion with at least complete submission; but the tight arm-holes of his jacket could hardly be such a decree of providence as it was rebellion to interfere with; and therefore i do not relate what follows, as a pure outcome of that benevolence in him which was yet equal to the sacrifice of the best fitting of garments. as they walked along pearl-street, the handsomest street of the city, he darted suddenly from mrs. sclater's side, and crossed to the opposite pavement. she stood and looked after him wondering, hitherto he had broken out in no vagaries! as he ran, worse and worse! he began tugging at his jacket, and had just succeeded in getting it off as he arrived at the other side, in time to stop a lad of about his own size, who was walking bare-footed and in his shirt sleeves--if shirt or sleeves be a term applicable to anything visible upon him. with something of the air of the tailor who had just been waiting upon himself, but with as much kindness and attention as if the boy had been donal grant instead of a stranger, he held the jacket for him to put on. the lad lost no time in obeying, gave him one look and nod of gratitude, and ran down a flight of steps to a street below, never doubting his benefactor an idiot, and dreading some one to whom he belonged would be after him presently to reclaim the gift. mrs. sclater saw the proceeding with some amusement and a little foreboding. she did not mourn the fate of the jacket; had it been the one she had just ordered, or anything like it, the loss would have been to her not insignificant: but was the boy altogether in his right mind? she in her black satin on the opposite pavement, and the lad scudding down the stair in the jacket, were of similar mind concerning the boy, who, in shirt sleeves indubitable, now came bounding back across the wide street. he took his place by her side as if nothing had happened, only that he went along swinging his arms as if he had just been delivered from manacles. having for so many years roamed the streets with scarcely any clothes at all, he had no idea of looking peculiar, and thought nothing more of the matter. but mrs. sclater soon began to find that even in regard to social externals, she could never have had a readier pupil. he watched her so closely, and with such an appreciation of the difference in things of the kind between her and her husband, that for a short period he was in danger of falling into habits of movement and manipulation too dainty for a man, a fault happily none the less objectionable in the eyes of his instructress, that she, on her own part, carried the feminine a little beyond the limits of the natural. but here also she found him so readily set right, that she imagined she was going to do anything with him she pleased, and was not a little proud of her conquest, and the power she had over the young savage. she had yet to discover that gibbie had his own ideas too, that it was the general noble teachableness and affection of his nature that had brought about so speedy an understanding between them in everything wherein he saw she could show him the better way, but that nowhere else would he feel bound or inclined to follow her injunctions. much and strongly as he was drawn to her by her ladyhood, and the sense she gave him of refinement and familiarity with the niceties, he had no feeling that she had authority over him. so neglected in his childhood, so absolutely trusted by the cottagers, who had never found in him the slightest occasion for the exercise of authority, he had not an idea of owing obedience to any but the one. gifted from the first with a heart of devotion, the will of the master set the will of the boy upon the throne of service, and what he had done from inclination he was now capable of doing against it, and would most assuredly do against it if ever occasion should arise: what other obedience was necessary to his perfection? for his father and mother and donal he had reverence--profound and tender, and for no one else as yet among men; but at the same time something far beyond respect for every human shape and show. he would not, could not make any of the social distinctions which to mr. and mrs. sclater seemed to belong to existence itself, and their recognition essential to the living of their lives; whence it naturally resulted that upon occasion he seemed to them devoid of the first rudiments of breeding, without respect or any notion of subordination. mr. sclater was conscientious in his treatment of him. the very day following that of their arrival, he set to work with him. he had been a tutor, was a good scholar, and a sensible teacher, and soon discovered how to make the most of gibbie's facility in writing. he was already possessed of a little latin, and after having for some time accustomed him to translate from each language into the other, the minister began to think it might be of advantage to learning in general, if at least half the boys and girls at school, and three parts of every sunday congregation, were as dumb as sir gilbert galbraith. when at length he set him to greek, he was astonished at the avidity with which he learned it! he had hardly got him over tupto, {compilers note: spelled in greek: tau, upsilon with stress, pi, tau, omega} when he found him one day so intent upon the greek testament, that, exceptionally keen of hearing as he was, he was quite unaware that anyone had entered the room. what gibbie made of mr. sclater's prayers, either in congregational or family devotion, i am at some loss to imagine. beside his memories of the direct fervid outpouring and appeal of janet, in which she seemed to talk face to face with god, they must have seemed to him like the utterances of some curiously constructed wooden automaton, doing its best to pray, without any soul to be saved, any weakness to be made strong, any doubt to be cleared, any hunger to be filled. what can be less like religion than the prayers of a man whose religion is his profession, and who, if he were not "in the church," would probably never pray at all? gibbie, however, being the reverse of critical, must, i can hardly doubt, have seen in them a good deal more than was there--a pitiful faculty to the man who cultivates that of seeing in everything less than is there. to mrs. sclater, it was at first rather depressing, and for a time grew more and more painful, to have a live silence by her side. but when she came into rapport with the natural utterance of the boy, his presence grew more like a constant speech, and that which was best in her was not unfrequently able to say for the boy what he would have said could he have spoken: the nobler part of her nature was in secret alliance with the thoughts and feelings of gibbie. but this relation between them, though perceptible, did not become at all plain to her until after she had established more definite means of communication. gibbie, for his part, full of the holy simplicities of the cottage, had a good many things to meet which disappointed, perplexed, and shocked him. middling good people are shocked at the wickedness of the wicked; gibbie, who knew both so well, and what ought to be expected, was shocked only at the wickedness of the righteous. he never came quite to understand mr. sclater: the inconsistent never can be understood. that only which has absolute reason in it can be understood of man. there is a bewilderment about the very nature of evil which only he who made us capable of evil that we might be good, can comprehend. chapter xlii. donal's lodging. donal had not accompanied mr. sclater and his ward, as he generally styled him, to the city, but continued at the mains until another herd-boy should be found to take his place. all were sorry to part with him, but no one desired to stand in the way of his good fortune by claiming his service to the end of his half-year. it was about a fortnight after gibbie's departure when he found himself free. his last night he spent with his parents on glashgar, and the next morning set out in the moonlight to join the coach, with some cakes and a bit of fresh butter tied up in a cotton handkerchief. he wept at leaving them, nor was too much excited with the prospect before him to lay up his mother's parting words in his heart. for it is not every son that will not learn of his mother. he who will not goes to the school of gideon. those last words of janet to her donal were, "noo, min' yer no a win'le strae (a straw dried on its root), but a growin' stalk 'at maun luik till 'ts corn." when he reached the spot appointed, there already was the cart from the mains, with his kist containing all his earthly possessions. they did not half fill it, and would have tumbled about in the great chest, had not the bounty of mistress jean complemented its space with provision--a cheese, a bag of oatmeal, some oatcakes, and a pound or two of the best butter in the world; for now that he was leaving them, a herd-boy no more, but a colliginer, and going to be a gentleman, it was right to be liberal. the box, whose ponderosity was unintelligible to its owner, having been hoisted, amid the smiles of the passengers, to the mid region of the roof of the coach, donal clambered after it, and took, for the first time in his life, his place behind four horses--to go softly rushing through the air towards endless liberty. it was to the young poet an hour of glorious birth--in which there seemed nothing too strange, nothing but what should have come. i fancy, when they die, many will find themselves more at home than ever they were in this world. but donal is not the subject of my story, and i must not spend upon him. i will only say that his feelings on this grand occasion were the less satisfactory to himself, that, not being poet merely, but philosopher as well, he sought to understand them: the mere poet, the man-bird, would have been content with them in themselves. but if he who is both does not rise above both by learning obedience, he will have a fine time of it between them. the streets of the city at length received them with noise and echo. at the coach-office mr. sclater stood waiting, welcomed him with dignity rather than kindness, hired a porter with his truck whom he told where to take the chest, said sir gilbert would doubtless call on him the next day, and left him with the porter. it was a cold afternoon, the air half mist, half twilight. donal followed the rattling, bumping truck over the stones, walking close behind it, almost in the gutter. they made one turning, went a long way through the narrow, sometimes crowded, widdiehill, and stopped. the man opened a door, returned to the truck, and began to pull the box from it. donal gave him effective assistance, and they entered with it between them. there was just light enough from a tallow candle with a wick like a red-hot mushroom, to see that they were in what appeared to donal a house in most appalling disorder, but was in fact a furniture shop. the porter led the way up a dark stair, and donal followed with his end of the trunk. at the top was a large room, into which the last of the day glimmered through windows covered with the smoke and dust of years, showing this also full of furniture, chiefly old. a lane through the furniture led along the room to a door at the other end. to donal's eyes it looked a dreary place; but when the porter opened the other door, he saw a neat little room with a curtained bed, a carpeted floor, a fire burning in the grate, a kettle on the hob, and the table laid for tea: this was like a bit of a palace, for he had never in his life even looked into such a chamber. the porter set down his end of the chest, said "guid nicht to ye," and walked out, leaving the door open. knowing nothing about towns and the ways of them, donal was yet a little surprised that there was nobody to receive him. he approached the fire, and sat down to warm himself, taking care not to set his hobnailed shoes on the grandeur of the little hearthrug. a few moments and he was startled by a slight noise, as of suppressed laughter. he jumped up. one of the curtains of his bed was strangely agitated. out leaped gibbie from behind it, and threw his arms about him. "eh, cratur! ye gae me sic a fleg!" said donal. "but, losh! they hae made a gentleman o' ye a'ready!" he added, holding him at arms length, and regarding him with wonder and admiration. a notable change had indeed passed upon gibbie, mere externals considered, in that fortnight. he was certainly not so picturesque as before, yet the alteration was entirely delightful to donal. perhaps he felt it gave a good hope for the future of his own person. mrs. sclater had had his hair cut; his shirt was of the whitest of linen, his necktie of the richest of black silk, his clothes were of the newest cut and best possible fit, and his boots perfect: the result was altogether even to her satisfaction. in one thing only was she foiled: she could not get him to wear gloves. he had put on a pair, but found them so miserably uncomfortable that, in merry wrath, he pulled them off on the way home, and threw them--"the best kid!" exclaimed mrs. sclater--over the pearl bridge. prudently fearful of over-straining her influence, she yielded for the present, and let him go without. mr. sclater also had hitherto exercised prudence in his demands upon gibbie--not that he desired anything less than unlimited authority with him, but, knowing it would be hard to enforce, he sought to establish it by a gradual tightening of the rein, a slow encroachment of law upon the realms of disordered license. he had never yet refused to do anything he required of him, had executed entirely the tasks he set him, was more than respectful, and always ready; yet somehow mr. sclater could never feel that the lad was exactly obeying him. he thought it over, but could not understand it, and did not like it, for he was fond of authority. gibbie in fact did whatever was required of him from his own delight in meeting the wish expressed, not from any sense of duty or of obligation to obedience. the minister had no perception of what the boy was, and but a very small capacity for appreciating what was best in him, and had a foreboding suspicion that the time would come when they would differ. he had not told him that he was going to meet the coach, but gibbie was glad to learn from mrs. sclater that such was his intention, for he preferred meeting donal at his lodging. he had recognized the place at once from the minister's mention of it to his wife, having known the shop and its owner since ever he could remember himself. he loitered near until he saw donal arrive, then crept after him and the porter up the stair, and when donal sat down by the fire, got into the room and behind the curtain. the boys had then a jolly time of it. they made their tea, for which everything was present, and ate as boys know how, donal enjoying the rarity of the white bread of the city, gibbie, who had not tasted oatmeal since he came, devouring "mother's cakes." when they had done, gibbie, who had learned much since he came, looked about the room till he found a bell-rope, and pulled it, whereupon the oddest-looking old woman, not a hair altered from what gibbie remembered her, entered, and, with friendly chatter, proceeded to remove the tray. suddenly something arrested her, and she began to regard gibbie with curious looks; in a moment she was sure of him, and a torrent of exclamations and reminiscences and appeals followed, which lasted, the two lads now laughing, now all but crying for nearly an hour, while, all the time, the old woman kept doing and undoing about the hearth and the tea table. donal asked many questions about his friend, and she answered freely, except as often as one approached his family, when she would fall silent, and bustle about as if she had not heard. then gibbie would look thoughtful and strange and a little sad, and a far-away gaze would come into his eyes, as if he were searching for his father in the other world. when the good woman at length left them, they uncorded donal's kist, discovered the cause of its portentous weight, took out everything, put the provisions in a cupboard, arranged the few books, and then sat down by the fire for "a read" together. the hours slipped away; it was night; and still they sat and read. it must have been after ten o' clock when they heard footsteps coming through the adjoining room; the door opened swiftly; in walked mr. sclater, and closed it behind him. his look was angry--severe enough for boys caught card-playing, or drinking, or reading something that was not divinity on a sunday. gibbie had absented himself without permission, had stayed away for hours, had not returned even when the hour of worship arrived; and these were sins against the respectability of his house which no minister like mr. sclater could pass by. it mattered nothing what they were doing! it was all one when it got to midnight! then it became revelling, and was sinful and dangerous, vulgar and ungentlemanly, giving the worst possible example to those beneath them! what could their landlady think?--the very first night?--and a lodger whom he had recommended? such was the sort of thing with which mr. sclater overwhelmed the two boys. donal would have pleaded in justification, or at least excuse, but he silenced him peremptorily. i suspect there had been some difference between mrs. sclater and him just before he left: how otherwise could he have so entirely forgotten his wise resolves anent gibbie's gradual subjugation? when first he entered, gibbie rose with his usual smile of greeting, and got him a chair. but he waved aside the attention with indignant indifference, and went on with his foolish reproof--unworthy of record except for gibbie's following behaviour. beaten down by the suddenness of the storm, donal had never risen from his chair, but sat glowering into the fire. he was annoyed, vexed, half-ashamed; with that readiness of the poetic nature to fit itself to any position, especially one suggested by an unjust judgment, he felt, with the worthy parson thus storming at him, almost as if guilty in everything laid to their joint charge. gibbie on his feet looked the minister straight in the face. his smile of welcome, which had suddenly mingled itself with bewilderment, gradually faded into one of concern, then of pity, and by degrees died away altogether, leaving in its place a look of question. more and more settled his countenance grew, while all the time he never took his eyes off mr. sclater's, until its expression at length was that of pitiful unconscious reproof, mingled with sympathetic shame. he had never met anything like this before. nothing low like this--for all injustice, and especially all that sort of thing which janet called "dingin' the motes wi' the beam," is eternally low--had gibbie seen in the holy temple of glashgar! he had no way of understanding or interpreting it save by calling to his aid the sad knowledge of evil, gathered in his earliest years. except in the laird and fergus and the gamekeeper, he had not, since fleeing from lucky croale's houff, seen a trace of unreasonable anger in any one he knew. robert or janet had never scolded him. he might go and come as he pleased. the night was sacred as the day in that dear house. his father, even when most overcome by the wicked thing, had never scolded him! the boys remaining absolutely silent, the minister had it all his own way. but before he had begun to draw to a close, across the blinding mists of his fog-breeding wrath he began to be aware of the shining of two heavenly lights, the eyes, namely, of the dumb boy fixed upon him. they jarred him a little in his onward course; they shook him as if with a doubt; the feeling undefined slowly grew to a notion, first obscure, then plain: they were eyes of reproof that were fastened upon his! at the first suspicion, his anger flared up more fierce than ever; but it was a flare of a doomed flame; slowly the rebuke told, was telling; the self-satisfied in-the-rightness--a very different thing from righteousness--of the man was sinking before the innocent difference of the boy; he began to feel awkward, he hesitated, he ceased: for the moment gibbie, unconsciously, had conquered; without knowing it, he was the superior of the two, and mr. sclater had begun to learn that he could never exercise authority over him. but the wordly-wise man will not seem to be defeated even where he knows he is. if he do give in, he will make it look as if it came of the proper motion of his own goodness. after a slight pause, the minister spoke again, but with the changed tone of one who has had an apology made to him, whose anger is appeased, and who therefore acts the neptune over the billows of his own sea. that was the way he would slide out of it. "donal grant," he said, "you had better go to bed at once, and get fit for your work to-morrow. i will go with you to call upon the principal. take care you are not out of the way when i come for you.--get your cap, sir gilbert, and come. mrs. sclater was already very uneasy about you when i left her." gibbie took from his pocket the little ivory tablets mrs. sclater had given him, wrote the following words, and handed them to the minister: "dear sir, i am going to slepe this night with donal. the bed is bigg enuf for . good night, sir." for a moment the minister's wrath seethed again. like a volcano, however, that has sent out a puff of steam, but holds back its lava, he thought better of it: here was a chance of retiring with grace--in well-conducted retreat, instead of headlong rout. "then be sure you are home by lesson-time," he said. "donal can come with you. good night. mind you don't keep each other awake." donal said "good night, sir," and gibbie gave him a serious and respectful nod. he left the room, and the boys turned and looked at each other. donal's countenance expressed an indignant sense of wrong, but gibbie's revealed a more profound concern. he stood motionless, intent on the receding steps of the minister. the moment the sound of them ceased, he darted soundless after him. donal, who from mr. sclater's reply had understood what gibbie had written, was astonished, and starting to his feet followed him. by the time he reached the door, gibbie was past the second lamp, his shadow describing a huge half-circle around him, as he stole from lamp to lamp after the minister, keeping always a lamp-post still between them. when the minister turned a corner, gibbie made a soundless dart to it, and peeped round, lingered a moment looking, then followed again. on and on went mr. sclater, and on and on went gibbie, careful constantly not to be seen by him; and on and on went donal, careful to be seen of neither. they went a long way as he thought, for to the country boy distance between houses seemed much greater than between dykes or hedges. at last the minister went up the steps of a handsome house, took a key from his pocket, and opened the door. from some impulse or other, as he stepped in, he turned sharp round, and saw gibbie. "come in," he said, in a loud authoritative tone, probably taking the boy's appearance for the effect of repentance and a desire to return to his own bed. gibbie lifted his cap, and walked quietly on towards the other end of daur-street. donal dared not follow, for mr. sclater stood between, looking out. presently however the door shut with a great bang, and donal was after gibbie like a hound. but gibbie had turned a corner, and was gone from his sight. donal turned a corner too, but it was a wrong corner. concluding that gibbie had turned another corner ahead of him, he ran on and on, in the vanishing hope of catching sight of him again; but he was soon satisfied he had lost him,--nor him only, but himself as well, for he had not the smallest idea how to return, even as far as the minister's house. it rendered the matter considerably worse that, having never heard the name of the street where he lodged but once--when the minister gave direction to the porter, he had utterly forgotten it. so there he was, out in the night, astray in the streets of a city of many tens of thousands, in which he had never till that day set foot--never before having been in any larger abode of men than a scattered village of thatched roofs. but he was not tired, and so long as a man is not tired, he can do well, even in pain. but a city is a dreary place at night, even to one who knows his way in it--much drearier to one lost--in some respects drearier than a heath--except there be old mine-shafts in it. "it's as gien a' the birds o' a country had creepit intil their bit eggs again, an' the day was left bare o' sang!" said the poet to himself as he walked. night amongst houses was a new thing to him. night on the hillsides and in the fields he knew well; but this was like a place of tombs--what else, when all were dead for the night? the night is the world's graveyard, and the cities are its catacombs. he repeated to himself all his own few ballads, then repeated them aloud as he walked, indulging the fancy that he had a long audience on each side of him; but he dropped into silence the moment any night-wanderer appeared. presently he found himself on the shore of the river, and tried to get to the edge of the water; but it was low tide, the lamps did not throw much light so far, the moon was clouded, he got among logs and mud, and regained the street bemired, and beginning to feel weary. he was saying to himself what ever was he to do all the night long, when round a corner a little way off came a woman. it was no use asking counsel of her, however, or of anyone, he thought, so long as he did not know even the name of the street he wanted--a street which as he walked along it had seemed interminable. the woman drew near. she was rather tall, erect in the back, but bowed in the shoulders, with fierce black eyes, which were all that he could see of her face, for she had a little tartan shawl over her head, which she held together with one hand, while in the other she carried a basket. but those eyes were enough to make him fancy he must have seen her before. they were just passing each other, under a lamp, when she looked hard at him, and stopped. "man," she said, "i hae set e'en upo' your face afore!" "gien that be the case," answered donal, "ye set e'en upo' 't again." "whaur come ye frae?" she asked. "that's what i wad fain speir mysel'," he replied. "but, wuman," he went on, "i fancy i hae set e'en upo' your e'en afore--i canna weel say for yer face. whaur come ye frae?" "ken ye a place they ca'--daurside?" she rejoined. "daurside's a gey lang place," answered donal; "an' this maun be aboot the tae en' o' 't, i'm thinkin'." "ye're no far wrang there," she returned; "an' ye hae a gey gleg tongue i' yer heid for a laad frae daurside." "i never h'ard 'at tongues war cuttit shorter there nor ither gaits," said donal; "but i didna mean ye ony offence." "there's nane ta'en, nor like to be," answered the woman.--"ken ye a place they ca' mains o' glashruach?" as she spoke she let go her shawl, and it opened from her face like two curtains. "lord! it's the witch-wife!" cried donal, retreating a pace in his astonishment. the woman burst into a great laugh, a hard, unmusical, but not unmirthful laugh. "ay!" she said, "was that hoo the fowk wad hae't o' me?" "it wasna muckle won'er, efter ye cam wydin' throu' watter yairds deep, an' syne gaed doon the spate on a bran'er." "weel, it was the maddest thing!" she returned, with another laugh which stopped abruptly. "--i wadna dee the like again to save my life. but the michty cairried me throu'.--an' hoo's wee sir gibbie?--come in--i dinna ken yer name--but we're jist at the door o' my bit garret. come quaiet up the stair, an' tell me a' aboot it." "weel, i wadna be sorry to rist a bit, for i hae tint mysel a'thegither, an' i'm some tiret," answered donal. "i but left the mains thestreen." "come in an' walcome; an whan ye're ristit, an' i'm rid o' my basket, i'll sune pit ye i' the gait o' hame." donal was too tired, and too glad to be once more in the company of a human being, to pursue further explanation at present. he followed her, as quietly as he could, up the dark stair. when she struck a light, he saw a little garret-room--better than decently furnished, it seemed to the youth from the hills, though his mother would have thought it far from tidy. the moment the woman got a candle lighted, she went to a cupboard, and brought thence a bottle and a glass. when donal declined the whisky she poured out, she seemed disappointed, and setting down the glass, let it stand. but when she had seated herself, and begun to relate her adventures in quest of gibbie, she drew it towards her, and sipped as she talked. some day she would tell him, she said, the whole story of her voyage on the brander, which would make him laugh; it made her laugh, even now, when it came back to her in her bed at night, though she was far enough from laughing at the time. then she told him a great deal about gibbie and his father. "an' noo," remarked donal, "he'll be thinkin' 't a' ower again, as he rins aboot the toon this verra meenute, luikin' for me!" "dinna ye trible yersel' aboot him," said the woman. "he kens the toon as weel's ony rottan kens the drains o' 't.--but whaur div ye pit up?" she added, "for it's time dacent fowk was gauin' to their beds." donal explained that he knew neither the name of the street nor of the people where he was lodging. "tell me this or that--something--onything aboot the hoose or the fowk, or what they're like, an' it may be 'at i'll ken them," she said. but scarcely had he begun his description of the house when she cried, "hoot, man! it's at lucky murkison's ye are, i' the wuddiehill. come awa', an' i s' tak ye hame in a jiffey." so saying, she rose, took the candle, showed him down the stair, and followed. it was past midnight, and the moon was down, but the street-lamps were not yet extinguished, and they walked along without anything to interrupt their conversation--chiefly about sir gibbie and sir george. but perhaps if donal had known the cause of gibbie's escape from the city, and that the dread thing had taken place in this woman's house, he would not have walked quite so close to her. poor mistress croale, however, had been nowise to blame for that, and the shock it gave her had even done something to check the rate of her downhill progress. it let her see, with a lightning flash from the pit, how wide the rent now yawned between her and her former respectability. she continued, as we know, to drink whisky, and was not unfrequently overcome by it; but in her following life as peddler, she measured her madness more; and, much in the open air and walking a great deal, with a basket sometimes heavy, her indulgence did her less physical harm; her temper recovered a little, she regained a portion of her self-command; and at the close of those years of wandering, she was less of a ruin, both mentally and spiritually, than at their commencement. when she received her hundred pounds for the finding of sir gibbie, she rented a little shop in the gallery of the market, where she sold such things as she had carried about the country, adding to her stock, upon the likelihood of demand, without respect to unity either conventional or real, in the character of the wares she associated. the interest and respectability of this new start in life, made a little fresh opposition to the inroads of her besetting sin; so that now she did not consume as much whisky in three days as she did in one when she had her houff on the shore. some people seem to have been drinking all their lives, of necessity getting more and more into the power of the enemy, but without succumbing at a rapid rate, having even their times of uplifting and betterment. mistress croale's complexion was a little clearer; her eyes were less fierce; her expression was more composed; some of the women who like her had shops in the market, had grown a little friendly with her; and, which was of more valuable significance, she had come to be not a little regarded by the poor women of the lower parts behind the market, who were in the way of dealing with her. for the moment a customer of this class, and she had but few of any other, appeared at her shop, or covered stall, rather, she seemed in spirit to go outside the counter and buy with her, giving her the best counsel she had, now advising the cheaper, now the dearer of two articles; while now and then one could tell of having been sent by her to another shop, where, in the particular case, she could do better. a love of affairs, no doubt, bore a part in this peculiarity, but there is all the difference between the two ways of embodying activity--to one's own advantage only, and--to the advantage of one's neighbour as well. for my part, if i knew a woman behaved to her neighbours as mistress croale did to hers, were she the worst of drunkards in between, i could not help both respecting and loving her. alas that such virtue is so portentously scarce! there are so many that are sober for one that is honest! deep are the depths of social degradation to which the clean, purifying light yet reaches, and lofty are the heights of social honour where yet the light is nothing but darkness. any thoughtful person who knew mistress croale's history, would have feared much for her, and hoped a little: her so-called fate was still undecided. in the mean time she made a living, did not get into debt, spent an inordinate portion of her profits in drink, but had regained and was keeping up a kind and measure of respectability. before they reached the widdiehill, donal, with the open heart of the poet, was full of friendliness to her, and rejoiced in the mischance that had led him to make her acquaintance. "ye ken, of coorse," he happened to say, "'at gibbie's wi' maister sclater?" "weel eneuch," she answered. "i hae seen him tee; but he's a gran' gentleman grown, an' i wadna like to be affrontit layin' claim till's acquaintance,--walcome as he ance was to my hoose!" she had more reason for the doubt and hesitation she thus expressed than donal knew. but his answer was none the less the true one as regarded his friend. "ye little ken gibbie," he said "gien ye think that gait o' 'im! gang ye to the minister's door and speir for 'im! he'll be doon the stair like a shot.--but 'deed maybe he's come back, an' 's i' my chaumer the noo! ye'll come up the stair an' see?" "na, i wunna dee that," said mistress croale, who did not wish to face mistress murkison, well known to her in the days of her comparative prosperity. she pointed out the door to him, but herself stood on the other side of the way till she saw it opened by her old friend in her night-cap, and heard her make jubilee over his return. gibbie had come home and gone out again to look for him, she said. "weel," remarked donal, "there wad be sma' guid in my gaein' to luik for him. it wad be but the sheep gaein' to luik for the shepherd." "ye're richt there," said his landlady. "a tint bairn sud aye sit doon an' sit still." "weel, ye gang till yer bed, mem," returned donal. "lat me see hoo yer door works, an' i'll lat him in whan he comes." gibbie came within an hour, and all was well. they made their communication, of which donal's was far the more interesting, had their laugh over the affair, and went to bed. chapter xliii. the minister's defeat. the minister's wrath, when he found he had been followed home by gibbie who yet would not enter the house, instantly rose in redoubled strength. he was ashamed to report the affair to mrs. sclater just as it had passed. he was but a married old bachelor, and fancied he must keep up his dignity in the eyes of his wife, not having yet learned that, if a man be true, his friends and lovers will see to his dignity. so his anger went on smouldering all night long, and all through his sleep, without a touch of cool assuagement, and in the morning he rose with his temper very feverish. during breakfast he was gloomy, but would confess to no inward annoyance. what added to his unrest was, that, although he felt insulted, he did not know what precisely the nature of the insult was. even in his wrath he could scarcely set down gibbie's following of him to a glorying mockery of his defeat. doubtless, for a man accustomed to deal with affairs, to rule over a parish--for one who generally had his way in the kirk-session, and to whom his wife showed becoming respect, it was scarcely fitting that the rude behaviour of an ignorant country dummy should affect him so much: he ought to have been above such injury. but the lad whom he so regarded, had first with his mere looks lowered him in his own eyes, then showed himself beyond the reach of his reproof by calmly refusing to obey him, and then become unintelligible by following him like a creature over whom surveillance was needful! the more he thought of this last, the more inexplicable it seemed to become, except on the notion of deliberate insult. and the worst was, that henceforth he could expect to have no power at all over the boy! if it was like this already, how would it be in the time to come? if, on the other hand, he were to re-establish his authority at the cost of making the boy hate him, then, the moment he was of age, his behaviour would be that of a liberated enemy: he would go straight to the dogs, and his money with him!--the man of influence and scheme did well to be annoyed. gibbie made his appearance at ten o'clock, and went straight to the study, where at that hour the minister was always waiting him. he entered with his own smile, bending his head in morning salutation. the minister said "good morning," but gruffly, and without raising his eyes from the last publication of the spalding club. gibbie seated himself in his usual place, arranged his book and slate, and was ready to commence--when the minister, having now summoned resolution, lifted his head, fixed his eyes on him, and said sternly-- "sir gilbert, what was your meaning in following me, after refusing to accompany me?" gibbie's face flushed. mr. sclater believed he saw him for the first time ashamed of himself; his hope rose; his courage grew; he augured victory and a re-established throne: he gathered himself up in dignity, prepared to overwhelm him. but gibbie showed no hesitation; he took his slate instantly, found his pencil, wrote, and handed the slate to the minister. there stood these words: "i thought you was drunnk." mr. sclater started to his feet, the hand which held the offending document uplifted, his eyes flaming, his checks white with passion, and with the flat of the slate came down a great blow on the top of gibbie's head. happily the latter was the harder of the two, and the former broke, flying mostly out of the frame. it took gibbie terribly by surprise. half-stunned, he started to his feet, and for one moment the wild beast which was in him, as it is in everybody, rushed to the front of its cage. it would have gone ill then with the minister, had not as sudden a change followed; the very same instant, it was as if an invisible veil, woven of gracious air and odour and dew, had descended upon him; the flame of his wrath went out, quenched utterly; a smile of benignest compassion overspread his countenance; in his offender he saw only a brother. but mr. sclater saw no brother before him, for when gibbie rose he drew back to better his position, and so doing made it an awkard one indeed. for it happened occasionally that, the study being a warm room, mrs. sclater, on a winter evening, sat there with her husband, whence it came that on the floor squatted a low foot-stool, subject to not unfrequent clerical imprecation: when he stepped back, he trod on the edge of it, stumbled, and fell. gibbie darted forward. a part of the minister's body rested upon the stool, and its elevation, made the first movement necessary to rising rather difficult, so that he could not at once get off his back. what followed was the strangest act for a scotch boy, but it must be kept in mind how limited were his means of expression. he jumped over the prostrate minister, who the next moment seeing his face bent over him from behind, and seized, like the gamekeeper, with suspicion born of his violence, raised his hands to defend himself, and made a blow at him. gibbie avoided it, laid hold of his arms inside each elbow, clamped them to the floor, kissed him on forehead and cheek, and began to help him up like a child. having regained his legs, the minister stood for a moment, confused and half-blinded. the first thing he saw was a drop of blood stealing down gibbie's forehead. he was shocked at what he had done. in truth he had been frightfully provoked, but it was not for a clergyman so to avenge an insult, and as mere chastisement it was brutal. what would mrs. sclater say to it? the rascal was sure to make his complaint to her! and there too was his friend, the herd-lad, in the drawing-room with her! "go and wash your face," he said, "and come back again directly." gibbie put his hand to his face, and feeling something wet, looked, and burst into a merry laugh. "i am sorry i have hurt you," said the minister, not a little relieved at the sound; "but how dared you write such a--such an insolence? a clergyman never gets drunk." gibbie picked up the frame which the minister had dropped in his fall: a piece of the slate was still sticking in one side, and he wrote upon it: i will kno better the next time. i thout it was alwais whisky that made peeple like that. i begg your pardon, sir. he handed him the fragment, ran to his own room, returned presently, looking all right, and when mr. sclater would have attended to his wound, would not let him even look at it, laughing at the idea. still further relieved to find there was nothing to attract observation to the injury, and yet more ashamed of himself, the minister made haste to the refuge of their work; but it did not require the gleam of the paper substituted for the slate, to keep him that morning in remembrance of what he had done; indeed it hovered about him long after the gray of the new slate had passed into a dark blue. from that time, after luncheon, which followed immediately upon lessons, gibbie went and came as he pleased. mrs. sclater begged he would never be out after ten o'clock without having let them know that he meant to stay all night with his friend: not once did he neglect this request, and they soon came to have perfect confidence not only in any individual promise he might make, but in his general punctuality. mrs. sclater never came to know anything of his wounded head, and it gave the minister a sharp sting of compunction, as well as increased his sense of moral inferiority, when he saw that for a fortnight or so he never took his favourite place at her feet, evidently that she should not look down on his head. the same evening they had friends to dinner. already gibbie was so far civilized, as they called it, that he might have sat at any dining-table without attracting the least attention, but that evening he attracted a great deal. for he could scarcely eat his own dinner for watching the needs of those at the table with him, ready to spring from his chair and supply the least lack. this behaviour naturally harassed the hostess, and at last, upon one of those occasions, the servants happening to be out of the room, she called him to her side, and said, "you were quite right to do that now, gilbert, but please never do such a thing when the servants are in the room. it confuses them, and makes us all uncomfortable." gibbie heard with obedient ear, but took the words as containing express permission to wait upon the company in the absence of other ministration. when therefore the servants finally disappeared, as was the custom there in small households, immediately after placing the dessert, gibbie got up, and, much to the amusement of the guests, waited on them as quite a matter of course. but they would have wondered could they have looked into the heart of the boy, and beheld the spirit in which the thing was done, the soil in which was hid the root of the service; for to him the whole thing was sacred as an altar-rite to the priest who ministers. round and round the table, deft and noiseless, he went, altogether aware of the pleasure of the thing, not at all of its oddity--which, however, had he understood it perfectly, he would not in the least have minded. all this may, both in gibbie and the narrative, seem trifling, but i more than doubt whether, until our small services are sweet with divine affection, our great ones, if such we are capable of, will ever have the true christian flavour about them. and then such eagerness to pounce upon every smallest opportunity of doing the will of the master, could not fail to further proficiency in the service throughout. presently the ladies rose, and when they had left the room, the host asked gibbie to ring the bell. he obeyed with alacrity, and a servant appeared. she placed the utensils for making and drinking toddy, after scotch custom, upon the table. a shadow fell upon the soul of gibbie: for the first time since he ran from the city, he saw the well-known appointments of midnight orgy, associated in his mind with all the horrors from which he had fled. the memory of old nights in the street, as he watched for his father, and then helped him home; of his father's last prayer, drinking and imploring; of his white, motionless face the next morning; of the row at lucky croale's, and poor black sambo's gaping throat--all these terrible things came back upon him, as he stood staring at the tumblers and the wine glasses and the steaming kettle. "what is the girl thinking of!" exclaimed the minister, who had been talking to his next neighbour, when he heard the door close behind the servant. "she has actually forgotten the whisky!--sir gilbert," he went on, with a glance at the boy, "as you are so good, will you oblige me by bringing the bottle from the sideboard?" gibbie started at the sound of his name, but did not move from the place. after a moment, the minister, who had resumed the conversation, thinking he had not heard him, looked up. there, between the foot of the table and the sideboard, stood gibbie as if fixed to the floor gazing out of his blue eyes at the minister--those eyes filmy with gathering tears, the smile utterly faded from his countenance.--would the master have drunk out of that bottle? he was thinking with himself. imagining some chance remark had hurt the boy's pride, and not altogether sorry--it gave hope of the gentleman he wanted to make him--mr. sclater spoke again: "it's just behind you, sir gilbert--the whisky bottle--that purple one with the silver top." gibbie never moved, but his eyes began to run over. a fearful remembrance of the blow he had given him on the head rushed back on mr. sclater: could it be the consequence of that? was the boy paralyzed? he was on the point of hurrying to him, but restrained himself, and rising with deliberation, approached the sideboard. a nearer sight of the boy's face reassured him. "i beg your pardon, sir gilbert," he said; "i thought you would not mind waiting on us as well as on the ladies. it is your own fault, you know.--there," he added, pointing to the table; "take your place, and have a little toddy. it won't hurt you." the eyes of all the guests were by this time fixed on gibbie. what could be the matter with the curious creature? they wondered. his gentle merriment and quiet delight in waiting upon them, had given a pleasant concussion to the spirits of the party, which had at first threatened to be rather a stiff and dull one; and there now was the boy all at once looking as if he had received a blow, or some cutting insult which he did not know how to resent! between the agony of refusing to serve, and the impossibility of putting his hand to unclean ministration, gibbie had stood as if spell-bound. he would have thought little of such horrors in lucky croale's houff, but the sight of the things here terrified him. he felt as a corinthian christian must, catching a sight of one of the elders of the church feasting in a temple. but the last words of the minister broke the painful charm. he burst into tears, and darting from the room, not a little to his guardian's relief, hurried to his own. the guests stared bewildered. "he'll be gone to the ladies," said their host. "he's an odd creature. mrs. sclater understands him better than i do. he's more at home with her." therewith he proceeded to tell them his history, and whence the interest he had in him, not bringing down his narrative beyond the afternoon of the preceding day. the next morning, mrs. sclater had a talk with him concerning his whim of waiting at table, telling him he must not do so again; it was not the custom for gentlemen to do the things that servants were paid to do; it was not fair to the servants, and so on--happening to end with an utterance of mild wonder at his fancy for such a peculiarity. this exclamation gibbie took for a question, or at least the expression of a desire to understand the reason of the thing. he went to a side-table, and having stood there a moment or two, returned with a new testament, in which he pointed out the words, "but i am among you as he that serveth." giving her just time to read them, he took the book again, and in addition presented the words, "the disciple is not above his master, but every one that is perfect shall be as his master." mrs. sclater was as much put out as if he had been guilty of another and worse indiscretion. the idea of anybody ordering his common doings, not to say his oddities, by principles drawn from a source far too sacred to be practically regarded, was too preposterous to have ever become even a notion to her. henceforth, however, it was a mote to trouble her mind's eye, a mote she did not get rid of until it began to turn to a glimmer of light. i need hardly add that gibbie waited at her dinner-table no more. chapter xliv. the sinner. no man can order his life, for it comes flowing over him from behind. but if it lay before us, and we could watch its current approaching from a long distance, what could we do with it before it had reached the now? in like wise a man thinks foolishly who imagines he could have done this and that with his own character and development, if he had but known this and that in time. were he as good as he thinks himself wise he could but at best have produced a fine cameo in very low relief: with a work in the round, which he is meant to be, he could have done nothing. the one secret of life and development, is not to devise and plan, but to fall in with the forces at work--to do every moment's duty aright--that being the part in the process allotted to us; and let come--not what will, for there is no such thing--but what the eternal thought wills for each of us, has intended in each of us from the first. if men would but believe that they are in process of creation, and consent to be made--let the maker handle them as the potter his clay, yielding themselves in respondent motion and submissive hopeful action with the turning of his wheel, they would ere long find themselves able to welcome every pressure of that hand upon them, even when it was felt in pain, and sometimes not only to believe but to recognize the divine end in view, the bringing of a son into glory; whereas, behaving like children who struggle and scream while their mother washes and dresses them, they find they have to be washed and dressed, notwithstanding, and with the more discomfort: they may even have to find themselves set half naked and but half dried in a corner, to come to their right minds, and ask to be finished. at this time neither gibbie nor donal strove against his creation--what the wise of this world call their fate. in truth gibbie never did; and for donal, the process was at present in a stage much too agreeable to rouse any inclination to resist. he enjoyed his new phase of life immensely. if he did not distinguish himself as a scholar, it was not because he neglected his work, but because he was at the same time doing that by which alone the water could ever rise in the well he was digging: he was himself growing. far too eager after knowledge to indulge in emulation, he gained no prizes: what had he to do with how much or how little those around him could eat as compared with himself? no work noble or lastingly good can come of emulation any more than of greed: i think the motives are spiritually the same. to excite it is worthy only of the commonplace vulgar schoolmaster, whose ambition is to show what fine scholars he can turn out, that he may get the more pupils. emulation is the devil-shadow of aspiration. the set of the current in the schools is at present towards a boundless swamp, but the wise among the scholars see it, and wisdom is the tortoise which shall win the race. in the mean time how many, with the legs and the brain of the hare, will think they are gaining it, while they are losing things whose loss will make any prize unprized! the result of donal's work appeared but very partially in his examinations, which were honest and honourable to him; it was hidden in his thoughts, his aspirations, his growth, and his verse--all which may be seen should i one day tell donal's story. for gibbie, the minister had not been long teaching him, before he began to desire to make a scholar of him. partly from being compelled to spend some labour upon it, the boy was gradually developing an unusual facility in expression. his teacher, compact of conventionalities, would have modelled the result upon some writer imagined by him a master of style; but the hurtful folly never got any hold of gibbie: all he ever cared about was to say what he meant, and avoid saying something else; to know when he had not said what he meant, and to set the words right. it resulted that, when people did not understand what he meant, the cause generally lay with them not with him; and that, if they sometimes smiled over his mode, it was because it lay closer to nature than theirs: they would have found it a hard task to improve it. what the fault with his organs of speech was, i cannot tell. his guardian lost no time in having them examined by a surgeon in high repute, a professor of the university, but dr. skinner's opinion put an end to question and hope together. gibbie was not in the least disappointed. he had got on very well as yet without speech. it was not like sight or hearing. the only voice he could not hear was his own, and that was just the one he had neither occasion nor desire to hear. as to his friends, those who had known him the longest minded his dumbness the least. but the moment the defect was understood to be irreparable, mrs. sclater very wisely proceeded to learn the finger-speech; and as she learned it, she taught it to gibbie. as to his manners, which had been and continued to be her chief care, a certain disappointment followed her first rapid success: she never could get them to take on the case-hardening needful for what she counted the final polish. they always retained a certain simplicity which she called childishness. it came in fact of childlikeness, but the lady was not child enough to distinguish the difference--as great as that between the back and the front of a head. as, then, the minister found him incapable of forming a style, though time soon proved him capable of producing one, so the minister's wife found him as incapable of putting on company manners of any sort, as most people are incapable of putting them off--without being rude. it was disappointing to mrs. sclater, but gibbie was just as content to appear what he was, as he was unwilling to remain what he was. being dumb, she would say to herself he would pass in any society; but if he had had his speech, she never could have succeeded in making him a thorough gentleman: he would have always been saying the right thing in the wrong place. by the wrong place she meant the place where alone the thing could have any pertinence. in after years, however, gibbie's manners were, whether pronounced such or not, almost universally felt to be charming. but gibbie knew nothing of his manners any more than of the style in which he wrote. one night on their way home from an evening party, the minister and his wife had a small difference, probably about something of as little real consequence to them as the knowledge of it is to us, but by the time they reached home, they had got to the very summit of politeness with each other. gibbie was in the drawing-room, as it happened, waiting their return. at the first sound of their voices, he knew, before a syllable reached him that something was wrong. when they entered, they were too much engrossed in difference to heed his presence, and went on disputing--with the utmost external propriety of words and demeanour, but with both injury and a sense of injury in every tone. had they looked at gibbie, i cannot think they would have been silenced; but while neither of them dared turn eyes the way of him, neither had moral strength sufficient to check the words that rose to the lips. a discreet, socially wise boy would have left the room, but how could gibbie abandon his friends to the fiery darts of the wicked one! he ran to the side-table before mentioned. with a vague presentiment of what was coming, mrs. sclater, feeling rather than seeing him move across the room like a shadow, sat in dread expectation; and presently her fear arrived, in the shape of a large new testament, and a face of loving sadness, and keen discomfort, such as she had never before seen gibbie wear. he held out the book to her, pointing with a finger to the words--she could not refuse to let her eyes fall upon them--"have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with another." what gibbie made of the salt, i do not know; and whether he understood it or not was of little consequence, seeing he had it; but the rest of the sentence he understood so well that he would fain have the writhing yoke-fellows think of it. the lady's cheeks had been red before, but now they were redder. she rose, cast an angry look at the dumb prophet, a look which seemed to say "how dare you suggest such a thing?" and left the room. "what have you got there?" asked the minister, turning sharply upon him. gibbie showed him the passage. "what have you got to do with it?" he retorted, throwing the book on the table. "go to bed." "a detestable prig!" you say, reader?--that is just what mr. and mrs. sclater thought him that night, but they never quarrelled again before him. in truth, they were not given to quarrelling. many couples who love each other more, quarrel more, and with less politeness. for gibbie, he went to bed--puzzled, and afraid there must be a beam in his eye. the very first time donal and he could manage it, they set out together to find mistress croale. donal thought he had nothing to do but walk straight from mistress murkison's door to hers, but, to his own annoyance, and the disappointment of both, he soon found he had not a notion left as to how the place lay, except that it was by the river. so, as it was already rather late, they put off their visit to another time, and took a walk instead. but mistress croale, haunted by old memories, most of them far from pleasant, grew more and more desirous of looking upon the object of perhaps the least disagreeable amongst them: she summoned resolution at last, went to the market a little better dressed than usual, and when business there was over, and she had shut up her little box of a shop, walked to daur-street to the minister's house. "he's aften eneuch crossed my door," she said to herself, speaking of mr. sclater; "an' though, weel i wat, the sicht o' 'im never bodit me onything but ill, i never loot him ken he was less nor walcome; an' gien bein' a minister gies the freedom o' puir fowk's hooses, it oucht in the niffer (exchange) to gie them the freedom o' his." therewith encouraging herself, she walked up the steps and rang the bell. it was a cold, frosty winter evening and as she stood waiting for the door to be opened, much the poor woman longed for her own fireside and a dram. her period of expectation was drawn out not a little through the fact that the servant whose duty it was to answer the bell was just then waiting at table: because of a public engagement, the minister had to dine earlier than usual. they were in the middle of their soup--cockie-leekie, nice and hot, when the maid informed her master that a woman was at the door, wanting to see sir gilbert. gibbie looked up, put down his spoon, and was rising to go, when the minister, laying his hand on his arm, pressed him gently back to his chair, and gibbie yielded, waiting. "what sort of a woman?" he asked the girl. "a decent-lookin' workin'-like body," she answered. "i couldna see her verra weel, it's sae foggy the nicht aboot the door." "tell her we're at dinner; she may call again in an hour. or if she likes to leave a message--stay: tell her to come again to-morrow morning.--i wonder who she is," he added, turning, he thought, to gibbie. but gibbie was gone. he had passed behind his chair, and all he saw of him was his back as he followed the girl from the room. in his eagerness he left the door open, and they saw him dart to the visitor, shake hands with her in evident delight, and begin pulling her towards the room. now mistress croale, though nowise inclined to quail before the minister, would not willingly have intruded herself upon him, especially while he sat at dinner with his rather formidable lady; but she fancied, for she stood where she could not see into the dining-room, that gibbie was taking her where they might have a quiet news together, and, occupied with her bonnet or some other source of feminine disquiet, remained thus mistaken until she stood on the threshold, when, looking up, she started, stopped, made an obedience to the minister, and another to the minister's lady, and stood doubtful, if not a little abashed. "not here! my good woman," said mr. sclater, rising. "--oh, it's you, mistress croale!--i will speak to you in the hall." mrs. croale's face flushed, and she drew back a step. but gibbie still held her, and with a look to mr. sclater that should have sent straight to his heart the fact that she was dear to his soul, kept drawing her into the room; he wanted her to take his chair at the table. it passed swiftly through her mind that one who had been so intimate both with sir george and sir gibbie in the old time, and had given the latter his tea every sunday night for so long, might surely, even in such changed circumstances, be allowed to enter the same room with him, however grand it might be; and involuntarily almost she yielded half a doubtful step, while mr. sclater, afraid of offending sir gilbert, hesitated on the advance to prevent her. how friendly the warm air felt! how consoling the crimson walls with the soft flicker of the great fire upon them! how delicious the odour of the cockie-leekie! she could give up whisky a good deal more easily, she thought, if she had the comforts of a minister to fall back upon! and this was the same minister who had once told her that her soul was as precious to him as that of any other in his parish--and then driven her from respectable jink lane to the disreputable daurfoot! it all passed through her mind in a flash, while yet gibbie pulled and she resisted. "gilbert, come here," called mrs. sclater. he went to her side, obedient and trusting as a child. "really, gilbert, you must not," she said, rather loud for a whisper. "it won't do to turn things upside down this way. if you are to be a gentleman, and an inmate of my house, you must behave like other people. i cannot have a woman like that sitting at my table.--do you know what sort of a person she is?" gibbie's face shone up. he raised his hands. he was already able to talk a little. "is she a sinner?" he asked on his fingers. mrs. sclater nodded. gibbie wheeled round, and sprang back to the hall, whither the minister had, coming down upon her, bows on, like a sea-shouldering whale, in a manner ejected mistress croale, and where he was now talking to her with an air of confidential condescension, willing to wipe out any feeling of injury she might perhaps be inclined to cherish at not being made more welcome: to his consternation, gibbie threw his arms round her neck, and gave her a great hug. "sir gilbert!" he exclaimed, very angry, and the more angry that he knew he was in the right, "leave mistress croale alone, and go back to your dinner immediately.--jane, open the door." jane opened the door, gibbie let her go, and mrs. croale went. but on the threshold she turned. "weel, sir," she said, with more severity than pique, and a certain sad injury not unmingled with dignity, "ye hae stappit ower my door-sill mony's the time, an' that wi' sairer words i' yer moo' nor i ever mintit at peyin' ye back; an' i never said to ye gang. sae first ye turnt me oot o' my ain hoose, an' noo ye turn me oot o' yours; an' what's left ye to turn me oot o' but the hoose o' the lord? an', 'deed, sir, ye need never won'er gien the likes o' me disna care aboot gangin' to hear a preacht gospel: we wad fain see a practeesed ane! gien ye had said to me noo the nicht, 'come awa' ben, mistress croale, an' tak a plet o' cockie-leekie wi' 's; it's a cauld nicht;' it's mysel' wad hae been sae upliftit wi' yer kin'ness, 'at i wad hae gane hame an' ta'en--i dinna ken--aiblins a read at my bible, an' been to be seen at the kirk upo' sunday i wad--o' that ye may be sure; for it's a heap easier to gang to the kirk nor to read the buik yer lane, whaur ye canna help thinkin' upo' what it says to ye. but noo, as 'tis, i'm awa' hame to the whusky boatle, an' the sin o' 't, gien there be ony in sic a nicht o' cauld an' fog, 'ill jist lie at your door." "you shall have a plate of soup, and welcome, mistress croale!" said the minister, in a rather stagey tone of hospitality "--jane, take mistress croale to the kitchen with you, and--" "the deil's tail i' yer soup!--'at i sud say 't!" cried mistress croale, drawing herself up suddenly, with a snort of anger: "whan turnt i beggar? i wad fain be informt! was't yer soup or yer grace i soucht till, sir? the lord be atween you an' me! there's first 'at 'll be last, an' last 'at 'll be first. but the tane's no me, an' the tither's no you, sir." with that she turned and walked down the steps, holding her head high. "really, sir gilbert," said the minister, going back into the dining-room--but no gibbie was there!--nobody but his wife, sitting in solitary discomposure at the head of her dinner-table. the same instant, he heard a clatter of feet down the steps, and turned quickly into the hall again, where jane was in the act of shutting the door. "sir gilbert's run oot efter the wuman, sir!" she said. "hoot!" grunted the minister, greatly displeased, and went back to his wife. "take sir gilbert's plate away," said mrs. sclater to the servant. "that's his new testament again!" she went on, when the girl had left the room. "my dear! my dear! take care," said her husband. he had not much notion of obedience to god, but he had some idea of respect to religion. he was just an idolater of a christian shade. "really, mr. sclater," his wife continued, "i had no idea what i was undertaking. but you gave me no choice. the creature is incorrigible. but of course he must prefer the society of women like that. they are the sort he was accustomed to when he received his first impressions, and how could it be otherwise? you knew how he had been brought up, and what you had to expect!" "brought up!" cried the minister, and caused his spoonful of cockie-leekie to rush into his mouth with the noise of the german schlürfen, then burst into a loud laugh. "you should have seen him about the streets!--with his trowsers--" "mister sclater! then you ought to have known better!" said his wife, and laying down her spoon, sat back into the embrace of her chair. but in reality she was not the least sorry he had undertaken the charge. she could not help loving the boy, and her words were merely the foam of vexation, mingled with not a little jealousy, that he had left her, and his nice hot dinner, to go with the woman. had she been a fine lady like herself, i doubt if she would have liked it much better; but she specially recoiled from coming into rivalry with one in whose house a horrible murder had been committed, and who had been before the magistrates in consequence. nothing further was said until the second course was on the table. then the lady spoke again: "you really must, mr. sclater, teach him the absurdity of attempting to fit every point of his behaviour to--to--words which were of course quite suitable to the time when they were spoken, but which it is impossible to take literally now-a-days--as impossible as to go about the streets with a great horn on your head and a veil hanging across it.--why!"--here she laughed--a laugh the less lady-like that, although it was both low and musical, it was scornful, and a little shaken by doubt.--"you saw him throw his arms round the horrid creature's neck!--well, he had just asked me if she was a sinner. i made no doubt she was. off with the word goes my gentleman to embrace her!" here they laughed together. dinner over, they went to a missionary meeting, where the one stood and made a speech and the other sat and listened, while gibbie was having tea with mistress croale. from that day gibbie's mind was much exercised as to what he could do for mistress croale, and now first he began to wish he had his money. as fast as he learned the finger-alphabet he had taught it to donal, and, as already they had a good many symbols in use between them, so many indeed that donal would often instead of speaking make use of signs, they had now the means of intercourse almost as free as if they had had between them two tongues instead of one. it was easy therefore for gibbie to impart to donal his anxiety concerning her, and his strong desire to help her, and doing so, he lamented in a gentle way his present inability. this communication donal judged it wise to impart in his turn to mistress croale. "ye see, mem," he said in conclusion, "he's some w'y or anither gotten 't intil's heid 'at ye're jist a wheen ower free wi' the boatle. i kenna. ye'll be the best jeedge o' that yersel'!" mistress croale was silent for a whole minute by the clock. from the moment when gibbie forsook his dinner and his grand new friends to go with her, the woman's heart had begun to grow to the boy, and her old memories fed the new crop of affection. "weel," she replied at length, with no little honesty, "--i mayna be sae ill 's he thinks me, for he had aye his puir father afore 's e'en; but the bairn's richt i' the main, an' we maun luik till't, an' see what can be dune; for eh! i wad be laith to disappint the bonnie laad!--maister grant, gien ever there wis a christi-an sowl upo' the face o' this wickit warl', that christi-an sowl's wee sir gibbie!--an' wha cud hae thoucht it! but it's the lord's doin', an' mervellous in oor eyes!--ow! ye needna luik like that; i ken my bible no that ill!" she added, catching a glimmer of surprise on donal's countenance. "but for that maister scletter--dod! i wadna be sair upon 'im--but gien he be fit to caw a nail here an' a nail there, an fix a sklet or twa, creepin' upo' the riggin' o' the kirk, i'm weel sure he's nae wise maister-builder fit to lay ony fundation.--ay! i tellt ye i kent my beuk no that ill!" she added with some triumph; then resumed: "what the waur wad he or she or sir gibbie hae been though they hed inveetit me, as i was there, to sit me doon, an' tak' a plet o' their cockie-leekie wi' them? there was ane 'at thoucht them 'at was far waur nor me, guid eneuch company for him; an' maybe i may sit doon wi' him efter a', wi' the help o' my bonnie wee sir gibbie.--i canna help ca'in' him wee sir gibbie--a' the toon ca'd 'im that, though haith! he'll be a big man or he behaud. an' for 's teetle, i was aye ane to gie honour whaur honour was due, an' never ance, weel as i kenned him, did i ca' his honest father, for gien ever there was an honest man yon was him!--never did i ca' him onything but sir george, naither mair nor less, an' that though he vroucht at the hardest at the cobblin' a' the ook, an' upo' setterdays was pleased to hae a guid wash i' my ain bedroom, an' pit on a clean sark o' my deid man's, rist his sowl!--no 'at i'm a papist, maister grant, an' aye kent better nor think it was ony eese prayin' for them 'at's gane; for wha is there to pey ony heed to sic haithenish prayers as that wad be? na! we maun pray for the livin' 'at it may dee some guid till, an' no for them 'at its a' ower wi'--the lord hae mercy upo' them!" my readers may suspect, one for one reason another for another, that she had already, before donal came that evening been holding communion with the idol in the three-cornered temple of her cupboard; and i confess that it was so. but it is equally true that before the next year was gone, she was a shade better--and that not without considerable struggle, and more failures than successes. upon one occasion--let those who analyze the workings of the human mind as they would the entrails of an eight-day clock, explain the phenomenon i am about to relate, or decline to believe it, as they choose--she became suddenly aware that she was getting perilously near the brink of actual drunkenness. "i'll tak but this ae mou'fu' mair," she said to herself; "it's but a mou'fu', an' it's the last i' the boatle, an' it wad be a peety naebody to get the guid o' 't." she poured it out. it was nearly half a glass. she took it in one large mouthful. but while she held it in her mouth to make the most of it, even while it was between her teeth, something smote her with the sudden sense that this very moment was the crisis of her fate, that now the axe was laid to the root of her tree. she dropped on her knees--not to pray like poor sir george--but to spout the mouthful of whisky into the fire. in roaring flame it rushed up the chimney. she started back. "eh!" she cried; "guid god! sic a deevil's i maun be, to cairry the like o' that i' my inside!--lord! i'm a perfec' byke o' deevils! my name it maun be legion. what is to become o' my puir sowl!" it was a week before she drank another drop--and then she took her devils with circumspection, and the firm resolve to let no more of them enter into her than she could manage to keep in order. mr. and mrs. sclater got over their annoyance as well as they could, and agreed that in this case no notice should be taken of gibbie's conduct. chapter xlv. shoals ahead. it had come to be the custom that gibbie should go to donal every friday afternoon about four o'clock, and remain with him till the same time on saturday, which was a holiday with both. one friday, just after he was gone, the temptation seized mrs. sclater to follow him, and, paying the lads an unexpected visit, see what they were about. it was a bright cold afternoon; and in fur tippet and muff, amidst the snow that lay everywhere on roofs and window-sills and pavements, and the wind that blew cold as it blows in few places besides, she looked, with her bright colour and shining eyes, like life itself laughing at death. but not many of those she met carried the like victory in their countenances, for the cold was bitter. as she approached the widdiehill, she reflected that she had followed gibbie so quickly, and walked so fast, that the boys could hardly have had time to settle to anything, and resolved therefore to make a little round and spend a few more minutes upon the way. but as, through a neighbouring street, she was again approaching the widdiehill, she caught sight of something which, as she was passing a certain shop, that of a baker known to her as one of her husband's parishioners, made her stop and look in through the glass which formed the upper half of the door. there she saw gibbie, seated on the counter, dangling his legs, eating a penny loaf, and looking as comfortable as possible.--"so soon after luncheon, too!" said mrs. sclater to herself with indignation, reading through the spectacles of her anger a reflection on her housekeeping. but a second look revealed, as she had dreaded, far weightier cause for displeasure: a very pretty girl stood behind the counter, with whose company gibbie was evidently much pleased. she was fair of hue, with eyes of gray and green, and red lips whose smile showed teeth whiter than the whitest of flour. at the moment she was laughing merrily, and talking gaily to gibbie. clearly they were on the best of terms, and the boy's bright countenance, laughter, and eager motions, were making full response to the girl's words. gibbie had been in the shop two or three times before, but this was the first time he had seen his old friend, mysie, of the amethyst ear-ring. and now one of them had reminded the other of that episode in which their histories had run together; from that mysie had gone on to other reminiscences of her childhood in which wee gibbie bore a part, and he had, as well as he could, replied with others, of his, in which she was concerned. mysie was a simple, well-behaved girl, and the entrance of neither father nor mother would have made the least difference in her behaviour to sir gilbert, though doubtless she was more pleased to have a chat with him than with her father's apprentice, who could speak indeed, but looked dull as the dough he worked in, whereas gibbie, although dumb, was radiant. but the faces of people talking often look more meaningful to one outside the talk-circle than they really are, and mrs. sclater, gazing through the glass, found, she imagined, large justification of displeasure. she opened the door sharply, and stepped in. gibbie jumped from his seat on the counter, and, with a smile of playful roguery, offered it to her; a vivid blush overspread mysie's fair countenance. "i thought you had gone to see donal," said mrs. sclater, in the tone of one deceived, and took no notice of the girl. gibbie gave her to understand that donal would arrive presently, and they were then going to the point of the pier, that donal might learn what the sea was like in a nor'-easter. "but why did you make your appointment here?" asked the lady. "because mysie and i are old friends," answered the boy on his fingers. then first mrs. sclater turned to the girl: having got over her first indignation, she spoke gently and with a frankness natural to her. "sir gilbert tells me you are old friends," she said. thereupon mysie told her the story of the ear-ring, which had introduced their present conversation, and added several other little recollections, in one of which she was drawn into a description, half pathetic, half humorous, of the forlorn appearance of wee gibbie, as he ran about in his truncated trousers. mrs. slater was more annoyed, however, than interested, for, in view of the young baronet's future, she would have had all such things forgotten; but gibbie was full of delight in the vivid recollections thus brought him of some of the less painful portions of his past, and appreciated every graphic word that fell from the girl's pretty lips. mrs. sclater took good care not to leave until donal came. then the boys, having asked her if she would not go with them, which invitation she declined with smiling thanks, took their departure and went to pay their visit to the german ocean, leaving her with mysie--which they certainly would not have done, could they have foreseen how the well-meaning lady--nine-tenths of the mischiefs in the world are well-meant--would hurt the feelings of the gentle-conditioned girl. for a long time after, as often as gibbie entered the shop, mysie left it and her mother came--a result altogether as mrs. sclater would have had it. but hardly anybody was ever in less danger of falling in love than gibbie; and the thing would not have been worth recording, but for the new direction it caused in mrs. sclater's thoughts: measures, she judged, must be taken. gladly as she would have centred gibbie's boyish affections in herself, she was too conscientious and experienced not to regard the danger of any special effort in that direction, and began therefore to cast about in her mind what could be done to protect him from one at least of the natural consequences of his early familiarity with things unseemly--exposure, namely, to the risk of forming low alliances--the more imminent that it was much too late to attempt any restriction of his liberty, so as to keep him from roaming the city at his pleasure. recalling what her husband had told her of the odd meeting between the boy and a young lady at miss kimble's school--some relation, she thought he had said--also the desire to see her again which gibbie, on more than one occasion, had shown, she thought whether she could turn the acquaintance to account. she did not much like miss kimble, chiefly because of her affectations--which, by the way, were caricatures of her own; but she knew her very well, and there was no reason why she should not ask her to come and spend the evening, and bring two or three of the elder girls with her: a little familiarity with the looks, manners, and dress of refined girls of his own age, would be the best antidote to his taste for low society, from that of bakers' daughters downwards. it was mrs. sclater's own doing that gibbie had not again spoken to ginevra. nowise abashed at the thought of the grenadier or her array of doves, he would have gone, the very next day after meeting them in the street, to call upon her: it was some good, he thought, of being a rich instead of a poor boy, that, having lost thereby those whom he loved best, he had come where he could at least see miss galbraith; but mrs. sclater had pretended not to understand where he wanted to go, and used other artifices besides--well-meant, of course--to keep him to herself until she should better understand him. after that he had seen ginevra more than once at church, but had had no chance of speaking to her. for, in the sudden dispersion of its agglomerate particles, a scotch congregation is--or was in gibbie's time--very like the well-known vitreous drop called a prince rupert's tear, in which the mutually repellent particles are held together by a strongly contracted homogeneous layer--to separate with explosion the instant the tough skin is broken and vibration introduced; and as mrs. sclater generally sat in her dignity to the last, and gibbie sat with her, only once was he out in time to catch a glimpse of the ultimate rank of the retreating girls. he was just starting to pursue them, when mrs. sclater, perceiving his intention, detained him by requesting the support of his arm--a way she had, pretending to be weary, or to have given her ankle a twist, when she wanted to keep him by her side. another time he had followed them close enough to see which turn they took out of daur-street; but that was all he had learned, and when the severity of the winter arrived, and the snow lay deep, sometimes for weeks together, the chances of meeting them were few. the first time the boys went out together, that when they failed to find mistress croale's garret, they made an excursion in search of the girls' school, but had been equally unsuccessful in that; and although they never after went for a walk without contriving to pass through some part of the region in which they thought it must lie, they had never yet even discovered a house upon which they could agree as presenting probabilities. mr. galbraith did not take miss kimble into his confidence with respect to his reasons for so hurriedly placing his daughter under her care: he was far too reticent, too proud, and too much hurt for that. hence, when mrs. sclater's invitation arrived, the schoolmistress was aware of no reason why miss galbraith should not be one of the girls to go with her, especially as there was her cousin, sir gilbert, whom she herself would like to meet again, in the hope of removing the bad impression which, in the discharge of her duty, she feared she must have made upon him. one day, then, at luncheon, mrs. sclater told gibbie that some ladies were coming to tea, and they were going to have supper instead of dinner. he must put on his best clothes, she said. he did as she desired, was duly inspected, approved on the whole, and finished off by a few deft fingers at his necktie, and a gentle push or two from the loveliest of hands against his hair-thatch, and was seated in the drawing-room with mrs. sclater when the ladies arrived. ginevra and he shook hands, she with the sweetest of rose-flushes, he with the radiance of delighted surprise. but, a moment after, when mrs. sclater and her guests had seated themselves, gibbie, their only gentleman, for mr. sclater had not yet made his appearance, had vanished from the room. tea was not brought until some time after, when mr. sclater came home, and then mrs. sclater sent jane to find sir gilbert; but she returned to say he was not in the house. the lady's heart sank, her countenance fell, and all was gloom: her project had miscarried! he was gone! who could tell whither?--perhaps to the baker's daughter, or to the horrid woman croale! the case was however very much otherwise. the moment gibbie ended his greetings, he had darted off to tell donal: it was not his custom to enjoy alone anything sharable. the news that ginevra was at that moment seated in mrs. sclater's house, at that moment, as his eagerness had misunderstood gibbie's, expecting his arrival, raised such a commotion in donal's atmosphere, that for a time it was but a huddle of small whirlwinds. his heart was beating like the trample of a trotting horse. he never thought of inquiring whether gibbie had been commissioned by mrs. sclater to invite him, or reflected that his studies were not half over for the night. an instant before the arrival of the blessed fact, he had been absorbed in a rather abstruse metaphysico-mathematical question; now not the metaphysics of the universe would have appeared to him worth a moment's meditation. he went pacing up and down the room, and seemed lost to everything. gibbie shook him at length, and told him, by two signs, that he must put on his sunday clothes. then first shyness, like the shroud of northern myth that lies in wait in a man's path, leaped up, and wrapped itself around him. it was very well to receive ladies in a meadow, quite another thing to walk into their company in a grand room, such as, before entering mrs. sclater's, he had never beheld even in fairyland or the arabian nights. he knew the ways of the one, and not the ways of the other. chairs ornate were doubtless poor things to daisied banks, yet the other day he had hardly brought himself to sit on one of mrs. sclater's! it was a moment of awful seeming. but what would he not face to see once more the lovely lady-girl! he bethought himself that he was no longer a cowherd but a student, and that such feelings were unworthy of one who would walk level with his fellows. he rushed to the labours of his toilette, performed severe ablutions, endued his best shirt--coarse, but sweet from the fresh breezes of glashgar, a pair of trousers of buff-coloured fustian stamped over with a black pattern, an olive-green waistcoat, a blue tailcoat with lappets behind, and a pair of well-polished shoes, the soles of which in honour of sunday were studded with small instead of large knobs of iron, set a tall beaver hat, which no brushing would make smooth, on the back of his head, stuffed a silk hankerchief, crimson and yellow, in his pocket, and declared himself ready. now gibbie, although he would not have looked so well in his woolly coat in mrs. sclater's drawing-room as on the rocks of glashgar, would have looked better in almost any other than the evening dress, now, alas! nearly european. mr. sclater, on the other hand, would have looked worse in any other because being less commonplace, it would have been less like himself; and so long as the commonplace conventional so greatly outnumber the simply individual, it is perhaps well the present fashion should hold. but donal could hardly have put on any clothes that would have made him look worse, either in respect of himself or of the surroundings of social life, than those he now wore. neither of the boys, however, had begun to think about dress in relation either to custom or to fitness, and it was with complete satisfaction that gibbie carried off donal to present to the guest of his guardians. donal's preparations had taken a long time, and before they reached the house, tea was over and gone. they had had some music; and mrs. sclater was now talking kindly to two of the school-girls, who, seated erect on the sofa, were looking upon her elegance with awe and envy. ginevra, was looking at the pictures of an annual. mr. sclater was making miss kimble agreeable to herself. he had a certain gift of talk--depending in a great measure on the assurance of being listened to, an assurance which is, alas! nowise the less hurtful to many a clergyman out of the pulpit, that he may be equally aware no one heeds him in it. chapter xlvi. the girls. the door was opened. donal spent fully a minute rubbing his shoes on the mat, as diligently as if he had just come out of the cattle-yard, and then gibbie led him in triumph up the stair to the drawing-room. donal entered in that loose-jointed way which comes of the brains being as yet all in the head, and stood, resisting gibbie's pull on his arm, his keen hazel eyes looking gently round upon the company, until he caught sight of the face he sought, when, with the stride of a sower of corn, he walked across the room to ginevra. mrs. sclater rose; mr. sclater threw himself back and stared; the latter astounded at the presumption of the youths, the former uneasy at the possible results of their ignorance. to the astonishment of the company, ginevra rose, respect and modesty in every feature, as the youth, clownish rather than awkward, approached her, and almost timidly held out her hand to him. he took it in his horny palm, shook it hither and thither sideways, like a leaf in a doubtful air, then held it like a precious thing he was at once afraid of crushing by too tight a grasp, and of dropping from too loose a hold, until ginevra took charge of it herself again. gibbie danced about behind him, all but standing on one leg, but, for mrs. sclater's sake, restraining himself. ginevra sat down, and donal, feeling very large and clumsy, and wanting to "be naught a while," looked about him for a chair, and then first espying mrs. sclater, went up to her with the same rolling, clamping stride, but without embarrassment, and said, holding out his hand, "hoo are ye the nicht, mem? i sawna yer bonnie face whan i cam in. a gran' hoose, like this o' yours--an' i'm sure, mem, it cudna be ower gran' to fit yersel', but it's jist some perplexin' to plain fowk like me, 'at's been used to mair room, an' less intill't." donal was thinking of the meadow on the lorrie bank. "i was sure of it!" remarked mrs. sclater to herself. "one of nature's gentlemen! he would soon be taught." she was right; but he was more than a gentleman, and could have taught her what she could have taught nobody in turn. "you will soon get accustomed to our town ways, mr. grant. but many of the things we gather about us are far more trouble than use," she replied, in her sweetest tones, and with a gentle pressure of the hand, which went a long way to set him at his ease. "i am glad to see you have friends here," she added. "only ane, mem. gibbie an' me--" "excuse me, mr. grant, but would you oblige me--of course with me it is of no consequence, but just for habit's sake, would you oblige me by calling gilbert by his own name--sir gilbert, please. i wish him to get used to it." "yer wull be't, mem.--weel, as i was sayin', sir gibbie--sir gilbert, that is, mem--an mysel', we hae kenned miss galbraith this lang time, bein' o' the laird's ain fowk, as i may say." "will you take a seat beside her, then," said mrs. sclater, and rising, herself placed a chair for him near ginevra, wondering how any scotch laird, the father of such a little lady as she, could have allowed her such an acquaintance. to most of the company he must have looked very queer. gibbie, indeed, was the only one who saw the real donal. miss kimble and her pupils stared at the distorted reflexion of him in the spoon-bowl of their own elongated narrowness; mrs. sclater saw the possible gentleman through the loop-hole of a compliment he had paid her; and mr. sclater beheld only the minimum which the reversed telescope of his own enlarged importance, he having himself come of sufficiently humble origin, made of him; while ginevra looked up to him more as one who marvelled at the grandly unintelligible, than one who understood the relations and proportions of what she beheld. nor was it possible she could help feeling that he was a more harmonious object to the eye both of body and mind when dressed in his corduroys and blue bonnet, walking the green fields, with cattle about him, his club under his arm, and a book in his hand. so seen, his natural dignity was evident; now he looked undeniably odd. a poet needs a fine house rather than a fine dress to set him off, and mrs. sclater's drawing-room was neither large nor beautiful enough to frame this one, especially with his sunday clothes to get the better of. to the school ladies, mistress and pupils, he was simply a clodhopper, and from their report became a treasure of poverty-stricken amusement to the school. often did ginevra's cheek burn with indignation at the small insolences of her fellow-pupils. at first she attempted to make them understand something of what donal really was, but finding them unworthy of the confidence, was driven to betake herself to such a silence as put a stop to their offensive remarks in her presence. "i thank ye, mem," said donal, as he took the chair; "ye're verra condescendin'." then turning to ginevra, and trying to cross one knee over the other, but failing from the tightness of certain garments, which, like david with saul's not similarly faulty armour, he had not hitherto proved, "weel, mem," he said, "ye haena forgotten hornie, i houp." the other girls must be pardoned for tittering, offensive as is the habit so common to their class, for the only being they knew by that name was one to whom the merest reference sets pit and gallery in a roar. miss kimble was shocked--disgusted, she said afterwards; and until she learned that the clown was there uninvited, cherished a grudge against mrs. sclater. ginevra smiled him a satisfactory negative. "i never read the ballant aboot the worm lingelt roun' the tree," said donal, making rather a long link in the chain of association, "ohn thoucht upo' that day, mem, whan first ye cam doon the brae wi' my sister nicie, an' i cam ower the burn till ye, an' ye garred me lauch aboot weetin' o' my feet! eh, mem! wi' you afore me there, i see the blew lift again, an' the gerse jist lowin' (flaming) green, an' the nowt at their busiest, the win' asleep, an' the burn sayin', 'ye need nane o' ye speyk: i'm here, an' it's my business.' eh, mem! whan i think upo' 't a', it seems to me 'at the human hert closed i' the mids o' sic a coffer o' cunnin' workmanship, maun be a terrible precious-like thing." gibbie, behind donal's chair, seemed pulsing light at every pore, but the rest of the company, understanding his words perfectly, yet not comprehending a single sentence he uttered, began to wonder whether he was out of his mind, and were perplexed to see ginevra listening to him with such respect. they saw a human offence where she knew a poet. a word is a word, but its interpretations are many, and the understanding of a man's words depends both on what the hearer is, and on what is his idea of the speaker. as to the pure all things are pure, because only purity can enter, so to the vulgar all things are vulgar, because only the vulgar can enter. wherein then is the commonplace man to be blamed, for as he is, so must he think? in this, that he consents to be commonplace, willing to live after his own idea of himself, and not after god's idea of him--the real idea, which, every now and then stirring in him, makes him uneasy with silent rebuke. ginevra said little in reply. she had not much to say. in her world the streams were still, not vocal. but donal meant to hold a little communication with her which none of them, except indeed gibbie--he did not mind gibbie--should understand. "i hed sic a queer dream the ither nicht, mem," he said, "an' i'll jist tell ye't.--i thoucht i was doon in an awfu' kin' o' a weet bog, wi' dry graivelly-like hills a' aboot it, an' naething upo' them but a wheen short hunger-like gerse. an' oot o' the mids o' the bog there grew jist ae tree--a saugh, i think it was, but unco auld--'maist past kennin' wi' age;--an' roun' the rouch gnerlet trunk o' 't was twistit three faulds o' the oogliest, ill-fauredest cratur o' a serpent 'at ever was seen. it was jist laithly to luik upo'. i cud describe it till ye, mem, but it wad only gar ye runkle yer bonny broo, an' luik as i wadna hae ye luik, mem, 'cause ye wadna luik freely sae bonny as ye div noo whan ye luik jist yersel'. but ae queer thing was, 'at atween hit an' the tree it grippit a buik, an' i kent it for the buik o' ballants. an' i gaed nearer, luikin' an' luikin', an' some frichtit. but i wadna stan' for that, for that wad be to be caitiff vile, an' no true man: i gaed nearer an' nearer, till i had gotten within a yaird o' the tree, whan a' at ance, wi' a swing an' a swirl, i was three-fauld aboot the tree, an' the laithly worm was me mesel'; an' i was the laithly worm. the verra hert gaed frae me for hoarible dreid, an' scunner at mysel'! sae there i was! but i wasna lang there i' my meesery, afore i saw, oot o' my ain serpent e'en, maist blin't wi' greitin', ower the tap o' the brae afore me, 'atween me an' the lift, as gien it reacht up to the verra stars, for it wasna day but nicht by this time aboot me, as weel it micht be,--i saw the bonny sicht come up o' a knicht in airmour, helmet an' shield an' iron sheen an' a'; but somehoo i kent by the gang an' the stan' an' the sway o' the bonny boady o' the knicht, 'at it was nae man, but a wuman.--ye see, mem, sin i cam frae daurside, i hae been able to get a grip o' buiks 'at i cudna get up there; an' i hed been readin' spenser's fairy queen the nicht afore, a' yon aboot the lady 'at pat on the airmour o' a man, an' foucht like a guid ane for the richt an' the trowth--an' that hed putten 't i' my heid maybe; only whan i saw her, i kent her, an' her name wasna britomart. she had a twistit brainch o' blew berries aboot her helmet, an' they ca'd her juniper: wasna that queer, noo? an' she cam doon the hill wi' bonny big strides, no ower big for a stately wuman, but eh, sae different frae the nipperty mincin' stippety-stap o' the leddies ye see upo' the streets here! an' sae she cam doon the brae. an' i soucht sair to cry oot--first o' a' to tell her gien she didna luik till her feet, she wad he lairt i' the bog, an' syne to beg o' her for mercy's sake to draw her swoord, an' caw the oogly heid aff o' me, an' lat me dee. noo i maun confess 'at the ballant o' kemp owen was rinnin' i' the worm-heid o' me, an' i cudna help thinkin' what, notwithstan'in' the cheenge o' han's i' the story, lay still to the pairt o' the knicht; but hoo was ony man, no to say a mere ugsome serpent, to mint at sic a thing till a leddy, whether she was in steel beets an' spurs or in lang train an' silver slippers? an' haith! i sune fan' 'at i cudna hae spoken the word, gien i had daured ever sae stoot. for whan i opened my moo' to cry till her, i cud dee naething but shot oot a forkit tongue, an' cry sss. mem, it was dreidfu'! sae i had jist to tak in my tongue again, an' say naething, for fear o' fleggin' awa' my bonny leddy i' the steel claes. an' she cam an' cam, doon an' doon, an' on to the bog; an' for a' the weicht o' her airmour she sankna a fit intill 't. an' she cam, an' she stude, an' she luikit at me; an' i hed seen her afore, an' kenned her weel. an' she luikit at me, an' aye luikit; an' i winna say what was i' the puir worm's hert. but at the last she gae a gret sich, an' a sab, like, an' stude jist as gien she was tryin' sair, but could not mak up her bonny min' to yon 'at was i' the ballant. an' eh! hoo i grippit the buik atween me an' the tree--for there it was--a' as i saw 't afore! an' sae at last she gae a kin' o' a cry, an' turnt an' gaed awa', wi' her heid hingin' doon, an' her swoord trailin', an' never turnt to luik ahint her, but up the brae, an' ower the tap o' the hill, an' doon an' awa'; an' the brainch wi' the blew berries was the last i saw o' her gaein' doon like the meen ahint the hill. an' jist wi' the fell greitin' i cam to mysel', an' my hert was gaein' like a pump 'at wad fain pit oot a fire.--noo wasna that a queer-like dream?--i'll no say, mem, but i hae curriet an' kaimbt it up a wee, to gar't tell better." ginevra had from the first been absorbed in listening, and her brown eyes seemed to keep growing larger and larger as he went on. even the girls listened and were silent, looking as if they saw a peacock's feather in a turkey's tail. when he ended, the tears rushed from ginevra's eyes--for bare sympathy--she had no perception of personal intent in the parable; it was long before she saw into the name of the lady-knight, for she had never been told the english of ginevra; she was the simplest, sweetest of girls, and too young to suspect anything in the heart of a man. "o donal!" she said, "i am very sorry for the poor worm; but it was naughty of you to dream such a dream." "hoo's that, mem?" returned donal, a little frightened. "it was not fair of you," she replied, "to dream a knight of a lady, and then dream her doing such an unknightly thing. i am sure if ladies went out in that way, they would do quite as well, on the whole, as gentlemen." "i mak nae doobt o' 't, mem: h'aven forbid!" cried donal; "but ye see dreams is sic senseless things 'at they winna be helpit;--an' that was hoo i dreemt it." "well, well, donal!" broke in the harsh pompous voice of mr. sclater, who, unknown to the poet, had been standing behind him almost the whole time, "you have given the ladies quite enough of your romancing. that sort of thing, you know, my man, may do very well round the fire in the farm kitchen, but it's not the sort of thing for a drawing-room. besides, the ladies don't understand your word of mouth; they don't understand such broad scotch.--come with me, and i'll show you something you would like to see." he thought donal was boring his guests, and at the same time preventing gibbie from having the pleasure in their society for the sake of which they had been invited. donal rose, replying, "think ye sae, sir? i thoucht i was in auld scotlan' still--here as weel's upo' glashgar. but may be my jography buik's some auld-fashioned.--didna ye un'erstan' me, mem?" he added, turning to ginevra. "every word, donal," she answered. donal followed his host contented. gibbie took his place, and began to teach ginevra the finger alphabet. the other girls found him far more amusing than donal--first of all because he could not speak, which was much less objectionable than speaking like donal--and funny too, though not so funny as donal's clothes. and then he had such a romantic history! and was a baronet! in a few minutes ginevra knew the letters, and presently she and gibbie were having a little continuous talk together, a thing they had never had before. it was so slow, however, as to be rather tiring. it was mainly about donal. but mrs. sclater opened the piano, and made a diversion. she played something brilliant, and then sang an italian song in strillaceous style, revealing to donal's clownish ignorance a thorough mastery of caterwauling. then she asked miss kimble to play something, who declined, without mentioning that she had neither voice nor ear nor love of music, but said miss galbraith should sing--"for once in a way, as a treat.--that little scotch song you sing now and then, my dear," she added. ginevra rose timidly, but without hesitation, and going to the piano, sang, to a simple old scotch air, to which they had been written, the following verses. before she ended, the minister, the late herd-boy, and the dumb baronet were grouped crescent-wise behind the music-stool. i dinna ken what's come ower me! there's a how whaur ance was a hert; (hollow) i never luik oot afore me, an' a cry winna gar me stert; there's naething nae mair to come ower me, blaw the win' frae ony airt. (quarter) for i' yon kirkyaird there's a hillock, a hert whaur ance was a how; an' o' joy there's no left a mealock--(crumb) deid aiss whaur ance was a low; (ashes)(flame) for i' you kirkyaird, i' the hillock, lies a seed 'at winna grow. it's my hert 'at hauds up the wee hillie-- that's hoo there's a how i' my breist; it's awa' doon there wi' my willie, gaed wi' him whan he was releast; it's doon i' the green-grown hillie, but i s' be efter it neist. come awa', nichts and mornin's, come ooks, years, a' time's clan; ye're walcome ayont a' scornin': tak me till him as fest as ye can. come awa', nichts an' mornin's, ye are wings o' a michty span! for i ken he's luikin' an' waitin', luikin' aye doon as i clim': wad i hae him see me sit greitin', i'stead o' gaein' to him? i'll step oot like ane sure o' a meetin', i'll traivel an' rin to him. three of them knew that the verses were donal's. if the poet went home feeling more like a fellow in blue coat and fustian trowsers, or a winged genius of the tomb, i leave my reader to judge. anyhow, he felt he had had enough for one evening, and was able to encounter his work again. perhaps also, when supper was announced, he reflected that his reception had hardly been such as to justify him in partaking of their food, and that his mother's hospitality to mr. sclater had not been in expectation of return. as they went down the stair, he came last and alone, behind the two whispering school-girls; and when they passed on into the dining-room, he spilt out of the house, and ran home to the furniture-shop and his books. when the ladies took their leave, gibbie walked with them. and now at last he learned where to find ginevra. chapter xlvii. a lesson of wisdom. in obedience to the suggestion of his wife, mr. sclater did what he could to show sir gilbert how mistaken he was in imagining he could fit his actions to the words of our lord. shocked as even he would probably have been at such a characterization of his attempt, it amounted practically to this: do not waste your powers in the endeavour to keep the commandments of our lord, for it cannot be done, and he knew it could not be done, and never meant it should be done. he pointed out to him, not altogether unfairly, the difficulties, and the causes of mistake, with regard to his words; but said nothing to reveal the spirit and the life of them. showing more of them to be figures than at first appeared, he made out the meanings of them to be less, not more than the figures, his pictures to be greater than their subjects, his parables larger and more lovely than the truths they represented. in the whole of his lecture, through which ran from beginning to end a tone of reproof, there was not one flash of enthusiasm for our lord, not a sign that, to his so-called minister, he was a refuge, or a delight--that he who is the joy of his father's heart, the essential bliss of the universe, was anything to the soul of his creature, who besides had taken upon him to preach his good news, more than a name to call himself by--that the story of the son of god was to him anything better than the soap and water wherewith to blow theological bubbles with the tobacco-pipe of his speculative understanding. the tendency of it was simply to the quelling of all true effort after the knowing of him through obedience, the quenching of all devotion to the central good. doubtless gibbie, as well as many a wiser man, might now and then make a mistake in the embodiment of his obedience, but even where the action misses the command, it may yet be obedience to him who gave the command, and by obeying one learns how to obey. i hardly know, however, where gibbie blundered, except it was in failing to recognize the animals before whom he ought not to cast his pearls--in taking it for granted that, because his guardian was a minister, and his wife a minister's wife, they must therefore be the disciples of the jewish carpenter, the eternal son of the father of us all. had he had more of the wisdom of the serpent, he would not have carried them the new testament as an ending of strife, the words of the lord as an enlightening law; he would perhaps have known that to try too hard to make people good, is one way to make them worse; that the only way to make them good is to be good--remembering well the beam and the mote; that the time for speaking comes rarely, the time for being never departs. but in talking thus to gibbie, the minister but rippled the air: gibbie was all the time pondering with himself where he had met the same kind of thing, the same sort of person before. nothing he said had the slightest effect upon him. he was too familiar with truth to take the yeasty bunghole of a working barrel for a fountain of its waters. the unseen lord and his reported words were to gibbie realities, compared with which the very visible mr. sclater and his assured utterance were as the merest seemings of a phantom mood. he had never resolved to keep the words of the lord: he just kept them; but he knew amongst the rest the lord's words about the keeping of his words, and about being ashamed of him before men, and it was with a pitiful indignation he heard the minister's wisdom drivel past his ears. what he would have said, and withheld himself from saying, had he been able to speak, i cannot tell; i only know that in such circumstances the less said the better, for what can be more unprofitable than a discussion where but one of the disputants understands the question, and the other has all the knowledge? it would have been the eloquence of the wise and the prudent against the perfected praise of the suckling. the effect of it all upon gibbie was to send him to his room to his prayers, more eager than ever to keep the commandments of him who had said, if ye love me. comforted then and strengthened, he came down to go to donal--not to tell him, for to none but janet could he have made such a communication. but in the middle of his descent he remembered suddenly of what and whom mr. sclater had all along been reminding him, and turned aside to mrs. sclater to ask her to lend him the pilgrim's progress. this, as a matter almost of course, was one of the few books in the cottage on glashgar--a book beloved of janet's soul--and he had read it again and again. mrs. sclater told him where in her room to find a copy, and presently he had satisfied himself that it was indeed mr. worldly wiseman whom his imagination had, in cloudy fashion, been placing side by side with the talking minister. finding his return delayed, mrs. sclater went after him, fearing he might be indulging his curiosity amongst her personal possessions. peeping in, she saw him seated on the floor beside her little bookcase, lost in reading: she stole behind, and found that what so absorbed him was the conversation between christian and worldly--i beg his pardon, he is nothing without his mr.--between christian and mr. worldly wiseman. in the evening, when her husband was telling her what he had said to "the young pharisee" in the morning, the picture of gibbie on the floor, with the pilgrim's progress and mr. worldly wiseman, flashed back on her mind, and she told him the thing. it stung him, not that gibbie should perhaps have so paralleled him, but that his wife should so interpret gibbie. to her, however, he said nothing. had he been a better man, he would have been convinced by the lesson; as it was, he was only convicted, and instead of repenting was offended grievously. for several days he kept expecting the religious gadfly to come buzzing about him with his sting, that is, his forefinger, stuck in the pilgrim's progress, and had a swashing blow ready for him; but gibbie was beginning to learn a lesson or two, and if he was not yet so wise as some serpents, he had always been more harmless than some doves. that he had gained nothing for the world was pretty evident to the minister the following sunday--from the lofty watchtower of the pulpit where he sat throned, while the first psalm was being sung. his own pew was near one of the side doors, and at that door some who were late kept coming in. amongst them were a stranger or two, who were at once shown to seats. before the psalm ended, an old man came in and stood by the door--a poor man in mean garments, with the air of a beggar who had contrived to give himself a sunday look. perhaps he had come hoping to find it warmer in church than at home. there he stood, motionless as the leech-gatherer, leaning on his stick, disregarded of men--it may have been only by innocent accident, i do not know. but just ere the minister must rise for the first prayer, he saw gibbie, who had heard a feeble cough, cast a glance round, rise as swiftly as noiselessly, open the door of the pew, get out into the passage, take the old man by the hand, and lead him to his place beside the satin-robed and sable-muffed ministerial consort. obedient to gibbie's will, the old man took the seat, with an air both of humility and respect, while happily for mrs. sclater's remnant of ruffled composure, there was plenty of room in the pew, so that she could move higher up. the old man, it is true, followed, to make a place for gibbie, but there was still an interval between them sufficient to afford space to the hope that none of the evils she dreaded would fall upon her to devour her. flushed, angry, uncomfortable, notwithstanding, her face glowed like a bale-fire to the eyes of her husband, and, i fear, spoiled the prayer--but that did not matter much. while the two thus involuntarily signalled each other, the boy who had brought discomposure into both pulpit and pew, sat peaceful as a summer morning, with the old man beside him quiet in the reverence of being himself revered. and the minister, while he preached from the words, let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall, for the first time in his life began to feel doubtful whether he might not himself be a humbug. there was not much fear of his falling, however, for he had not yet stood on his feet. not a word was said to gibbie concerning the liberty he had taken: the minister and his wife were in too much dread--not of st. james and the "poor man in vile raiment," for they were harmless enough in themselves, but of gibbie's pointing finger to back them. three distinct precautions, however, they took; the pew-opener on that side was spoken to; mrs. sclater made gibbie henceforth go into the pew before her; and she removed the new testament from the drawing-room. chapter xlviii. needfull odds and ends. it will be plain from what i have told, that donal's imagination was full of ginevra, and his was not an economy whose imagination could enjoy itself without calling the heart to share. at the same time, his being in love, if already i may use concerning him that most general and most indefinite of phrases, so far from obstructing his study, was in reality an aid to his thinking and a spur to excellence--not excellence over others, but over himself. there were moments, doubtless, long moments too, in which he forgot homer and cicero and differential calculus and chemistry, for "the bonnie lady-lassie,"--that was what he called her to himself; but it was only, on emerging from the reverie, to attack his work with fresh vigour. she was so young, so plainly girlish, that as yet there was no room for dread or jealousy; the feeling in his heart was a kind of gentle angel-worship; and he would have turned from the idea of marrying her, if indeed it had ever presented itself, as an irreverent thought, which he dared not for a moment be guilty of entertaining. it was besides, an idea too absurd to be indulged in by one who, in his wildest imaginations, always, through every protean embodiment, sought and loved and clung to the real. his chief thought was simply to find favour in the eyes of the girl. his ideas hovered about her image, but it was continually to burn themselves in incense to her sweet ladyhood. as often as a song came fluttering its wings at his casement, the next thought was ginevra--and there would be something to give her! i wonder how many loves of the poets have received their offerings in correspondent fervour. i doubt if ginevra, though she read them with marvel, was capable of appreciating the worth of donal's. she was hardly yet woman enough to do them justice; for the heart of a girl, in its very sweetness and vagueness, is ready to admire alike the good and the indifferent, if their outer qualities be similar. it would cause a collapse in many a swelling of poet's heart if, while he heard lovely lips commending his verses, a voice were to whisper in his ear what certain other verses the lady commended also. on saturday evenings, after gibbie left him, donal kept his own private holiday, which consisted in making verses, or rather in setting himself in the position for doing so, when sometimes verses would be the result, sometimes not. when the moon was shining in at the windows of the large room adjoining, he would put out his lamp, open his door, and look from the little chamber, glowing with fire-light, into the strange, eerie, silent waste, crowded with the chaos of dis-created homes. there scores on scores of things, many of them unco, that is uncouth, the first meaning of which is unknown, to his eyes, stood huddled together in the dim light. the light looked weary and faint, as if with having forced its way through the dust of years on the windows; and donal felt as if gazing from a clear conscious present out into a faded dream. sometimes he would leave his nest, and walk up and down among spider-legged tables, tall cabinets, secret-looking bureaus, worked chairs--yielding himself to his fancies. he was one who needed no opium, or such-like demon-help, to set him dreaming; he could dream at his will--only his dreams were brief and of rapid change--probably not more so, after the clock, than those other artificial ones, in which, to speculate on the testimony, the feeling of their length appears to be produced by an infinite and continuous subdivision of the subjective time. now he was a ghost come back to flit, hovering and gliding about sad old scenes, that had gathered a new and a worse sadness from the drying up of the sorrow which was the heart of them--his doom, to live thus over again the life he had made so little of in the body; his punishment, to haunt the world and pace its streets, unable to influence by the turn of a hair the goings on of its life,--so to learn what a useless being he had been, and repent of his self-embraced insignificance. now he was a prisoner, pining and longing for life and air and human companionship; that was the sun outside, whose rays shone thus feebly into his dungeon by repeated reflections. now he was a prince in disguise, meditating how to appear again and defeat the machinations of his foes, especially of the enchanter who made him seem to the eyes of his subjects that which he was not. but ever his thoughts would turn again to ginevra, and ever the poems he devised were devised as in her presence and for her hearing. sometimes a dread would seize him--as if the strange things were all looking at him, and something was about to happen; then he would stride hastily back to his own room, close the door hurriedly, and sit down by the fire. once or twice he was startled by the soft entrance of his landlady's grand-daughter, come to search for something in one of the cabinets they had made a repository for small odds and ends of things. once he told gibbie that something had looked at him, but he could not tell what or whence or how, and laughed at himself, but persisted in his statement. he had not yet begun to read his new testament in the way gibbie did, but he thought in the direction of light and freedom, and looked towards some goal dimly seen in vague grandeur of betterness. his condition was rather that of eyeless hunger after growth, than of any conscious aspiration towards less undefined good. he had a large and increasing delight in all forms of the generous, and shrunk instinctively from the base, but had not yet concentrated his efforts towards becoming that which he acknowledged the best, so that he was hardly yet on the straight path to the goal of such oneness with good as alone is a man's peace. i mention these things not with the intent of here developing the character of donal, but with the desire that my readers should know him such as he then was. gibbie and he seldom talked about ginevra. she was generally understood between them--only referred to upon needful occasion: they had no right to talk about her, any more than to intrude on her presence unseasonably. donal went to mr. sclater's church because mr. sclater required it, in virtue of the position he assumed as his benefactor. mr. sclater in the pulpit was a trial to donal, but it consoled him to be near gibbie, also that he had found a seat in the opposite gallery, whence he could see ginevra when her place happened to be not far from the door of one of the school-pews. he did not get much benefit from mr. sclater's sermons: i confess he did not attend very closely to his preaching--often directed against doctrinal errors of which, except from himself, not one of his congregation had ever heard, or was likely ever to hear. but i cannot say he would have been better employed in listening, for there was generally something going on in his mind that had to go on, and make way for more. i have said generally, for i must except the times when his thoughts turned upon the preacher himself, and took forms such as the following. but it might be a lesson to some preachers to know that a decent lad like donal may be making some such verses about one of them while he is preaching. i have known not a few humble men in the pulpit of whom rather than write such a thing donal would have lost the writing hand. 'twas a sair sair day 'twas my hap till come under yer soon', mr. sclater; but things maun he putten a tap till, an' sae maun ye, seener or later! for to hear ye rowtin' an' scornin', is no to hark to the river; an' to sit here till brak trowth's mornin', wad be to be lost for ever. i confess i have taken a liberty, and changed one word for another in the last line. he did not show these verses to gibbie; or indeed ever find much fault with the preacher in his hearing; for he knew that while he was himself more open-minded to the nonsense of the professional gentleman, gibbie was more open-hearted towards the merits of the man, with whom he was far too closely associated on week-days not to feel affection for him; while, on the other hand, gibbie made neither head nor tail of his sermons, not having been instructed in the theological mess that goes with so many for a theriac of the very essentials of religion; and therefore, for anything he knew, they might be very wise and good. at first he took refuge from the sermon in his new testament; but when, for the third time, the beautiful hand of the ministerial spouse appeared between him and the book, and gently withdrew it, he saw that his reading was an offence in her eyes, and contented himself thereafter with thinking: listening to the absolutely unintelligible he found impossible. what a delight it would have been to the boy to hear christ preached such as he showed himself, such as in no small measure he had learned him--instead of such as mr. sclater saw him reflected from the tenth or twentieth distorting mirror! they who speak against the son of man oppose mere distortions and mistakes of him, having never beheld, neither being now capable of beholding, him; but those who have transmitted to them these false impressions, those, namely, who preach him without being themselves devoted to him, and those who preach him having derived their notions of him from other scources than himself, have to bear the blame that they have such excuses for not seeking to know him. he submits to be mis-preached, as he submitted to be lied against while visibly walking the world, but his truth will appear at length to all: until then until he is known as he is, our salvation tarrieth. mrs. sclater showed herself sincere, after her kind, to donal as well as to gibbie. she had by no means ceased to grow, and already was slowly bettering under the influences of the new testament in gibbie, notwithstanding she had removed the letter of it from her public table. she told gibbie that he must talk to donal about his dress and his speech. that he was a lad of no common gifts was plain, she said, but were he ever so "talented" he could do little in the world, certainly would never raise himself, so long as he dressed and spoke ridiculously. the wisest and best of men would be utterly disregarded, she said, if he did not look and speak like other people. gibbie thought with himself this could hardly hold, for there was john the baptist; he answered her, however, that donal could speak very good english if he chose, but that the affected tone and would-be-fine pronunciation of fergus duff had given him the notion that to speak anything but his mother-tongue would be unmanly and false. as to his dress, donal was poor, gibbie said, and could not give up wearing any clothes so long as there was any wear in them. "if you had seen me once!" he added, with a merry laugh to finish for his fingers. mrs. sclater spoke to her husband, who said to gibbie that, if he chose to provide donal with suitable garments, he would advance him the money:--that was the way he took credit for every little sum he handed his ward, but in his accounts was correct to a farthing. gibbie would thereupon have dragged donal at once to the tailor; but donal was obstinate. "na, na," he said; "the claes is guid eneuch for him 'at weirs them. ye dee eneuch for me, sir gilbert, a'ready; an' though i wad be obleeged to you as i wad to my mither hersel', to cleed me gien i warna dacent, i winna tak your siller nor naebody ither's to gang fine. na, na; i'll weir the claes oot, an' we s' dee better wi' the neist. an' for that bonnie wuman, mistress scletter, ye can tell her, 'at by the time i hae onything to say to the warl', it winna be my claes 'at'll haud fowk ohn hearkent; an' gien she considers them 'at i hae noo, ower sair a disgrace till her gran' rooms, she maun jist no inveet me, an' i'll no come; for i canna presently help them. but the neist session, whan i hae better, for i'm sure to get wark eneuch in atween, i'll come an' shaw mysel', an' syne she can dee as she likes." this high tone of liberty, so free from offence either given or taken, was thoroughly appreciated by both mr. and mrs. sclater, and they did not cease to invite him. a little talk with the latter soon convinced him that there was neither assumption nor lack of patriotism in speaking the language of the people among whom he found himself; and as he made her his model in the pursuit of the accomplishment, he very soon spoke a good deal better english than mr. sclater. but with gibbie, and even with the dainty ginevra, he could not yet bring himself to talk anything but his mother-tongue. "i cannot mak my moo'," he would say, "to speyk onything but the nat'ral tongue o' poetry till sic a bonnie cratur as miss galbraith; an' for yersel', gibbie--man! i wad be ill willin' to bigg a stane wa' atween me an' the bonnie days whan angus mac pholp was the deil we did fear, an' hornie the deil we didna.--losh, man! what wad come o' me gien i hed to say my prayers in english! i doobt gien 't wad come oot prayin' at a'!" i am well aware that most scotch people of that date tried to say their prayers in english, but not so janet or robert, and not so had they taught their children. i fancy not a little unreality was thus in their case avoided. "what will you do when you are a minister?" asked gibbie on his fingers. "me a minnister?" echoed donal. "me a minnister!" he repeated. "losh, man! gien i can save my ain sowl, it'll be a' 'at i'm fit for, ohn lo'dent it wi' a haill congregation o' ither fowk's. na, na; gien i can be a schuilmaister, an' help the bairnies to be guid, as my mither taucht mysel', an' hae time to read, an' a feow shillin's to buy buiks aboot aigypt an' the holy lan', an' a full an' complete edition o' plato, an' a greek lexicon--a guid ane, an' a jamieson's dictionar', haith, i'll be a hawpy man! an' gien i dinna like the schuilmaisterin', i can jist tak to the wark again, whilk i cudna dee sae weel gien i had tried the preachin': fowk wad ca' me a stickit minister! or maybe they'll gie me the sheep to luik efter upo' glashgar, whan they're ower muckle for my father, an' that wad weel content me. only i wad hae to bigg a bit mair to the hoosie, to haud my buiks: i maun hae buiks. i wad get the newspapers whiles, but no aften, for they're a sair loss o' precious time. ye see they tell ye things afore they're sure, an' ye hae to spen' yer time the day readin' what ye'll hae to spen' yer time the morn readin' oot again; an' ye may as weel bide till the thing's sattled a wee. i wad jist lat them fecht things oot 'at thoucht they saw hoo they oucht to gang; an' i wad gie them guid mutton to haud them up to their dreary wark, an' maybe a sangy noo an' than 'at wad help them to drap it a'thegither." "but wouldn't you like to have a wife, donal, and children, like your father and mother?" spelt gibbie. "na, na; nae wife for me, gibbie!" answered the philosopher. "wha wad hae aither a pure schuilmaister or a shepherd?--'cep' it was maybe some lass like my sister nicie, 'at wadna ken euclid frae her hose, or burns frae a mill-dam, or conic sections frae the hole i' the great peeramid." "i don't like to hear you talk like that, donal," said gibbie. "what do you say to mother?" "the mither's no to be said aboot," answerd donal. "she's ane by hersel', no ane like ither fowk. ye wadna think waur o' the angel gabriel 'at he hedna jist read homer clean throu', wad ye?" "if i did," answered gibbie, "he would only tell me there was time enough for that." when they met on a friday evening, and it was fine, they would rove the streets, gibbie taking donal to the places he knew so well in his childhood, and enjoying it the more that he could now tell him so much better what he remembered. the only place he did not take him to was jink lane, with the house that had been mistress croale's. he did take him to the court in the widdiehill, and show him the auld hoose o' galbraith, and the place under the stair where his father had worked. the shed was now gone; the neighbours had by degrees carried it away for firewood. the house was occupied still as then by a number of poor people, and the door was never locked, day or night, any more than when gibbie used to bring his father home. he took donal to the garret where they had slept--one could hardly say lived, and where his father died. the door stood open, and the place was just as they had left it. a year or two after, gibbie learned how it came to be thus untenanted: it was said to be haunted. every sunday sir george was heard at work, making boots for his wee gibbie from morning to night; after which, when it was dark, came dreadful sounds of supplication, as of a soul praying in hell-fire. for a while the house was almost deserted in consequence. "gien i was you, sir gilbert," said donal, who now and then remembered mrs. sclater's request--they had come down, and looking at the outside of the house, had espied a half-obliterated stone-carving of the galbraith arms--"gien i was you, sir gilbert, i wad gar maister scletter keep a sherp luik oot for the first chance o' buyin' back this hoose. it wad be a great peety it sud gang to waur afore ye get it. eh! sic tales as this hoose cud tell!" "how am i to do that, donal? mr. sclater would not mind me. the money's not mine yet, you know," said gibbie. "the siller is yours, gibbie," answered donal; "it's yours as the kingdom o' h'aven's yours; it's only 'at ye canna jist lay yer han's upo' 't yet. the seener ye lat that maister scletter ken 'at ye ken what ye're aboot, the better. an' believe me, whan he comes to un'erstan' 'at ye want that hoose koft, he'll no be a day ohn gane to somebody or anither aboot it." donal was right, for within a month the house was bought, and certain necessary repairs commenced. sometimes on those evenings they took tea with mistress croale, and it was a proud time with her when they went. that night at least the whisky bottle did not make its appearance. mrs. sclater continued to invite young ladies to the house for gibbie's sake, and when she gave a party, she took care there should be a proportion of young people in it; but gibbie, although of course kind and polite to all, did not much enjoy these gatherings. it began to trouble him a little that he seemed to care less for his kind than before; but it was only a seeming, and the cause of it was this: he was now capable of perceiving facts in nature and character which prevented real contact, and must make advances towards it appear as offensive as they were useless. but he did not love the less that he had to content himself, until the kingdom should come nearer, with loving at a more conscious distance; by loving kindness and truth he continued doing all he could to bring the kingdom whose end is unity. hence he had come to restrain his manner--nothing could have constrained his manners, which now from the conventional point of view were irreproachable; but if he did not so often execute a wild dance, or stand upon one leg, the glow in his eyes had deepened, and his response to any advance was as ready and thorough, as frank and sweet as ever; his eagerness was replaced by a stillness from which his eyes took all coldness, and his smile was as the sun breaking out in a gray day of summer, and turning all from doves to peacocks. in this matter there was one thing worthy of note common to donal and him, who had had the same divine teaching from janet: their manners to all classes were the same, they showed the same respect to the poor, the same ease with the rich. i must confess, however, that before the session was over, donal found it required all his strength of mind to continue to go to mrs. sclater's little parties--from kindness she never asked him to her larger ones; and the more to his praise it was that he did not refuse one of her invitations. the cause was this: one bright sunday morning in february, coming out of his room to go to church, and walking down the path through the furniture in a dreamy mood, he suddenly saw a person meeting him straight in the face. "sic a queer-like chield!" he remarked inwardly, stepped on one side to let him pass--and perceived it was himself reflected from head to foot in a large mirror, which had been placed while he was out the night before. the courage with which he persisted, after such a painful enlightenment, in going into company in those same garments, was right admirable and enviable; but no one knew of it until its exercise was long over. the little pocket-money mr. sclater allowed gibbie, was chiefly spent at the shop of a certain secondhand bookseller, nearly opposite mistress murkison's. the books they bought were carried to donal's room, there to be considered by gibbie donal's, and by donal gibbie's. among the rest was a reprint of marlow's faust, the daring in the one grand passage of which both awed and delighted them; there were also some of the ettrick shepherd's eerie stories, alone in their kind; and above all there was a miniature copy of shelley, whose verse did much for the music of donal's, while yet he could not quite appreciate the truth for the iridescence of it: he said it seemed to him to have been all composed in a balloon. i have mentioned only works of imagination, but it must not be supposed they had not a relish for stronger food: the books more severe came afterwards, when they had liberty to choose their own labours; now they had plenty of the harder work provided for them. somewhere about this time fergus duff received his license to preach, and set himself to acquire what his soul thirsted after--a reputation, namely, for eloquence. this was all the flood-mark that remained of the waters of verse with which he had at one time so plentifully inundated his soul. he was the same as man he had been as youth--handsome, plausible, occupied with himself, determined to succeed, not determined to labour. praise was the very necessity of his existence, but he had the instinct not to display his beggarly hunger--which reached even to the approbation of such to whom he held himself vastly superior. he seemed generous, and was niggardly, by turns; cultivated suavity; indulged in floridity both of manners and speech; and signed his name so as nobody could read it, though his handwriting was plain enough. in the spring, summer, and autumn, donal laboured all day with his body, and in the evening as much as he could with his mind. lover of nature as he was, however, more alive indeed than before to the delights of the country, and the genial companionship of terrene sights and sounds, scents and motions, he could not help longing for the winter and the city, that his soul might be freer to follow its paths. and yet what a season some of the labours of the field afforded him for thought! to the student who cannot think without books, the easiest of such labours are a dull burden, or a distress; but for the man in whom the wells have been unsealed, in whom the waters are flowing, the labour mingles gently and genially with the thought, and the plough he holds with his hands lays open to the sun and the air more soils than one. mr. sclater without his books would speedily have sunk into the mere shrewd farmer; donal, never opening a book, would have followed theories and made verses to the end of his days. every saturday, as before, he went to see his father and mother. janet kept fresh and lively, although age told on her, she said, more rapidly since gibbie went away. "but gien the lord lat auld age wither me up," she said, "he'll luik efter the cracks himsel'." six weeks of every summer between donal's sessions, while the minister and his wife took their holiday, gibbie spent with robert and janet. it was a blessed time for them all. he led then just the life of the former days, with robert and oscar and the sheep, and janet and her cow and the new testament--only he had a good many more things to think about now, and more ways of thinking about them. with his own hands he built a neat little porch to the cottage door, with close sides and a second door to keep the wind off: donal and he carried up the timber and the mortar. but although he tried hard to make janet say what he could do for her more, he could not bring her to reveal any desire that belonged to this world--except, indeed, for two or three trifles for her husband's warmth and convenience. "the sicht o' my lord's face," she said once, when he was pressing her, "is a' 'at i want, sir gibbie. for this life it jist blecks me to think o' onything i wad hae or wad lowse. this boady o' mine's growin' some heavy-like, i maun confess, but i wadna hae't ta'en aff o' me afore the time. it wad be an ill thing for the seed to be shal't ower sune." they almost always called him sir gibbie, and he never objected, or seemed either annoyed or amused at it; he took it just as the name that was his, the same way as his hair or his hands were his; he had been called wee sir gibbie for so long. chapter xlix. the houseless. the minister kept gibbie hard at work, and by the time donal's last winter came, gibbie was ready for college also. to please mr. sclater he competed for a bursary, and gained a tolerably good one, but declined accepting it. his guardian was annoyed, he could not see why he should refuse what he had "earned." gibbie asked him whether it was the design of the founder of those bursaries that rich boys should have them. were they not for the like of donal? whereupon mr. sclater could not help remembering what a difference it would have made to him in his early struggles, if some rich bursar above him had yielded a place--and held his peace. daur-street being too far from elphinstone college for a student to live there, mr. sclater consented to gibbie's lodging with donal, but would have insisted on their taking rooms in some part of the town--more suitable to the young baronet's position, he said; but as there was another room to be had at mistress murkison's, gibbie insisted that one who had shown them so much kindness must not be forsaken; and by this time he seldom found difficulty in having his way with his guardian. both he and his wife had come to understand him better, and nobody could understand gibbie better without also understanding better all that was good and true and right: although they hardly knew the fact themselves, the standard of both of them had been heightened by not a few degrees since gibbie came to them; and although he soon ceased to take direct notice of what in their conduct distressed him, i cannot help thinking it was not amiss that he uttered himself as he did at the first; knowing a little his ways of thinking they came to feel his judgment unexpressed. for mrs. sclater, when she bethought herself that she had said or done something he must count worldly, the very silence of the dumb boy was a reproof to her. one night the youths had been out for a long walk and came back to the city late, after the shops were shut. only here and there a light glimmered in some low-browed little place, probably used in part by the family. not a soul was visible in the dingy region through which they now approached their lodging, when round a corner, moving like a shadow, came, soft-pacing, a ghostly woman in rags, with a white, worn face, and the largest black eyes, it seemed to the youths that they had ever seen--an apparition of awe and grief and wonder. to compare a great thing to a small, she was to their eyes as a ruined, desecrated shrine to the eyes of the saint's own peculiar worshipper. i may compare her to what i please, great or small--to a sapphire set in tin, to an angel with draggled feathers; for far beyond all comparison is that temple of the holy ghost in the desert--a woman in wretchedness and rags. she carried her puny baby rolled hard in the corner of her scrap of black shawl. to the youths a sea of trouble looked out of those wild eyes. as she drew near them, she hesitated, half-stopped, and put out a hand from under the shawl--stretched out no arm, held out only a hand from the wrist, white against the night. donal had no money. gibbie had a shilling. the hand closed upon it, a gleam crossed the sad face, and a murmur of thanks fluttered from the thin lips as she walked on her way. the youths breathed deep, and felt a little relieved, but only a little. the thought of the woman wandering in the dark and the fog and the night, was a sickness at their hearts. was it impossible to gather such under the wings of any night-brooding hen? that gibbie had gone through so much of the same kind of thing himself, and had found it endurable enough, did not make her case a whit the less pitiful in his eyes, and indeed it was widely, sadly different from his. along the deserted street, which looked to donal like a waterless canal banked by mounds of death, and lighted by phosphorescent grave-damps, they followed her with their eyes, the one living thing, fading away from lamp to lamp; and when they could see her no farther, followed her with their feet; they could not bear to lose sight of her. but they kept just on the verge of vision, for they did not want her to know the espial of their love. suddenly she disappeared, and keeping their eyes on the spot as well as they could, they found when they reached it a little shop, with a red curtain, half torn down, across the glass door of it. a dim oil lamp was burning within. it looked like a rag-shop, dirty and dreadful. there she stood, while a woman with a bloated face, looking to donal like a feeder of hell-swine, took from some secret hole underneath, a bottle which seemed to gibbie the very one his father used to drink from. he would have rushed in and dashed it from her hand, but donal withheld him. "hoots!" he said, "we canna follow her a' nicht; an' gien we did, what better wad she be i' the mornin'? lat her be, puir thing!" she received the whisky in a broken tea-cup, swallowed some of it eagerly, then, to the horror of the youths, put some of it into the mouth of her child from her own. draining the last drops from the cup, she set it quietly down, turned, and without a word spoken, for she had paid beforehand, came out, her face looking just as white and thin as before, but having another expression in the eyes of it. at the sight donal's wisdom forsook him. "eh, wuman," he cried, "yon wasna what ye hed the shillin' for!" "ye said naething," answered the poor creature, humbly, and walked on, hanging her head, and pressing her baby to her bosom. the boys looked at each other. "that wasna the gait yer shillin' sud hae gane, gibbie," said donal. "it's clear it winna dee to gie shillin's to sic like as her. wha kens but the hunger an' the caul', an' the want o' whisky may be the wuman's evil things here, 'at she may 'scape the hellfire o' the rich man hereafter?" he stopped, for gibbie was weeping. the woman and her child he would have taken to his very heart, and could do nothing for them. love seemed helpless, for money was useless. it set him thinking much, and the result appeared. from that hour the case of the homeless haunted his heart and brain and imagination; and as his natural affections found themselves repelled and chilled in what is called society, they took refuge more and more with the houseless and hungry and shivering. through them, also, he now, for the first time, began to find grave and troublous questions mingling with his faith and hope; so that already he began to be rewarded for his love: to the true heart every doubt is a door. i will not follow and describe the opening of these doors to gibbie, but, as what he discovered found always its first utterance in action, wait until i can show the result. for the time the youths were again a little relieved about the woman: following her still, to a yet more wretched part of the city, they saw her knock at a door, pay something, and be admitted. it looked a dreadful refuge, but she was at least under cover, and shelter, in such a climate as ours in winter, must be the first rudimentary notion of salvation. no longer haunted with the idea of her wandering all night about the comfortless streets, "like a ghost awake in memphis," donal said, they went home. but it was long before they got to sleep, and in the morning their first words were about the woman. "gien only we hed my mither here!" said donal. "mightn't you try mr. sclater?" suggested gibbie. donal answered with a great roar of laughter. "he wad tell her she oucht to tak shame till hersel'," he said, "an' i'm thinkin' she's lang brunt a' her stock o' that firin'. he wud tell her she sud work for her livin', an' maybe there isna ae turn the puir thing can dee 'at onybody wad gie her a bawbee for a day o'!--but what say ye to takin' advice o' miss galbraith?" it was strange how, with the marked distinctions between them, donal and gibbie would every now and then, like the daughters of the vicar of wakefield, seem to change places and parts. "god can make praise-pipes of babes and sucklings," answered gibbie; "but it does not follow that they can give advice. don't you remember your mother saying that the stripling david was enough to kill a braggart giant, but a sore-tried man was wanted to rule the people?" it ended in their going to mistress croale. they did not lay bare to her their perplexities, but they asked her to find out who the woman was, and see if anything could be done for her. they said to themselves she would know the condition of such a woman, and what would be moving in her mind, after the experience she had herself had, better at least than the minister or his lady-wife. nor were they disappointed. to be thus taken into counsel revived for mistress croale the time of her dignity while yet she shepherded her little flock of drunkards. she undertook the task with hearty good will, and carried it out with some success. its reaction on herself to her own good was remarkable. there can be no better auxiliary against our own sins than to help our neighbour in the encounter with his. merely to contemplate our neighbour will recoil upon us in quite another way: we shall see his faults so black, that we will not consent to believe ours so bad, and will immediately begin to excuse, which is the same as to cherish them, instead of casting them from us with abhorrence. one day early in the session, as the youths were approaching the gate of miss kimble's school, a thin, care-worn man, in shabby clothes, came out, and walked along meeting them. every now and then he bowed his shoulders, as if something invisible had leaped upon them from behind, and as often seemed to throw it off and with effort walk erect. it was the laird. they lifted their caps, but in return he only stared, or rather tried to stare, for his eyes seemed able to fix themselves on nothing. he was now at length a thoroughly ruined man, and had come to the city to end his days in a cottage belonging to his daughter. already mr. sclater, who was unweariedly on the watch over the material interests of his ward, had, through his lawyer, and without permitting his name to appear, purchased the whole of the glashruach property. for the present, however, he kept sir gilbert in ignorance of the fact. chapter l a walk. the cottage to which mr. galbraith had taken ginevra, stood in a suburban street--one of those small, well-built stone houses common, i fancy, throughout scotland, with three rooms and a kitchen on its one floor, and a large attic with dormer windows. it was low and wide-roofed, and had a tiny garden between it and the quiet street. this garden was full of flowers in summer and autumn, but the tops of a few gaunt stems of hollyhocks, and the wiry straggling creepers of the honeysuckle about the eaves, was all that now showed from the pavement. it had a dwarf wall of granite, with an iron railing on the top, through which, in the season, its glorious colours used to attract many eyes, but mr. galbraith had had the railing and the gate lined to the very spikes with boards: the first day of his abode he had discovered that the passers-by--not to say those who stood to stare admiringly at the flowers, came much too near his faded but none the less conscious dignity. he had also put a lock on the gate, and so made of the garden a sort of propylon to the house. for he had of late developed a tendency towards taking to earth, like the creatures that seem to have been created ashamed of themselves, and are always burrowing. but it was not that the late laird was ashamed of himself in any proper sense. of the dishonesty of his doings he was as yet scarcely half conscious, for the proud man shrinks from repentance, regarding it as disgrace. to wash is to acknowledge the need of washing. he avoided the eyes of men for the mean reason that he could no longer appear in dignity as laird of glashruach and chairman of a grand company; while he felt as if something must have gone wrong with the laws of nature that it had become possible for thomas galbraith, of glashruach, esq., to live in a dumpy cottage. he had thought seriously of resuming his patronymic of durrant, but reflected that he was too well known to don that cloak of transparent darkness without giving currency to the idea that he had soiled the other past longer wearing. it would be imagined, he said, picking out one dishonesty of which he had not been guilty, that he had settled money on his wife, and retired to enjoy it. his condition was far more pitiful than his situation. having no faculty for mental occupation except with affairs, finding nothing to do but cleave, like a spent sailor, with hands and feet to the slippery rock of what was once his rectitude, such as it was, trying to hold it still his own, he would sit for hours without moving--a perfect creature, temple, god, and worshipper, all in one--only that the worshipper was hardly content with his god, and that a worm was gnawing on at the foundation of the temple. nearly as motionless, her hands excepted, would ginevra sit opposite to him, not quieter but more peaceful than when a girl, partly because now she was less afraid of him. he called her, in his thoughts as he sat there, heartless and cold, but not only was she not so, but it was his fault that she appeared to him such. in his moral stupidity he would rather have seen her manifest concern at the poverty to which he had reduced her, than show the stillness of a contented mind. she was not much given to books, but what she read was worth reading, and such as turned into thought while she sat. they are not the best students who are most dependent on books. what can be got out of them is at best only material: a man must build his house for himself. she would have read more, but with her father beside her doing nothing, she felt that to take a book would be like going into a warm house, and leaving him out in the cold. it was very sad to her to see him thus shrunk and withered, and lost in thought that plainly was not thinking. nothing interested him; he never looked at the papers, never cared to hear a word of news. his eyes more unsteady, his lips looser, his neck thinner and longer, he looked more than ever like a puppet whose strings hung slack. how often would ginevra have cast herself on his bosom if she could have even hoped he would not repel her! now and then his eyes did wander to her in a dazed sort of animal-like appeal, but the moment she attempted response, he turned into a corpse. still, when it came, that look was a comfort, for it seemed to witness some bond between them after all. and another comfort was, that now, in his misery, she was able, if not to forget those painful thoughts about him which had all these years haunted her, at least to dismiss them when they came, in the hope that, as already such a change had passed upon him, further and better change might follow. she was still the same brown bird as of old--a bird of the twilight, or rather a twilight itself, with a whole night of stars behind it, of whose existence she scarcely knew, having but just started on the voyage of discovery which life is. she had the sweetest, rarest smile--not frequent and flashing like gibbie's, but stealing up from below, like the shadowy reflection of a greater light, gently deepening, permeating her countenance until it reached her eyes, thence issuing in soft flame. always however, an soon as her eyes began to glow duskily, down went their lids, and down dropt her head like the frond of a sensitive plant, her atmosphere was an embodied stillness; she made a quiet wherever she entered; she was not beautiful, but she was lovely; and her presence at once made a place such as one would desire to be in. the most pleasant of her thoughts were of necessity those with which the two youths were associated. how dreary but for them and theirs would the retrospect of her life have been! several times every winter they had met at the minister's, and every summer she had again and again seen gibbie with mrs. sclater, and once or twice had had a walk with them, and every time gibbie had something of donal's to give her. twice gibbie had gone to see her at the school, but the second time she asked him not to come again, as miss kimble did not like it. he gave a big stare of wonder, and thought of angus and the laird; but followed the stare with a swift smile, for he saw she was troubled, and asked no question, but waited for the understanding of all things that must come. but now, when or where was she ever to see them more? gibbie was no longer at the minister's, and perhaps she would never be invited to meet them there again. she dared not ask donal to call: her father would be indignant; and for her father's sake she would not ask gibbie; it might give him pain; while the thought that he would of a certainty behave so differently to him now that he was well-dressed, and mannered like a gentleman, was almost more unendurable to her than the memory of his past treatment of him. mr. and mrs. sclater had called upon them the moment they were settled in the cottage; but mr. galbraith would see nobody. when the gate-bell rang, he always looked out, and if a visitor appeared, withdrew to his bedroom. one brilliant saturday morning, the second in the session, the ground hard with an early frost, the filmy ice making fairy caverns and grottos in the cart-ruts, and the air so condensed with cold that every breath, to those who ate and slept well, had the life of two, mrs. sclater rang the said bell. mr. galbraith peeping from the window, saw a lady's bonnet, and went. she walked in, followed by gibbie, and would have ginevra go with them for a long walk. pleased enough with the proposal, for the outsides of life had been dull as well as painful of late, she went and asked her father. if she did not tell him that sir gilbert was with mrs. sclater, perhaps she ought to have told him; but i am not sure, and therefore am not going to blame her. when parents are not fathers and mothers, but something that has no name in the kingdom of heaven, they place the purest and most honest of daughters in the midst of perplexities. "why do you ask me?" returned her father. "my wishes are nothing to any one now; to you they never were anything." "i will stay at home, if you wish it, papa,--with pleasure," she replied, as cheerfully as she could after such a reproach. "by no means. if you do, i shall go and dine at the red hart," he answered--not having money enough in his possession to pay for a dinner there. i fancy he meant to be kind, but, like not a few, alas! took no pains to look as kind as he was. there are many, however, who seem to delight in planting a sting where conscience or heart will not let them deny. it made her miserable for a while of course, but she had got so used to his way of breaking a gift as he handed it, that she answered only with a sigh. when she was a child, his ungraciousness had power to darken the sunlight, but by repetition it had lost force. in haste she put on her little brown-ribboned bonnet, took the moth-eaten muff that had been her mother's, and rejoined mrs. sclater and gibbie, beaming with troubled pleasure. life in her was strong, and their society soon enabled her to forget, not her father's sadness, but his treatment of her. at the end of the street, they found donal waiting them--without greatcoat or muffler, the picture of such health as suffices to its own warmth, not a mark of the midnight student about him, and looking very different, in town-made clothes, from the donal of the mirror. he approached and saluted her with such an air of homely grace as one might imagine that of the red cross knight, when, having just put on the armour of a christian man, from a clownish fellow he straightway appeared the goodliest knight in the company. away they walked together westward, then turned southward. mrs. sclater and gibbie led, and ginevra followed with donal. and they had not walked far, before something of the delight of old times on glashruach began to revive in the bosom of the too sober girl. in vain she reminded herself that her father sat miserable at home, thinking of her probably as the most heartless of girls; the sun, and the bright air like wine in her veins, were too much for her, donal had soon made her cheerful, and now and then she answered his talk with even a little flash of merriment. they crossed the bridge, high-hung over the daur, by which on that black morning gibbie fled; and here for the first time, with his three friends about him, he told on his fingers the dire deed of the night, and heard from mrs. sclater that the murderers had been hanged. ginevra grew white and faint as she read his fingers and gestures, but it was more at the thought of what the child had come through, than from the horror of his narrative. they then turned eastward to the sea, and came to the top of the rock-border of the coast, with its cliffs rent into gullies, eerie places to look down into, ending in caverns into which the waves rushed with bellow and boom. although so nigh the city, this was always a solitary place, yet, rounding a rock, they came upon a young man, who hurried a book into his pocket, and would have gone by the other side, but perceiving himself recognized, came to meet them, and saluted mrs. sclater, who presented him to ginevra as the rev. mr. duff. "i have not had the pleasure of seeing you since you were quite a little girl, miss galbraith," said fergus. ginevra said coldly she did not remember him. the youths greeted him in careless student fashion: they had met now and then for a moment about the college; and a little meaningless talk followed. he was to preach the next day--and for several sundays following--at a certain large church in the city, at the time without a minister; and when they came upon him he was studying his sermon--i do not mean the truths he intended to press upon his audience--those he had mastered long ago--but his manuscript, studying it in the sense in which actors use the word, learning it, that is, by heart laboriously, that the words might come from his lips as much like an extemporaneous utterance as possible, consistently with not being mistaken for one, which, were it true as the bible, would have no merit in the ears of those who counted themselves judges of the craft. the kind of thing suited fergus, whose highest idea of life was seeming. naturally capable, he had already made of himself rather a dull fellow; for when a man spends his energy on appearing to have, he is all the time destroying what he has, and therein the very means of becoming what he desires to seem. if he gains his end his success is his punishment. fergus never forgot that he was a clergyman, always carrying himself according to his idea of the calling; therefore when the interchange of commonplaces flagged, he began to look about him for some remark sufficiently tinged with his profession to be suitable for him to make, and for the ladies to hear as his. the wind was a thoroughly wintry one from the north-east, and had been blowing all night, so that the waves were shouldering the rocks with huge assault. now fergus's sermon, which he meant to use as a spade for the casting of the first turf of the first parallel in the siege of the pulpit of the north parish, was upon the vanity of human ambition, his text being the grand verse--and so i saw the wicked buried, who had come and gone from the place of the holy; there was no small amount of fine writing in the manuscript he had thrust into his pocket; and his sermon was in his head when he remarked, with the wafture of a neatly-gloved hand seawards-- "i was watching these waves when you found me: they seem to me such a picture of the vanity of human endeavour! but just as little as those waves would mind me, if i told them they were wasting their labour on these rocks, will men mind me, when i tell them to-morrow of the emptiness of their ambitions." "a present enstance o' the vainity o' human endeevour!" said donal. "what for sud ye, in that case, gang on preachin', sae settin' them an ill exemple?" duff gave him a high-lidded glance, vouchsafing no reply. "just as those waves," he continued, "waste themselves in effort, as often foiled as renewed, to tear down these rocks, so do the men of this world go on and on, spending their strength for nought." "hoots, fergus!" said donal again, in broadest speech, as if with its bray he would rebuke not the madness but the silliness of the prophet, "ye dinna mean to tell me yon jaws (billows) disna ken their business better nor imaigine they hae to caw doon the rocks?" duff cast a second glance of scorn at what he took for the prosaic stupidity or poverty-stricken logomachy of donal, while ginevra opened on him big brown eyes, as much as to say, "donal, who was it set me down for saying a man couldn't be a burn?" but gibbie's face was expectant: he knew donal. mrs. sclater also looked interested: she did not much like duff, and by this time she suspected donal of genius. donal turned to ginevra with a smile, and said, in the best english he could command-- "bear with me a moment, miss galbraith. if mr. duff will oblige me by answering my question, i trust i shall satisfy you i am no turncoat." fergus stared. what did his father's herd-boy mean by talking such english to the ladies, and such vulgar scotch to him? although now a magistrand--that is, one about to take his degree of master of arts--donal was still to fergus the cleaner-out of his father's byres--an upstart, whose former position was his real one--towards him at least, who knew him. and did the fellow challenge him to a discussion? or did he presume on the familiarity of their boyhood, and wish to sport his acquaintance with the popular preacher? on either supposition, he was impertinent. "i spoke poetically," he said, with cold dignity. "ye'll excuse me, fergus," replied donal, "--for the sake o' auld langsyne, whan i was, as i ever will be, sair obligatit till ye--but i' that ye say noo, ye're sair wrang: ye wasna speykin' poetically, though i ken weel ye think it, or ye wadna say 't; an' that's what garred me tak ye up. for the verra essence o' poetry is trowth, an' as sune's a word's no true, it's no poetry, though it may hae on the cast claes o' 't. it's nane but them 'at kens na what poetry is, 'at blethers aboot poetic license, an' that kin' o' hen-scraich, as gien a poet was sic a gowk 'at naebody eedit hoo he lee'd, or whether he gaed wi' 's cwite (coat) hin' side afore or no." "i am at a loss to understand you--donal?--yes, donal grant. i remember you very well; and from the trouble i used to take with you to make you distinguish between the work of the poet and that of the rhymester, i should have thought by this time you would have known a little more about the nature of poetry. personification is a figure of speech in constant use by all poets." "ow ay! but there's true and there's fause personification; an' it's no ilka poet 'at kens the differ. ow, i ken! ye'll be doon upo' me wi' yer byron,"--fergus shook his head as at a false impeachment, but donal went on--"but even a poet canna mak lees poetry. an' a man 'at in ane o' his gran'est verses cud haiver aboot the birth o' a yoong airthquack!--losh! to think o' 't growin' an auld airthquack!--haith, to me it's no up till a deuk-quack!--sic a poet micht weel, i grant ye, be he ever sic a guid poet whan he tuik heed to what he said, he micht weel, i say, blether nonsense aboot the sea warrin' again' the rocks, an' sic stuff." "but don't you see them?" said fergus, pointing to a great billow that fell back at the moment, and lay churning in the gulf beneath them. "are they not in fact wasting the rocks away by slow degrees?" "what comes o' yer seemile than, anent the vainity o' their endeevour? but that's no what i'm carin' aboot. what i mainteen is, 'at though they div weir awa' the rocks, that's nae mair their design nor it's the design o' a yewky owse to kill the tree whan he rubs hit's skin an' his ain aff thegither." "tut! nobody ever means, when he personifies the powers of nature, that they know what they are about." "the mair necessar' till attreebute till them naething but their rale design." "if they don't know what they are about, how can you be so foolish as talk of their design?" "ilka thing has a design,--an' gien it dinna ken't itsel', that's jist whaur yer true an' lawfu' personification comes in. there's no rizon 'at a poet sudna attreebute till a thing as a conscious design that which lies at the verra heart o' 'ts bein', the design for which it's there. that an' no ither sud determine the personification ye gie a thing--for that's the trowth o' the thing. eh, man, fergus! the jaws is fechtin' wi' nae rocks. they're jist at their pairt in a gran' cleansin' hermony. they're at their hoosemaid's wark, day an' nicht, to haud the warl' clean, an' gran' an' bonnie they sing at it. gien i was you, i wadna tell fowk any sic nonsense as yon; i wad tell them 'at ilk ane 'at disna dee his wark i' the warl', an' dee 't the richt gait, 's no the worth o' a minnin, no to say a whaul, for ilk ane o' thae wee craturs dis the wull o' him 'at made 'im wi' ilka whisk o' his bit tailie, fa'in' in wi' a' the jabble o' the jaws again' the rocks, for it's a' ae thing--an' a' to haud the muckle sea clean. an' sae whan i lie i' my bed, an' a' at ance there comes a wee soughie o' win' i' my face, an' i luik up an' see it was naething but the wings o' a flittin' flee, i think wi' mysel' hoo a' the curses are but blessin's 'at ye dinna see intill, an' hoo ilka midge, an' flee, an' muckle dronin' thing 'at gangs aboot singin' bass, no to mention the doos an' the mairtins an' the craws an' the kites an' the oolets an' the muckle aigles an' the butterflees, is a' jist haudin' the air gauin' 'at ilka defilin' thing may be weel turnt ower, an' brunt clean. that's the best i got oot o' my cheemistry last session. an' fain wad i haud air an' watter in motion aboot me, an' sae serve my en'--whether by waggin' wi' my wings or whiskin' wi' my tail. eh! it's jist won'erfu'. its a' ae gran' consortit confusion o' hermony an' order; an' what maks the confusion is only jist 'at a' thing's workin' an' naething sits idle. but awa! wi' the nonsense o' ae thing worryin' an' fechtin' at anither!--no till ye come to beasts an' fowk, an' syne ye hae eneuch o' 't." all the time fergus had been poking the point of his stick into the ground, a smile of superiority curling his lip. "i hope, ladies, our wits are not quite swept away in this flood of doric," he said. "you have a poor opinion of the stability of our brains, mr. duff," said mrs. sclater. "i was only judging by myself," he replied, a little put out. "i can't say i understood our friend here. did you?" "perfectly," answered mrs. sclater. at that moment came a thunderous wave with a great bowff into the hollow at the end of the gully on whose edge they stood. "there's your housemaid's broom, donal!" said ginevra. they all laughed. "everything depends on how you look at a thing," said fergus, and said no more--inwardly resolving, however, to omit from his sermon a certain sentence about the idle waves dashing themselves to ruin on the rocks they would destroy, and to work in something instead about the winds of the winter tossing the snow. a pause followed. "well, this is saturday, and tomorrow is my work-day, you know, ladies," he said. "if you would oblige me with your address, miss galbraith, i should do myself the honour of calling on mr. galbraith." ginevra told him where they lived, but added she was afraid he must not expect to see her father, for he had been out of health lately, and would see nobody. "at all events i shall give myself the chance," he rejoined, and bidding the ladies good-bye, and nodding to the youths, turned and walked away. for some time there was silence. at length donal spoke. "poor fergus!" he said with a little sigh. "he's a good-natured creature, and was a great help to me; but when i think of him a preacher, i seem to see an egyptian priest standing on the threshold of the great door at ipsambul, blowing with all his might to keep out the libyan desert; and the four great stone gods, sitting behind the altar, far back in the gloom, laughing at him." then ginevra asked him something which led to a good deal of talk about the true and false in poetry, and made mrs. sclater feel it was not for nothing she had befriended the lad from the hills in the strange garments. and she began to think whether her husband might not be brought to take a higher view of his calling. on monday fergus went to pay his visit to mr. galbraith. as ginevra had said, her father did not appear, but fergus was far from disappointed. he had taken it into his head that miss galbraith sided with him when that ill-bred fellow made his rude, not to say ungrateful, attack upon him, and was much pleased to have a talk with her. ginevra thought it would not be right to cherish against him the memory of the one sin of his youth in her eyes, but she could not like him. she did not know why, but the truth was, she felt, without being able to identify, his unreality: she thought it was because, both in manners and in dress, so far as the custom of his calling would permit, he was that unpleasant phenomenon, a fine gentleman. she had never heard him preach, or she would have liked him still less; for he was an orator wilful and prepense, choice of long words, fond of climaxes, and always aware of the points at which he must wave his arm, throw forward his hands, wipe his eyes with the finest of large cambric handkerchiefs. as it was, she was heartily tired of him before he went, and when he was gone, found, as she sat with her father, that she could not recall a word he had said. as to what had made the fellow stay so long, she was therefore positively unable to give her father an answer; the consequence of which was, that, the next time he called, mr. galbraith, much to her relief, stood the brunt of his approach, and received him. the ice thus broken, his ingratiating manners, and the full-blown respect he showed mr. galbraith, enabling the weak man to feel himself, as of old, every inch a laird, so won upon him that, when he took his leave, he gave him a cordial invitation to repeat his visit. he did so, in the evening this time, and remembering a predilection of the laird's, begged for a game of backgammon. the result of his policy was, that, of many weeks that followed, every monday evening at least he spent with the laird. ginevra was so grateful to him for his attention to her father, and his efforts to draw him out of his gloom, that she came gradually to let a little light of favour shine upon him. and if the heart of fergus duff was drawn to her, that is not to be counted to him a fault--neither that, his heart thus drawn, he should wish to marry her. had she been still heiress of glashruach, he dared not have dreamed of such a thing, but, noting the humble condition to which they were reduced, the growing familiarity of the father, and the friendliness of the daughter, he grew very hopeful, and more anxious than ever to secure the presentation to the north church, which was in the gift of the city. he could easily have got a rich wife, but he was more greedy of distinction than of money, and to marry the daughter of the man to whom he had been accustomed in childhood to look up as the greatest in the known world, was in his eyes like a patent of nobility, would be a ratification of his fitness to mingle with the choice of the land. chapter li. the north church. it was a cold night in march, cloudy and blowing. every human body was turned into a fortress for bare defence of life. there was no snow on the ground, but it seemed as if there must be snow everywhere else. there was snow in the clouds overhead, and there was snow in the mind of man beneath. the very air felt like the quarry out of which the snow had been dug which was being ground above. the wind felt black, the sky was black, and the lamps were blowing about as if they wanted to escape for the darkness was after them. it was the sunday following the induction of fergus, and this was the meteoric condition through which donal and gibbie passed on their way to the north church, to hear him preach in the pulpit that was now his own. the people had been gathering since long before the hour, and the youths could find only standing room near the door. cold as was the weather, and keen as blew the wind into the church every time a door was opened, the instant it was shut again it was warm, for the place was crowded from the very height of the great steep-sloping galleries, at the back of which the people were standing on the window sills, down to the double swing-doors, which were constantly cracking open as if the house was literally too full to hold the congregation. the aisles also were crowded with people standing, all eager yet solemn, with granite faces and live eyes. one who did not know better might well have imagined them gathered in hunger after good tidings from the kingdom of truth and hope, whereby they might hasten the coming of that kingdom in their souls and the souls they loved. but it was hardly that; it was indeed a long way from it, and no such thing: the eagerness was, in the mass, doubtless with exceptions, to hear the new preacher, the pyrotechnist of human logic and eloquence, who was about to burn his halfpenny blue lights over the abyss of truth, and throw his yelping crackers into it. the eyes of the young men went wandering over the crowd, looking for any of their few acquaintances, but below they mostly fell of course on the backs of heads. there was, however, no mistaking either ginevra's bonnet or the occiput perched like a capital on the long neck of her father. they sat a good way in front, about the middle of the great church. at the sight of them gibbie's face brightened, donal's turned pale as death. for, only the last week but one, he had heard of the frequent visits of the young preacher to the cottage, and of the favour in which he was held by both father and daughter; and his state of mind since, had not, with all his philosophy to rectify and support it, been an enviable one. that he could not for a moment regard himself as a fit husband for the lady-lass, or dream of exposing himself or her to the insult which the offer of himself as a son-in-law would bring on them both from the laird, was not a reflection to render the thought of such a bag of wind as fergus duff marrying her, one whit the less horribly unendurable. had the laird been in the same social position as before, donal would have had no fear of his accepting fergus; but misfortune alters many relations. fergus's father was a man of considerable property, fergus himself almost a man of influence, and already in possession of a comfortable income: it was possible to imagine that the impoverished thomas galbraith, late of glashruach, esq., might contrive to swallow what annoyance there could not but in any case be in wedding his daughter to the son of john duff, late his own tenant of the mains. altogether donal's thoughts were not of the kind to put him in fit mood--i do not say to gather benefit from the prophesying of fergus, but to give fair play to the peddler who now rose to display his loaded calico and beggarly shoddy over the book-board of the pulpit. but the congregation listened rapt. i dare not say there was no divine reality concerned in his utterance, for gibbie saw many a glimmer through the rents in his logic, and the thin-worn patches of his philosophy; but it was not such glimmers that fettered the regards of the audience, but the noisy flow and false eloquence of the preacher. in proportion to the falsehood in us are we exposed to the falsehood in others. the false plays upon the false without discord; comes to the false, and is welcomed as the true; there is no jar, for the false to the false look the true; darkness takes darkness for light, and great is the darkness. i will not attempt an account of the sermon; even admirably rendered, it would be worthless as the best of copies of a bad wall-paper. there was in it, to be sure, such a glowing description of the city of god as might have served to attract thither all the diamond-merchants of amsterdam; but why a christian should care to go to such a place, let him tell who knows; while, on the other hand, the audience appeared equally interested in his equiponderating description of the place of misery. not once {did he even} attempt to give, or indeed could have given, the feeblest idea, to a single soul present, of the one terror of the universe--the peril of being cast from the arms of essential love and life into the bosom of living death. for this teacher of men knew nothing whatever but by hearsay, had not in himself experienced one of the joys or one of the horrors he endeavoured to embody. gibbie was not at home listening to such a sermon; he was distressed, and said afterwards to donal he would far rather be subjected to mr. sclater's isms than fergus's ations. it caused him pain too to see donal look so scornful, so contemptuous even; while it added to donal's unrest, and swelled his evil mood, to see mr. galbraith absorbed. for ginevra's bonnet, it did not once move--but then it was not set at an angle to indicate either eyes upturned in listening, or cast down in emotion. donal would have sacrificed not a few songs, the only wealth he possessed, for one peep round the corner of that bonnet. he had become painfully aware, that, much as he had seen of ginevra, he knew scarcely anything of her thoughts; he had always talked so much more to her than she to him, that now, when he longed to know, he could not even guess what she might be thinking, or what effect such "an arrangement" of red and yellow would have upon her imagination and judgment. she could not think or receive what was not true, he felt sure, but she might easily enough attribute truth where it did not exist. at length the rockets, roman candles, and squibs were all burnt out, the would-be "eternal blazon" was over, and the preacher sunk back exhausted in his seat. the people sang; a prayer, fit pendent to such a sermon, followed, and the congregation was dismissed--it could not be with much additional strength to meet the sorrows, temptations, sophisms, commonplaces, disappointments, dulnesses, stupidities, and general devilries of the week, although not a few paid the preacher welcome compliments on his "gran' discoorse." the young men were out among the first, and going round to another door, in the church-yard, by which they judged ginevra and her father must issue, there stood waiting. the night was utterly changed. the wind had gone about, and the vapours were high in heaven, broken all into cloud-masses of sombre grandeur. now from behind, now upon their sides, they were made glorious by the full moon, while through their rents appeared the sky and the ever marvellous stars. gibbie's eyes went climbing up the spire that shot skyward over their heads. around its point the clouds and the moon seemed to gather, grouping themselves in grand carelessness; and he thought of the son of man coming in the clouds of heaven; to us mere heaps of watery vapour, ever ready to fall, drowning the earth in rain, or burying it in snow, to angel-feet they might be solid masses whereon to tread attendant upon him, who, although with his word he ruled winds and seas, loved to be waited on by the multitude of his own! he was yet gazing, forgetful of the human tide about him, watching the glory dominant over storm, when his companion pinched his arm: he looked, and was aware that fergus, muffled to the eyes, was standing beside them. he seemed not to see them, and they were nowise inclined to attract his attention, but gazed motionless on the church door, an unsealed fountain of souls. what a curious thing it is to watch an issuing crowd of faces for one loved one--all so unattractive, provoking, blamable, as they come rolling round corners, dividing, and flowing away--not one of them the right one! but at last out she did come--ginevra, like a daisy among mown grass! it was really she!--but with her father. she saw donal, glanced from him to gibbie, cast down her sweet eyes, and made no sign. fergus had already advanced and addressed the laird. "ah, mr. duff!" said mr. galbraith; "excuse me, but would you oblige me by giving your arm to my daughter? i see a friend waiting to speak to me. i shall overtake you in a moment." fergus murmured his pleasure, and ginevra and he moved away together. the youths for a moment watched the father. he dawdled--evidently wanted to speak to no one. they then followed the two, walking some yards behind them. every other moment fergus would bend his head towards ginevra; once or twice they saw the little bonnet turn upwards in response or question. poor donal was burning with lawless and foolish indignation: why should the minister muffle himself up like an old woman in the crowd, and take off the great handkerchief when talking with the lady? when the youths reached the street where the cottage stood, they turned the corner after them, and walked quickly up to them where they stood at the gate waiting for it to be opened. "sic a gran' nicht!" said donal, after the usual greetings. "sir gibbie an' me 's haein' a dauner wi' the mune. ye wad think she had licht eneuch to haud the cloods aff o' her, wad ye no, mem? but na! they'll be upon her, an' i'm feart there's ae unco black ane yon'er--dinna ye see 't--wi' a straik o' white, aboot the thrapple o' 't?--there--dinna ye see 't?" he went on pointing to the clouds about the moon, "--that ane, i'm doobtin', 'ill hae the better o' her or lang--tak her intill 'ts airms, an' bray a' the licht oot o' her. guid nicht, mem.--guid nicht, fergus. you ministers sudna mak yersels sae like cloods. ye sud be cled in white an' gowd, an' a' colours o' stanes, like the new jerooslem ye tell sic tales aboot, an' syne naebody wad mistak the news ye bring." therewith donal walked on, doubtless for the moment a little relieved. but before they had walked far, he broke down altogether. "gibbie," he said, "yon rascal's gauin' to merry the leddy-lass! an' it drives me mad to think it. gien i cud but ance see an' speyk till her--ance--jist ance! lord! what 'll come o' a' the gowans upo' the mains, an' the heather upo' glashgar!" he burst out crying, but instantly dashed away his tears with indignation at his weakness. "i maun dree my weird," (undergo my doom), he said, and said no more. gibbie's face had grown white in the moon-gleams, and his lips trembled. he put his arm through donal's and clung to him, and in silence they went home. when they reached donal's room, donal entering shut the door behind him and shut out gibbie. he stood for a moment like one dazed, then suddenly coming to himself, turned away, left the house, and ran straight to daur-street. when the minister's door was opened to him, he went to that of the dining-room, knowing mr. and mrs. sclater would then be at supper. happily for his intent, the minister was at the moment having his tumbler of toddy after the labours of the day, an indulgence which, so long as gibbie was in the house, he had, ever since that first dinner-party, taken in private, out of regard, as he pretended to himself, for the boy's painful associations with it, but in reality, to his credit be it told if it may, from a little shame of the thing itself; and his wife therefore, when she saw gibbie, rose, and, meeting him, took him with her to her own little sitting-room, where they had a long talk, of which the result appeared the next night in a note from mrs. sclater to gibbie, asking him and donal to spend the evening of tuesday with her. chapter lii. the quarry. donal threw everything aside, careless of possible disgrace in the class the next morning, and, trembling with hope, accompanied gibbie: she would be there--surely! it was one of those clear nights in which a gleam of straw-colour in the west, with light-thinned gray-green deepening into blue above it, is like the very edge of the axe of the cold--the edge that reaches the soul. but the youths were warm enough: they had health and hope. the hospitable crimson room, with its round table set out for a scotch tea, and its fire blazing hugely, received them. and there sat ginevra by the fire! with her pretty feet on a footstool before it: in those days ladies wore open shoes, and showed dainty stockings. her face looked rosy, but it was from the firelight, for when she turned it towards them, it showed pale as usual. she received them, as always, with the same simple sincerity that had been hers on the bank of the lorrie burn. but gibbie read some trouble in her eyes, for his soul was all touch, and, like a delicate spiritual seismograph, responded at once to the least tremble of a neighbouring soul. the minister was not present, and mrs. sclater had both to be the blazing coal, and keep blowing herself, else, however hot it might be at the smouldering hearth, the little company would have sent up no flame of talk. when tea was over, gibbie went to the window, got within the red curtains, and peeped out. returning presently, he spelled with fingers and signed with hands to ginevra that it was a glorious night: would she not come for a walk? ginevra looked to mrs. sclater. "gibbie wants me to go for a walk," she said. "certainly, my dear--if you are well enough to go with him," replied her friend. "i am always well," answered ginevra. "i can't go with you," said mrs. sclater, "for i expect my husband every moment; but what occasion is there, with two such knights to protect you?" she was straining hard on the bit of propriety; but she knew them all so well? she said to herself. then first perceiving gibbie's design, donal cast him a grateful glance, while ginevra rose hastily, and ran to put on her outer garments. plainly to donal, she was pleased to go. when they stood on the pavement, there was the moon, the very cream of light, ladying it in a blue heaven. it was not all her own, but the clouds about her were white and attendant, and ever when they came near her took on her livery--the poor paled-rainbow colours, which are all her reflected light can divide into: that strange brown we see so often on her cloudy people must, i suppose, be what the red or the orange fades to. there was a majesty and peace about her airy domination, which donal himself would have found difficult, had he known her state, to bring into harmony with her aeonian death. strange that the light of lovers should be the coldest of all cold things within human ken--dead with cold, millions of years before our first father and mother appeared each to the other on the earth! the air was keen but dry. nothing could fall but snow; and of anything like it there was nothing but those few frozen vapours that came softly out of the deeps to wait on the moon. between them and behind them lay depth absolute, expressed in the perfection of nocturnal blues, deep as gentle, the very home of the dwelling stars. the steps of the youths rang on the pavements, and donal's voice seemed to him so loud and clear that he muffled it all in gentler meaning. he spoke low, and ginevra answered him softly. they walked close together, and gibbie flitted to and fro, now on this side, now on that, now in front of them, now behind. "hoo likit ye the sermon, mem?" asked donal. "papa thought it a grand sermon," answered ginevra. "an' yersel'?" persisted donal. "papa tells me i am no judge," she replied. "that's as muckle as to say ye didna like it sae weel as he did!" returned donal, in a tone expressing some relief. "mr. duff is very good to my father, donal," she rejoined, "and i don't like to say anything against his sermon; but all the time i could not help thinking whether your mother would like this and that; for you know, donal, any good there is in me i have got from her, and from gibbie--and from you, donal." the youth's heart beat with a pleasure that rose to physical pain. had he been a winged creature he would have flown straight up; but being a sober wingless animal, he stumped on with his two happy legs. gladly would he have shown her the unreality of fergus--that he was a poor shallow creature, with only substance enough to carry show and seeming, but he felt, just because he had reason to fear him, that it would be unmanly to speak the truth of him behind his back, except in the absolute necessity of rectitude. he felt also that, if ginevra owed her father's friend such delicacy, he owed him at least a little silence; for was he not under more obligation to this same shallow-pated orator, than to all eternity he could wipe out, even if eternity carried in it the possibility of wiping out an obligation? few men understand, but donal did, that he who would cancel an obligation is a dishonest man. i cannot help it that many a good man--good, that is, because he is growing better--must then be reckoned in the list of the dishonest: he is in their number until he leaves it. donal remaining silent, ginevra presently returned him his own question: "how did you like the sermon, donal?" "div ye want me to say, mem?" he asked. "i do, donal," she answered. "weel, i wad jist say, in a general w'y, 'at i canna think muckle o' ony sermon 'at micht gar a body think mair o' the precher nor o' him 'at he comes to prech aboot. i mean, 'at i dinna see hoo onybody was to lo'e god or his neebour ae jot the mair for hearin' yon sermon last nicht." "but might not some be frightened by it, and brought to repentance, donal?" suggested the girl. "ou ay; i daur say; i dinna ken. but i canna help thinkin' 'at what disna gie god onything like fair play, canna dee muckle guid to men, an' may, i doobt, dee a heap o' ill. it's a pagan kin' o' a thing yon." "that's just what i was feeling--i don't say thinking, you know--for you say we must not say think when we have taken no trouble about it. i am sorry for mr. duff, if he has taken to teaching where he does not understand." they had left the city behind them, and were walking a wide open road, with a great sky above it. on its borders were small fenced fields, and a house here and there with a garden. it was a plain-featured, slightly undulating country, with hardly any trees--not at all beautiful, except as every place under the heaven which man has not defiled is beautiful to him who can see what is there. but this night the earth was nothing: what was in them and over them was all. donal felt--as so many will feel, before the earth, like a hen set to hatch the eggs of a soaring bird, shall have done rearing broods for heaven--that, with this essential love and wonder by his side, to be doomed to go on walking to all eternity would be a blissful fate, were the landscape turned to a brick-field, and the sky to persistent gray. "wad ye no tak my airm, mem?" he said at length, summoning courage. "i jist fin' mysel' like a horse wi' a reyn brocken, gaein' by mysel' throu' the air this gait." before he had finished the sentence ginevra had accepted the offer. it was the first time. his arm trembled. he thought it was her hand. "ye're no cauld, are ye, mem?" he said. "not the least," she answered. "eh, mem! gien fowk was but a' made oot o' the same clay, like, 'at ane micht say till anither--'ye hae me as ye hae yersel''!" "yes, donal," rejoined ginevra; "i wish we were all made of the poet-clay like you! what it would be to have a well inside, out of which to draw songs and ballads as i pleased! that's what you have, donal--or, rather, you're just a draw-well of music yourself." donal laughed merrily. a moment more and he broke out singing: my thoughts are like fireflies, pulsing in moonlight; my heart is a silver cup, full of red wine; my soul a pale gleaming horizon, whence soon light will flood the gold earth with a torrent divine. "what's that, donal?" cried ginevra. "ow, naething," answered donal. "it was only my hert lauchin'." "say the words," said ginevra. "i canna--i dinna ken them noo," replied donal. "oh, donal! are those lovely words gone--altogether--for ever? shall i not hear them again?" "i'll try to min' upo' them whan i gang hame," he said. "i canna the noo. i can think o' naething but ae thing." "and what is that, donal?" "yersel'," answered donal. ginevra's hand lifted just a half of its weight from donal's arm, like a bird that had thought of flying, then settled again. "it is very pleasant to be together once more as in the old time, donal--though there are no daisies and green fields.--but what place is that, donal?" instinctively, almost unconsciously, she wanted to turn the conversation. the place she pointed to was an opening immediately on the roadside, through a high bank--narrow and dark, with one side half lighted by the moon. she had often passed it, walking with her school-fellows, but had never thought of asking what it was. in the shining dusk it looked strange and a little dreadful. "it's the muckle quarry, mem," answered donal: "div ye no ken that? that's whaur maist the haill toon cam oot o'. it's a some eerie kin' o' a place to luik at i' this licht. i won'er at ye never saw't." "i have seen the opening there, but never took much notice of it before," said ginevra. "come an' i'll lat ye see't," rejoined donal. "it's weel worth luikin' intill. ye hae nae notion sic a place as 'tis. it micht be amo' the grenite muntains o' aigypt, though they takna freely sic fine blocks oot o' this ane as they tuik oot o' that at syene. ye wadna be fleyt to come an' see what the meen maks o' 't, wad ye, mem?" "no, donal. i would not be frightened to go anywhere with you. but--" "eh, mem! it maks me richt prood to hear ye say that. come awa' than." so saying, he turned aside, and led her into the narrow passage, cut through a friable sort of granite. gibbie, thinking they had gone to have but a peep and return, stood in the road, looking at the clouds and the moon, and crooning to himself. by and by, when he found they did not return, he followed them. when they reached the end of the cutting, ginevra started at sight of the vast gulf, the moon showing the one wall a ghastly gray, and from the other throwing a shadow half across the bottom. but a winding road went down into it, and donal led her on. she shrunk at first, drawing back from the profound, mysterious-looking abyss, so awfully still; but when donal looked at her, she was ashamed to refuse to go farther, and indeed almost afraid to take her hand from his arm; so he led her down the terrace road. the side of the quarry was on one hand, and on the other she could see only into the gulf. "oh, donal!" she said at length, almost in a whisper, "this is like a dream i once had, of going down and down a long roundabout road, inside the earth, down and down, to the heart of a place full of the dead--the ground black with death, and between horrible walls." donal looked at her; his face was in the light reflected from the opposite gray precipice: she thought it looked white and strange, and grew more frightened, but dared not speak. presently donal again began to sing, and this is something like what he sang:-- "death! whaur do ye bide, auld death?" "i bide in ilka breath," quo' death. "no i' the pyramids, an' no the worms amids, 'neth coffin-lids; i bidena whaur life has been, an' whaur's nae mair to be dune." "death! whaur do ye bide, auld death?" "wi' the leevin', to dee 'at's laith," quo' death. "wi' the man an' the wife 'at lo'e like life, but strife; (without) wi' the bairns 'at hing to their mither, an' a' 'at lo'e ane anither." "death! whaur do ye bide, auld death?" "abune an' aboot an' aneath," quo' death. "but o' a' the airts, an' o' a' the pairts, in herts, whan the tane to the tither says na, an' the north win' begins to blaw." "what a terrible song, donal!" said ginevra. he made no reply, but went on, leading her down into the pit: he had been afraid she was going to draw back, and sang the first words her words suggested, knowing she would not interrupt him. the aspect of the place grew frightful to her. "are you sure there are no holes--full of water, down there?" she faltered. "ay, there's ane or twa," replied donal, "but we'll haud oot o' them." ginevra shuddered, but was determined to show no fear: donal should not reproach her with lack of faith! they stepped at last on the level below, covered with granite chips and stones and great blocks. in the middle rose a confused heap of all sorts. to this, and round to the other side of it, donal led her. there shone the moon on the corner of a pool, the rest of which crept away in blackness under an overhanging mass. she caught his arm with both hands. he told her to look up. steep granite rock was above them all round, on one side dark, on the other mottled with the moon and the thousand shadows of its own roughness; over the gulf hung vaulted the blue, cloud-blotted sky, whence the moon seemed to look straight down upon her, asking what they were about, away from their kind, in such a place of terror. suddenly donal caught her hand. she looked in his face. it was not the moon that could make it so white. "ginevra!" he said, with trembling voice. "yes, donal," she answered. "ye're no angry at me for ca'in ye by yer name? i never did it afore." "i always call you donal," she answered. "that's nait'ral. ye're a gran' leddy, an' i'm naething abune a herd-laddie." "you're a great poet, donal, and that's much more than being a lady or a gentleman." "ay, maybe," answered donal listlessly, as if he were thinking of something far away; "but it winna mak up for the tither; they're no upo' the same side o' the watter, like. a puir lad like me daurna lift an ee till a gran' leddy like you, mem. a' the warl' wad but scorn him, an' lauch at the verra notion. my time's near ower at the college, an' i see naething for 't but gang hame an' fee (hire myself). i'll be better workin' wi' my han's nor wi' my heid whan i hae nae houp left o' ever seein' yer face again. i winna lowse a day aboot it. gien i lowse time i may lowse my rizon. hae patience wi' me ae meenute, mem; i'm jist driven to tell ye the trowth. it's mony a lang sin' i hae kent mysel' wantin' you. ye're the boady, an' i'm the shaidow. i dinna mean nae hyperbolics--that's the w'y the thing luiks to me i' my ain thouchts. eh, mem, but ye're bonnie! ye dinna ken yersel' hoo bonnie ye are, nor what a subversion you mak i' my hert an' my heid. i cud jist cut my heid aff, an' lay 't aneth yer feet to haud them aff o' the cauld flure." still she looked him in the eyes, like one bewildered, unable to withdraw her eyes from his. her face too had grown white. "tell me to haud my tongue, mem, an' i'll haud it," he said. her lips moved, but no sound came. "i ken weel," he went on, "ye can never luik upo' me as onything mair nor a kin' o' a human bird, 'at ye wad hing in a cage, an' gie seeds an' bits o' sugar till, an' hearken till whan he sang. i'll never trouble ye nae mair, an' whether ye grant me my prayer or no, ye'll never see me again. the only differ 'ill be 'at i'll aither hing my heid or haud it up for the rest o' my days. i wad fain ken 'at i wasna despised, an' 'at maybe gien things had been different,--but na, i dinna mean that; i mean naething 'at wad fricht ye frae what i wad hae. it sudna mean a hair mair nor lies in itsel'." "what is it, donal?" said ginevra, half inaudibly, and with effort: she could scarcely speak for a fluttering in her throat. "i cud beseech ye upo' my k-nees," he went on, as if she had not spoken, "to lat me kiss yer bonnie fut; but that ye micht grant for bare peety, an' that wad dee me little guid; sae for ance an' for a', till maybe efter we're a' ayont the muckle sea, i beseech at the fauvour o' yer sweet sowl, to lay upo' me, as upo' the lips o' the sowl 'at sang ye the sangs ye likit sae weel to hear whan ye was but a leddy-lassie--ae solitary kiss. it shall be holy to me as the licht; an' i sweir by the trowth i'll think o' 't but as ye think, an' man nor wuman nor bairn, no even gibbie himsel', sall ken--" the last word broke the spell upon ginevra. "but, donal," she said, as quietly as when years ago they talked by the lorrie side, "would it be right?--a secret with you i could not tell to any one?--not even if afterwards--" donal's face grew so ghastly with utter despair that absolute terror seized her; she turned from him and fled, calling "gibbie! gibbie!" he was not many yards off, approaching the mound as she came from behind it. he ran to meet her. she darted to him like a dove pursued by a hawk, threw herself into his arms, laid her head on his shoulder, and wept. gibbie held her fast, and with all the ways in his poor power sought to comfort her. she raised her face at length. it was all wet with tears which glistened in the moonlight. hurriedly gibbie asked on his fingers: "was donal not good to you?" "he's beautiful," she sobbed; "but i couldn't, you know, gibbie, i couldn't. i don't care a straw about position and all that--who would with a poet?--but i couldn't, you know, gibbie. i couldn't let him think i might have married him--in any case: could i now, gibbie?" she laid her head again on his shoulder and sobbed. gibbie did not well understand her. donal, where he had thrown himself on a heap of granite chips, heard and understood, felt and knew and resolved all in one. the moon shone, and the clouds went flitting like ice-floe about the sky, now gray in distance, now near the moon and white, now in her very presence and adorned with her favour on their bosoms, now drifting again into the gray; and still the two, ginevra and gibbie, stood motionless--gibbie with the tears in his eyes, and ginevra weeping as if her heart would break; and behind the granite blocks lay donal. again ginevra raised her head. "gibbie, you must go and look after poor donal," she said. gibbie went, but donal was nowhere to be seen. to escape the two he loved so well, and be alone as he felt, he had crept away softly into one of the many recesses of the place. again and again gibbie made the noise with which he was accustomed to call him, but he gave back no answer, and they understood that wherever he was he wanted to be left to himself. they climbed again the winding way out of the gulf, and left him the heart of its desolation. "take me home, gibbie," said ginevra, when they reached the high road. as they went, not a word more passed between them. ginevra was as dumb as gibbie, and gibbie was sadder than he had ever been in his life--not only for donal's sake, but because, in his inexperienced heart, he feared that ginevra would not listen to donal because she could not--because she had already promised herself to fergus duff; and with all his love to his kind, he could not think it well that fergus should be made happy at such a price. he left her at her own door, and went home, hoping to find donal there before him. he was not there. hour after hour passed, and he did not appear. at eleven o'clock, gibbie set out to look for him, but with little hope of finding him. he went all the way back to the quarry, thinking it possible he might be waiting there, expecting him to return without ginevra. the moon was now low, and her light reached but a little way into it, so that the look of the place was quite altered, and the bottom of it almost dark. but gibbie had no fear. he went down to the spot, almost feeling his way, where they had stood, got upon the heap, and called and whistled many times. but no answer came. donal was away, he did not himself know where, wandering wherever the feet in his spirit led him. gibbie went home again, and sat up all night, keeping the kettle boiling, ready to make tea for him the moment he should come in. but even in the morning donal did not appear. gibbie was anxious--for donal was unhappy. he might hear of him at the college, he thought, and went at the usual hour. sure enough, as he entered the quadrangle, there was donal going in at the door leading to the moral philosophy class-room. for hours, neglecting his own class, he watched about the court, but donal never showed himself. gibbie concluded he had watched to avoid him, and had gone home by crown-street, and himself returned the usual and shorter way, sure almost of now finding him in his room--although probably with the door locked. the room was empty, and mistress murkison had not seen him. donal's final examination, upon which alone his degree now depended, came on the next day: gibbie watched at a certain corner, and unseen saw him pass--with a face pale but strong, eyes that seemed not to have slept, and lips that looked the inexorable warders of many sighs. after that he did not see him once till the last day of the session arrived. then in the public room he saw him go up to receive his degree. never before had he seen him look grand; and gibbie knew that there was not any evil in the world, except wrong. but it had been the dreariest week he had ever passed. as they came from the public room, he lay in wait for him once more, but again in vain: he must have gone through the sacristan's garden behind. when he reached his lodging, he found a note from donal waiting him, in which he bade him good-bye, said he was gone to his mother, and asked him to pack up his things for him: he would write to mistress murkison and tell her what to do with the chest. chapter liii. a night-watch. a sense of loneliness, such as in all his forsaken times he had never felt, overshadowed gibbie when he read this letter. he was altogether perplexed by donal's persistent avoidance of him. he had done nothing to hurt him, and knew himself his friend in his sorrow as well as in his joy. he sat down in the room that had been his, and wrote to him. as often as he raised his eyes--for he had not shut the door--he saw the dusty sunshine on the old furniture. it was a bright day, one of the poursuivants of the yet distant summer, but how dreary everything looked! how miserable and heartless now donal was gone, and would never regard those things any more! when he had ended his letter, almost for the first time in his life, he sat thinking what he should do next. it was as if he were suddenly becalmed on the high seas; one wind had ceased to blow, and another had not begun. it troubled him a little that he must now return to mr. sclater, and once more feel the pressure of a nature not homogeneous with his own. but it would not be for long. mr. sclater had thought of making a movement towards gaining an extension of his tutelage beyond the ordinary legal period, on the ground of unfitness in his ward for the management of his property; but gibbie's character and scholarship, and the opinion of the world which would follow failure, had deterred him from the attempt. in the month of may, therefore, when, according to the registry of his birth in the parish book, he would be of age, he would also be, as he expected, his own master, so far as other mortals were concerned. as to what he would then do, he had thought much, and had plans, but no one knew anything of them except donal--who had forsaken him. he was in no haste to return to daur-street. he packed donal's things, with all the books they had bought together, and committed the chest to mistress murkison. he then told her he would rather not give up his room just yet, but would like to keep it on for a while, and come and go as he pleased; to which the old woman replied, "as ye wull, sir gibbie. come an' gang as free as the win'. mak o' my hoose as gien it war yer ain." he told her he would sleep there that night, and she got him his dinner as usual; after which, putting a greek book in his pocket, he went out, thinking to go to the end of the pier and sit there a while. he would gladly have gone to ginevra, but she had prevented him when she was at school, and had never asked him since she left it. but gibbie was not _ennuyé_: the pleasure of his life came from the very roots of his being, and would therefore run into any channel of his consciousness; neither was he greatly troubled; nothing could "put rancours in the vessel of" his "peace;" he was only very hungry after the real presence of the human; and scarcely had he set his foot on the pavement, when he resolved to go and see mistress croale. the sun, still bright, was sinking towards the west, and a cold wind was blowing. he walked to the market, up to the gallery of it, and on to the farther end, greeting one and another of the keepers of the little shops, until he reached that of mistress croale. she was overjoyed at sight of him, and proud the neighbours saw the terms they were on. she understood his signs and finger-speech tolerably, and held her part of the conversation in audible utterance. she told him that for the week past donal had occupied her garret--she did not know why, she said, and hoped nothing had gone wrong between them. gibbie signed that he could not tell her about it there, but would go and take tea with her in the evening. "i'm sorry i canna be hame sae ear'," she replied. "i promised to tak my dish o' tay wi' auld mistress green--the kail-wife, ye ken, sir gibbie."--gibbie nodded and she resumed:--"but gien ye wad tak a lug o' a fin'on haddie wi' me at nine o'clock, i wad be prood." gibbie nodded again, and left her. all this time he had not happened to discover that the lady who stood at the next counter, not more than a couple of yards from him, was miss kimble--which was the less surprising in that the lady took some trouble to hide the fact. she extended her purchasing when she saw who was shaking hands with the next stall-keeper, but kept her face turned from him, heard all mrs. croale said to him, and went away asking herself what possible relations except objectionable ones could exist between such a pair. she knew little or nothing of gibbie's early history, for she had not been a dweller in the city when gibbie was known as well as the town-cross to almost every man, woman, and child in it, else perhaps she might, but i doubt it, have modified her conclusion. her instinct was in the right, she said, with self-gratulation; he was a lad of low character and tastes, just what she had taken him for the first moment she saw him: his friends could not know what he was; she was bound to acquaint them with his conduct; and first of all, in duty to her old pupil, she must let mr. galbraith know what sort of friendships this sir gilbert, his nephew, cultivated. she went therefore straight to the cottage. fergus was there when she rang the bell. mr. galbraith looked out, and seeing who it was, retreated--the more hurriedly that he owed her money, and imagined she had come to dun him. but when she found to her disappointment that she could not see him, miss kimble did not therefore attempt to restrain a little longer the pent-up waters of her secret. mr. duff was a minister, and the intimate friend of the family: she would say what she had seen and heard. having then first abjured all love of gossip, she told her tale, appealing to the minister whether she had not been right in desiring to let sir gilbert's uncle know how he was going on. "i was not aware that sir gilbert was a cousin of yours, miss galbraith," said fergus. ginevra's face was rosy red, but it was now dusk, and the fire-light had friendly retainer-shadows about it. "he is not my cousin," she answered. "why, ginevra! you told me he was your cousin," said miss kimble, with keen moral reproach. "i beg your pardon; i never did," said ginevra. "i must see your father instantly," cried miss kimble, rising in anger. "he must be informed at once how much he is mistaken in the young gentleman he permits to be on such friendly terms with his daughter." "my father does not know him," rejoined ginevra; "and i should prefer they were not brought together just at present." her words sounded strange even in her own ears, but she knew no way but the straight one. "you quite shock me, ginevra!" said the school-mistress, resuming her seat: "you cannot mean to say you cherish acquaintance with a young man of whom your father knows nothing, and whom you dare not introduce to him?" to explain would have been to expose her father to blame. "i have known sir gilbert from my childhood," she said. "is it possible your duplicity reaches so far?" cried miss kimble, assured in her own mind that ginevra had said he was her cousin. fergus thought it was time to interfere. "i know something of the circumstances that led to the acquaintance of miss galbraith with sir gilbert," he said, "and i am sure it would only annoy her father to have any allusion made to it by one--excuse me, miss kimble--who is comparatively a stranger. i beg you will leave the matter to me." fergus regarded gibbie as a half witted fellow, and had no fear of him. he knew nothing of the commencement of his acquaintance with ginevra, but imagined it had come about through donal; for, studiously as mr. galbraith had avoided mention of his quarrel with ginevra because of the lads, something of it had crept out, and reached the mains; and in now venturing allusion to that old story, fergus was feeling after a nerve whose vibration, he thought, might afford him some influence over ginevra. he spoke authoritatively, and miss kimble, though convinced it was a mere pretence of her graceless pupil that her father would not see her, had to yield, and rose. mr. duff rose also, saying he would walk with her. he returned to the cottage, dined with them, and left about eight o'clock. already well enough acquainted in the city to learn without difficulty where mistress croale lived, and having nothing very particular to do, he strolled in the direction of her lodging, and saw gibbie go into the house. having seen him in, he was next seized with the desire to see him out again; having lain in wait for him as a beneficent brownie, he must now watch him as a profligate baronet forsooth! to haunt the low street until he should issue was a dreary prospect--in the east wind of a march night, which some giant up above seemed sowing with great handfuls of rain-seed; but having made up his mind, he stood his ground. for two hours he walked, vaguely cherishing an idea that he was fulfilling a duty of his calling, as a moral policeman. when at length gibbie appeared, he had some difficulty in keeping him in sight, for the sky was dark, the moon was not yet up, and gibbie walked like a swift shadow before him. suddenly, as if some old association had waked the old habit, he started off at a quick trot. fergus did his best to follow. as he ran, gibbie caught sight of a woman seated on a doorstep, almost under a lamp, a few paces up a narrow passage, stopped, stepped within the passage, and stood in a shadow watching her. she had turned the pocket of her dress inside out, and seemed unable to satisfy herself that there was nothing there but the hole, which she examined again and again, as if for the last news of her last coin. too thoroughly satisfied at length, she put back the pocket, and laid her head on her hands. gibbie had not a farthing. oh, how cold it was! and there sat his own flesh and blood shivering in it! he went up to her. the same moment fergus passed the end of the court. gibbie took her by the hand. she started in terror, but his smile reassured her. he drew her, and she rose. he laid her hand on his arm, and she went with him. he had not yet begun to think about prudence, and perhaps, if some of us thought more about right, we should have less occasion to cultivate the inferior virtue. perhaps also we should have more belief that there is one to care that things do not go wrong. fergus had given up the chase, and having met a policeman, was talking to him, when gibbie came up with the woman on his arm, and passed them. fergus again followed, sure of him now. had not fear of being recognized prevented him from passing them and looking, he would have seen only a poor old thing, somewhere about sixty; but if she had been beautiful as the morning, of course gibbie would have taken her all the same. he was the gibbie that used to see the drunk people home. gibbies like him do not change; they grow. after following them through several streets, fergus saw them stop at a door. gibbie opened it with a key which his spy imagined the woman gave him. they entered, and shut it almost in fergus's face, as he hurried up determined to speak. gibbie led the poor shivering creature up the stair, across the chaos of furniture, and into his room, in the other corner next to donal's. to his joy he found the fire was not out. he set her in the easiest chair he had, put the kettle on, blew the fire to a blaze, made coffee, cut bread and butter, got out a pot of marmalade, and ate and drank with his guest. she seemed quite bewildered and altogether unsure. i believe she took him at last, finding he never spoke, for half-crazy, as not a few had done, and as many would yet do. she smelt of drink, but was sober, and ready enough to eat. when she had taken as much as she would, gibbie turned down the bed-clothes, made a sign to her she was to sleep there, took the key from the outside of the door, and put it in the lock on the inside, nodded a good-night, and left her, closing the door softly, which he heard her lock behind him, and going to donal's room, where he slept. in the morning he knocked at her door, but there was no answer, and opening it, he found she was gone. when he told mistress murkison what he had done, he was considerably astonished at the wrath and indignation which instantly developed themselves in the good creature's atmosphere. that her respectable house should be made a hiding-place from the wind and a covert from the tempest, was infuriating. without a moment's delay, she began a sweeping and scrubbing, and general cleansing of the room, as if all the devils had spent the night in it. and then for the first time gibbie reflected, that, when he ran about the streets, he had never been taken home--except once, to be put under the rod and staff of the old woman. if janet had been like the rest of them, he would have died upon glashgar, or be now wandering about the country, doing odd jobs for half-pence! he must not do like other people--would not, could not, dared not be like them! he had had such a thorough schooling in humanity as nobody else had had! he had been to school in the streets, in dark places of revelry and crime, and in the very house of light! when mistress murkison told him that if ever he did the like again, she would give him notice to quit, he looked in her face: she stared a moment in return, then threw her arms round his neck, and kissed him. "ye're the bonniest cratur o' a muckle idiot 'at ever man saw!" she cried; "an' gien ye dinna tak the better care, ye'll be soopit aff to haiven afore ye ken whaur ye are or what ye're aboot." her feelings, if not her sentiments, experienced a relapse when she discovered that one of her few silver tea-spoons was gone--which, beyond a doubt, the woman had taken: she abused her, and again scolded gibbie, with much vigour. but gibbie said to himself, "the woman is not bad, for there were two more silver spoons on the table." even in the matter of stealing we must think of our own beam before our neighbour's mote. it is not easy to be honest. there is many a thief who is less of a thief than many a respectable member of society. the thief must be punished, and assuredly the other shall not come out until he has paid the uttermost farthing. gibbie, who would have died rather than cast a shadow of injustice, was not shocked at the woman's depravity like mistress murkison. i am afraid he smiled. he took no notice either of her scoldings or her lamentations; but the first week after he came of age, he carried her a present of a dozen spoons. fergus could not tell ginevra what he had seen; and if he told her father, she would learn that he had been playing the spy. to go to mr. sclater would have compromised him similarly. and what great occasion was there? he was not the fellow's keeper! that same day gibbie went back to his guardians. at his request mrs. sclater asked ginevra to spend the following evening with them: he wanted to tell her about donal. she accepted the invitation. but in a village near the foot of glashgar, donal had that morning done what was destined to prevent her from keeping her engagement: he had posted a letter to her. in an interval of comparative quiet, he had recalled the verses he sang to her as they walked that evening, and now sent them--completed in a very different tone. not a word accompanied them. my thoughts are like fire-flies pulsing in moonlight; my heart like a silver cup full of red wine; my soul a pale gleaming horizon, whence soon light will flood the gold earth with a torrent divine. my thouchts are like worms in a starless gloamin'; my hert like a sponge that's fillit wi' gall; my sowl like a bodiless ghaist sent a roamin', to bide i' the mirk till the great trumpet call. but peace be upo' ye, as deep as ye're lo'esome! brak na an hoor o' yer fair-dreamy sleep, to think o' the lad wi' a weicht in his bosom, 'at ance sent a cry till ye oot o' the deep. some sharp rocky heicht, to catch a far mornin' ayont a' the nichts o' this warld, he'll clim'; for nane shall say, luik! he sank doon at her scornin', wha rase by the han' she hield frank oot to him. the letter was handed, with one or two more, to mr. galbraith, at the breakfast table. he did not receive many letters now, and could afford time to one that was for his daughter. he laid it with the rest by his side, and after breakfast took it to his room and read it. he could no more understand it than fergus could the epistle to the romans, and therefore the little he did understand of it was too much. but he had begun to be afraid of his daughter: her still dignity had begun to tell upon him in his humiliation. he laid the letter aside, said nothing, and waited, inwardly angry and contemptuous. after a while he began to flatter himself with the hope that perhaps it was but a sort of impertinent valentine, the writer of which was unknown to ginevra. from the moment of its arrival, however, he kept a stricter watch upon her, and that night prevented her from going to mrs. sclater's. gibbie, aware that fergus continued his visits, doubted less and less that she had given herself to "the bledder," as donal called the popular preacher. chapter liv. of age. there were no rejoicings upon gibbie's attainment of his twenty-first year. his guardian, believing he alone had acquainted himself with the date, and desiring in his wisdom to avoid giving him a feeling of importance, made no allusion to the fact, as would have been most natural, when they met at breakfast on the morning of the day. but, urged thereto by donal, gibbie had learned the date for himself, and finding nothing was said, fingered to mrs. sclater, "this is my birthday." "i wish you many happy returns," she answered, with kind empressement. "how old are you to-day?" "twenty-one," he answered--by holding up all his fingers twice and then a forefinger. she looked struck, and glanced at her husband, who thereupon, in his turn, gave utterance to the usual formula of goodwill, and said no more. seeing he was about to leave the table, gibbie, claiming his attention, spelled on his fingers, very slowly, for mr. sclater was slow at following this mode of communication: "if you please, sir, i want to be put in possession of my property as soon as possible." "all in good time, sir gilbert," answered the minister, with a superior smile, for he clung with hard reluctance to the last vestige of his power. "but what is good time?" spelled gibbie with a smile, which, none the less that it was of genuine friendliness, indicated there might be difference of opinion on the point. "oh! we shall see," returned the minister coolly. "these are not things to be done in a hurry," he added, as if he had been guardian to twenty wards in chancery before, "we'll see in a few days what mr. torrie proposes." "but i want my money at once," insisted gibbie. "i have been waiting for it, and now it is time, and why should i wait still?" "to learn patience, if for no other reason, sir gilbert," answered the minister, with a hard laugh, meant to be jocular. "but indeed such affairs cannot be managed in a moment. you will have plenty of time to make a good use of your money, if you should have to wait another year or two." so saying he pushed back his plate and cup, a trick he had, and rose from the table. "when will you see mr. torrie?" asked gibbie, rising too, and working his telegraph with greater rapidity than before. "by and by," answered mr. sclater, and walked towards the door. but gibbie got between him and it. "will you go with me to mr. torrie to-day?" he asked. the minister shook his head. gibbie withdrew, seeming a little disappointed. mr. sclater left the room. "you don't understand business, gilbert," said mrs. sclater. gibbie smiled, got his writing-case, and sitting down at the table, wrote as follows:-- "dear mr. sclater,--as you have never failed in your part, how can you wish me to fail in mine? i am now the one accountable for this money, which surely has been idle long enough, and if i leave it still unused, i shall be doing wrong, and there are things i have to do with it which ought to be set about immediately. i am sorry to seem importunate, but if by twelve o'clock you have not gone with me to mr. torrie, i will go to messrs. hope & waver, who will tell me what i ought to do next, in order to be put in possession. it makes me unhappy to write like this, but i am not a child any longer, and having a man's work to do, i cannot consent to be treated as a child. i will do as i say. i am, dear mr. sclater, your affectionate ward, gilbert galbraith." he took the letter to the study, and having given it to mr. sclater, withdrew. the minister might have known by this time with what sort of a youth he had to deal! he came down instantly, put the best face on it he could, said that if sir gilbert was so eager to take up the burden, he was ready enough to cast it off, and they would go at once to mr. torrie. with the lawyer, gibbie insisted on understanding everything, and that all should be legally arranged as speedily as possible. mr. torrie saw that, if he did not make things plain, or gave the least cause for doubt, the youth would most likely apply elsewhere for advice, and therefore took trouble to set the various points, both as to the property and the proceedings necessary, before him in the clearest manner. "thank you," said gibbie, through mr. sclater. "please remember i am more accountable for this money than you, and am compelled to understand."--janet's repeated exhortations on the necessity of sending for the serpent to take care of the dove, had not been lost upon him. the lawyer being then quite ready to make him an advance of money, they went with him to the bank, where he wrote his name, and received a cheque book. as they left the bank, he asked the minister whether he would allow him to keep his place in his house till the next session, and was almost startled at finding how his manner to him was changed. he assured sir gilbert, with a deference and respect both painful and amusing, that he hoped he would always regard his house as one home, however many besides he might now choose to have. so now at last gibbie was free to set about realizing a long-cherished scheme. the repairs upon the auld hoose o' galbraith were now nearly finished. in consequence of them, some of the tenants had had to leave, and gibbie now gave them all notice to quit at their earliest convenience, taking care, however, to see them provided with fresh quarters, towards which he could himself do not a little, for several of the houses in the neighbourhood had been bought for him at the same time with the old mansion. as soon as it was empty, he set more men to work, and as its internal arrangements had never been altered, speedily, out of squalid neglect, caused not a little of old stateliness to reappear. he next proceeded to furnish at his leisure certain of the rooms, chiefly from the accumulations of his friend mistress murkison. by the time he had finished, his usual day for going home had arrived: while janet lived, the cottage on glashgar was home. just as he was leaving, the minister told him that glashruach was his. mrs. sclater was present, and read in his eyes what induced her instantly to make the remark: "how could that man deprive his daughter of the property he had to take her mother's name to get!" "he had misfortunes," indicated gibbie, "and could not help it, i suppose." "yes indeed!" she returned, "--misfortunes so great that they amounted to little less than swindling. i wonder how many he has brought to grief besides himself! if he had glashruach once more he would begin it all over again." "then i'll give it to ginevra," said gibbie. "and let her father coax her out of it, and do another world of mischief with it!" she rejoined. gibbie was silent. mrs. sclater was right! to give is not always to bless. he must think of some way. with plenty to occupy his powers of devising he set out. he would gladly have seen ginevra before he left, but had no chance. he had gone to the north church every sunday for a long time now, neither for love of fergus, nor dislike to mr. sclater, but for the sake of seeing his lost friend: had he not lost her when she turned from donal to fergus? did she not forsake him too when she forsook his donal? his heart would rise into his throat at the thought, but only for a moment: he never pitied himself. now and then he had from her a sweet sad smile, but no sign that he might go and see her. whether he was to see donal when he reached daurside, he could not tell; he had heard nothing of him since he went; his mother never wrote letters. "na, na; i canna," she would say. "it wad tak a' the pith oot o' me to vreet letters. a' 'at i hae to say i sen' the up-road; it's sure to win hame ear' or late." notwithstanding his new power, it was hardly, therefore, with his usual elation, that he took his seat on the coach. but his reception was the same as ever. at his mother's persuasion, donal, he found, instead of betaking himself again to bodily labours as he had purposed, had accepted a situation as tutor offered him by one of the professors. he had told his mother all his trouble. "he'll be a' the better for 't i' the en'," she said, with a smile of the deepest sympathy, "though, bein' my ain, i canna help bein' wae for 'im. but the lord was i' the airthquak, an' the fire, an' the win' that rave the rocks, though the prophet couldna see 'im. donal 'ill come oot o' this wi' mair room in's hert an' mair licht in's speerit." gibbie took his slate from the crap o' the wa' and wrote. "if money could do anything for him, i have plenty now." "i ken yer hert, my bairn," replied janet; "but na; siller's but a deid horse for onything 'at smacks o' salvation. na; the puir fallow maun warstle oot o' the thicket o' deid roses as best he can--sair scrattit, nae doobt. eh! it's a fearfu' an' won'erfu' thing that drawin' o' hert to hert, an' syne a great snap, an' a stert back, an' there's miles atween them! the lord alane kens the boddom o' 't; but i'm thinkin' there's mair intill't, an' a heap mair to come oot o' 't ere a' be dune, than we hae ony guiss at." gibbie told her that glashruach was his. then first the extent of his wealth seemed to strike his old mother. "eh! ye'll be the laird, wull ye, than? eh, sirs! to think o' this hoose an' a' bein' wee gibbie's! weel, it dings a'. the w'ys o' the lord are to be thoucht upon! he made dawvid a king, an' gibbie he's made the laird! blest be his name." "they tell me the mountain is mine," gibbie wrote: "your husband shall be laird of glashgar if he likes." "na, na," said janet, with a loving look. "he's ower auld for that. he micht na dee sae easy for't.--eh! please the lord, i wad fain gang wi' him.--an' what better wad robert be to be laird? we pey nae rent as 'tis, an' he has as mony sheep to lo'e as he can weel ken ane frae the ither, noo 'at he's growin' auld, i ken naething 'at he lacks, but gibbie to gang wi' 'im aboot the hill. a neebour's laddie comes an' gangs, to help him, but, eh, says robert, he's no gibbie!--but gien glashruach be yer ain, my bonnie man, ye maun gang doon there this verra nicht, and gie a luik to the burn; for the last time i was there, i thoucht it was creepin' in aneth the bank some fearsome like for what's left o' the auld hoose, an' the suner it's luikit efter maybe the better. eh, sir gibbie, but ye sud merry the bonnie leddy, an' tak her back till her ain hoose." gibbie gave a great sigh to think of the girl that loved the hill and the heather and the burns, shut up in the city, and every sunday going to the great church--with which in gibbie's mind was associated no sound of glad tidings. to him glashgar was full of god; the north church or mr. sclater's church--well, he had tried hard, but had not succeeded in discovering temple-signs about either. the next day he sent to the city for an architect; and within a week masons and quarrymen were at work, some on the hill blasting blue boulders and red granite, others roughly shaping the stones, and others laying the foundation of a huge facing and buttressing wall, which was to slope up from the bed of the glashburn fifty feet to the foot of the castle, there to culminate in a narrow terrace with a parapet. others again were clearing away what of the ruins stuck to the old house, in order to leave it, as much as might be, in its original form. there was no space left for rebuilding, neither was there any between the two burns for adding afresh. the channel of the second remained dry, the landslip continuing to choke it, and the stream to fall into the glashburn. but gibbie would not consent that the burn ginevra had loved should sing no more as she had heard it sing. her chamber was gone, and could not be restored, but another chamber should be built for her, beneath whose window it should again run: when she was married to fergus, and her father could not touch it, the place should be hers. more masons were gathered, and foundations blasted in the steep rock that formed the other bank of the burn. the main point in the building was to be a room for ginevra. he planned it himself--with a windowed turret projecting from the wall, making a recess in the room, and overhanging the stream. the turret he carried a story higher than the wall, and in the wall placed a stair leading to its top, whence, over the roof of the ancient part of the house, might be seen the great glashgar, and its streams coming down from heaven, and singing as they came. then from the middle of the first stair in the old house, the wall, a yard and a half thick, having been cut through, a solid stone bridge, with a pointed arch, was to lead across the burn to a like landing in the new house--a close passage, with an oriel window on each side, looking up and down the stream, and a steep roof. and while these works were going on below, two masons, high on the mountain, were adding to the cottage a warm bedroom for janet and robert. the architect was an honest man, and kept gibbie's secret, so that, although he was constantly about the place, nothing disturbed the general belief that glashruach had been bought, and was being made habitable, by a certain magnate of the county adjoining. chapter lv. ten auld hoose o' galbraith. one cold afternoon in the end of october, when mistress croale was shutting up her shop in the market, and a tumbler of something hot was haunting her imagination, gibbie came walking up the long gallery with the light hill-step which he never lost, and startled her with a hand on her shoulder, making signs that she must come with him. she made haste to lock her door, and they walked side by side to the widdiehill. as they crossed the end of it she cast a look down jink lane, and thought of her altered condition with a sigh. then the memory of the awful time amongst the sailors, in which poor sambo's frightful death was ever prominent, came back like a fog from hell. but so far gone were those times now, that, seeing their events more as they really were, she looked upon them with incredulous horror, as things in which she could hardly have had any part or lot. then returned her wanderings and homeless miseries, when often a haystack or a heap of straw in a shed was her only joy--whisky always excepted. last of all came the dread perils, the hairbreadth escapes of her too adventurous voyage on the brander;--and after all these things, here she was, walking in peace by the side of wee sir gibbie, a friend as strong now as he had always been true! she asked herself, or some power within asked her, whence came the troubles that had haunted her life. why had she been marked out for such misfortunes? her conscience answered--from her persistence in living by the sale of drink after she had begun to feel it was wrong. thence it was that she had learned to drink, and that she was even now liable, if not to be found drunk in the streets, yet to go to bed drunk as any of her former customers. the cold crept into her bones; the air seemed full of blue points and clear edges of cold, that stung and cut her. she was a wretched, a low creature! what would her late aunt think to see her now? what if this cold in her bones were the cold of coming death? to lie for ages in her coffin, with her mouth full of earth, longing for whisky! a verse from the end of the new testament with "nor drunkards" in it, came to her mind. she had always had faith, she said to herself; but let them preach what they liked about salvation by faith, she knew there was nothing but hell for her if she were to die that night. there was mistress murkison looking out of her shop-door! she was respected as much as ever! would mistress murkison be saved if she died that night? at least nobody would want her damned; whereas not a few, and mr. sclater in particular, would think it no fair play if mistress croale were not damned! they turned into the close of the auld hoose o' galbraith. "wee gibbie's plottin' to lead me to repentance!" she said to herself. "he's gaein' to shaw me whaur his father dee'd, an' whaur they leevit in sic meesery--a' throu' the drink i gae 'im, an' the respectable hoose i keepit to 'tice him till't! he wad hae me persuaudit to lea' aff the drink! weel, i'm a heap better nor ance i was, an' gie't up i wull a'thegither--afore it comes to the last wi' me." by this time gibbie was leading her up the dark stair. at the top, on a wide hall-like landing, he opened a door. she drew back with shy amaze. her first thought was--"that prood madam, the minister's wife, 'ill be there!" was affront lying in wait for her again? she looked round angrily at her conductor. but his smile re-assured her, and she stepped in. it was almost a grand room, rich and sombre in colour, old-fashioned in its somewhat stately furniture. a glorious fire was blazing and candles were burning. the table was covered with a white cloth, and laid for two. gibbie shut the door, placed a chair for mistress croale by the fire, seated himself, took out his tablets, wrote "will you be my housekeeper? i will give you £ a year," and handed them to her. "lord, sir gibbie!" she cried, jumping to her feet, "hae ye tint yer wuts? hoo wad an auld wife like me luik in sic a place--an' in sic duds as this? it wad gar sawtan lauch, an' that he can but seldom." gibbie rose, and taking her by the hand, led her to the door of an adjoining room. it was a bedroom, as grand as the room they had left, and if mistress croale was surprised before, she was astonished now. a fire was burning here too, candles were alight on the dressing-table, a hot bath stood ready, on the bed lay a dress of rich black satin, with linen and everything down, or up, to collars, cuffs, mittens, cap, and shoes. all these things gibbie had bought himself, using the knowledge he had gathered in shopping with mrs. sclater, and the advice of her dressmaker, whom he had taken into his confidence, and who had entered heartily into his plan. he made signs to mistress croale that everything there was at her service, and left her. like one in a dream she yielded to the rush of events, not too much bewildered to dress with care, and neither too old nor too wicked nor too ugly to find pleasure in it. she might have been a born lady just restored to the habits of her youth, to judge by her delight over the ivory brushes and tortoise-shell comb, and great mirror. in an hour or so she made her appearance--i can hardly say reappeared, she was so altered. she entered the room neither blushing nor smiling, but wiping the tears from her eyes like a too blessed child. what mrs. sclater would have felt, i dare hardly think; for there was "the horrid woman" arrayed as nearly after her fashion as gibbie had been able to get her up! a very good "get-up" nevertheless it was, and satisfactory to both concerned. mistress croale went out a decent-looking poor body, and entered a not uncomely matron of the housekeeper class, rather agreeable to look upon, who had just stood a nerve-shaking but not unpleasant surprise, and was recovering. gibbie was so satisfied with her appearance that, come of age as he was, and vagrant no more, he first danced round her several times with a candle in his hand, much to the danger but nowise to the detriment of her finery, then set it down, and executed his old lavolta of delight, which, as always, he finished by standing on one leg. then they sat down to a nice nondescript meal, also of gibbie's own providing. when their meal was ended, he went to a bureau, and brought thence a paper, plainly written to this effect: "i agree to do whatever sir gilbert galbraith may require of me, so long as it shall not be against my conscience; and consent that, if i taste whisky once, he shall send me away immediately, without further reason given." he handed it to mistress croale; she read, and instantly looked about for pen and ink: she dreaded seeming for a moment to hesitate. he brought them to her, she signed, and they shook hands. he then conducted her all over the house--first to the rooms prepared for his study and bedroom, and next to the room in the garret, which he had left just as it was when his father died in it. there he gave her a look by which he meant to say, "see what whisky brings people to!" but which her conscience interpreted, "see what you brought my father to!" next, on the floor between, he showed her a number of bedrooms, all newly repaired and fresh-painted,--with double windows, the inside ones filled with frosted glass. these rooms, he gave her to understand, he wished her to furnish, getting as many things as she could from mistress murkison. going back then to the sitting-room, he proceeded to explain his plans, telling her he had furnished the house that he might not any longer be himself such a stranger as to have no place to take a stranger to. then he got a bible there was in the room, and showed her those words in the book of exodus--"also, thou shalt not oppress a stranger; for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of egypt;" and while she thought again of her wanderings through the country, and her nights in the open air, made her understand that whomsoever he should at any time bring home she was to treat as his guest. she might get a servant to wait upon herself, he said, but she must herself help him to wait upon his guests, in the name of the son of man. she expressed hearty acquiescence, but would not hear of a servant: the more work the better for her! she said. she would to-morrow arrange for giving up her shop and disposing of her stock and the furniture in her garret. but gibbie requested the keys of both those places. next, he insisted that she should never utter a word as to the use he intended making of his house; if the thing came out, it would ruin his plans, and he must give them up altogether--and thereupon he took her to the ground floor and showed her a door in communication with a poor little house behind, by which he intended to introduce and dismiss his guests, that they should not know where they had spent the night. then he made her read to him the hundred and seventh psalm; after which he left her, saying he would come to the house as soon as the session began, which would be in a week; until then he should be at mr. sclater's. left alone in the great house--like one with whom the most beneficent of fairies had been busy, the first thing mistress croale did was to go and have a good look at herself--from head to foot--in the same mirror that had enlightened donal as to his outermost man. very different was the re-reflection it caused in mistress croale: she was satisfied with everything she saw there, except her complexion, and that she resolved should improve. she was almost painfully happy. out there was the widdiehill, dark and dismal and cold, through which she had come, sad and shivering and haunted with miserable thoughts, into warmth and splendour and luxury and bliss! wee sir gibbie had made a lady of her! if only poor sir george were alive to see and share!--there was but one thing wanted to make it paradise indeed--a good tumbler of toddy by the fire before she went to bed! then first she thought of the vow she had made as she signed the paper, and shuddered--not at the thought of breaking it, but at the thought of having to keep it, and no help.--no help! it was the easiest thing in the world to get a bottle of whisky. she had but to run to jink lane at the farthest, to her own old house, which, for all mr. sclater, was a whisky shop yet! she had emptied her till, and had money in her pocket. who was there to tell? she would not have a chance when sir gibbie came home to her. she must make use of what time was left her. she was safe now from going too far, because she must give it up; and why not then have one farewell night of pleasure, to bid a last good-bye to her old friend whisky? what should she have done without him, lying in the cold wind by a dykeside, or going down the daur like a shot on her brander?--thus the tempting passion; thus, for aught i know, a tempting devil at the ear of her mind as well.--but with that came the face of gibbie; she thought how troubled that face would look if she failed him. what a lost, irredeemable wretch was she about to make of herself after all he had done for her! no; if whisky was heaven, and the want of it was hell, she would not do it! she ran to the door, locked it, brought away the key, and laid it under the bible from which she had been reading to sir gibbie. perhaps she might have done better than betake herself again to her finery, but it did help her through the rest of the evening, and she went to her grand bed not only sober, but undefiled of the enemy. when gibbie came to her a week after, he came to a true woman, one who had kept faith with him. chapter lvi. the laird and the preacher. since he came to town, gibbie had seen ginevra but once--that was in the north church. she looked so sad and white that his heart was very heavy for her. could it be that she repented?--she must have done it to please her father! if she would marry donal, he would engage to give her glashruach. she should have glashruach all the same whatever she did, only it might influence her father. he paced up and down before the cottage once for a whole night, but no good came of that. he paced before it from dusk to bedtime again and again, in the poor hope of a chance of speaking to ginevra, but he never saw even her shadow on the white blind. he went up to the door once, but in the dread of displeasing her lost his courage, and paced the street the whole morning instead, but saw no one come out. fergus had gradually become essential to the small remaining happiness of which the laird was capable. he had gained his favour chiefly through the respect and kindly attention he showed him. the young preacher knew little of the laird's career, and looked upon him as an unfortunate man, towards whom loyalty now required even a greater show of respect than while he owned his father's farm. the impulse transmitted to him from the devotion of ancestors to the patriarchal head of the clan, had found blind vent in the direction of the mere feudal superior, and both the impulse and its object remained. he felt honoured, even now that he had reached the goal of his lofty desires and was a popular preacher, in being permitted to play backgammon with the great man, or to carve a chicken, when the now trembling hands, enfeebled far more through anxiety and disappointment than from age, found themselves unequal to the task: the laird had begun to tell long stories, and drank twice as much as he did a year ago; he was sinking in more ways than one. fergus at length summoned courage to ask him if he might pay his addresses to miss galbraith. the old man started, cast on him a withering look, murmured "the heiress of glashruach!" remembered, threw himself back in his chair, and closed his eyes. fergus, on the other side of the table, sat erect, a dice-box in his hand, waiting a reply. the father reflected that if he declined what he could not call an honour, he must lose what was unquestionably a comfort: how was he to pass all the evenings of the week without the preacher? on the other hand, if he accepted him, he might leave the miserable cottage, and go to the manse: from a moral point of view--that was, from the point of other people's judgment of him--it would be of consequence to have a clergyman for a son-in-law. slowly he raised himself in his chair, opened his unsteady eyes, which rolled and pitched like boats on a choppy sea, and said solemnly, "you have my permission, mr. duff." the young preacher hastened to find ginevra, but only to meet a refusal, gentle and sorrowful. he pleaded for permission to repeat his request after an interval, but she distinctly refused. she did not, however, succeed in making a man with such a large opinion of himself hopeless. disappointed and annoyed he was, but he sought and fancied he found reasons for her decision which were not unfavourable to himself, and continued to visit her father as before, saying to him he had not quite succeeded in drawing from her a favourable answer, but hoped to prevail. he nowise acted the despairing lover, but made grander sermons than ever, and, as he came to feel at home in his pulpit, delivered them with growing force. but delay wrought desire in the laird; and at length, one evening, having by cross-questioning satisfied himself that fergus made no progress, he rose, and going to his desk, handed him donal's verses. fergus read them, and remarked he had read better, but the first stanza had a slight flavour of shelley. "i don't care a straw about their merit or demerit," said mr. galbraith; "poetry is nothing but spoilt prose. what i want to know is, whether they do not suggest a reason for your want of success with jenny. do you know the writing?" "i cannot say i do. but i think it is very likely that of donal grant; he sets up for the burns of daurside." "insolent scoundrel!" cried the laird, bringing down his fist on the table, and fluttering the wine glasses. "next to superstition i hate romance--with my whole heart i do!" and something like a flash of cold moonlight on wintred water gleamed over, rather than shot from, his poor focusless eyes. "but, my dear sir," said fergus, "if i am to understand these lines--" "yes! if you are to understand where there is no sense whatever!" "i think i understand them--if you will excuse me for venturing to say so; and what i read in them is, that, whoever the writer may be, the lady, whoever she may be, had refused him." "you cannot believe that the wretch had the impudence to make my daughter--the heiress of--at least--what! make my daughter an offer! she would at once have acquainted me with the fact, that he might receive suitable chastisement. let me look at the stuff again." "it is quite possible," said fergus, "it may be only a poem some friend has copied for her from a newspaper." while he spoke, the laird was reading the lines, and persuading himself he understood them. with sudden resolve, the paper held torch-like in front of him, he strode into the next room, where ginevra sat. "do you tell me," he said fiercely, "that you have so far forgotten all dignity and propriety as to give a dirty cow-boy the encouragement to make you an offer of marriage? the very notion sets my blood boiling. you will make me hate you, you--you--unworthy creature!" ginevra had turned white, but looking him straight in the face, she answered, "if that is a letter for me, you know i have not read it." "there! see for yourself.--poetry!" he uttered the word with contempt inexpressible. she took the verses from his hand and read them. even with her father standing there, watching her like an inquisitor, she could not help the tears coming in her eyes as she read. "there is no such thing here, papa," she said. "they are only verses--bidding me good-bye." "and what right has any such fellow to bid my daughter good-bye? explain that to me, if you please. of course i have been for many years aware of your love of low company, but i had hoped as you grew older you would learn manners: modesty would have been too much to look for.--if you had nothing to be ashamed of, why did you not tell me of the unpleasant affair? is not your father your best friend?" "why should i make both him and you uncomfortable, papa--when there was not going to be anything more of it?" "why then do you go hankering after him still, and refusing mr. duff? it is true he is not exactly a gentleman by birth, but he is such by education, by manners, by position, by influence." "papa, i have already told mr. duff, as plainly as i could without being rude, that i would never let him talk to me so. what lady would refuse donal grant and listen to him!" "you are a bold, insolent hussey!" cried her father in fresh rage and leaving the room, rejoined fergus. they sat silent both for a while--then the preacher spoke. "other communications may have since reached her from the same quarter," he said. "that is impossible," rejoined the laird. "i don't know that," insisted fergus. "there is a foolish--a half-silly companion of his about the town. they call him sir gibbie galbraith." "jenny knows no such person." "indeed she does. i have seen them together." "oh! you mean the lad the minister adopted! the urchin he took off the streets!--sir gibbie galbraith!" he repeated sneeringly, but as one reflecting. "--i do vaguely recall a slanderous rumour in which a certain female connection of the family was hinted at.--yes! that's where the nickname comes from.--and you think she keeps up a communication with the clown through him?" "i don't say that, sir. i merely think it possible she may see this gibbie occasionally; and i know he worships the cow-boy: it is a positive feature of his foolishness, and i wish it were the worst." therewith he told what he heard from miss kimble, and what he had seen for himself on the night when he watched gibbie. "her very blood must be tainted!" said her father to himself, but added, "--from her mother's side;" and his attacks upon her after this were at least diurnal. it was a relief to his feeling of having wronged her, to abuse her with justice. for a while she tried hard to convince him now that this now that that notion of her conduct, or of gibbie's or donal's, was mistaken: he would listen to nothing she said, continually insisting that the only amends for her past was to marry according to his wishes; to give up superstition, and poetry, and cow-boys, and dumb rascals, and settle down into a respectable matron, a comfort to the gray hairs she was now bringing with sorrow to the grave. then ginevra became absolutely silent; he had taught her that any reply was but a new start for his objurgation, a knife wherewith to puncture a fresh gall-bladder of abuse. he stormed at her for her sullenness, but she persisted in her silence, sorely distressed to find how dead her heart seemed growing under his treatment of her: what would at one time have made her utterly miserable, now passed over her as one of the billows of a trouble that had to be borne, as one of the throbs of a headache, drawing from her scarcely a sigh. she did not understand that, her heaven being dark, she could see no individual cloud against it, that, her emotional nature untuned, discord itself had ceased to jar. chapter lvii. a hiding-place from the wind. gibbie found everything at the auld hoose in complete order for his reception: mistress croale had been very diligent, and promised well for a housekeeper--looked well, too, in her black satin and lace, with her complexion, she justly flattered herself, not a little improved. she had a good meal ready for him, with every adjunct in proper style, during the preparation of which she had revelled in the thought that some day, when she had quite established her fitness for her new position, sir gibbie would certainly invite the minister and his lady to dine with him, when she, whom they were too proud to ask to partake of their cockie-leekie, would show them she knew both what a dinner ought to be, and how to preside at it; and the soup it should be cockie-leekie. everything went comfortably. gibbie was so well up in mathematics, thanks to mr. sclater, that, doing all requisite for honourable studentship, but having no desire to distinguish himself, he had plenty of time for more important duty. now that he was by himself, as if old habit had returned in the shape of new passion, he roamed the streets every night. his custom was this: after dinner, which he had when he came from college, about half-past four, he lay down, fell asleep in a moment, as he always did, and slept till half-past six; then he had tea, and after that, studied--not dawdled over his books, till ten o'clock, when he took his greek testament. at eleven he went out, seldom finally returning before half-past one, sometimes not for an hour longer--during which time mistress croale was in readiness to receive any guest he might bring home. the history of the special endeavour he had now commenced does not belong to my narrative. some nights, many nights together, he would not meet a single wanderer; occasionally he would meet two or three in the same night. when he found one, he would stand regarding him until he spoke. if the man was drunk he would leave him: such were not those for whom he could now do most. if he was sober, he made him signs of invitation. if he would not go with him, he left him, but kept him in view, and tried him again. if still he would not, he gave him a piece of bread, and left him. if he called, he stopped, and by circuitous ways brought him to the little house at the back. it was purposely quite dark. if the man was too apprehensive to enter, he left him; if he followed, he led him to mistress croale. if anything suggested the possibility of helping farther, a possibility turning entirely on the person's self, the attempt was set on foot; but in general, after a good breakfast, gibbie led him through a dark passage into the darkened house, and dismissed him from the door by which he had entered. he never gave money, and never sought such guest except in the winter. indeed, he was never in the city in the summer. before the session was over, they had one woman and one girl in a fair way of honest livelihood, and one small child, whose mother had an infant besides, and was evidently dying, he had sent "in a present" to janet, by the hand of mistress murkison. altogether it was a tolerable beginning, and during the time not a word reached him indicating knowledge of his proceedings, although within a week or two a rumour was rife in the lower parts of the city, of a mysterious being who went about doing this and that for poor folk, but, notwithstanding his gifts, was far from canny. mr. and mrs. sclater could not fail to be much annoyed when they found he was no longer lodging with mistress murkison, but occupying the auld hoose, with "that horrible woman" for a housekeeper; they knew, however, that expostulation with one possessed by such a headstrong sense of duty was utterly useless, and contented themselves with predicting to each other some terrible check, the result of his ridiculous theory concerning what was required of a christian--namely, that the disciple should be as his master. at the same time mrs. sclater had a sacred suspicion that no real ill would ever befall god's innocent, gilbert galbraith. fergus had now with his father's help established himself in the manse of the north church, and thither he invited mr. and miss galbraith to dine with him on a certain evening. her father's absolute desire compelled ginevra's assent; she could not, while with him, rebel absolutely. fergus did his best to make the evening a pleasant one, and had special satisfaction in showing the laird that he could provide both a good dinner and a good bottle of port. two of his congregation, a young lawyer and his wife, were the only other guests. the laird found the lawyer an agreeable companion, chiefly from his readiness to listen to his old law stories, and fergus laid himself out to please the two ladies: secure of the admiration of one, he hoped it might help to draw the favour of the other. he had conceived the notion that ginevra probably disliked his profession, and took pains therefore to show how much he was a man of the world--talked about shakspere, and flaunted rags of quotation in elocutionary style; got books from his study, and read passages from byron, shelley, and moore--chiefly from "the loves of the angels" of the last, ecstasizing the lawyer's lady, and interesting ginevra, though all he read taken together seemed to her unworthy of comparison with one of poor donal's songs. it grew late. the dinner had been at a fashionable hour; they had stayed an unfashionable time: it was nearly twelve o'clock when guests and host left the house in company. the lawyer and his wife went one way, and fergus went the other with the laird and ginevra. hearing the pitiful wailing of a child and the cough of a woman, as they went along a street bridge, they peeped over the parapet, and saw, upon the stair leading to the lower street, a woman, with a child asleep in her lap, trying to eat a piece of bread, and coughing as if in the last stage of consumption. on the next step below sat a man hushing in his bosom the baby whose cry they had heard. they stood for a moment, the minister pondering whether his profession required of him action, and ginevra's gaze fixed on the head and shoulders of the foreshortened figure of the man, who vainly as patiently sought to soothe the child by gently rocking it to and fro. but when he began a strange humming song to it, which brought all glashgar before her eyes, ginevra knew beyond a doubt that it was gibbie. at the sound the child ceased to wail, and presently the woman with difficulty rose, laying a hand for help on gibbie's shoulder. then gibbie rose also, cradling the infant on his left arm, and making signs to the mother to place the child on his right. she did so, and turning, went feebly up the stair. gibbie followed with the two children, one lying on his arm, the other with his head on his shoulder, both wretched and pining, with gray cheeks, and dark hollows under their eyes. from the top of the stair they went slowly up the street, the poor woman coughing, and gibbie crooning to the baby, who cried no more, but now and then moaned. then fergus said to the laird: "did you see that young man, sir? that is the so-called sir gilbert galbraith we were talking of the other night. they say he has come into a good property, but you may judge for yourself whether he seems fit to manage it!" ginevra withdrew her hand from his arm. "good god, jenny!" exclaimed the laird, "you do not mean to tell me you have ever spoken to a young man like that?" "i know him very well, papa," replied ginevra, collectedly. "you are incomprehensible, jenny! if you know him, why do i not know him? if you had not known good reason to be ashamed of him, you would, one time or other, have mentioned his name in my hearing.--i ask you, and i demand an answer,"--here he stopped, and fronted her--"why have you concealed from me your acquaintance with this--this--person?" "because i thought it might be painful to you, papa," she answered, looking in his face. "painful to me! why should it be painful to me--except indeed that it breaks my heart as often as i see you betray your invincible fondness for low company?" "do you desire me to tell you, papa, why i thought it might be painful to you to make that young man's acquaintance?" "i do distinctly. i command you." "then i will: that young man, sir gilbert galbraith,--" "nonsense, girl! there is no such galbraith. it is the merest of scoffs." ginevra did not care to argue with him this point. in truth she knew little more about it than he. "many years ago," she recommenced, "when i was a child,--excuse me, mr. duff, but it is quite time i told my father what has been weighing upon my mind for so many years." "sir gilbert!" muttered her father contemptuously. "one day," again she began, "mr. fergus duff brought a ragged little boy to glashruach--the most innocent and loving of creatures, who had committed no crime but that of doing good in secret. i saw mr. duff box his ears on the bridge; and you, papa, gave him over to that wretch, angus mac pholp, to whip him--so at least angus told me, after he had whipped him till he dropped senseless. i can hardly keep from screaming now when i think of it." "all this, jenny, is nothing less than cursed folly. do you mean to tell me you have all these years been cherishing resentment against your own father, for the sake of a little thieving rascal, whom it was a good deed to fright from the error of his ways? i have no doubt angus gave him merely what he deserved." "you must remember, miss galbraith, we did not know he was dumb," said fergus, humbly. "if you had had any heart," said ginevra, "you would have seen in his face that he was a perfect angelic child. he ran to the mountain, without a rag to cover his bleeding body, and would have died of cold and hunger, had not the grants, the parents of your father's herd-boy, mr. duff, taken him to their hearts, and been father and mother to him."--ginevra's mouth was opened at last.--"after that," she went on, "angus, that bad man, shot him like a wild beast, when he was quietly herding robert grant's sheep. in return sir gilbert saved his life in the flood. and just before the house of glashruach fell--the part in which my room was, he caught me up, because he could not speak, and carried me out of it; and when i told you that he had saved my life, you ordered him out of the house, and when he was afraid to leave me alone with you, dashed him against the wall, and sent for angus to whip him again. but i should have liked to see angus try it then!" "i do remember an insolent fellow taking advantage of the ruinous state the house was in to make his way into my study," said the laird. "and now," ginevra continued, "mr. duff makes question of his wits because he finds him carrying a poor woman's children, going to get them a bed somewhere! if mr. duff had run about the streets when he was a child, like sir gilbert, he might not, perhaps, think it so strange he should care about a houseless woman and her brats!" therewith ginevra burst into tears. "abominably disagreeable!" muttered the laird. "i always thought she was an idiot!--hold your tongue, jenny! you will wake the street. all you say may or may not be quite true; i do not say you are telling lies, or even exaggerating; but i see nothing in it to prove the lad a fit companion for a young lady. very much to the contrary. i suppose he told you he was your injured, neglected, ill-used cousin? he may be your cousin: you may have any number of such cousins, if half the low tales concerning your mother's family be true." ginevra did not answer him--did not speak another word. when fergus left them at their own door, she neither shook hands with him nor bade him good night. "jenny," said her father, the moment he was gone, "if i hear of your once speaking again to that low vagabond,--and now i think of it," he cried, interrupting himself with a sudden recollection, "there was a cobbler-fellow in the town here they used to call sir somebody galbraith!--that must be his father! whether the sir was title or nickname, i neither know nor care. a title without money is as bad as a saintship without grace. but this i tell you, that if i hear of your speaking one word, good or bad, to the fellow again, i will, i swear to almighty god, i will turn you out of the house." to ginevra's accumulated misery, she carried with her to her room a feeling of contempt for her father, with which she lay struggling in vain half the night. chapter lviii. the confession. although gibbie had taken no notice of the laird's party, he had recognized each of the three as he came up the stair, and in ginevra's face read an appeal for deliverance. it seemed to say, "you help everybody but me! why do you not come and help me too? am i to have no pity because i am neither hungry nor cold?" he did not, however, lie awake the most of the night, or indeed a single hour of it, thinking what he should do; long before the poor woman and her children were in bed, he had made up his mind. as soon as he came home from college the next day and had hastily eaten his dinner, going upon his vague knowledge of law business lately acquired, he bought a stamped paper, wrote upon it, and put it in his pocket; then he took a card and wrote on it: sir gilbert galbraith, baronet, of glashruach, and put that in his pocket also. thus provided, and having said to mistress croale that he should not be home that night--for he expected to set off almost immediately in search of donal, and had bespoken horses, he walked deliberately along pearl-street out into the suburb, and turning to the right, rang the bell at the garden gate of the laird's cottage. when the girl came, he gave her his card, and followed her into the house. she carried it into the room where, dinner over, the laird and the preacher were sitting, with a bottle of the same port which had pleased the laird at the manse between them. giving time, as he judged, and no more, to read the card, gibbie entered the room: he would not risk a refusal to see him. it was a small room with a round table. the laird sat sideways to the door; the preacher sat between the table and the fire. "what the devil does this mean? a vengeance take him!" cried the laird. his big tumbling eyes had required more time than gibbie had allowed, so that, when with this exclamation he lifted them from the card, they fell upon the object of his imprecation standing in the middle of the room between him and the open door. the preacher, snug behind the table, scarcely endeavoured to conceal the smile with which he took no notice of sir gilbert. the laird rose in the perturbation of mingled anger and unpreparedness. "ah!" he said, but it was only a sound, not a word, "to what--may i ask--have i--i have not the honour of your acquaintance, mr.--mr.--" here he looked again at the card he held, fumbled for and opened a double eyeglass, then with deliberation examined the name upon it, thus gaining time by rudeness, and gathering his force for more, while gibbie remained as unembarrassed as if he had been standing to his tailor for his measure. "mr.--ah, i see! galbraith, you say.--to what, mr., mr."--another look at the card--"galbraith, do i owe the honour of this unexpected--and--and--i must say--un--looked-for visit--and at such an unusual hour for making a business call--for business, i presume, it must be that brings you, seeing i have not the honour of the slightest acquaintance with you?" he dropped his eyeglass with a clatter against his waistcoat, threw the card into his finger-glass, raised his pale eyes, and stared at sir gilbert with all the fixedness they were capable of. he had already drunk a good deal of wine, and it was plain he had, although he was far from being overcome by it. gibbie answered by drawing from the breast-pocket of his coat the paper he had written, and presenting it like a petition. mr. galbraith sneered, and would not have touched it had not his eye caught the stamp, which from old habit at once drew his hand. from similar habit, or perhaps to get it nearer the light, he sat down. gibbie stood, and fergus stared at him with insolent composure. the laird read, but not aloud: i, gilbert galbraith, baronet, hereby promise and undertake to transfer to miss galbraith, only daughter of thomas galbraith, esq., on the day when she shall be married to donal grant, master of arts, the whole of the title deeds of the house and lands of glashruach, to have and to hold as hers, with absolute power to dispose of the same as she may see fit. gilbert galbraith, old house of galbraith, widdiehill, march, etc., etc. the laird stretched his neck like a turkeycock, and gobbled inarticulately, threw the paper to fergus, and turning on his chair, glowered at gibbie. then suddenly starting to his feet, he cried, "what do you mean, you rascal, by daring to insult me in my own house? damn your insolent foolery!" "a trick! a most palpable trick! and an exceedingly silly one!" pronounced fergus, who had now read the paper; "quite as foolish as unjustifiable! everybody knows glashruach is the property of major culsalmon!"--here the laird sought the relief of another oath or two.--"i entreat you to moderate your anger, my dear sir," fergus resumed. "the thing is hardly worth so much indignation. some animal has been playing the poor fellow an ill-natured trick--putting him up to it for the sake of a vile practical joke. it is exceedingly provoking, but you must forgive him. he is hardly to blame, scarcely accountable, under the natural circumstances.--get away with you," he added, addressing gibbie across the table. "make haste before worse comes of it. you have been made a fool of." when fergus began to speak, the laird turned, and while he spoke stared at him with lack-lustre yet gleaming eyes, until he addressed gibbie, when he turned on him again as fiercely as before. poor gibbie stood shaking his head, smiling, and making eager signs with hands and arms; but in the laird's condition of both heart and brain he might well forget and fail to be reminded that gibbie was dumb. "why don't you speak, you fool?" he cried. "get out and don't stand making faces there. be off with you, or i will knock you down with a decanter." gibbie pointed to the paper, which lay before fergus, and placed a hand first on his lips, then on his heart. "damn your mummery!" said the laird, choking with rage. "go away, or, by god! i will break your head." fergus at this rose and came round the table to get between them. but the laird caught up a pair of nutcrackers, and threw it at gibbie. it struck him on the forehead, and the blood spirted from the wound. he staggered backwards. fergus seized the laird's arm, and sought to pacify him. her father's loud tones had reached ginevra in her room; she ran down, and that instant entered: gibbie all but fell into her arms. the moment's support she gave him, and the look of loving terror she cast in his face, restored him; and he was again firm on his feet, pressing her handkerchief to his forehead, when fergus, leaving the laird, advanced with the pacific intention of getting him safe from the house. ginevra stepped between them. her father's rage thereupon broke loose quite, and was madness. he seized hold of her with violence, and dragged her from the room. fergus laid hands upon gibbie more gently, and half would have forced, half persuaded him to go. a cry came from ginevra: refusing to be sent to her room before gibbie was in safety, her father struck her. gibbie would have darted to her help. fergus held him fast, but knew nothing of gibbie's strength, and the next moment found himself on his back upon the table, amidst the crash of wineglasses and china. having locked the door, gibbie sprung to the laird, who was trying to drag his daughter, now hardly resisting, up the first steps of the stair, took him round the waist from behind, swept him to the other room, and there locked him up also. he then returned to ginevra where she lay motionless on the stair, lifted her in his arms, and carried her out of the house, nor stopped until, having reached the farther end of the street, he turned the corner of it into another equally quiet. the laird and fergus, when they were released by the girl from their respective prisons and found that the enemy was gone, imagined that ginevra had retired again to her room; and what they did after is not interesting. under a dull smoky oil-lamp gibbie stopped. he knew by the tightening of her arms that ginevra was coming to herself. "let me down," she said feebly. he did so, but kept his arm round her. she gave a deep sigh, and gazed bewildered. when she saw him, she smiled. "with you, gibbie!" she murmured. "--but they will be after us!" "they shall not touch you," signified gibbie. "what was it all about?" she asked. gibbie spelled on his fingers, "because i offered to give you glashruach, if your father would let you marry donal." "gibbie! how could you?" she cried almost in a scream, and pushing away his arm, turned from him and tried to run, but after two steps, tottered to the lamp-post, and leaned against it--with such a scared look! "then come with me and be my sister, ginevra, and i will take care of you," spelled gibbie. "i can do nothing to take care of you while i can't get near you." "oh, gibbie! nobody does like that," returned ginevra, "--else i should be so glad!" "there is no other way then that i know. you won't marry anybody, you see." "won't i, gibbie? what makes you think that?" "because of course you would never refuse donal and marry anybody else; that is not possible." "oh! don't tease me, gibbie." "ginevra, you don't mean you would?" in the dull light, and with the imperfect means of gibbie for the embodiment of his thoughts, ginevra misunderstood him. "yea, gibbie," she said, "i would. i thought it was understood between us, ever since that day you found me on glashgar. in my thoughts i have been yours all the time." she turned her face to the lamp-post. but gibbie made her look. "you do not mean," he spelled very hurriedly, "that you would marry me?--me? i never dreamed of such a thing!" "you didn't mean it then!" said ginevra, with a cry--bitter but feeble with despair and ending in a stifled shriek. "what have i been saying then! i thought i belonged to you! i thought you meant to take me all the time!" she burst into an agony of sobbing. "oh me! me! i have been alone all the time, and did not know it!" she sank on the pavement at the foot of the lamp-post, weeping sorely, and shaken with her sobs. gibbie was in sad perplexity. heaven had opened before his gaze; its colours filled his eyes; its sounds filled his ears and heart and brain; but the portress was busy crying and would not open the door. neither could he get at her to comfort her, for, her eyes being wanted to cry with, his poor signs were of no use. dumbness is a drawback to the gift of consolation. it was a calm night early in march, clear overhead, and the heaven full of stars. the first faint think-odour of spring was in the air. a crescent moon hung half-way between the zenith and the horizon, clear as silver in firelight, and peaceful in the consciousness that not much was required of her yet. both bareheaded, the one stood under the lamp, the other had fallen in a heap at its foot; the one was in the seventh paradise, and knew it; the other was weeping her heart out, yet was in the same paradise, if she would but have opened her eyes. gibbie held one of her hands and stroked it. then he pulled off his coat and laid it softly upon her. she grew a little quieter. "take me home, gibbie," she said, in a gentle voice. all was over; there was no use in crying or even in thinking any more. gibbie put his arms round her, and helped her to her feet. she looked at him, and saw a face glorious with bliss. never, not even on glashgar, in the skin-coat of the beast-boy, had she seen him so like an angel. and in his eyes was that which triumphed, not over dumbness, but over speech. it brought the rose-fire rushing into her wan cheeks; she hid her face on his bosom; and, under the dingy red flame of the lamp in the stony street, they held each other, as blessed as if they had been under an orange tree haunted with fire-flies. for they knew each the heart of the other, and god is infinite. how long they stood thus, neither of them knew. the lady would not have spoken if she could, and the youth could not if he would. but the lady shivered, and because she shivered, she would have the youth take his coat. he mocked at cold; made her put her arms in the sleeves, and buttoned it round her: both laughed to see how wide it was. then he took her by the hand, and led her away, obedient as when first he found her and her heart upon glashgar. like two children, holding each other fast, they hurried along, in dread of pursuit. he brought her to daur-street, and gave her into mrs. sclater's arms. ginevra told her everything except that her father had struck her, and gibbie begged her to keep his wife for him till they could be married. mrs. sclater behaved like a mother to them, sent gibbie away, and ginevra to a hot bath and to bed. chapter lix. catastrophe. gibbie went home as if pearl-street had been the stairs of glashgar, and the auld hoose a mansion in the heavens. he seemed to float along the way as one floats in a happy dream, where motion is born at once of the will, without the intermediating mechanics of nerve, muscle, and fulcrum. love had been gathering and ever storing itself in his heart so many years for this brown dove! now at last the rock was smitten, and its treasure rushed forth to her service. in nothing was it changed as it issued, save as the dark, silent, motionless water of the cavern changes into the sparkling, singing, dancing rivulet. gibbie's was love simple, unselfish, undemanding--not merely asking for no return, but asking for no recognition, requiring not even that its existence should be known. he was a rare one, who did not make the common miserable blunder of taking the shadow cast by love--the desire, namely, to be loved--for love itself; his love was a vertical sun, and his own shadow was under his feet. silly youths and maidens count themselves martyrs of love, when they are but the pining witnesses to a delicious and entrancing selfishness. but do not mistake me through confounding, on the other hand, the desire to be loved--which is neither wrong nor noble, any more than hunger is either wrong or noble--and the delight in being loved, to be devoid of which a man must be lost in an immeasurably deeper, in an evil, ruinous, yea, a fiendish selfishness. not to care for love is the still worse reaction from the self-foiled and outworn greed of love. gibbie's love was a diamond among gem-loves. there are men whose love to a friend is less selfish than their love to the dearest woman; but gibbie's was not a love to be less divine towards a woman than towards a man. one man's love is as different from another's as the one is himself different from the other. the love that dwells in one man is an angel, the love in another is a bird, that in another a hog. some would count worthless the love of a man who loved everybody. there would be no distinction in being loved by such a man!--and distinction, as a guarantee of their own great worth, is what such seek. there are women who desire to be the sole object of a man's affection, and are all their lives devoured by unlawful jealousies. a love that had never gone forth upon human being but themselves, would be to them the treasure to sell all that they might buy. and the man who brought such a love might in truth be all-absorbed therein himself: the poorest of creatures may well be absorbed in the poorest of loves. a heart has to be taught to love, and its first lesson, however well learnt, no more makes it perfect in love, than the a b c makes a savant. the man who loves most will love best. the man who throughly loves god and his neighbour is the only man who will love a woman ideally--who can love her with the love god thought of between them when he made man male and female. the man, i repeat, who loves god with his very life, and his neighbour as christ loves him, is the man who alone is capable of grand, perfect, glorious love to any woman. because gibbie's love was towards everything human, he was able to love ginevra as donal, poet and prophet, was not yet grown able to love her. to that of the most passionate of unbelieving lovers, gibbie's love was as the fire of a sun to that of a forest. the fulness of a world of love-ways and love-thoughts was gibbie's. in sweet affairs of loving-kindness, he was in his own kingdom, and sat upon its throne. and it was this essential love, acknowledging and embracing, as a necessity of its being, everything that could be loved, which now concentrated its rays on the individual's individual. his love to ginevra stood like a growing thicket of aromatic shrubs, until her confession set the fire of heaven to it, and the flame that consumes not, but gives life, arose and shot homeward. he had never imagined, never hoped, never desired she should love him like that. she had refused his friend, the strong, the noble, the beautiful, donal the poet, and it never could but from her own lips have found way to his belief that she had turned her regard upon wee sir gibbie, a nobody, who to himself was a mere burning heart running about in tattered garments. his devotion to her had forestalled every pain with its antidote of perfect love, had negatived every lack, had precluded every desire, had shut all avenues of entrance against self. even if "a little thought unsound" should have chanced upon an entrance, it would have found no soil to root and grow in: the soil for the harvest of pain is that brought down from the peaks of pride by the torrents of desire. immeasurably the greater therefore was his delight, when the warmth and odour of the love that had been from time to him immemorial passing out from him in virtue of consolation and healing, came back upon him in the softest and sweetest of flower-waking spring-winds. then indeed was his heart a bliss worth god's making. the sum of happiness in the city, if gathered that night into one wave, could not have reached half-way to the crest of the mighty billow tossing itself heavenward as it rushed along the ocean of gibbie's spirit. he entered the close of the auld hoose. but the excess of his joy had not yet turned to light, was not yet passing from him in physical flame: whence then the glow that illumined the court? he looked up. the windows of mistress croale's bedroom were glaring with light! he opened the door hurriedly and darted up. on the stair he was met by the smell of burning, which grew stronger as he ascended. he opened mistress croale's door. the chintz curtains of her bed were flaming to the ceiling. he darted to it. mistress croale was not in it. he jumped upon it, and tore down the curtains and tester, trampling them under his feet upon the blankets. he had almost finished, and, at the bottom of the bed, was reaching up and pulling at the last of the flaming rags, when a groan came to his ears. he looked down: there, at the foot of the bed, on her back upon the floor, lay mistress croale in her satin gown, with red swollen face, wide-open mouth, and half-open eyes, dead drunk, a heap of ruin. a bit of glowing tinder fell on her forehead. she opened her eyes, looked up, uttered a terrified cry, closed them, and was again motionless, except for her breathing. on one side of her lay a bottle, on the other a chamber-candlestick upset, with the candle guttered into a mass. with the help of the water-jugs, and the bath which stood ready in his room, he succeeded at last in putting out the fire, and then turned his attention to mistress croale. her breathing had grown so stertorous that he was alarmed, and getting more water, bathed her head, and laid a wet handkerchief on it, after which he sat down and watched her. it would have made a strange picture: the middle of the night, the fire-blasted bed, the painful, ugly carcase on the floor, and the sad yet--i had almost said radiant youth, watching near. the slow night passed. the gray of the morning came, chill and cheerless. mistress croale stirred, moved, crept up rather than rose to a sitting position, and stretched herself yawning. gibbie had risen and stood over her. she caught sight of him; absolute terror distorted her sodden face; she stared at him, then stared about her, like one who had suddenly waked in hell. he took her by the arm. she obeyed, rose, and stood, fear conquering the remnants of drunkenness, with her whisky-scorched eyes following his every movement, as he got her cloak and bonnet. he put them on her. she submitted like a child caught in wickedness, and cowed by the capture. he led her from the house, out into the dark morning, made her take his arm, and away they walked together, down to the riverside. she gave a reel now and then, and sometimes her knees would double under her; but gibbie was no novice at the task, and brought her safe to the door of her lodging--of which, in view of such a possibility, he had been paying the rent all the time. he opened the door with her pass-key, led her up the stair, unlocked the door of her garret, placed her in a chair, and left her, closing the doors gently behind him. instinctively she sought her bed, fell upon it, and slept again. when she woke, her dim mind was haunted by a terrible vision of resurrection and damnation, of which the only point she could plainly recall, was an angel, as like sir gibbie as he could look, hanging in the air above her, and sending out flames on all sides of him, which burned her up, inside and out, shrivelling soul and body together. as she lay thinking over it, with her eyes closed, suddenly she remembered, with a pang of dismay, that she had got drunk and broken her vow--that was the origin of the bad dream, and the dreadful headache, and the burning at her heart! she must have water! painfully lifting herself upon one elbow, she opened her eyes. then what a bewilderment, and what a discovery, slow unfolding itself, were hers! like her first parents she had fallen; her paradise was gone; she lay outside among the thorns and thistles before the gate. from being the virtual mistress of a great house, she was back in her dreary lonely garret! re-exiled in shame from her briefly regained respectability, from friendship and honourable life and the holding forth of help to the world, she lay there a sow that had been washed, and washed in vain! what a sight of disgrace was her grand satin gown--wet, and scorched, and smeared with candle! and ugh! how it smelt of smoke and burning and the dregs of whisky! and her lace!--she gazed at her finery as an angel might on his feathers which the enemy had burned while he slept on his watch. she must have water! she got out of bed with difficulty, then for a whole hour sat on the edge of it motionless, unsure that she was not in hell. at last she wept--acrid tears, for very misery. she rose, took off her satin and lace, put on a cotton gown, and was once more a decent-looking poor body--except as to her glowing face and burning eyes, which to bathe she had nothing but tears. again she sat down, and for a space did nothing, only suffered in ignominy. at last life began to revive a little. she rose and moved about the room, staring at the things in it as a ghost might stare at the grave-clothes on its abandoned body. there on the table lay her keys; and what was that under them?--a letter addressed to her. she opened it, and found five pound-notes, with these words: "i promise to pay to mrs. croale five pounds monthly, for nine months to come. gilbert galbraith." she wept again. he would never speak to her more! she had lost him at last--her only friend!--her sole link to god and goodness and the kingdom of heaven!--lost him for ever! the day went on, cold and foggy without, colder and drearier within. sick and faint and disgusted, the poor heart had no atmosphere to beat in save an infinite sense of failure and lost opportunity. she had fuel enough in the room to make a little fire, and at length had summoned resolve sufficient for the fetching of water from the street-pump. she went to the cupboard to get a jug: she could not carry a pailful. there in the corner stood her demon-friend! her own old familiar, the black bottle! as if he had been patiently waiting for her all the long dreary time she had been away! with a flash of fierce joy she remembered she had left it half-full. she caught it up, and held it between her and the fading light of the misty window: it was half-full still!--one glass--a hair of the dog--would set her free from faintness and sickness, disgust and misery! there was no one to find fault with her now! she could do as she liked--there was no one to care!--nothing to take fire!--she set the bottle on the table, because her hand shook, and went again to the cupboard to get a glass. on the way--borne upward on some heavenly current from the deeps of her soul, the face of gibbie, sorrowful because loving, like the face of the son of man, met her. she turned, seized the bottle, and would have dashed it on the hearthstone, but that a sudden resolve arrested her lifted arm: gibbie should see! she would be strong! that bottle should stand on that shelf until the hour when she could show it him and say, "see the proof of my victory!" she drove the cork fiercely in. when its top was level with the neck, she set the bottle back in its place, and from that hour it stood there, a temptation, a ceaseless warning, the monument of a broken but reparable vow, a pledge of hope. it may not have been a prudent measure. to a weak nature it would have involved certain ruin. but there are natures that do better under difficulty; there are many such. and with that fiend-like shape in her cupboard the one ambition of mistress croale's life was henceforth inextricably bound up: she would turn that bottle into a witness for her against the judgment she had deserved. close by the cupboard door, like a kite or an owl nailed up against a barn, she hung her soiled and dishonoured satin gown; and the dusk having now gathered, took the jug, and fetched herself water. then, having set her kettle on the fire, she went out with her basket, and bought bread, and butter. after a good cup of tea and some nice toast, she went to bed again, much easier both in mind and body, and slept. in the morning she went to the market, opened her shop, and waited for customers. pleasure and surprise at her reappearance brought the old ones quickly back. she was friendly and helpful to them as before; but the slightest approach to inquiry as to where she had been or what she had been doing, she met with simple obstinate silence. gibbie's bounty and her faithful abstinence enabled her to add to her stock and extend her trade. by and by she had the command of a little money; and when in the late autumn there came a time of scarcity and disease, she went about among the poor like a disciple of sir gibbie. some said that, from her knowledge of their ways, from her judgment, and by her personal ministration of what, for her means, she gave more bountifully than any, she did more to hearten their endurance, than all the ladies together who administered money subscribed. it came to sir gibbie's ears, and rejoiced his heart: his old friend was on the king's highway still! in the mean time she saw nothing of him. not once did he pass her shop, where often her mental, and not unfrequently her bodily, attitude was that of a watching lover. the second day, indeed, she saw him at a little distance, and sorely her heart smote her, for one of his hands was in a sling; but he crossed to the other side, plainly to avoid her. she was none the less sure, however, that when she asked him he would forgive her; and ask him she would, as soon as she had satisfactory proof of repentance to show him. chapter lx. arrangement and preparation. the next morning, the first thing after breakfast, mr. sclater, having reflected that ginevra was under age and they must be careful, resumed for the nonce, with considerable satisfaction, his office of guardian, and holding no previous consultation with gibbie, walked to the cottage, and sought an interview with mr. galbraith, which the latter accorded with a formality suitable to his idea of his own inborn grandeur. but his assumption had no effect on nut-headed mr. sclater, who, in this matter at all events, was at peace with his conscience. "i have to inform you, mr. galbraith," he began, "that miss galbraith--" "oh!" said the laird, "i beg your pardon; i was not aware it was my daughter you wished to see." he rose and rang the bell. mr. sclater, annoyed at his manner, held his peace. "tell your mistress," said the laird, "that the rev. mr. sclater wishes to see her." the girl returned with a scared face, and the news that her mistress was not in her room. the laird's loose mouth dropped looser. "miss galbraith did us the honour to sleep at our house last night," said mr. sclater deliberately. "the devil!" cried the laird, relieved. "why!--what!--are you aware of what you are saying, sir?" "perfectly; and of what i saw too. a blow looks bad on a lady's face." "good heavens! the little hussey dared to say i struck her?" "she did not say so; but no one could fail to see some one had. if you do not know who did it, i do." "send her home instantly, or i will come and fetch her," cried the laird. "come and dine with us if you want to see her. for the present she remains where she is. you want her to marry fergus duff; she prefers my ward, gilbert galbraith, and i shall do my best for them." "she is under age," said the laird. "that fault will rectify itself as fast in my house as in yours," returned the minister. "if you invite the publicity of a legal action, i will employ counsel, and wait the result." mr. sclater was not at all anxious to hasten the marriage; he would much rather, in fact, have it put off, at least until gibbie should have taken his degree. the laird started up in a rage, but the room was so small that he sat down again. the minister leaned back in his chair. he was too much displeased with the laird's behaviour to lighten the matter for him by setting forth the advantages of having sir gibbie for a son-in-law. "mr. sclater," said the laird at length, "i am shocked, unspeakably shocked, at my daughter's conduct. to leave the shelter of her father's roof, in the middle of the night, and--" "about seven o'clock in the evening," interjected mr. sclater. "--and take refuge with strangers!" continued the laird. "by no means strangers, mr. galbraith!" said the minister. "you drive your daughter from your house, and are then shocked to find she has taken refuge with friends!" "she is an unnatural child. she knows well enough what i think of her, and what reason she has given me so to think." "when a man happens to be alone in any opinion," remarked the minister, "even if the opinion should be of his own daughter, the probabilities are he is wrong. every one but yourself has the deepest regard for miss galbraith." "she has always cultivated strangely objectionable friendships," said the laird. "for my own part," said the minister, as if heedless of the laird's last remark, "although i believe she has no dowry, and there are reasons besides why the connection should not be desirable, i do not know a lady i should prefer for a wife to my ward." the minister's plain speaking was not without effect upon the laird. it made him uncomfortable. it is only when the conscience is wide awake and regnant that it can be appealed to without giving a cry for response. again he sat silent a while. then gathering all the pomp and stiffness at his command, "oblige me by informing my daughter," he said, "that i request her, for the sake of avoiding scandal, to return to her father's house until she is of age." "and in the mean time you undertake--" "i undertake nothing," shouted the laird, in his feeble, woolly, yet harsh voice. "then i refuse to carry your message. i will be no bearer of that from which, as soon as delivered, i should dissuade." "allow me to ask, are you a minister of the gospel, and stir up a child against her own father?" "i am not here to bandy words with you, mr. galbraith. it is nothing to me what you think of me. if you will engage not to urge your choice upon miss galbraith, i think it probable she will at once return to you. if not--" "i will not force her inclinations," said the laird. "she knows my wish, and she ought to know the duty of a daughter." "i will tell her what you say," answered the minister, and took his departure. when gibbie heard, he was not at all satisfied with mr. sclater's interference to such result. he wished to marry ginevra at once, in order to take her from under the tyranny of her father. but he was readily convinced it would be better, now things were understood, that she should go back to him, and try once more to gain him. the same day she did go back, and gibbie took up his quarters at the minister's. ginevra soon found that her father had not yielded the idea of having his own way with her, but her spirits and courage were now so good, that she was able not only to endure with less suffering, but to carry herself quite differently. much less afraid of him, she was the more watchful to minister to his wants, dared a loving liberty now and then in spite of his coldness, took his objurgations with something of the gaiety of one who did not or would not believe he meant them, and when he abused gibbie, did not answer a word, knowing events alone could set him right in his idea of him. rejoiced that he had not laid hold of the fact that glashruach was gibbie's, she never mentioned the place to him; for she shrunk with sharpest recoil from the humiliation of seeing him, upon conviction, turn from fergus to gibbie: the kindest thing they could do for him would be to marry against his will, and save him from open tergiversation; for no one could then blame him, he would be thoroughly pleased, and not having the opportunity of self-degradation, would be saved the cause for self-contempt. for some time fergus kept on hoping. the laird, blinded by his own wishes, and expecting gibbie would soon do something to bring public disgrace upon himself, did not tell him of his daughter's determination and self-engagement, while, for her part, ginevra believed she fulfilled her duty towards him in the endeavour to convince him by her conduct that nothing could ever induce her to marry him. so the remainder of the session passed--the laird urging his objections against gibbie, and growing extravagant in his praises of fergus, while ginevra kept taking fresh courage, and being of good cheer. gibbie went to the cottage once or twice, but the laird made it so uncomfortable for them, and fergus was so rude, that they agreed it would be better to content themselves with meeting when they had the chance. at the end of the month gibbie went home as usual, telling ginevra he must be present to superintend what was going on at glashruach to get the house ready for her, but saying nothing of what he was building there. by the beginning of the winter, they had got the buttress-wall finished and the coping on it, also the shell of the new house roofed in, so that the carpenters had been at work all through the frost and snow, and things had made great progress without any hurry; and now, since the first day the weather had permitted, the masons were at work again. the bridge was built, the wall of the old house broken through, the turret carried aloft. the channel of the little burn they had found completely blocked by a great stone at the farther edge of the landslip; up to this stone they opened the channel, protecting it by masonry against further slip, and by gibbie's directions left it so--after boring the stone, which still turned every drop of the water aside into the glashburn, for a good charge of gunpowder. all the hollow where the latter burn had carried away pine-wood and shrubbery, gravel drive and lawn, had been planted, mostly with fir trees; and a weir of strong masonry, a little way below the house, kept the water back, so that it rose and spread, and formed a still pool just under the house, reflecting it far beneath. if ginevra pleased, gibbie meant to raise the weir, and have quite a little lake in the hollow. a new approach had been contrived, and was nearly finished before gibbie returned to college. chapter lxi. the wedding. in the mean time fergus, dull as he was to doubt his own importance and success--for did not the public acknowledge both?--yet by degrees lost heart and hope so far as concerned ginevra, and at length told the laird that, much as he valued his society, and was indebted for his kindness, he must deny himself the pleasure of visiting any more at the cottage--so plainly was his presence unacceptable to miss galbraith. the laird blustered against his daughter, and expostulated with the preacher, not forgetting to hint at the ingratitude of forsaking him, after all he had done and borne in the furthering of his interests: jenny must at length come to see what reason and good sense required of her! but fergus had at last learned his lesson, and was no longer to be blinded. besides, there had lately come to his church a certain shopkeeper, retired rich, with one daughter; and as his hope of the dignity of being married to ginevra faded, he had come to feel the enticement of miss lapraik's money and good looks--which gained in force considerably when he began to understand the serious off-sets there were to the honour of being son-in-law to mr. galbraith: a nobody as was old lapraik in himself and his position, he was at least looked upon with respect, argued fergus; and indeed the man was as honest as it is possible for any worshipper of mammon to be. fergus therefore received the laird's expostulations and encouragements with composure, but when at length, in his growing acidity, mr. galbraith reflected on his birth, and his own condescension in showing him friendship, fergus left the house, never to go near it again. within three months, for a second protracted courtship was not to be thought of, he married miss lapraik, and lived respectable ever after--took to writing hymns, became popular afresh through his poetry, and exercised a double influence for the humiliation of christianity. but what matter, while he counted himself fortunate, and thought himself happy! his fame spread; he had good health; his wife worshipped him; and if he had had a valet, i have no doubt he would have been a hero to him, thus climbing the topmost untrodden peak of the world's greatness. when the next evening came, and fergus did not appear, the laird fidgeted, then stormed, then sank into a moody silence. when the second night came, and fergus did not come, the sequence was the same, with exasperated symptoms. night after night passed thus, and ginevra began to fear for her father's reason. she challenged him to play backgammon with her, but he scorned the proposal. she begged him to teach her chess, but he scouted the notion of her having wit enough to learn. she offered to read to him, entreated him to let her do something with him, but he repelled her every advance with contempt and surliness, which now and then broke into rage and vituperation. as soon as gibbie returned, ginevra let him know how badly things were going with her father. they met, consulted, agreed that the best thing was to be married at once, made their preparations, and confident that, if asked, he would refuse his permission, proceeded, for his sake, as if they had had it. one morning, as he sat at breakfast, mr. galbraith received from mr. torrie, whom he knew as the agent in the purchase of glashruach, and whom he supposed to have bought it for major culsalmon, a letter, more than respectful, stating that matters had come to light regarding the property which rendered his presence on the spot indispensable for their solution, especially as there might be papers of consequence in view of the points in question, in some drawer or cabinet of those he had left locked behind him. the present owner, therefore, through mr. torrie, begged most respectfully that mr. galbraith would sacrifice two days of his valuable time, and visit glashruach. the result, he did not doubt, would be to the advantage of both parties. if mr. galbraith would kindly signify to mr. torrie his assent, a carriage and four, with postilions, that he might make the journey in all possible comfort, should be at his house the next morning, at ten o'clock, if that hour would be convenient. for weeks the laird had been an unmitigated bore to himself, and the invitation laid hold upon him by the most projecting handle of his being, namely, his self-importance. he wrote at once to signify his gracious assent; and in the evening told his daughter he was going to glashruach on business, and had arranged for miss kimble to come and stay with her till his return. at nine o'clock the schoolmistress came to breakfast, and at ten a travelling-carriage with four horses drew up at the door, looking nearly as big as the cottage. with monstrous stateliness, and a fur-coat on his arm, the laird descended to his garden gate, and got into the carriage, which instantly dashed away for the western road, restoring mr. galbraith to the full consciousness of his inherent grandeur: if he was not exactly laird of glashruach again, he was something quite as important. his carriage was just out of the street, when a second, also with four horses, drew up, to the astonishment of miss kimble, at the garden gate. out of it stepped mr. and mrs. sclater! then a young gentleman, whom she thought very graceful until she discovered it was that low-lived sir gilbert! and mr. torrie, the lawyer! they came trooping into the little drawing-room, shook hands with them both, and sat down, sir gilbert beside ginevra--but nobody spoke. what could it mean! a morning call? it was too early. and four horses to a morning call! a pastoral visitation? four horses and a lawyer to a pastoral visitation! a business call? there was mrs. sclater! and that sir gilbert!--it must after all be a pastoral visitation, for there was the minister commencing a religious service!--during which however it suddenly revealed itself to the horrified spinster that she was part and parcel of a clandestine wedding! an anxious father had placed her in charge of his daughter, and this was how she was fulfilling her trust! there was ginevra being married in a brown dress! and to that horrid lad, who called himself a baronet, and hobnobbed with a low market-woman! but, alas! just as she was recovering her presence of mind, mr. sclater pronounced them husband and wife! she gave a shriek, and cried out, "i forbid the banns," at which the company, bride and bridegroom included, broke into "a loud smile." the ceremony over, ginevra glided from the room, and returned almost immediately in her little brown bonnet. sir gilbert caught up his hat, and ginevra held out her hand to miss kimble. then at length the abashed and aggrieved lady found words of her own. "ginevra!" she cried, "you are never going to leave me alone in the house!--after inviting me to stay with you till your father returned!" but the minister answered her. "it was her father who invited you, i believe, not lady galbraith," he said; "and you understood perfectly that the invitation was not meant to give her pleasure. you would doubtless have her postpone her wedding-journey on your account, but my lady is under no obligation to think of you."--he had heard of her tattle against sir gilbert, and thus rudely showed his resentment. miss kimble burst into tears. ginevra kissed her, and said, "never mind, dear miss kimble. you could not help it. the whole thing was arranged. we are going after my father, and we have the best horses." mr. torrie laughed outright. "a new kind of runaway marriage!" he cried. "the happy couple pursuing the obstinate parent with four horses! ha! ha! ha!" "but after the ceremony!" said mr. sclater. here the servant ran down the steps with a carpet-bag, and opened the gate for her mistress. lady galbraith got into the carriage; sir gilbert followed; there was kissing and tears at the door of it; mrs. sclater drew back; the postilions spurred their horses; off went the second carriage faster than the first; and the minister's party walked quietly away, leaving miss kimble to declaim to the maid of all work, who cried so that she did not hear a word she said. the schoolmistress put on her bonnet, and full of indignation carried her news of the treatment to which she had been subjected to the rev. fergus duff, who remarked to himself that it was sad to see youth and beauty turn away from genius and influence to wed money and idiocy, gave a sigh, and went to see miss lapraik. between the second stage and the third, gibbie and ginevra came in sight of their father's carriage. having arranged with the postilions that the two carriages should not change horses at the same places, they easily passed unseen by him, while, thinking of nothing so little as their proximity, he sat in state before the door of a village inn. just as mr. galbraith was beginning to hope the major had contrived a new approach to the place, the carriage took an unexpected turn, and he found presently they were climbing, by a zig-zag road, the height over the lorrie burn; but the place was no longer his, and to avoid a sense of humiliation, he avoided taking any interest in the change. a young woman--it was donal's eldest sister, but he knew nothing of her--opened the door to him, and showed him up the stair to his old study. there a great fire was burning; but, beyond that, everything, even to the trifles on his writing table, was just as when last he left the house. his chair stood in its usual position by the fire, and wine and biscuits were on a little table near. "very considerate!" he said to himself. "i trust the major does not mean to keep me waiting, though. deuced hard to have to leave a place like this!" weary with his journey he fell into a doze, dreamed of his dead wife, woke suddenly, and heard the door of the room open. there was major culsalmon entering with outstretched hand! and there was a lady--his wife doubtless! but how young the major was! he had imagined him a man in middle age at least!--bless his soul! was he never to get rid of this impostor fellow! it was not the major! it was the rascal calling himself sir gilbert galbraith!--the half-witted wretch his fool of a daughter insisted on marrying! here he was, ubiquitous as satan! and--bless his soul again! there was the minx, jenny! looking as if the place was her own! the silly tears in her eyes too!--it was all too absurd! he had just been dreaming of his dead wife, and clearly that was it! he was not awake yet! he tried hard to wake, but the dream mastered him. "jenny!" he said, as the two stood for a moment regarding him, a little doubtfully, but with smiles of welcome, "what is the meaning of this? i did not know major culsalmon had invited you! and what is this person doing here?" "papa," replied ginevra, with a curious smile, half merry, half tearful, "this person is my husband, sir gilbert galbraith of glashruach; and you are at home in your own study again." "will you never have done masquerading, jenny?" he returned. "inform major culsalmon that i request to see him immediately." he turned towards the fire, and took up a newspaper. they thought it better to leave him. as he sat, by degrees the truth grew plain to him. but not one other word on the matter did the man utter to the day of his death. when dinner was announced, he walked straight from the dining-room door to his former place at the foot of the table. but robina grant was equal to the occasion. she caught up the dish before him, and set it at the side. there gibbie seated himself; and, after a moment's hesitation, ginevra placed herself opposite her husband. the next day gibbie provided him with something to do. he had the chest of papers found in the auld hoose o' galbraith carried into his study, and the lawyer found both employment and interest for weeks in deciphering and arranging them. amongst many others concerning the property, its tenures, and boundaries, appeared some papers which, associated and compared, threw considerable doubt on the way in which portions of it had changed hands, and passed from those of gibbie's ancestors into those of ginevra's--who were lawyers as well as galbraiths; and the laird was keen of scent as any nose-hound after dishonesty in other people. in the course of a fortnight he found himself so much at home in his old quarters, and so much interested in those papers and his books, that when sir gilbert informed him ginevra and he were going back to the city, he pronounced it decidedly the better plan, seeing he was there himself to look after affairs. for the rest of the winter, therefore, mr. galbraith played the grand seigneur as before among the tenants of glashruach. chapter lxii. the burn. the moment they were settled in the auld hoose, gibbie resumed the habits of the former winter, which mistress croale's failure had interrupted. and what a change it was to ginevra--from imprisonment to ministration! she found difficulties at first, as may readily be believed. but presently came help. as soon as mistress croale heard of their return, she went immediately to lady galbraith, one morning while sir gibbie was at college, literally knelt at her feet, and with tears told her the whole tale, beseeching her intercession with sir gibbie. "i want naething," she insisted, "but his fawvour, an' the licht o' his bonnie coontenance." the end of course was that she was gladly received again into the house, where once more she attended to all the principal at least of her former duties. before she died, there was a great change and growth in her: she was none of those before whom pearls must not be cast. every winter, for many years, sir gilbert and lady galbraith occupied the auld hoose; which by degrees came at length to be known as the refuge of all that were in honest distress, the salvation of all in themselves such as could be helped, and a covert for the night to all the houseless, of whatever sort, except those drunk at the time. caution had to be exercised, and judgment used; the caution was tender and the judgment stern. the next year they built a house in a sheltered spot on glashgar, and thither from the city they brought many invalids, to spend the summer months under the care of janet and her daughter robina, whereby not a few were restored sufficiently to earn their bread for a time thereafter. the very day the session was over, they returned to glashruach, where they were received by the laird, as he was still called, as if they had been guests. they found joseph, the old butler, reinstated, and angus again acting as gamekeeper. ginevra welcomed joseph, but took the first opportunity of telling angus that for her father's sake sir gilbert allowed him to remain, but on the first act of violence he should at once be dismissed, and probably prosecuted as well. donal's eldest brother was made bailiff. before long gibbie got the other two also about him, and as soon as, with justice, he was able, settled them together upon one of his farms. every saturday, so long as janet lived, they met, as in the old times, at the cottage--only with ginevra in the place of the absent donal. more to her own satisfaction, after all, than robert's, janet went home first,--"to be at han'," she said, "to open the door till him whan he chaps." then robert went to his sons below on their farm, where he was well taken care of; but happily he did not remain long behind his wife. that first summer, nicie returned to glashruach to wait on lady galbraith, was more her friend than her servant, and when she married, was settled on the estate. for some little time ginevra was fully occupied in getting her house in order, and furnishing the new part of it. when that was done, sir gilbert gave an entertainment to his tenants. the laird preferred a trip to the city, "on business," to the humiliation of being present as other than the greatest; though perhaps he would have minded it less had he ever himself given a dinner to his tenants. robert and janet declined the invitation. "we're ower auld for makin' merry 'cep' in oor ain herts," said janet. "but bide ye, my bonny sir gibbie, till we're a' up yon'er, an' syne we'll see." the place of honour was therefore given to jean mavor, who was beside herself with joy to see her broonie lord of the land, and be seated beside him in respect and friendship. but her brother said it was "clean ridic'lous;" and not to the last would consent to regard the new laird as other than half-witted, insisting that everything was done by his wife, and that the talk on his fingers was a mere pretence. when the main part of the dinner was over, sir gilbert and his lady stood at the head of the table, and, he speaking by signs and she interpreting, made a little speech together. in the course of it sir gibbie took occasion to apologize for having once disturbed the peace of the country-side by acting the supposed part of a broonie, and in relating his adventures of the time, accompanied his wife's text with such graphic illustration of gesture, that his audience laughed at the merry tale till the tears ran down their cheeks. then with a few allusions to his strange childhood, he thanked the god who led him through thorny ways into the very arms of love and peace in the cottage of robert and janet grant, whence, and not from the fortune he had since inherited, came all his peace. "he desires me to tell you," said lady galbraith, "that he was a stranger, and you folk of daurside took him in, and if ever he can do a kindness to you or yours, he will.--he desires me also to say, that you ought not to be left ignorant that you have a poet of your own, born and bred among you--donal grant, the son of robert and janet, the friend of sir gilbert's heart, and one of the noblest of men. and he begs you to allow me to read you a poem he had from him this very morning--probably just written. it is called the laverock. i will read it as well as i can. if any of you do not like poetry, he says--i mean sir gilbert says--you can go to the kitchen and light your pipes, and he will send your wine there to you." she ceased. not one stirred, and she read the verses--which, for the sake of having donal in at the last of my book, i will print. those who do not care for verse, may--metaphorically, i would not be rude--go and smoke their pipes in the kitchen. the laverock. (lark) the man says: laverock i' the lift, (sky) hae ye nae sang-thrift, 'at ye scatter't sae heigh, an' lat it a' drift? wasterfu' laverock! dinna ye ken 'at ye hing ower men wha haena a sang or a penny to spen'? hertless laverock! but up there, you, i' the bow o' the blue, haud skirlin' on as gien a' war new! (keep shrilling) toom-heidit laverock! (empty-headed) haith! ye're ower blythe: i see a great scythe swing whaur yer nestie lies, doon i' the lythe, (shelter) liltin' laverock! eh, sic a soon'! birdie, come doon-- ye're fey to sing sic a merry tune, (death-doomed) gowkit laverock! (silly) come to yer nest; yer wife's sair prest; she's clean worn oot wi' duin' her best, rovin' laverock! winna ye haud? ye're surely mad! is there naebody there to gie ye a daud? (blow) menseless laverock! come doon an' conform; pyke an honest worm, an' hap yer bairns frae the muckle storm, spendrife laverock! the bird sings: my nestie it lieth i' the how o' a han'; (hollow) the swing o' the scythe 'ill miss 't by a span. the lift it's sae cheerie! the win' it's sae free! i hing ower my dearie, an' sing 'cause i see. my wifie's wee breistie grows warm wi' my sang, an' ilk crumpled-up beastie kens no to think lang. up here the sun sings, but he only shines there! ye haena nae wings, but come up on a prayer. the man sings: ye wee daurin' cratur, ye rant an' ye sing like an oye o' auld natur' (grandchild) ta'en hame by the king! ye wee feathert priestie, yer bells i' yer thro't. yer altar yer breistie yer mitre forgot-- offerin' an' aaron, ye burn hert an' brain an' dertin' an' daurin flee back to yer ain ye wee minor prophet, it's 'maist my belief 'at i'm doon i' tophet, an' you abune grief! ye've deavt me an' daudit, (deafened) (buffeted) an' ca'd me a fule: i'm nearhan' persuaudit to gang to your schule! for, birdie, i'm thinkin' ye ken mair nor me-- gien ye haena been drinkin', an' sing as ye see. ye maun hae a sicht 'at sees geyan far ben; (considerably) (inwards) an' a hert for the micht o' 't wad sair for nine men! (serve) somebody's been till roun to ye wha (whisper) said birdies war seen till e'en whan they fa'! after the reading of the poem, sir gilbert and lady galbraith withdrew, and went towards the new part of the house, where they had their rooms. on the bridge, over which ginevra scarcely ever passed without stopping to look both up and down the dry channel in the rock, she lingered as usual, and gazed from its windows. below, the waterless bed of the burn opened out on the great valley of the daur; above was the landslip, and beyond it the stream rushing down the mountain. gibbie pointed up to it. she gazed a while, and gave a great sigh. he asked her--their communication was now more like that between two spirits: even signs had become almost unnecessary--what she wanted or missed. she looked in his face and said, "naething but the sang o' my burnie, gibbie." he took a small pistol from his pocket, and put it in her hand; then, opening the window, signed to her to fire it. she had never fired a pistol, and was a little frightened, but would have been utterly ashamed to shrink from anything gibbie would have her do. she held it out. her hand trembled. he laid his upon it, and it grew steady. she pulled the trigger, and dropped the pistol with a little cry. he signed to her to listen. a moment passed, and then, like a hugely magnified echo, came a roar that rolled from mountain to mountain, like a thunder drum. the next instant, the landslip seemed to come hurrying down the channel, roaring and leaping: it was the mud-brown waters of the burn, careering along as if mad with joy at having regained their ancient course. ginevra stared with parted lips, delight growing to apprehension as the live thing momently neared the bridge. with tossing mane of foam, the brown courser came rushing on, and shot thundering under. they turned, and from the other window saw it tumbling headlong down the steep descent to the lorrie. by quick gradations, even as they gazed, the mud melted away; the water grew clearer and clearer, and in a few minutes a small mountain-river, of a lovely lucid brown, transparent as a smoke-crystal, was dancing along under the bridge. it had ceased its roar and was sweetly singing. "let us see it from my room, gibbie," said ginevra. they went up, and from the turret window looked down upon the water. they gazed until, like the live germ of the gathered twilight, it was scarce to be distinguished but by abstract motion. "it's my ain burnie," said ginevra, "an' it's ain auld sang! i'll warran' it hasna forgotten a note o' 't! eh, gibbie, ye gie me a' thing!" "gien i was a burnie, wadna i rin!" sang gibbie, and ginevra heard the words, though gibbie could utter only the air he had found for them so long ago. she threw herself into his arms, and hiding her face on his shoulder, clung silent to her silent husband. over her lovely bowed head, he gazed into the cool spring night, sparkling with stars, and shadowy with mountains. his eyes climbed the stairs of glashgar to the lonely peak dwelling among the lights of god; and if upon their way up the rocks they met no visible sentinels of heaven, he needed neither ascending stairs nor descending angels, for a better than the angels was with them. footnotes: [ ] it amuses a scotchman to find that the word cakes, as in "the land of cakes," is taken, not only by foreigners, but by some english people--as how, indeed, should it be otherwise?--to mean compositions of flour, more or less enriched, and generally appreciable; whereas, in fact, it stands for the dryest, simplest preparation in the world. the genuine cakes is--(my grammar follows usage: cakes is; broth are.)--literally nothing but oatmeal made into a dough with cold water and dried over the fire--sometimes then in front of it as well. [ ] metrical paraphrases of passages of scripture, always to be found at the end of the bibles printed for scotland. [ ] see sir thomas dick lauder's account of the morayshire floods in ( st ed., p. )--an enchanting book, especially to one whose earliest memories are interwoven with water-floods. for details in such kind here given, i am much indebted to it. again and again, as i have been writing, has it rendered me miserable--my tale showing so flat and poor beside sir thomas's narrative. known to me from childhood, it wakes in me far more wonder and pleasure now, than it did even in the days when the marvel of things came more to the surface. note from john bechard, creator of this electronic text. the following is a list of scottish words which are found in george macdonald's "sir gibbie". i have compiled this list myself and worked out the definitions from context with the help of margaret west, from leven in fife, scotland, and also by referring to a word list found in a collection of poems by robert burns and "chamber's scots dialect dictionary from the th century to the present" c. . i have tried to be as thorough as possible given the limited resources and welcome any feedback on this list which may be wrong (my e-mail address is jabbechard@aol.com). this was never meant to be a comprehensive list of the national scottish language, but rather an aid to understanding some of the conversations in this text which are carried out in the broad scots. i do apologise for any mistakes or omissions. i aimed for my list to be very comprehensive, and it often repeats the same word in a plural or diminutive form. as well, it includes words that are quite obvious to native english speakers, only spelled in such a way to demonstrate the local pronunciation. there is a web site under construction which will feature the scottish language; and the national scottish dictionary can be consulted if you have access to one. this list is a compressed form that consists of three columns for 'word', 'definition', and 'additional notes'. it is set up with a comma between each item and a hard return at the end of each definition. this means that this section could easily be cut and pasted into its own text file and imported into a database or spreadsheet as a comma separated variable file (.csv file). failing that, you could do a search and replace for commas in this section (i have not used any commas in my words, definitions or notes) and replace the commas with spaces or tabs. word, definition, notes a', all; every, also have a' body, everyone; everybody, a' thing, everything; anything, aboot, about, absteen, abstain, abune, above; up, accoont, account, accordin', according, accre, acre, ae, one, aff, off; away; past; beyond, affrontit, affronted; disgraced, also ashamed; shamed afore, before; in front of, aften, often, again, against; opposed to, also again again', against, agreeable, in agreement; willing, ahchan, achan, reference to joshua ahin', behind; after; at the back of, ahint, behind; after; at the back of, aiblins, perhaps; possibly, aigles, eagles, aigypt, egypt, ain, own, also one aipple, apple, airm, arm, airmour, armour, airms, arms, also coat of arms; crest airt, quarter; direction; compass point, airthquack, earthquake, airts, quarters; directions; compass points, aiss, ashes, ait, eat, aiten, eaten, aith, oath, aither, either, aiven, even, alane, alone, alloo, allow, allooin', allowing, almichty, almighty; god, amids, amidst, amo', among, an', and, ance, once, ane, one, also a single person or thing aneath, beneath; under, anent, opposite to; in front of, also concerning aneth, beneath; under, 'aneth, beneath; under, angert, angered; angry, also grieved anither, another, anker, liquid measure of gallons, a'ready, already, arrenge, arrange, as lang's, as long as, as sune's, as soon as, ashmy, asthma, 'at, that, at farest, at the farthest, also at the latest ates, hates, a'thegither, all together, a'thing, everything; anything, 'at'll, that will, 'at's, that is, attreebute, attribute, atween, between, 'atween, between, auld, old, auld langsyne, old days of long ago, also old friendship auld-fashioned, old-fashioned, auncient, ancient, aw, i, also all; owning awa, away, awa', away, awfu', awful, awva!, at all!, exclamation of surprise; contempt ay, yes; indeed, exclamation of surprise; wonder aye, yes; indeed, ayont, beyond; after, bairn, child, bairnies, little children, diminutive bairns, children, baith, both, bale-fire, any large fire; bonfire, ballant, ballad; song, ballants, ballads; songs, banes, bones, bannin', cursing; swearing; abuse; scold, bannock, round flat griddle-baked cake, barebanes, bare bones (i.e. death), barkin', barking, bawbee, half penny, bealt, festered, beastie, beast; animal, diminutive to express sympathy or affection becomin', becoming, beets, boots, beginnin', beginning, behaud, withhold; wait; delay, also behold bein', being, beirin', bearing; allowing, belang, belong, believet, believed, believe't, believe it, ben, in; inside; into; within; inwards, also inner room be't, be it, bethink (oneself), stop to think; reflect, beuk, book, also bible bible-word, word of honour, bicker, wooden vessel, bidden, abided; stayed, biddin', bidding, bide, endure; bear; remain; live, also desire; wish bidena, do not bide; do not stay, bides, endures; bears; remains; lives, also stays for bield, protection; shelter; cover, bigg, build, biggit, built, bilin', boiling, also the whole quantity bin', bind, binna, be not, birdie, little bird, diminutive birdies, little birds, diminutive birk, birch tree, birks, birch trees, bit, but; bit, also little-diminutive blate, over-modest; bashful; shy, blaw, blow, blawin', blowing, bleck, black; smut, also nonplus; perplex blecks, nonplusses; perplexes, bledder, bleater; snipe, also foolish or idle talker bleedin', bleeding, blessin's, blessings, blest, blessed, blether, talk nonsense; babble; boast, blethers, talks nonsense; babbles; boasts, blew, blue, blin't, blinded, blude, blood, bluidy, bloody, boady, body, boasoms, bosoms, boatle, bottle (of whisky), boddom, bottom, bodies, people; fellows; folk, bodit, boded, body, person; fellow, also body bonnie, good; beautiful; pretty; handsome, bonniest, best; most beautiful; prettiest, bonny, good; beautiful; pretty; handsome, boortree, shrub elder, bosky, wild; unfrequented, bossie, large wooden bowl, serving bowl boucht, bought, bow-ribbit, bent in the ribs, brackens, bracken; coarse fern, brae, hill; hillside; high ground by a river, brainch, branch, brainches, branches, braird, first sprouting of young grain, brak, break, brakfast, breakfast, brakin', breaking, brander, grating; gridiron; trestle, bra'ner, grating; gridiron; trestle, braw, beautiful; good; fine, also lovely (girl); handsome (boy) bray, press; squeeze; push, bree, brew; whisky; broth; gravy, breeks, breeches; trousers, breist, breast, breistie, little breast, diminutive breith, breath, bridle, modify, brither, brother, brithers, brothers; fellows, brocken, broken, brods, boards; (book covers), broo, brow, broom, shrub with bright yellow flowers, broonie, brownie; benevolent elf, broonies, brownies; benevolent elves, brose, water; soup; meal, broucht, brought, brunt, burned, buik, book, also bible buiks, books, bun'le, bundle, burn, water; stream; brook, burnie, little stream, diminutive bursten, burst, buss, bush, butterflees, butterflies, buyin', buying, by ordinar', out of the ordinary; supernatural, byke, hive; swarm; crowd, byre, cowshed, byres, cowsheds, ca', call; name, ca'd, called, ca'in, calling, ca'in', calling, cairried, carried, cairries, carries, cairry, carry, cairryin', carrying, caitiff, coward; cowardly, more of an older english word than scots caller, fresh; refreshing; cool, cam, came, cam', came, camna, did not come, canna, cannot, carena, do not care, carin', caring, carolled, sang (carols), cast, thrown off; discarded (clothes), casten, spoilt; worthless; thrown aside, catched, caught, caul', cold, cauld, cold, caup, small wooden bowl, caups, small wooden bowls, 'cause, because, caw, drive; impel; hammer, cawpable, capable, 'cep, except; but, 'cep', except; but, certie, of a truth; certainly, certy, of a truth; certainly, chaps, knocks; hammers; strikes; raps, chatterin', chattering, chaumer, chamber; room, cheek, side, cheemistry, chemistry, cheenge, change, cheenged, changed, cheengin', changing, cheerie, cheery, cheese, choose, chiel, child; young person, term of fondness or intimacy chield, child; young person, term of fondness or intimacy chop, shop; store, chopdoor, shop door, claes, clothes; dress, clan, group; class; coterie, clappers, door knockers; rattles, clean, altogether; entirely, also comely; shapely; empty; clean cleansin', cleansing, cled, clothed; clad, cleed, clothe; shelter, clim', climb, cloaset, (prayer) closet, cloods, clouds, cloot, clout; box (ear); beat; slap, also patch; mend closed, enclosed, closet, room; bedroom, coaties, children's coats or petticoats, cobblin', cobbling; shoemaking, cock-crawin', crowing of the cock, coffer, legacy of wealth; fortune, colliginer, college student, also college boy colloguin', associating; conspiring; plotting, come awa' ben., come on in., come yer wa's in., come on in., comena, do not come, comin', coming, concernt, concerned, condescendin', condescending, conduckit, conducted, conneckit, connected, consaive, conceive, considert, considered, consortit, consorted, contentit, contented, contrar', contrary, coo, cow, cooard, coward, cooards, cowards, coontenance, countenance, coorse, coarse, also course cottar, farm tenant; cottager, cottars, farm tenants; cottagers, couldna, could not, couples, rafters, coverin', covering, cowt, colt, crap o' the wa', natural shelf between wall and roof, cratur, creature, craturs, creatures, craw, crow; rook (types of birds), craws, crows, creepie, (three legged) stool, a child's chair creepin', creeping; crawling, creepit, crept; crawled, crook, hooked iron chain inside a chimney, for hanging cooking pots on cry, call; summon, cud, could, cudna, could not, cunnin', cunning, curriet, curried; dressed, cursit, cursed, cuttit, cut; harvested, cweentry, country, cwite, coat, dacency, decency, dacent, decent, dale, deal; fir- or pinewood plank, dammin', damming; condemning, damps, coal-pit gases, dang, knock; bang; drive, daud, blow; strike; abuse, daudit, buffeted; struck, dauner, stroll; saunter, daur, dare; challenge, daured, dared; challenged, daurin, daring; challenging, daurin', daring; challenging, daurna, dare not; do not dare, daursay, dare say, dawvid, david, dearie, sweetheart; darling, deavt, deafened, dee, do, also die deed, died, also deed; indeed 'deed, indeed, dee'd, died, deein', doing, also dying deen, done, deene, done, dee't, do it, deevil, devil, deevilry, devilry, deevils, devils, defilin', defiling, deid, dead, deif, deaf, deil, devil, deils, devils, deith, death, delicht, delight, dementit, demented; mad; crazy, dene, done, denner, dinner, denner-time, dinner time, denyin', denying, dertin', darting, despisin', despising, deuk-quack, duck quack, deuks, ducks, dictionar', dictionary, didna, did not, differ, difference, also differ din, sound; din, dingin', overcoming; wearying; vexing, dings, overcomes; wearies; vexes, dinna, do not, dinna fling the calf efter the coo, don't give up, also baby/bathwater dirt, worthless persons or things, term of contempt dis, does, disappint, disappoint, discoorse, discourse, disna, does not, dissiples, disciples, dis't, does it, div, do, dod!, god! (exclamation), doggie, little dog, diminutive doin', doing, doobt, suspect; know; doubt, have an unpleasant conviction doobtin', suspecting; knowing, also doubting doobtless, doubtless, doobtna, do not suspect; do not know, also does not doubt doobts, suspects; knows, also doubts dooms, extremely; exceedingly, doon, down, doon', down, door-cheek, door-post; threshold, door-sill, threshold, doos, doves, dos, does, do't, do it, douce, gentle; sensible; sober; prudent, doup, bottom; backside; buttocks, draigon, dragon, reference to revelation - draigons, dragons, dram, glass of whisky, drap, drop; small quantity of, drappit, dropped, drappy, little drop; a little (liquor), diminutive drawin', drawing, drear, dreary; dreariness; tedium, dree, endure; undergo; suffer, dree my weird, undergo my doom, dreemt, dreamed, dreid, dread, dreidfu', dreadful; dreadfully, drinkin', drinking, dronin', droning, drookit, drenched; soaked, droon, drown, droonin', drowning, droont, drowned, drop, drop-shaped earring, also drop drouth, thirst; dryness, also drought drouthie, thirsty; dry, drucken, drunken; tipsy, du, do, duds, clothes; rags; tatters, duin', doing, dulse, type of seaweed, dummie, little mute person, diminutive dune, done, dyke, wall of stone or turf, dykes, walls of stone or turf, ear, early, ear', early, ee, eye, e'e, eye, eedit, heeded, een, eyes, e'en, even; just; simply, also eyes; evening eese, use, efter, after; afterwards, else, otherwise; at another time; already, embrough, edinburgh, en', end, endeevour, endeavour, endeevourin', endeavouring; trying, eneuch, enough, enstance, instance, er, ere; before, er', ere; before, ettle, reach; intend; purpose; aim, even, even; compare, ever, before, also ever ever-mair, ever more, exemple, example, expeckit, expected, fa', fall; befall, failt, failed, faimily, family, fain, eager; anxious; fond, also fondly fa'in', falling, fallow, fellow; chap, fallow-feelin', mutual feeling, fan', found, fan't, found it, fa'ntit, fainted, fardin', farthing, faulds, folds, fause, false, fau't, fault; blame, fauvour, favour, fawvour, favour, feared, afraid; frightened; scared, fearfu', fearful; easily frightened, fearsome, terrifying; fearful; awful, feart, afraid; frightened; scared, feathert, feathered, fecht, fight; struggle, fechtin', fighting; struggling, feck, value; worth; advantage; majority, fee, hire oneself out, feel, foolish, also fool fegs, truly, mild oath; exclamation of surprise fell, very; potent; keen; harsh; sharp, intensifies; also turf fell-dyke, wall made of layers of sod, fellow-cratur, fellow creature, fells, sods, feow, few, fess, fetch, fest, fast, fey, doomed (to death), fillit, filled, fin', find; feel, fin'in', finding; feeling, fin'on haddie, smoked haddock, firin', firing; heating, fit, foot; base, also fit; capable; able fittin', fitting, flax, flax; wick, flee, fly (insect), fleers, floors, fleg, blow; kick; stroke, fleggin', blowing; kicking; stroking, fleggit, blew; kicked; stroked, flegs, blows; kicks; strokes, fleyt, terrified; frightened, fling, kick; throw, fling't, kick it; throw it, flit, shift; remove; depart, flitted, shifted; removed; departed, flittin', shifting; removing; departing, flure, floor, forby, as well; as well as; besides, forgie, forgive, forgiein', forgiving, forgi'en, forgiven, forgifness, forgiveness, forkit, forked, for's, for his, for't, for it, foucht, fought, fowk, folk, fowth, plenty; abundance; full measure, frae, from, frank, generous; lavish, also generously fricht, frighten; scare away, frichtit, frightened; scared away, fule, fool, fules, fools, fulfillt, fulfilled, fundation, foundation, fun't, founded, fut, foot, gae, gave, gaed, went, gaein', going, 'gain, by; nearly; almost, gairdens, gardens, gait, way; fashion, also route; street gaits, ways, also routes; streets ga'le, gable, gane, gone, gang, go; goes; depart; walk, gang yer wa's, go on, gangin', going; walking, gar, cause; make; compel, garred, made; caused; compelled, gars, makes; causes; compels, gar't, made; caused; compelled, gat, got, gauin, going, gauin', going, gear, possessions; money; property, also livestock geese, goose, german ocean, , old reference to the english channel & north sea gerse, grass, gether, gather, gey, very; considerable, geyan, considerably; somewhat; rather, ghaist, ghost, ghem, game (hunted animal), gie, give, gied, gave, giein, giving, giein', giving, gien, if; as if; then; whether, also given gien't, if it, gies, gives, gie't, give it, gin, if; as if; then; whether, girdle, griddle for baking scones, iron disc girnels, granaries; meal-chests, glaid, glad, glaiss, glass, glaisses, glasses, glamour, spell; charm; enchantment, glaur, mud; dirt; ooze, gleg, quick; lively; smart; quick-witted, glimp, glimpse; glance, also the least degree glintin', twinkling; glittering, gloamin', twilight; dusk, gloaming, twilight; dusk, gnerlet, gnarled, goodman, master; husband; head of household, gowans, daisies, gowany, flowered with daisies, gowd, gold, gowk, cuckoo; fool; blockhead, gowkit, foolish; silly, gowks, cuckoos; fools; blockheads, graivelly, gravely, gran', grand; capital; first-rate, gran'est, grandest, gran'father, grandfather, green bree, cesspool, also stagnant pool by a dunghill greitin', crying; weeping, grenite, granite, gret, great, grief, grieve, grip, grasp; understand, grippit, grasped; understood, growin', growing, growlin', growling, grue, feeling of horror; tremor, grum'lin', grumbling, grup, grip; grasp, gruppit, gripped; grabbed, gudeman, master; husband; head of household, guid, good, also god guid-hertit, good-hearted, guidit, treated; handled; managed, guiss, guess, guissin', guessing, haddie, haddock, hadna, had not, hae, have; has, hae a news, talk; gossip, haein, having, haein', having, haena, have not, hae's, have his, hae't, have it, haill, whole, hairm, harm, haith!, faith!, exclamation of surprise haithen, heathen, haithenish, heathenish, haiven, heaven, haiver, talk nonsense, hale, whole, half-hoor, half-hour, hame, home, han', hand, hang, hanged, also made hangin', hanging, hangt, hanged, hanks, rope; coil; skein of cotton, han'le, handle, han's, hands, hantle, much; large quantity; far, hap, cover; wrap; shield, h'ard, heard, hark, listen, harns, brains, hasna, does not have, haud, hold; keep, hauden, held; kept, haudin', holding; keeping, hauds, holds; keeps, haugh, river-meadow, hause, neck; throat, h'aven, heaven, hawpy, happy, haymows, large haystacks, heap, very much; heap, hearin', hearing, hearken, hearken; hear; listen to, hearkenin', hearkening; listening to, hearkent, hearkened; heard; listened to, hear't, hear it, hearten, encourage, hech!, oh! strange!, a sighing exclamation hed, had, hedna, had not, heedna, heed not; do not heed, heicht, height, heid, head; heading, heids, heads; headings, heigh, high, he'll, he will, helpin', helping, helpit, helped, hen-scraich, chicken cackle, lit. chicken scream her, she, also her herd, herd-boy; cow-boy, also herd hermony, harmony, hersel', herself, hert, heart, her't, it to her, hertenin', enheartening; encouraging, hertless, heartless, herts, hearts, herty, heartily; hearty, he'rty, heartily; hearty, hicht, height, hid, had, also hid hield, held, hillie, little hill, diminutive himsel', himself, hin', hind; backside, hin' side afore, back to front, hing, hang, hingin', hanging, hings, hangs, hirplin, limping; hobbling, his, has, also his; us (emphatic) hit, it, emphatic hiz, us, emphatic hoarible, horrible, hoo, how, hoor, hour, hoors, hours, hoose, house, hoosemaid, housemaid, hooses, houses, hoosie, little house, diminutive hoot, exclamation of doubt or contempt hoots, exclamation of doubt or contempt hose, stocking, houff, haunt, houp, hope, how, hollow; valley; glen, hum'le, hornless; fingerless, hun'ers, hundreds, hungerin', hungering; hungry, hunger-like, shrivelled; lacking nutrients, hungert, starved, hurtin', hurting, hurtit, hurt, hyne, far (away), i', in; into, i doobt, i know; i suspect, i wat, i know; i assure (you), idleseat, idleness; frivolous amusement, idleset, idleness; frivolous amusement, ilk, every; each, also common; ordinary ilka, every; each, also common; ordinary ill, bad; evil; hard; harsh, also misfortune; harm 'ill, will, ill-fauredest, most unbecoming or unmannerly, ill-guideship, mismanagement; ill-treatment, ill-guidit, mismanaged; ill-treated, 'im, him, imaigine, imagine, immorawlity, immorality, in atween, in the meantime; between, informt, informed, ingle-neuk, chimney-corner or recess, in's, in his, inten', intend, inten'it, intended, intil, into; in; within, intill, into; in; within, intill't, into it, intil's, into his; into us, intil't, into it, inveet, invite; invitation, inveetit, invited, ir, are, 'is, his, i's awa., i'm off.; i'd better go., ise, i shall, isna, is not, is't, is it, i'stead, instead, ither, other; another; further, 'ithin, within, it'll, it will, itsel', itself, jabble, ripple; small broken waves, jaws, billows; splashes; surges, jeames, james, jeedge, judge, jeedgin', judging, jerooslem, jerusalem, jine, join, jints, joints, jist, just, j'ists, joists, jography, geography, jokin', joking, jooggy, jigger; shot (of whisky), justifeed, justified, kail-wife, woman who sells colewort, kaimbt, combed, keepin', keeping, keepit, kept, keerious, curious, ken, know; be acquainted with; recognise, kenna, do not know, kenned, known; knew, kennin', knowing, kens, knows, kenspeckle, conspicuous, easily recognised from some peculiarity kent, known; knew, ken't, know it, killt, killed, kin', kind; nature; sort; agreeable, also somewhat; in some degree kin'ness, kindness, kirk, church, kirkyaird, churchyard, kirkyard, churchyard, kist, chest; coffer; box; chest of drawers, knicht, knight, koft, bought, kye, cattle; cows, laad, lad; boy, term of commendation or reverence laads, lads; boys, term of commendation or reverence laddie, boy, term of affection laddies, boys, term of affection lads, boys, term of commendation or reverence laidders, ladders, laird, landed proprietor; squire; lord, lairick, larch (type of tree), lairt, stuck fast (in mud or snow), laith, loath; unwilling; reluctant, laithly, loathsome; foul; repulsive, laitin, latin, lan', land; country; ground, lane, lone; alone; lonely; solitary, lanes, lone; alone, lang, long; big; large, also slow; tedious langer, longer, lang's, long as, langsyne, ancient; (old) times; long ago, lan's, lands; estates, lass, girl; young woman, term of address lasses, girls; young women, lassie, girl, term of endearment lat, let; allow, lat gang to dirt an' green bree, go to pot; go to ruin, lat's, let's; let us; let his, latten, let; allowed, lattin', letting; allowing, lauch, laugh, lauchin', laughing, lave, rest; remainder; others, also leave laverock, lark (type of bird), lawfu', lawful, layin', laying, lea', leave, lear, learning; education; lore, also teach learn, learn, also teach learnin', learning, also teaching learnt, learned, also taught leddies, ladies, leddy, boy; lad; laddy, also lady lee, pasture; fallow ground, also shelter from wind or rain lee'd, lied; told lies, lees, lies, leest, least, leeve, live, leevin', living; living being, leevit, lived, leeward, towards the grassland, also towards the sheltered side len', lend; give; grant, also loan len'th, length, leuk, look; watch; appearance, licht, light, lichtin', lighting, lickit, thrashed; punished; struck, lift, load; boost; lift; helping hand, also sky; heavens like, like; likely to; looking as if to, also as it were; as if likesna, does not like, likin', liking, likit, liked, liltin', singing softly; humming, lingelt, fastened; fettered; hobbled, lippen, trust; depend on, livin', living, 'll, will, loch, loch; lake, lodd, loaded, lo'denin', loading, lo'dent, loaded, lo'e, love, lo'esome, loveable; lovely; winsome, lood, loud, lookin', looking, loon, rascal; rogue; ragamuffin, loons, rascals; rogues; ragamuffins, loot, let; allowed; permitted, losh!, corrupt form of 'lord', exclamation of surprise or wonder low, flame, lowin', flaming, lowse, loose; free, lowsed, loosened; let loose; freed, lucifer spunks, lucifer-matches, lug, ear, also shallow wooden dish luggin', lugging, lugs, ears, luik, look, luikin', looking, luikit, looked, luiks, looks, lum, chimney, lyin', lying, lythe, shelter, 'm, him, mainner, manner, mainners, manners, mainteen, maintain, mair, more; greater, mairtins, martins (type of bird), maist, most; almost, 'maist, almost, maister, master; mister, maistly, mostly; almost, maitter, matter, maitters, matters, mak, make; do, mak', make; do, makin', making; doing, maks, makes; does, mankin', mankind, mappies, young rabbits, diminutive maun, must; have to, maunna, must not; may not, mavis, song-thrush (type of bird), mayhap, perhaps; maybe, mayna, may not, mealock, crumb (of oatcake etc.), meanin', meaning, meen, moon, meenute, minute, meeserable, miserable, meesery, misery, meetin', meeting, mem, ma'am; miss; madam, mendit, mended; healed, menseless, ill-bred; boorish; unmannerly, mentionin', mentioning, mercifu', merciful; favourable, merriage, marriage, merry, marry, also merry merryin', marrying, mervel, marvel, mervellous, marvellous, mesel', myself, me't, it to me, micht, might, michtna, might not, michty, mighty; god, midden, dunghill; manure pile, midge, midge; gnat; mosquito, mids, midst; middle, miltin', melting, min', mind; recollection, also recollect; remember mincin', mincing, minnin, minnow, minnister, minister, min's, minds; reminds; recollects, mint, aimed at; intended to; attempted, mintit, minded; remembered, mirricle, miracle, mischeef, mischief; injury; harm, misguidit, wasted; mismanaged; ill-used, mistak, mistake, mither, mother, mony, many, moo, mouth, moo', mouth, moo'fu's, mouthfuls, mornin', morning, mornin's, mornings, motes, motes; specks; crumbs, reference to matthew : - mou'fu', mouthful, moul', mould; loose earth; top soil, mould, mould; loose earth; top soil, muckle, huge; enormous; big; great; much, mune, moon, muntains, mountains, murderin', murdering, muv, move; affect, my certie!, take my word for it!, my certy!, take my word for it!, my lane, on my own, mysel, myself, mysel', myself, na, not; by no means, nae, no; none; not, nae wise, nowise; in no way, naebody, nobody; no one, naegait, in no wise; nowhere, naething, nothing, naither, neither, naitral, natural, nait'ral, natural, nane, none, nat'ral, natural, natur, nature, natur', nature, near han', nearly; almost; near by, nearhan', nearly; almost; near by, necessar', necessary, neebour, neighbour, needcessity, necessity; state of need, needfu', needful; necessary; needy, needna, do not need; need not, neepers, neighbours, negleckit, neglected, neiper, neighbour, neist, next; nearest, nepkin, large handkerchief, nestie, little nest, diminutive 'neth, beneath; under, neuk, nook; recess; interior angle, news, talk; gossip, nicht, night; evening, nichts, nights, nick, score; mark (as signature), also cut nickum, mischievous and tricky boy, niffer, exchange; barter, nigher, nearer; closer, nipperty, mincing; affected, no, not, no', not, noo, now, nor, than; although; if, also nor nor'-easter, northeast wind, notwithstan'in', notwithstanding, noucht, nothing; not, nowt, cattle; oxen, o', of; on, obleeged, obliged, obligatit, obligated; obliged, o'er, over; upon; too, offerin', offering, ohn, without; un-, uses past participle not present progressive ohn expeckit, unexpected, on't, on it, ony, any, onybody, anybody; anyone, onything, anything, oogliest, ugliest, oogly, ugly, ook, week, ooks, weeks, oolets, owls, oonprovidit, unprovided, oor, our, oor lanes, on our own, oors, ours, oorsel's, ourselves, oot, out, ootcast, outcast, or, before; ere; until; by, also or ordinar', ordinary; usual; natural, also custom; habit orra, odd job (man), also idle; having no settled occupation o't, of it, ou, oh, oucht, anything; all, also ought ow, oh, exclamation of surprise ower, over; upon; too, owershot, very fast; racing; exploding, owre, over; upon; too, owse, ox, oye, grandchild; grandson; nephew, pairt, part, pairts, parts, pale, pointed piece of wood for fencing, paling, fence of pales, passin', passing; occasional, pastern, ankle (between hoof and fetlock), pasturs, pastures, pat, put; made, pawkiness, shrewdness; cunning, peelt, skinned, peeramid, pyramid, peetied, pitied, peety, pity, percaution, precaution, perfec', perfect; thorough; utter, perfeckly, perfectly; thoroughly; utterly, perplexin', perplexing, perris, parish, persuaudit, persuaded, perswaud, persuade, perswaudin', persuading, perswaudit, persuaded, pey, pay, peyed, paid, peyin', paying, pit, put; make, pitawtas, potatoes, pits, puts; makes, pitten, put; made, plaguit, plagued; troubled, plet, plate; dish, plooed, ploughed, plottin', plotting; planning, ploy, amusement; sport; escapade, poassible, possible, pooch, pocket, pooer, power, poun', pound (sterling), practeesed, practised, prankit, played tricks on, also played fast and loose with prayin', praying, prayt, prayed, preachin', preaching, preacht, preached, prech, preach, precher, preacher, pree, taste; try; prove; experience, preevileeges, privileges, prentit, printed, press-bed, box-bed with doors, prest, pressed, preten'it, pretended, priestie, little priest, diminutive pris'ner, prisoner, prood, proud, provokin', provoking, pruv, prove, pruv't, proven; proved, pu', pull, puckle, small quantity, puir, poor, pump, beer-shop, also pump putten, put, pyke, pick; pluck, quaiet, quiet, quaiet sough, quiet tongue, quaietest, quietest, quaitet, quieted; silenced, quest'ons, questions, quo', swore; said; quoth, railly, really, raither, rather, rale, real; true; very, randy, rough; wild; riotous, also coarse-tongued; abusive rant, make merry; revel, rase, rose, rave, tore, rax, extend; overdo it; stretch, raxed, extended; overdone it; stretched, reacht, reached, readin', reading, red, rid; free, redd, set in order; tidy; clean, reef, roof, refar, refer, refeese, refuse, reid, red, reik, smoke, releast, released, repentit, repented, reyn, rein, richt, right; correct, also mend richtly, certainly; positively, ridic'lous, ridiculous; unseasonable (weather), riggin', ridge; roof, rigs, ridges (in a ploughed field), rin, run, rinnin', running, rins, runs, rintherroot, gadabout; homeless vagrant; tramp, risin', rising, rist, rest, ristet, rested, rizon, reason, roamin', roaming, roarin', roaring, ro'd, road; course; way, roomie, little room, diminutive roon', around; round, rottan, rat, rouch, rough, roun, whisper, roun', around; round, rovin', roving, rowtin', bellowing; roaring; lowing, rucks, ricks; stacks, run k-nots, slip knots (that can not be untied), runkle, wrinkle; crease, 's, us; his; as; is, also has s', shall, sab, sob, sae, so; as, safe, safely, also safe safity, safety, sair, sore; sorely; sad; hard; very; greatly, also serve sairer, harder; sadder; sorer, saitisfee, satisfy, saiven, seven, sall, shall, san', sand, sang, song, sangie, little song, diminutive sangna, did not sing, sangs, songs, sangy, little song, diminutive sankna, did not sink, sarious, serious, sark, shirt, sattle, settle, sattled, settled, saugh, sallow; willow (type of tree), saven, wise; knowledgeable, savet, saved, savin', saving, also except sawbath, sabbath, sawmon, salmon, sawna, did not see, saw't, saw it, sawtan, satan, saxpence, sixpence, sayin', saying, says't, says it, say't, say it, 'scape, escape, scatter't, scattered, schuil, school, schuilin', schooling; education, schuilmaister, schoolmaster, schuilmaisterin', schoolmastering; teaching, scomfished, suffocated; stifled; choked, scoorin', scampering, scornin', mocking; ridiculing, scotlan', scotland, scrape, scrape; shave, scrattit, scratched; dug, scrimp, stunted; sparing, also short in weight or measure scriptur', scripture, scunner, disgust; disgusting; revolting, scunnerfu', disgusting; loathsome; sickening, seein', seeing, seemile, simile, seemin', seeming, seener, sooner, see't, see it, sen', send, set, set out; start off; become, set doon bony an' set up louy, lowers one; exalts another, psalm : setna, do not set, setterday, saturday, setterdays, saturdays, settin', setting, settisfaction, satisfaction, shaidow, shadow, shal't, shelled, shaw, show; reveal, shee, shoe, sheen, shoes, sherp, sharp, shillin', shilling, shillin's, shillings, shirra, sheriff, shirra', sheriff, shoothers, shoulders, shot, speed; blasting; heavy breakers (sea), also shoot shottin', shooting, shuitable, suitable, sic, such; so, sich, sigh, sicht, sight, sids, husks of oats, siller, silver; money; wealth, simmer, summer, simmerin', simmering, sin, since; ago; since then, also sin; sun sin', since; ago; since then, singin', singing, sitten, sat, sittin', sitting, sizon, season, skirlin', screaming; singing shrilly, sklet, (school) slate, also roofing slate sklet-pike, slate pencil, sma', small; little; slight; narrow; young, smokin', smoking; smouldering, smokin' flax, smouldering wick, reference to matthew : snap, sharp blow; sudden stumble, snawba', snowball, sneck, door-latch; catch (gate), snot, small lump (of soot), soary, sorry, some, somewhat; rather; quite; very, also some somehoo, somehow, soo, ache; throb, soomin', swimming; floating, soon', sound, soopit, swept, soucht, sought, sough, sigh; sound of wind; deep breath, soughie, little sough, diminutive sowens, sour pudding of oats and water, sowl, soul, sowls, souls, spak, spoke, spate, spate; flood, speat, spate; flood, speerin', asking about; enquiring; questioning, speerit, spirit, speerits, spirits, speir, ask about; enquire; question, speirin', asking about; enquiring; questioning, speirs, asks about; enquires; questions, speirt, asked about; enquired; questioned, spen', spend, spendrife, spendthrift, speyk, speak, speykin', speaking, spier, ask about; enquire; question, spune, spoon, spunks, sparks; matches, spurtle, porridge stick, also wooden rod for turning oatcakes stair, stairs, stan, stand, stan', stand; stop, stane, stone; measure of weight, stone = pounds stanes, stones, stan'in, standing, stap, stop; stuff, also step stappit, stopped; stuffed, also stepped steek, shut; close; push, also stitch (as in clothing) stert, start; jump with surprise, sterve, starve, stick, stick; gore; butt with horns, stickin', sticking; goring, stickit, stuck; gored, stippety-stap, short mincing gait, stirks, steers, stockin', stocking, stockins, stockings, stockin's, stockings, stoot, stout; healthy; strong; plucky, strae, straw, straik, streak; stroke; caress, strang, strong, stray, lost; not at home, stude, stood, subjec', subject, subjec's, subjects, sucklin's, sucklings, sud, should, sudna, should not, sune, soon; early, suner, sooner, sune's, soon as, sunest, soonest, supposit, supposed, sutor, shoemaker; cobbler, sweem, swim; float, sweir, swear, sweirin', swearing, swoord, sword, syne, ago; since; then; at that time, also in (good) time 't, it, tae, toe, also the one taeless, toeless, taen, taken; seized, ta'en, taken; seized, tailie, little tail, diminutive tak, take; seize, tak a lug, have a dish, tak tent, look out; pay attention, takin', taking, takna, do not take, taks, takes; seizes, tane, the one, tap, top; tip; head, tarn, mountain lake, tarns, mountain lakes, taucht, taught, tay, tea, tee, 'to ye' i.e. to you, also tea; too; also teetle, title, tellin', telling, tellt, told, tent, attention; care; heed; notice, teuch, tough; hard, teuk, took, than, then, also than thankit, thanked, the day, today, the morn, tomorrow, the morn's, tomorrow is, the nicht, tonight, the noo, just now, thegither, together, themsels, themselves, themsel's, themselves, thereoot, outside; out there; out-of-doors, thestreen, last night, think, feel; experience; expect; wonder, think ye?, do you think so?, thinkin', thinking, this lang time, for a long time, tho', though, thoo, thou; you (god), thoom, thumb, thoosan', thousand, thoosan's, thousands, thouch, though, thoucht, thought, thouchts, thoughts, thrapple, windpipe; neck, thrapples, windpipes; necks, thraw, throw; turn; twist, thraw one's lug, twist one's ear; punish, three-fauld, threefold; three times, threep, argue obstinately, also maintain by dint of assertion threip, argue obstinately, also maintain by dint of assertion thro't, throat, throt-ro'd, throat, i.e. be drunk throts, throats, throu', through, thunner, thunder, tice, entice; coax, 'tice, entice; coax, till, to; till; until; about; at; before, till's, to his; to us, till't, to it, ting-a-ling, sound of a small bell, tint, lost; got lost, tiret, tired, 'tis, it is, tither, the other, tod, fox, toom, empty; unload, toom-heidit, empty headed, toon, town; village, tow, rope; string, tows, ropes; strings, trail, drag forcibly; haul along, trailin', dragging forcibly; hauling along, traivel, travel, trible, trouble, tribled, troubled, tribles, troubles, trifflin', trifling, trim'le, tremble, trimmin', beating; scolding, troth, truth; indeed, also used as an exclamation trouth, truth; indeed, also used as an exclamation trowth, truth; indeed, also used as an exclamation trustit, trusted, tryin', trying, 'ts, its, tuck, beat (drum), tuik, took, tum'ler, tumbler; glass (of whisky), turnin', turning, turnt, turned, twa, two; a few, 'twar, it were, 'twarna, it were not, 'twas, it was, twise, twice, twistet, twisted, tyauve, strive; struggle, tyne, lose; get lost, ugsome, disgusting; frightful; ghastly, umbrell, umbrella, unco, unknown; odd; strange; uncouth, also very great un'er, under, un'erstan', understand, up the stair, upstairs, upliftit, uplifted, upo', upon; on to; at, up-road, road (to heaven), up's, up his, vailue, value, vainity, vanity, verra, very; true; real, v'ice, voice, vreet, write, vroucht, wrought; worked, wa', wall, also way wad, would, wadna, would not, wae, woe; sad; sorrowful, waggin', wagging; nodding, waitin', waiting, waitit, waited, walcome, welcome, walkin', walking, w'alth, wealth; abundance, wan, reached; gained; got, wantin', wanting; lacking; without; in want of, wantit, wanted, war, were, wark, work; labour, warks, works, warl', world; worldly goods, also a large number warl' 's gear, worldly substance, warld, world, warna, were not, warran', warrant; guarantee, warrin', warring, warst, worst, warstle, wrestle, warstlin', wrestling, wa's, walls, also ways washen, washed, washin', washing, wasna, was not, was't, was it, wasterfu', wasteful; extravagant, water-brose, oatmeal stirred into boiling, water until thick wather, weather, watter, water, watters, waters, waur, worse, also spend money wee, small; little; bit, also short time; while weel, well; fine, weel-behaved, well-behaved, weel's, well as, weet, wet; dew; rain, weetin', wetting; getting wet, weicht, weight, weir, wear, also hedge; fence; enclosure weird, doom; disaster, weirs, wears, weyve, weave; knit, weyver, weaver; knitter, also knitter of stockings; spider wha, who, whae'er, whoever, wha'll, who will, whan, when, wharfor, what for; why; for what reason, wha's, who is, also whose what ca' they ye?, what is your name?, what for no?, why not?, what for?, why?, whaten, (on; by) what; what kind of, what-for, why; reason, also punishment; retribution whaul, whale, whaur, where, whause, whose, wheel, eddy; pool; deep still part of the river, wheen, little; few; number; quantity, whiles, sometimes; at times; now and then, whilk, which, whisht!, quiet! silence! hush!, whiskin', whisking, whumled, whelmed; overwhelmed; upset, whup, whip, whups, whipping, whusky, whisky, whustle, whistle, wi', with, wice-like, seem wise, wicket, back-door of a barn, wickit, wicked, wifie, little woman, term of endearment willin', willing, willin'est, willingest, win, reach; gain; get, win', wind, win'le strae, straw or grass dried on its root, weak; unhealthy winna, will not, wins, reaches; gains; gets, winsome, large; comely, wi'oot, without, wires, knitting needles, wis, was, wi't, with it, wither, weather, won'er, wonder; marvel, won'erfu', wonderful; great; large, won'erin', wondering, workin', working, worryin', worrying, worset, woollen fabric; wool; worsted, worum, worm, wrang, wrong; injured, writch, rich, wuddie, gallows, also willow wuds, woods; forests, wull, will; wish; desire, also astray; stray; wild wullin', willing; wanting, wulls, wills; wishes; desires, wuman, woman, wunna, would not; will not, wur, lay out, wuss, wish, wussed, wished, wut, wit; intelligence; sense, wuts, wits; senses, w'y, way, wydin', wading, w'ys, ways, wyte, blame; reproach, yaird, yard, yairds, yards, ye, you; yourself, year, years, also year ye'll, you will, yer, your, yer lane, on your own, yerd, yard; garden, ye're, you are, yersel, yourself, yersel', yourself, ye't, it to you, yett, gate, yeuks, itches, ye've, you have, yewky, itchy, yon, that; those; that there, yon'er, yonder; over there; in that place, yon'll, that will; that (thing) there will, yon's, that is; that (thing) there is, yoong, young, highland ballad approximately , words (historical fiction) copyright by christopher leadem, all rights reserved. isbn: - - - aragorn books www.aragornbooks.com highland ballad for natasha part one: a lingering flame one the red sun rose slowly, achingly across the high scottish moor, touching with melancholy gold the patching hoar frost and purple heath. for this was a land of pain, and stark beauty, and restless dream. here the spirits of the dead walked by night through grim castles of shadow and dust, their glory long past. here the spirits of the living grieved by day for a proud and chivalrous time forever lost. for now the english ruled the land. the battle of culloden was three years lost and bonnie prince charles, the drunken fool in whom they had placed such hope, was living in exile in france. for what then had the pride of highland manhood shed their blood, leaving behind them the heart-broken wives, aging fathers, and uncomprehending child sisters? was it to see the lord purceville establish his thieving court at the ancestral home of the macphersons? was it to pay hard tribute in grain and goods which could not be spared, to an empire already bloated and corrupt? none felt the pangs of lost promise more deeply than young mary scott, aged sixteen years, with a future as uncertain as the fretting october wind. her father had died before she could say his name, leaving their estate in the keeping of guardians until michael came of age. now it was completely lost, their legacy ruined. now she lived with her mother and aging aunt in the fading cottage that had once belonged to the chief steward, all that remained of the family property. it was neither beautiful nor poetic; but it was warm, and for the time at least, safe from the hungry eyes of soldiers. the dangers to a young girl in an occupied land need hardly be detailed. and there were other dangers as well. on this morning, as on many others, she walked slowly down the narrow, winding path to the gravesite of her clan. bordered by scrub oak and maple, alone in its silent dell, it was a place removed from time, hallowed, and to her, sacred. for here, among the stones of four hundred years of stuart knights, lay the body of her beloved, her soul. her brother. brushing back a long lock of raven hair, she stepped furtively towards the mound of earth that was like an iron door between them. michael james scott --- he died a man's death, fighting for his home. the words on the small tombstone had always seemed to her a blasphemy, the hurried cutters finding it more important to speak of patriotism than to give the date of his birth. these trite, inadequate words were all that future generations would ever know of him. they could never see him as he had been in life---the shock of curling, golden hair, the fierce and penetrating sapphire eyes. he had been strong and stubborn like all his blood, but with a sudden tenderness that had long ago stolen her heart. her friend, brother and father. and in the most secret depths of her heart, her lover as well. one image of him remained indelibly carved in her memory. he stood silhouetted against the open door of the shepherd's hut, in which they had taken shelter from a sudden, violent downpour. the play of lightnings beyond flashed his tall, muscular form into brilliant lines out of the grey. he stood defiant, legs spread, crying out to the storm that lashed him. aye! it'll take more than that to kill a scott! and he had laughed his fearless laugh. "michael don't, i'm scared," she said aloud. and he closed and barred the door, and came to her with the gentle smile which he gave to her alone..... she fell to her knees on the cold ground, unable to stop the flow of bitter and blessed memories. she wrapped the shawl tighter, remembering, feeling as deeply and surely as if it were not a thing of the past, but happening now, this moment: he came to her, and put his cloak about her. then feeling her shiver in his arms, changed his mind. "no. we'll have to get you out of your wet things. i'm an ugly brute, but you'll catch your death." he built a warming blaze in the fireplace, then took the heavy woolen blanket from the bed and brought it to her. "come on now. no time for being shy; i'll turn away." and he carefully tended the fire as she shed her dripping garments, and wrapped herself in the blanket. perhaps an hour later he lay sprawled on his back, stripped to the waist on the broad, solid bed. she stood watching him, his dried riding cloak about her. her own clothes were nearly dry, and the rain was less; yet for reasons she did not understand, her one desire was to remain with him there, as they were, forever. he stretched his arms behind him and let out a yawn, and looked at her with laughing, sleepy eyes. "i'm all done in, my little mary, riding and running about with you after the long day's work. better let me have a bit of sleep, then we'll take ourselves home. wake me in a bit, won't you?" and he rolled over on his side, leaving her flushed and agitated, not understanding the feelings that stirred inside her. the early night was hushed, her brother lay long and beautiful in the firelight, and she was thirteen years old. after a short time that seemed like an eternity, during which she never once took her eyes from him, she heard the soft, steady breathing of his slumber. all her love and confused desire suddenly took hold of her. she loosed the cloak about her bare shoulders, and came closer. quietly, timidly, her heart pounding, she lay down next to him, drawing the broad cloak about them both. she rested her face against his arm, while her hand mysteriously sought out the scraggly down of his chest. he stirred. "what's all this?" he whispered dreamily. "you're not still afraid?" "no ," she nearly shouted. "it's not that at all." and then, as if afraid the moment was lost, she drew in her arms and snuggled closer to him still. "you're not shamed for me, are you, michael? i've done nothing wrong." "ah, hush girl. you love your michael and he loves you. where's the sin?" and his strong arm enveloped her back, as he gently kissed her forehead..... oh, to feel his arms around her, his skin against hers! she sobbed aloud at the thought of it, and flung herself to the ground. how gladly she would have died, then as now, to be with him forever. but still her life went on, still the feelings and images would not stop: they lay quiet for a time, her breasts touching his, their faces so close, breath intermingling. then all at once, with a voice hardly her own, she said the words that had sealed her fate. "kiss me, michael. if you don't kiss me i swear i'll die." and though she could not see them, she felt the laughter of his eyes. but he did as she asked, slowly bringing his lips to hers. they touched, ever so gently. then with a sudden passion which surprised them both, he gave a deep, despairing sigh and crushed her to him, his hungry mouth devouring hers. "my mary," he said. "my beautiful mary." then just as suddenly he broke away and stood up from the bed. he began to pace back and forth, cursing himself, so afraid he had in some way wounded her. she lay still, feeling the loss of his flesh like the loss of a limb. and two months later. . .he was no more. she found herself hopelessly, hatefully back in the present. alone. convulsive sobs shook her as she lay across the mound of uncaring earth. her tears wet the rough grass beneath her, flowing like blood from a mortal wound. one word, one thought only existed in the whole of her being. "michael!" a fresh burst of wind whistled through the heath and fretted the fallen leaves around her, carrying with it, or so it seemed, a faint strain of bagpipes. she turned her face to listen. was it possible: that soul-stirring sound, so terrible in battle that the english had since outlawed it? was it there, or was she truly mad? she strained all her senses..... no. the sound was gone. she buried her face and wept once more, defeated. again a breeze stirred, this time more gentle, this time much nearer. she felt a large hand caress the crown of her head, and brush the side of her face as she turned again, bewildered. half blind with tears she saw the wavering outline of a man, and heard a voice whisper, "my mary." she knew no more. two she was found there by her aunt, pale and shivering. and as consciousness and memory returned to her, a light of wild hope and fear widened the deep emerald of her eyes. "aunt margaret, i saw him! he called me by name, i swear it!" but whether because the wisdom of age had taught her the wishful fancies of the young, or for some other reason, the hale, grey-haired woman elucidated no surprise. she helped the frightened girl to her feet, and without a word, started her on the path to home. but once mary had gone the old woman turned, and made her way back to the grave. reaching inside a goat-skin pouch that hung from her side she produced something cold and pale, and kneeling, laid it upon the heart of the mound. then rose and looked about her with a narrowing eye. clasping a withered hand about the amulet that hung from her neck she set off, leaving the bit of melancholy white behind. a human finger. the amulet about her neck was a raven's foot, clutching in frozen death a dark opal. many hours later the old woman had still not returned to the cottage. mary sat with her elbows upon the sill of the loft window, the rage of thoughts and questions inside her gradually slowing to the one emotion possible in one who had seen and known such endless disappointment: disbelief. but try as she might to resolve herself to it, to accept that it had not happened, still the phantom touch lingered inside her, denying all peace. "my mary." how differently the voice had said those words, than on the day of her brother's passion! and yet how similar, how full of the same love and care. and the only thought that would take solid hold in her mind was that the two feelings, gentle love and hard desire, were one in a man, inseparable, and that even as a child she had inspired both in him. my mary. mine. she wanted to fall on her knees then and there, and pray to be taken to him, in death or in life. but the sound of her mother's voice stayed her, rising angrily from below. "mary! what are you about? come down here at once." obediently, though without affection she submitted, descending the wooden ladder-stair from the loft that served as her bedroom. her mother's face and whole bearing spoke of the cold composure, the loveless discipline which always followed such an outburst. it was an expression she had come to know all too well. wherein lay the mystery of this woman? she did not know, only that there was no commiseration, no sense of shared loss between them, and that she was hardly what the younger woman imagined a mother should be. but on this day there was especial agitation among her classic, though faded scot features---round, sturdy face and steady, full blue eyes---and a greater visible effort to control herself. of late this usually meant that she had quarreled with margaret. and these arguments, mary knew, somehow centered on herself. "where is she?" the mother burst all at once. like michael she often kept her deepest feelings under lock and key, revealing to the world only a lesser parody of herself. but now something had happened--- "go and find her!" she cried, at long last giving in. "and if she has gone to that witch's hole of hers, then. . .tell her she may just as well stay there, and the devil take her! i've had enough of it, do you hear? let them burn her at the stake; i'll not have her bring shame upon this house. it's all the same to me!" and she ran to the armchair by the fireplace, hiding her face in her hands. the daughter followed, more confused and forlorn than ever. she loved her aunt, though she also feared her, and could not understand the vindictive nature of the words spoken against her. "mother, what are you saying? what are you thinking of?" the hands came down to reveal a tired, careworn face no longer able to think of pity. "so, you never knew she was a witch? how blind a woman can be, when she wants to. why, you don't even know, still haven't guessed---" she faltered, then cried out. "dear god, i cannot bear this cross any longer! you have taken my husband, my beloved son, and left me with his temptress." then turning to mary. "go to her! get out, i tell you! she will tell you everything, everything now. make your home with her if you like. leave me to my wretched memories." and physical sorrow bent her nearly double in the chair. the girl took a step to console her, but the hateful, flashing eyes turned on her erased any such notion. she hesitated, then ran to the door in dismay, and out into the bracing, october wild. it seemed the last vestiges of solace and sanctuary were crumbling around her, leaving a world too terrible, too full of dark meaning to endure. she ran. but her steps were not blind. instinctively she stayed on the western side of the rise, which hid her from sight of the road. and though she had rarely seen it, the back of her mind knew where her aunt's strange and secret abode lay: beyond the ravine, in land too wild and rocky to grow or graze. it was growing dark when she finally reached the high pass in which it lay, and in place of the wind a cold stillness reigned. the rocky culvert did not benefit from the failing light. it was a harsh and cheerless place, all thorn and sloe, with here and there a gnarled, leafless tree. the faraway cry of a wolf froze her to the marrow: she was alone, and could not find what she sought. why had she come in such haste, without horse or cloak? her body ached and the sense of youthful despair, never far from her, returned with the added force of cold, helpless exposure. an owl swooped, and half fearfully she followed the line of its flight. as it rose again against the near horizon, she saw there at the meeting of stone and sky a trail of black smoke, barely distinguishable in the darkening gloom. she followed it downward. and there, half buried in the hard earth which bounded it on three sides, she saw her aunt's sometime residence, the `witch's hole' as her mother had called it. and though she loved her aunt, and had nowhere else to go, she could not help feeling a moment of doubt. a wedge of stone wall---one door, one window---was all the face it showed, the short chimney rising further to the sunken right. it was in fact a hole, dug and lined with stone perhaps a thousand years before by some wandering pict, with a living roof of roots and turf. her aunt had merely dug it out again and repaired the chimney. the window and door, framed in ready openings, were new, along with stout ceiling beams. nothing more. it was a place that perhaps ten people knew of, and nine avoided. she stood unresolved, chafing the arms of her dress, unable to keep warm. but at that moment a solitary figure came up the path towards her, and she recognized the shawl and bound hair of her aunt, stooped beneath a large bundle of sticks. "inside with you, lass," said the woman evenly, again not evincing the least surprise. "you'll catch your death." "let me help you with your load," the girl offered. "i can quite carry my own burden, mary. just open the door for me; i'll walk through it." mary did as she asked. they went inside. the single room was dark and low-ceilinged, with no light but the hearth fire, which played strange shadows across the rough stones and wooden bracings. herbs, tools and utensils, bizarre talismans hung from the walls. the floor was of solid earth. a wooden table and chair, two frameless beds, an ancient rocking chair---there were no other furnishings. "sit by the fire, child, and wrap a blanket around you. i'll have the tea....." but studying her face more closely, the old woman put a hand to her forehead, and could not entirely suppress a look of concern. "into bed with you, mary, you're burning with fever." and she quickly arranged warm coverings for the thin, down mattress, which lay on a jutting shelf of stone covered with straw, and threw more wood on the fire. soon the room was warm, and in its primitive way, quite comfortable. mary lay in the bed, her shivering stopped, and the herb tea that her aunt had given her calming her nerves. but still there were the questions that would not rest. "aunt margaret," she began pensively, eyes glittering. "you quarreled with mother, and now she can bear her cross no longer, and she says you must tell me everything." though the sentence was hardly coherent, the old woman nodded her understanding. she came and sat on the bed, taking the young girl's hand in her own. "i'll tell you this much now, and then you must sleep. there'll be worlds of time in the morning. will you promise me you'll sleep, and trust me till the sunrise?" the daughter nodded. "she's not your mother, mary. i am." three that night, her subconscious stirred by fever, and by the maelstrom of unsettling events, mary dreamed more deeply and vividly than she had since childhood. the fire burned brightly before her as the old woman, ever mindful, rocked slowly back and forth, beside her. she stood atop a high hill, looking down into a broad expanse of green valley. to the left she heard the stirring sound of bagpipes, to the right, the ominous drums and steady tramp of the english. two armies advanced upon each other, making for some indefinable object in the center of the field, which for some reason both sides wanted. to the left the plaid kilts and mixed uniforms of the highlanders, to the right a rigid, regimented sea of red. she watched them draw together with the uncomprehending horror that every woman feels for war, unmoved by words of glory and patriotism, understanding only that men, men dear to herself and others, are about to die. it seemed that the scots would reach the object first, being the swifter and on their own ground; but suddenly they stopped. at their head she saw two men on horseback: a rugged, wizened general, and a handsome young prince with long plumes in his hat, seated on a brilliant white charger. the general was arguing and gesticulating sharply that they must advance and attack. but the prince, with an air of supreme confidence and divine understanding, only made a sign of the cross and remained where he was, content. the british halted and formed ranks, expecting a charge. but not receiving it, and perceiving their opponent's hesitation, they quickly brought their artillery to the fore. unlimbering the cannon, they loaded and took aim, and began to shower the unmoving highlanders with grapeshot and thundering shells. the young girl gasped in terror, and shouted for them to fight back, or run away. the general waved his arms more violently than before. but still the prince gave no order, and only looked about him as if puzzled, unable to fathom what was happening to his men. and at length the english charged, mowing down the decimated scottish lines like so much rye after a hailstorm. while the prince slipped away with his escort. but all of this, gruesome and sinister as it was. . .this was not what froze her heart. in a smaller scene that somehow stood out sharp and clear, two red-coated foot soldiers were dragging by the arms a tall scot with a bloodied shock of golden hair. he was dazed and plainly wounded, but still they pulled at him fiercely, as if to throw him to the ground and run him through. they carried him out of sight, into a copse of death-black trees. "michael!" she cried frantically, trying to follow. but her legs would not move, and she sank slowly into quicksand, her skirts billowing..... then the dream shifted and she was back at the grave, lying in the rough grass. again she felt the gentle touch on her hair and startled cheek, again the reassuring voice: "my mary." and then. . .was it real or imagined? "i'll come back for you." from the bottom of a well. "i've come back for you." farther, and fainter, then suddenly sharp and near. "my mary. mary....." "mary!" "mary, wake up. you've put yourself in a frenzy." and her guardian steadily, though not without emotion, replaced the thrown and disheveled blankets. "you've got to keep yourself---" "i. . .i saw him again," she stammered. "he called to me. he said he'd come back for me." she tried to rise. "i've got to go to him, i've got to find him!" "no." for the first time her mother (the claim was true) spoke forbiddingly, taking her by the shoulders and forcing her back down. "he's dead and in the grave, and that's where he's going to stay. and unless you want to join him there---" "but i do!" cried the girl. "i do. why doesn't anyone understand?" and she turned away and fell to weeping. her mother was silent. perhaps an hour later the girl was asleep again, or appeared to be. troubled, her mother rose and went to an ancient chest that lay hidden beneath a musty stretch of carpet, in a niche carved out of the cold ground beneath. kneeling over it, she unfastened the broad belt that secured the lid, which she lifted and leaned carefully back against the wall. then with a quick glance at her daughter, she reached inside and lifted out from among its shadowy contents a withered branch of hemlock. moving to the fire, which glowed and hissed sullenly at her approach, she thrust its head into the flames, holding the root in a stubborn fist. quietly and solemnly, she chanted some words in a language that her daughter could not understand, and at length the dead leaves and smoking stalk caught solid fire. standing once more, she drew a slow circle with it in the center of the room, then went to the door. as soon as she opened it a cold wind pushed past and blew out the trembling torch, but this seemed no more than she expected. stepping outside and closing the door behind her, the witch took a few paces forward, turned again to face the hut. she waved the branch in strange patterns, moving from side to side and repeating the same chant, so that the smoke which still seethed from it drew wisping traces about the door, the window, the whole of the house. then turned again, and cast it to the ground before her. she opened her eyes wide, oblivious to the stinging smoke, and whispered harshly. "you leave us be!" she went inside. four as if a troubled thought that had slowly worked its way through her second sleep, with the first light of dawn mary sat bolt upright in the bed, and said aloud. "he's not my brother." the old woman, who had apparently not slept at all, turned to her from her place by the fire, now lowered to glowering coals for cooking. she thought to reply harshly, then checked herself. like a skilled surgeon or a patient general (or a bitter woman gnawed by hate), she knew that the matter of her daughter's lost love must be handled with extreme care. "not your brother. your cousin." "then---" the realization scalded her. "we could have married! there was no sin, no shame in what i felt for him." again, though it ran counter to all her designs for the girl, the old woman knew this was not the time to speak against the hopeless romance that she still carried like a torch in the night. and also (the darkness had not yet swallowed her completely), she felt that her daughter deserved this much. "there was no sin. naivety perhaps." with this her daughter broke into wretched tears, and it was some time before the woman could calm her enough to speak. she moved to sit beside her on the bed; and so helpless and forlorn did mary then appear, that for a moment her mother forgot all else and slowly brought to her breast the face that had suckled there so long ago. "what is it child?" she said gently, stroking the soft hair that had once been her own. "what is it hurting you so?" "all this time..... i thought it was because..... after he was killed, i went to my confessor. i told him everything, and he said---" there was no need for her to finish. too well did the other understand the vindictive nature of men. "he said that michael was taken because you had committed incest: that it was god's punishment for a grievous sin, and that it's your fault he died." the pitiful nod and freshened weeping told her she was right. "nay, lass. it was not the hand of god that killed him, and many other good men besides. it is not the creator who so brutalizes lives and emotions. it is men. " and with this all her maternal softness faded, as her eyes stared hard and dry into some galling distance of thought and memory. her arms fell away from her daughter's shoulders, and she unconsciously ground her teeth. mary, who had seen none of this, raised her head and wiped the tears from her eyes, feeling something like a pang of conscience. "i'm sorry. . . mother." she could not help blushing at the word. "i've been selfish, thinking only of my own sorrow. won't you tell me something of yourself? it must have been hard for you, surely." the woman's gaze returned. "ah, life is hard, girl. someday i'll speak of the roads that brought me here, but not now." she rose as if to say no more, then turned to the girl, so young, with the only words of comfort she could find. but at that they were not gentle, were not the words of hope. "you must learn from the trees, mary. a lightning bolt, a cruel axe, cleaves a trunk nearly to the root, and the oak writhes in agony. but it does not die. it continues. and though the hard and knotted scars of healing are not pleasant to look upon, they are stronger, many times stronger, than the virgin wood. you must learn from the trees," she repeated. "it is among their boughs and earthward tracings that the true gods are found." "you're not a christian, then?" this simple non-belief seemed to her incomprehensible. "nay, mary, i'm not. the gentle jesus may comfort the meek, but he is of little use when it comes to vengeance." the woman stopped, knowing she had said more than she intended. but perhaps this much of the truth was for the best. she would have to know soon enough, anyway. "there are other powers, closer to hand, that give the strong a reason to go on living." the younger woman studied her in silence, and all the awe and fear of her that she had felt since childhood returned. she remembered the chant, the flaming branch. and now the callous determination..... toward what end? she recalled the words that had seemed so innocent the day before: just open the door for me; i'll walk through it. but what door was she to open? what vengeance? but first there was one more question, which rose in sudden fullness before her. "my god. margaret. who was my father?" "the lord purceville, though it was not willingly i took him to my bed." there was no need to say more. her mother went back to the hearth, and after a cheerless meal, told her to remain in bed until the fever broke. then went out on some errand of her own. five mary remained in the bed as she was told until, between her natural vigor and childlike curiosity, she began to feel better, and then, quite restless. putting more wood on the fire and dressing warmly (she was not incautious), she began to look around her for something to do, or perhaps, something to read. it was impossible yet to think through all that had happened in just these twenty-four hours, or to know what she must do in answer. she felt like a shipwrecked swimmer, far from shore on a dark night: that the water around her was much too deep, that she must rest, and wait for some beacon to lead her again to solid ground. but for all this, she could not help feeling drawn to the ancient chest from which her mother had taken the hemlock. she told herself to forget it, but could not. that her mother practiced in the black arts was apparent; and a vague feeling that perhaps through witchcraft she might reach the troubled spirit of her beloved, drove her in the end to hard courage, overriding all other considerations. she went to the window and peered out, then moved to the door. stepping beyond it furtively, like a young rabbit outside the den, she looked about her. the sun hung motionless almost exactly at the noon, and the chill of night had passed. there was no sign of her mother, nor any other creature save a solitary hawk, which soared watchful high above. she went inside again and rolled back the corner of the carpet, as in quick glances she had seen her mother do. the chest lay beneath. the thick belt was easily undone, and there was no other lock or latch. it occurred to her briefly that this was what the old woman wanted, and at the same time that she would be furious, and fly into a terrible rage. but this did not matter. nothing mattered except that michael had come to her, and touched her, and called out to her in living dream. she lifted the wide lid, and set it back against the wall. somewhere outside a raven spoke, and a sudden blast of wind shook the door. she started, and whirled about, but did not waver in her resolve. inside the trunk were many grim and grotesque articles which appalled her, and which she would not touch. but to the extreme left, pushed together with their bindings upward, were four large manuscript books, bound in leather. her eyes, and seeking spirit, were drawn to these. they were alike untitled and unadorned, yet to one she was unmistakably drawn. her hand moved toward it almost without conscious thought: the smallest, burnished black. it was thinner than the others as well. and so, growing wary of the witch's return, she lifted it quickly and moved to the bed. there she slid it beneath her mattress, then returned to the chest, which she closed and bound as before. she had only just rolled back the carpet when she heard, muffled but distinct, the cry of the hawk high above. and she knew, somehow she knew, that her mother was coming back up the path. she undressed again quickly, down to the slip, and was careful to set the dress back on the chair as it had lain before. climbing back into the bed she was acutely aware of two sensations: the lump at the small of her back made by the book, and the pounding of her heart. the door-latch was lifted, the hinges creaked, and her mother stepped into the room. she looked exhausted and grim, and seemed to take no notice as her daughter sat up in the bed and addressed her. "i'm feeling much better," she said, trying to sound bright and happy. she could not quite pull it off, but thankfully, the old woman's mind was elsewhere. "it is done," she mumbled in reply, as much to herself as to the girl. laying her things absently on the table, she pulled loose the comb which bound the iron-grey locks behind her head, and shook them free about her shoulders. at this simple act mary drew a startled breath, and it was all she could do to suppress a gasp of fright. for here, truly, was the classic apparition of a witch: the ragged, wind-blown dress and shawl, the long, wild hair and intent, burning eyes. this, the woman noticed. "not much to look at, am i?" at first she glared as she said this, then turned away, remembering to whom she spoke. "there was a time, mary, and perhaps not so long ago as you might imagine, when men said i was still quite fair. but time. . .and poison. . .have done their work." she grew silent, and bitter, once more. but something inside the girl urged her now to draw the woman out, not leave her alone in this darkness. she got down from the bed and stepped timidly towards her. placing one hand on her shoulder, with the other she lifted a stray lock of her mother's hair and tucked it gently behind her ear. the witch pulled forward and away, but mary persisted. she came close again, and this time put her arms around her full, and kissed her lightly on the temple. "mother," she said, the word arresting the other's anger. "won't you tell me how it was for you, all these years, and what you're feeling now?" "what does it matter, girl? the wine is drawn and must be drunk." but ominous as these words sounded, her daughter brushed them aside. because now, her eyes clouding with tears, she understood what was taking place in her own heart: an orphan's awkward and tremulous love for her true parent. "but it does matter," she insisted, "to you. and to me." their eyes met. for a moment mary thought the woman would weep, and embrace her, and all would be well. but the aged eyes knew no more tears. she turned away. "all right, mary, i'll tell you, though i've little doubt you will stop me halfway. but just now i'm exhausted. if you really want to help me, put on the kettle for tea, and bring me a rye cake. the weather is turning," she went on, rubbing her arthritic shoulder. "we'll have no visitors tonight, at least. there'll be hours of time for talk." "promise me, then. tonight you'll open your heart?" her mother gave a queer sort of laugh. "what little is left of it. yes, yes, child, i promise. now bring me the tea and give me a moment's peace." mary did as she asked. six that same afternoon a single rider approached the steward's cottage, in which now only michael's mother remained. hearing hoofbeats, she went quickly to the window and pulled back the heavy curtains. though this woman had little left to lose, she was concerned almost in spite of herself for the safety of her niece. and in her darkened frame of mind, she could not help but fear the worst. a british officer, seated on a majestic bay stallion, slowed his horse to a loose trot and drew rein just beyond the porch. this in itself did not seem such a threat. it could mean anything: some kind of summons, a requisition for cavalry horses and supplies (which they did not have), or simply a saddle-weary officer wanting a drink to soothe his parched throat. but when she opened the door at his ringing, impatient knock, she took a step back in astonishment, and it was only with difficulty that she preserved a veneer of resignation and indifference. she saw before her mary's face. it was broader, and infinitely masculine---framed in strong and curling black hair, the green eyes fierce beneath scowling brows. but it was the same green, the hair the same shimmering black. identical too was the fair, unmarked complexion, the smooth and finely chiseled nose and chin. something in the shape was dissimilar, yet still..... she could not at first read the riddle, until with an arrogance that could never have come from her niece, he threw back the door and advanced upon her, driving her back into the passage. "so, my good widow scott. you recognize the son of your esteemed overlord, and perhaps were expecting him as well?" "no, truly sir. i don't know what you mean." it was not necessary to feign surprise. she could not imagine what the son of the lord purceville could want of her. "i don't have time for games!" he shouted, pushing past her and searching the adjacent rooms before returning to stand before her. "and what of that hag sister of yours. . .and your daughter?" at these words he perceived genuine alarm in the face of the other. and alarmed she truly was. for since the day of that terrible battle, which had occurred but a few days' ride from the cottage, the two women had done everything possible to hide their adolescent charge, whose beauty and innocence made her a natural target for marauding troops. "i have no daughter, sir, you are mistaken. no one lives here but myself and my aged sister-in-law. if you would be so kind---" the back of his hand crashed across her face, starting a trickle of blood at the corner of her mouth. he raised the hand again threateningly, then for some reason, smiled. "you're not too old, you know. i might have a bit of sport on you myself." but remembering his purpose, he grew cold and severe again. "pray do not think me an idiot. we too have spies, loyal folk among the hills. i spoke to one such gentleman scarcely an hour ago..... but that would be telling. you have a daughter, mrs. scott: mary by name, a charming creature by all accounts. if you wish her to remain so, you had best tell me what i want to know." "please, sir, i beg you. just tell me what it is you want. i'll give you anything i have, but please, spare the girl. she's a poor, helpless creature, alone but for the two of us. we've done nothing wrong, i swear it." "well," he replied more calmly. "at least you have a bit of sense." but if she had meant to turn aside his interest in the girl by calling her helpless, and alone in the world, her understanding of men (at least that kind of man) had failed her badly. he began to pace eagerly, his hands behind his back, speaking with the aggressive assurance of one accustomed to having his own way. and for all her fear and agitation, she could not help but notice that he was also terribly handsome. "this is what i want from you, for now. a small group of war prisoners (in truth it was closer to a hundred) have escaped from the hold at edinburgh, the last, effectively speaking, of your would-be prince's highland rabble. our information is that they have since split up into smaller bands, each heading for their respective homeland. there, no doubt, they will attempt to stir sympathy for your deluded cause. "fools!" he continued, as if possessed of the truths of the universe. "scotland's day is done. henceforth her destiny shall be irrevocably tied to that of england. we are trying to be magnanimous, and make reforms. but we will not tolerate, we will crush utterly, any attempt at further rebellion." "magnanimous?" she mocked, her pride returning. "is that why you struck me? is that why you threaten three lonely, bereft women, who have already lost to you all that they loved and held dear?" "i did what i had to do!" he cried hotly. "and will do more besides, if you don't hold your tongue. these traitors will be found, and punished---drawn and quartered, or hanged from the nearest tree. and anyone who aids them, or does not send word of them to me at once, will receive much the same. though in the case of three lonely, bereft women, the punishment might be slower, more amusing." again she was driven to fearful silence. she hoped that this would be the end of it, but apparently he had not yet received what he came for, a motive, perhaps, not entirely official. "and now, good widow scott, i would very much like you to tell me where i might catch a glimpse of your charming daughter. oh, do stop the theatrics," he said irritably, as she clasped her hands to her bosom and made as if to fall on her knees before him. "if i wanted the services of a whore i have the whole countryside to choose from. it is just that your daughter. . . interests me. for unless i am much mistaken, i have seen her once before." "i must beg you this last time," she pleaded. "ask of me anything but this. take me if you like, kill me if you must; but i cannot---" he had raised his pistol to arm's length as she spoke, and now fired it with a crack at a portrait of the child mary that hung in the adjacent room. the ball found its mark at her throat, leaving a dark hole through the canvas of the shadow behind, and the frightened woman turned paler still. she tried to speak but he cut her short, his voice low and menacing. "i swear to you, my highland whore, you will tell me where she is to be found. because if you don't, this very moment, i will find her myself, and with this same pistol put a hole in the real mary scott, and leave her to die in the dirt!" "my sister has a second home," she stammered, hardly knowing how she found the words. "on kilkenny ridge, beyond the ravine. a small path winds up to it from the standing stone, one branch left, then two to the right. we quarreled, and the girl has gone off to live with her. it is the whole truth, i swear it. god have mercy on us!" "i believe you speak the truth at that," he said coolly. and reaching inside his unbuttoned officer's coat, he drew out a felt purse. loosing the strand with his fingers, he reached inside and removed several gold coins, which he placed gently on a table beside her. "thank you, mrs. scott. i will take that as permission to pay court upon your daughter. i fancy i may even marry her, if she is the girl i'm thinking of. good day to you." he stepped past her, out through the open door, and remounted his beautiful bay. seven towards evening the weather did in fact turn foul, with heavy clouds blowing in from the sea. laden with rain, and stirred to inner violence by the turbulent upland airs, they discharged their burden with a vengeance among deep cracks of thunder. bolts of white fire stabbed the earth as the deluge broke, turning good roads to bad, and bad to treacherous and impassible quagmire. so forbidding had the mountain paths become that even the young lord purceville, the most stubborn and heedless of men, was forced to turn back and seek shelter, postponing, for one day at least, his desired meeting with young mary scott, of whom he had heard such glowing reports. so deeply, in fact, had the old man's words affected him, that he fancied (though this was unlikely) he truly had seen her once before, gathering wildflowers on a green hillside in spring. and whether of human or otherworldly origins, the spell, to which he was particularly susceptible, had done its work on him. he wanted her. * * * the man staggered wearily down the high embankment, until he came to the final, near-vertical stretch of cliff. the cold rain lashed him; the need to reach shelter and the warmth of a fire had become all consuming. he had not eaten, or slept, for days. but for all of this, and for the pride that had once been his, he knew that he must now be supremely cautious. one half-hearted grip on the dripping rock, one misplaced footing, would send him crashing to the ground below. and while at this height such a fall might not mean death, it surely would mean broken bones, which in his present plight, hunted and desperate, amounted to one and the same thing. the stretch of sand was now only a few yards beneath him. the agitated sea roared and pounded just beyond. weak and trembling, chilled to his very bones, the prisoner at last set foot on level ground. struggling on in the wet, giving sand, he searched for the entrance of the walled-in hiding place. even in daylight it would be difficult to find. in the murky dusk it was next to impossible. so far as he knew, no one but himself and his childhood companions had ever found it. of these all but one had been killed in the war. and as for the girl..... he doubted that she would remember. at last he found the slight ravine, which led back into the sea-cliffs. a short distance further was the place where the granite had split, and one huge shingle buckled and slid forward. climbing the slanting crack it formed, he came to the narrow fissure, which in daylight appeared as little more than a deeper shadow among the darkened wedge of the seam. he twisted his shoulders, and crawled forward until he reached the ledge on the other side, within the enclosure. and though he stood hunched in a blackness complete as the hole of hell, still his spirit rejoiced as if it had fought and clawed its way to heaven. he had beaten them. he was free. with a surge of fierce courage such as he had not felt for many months, he leapt down blind, trusting that the place had remained as he remembered it. his feet landed easily in the soft, giving sand, as his body fell forward in a weary ecstasy of surrender. he embraced its sheltering softness like a lover, then found to his bewilderment that he was crying. this was something he had not done since childhood. he tried to check the tears but could not, as all the pain and fear of the last three years, and of that terrible day, poured out of him. he thought of the girl and he knew, even then, that though danger still surrounded him, he must see her again as soon as it was safely possible. for he had held her image before him like an icon and a guiding light through the years of brutal captivity, placing his hope, and all his heart, in the belief that she remained, alive and free. that she did not love him in return, but loved another, did not seem to matter now. nothing mattered except that he must see her, and speak to her, and tell her what she meant to him. then he would be content, and gladly lay down his life. with tears still wounding him, he searched the niche in the adjacent wall, until he found the tinderbox that he had left there. against all odds its contents were intact. the rotting straw beneath it was dry, as was the piled driftwood he had gathered and stored so long ago. clearing a level space in the sand, he built a waiting bed of straw and thin slivers, then struck flint to steel, shooting tiny sparks into the heart of it. again and again, until with the aid of his living breath a single tongue appeared, and began to spread. then with the knowledge acquired of a lifetime, he fed the fire slowly, nurtured it, until at last it grew and swelled into a living, warming blaze. he hung his head and wept outright. the lingering flame of his life and his love still remained. he groaned, and in a torment of joy and suffering, said her name. "mary!" he stripped off his soaking clothes and draped them across driftwood stands to dry. lying naked now in the growing warmth of the chamber, he said a defiant prayer of thanks, and with her image before him still, drifted at last into sleep. eight the rain beat against the single window; the door trembled beneath the force of the wind. but for the dry heat that emanated from the blazing hearth fire, mary would have thought herself in a dank and dripping cave. the night aura of the place had returned as well, with strange shadows playing once more across everything she saw. half fearfully now she asked her mother to keep her promise, and speak of the hard life which had led her to the present. she herself sat in the rocker, warmly wrapped and with the steaming kettle close at hand, while true to her nature, the old woman sat stiffly and without comforts in the plain unmoving wooden chair. "all right, mary, i'll tell you. and you've a bit of salt, no denying, to parry with an old she-wolf in the den. but if the words i speak begin to feel too harsh, like sack-cloth against your delicate skin, i'll understand if you stop me. it's hardly a tale for a lady." "i won't stop you," said mary stubbornly, beginning to see that every inch of this woman's bitter fortress would be yielded grudgingly, and that pain and courage were the only measure she respected. "you must tell me everything, from the beginning." "that would take many days, child, and even then you would not know the half of it. i will tell you now only those events which concern yourself, along with such glimpses of my youth which you will understand, and are needful." "i'm listening," said the girl. "very well." and the old woman began her tale. "when i was scarcely older than you are now, and no less naive, i fell in love with a man twice my age. he was a fisherman, whose wife had died in giving birth to their only child, a strapping son, now five years old. "john was a lonely man, and beginning to feel the weight of his years. i was a lonely girl, and to his mind innocent, full with the first bloom of untainted womanhood. i was to be the empty page that he would write upon, the flowering stream beside which he would rebuild his life. he saw nothing but the good in me, and my one desire was to please him, and to give him all that he needed. "but my parents, being blind with wealth and comfort, could not see him as i did, could never know the honest depth of his soul, or the gentle touch of his big, calloused hands as he held me. the need and loving warmth he showered over me quite stole my heart..... they saw only that such a match was beneath me, as the only daughter of a respected landowner, a man of solid means and family background. "so we eloped, john and i, and were married in a chapel by the sea. when my father learned of it he was furious, and disowned me. it was the last time he ever spoke to me, as this will be the very last, i warn you, that i will ever say of him. child-lusting bastard! had me in his bed more than once, when we were alone and i could not escape him. "don't look so shocked. it is always within the most staid, aristocratic families that the heart is most deeply rotted. so don't feel yourself cheated, girl, that you never knew your father---the man you most want to love, but in the end must despise more than any. "but never mind all that. it hardly matters. good, decent john maccain and i were married, and lived happily enough for two years. i still bear his name, though it is seldom remembered. but if there is one thing the cruel christian god will not tolerate---he, too, is called the father---it is those who find meaning and bounty without him. we had little enough in the world's eyes, and never more than we needed to live day by day. but what of that? we had each other, and the boy, who had come to think of me as his mother. we had the sun and the sea, and the land behind. our scotland. "then one day he took the boy and went out in his boat, as ever, to earn our daily bread. it was as fine an april morning as you could ask, and i saw them off under a gentle sky, with softly lapping waves to put a woman's heart at ease. it need hardly be said that the skies soon darkened, and a gale blew in like thunder--- "nay, girl, back to your chair; i don't want pity. that was the way of it, and nothing to be said or done now. "he did not return that night. and after three days' fruitless vigil, there was no use hoping further. a priest came to our small cottage, and said some words as empty as the promise of afterlife. my brother and i held candles in our hands, and i think he was truly shocked that i shed not a single tear. he could not know that my nights for many years had been filled with them, and that those last, worry-sick three had drained the well to its dregs, and beyond. that was the end of it. my first love was gone, leaving me a widow at nineteen, wholly without means. "my brother did what he could for me, i'll give him that. and he would have played the father well enough for you, if the fever* hadn't got him first. they're not all bad; i do know it. but the good ones with hearts that feel, are forever and always at the mercy of them that don't---the aggressive lot who just take, and trample, without thinking. *typhus. "but here, i'm ahead of myself, and you look near done-in. into bed with you now, and enough of my sad stories." "no!" said her daughter at once. "you promised. i want to hear it all!" though she was in fact tired and morose, and beginning to feel again the ache of her affliction, mary sensed that now or never would she learn the whole truth. she must show this woman that she too could be strong, and was not afraid of dark reality. the widow maccain looked hard at her, trying to gauge the depth, and source, of her daughter's desire to know. but at the same time she felt the slow stirrings of concerned motherhood, and at that not the detached, objective instincts of a guardian, the role she had been forced to assume, and grown accustomed to these many years. she turned away, and wrung her hands as if deep in thought. "all right," she said at last. "but we must get you into bed in any case. i'll not have you seriously ill." she rose, and took the tea-cup from mary's hand. she turned down the covers for her, and saw her securely tucked in. then to her dismay as she sat down on the bed beside her, felt such a surge of tenderness for this innocent extension of her own flesh, that it was only with difficulty she did not bend down and kiss her damp, flushed forehead. "go on," said mary, who in her mother's eyes crossed that very hour from adolescence into womanhood. there was no denying the soul inside her. "are you very sure, lass? i do not say it in mockery, but truth be told it's not a tale to make the young heart glad. i'll understand if you've had enough." "no, really, i'm all right now. mother," and she took her hand. "i want to know." the woman gave a sigh, and shook her head. she found herself cornered, and not by the hounds and hunters of treachery, but by honesty and simple love. there was only one way out: forward, through memories and emotions she had long banished. there was nothing else for it. she continued. "my father grew old and finally died, with my mother not far behind. my brother became man of the house then, and one of the first things he did was to send for me, though it was not straight away that i went to him. "i had been earning my modest keep as a teacher to the children of the fishing village, and living alone in the spare, two-room schoolhouse that they built for me. i'd had chance enough for suitors if i wanted them. but i did not, could not think to put myself through such pain again. and though i loved them well enough for the simple, hard-working folk they were, but for my john i never met one as stirred the embers of any true romantic feeling. of course the men of the distant gentry wanted no part of me, a dowerless widow who had shamed her family and married beneath her class. they were not all so heartless, and i kept a good deal to myself. but the truth remains that none ever cared enough to overcome the obstacles, and learn what lay hidden in my heart. "so the years went by and i found myself at thirty. my mother had died, and my brother taken anne for a wife, who had borne him a child. so at last i swallowed my pride, and thinking to be useful, went back to the big house that still haunted my dreams. both bryan and your aunt were kind enough in their awkward, christian way, and did what they could to make me feel welcome and at home. but as michael continued to grow---yes, child, who else would it be?---they naturally began to feel a tight bond of family that did not include me..... "but here the way becomes less clear. it is never a single incident, nor even a closely knit series of events that makes us what we are, but a lifetime of broken promises and shattered dreams. they say that hope springs eternal, and i dare say that's true. more's the pity, since it must always end in disillusion, and finally, in dark and lonely death." she felt her daughter's hand grasp her own, and saw that there were standing tears in her eyes. as if a veil had been drawn aside between them, she saw at last the terrible loss the girl had already suffered, and was suffering still, in the form of an impossible love for a man three years dead. yes, thought the dark widow to herself, she deserves to know the truth. "i began to feel the need for solitude, and a place to dwell on the long chains of thought that had taken root inside me. so i made this place my own, and spent long hours, whole days and nights here, learning. for i had been shown three books of druid lore during the first year of my mourning, by an old welsh woman who lived in the village, my only real companion. she taught me the ancient tongues, and asked me to copy them out in english, along with other tales and spells which she knew only in her mind, that they might not be lost at her death. yes, mary, she was a witch, though that name need not mean all that fear implies." she paused. "a priest has a kind of power over men, because he appeals to the angelic, or 'right' side of the soul---all filled with yearning for the light, and the fear of god. the witch works through the left, no less powerful, because its roots lie in corrupted instinct: vanity, unclean desire, treachery and violence. and to the weak and abusive, men such as my father, it is only that much harder to deny. the daughters of lug cast no darkness of their own, create no evil that does not already exist in a man, but only turn that inner blackness to his own undoing. "vengeance is mine, sayeth the lord. these words are attributed to the great god of christian and jew alike. but what men cannot see, because their simplicity demands a single being to worship and fear, is that the one god is divided into many facets, wholly separate beings, with moods and purposes all their own. i have chosen the god dagda, as he has chosen me. his passion is for retribution against the violent---the axe-wielders and plunderers, the outwardly strong. it is he who spoke through the prophet long ago." "mother," said mary. "please don't be angry, but you're frightening me. you know i don't pass judgment, and that i'm trying to understand. . . and love you. but this isn't what i want, what i need to know." with this the old woman, whose eyes had lost their focus and begun to stare off into space, came back to herself. "aye, lass, i hear what it is you're telling me. i was only trying to give you a glimpse of that part of myself which cannot be shown in outward events. you'll be wanting to know about the circumstances of your birth..... about your father." at this the cold eyes gleamed with unspeakable malice, and with a shiver of stark insight mary discovered the source, the burning heart of her mother's hatred. it was as if all the bitter rage she felt for the world of men, every grudge, even blame for the war itself, had been focused upon this one man as the symbol, the living embodiment of evil, and sole object of revenge. and with a second shock, and full knowledge that had somehow eluded her, she realized that this him, this monster her mother wished to destroy, using her as a vehicle, was the first, the original lord purceville. her father, who formed half her living flesh. and as much as she knew him for the man he was, as much as she sympathized with her mother and abhorred his rape of her, yet again she felt that sudden and all-inclusive pang: the orphan, who after years in the lonely dark, discovers a natural parent, living still. but now the old woman was speaking again, had in fact been speaking all the while these thoughts raced through her, no longer aware, it seemed, of any presence save her own, blindly reciting the words that had become to her a litany of hate. ".....was just an officer then, in command of the northern garrison. we were not yet in open rebellion, and after a fashion, were content to be subjects of the british crown. but we were never equals. the purcevilles, outsiders that they were, still secured for themselves a beautiful estate, with a magnificent home and many servants. and one of them, by a strange twist of fate, was i. "hard times and higher taxes were beginning to take their toll on bryan, and i felt useless enough in his house. so i determined to seek employment, and a place of my own, wherever i might find them. for i had not yet learned that my place was here, and that the world of men held nothing for me. stubbornly i hoped, and stubbornly i fell into the trap. "as much as perhaps i should have known better, i solicited for, and was given the job of governess to young stephen purceville, aged then seven years. he was a hard and abrasive lad, his mother dead and gone years past. yes, mary, you begin to see how life repeats, and how i was laid bare for the final sting. i loved the boy, hard as it was sometimes. there was something in him, a brooding hunger of the eyes, which endeared him to me for all his excesses and bursts of temper. and if the truth be told, i saw the same hunger and restless need in the aggressive coldness, the outward ferocity of his father. "fool, fool, fool!" she cursed herself. "we women find a strong, demanding master, and we think that because of his strength there must be goodness and nobility within, that if nurtured..... but it does not exist. takers and users, they plunder our hearts and our bodies, then throw us to the dogs." "then," asked mary gently, trying hard not to upset her. "he didn't actually rape you?" "aye, rape he did, though not in the sense that fear casts the word---alone in some barren place, far from help. but i said it was not willingly i took him to my bed, and it's the god's truth. he would come to my room of an evening, and letting himself in---he held keys to every room in the house, and none were spared---he would..... "this is a hard thing for me to tell you, girl. he forced himself on me, and at times i struggled, or even cried out, until a cuff or sharp threat silenced me. and yet, strange to say. . .after the incestuous horrors of my father's house, it was a kind of cleansing, purging pleasure to be so used, so long as i believed that somewhere, in the depths of his heart, he loved and cared for me. "dear god, how blind we can be! it was not love he felt, nor secret tenderness. it was not even clean desire, but the novelty of a woman my age---thirty-three---who was still fair, and of violating by night the woman who coddled his son by day. "but it was more than even that. in his meanness and baseness he knew, in some measure, what it was i felt for him, and it gave him a twisted satisfaction to be admired and cherished by a native lass, who meant to him less than nothing." again she paused, as if herself overwhelmed by the memory. "in time i became pregnant," she said, in a voice almost sad. "and all my confused, forlorn affection became the more profound. for he had stirred inside me what even john could not: a child of my own. "so on the last night that he came to me, as we lay panting side by side---for i had not resisted him..... i looked over at him in the gentle candlelight, and with the trembling emotions of a lifetime, told him that i loved him, loved his son, and now would bear his child. to think that in that moment i half fancied he would take me in his arms, and ask me to marry him. "he laughed at me! so utterly cold and cruel. then as he came back to himself he seized me by the wrists, and swore that no child of his would be born to a scheming slut---his very words---the likes of me. and he beat me, as if trying to snuff out the lives of both of us. i honestly believe he would have done it, if fear of losing his position had not intervened. "then he dragged me by the hair, down the long hallway, and threw me out into the cold winter night, with only the torn nightdress wrapped about my battered limbs. the last words he said as i ran from the house in tears, were that if anyone ever learned the child was his, he would kill us both. and he meant it." mary was crying now for both of them, feeling as if she, too, had been beaten and raped. "how could he?" was all she could manage. "how?" asked the old woman, half mocking, half in earnest. "for a man like that it was as easy as breathing. `the shark will strike and the spider spin, the mad dog kill, and kill again until he is killed in his turn.' remember that, mary. it is the way of things." "but why....." it seemed almost cruel to ask, but she had to. "why the charade of my being anne's child? why couldn't you and i have had each other, at least?" "aye, that. well." and for the first time that night, through all the gruesome details, the woman found herself at a loss, as if this alone still caused in her something akin to remorse. "at first it was the family honor. it was as easy to cloister the two of us, as one. and then. "i tried to poison myself a short time after you were born, as only your life inside me had prevented my doing before. as much as i wanted to love and care for you, as the innocent babe you were..... "it all became too much for me, mary, and my brother's death was the final blow. i just wanted it to end. they say i went quite mad for a time, if endless loss, and a death-like sense of oppression be madness. "the surviving family, the talberts, then considered me an unfit guardian. and with the coming of dark times it was difficult to blame them, or disagree..... and so i gave you up---" she had to stop, because the girl had risen beside her in the bed, and this time in deepest earnest, wrapped her arms about the withered neck, weeping as if there were nothing left in all the world. the old woman (old and haggard at fifty) felt a moment of weakness. she wanted to cry herself, to give, and receive comfort in return. but the tears would not come. then she remembered the man, and was silent. and more than anything else mary had heard or experienced that night, this simple non-action, and the three words the witch finally uttered. . . brought home to her the full brutality, and continuing tragedy of her mother's life. "he will pay." as the rain beat relentlessly, and the wind howled through the barren pass. nine stephen purceville rose early the next morning. he had slept alone that night, something of a rarity, and woke feeling both cleansed and restless. cleansed because, like all men who give and take love too freely, he knew in his heart how meaningless the endless procession of women had become. restless because he fancied, and simultaneously feared it was not true, that he had at last found the woman who would make it all real, and still the inner turmoil which had haunted him time out of mind. he got up and stretched his lean, hard-muscled frame, calling for his valet, who came at once and began helping him dress. this act was by now such a matter of ritual that it left his mind soft and dreamlike, free to think again of that mystical creature of beauty and innocence, so unlike the others, that he would woo, and take as his wife. that he had done nothing to earn, and therefore to deserve such a blessing, that real love could not possibly find him until he stopped using and hurting all who came within his reach---these were thoughts which could never occur to him. rather, it seemed unlikely that he would ever wake from the dream of dominance and superiority in which he had been raised. for he had been born into wealth, and taught (though not by his father, who in fact had taken little hand in his upbringing) that his noble birth entitled him to both material satisfaction, and the subservient respect of all around him. and because the world could not possibly live up to this contrived and irrational viewpoint, he was forever angry, feeling cheated, though by whom he could not say, of the peace and happiness that were rightfully his. sending the servant from him, he splashed cold water across his face and neck, brushed and pomaded his strong, raven locks, then set about to shaving with especial care. toweling away the remaining lather he finished dressing, buckled on his sword and walked briskly down the corridor, roughly pushing aside the butler, who in the semi-darkness had failed to descry his young master's approaching form, and deferentially stand aside. entering at length the high, majestic dining room, he was oblivious to the opulent splendor all around him. his one thought, as he seated himself brusquely, was a mild gratitude that his father, whom he despised, had not yet risen. for in the aging baron he saw what he considered an unfair reflection of himself---what he was, and would become---and he judged most harshly in his father those shortcomings which he himself possessed. but on a more human level, and in the open book to which all save murderers (and he was not yet that) are entitled, the `brooding hunger of the eyes' which the old woman had described in him as a child, was in fact a true window into his innermost self---his deep-seated need for womanly care and affection. his only memories of his mother, who had died so young, were of an angelic being in a long white gown, who stood in the twilit doorway of his bedroom. . .then entered softly, and kissed and petted him good-night. and without realizing it, he longed with all his soul for that gentle, reassuring touch, so suddenly and irrevocably lost. he remembered more distinctly his first governess, the widow maccain, whose patient affection he had begun to return when his father, for reasons he would never make clear, had sent her away in disgrace. in later life he had solved the bitter puzzle for himself, after his own fashion and understanding, and hated them both for it. back to the present, he set to his breakfast with a will. he ate not because he was hungry---genuine, limb-weakening hunger was something he had never known---but because he had a long ride ahead of him, and wished to retain a good measure of strength at the end of it, when he saw, and would meet..... her. he abruptly pushed away his plate. and for perhaps the second time in his adult life (the first being the morning of the battle, in which he had served as an adjutant) he felt a kind of fear and nervous awe of what lay ahead. wiping his mouth mechanically, he threw aside the napkin, strode down the long hallway, and made his way out toward the stables, buttoning his crimson officer's coat against the early morning chill. the great irony of his existence, and of his current fixation on a woman he had never met, was that the same restless hunger which drove him to her, and which was so transparent in his eyes, had acted as both a heart-throb and aphrodisiac on a score of beautiful women, english and scottish alike, and he could have picked from their number anyone he wished. servant girls, ladies, wives and mistresses of other men, all were quite helpless before his sharp and demanding emerald gaze, enhanced as it was by his high position and rakish good looks. at any moment there were always two or three jewel-like creatures who considered themselves deeply in love with him, and would gladly have forsaken all others to be his wife. but of these he wanted none. beyond the plunder of their willing bodies (and this very willingness made him look upon them with contempt), he thought of them, and cared for them, not at all. the groom, who had been warned of his master's mood and early approach, stood ready, holding the reins of the saddled stallion. again the young man took no particular notice of his good fortune---that here was arguably the finest horse in the countryside, sleek and tireless, worth more in stud alone than many of the country folk could hope to earn in a lifetime. he knew only that it was his, and that this, at least, was as it should be. in a rare show of affection, he went so far as to pat its beautiful neck before mounting. but this did not keep him from upbraiding the groom for a loose strand on the saddle-blanket. and no sooner had he mounted the animal than it ceased to be for him a living creature, and became instead a vehicle, existing merely to carry him to a desired end. he rode off, leaving the groom to shake his head, and spit disparagingly in the dirt. such was the love he inspired in men. mary sat at the bare table, drinking tea and chewing a hard biscuit, while her mother peered narrowly out of the window. both had been silent since waking---there seemed little left to say---but at last her mother broke the stillness. "mary. what will you do if stephen purceville comes to call on you today?" mary knew better than to ask why he would. so far as her mother was concerned, there was no such thing as coincidence. she thought for a moment, then replied honestly. "i don't know. he is, after all, my brother." "half-brother," the old woman hissed. "and not the better half, remember that." the girl did not like, and could not understand, her mother's tone. "margaret," she said flatly. "if you did not want us to meet, you would not have arranged his coming here. you show me one path, then chastise me for taking it. at least tell me what it is you want, so i can make an intelligent choice." "what i want," she repeated thoughtfully, as if regretting her earlier outburst. "for now all i want is that you should meet, and let nature take it's course." again mary felt hostility rising inside her. she wanted to love this woman, and help her if she could. but not as a puppet, and not in that way. "nature's course! are you suggesting that i---" "easy, lass. i'm suggesting no such thing." her voice was cool and soothing. "just get to know him. do what you feel. nay, child, that's not what i mean. i think you'll find he has a certain charm. you may even like him." mary rested her chin on her fists, and let out a deep breath, bewildered. of all the strange fates and traps: to be given a set of natural parents after feeling she had none, only to find that one was detestable, and the other wanted him dead. but the son, her half-brother. . .here was a mystery. what was his guilt, or innocence, and what would he feel towards her? whereas michael had known all along that she was not his sister, stephen would have no notion that she was. of one thing only was she certain: she had had enough of violence and hatred. she decided she would judge this man by himself alone. and if he turned out to be a friend, so much the better. whatever the case, she would not take part in any scheme to hurt him. and perhaps..... as if divining the thought, the old woman broke in upon her reverie. "just remember this. you must not tell him that he is your brother, and you must not use my name." "but why?" "why? because if his father learns of it he will kill us both." "i'm sorry, but i don't believe that." "believe it!" again the harsh voice was edged in steel. "by the god, girl, haven't you been listening? don't you know yet what kind of man he is?" "but to kill two women without pretext? even a governor---" "oh, he would find a pretext. harboring a fugitive, spying..... witch craft." mary was silent. and though she reproached herself for it, her one desire in that moment was to get as far away from the hate-filled old woman as possible. she longed to escape from the smouldering darkness of that place, to find some quiet hillside where she could think it all through, and decide what must be done. what must be done..... but at the same time she felt the need, far stronger than she cared to admit, for some strong and reassuring male presence. at that moment she heard hoofbeats outside the door. not waiting to ask, or consider whether it was right or wrong, she rose from her place and went to the door. the old woman did not try to stop her. she went outside. stephen purceville stopped short in the saddle, and for the space of several seconds, did not move or breathe. then with an effort to remain calm he dismounted, for that brief instant losing sight of her, and telling himself it had not happened. but when he moved forward around the horse, holding tight the reins as if trying to keep a dream from fading, he felt again the strange and forbidding shock of her presence. the girl was beautiful, yes, but it was far more than that. there was a depth to her, a genuine suffering..... but that was not the whole of it, either. what did it mean? what did it mean? he could not know that part of what he was feeling was an instinctive sense of kin, the primal recognition of blood and family, a feeling which jarred against, and at the same time increased, his awed physical desire, for her. and alongside this, no less tangible, was an almost spiritual softening, and unconditional love. . .yes, love, for the beautiful and innocent child before him. everything about her, from the gentle eyes and supple figure, to the long and simple dress she wore, seemed to him more becoming and picturesque than anything he had ever seen. at the back of his mind flashed a vision: an angelic being all in white..... for her own part, mary also felt a shock. from the first glimpse there could be no doubt that he was in fact her brother. she knew this not by any cold comparison of features, but by the sudden love and pity that welled up in her own heart. love because, whatever his faults and follies (these too she sensed), he was her brother, a fellow orphan and lonely, wayward soul. her womanly instinct recognized this at once. pity, because she saw in his eyes the rising of a passion that could never be fulfilled. he was in love with her. this she knew with equal certainty. still holding tightly to the reins, he came forward. remembering his pretext for coming, he began to speak stiffly of escaped prisoners and official duties. she listened, hearing not so much the content of his words, as reading in his voice and manner the confirmation of what she had intuitively sensed. and she could not help but feel a certain thrill that this powerful, aggressive man should find himself groping for speech, shy and self-conscious before her. and indeed, the young captain soon felt the emptiness of his words, which were like banners raised without wind to support them. he stopped, flushing with anger and embarrassment, and looked at her. as clearly as if she had spoken, her eyes said to him. "it doesn't matter. i know why you're here, and it's all right." she stepped closer, and without fear or hesitation, began to stroke the white muzzle of the bay, which to his surprise, did not pull away. "he's never let anyone do that," he said honestly. "a perfect stranger." he unconsciously stepped back, allowing her greater freedom. "have you been around horses all your life?" "when i was younger, before....." her face flushed. "but that's not why. we understand each other." "before the war?" "yes," she said defensively. she could not understand his persistence, into a matter that was clearly painful to her. "do you hate us all, then?" her eyes flashed, then became quiet again. "no. i've seen too much of hate, and death. i lost..... i lost everything." and suddenly it came to her. she was standing and talking with a man, her own flesh, who had been on the other side of the firing, and might well have given the order to kill--- her face went pale as an intolerable pain rose in the hollow of her chest, and the full horror of war loomed before her. she stepped back, senses failing, and would have fallen if he had not rushed forward and caught her up. horrified at his own actions, which could have caused in her such pain, he carried her back to a flat stone before the hut, which served as a bench. she sat woozily for a moment, not knowing where she was, until she became aware of his voice, and of his strong arm about her shoulders, supporting her. "mary, it's all right," he said. "please, please forgive me. we won't speak of it again." and looking up at his troubled countenance, so full of concern and self-reproach, she could not help but forgive him. he continued, hardly knowing what he said, trying to mend the breach that he had caused between them. "i, too, know what it is to lose: my mother, when i was very young." and in that moment it did not seem strange to him to speak of this, his greatest secret and vulnerability, which he hid so tenaciously from others. "stephen." she spoke plainly, though she was not sure herself what she felt, sitting there so close beside him. "you came in the hope of becoming in some way intimate with me. that has already happened; i ask you to think of me as your friend. and as a friend, i have something to ask of you." "you know that i would do anything." and he colored to hear himself speak. "thank you for saying that just now." she laid her hand lightly on his, feeling the shiver it caused in him. half against her will she left it there, and felt his grateful fingers close around hers. "would you take me riding today?" she asked. "without expecting anything in return? more than anything right now i want to go somewhere wide open and free, where i can think, and feel alive. i need someone i can be alone, with. do you understand?" "i think so." but even as he said this, he realized that in the confusion he had lost his grip on the stallion. with a catch at his throat he looked out, and saw that it had moved off, grazing now on a sparse patch of green perhaps forty yards away. as if sensing his eyes upon it, the horse looked back at them alertly. "i've got to catch him!" said the man. and he leapt to his feet. but at his first running strides toward it, the beast raised its head and galloped easily out of his reach, a short distance further up the path. again the young officer made as if to charge. "stephen, wait." slowly she walked over to him, as to a child who had not understood his lessons. "but i've got to---" she shook her head. "no. what you've got to do is stop grabbing so hard at life, and learn to caress it---stop trying to make everything your slave. haven't you ever just let life come to you?" "but the horse---" "has probably not experienced a moment of true freedom since you've owned him." "mary." his face betrayed deep conflict, and she knew that she had been right, and struck upon the roots of his character. "that animal is worth a fortune," he continued desperately. "if he escapes, or is stolen....." "he won't escape," she said firmly. "this pass leads nowhere: a dead-end of stone. but that's not what this is about. what you're showing me now is that you're afraid, terribly afraid to let go. you think that if you don't go out and take, by force if necessary, then life will give you nothing, nothing at all. that is a lie which is cruel to both yourself and others. and if you want anything to do with me it must stop, here and now." "how do you know this?" he demanded. "you're only guessing." but he realized that by his very vehemence he was admitting the truth of what she said. already she knew him. somehow, she knew. he let out a breath, and said to her simply. "how would you retrieve my horse?" "by giving him what he needs. by kindness rather than the noose. no," she insisted. "i am not speaking of ideals. i will do it, like this." without haste she returned to the door of the hut, and went inside. her mother sat staring blankly at the fire, though mary had little doubt that she had moved there but recently, and had heard, if not seen, all that had taken place. "mother, may i take some apples?" "they are in the basket, as you know for yourself." "thank you." there was no time to wonder what her mother was feeling, if anything. she strode up and kissed her quickly, then took two of the apples and went outside. there both man and beast looked back at her. with neither haste nor hesitation, she took a bite of the first apple, and, as if the man did not exist, walked directly toward the stallion. it craned its neck at this, and looked cautiously back at its master. but as he made no move, it turned its large, animal eyes back to the girl. she did not hold the apple out enticingly, or make the cooing sounds of entreaty which she knew it would instinctively mistrust. she simply advanced, acting as if the reins did not exist, paused, came closer, then stopped carelessly perhaps ten feet away. she took another bite of the apple, then laughed as the creature snorted impatiently, and at last came up to her. she reached below its head with one hand, and fed it the apples with the other. the reins were in her hand, and the animal ate greedily. then all at once she burst into tears, and hid her face against its long and beautiful neck. together they rode across the wide and wild moors, past stark mountain ridges, and lochs many thousand feet deep. all beneath a warming sun and mild, caressing wind. they spoke quietly or not at all, taking in the broad magnificence around them, each thinking their own thoughts, alone, and yet in the deepest sense, together. at least that is how the girl perceived their long ride through nature. for her it was poetry and roses, a spiritual as well as physical reunion with the brother she had never known, and who so obviously needed her love and softening influence. and to one so young, knowing so little of men, it was easy to imagine that a sort of romantic friendship was also possible, had in fact already been established, and that all of this was understood between them. having been so long without the company of men, and in her life being close to only one---a man of exceptional virtue and character---she could not help but think the best of her new-found brother, and to believe, with her heart rather than her mind, that whatever injustices he may have committed, were over and in the past. further, she reasoned, the world had need of such aggressive leaders: men who got things done. she could not know that in following this naive and wishful train of thought she was making a classic mistake, indeed, the same mistake her mother had made before her. she was yielding to a woman's instinctive attraction and submission to raw strength, which clouds the conscience, and hampers honest judgment. michael had been strong and good; stephen was merely strong. she was too young, and too needful, to see the difference. so riding back with the setting sun, feeling fatigued but at the same time warm and secure in his presence, it did not seem out of place for her to rest her head on his shoulder and let her arms, which were wrapped about his waist for support, squeeze him affectionately. and if she felt inclined to add, "thank you, stephen, i feel wonderful," where was the harm? and as they reached the steep and narrow final passage, his actions seemed to confirm all the noble, underlying qualities which she had begun to read into his character. sensing that his horse was tired he dismounted, and taking hold of the bridle, led it the rest of the way on foot, displaying both a firm, sure tread, and surprising physical stamina. of his virility, had she known the word, there could be no question. when they reached the hut, the sky seemed to hover in a peaceful and many-hued twilight. everything around them was hushed and still, with no light showing from within. stephen reached up to help her dismount, and as her feet lightly touched ground, took her in his arms. her eyes looked up at him searchingly, his face so close to hers. then he was kissing her, and before she could turn away she felt his right hand glide across her ribs. she tried to pull away, but he only brought her body more firmly against his. and she felt a part of herself yield as they kissed again, her lips parting expectantly. once more she felt the hand kneading toward her breast. but as it touched, and she felt the growing insistence of his movements she came back to herself, and with a shock realized what she was doing, and with whom. "no!" she gasped, trying to break free. still he held her, but she persisted. "it's not right." at last he released her. with this action he too seemed to remember himself, and to refrain, though his reasons were vastly different. "i'm sorry," he said simply. "i'm afraid you quite carry me away." she gazed back at him, his features half hidden in the gloom, trying to understand the source and meaning of his words. it was impossible. "oh," she said in despair. "i didn't want it to end like this. couldn't you just embrace me, as you would a friend, and say good-night?" "as a friend ?" so sharp and demanding was his voice, his whole bearing, that she found herself saying, quite against her will: "please, just give me a little more time. i'm not ready....." and these words, like so many other innocent acts, seemed to achieve an end of their own, altogether separate from what she had intended. stephen was strangely soothed, and gratified, as if hearing exactly what he wanted to. she felt, as much as saw him smile. he came to her, and embraced her gently. "oh, mary," he whispered, as he kissed her cheek. "thank you for this. thank you for not giving in. i've been waiting all my life for a feeling, like this." and he kissed her again with heart-breaking softness. then he stepped away and swiftly mounted. "i'll be back three days hence. we will ride again, and make our love in the fields." and he rode off, leaving her bewildered and unable to reply. and all at once the last light of day was gone. the breeze which had seemed so gentle, now fled before the cold and chilling airs of night. she retreated into the woeful shelter of the hut, and lay down on the bed in confusion. ten the prisoner had slept for nearly twenty hours, woken off and on by the cold as his fire grew dim. at such times he would rise only long enough to fuel it once more to a warm and yet (so far as this was possible) a slow burning blaze. he knew the white smoke of the driftwood would be difficult to see, dispersed as it was through the cracks high above, and carried away by the steady breeze from the sea. but still he took no chances, using only pieces that were cracked with age, retaining not the slightest trace of moisture. then trying to forget his parched throat and empty stomach, he would lie yet again in the sand, sleep remaining the single greatest need. but as night fell again on the interceding day---even as mary watched the englishman ride off---he woke for the last time, feeling troubled and restless. so dry had his throat become that each involuntary swallow brought with it a sharp and brittle pain. his mouth felt lined with parchment, and he was dizzy and weak from hunger. he knew that whatever the risks, he could no longer remain where he was, but must find food and drink. and this meant people, of whom life had made him so mistrustful. his clothes were dry, nearly scorched. these he had stolen as he fled across the countryside with his companion, who along with himself had broken early from the rest. but the fit of them was bad, and their look on him plainly suspicious. as he dressed, then climbed carefully up to the narrow opening, he felt a deep trepidation he could not suppress. because somewhere inside him a voice had said, "enough. enough running and hiding and stealing. i must take myself openly to the first villager i see, and ask for help." and while this ran counter to all the hard lessons he had learned in the stockade---that a man must look out for himself, trusting and needing no one else---yet a line had been crossed inside him, from which there was no returning. he did not wish to die, but neither could he live as some hunted and detestable beast. he climbed down from the rock. the twilit beach was empty and the waves had grown less. here and again came the sound of gulls, along with the high screech of a sea-hawk somewhere above. he plodded on through the indifferent sand, toward the small fishing village some two miles distant. upon leaving the hiding place he had formed no clear plan, and in his bitterness told himself he did not want one. but as the cliffs that walked with him began to diminish and pull back from the shore, leaving the more level expanse and tiny harbor of the village, his mind of necessity began to work again, trying to think of anyone he might know there, who would have no love for the english, and be willing to take him in. in the midst of his reveries he looked up to see an old man sitting on the porch of a low ancient cottage, separated from the rest of the village, holding aloof as it were on this, the nearer and less accessible side of the harbor. a steep stretch of sand led down from it to the very edge of the horseshoe bay, broken here and there by large projections of stone. the old man looked back at him placidly, smoking a short pipe and humming quietly but distinctly to himself. the prisoner felt fear, and a deep hesitation, until almost in spite of himself he began to follow the rise and fall of the simple tune. then with a rush of warmth and melancholy he recognized it: "the walls of inverness." it was a song that had been sung at the camp fires of highland soldiers for time out of mind. the old man was a veteran, in this blessed, unmistakable way telling him that he knew of his plight, and would help. with relief but at the same time caution, the younger man approached the cottage, and mounted the steps to the weather-beaten porch. the two men regarded each other a moment in silence. "you know, then?" "aye, lad," rejoined the fisherman in his clear baritone. "three red-coated cavalry were here yesterday, searching about and makin' a fuss. saw fit to post a threatening bill on the door of the church. `escaped traitors (traitors, mind) from edinburgh. . .believed headed. . .fifty pounds reward . . .death to anyone aiding or abetting.' the usual stuff." "the villagers will be on the watch for me, then?" "nay, lad. that bill was torn down before their horses were out of sight. and you plainly don't know sea-folk if you have to ask." he took a puff on his pipe, and continued without haste. "we live with death every day of our lives, and would not last one season if we grew afraid every time the word was spoken. that lady out there." he moved his arm to indicate the sea. "she gives and takes life as she pleases, with hardly a warning. god's mistress she is, with moods and temper to match. if we'll not bow to her, then what have we to fear from three young hoodlums, flashing their sabers as if to wake the dead?" "meaning no offense," said the other, "and i'm sure you're right. but aren't there some as might be tempted by the money? and might the english not have spies?" "perhaps," said the fisherman thoughtfully. "the arm of the devil is long, and no denying. but you'll have naught to fear of that tonight. i live quite alone, as you see, and in the morning there'll be a fog to blot out the sun." he said this with confidence, as one who had seen it a thousand times before. then extinguishing his pipe against the wooden arm of the chair, he rose as if to go inside, with an open hand indicating the door. "right now i imagine you're hungry, and might do with a mug of stout?" "yes. thank you." no other words would form, as he felt his throat tighten with emotion. they walked through the painted doorway, and into the shelter of stone. in troubled dream mary lay upon the bed, restlessly turning. words and pictures of the day would appear to her, soft and lovely---riding through the magnificent countryside, feeling him close beside her---till with a start she felt again the claw-like hand upon her breast, and beheld the iron gaze which knew no entreaty. and shaking her head in torment, she would drive the images away. after some time of this she half woke, though her eyes remained closed against the bitter truth of the waking world. she clutched the pillow to her like a lover, and in a moaning, despairing voice said his name. "oh, michael. where are you?" where are you? where are you? the words resounded in her mind, growing fainter, spiralling through a dark tunnel which became a deep well, leading to the heart of the abyss. and like tiny pebbles they struck the water far below with the faintest echo of sound. something stirred, as if woken from a fearful and everlasting sleep. she saw clearly, now level with her eyes, a dark and shallow pool among a copse of death-black trees, the whole of the scene shrouded by mist and lit by seeping moonlight. and in its midst, lying face downward with only his arched back protruding above the surface of those terrible waters, the figure of a scottish soldier. as if sensing her presence the figure lifted its head, bewildered, and stood up. a fearful, long-drawn wail split the night, whether from the spirit or from herself she could not have said, only that the face was that of her beloved, that he was in great pain, and had been struck blind. he turned wildly from side to side, trying to penetrate the blackness of his eyes. and the same words that she had sent to him now became his own, endlessly, hopelessly repeated. "where are you? where are you? where are you!" she tried to answer but could not, as if between them they possessed but a single voice. and as he finally stopped thrashing, and she felt her tongue loosed, she became aware of the thing which had stilled him, so utterly that she knew he had lost all hope, confronted by the sinister, solitary figure which parted the mist and stood before him: her hated half-brother, who had stolen and crushed his heart. all was deathly still as they faced one another in silence. purceville drew a long pistol, and held it at arm's length. michael was a statue, head down, hands at his sides in resignation. there was the crack of a shot, and again a frozen wail split the night, this time undeniably her own. mary sat bolt upright in the bed. she was trembling, and her inner garments clung to her in a cold sweat. fully awake now, and with the sudden insight brought by waking, she knew beyond a shadow of doubt what she must do. still fully clothed, she stepped down from the bed and lifted up the mattress. the manuscript book was there, had been there all the while she slept. the feel of its widow-black cover was cold and forbidding, but there was no longer time for fear or hesitation. she lit a thick tallow candle, and moved with it to the hard, bare table and chair. her mother was still nowhere to be seen. she bolted the door from within, then opened the book before her. eleven the two men sat before the roaring fire, smoking contentedly. the prisoner put a hand to his stomach, feeling nourished and filled as he had not been for many months. the room was warm; he was safe for the night, at least. and yet something was troubling him. nothing to do with the man, or the place. it did not even seem to concern himself. but in some remote corner of his mind there was disquiet, as if someone he cared about was in trouble or in danger. he took another deep puff on the pipe that had been given him, unable to work the thought through. they had remained thus for some time when at last the old man spoke. from his patient movements and steady gaze throughout, and still more from his present silence, the younger man sensed a profound caution and wisdom. so now that he chose to speak, the prisoner deemed it best to leave his disquiet for a time, to listen or to speak as was asked of him, and to learn from the seasoned veteran what was needful. "i don't ask you to tell me your name," he began. "in truth i'd rather not know it, since what i don't know i can't tell. but if there's some name you would be called, near enough the mark to feel it yours, but wide enough to leave safe your parentage, i'd be pleased to learn it." the younger man smiled. "call me jamie." "well then, jamie. for the sake of an old man's curiosity, if nothing else, won't you tell me something of yourself? the escape and such, and what your plans are now. needless to say you'll sleep in a bed tonight, much better than that old crack in the northern cliffs." "how did you know about that?" his mind raced; perhaps the hiding place was not as safe as he imagined. "could you see the smoke, then? do you think others saw it as well?" "nay, lad. fear not. what smoke there was could hardly be seen: a wisp or two among the rocks, which i saw only when i brought my skiff close in." "then how?" asked the prisoner anxiously. "t'was the sea hawk that gave you away. she's got a roost up near the top, and it seems you smoked her out proper. wouldn't land all day, just kept circlin' about and looking down. if there's one thing a beast won't abide it's the smell of smoke. puts `em in a god's fear, and no mistake." "but how did you know about the hiding place? i thought that just myself and my childhood companions....." "and of course you thought that i was never young. but truth to tell, i was. lost the virgin there, i did, and haven't seen her since." he let out a grunt of laughter, and broke into a boyish grin. then slowly returned to the matter at hand. "all in all, i doubt there's half a dozen as know of it, and none of them english. you're well enough there, and in the morning i'll see you safely back." he paused, relit his pipe. "but right now i'm in the mood for a story. a good one, mind. and i'm obliging you to tell it to me." so the man called jamie began his tale, relating at first only the barest facts of his capture and imprisonment, leading up to the mass escape as they were being transferred from one hell-hole to another. but as the memories and emotions rose up in their fullness before him, he found that he could no more pass over them quickly than he could forget them. the wounds were too deep, and too many, for that. so gradually, without himself realizing the change, he spoke in greater length and detail of the trials and fears of that time, and of his desperate struggle not to be broken, or to lose sight of his dreams and yearnings, no matter how black his world became. even his childhood, and his passionate love for the girl, found their rightful place in his tale, so much so that his throat often swelled or shut tight, and he was unable for a time to go on. but go on he did, far into the night, while the old man here and there nodded his understanding, or gave a timely word of encouragement. until it had all come out, and he slumped back in the chair, exhausted, his face wet with tears. then without further speech the old man rose. and taking down a candle from the mantle he showed him to the bedroom, where he gave him his own bed to sleep in. then with the young man safely at rest, he returned to the fire to think through all that he had heard, and decide what he must do to help him. because this same weather-beaten mariner, who was never to be seen making dramatic gestures at the church, or heard to raise his voice in righteous patriotism at the tavern, who himself had so little in the world, was then and there willing to risk it all to restore a single life to fullness. without being asked, or telling himself that he was good or kind to do so, he felt the simple, organic stirrings of compassion in his aged heart. and expecting no greater reward than the warmth of the feeling itself, he determined to do all he could to guide this lad back to safety and freedom. simply put, he had vision enough to see another human soul before him, and courage enough not to turn away. for such was the spirit of his kind. twelve she had found what she sought: a chant to raise the spirits of the dead. in terror at her own resolve, yet no more able to restrain herself than to stop her heart from beating, she put the book beneath her arm, wrapped a thick cloak about her, then lit and lifted the torch that she had found. the night was still and cold as she stole from the hut, with traces of ghostly mist already forming in the hollows. the moon shone full and hard, dimming the surrounding stars with its halo of pale white. she made for the standing stone, as dry as bone, where the power was strongest, older than the hills themselves. she felt that she moved not of her own accord, but as a puppet upon the strings of some higher (or lower) being. the reading of those dark, soul-splitting words had done its work on her. she moved as if entranced---eyes wide, mind dark and dulled. only very deep, in the roots of her being, did the heart remain intact; and she realized that no matter how strange the vehicle, or how terrible the consequences, this was a thing which must be done. she must reach out to him with living hands, and in death or in life, calm the tortured spirit of her beloved. the standing stone was just that, an uncarved granite tusk, thrusting up from a high shelf which overlooked the ravine. she approached it slowly, her senses returning. it did not need the reading of ancient lore to make her stand in awe of it, or believe in its dark powers. for this was a place known throughout the countryside, to be wondered at by day, religiously avoided by night. it was said that the ghosts of william wallace and mary stuart could be summoned here by those possessed of the black arts, as well as murdered warriors and chieftains from the grim, violent times before memory. she trembled at the sight of it, as everything beyond fell away, shrouded by mist and distance. it was as if she stood at the edge of the living world, opening upon the vague and endless sea of death's kingdom. her one desire was to turn and flee, back to the world of daylight and living flesh. and yet she must not only force herself to look upon it, but pass beyond, and standing in its far shadow, to call upon the very darkness from which her spirit palled. she stood motionless, her resolve wavering before the onslaught of doubts and questions. was she doing the right thing? might her actions not only do them both further injury? these thoughts interlaced with a raw, gut-level fear for her own safety. yet strong as these forebodings were, there lived inside her something stronger: the love of a single man. the thought of michael alone and in pain, was more than she could bear. she took the final steps, and stood on the sloping ground just beyond..... it. the ravine opened before her, its steep sides leading down to the flatted heath below: a narrow vale of silvered grass, withered shrubs and speckled stone, here and there marked by solitary trees which rose up from the wreathing fog like pillars in a flood. the same fitful breeze which had carried it from the sea beyond, moved the vapory shroud across the scene in ghostly patterns: here and again clearing an open stage, only to wrap it once more in its cloak of white invisibility. but this she took in with her eyes only. more acutely than any other sense, she felt the stone behind her, a glowering menace, an evil force aware of her presence. she steeled herself to turn and face it. then braving its deepest shadows, she wedged the torch between it and a smaller stone, half crushed beneath. and with this action, thrusting stubborn light into a place of darkness, she found the courage needed to perform the grim task ahead. kneeling in the dank ground with her back against the stone, she shook off the cold shudder that ran through her at its touch, and opened the book before her, turning to the ribbon-marked page. holding his image ever before her, she began to read aloud the chant. the words came haltingly at first, unwilling, then stronger, slowly taking hold of her until it seemed another, far older woman spoke through her: that she did not need her eyes to recall the words or sound their meaning. the voice rose and fell. by the standing stone, as dry as bone through ancient tales to walk alone by moonlight stark, to spirits dark we call to you their way be shown. back from the land, of withered hand to islands where the living stand with arms apart, and naked heart this spell to thee i do command. send spirit forth, by dark stream's course if hell itself should be the source let cerberus' gate, not hold his fate but shatter walls with killing force. all this she read, and more besides, until her arms seemed to open of their own accord, in the final gesture of invocation. then with the trembling emotions of a lifetime, she said his name..... nothing happened. a slight freshening of the breeze, nothing more. the spell had failed. all her mother's arts were but seeming and superstition. michael remained on the other side of death's iron door, unreachable. she fell forward onto the bitter earth, overcome by unquenchable despair..... she heard a sound. was it again the wind's mockery of bagpipes, the faintest strain playing upon her mind alone? she listened again. the sound grew stronger, undeniable, moving toward her from the west. far away it seemed, from the depths of the ravine, which led after many miles to the sea. it played scotland the brave, a poignant sound in that dismal place, as she heard in its every note a proud defiance of death and darkness. she got to her feet, and moving to the very edge of the shelf, peered intently into the wavering vale below. the sound continued to come on, nearer and nearer, then suddenly ceased, now surely no more than two hundred yards away. she strained her every sense for sight or sound of him, in vain. she began to despair once more, until it occurred to her that perhaps the torchlight held his troubled spirit at bay. quickly she returned to the stone, and forcing out the beacon, rolled its lighted knob against the hissing turf until it sputtered and went out. then moving back to the ledge she rejoined her vigil, prepared to wait all night. but she did not have to. almost at once she perceived the figure of a man, moving slowly through the fog. it came on steadily, down the center of the vale. now hidden by the mist, now clearly outlined: a kilted scottish soldier, pale and weary, wandering it seemed to her, without direction or hope. her heart leapt inside her, reaching out to him with all that she was. the curly head was raised at last, still vague with distance. the figure stopped, as if sensing some presence. . .then turned and looked up at her. a face once handsome and strong. his name was instantly upon her lips, as in fear and ecstasy she made to cry out to him--- suddenly from behind her came a whoosh and swell of blazing light, and a harsh voice crying harsh words. she whirled to see her mother outlined in fire and smoke against the blood-red backdrop of the stone. then pushing past her, the witch hurled a flaming brand into the abyss. "in se nama dagda!" she cried in anger. "baek wealcan sawol, to helan!" a great billowing fog engulfed the place where the figure had stood. and when it cleared again, he was gone. still her mother stood poised, waited expectantly, a blackened rib held in her uplifted hand. but when the apparition did not reappear, slowly she lowered it. . .and the look of wild fear passed from her eyes. she trembled, and spat upon the ground. then with a sharp look at the girl, she turned to extinguish the swift bonfire she had made. then without a word, she took the sobbing girl by the wrist and led her away. utterly devastated, mary did not resist. only when they were safely shut up inside the lair did the old woman give vent to her fear and vexation. "by all the gods, girl. . .you shall do no such thing again! did you want to lose your own soul as well?" "i don't care!" cried her daughter sullenly. "i don't care." and with the utterance of these words, rising as they did from her long suppressed darker nature, something precious and fine collapsed inside her: the will to live, and keep giving. she moved listlessly to sit before the fire, not for warmth, but only to turn her back on the endless pain and disillusion of this world. all was lost, and darkness overwhelmed her. thirteen the next morning she was just the same, sitting silently before the fire, with unseeing eyes gazing into it, thinking not of light but of darkness. her mother, who had slept little and worried much, offered her tea and breakfast, which she refused. she asked her then to build up the fire, to which the girl consented, though not for any reason that her mother might have hoped. and this solitary action, which she repeated several times that day, was all the movement that the woman could rouse from her. when evening came, she asked her daughter why she stared into the coals. mary answered simply, without emotion. "i am watching the fire die. like a human life, no matter how many times it is built up, the end is always the same. and when the will to feed it is gone, there is death." with this she turned slowly towards her mother, adding with grim satisfaction. "yes. at least there is death." then she turned away again, the faint smile dissolving into the stone coldness of her face. the witch spent the whole of that first day, and much of the second, reading through her books of lore, trying to find some spell or charm that would cure her daughter's malady. because to her understanding, she had been touched by some dark spirit of the netherworld, or perhaps possessed in some measure by the stone itself. but what ailed the girl was not the work of witchcraft, and there was nothing in her mother's books or box of talismans that would move or affect her in the least. what the old woman could not see, because it was too close to her own experience, was that mary had given herself heart and soul to a man she could never have, the only man that she would ever love; and without him all life seemed but a mockery of hope. there was no longer any reason to live, nor did she wish to find one. and so she had resolved to die, death being the only comfort she could see on the black horizon of her ravaged world. her mother put her to bed on that second night, to which she consented only because it was less troublesome than to refuse. and whether she slept at all the woman could not have said, for in the morning she lay exactly as she had before, hands at her sides, staring blankly at some fixed point above her. again she would not eat, and rising, drank a little water only because her throat felt dry and uncomfortable. but as the third morning wore on, the young girl began to show signs of agitation, as it recalling some unpleasant fact that interfered with her sullen wish to die. all at once she stood up from the chair, pulling the hair at her temples and groaning angrily. the old woman, glad for any sign of life, stepped closer. "what is it, mary?" "the fool! the fool!" she raged, pacing back and forth like a caged animal. "who?" "stephen purceville! today we are to, `ride again, and make our love in the fields.' oh, if he only knew how i detest him now!" as if some horrid music box which played always the same restless dirge, the lid of it thus lifted, her mother's long obsession for vengeance once more began to work inside her. even then. "you must be careful, lass. if you tell him as much there could be trouble, and not the swift and easy death you seem to long for. if you truly wish to hurt him---" mary cut her short with a swift, knifing motion of her arm. upon hearing these words an intolerable irritation had come over her at the stupidity of these sorry puppets: her mother, and the purcevilles both young and old, playing out their little games of lust and hate, as if they mattered at all in the end. how could they fail to see that everything, everything ended in death and ruin? all their petty desires were less than meaningless; they were absurd. but this was not what lay at the heart of her unease. for at the thought of her half-brother, and of the very real threat he posed, the will to survive had once more begun to assert itself inside her. she was afraid. and this simple, undeniable impulse---the desire to avoid pain and danger---tormented her now because it would not be suppressed. death she did not fear. but thoughts of trying to fight off her brother's oblivious, self-satisfied advances, the possibility of rape or imprisonment if she refused him..... these she could not face. "i've got to get out of here!" she said suddenly, as if herself a puppet whose strings had been violently jerked. and rushing to the door before her mother could stop her, she broke from the hut and began running wildly down the path, her one desire to reach its root and turn aside before stephen purceville could arrive there, trapping her in the narrow pass. she did not know how narrowly she succeeded. for no sooner had she reached and taken the track west, climbing a shallow hill and then dropping again out of sight, than the expectant officer on his panting steed arrived at the meeting of ways, and began climbing steadily the final stretch to the hut, and the long-awaited rendezvous with his imagined lover. fourteen the man called jamie spent the night, and the two days following, at the cottage of the fisherman. this had in no way been planned. but he had woken trembling and feverish, and with a deep cough that would not be silenced. it was as if only now, when it had reached a safe haven, that his body could tell him of its many ills and deprivations. the old man insisted that he remain in bed, at least until the high fever broke. as to thoughts of his own safety, he had none; and with the heavy overcast and clinging fog he deemed it prudent, and a necessary risk, to keep him from the cold and damp of out-of-doors. the younger man at length agreed, not because it seemed wise, but because it was inevitable. he had no choice. once so healthy and robust, he now felt a dull ache in the very marrow of his bones, and a chill that would not be abated. so he remained in bed, and with forced patience, passed the two hard days. but on the succeeding morning---perhaps two hours before mary fled in panic from the hut---he felt again the deep restlessness which had troubled him three days before. something was wrong. someone dear to him was in danger. he could not have said how he knew this; but know it he did, and resolved then and there to pay call upon those he loved. though he was still far from well, and fully realized the risk, this instinctive sense would not be overruled. he now found it as impossible to remain in the cottage as it had previously been to leave. he thanked the fisherman for all that he had done, and promised to send word to him, or come himself, as soon as he knew that all was well. and he promised to be careful. the veteran was concerned: his experience had taught him the inadvisability of haste. but seeing the intensity of the younger man's face he could only wish him well, and after he had gone, say a silent prayer for him in his own fashion. the wheels of fate were turning. events were in god's hands now. * * * mary wandered aimlessly across the high plateau toward the sea, feeling lost and miserable. as she walked she watched the fog rise slowly and evaporate, along with all faith in herself. vaguely she told herself that she would never again live with her mother in the dark, dismal hut, where everything was smoke and confusion. but even this seemed a wavering resolve. how could she promise herself anything, when she had been so weak..... a single tear broke from the stillness of her face, as she realized that in all the haste of her flight she had nonetheless seized the heavy cloak from its peg by the door, the same which she now wrapped about her. she cried because this instinctive action showed her, more even than the painful workings of her mind, that a part of her still wanted to live. as much as she had loved michael, and loathed the thought of a world without him. . .still, she desired life. it was in that moment an unbearable anguish. she heard hoofbeats approaching from the west. this did not at first seem to register, except perhaps for a dim realization that it could not be the man she feared, who would have to approach from the east---behind her. the plateau had gradually sunk and narrowed, until now it was little more than a rough gully between the two rocky shoulders which pressed upon it. it occurred to her that the riders, still hidden by the rise and fall of the track ahead, would soon be upon her, and that there was nowhere to hide. but the same nightmare logic that says not to fear, it is only a dream, told her now that this could not be what in fact it was: a dangerous meeting in a place far from help. it all seemed so inevitable. and she was tired of fighting. two horsemen appeared on the track below her as she reached the crown of the rise, which occurred at the very point where the opposing walls were highest, rising in serrated levels to a height of sixty feet, several yards to either side of her. the riders were dressed in red. she looked quickly about her for a sheltering shadow or place to hide, as all the warnings that she had been raised on began to torment her. but the noon sun was hidden by a cloud, as if it had not the heart to watch: there were no shadows. and they had seen her. the two men rode easily, lazily in their fine english saddles. young cavalrymen, they had been sent to investigate reports that one of the escaped prisoners believed to be in the area had been sighted. but if their superiors placed a high importance on the capture of these elusive wretches, clearly they did not. for them it was a tedious duty; and without their captain to oversee them they were merely pretending to search, killing time and half looking for trouble. like much of the english military of that time they were not volunteers, but had been pressed into service as an alternative to prison. they were neither dedicated nor high-minded, and had been assigned to this remote desert (as they thought of it) because they were fit for little else. in fact, they were hooligans, representing not the best of their country, but the worst. as for compassion, they had little enough for their own kind. for the kin of these stubborn highland fools, they had none. so when they saw the girl it was not a question of what they wanted from her, but only, would there be anyone to witness the act? their eyes searched ahead and behind, to either side, then fixed resolutely on the girl. mary observed all of this, but stood rooted to the spot in fear and disbelief. surely they could not want her like this, pale and distraught. surely they had some conscience. the two riders stopped just in front of her, addressing each other as if she did not exist. "what d'ya think?" said the first in a heavy cockney. he was a smallish, heavy-set man with a nondescript face and yellow teeth. "would be a fine catch, and no mistake." his companion, a lean, dour-looking man with drooping red moustaches, did not at first reply, but only continued to stare at the object in question. "i think," he said at length, dismounting. "that i want you to hold my horse." the smaller man laughed harshly, and spurred his own steed forward to take hold of the reins. "just be sure ya save some for me," he said. "i don't fancy ridin' a dead horse." the red-haired man began to advance, as mary backed away in rising horror. "please," she said in a pathetic voice. "don't do this." but her words had no effect. the man seized her by the arms, and after a moment's indecision, threw her to the ground. and then he was upon her, tearing at the buttons of her dress, pressing her body hard against the stony track. writhing in terror, mary let out a piercing scream. the man lifted his hand to strike her. but the blow never fell. a shadow flashed across her vision, as an indistinct shape flew down from the rocks above. there was the thud of impact, as the man on top of her was torn aside. two men wrestled on the ground beside her. the one, in rough clothes that fit him badly, quickly gained the upper hand, pinning the other beneath him. he raised a long knife in his hand, and with a savage cry, drove the blade home. but an instant later there came a shot from behind, and the prisoner fell forward across the man that he had stilled. the second cavalryman, still mounted, had draw his pistol as soon as he regained his senses, and waited only for a clear shot at the highlander. in the confusion he had lost his grip on the other's horse, which bolted at the sound. and taking quick stock of the situation, the cavalryman seemed to feel much the same panic. for he too rode away, as if the devil rode behind him. his hoofbeats died slowly in the distance. recovering somewhat from the shock, mary rose and went to the crumpled form of her deliverer, to see if anything could be done. the ball had pierced his back, but perhaps..... raising his upper body carefully, she drew him clear of the other. then kneeling, she slowly laid him down, causing the fair, curly head to loll weakly into her lap. she let out a gasp as a familiar face looked up at her, and said her name with a smile. "my mary." it was james talbert, her cousin, and companion of her youth. and though he lay dying, there was yet a look of strained happiness on his worn, still boyish face. "james!" she choked through her tears. "you should have just let them..... oh. don't die!" "hush, my girl. i don't mind." his words were quiet but distinct. "you don't know it---" his face clouded with pain, and for a time he was unable to speak. "you've done me a kindness," he said finally. "you've given my death meaning." with this he stiffened, and gave a convulsive shudder. she feared he was already gone; but after a pause the blue eyes opened again, and he spoke. "will you do something for me?" "anything," she wept. "anything." "kiss me, mary." brushing the tear-stained hair from her face, she did as he asked. "thank you, love..... you're so very sweet..... too bad you're in love with that other one, eh?" he tried to wink at her, but his face was suddenly changed, as crestfallen as the moment before it had been triumphant. his muscles convulsed from the pain of his mortal wound. "kiss me, mary. i'm gone to a better world." trembling, she bent once more to press her lips to his. and when she rose again, he was gone. "no . dear god, please! it should have been me," she sobbed. "it should have been me." she rocked him slowly back and forth, for the second time in her young life crying the bitter tears of a loved one lost. a heavy silence reigned about her, and the birds in the heath would not sing. fifteen so it was that stephen purceville found her. he had knocked twice on the door of the hut, with growing impatience until, receiving no answer to his summons, he kicked it in. there he had found her gone, the place empty but for a filthy hag who hid her face and said nothing. yet for all his indifference and haste, the momentary glimpse of her eyes had struck a chord of memory inside him, though he was far too angry to puzzle it out. his woman (he thought of everything he desired as his) had betrayed him, gone off, when she knew that he wanted to see her. riding off in a storm of emotion, he came across sergeant billings as he rejoined the main track, who with a scared face spoke of ambush and treachery, and pointed back along the way he had come. angered still further by the intrusion of duty (and reality) upon his romantic dreams, he forced out of the man what information he could, then bluntly ordered him to be silent, and follow. so the two rode west together, and found her still in the same attitude, holding the body as she would a sick child. she did not at first seem to hear them approach, till with a vehemence which startled them both, the young purceville screamed at her: "what is the meaning of this!" mary turned, as if not understanding what was wanted of her. her eyes focused on him with an effort, and she replied slowly, in a voice that seemed to come from far away: from the bottom of a well. "two men are dead, who perhaps desired life. and one who desired death still lives. what meaning would you have?" the blankness of her face astonished him. for a brief instant he felt something akin to genuine horror. what could have happened to transform the lithe, innocent creature of so few days before? but the thought could not penetrate deeply, for now the smaller man had begun to speak. "you see, captain, it's just as i told you." he spoke rapidly, eyes wide and shifting with the obvious lie. "she `ates us. set a trap for us she did, acting all seductive like. then her man jumps down from the rocks---" "you shut your mouth!" cried purceville bitterly. he had seen mary's torn dress, and knew how much faith to place in the character of these men. "get out of here," he said. "back to the barracks. and god help you when i return." the small man rode off in haste, but did not go where he was sent. as he struck the high road he turned to the south instead, and fled into obscurity. the englishman dismounted and came closer. his face was a study of inner conflict, as rage and compassion warred inside him. mary had little doubt (nor was she wrong) which side would win. "why?" he asked flatly, stopping a few feet away. "why didn't you wait for me? if you had. . .none of this would have happened." the girl slowly lowered the body, then stood to face him. "in the name of god, stephen, is there any part of you that isn't utterly cruel? do you think i don't know that?" this was too much. her patience expired, and she no longer cared for the consequences. "am i supposed to feel worse because i also hurt your feelings? am i supposed to equate that with the death of two men, one of them my cousin? damn you! if you possessed the least sensitivity you'd have known three days ago there could be nothing romantic between us. and today. if i had thought for one moment that you would listen to reason, and let me explain---" "what would you explain!" he cried hotly. "that you have been sleeping with a traitor? that you prefer his filthy scottish bed to mine? that you are a whore, like all the others? well? why don't you speak!" "i am very sorry for you," she said at last. "you are blind, as no man i have ever known. you will never learn, and you will never change." and with that she turned her back on him. for a single moment he stood transfixed, loving, and at the same time hating. . .her . she knew him as no one else, and had always spoken the truth. but the words she spoke now were not soothing, were not the gentle words of comfort he sought. instead they burned, like salt on an open wound. pure, blind hatred rose up inside him, devouring all else. he seized her by the shoulders, and with the heat of the primal hunger, turned her towards him. if love would not be gratified, then he would at least have lust. for the second time that day, mary looked into the unseeing eyes of rape. terror was no longer possible. all she could feel was despair, and pity. this would be the final, unbearable shame for them both. "stephen, i beg you. in the name of what you once felt for me, and i for you. don't do this. forgive my hard words. i do not hate you. but this..... this can never be." "why not? why can't it?" he pressed her hard against him. "you know you want me." his mouth engulfed hers, then moved greedily to the skin of her throat. "stephen, don't . it's not right!" she tried to pull away, but he held her fast. she felt his left hand drag her downward, as his right hand worked to free the remaining buttons. "stephen. . .no!" she was on the ground, and he had flung aside his coat, looming on one knee beside her. then with a swift movement of both hands he tore open her slip, the widening v of her dress. still further, till the treasures of her body lay exposed. his mouth was upon her breast, as his hand swept low to engulf her. "stephen! for god's sake. . .i'm your sister!" he froze instantly, then lifted his head with a jerk. "you're lying." "no," she said bitterly. "my mother is the widow maccain. your father raped her, then sent her away when he found she was with child. your father. . .is my father, too." she sat up, pulling her knees to her chest. and the pain in her eyes was more than he could face. because he knew that it was true. then for the first time he seemed to see the bodies, and to realize that they had once been men. and he saw her, his gentle sister, ravaged and distraught by the work of his own hands. he did not feel remorse, which was beyond him. but sorrow he could feel, and even, in that moment, a halting compassion. "i'm sorry. mary. i didn't know..... there's really nothing more i can say." he rose, shifted uncomfortably, trying to reconcile himself to his actions. it was impossible. "is there anything i can do now," he said stiffly. "to make it better." "no. just go away." he turned, and started to leave. "wait," she said, half against her will. she could not look at him. "help me to bury him. both of them." he put on his jacket, pawed the ground with his boot. ".....i'll need a shovel." "ride back to the hut. my mother will give you one." she finally looked up at him, and the tears would not stop. "please leave now. i'm not that strong." he remounted slowly, and with one last look at her, rode off. mary was left to prepare her cousin's body, and to seeping thoughts of death and earth. when stephen returned, they buried james talbert. and then the other, placing stones over the mounds to keep the wolves off. there were no other adornments to give them. and even as they worked, the clouds thickened and turned to rain, as if nature wept, to see the unending tragedy of man. sixteen "may i take you back to the hut," stephen said when they had laid the last stone. "i have much on my conscience already. i would see you safely home, at least." he could say no more, nor did she wish him to. they rode back in silence, and in silence they parted. with silence, too, did she greet her mother, who asked no questions, but only welcomed her with a strange, apologetic smile. hardly able to notice, let alone dissect the mysterious change in her, mary shed her wet and tattered garments, then hung her cloak by the fire to dry. as she put on the nightgown the old woman provided she said blankly, and bitterly. "james talbert is dead. i must go and tell anne this evening. please don't wake me until then." she lay listlessly in the bed, and after a long, empty passage of time, fell asleep. she did not dream. her mother returned to her place by the fire, and sat down in a melancholy heap. she felt anxious and utterly lost, without place or purpose in the world. for a change had in fact taken place in her, with or without her consent. in the troubled hours since her daughter's flight, it had become impossible to think of killing and tearing down. too clearly did she see, and feel, and remember all the dark, destructive forces that pull the living back to earth, wholly without a woman's schemes. and she felt this to the core of her being, because she knew that she, too, would soon return to dust. because her body was at long last giving out. beside the painful angina which had plagued her since the night of the stone, she felt in these bitter, infinite hours a dizziness and blurring of vision which she knew to be the forerunner of stroke. her daughter had not yet realized her condition, and for this, at least, she was grateful. as her own life inexorably diminished, she found she thought less and less of herself---of the past---and more and more of her daughter's future. this was both painful and sad, because she saw the tragedy of her own life mingling, and becoming one, with mary's. how similar. her love for john maccain---clean, strong, yet ended by untimely death. then the desperate, animal attraction to a handsome, brutal man who had broken her heart, and crushed the last of her dreams. he was his father's son..... then the emptiness, and finally the horrid, burning hatred of all that still lived, loved, and desired happiness. her one hope now, strange as it might have seemed but a few days before, was that the girl might still be young enough to heal, and wise enough to seek that healing in the light of life, rather than the darkness of revenge, which had so fruitlessly swallowed the remnant of her years. mary woke to find a fresh dress and undergarments waiting at the foot of the bed. after she had dressed, her mother gave her tea and porridge, and to her surprise, did not try to dissuade her from the long journey to the faded cottage. both of them knew it to be a dreary, and possibly dangerous task. but both, for different reasons, also knew it to be essential. wrapping the cloak about her mary went to the door, determined not to look back. still, something made her turn. "i may not be coming back for a time," she said. "you understand that?" "yes," replied the old woman, in a voice wholly lacking its former strength. "will you make me one promise before you go? only make it, and i will rest easier." "what is it?" "promise me. . .that you won't try to take your own life. that you will not let the bitterness fester inside you like an unclean wound, turning slowly to the poison of hate. will you give me your word?" mary looked back at her, confused. "you have nothing to fear, i'm sure. i should have thought my weak character well known to you by now, and to have removed any such concern. twice i have set a hard resolve, and twice failed. i doubt if i should ever find the courage." "listen to me, mary." her mother spoke now so earnestly, and with a desperate entreaty so unlike her, that despite the numb lethargy into which her heart had sunk, mary felt a qualm of fear on her behalf. "it is not weakness," said the woman, "to desire life, and to respect it enough...." tears gathered in the pale, aged eyes that had lost their hard luster. "i fear i have done you a grievous ill. forgive me!" and she hid her face, ashamed. and for all the pain this woman had caused her, all the mother's love withheld for so many years, mary found herself unable to return the injury, now that the chance had come. she went to the old woman slowly, took down the trembling hands, and kissed her on the forehead. "you are what your life has made you. of course i forgive you. and i'll make your promise, if you'll make me one in return." her mother nodded helplessly. "will you promise to rest, and be gentle with yourself, until i can send a doctor back to check on you?" ... "yes." "all right, then. let me help you to bed, then i'll build up the fire one last time." her mother was unable to reply. and having done what she said, mary left her with those words. margaret maccain died three hours later, as a black curtain descended slowly across the field of her vision. a single tear escaped her. she said a silent prayer for her daughter. and then she, too, was gone. mary walked on through the bitter night, the faltering torch she held like a fretted candle in the depths of the dark. the rain had stopped, and the ground frozen solid. each footstep clumped painfully against the hard, unyielding earth. her mind was so numbed with pain and loss that she found she could not even think. time seemed to stop dead in its tracks just to mock her. she continued. passing without fear the standing stone, she regarded it now in blank wonder, that she could ever have thought it more than a broken and projecting bone of the lifeless earth. it fell behind her plodding footsteps, an impotent slab of nothingness. a wolf cried out in the distance, and she did not even care. right foot, left foot, followed one another in mindless, meaningless rhythm. all was dead for her. nothing lived, nothing moved, nothing breathed. there was only this one last task to perform, and then oblivion. at long, impossible length her weary footsteps took her along a familiar path, past a silent dell wreathed in scrub oak and maple. white crosses of stone shone dully in the moonlight, in a hollow she had once held sacred. a name was spoken in her mind, and in distant memory a hand caressed her face. she felt a moment of profound sadness, for a love that had died. but even that lost sorrow faded, till she knew that it was truly over. up the shallow hill to the cottage. she turned the knob of the thrice-familiar back door, and entered. through the kitchen, into the passage to the main room, where a fire was burning brightly. her aunt looked up as she entered, from the same armchair in which she had left her. a man stood beside her, with eyes so deep and piercing..... she collapsed to the floor. michael james scott lifted her in his trembling arms, and carried her to his mother's bed. part two: the fortress seventeen mary felt something cool being pressed against her forehead, and at the same time a warmth and lightness of being for which she could in no way account. remembering the vision she had seen of him---was it days, hours, moments before?---she opened her eyes slowly, afraid of waking from the blissful dream of his return, which could not possibly be real. yet the first thing she saw as they focused in the gentle candlelight, was the same beloved face, neither shrouded nor ghostly nor pale. it had aged, become more serious. but it was still of living flesh, still shared the same world as her own. he sat leaning across her on the bed, with softened, loving eyes taking in her every movement. his arms were spread to either side of her, within reach of her hands. and feeling again the swoon of emotion and disbelief, she caught at them quickly. her fingers encircled his wrists, and he did not fade away. again he pressed the cloth lightly to her forehead. then with a tenderness and swelling of the heart that erased in one moment the imprisoned hell of the past three years, he bent down and kissed her gently. "stay, mary. it's your michael, in the flesh, and he'll not leave you again." her eyes closed hard, and the tears that flowed from them were an anguish and an ecstasy for which no words exist. "hold me," was all she could say. "just hold me." he raised her up and crushed her to him, his face as wet as hers. "dear god, i love you." and again he kissed her, long and full. but then he drew back, and a dark shadow clouded his features, as if recalling some barrier which stood between them still. "what is it?" she asked, terrified. "forgive me," he said. "i know you're glad to see me. . .and i have no right to ask." their eyes met, and there was such astonished pain in her gaze..... "do you still love him?" he whispered. "do i still love who?" "the englishman." "michael! whoever said that i did?" ".....but your letter, the day i left to join our troops. the one you put in my pack, explaining---" "michael, look at me." he did, as bewildered as she. "i have never loved anyone but you. i never could. and i wrote you no such letter, then or otherwise. the only englishman i know is my half-brother, and if in the whole of my lifetime i can learn not to hate him, i will deem it a blessing from heaven." he fell back further still, as if it was she who had returned from the dead. the question of who, then, had written the letter, hardly occurred to him. only one thing mattered. against all hope. . .she loved him too. a tortured groan escaped him, and his face so convulsed with emotion that he could only hide it in shame against the coverlet. but slowly the paroxysm passed, and he felt loving fingers caressing his hair, and whispering words of comfort. "michael," she said, as he drew himself up, exhausted. "it must have been my mother who gave you the letter, part of a long, bitter plot against lord purceville. she needed my help, and wanted you out of the way. please forgive her. she harbored such hatred against him, that it made her blind to all else..... but that is in the past." she tried to smile, as he nodded his understanding. "you know," she said. "i have a few questions for you, too." he put a finger to her lips. "soon, but not now. let us have what remains of this night, at least, free from sorrow and danger. let us have each other." at that moment there came a light knocking at the door, and anne scott entered the room. her face was so softened, and beaming with such reborn faith that mary hardly recognized it. her unbound hair formed a loop of pale gold upon the shoulder of the nightdress, and she looked years younger than either could remember seeing her. "is everything all right?" she asked, as if this were not her home, but theirs. "if my son will give a doting mother one last embrace, i will leave the two of you in peace. i fancy i'll sleep in mary's room tonight, and give up my chambers to you." "truly, anne? would it be all right?" "listen to me, mary. god married the two of you long ago. and in this moment i'm so happy, so grateful....." she faltered, and her eyes glistened. "my son is given back to me, whom i thought to be dead. do you think i can't share him, this one night, with the woman he loves, and the girl i raised up from a child? please, michael, before i make a fool of myself. kiss me, then send me off to bed." he rose, but not more quickly than she. mary embraced her first, like a schoolgirl, then stood aside as mother and son said their affectionate good-night. "in the morning hard choices await us," said the woman, addressing them both. "but for now, let us thank god. let us thank him." she was blinded by tears, and turned away. michael watched her go, then closed the door softly behind her. "in the morning i shall have to give her sad news," said the girl, remembering her purpose. "and perhaps it will grieve you as well." "what is it, mary?" and despite his own assurances, he felt that he must know. "tell me now, and let us have done with dark surprises." ... "michael. your friend and mine. james talbert is dead." he was silent for a time, then asked simply. "how?" "two men attacked me on the road west of my mother's hut." she thought it best not to add that they were english. as it was he came forward and took her by the shoulders, with a look of sudden anger and concern. "attacked you? are you all right? they didn't---" she shook her head quickly, emphatically. "no. james saw to that. he killed the one. . .then was shot in the back by the other, who rode away." she looked at him imploringly. "i'm so terribly sorry. i feel as if it's my fault....." he held her close to him, and closed his eyes. "no, my girl," he said at length. "it's not your fault, and no more than i expected. i don't know if i can explain this to you. here. sit you down, and let me wrap the coverlet about me. i'm afraid i'm not quite well." she did as he asked, and studied this new michael as he spoke. he had changed both physically and spiritually, though there had always been another side of him, seeming at times so serious and worn that she could find no trace of the hardy, boisterous youth she had once known. and even as he spoke of the hardship and sorrow of another, her woman's instinct read his own tale between the lines. and seeing his pain, she determined to learn fully of the scars and afflictions he bore, that she might nurse him again to health and ease of mind. "james had a rough go of it in prison, as did we all. but for him the more so, because he could never master his pride and fierce temper. he didn't know when to back down, and just survive. because of this he was often singled out for punishment, as an example to the rest. punishment in that place. . .took various forms. but it always ended with the cellar, a cold and solitary cell in the ancient dungeon that lay beneath our castle prison. "for weeks on end. . .he was caged there without light or hope, like an animal. each return to the light of day saw him more ill, and more distracted. but it never once brought him closer to submission. towards the end, his feverish mental state had become so acute that our captors thought of sending him to an asylum. this, until it was learned that he had contracted the shakes*, which would sooner or later carry him off of their own accord. *ague. "it is a wonder that he lived to see the escape, let alone survived our long flight across the countryside. what a bloody hell that was. stealing food, horses when we could get them, riding or walking the endless miles by night, hiding out like thieves and murderers by day. all in the land of our birth, and the home that we had fought for. after what we had already been through, i don't know how he endured it. i, at least, had thoughts of you, though i had lost all hope of your love. he had nothing but fever and chills, and a strength that grew less each day." "my god. michael. did he know about the letter, the one you thought i wrote?" "yes, love. we'd been together through so much, and were now thrown into such a desperate pass..... there could be no secrets between us. but he loved you, as cousin and friend, and never held it against you." "then he died thinking. . .that i was in love with those who did this to you. oh, it is horrible." "easy, lass. his pain is over." again they embraced, taking that last human comfort against young and tragic death. then michael began to pace again, both to warm himself, and to finish what he must say. for he, too, carried a burden of guilt and remorse. "as i said, it is a wonder that he survived it. but some last obsession drove him: whether hope or madness, i could never say. he was determined to return to the home of his fathers, and perform some last act of heroism." he paused. "there is something else i haven't told you. something very painful to me." "what is it, michael?" he could not face her, as if she were some part of himself which he had shamed. and the look of self-reproach that she had long known in him, returned with a force she had not yet seen. "it was a horror for me to watch his decline, his hopeless battle in the stockade. because we are so much alike, and because i felt..... i often felt that he made my mistakes for me. that i learned, and survived, only because of him. many is the time that my own temper was about to explode, to my injury, and possible undoing.... but it was always james who struck the guard first, or raised his voice in anger at the outrage we all felt, but lacked the courage to act upon. "it is a terrible thing to think that he died for that courage, and that because of my cowardice i live. seeing the black end to which we must all come, still i shunned the fight. after the first year..... i only turned the other cheek, again and again. i told myself that i had to survive, just keep trying and hoping. but survival becomes a poor excuse, when pride is lost. "it will be many years," he concluded, "before i can look myself in the face when i think of james talbert." "why?" she asked, in deepest earnest. "because you desired life instead of death? because you saw the futility of resistance, and chose not to follow him into the grave? for i tell you now, and from the bottom of my heart, that if you had not lived, and come back to me. . .my own sorry tale could not have gone much further. "and what of your mother? do you have any idea what her life has been like, without you? i will never understand. why do men call it a virtue to die, to leave bereft the ones they love, and a weakness to return to them, and give meaning and substance to their lives? "perhaps that is unfair," she continued. "i have seen in the years of your absence just how bitter, how unanswerable sorrow can be. and i know that nothing is ever that simple. i only want you to know that this pain, this scar, i understand as well as you. i have felt the same remorse, the same bludgeoning sense of guilt. until tonight. "do you know what he said to me, as he lay dying in my arms? `you have given my death meaning.' he performed that last act of heroism, michael. he may have saved my life." her voice faltered. "and if what you say is true, then he also helped deliver my love from the depths of the darkness. and to me, his name shall always be thrice blessed. "hold me, michael, please. don't ever let me go. dear god!" "my only love, i promise you that. with all my soul, i promise you that." they put aside all further talk until the morning, and made their bed together for the first time. michael was too ill, and she herself too weary, to make love. and without any words this was understood between them. they found joy and solace instead in the slow, gentle caress many lovers never feel, because they do not first feel love. their passion would come when the skies above them were less dark, and when the fruit was ripe on the tree. not before. they slept far into the overcast morning. and when they rose a further bond had been established between them, that no earthly trial could ever put asunder. he was a man, and she was his woman. eighteen the lord henry purceville, governor of macpherson castle and the northern garrison, awoke in the worst possible humor. he had quarreled bitterly with his son the night before, after being informed that one of his cavalrymen had died in disgrace, and another deserted rank in consequence. his head throbbed from the excesses of food and drink that had become habitual with him; the whore that lay sleeping beside him (his mistress) stank of his own corruption; and the prisoners he had been charged to find, in the most demanding terms, still eluded him. in the chill of early morning, he felt every day of the fifty-three years he bore. of all these circumstances, the quarrel with his son troubled him most deeply. it was not so much the fact of a dispute, all too common between them, as the disturbing revelation which had come from it. because no man, no matter how far he has strayed from the path of wisdom, wants to appear low and cowardly in the eyes of his son. and no man, retaining from childhood the slightest memory of loving female attention, can wantonly desecrate the altar of motherhood without a latent stab of conscience. yet both these things had now risen up to haunt him, in the form of a daughter he had never seen. if the bastard child had been a boy (as he had vaguely imagined, when he thought of it at all), the problem might have been more easily reconciled and acted upon, one way or the other. but a young woman, and still more, a young woman who had evidently sparked some feeling of affection in his son---the only person he cared for in the world---this was far more complicated. sending his mistress to the floor with a savage kick, he bellowed for his servants, ordered her dismissed, then sent for his son to learn the particulars of the maccain girl. he was a man of action, and action would be taken. one way or the other. it was the widow scott who woke them. a premonition of danger had come to her, and whether real or imagined, she would take no chances so long as her son remained a wanted man. she knocked on their door as the mantle clock struck eleven, and asked them to dress quickly and come out, that they might formulate precautions in the event that mounted soldiers, or other unwanted strangers appeared at the house. when the two emerged and sat down to breakfast, and again as they moved to sit by the fire to hold counsel, the woman was struck by the seriousness of both faces. caution and determination she expected from her son, who had spoken to her the day before of the hardships and dangers he had already faced, and must face again, until he won his way to true freedom. but mary seemed to understand as well as he the risks and perils of their position, and acted not at all the happy, naive bride-to-be. and now, as michael built up the fire and drew the curtains tight, she found that the girl would not even look at her, would not return her questioning gaze. "mary? what is it, girl, what's wrong?" michael, who now returned to stand before her, intervened. "mother," he said gently, putting a hand on her shoulder. "my fears for james talbert have been realized. he died yesterday, defending those he loved. he has been given christian burial, and as soon as may be, we will place a stone over the grave. i'm sorry." the woman looked searchingly into his face, then lowered her head and wept silently. but when she raised it again, though her eyes still glistened, their look was firm and determined. "i will notify my brother tonight. it will be hard for him, and for his wife, because he meant as much to them..... nay, do not try to comfort me. i am a proud scottish woman, and not rendered helpless in my grief. the times are hard, and the living must look to their own devices. "that is why we are here," she went on. "painful as it may be, we must now turn our attention to our own precaution. we must be prepared for the worst. we must vow to protect your union to the last. and if it comes to it, you must be willing to sacrifice my safety for your own. do not argue with me, michael! i have had a full life, thank god, for all its latter hardship. i am determined that you shall have the same. the blood of scott and talbert, our family, must endure." having said this, she put one hand to the other, and slowly removed her wedding ring. she then placed it solemnly in her son's hand. no further explanation was needed. "thank you, mother. it means a great deal to me." michael returned to stand by his betrothed, who looked up at him in awe and astonishment, feeling for the first time the full import of what was happening between them. they were to be man and wife, as surely, and unalterably, as he now stood before her. "give me your hand, mary." she did. "with this ring, on the day of november , , i pledge to you my life, in the eyes of god and man. mary. will you have me as your husband?" she nodded fiercely, then all at once burst into tears. "you remember then," he added gently, "that this is your seventeenth birthday as well? i have not forgotten. it is the date i set long ago, when you were but a child, to speak openly of my love for you. i tell you now, if you did not already know it, that you have been my beacon and guiding star, the hope which i held fast to my heart, when all others deserted me. i love you, mary, with every drop of my mortal blood. i'll love you in this world, and if there is a god, then surely i will love you in the next." he kissed her, long and full. then began to pace, as if to master his own emotions. "all right then," he said, moving still. "our safety. "the immediate danger---that of a sudden search---has already been addressed by my mother and myself. our good steward, as the times grew dark, had the foresight to install a trap door with a small, stone-lined cellar beneath it. it has been checked, and with minor repairs, put in good working order. the cellar itself has been furnished with blankets, food and water. this occupied the better part of yesterday afternoon, the first of my return. i had determined to go in search of you this morning, when fortunately for both of us (i am still far from well, and had risked the daylight once already), you came to me first. "so far, until we've heard your story, i remain the principal danger to us all. if trouble does come, i can be hidden away in thirty seconds time. the door is here." he rolled back the threadbare carpet. "and the latch, here." he bent down and lifted the square trap on its hinges. when he let it down again, except by close scrutiny the wooden floor seemed of a piece, the door itself invisible. he replaced the carpet and came towards her, seeming calmer. "you see, my girl, anne and i have already had a chance to talk. from what she told me of her meeting with young purceville---and i expect that for my sake she did not tell all---i wonder if you are not in danger as well. we need to know fully who our enemies are, or are likely to be, and who can be trusted to come to our aid. i have one ally, a fisherman from the village of kroe, and the beginnings of a plan, though it is still far from ripe. the first step, as it must always be, is survival. can you tell us then, in as much detail as possible, what has happened in the time since you left the cottage?" "will you tell me one thing first?" she asked. "forgive me, michael, but after all i've been through, as you will soon hear..... it would put my mind very much at rest, if you would tell me....." her face betrayed a deep, lingering fear of the night. "who, if not yourself, lies in the grave beneath your stone?" "it is you who must forgive me. i should have told you sooner." he took her hand, and held it firmly. "it is no wraith who stands before you, and no one has raised me from the dead. "i can't be certain, but i believe it to be a man of my regiment. he was about the same height and build as myself, with roughly similar features. poor beggar. the only name i ever heard him called was jack. he was one of the younger lads, and shivering so dreadfully on the morning of the battle ---from cold and fear alike---that i gave him my coat, his being tattered, and far too light to serve. it's hard to believe to look at me now, wrapped up as for a winter storm, and pacing like an animal just to warm myself. but i was never cold in those days, as you'll recall." he gave a bitter laugh, then shook his head, as if to drive away the feeling. "looking back, i guess i was luckier than some. a ball grazed my head very early in the fighting, and i knew nothing more, until i found myself being dragged away by two english infantry..... what is it, mary? what have i said to upset you?" "they dragged you to a grove of dark trees! you were dazed and pale, but still they pulled at you fiercely, as if to throw you to the ground and run you through." "how on earth did you know that?" "i saw it in my dream! i thought i was witnessing your death. oh, michael, i've been so afraid!" it was some time before he could calm her enough to give voice to his own bewilderment. "it's all right, now. it's over. but the strange truth is....." he hesitated, not wanting to upset her further. "i thought it was the end for me as well, though they only took me to stand with the other prisoners. that day, and especially those first moments when i regained consciousness, have woven themselves in and out of my nightmares ever since. i don't understand. how could you have known?" surprisingly, it was the widow scott who shed light on this first part of the mystery. "i've heard it said that twins, or merely siblings who have been close since childhood, can be miles apart, after a separations of years, and suddenly know when the other is ill or in danger. the two of you, growing up as brother and sister, were every bit as close. and in some ways you shared a bond that was closer still, because you were in love. "i once heard you, mary, cry out `wolf!' in your sleep, only to learn the next day that michael had had a terrible dream, in which he was being torn apart by wolves. i thought it unnatural, and an ill omen, at the time. now i do not. there is obviously a deep spiritual link between you, such as i felt at times with my own husband. it is not for us to question god's gifts," she concluded, "but only to use them as well and honestly as we can." "that is why i came when i did," the man confirmed. "i knew that you were hurting and afraid. somehow i knew." "but the man in your grave," mary persisted. "you gave another man your coat. . .i remember they would not let me see the body. but surely that was not enough, of itself, to mistake him for you." "i'm afraid i must take the blame for that," said the woman sadly. "the body, when it was brought to me for identification, was so mangled by grapeshot. . .the face nothing but a bloody pulp. . .that i'm ashamed to say i lost my self-control. knowing that michael's papers had been found on him, i went into such a swoon of grief..... our poor countrymen who brought him could only assume that he was, in fact, my son. the coffin was brought and sealed, and the next day we buried him, along with all my hopes. "i was trying to protect you, mary, and was far too devastated to think clearly, or to search for further proofs. his hair and features, what could still be seen of them, were enough to complete the illusion. i suppose that in after times some doubt of it crept back to me. but as the months turned into years, and brought no word, i despaired. the only defense i can make, is that the pain of not knowing was greater still..... i could not ask myself, or those around me, to bear it any longer." there was silence. and then, without prompting, the young woman knew that the time had come to tell her tale. the spirits of the night, and the shadows of fear, must not be allowed to dwell inside her, but must be held forth in the hard light of day. she was afraid, and many times in the telling felt the pain of it too great to bear. but as michael had done in the hearing of a wise man of the sea, so mary now poured out the cup of her grief, not asking for pity, or answers, but only speaking the words that would not lie still. and when she had finished, michael was there beside her, and her own flesh still lived. her eyes, which had misted and looked into places dark and unfathomable, focused again on that which was real: stone, fire, and flesh. and in this return to daylight senses she no longer felt an all-conquering fear of the strange evens through which she had passed, but only a restless curiosity, and reborn questioning of the sinister forces which had then seemed so strong and undeniable. "can you tell me, michael, what these things portend? do you believe in the powers that my mother worshipped and feared?" "no, love. i do not believe in that kind of magic, nor have i any use for miracles, outside the one great miracle of life. still less do i believe in demons and sorcery now, for having heard your tale. it only shows me, more clearly than ever, the power of superstition to deceive. would you like me to show you the key to the mystery, the weak link which shatters the entire chain of seeming?" "yes," she replied. "more than anything." "the answer is simple," he said. "it is music: a magic that is real, disproving a magic that is not." "i don't understand." "bagpipes, mary. bagpipes. twice you heard them, and twice after saw the `spirits' which gave credence to all else, the foundation on which the whole illusion was built. here is what must have happened. "the first spirit i can answer for plainly, for it was myself. james and i had at last crossed the high road, and returned to land we could think of as our own. he had been given the pipes by a crippled soldier, one of our own, who took us in along the way. and now james would be silent no longer. he insisted that we return as proud veterans, and not skulking thieves. so as we parted ways at the last, and when he deemed me safely hidden by the rise that shields the cottage, he began to play, and marched off in defiant glory. "shortly afterward i found you in tears, lying across a grave that bore my name. it broke my heart to leave you there, even with the spoken promise---you did not imagine it---that i would come back to you. but i was determined to bring no danger upon you, or upon this house, until the pursuit had cooled, and the chance of discovery grown less. looking back, it was a cruel mistake. but i was obsessed. i was going to escape, and bring no danger upon you. i hope you can understand, and forgive me." "of course," said his mother, for both of them. "thank you," he said quietly. mary nodded gently, and asked him to continue. "all right.... and yet again, by the standing stone, you heard bagpipes. did they play scotland the brave?" "yes," she answered, understanding at last. "it is the only song james knew, or ever wanted to learn. it was he you saw: pale with affliction, kilted as a sign of defiance, as he could not be by day. he must have been half dead by then..... "for he, too, was determined to bring no harm upon his family. like myself he would not go to them, though he was too proud, and too far gone, to conceal himself as i did. i could not convince him to follow me to the hiding place, and i could not force him. i believe now that he must have spent those last nights in wandering and delirium, waiting for the chance to perform his final deed. but unstable as his mind had become, the heart beneath remained intact. and there were moments of perfect lucidity, as when he looked up from the ravine, and saw you. "he fled from your mother not in fear, but to protect her, and yourself." he released a deep breath. "the stone, and the words of the spell, were impotent but for the power you gave them. the mind creates worlds of its own, every bit as tangible, and every bit as dangerous, as the physical reality we all share. give up your common sense, your right to question, and you become a helpless lamb among the wolves of this world." "yes," said mary. "now it all seems so clear. the trunk filled with charms, the talismans to drive away your spirit, the spell my mother believes she cast over stephen purceville: all but the fabric of illusion, given substance by the wholly independent actions of men. i, too, have no more need of such miracles." "but," said michael firmly. "though the shadows of evil fade in the light of day, the evil itself does not. the purcevilles, both young and old, are still very much to be feared." nineteen as if in answer to his words, the thunder of hoofbeats came suddenly to their ears, approaching unexpectedly (for the british fortress lay in the opposite direction) from the west. the widow scott, who had felt the danger growing as the day wore on, was the first to react. she was up and out of her chair, and pulling back on the carpet before her son had a chance to stand clear. "michael, quickly!" and she forced her trembling hands to find the latch, and pull open the trap door. "michael, quickly!" and she forced her trembling hands to find the latch, and pull open the trap door. michael moved toward the opening, then turned to say a last word to his betrothed. but by chance his eyes lighted on her portrait, and for the first time he saw the bullet-hole at her throat. in horror he thought of stephen purceville, and in a flash read between the lines of what the women had (and had not) told him. and even as his mother tried to urge him down the steps, he reached out and took his lover by the wrist. "mary, too! until we're sure!" she nodded gratefully, not wanting to be parted from him, and the two descended. "remember my words," the widow whispered through the crack, before sealing them in darkness. "you must be willing to sacrifice me. no arguments!" she closed the trap and pulled the rug to, even as the snorting of hard-driven animals mingled with men's voices and the sounds of dismounting. heavy boots rattled the front steps, followed by a thumping fist upon the door. "open," came a heavy voice. "in the name of the king, and on peril of your life. open!" anne scott looked quickly about her for any tell-tale signs of company. there were none, and gratefully she recalled the other precautions she had taken: both bedrooms had been straightened, the dishes cleaned and put away. but for mary's cloak, which she could pass as her own, the two still wore all the clothing they had brought. mastering her fright as best she could, fiercely determined to protect her young, she went to the door. . .and opened it. but for all her resolve, her eyes were unprepared for the spectacle which greeted them. the lord henry purceville himself stood before her. and beyond his hulking form, she saw the bodies of two men slung across spare horses, one of which, dressed in ill-fitting clothes, pale and stained with earth..... it was only by supreme exertion that she kept herself from swooning. there were twenty riders at least, all tainted with the smell of smoke. "where is she?" bellowed lord purceville, pushing her aside with such force that she really did stagger. then to her bewilderment his son, who had followed him in, caught her up, and in the moment it took to steady her, whispered in her ear: "tell him nothing. i'll do what i can to protect you." the older man whirled angrily. "i tell you i want her. ballard! tear the place apart. stubb! take the rest of the men and search the surrounding countryside. meet me back at the barracks with your report; and if you value your hide, don't come back empty!" with this all but two of the men---the one called ballard, and another he detained by seizing his collar and shoving him forward---rode off. these entered quickly, and began going through the rooms, opening drawers and overturning furniture. of the two only ballard, a large, swarthy man whose hands and face were darkened with soot, seemed to enjoy the work. the other, a lad of sixteen or thereabouts, only followed with a scared look, doing what his lieutenant commanded. as for lord purceville, he sat himself in the chair that mary had occupied, and stared at the woman icily, beckoning (ordering) his son to sit across from him. the widow scott could only look back at him in dismay, and try not to notice his thick black boots, resting at the very edge of the carpet. he was heavier, and grayer than she remembered, those many long years ago. but her first impression of him then---that of a bull about to charge---still held true. he was a big man, both taller and more thickly muscled than his son. their faces were much alike, except that the father's was fuller: more rudely carved, more deeply lined, more savage. but if harsh features were a mark of lesser intelligence, then the rule was broken here. his mind was more than a match for his son's, or even mary's. the truly frightening thing about him, as she would soon learn, was that this glowering beast, this physical brute, was also sharper and shrewder than any man she had ever known. she could not feel brave in his presence, only vulnerable and afraid. but as the two men returned from the loft, reporting, "no sign that anyone's been here but herself, though the upper room is undoubtedly a young lady's," she remembered the dangerous nearness of those she had sworn to protect, and the injuries they had already suffered at the hands of such men. her pride returned, along with the instinctive cunning of a woman cornered. "of course," she said, feigning indignation against the search alone, and total ignorance of what they could want from her. "it is my niece's room, to return to if and when she chooses." "and where is she now?" demanded the tyrant. "she has gone to live with her mother, as i told your son not a fortnight since. i suggest you look for her there." it occurred to her only after she had said this that it might endanger her sister-in-law. "it may please you to know," he said calmly, taking a sharpened letter-knife from his coat and twirling it carelessly between his fingers, "that we have already been to see the widow maccain. she, too, had the insolence to speak to me in such a manner. would you like to know what we did to her? tell her, ballard." "burned her for a witch, we did---tied to a tree, right up on her own roof." the man smiled, as if he found this detail particularly satisfying. "my one regret, lord, is that you hit her so hard in the questioning, she never regained her senses to enjoy it. one would have thought she was dead already." "that will be all, lieutenant. take the bodies back to the castle. but first, check the neighborhood. see if you can't flush out a kilt and jacket for our amorous red-haired friend, if you follow my meaning." "i do at that, sir. and i don't suppose it would hurt to brand him for a prisoner as well?" "number . good day, ballard." the lieutenant pushed the younger man forward, then followed him out, closing the door behind. "as you see," continued purceville, "i have ways of arranging circumstances to meet my own ends. and i have no qualms at all about eliminating women who oppose me. i can think of at least a dozen pretexts to end your life right now. would you like to hear them?" "i have told you already," said the woman, vainly trying to suppress the image of her sister engulfed in flames. "i have told you that my niece is not here, that she left me a week ago. your son himself can attest to that..... i do not know where she is." "that is the second time today you have referred me to my son. the truth is, dead woman , that i have no strong inclination to believe him. i don't know what it is about the maccain girl that causes those around her to feel so protective---the illusion of innocence, no doubt---but it seems i must accept the fact. my own son has lied to me about the `cousin' who saved her from assault, neglecting to mention that the man was also a jacobite, and one of the fugitives we sought. fortunately, as you saw, i take nothing for granted. i found it out for myself, and now have the evidence i need to hang her, if i so desire." "on what charge?" "harboring a fugitive!" he bellowed. "and conspiracy to murder soldiers of the crown! one of my men was killed in this alleged `assault', and another has disappeared entirely. all serious crimes, punishable by death." he paused, letting this new threat sink in. "now do you have anything to say to me, to save the girl's life, as well as your own?" the widow glanced quickly at the son, wondering when, if not now, he intended to come to her aid. but he only turned away, and she surrendered all hope of it. looking back at the father, who had stopped twirling the knife, and only stared back at her with cold murder in his eyes, she could not help but feel that the end had truly come. she had been prepared for the worst, and ready to sacrifice all. because of this, and because of the skilled aggression of the lord purceville, everything she saw and heard only worked to confirm her darkest imaginings. her heart went cold inside her as he rose to his feet, the knife clenched firmly in his hand. her eyes misted and her limbs trembled; but she never once thought of betraying her son. she hung her head and was silent, waiting for death. she waited in vain. stephen purceville did not intervene, among other considerations, because he knew that his father was bluffing. even a governor could not kill a woman without cause, and stephen was astute enough to know it. the political winds, to which his father was not immune, were shifting. a move toward reconciliation had begun, and such acts of wanton violence, as well as the men who employed them, were rapidly losing favor in the eyes of the court. also, his father had made many enemies in his rise to power, men who would use such a thing against him, as they had tried to use the escaped prisoners. to burn a corpse as a scare tactic was one thing. to murder a woman in cold blood was quite another. not that the younger man put it to himself in this way. he did not have to. he knew the realities, and he knew the man. his father was bluffing. the woman was startled out of her black study by the last sound on earth she expected. rather than the slow, sinister footsteps she had tried to anticipate, she was called back instead by the sound, infinitely more mocking than laughter, of strong male hands striking together. she looked up, and he was clapping! "madame," he said, "i salute you. you have withstood the first assault. i can afford to be magnanimous, for you will not survive the second." and again the face turned deadly serious, though the look of restless violence was gone. it was impossible to believe that it had been feigned. it had not. but neither had it brought the desired result; and he was wise enough, now, to adopt a different course. for he had no doubt that the woman was hiding something. the hard edge of his foil remained, but the strokes became finer, more mincing. "a lesson for you, stephen. most women, indeed, almost all, can either be bought, or threatened into giving up what is wanted. why? because they lack the simple courage---to face life in the first case, and death in the second. they use money, and men, as a shield against life; and nothing on this earth can induce them to face death, or even the thought of death. "i have heard it said that if women ruled the world, there would be no war. that is true, but hardly a compliment. the reason there would be no war is that none of them would have the courage to fight it. at the first shot they would all throw down their arms and run away. deceit, manipulation, love. these are the weapons they employ. "but as witnessed here, there are a few scattered instances of honest character, of a woman standing up to death. but almost always it is done in the defense of her immediate family: her husband, her child. that is what puzzles me here. having threatened her own life unsuccessfully, i took the next step, as i taught you long ago: threaten the thing she is trying to protect, and mean it. but even this brought no result. why? at such times one must draw back, look beneath the surface, examine motive . "the implied motive here is to protect her niece alone, but i do not believe it. no woman is willing to die for the bastard child---oh yes, i know! ---of her sister-in-law, and a man she both fears and detests. perhaps she raised her from a child? still not enough. we must look for some deeper relationship. "did you see, when she thought i meant to kill her, the way she hung her head, and reached down into some secret place she believes i cannot touch? whose image did she turn to in her moment of need? for i tell you, stephen, she was prepared to die. and it wasn't for any half-breed girl." he took a sheet of folded parchment from an inner pocket, and settling more deeply in the chair, smoothed it open against his thigh. "i have here a list, names and numbers. it was brought to me yesterday, along with more detailed information, concerning the prisoners still at large---thankfully, very few. i think you will find our information quite thorough and up to date. now i know not only the men who hail from this country---and are therefore likely to return---but also the friends they kept in the stockade, and the smaller groups they split into after the escape. "you heard me tell my lieutenant to brand the number on our dead comrade's body---though i warn you, i may still use it to incriminate your niece. why that particular number? i will tell you. it is the number of one of the men decidedly traced to this area: the companion, protector, and...could it be...the cousin of our heroic james talbert? are we coming nearer the mark, mrs. scott? you look quiet pale; would you like to sit down?" "i will stand," she said desperately, trying to prepare herself against the coming blow. for now he had found the weak place in her armor, the secret refuge of her soul. one thought only kept hammering at her brain. admit nothing. at all costs she must not let this shark catch scent of her son's blood. and in fact the identity of the second prisoner was not known to him, though his insight and shrewd guesses had brought him dangerously close to the truth. beside the number , the reported friend and fellow fugitive of james talbert, were written these words: no name given, possible memory loss from head wound, called by fellow prisoners `jamie' . this was the small victory that michael had won during the first brutal year of his captivity: he would not give up his true name. his identity, and therefore his life, remained hidden. but through the uncanny memory for persons and places which every tyrant must possess, the lord purceville recalled a sturdy youth, several years older than his son, who had once accompanied the scotts on a visit to margaret maccain, during the time of her employment at his estate---the fierce disdain he had shown as he stepped from the carriage, and spied its hated master. where was this fiery-eyed youth now, who must surely have been of fighting age and temperament at the time of the revolt? had he been taken prisoner, and escaped along with james talbert, or merely been killed in the war? in any event the mention of his name was bound to cause an emotional reaction in the mother, which might lead him in turn to the girl. like a skilled fortune-teller he would draw her out, read the story in her face, and follow where it led. between pauses: "what was this prisoner's name, you ask? why, his last name appears to be scott. could that be your son? has he been here of late, to visit you? is it he you are trying to protect? is he in hiding along with mary? yes, of course. that's it. they grew up together, did they not? were they very close, your strong, golden-haired son and fair, emerald-eyed niece? they say that cousin is a dangerous relationship; surely there was an attraction. could they have been more than friends. . .even, lovers?" at this stephen's head jerked towards her, as if he had been scalded. the woman could bear it no longer; she felt herself ready to explode. but just as fear and rage rose irrepressibly inside her, she instinctively channeled the outburst to lead him away from her son. "have you no shame, sir! my son is dead and buried these three years, as a short walk to the gravesite of our clan will plainly show. he was a brother and father both to my niece, and as fine a man as you could ask. you will not speak against his honor in my house! he was willing to die to stand up to the likes of you, and so am i. kill me, if you have the courage. by god, i'll listen to no more of this!" "careful, mrs. scott. you say your son lies yonder in the grave, but that too could be a hoax. i have unearthed two bodies already. i will not hesitate---" this was too much for her. for the first time in her life, hatred flared into animal violence. "you will do no such thing! check the funeral record at the vestry, then take yourself to the devil!" seizing her husband's stout walking stick from its place in the corner she flew at him, screaming. "you get out of my house! get out, you godless bastard!" and though she was but a woman---though her blows were blocked and the stick taken from her---the suddenness of her fury served its purpose. the man believed her son was dead, and saw plainly there was nothing more to be got out of her. yet in his answering rage he might still have done her serious injury, if his son had not intervened. henry purceville pushed her back against the stone hearth wall, and cocked his great fist for a blow which might well have killed her. stephen caught his father's arm and pulled him away from her, slowly but firmly. "you don't want to do this," he said. "no one speaks to me like that. i'll kill her!" "and give earl arthur the weapon he needs to call an inquest? destroy yourself for a moment's passion?" "she has defied me! i will have my daughter brought before me." "then leave her to me, if that is all you want. i know more of this family than you do. promise me now, in front of her, give me your word, that you will do nothing to harm the girl, or put her on trial for conspiracy." his father only struggled more fiercely, outraged that anyone should force on him such a condition. but he found himself breathing too hard: his chest ached, and the exertions of the day had begun to take their toll on him. he was tired. he felt old. still, had the request not come from his son, and had he not already been willing..... with a last sweep of his arm he broke free, and relaxed his great limbs. then looked his son full in the face. "i will do it for you , to show that i am not what you think. if you bring the girl to me, tonight, i will drop all charges. and i never meant to harm her..... "you accused me of many things last night. you are very naive. since your mother's death, it is true that i have not been kind. kindness gains a man nothing, nor does the illusion of love, as you will find. yes, i sent the maccain woman away, as the scheming slut she was. but i have no intention of hanging my own daughter. perhaps you will not believe it, but as much as anything..... i just want to see her." he threw up his hands in disgust. "i promise, damn you all! bring her to me, tonight, and the charges will be dropped." stephen stepped away, and to the center of the room, feeling awkward and stiff. this was the closest thing to a confidence that his father had shown him in many years. "thank you, father. that should be agreeable..... you might as well start back. if i may speak to mrs. scott alone, i think i can convince her that it is the only way." "see that you do!" he growled, turning on the woman once more. "if you can't, bring her instead. i'm not over-fond of hostages, but they usually bring the desired result. good day , mrs. scott." without further speech he filed past and out the door, remounted his fierce gray, and rode off. stephen was silent for several minutes, as if confused in his loyalties. then turned again to face the woman. he spoke stiffly. "mrs. scott. i must apologize to you for my conduct at our last meeting. you have no reason to believe it, i'm sure. but i am not the same man now, that i was. your niece, my sister, has forced me to look at myself in a new light. i don't much like what i see. i make no excuses, except to say that i am my father's son, and was raised without..... nevermind. i am sorry, too, that you had to endure his wrath for so long. there was no other way. had i spoken before i did, it would simply have made matters worse." the woman could only stare at him in disbelief. "and now all you ask," she replied, "in exchange for my own freedom, is that i turn an innocent young woman over to the man who burned her mother at the stake, and threatened to violate my son's grave. to say nothing of what you yourself have done. why should my answer to you be any different than the one i made your father?" his face flushed with anger, which he then suppressed. "first, because i am trying to protect her. and you, though you don't believe it. second, because he didn't kill her mother, or even strike her, as he told his men. she was dead when we arrived..... you don't believe me. here. she left this note for mary." he handed her a single sheet, on which was written the woman's dying message to her daughter. the hand was weak and failing, but undoubtedly that of her sister. anne scott read it quickly, then looked searchingly into the young man's face. "the third reason, and i do not say it as my father would..... i know she's here, mrs. scott. the soiled cloak on the peg, is hers. she was wearing it yesterday when..... when i found out what kind of man i had become. i can't forgive myself for that. i can only try to make amends, by seeing to it that she is never again brought to such a pass. "but i'm afraid the first step toward that end, must be the visit to my father. you must believe me, he will do nothing to harm her, so long as i remain as her protector. he is angry now, and afraid that she may pose some new threat, when his skies are already darkened for a storm. but when he learns her true nature, as i have, he will realize his mistake. and if i have anything to say about it, he will make restitution as well, for the years he left her destitute. "mrs. scott. i don't ask you to forgive the wrongs that were committed in the past, only that you trust me to know the realities of the present. if he is defied, my father will only become more ruthless. he will scour the countryside; he will never stop. you must let me take her to him. there is no other way." the woman moved wearily to her chair, and sat down. violence she had been prepared to withstand, and treachery. but a seemingly genuine offer of help, from the one man with any influence over their most deadly enemy. . .confused her utterly. where did her responsibility lie now? for though she tried to suppress it, another thought had occurred to her. if lord purceville dropped the charges against her niece, and sent to edinburgh (or merely buried) the body of mary's assailant as prisoner number , would that not end the search for her son, and make him, in time, a free man? try as she might, she could not help but wonder at this chance, and weigh it against the possible danger to her niece. "will you do something for me?" she asked him. "will you return to me in an hour's time? my niece, as you guessed, is close by. but i must have time to think, and speak to her at length, before i can come to any decision." "you understand that i cannot go far? and that if either of you try to escape, i merely become an extension of my father---just as hard, just as ruthless." "yes," she replied. "i ask nothing more." ... "where would you suggest i go?" "our ancestral gravesite lies in the wooded dell, a quarter of a mile from here, by the back path. there you may satisfy yourself that my son was in fact killed in the war. nay, don't be angry. i saw the look that crossed your face when your father said those things about him. if you are to remain as mary's protector..... it's important to me that you know they were not true." "all right. i will remain in the dell for thirty minutes, no more. then i will ride in wide circles about the house, to insure that no attempt is made to escape. i must take her back, tonight. and the day is already growing long." "thank you," said the woman. "if you will truly act as the friend and benefactor of my niece..... you will not only have my forgiveness, but my gratitude as well." stephen nodded with an unreadable expression, and left the house. as soon as his horse's hooves could no longer be heard, she went to the trap. despite all michael's objections, when she learned the chance existed to free him from the pursuit and persecution of the english, mary too insisted that it must be taken, the plan tried. and his mother told him plainly: "you are unwell, and a wanted man. if nothing else, this buys you time to recover from the harrows of your affliction. you are the one among us most in danger, and most in need. we are going to do this for you; there is no time for pride and fear!" he would never have consented, no matter how great the pressure, if he knew that stephen purceville himself had assaulted mary, and that his father had violated the grave of james talbert, to obtain for him this `chance'. but he did not know. and it soon became clear that the only way to stop the two from going---anne scott accompanying her as a guardian---would be to try to restrain them physically, to the possible undoing of them all. for at irregular intervals they heard the hoofbeats of stephen's horse, now nearer, now farther away. and the hour was nearly expired. as it was he was far from pacified, and had nearly to be forced down the steps as purceville drew rein, and approached the door. and when two more hours had passed, and he forced open the trap door beneath the added weight and resistance of the carpet..... they were gone. the house was dark and empty. purceville had ridden ahead to send a carriage back to meet them, as the two women he loved more than his own life, advanced slowly north along the road to macpherson castle. twenty when the carriage at last arrived for them, looming up out of the fog like a great floating skull, it was full night, and the shadows had again grown long across the young girl's heart. walking beside her like a wraith in the gloom, explaining to her the `details' which she withheld from michael, anne scott had seemed less and less a loving guardian, more and more the whispering narrator of the black comedy into which she had so suddenly returned, after a brief and unreal respite of light and hope. but of all the things the woman said, only one would take solid hold in her mind, dimming and obscuring all others like the wreathing mists that had engulfed her fated cousin upon the margins of death's kingdom: her mother, who in her short-lived happiness she had all but forgotten, had joined him there. she was dead. dead. her mother, who had suffered so much, whom she had promised both in thought and word to restore, if not avenge..... gone forever. small voices, peeping like crickets in the dark silent halls of damnation, told her she had done everything she could, and must now surrender her to memory. "would have told anne this evening. . .before she set out for the talberts. . .from there to send a doctor." all useless now, swept away, as the lord purceville had swept away her mother's love, and then her life. and now, just as surely, she herself was being drawn into the heart of that great spider's web, to be sucked dry and then discarded. she remembered her mother's words: the man you most want to love, but in the end must despise more than any. her spirit palled as the door of the plush carriage, like the padded lid of a casket, sealed them in. fear and cold and grief at last overcame her, as she sloughed in near unconsciousness against the known and unknown woman beside her. but a moment before all was consumed in the black sleep of despair, a tiny figure stood at the heart of the abyss and whispered a single, heart-breaking word. the figure was herself, and the word: "michael." twenty-one mary woke to find herself in a strange bed, with monogrammed sheets and a broad, crimson canopy. she lay still and tried to realize all that had happened. it was impossible. her recollections of the night before were so confused. . .and her present surroundings in such flat contradiction to the naked exposure she felt. . .that the aura of unreality remained. she let out a bewildered breath, and pressing her fingers to her temples, tried to reshape in some logical pattern the events of her journey, and later installment in this room. images came to her in sharp detail, but would not arrange themselves to any firm order or conclusion. she saw again the pale interior of the carriage. then through the window, the grim castle looming upon the promontory: above the mists, beneath the moon . she saw the drawbridge raised again behind them, and the spiked portcullis lowered in the arch beyond. and then the great, hulking form of a man, seated as if in judgment upon a raised throne of oak at the head of a long reception hall, hung with bright banners and fading tapestry. she walked towards him, came closer, then stopped. at this point, had she known it, she did in fact lose consciousness, collapsing to the apparent (and unexpected) distress of her father. he had been the first to come to her aid, and loudly summon a physician. afterward she had been taken to the rooms she now shared with her aunt, who was stationed in the adjoining chamber. a door opened in the wall to her right, calling her back to the present. the widow scott entered quickly, seeming no more assured or at peace than herself. with a troubled look she approached the bed, and took her niece by the hand. "i fear we have made a serious mistake," she said. the words were so obvious, and such a gross understatement of their position, that the one reaction the girl felt capable of was annoyance. the widow read this in her face, shook her head. "that's not what i mean. whether we did right or wrong in coming here, and whether it will help michael---" she looked about her, as if fearing the very walls, then went on in a lowered voice. "whether or not we can do anything to call off the search. . .i have found a dangerous weakness in our story, and the one physical detail i overlooked. i cannot hope lord purceville did not notice." she lifted mary's hand before her, and slowly she understood. the ring . such a bitter irony: the very symbol of life and enduring love, of the common purpose that bound them together. . .might work to the undoing of them all. for at that same moment the lord purceville sat alone in his study, pondering many things, not least among them that slender band of silver, set with a single diamond. the contradiction to the facade of innocence which the widow had tried to plant in his mind was obvious. why did the girl wear a wedding ring, while the woman did not? who, and where, was the man who had given it to her? and what string had stephen pulled, perhaps inadvertently, to bring them here? for though in his hard way he loved his son, he was not blind to his shortcomings. it was unlikely that stephen had, of his own devices, unearthed and exploited some weakness which he himself had missed. but most puzzling of all was a question far more simple. why, after facing death to protect her, had the woman suddenly put her niece, his daughter, into the palm of his hand? back in their chambers, the two women saw they had no choice but to see it through. to switch the ring back to the widow's hand might prove disastrous, while to change any element of their story (much of which was still unclear to mary), would prove equally perilous. it was decided that they should speak of the ring as an heirloom, which had been passed on to the sole inheritor of scott blood and tradition. this might also lend credence to the guardian's fierce determination to protect her. and in this same hurried conference, anne scott went over again all that should, and should not be said at mary's inevitable, and surely imminent meeting with her father. still, if she had been summoned to him in that moment, and had he not been distracted, he might easily have picked her story apart, and held them all at his questionable mercy. but he was distracted, and distraught. a courier had arrived the night before, only hours ahead of his daughter's carriage, bearing news that he was loathe to hear. earl emerson arthur, his sworn enemy of so many years, had been appointed secretary of state for scotland. and full of his new-found authority, the vindictive old man had decided to abandon his long siege---waiting for some damning evidence to arise against his rival---and decided to attack instead, on purceville's own ground, while the tide of disfavor was still strong against him. a review was to be called, if not a formal inquest, and evidence gathered to dismiss him. and while losing his seat as governor was not a literal matter of life and death, to the aged and slowly despairing lord purceville, the two amounted to one and the same thing. for no man is so strong that he can hold off forever the grim whisperings of age. his power and station were all that remained to him, a last shield of illusion, which so narrowly blocked out the sureness and finality of death. without it, he would have to look its grim harvest square in the face. and for all his mockery and outward courage (unfeigned), this was something he was consummately unwilling to do. now he was cornered. and the cornered beast is most to be feared. twenty-two several hours later a man-servant came to the women's quarters to announce: "the lord purceville," (his exact words), "requests a private interview with his daughter." whatever their desired affect, upon hearing these words something shook in mary's heart, as she felt again the sudden pang of the orphan. because she realized in that moment that this simple phrase, `his daughter', had never once been applied to her. for an instant the tears started in her eyes; and for all her fear of him, her one desire was to run and fall weeping in his arms. but then she remembered all that her mother had told her. she remembered, too, the life of empty hatred to which he had driven her, at the cost of all that was gentle and giving inside her. and the way he had burned her very corpse. the tears stopped. a look of such implacable will came into her eyes that the widow scott, who had been plaiting her hair in preparation, took a step back in dismay. all the brooding anger that she had once seen in stephen, the forerunner of violence, now showed itself in the girl, with a keener edge, and yet whiter fire. "mary, listen to me," she whispered closely. "you must not do or say anything to upset him. our lives, all of them, are in his hands." but her words were without effect. mary stood like a fierce, enchanted statue, waiting only for the sculptor to finish, to come to life and fulfill its vengeful purpose. and when the last lock of hair was in place and bound she stalked silently from the room, following the startled servant. after two long hallways she hardly noticed, she passed by several doors in a third, then was ushered in to the great man's den. her eyes took in nothing but his seated form, which stamped itself forever in her mind as the living embodiment of evil, and sole object of revenge..... if henry purceville had harbored any notions of winning the girl over, or of displaying even the most distant paternal affection, he soon forgot them. her iron gaze quickly despatched the small stirrings of tenderness (and guilt) which he had felt the night before. but strange to say, the fearless disdain she showed him was not without reward. in truth it was the one emotion he still respected. it at once cut through his predisposition toward women as weak and spineless manipulators, and gave her a separate identity. she was his daughter, and she was not afraid. there could be, for the moment, no thought of killing her. "well, girl," he said, settling back in his chair as the servant closed the polished doors behind them. "if you have hard words to say to me, say them." "i hate you," she hissed. "and why is that?" his face remained immobile, whatever the underlying emotions. "you raped my mother." "yes, though she did not ask me to stop. and if i hadn't, you would not exist." the thought staggered her, but she pressed on. "you burned her body! you denied her christian burial." "your mother was not a christian. by the look of her hut, i'd say she fancied herself a daughter of the trees. such as she are not buried, as you must know." "if not for your countrymen, and their accursed king, my cousins....." she struggled. "they would not have been killed in the war." "and if not for your countrymen, and their drunkard prince, there would have been no war. "no," he continued, raising his hand to stop her. "don't tell me that you were oppressed, and had no choice but to rise in revolt. the strong have always dominated the weak: it is nature's unchanging law. had you been strong enough to defeat us, you would have won your freedom, and left the women of england to mourn the dead." mary looked hard at him, disconcerted. she had been ready to pour out the crucible of her wrath upon him, and at the slightest mockery, to rush forward and scratch out his eyes. but he only remained before her, unmoved and unmovable, with no apparent effort refuting her every grievance. worst of all, his words held the power of a twisted truth. "you have an answer for everything. that doesn't make you right. in the eyes of god---" "god ?" he sneered, as if the very thought were offensive. "you have reached young womanhood and still not seen through that, the cruelest and emptiest of farces? look at me, girl." she did, then wished she hadn't. those cold and knowing eyes seemed to look straight through her. hatred deserted her, leaving only fear. and in that moment she was sure it was not her father, but the devil himself who stood before her. his wicked tongue was a foil far too clever for her innocence, and she knew it. she felt her innermost temples exposed, and had little doubt that he could ridicule and undo the most sacred feelings she possessed. "aren't you going to ask me why i i don't believe? are you afraid? i am going to tell you; and if only once in your fairy-tale existence you listen to the voice of reason, then let it be now." he spoke evenly at first, but it was clear that she had stirred the cauldron of his emotions. "i disbelieve for the simplest, and most undeniable reason of all. experience . for forty years i have taken what i wanted, disobeying each commandment, each precept, a thousand times over. and not only do i go unpunished. . .but i have thriven, and raised myself to great power. "i will tell you something i have never told anyone; you may take that any way you like. listen! from earliest manhood i have fought against the principles, nay, the very heart of christianity. in truth, a part of me longed for punishment and reversal: to be put in my place, as a sign there was some meaning, some order in the world. but there is none, unless it be survival of the fittest. hardly the kind of world that a god would make, unless his sole purpose was to punish its weak, pathetic creatures." he paused, trying unsuccessfully to calm himself. "the only `earth' that the meek shall inherit. . .are the indifferent shovelfuls the diggers throw back into their graves! "what have you to say of that , little whore of my flesh? answer me!" she knew not where she found the words, nor the courage to speak them. she only knew that they were right. "the final reckoning has not yet come," she said quietly. "your imagined victory will slip through your fingers like sand." he bolted from his chair and came at her, before either realized what had happened. pinning her against the door, he mastered his wrath only long enough to cry out in a dreadful voice: "be gone! out of my sight!" mary fled from the room in tears. he slammed the door after her, then struck it so violently that the oak shivered and his hand nearly broke. for she had committed the one act that no evil man can tolerate. she had spoken the truth. that evening lieutenant ballard appeared, to escort the ladies to, "more suitable quarters." he led them, along with two armed guards, to the high tower at the furthest extremity of the castle. after a long and torturous spiralling of stairs (for their escort would not let them rest), they came at last to the uppermost story. there ballard took a long iron key, and forcing the eye of the lock, pulled back the thick wooden door, pierced by a single, barred window. they were ushered in, and all doubt of their position left them. it was a prison cell. piled hay on the floor comprised the beds, two water buckets, one filled, the other empty, their only toilet. two woolen blankets had been rudely thrown down, as if their captors resented even this small show of humanity. but for these, and for the water, the place might have gone unchanged for a hundred years. ballard approached the girl, and took her roughly by the wrist. too numb to react, she could only watch as he pulled the ring from her finger, and flung it out of the high, paneless window. no explanation was given for this action, or for the sudden change in their status. and when they tried to ask, the lieutenant only smiled, and said in a harsh voice: "little mary, queen of scots, locked in the tower, waiting for death." and he let go a laugh, so void of compassion that it made the blood run cold. he strode back out onto the landing, then turned again to face them through the closing door. "master `enry has a visitor, and needs no more trouble of you. if you want to live a little longer, do nothing to call attention to yourselves. quiet as mice, my pretties, or bad men will be sent to keep an eye, and more `an likely both hands, on you ." he pulled the door to, and left them in darkness. twenty-three that same evening, after observing the necessary formalities surrounding the arrival of earl arthur, stephen at last broke away from the banquet and went in search of his sister. whatever his father's feelings, he was both glad to have her under his roof, and firmly set in the belief that he was acting on her behalf. his motive for seeing her now (so he told himself) was a sense of responsibility for her comfort and well-being. the affection which he felt for her at their first meeting had not changed, his thoughts continued, except that the lust had gone out of it. and in a sense, even this was a relief. his greatest need now was for friendship and a sense of family, both of which might only have been lost and obscured, had they become conventional lovers. he had drunk more than his share of the wine served at dinner, seeming unconcerned by his father's tension, and the measured severity of earl arthur. and now, as he walked the long corridors he fell to reminiscing, to gentle, water-color thoughts of their long ride together across the countryside. and he remembered their first kiss, so innocent, so full of feeling. to see her now, and to know that it was in his power to bring her back to pride and prosperity, aroused in him a feeling of warmth and tenderness which he had not experienced since childhood. to speak with her late into the night. to kiss and to touch, her..... the door was ajar. the room was empty. she was gone. an old peasant woman was making up the bed. he wasted little time on her. "where is my sister?" he demanded. her eyes narrowed at this. but after a moment's pondering, she seemed to understand doubly. "ah. she and her guardian have been moved to other quarters." "what other quarters?" "i'm sure i don't know, sir." "what do you know!" he cried angrily. "only it was the lieutenant as took `em, and that he was none too gentle." and she turned away, concealing her purpose, as ever. stephen stormed out of the room, blind with rage. those who passed him in the hallway drew back as from a fire. even those servants of long standing. . .none had seen him in a state like this. he entered the banquet hall just as the earl and his entourage were leaving. the withered arthur nodded stiffly in greeting, but stephen never saw him. his eyes knew the presence of one man only, and that man stood at the head of an emptying table. his father eyed him darkly as he approached, and with a stern gesture, ordered him to keep silent until they were alone. then giving final instructions to his steward about the service and lodging of his guests, he turned and walked sharply to an auxiliary den, with his son a brooding tempest behind. no sooner had the doors closed behind them than the deluge broke. at first the father tried to weather his son's wrath, hoping that it would soon spend itself, like all his passions. but stephen was not merely upset. he was outraged. for perhaps the first time in his life, he knew the intoxicating power of righteous anger. his sister, whom he loved and had sworn to protect, had been locked away like the coarsest and commonest of criminals. and he knew ballard well enough to imagine the state in which he must have left her, and what she must be feeling now. the thought of his thick, gnarled hands upon her, dragging her away, was the final straw. "you bastard ." it has been truly said that a father shall be judged by his sons, and that if he is found wanting, they will be a bane and a curse until death. all the enmity and resentment he had ever felt toward this man, all the shortcomings of his own character, indeed, every injury he had ever suffered, he now held to be the fault of the fat, corrupted animal before him. "you will set her free, now ," he ejaculated. "or so help me god, i will find her and do it myself!" "stephen ....." "you fear earl arthur? it is i you should fear. i know enough to have you transported, along with the lowest horse-thieves and highwaymen!" "you had best calm yourself, stephen," replied lord purceville coldly. "and if you know what is good for you---" "are you threatening me ? do you think i'm bluffing!" he cried, coming to within inches of his father's face. "i am going to the tower, now. and if i am in any way resisted, i will go to earl arthur instead, and put an end to your sorry game." "you will not ---" "watch me!" and he turned on his heel, and made for the door. henry purceville seized his son by the arm, and jerked him back into the center of the room. "be still , i'm warning you! don't make me lock you away as well." with a scream of rage stephen pushed him off, then flew at him, fists reeling. so great was his fury that he knocked the larger man down and, pinning him there, began to pummel him with half-blocked punches to the face. then he felt a sharp pain at the base of his skull, and falling forward, knew no more. twenty-four the first night that michael spent alone was indescribable. to have held the treasure of his heart so near, after both had suffered so much, only to be forced to turn her over to the most feared and hated man of the district, and a name of ill repute since childhood..... there was no reconciling himself to the facts. that she was his daughter might afford her the narrowest margin of protection. but who could say what an english lord---his noble birth a sham, at that---might do when confronted by the threat of an illegitimate child? and the son, stephen purceville. both mary and his mother had doctored their accounts of him, knowing michael's fiery temper of old. but he was wise enough, with the passing years, to know when he was being shielded from the truth. the bullet-hole in the portrait spoke for itself, a constant reminder that the younger purceville was a force, and a danger, unto himself. at best he was an emotional powder keg, prone to sudden threats (and possibly acts) of violence. at worst he was as cold and calculating as his father. the effectiveness of his methods could not be questioned. he had taken the two women he loved, without a fight, from under his very wing. what nest-thieving fox could claim as much? such was the image he began to form of his imagined nemesis. the morning after was no less a torment. because for all the unquenchable fear and concern he felt for them, mary and his mother had been right about one thing: he was not well. nothing short of bed-rest and shelter from the cold would begin to rid him of the debilitating fever, and the deep, constrictive cough that had settled in his chest. but how could he remain calm, and rest, when those he loved remained in unspeakable danger? several times he started for the door, only to be halted by the cruel realization that there was nothing he could do. not only would the exposure to the elements do injury to himself, but his very presence, in any way connected with them, would only increase their peril ten-fold. and the still deeper question, which lay at the back of all others, which haunted him and gave him no peace: what could one frail, unarmed man do against the grim, unyielding walls of macpherson castle? as evening began to deepen, and in the same hour that the cell door was being closed upon the women, his inner turmoil reached a fever pitch. something had to be done! he paced back and forth, howling his rage at the walls. and yet his mind knew, for all the throbbings of the heart, that he could not yield. he had learned the hard way, in the stockade, that there were times when self-denial and an iron discipline were the only way. and for all the pain it cost him, he knew that he must wrap himself warmly and try to sleep. in the morning there might be some meaningful action he could take. and there was nothing, save pneumonia, that he could accomplish how, alone and in the dead of night. so he prepared to pass the dark hours as he had passed those previous. leaving the fire to burn itself out, he took the stones that had been heating before it, wrapped them in a sling, and carried them up the ladder-stair to mary's bed, where he would sleep. in the loft he would at least have some warning in the event of a sudden search, as well as the advantage of height in a struggle. there was, perhaps, no reason for the english to return to the cottage..... still, he could take nothing for granted. the evening fire was a necessary evil, now smoldering to ash. all else must be patience and concealment, until the morning light brought clearer counsel, or dealt him some new card unforeseen. until then, patience and hiding. patience and hiding..... he fell asleep. twenty-five clear your mind, begin again all that came before is gone; there is no truth, there is no past the day is gone, the light is lost. the long fought hours slip away to whited stones; the stones are ground to dust dust blows in the wind, then the song begins again. the time has come the judgment soon; above the mists, beneath the moon. youth to age, and back again and all resounds in death; death to old and young alike, and all for heaven's breath. such were the words that mary heard, as she slipped into a dream. the voice seemed to come from the walls, and the walls from the stone heart of earth, the earth so old it had forgotten them. too weary and wretched to fight, yet as she spiralled back and always down, the voice became familiar, and edged all else in fear. it was the voice of her mother, unburied and unwept. the voice became a hovering form, which followed her as she walked. the ground beneath her feet grew hard: it was cold, and the winter wind touched her harshly. till a great house appeared at the top of a hill, surrounded by well-ordered green. she drew nearer its stone walls, passed through and into warmth and firelight. but it was quickly night, and in silent corners the shadows gathered thick to hold their counsel. a long corridor it was, and in the distance a candlelight appeared, drawing closer: a large, strong handsome man. he was her father, but she was not his daughter, only woman already swayed by the strength of his gait, and the unswerving resolution of his hands. he held a ring of keys, as ballard had, and like him forced the lock. the doorway opened and a woman no longer young, but still fair and far from old, sat up in the ghostly bed and wrapped the coverlet about her. and the form of light and darkness was no longer behind her, because it was she, her mother in the bed. the lord purceville took her hard by the wrists, and dared her to scream. but no such sound came, and it puzzled him. something like love shone in the deep and pleading blue eyes. and pain and pain and pain, because she knew it all before. yet again the tragedy must be played. and she could only watch, and feel her heart weeping blood as all life was drained by him, the widow-spider. and then her mother was alone in an unknown room, familiar though she had never seen it, a chalice of poison in her hands. her face was wet, for the innocent babe that lay wrapped upon the bed. but the anguish and despair were too great, and with trembling limbs she lifted the cup of sorrow to her lips. yet bitter was the taste, bitter even as the road which led her to it: the cup was still half full when the baby cried, and something shook in her heart. she uttered a scream, and anne scott burst into the room, followed by her brother. and she did not die, but was taken away. and the child taken from her, forever. the light went out in her soul, and the softness of her heart. . . her youth was gone. and then she was old and dry, alone in a smoky hut, gnawing on the ends of schemes. alone in ruin, alone with death. but somewhere a door was opened, and in walked the babe, grown to woman. and though she tried not to love her it was in vain: her own mary, conceived in broken love, the lost treasure of her heart. and she loved her, full love once more, though it was too late. a black curtain was lowered before her eyes, as blood and water flowed from the breast..... then large, calloused hands almost roman, came and took her from the lair, and tied her to a tree. and wood was brought and gathered round. . . till smoking tongues licked her feet, a beast unproud, devouring death as sure as life, and old and young alike. mary shuddered, and her eyes opened wide. her eyes were open. she was not sleeping, nor dreaming of a dream. and yet the presence remained. the widow scott lay breathing evenly, somewhere in the gloom. but the presence remained. not a raging ghost, not the white-shrouded form of a woman, but an invisible essence, unimagined: the echo, the afterglow, the spirit of margaret maccain. it did not speak to her, but only watched, knowing her thoughts, in some way bound to earth until the drama was played out. or the dream was gone. mary lay still, afraid but understanding. it was not a thing that needed to be taught; it simply was. and she knew it in the depths of her being. and the darkness of night was infinitely deeper than the darkness of the mind. fear could not match the hard truth of it. thunder rolled beyond the walls in a glowering storm, as spiders crawled freely through the window. twenty-six michael woke suddenly, to the sound of the front door being thrown open, and a low scuffling noise in the passage which he could not dissect. the door was closed again and voices were heard, along with the muffled curses of a man bound. and for all the fugitive plans he had tried to form, michael knew his one defense now was utter silence. "the old man's lost his mind," said the first voice, breathing hard but speaking in hushed tones. "how long's he think he can keep things dark, now it's come to this? we can't keep him stowed here like a barrel in the hold forever." "and you're a damned fool, stubb," came the second, harsh and uncowed. "all we've got to do is keep him out of sight till arthur turns tail and runs. and he will, or i know naught. the old man can't be took on his own ground. and but for his majesty here, and them bitches in the tower, there ain't none as lived long enough to speak against him. master `enry does things proper, and no mistake." "you may be right for now, ballard, but how long do you think he can keep it up? he's squeezed blood from these stones long enough. there's hell to pay, i'm sure of it." "tell it to the parson, stubb, he'll put it in his sunday speech." "you don't understand." "you're the one who don't understand. you think i'm married to the old man, but i ain't. if he comes out on top, i'll stand by him right enough. but if he don't, he'll learn that toby ballard is no man's slave. me, i sticks with the meanest dog, and when he's killed i go my own way..... oh, his lordship didn't like that. here, loosen his gag. no one to hear him now but the walls." "---kill you myself!" cried the bound man. "so help me, ballard, you won't live to see the new year!" "ah, now, your majesty," said the other, unconcerned. "maybe i will, and maybe i won't. for the time, though, i think you'd best concern yourself with yourself. it might trouble your father for a time if some `accident' were to befall you while in my care. but he'd get over it." "you wouldn't dare." there was a sinister pause, in which the only sound was that of a saber being drawn, metal against smooth metal. then with an icy menace such as michael had heard only once before, in the stockade, the man put it to his throat and said bluntly. "try me." again there was silence. the gag was refitted. "he's all yours, stubb. don't leave him alone, even for a short time. i'll send someone to relieve you in a day or two." he turned again to face the young captain. "good night, or should i say, good morrow, your majesty ." ballard's heavy tread reached the door, opened, closed, and went beyond it, as he mounted and rode back to the castle. michael tried to think what he must do. there were too many questions here for which he had no answer. only one thing was clear to him: the man stubb was the immediate danger. there could be no thought of flight, in any case. a weapon, albeit a treacherous one, had been placed within his reach, in the form of stephen purceville. he must find a way to use it. with no clear plan, but not without hope, he determined to bide his time, and watch for some opportunity to ambush and subdue the guard. he did not have to wait long. apparently the officer had determined to have a look at all the rooms. for after first checking those on the main level, he was heard just below, as he put his boot to the first rung of the ladder-stair, and began to climb. startled into action michael leapt from the bed, and when the man's face appeared above the level of the floor, kicked it squarely with the flat of his foot. he had not envisioned the consequences. perhaps in fear he had struck too hard; perhaps the man had thrown himself backward in sudden shock. whatever the reason, his body was sent hurtling back and down, and crashed in a terrible angle against the joining of wall and floor below. the man was killed instantly, his neck broken. stepping back from the opening, michael pulled on his boots with a trembling hand, trying to disbelieve what his eyes had just shown him. but when he climbed down to examine his foe, all uncertainty left him. no breath, no pulse. no life. an anguish such as he had never known overcame him. by his own hand, a human life was ended. with hot tears stinging him, he gently lifted the body and carried it to his mother's bed. his only thought, irrational as it may have been, was to lay the man more comfortably, and block from his mind the horrible contortion in which he had found him. this done, he staggered toward the cold hearth as if for shelter, arms crossed before him to block out the world. but the world would not go away. almost as soon as he entered the main room he heard a muffled gasp, and the scrape of a wooden chair being pushed back in alarm. michael lowered his arms in dismay, not remembering. he saw before him an english officer, bound tightly to a stiff upright chair, and gagged with a twisted length of black cloth. his senses told him he was looking at stephen purceville, but his mind was too dazed to take it in. in that moment he only knew that it was a man, like himself. "i didn't mean to kill him," he choked. "i just wanted to knock him out, and take his weapon." having said this michael steadied somewhat, and tried to force himself back to the present. with no clearer motive than to relieve the discomfort of the other---his enemy, he knew---he loosened and removed the gag. still purceville could not gather himself to speak. all his life, he had been the one to hold another powerless before him. to be so bound, and at the mercy of an unknown highlander---who by the look of him was not altogether rational---terrified him. but at last pride goaded him to words. "who are you?" he demanded. "what are you going to do with me?" and with this, like the tolling of a bell, michael saw the situation laid out clearly before him. and into focus, doubly sharp, came the memories of a lifetime of injustice: the seizure of his father's home and property, the impoverished conditions to which he was unused, and the contaminated well that had taken his life. then the war, the battle, and the stockade. and he remembered, too, that the english held prisoner his nearest and dearest, in some wretched place called the tower, where they were no doubt abject and afraid. and though he couldn't hate to violence any man, now that the soldier's fall had shown him the fragility of all human life. . .pride he could feel, and anger. roughly opening his shirt, he pulled it down across his shoulder, then turned his back to show the numbers branded there. "what does this tell you?" he demanded in turn. "you were a prisoner," said stephen. "i'm sorry. you're a free man, now..... look, you can't kill me. there's no reason---" "what in hell do you mean, free?" the englishman could not understand the vehemence with which the word was spoken. "all prisoners of war have been pardoned. the word arrived yesterday, with the new secretary. you have only to turn yourself in, and renounce your former cause..... reconciliation." "you're lying," said michael desperately. "you're like your father. . . you're lying !" "no. on my mother's grave, i swear it." then to his bewilderment, stephen saw the man take his head in both hands, and fall to his knees with a tortured cry. at length the worn face looked up, and it was neither joy nor relief, but unutterable sorrow that was written there. almost a whisper. "then why. why, in god's name, were you so hell-bound to capture us?" purceville hesitated, fearful of another outburst. but the answer was so obvious. "a last minute power play. you know. politics." and indeed another outburst came. trembling with rage michael stormed to the lifeless hearth, and smashed his boot-heel against it. "god damn you to hell!" he cried. "you, and this bloody world you've made for yourselves! my cousin is dead because of your politics . the man in the next room is dead, and i am a murderer..... aahh! jesus!" stunned by the power of the man's emotions, and fearing for the consequences, stephen all but begged. "it was an accident. i'll testify on your behalf. look, it's not the end---" "no! not for you and me. we're the lucky ones. we're left to go on fighting." michael brought his gaze back to earth, knowing his words would never reach the younger man. but still they must be spoken. "can't you see, purceville? when men hold in their hands the fate of nations, there's no room for whim, or politics. don't you see that every time your king rolls angrily in his bed, a thousand lives are swept away? "you! you took away our land, our dignity, and gave us nothing in return but the butt of your muskets. do you wonder that it came to war? then for years those of us with the courage to resist you were called `traitors', and hunted down like dogs. now you say we are prisoners of war, and all we have to do is walk away." he paused, overwhelmed by the thought. "can a man walk away from his past? can the cold stones of the grave lose their shadow, and rotted flesh grow whole again to walk with the living? god damn you! we stand atop a pile of bodies four miles deep, over which you would hold a pretty picnic. and ten times ten thousand left to grieve. "dear god, i cannot look at you, for the very sight is bile in my throat. when ignorance leads the blind, how black shall the blindness be?" he walked out of the room, with all feeling gone from his soul. twenty-seven the widow scott opened her eyes in the chill hour of dawn. indirect sunlight filtered through the high window, silhouetting the statued form of her niece, who stood in silence before it. at her side the girl held something metal that gleamed dully. her eyes looked out unseeing. "mary? what's that in your hand?" slowly, as from a distance. "i've got to kill him." once more anne scott felt herself in the presence of a will, a force that was beyond swaying. but she knew that she too had a part in the unfolding drama, and she would not watch idly as her niece destroyed herself. "because of your mother? you think that you must follow her down the bitter road---" "you speak of what you cannot imagine." there was no answering obsession. the woman did not try. "how will you do it?" she asked simply. "they did not think to search us." mary held up the slender blade that the witch had sewn into a fold of her dress, then forgotten. "surely that, of itself, would not kill a man." "human excrement makes a very effective blood poison." all said evenly, without emotion or remorse, without living movement of any kind. ... "mary. your mother left something for you." at this she turned, like a sleepwalker disturbed by the calling of her true name. "stephen brought me this note. her dying words." "a forgery," she stammered, "meant to dissuade me." "no," said anne scott firmly. "after twenty-nine years, i ought to know my sister's hand." "don't come any closer." she raised the knife halfheartedly. "i don't want to see it." but anne scott continued forward, held out the folded sheet. mary's left hand could not stop the right. she took the page and held it open against the angled sill. she read. a single tear escaped her, then another, till at last she dropped the blade and leaned heavily back against the stone. the tortured grip had managed but five words, the last broken and trailing, but undeniable. mary, i love you. forgive anne scott moved closer, and took the forlorn head to her shoulder. mary did not resist. she only wept, unable for a time to speak. "but, if i do not avenge her. . .then her story is truly ended. she lived, and died, for nothing. oh, it is too terrible." "no, mary. her life, and broken love, brought about your life, and a love that is real. you must never forget that." the widow paused, understanding at last. "listen to me, girl. you carry a part of her in yourself: in your flesh, and in your seed. the story never ends, it only changes characters. and those who have left something beautiful behind them, never die. they live on in the thoughts, the hearts, the very lives of those who loved them." and the woman found that she too was crying, the most profound tears of her life. for in this, most unlikely of moments, she had seen beyond the grave, and touched the face of god. "when you bear a child of your own, you will understand just how very much that means. for now, my sad mary, just cry. cry, and love her." "oh, anne, i'm so cold." and she began to shiver, her trembling flesh once more asserting its will to live. anne scott took their two blankets, joined them together, and sat with her closely huddled in the straw. both wept, and held each other, knowing fully and without illusion, what it was to be a woman. twenty-eight life would not go away. there was no room for fatalism or self-pity, and he knew it. nothing else mattered, nothing was real, until mary and his mother were set free. michael put on his coat, and climbed down from the loft. going to his mother's room, he unbuckled the fallen officer's sword, and put it about his own waist. then he took the man's pistol and slipped it under his belt. moving to the kitchen, he filled a dipper with water from the urn, and walked with it into the main room. by now the morning was full, and sunlight pushed against the heavy curtains. the two men saw each other clearly. "i thought you might be wanting this," said the highlander. stephen purceville eyed the dipper, then the man, suspiciously. "i'm not going to poison you, purceville." stephen's eyes then shifted to the pistol. "i'm not going to shoot you, either. if you'll drink this, and promise not to try anything foolish, i'll untie you as well. we've got to come to an understanding." "first tell me who you are," said the englishman. "and what you're doing here." "my name doesn't matter. all you need know is that i'm a friend to mary, and the widow scott. my one concern now is to get them out of your father's prison. here, drink." and again he held forward the dipper. "why is that so important to you?" "because i want you to know where your sustenance is coming from. and your freedom, if you'll help me." "but why---" "for the love of god, man, drink! i cannot untie you while i am holding this. time enough for talk while we dig the grave..... for your comrade , purceville. i don't intend to kill you. just remember i've a gun and sword both, and know how to use them." reluctantly stephen drank, then followed the highlander's every move as he untied him. but if he had harbored any thoughts of attacking him once he was freed, the painful stiffness of his limbs dispelled them. there was nothing for it now but to play along, and keep watching for a chance..... but in spite of all he could not fully submerge a feeling of relief at being set free, and a raw animal gratitude as they moved to the kitchen, and he drank his fill of water from the urn. with the pistol in his hand but not pointed, michael led him next to the small, attached toolshed behind the cottage. pointing inside it to a shovel, he instructed the englishman to take it up, then walk ahead of him slowly to the gravesite of his clan. "you're not going to bury him here?" said stephen as they reached it. "yes, i am. he may have been an honorable man, and he may not. but he died among us, and among us he will lie." "us?" "master purceville, you have a nasty habit of questioning the inevitable. we are in a place of burial, because a man is dead. i am a scot with a pistol, and you are a brit with a spade. there is the earth; now dig . i will ask the questions." muttering, but having no choice, stephen did as he was told. michael leaned back wearily against a tree. and shaking off the melancholy of both the place and the task at hand, he forced his mind to think. he must unravel the mystery of the man before him. so speaking with the half-truths and feigned ignorance which had become habitual with him among strangers, he began. "the first question is simply put, and simply answered. i expect nothing less than the truth....." nothing. "i have heard it said that mary is your half-sister. is that true?" bluntly. "yes." "you have been less than kind to her." stephen felt the color rising at the back of his neck. "i didn't know, until a few days ago." "and how do you feel towards her now?" "that's none of your affair!" he cried, whirling angrily. he would have advanced, but michael straightened and pointed the gun squarely at his chest. "that's enough. save your anger for the digging." the other relented, but did not turn away. "very well," continued michael. "i will assume from the heat of your answer that you care for her, and perhaps are not altogether happy that she has been locked away." "why in hell do you think i'm here?" he snapped. "you bloody savages think you're the only ones to stand up for something? i stood up for mary, and look what became of it." he threw down the shovel in disgust. "do you think i'm glad at what's happened? i promised to protect her! my father will pay for what he's done to me." michael watched the younger man's face intently, searching for any sign of deceit. he found none. it seemed almost too good to be true. not only might this man's emotions be turned toward freeing the women. . .but by all appearances he was as shallow and guileless as his father was deep and cunning. but he knew better than to hope too much, or to show his true feelings, at all. "well. leaving `bloody savages' aside for the moment, perhaps we are not as far apart as i feared." he lowered the weapon, leaned back against the tree. "calm yourself, and perhaps we can talk as reasonable men. "all right," he continued. "here, then, is what i'm offering. your freedom, in exchange for the safe deliverance of mary and the widow scott. in this you may serve me as ally, or hostage. the choice is yours." "if you want them back," said stephen, "then let me go now. give me stubb's horse, and a weapon to protect myself. all i have to do is reach earl arthur, and tell him my story. my father will lose all power over their fate, and a good many other things as well." "you will forgive me," replied michael, "if i am not as confident of english justice as you are. after they are rescued, you may do what you like to hurt your father. not before." stephen looked hard at him, first in anger, then in disbelief. "you're not serious. you can't expect to win them from the tower by stealth? it's over two hundred feet high. inside the castle are scores of armed soldiers, with a thousand more garrisoned less than two miles away. we don't even know which cell they're in, or if they're still together." michael grimaced, releasing a heavy breath. though in his heart he knew the grim realities, to hear them spoken was still disquieting. "i do not say it will be easy, or without danger. i only know that between you and i. . .we've got to find a way." he stiffened. "look at me, purceville, square in the eye. as you love your sister, and on your word as an englishman, will you help me to free her? for i tell you, in the eyes of god we can do no less." stephen did not answer at first, but stood returning his captor's firm gaze. "why do you ask me to swear as an englishman? what makes you think any promise will bind me?" "because i know that's important to you. and because i believe that in spite of yourself, deep down, you are an honorable man." the other turned away. "listen to me. sooner or later you've got to choose between good and evil, right and wrong. there's no middle ground. and the line between them's got nothing to do with country, or birthright, but the way a man acts in the role, the place he's been given. i'm asking you now, not as a highlander to a red-coat, a commoner to nobility, or any other distinction you care to draw. i'm asking you as a man, to another man. won't you help me, in what we both know is right?" "you're very naive." "no. god damn it, purceville, listen! no man has greater reason to hate and mistrust than i have. you've taken everything: my youth, my health, my home, and now the only ones i love in all the world. but i refuse to hate you. i refuse to stoop so low, to believe in so little, to sell my honor and my hope for that bastard emotion. there is no greater defiance than that. "think! have you never loved someone you should have hated? or held on to something you were told you must surrender? we share the same needs, the worst of us, as we share the same flesh. stephen. you and i, we've got to trust each other. we've got to get them out." "while you hold the gun, and i dig the grave?" "no." michael opened his coat, and tucked the pistol once more beneath his belt. "come back to the house with me now---don't try anything foolish---and i'll find you something to eat. by rights i should dig this grave myself." "and the horse?" "i will use it to bear the body, and keep it close to me at all times. i said trust, stephen, not stupidity. trust isn't blind, any more than faith is, if it's real." "faith in what? in god? you're dreaming." "call it god, or life, or anything else you like. i haven't given up on it. because no matter how close i've come to it, death has never had the final word. my flesh still lives, and therefore my hope. maybe i am dreaming. but without dreams a man's got nothing, nothing at all." stephen looked down, undecided. "so what's to keep me from walking out, except the threat of a shot in the back?" "i won't shoot you. if you want to walk out into hostile country, a wanted man, that's up to you. but i wouldn't give a ha'penny for your life, if you run afoul of that man ballard. at least you know, or you should, that i'm an honorable man." "you speak of honor," said stephen, "and trust. and yet you won't even tell me your name. don't i deserve that much?" "i will tell you that when we have set them free, along with anything else you like. i don't ask you to understand that, just accept it. anonymity is my one defense. that's the way it is." ... "i need time to think," said stephen finally. "and you shall have it. after i finish here i've got a long ride ahead of me, to make preparations. you shall have most of the day. but whatever you decide, we must be gone from here tonight. if i know human nature, your ballard won't send anyone to relieve his comrade, or come himself, till tomorrow at least. be we can't take that chance." "and what if he comes back today? you're not going to bind me, and leave me here without a weapon?" "i'm not going to bind you at all. as for a weapon, you've got surprise. and you've got something far more lethal. the human mind, and will to survive, are not to be underestimated." he shaded his eyes and looked up, saw the sun already approaching the noon. "enough of this. you've got to eat, and then think. i've got to work." without further speech, they set out for the cottage. but as stephen passed the grave of michael scott, he could not help but wonder at the identity of his worn but indomitable deliverer. and looking back to the place where stubb would lie, who but a day before had walked and breathed, been proud, and stubborn, and afraid like himself, he felt a cold shudder run through him. for he, too, had been given a taste of death. twenty-nine michael rode in full daylight toward the sea. it was a little used road, linking the fishing village of kroe to the uplands; and if what purceville said was true, he was, for the moment, no longer a wanted man. but he had little choice in any case. riding against the sea-winds at night would be the death of him, and plans must be laid for the twilight after next. even so, he could not help feeling apprehensive as he slowed his horse to a canter, and turned down the single brick street of the town, overlooking the bay, then the sea beyond. as he passed through its center---small shops, a public house, plain, two story homes joined at the shoulder---he found himself looking down and straight ahead, subconsciously drawing his shoulders together as if to fade into every shadow, afraid of every eye. james talbert's phrase, "skulking thieves," came back to him. at the same moment he passed a sturdy lad of fifteen or thereabouts, who looked up at him with a fearless eye, almost mocking. and all at once his fugitive life became intolerable. for in the boy he had seen himself, half a lifetime before. with sudden resolution he checked his horse, and sat up straight and proud in the saddle. shading his eyes he looked out to the sea, and beyond. somewhere, across the unfathomable waters, there had to be a better life: a new land, where he could start again. he would never submit to imperial rule; this he knew with absolute certainty. and he would not live like this. what had begun in his mind as a means of short-term escape---fleeing the castle by sea---now branched out into thoughts of a new home, a new world, where the skies were freer and a man could still dream. he turned back again to the hills of his beloved scotland, the land of his birth. a great sorrow filled him, and an ache that was almost physical gripped his chest, for a dream that had died, and a home that was lost. but the past was gone, and there was no returning. he must look to the future. he must live free or die. the lad looked back at him, startled by the change. "master," he said plainly. "who are you?" the highlander breathed deep the sea air, then replied. "i am michael james scott, a proud veteran of the war against tyranny, and a man who will hide no more." with that he gave rein to his fretting animal, and rode openly to the fisherman's cottage. the old man had seen him coming, but remained smoking placidly as before. there was much here that he did not understand, and he had many questions. but he knew enough not to worry himself, or to act in haste. life, in the form of young `jamie', was coming straight toward him, and would no doubt make itself clear. drawing up to the low stone shelter, michael dismounted and tethered his horse, then strode quickly up the steps. the eyes of the two men met, and though everything had changed, nothing had changed between them. michael was still in need, and the fisherman was still willing to help. "can we go inside and talk?" he said. the old man nodded. again they sat before the fire, grateful for its warmth, and for the strong walls around them. michael had laid out the facts as he understood them, told his friend all that he knew. and now he waited on his judgment, seeking aid and counsel alike. "well," said the other, after mulling over all that he had heard. "i'd say it's more than clear we've got to get them out. . .and i'd have to say you're right, not trusting their fate to the english. there's good men among `em, it's true. but when there's a struggle for power between adamant men, innocents are going to be hurt, and conscience swept aside. "on one thing you can rest assured," he went on. "i'll be at the cove with a skiff, if and when you need me, with my boat anchored not far off. i'll move in at nightfall tomorrow, prepared to stay till dawn, then do the same the next night if need be. i know the place well enough, as i know most every coast from skye to inverness. it'll be a tricky sail coming out---with the wind against us. but i'll warrant the wind's been against us some years now, eh?" "thank you," said michael. "it means a lot." "aye, but that's the easy part. first we've got to get them out." again he puffed on his pipe thoughtfully. "well then. i've seen that tower from a distance, and know the castle by reputation alone. it was built centuries ago as a defense against the vikings, and word has it it's never been taken. it was built to withstand far greater force than any you or i could hope to bring against it." the mariner paused, considering. "stealth, you say. and rope..... aye. a grappling hook might be the answer, if the window weren't as high as it's bound to be, and you had all night to make the throw. but i suspect you don't, and the weight of the attached line would make it all but impossible in any case." "i'd thought of that," said michael. "but i didn't know what else to try..... tell me the truth, john. is it hopeless? i think another prison cell would be the death of me. but if there's no other way. . .i'll turn myself in along with purceville, and try to reach the new secretary---" the fisherman shook his head. "no. your kin have turned themselves in once already, and you see the result. and i did not say it was hopeless. you were on the right scent. you're just not the crafty old hound that i am." he gave the younger man a wink. "where a rope won't go, perhaps a bit of string will, to lead the way." michael set his horse at an easy gallop, as the road leveled and he began the second, less arduous leg toward home. he felt heartened as his leg brushed against the saddlebag, and he thought of the bundles contained within. for the first time since the women had been taken from him, he felt a tentative hope. there was a chance. the last daylight faded behind him; but now the feared night wind was less, and only urged his mount to greater speed. after a time he looked up at the waning, but still formidable moon, wondering if its light would be a blessing or a curse in the coming escape. for the hard clear skies of mid autumn had begun, with ten thousand stars looking down unobstructed. there seemed little likelihood of change by the following night. perhaps the fog would be a factor, though the high promontory on which the castle was set..... it was no use worrying, he told himself, with less conviction than he wished he felt. again he fought off the familiar sense of dread which had never fully left him since the morning of the battle, but only varied in theme and intensity. familiar too was the dull, oppressive ache of his affliction. how much longer he could deceive his body with the promise of future rest, he did not know. he was worn, both physically and emotionally, to the last thread of resilience. and yet he could not rest. still one more journey must be undertaken, before he slept that night. perhaps an hour later he came at last into sight of the lonely homestead. when he circled at a distance, to interpose the chimney between himself and the moon, a faint trail of smoke could be seen rising from it, and this encouraged him. someone remained within. any trap set by the english, he felt sure, would be presaged by absolute silence and stillness. but this did not rule out the possibility of an ambush by purceville, who had not yet made his intentions clear. with this in mind, he dismounted several hundred yards from the house, and wrapping the horse's reins about the branch of a sheltering tree, advanced on foot. opening the back door soundlessly, he slipped inside with the pistol cocked and ready. nothing. heart pounding, he advanced slowly down the passage, toward the indirect glow of the hearth. he turned the corner..... purceville sat motionless facing him, a drained goblet in his hand. he evinced no surprise. apparently his senses were sharper than the highlander guessed. "i will do it," he said evenly. "on the condition that i am never again left weaponless in an indefensible corner." michael came closer, unbuckled the dead officer's sword. he handed it to purceville in the english fashion, then straightened and looked him square in the eye. "i ask for no greater promise," he said, "than that you do what you know is right. now, if you will take it, here is my hand." the englishman took it in his own, with the same measured gaze that he had worn since the highlander's return. there was no time to wonder at the thoughts that lay behind it. "come on," said michael. "we've got a long ride ahead of us." "where are we going?" "to find a more defensible corner." thirty the lord henry purceville lay alone in the heavy framed bed, with sleep the distant memory of a child. and though he knew there were a thousand contingencies which he must anticipate, and prepare against, still a single question drove all others from his mind. how had it come to this? his own son, whose hatred now seemed assured, had turned against him, and had to be bound and dragged away like a criminal. his beautiful, melancholy daughter, who had dared to stand up to him, lay pale and shivering in the tower at his own command. and he himself, once a proud and fearless soldier of the line, lying and hiding to protect his pitiful gains from a withered aristocrat whose skull he could so easily crush. feeling suffocated, frothing with rage at his helplessness, he threw aside the covers and rose to pace about the room as if a cage. because the question that truly galled him was not why , but why now? if such a reversal had come when he was younger, with his future still ahead of him, he might have seen some justice to it. he would have known there was a difference between good and evil, and all that this knowledge implied. he would have believed in something. he could not lie, and say the knowledge would have changed him much. but at least he would have known, as his daughter's plight had shown him, that real people were the victims of his blind aggression, people whose only crimes were not weakness and naiveté, but kindness and compassion. but he had not know, or so he told himself. his life had run on, untaught and unobstructed, a raging beast crushing everything in its path. and now, just as surely, that killing momentum would hurl him from the brink of its dark height---down, down into the yawning abyss. of what lay at the bottom, he dared not even think. and not only was it too late for him, but for his victims as well. how many men had he killed in battle, or destroyed in the political arena, to attain what he had once called power? how many women had he sucked dry and then discarded? and for what? only to learn when the damage was already done that the actions of men, for good or evil, made a difference. they mattered! the bile rose in his throat, nearly choking him. for now the mindless cruelty of life. . .was slowly turning back upon him. that same unyielding blade, the heartless razor that he had served and become, was proving to be double-edged. but fear and a momentary helplessness were not to be confused with impotent despair. the lord purceville was far from defeated. he let the feelings run, because for the first time in many years he could not stop them, and he knew it was unwise to try. time enough to master his emotions when the flood had died down. for now he must know where personal weakness was likely to occur. for as anne scott had already glimpsed, the truly frightening thing about this man, was that he defied all the self-destructive traits of the storybook villain. and though he had given himself over to evil, he was still capable of a kind of wisdom. though he lived on one side of the boundary, he never ceased learning from the other. he understood killing and healing alike. forcing all else from his mind, he looked back across the pages of his life, trying to find some common thread, some shred of lost meaning that would make him understand. his childhood memories remained the most vivid of his life, and though long suppressed, it took little effort to bring them back in sharp detail. he shuddered as he sat again on the edge of the bed, anticipating the grim scenes which had hardened him and made him cold, but never lessened in their stark brutality. he had grown, a wild weed, among the wharves of london. his mother was a sometime prostitute, his father a man he had never seen. the only thing she would ever say of him was that he had been a sailor, and had left her destitute when she was but a girl. he wanted to hate the man for it, but he knew his mother too well to trust her version of the past, or to feel much pity on her account. she fed him, sometimes, and gave him a corner of the floor in which to sleep. in return for this he was expected to steal, to warn her of the police, and to keep silent when she brought home from the public houses the dirty, hardened wretches who filled her cup and purse alike. one evening she had returned with a particularly evil looking portuguese, a cut-throat pirate by the look of him, living like others of his kind under the king's protection, so long as they terrorized spanish treasure ships and not his own. the man's dark eyes through their narrow slits spoke of a malevolence that even his mother must have felt. but she said nothing, gave him the wine he demanded though he already stank of it, and led him up to her room, oblivious. through the poor ceiling he could hear the clothes tearing, the blows and sharp curses of the man. but these meant little to him. the rougher sort were like that, and if his mother minded, it never kept her from bringing the same lot back again. so long as they paid in gold and silver, it was all the same to her. but then he heard an unfamiliar sound, and it brought him up short. his mother had screamed in earnest. he could hear her pleading, while the man before her had become deathly silent. trembling with sudden fear and concern, he reached under the floor-boards to the place where he kept the stolen pistol. then ran with it up the doubling stairway. again the woman screamed, the sound cut short by a dull gasp of pain. he lifted the latch and burst into the room. . .too late. his mother lay bleeding on the bed, her eyes wide with uncomprehending horror. the long knife had started in her womb, and jerked upward with a vicious pull. the man, fully clothed, stood watching her die. he turned toward the frozen child, the bloodied knife poised, ready to strike again. but the young man was not his mother. with the instinctive ferocity re-taught him by the streets and quays of london, he stiffened his arm and fired. the murderer fell at his feet. at the age of ten, he had killed his first man. he did not wait for the law to decide his fate: he had seen too much of its handiwork. and he had no intention of slowly starving like the other orphans of the gutter. instead he crept down to the docks, and stowed away on the most imposing ship he could find, dreaming, in his way, of a life of adventure at sea. and when the vessel was well out in the channel, he left his hiding place and snuck into the captain's cabin, late at night as he paced the deck. once inside he worked his fingers to the bone, scrubbing, polishing, and straightening the room. the strategy worked. when the captain entered and saw what he was doing, he beat him half to death, then ordered him chained in the hold. but after three days he released him and set him to work, performing tasks of the lowliest kind, with no other pay than a meager share of salt pork and hard biscuit, and the constant threat of being thrown over the side. but to a boy who had never known or expected kindness, it was enough. he never thought to complain or answer back, except to the cruder sailors, who thought to use him as a girl. these soon learned that the knife he carried was no idle threat, and that the boy could not be cowed. they left him be. even the iron-willed captain had come to respect him. after a time he made him his cabin boy, going so far as to teach him the rudiments of sailing and navigation. he never showed affection, most probably did not feel it. but he became nonetheless the closest thing to a father that he would ever know. the vessel was a slave ship, and it gave him his first confirmation of life's inherent cruelty. for the strange dark men they transported were no less strong, subtle, or determined than themselves. and yet for no greater crime than being primitive, and unable to defend themselves against the weapons and treacheries of europe, they were sold into a bondage from which there was no escape, ending only in death. he never thought to question whether this was right or wrong. and if this captain and this ship did not carry their human cargo to the colonies, some other would have, and perhaps not as safely or as well. so at the beginning of each westward passage, he learned but a single word of the tribe's native tongue. and when he went down into the hold to bring them their gruel, when one of them would catch his eye and make pleading gestures, bewildered at his lot, he used it: "accept." there was no other way to survive. and so for five years he had lived, making the long triangular passage: from london to the coast of africa, carrying medicine and supplies, from africa to america, with the slave labor which helped build it, then back again to england with raw materials, and the profits that came from being aggressive, and willing to do what was necessary. it was a lesson he never forgot: injustice there would always be, and a man must look to his own advancement. but then captain horne had died, strangled to death by a slave's chain in a ship revolt. the huge, fierce black man had been oblivious to the thrusts of his own knife from behind, his one desire to kill the man in front of him before his own life was ended. this, too, was a lesson he would long remember. the captain had grown less severe with age, and had loosed his grip, just enough, for those he kept under his thumb to rise up and take his life. the moral? victory must be consolidated by ruthless vigilance. he had shed no tears when order was restored, and his captain's body returned to the deep. he was simply gone, along with the life that he had come to know so well. and though he might easily have found work on another ship, being then a strong and tireless lad of fifteen, he decided that the rise to power was too slow, and too limited at sea. real opportunity, in his eyes, lay in the military and political arenas. so when the ship returned to plymouth, he joined the army as an infantryman, and later forged and sponsored his own commission as officer. at every step he gained the reputation of a fearless soldier, and of a fierce, unyielding leader of men. such indomitable young lions were much needed in those days of expanding empire, and could rise quickly to positions of prominence, especially along the frontiers. nor was he to rise in rank alone, but also in station. after a determined search, he at last found a noble family in ruin, ready to collapse. and through a combination of bribes, extortion, and the threat of violence, he forced the aging and childless lord to recognize him as his legitimate son, and rightful heir to his name and property alike. the old man died but a few months later, his spirit broken, his body racked by poison. and so he found himself at twenty-nine, his implacable charge taking him to the heights of his profession, swift and sure as an arrow's flight. he had no illusions; he had no dreams; and he could not conceive of anything that would alter his life's course in the least. he believed he knew and understood all that the world held for a man, and did not hold. he knew what he wanted, and he was willing to pay the price. yet it was at the very heart of this emotional wasteland that the one kindness, the one exception of his life had somehow found him. he had just returned from southern africa, where forces under his command had crushed a native uprising before it could gather impetus and support. in honor of this he had been decorated, and invited to a special reception held for him at the summer estates of the earl of sussex. arriving in little-used dress uniform, making no attempt to hide his disdain for this aristocratic gathering and all that it implied, he had seemed, as he often did in society, a poorly disguised wolf among dogs. his one desire was to make the acquaintance of those persons who could advance his career, ignore those who could not, and get out before his deep-seated hatred of the rich caused him to do or say something he would later regret. but during the meal he found himself seated across from a beautiful and fragile young woman who for some reason looked down, blushing, each time his eyes fell upon her. there was something in her face. . .he had never been able to describe it. . .that made him curious about her. he felt drawn to her somehow. he did not know why, nor did he think to ask. thinking and asking, outside the pale of his ambition, were a thing almost forgotten. so when the company moved to the ballroom he stayed on, and after watching her for several minutes from a distance, approached her and asked her to dance. she flushed more deeply than before, looked up at him with pleading eyes. she started to say yes, then fell into a swoon. oblivious to all else in the room, indeed, in all the world, he caught her up and carried her to the freer air of the balcony. those who tried to follow were met with such a murderous glare..... sitting beside her in the gentle moonlight, he had felt such concern. and when she came back to herself, when she opened her eyes and saw him she said simply, to his astonishment: "you know that i love you." knowing nothing else he embraced her gently, with such a surge of tender emotion that for a time he did not know himself. the past fell away. the future as he had planned it turned cold and barren in his sight. without so much as knowing her name, or even believing in the possibility, he knew that he had found the love of his life. there were many obstacles, not the least of which was earl arthur himself, her uncle and guardian, who violently opposed their union. but the newly empowered lord purceville was obsessed, and let nothing stand in his way, until they were man and wife. he remembered their wedding night, angelica beside him in the moonlit bed. her virgin's blood ran softly, like a benediction, as he wept the only real tears of his life. the world lay gentle and loving in his arms, knowing him as even he did not. he could see no end to their happiness..... the pain of it became too much to bear. he tried to force himself back to the present. but there remained one more memory, one more brutal image that would not lie still---a savagery that went beyond simple violence. for it was the cold, unfeeling hand of death: death to the young, who so desired life. the vaginal blood ran again, as if in mockery of their love. his second son, stillborn, lay beside her in the bed, as she clutched his hand in uncomprehending pain and fear. the physician bowed his head in resignation, and walked away. no gentle and loving farewell was left to her, only life seeping out, and death creeping in. she knew that it was over, and in the final moments only begged him to go on, to love their living son, and try not to hate. but as she died his hope died with her. the one love, the one exception, had gone from his life. and in time he grew harder and more ruthless than before, a meanness added to the fire of his charge, as innocence enraged him, and naivety invoked his wrath..... how could she be gone, the one he held so close? there was no justice..... god? if such a being had stood before him in that moment, telling him the reason, he would have cursed him and tried to kill him. the lord purceville found himself alone, on the bed that he had made, his eyes as dry as the desert of his life, the hateful emptiness of the present. it was pointless: to look for meaning in a world where none existed, to search for reason among the airless stones of a ruined temple. he had never known such bitterness. there was nothing left. nothing but to destroy his enemies, and live out his life in defiance, unvanquished and unawed. the soft light that had tried to suffuse his soul, was snuffed out like an insolent candle in ancient and unchangeable darkness. he had made his choice. the night had wounded him, but not enough. he had chosen the sword long ago, and by the sword he would die. he cast aside worthless sentiment, and studied the end-game before him. because stone is hard---it does not change---and a stream will run to its conclusion. thirty-one michael woke with a sense of foreboding that was almost physical. he often felt uneasy after too short a sleep, as if hearing the distant thunder of inevitable death. but this was more immediate, more intense. the knowledge of what he must do that day had never left him, but had woven itself in and out of his dreams. it was not that. something was wrong. where was margaret maccain, and why had she left the hut deserted? looking across at purceville's empty bed, he felt his throat tighten and his heart beat heavily. pulling on his boots and long coat, he walked as calmly as he could to the door of the ancient dwelling, afraid what he might find on the other side. he opened it. the horse was still there, grazing unconcerned in the place where he had left it. so the englishman had not deserted him. this, and his bent form not far off, calmed him. but not for long. first his eyes made out the shovel in his hands, then the newly dug grave at his feet. the red, clay-like soil piled around it called to mind images of an unhealing wound. what did it mean? his mind flashed back to their conversation the night before, as they reached the high narrow pass, and approached the witch's hut. it was not so much what purceville had said that troubled him, but what he had not said..... "you'd best stay back and out of sight until i've spoken to her," had been his own words. "the widow maccain has no love for the english, and your father..... well. let's just say i may have spoken too soon, when i said that no one has greater reason to hate you." nothing. "i'm not even sure how she feels about me," he continued. "but when she learns that mary is in trouble, and that we are trying to help her, i think she will see things as they are." still no reply. "you don't seem overly concerned, purceville. she's a hard old woman, and as determined an enemy as you're ever likely to face. i'm not one to fear her for a witch, but there are other weapons she might employ." "she won't resist us," said the other strangely. ".....she's not as hard as you think." "what makes you so sure?" again no answer. he had been too weary to press the point; he only thought it curious. and when they reached the dark shelter and found the woman gone, the night's small rest assured, he had been far too relieved to wonder at it. for in the clinging darkness he had not seen the charred tree above, or the withered bones that shrank away from it. walking stiffly now in the early morning cold, he approached the englishman. stephen heard him, but did not turn. one last ashen limb projected above the rising level of earth in the hole. he began to hurry himself to cover it, then stopped. "stephen? what are you doing?" purceville straightened. he said, without turning. "i am burying the mother of my sister, and the woman who cared for me as a child." at that moment a flock of ravens spoke behind, an evil sound that seemed to mesh the rising web of horror about him. turning toward the summons michael saw the tree, as a gust of wind shook its blackened limbs in a dull rattle of death. then whirling back in shock, he saw the bones. "what happened here?" he cried. "what have you bastards done! " in a flash it came to him: the party of horsemen riding hard from the west, the soot-marks of their boots upon the threshold. anger and hatred overwhelmed him, as before he knew what had happened the pistol was in his hand, and pointed at the back of his enemy. but then stephen turned to face him, and he lowered it again. because there were standing tears, and real shame in the englishman's eyes. "it's not what you think," he said weakly, head down. "what we did, was bad enough. but she was dead when we arrived." he put one sleeve to his eyes. "she left a note, which i gave to mary, asking her to forgive..... my father. . .burned her body as a warning, and to frighten his own men into action. i hate what we've become. i hate it." ... "i believe you," said michael slowly. "and i'm sorry." "please don't say any more." the highlander started to walk away. "no, wait," said stephen. "i want you..... i want someone to hear this." "i'm listening." purceville shifted uncomfortably, resisting to the end. then spoke what he truly felt: the only eulogy the woman would ever have. "she was my governess, and treated me kindly. but i never told her. . .that i loved her, too." he started to lower his head in despair, then raised it again in sudden resolution. "we've got to get mary out, and away from all of this. she deserves so much more, than this." "we will, stephen. tonight." a pause. "would you like me to help you?" "no. it is my responsibility. mine....." the realization stunned him. he fought back a sob. "dear god, i am weary of graves." "then let us vow to do the work before us well," said michael, "that there may be no more." "you don't understand," said stephen. "if we rescue my sister and her guardian, and you take them away from here, your fight is ended. but mine is just begun." michael wrestled with his own emotions, then came up and put a hand on the troubled man's shoulder. "you've made a good beginning, my friend. you've looked the devil in the eye." purceville met his penetrating gaze, puzzled that these simple words should mean so much. and in that moment this stranger was so like mary---the way he spoke, the way he knew him so well..... "stephen. every man chooses his own time to stop running. and it's only when you turn, that you find out what you have inside you. i cannot lie, and say it will be easy, or that you will triumph simply because your cause is just. the truth is that it's much harder to be a good man than a bad one, to do what's right, than to be selfish and afraid. i've fought the devil, in my way, for thirty years, and come to no reward. on the contrary, my life has been a constant struggle. "and tonight," he went on, "i face the battle of my life. nothing else matters, in all the world. and so help me, stephen, i'm terrified. i speak of faith, and yet i do not feel it. getting mary safely away is everything. everything . if i fail, or injure her in the attempt, my own life is less than meaningless. my life must end....." then it was he who stiffened in defiance. "but god or no god, i will have her out. with all my soul i swear it. she will be freed." stephen studied him, both stirred and bewildered. "who are you?" michael, too, hesitated at the truth. it could forge a bond between them, or destroy everything. ... "i am michael scott. another man lies in my grave." stunned silence. "then it's true! you are in love with her." "yes, and i have been for most of my life. but it's not something sordid, stephen, whatever you've been told, or your fears may imagine. i've watched her grow from a child. i've dried her fatherless tears. i've loved her in silence, as a brother and a friend. and never, until a few days ago, did i tell her all that was in my heart. "she loves me too, stephen. if ever two people were meant to be together, it is she and i..... i have asked her to marry me, and she's consented." stephen walked away to control himself, as bitter jealousy burned through him. the thought of her with anyone was more than he could bear. he whirled, his face flushed and distorted. but anger was soon drowned in despair. because the truth had finally come to him: he was in love with his sister, whom he could never have. he clenched his fists to his eyes as if to banish all sight, all memory. then slowly he mastered himself, became perfectly still. "well," he said darkly. "there it is." "what do you mean, stephen?" the englishman looked full into his face, then turned away. "my trial. my test. in order to free the one person i truly love, i must lose her forever. to do what is right for others, i must do injury to myself. it is a bitter choice." "yes," said michael. "but it is not the choice you think. what you do tonight, or do not do, will be for yourself, not for mary or for me. because if you don't help, and something happens to her, you will carry it for the rest of your life." he released a weary breath, and shook his head. "i cannot help you choose." "no," said the other, looking down. "it seems i must help myself." there was nothing more to say. michael started back toward the hut, wondering if he hadn't made a terrible mistake---if he hadn't tried the character of this man too hard already. he slowed, stopped outright, then said without turning. "i would like to have you with me, stephen. you know the place, and the situation, far better than i. but if you feel you cannot. . .you are free to do as you like after i have gone, with no further obligation to me." purceville was silent. michael first saw to the horse, thought for a moment to keep it with him at all times..... no. if this man was going to risk life and limb to help them, he must be shown this much trust, at least. he reentered the hut, and began to work on the long length of rope he had brought with him from the cottage. purceville watched him go, then slowly refilled the hole that he had dug, thinking his own dark thoughts. thirty-two earl arthur stood in the cold cellar-chamber with a cloth held to his mouth, examining two corpses. while both were branded, and both wore native clothing, that was where the similarity ended. the authenticity of number , james talbert, could not be questioned. his curling, brown-blondish hair and classic scot features, his square but emaciated form, all fit the known facts: the prisoner who would not be disciplined, who had escaped mentally ill, and on the verge of death. even now he wore a look of defiance. but the other, number , was all wrong. while no physical descriptions were listed on the tally sheet he held, this surely could not be a man who had fled across half the country, hunted and desperate, remaining with and protecting his doubly afflicted companion. beside the physical anomalies---the body before him was lean, but not from hunger, and bore no other signs of a destitute existence---he could find no indication in the pale, languid countenance of the necessary courage and character to survive such an ordeal. indeed, it was difficult to imagine a face that exhibited less character, or spoke of a nature so obviously low and unseemly. and what of the way he had been killed---by a single, clean blade-thrust to the heart? why wouldn't mounted patrols simply shoot him, if it came to it, rather than dismount, and engage in hand-to-hand fighting? such a confrontation, with such a result, seemed unlikely at best. and to think of it, why had talbert been shot in the back? a dying man, and one of his fiery and unstable temperament, was not likely to turn and run from his final meeting with the hated english pursuers. but the most damning evidence required no such speculation. as an underling reluctantly turned the red-haired man onto his stomach, the discrepancy was plain. the brand just below the left shoulder was not a scar, but an unhealed burn, perhaps not even inscribed while the man still lived. earl arthur had the weapon he needed. but there was more to come. upon returning to his chambers to mull over the discovery, and think how to use it to greatest advantage, he had found an old woman still at work on the rooms. he started to leave for the solitude of an adjacent library, when she accosted him with her knowing voice. "begging your lordship's pardon," she said, eyeing him steadily. "if you will forgive me, speaking so bold, i have words about my master you may find worthy of your attention." the secretary did not think to remind her of her place, as he normally would have done. this was the very type of disclosure he had sought, and been unable to secure, from all the local persons his men had questioned. fear seemed to padlock their jaws, and even the promise of reward (and protection from lord purceville's wrath) could not induce them to speak. so seating himself graciously on one side of a small table, he bid her sit down on the other, and the interview began. the woman spoke mysteriously of an illegitimate daughter and her guardian, locked away to keep them from telling what they knew, and of the sudden disappearance of purceville's son when he learned of it, and sought out his father in a rage. arthur himself had witnessed their tense meeting in the banquet hall, and marked the subsequent absence of young stephen, which had been explained to him in a most unusual and unsatisfactory manner. wasting no more time he thanked the servant, gave her a silver coin, then called for his orderly and dictated a strong letter, informing parliament and the king of his intention to call an immediate inquest. by this time it was late afternoon. the earl's breathing was tight, as ever, and his heart beat hard and unevenly from the excitement. but he was determined to act swiftly. after a quarter century, he finally had the means to slap down this crude upstart, who had seduced his niece away from him, and forced her into an unnatural marriage, ending in death. from that time on they had been enemies. and he had sworn that if it took a lifetime, the rogue would be brought to term for his insolence. that purceville had risen still further, despite his every intervention, had only fanned the embers of his jealous hatred, driving him on and on. most galling (to a man who held as sacred trust his own noble birth) were the manipulations, never proved, which had led to his recognition as a lord, descended from other lords. let others believe what they liked! this man was lower born than the commonest sailor, and one day he would hold forth his true nature for all to see. and now, now that day had come! throwing caution to the winds, he strode briskly down the long corridors, seeking a direct confrontation with his foe. at length he came upon him in his study, sitting unconcerned with a beautifully printed, leather-bound book in his hands: the gentleman's creed, by sir william blythe. "purceville," said the smaller man hotly. "i should like a word." "certainly, earl," returned the other, with his hand indicating an adjacent armchair. "to what do i owe the pleasure of this visit?" his calm and courteous manner were infuriating. but seeing the book, earl arthur contained himself. "i am here to inform you, lord purceville, of my decision to hold a formal inquest into your conduct as governor of this province. i have made this intention known to the king, and only await the arrival of his official observer to begin proceedings against you." "well," replied purceville calmly. "you are within your rights as secretary, i am sure. but might i inquire, as an innocent man, what it is i am being charged with?" arthur went on to tell him, with some heat, of the suspicious nature of the second corpse, of the bastard daughter imprisoned somewhere within the castle walls, and of the subsequent disappearance of his son, who could perhaps have explained both these things. but not only was purceville unruffled, when the girl was mentioned, it was all he could do to suppress a sinister smile. "yes," he said, when the other had finished. "i can see how these things might upset you. and to tell the truth, i am as anxious for the answers as you are. i myself suspected mischief, when my men brought to me the alleged prisoner, number . i have since been conducting my own investigation into the matter. "in fact, it was to this very end that i despatched my son---to the place where the capture is said to have occurred---to secure further details. i'm sorry i could not have been more forthcoming with you on this. perhaps you will understand if an old soldier, far from his native soil, feels a certain loyalty to the men who help him defend an often hostile frontier? i did not wish to hold one or more of them before you as criminal, until there was conclusive evidence against him." he touched his fingertips lightly together, continued. "as to the second charge---that of an illegitimate daughter---i must confess that i myself am bewildered. there is in fact a young woman here who claims that title---or rather, her guardian claims it for her. and though the evidence is quite clearly against them, still the woman persists. she has asked for a rather large sum as recompense, which i can only interpret as outright blackmail. but i assure you, they are not under lock and key. if it will ease your mind, i will take you to them after supper. in fact, i insist." so convincing had the performance been, the casual air and supreme confidence, that earl arthur experienced a moment of doubt. what if purceville had spoken the truth, and the charges against him proved groundless? but his stubborn anger rallied, and he remembered with whom he was dealing. "yes, we will pay a call on them, immediately ---and i mean just that!---after the evening meal." which was, of course, exactly what purceville wanted. the old man started to leave, then paused in the doorway. "and when shall i have the pleasure of speaking to your son?" the master never batted an eye. "will tomorrow noon be acceptable? that is when he is scheduled to return to me with his report." arthur grunted, presumably in assent, and left the room. the stage was set. alone in her chambers, the old woman smiled. thirty-three as the shadows of afternoon grew long, deepening toward sunset, michael began the final preparations. trying to suppress his own anxiety, he saddled the horse slowly and with care. he stroked its flanks, checked its limbs and hooves, all the while speaking softly and steadily. for this animal must not only carry them a considerable distance, but be silent and disciplined when they arrived. it was a good mount, he reassured himself, sturdy and well trained. whatever its master's faults, he had clearly loved and cared for his horse. with a sudden pang of sorrow and exhaustion, he remembered who that man had been, and to what end he had come. the unfairness of life, the endless cruelty..... no. he could not give in. whatever happened this night, to himself and the ones he loved, rested squarely on his shoulders. he must act. he must find a way. as he finished, and led the mare toward the hut, stephen stepped out of it. "you're coming?" michael asked him, as calmly as he could. "nothing has changed," replied purceville stiffly. "we've got to get her out. all else comes after." "good," said michael thickly. "good..... will you hold her while i fetch the rope?" the other nodded. once inside, michael slung the long, heavy coil across his neck and shoulder, then reemerged into the still, expectant air. the time had come. he bowed his head in silence, but no words of prayer would come to him. instead he took a deep breath, and opened his eyes to the task that lay ahead. he nodded tersely to his companion. then began to descend, with stephen leading the animal behind. upon reaching the branching of ways, it was agreed that neither would ride until they came down from the rough mountain paths, onto smoother, more tractable ground. they walked, as distance and night closed around them. * * * "what is it, anne? what's wrong?" "i don't know, mary. a premonition. . .something." she stood up and shook herself against the cold, but the feeling remained. at first she thought to keep it to herself, out of habit, and to protect the girl. but they had grown so close these long, empty days in the cell, with little to eat and only the shelter of each other's bodies to keep them from despair. all barriers had fallen away, leaving them what in fact they were: two frail and frightened human beings, surviving both physically and emotionally by sharing the same warmth, the same breath, the same meager sustenance. she could not hide anything from her now. "i feel," she went on, "as if something terrible is going to happen." "to michael?" both understood so many things without words. "no, mary, i don't think so. perhaps to us..... someone is going to be murdered, and it will happen in this room." * * * the banquet hall was again nearly full, though the air was far from festive. both camps seemed to realize that something major had occurred in the battle between their respective leaders, and to sense that something further would happen that night. only purceville himself, and the large, rough-looking officer to his right, appeared unconcerned. the meal proceeded, largely in silence. then, as the cloth was drawn, the governor rose and began to propose a series of toasts. there was nothing unusual in this. rather, it seemed the act of a genial host, trying to smooth over the obvious tension of his guests. "gentlemen, i give you the health of the king. "gentlemen, to a strong and united britain." and so forth. but after these stock phrases, suitable for such an occasion, his words began to take on a more personal tone, which bordered at times on outright sarcasm. during the first several toasts, arthur had worn the air of a righteous man who would not be pacified. but as their nature and content became more inflammatory, and their number far exceeded decorum, he became first agitated, then flushed and quite angry. the latter speeches of purceville ran something like this: "gentleman, to the health of vibrant leaders." to arthur, an obvious slur against his age and recurring angina. "gentlemen, to the gallant soldiers who conquer and protect, so that others may live comfortably from their labors." the secretary had never been more than a token officer, nor served in a single campaign. "gentlemen, to those with the strength and courage to make their own way in the world." and so on. finally the aged aristocrat stood defiantly, and raised his own cup high. "i see no gentleman before me," he retorted. "but i will answer his challenge." and he glared about the room. "to the truth about low-born men. and to those who will not leave their treachery in darkness, but hold it forth in the hard light of day." the gathering, already hushed and apprehensive, now fell silent as a stone. for unlike his rival, arthur had made no attempt to hide his animosity, or to engage in verbal cat-and-mouse. but purceville only smiled blithely. "splendid!" he cried, as if the remark could not possibly have been directed at him. he drained his goblet with a flourish, then crashed it gaily back down onto the table. anyone who did not know him well (and there were many present who did not), might have thought him too deep in his cups. "well, my friends," he said, a bit unsteadily. "it has been a lovely evening. but sadly, all things must come to an end..... "for now there is work to be done. in the name of that same truth which the earl so eloquently serves, he and i must be off on an errand of our own. we are going to interview a lady ." and he raised his eyebrows suggestively, the very portrait of a man who had lost all restraint. "lieutenant ballard will accompany me, as my faithful right hand in all things. but perhaps earl arthur would feel more secure with a somewhat larger retinue?" again (to arthur) the underlying insult, the slur against his courage and character. "my orderly officer will be more than sufficient escort for me," returned the secretary. "to record the events of our interview. for i am sure that i will have nothing to fear, once the truth is known." "bravo," said the larger man heartily. "your strength and vitality are an inspiration to us all. now gentlemen, if you will excuse us." purceville himself led the way, as the four-man procession filed out of the room, leaving behind the light and heat of the banquet hall. and on toward the back reaches of the castle. "i'm afraid it's rather a long way," he said, as they turned the first corner. "perhaps the earl might care to take a short rest?" "your audience is gone, purceville. this is between you and me. i may not be as young as you; but by god i'd walk to the ends of the earth tonight!" "of course." and after a time. "one last corridor." when they reached the massive tower door, ballard drew out his ring of keys. inserting the largest, he turned it roughly in the lock, then pushed in on the heavy oak barrier with a groan of iron hinges. a dark opening awaited them. the company stepped inside, and were enfolded in echoes. to their right, illumined by a single, recessed lamp, stood the beginnings of an ancient stairway, cold stone that spiralled out of sight. ballard relocked the door behind them, then took up a torch, and lighted it at the lamp. "perhaps you should reconsider, earl? i'm afraid the ladies in question reside on the uppermost story." arthur ground his teeth in impotent wrath. he had eaten and drunk obstinately at the meal, as if to prove himself. he had taken the bait, and dug the hook deep into his flesh. and though now a part of him smelled the trap, his pride would not let him back down. for the strong wine had gone to his head, and he believed himself more than he was. "i shall go wherever you lead," he said hotly, unable to control himself. "to bury you, i would descend into hell itself." "very well, secretary. my second will lead the way with the torch. watch your step, and be sure to tell us if you begin to flag along the way." ballard suppressed a grin of pleasure, and began to climb. the others followed. the aristocrat's hard resolve could not last. soon he moved as if in chains, every step a punishment. this man who had begun life so high, gliding easily and arrogantly down the gentle incline, now found himself struggling bitterly just to reach the level ground of final judgment. halfway up it was clear that he should go no further. his breath came in tight gasps, as almost unconsciously he clutched at the growing pain in his left arm and shoulder. becoming alarmed, his orderly called a halt, and approached his failing master. "your lordship must rest," he whispered emphatically. but the others looked down in sneering silence. as soon as he regained his breath the old man pushed him off, and said harshly. "we go on." "but surely," said purceville, in his best native tongue. "'tis no trouble to stop." "we move !" the procession continued, always upward. ten steps from the top, arthur collapsed. rushing toward him with a look of sudden concern, the lord purceville lifted his shriveled form, and carried it like an injured child up to the broad final landing. "oh, this is bad," he said, as he set him down and stooped to examine him. "i fear i've made a terrible mistake. mister cummings," (this was the orderly), "run like the devil! fetch my personal physician. tell him what has happened, and that i fear for the secretary's heart. i'll do what i can to make him comfortable here: we dare not try to move him." the man turned pale with fright, then rushed headlong down the steps. as soon as he was out of sight and hearing, ballard set the torch in its iron mount, and allowed himself to smile in earnest. "got to hand it to you, governor. that was a fine piece of work. he'll be nine parts down before he remembers he can't get out without my key. and he's half winded as it is." "you must not take that for granted!" growled purceville, himself not immune to the rigors of the climb. "did you bring the flask as i told you?" "of course." and a look of reproach. "then give it to me. now !" ballard glared at him, but the other was not even looking. he lifted the tin from his pocket, and placed it in purceville's outstretched hand. burning with rage, henry purceville took the fine embroidered handkerchief from the breast pocket of the crumpled man. then soaked it with water, and brought it slowly toward his face. "what are you going to do?" ejaculated arthur helplessly. but his voice had been reduced to a cracked whisper, and his imagined safety deserted him. "this is for the soldiers, your highness . and for me." and the son of a sailor stuffed the cloth full into his mouth. then with one great hand holding the jaw shut, he pinched off the nose with the other, and stopped all flow of air. the old man could not endure it long. suffocating, struggling to breathe and break free, his heart gave one last, violent pump, then seized and ceased forever. the life slowly left his body, and his eyes sank deeper in their sockets. earl emerson arthur, was dead. but a moment later a sound became audible below: the soft rasp of leather on stone. the orderly was returning. purceville reached hurriedly into the dead man's mouth and began to pull out the soiled cloth, but too late. the orderly turned the final arc, his head rising above the floor of the landing. . .and he saw. the scene before him, the events of the entire evening, required no further explanation. "you--- you've killed him!" and though weary to his very bones, the man whirled and flew down the steps once more. for now his own life was in danger, and the fear of death worked like lightning on his limbs, still young enough to respond. it could not occur to him that he was still trapped inside the tower (as he had realized halfway down), or that all its doors remained locked to him. he only knew that these men would try to kill him, and that he still wanted to live. "what are you waiting for?" bellowed purceville at his lieutenant. "go after him!" but ballard stood very still, his eyes narrowing. "and what about them bitches?" he said, motioning with his head toward the door of mary's cell, pierced by the barred window. "they heard the whole of it, too." "fool!" cried purceville, with deliberate menace. "they'll not live out the night. now go! " ballard lowered his head, then walked sullenly past his two superiors: the one living, the other dead. he began to descend in pursuit, but his pace was far from running. after a time he slowed to a walk. . .then finally stopped altogether. he knew the man could not escape him. the thick and impenetrable door sealed him in, and two of his own men guarded the long, unapproachable corridor. no outsider would hear his cries, or come to his aid. but this was not what made him pause. things were becoming too complicated, as the old man took more and more chances to protect himself. and what if he failed? who had been his `loyal right hand' these many years, doing the dirty work, and taking all the risks? "toby ballard," he muttered. "that's who. and likely to have my neck stretched for the trouble." that very day he had killed a king's messenger---the man arthur had despatched---for which he might well taste the gallows. and there was yet one more bitter savor added to the stew: he had developed a weakness for the girl. what he felt for his `little prisoner' could hardly be called love, and he knew that in time she would have to be done away with. but to be killed by him , tonight, before his desire had been met and served..... he sat down on a middle landing, neither high nor low, trying to work it all through in his mind. for the lord purceville had misjudged him. what this man felt for him was not loyalty, but merely a primal respect for his strength, such as any pack animal might feel. and now that strength had begun to fail. me, i sticks with the meanest dog, and when he's killed i go my own way . but who was the meanest dog now, and which side would prevail? arthur was dead, but the power of the crown..... these were the things he tried to weigh, knowing that very soon he must decide. and then he must act. thirty-four the two men lay peering over the edge of a low, crumbling wall, looking down a sharp slope at the garrison below. row after row of long, low buildings met their eyes. behind the barracks, to the watchers' left, were the stables for the horses; in front of them, the night watch stood talking or drinking coffee before a blazing fire. two sentinels paced back and forth between cornering guardhouses, with the pickets of the mounted patrols just beyond. it was now full night. the rising moon was exactly halved, with long bars of smoky cloud passing at intervals across it. the resulting twilight was neither pale nor pitch, but a sporadic intermingling of both. whether moonlight or deepest shadow fell across the creatures of earth, seemed entirely a matter of chance. neither help nor hindrance, michael thought. but he expected no more. thus far their journey had gone without incident, though the real difficulty and danger lay ahead. yet the largest part of what he fought in that moment was not fear, but a fatigue that bordered on despair. it was a sore trial to have ridden so far, and lived in darkness so long, only to arrive weary and unsure at the time of greatest need, when courage and decisive action were most critical. as he looked down at the garrison, and on to the castle in the distance, he felt again his own frailty and insignificance. rustic proverbs about weakness overcoming strength, and water (in time) eroding the hardest stone, brought little comfort. for mary and his mother were imprisoned by the hands of men. proverbs and faith would not free them, only active human resistance. his heart beat heavily against the cold ground. he knew what he must do. "how do we slip past them?" he asked purceville. it was a formidable question. for behind the stables the stone rose sheer, a bony ridge forming one margin of the high peninsula on which the castle was set: a long and difficult climb at best, to an uncertain end. it also forced them to leave the horse behind, and to abandon all thoughts of mounted escape. to the fore of the compound as well, there seemed little hope of stealth. the only road in passed directly in front of it, full in the glare of the watchfire. beyond it, to the right, lay only a narrow stretch of rough greenbelt, then again the ground rose, rocky and untenable. perhaps they might creep along in the far shadows, where the uneven turf met stone. but one false step, one noisy balk on the part of the animal, already restive, and they were as good as caught. stephen stared directly at him. "we don't." michael felt his blood run cold. "stephen! you're not thinking of betraying---" "of course not. if i wanted to turn you in, and try to reach earl arthur, i'd have only to raise my voice and we'd be surrounded at once. i will admit that i'd thought of it. but your way has certain. . . advantages." in a brief moment of unobscured moonlight, michael saw that the englishman's face had resumed something of its domineering cruelty, and realized that the tables had been turned once more. but there was something else at work there as well, some deep inner conflict, not yet resolved. and he knew, for all the anger and fear that now welled up in him..... he still needed this man's help. he forced his hand to loose its grip on the pistol, and his voice to remain calm. "what is your plan?" he said, as evenly as he could. "to walk right past them---myself on horseback, you tied to a length of rope behind. i'll say i've caught another prisoner, and am taking him to my father for interrogation." again michael forced back his emotions. "and what if one of those men knows of the rift between you, or ballard is there himself?" "those `men'," said stephen with disdain, "are the king's soldiers. they know nothing of the inner machinations. the ones who do my father's dirty work---those either cruel enough to like it, or weak enough to be bullied into submission---are stationed with him in the castle. and if ballard should be there, i will have him arrested and put in chains. you forget that in the king's army i am still a captain." stephen paused. "and if you have a better plan, highlander, i should very much like to hear it." again michael felt the sense of helpless inevitability that had assailed him as the women were taken from him. he railed against it, cursed it, hated himself for beginning to yield. fate's endless trap opened yet again before him. . .to what end ? but no matter how he searched and fought, he could see no other way. this time, at least, he would force one concession. he drew out the pistol, and rested its cold muzzle against the englishman's chest. "purceville. will you swear to me now, on your life, that no matter what happens to me, you will get mary out and away from here? i mean just and only that. in the eyes of god, and on peril of your life, do you so swear?" this time there was no hesitation. "that i do most solemnly swear." "all right, then." slowly he lowered the pistol, and handed it to purceville. "let's see if you've got any of your father's gift for deception." their eyes met, though coldly, and both understood. together they crept back from the wall, then rose and moved to the deeper shadows of a weather-worn tree, where they had left the horse. michael himself cut a length from the coiled rope, untied the knots he had put in it for mary's rescue, and fastened one end to the saddle. "all right," he said. "bind my wrists, before i change my mind. and see that the knots are tight. if anyone examines them, i want it to look real." purceville did as he asked, exactly, then remounted. all done in silence, and without once looking into his face. in silence also did he spur his mount, and lead the bound man, none too gently, down the hill and onto the road that had swallowed the women. and on to the garrison of men. thirty-five the lord purceville leaned back heavily against the cold stone wall, eyes wide with a fear that was altogether new to him. his own breathing as they reached the upper stories had become tight and irregular; and now, though nearly twenty minutes had elapsed, his chest had still not relented its angry rebellion at such use. for he was no longer young, and his body's weight had begun to overmatch the inherent strength of his limbs and heart. and this same heart, which had served him so long and so well as to be all but forgotten, now labored heavily to compensate. and while he was probably in no danger of a seizure, what he had seen in arthur, and the long suppressed fear that his physical hardihood would one day desert him, combined to race dark imaginings through his mind. and where the hell was ballard? that they must kill the orderly was clear, but it must be done in such a way..... damn him! his sudden appearance had undone a scheme so perfect it would have solved everything. "everything!" but his wrath was wasted here, and he knew it. he let his great body slide down to the hard, unyielding floor. and for all the anguish it cost him, he knew he must remain there until the furor of his body had lessened, and his thoughts become more tenable. then he would act with swift resolution. or so he imagined. for ballard, in his ponderous and short-sighted way, had reached a very different conclusion. though unable to weigh the full consequences of such a choice, he had decided that the days of his master's dominance were numbered, and that it was time to abandon him. "i'm me own master now," he said aloud. "now i decide who lives, and who don't." so rising slowly, with plans of his own passing through him in the dark, he descended the remaining steps, and approached at last the final landing---the broad level space before the massive door. he heard a sudden start in the gloom, and strained his eyes to see. the single lamp was now smoking so badly, and cast such a wavering glow..... he saw the orderly, crouched like a frightened child at the foot of the impenetrable door. the lieutenant took a breath, then chose his course. "peace, master cummings," he said to him. "i haven't come to kill you. stand against the far wall if it will make your mind easier. i'm going to let you out." "but you. . .you murdered him." almost a sob. "not i, my friend. it was that bastard, purceville, who done it before i could stop him. and that'll be an end to my faithful service, i promise you. after all these years' blind obedience, i see him now in his true colors. i tell you, i've had enough." he came forward with the ring of keys in his hand, as the other moved distrustfully away. he inserted the iron shaft, turned it in the lock, and pulled open the door with a seditious crack like the unsealing of a coffin. then stood away. the orderly eyed the opening, torn between desire and fear. then began to inch toward it with his back against the stone, arms spread plaintively behind him. "be cautioned," said ballard as he drew closer. "you must walk past the guards at the end of the corridor as if nothing has happened, then lie low till i've had time to deal with the master. his men are ruthless, and the lord only knows what they'll do if they suspect....." the young man looked back at him, confused, then suddenly burst through the opening and out into the corridor beyond. ballard sealed and locked the barrier once more. and thinking of the girl, so utterly helpless in the cold dark cell, he smiled. thirty-six perhaps a mile from the garrison, the bony ridge to the left of the road began to decline and pull back, leaving in its place a high, grassy plateau. this continued largely unbroken to the castle, due north, ending to westward in a stark precipice that fell for a thousand feet into the churling seas below. at this same point the road began a long, slow loop to the right, at length bending back to meet the fortified drawbridge at the castle's eastern gate. here stephen turned off the weathered track, moving up into the lateral plain. michael plodded on behind him, still bound, his wrists raw and aching. so convincing had purceville's performance been before the garrison---so rough and disdainful his treatment of the prisoner---that michael himself was not certain how things now stood between them. but a short distance from the precipice the englishman checked his horse and dismounted, approaching him. "i underestimated you," said the highlander. to this the other did not reply, but sternly set to work loosing the bonds. "this much i did for you," said stephen, as the last knot fell away. "what i do from here on is for myself, and for the girl." "i ask no more." nothing was said about the pistol, which the englishman did not return. for michael knew that the time for weapons and fighting was passed. now there was only the tower, and the sea. the two mounted, and rode the remaining distance carefully, the horse weary and unsure beneath them. and soon the hard dark walls of the fortress were sharply outlined against the tattered sky beyond. drawing closer still, stephen guided the reluctant animal to the very edge of the cliffs upon their left. far below the seas crashed sullenly against the unyielding stone, or hissed dark warnings upon the sands of a shallow inlet. michael strained his eyes for any sign of the waiting skiff, but distance and darkness defied him. and soon the great, cornering tower frowned black and menacing before them. they dismounted, feeling small, perhaps a hundred yards away, in the hollow beneath a wind-riven oak. together they advanced on foot, through the cold stubble-grass, until they were halted by the rounded bulge of the tower itself. immediately to the right of it a dry, deep-cloven moat had been cut into the stone foundation, encircling the castle on its three exposed sides. the fourth, to westward, was protected by the fall of cliffs behind. but the tower itself needed no such fortification. two hundred feet high, its thick and unscalable walls showed no opening for at least half that distance, and then only a staggered spiralling of high narrow windows for archers. the only other feature it showed beneath the crowning battlements, were the lizard- and gargoyle-headed drainspouts, which in centuries past had been used to pour boiling oil down upon the heads of would-be attackers, along with a volley of arrows and a shower of stones. craning his neck to look up at it, michael saw neither light nor sentinel, either in the tower itself, or upon the high, adjacent wall. for none were needed. sheer physical impassability guarded this bulwark turned prison, where there could be no thought of rescue or escape. the berserkers themselves had not been able to storm its fastness, and they were five centuries gone and forgotten. here at the last, michael realized the full desperation of his scheme. it would take a near perfect throw to reach the upper windows with one of the projectiles in which he placed such hope. and as stephen had said, they didn't even know which cell the women were in. he could not look at purceville now, who surely must be sneering at his `faith' and naiveté. so there it was. to have come so far, and overcome such obstacles, only to be defeated in the end by cold, indifferent stone. his whole soul longed to cry out her name in passionate summons. . .but he dared not. for though the walls were blind, surely there were ears within to hear his desperation, and descend upon them like angry birds of prey. feeling utterly lost, he lifted the great coil from his shoulders, and let it fall in a useless heap to the ground. and hung his head, unable for a time to continue. but when he raised it again, unvanquished, his eyes caught a gleam of something bright and solid in the grass, as for a moment the moon shone down clear and unobstructed. he moved closer, before the pale light could hide itself once more. was it possible..... the ring! he lifted it gently, as if it were a thing of smoke which might dissolve upon his touch. but the slender band remained. "what is it?" asked stephen. "a sign," replied the highlander. and with these words all the hope and urgency of his task returned to him. "it is my mother's. . .it is mary's ring, cast down as a marker from one of the cells above." he turned again to face the tower, careful to stand in the exact spot where he had found it. "the way the windows are staggered, it could only have come from the uppermost story. would that make sense, based on your knowledge of the tower?" "yes," said stephen, understanding. "and it would suit my father's temperament as well. he'll have done everything possible to intimidate....." but michael was no longer listening. instead he ran with sudden resolution, back to the startled horse, and removed the saddlebags. returning again, but this time not so close, he tried to gauge the height and distance exactly, then poured out his bundles on the ground. * * * the two women sat huddled together in fear, at the farthest point from the wretched, inadequate door. for as ballard suspected, they had heard every word of the murderous doings beyond it, including lord purceville's promise that they would not live out the night. of all the moments mary had yet endured, this was undeniably the darkest. to hear one's death sentence pronounced is a trial few can face. to hear the words spoken by her own father, the man who had brought her into the world, who should have loved and cared for her above all others. . .was a horror so black it nearly clove her heart in two. she hunched together, pale and shivering with fright---unable to act, or even to think. and yet it was only in that, most desperate of corners, that the true strength of her spirit revealed itself. her slow-awakened courage, pushed to its final need, became galvanized at the last, not a momentary surge, to be swept away as soon as anger left her, but a permanent foundation, underlying all. the will to live, and to resist the evil that would snuff out that life, rose so strong in her that it was all she could do not to cry out in rage. clenching her jaws to keep the lower from trembling, she broke away from the helpless embrace and began to move across the floor on all fours, searching for the blade that she had earlier discarded. with this, anne scott too seemed to gather herself, and perceiving her niece's intention, began to search for the knife as well. all done in the poor and inconstant light from without, and with the urgency that only threat of death can bring. it was no easy task. for the uneven paving stones held many cracks, with scattered straw overlying all. but at last mary's hand touched steel, and her fingers closed around it. a moment later two sounds were heard, one almost in answer to the other. first came ballard's heavy tread upon the threshold of the landing. then somewhere in the distance, a startled horse gave voice to its weary confusion. as if with one mind the women sought each other out. then locking arms, they turned all senses outward, poised for instantaneous action. together they heard the rough speech of the men outside the door, at the same time wondering with secret hope what rider had approached the outer walls, where none had come before. "where have you been?" growled purceville angrily. "what did you do with him?" "mister cummings met with an accident. he was in such haste to bring help to his dying master, that he missed his footing and fell headlong down the stairs. broke his neck. an ugly accident, but natural enough." "good," said purceville more calmly. "good work." but ballard would have none of it. "so the death of these two we can explain," he said flatly. "but how are you going to explain throttling them bitches?" "i'm not, lieutenant , and i suggest you watch your tongue." he paused, perceiving for the first time the danger of the man before him. not even his son knew more..... "we throw the bodies out the window, then have them collected by simon's men and hurled into the sea. arthur's escort will be too unnerved by his death to remember why he came here tonight, if they ever knew. then tomorrow we put two other women in their place---my former mistress and her mother---who'll say only what we tell them to say. all done as neat as neat." "well it don't sound such a sure thing to me," rumbled ballard, whose one thought amidst the closing web of treacheries was to have his way with the girl, possibly even steal her away. "so who bloody asked you!" cried purceville, drawing a great pistol from the inner lining of his coat. but the sudden outburst brought an answering pain from his chest, and he fell back against the wall for support. yet he still had fire enough to point the weapon squarely at his subordinate, who had taken a menacing step towards him. "i catch my breath. . .then we go in, and do it!" ballard could only glare at him, his hopes for lust slipping away. the two women, holding whispered counsel of their own, had begun to form plans for an ambush, when a second unexplained sound met their ears. soft, but infinitely nearer it came: some round and yielding object had struck the floor gently, then bounded a short distance further with a rustle of hay. again mary dropped down on all fours, groping, but this time toward a more definite source. again her hand met something solid, which she could not at first identify. it seemed to be. . .a ball of twine, wrapped about some heavier object. "anne," she whispered anxiously, rejoining her companion. "it must have been cast through the window. what can it be?" holding it up in what poor light could be found, the older woman made out a tiny sheet of parchment wrapped beneath the first few strands, on which some kind of message had been scrawled. she hurriedly worked it out with her fingers, beginning to understand. recognizing the word `rope', as well as the hand which must have written it, she needed no further explanation. "it is your way out," she replied firmly. "yours. remember that, both of you. and as you love me, do as i say. you must leave me behind ." with that she moved swiftly to the window, and wrapping the end of the twine securely about her left hand, with her right cast the remaining bundle as hard and as far as she could. michael, still at his distance, unsure of success, did not see her. but stephen could; and sensing the same urgency that had driven the highlander to sudden action, he called to him in a harsh whisper. "michael!" the slender cord had unraveled perhaps half the necessary length to reach the ground when, catching slightly, it pulled the remaining ball back against the tower wall. but the force of impact loosed the snag, and the weight of the stone within carried it bouncing and unwinding to the turf below. michael, coming forward, still had not seen his mother. but he saw the shrunken ball of twine, reduced to almost nothing, and wasted not an instant. seizing the end of the rope, which lay but a short distance off, he tied the thinner cord firmly below the first of the spaced knots, then tugged gently in signal. only then did he look up to see the female form leaning out, and with frozen breath, watched the life-line beginning to ascend. anne scott held the tensing line away from the wall for as long as she could, till the growing weight of the rope forced her to bring it closer to her body, praying that the twine would not catch and tear against the stone. mary stood guard behind her, the knife clenched, trying to understand what was happening. anne scott stepped back. the rope was in her hand. ".....i tell you i don't like it," snapped ballard just beyond. "and what if i told you i hadn't got the key?" "i'd blow your god damned head off." searching the floor, the widow found the iron hoop through which ancient shackles had once been passed. she put the end of the rope through and tied it fast, tested it with a severe pull, then guided mary quickly to the window. "over the side with you, mary," she whispered. "no time for fear. michael is below with your brother. yes! give me the weapon. . .now up into the sill. that's it. keep firm hold of the rope, and use the knots to guide you down. climb swiftly but carefully, then be gone, both of you! i'll deal with this lot." hardly knowing what had happened, mary found herself outside the window, clutching a dark rope with all the desperate strength of youth. she tried at first to gain some foothold, then in a moment of panic, to reach up and climb back into the sill. but the groping hand slid away, and the downward momentum twisted her body outward..... she hung by one hand above the void, as a sudden wind ripped across her, and the surf beat hungrily against the rocks far below. fear choked her nearly to paralysis. but there was something else, there on the solid ground. two figures stood, one of them..... twisting her body and using her legs for leverage, she turned again to face the stone, and with her right hand, once more took firm hold of the lifeline. not looking down, breath coming in gasps and limbs trembling, she began to descend, her feet wrapped tightly, tensely sliding from one catch-knot to the next. when she dared to look again she was halfway down, and michael was standing beneath her, arms wide as if to embrace the sky. anne scott heard the key being turned in the lock. but for all her determination, the great hulking figure who threw open the door was too fast for her. as she moved swiftly toward him, the knife raised, her motion was checked by a savage blow that felled her at once, and left her all but senseless. the lord purceville, with the light behind him had seen her coming, and with his great fist crashed her to the floor. moving past her as his eyes strained to adjust to the gloom, he swept the cold shadows of the chamber like a ravening wolf that had lost sight of its prey. for a moment he despaired, as it became clear that the girl was gone. but then he saw the rope, rising tautly from the floor and over the lip of the sill. himself not wasting an instant he ran to the window, shifted his bulk, leaned over and out of it. seeing the girl still descending far below, he swept out his own knife and began cutting into the strands one by one. michael was too intent upon the progress of his nearing lover to take in the dark bulge that appeared at the window. mary never thought to look up, but only continued to descend. perhaps twenty feet from the ground she suddenly felt the rope begin to give. releasing her hands once each, she instinctively pushed away from the wall--- the last strands gave way as she fell back, stifling a scream. michael caught her, shielding her body with his own; but the force of impact sent them both to the ground. together they rose, embracing and in tears. . .until slowly they perceived the danger that awaited them. and it came not from above, where lord purceville knew that any shot was as likely to strike his son as the two lovers. . .but from directly behind them. more sinister than raw violence, because it came from an unguarded quarter, the dark spectre of betrayal rose before them. stephen purceville stood with the pistol at arm's length, his eyes fastened with twisted vehemence upon the turning form of the highlander, his passion all the greater for the torment of his soul. "stephen!" cried the girl in sudden terror. for in her mind's eye she recalled the dream: michael standing blind and helpless, returned from the dark pool of death, only to find its second emissary standing ruthless and final before him. as in the dream, the messenger of hate knew no entreaty. his eyes and voice were cold as steel. "i vowed that i would help you win her freedom. that i have done. but i will not surrender her to you . the girl will come away with me, or be buried here beside you." "no," said michael flatly. "no." "i'll kill you!" cried the betrayer. and the scarlet arm began to stiffen in the firing motion. but at the very instant he would have shot, mary stepped before her only love, willing to die to save him. a moment later the englishmen was confronted by something more unnerving still. for it was not the love loyalty of another, but his own, unrealized devotion. a cry was heard from above: not a scream, for it contained rage as well as fear. like a stone from a precipice it fell, and like a stone struck the earth beside him, changing to the horror of his eyes from a formless clot. . .into the writhing figure of a man. his father lay, broken and dying, on the ground. and from the tower above came another sound, as if in answer to his pain: a howl of laughter so complete, so devoid of all remorse..... ballard had come up behind his leaning master and, all other base pleasures denied him, with his own strong and gnarled hands, hurled the aging tyrant to his death. casting away the pistol as if itself the instrument of murder, stephen fell to his knees before his father. "what can i do!" he cried. and while the man's tortured movements grew less, the son knew in his heart that this was not the easing of pain, but the end of all struggle, brought by death. the lord purceville had just strength enough to turn his head once, and view the flesh that would outlive his own. but that was all. the life flowed out..... angelica. i'm sorry . too late. he had tried to kill his own daughter. his eyes rolled back, and he was dead. stephen's head shot back in agony, as he released a sound more bestial than human. all was dead for him. he was alone. but no tears would form, nor did he wish them to. the one emotion that still burned, and seemed capable of sustaining him, was revenge. he rushed blindly back and remounted the horse. and brandishing the sword, rode away toward the gate in a fury, as if the lovers did not exist. anne scott remained prone on the floor, her mind dazed but her senses still aware. she had seen lord purceville go to the window, as she had watched his treacherous lieutenant move behind him. . .and heard the long fall to ruin. now she lay very still, as the man remained with his back to her, perhaps in contemplation of what to do next. moving one arm only, she again found the knife, which had not slipped far from her grasp. and she in turn felt a strong temptation to creep up behind him..... but all around her was the taste of murder and death. and for the love she still bore her children, she could not. then ballard, for reasons known only to himself, turned away and walked past her, out of the cell, and locked the door behind him. mary was the first to regain her senses. for a warning bell had tolled somewhere within the castle, and now an answering shot was heard from the garrison below. "we've got to get out of here, michael." "but my mother....." "go!" came a woman's voice, descending from on high with the strength and finality of angels. the two looked up to see the widow's stern form pointing out and away, not in gesture, but command: they were to live, and go on giving. michael looked to the ground, to the wasted rope, then into the eyes of the young life entrusted to his care. and for all the pain it cost him, he was left no choice. "i'll come back for you!" he cried. "i love you!" and taking mary by the hand, he led her to a crease in the cliffs, where a knife-slash path led to the sheltered cove far below. there, in that place removed, he could only hope that the fisherman was waiting with a boat. thirty-seven the long, snaking descent seemed to take forever, yet still no pursuit showed itself on the heights above. perhaps the death of their leader had thrown the soldiers into confusion..... as they drew nearer the shallow inlet, michael could see something dark against the encircling stretch of sand; but it gave him little hope. at first the shape of it was wrong. then, as the distance grew less and his eyes began to assimilate detail, he saw that it was in fact a skiff, but swamped and overturned as from a wreck: the oars scattered, and no sign whatever of the pilot. real despair gripped him, as he could only assume the worst--- a shot was fired from the heights above, and then another, as soldiers with torches and long muskets appeared suddenly upon the promontory. shielding her body with his own, michael guided his beloved through a last knifing trough, and out onto the rough outer sands of the cove. together they huddled down in the shelter of a jutting stone, as he tried desperately to form some alternative plan. but none was needed. from beneath the overturned skiff, now scarcely forty yards distant, a shadow emerged and stood hard against the shoreline. "michael!" cried a familiar voice, and the highlander's heart leapt inside him. without answering, almost without breathing, he took the girl by the hand and ran with her that last naked distance toward the boat. the crack of muskets was again heard from the promontory, and the torches began to descend in a long, angling file. but it would have taken a perfect shot to hit them, even if they had been stationary. and the three were anything but that. by the time the lovers reached him, the fisherman had righted the skiff and retrieved the oars. then all together they set the prow to seaward, and half lifted, half lunged it down the wet sand incline, to where the ends of waves splashed around them. "into the boat with you lass," said the fisherman, as the waters surged stronger beneath it. "kneel in the prow, and hold steady as you can." then together the two men urged the craft forward, into depths that would sustain it. a short way further, and they clambered over the sides, taking up their rowing positions. then lowering oars, they bent their backs in unison, and prepared to meet the oncoming waves. the first nearly swamped them with a crash of angry foam. the second was little better. but each time, during the lull that followed they would steady the craft, and with determined oars drive the boat further, away from the writhing shores, and out into the calming vastness. another wave, and then another. . .and they floated upon the bosom of the sea. several hundred yards offshore, and perhaps a mile further up the coast, they came upon the fisherman's boat, securely anchored. pulling alongside it, the two men helped mary up and over the side, the old man instructing her to go below and change out of her wet clothes, then heat some broth over the small, cast-iron stove. "i'm afraid there's no such luxury for us," he said to michael, as the two boarded and tied the skiff behind. "the nearest english-held port is some miles from here, and i'm not sure they'd try to come after us at sea. but we can't take that for granted; and in any case, we've got to be off before the fog gets too thick. i'll not have us tacking blind, this close to an uneven shoreline. "there's a blanket forward," he continued, catching his breath. "that's where i'll need you to stand. help me set the sails, then to your post, and keep your eyes wide open. things might get a bit close. we'll have to find our way out by dead reckoning." even as he spoke, the trailing mists that had seemed so harmless began to thicken, and the wind to grow less. soon the fog became a patching curtain, then finally, a dense cloud. kneeling at the fore of the vessel, shivering with cold, michael strained all his senses for any sign of hidden rock looming up out of the grey, or sound of crashing surf upon the shore. the cloud-wrack above had at last cleared away, but the unbridled moon only served to cast a ghostly aspect throughout the clinging shroud, so near, ever-present, and menacing. he fully realized the danger. even with all the mariner's skill, to sail in these waters half-blind..... he looked back to see him standing by the wheel, with compass and lantern beside him, navigating by instinct and memory alone. framed by the mists, weathered but hale, he formed a classic portrait of savvy and determination. but was that enough? only time, and agony, would tell. at length mary came back on deck with a lantern, bringing each of the men a steaming cup. standing by her troubled companion, she offered to watch in his stead. but for all her courage she shook from the cold as badly as he, and her darkened eyes and sunken cheeks spoke plainly of the harrows of the cell. "thank you, my mary," he said to her. "but i've got to fight this last battle myself. the best gift you can give me now is to know that you are safe and well. go lay you down, wrap yourself warmly, and try to sleep. go on with you now. john and i still have a bit of work ahead of us." she wept to see him struggling so, unable even to keep his jaw from trembling as he spoke. but she saw that his mind was set, and that forces warred inside him with which she must not interfere. she kissed him gently, whispered, "i love you," and went below. the hours seemed endless, the tension unbearable. a thousand times michael thought he must crack---from the pressure, the cold, and the need to peer unerringly into the formless void. but he knew that he must stand his ground. then slowly, so slowly that at first he thought his eyes deceived him, the shroud began to thin, and a grey light to grow in what he knew must be the east. the fog began to patch, as the stubborn light grew stronger. then suddenly they broke into the open, and the red sun climbed once more above the rim of the world. he lowered his head in exhaustion, closing his eyes at the last. and when he opened them again, there on his left hand he saw the ring, still clinging, forgotten, to the middle joint of his smallest finger. a sob escaped him, undeniable. because through all the numbing darkness, the anguish, futility and death, its single jewel shone hard and clear and perfect, untouched by the ravages of time, or the treacheries of men. the tears flowed freely, passionately, for he knew the bastard had not beaten him. his love survived. epilogue michael sat before a warm fire in the small island cottage, contemplating the ring about his finger. it had remained there since the night of the escape, and he had vowed not to take it off until his mother had been freed, and he gave it once more to his betrothed, this time in marriage. both he and the girl had fallen ill during the long sail to rona, a lonely island of the hebrides, and a place as far removed from english control as one was likely to find in the whole of britain. their first days there, in the care of the fisherman's brother, had been spent bedridden, fighting fever and exhaustion alike. mary, with her natural vigor and stubborn optimism, had been up and about some days now. but michael's hurts were deeper, of longer duration. only now, after more than a fortnight, did he feel his body beginning to respond. the fisherman had returned to the mainland after seeing them settled in, and had promised to do all he could to secure the widow's release, including hiring a solicitor, and filing for clemency under the new articles of reconciliation. but he cautioned that patience and prudence were still needed: that they must lie low, and make no plans without him. in any event, he had said, he would return with news as soon as it was safely possible. but each day that passed left michael more in doubt. for what had become of the hornet's nest they left behind---earl arthur dead at lord purceville's hand, purceville himself murdered by a subordinate, and stephen half mad with rage---he could not imagine. surely after a time a new governor would be appointed, and some kind of stability return. but where that left his mother..... it was beyond contemplation, almost beyond hope. and this was what galled him. he had done all that a man could do, winning freedom for himself, and for the chosen of his heart. and yet he could not think of joining her life to his own, because the other half of his devotion remained imprisoned and destitute. . .for the crime of loving her children. try as he might, he could not swallow this last bitterness, nor put it from his mind. the cottage door opened suddenly and in burst the girl, breathless and in tears. he tried to ask her what was wrong, as dark fears of pursuit and capture raced through him. but she shook her head emphatically, unable yet to speak. "you must come with me," she finally managed. "put on your coat; something wonderful has happened." he did as she asked, wrapping himself warmly, then walked with her out into the bracing, december morning. and as he took those first steps along the path, it occurred to him that he had not seen the sun, nor felt the free wind across his face, for what seemed an eternity. the brisk fall air was invigorating, the long sweep of rocky hillside magnificent. he thought he had never seen a sky so deep and blue. real hope stirred in him, tormented him. he tried to stay the girl and make her speak. but she only clutched his hand more tightly, and urged him down the broadening track toward the sea. looking out across the blinding sparkle of blue-green waters, he saw a single sail approaching the tiny harbor. shading his eyes he made out a smallish vessel, with a weathered pilot standing at the wheel. and beside him stood another, a woman..... he fell to his knees, unable for a time to continue. at length he rose, and walked with his beloved the remaining distance to the landing. there, drawing nearer, the fisherman met his gaze with a smile that seemed to melt away the years, and make them both children again. the older man threw the mooring line to his friend, who tied it to the dock with a trembling but joyous hand. anne scott stepped off the boat, and mother and son embraced. * * * mr. and mrs. michael scott stood aboard the deck of the merchant brig `dauntless', watching with deep emotion the nearing coastline. it was now nearly june, and they had been at sea for two months. a single word resounded in both their hearts, as the burly captain approached them, and clapped his fellow highlander on the back. "america," he said to them, "and god bless her. america." when he had gone, michael put one arm about his young wife's shoulders, and drew her near. with the other hand he touched the growing swell of her womb, as if to caress the unborn life inside it. he looked at her with glowing eyes and said simply, truthfully. "now the work really begins." for he knew that his mother had been right. the story never ends, it only changes characters. they stood at the end of one road, and the beginning of another, holding firmly to the roots of their past, sending hopeful and determined branches into the future. anne scott remained in her native highlands and eventually remarried, living with her husband in a modest home near the place of her birth, until her death in . she was buried in the gravesite of her clan, and on her tombstone, these words: "those who have left something beautiful behind them never die. they live on in the hearts, the minds, the very souls of those who loved them." and on her grave a single, glorious rose. the end acknowledgements the author would like to gratefully acknowledge the help of dr. daniel szechi, professor of history at auburn university, who so unselfishly read, and made historical notations upon the entire work, without thought of acknowledgement or reward. while for artistic reasons i was not always able to correct the inaccuracies he pointed out, i am aware of them, and remain deeply grateful for his assistance in making the book as authentic as the needs of the storyteller would allow. [image .gif] about the author christopher leadem was born in arlington, virginia in , the second son of an air force intelligence officer and a schoolteacher. shortly after his birth, his father transferred to the central intelligence agency, and the young family moved frequently, adding two daughters along the way. leadem's primary education was in catholic schools, where he earned the reputation of a gifted student. attending public high school in bucks county, pennsylvania, the birthplace of james michener, he displayed a talent for writing, and a love of history and science. at the age of fourteen, he saw a short film by ray bradbury about the life of a writer, which galvanized his desire to be an author himself. burned out by a stifling high school environment, he did not immediately attend college, but launched headlong into his writing. this began with a spiritual novel, "in search of the evermore," until poor health and relative poverty left him injured and dispirited. after a difficult recovery he attended penn state and the university of colorado, excelling at english literature. he resumed his writing career and completed his first novel, "within a crimson circle," at the age of . he has since completed five other novels, five volumes of poetry and nine screenplays. three other novels are in progress. he currently lives in colorado with his three children. www.aragornbooks.com proofreading team. what's mine's mine by george macdonald in three volumes vol. i. contents of vol. i. chapter i. how come they there? ii. a short glance over the shoulder iii. the girls' first walk iv. the shop in the village v. the chief vi. work and wage vii. mother and son viii. a morning call ix. mr. sercombe x. the plough-bulls xi. the fir-grove xii. among the hills xiii. the lake xiv. the wolves xv. the gulf that divided xvi. the clan christmas xvii. between dancing and supper what's mine's mine. chapter i. how come they there? the room was handsomely furnished, but such as i would quarrel with none for calling common, for it certainly was uninteresting. not a thing in it had to do with genuine individual choice, but merely with the fashion and custom of the class to which its occupiers belonged. it was a dining-room, of good size, appointed with all the things a dining-room "ought" to have, mostly new, and entirely expensive--mirrored sideboard in oak; heavy chairs, just the dozen, in fawn-coloured morocco seats and backs--the dining-room, in short, of a london-house inhabited by rich middle-class people. a big fire blazed in the low round-backed grate, whose flashes were reflected in the steel fender and the ugly fire-irons that were never used. a snowy cloth of linen, finer than ordinary, for there was pride in the housekeeping, covered the large dining-table, and a company, evidently a family, was eating its breakfast. but how come these people there? for, supposing my reader one of the company, let him rise from the well-appointed table--its silver, bright as the complex motions of butler's elbows can make it; its china, ornate though not elegant; its ham, huge, and neither too fat nor too lean; its game-pie, with nothing to be desired in composition, or in flavour natural or artificial;--let him rise from these and go to the left of the two windows, for there are two opposite each other, the room having been enlarged by being built out: if he be such a one as i would have for a reader, might i choose--a reader whose heart, not merely his eye, mirrors what he sees--one who not merely beholds the outward shows of things, but catches a glimpse of the soul that looks out of them, whose garment and revelation they are;--if he be such, i say, he will stand, for more than a moment, speechless with something akin to that which made the morning stars sing together. he finds himself gazing far over western seas, while yet the sun is in the east. they lie clear and cold, pale and cold, broken with islands scattering thinner to the horizon, which is jagged here and there with yet another. the ocean looks a wild, yet peaceful mingling of lake and land. some of the islands are green from shore to shore, of low yet broken surface; others are mere rocks, with a bold front to the sea, one or two of them strange both in form and character. over the pale blue sea hangs the pale blue sky, flecked with a few cold white clouds that look as if they disowned the earth they had got so high--though none the less her children, and doomed to descend again to her bosom. a keen little wind is out, crisping the surface of the sea in patches--a pretty large crisping to be seen from that height, for the window looks over hill above hill to the sea. life, quiet yet eager, is all about; the solitude itself is alive, content to be a solitude because it is alive. its life needs nothing from beyond--is independent even of the few sails of fishing boats that here and there with their red brown break the blue of the water. if my reader, gently obedient to my thaumaturgy, will now turn and cross to the other window, let him as he does so beware of casting a glance on his right towards the place he has left at the table, for the room will now look to him tenfold commonplace, so that he too will be inclined to ask, "how come these and their belongings here--just here?"--let him first look from the window. there he sees hills of heather rolling away eastward, at middle distance beginning to rise into mountains, and farther yet, on the horizon, showing snow on their crests--though that may disappear and return several times before settling down for the winter. it is a solemn and very still region--not a pretty country at all, but great--beautiful with the beauties of colour and variety of surface; while, far in the distance, where the mountains and the clouds have business together, its aspect rises to grandeur. to his first glance probably not a tree will be discoverable; the second will fall upon a solitary clump of firs, like a mole on the cheek of one of the hills not far off, a hill steeper than most of them, and green to the top. is my reader seized with that form of divine longing which wonders what lies over the nearest hill? does he fancy, ascending the other side to its crest, some sweet face of highland girl, singing songs of the old centuries while yet there was a people in these wastes? why should he imagine in the presence of the actual? why dream when the eyes can see? he has but to return to the table to reseat himself by the side of one of the prettiest of girls! she is fair, yet with a glowing tinge under her fairness which flames out only in her eyes, and seldom reddens her skin. she has brown hair with just a suspicion of red and no more, and a waviness that turns to curl at the ends. she has a good forehead, arched a little, not without a look of habitation, though whence that comes it might be hard to say. there are no great clouds on that sky of the face, but there is a soft dimness that might turn to rain. she has a straight nose, not too large for the imperfect yet decidedly greek contour; a doubtful, rather straight, thin-lipped mouth, which seems to dissolve into a bewitching smile, and reveals perfect teeth--and a good deal more to the eyes that can read it. when the mouth smiles, the eyes light up, which is a good sign. their shape is long oval--and their colour when unlighted, much that of an unpeeled almond; when she smiles, they grow red. she has an object in life which can hardly be called a mission. she is rather tall, and quite graceful, though not altogether natural in her movements. her dress gives a feathery impression to one who rather receives than notes the look of ladies. she has a good hand--not the doll hand so much admired of those who can judge only of quantity and know nothing of quality, but a fine sensible hand,--the best thing about her: a hand may be too small just as well as too large. poor mother earth! what a load of disappointing women, made fit for fine things, and running all to self and show, she carries on her weary old back! from all such, good lord deliver us!--except it be for our discipline or their awaking. near her at the breakfast table sits one of aspect so different, that you could ill believe they belonged to the same family. she is younger and taller--tall indeed, but not ungraceful, though by no means beautiful. she has all the features that belong to a face--among them not a good one. stay! i am wrong: there were in truth, dominant over the rest, two good features--her two eyes, dark as eyes well could be without being all pupil, large, and rather long like her sister's until she looked at you, and then they opened wide. they did not flash or glow, but were full of the light that tries to see--questioning eyes. they were simple eyes--i will not say without arriere pensee, for there was no end of thinking faculty, if not yet thought, behind them,--but honest eyes that looked at you from the root of eyes, with neither attack nor defence in them. if she was not so graceful as her sister, she was hardly more than a girl, and had a remnant of that curiously lovely mingling of grace and clumsiness which we see in long-legged growing girls. i will give her the advantage of not being further described, except so far as this--that her hair was long and black, that her complexion was dark, with something of a freckly unevenness, and that her hands were larger and yet better than her sister's. there is one truth about a plain face, that may not have occurred to many: its ugliness accompanies a condition of larger undevelopment, for all ugliness that is not evil, is undevelopment; and so implies the larger material and possibility of development. the idea of no countenance is yet carried out, and this kind will take more developing for the completion of its idea, and may result in a greater beauty. i would therefore advise any young man of aspiration in the matter of beauty, to choose a plain woman for wife--if through her plainness she is yet lovely in his eyes; for the loveliness is herself, victorious over the plainness, and her face, so far from complete and yet serving her loveliness, has in it room for completion on a grander scale than possibly most handsome faces. in a handsome face one sees the lines of its coming perfection, and has a glimpse of what it must be when finished: few are prophets enough for a plain face. a keen surprise of beauty waits many a man, if he be pure enough to come near the transfiguration of the homely face he loved. this plain face was a solemn one, and the solemnity suited the plainness. it was not specially expressive--did not look specially intelligent; there was more of latent than operative power in it--while her sister's had more expression than power. both were lady-like; whether they were ladies, my reader may determine. there are common ladies and there are rare ladies; the former may be countesses; the latter may be peasants. there were two younger girls at the table, of whom i will say nothing more than that one of them looked awkward, promised to be handsome, and was apparently a good soul; the other was pretty, and looked pert. the family possessed two young men, but they were not here; one was a partner in the business from which his father had practically retired; the other was that day expected from oxford. the mother, a woman with many autumnal reminders of spring about her, sat at the head of the table, and regarded her queendom with a smile a little set, perhaps, but bright. she had the look of a woman on good terms with her motherhood, with society, with the universe--yet had scarce a shadow of assumption on her countenance. for if she felt as one who had a claim upon things to go pleasantly with her, had she not put in her claim, and had it acknowledged? her smile was a sweet white-toothed smile, true if shallow, and a more than tolerably happy one--often irradiating the governor opposite--for so was the head styled by the whole family from mother to chit. he was the only one at the table on whose countenance a shadow--as of some end unattained--was visible. he had tried to get into parliament, and had not succeeded; but i will not presume to say that was the source of the shadow. he did not look discontented, or even peevish; there was indeed a certain radiance of success about him-only above the cloudy horizon of his thick, dark eyebrows, seemed to hang a thundery atmosphere. his forehead was large, but his features rather small; he had, however, grown a trifle fat, which tended to make up. in his youth he must have been very nice-looking, probably too pretty to be handsome. in good health and when things went well, as they had mostly done with him, he was sweet-tempered; what he might be in other conditions was seldom conjectured. but was that a sleeping thunder-cloud, or only the shadow of his eyebrows? he had a good opinion of himself-on what grounds i do not know; but he was rich, and i know no better ground; i doubt if there is any more certain soil for growing a good opinion of oneself. certainly, the more you try to raise one by doing what is right and worth doing, the less you succeed. mr. peregrine palmer had finished his breakfast, and sat for a while looking at nothing in particular, plunged in deep thought about nothing at all, while the girls went on with theirs. he was a little above the middle height, and looked not much older than his wife; his black hair had but begun to be touched with silver; he seemed a man without an atom of care more than humanity counts reasonable; his speech was not unlike that of an englishman, for, although born in glasgow, he had been to oxford. he spoke respectfully to his wife, and with a pleasant playfulness to his daughters; his manner was nowise made to order, but natural enough; his grammar was as good as conversation requires; everything was respectable about him-and yet-he was one remove at least from a gentleman. something hard to define was lacking to that idea of perfection. mr. peregrine palmer's grandfather had begun to make the family fortune by developing a little secret still in a remote highland glen, which had acquired a reputation for its whisky, into a great superterrene distillery. both he and his son made money by it, and it had "done well" for mr. peregrine also. with all three of them the making of money had been the great calling of life. they were diligent in business, fervent in spirit, serving mammon, and founding claim to consideration on the fact. neither jacob nor john palmer's worst enemy had ever called him a hypocrite: neither had been suspected of thinking to serve mammon and god. both had gone regularly to church, but neither had taught in a sunday school, or once gone to a week-day sermon. peregrine had built a church and a school. he did not now take any active part in the distillery, but worked mainly in money itself. jacob, the son of a ship-chandler in greenock, had never thought about gentleman or no gentleman; but his son john had entertained the difference, and done his best to make a gentleman of peregrine; and neither peregrine nor any of his family ever doubted his father's success; and if he had not quite succeeded, i would have the blame laid on peregrine and not on either father or grandfather. for a man to grow a gentleman, it is of great consequence that his grandfather should have been an honest man; but if a man be a gentleman, it matters little what his grandfather or grandmother either was. nay--if a man be a gentleman, it is of the smallest consequence, except for its own sake, whether the world counts him one or not. mr. peregrine palmer rose from the table with a merry remark on the prolongation of the meal by his girls, and went towards the door. "are you going to shoot?" asked his wife. "not to-day. but i am going to look after my guns. i daresay they've got them all right, but there's nothing like seeing to a thing yourself!" mr. palmer had this virtue, and this very gentlemanlike way--that he always gave his wife as full an answer as he would another lady. he was not given to marital brevity. he was there for the grouse-shooting--not exactly, only "as it were." he did not care very much about the sport, and had he cared nothing, would have been there all the same. other people, in what he counted his social position, shot grouse, and he liked to do what other people did, for then he felt all right: if ever he tried the gate of heaven, it would be because other people did. but the primary cause of his being so far in the north was the simple fact that he had had the chance of buying a property very cheap--a fine property of mist and cloud, heather and rock, mountain and moor, and with no such reputation for grouse as to enhance its price. "my estate" sounded well, and after a time of good preserving he would be able to let it well, he trusted. no sooner was it bought than his wife and daughters were eager to visit it; and the man of business, perceiving it would cost him much less if they passed their autumns there instead of on the continent, proceeded at once to enlarge the house and make it comfortable. if they should never go a second time, it would, with its perfect appointments, make the shooting there more attractive! they had arrived the day before. the journey had been fatiguing, for a great part of it was by road; but they were all in splendid health, and not too tired to get up at a reasonable hour the next day. chapter ii. a short glance over the shoulder. mr. peregrine was the first of the palmer family to learn that there was a palmer coat of arms. he learned it at college, and on this wise. one day a fellow-student, who pleased himself with what he called philology, remarked that his father must have been a hit of a humorist to name him peregrine:--"except indeed it be a family name!" he added. "i never thought about it," said peregrine. "i don't quite know what you mean." the fact was he had no glimmer of what he meant. "nothing profound," returned the other. "only don't you see peregrine means pilgrim? it is the same as the italian pellegrino, from the latin, peregrinus, which means one that goes about the fields,--what in scotland you call a landlouper." "well, but," returned peregrine, hesitatingly, "i don't find myself much wiser. peregrine means a pilgrim, you say, but what of that? all names mean something, i suppose! it don't matter much." "what is your coat of arms?" "i don't know." "why did your father call you peregrine?" "i don't know that either. i suppose because he liked the name." "why should he have liked it?" continued the other, who was given to the socratic method. "i know no more than the man in the moon." "what does your surname mean?" "something to do with palms, i suppose." "doubtless." "you see i don't go in for that kind of thing like you!" "any man who cares about the cut of his coat, might have a little curiosity about the cut of his name: it sits to him a good deal closer!" "that is true--so close that you can't do anything with it. i can't pull mine off however you criticize it!" "you can change it any day. would you like to change it?" "no, thank you, mr. stokes!" returned peregrine dryly. "i didn't mean with mine," growled the other. "my name is an historical one too--but that is not in question.--do you know your crest ought to be a hairy worm?" "why?" "don't you know the palmer-worm? it got its name where you got yours!" "well, we all come from adam!" "what! worms and all?" "surely. we're all worms, the parson says. come, put me through; it's time for lunch. or, if you prefer, let me burst in ignorance. i don't mind." "well, then, i will explain. the palmer was a pilgrim: when he came home, he carried a palm-branch to show he had been to the holy land." "did the hairy worm go to the holy land too?" "he is called a palmer-worm because he has feet enough to go any number of pilgrimages. but you are such a land-louper, you ought to blazon two hairy worms saltier-wise." "i don't understand." "why, your name, interpreted to half an ear, is just pilgrim pilgrim!" "i wonder if my father meant it!" "that i cannot even guess at, not having the pleasure of knowing your father. but it does look like a paternal joke!" his friend sought out for him the coat and crest of the palmers; but for the latter, strongly recommended a departure: the fresh family-branch would suit the worm so well!--his crest ought to be two worms crossed, tufted, the tufts ouched in gold. it was not heraldic language, but with peregrine passed well enough. still he did not take to the worms, but contented himself with the ordinary crest. he was henceforth, however, better pleased with his name, for he fancied in it something of the dignity of a doubled surname. his first glance at his wife was because she crossed the field of his vision; his second glance was because of her beauty; his third because her name was shelley. it is marvellous how whimsically sentimental commonplace people can be where their own interesting personality is concerned: her name he instantly associated with scallop-shell, and began to make inquiry about her. learning that her other name was miriam, one also of the holy land-- "a most remarkable coincidence!--a mere coincidence of course!" he said to himself. "evidently that is the woman destined to be the companion of my pilgrimage!" when their first child was born, the father was greatly exercised as to a fitting name for him. he turned up an old botany book, and sought out the scientific names of different palms. chamaerops would not do, for it was a dwarf-palm; borassus might do, seeing it was a boy--only it stood for a fan-palm; corypha would not be bad for a girl, only it was the name of a heathen goddess, and would not go well with the idea of a holy palmer. cocoa, phoenix, and areca, one after the other, went in at his eyes and through his head; none of them pleased him. his wife, however, who in her smiling way had fallen in with his whim, helped him out of his difficulty. she was the daughter of nonconformist parents in lancashire, and had been encouraged when a child to read a certain old-fashioned book called the pilgrim's progress, which her husband had never seen. he did not read it now, but accepting her suggestion, named the boy christian. when a daughter came, he would have had her christiana, but his wife persuaded him to be content with christina. they named their second son valentine, after mr. valiant-for-truth. their second daughter was mercy; and for the third and fourth, hope and grace seemed near enough. so the family had a cool glow of puritanism about it, while nothing was farther from the thoughts of any of them than what their names signified. all, except the mother, associated them with the crusades for the rescue of the sepulchre of the lord from the pagans; not a thought did one of them spend on the rescue of a live soul from the sepulchre of low desires, mean thoughts, and crawling selfishness. chapter iii. the girls' first walk. the governor, peregrine and palmer as he was, did not care about walking at any time, not even when he had to do it because other people did; the mother, of whom there would have been little left had the sweetness in her moral, and the house-keeping in her practical nature, been subtracted, had things to see to within doors: the young people must go out by themselves! they put on their hats, and issued. the temperature was keen, though it was now nearly the middle of august, by which time in those northern regions the earth has begun to get a little warm: the house stood high, and the atmosphere was thin. there was a certain sense of sadness in the pale sky and its cold brightness; but these young people felt no cold, and perceived no sadness. the air was exhilarating, and they breathed deep breaths of a pleasure more akin to the spiritual than they were capable of knowing. for as they gazed around them, they thought, like hamlet's mother in the presence of her invisible husband, that they saw all there was to be seen. they did not know nature: in the school to which they had gone they patronized instead of revering her. she wrought upon them nevertheless after her own fashion with her children, unheedful whether they knew what she was about or not. the mere space, the mere height from which they looked, the rarity of the air, the soft aspiration of earth towards heaven, made them all more of children. but not one of them being capable of enjoying anything by herself, together they were unable to enjoy much; and, like the miser who, when he cannot much enjoy his money, desires more, began to desire more company to share in the already withering satisfaction of their new possession--to help them, that is, to get pleasure out of it, as out of a new dress. it is a good thing to desire to share a good thing, but it is not well to be unable alone to enjoy a good thing. it is our enjoyment that should make us desirous to share. what is there to share if the thing be of no value in itself? to enjoy alone is to be able to share. no participation can make that of value which in itself is of none. it is not love alone but pride also, and often only pride, that leads to the desire for another to be present with us in possession. the girls grew weary of the show around them because it was so quiet, so regardless of their presence, so moveless, so monotonous. endless change was going on, but it was too slow for them to see; had it been rapid, its motions were not of a kind to interest them. ere half an hour they had begun to think with regret of piccadilly and regent street--for they had passed the season in london. there is a good deal counted social which is merely gregarious. doubtless humanity is better company than a bare hill-side; but not a little depends on how near we come to the humanity, and how near we come to the hill. i doubt if one who could not enjoy a bare hill-side alone, would enjoy that hill-side in any company; if he thought he did, i suspect it would be that the company enabled him, not to forget himself in what he saw, but to be more pleasantly aware of himself than the lone hill would permit him to be;--for the mere hill has its relation to that true self which the common self is so anxious to avoid and forget. the girls, however, went on and on, led mainly by the animal delight of motion, the two younger making many a diversion up the hill on the one side, and down the hill on the other, shrieking at everything fresh that pleased them. the house they had just left stood on the projecting shoulder of a hill, here and there planted with firs. of the hardy trees there was a thicket at the back of the house, while toward the south, less hardy ones grew in the shrubbery, though they would never, because of the sea-breezes, come to any height. the carriage-drive to the house joined two not very distant points on the same road, and there was no lodge at either gate. it was a rough, country road, a good deal rutted, and seldom repaired. opposite the gates rose the steep slope of a heathery hill, along the flank of which the girls were now walking. on their right lay a piece of rough moorland, covered with heather, patches of bracken, and coarse grass. a few yards to the right, it sank in a steep descent. such was the disposition of the ground for some distance along the road--on one side the hill, on the other a narrow level, and abrupt descent. as they advanced they caught sight of a ruin rising above the brow of the descent: the two younger darted across the heather toward it; the two elder continued their walk along the road, gradually descending towards a valley. "i wonder what we shall see round the corner there!" said mercy, the younger of the two. "the same over again, i suppose!" answered christina. "what a rough road it is! i've twice nearly sprained my ankle!" "i was thinking of what i saw the other day in somebody's travels--about his interest in every turn of the road, always looking for what was to come next." "time enough when it comes, in my opinion!" rejoined christina. for she was like any other mirror--quite ready to receive what was thrown upon her, but incapable of originating anything, almost incapable of using anything. as they descended, and the hill-side, here covered with bracken and boulders, grew higher and higher above them, the valley, in front and on the right, gradually opened, here and there showing a glimpse of a small stream that cantered steadily toward the sea, now tumbling over a rock, now sullen in a brown pool. arriving at length at a shoulder of the hill round which the road turned, a whole mile of the brook lay before them. it came down a narrow valley, with scraps of meadow in the bottom; but immediately below them the valley was of some width, and was good land from side to side, where green oats waved their feathery grace, and the yellow barley was nearly ready for the sickle. no more than the barren hill, however, had the fertile valley anything for them. their talk was of the last ball they were at. the sisters were about as good friends as such negative creatures could be; and they would be such friends all their lives, if on the one hand neither of them grew to anything better, and on the other no jealousy, or marked difference of social position through marriage, intervened. they loved each other, if not tenderly, yet with the genuineness of healthy family-habit--a thing not to be despised, for it keeps the door open for something better. in itself it is not at all to be reckoned upon, for habit is but the merest shadow of reality. still it is not a small thing, as families go, if sisters and brothers do not dislike each other. they were criticizing certain of the young men they had met at the said ball. being, in their development, if not in their nature, commonplace, what should they talk about but clothes or young men? and why, although an excellent type of its kind, should i take the trouble to record their conversation? to read, it might have amused me--or even interested, as may a carrot painted by a dutchman; but were i a painter, i should be sorry to paint carrots, and the girls' talk is not for my pen. at the same time i confess myself incapable of doing it justice. when one is annoyed at the sight of things meant to be and not beautiful, there is danger of not giving them even the poor fair-play they stand in so much the more need of that it can do so little for them. but now they changed the subject of their talk. they had come to a point of the road not far from the ruin to which the children had run across the heather. "look, chrissy! it is an old castle!" said mercy. "i wonder whether it is on our land!" "not much to be proud of!" replied the other. "it is nothing but the walls of a square house!" "not just a common square house! look at that pepper-pot on one of the corners!--i wonder how it is all the old castles get deserted!" "because they are old. it's well to desert them before they tumble down." "but they wouldn't tumble down if they weren't neglected. think of warwick castle! stone doesn't rot like wood! just see the thickness of those walls!" "yes, they are thick! but stone too has its way of rotting. westminster palace is wearing through, flake by flake. the weather will be at the lords before long." "that's what valentine would call a sign of the times. i say, what a radical he is, chrissy!--look! the old place is just like an empty egg-shell! i know, if it had been mine, i wouldn't have let it come to that!" "you say so because it never was yours: if it had been, you would know how uncomfortable it was!" "i should like to know," said mercy, after a little pause, during which they stood looking at the ruin, "whether the owners leave such places because they get fastidious and want better, or because they are too poor to keep them up! at all events a man must be poor to sell the house that belonged to his ancestors!--it must be miserable to grow poor after being used to plenty!--i wonder whose is the old place!" "oh, the governor's, i suppose! he has all hereabout for miles." "i hope it is ours! i should like to build it up again! i would live in it myself!" "i'm afraid the governor won't advance your share for that purpose!" "i love old things!" said mercy. "i believe you take your old doll to bed with you yet!" rejoined christina. "i am different to you!" she continued, with frenchified grammar; "i like things as new as ever i can have them!" "i like new things well enough, chrissy--you know i do! it is natural. the earth herself has new clothes once a year. it is but once a year, i grant!" "often enough for an old granny like her!" "look what a pretty cottage!--down there, half-way to the burn! it's like an english cottage! those we saw as we came along were either like a piece of the earth, or so white as to look ghastly! this one looks neat and comfortable, and has trees about it!" the ruin, once a fortified house and called a castle, stood on a sloping root or spur that ran from the hill down to the bank of the stream, where it stopped abruptly with a steep scaur, at whose foot lay a dark pool. on the same spur, half-way to the burn, stood a low, stone-built, thatched cottage, with a little grove about it, mostly of the hardy, contented, musical fir--a tree that would seem to have less regard to earthly prosperity than most, and looks like a pilgrim and a stranger: not caring much, it thrives where other trees cannot. there might have been a hundred of them, mingled, in strangest contrast, with a few delicate silver birches, about the cottage. it stood toward the east side of the sinking ridge, which had a steep descent, both east and west, to the fields below. the slopes were green with sweet grass, and apparently smooth as a lawn. not far from where the cottage seemed to rest rather than rise or stand, the burn rushed right against the side of the spur, as if to go straight through it, but turned abruptly, and flowed along the side to the end of it, where its way to the sea was open. on the point of the ridge were a few more firs: except these, those about the cottage, the mole on the hill-cheek, and the plantation about the new house, up or down was not a tree to be seen. the girls stood for a moment looking. "it's really quite pretty!" said christina with condescension. "it has actually something of what one misses here so much--a certain cosy look! tidy it is too! as you say, mercy, it might be in england--only for the poverty of its trees.--and oh those wretched bare hills!" she added, as she turned away and moved on. "wait till the heather is quite out: then you will have colour to make up for the bareness." "tell true now, mercy: that you are scotch need not keep you from speaking the truth:--don't you think heather just--well--just a leetle magentaish?--not a colour to be altogether admired?--just a little vulgar, don't you know? the fashion has changed so much within the last few years!" "no, i don't think so; and if i did i should be ashamed of it. i suppose poor old mother earth ought to go to the pre-raphaelites to be taught how to dress herself!" mercy spoke with some warmth, but christina was not sufficiently interested to be cross. she made no answer. they were now at the part of the road which crossed the descending spur as it left the hill-side. here they stopped again, and looked down the rocky slope. there was hardly anything green betwixt them and the old ruin--little but stones on a mass of rock; but immediately beyond the ruin the green began: there it seemed as if a wave of the meadow had risen and overflowed the spur, leaving its turf behind it. catching sight of hope and grace as they ran about the ruin, they went to join them, the one drawn by a vague interest in the exuviae of vanished life, the other by mere curiosity to see inside the care-worn, protesting walls. through a gap that might once have been a door, they entered the heart of the sad unhoping thing dropt by the past on its way to oblivion: nothing looks so unlike life as a dead body, nothing so unfit for human dwelling as a long-forsaken house. finding in one corner a broken stair, they clambered up to a gap in the east wall; and as they reached it, heard the sound of a horse's feet. looking down the road, they saw a gig approaching with two men. it had reached a part not so steep, and was coming at a trot. "why!" exclaimed christina, "there's val!--and some one with him!" "i heard the governor say to mamma," returned mercy, "that val was going to bring a college friend with him,--'for a pop at the grouse,' he said. i wonder what he will be like!" "he's a good-big-looking fellow," said christina. they drew nearer. "you might have said a big, good-looking fellow!" rejoined mercy. "he really is handsome!--now mind, mercy, i was the first to discover it!" said christina. "indeed you were not!--at least i was the first to say it!" returned mercy. "but you will take him all to yourself anyhow, and i am sure i don't care!" yet the girls were not vulgar--they were only common. they did and said vulgar things because they had not the sensitive vitality to shrink from them. they had not been well taught--that is roused to live: in the family was not a breath of aspiration. there was plenty of ambition, that is, aspiration turned hell-ward. they thought themselves as far from vulgar as any lady in any land, being in this vulgar--that they despised the people they called vulgar, yet thought much of themselves for not being vulgar. there was little in them the world would call vulgar; but the world and its ways are vulgar; its breeding will not pass with the ushers of the high countries. the worst in that of these girls was a fast, disagreeable way of talking, which they owed to a certain governess they had had for a while. they hastened to the road. the gig came up. valentine threw the reins to his companion, jumped out, embraced his sisters, and seemed glad to see them. had he met them after a like interval at home, he would have given them a cooler greeting; but he had travelled so many miles that they seemed not to have met for quite a long time. "my friend, mr. sercombe," he said, jerking his head toward the gig. mr. sercombe raised his pot-lid--the last fashion in head-gear--and acquaintance was made. "we'll drive on, sercombe," said valentine, jumping up. "you see, chris, we're half dead with hunger! do you think we shall find anything to eat?" "judging by what we left at breakfast," replied christina, "i should say you will find enough for--one of you; but you had better go and see." chapter iv. the shop in the village. two or three days have passed. the sun had been set for an hour, and the night is already rather dark notwithstanding the long twilight of these northern regions, for a blanket of vapour has gathered over the heaven, and a few stray drops have begun to fall from it. a thin wind now and then wakes, and gives a feeble puff, but seems immediately to change its mind and resolve not to blow, but let the rain come down. a drearier-looking spot for human abode it would be difficult to imagine, except it were as much of the sandy sahara, or of the ashy, sage-covered waste of western america. a muddy road wound through huts of turf--among them one or two of clay, and one or two of stone, which were more like cottages. hardly one had a window two feet square, and many of their windows had no glass. in almost all of them the only chimney was little more than a hole in the middle of the thatch. this rendered the absence of glass in the windows not so objectionable; for, left without ordered path to its outlet, the smoke preferred a circuitous route, and lingered by the way, filling the air. peat-smoke, however, is both wholesome and pleasant, nor was there mingled with it any disagreeable smell of cooking. outside were no lamps; the road was unlighted save by the few rays that here and there crept from a window, casting a doubtful glimmer on the mire. one of the better cottages sent out a little better light, though only from a tallow candle, through the open upper half of a door horizontally divided in two. except by that same half-door, indeed, little light could enter the place, for its one window was filled with all sorts of little things for sale. small and inconvenient for the humblest commerce, this was not merely the best, it was the only shop in the hamlet. there were two persons in it, one before and one behind the counter. the latter was a young woman, the former a man. he was leaning over the counter--whether from weariness, listlessness, or interest in his talk with the girl behind, it would not have been easy, in the dim light and deep shadow, to say. he seemed quite at home, yet the young woman treated him with a marked, though unembarrassed respect. the candle stood to one side of them upon the counter, making a ghastly halo in the damp air; and in the light puff that occasionally came in at the door, casting the shadow of one of a pair of scales, now on this now on that of the two faces. the young woman was tall and dark, with a large forehead:--so much could be seen; but the sweetness of her mouth, the blueness of her eyes, the extreme darkness of her hair, were not to be distinguished. the man also was dark. his coat was of some rough brown material, probably dyed and woven in the village, and his kilt of tartan. they were more than well worn--looked even in that poor light a little shabby. on his head was the highland bonnet called a glengarry. his profile was remarkable--hardly less than grand, with a certain aquiline expression, although the nose was not roman. his eyes appeared very dark, but in the daylight were greenish hazel. usually he talked with the girl in gaelic, but was now speaking english, a far purer english than that of most english people, though with something of the character of book-english as distinguished from conversation-english, and a very perceptible accent. "and when was it you heard from lachlan, annie?" he asked. after a moment's pause, during which she had been putting away things in a drawer of the counter--not so big as many a kitchen dresser-- "last thursday it was, sir," answered the girl. "you know we hear every month, sometimes oftener." "yes; i know that.--i hope the dear fellow is well?" "he is quite well and of good hope. he says he will soon come and see us now." "and take you away, annie?" "well, sir," returned annie, after a moment's hesitation, "he does not say so!" "if he did not mean it, he would be a rascal, and i should have to kill him. but my life on lachlan's honesty!" "thank you, sir. he would lay down his for you." "not if you said to him, don't!-eh, annie?" "but he would, macruadh!" returned the young woman, almost angrily. "are not you his chief?" "ah, that is all over now, my girl! there are no chiefs, and no clans any more! the chiefs that need not, yet sell their land like esau for a mess of pottage--and their brothers with it! and the sasunnach who buys it, claims rights over them that never grew on the land or were hid in its caves! thank god, the poor man is not their slave, but he is the worse off, for they will not let him eat, and he has nowhere to go. my heart is like to break for my people. sometimes i feel as if i would gladly die." "oh, sir! don't say that!" expostulated the young woman, and her voice trembled. "every heart in glenruadh is glad when it goes well with the macruadh." "yes, yes; i know you all love my father's son and my uncle's nephew; but how can it go well with the macruadh when it goes ill with his clan? there is no way now for a chief to be the father of his people; we are all poor together! my uncle--god rest his soul!--they managed it so, i suppose, as to persuade him there was no help for it! well, a man must be an honest man, even if there be no way but ruin! god knows, as we've all heard my father say a hundred times from the pulpit, there's no ruin but dishonesty! for poverty and hard work, he's a poor creature would crouch for those!" "he who well goes down hill, holds his head up!" said annie, and a pause followed. "there are strangers at the new house, we hear," she said. "from a distance i saw some young ladies, and one or two men. i don't desire to see more of them. god forbid i should wish them any manner of harm! but--i hardly understand myself--i don't like to see them there. i am afraid it is pride. they are rich, i hear, so we shall not be troubled with attention from them; they will look down upon us." "look down on the macruadh!" exclaimed annie, as if she could not believe her ears. "not that i should heed that!" he went on. "a cock on the barn-ridge looks down on you, and you don't feel offended! what i do dread is looking down on them. there is something in me that can hate, annie, and i fear it. there is something about the land--i don't care about money, but i feel like a miser about the land!--i don't mean any land; i shouldn't care to buy land unless it had once been ours; but what came down to me from my own people--with my own people upon it--i would rather turn the spigot of the molten gold and let it run down the abyss, than a rood of that slip from me! i feel it even a disgrace to have lost what of it i never had!" "indeed, macruadh," said annie, "it's a hard time! there is no money in the country! and fast the people are going after lachlan!" "i shall miss you, annie!" "you are very kind to us all, sir." "are you not all my own! and you have to take care of for lachlan's sake besides. he left you solemnly to my charge--as if that had been necessary, the foolish fellow, when we are foster-brothers!" again came a pause. "not a gentleman-farmer left from one end of the strath to the other!" said the chief at length. "when ian is at home, we feel just like two old turkey-cocks left alone in the yard!" "say two golden eagles, sir, on the cliff of the rock." "don't compare us to the eagle, annie. i do not love the bird. he is very proud and greedy and cruel, and never will know the hand that tames him. he is the bird of the monarch or the earl, not the bird of the father of his people. but he is beautiful, and i do not kill him." "they shot another, the female bird, last week! all the birds are going! soon there will be nothing but the great sheep and the little grouse. the capercailzie's gone, and the ptarmigan's gone!--well, there's a world beyond!" "where the birds go, annie?--well, it may be! but the ptarmigan's not gone yet, though there are not many; and for the capercailzie--only who that loves them will be here to see!--but do you really think there is a heaven for all god's creatures, annie? ian does." "i don't know what i said to make you think so, sir! when the heart aches the tongue mistakes. but how is my lady, your mother?" "pretty well, thank you--wonderfully cheerful. it is time i went home to her. lachlan would think i was playing him false, and making love to you on my own account!" "no fear! he would know better than that! he would know too, if she was not belonging to lachlan, her father's daughter would not let her chief humble himself." "you're one of the old sort, annie! good night. mind you tell lachlan i never miss a chance of looking in to see how you are getting on." "i will. good night, macruadh." they shook hands over the counter, and the young chief took his departure. as he stood up, he showed a fine-made, powerful frame, over six feet in height, and perfectly poised. with a great easy stride he swept silently out of the shop; nor from gait any more than look would one have thought he had been all day at work on the remnant of property he could call his own. to a cit it would have seemed strange that one sprung from innumerable patriarchal ancestors holding the land of the country, should talk so familiarly with a girl in a miserable little shop in a most miserable hamlet; it would have seemed stranger yet that such a one should toil at the labour the soul of a cit despises; but stranger than both it would seem to him, if he saw how such a man is tempted to look down upon him. if less cleverness is required for country affairs, they leave the more room for thinking. there are great and small in every class; here and there is a ploughman that understands burns, here and there a large-minded shopkeeper, here and there perhaps an unselfish duke. doubtless most of the youth's ancestors would likewise have held such labour unworthy of a gentleman, and would have preferred driving to their hills a herd of lowland cattle; but this, the last macruadh, had now and then a peep into the kingdom of heaven. chapter v. the chief. the macruadh strode into the dark, and down the village, wasting no time in picking his way--thence into the yet deeper dark of the moorland hills. the rain was beginning to come down in earnest, but he did not heed it; he was thoroughbred, and feared no element. an umbrella was to him a ludicrous thing: how could a little rain--as he would have called it had it come down in torrents--hurt any one! the macruadh, as the few who yet held by the sore-frayed, fast-vanishing skirt of clanship, called him, was the son of the last minister of the parish-a godly man, who lived that which he could ill explain, and was immeasurably better than those parts of his creed which, from a sense of duty, he pushed to the front. for he held devoutly by the root of which he spoke too little, and it supplied much sap to his life and teaching--out of the pulpit. he was a genial, friendly, and by nature even merry man, always ready to share what he had, and making no show of having what he had not, either in wisdom, knowledge, or earthly goods. his father and brother had been owners of the property and chiefs of the clan, much beloved by the poor of it, and not a little misunderstood by most of the more nourishing. for a great hunger after larger means, the ambition of the mammon-ruled world, had arisen in the land, and with it a rage for emigration. the uncle of the present macruadh did all he could to keep his people at home, lived on a couple of hundreds a year himself, and let many of his farms to his gentlemen-tacksmen, as they were called, at lower rents; but it was unavailing; one after another departed, until his land lay in a measure waste, and he grew very poor, mourning far more over his clan and his country than his poverty. in more prosperous times he had scraped together a little money, meaning it, if he could but avoid spending it in his old age, for his brother, who must soon succeed him; for he was himself a bachelor--the result of a romantic attachment and sorrow in his youth; but he lent it to a company which failed, and so lost it. at length he believed himself compelled, for the good of his people, to part with all but a mere remnant of the property. from the man to whom he sold it, mr. peregrine palmer bought it for twice the money, and had still a good bargain. but the hopes of the laird were disappointed: in the sheep it fed, and the grouse it might be brought to breed, lay all its value in the market; there was no increase in the demand for labour; and more and more of the peasantry emigrated, or were driven to other parts of the country. such was the present treatment of the land, causing human life to ebb from it, and working directly counter to the creative god. the laird retired to the humble cottage of his brother the pastor, just married rather late in life--where every comfort love could give waited for him; but the thought that he could have done better for his people by retaining the land soon wore him out; and having made a certain disposition of the purchase-money, he died. what remained of the property came to the minister. as for the chieftainship, that had almost died before the chief; but, reviving by union with the reverence felt for the minister, it took thereafter a higher form. when the minister died, the idea of it transmitted to his son was of a peculiarly sacred character; while in the eyes of the people, the authority of the chief and the influence of the minister seemed to meet reborn in alister notwithstanding his youth. in himself he was much beloved, and in love the blessed rule, blessed where understood, holds, that to him that hath shall be given, he only who has being fit to receive. the love the people bore to his father, both pastor and chief, crowned head and heart of alister. scarce man or woman of the poor remnant of the clan did not love the young macruadh. on his side was true response. with a renewed and renovating conscience, and a vivid sense that all things had to be made new, he possessed an old strong heart, clinging first to his father and mother, and then to the shadow even of any good thing that had come floating down the ages. call it a dream, a wild ideal, a foolish fancy--call it what you please, he was filled with the notion of doing something in his own person and family, having the remnant of the clan for the nucleus of his endeavour, to restore to a vital reality, let it be of smallest extent, that most ancient of governments, the patriarchal, which, all around, had rotted into the feudal, in its turn rapidly disintegrating into the mere dust and ashes of the kingdom of the dead, over which mammon reigns supreme. there may have been youthful presumption and some folly in the notion, but it sprang neither from presumption nor folly, but from simple humanity, and his sense of the responsibility he neither could nor would avoid, as the person upon whom had devolved the headship, however shadowy, of a house, ruinous indeed, but not yet razed. the castle on the ridge stood the symbol of the family condition. it had, however, been a ruin much longer than any one alive could remember. alister's uncle had lived in a house on the spot where mr. peregrine palmer's now stood; the man who bought it had pulled it down to build that which mr. palmer had since enlarged. it was but a humble affair--a great cottage in stone, much in the style of that in which the young chief now lived--only six times the size, with the one feature indispensable to the notion of a chief's residence, a large hall. some would say it was but a huge kitchen; but it was the sacred place of the house, in which served the angel of hospitality. there was always plenty to eat and drink for any comer, whether he had "claim" or not: the question of claim where was need, was not thought of. when the old house had to make room for the new, the staves of the last of its half-pipes of claret, one of which used always to stand on tap amidst the peat-smoke, yielded its final ministration to humanity by serving to cook a few meals for mason and carpenter. the property of clanruadh, for it was regarded as clan-property because belonging to the chief, stretched in old time away out of sight in all directions--nobody, in several, could tell exactly how far, for the undrawn boundary lines lay in regions of mist and cloud, in regions stony, rocky, desert, to which a red deer, not to say a stray sheep, rarely ascended. at one time it took in a portion at least of every hill to be seen from the spot where stood the ruin. the chief had now but a small farm, consisting of some fair soil on the slope of a hill, and some very good in the valley on both sides of the burn; with a hill-pasture that was not worth measuring in acres, for it abounded in rocks, and was prolific in heather and ling, with patches of coarse grass here and there, and some extent of good high-valley grass, to which the small black cattle and black-faced sheep were driven in summer. beyond periodical burnings of the heather, this uplifted portion received no attention save from the mist, the snow, the rain, the sun, and the sweet air. a few grouse and black game bred on it, and many mountain-hares, with martens, wild cats, and other vermin. but so tender of life was the macruadh that, though he did not spare these last, he did not like killing even a fox or a hooded crow, and never shot a bird for sport, or would let another shoot one, though the poorest would now and then beg a bird or two from him, sure of having their request. it seemed to him as if the creatures were almost a part of his clan, of which also he had to take care against a greedy world. but as the deer and the birds ranged where they would, it was not much he could do for them--as little almost as for the men and women that had gone over the sea, and were lost to their country in canada. regret, and not any murmur, stirred the mind of alister macruadh when he thought of the change that had passed on all things around him. he had been too well taught for grumbling--least of all at what was plainly the will of the supreme--inasmuch as, however man might be to blame, the thing was there. personal regrets he had none beyond those of family feeling and transmitted sentiment. he was able to understand something of the signs of the times, and saw that nothing could bring back the old way--saw that nothing comes back--at least in the same form; saw that there had been much that ought not to come back, and that, if patriarchal ways were ever to return, they must rise out of, and be administered upon loftier principles--must begin afresh, and be wrought out afresh from the bosom of a new abraham, capable of so bringing up his children that a new development of the one natural system, of government should be possible with and through them. perhaps even now, in the new country to which so many of his people were gone, some shadowy reappearance of the old fashion might have begun to take shape on a higher level, with loftier aims, and in circumstances holding out fewer temptations to the evils of the past! alister could not, at his years, have generated such thoughts but for the wisdom that had gone before him--first the large-minded speculation of his father, who was capable even of discarding his prejudices where he saw they might mislead him; and next, the response of his mother to the same: she was the only one who entirely understood her husband. isobel macruadh was a woman of real thinking-power. her sons being but boys when their father died, she at once took the part of mediator between the mind of the father and that of his sons; and besides guiding them on the same principles, often told them things their father had said, and talked with them of things they had heard him say. one of the chief lessons he left them wrought well for the casting out of all with which the feudal system had debased the patriarchal; and the poverty shared with the clan had powerfully helped: it was spoken against the growing talionic regard of human relations--that, namely, the conditions of a bargain fulfilled on both sides, all is fulfilled between the bargaining parties. "in the possibility of any bargain," he had said, "are involved eternal conditions: there is relationship--there is brotherhood. even to give with a denial of claim, to be kind under protest, is an injury, is charity without the love, is salt without the saltness. if we spent our lives in charity we should never overtake neglected claims--claims neglected from the very beginning of the relations of men. if a man say, 'i have not been unjust; i owed the man nothing;' he sides with death--says with the typical murderer, 'am i my brother's keeper?' builds the tombs of those his fathers slew." in the bosom of young alister macruadh, the fatherly relation of the strong to the weak survived the disappearance of most of the outward signs of clan-kindred: the chieftainship was sublimed in him. the more the body of outer fact died, the stronger grew in him the spirit of the relation. as some savage element of a race will reappear in an individual of it after ages of civilization, so may good old ways of thinking and feeling, modes long gone out of fashion and practice, survive and revive modified by circumstance, in an individual of a new age. such a one will see the customs of his ancestors glorified in the mists of the past; what is noble in them will appeal to all that is best in his nature, spurring the most generous of his impulses, and stirring up the conscience that would be void of offence. when the operative force of such regards has been fostered by the teaching of a revered parent; when the influences he has left behind are nourished and tended, with thorough belief and devoted care, by her who shared his authority in life, and now bears alone the family sceptre, there can be no bound set to their possible potency in a mind of high spiritual order. the primary impulse became with alister a large portion of his religion: he was the shepherd of the much ravaged and dwindled macruadh-fold; it was his church, in which the love of the neighbour was intensified in the love of the relation and dependent. to aid and guard this his flock, was alister's divine service. it was associated with a great dislike of dogma, originating in the recoil of the truth within him from much that was commonly held and taught for true. call the thing enthusiasm or what you will, so you believe it there, and genuine. it was only towards the poor of a decayed clan he had opportunity of exercising the cherished relation; almost all who were not poor had emigrated before the lands were sold; and indeed it was only the poor who set store by their unity with the old head. not a few of the clan, removed elsewhither, would have smiled degenerate, and with scorn in their amusement, at the idea of alister's clinging to any supposed reality in the position he could claim. among such nevertheless were several who, having made money by trade, would each have been glad enough to keep up old traditions, and been ready even to revive older, had the headship fallen to him. but in the hands of a man whom, from the top of their wealth, they regarded as but a poor farmer, they forgot all about it--along with a few other more important and older-world matters; for where mammon gets in his foot, he will soon be lord of the house, and turn not merely rank, his rival demon, out of doors, but god himself. alister indeed lived in a dream; he did not know how far the sea of hearts had ebbed, leaving him alone on the mount of his vision; but he dreamed a dream that was worth dreaming; comfort and help flowed from it to those about him, nor did it fail to yield his own soul refreshment also. all dreams are not false; some dreams are truer than the plainest facts. fact at best is but a garment of truth, which has ten thousand changes of raiment woven in the same loom. let the dreamer only do the truth of his dream, and one day he will realize all that was worth realizing in it--and a great deal more and better than it contained. alister had no far-reaching visions of anything to come out of his; he had, like the true man he was, only the desire to live up to his idea of what the people looked up to in him. the one thing that troubled him was, that his uncle, whom he loved so dearly, should have sold the land. doubtless there was pride mingled with his devotion, and pride is an evil thing. still it was a human and not a devilish pride. i would not be misunderstood as defending pride, or even excusing it in any shape; it is a thing that must be got rid of at all costs; but even for evil we must speak the truth; and the pride of a good man, evil as it is, and in him more evil than in an evil man, yet cannot be in itself such a bad thing as the pride of a bad man. the good man would at once recognize and reject the pride of a bad man. a pride that loves cannot be so bad as a pride that hates. yet if the good man do not cast out his pride, it will sink him lower than the bad man's, for it will degenerate into a worse pride than that of any bad man. each must bring its own divinely-ordained consequence. there is one other point in the character of the macruadh which i must mention ere i pass on; in this region, and at this time, it was a great peculiarity, one that yielded satisfaction to few of the clan, and made him even despised in the strath: he hated whisky, and all the drinking customs associated with it. in this he was not original; he had not come to hate it from noting the degradation and crime that attended it, or that as poverty grew, drunkenness grew, men who had used it in moderation taking more and more as circumstances became more adverse, turning sadness into slavery: he had been brought up to hate it. his father, who, as a clergyman doing his endeavour for the welfare of his flock, found himself greatly thwarted by its deadening influences, rendering men callous not only to the special vice itself, but to worse vices as well, had banished it from his table and his house; while the mother had from their very childhood instilled a loathing of the national weakness and its physical means into the minds of her sons. in her childhood she had seen its evils in her own father: by no means a drunkard, he was the less of a father because he did as others did. never an evening passed without his drinking his stated portion of whisky-toddy, growing more and more subject to attacks of had temper, with consequent injustice and unkindness. the recollection may have made her too sweeping in her condemnation of the habit, but i doubt it; and anyhow a habit is not a man, and we need not much condemn that kind of injustice. we need not be tender over a habit which, though not all bad, yet leads to endless results that are all bad. i would follow such to its grave without many tears! isobel macruadh was one of those rare women who preserve in years the influence gained in youth; and the thing that lay at the root of the fact was her justice. for though her highland temper would occasionally burst out in hot flame, everyone knew that if she were in the wrong, she would see it and say it before any one else would tell her of it. this justice it was, ready against herself as for another, that fixed the influence which her goodness and her teaching of righteousness gained. her eldest child, a girl, died in infancy. alister and ian were her whole earthly family, and they worshipped her. chapter vi. work and wage. alister strode through the night, revolving no questions hard to solve, though such were not strangers to him. he had not been to a university like his brother, but he had had a good educational beginning--who ever had more than a beginning?--chiefly from his father, who for his time and opportunity was even a learned man--and better, a man who knew what things were worth a man's human while, and what were not: he could and did think about things that a man must think about or perish; and his son alister had made himself able to think about what he did not know, by doing the thing he did know. but now, as he walked, fighting with the wind, his bonnet of little shelter pulled down on his forehead, he was thinking mostly of lachlan his foster-brother, whose devotion had done much to nourish in him the sense that he was head of the clan. he had not far to go to reach his home--about a couple of miles. he had left the village a quarter of the way behind him, when through the darkness he spied something darker yet by the roadside. going up to it, he found an old woman, half sitting, half standing, with a load of peats in a creel upon her back, unable, apparently, for the moment at least, to proceed. alister knew at once by her shape and posture who she was. "ah, mistress conal!" he said, "i am sorry to see you resting on such a night so near your own door. it means you have filled your creel too full, and tired yourself too much." "i am not too much tired, macruadh!" returned the old woman, who was proud and cross-tempered, and had a reputation for witchcraft, which did her neither much good nor much harm. "well, whether you are tired or not, i believe i am the stronger of the two!" "small doubt of that, alister!" said mistress conal with a sigh. "then i will take your creel, and you will soon be home. come along! it is going to be a wild night!" so saying he took the rope from the neck of the old woman right gently, and threw the creel with a strong swing over his shoulder. this dislodged a few of the topmost of the peats which the poor old thing had been a long way to fetch. she heard them fall, and one of them struck her foot. she started up, almost in a rage. "sir! sir! my peats!" she cried. "what would you be throwing away the good peats into the dark for, letting that swallow them they should swallow!" these words, as all that passed between them, were spoken neither in scotch nor english, but in gaelic--which, were i able to write it down, most of my readers would no more understand than they would phoenician: we must therefore content ourselves with what their conversation comes to in english, which, if deficient compared with gaelic in vowel-sounds, yet serves to say most things capable of being said. "i am sorry, mistress conal; but we'll not be losing them," returned the laird gently, and began to feel about the road for the fallen peats. "how many were there, do you think, of them that fell?" he asked, rising after a vain search. "how should i be knowing! but i am sure there would be nigh six of them!" answered the woman, in a tone of deep annoyance--nor was it much wonder; they were precious to the cold, feeble age that had gone so far to fetch so few. the laird again stooped his long back, and searched and searched, feeling on all sides around him. he picked up three. not another, after searching for several minutes, could he find. "i'm thinking that must be all of them, but i find only three!" he said. "come, let us go home! you must not make your cough worse for one or two peats, perhaps none!" "three, macruadh, three!" insisted the old woman in wavering voice, broken by coughing; for, having once guessed six, she was not inclined to lower her idea of her having. "well, well! we'll count them when we get home!" said alister, and gave his hand to her to help her up. she yielded grumbling, and, bowed still though relieved from her burden, tottered by his side along the dark, muddy, wind-and-rain-haunted road. "did you see my niece to-night at the shop?" she asked; for she was proud of being so nearly related to those who kept the shop of the hamlet. "that i did," answered the chief; and a little talk followed about lachlan in canada. no one could have perceived from the way in which the old woman accepted his service, and the tone in which she spoke to him while he bent under her burden, that she no less than loved her chief; but everybody only smiled at mistress conal's rough speech. that night, ere she went to bed, she prayed for the macruadh as she never prayed for one of her immediate family. and if there was a good deal of superstition mingled with her prayer, the main thing in it was genuine, that is, the love that prompted it; and if god heard only perfect prayers, how could he be the prayer-hearing god? her dwelling stood but a stone's-throw from the road, and presently they turned up to it by a short steep ascent. it was a poor hut, mostly built of turf; but turf makes warm walls, impervious to the wind, and it was a place of her own!--that is, she had it to herself, a luxury many cannot even imagine, while to others to be able to be alone at will seems one of the original necessities of life. even the lord, who probably had not always a room to himself in the poor houses he staid at, could not do without solitude; therefore not unfrequently spent the night in the open air, on the quiet, star-served hill: there even for him it would seem to have been easier to find an entrance into that deeper solitude which, it is true, he did not need in order to find his father and his god, but which apparently he did need in order to come into closest contact with him who was the one joy of his life, whether his hard life on earth, or his blessed life in heaven. the macruadh set down the creel, and taking out peat after peat, piled them up against the wall, where already a good many waited their turn to be laid on the fire; for, as the old woman said, she must carry a few when she could, and get ahead with her store ere the winter came, or she would soon be devoured: there was a death that always prowled about old people, she said, watching for the fire to go out. many of the celts are by nature poets, and mistress conal often spoke in a manner seldom heard from the lips of a lowland woman. the common forms of gaelic are more poetic than those of most languages, and could have originated only with a poetic people, while mistress conal was by no means an ordinary type of her people; maugre her ill temper and gruffness, she thought as well as spoke like a poetess. this, conjoined with the gift of the second sight, had helped to her reputation as a witch. as the chief piled the peats, he counted them. she sat watching him and them from a stone that made part of a rude rampart to the hearth. "i told you so, macruadh!" she said, the moment she saw his hand return empty from the bottom of the creel. "i was positive there should be three more!--but what's on the road is not with the devil." "i am very sorry!" said the chief, who thought it wiser not to contradict her. he would have searched his sporan for a coin to make up to her for the supposed loss of her peats; but he knew well enough there was not a coin in it. he shook hands with her, bade her good night, and went, closing the door carefully behind him against a great gust of wind that struggled to enter, threatening to sweep the fire she was now blowing at with her wrinkled, leather-like lips, off the hearth altogether--a thing that had happened before, to the danger of the whole building, itself of the substance burning in the middle of its floor. the macruadh ran down the last few steep steps of the path, and jumped into the road. through the darkness came the sound of one springing aside with a great start, and the click of a gun-lock. "who goes there?" cried a rather tremulous voice. "the macruadh," answered the chief. the utterance apparently conveyed nothing. "do you belong to these parts?" said the voice. a former macruadh might have answered, "no; these parts belong to me;" alister curtly replied, "i do." "here then, my good fellow! take my game-bag, and carry it as far as the new house--if you know where i mean. i will give you a shilling." one moment the chief spent in repressing a foolish indignation; the next he spent in reflection. had he seen how pale and tired was the youth with the gun, he would have offered to carry his bag for him; to offer and to be asked, however, most people find different; and here the offer of payment added to the difficulty. but the word shilling had raised the vision of the old woman in her lonely cottage, brooding over the loss, real or imaginary mattered nothing, of her three far-borne peats. what a happy night, through all the wind and the rain, would a silver shilling under her chaff pillow give her! the thought froze the chief's pride, and warmed his heart. what right had he to deny her such a pleasure! it would cost him nothing! it would even bring him a little amusement! the chief of clanruadh carrying his game-bag for a sasunnach fellow to earn a shilling! the idea had a touch of humorous consolation in it. i will not assert the consolation strong enough to cast quite out a certain feeling of shame that mingled with his amusement--a shame which--is it not odd!--he would not have felt had his sporan been full of sovereigns. but the shame was not altogether a shameful one; a fanciful fear of degrading the chieftainship, and a vague sense of the thing being an imposition, had each a part in it. there could be nothing dishonest, however, in thus earning a shilling for poor mistress conal! "i will carry your bag," he said, "but i must have the shilling first, if you please." "oh!" rejoined valentine palmer. "you do not trust me! how then am i to trust you?" "sir!" exclaimed alister--and, again finding himself on the point of being foolish, laughed. "i will pay you when the job is done," said valentine. "that is quite fair, but it does not suit my purpose," returned alister. they were walking along the road side by side, but each could scarcely see anything of the other. the sportsman was searching his pockets to find a shilling. he succeeded, and, groping, put it in alister's hand, with the words-- "all right! it is only a shilling! there it is! but it is not yours yet: here is the bag!" alister took the bag, turned, and ran back. "hillo!" cried valentine. but alister had disappeared, and as soon as he turned up the soft path to the cottage, his steps became inaudible through the wind. he opened the door, went in, laid the shilling on the back of the old woman's hand, and without a word hurried out again, and down to the road. the stranger was some distance ahead, tramping wearily on through the darkness, and grumbling at his folly in bribing a fellow with a shilling to carry off his game-bag. alister overtook him. "oh, here you are after all!" exclaimed valentine. "i thought you had made off with work and wages both! what did you do it for?" "i wanted to give the shilling to an old woman close by." "your mother--eh?" "no." "your grandmother?" "no." "some relation then!" insisted the stranger. "doubtless," answered the laird, and valentine thought him a surly fellow. they walked on in silence. the youth could hardly keep up with alister, who thought him ill bred, and did not care for his company. "why do you walk so fast?" said valentine. "because i want to get home," replied alister. "but i paid you to keep me company!" "you paid me to carry your bag. i will leave it at the new house." his coolness roused the weary youth. "you rascal!" he said; "you keep alongside of me, or i'll pepper you." as he spoke, he shifted his gun. but alister had already, with a few long strides, put a space of utter darkness between them. he had taken the shilling, and must carry the bag, but did not feel bound to personal attendance. at the same time he could not deny there was reason in the man's unwillingness to trust him. what had he about him to give him in pledge? nothing but his watch, his father's, a gift of the prince to the head of the family!--he could not profane that by depositing it for a game-bag! he must yield to his employer, moderate his pace, and move side by side with the sasunnach! again they walked some distance in silence. alister began to discover that his companion was weary, and his good heart spoke. "let me carry your gun," he said. "see you damned!" returned valentine, with an angry laugh. "you fancy your gun protects your bag?" "i do." the same instant the gun was drawn, with swift quiet force, through the loop of his arm from behind. feeling himself defenceless, he sprang at the highlander, but he eluded him, and in a moment was out of his reach, lost in the darkness. he heard the lock of one barrel snap: it was not loaded; the second barrel went off, and he gave a great jump, imagining himself struck. the next instant the gun was below his arm again. "it will be lighter to carry now!" said the macruadh; "but if you like i will take it." "take it, then. but no!--by jove, i wish there was light enough to see what sort of a rascal you look!" "you are not very polite!" "mind your own politeness. i was never so roughly served in my life!--by a fellow too that had taken my money! if i knew where to find a magistrate in this beastly place,--" "you would tell him i emptied your gun because you threatened me with it!" "you were going off with my bag!" "because i undertook to carry your bag, was i bound to endure your company?" "alister!" said a quiet voice out of the darkness. the highlander started, and in a tone strangely tremulous, yet with a kind of triumph in it, answered-- "ian!" the one word said, he stood still, but as in the act to run, staring into the darkness. the next moment he flung down the game-bag, and two men were in each other's arms. "where are you from, ian?" said the chief at length, in a voice broken with gladness. all valentine understood of the question, for it was in gaelic, was its emotion, and he scorned a fellow to show the least sign of breaking down. "straight from moscow," answered the new-comer. "how is our mother?" "well, ian, thank god!" "then, thank god, all is well!" "what brought you home in such haste?" "i had a bad dream about my mother, and was a little anxious. there was more reason too, which i will tell you afterwards." "what were you doing in moscow? have you a furlough?" "no; i am a sort of deserter. i would have thrown up my commission, but had not a chance. in moscow i was teaching in a school to keep out of the way of the police. but i will tell you all by and by." the voice was low, veiled, and sad; the joy of the meeting rippled through it like a brook. the brothers had forgotten the stranger, and stood talking till the patience of valentine was as much exhausted as his strength. "are you going to stand there all night?" he said at last. "this is no doubt very interesting to you, but it is rather a bore to one who can neither see you, nor understand a word you say." "is the gentleman a friend of yours, alister?" asked ian. "not exactly.--but he is a sasunnach," he concluded in english, "and we ought not to be speaking gaelic." "i beg his pardon," said ian. "will you introduce me?" "it is impossible; i do not know his name. i never saw him, and don't see him now. but he insists on my company." "that is a great compliment. how far?" "to the new house." "i paid him a shilling to carry my bag," said valentine. "he took the shilling, and was going to walk off with my bag!" "well?" "well indeed! not at all well! how was i to know--" "but he didn't--did he?" said ian, whose voice seemed now to tingle with amusement. "--alister, you were wrong." it was an illogical face-about, but alister responded at once. "i know it," he said. "the moment i heard your voice, i knew it.--how is it, ian,"--here he fell back into gaelic--"that when you are by me, i know what is right so much quicker? i don't understand it. i meant to do right, but--" "but your pride got up. alister, you always set out well--nobly--and then comes the devil's turn! then you begin to do as if you repented! you don't carry the thing right straight out. i hate to see the devil make a fool of a man like you! do you not know that in your own country you owe a stranger hospitality?" "my own country!" echoed alister with a groan. "yes, your own country--and perhaps more yours than it was your grandfather's! you know who said, 'the meek shall inherit the earth'! if it be not ours in god's way, i for one would not care to call it mine another way."--here he changed again to english.--"but we must not keep the gentleman standing while we talk!" "thank you!" said valentine. "the fact is, i'm dead beat." "have you anything i could carry for you?" asked ian. "no, i thank you.--yes; there! if you don't mind taking my gun?--you speak like a gentleman!" "i will take it with pleasure." he took the gun, and they started. "if you choose, alister," said his brother, once more in gaelic, "to break through conventionalities, you must not expect people to allow you to creep inside them again the moment you please." but the young fellow's fatigue had touched alister. "are you a big man?" he said, taking valentine gently by the arm. "not so big as you, i'll lay you a sovereign," answered valentine, wondering why he should ask. "then look here!" said alister; "you get astride my shoulders, and i'll carry you home. i believe you're hungry, and that takes the pith out of you!--come," he went on, perceiving some sign of reluctance in the youth, "you'll break down if you walk much farther!--here, ian! you take the bag; you can manage that and the gun too!" valentine murmured some objection; but the brothers took the thing so much as a matter of course, and he felt so terribly exhausted--for he had lost his way, and been out since the morning--that he yielded. alister doubled himself up on his heels; valentine got his weary legs over his stalwart shoulders; the chief rose with him as if he had been no heavier than mistress conal's creel, and bore him along much relieved in his aching limbs. so little was the chief oppressed by his burden, that he and his brother kept up a stream of conversation, every now and then forgetting their manners and gliding off into gaelic, but as often recollecting themselves, apologizing, and starting afresh upon the path of english. long before they reached the end of their journey, valentine, able from his perch to listen in some measure of ease, came to understand that he had to do, not with rustics, but, whatever their peculiarities, with gentlemen of a noteworthy sort. the brothers, in the joy of their reunion, talked much of things at home and abroad, avoiding things personal and domestic as often as they spoke english; but when they saw the lights of the new house, a silence fell upon them. at the door, alister set his burden carefully down. "there!" he said with a laugh, "i hope i have earned my shilling!" "ten times over," answered valentine; "but i know better now than offer to pay you. i thank you with all my heart." the door opened, ian gave the gun and the bag to the butler, and the brothers bade valentine good night. valentine had a strange tale to tell. sercombe refused to accept his conclusions: if he had offered the men half a crown apiece, he said, they would have pocketed the money. chapter vii. mother and son. the sun was shining bright, and the laird was out in his fields. his oats were nearly ready for the scythe, and he was judging where he had best begin to cut them. his fields lay chiefly along the banks of the stream, occupying the whole breadth of the valley on the east side of the ridge where the cottage stood. on the west side of the ridge, nearly parallel to, and not many yards from it, a small brook ran to join the stream: this was a march betwixt the chief's land and mr. peregrine palmer's. their respective limit was not everywhere so well defined. the air was clear and clean, and full of life. the wind was asleep. a consciousness of work approaching completion filled earth and air--a mood of calm expectation, as of a man who sees his end drawing nigh, and awaits the saving judgment of the father of spirits. there was no song of birds--only a crow from the yard, or the cry of a blackcock from the hill; the two streams were left to do all the singing, and they did their best, though their water was low. the day was of the evening of the year; in the full sunshine was present the twilight and the coming night, but there was a sense of readiness on all sides. the fruits of the earth must be housed; that alone remained to be done. when the laird had made up his mind, he turned towards the house--a lowly cottage, more extensive than many farmhouses, but looking no better. it was well built, with an outside wall of rough stone and lime, and another wall of turf within, lined in parts with wood, making it as warm a nest as any house of the size could be. the door, picturesque with abundant repair, opened by a latch into the kitchen. for long years the floor of the kitchen had been an earthen one, with the fire on a hearth in the middle of it, as in all the cottages; and the smoke rose into the roof, keeping it very dry and warm, if also very sooty, and thence into the air through a hole in the middle. but some ten years before this time, alister and ian, mere lads, had built a chimney outside, and opening the wall, removed the hearth to it--with the smoke also, which now had its own private way to liberty. they then paved the floor with such stones as they could find, in the fields and on the hill, sufficiently flat and smooth on one side, and by sinking them according to their thickness, managed to get a tolerably even surface. many other improvements followed; and although it was a poor place still, it would at the time of dr. johnson's visit to the highlands have been counted a good house, not to be despised by unambitious knight or poor baronet. nor was the time yet over, when ladies and gentlemen, of all courtesy and good breeding, might be found in such houses. in the kitchen a deal-dresser, scoured white, stood under one of the tiny windows, giving light enough for a clean-souled cook--and what window-light would ever be enough for one of a different sort? there were only four panes in it, but it opened and closed with a button, and so was superior to many windows. there was a larger on the opposite side, which at times in the winter nights when the cold was great, they filled bodily with a barricade of turf. here, in the kitchen, the chief takes his meals with his lady-mother. she and ian have just finished their breakfast, and gone to the other end of the house. the laird broke his fast long ago. a fire is burning on the hearth--small, for the mid-day-meal is not yet on its way. everything is tidy; the hearth is swept up, and the dishes are washed: the barefooted girl is reaching the last of them to its place on the rack behind the dresser. she is a red-haired, blue-eyed celt, with a pretty face, and a refinement of motion and speech rarer in some other peasantries. the chief enters, and takes from the wall an old-fashioned gun. he wants a bird or two, for ian's home-coming is a great event. "i saw a big stag last night down by the burn, sir," said the girl, "feeding as if he had been the red cow." "i don't want him to-day, nancy," returned her master. "had he big horns?" "great horns, sir; but it was too dark to count the tines." "when was it? why did you not tell me?" "i thought it was morning, sir, and when i got up it was the middle of the night. the moon was so shiny that i went to the door and looked out. just at the narrow leap, i saw him plain." "if you should see him again, nancy, scare him. i don't want the sasunnachs at the new house to see him." "hadn't you better take him yourself, macruadh? he would make fine hams for the winter!" "mind your own business, nancy, and hold your tongue," said the chief, with a smile that took all the harshness from the words. "don't you tell any one you saw him. for what you know he may be the big stag!" "sure no one would kill him, sir!" answered the girl aghast. "i hope not. but get the stoving-pot ready, nancy; i'm going to find a bird or two. lest i should not succeed, have a couple of chickens at hand." "sir, the mistress has commanded them already." "that is well; but do not kill them except i am not back in time." "i understand, sir." macruadh knew the stag as well as the horse he rode, and that his habit had for some time been to come down at night and feed on the small border of rich grass on the south side of the burn, between it and the abrupt heathery rise of the hill. for there the burn ran so near the hill, and the ground was so covered with huge masses of grey rock, that there was hardly room for cultivation, and the bank was left in grass. the stalking of the stag was the passion of the highlander in that part of the country. he cared little for shooting the grouse, black or red, and almost despised those whose ambition was a full bag of such game; he dreamed day and night of killing deer. the chief, however, was in this matter more of a man without being less of a highlander. he loved the deer so much, saw them so much a part of the glory of mountain and sky, sunshine and storm, that he liked to see them living, not dead, and only now and then shot one, when the family had need of it. he felt himself indeed almost the father of the deer as well as of his clan, and mourned greatly that he could do so little now, from the limited range of his property, to protect them. his love for live creatures was not quite equal to that of st. francis, for he had not conceived the thought of turning wolf or fox from the error of his ways; but even the creatures that preyed upon others he killed only from a sense of duty, and with no pleasure in their death. the heartlessness of the common type of sportsman was loathsome to him. when there was not much doing on the farm, he would sometimes be out all night with his gun, it is true, but he would seldom fire it, and then only at some beast of prey; on the hill-side or in the valley he would lie watching the ways and doings of the many creatures that roam the night--each with its object, each with its reasons, each with its fitting of means to ends. one of the grounds of his dislike to the new possessors of the old land was the raid he feared upon the wild animals. the laird gone, i will take my reader into the parlour, as they called in english their one sitting-room. shall i first tell him what the room was like, or first describe the two persons in it? led up to a picture, i certainly should not look first at the frame; but a description is a process of painting rather than a picture; and when you cannot see the thing in one, but must take each part by itself, and in your mind get it into relation with the rest, there is an advantage, i think, in having a notion of the frame first. for one thing, you cannot see the persons without imagining their surroundings, and if those should be unfittingly imagined, they interfere with the truth of the persons, and you may not be able to get them right after. the room, then, was about fifteen feet by twelve, and the ceiling was low. on the white walls hung a few frames, of which two or three contained water-colours--not very good, but not displeasing; several held miniature portraits--mostly in red coats, and one or two a silhouette. opposite the door hung a target of hide, round, and bossed with brass. alister had come upon it in the house, covering a meal-barrel, to which service it had probably been put in aid of its eluding a search for arms after the battle of culloden. never more to cover man's food from mice, or his person from an enemy, it was raised to the walhalla of the parlour. under it rested, horizontally upon two nails, the sword of the chief--a long and broad andrew ferrara, with a plated basket-hilt; beside it hung a dirk--longer than usual, and fine in form, with a carved hilt in the shape of an eagle's head and neck, and its sheath, whose leather was dry and flaky with age, heavily mounted in silver. below these was a card-table of marquetry with spindle-legs, and on it a work-box of ivory, inlaid with silver and ebony. in the corner stood a harp, an erard, golden and gracious, not a string of it broken. in the middle of the room was a small square table, covered with a green cloth. an old-fashioned easy chair stood by the chimney; and one sat in it whom to see was to forget her surroundings. in middle age she is still beautiful, with the rare beauty that shines from the root of the being. her hair is of the darkest brown, almost black; her eyes are very dark, and her skin is very fair, though the soft bloom, as of reflected sunset, is gone from her cheek, and her hair shows lines of keen silver. her features are fine, clear, and regular--the chin a little strong perhaps, not for the size, but the fineness of the rest; her form is that of a younger woman; her hand and foot are long and delicate. a more refined and courteous presence could not have been found in the island. the dignity of her carriage nowise marred its grace, or betrayed the least consciousness; she looked dignified because she was dignified. that form of falsehood which consists in assuming the look of what one fain would be, was, as much as any other, impossible to isobel macruadh. she wore no cap; her hair was gathered in a large knot near the top of her head. her gown was of a dark print; she had no ornament except a ring with a single ruby. she was working a bit of net into lace. she could speak gaelic as well as any in the glen--perhaps better; but to her sons she always spoke english. to them indeed english was their mother-tongue, in the sense that english only came addressed to themselves from her lips. there were, she said, plenty to teach them gaelic; she must see to their english. the one window of the parlour, though not large, was of tolerable size; but little light entered, so shaded was it with a rose-tree in a pot on the sill. by the wall opposite was a couch, and on the couch lay ian with a book in his hand--a book in a strange language. his mother and he would sometimes be a whole morning together and exchange no more than a word or two, though many a look and smile. it seemed enough for each to be in the other's company. there was a quite peculiar hond between the two. like so many of the young men of that country, ian had been intended for the army; but there was in him this much of the spirit of the eagle he resembled, that he passionately loved freedom, and had almost a gypsy's delight in wandering. when he left college, he became tutor in a russian family of distinction, and after that accepted a commission in the household troops of the czar. but wherever he went, he seemed, as he said once to his mother, almost physically aware of a line stretching between him and her, which seemed to vibrate when he grew anxious about her. the bond between him and his brother was equally strong, but in feeling different. between him and alister it was a cable; between him and his mother a harpstring; in the one case it was a muscle, in the other a nerve. the one retained, the other drew him. given to roaming as he was, again and again he returned, from pure love-longing, to what he always felt as the protection of his mother. it was protection indeed he often had sought--protection from his own glooms, which nothing but her love seemed able to tenuate. he was tall--if an inch above six feet be tall, but not of his brother's fine proportion. he was thin, with long slender fingers and feet like his mother's. his small, strong bones were covered with little more than hard muscle, but every motion of limb or body was grace. at times, when lost in thought and unconscious of movement, an observer might have imagined him in conversation with some one unseen, towards whom he was carrying himself with courtesy: plain it was that courtesy with him was not a graft upon the finest stock, but an essential element. his forehead was rather low, freckled, and crowned with hair of a foxy red; his eyes were of the glass-gray or green loved of our elder poets; his nose was a very eagle in itself--large and fine. he more resembled the mask of the dead shakspere than any other i have met, only in him the proportions were a little exaggerated; his nose was a little too large, and his mouth a little too small for the mask; but the mingled sweetness and strength in the curves of the latter prevented the impression of weakness generally given by the association of such a nose and such a mouth. on his short upper lip was a small light moustache, and on his face not a hair more. in rest his countenance wore a great calmness, but a calmness that might seem rooted in sadness. while the mother might, more than once in a day, differ to fault-finding from her elder-born--whom she admired, notwithstanding, as well as loved, from the bottom of her heart--she was never known to say a word in opposition to the younger. it was even whispered that she was afraid of him. it was not so; but her reverence for ian was such that, even when she felt bound not to agree with him, she seldom had the confidence that, differing from him, she was in the right. sometimes in the middle of the night she would slip like a ghost into the room where he lay, and sit by his bed till the black cock, the gray cock, the red cock crew. the son might be awake all the time, and the mother suspect him awake, yet no word pass between them. she would rise and go as she came. her feeling for her younger son was like that of hannah for her eldest--intensest love mixed with strangest reverence. but there were vast alternations and inexplicable minglings in her thoughts of him. at one moment she would regard him as gifted beyond his fellows for some great work, at another be filled with a horrible fear that he was in rebellion against the god of his life. doubtless mothers are far too ready to think their sons above the ordinary breed of sons: self, unpossessed of god, will worship itself in its offspring; yet the sons whom holy mothers have regarded as born to great things and who have passed away without sign, may have gone on toward their great things. whether this mother thought too much of her son or not, there were questions moving in his mind which she could not have understood--even then when he would creep to her bed in the morning to forget in her arms the terrible dreams of the night, or when at evening he would draw his little stool to her knee, unable or unwilling to enjoy his book anywhere but by her side. what gave him his unconscious power over his mother, was, first, the things he said, and next, the things he did not say; for he seemed to her to dwell always in a rich silence. yet throughout was she aware of a something between them, across which they could not meet; and it was in part her distress at the seeming impossibility of effecting a spiritual union with her son, that made her so desirous of personal proximity to him. such union is by most thinking people presumed impossible without consent of opinion, and this mistake rendered her unable to feel near him, to be at home with him. if she had believed that they understood each other, that they were of like opinion, she would not have been half so unhappy when he went away, would not have longed half so grievously for his return. ian on his part understood his mother, but knew she did not understand him, and was therefore troubled. hence it resulted that always after a time came the hour--which never came to her--when he could endure proximity without oneness no longer, and would suddenly announce his departure. and after a day or two of his absence, the mother would be doubly wretched to find a sort of relief in it, and would spend wakeful nights trying to oust it as the merest fancy, persuading herself that she was miserable, and nothing but miserable, in the loss of her darling. naturally then she would turn more to alister, and his love was a strengthening tonic to her sick motherhood. he was never jealous of either. their love for each other was to him a love. he too would mourn deeply over his brother's departure, but it became at once his business to comfort his mother. and while she had no suspicion of the degree to which he suffered, it drew her with fresh love to her elder born, and gave her renewal of the quiet satisfaction in him that was never absent, when she saw how he too missed ian. their mutual affection was indeed as true and strong as a mother could desire it. "if such love," she said to herself, "had appeared in the middle of its history instead of now at its close, the transmitted affection would have been enough to bind the clan together for centuries more!" it was with a prelusive smile that shone on the mother's heart like the opening of heaven, that ian lowered his book to answer her question. she had said-- "did you not feel the cold very much at st. petersburg last winter, ian?" "yes, mother, at times," he answered. "but everybody wears fur; the peasant his sheep-skin, the noble his silver fox. they have to fight the cold! nose and toes are in constant danger. did i never tell you what happened to me once in that way? i don't think i ever did!" "you never tell me anything, ian!" said his mother, looking at him with a loving sadness. "i was suddenly stopped in the street by what i took for an unheard-of insult: i actually thought my great proboscis was being pulled! if i had been as fiery as alister, the man would have found his back, and i should have lost my nose. without the least warning a handful of snow was thrust in my face, and my nose had not even a chance of snorting with indignation, it found itself so twisted in every direction at once! but i have a way, in any sudden occurrence, of feeling perplexed enough to want to be sure before doing anything, and if it has sometimes hindered me from what was expedient, it has oftener saved me from what would have been wrong: in another instant i was able to do justice to the promptitude of a fellow christian for the preservation of my nose, already whitening in frosty death: he was rubbing it hard with snow, the orthodox remedy! my whole face presently sharpened into one burning spot, and taking off my hat, i thanked the man for his most kind attention. he pointed out to me that time spent in explaining the condition of my nose, would have been pure loss: the danger was pressing, and he attacked it at once! i was indeed entirely unconscious of the state of my beak--the worst symptom of any!" "i trust, ian, you will not go back to russia!" said his mother, after a little more talk about frost-biting. "surely there is work for you at home!" "what can i do at home, mother? you have no money to buy me a commission, and i am not much good at farm-work. alister says i am not worth a horseman's wages!" "you could find teaching at home; or you could go into the church. we might manage that, for you would only have to attend the divinity classes." "mother! would you put me into one of the priests' offices that i may eat a piece of bread? as for teaching, there are too many hungry students for that: i could not take the bread out of their mouths! and in truth, mother, i could not endure it--except it were required of me. i can live on as little as any, but it must be with some liberty. i have surely inherited the spirit of some old sea-rover, it is so difficult for me to rest! i am a very thistle-down for wandering! i must know how my fellow-creatures live! i should like to be one man after another--each for an hour or two!" "your father used to say there was much norse blood in the family." "there it is, mother! i cannot help it!" "i don't like your holding the czar's commission, ian--somehow i don't like it! he is a tyrant!" "i am going to throw it up, mother." "i am glad of that! how did you ever get it?" "oddly enough, through the man that pulled my nose. i had a chance afterwards of doing him a good turn, which he was most generous in acknowledging; and as he belonged to the court, i had the offer of a lieutenant's commission. the scotch are in favour." a deep cloud had settled on the face of the young man. the lady looked at him for a moment with keenest mother-eyes, suppressed a deep sigh, and betook herself again to her work. ere she thought how he might take it, another question broke from her lips. "what sort of church had you to go to in st. petersburg, ian?" she said. ian was silent a moment, thinking how to be true, and not hurt her more than could not be helped. "there are a thousand places of worship there, mother," he returned, with a curious smile. "any presbyterian place?" she asked. "i believe so," he replied. "ian, you haven't given up praying?" "if ever i prayed, mother, i certainly have not given it up." "ever prayed, ian! when a mere child you prayed like an aged christian!" "ah, mother, that was a sad pity! i asked for things of which i felt no need! i was a hypocrite! i ought to have prayed like a little child!" the mother was silent: she it was who had taught him to pray thus--making him pray aloud in her hearing! and this was the result! the premature blossom had withered! she said to herself. but it was no blossom, only a muslin flower! "then you didn't go to church!" she said at length. "not often, mother dear," he answered. "when i do go, i like to go to the church of the country i happen to be in. going to church and praying to god are not the same thing." "then you do say your prayers? oh, do not tell me you never bow down before your maker!" "shall i tell you where i think i did once pray to god, mother?" he said, after a little pause, anxious to soothe her suffering. "at least i did think then that i prayed!" he added. "it was not this morning, then, before you left your chamber?" "no, mother," answered ian; "i did not pray this morning, and i never say prayers." the mother gave a gasp, but answered nothing. ian went on again. "i should like to tell you, mother, about that time when i am almost sure i prayed!" "i should like to hear about it," she answered, with strangest minglings of emotion. at one and the same instant she felt parted from her son by a gulf into which she must cast herself to find him, and that he stood on a height of sacred experience which she never could hope to climb. "oh for his father to talk to him!" she said to herself. he was a power on her soul which she almost feared. if he were to put forth his power, might he not drag her down into unbelief? it was the first time they had come so close in their talk. the moment his mother spoke out, ian had responded. he was anxious to be open with her so far as he could, and forced his natural taciturnity, the prime cause of which was his thoughtfulness: it was hard to talk where was so much thinking to be done, so little time to do it in, and so little progress made by it! but wherever he could keep his mother company, there he would not leave her! just as he opened his mouth, however, to begin his narration, the door of the room also opened, flung wide by the small red hand of nancy, and two young ladies entered. chapter viii. a morning call. had valentine known who the brothers were, or where they lived, he would before now have called to thank them again for their kindness to him; but he imagined they had some distance to go after depositing him, and had not yet discovered his mistake. the visit now paid had nothing to do with him. the two elder girls, curious about the pretty cottage, had come wandering down the spur, or hill-toe, as far as its precincts--if precincts they may be called where was no fence, only a little grove and a less garden. beside the door stood a milk-pail and a churn, set out to be sweetened by the sun and wind. it was very rural, they thought, and very homely, but not so attractive as some cottages in the south:--it indicated a rusticity honoured by the most unceremonious visit from its superiors. thus without hesitation concluding, christina, followed by mercy, walked in at the open door, found a barefooted girl in the kitchen, and spoke pleasantly to her. she, in simple hospitality forgetting herself, made answer in gaelic; and, never doubting the ladies had come to call upon her mistress, led the way, and the girls, without thinking, followed her to the parlour. as they came, they had been talking. had they been in any degree truly educated, they would have been quite capable of an opinion of their own, for they had good enough faculties; but they had never been really taught to read; therefore, with the utmost confidence, they had been passing judgment upon a book from which they had not gathered the slightest notion as to the idea or intention of the writer. christina was of that numerous class of readers, who, if you show one thing better or worse than another, will without hesitation report that you love the one and hate the other. if you say, for instance, that it is a worse and yet more shameful thing for a man to break his wife's heart by systematic neglect, than to strike her and be sorry for it, such readers give out that you approve of wife-beating, and perhaps write to expostulate with you on your brutality. if you express pleasure that a poor maniac should have succeeded in escaping through the door of death from his haunting demon, they accuse you of advocating suicide. but mercy was not yet afloat on the sea of essential lie whereon christina swung to every wave. one question they had been discussing was, whether the hero of the story was worthy the name of lover, seeing he deferred offering his hand to the girl because she told her mother a fib to account for her being with him in the garden after dark. "it was cowardly and unfair," said christina: "was it not for his sake she did it?" mercy did not think to say "was it?" as she well might. "don't you see, chrissy," she said, "he reasoned this way: 'if she tell her mother a lie, she may tell me a lie some day too!'?" so indeed the youth did reason; but it occurred to neither of his critics to note the fact that he would not have minded the girl's telling her mother the lie, if he could have been certain she would never tell him one! in regard to her hiding from him certain passages with another gentleman, occurring between this event and his proposal, christina judged he had no right to know them, and if he had, their concealment was what he deserved. when the girl, who would have thought it rude to ask their names--if i mistake not, it was a point in highland hospitality to entertain without such inquiry--led the way to the parlour, they followed expecting they did not know what: they had heard of the cowhouse, the stable, and even the pigsty, being under the same roof in these parts! when the opening door disclosed "lady" macruadh, every inch a chieftain's widow, their conventional breeding failed them a little; though incapable of recognizing a refinement beyond their own, they were not incapable of feeling its influence; and they had not yet learned how to be rude with propriety in unproved circumstances--still less how to be gracious without a moment's notice. but when a young man sprang from a couch, and the stately lady rose and advanced to receive them, it was too late to retreat, and for a moment they stood abashed, feeling, i am glad to say, like intruders. the behaviour of the lady and gentleman, however, speedily set them partially at ease. the latter, with movements more than graceful, for they were gracious, and altogether free of scroll-pattern or polonius-flourish, placed chairs, and invited them to be seated, and the former began to talk as if their entrance were the least unexpected thing in the world. leaving them to explain their visit or not as they saw fit, she spoke of the weather, the harvest, the shooting; feared the gentlemen would be disappointed: the birds were quite healthy, but not numerous--they had too many enemies to multiply! asked if they had seen the view from such and such a point;--in short, carried herself as one to whom cordiality to strangers was an easy duty. but she was not taken with them. her order of civilization was higher than theirs; and the simplicity as well as old-fashioned finish of her consciousness recoiled a little--though she had not experience enough of a certain kind to be able at once to say what it was in the manner and expression of the young ladies that did not please her. mammon, gaining more and more of the upper hand in all social relations, has done much to lower the petite as well as the grande morale of the country--the good breeding as well as the honesty. unmannerliness with the completest self-possession, is a poor substitute for stiffness, a poorer for courtesy. respect and graciousness from each to each is of the very essence of christianity, independently of rank, or possession, or relation. a certain roughness and rudeness have usurped upon the intercourse of the century. it comes of the spread of imagined greatness; true greatness, unconscious of itself, cannot find expression other than gracious. in the presence of another, a man of true breeding is but faintly aware of his own self, and keenly aware of the other's self. before the human--that bush which, however trodden and peeled, yet burns with the divine presence--the man who thinks of the homage due to him, and not of the homage owing by him, is essentially rude. mammon is slowly stifling and desiccating rank; both are miserable deities, but the one is yet meaner than the other. unrefined families with money are received with open arms and honours paid, in circles where a better breeding than theirs has hitherto prevailed: this, working along with the natural law of corruption where is no aspiration, has gradually caused the deterioration of which i speak. courtesy will never regain her former position, but she will be raised to a much higher; like duty she will be known as a daughter of the living god, "the first stocke father of gentilnes;" for in his neighbour every man will see a revelation of the most high. without being able to recognize the superiority of a woman who lived in a cottage, the young ladies felt and disliked it; and the matron felt the commonness of the girls, without knowing what exactly it was. the girls, on the other hand, were interested in the young man: he looked like a gentleman! ian was interested in the young women: he thought they were shy, when they were only "put out," and wished to make them comfortable--in which he quickly succeeded. his unconsciously commanding air in the midst of his great courtesy, roused their admiration, and they had not been many minutes in his company ere they were satisfied that, however it was to be accounted for, the young man was in truth very much of a gentleman. it was an unexpected discovery of northern produce, and "the estate" gathered interest in their eyes. christina did the greater part of the talking, but both did their best to be agreeable. ian saw quite as well as his mother what ordinary girls they were, but, accustomed to the newer modes in manner and speech, he was not shocked by movements and phrases that annoyed her. the mother apprehended fascination, and was uneasy, though far from showing it. when they rose, ian attended them to the door, leaving his mother anxious, for she feared he would accompany them home. till he returned, she did not resume her seat. the girls took their way along the ridge in silence, till the ruin was between them and the cottage, when they burst into laughter. they were ladies enough not to laugh till out of sight, but not ladies enough to see there was nothing to laugh at. "a harp, too!" said christina. "mercy, i believe we are on the top of mount ararat, and have this very moment left the real noah's ark, patched into a cottage! who can they be?" "gentlefolk evidently," said mercy, "--perhaps old-fashioned people from inverness." "the young man must have been to college!--in the north, you know," continued christina, thinking with pride that her brother was at oxford, "nothing is easier than to get an education, such as it is! it costs in fact next to nothing. ploughmen send their sons to st. andrew's and aberdeen to make gentlemen of them! fancy!" "you must allow this case a successful one!" "i didn't mean his father was a ploughman! that is impossible! besides, i heard him call that very respectable person mother! she is not a ploughman's wife, but evidently a lady of the middle class." christina did not count herself or her people to belong to the middle class. how it was it is not quite easy to say--perhaps the tone of implied contempt with which the father spoke of the lower classes, and the quiet negation with which the mother would allude to shopkeepers, may have had to do with it--but the young people all imagined themselves to belong to the upper classes! it was a pity there was no title in the family--but any of the girls might well marry a coronet! there were indeed persons higher than they; a duke was higher; the queen was higher--but that was pleasant! it was nice to have a few to look up to! on anyone living in a humble house, not to say a poor cottage, they looked down, as the case might be, with indifference or patronage; they little dreamed how, had she known all about them, the respectable person in the cottage would have looked down upon them! at the same time the laugh in which they now indulged was not altogether one of amusement; it was in part an effort to avenge themselves of a certain uncomfortable feeling of rebuke. "i will tell you my theory, mercy!" christina went on. "the lady is the widow of an indian officer--perhaps a colonel. some of their widows are left very poor, though, their husbands having been in the service of their country, they think no small beer of themselves! the young man has a military air which he may have got from his father; or he may be an officer himself: young officers are always poor; that's what makes them so nice to flirt with. i wonder whether he really is an officer! we've actually called upon the people, and come away too, without knowing their names!" "i suppose they're from the new house!" said ian, returning after he had bowed the ladies from the threshold, with the reward of a bewitching smile from the elder, and a shy glance from the younger. "where else could they be from?" returned his mother; "--come to make our poor country yet poorer!" "they're not english!" "not they!--vulgar people from glasgow!" "i think you are too hard on them, mother! they are not exactly vulgar. i thought, indeed, there was a sort of gentleness about them you do not often meet in scotch girls!" "in the lowlands, i grant, ian; but the daughter of the poorest tacksman of the macruadhs has a manner and a modesty i have seen in no sasunnach girl yet. those girls are bold!" "self-possessed, perhaps!" said ian. upon the awkwardness he took for shyness, had followed a reaction. it was with the young ladies a part of good breeding, whatever mistake they made, not to look otherwise than contented with themselves: having for a moment failed in this principle, they were eager to make up for it. "girls are different from what they used to be, i fancy, mother!" added ian thoughtfully. "the world changes very fast!" said the mother sadly. she was thinking, like rebecca, if her sons took a fancy to these who were not daughters of the land, what good would her life do her. "ah, mother dear," said ian, "i have never"--and as he spoke the cloud deepened on his forehead--"seen more than one woman whose ways and manners reminded me of you!" "and what was she?" the mother asked, in pleased alarm. but she almost repented the question when she saw how low the cloud descended on his countenance. "a princess, mother. she is dead," he answered, and turning walked so gently from the room that it was impossible for his mother to detain him. chapter ix. me. sercombe. the next morning, soon after sunrise, the laird began to cut his barley. ian would gladly have helped, but alister had a notion that such labour was not fit for him. "i had a comical interview this morning," said the chief, entering the kitchen at dinner-time. "i was out before my people, and was standing by the burn-side near the foot-bridge, when i heard somebody shouting, and looked up. there was a big english fellow in gray on the top of the ridge, with his gun on his shoulder, hollo-ing. i knew he was english by his hollo-ing. it was plain it was to me, but not choosing to be at his beck and call, i took no heed. 'hullo, you there! wake up!' he cried. 'what should i wake up for?' i returned. 'to carry my bag. you don't seem to have anything to do! i'll give you five shillings.'" "you see to what you expose yourself by your unconventionalities, alister!" said his brother, with mock gravity. "it was not the fellow we carried home the other night, ian; it was one twice his size. it would take all i have to carry him as far!" "the other must have pointed you out to him!" "it was much too dark for him to know me again!" "you forget the hall-lamp!" said ian. "ah, yes, to be sure! i had forgotten!" answered alister. "to tell the truth, i thought, when i took his shilling, he would never know me from nebuchadnezzar: that is the one thing i am ashamed of in the affair--i did in the dark what perhaps i should not have done in the daylight!--i don't mean i would not have carried him and his bag too! i refer only to the shilling! now, of course, i will hold my face to it; but i thought it better to be short with a fellow like that." "well?" "'you'll want prepayment, no doubt!' he went on, putting his hand in his pocket. those sasunnach fellows think every highlandman keen as a hawk after their dirty money!" "they have but too good reason in some parts!" said the mother. "it is not so bad here yet, but there is a great difference in that respect. the old breed is fast disappearing. what with the difficulty of living by the hardest work, and the occasional chance of earning a shilling easily, many have turned both idle and greedy." "that's for you and your shilling, alister!" said ian. "i confess," returned alister, "if i had foreseen what an idea of the gentlemen of the country i might give, i should have hesitated. but i haven't begun to be ashamed yet!" "ashamed, alister!" cried ian. "what does it matter what a fellow like that thinks of you?" "and mistress conal has her shilling!" said the mother. "if the thing was right," pursued ian, "no harm can come of it; if it was not right, no end of harm may come. are you sure it was good for mistress conal to have that shilling, alister? what if it be drawing away her heart from him who is watching his old child in her turf-hut? what if the devil be grinning at her from, that shilling?" "ian! if god had not meant her to have the shilling, he would not have let alister earn it." "certainly god can take care of her from a shilling!" said ian, with one of his strangely sweet smiles. "i was only trying alister, mother." "i confess i did not like the thought of it at first," resumed mrs. macruadh; "but it was mere pride; for when i thought of your father, i knew he would have been pleased with alister." "then, mother, i am glad; and i don't care what ian, or any sasunnach under the sun, may think of me." "but you haven't told us," said ian, "how the thing ended." "i said to the fellow," resumed alister, "that i had my shearing to do, and hadn't the time to go with him. 'is this your season for sheep-shearing?' said he.'we call cutting the corn shearing,' i answered, 'because in these parts we use the reaping hook.' 'that is a great waste of labour!' he returned. i did not tell him that some of our land would smash his machines like toys. 'how?' i asked. 'it costs so much more,' he said. 'but it feeds so many more!' i replied. 'oh yes, of course, if you don't want the farmer to make a living!' 'i manage to make a living,' i said. 'then you are the farmer?' 'so it would appear.' 'i beg your pardon; i thought--' 'you thought i was an idle fellow, glad of an easy job to keep the life in me!' 'you were deuced glad of a job the other night, they tell me!' 'so i was. i wanted a shilling for a poor woman, and hadn't one to give her without going home a mile and a half for it!' by this time he had come down, and i had gone a few steps to meet him; i did not want to seem unfriendly. 'upon my word, it was very good of you! the old lady ought to be grateful!' he said. 'so ought we all,' i answered, '--i to your friend for the shilling, and he to me for taking his bag. he did me one good turn for my poor woman, and i did him another for his poor leg!' 'so you're quits!' said he. 'not at all,' i answered; 'on the contrary, we are under mutual obligation.' 'i don't see the difference!--hillo, there's a hare!' and up went his gun to his shoulder. 'none of that!' i cried, and knocked up the barrel. 'what do you mean?' he roared, looking furious. 'get out of the way, or i'll shoot you.' 'murder as well as poaching!' i said. 'poaching!' he shouted. 'that rabbit is mine,' i answered; 'i will not have it killed.' 'cool!--on mr. palmer's land!' said he. 'the land is mine, and i am my own gamekeeper!' i rejoined. 'you look like it!' he said. 'you go after your birds!--not in this direction though,' i answered, and turned and left him." "you were rough with him!" said ian. "i did lose my temper rather." "it was a mistake on his part." "i expected to hear him fire," alister continued, "for there was the rabbit he took for a hare lurching slowly away! i'm glad he didn't: i always feel bad after a row!--can a conscience ever get too fastidious, ian?" "the only way to find that out is always to obey it." "so long as it agrees with the bible, ian!" interposed the mother. "the bible is a big book, mother, and the things in it are of many sorts," returned ian. "the lord did not go with every thing in it." "ian! ian! i am shocked to hear you!" "it is the truth, mother." "what would your father say!" "'he that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.'" ian rose from the table, knelt by his mother, and laid his head on her shoulder. she was silent, pained by his words, and put her arm round him as if to shelter him from the evil one. homage to will and word of the master, apart from the acceptance of certain doctrines concerning him, was in her eyes not merely defective but dangerous. to love the lord with the love of truest obedience; to believe him the son of god and the saver of men with absolute acceptance of the heart, was far from enough! it was but sentimental affection! a certain young preacher in scotland some years ago, accused by an old lady of preaching works, took refuge in the lord's sermon on the mount: "ow ay!" answered the partisan, "but he was a varra yoong mon whan he preacht that sermon!" alister rose and went: there was to him something specially sacred in the communion of his mother and brother. heartily he held with ian, but shrank from any difference with his mother. for her sake he received sunday after sunday in silence what was to him a bushel of dust with here and there a bit of mouldy bread in it; but the mother did not imagine any great coincidence of opinion between her and alister any more than between her and ian. she had not the faintest notion how much genuine faith both of them had, or how it surpassed her own in vitality. but while ian seemed to his brother, who knew him best, hardly touched with earthly stain, alister, notwithstanding his large and dominant humanity, was still in the troublous condition of one trying to do right against a powerful fermentation of pride. he held noblest principles; but the sediment of generations was too easily stirred up to cloud them. he was not quite honest in his attitude towards some of his ancestors, judging them far more leniently than he would have judged others. he loved his neighbour, but his neighbour was mostly of his own family or his own clan. he might have been unjust for the sake of his own--a small fault in the eyes of the world, but a great fault indeed in a nature like his, capable of being so much beyond it. for, while the faults of a good man cannot be such evil things as the faults of a bad man, they are more blameworthy, and greater faults than the same would be in a bad man: we must not confuse the guilt of the person with the abstract evil of the thing. ian was one of those blessed few who doubt in virtue of a larger faith. while its roots were seeking a deeper soil, it could not show so fast a growth above ground, he doubted most about the things he loved best, while he devoted the energies of a mind whose keenness almost masked its power, to discover possible ways of believing them. to the wise his doubts would have been his best credentials; they were worth tenfold the faith of most. it was truth, and higher truth, he was always seeking. the sadness which coloured his deepest individuality, only one thing could ever remove--the conscious presence of the eternal. this is true of all sadness, but ian knew it. he overtook alister on his way to the barley-field. "i have been trying to find out wherein lay the falseness of the position in which you found yourself this morning," he said. "there could be nothing wrong in doing a small thing for its reward any more than a great one; where i think you went wrong was in assuming your social position afterwards: you should have waited for its being accorded you. there was no occasion to be offended with the man. you ought to have seen how you must look to him, and given him time. i don't perceive why you should be so gracious to old mistress conal, and so hard upon him. certainly you would not speak as he did to any man, but he has been brought up differently; he is not such a gentleman as you cannot help being. in a word, you ought to have treated him as an inferior, and been more polite to him." chapter x. the plough-bulls. partly, it may be, from such incidents at the outset of their acquaintance, there was for some time no further meeting betwixt any of the chief's family and that of the new laird. there was indeed little to draw them together except common isolation. valentine would have been pleased to show gratitude to his helpers on that stormy night, but after his sisters' account of their call, he felt not only ashamed, which was right, but ashamed to show his shame, which was a fresh shame. the girls on their part made so much of what they counted the ridiculous elements of their "adventure," that, natural vengeance on their untruthfulness, they came themselves to see in it almost only what was ridiculous. in the same spirit mr. sercombe recounted his adventure with alister, which annoyed his host, who had but little acquaintance with the boundaries of his land. from the additional servants they had hired in the vicinity, the people of the new house gathered correct information concerning the people at the cottage, but the honour in which they were held only added to the ridicule they associated with them. on the other side also there was little inclination towards a pursuit of intercourse. mrs. macruadh, from nancy's account and the behaviour of the girls, divined the explanation of their visit; and, as their mother did not follow it up, took no notice of it. in the mind of mercy, however, lurked a little thorn, with the bluntest possible sting of suspicion, every time she joined in a laugh at the people of the cottage, that she was not quite just to them. the shooting, such as it was, went on, the sleeping and the eating, the walking and the talking. long letters were written from the new house to female friends--letters with the flourishes if not the matter of wit, and funny tales concerning the natives, whom, because of their poor houses and unintelligibility, they represented as semi-savages. the young men went back to oxford; and the time for the return of the family to civilization seemed drawing nigh. it happened about this time, however, that a certain speculation in which mr. peregrine palmer was very materially interested, failed utterly, depriving him of the consciousness of a good many thousands, and producing in him the feeling of a lady of moderate means when she loses her purse: he must save it off something! for though he spent freely, he placed a great value on money--as well he might, seeing it gave him all the distinction which before everything else he prized. he did not know what a poor thing it is to be distinguished among men, therefore did not like losing his thousands. having by failure sinned against mammon, he must do something to ease the money-conscience that ruled his conduct; and the first thing that occurred to him was, to leave his wife and daughters where they were for the winter. none of them were in the least delicate; his wife professed herself fond of a country life; it would give the girls a good opportunity for practice, drawing, and study generally, and he would find them a suitable governess! he talked the matter over with mrs. palmer. she did not mind much, and would not object. he would spend christmas with them, he said, and bring down christian, and perhaps mr. sercombe. the girls did not like the idea. it was so cold in the country in winter, and the snow would be so deep! they would be starved to death! but, of course--if the governor had made up his mind to be cruel! the thing was settled. it was only for one winter! it would be a new experience for them, and they would enjoy their next season all the more! the governor had promised to send them down new furs, and a great boxful of novels! he did not apprise them that he meant to sell their horses. their horses were his! he was an indulgent father and did not stint them, but he was not going to ask their leave! at the same time he had not the courage to tell them. he took his wife with him as far as inverness for a day or two, that she might lay in a good stock of everything antagonistic to cold. when father and mother were gone from the house, the girls felt larky. they had no wish to do anything they would not do if their parents were at home, but they had some sense of relief in the thought that they could do whatever they liked. a more sympathetic historian might say, and i am nowise inclined to contradict him, that it was only the reaction from the pain of parting, and the instinct to make the best of their loneliness. however it was, the elder girls resolved on a walk to the village, to see what might be seen, and in particular the young woman at the shop, of whom they had heard their brother and mr. sercombe speak with admiration, qualified with the remark that she was so proper they could hardly get a civil word out of her. she was in fact too scrupulously polite for their taste. it was a bright, pleasant, frosty morning, perfectly still, with an air like wine. the harvest had vanished from the fields. the sun shone on millions of tiny dew-suns, threaded on forsaken spider-webs. a few small, white, frozen clouds flecked the sky. the purple heather was not yet gone, and not any snow had yet fallen in the valley. the burn was large, for there had been a good deal of rain, but it was not much darker than its usual brown of smoke-crystal. they tripped gaily along. if they had little spiritual, they had much innocent animal life, which no great disappointments or keen twinges of conscience had yet damped. they were hut human kittens--and not of the finest breed. as they crossed the root of the spur, and looked down on the autumn fields to the east of it, they spied something going on which they did not understand. stopping, and gazing more intently, they beheld what seemed a contest between man and beast, but its nature they could not yet distinguish. gradually it grew plain that two of the cattle of the country, wild and shaggy, were rebelling against control. they were in fact two young bulls, of the small black highland breed, accustomed to gallop over the rough hills, jumping like goats, which alister had set himself the task of breaking to the plough--by no means an easy one, or to be accomplished single-handed by any but a man of some strength, and both persistence and patience. in the summer he had lost a horse, which he could ill afford to replace: if he could make these bulls work, they would save him the price of the horse, would cost less to keep, and require less attention! he bridled them by the nose, not with rings through the gristle, but with nose-bands of iron, bluntly spiked inside, against which they could not pull hard without pain, and had made some progress, though he could by no means trust them yet: every now and then a fit of mingled wildness and stubbornness would seize them, and the contest would appear about to begin again from the beginning; but they seldom now held out very long. the nose-band of one of them had come off, alister had him by a horn in each hand, and a fierce struggle was going on between them, while the other was pulling away from his companion as if determined to take to the hills. it was a good thing for them that share and coulter were pretty deep in the ground, to the help of their master; for had they got away, they would have killed, or at least disabled themselves. presently, however, he had the nose-band on, and by force and persuasion together got the better of them; the staggy little furies gave in; and quickly gathering up his reins, he went back to the plough-stilts, where each hand held at once a handle and a rein. with energetic obedience the little animals began to pull--so vigorously that it took nearly all the chief's strength to hold at once his plough and his team. it was something of a sight to the girls after a long dearth of events. many things indeed upon which they scarce cast an eye when they came, they were now capable of regarding with a little feeble interest. nor, although ignorant of everything agricultural, were they quite unused to animals; having horses they called their own, they would not unfrequently go to the stables to give their orders, or see that they were carried out. they waited for some time hoping the fight would begin again, and drew a little nearer; then, as by common consent, left the road, passed the ruin, ran down the steep side of the ridge, and began to toil through the stubble towards the ploughman. a sharp straw would every now and then go through a delicate stocking, and the damp soil gathered in great lumps on their shoes, but they plodded on, laughing merrily as they went. the macruadh was meditating the power of the frost to break up the clods of the field, when he saw the girls close to him. he pulled in his cattle, and taking off his bonnet with one hand while the other held both reins-- "excuse me, ladies," he said; "my animals are young, and not quite broken." they were not a little surprised at such a reception, and were driven to conclude that the man must be the laird himself. they had heard that he cultivated his own land, but had not therefore imagined him labouring in his own person. in spite of the blindness produced by their conventional training, vulgarly called education, they could not fail to perceive something in the man worthy of their regard. before them, on the alert toward his cattle, but full of courtesy, stood a dark, handsome, weather-browned man, with an eagle air, not so pronounced as his brother's. his hair was long, and almost black,--in thick, soft curls over a small, well-set head. his glance had the flash that comes of victorious effort, and his free carriage was that of one whom labour has nowise subdued, whose every muscle is instinct with ready life. true even in trifles, he wore the dark beard that nature had given him; disordered by the struggle with his bulls, it imparted a certain wild look that contrasted with his speech. christina forgot that the man was a labourer like any other, but noted that he did not manifest the least embarrassment in their presence, or any consciousness of a superfluity of favour in their approach: she did not know that neither would his hired servant, or the poorest member of his clan. it was said of a certain sutherland clan that they were all gentlemen, and of a certain argyll clan that they were all poets; of the macruadhs it was said they were both. as to mercy, the first glance of the chiefs hazel eyes, looking straight into hers with genial respect, went deeper than any look had yet penetrated. ladies in alister's fields were not an everyday sight. hardly before had his work been enlivened by such a presence; and the joy of it was in his eyes, though his behaviour was calm. christina thought how pleasant it would be to have him for a worshipping slave--so interpenetrated with her charms that, like una's lion, he would crouch at her feet, come and go at her pleasure, live on her smiles, and be sad when she gave him none. she would make a gentleman of him, then leave him to dream of her! it would be a pleasant and interesting task in the dullness of their winter's banishment, with the days so short and the nights so unendurably long! the man was handsome!--she would do it!--and would proceed at once to initiate the conquest of him! the temptation to patronize not unfrequently presents an object for the patronage superior to the would-be patron; for the temptation is one to which slight persons chiefly are exposed; it affords an outlet for the vague activity of self-importance. few have learned that one is of no value except to god and other men. miss palmer worshipped herself, and therefore would fain be worshipped--so dreamed of a friendship de haut en bas with the country fellow. she put on a smile--no difficult thing, for she was a good-natured girl. it looked to alister quite natural. it was nevertheless, like hamlet's false friends, "sent for." "do you like ploughing?" she asked. had she known the manners of the country, she would have added "laird," or "macruadh." "yes i do," alister answered; "but i should plough all the same if i did not. it has to be done." "but why should you do it?" "because i must," laughed the laird. what ought she to answer? should she condole with the man because he had to work? it did not seem prudent! she would try another tack! "you had some trouble with your oxen! we saw it from the road, and were quite frightened. i hope you are not hurt." "there was no danger of that," answered alister with a smile. "what wild creatures they are! ain't it rather hard work for them? they are so small!" "they are as strong as horses," answered the laird. "i have had my work to break them! indeed, i can hardly say i have done it yet! they would very much like to run their horns into me!" "then it must be dangerous! it shows that they were not meant to work!" "they were meant to work if i can make them work." "then you approve of slavery!" said mercy she hardly knew what made her oppose him. as yet she had no opinions of her own, though she did catch a thought sometimes, when it happened to come within her reach. alister smiled a curious smile. "i should," he said, "if the right people were made slaves of. i would take shares in a company of algerine pirates to rid the social world of certain types of the human!" the girls looked at each other. "sharp!" said christina to herself. "what sorts would you have them take?" she asked. "idle men in particular," answered alister. "would you not have them take idle ladies as well?" "i would see first how they behaved when the men were gone." "you believe, then," said mercy, "we have a right to make the lower animals work?" "i think it is our duty," answered alister. "at all events, if we do not, we must either kill them off by degrees, or cede them this world, and emigrate. but even that would be a bad thing for my little bulls there! it is not so many years since the last wolf was killed--here, close by! and if the dogs turned to wolves again, where would they be? the domestic animals would then have wild beasts instead of men for their masters! to have the world a habitable one, man must rule." "men are nothing but tyrants to them!" said christina. "most are, i admit." ere he could prevent her, she had walked up to the near bull, and begun to pat him. he poked a sharp wicked horn sideways at her, catching her cloak on it, and grazing her arm. she started back very white. alister gave him a terrible tug. the beast shook his head, and began to paw the earth. "it wont do to go near him," he said. "--but you needn't be afraid; he can't touch you. that iron band round his nose has spikes in it." "poor fellow!" said christina; "it is no wonder he should be out of temper! it must hurt him dreadfully!" "it does hurt him when he pulls against it, but not when he is quiet." "i call it cruel!" "i do not. the fellow knows what is wanted of him--just as well as any naughty child." "how can he when he has no reason!" "oh, hasn't he!" "animals have no reason; they have only instinct!" "they have plenty of reason--more than many men and women. they are not so far off us as pride makes most people think! it is only those that don't know them that talk about the instinct of animals!" "do you know them?" "pretty well for a man; but they're often too much for me." "anyhow that poor thing does not know better." "he knows enough; and if he did not, would you allow him to do as he pleased because he didn't know better? he wanted to put his horn into you a moment ago!" "still it must be hard to want very much to do a thing, and not be able to do it!" said mercy. "i used to feel as if i could tear my old nurse to pieces when she wouldn't let me do as i wanted!" said christina. "i suppose you do whatever you please now, ladies?" "no, indeed. we wanted to go to london, and here we are for the winter!" "and you think it hard?" "yes, we do." "and so, from sympathy, you side with my cattle?" "well--yes!" "you think i have no right to keep them captive, and make them work?" "none at all," said christina. "then it is time i let them go!" alister made for the animals' heads. "no, no! please don't!" cried both the girls, turning, the one white, the other red. "certainly not if you do not wish it!" answered alister, staying his step. "if i did, however, you would be quite safe, for they would not come near me. they would be off up that hill as hard as they could tear, jumping everything that came in their way." "is it not very dull here in the winter?" asked christina, panting a little, but trying to look as if she had known quite well he was only joking. "i do not find it dull." "ah, but you are a man, and can do as you please!" "i never could do as i pleased, and so i please as i do," answered alister. "i do not quite understand you." "when you cannot do as you like, the best thing is to like what you have to do. one's own way is not to be had in this world. there's a better, though, which is to be had!" "i have heard a parson talk like that," said mercy, "but never a layman!" "my father was a parson as good as any layman. he would have laid me on my back in a moment--here as i stand!" said alister, drawing himself to his height. he broke suddenly into gaelic, addressing the more troublesome of the bulls. no better pleased to stand still than to go on, he had fallen to digging at his neighbour, who retorted with the horn convenient, and presently there was a great mixing of bull and harness and cloddy earth. turning quickly towards them, alister dropped a rein. in a moment the plough was out of the furrow, and the bulls were straining every muscle, each to send the other into the wilds of the unseen creation. alister sprang to their heads, and taking them by their noses forced them back into the line of the furrow. christina, thinking they had broken loose, fled; but there was mercy with the reins, hauling with all her might! "thank you, thank you!" said the laird, laughing with pleasure. "you are a friend indeed!" "mercy! mercy! come away directly," cried christina. but mercy did not heed her. the laird took the reins, and administering a blow each to the animals, made them stand still. there are tender-hearted people who virtually object to the whole scheme of creation; they would neither have force used nor pain suffered; they talk as if kindness could do everything, even where it is not felt. millions of human beings but for suffering would never develop an atom of affection. the man who would spare due suffering is not wise. it is folly to conclude a thing ought not to be done because it hurts. there are powers to be born, creations to be perfected, sinners to be redeemed, through the ministry of pain, that could be born, perfected, redeemed, in no other way. but christina was neither wise nor unwise after such fashion. she was annoyed at finding the laird not easily to be brought to her feet, and mercy already advanced to his good graces. she was not jealous of mercy, for was she not beautiful and mercy plain? but mercy had by her pluck secured an advantage, and the handsome ploughman looked at her admiringly! partly therefore because she was not pleased with him, partly that she thought a little outcry would be telling,-- "oh, you wicked man!" she cried, "you are hurting the poor brutes!" "no more than is necessary," he answered. "you are cruel!" "good morning, ladies." he just managed to take off his bonnet, for the four-legged explosions at the end of his plough were pulling madly. he slackened his reins, and away it went, like a sharp knife through a dutch cheese. "you've made him quite cross!" said mercy. "what a brute of a man!" said christina. she never restrained herself from teasing cat or puppy for her amusement--did not even mind hurting it a little. those capable of distinguishing between the qualities of resembling actions are few. there are some who will regard alister as capable of vivisection. on one occasion when the brothers were boys, alister having lost his temper in the pursuit of a runaway pony, fell upon it with his fists the moment he caught it. ian put himself between, and received, without word or motion, more than one blow meant for the pony. "donal was only in fun!" he said, as soon as alister's anger had spent itself. "father would never have punished him like that!" alister was ashamed, and never again was guilty of such an outbreak. from that moment he began the serious endeavour to subjugate the pig, tiger, mule, or whatever animal he found in himself. there remained, however, this difference between them--that alister punished without compunction, while ian was sorely troubled at having to cause any suffering. chapter xi. the fir-grove. as the ladies went up the ridge, regarded in the neighbourhood as the chief's pleasure-ground where nobody went except to call upon the chief, they must, having mounted it lower down than where they descended, pass the cottage. the grove of birch, mountain-ash, and fir which surrounded it, was planted quite irregularly, and a narrow foot-path went winding through it to the door. against one of the firs was a rough bench turned to the west, and seated upon it they saw ian, smoking a formless mass of much defiled sea-foam, otherwise meer-schaum. he rose, uncovered, and sat down again. but christina, who regarded it as a praiseworthy kindness to address any one beneath her, not only returned his salutation, but stopped, and said, "good morning! we have been learning how they plough in scotland, but i fear we annoyed the ploughman." "fergus does sometimes look surly," said ian, rising again, and going to her; "he has bad rheumatism, poor fellow! and then he can't speak a word of english, and is ashamed of it!" "the man we saw spoke english very well. is fergus your brother's name?" "no; my brother's name is alister--that is gaelic for alexander." "he was ploughing with two wild little oxen, and could hardly manage them." "then it must have been alister--only, excuse me, he could manage them perfectly. alister could break a pair of buffaloes." "he seemed rather vexed, and i thought it might be that we made the creatures troublesome.--i do not mean he was rude--only a little rough to us." ian smiled, and waited for more. "he did not like to be told he was hard on the animals. i only said the poor things did not know better!" "ah--i see!--he understands animals so well, he doesn't like to be meddled with in his management of them. i daresay he told you that, if they didn't know better, he had to teach them better! they are troublesome little wretches.--yes, i confess he is a little touchy about animals!" somehow christina felt herself rebuked, and did not like it. he had almost told her that, if she had quarrelled with his ploughman-brother, the fault must be hers! "but indeed, captain macruadh," she said--for the people called him captain, "i am not ignorant about animals! we have horses of our own, and know all about them.--don't we, mercy?" "yes," said mercy; "they take apples and sugar from our hands." "and you would have the chief's bulls tamed with apples and sugar!" returned ian, laughing. "but the horses were tamed before ever you saw them! if you had taken them wild, or even when they were foals, and taught them everything, then you would know a little about them. an acquaintance is not a friendship! my brother loves animals and understands them almost like human beings; he understands them better than some human beings, for the most cunning of the animals are yet simple. he knows what they are thinking when i cannot read a word of their faces. i remember one terrible night, winters ago--there had been a blinding drift on and off during the day, and my father and mother were getting anxious about him--how he came staggering in, and fell on the floor, and a great lump in his plaid on his back began to wallow about, and forth crept his big colley! they had been to the hills to look after a few sheep, and the poor dog was exhausted, and alister carried him home at the risk of his life." "a valuable animal, i don't doubt," said christina. "he had been, but was no more what the world calls valuable. he was an old dog almost past work--but the wisest creature! poor fellow, he never recovered that day on the hills! a week or so after, we buried him--in the hope of a blessed resurrection," added ian, with a smile. the girls looked at each other as much as to say, "good heavens!" he caught the look, but said nothing, for he saw they had "no understanding." the brothers believed most devoutly that the god who is present at the death-bed of the sparrow does not forget the sparrow when he is dead; for they had been taught that he is an unchanging god; "and," argued ian, "what god remembers, he thinks of, and what he thinks of, is." but ian knew that what misses the heart falls under the feet! a man is bound to share his best, not to tumble his seed-pearls into the feeding-trough, to break the teeth of them that are there at meat. he had but lifted a corner to give them a glimpse of the life eternal, and the girls thought him ridiculous! the human caterpillar that has not yet even begun to sicken with the growth of her psyche-wings, is among the poorest of the human animals! but christina was not going to give in! her one idea of the glory of life was the subjugation of men. as if moved by a sudden impulse, she went close up to him. "do not be angry with me," she said, almost coaxingly, but with a visible mingling of boldness and shyness, neither of them quite assumed; for, though conscious of her boldness, she was not frightened; and there was something in the eagle-face that made it easy to look shy. "i did not mean to be rude. i am sorry." "you mistake me," he said gently. "i only wanted you to know you misjudged my brother." "then, if you have forgiven me, you will let me sit for a few minutes! i am so tired with walking in the sticky earth!" "do, pray, sit down," responded ian heartily, and led the way. but she sank gracefully at the foot of the next fir, while mercy sat down on the bench. "do go on with your pipe," she said, looking up as she arranged her dress; "i am quite used to smoke. papa would smoke in church if he dared!" "chrissy! you know he never smokes in the drawing-room!" cried mercy, scandalized. "i have seen him--when mamma was away." ian began to be a little more interested in the plain one. but what must his mother think to see them sitting there together! he could not help it! if ladies chose to sit down, it was not for him to forbid them! and there was a glimmer of conscience in the younger! most men believe only what they find or imagine possible to themselves. they may be sure of this, that there are men so different from them that no judgment they pass upon them is worth a straw, simply because it does not apply to them. i assert of ian that neither beauty nor intellect attracted him. imagination would entice him, but the least lack of principle would arrest its influence. the simplest manifestation of a live conscience would draw him more than anything else. i do not mean the conscience that proposes questions, but the conscience that loves right and turns from wrong. notwithstanding the damsel's invitation, he did not resume his pipe. he was simple, but not free and easy--too sensitive to the relations of life to be familiar upon invitation with any girl. if she was not one with whom to hold real converse, it was impossible to blow dandelions with her, and talk must confine itself to the commonplace. after gentlest assays to know what was possible, the result might be that he grew courteously playful, or drew back, and confined himself to the formal. in the conversation that followed, he soon found the younger capable of being interested, and, having seen much in many parts of the world, had plenty to tell her. christina smiled sweetly, taking everything with over-gentle politeness, but looking as if all that interested her was, that there they were, talking about it. provoked at last by her persistent lack of genuine reception, ian was tempted to try her with something different: perhaps she might be moved to horror! any feeling would be a find! he thought he would tell them an adventure he had read in a book of travels. in persia, alone in a fine moonlit night, the traveller had fallen asleep on his horse, but woke suddenly, roused by something frightful, he did not know what. the evil odour all about him explained, however, his bewilderment and terror. presently he was bumped on this side, then bumped on that; first one knee, then the other, would be struck; now the calf of one leg was caught, now the calf of the other; then both would be caught at once, and he shoved nearly over his pommel. his horse was very uneasy, but could ill help himself in the midst of a moving mass of uncertain objects. the traveller for a moment imagined himself in a boat on the sea, with a huge quantity of wrecked cargo floating around him, whence came the frequent collisions he was undergoing; but he soon perceived that the vague shapes were boxes, pannierwise on the backs of mules, moving in caravan along the desert. of not a few the lids were broken, of some gone altogether, revealing their contents--the bodies of good mussulmans, on their way to the consecrated soil of mecca for burial. carelessly shambled the mules along, stumbling as they jogged over the uneven ground, their boxes tilting from side to side, sorely shaken, some of them, in frustration of dying hopes, scattering their contents over the track--for here and there a mule carried but a wreck of coffins. on and on over the rough gravelly waste, under the dead cold moon, weltered the slow stream of death! "you may be sure," concluded ian, "he made haste out of the ruck! but it was with difficulty he got clear, happily to windward--then for an hour sat motionless on his horse, watching through the moonlight the long dark shadow flitting toward its far-off goal. when at length he could no longer descry it, he put his horse to his speed--but not to overtake it." as he spoke, mercy's eyes grew larger and larger, never leaving his face. she had at least imagination enough for that! christina curled her pretty lip, and looked disgusted. the one at a horrible tale was horrified, the other merely disgusted! the one showed herself capable of some reception; the other did not. "something might be done with that girl!" thought ian. "did he see their faces?" drawled christina. mercy was silent, but her eyes remained fixed on him. it was ian's telling, more than the story, that impressed her. "i don't think he mentions them," answered ian. "but shall i tell you," he went on, "what seems to me the most unpleasant thing about the business?" "do," said christina. "it is that the poor ghosts should see such a disagreeable fuss made with their old clothes." christina smiled. "do you think ghosts see what goes on after they are dead?" asked mercy. "the ghosts are not dead," said ian, "and i can't tell. but i am inclined to think some ghosts have to stay a while and look on." "what would be the good of that?" returned mercy. "perhaps to teach them the little good they were in, or got out of the world," he answered. "to have to stick to a thing after it is dead, is terrible, but may teach much." "i don't understand you," said mercy. "the world is not dead!" "better and better!" thought ian with himself. "the girl can understand!--a thing is always dead to you when you have done with it," he answered her. "suppose you had a ball-dress crumpled and unsightly--the roses on it withered, and the tinsel shining hideously through them--would it not be a dead dress?" "yes, indeed." "then suppose, for something you had done, or for something you would not stop being, you had to wear that ball-dress till something came about--you would be like the ghosts that cannot get away.--suppose, when you were old and wrinkled,--" "you are very amusing, captain macruadh!" said christina, with a bell-like laugh. but ian went on. "some stories tell us of ghosts with the same old wrinkled faces in which they died. the world and its uses over, they are compelled to haunt it still, seeing how things go but taking no share in them beholding the relief their death is to all, feeling they have lost their chance of beauty, and are fixed in ugliness, having wasted being itself! they are like a man in a miserable dream, in which he can do nothing, but in which he must stay, and go dreaming, dreaming on without hope of release. to be in a world and have nothing to do with it, must be awful! a little more imagination would do some people good!" "no, please!--no more for me!" said christina, laughing as she rose. mercy was silent. though she had never really thought about anything herself, she did not doubt that certain people were in earnest about something. she knew that she ought to be good, and she knew she was not good; how to be good she did not know, for she had never set herself, to be good. she sometimes wished she were good; but there are thousands of wandering ghosts who would be good if they might without taking trouble: the kind of goodness they desire would not be worth a life to hold it. fear is a wholesome element in the human economy; they are merely silly who would banish it from all association with religion. true, there is no religion in fear; religion is love, and love casts out fear; but until a man has love, it is well he should have fear. so long as there are wild beasts about, it is better to be afraid than secure. the vague awe ready to assail every soul that has not found rest in its source, readier the more honest the soul, had for the first time laid hold of mercy. the earnest face of the speaker had most to do with it. she had never heard anybody talk like that! the lady of the house appeared, asking, with kind dignity, if they would not take some refreshment: to a highlander hospitality is a law where not a passion. christina declined the offer. "thanks! we were only a little tired, and are quite rested now," she said. "how beautifully sheltered your house is!" "on the side of the sea, yes," answered mrs. macruadh; "but not much on the east where we want it most. the trees are growing, however!" when the sisters were out of sight of the cottage-- "well!" remarked christina, "he's a nice young man too, is he not? exceedingly well bred! and what taste he has! he knows how to amuse ladies!" mercy did not answer. "i never heard anything so disgusting!" pursued christina. "but," suggested mercy, "you like to read horrid stories, chrissy! you said so only yesterday! and there was nothing in what he told us that oughtn't to be spoken about." "what!--not those hideous coffins--and the bodies dropping out of them--all crawling, no doubt?" "that is your own, chrissy! you know he did not go so far as that! if colonel webberly had told you the story, you would have called it charming--in fun, of course, i mean!" but christina never liked the argumentum ad feminam. "i would not! you know i would not!" she exclaimed. "i do believe the girl has fallen in love with the horrid man! of the two, i declare, i like the ploughman better. i am sorry i happened to vex him; he is a good stupid sort of fellow! i can't bear this man! how horribly he fixed his eyes on you when he was talking that rubbish about the ball-dress!" "he was anxious to make himself understood. i know he made me think i must mind what i was about!" "oh, nonsense! we didn't come into this wilderness to be preached to by a lay john the baptist! he is an ill-bred fellow!" she would not have said so much against him, had not mercy taken his part. mercy rarely contradicted her sister, but even this brief passage with a real man had roused the justice in her. "i don't agree with you, chrissy," she said. "he seems to me very much of a gentleman!" she did not venture to say all she felt, not choosing to be at absolute variance, and the threatened quarrel blew over like a shower in spring. but some sort of impression remained from the words of ian on the mind of mercy, for the next morning she read a chapter in the book of genesis, and said a prayer her mother had taught her. chapter xii. among the hills. when mr. and mrs. palmer reached inverness, they found they could spend a few days there, one way and another, to good purpose, for they had friends to visit as well as shopping to do. mr. palmer's affairs calling him to the south were not immediately pressing, and their sojourn extended itself to a full week of eight days, during which the girls were under no rule but their own. their parents regarded them as perfectly to be trusted, nor were the girls themselves aware of any reason why they should not be so regarded. the window of christina's bedroom overlooked a part of the road between the new house and the old castle; and she could see from it all the ridge as far as the grove that concealed the cottage: if now they saw more of the young men their neighbours, and were led farther into the wilds, thickets, or pasturage of their acquaintance, i cannot say she had no hand in it. she was depressed by a sense of failure; the boor, as she called him, was much too thick-skinned for any society but that of his bulls! and she had made no progress with the valentine any more than with the orson; he was better pleased with her ugly sister than with her beautiful self! she would have given neither of tie men another thought, but that there was no one else with whom to do any of that huckster business called flirting, which to her had just harm enough in it to make it interesting to her. she was one of those who can imagine beauty nor enjoyment in a thing altogether right. she took it for granted that bad and beautiful were often one; that the pleasures of the world owed their delight to a touch, a wash, a tincture of the wicked in them. such have so many crooked lines in themselves that they fancy nature laid down on lines of crookedness. they think the obliquity the beauty of the campanile, the blurring the charm of the sketch. i tread on delicate ground--ground which, alas! many girls tread boldly, scattering much feather-bloom from the wings of poor psyche, gathering for her hoards of unlovely memories, and sowing the seed of many a wish that they had done differently. they cannot pass over such ground and escape having their nature more or less vulgarized. i do not speak of anything counted wicked; it is only gambling with the precious and lovely things of the deepest human relation! if a girl with such an experience marry a man she loves--with what power of loving may be left such a one--will she not now and then remember something it would be joy to discover she had but dreamed? will she be able always to forget certain cabinets in her brain which "it would not do" to throw open to the husband who thinks her simple as well as innocent? honesty and truth, god's essentials, are perhaps more lacking in ordinary intercourse between young men and women than anywhere else. greed and selfishness are as busy there as in money-making and ambition. thousands on both sides are constantly seeking more than their share--more also than they even intend to return value for. thousands of girls have been made sad for life by the speeches of a man careful all the time to say nothing that amounted to a pledge! i do not forget that many a woman who would otherwise have been worth little, has for her sorrow found such consolation that she has become rich before god; these words hold nevertheless: "it must needs be that offences come, but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh!" on a morning two days later, christina called mercy, rather imperiously, to get ready at once for their usual walk. she obeyed, and they set out. christina declared she was perishing with cold, and they walked fast. by and by they saw on the road before them the two brothers walking slow; one was reading, the other listening. when they came nearer they descried in alister's hand a manuscript volume; ian carried an old-fashioned fowling-piece. it was a hard frost, which was perhaps the cause of alister's leisure so early in the day. hearing the light steps of the girls behind them, the men turned. the laird was the first to speak. the plough and the fierce bulls not there to bewilder their judgment, the young women immediately discovered their perception in the matter of breeding to be less infallible than they had imagined it: no well bred woman could for a moment doubt the man before them a gentleman--though his carriage was more courteous and more natural than is often seen in a mayfair drawing-room, and his english, a little old-fashioned. ian was at once more like and more unlike other people. his manner was equally courteous, but notably stiffer: he was as much at his ease, but more reserved. to use a figure, he did not step out so far to meet them. they walked on together. "you are a little earlier than usual this morning, ladies!" remarked the chief. "how do you know that, mr. macruadh?" rejoined christina. "i often see you pass--and till now always at the same hour." "and yet we have never met before!" "the busy and the"--he hesitated a moment--"unbusy seldom meet," said the chief. "why don't you say the idle?" suggested christina. "because that would be rude." "why would it be rude? most people, suppose, are more idle than busy!" "idle is a word of blame; i had no right to use it." "i should have taken you for one of those who always speak their minds!" "i hope i do when it is required, and i have any to speak." "you prefer judging with closed doors!" the chief was silent: he did not understand her. did she want him to say he did not think them idle? or, if they were, that they were quite right? "i think it hard," resumed christina, with a tone of injury, almost of suffering, in her voice, "that we should be friendly and open with people, and they all the time thinking of us in a way it would be rude to tell us! it is enough to make one vow never to speak to--to anybody again!" alister turned and looked at her. what could she mean? "you can't think it hard," he said, "that people should not tell you what they think of you the moment they first see you!" "they might at least tell us what they mean by calling us idle!" "i said not busy." "is everybody to blame that is idle?" persisted christina. "perhaps my brother will answer you that question," said alister. "if my brother and i tell you honestly what we thought of you when first we saw you," said ian, "will you tell us honestly what you thought of us?" the girls cast an involuntary glance at each other, and when their eyes met, could not keep them from looking conscious. a twitching also at the corners of mercy's mouth showed they had been saying more than they would care to be cross-questioned upon. "ah, you betray yourselves, ladies!" ian said. "it is all very well to challenge us, but you are not prepared to lead the way!" "girls are never allowed to lead!" said christina. "the men are down on them the moment they dare!" "i am not that way inclined," answered ian. "if man or woman lead to anything, success will justify the leader. i will propose another thing!" "what is it?" asked christina. "to agree that, when we are about to part, with no probability of meeting again in this world, we shall speak out plainly what we think of each other!" "but that will be such a time!" said christina. "in a world that turns quite round every twenty-four hours, it may be a very short time!" "we shall be coming every summer, though i hope not to stay through another winter!" "changes come when they are least expected!" "we cannot know," said alister, "that we shall never meet again!" "there the probability will be enough." "but how can we come to a better--i mean a fairer opinion of each other, when we meet so seldom?" asked mercy innocently. "this is only the second time we have met, and already we are not quite strangers!" said christina. "on the other hand," said alister, "we have been within call for more than two months, and this is our second meeting!" "well, who has not called?" said christina. the young men were silent. they did not care to discuss the question as to which mother was to blame in the matter. they were now in the bottom of the valley, had left the road, and were going up the side of the burn, often in single file, alister leading, and ian bringing up the rear, for the valley was thickly strewn with lumps of gray rock, of all shapes and sizes. they seemed to have rolled down the hill on the other side of the burn, but there was no sign of their origin: the hill was covered with grass below, and with heather above. such was the winding of the way among the stones--for path there was none--that again and again no one of them could see another. the girls felt the strangeness of it, and began to experience, without knowing it, a little of the power of solitary places. after walking thus for some distance, they found their leader halted. "here we have to cross the burn," he said, "and go a long way up the other side." "you want to be rid of us!" said christina. "by no means," replied alister. "we are delighted to have you with us. but we must not let you get tired before turning to go back." "if you really do not mind, we should like to go a good deal farther. i want to see round the turn there, where another hill comes from behind and closes up the view. we haven't anybody to go with us, and have seen nothing of the country. the men won't take us shooting; and mamma is always so afraid we lose ourselves, or fall down a few precipices, or get into a bog, or be eaten by wild beasts!" "if this frost last, we shall have time to show you something of the country. i see you can walk!" "we can walk well enough, and should so like to get to the top of a mountain!" "for the crossing then!" said alister, and turning to the burn, jumped and re-jumped it, as if to let them see how to do it. the bed of the stream was at the spot narrowed by two rocks, so that, though there was little of it, the water went through with a roar, and a force to take a man off his legs. it was too wide for the ladies, and they stood eyeing it with dismay, fearing an end to their walk and the pleasant companionship. "do not be frightened, ladies," said alister: "it is not too wide for you." "you have the advantage of us in your dress!" said christina. "i will get you over quite safe," returned the chief. christina looked as if she could not trust herself to him. "i will try," said mercy. "jump high," answered alister, as he sprang again to the other side, and held out his hand across the chasm. "i can neither jump high nor far!" said mercy. "don't be in a hurry. i will take you--no, not by the hand; that might slip--but by the wrist. do not think how far you can jump; all you have to do is to jump. only jump as high as you can." mercy could not help feeling frightened--the water rushed so fast and loud below. "are you sure you can get me over?" she asked. "yes." "then i will jump." she sprang, and alister, with a strong pull on her arm, landed her easily. "it is your turn now," he said, addressing christina. she was rather white, but tried to laugh. "i--i--i don't think i can!" she said. "it is really nothing," persuaded the chief. "i am sorry to be a coward, but i fear i was born one." "some feelings nobody can help," said ian, "but nobody need give way to them. one of the bravest men i ever knew would always start aside if the meanest little cur in the street came barking at him; and yet on one occasion, when the people were running in all directions, he took a mad dog by the throat, and held him. come, alister! you take her by one arm and i will take her by the other." the chief sprang to her side, and the moment she felt the grasp of the two men, she had the needful courage. the three jumped together, and all were presently walking merrily along the other bank, over the same kind of ground, in single file--ian bringing up the rear. the ladies were startled by a gun going off close behind them. "i beg your pardon," said ian, "but i could not let the rascal go." "what have you killed?" his brother asked. "only one of my own family--a red-haired fellow!" answered ian, who had left the path, and was going up the hill. the girls looked, but saw nothing, and following him a few yards, came to him behind a stone. "goodness gracious!" exclaimed christina, with horror in her tone, "it's a fox!--is it possible you have shot a fox?" the men laughed. "and why not?" asked alister, as if he had no idea what she could mean. "is the fox a sacred animal in the south?" "it's worse than poaching!" she cried. "hardly!" returned alister. "no doubt you may get a good deal of fun out of reynard, but you can't make game of him! why--you look as if you had lost a friend! i admire his intellect, but we can't afford to feed it on chickens and lambs." "but to shoot him!" "why not? we do not respect him here. he is a rascal, to be sure, but then he has no money, and consequently no friends!" "he has many friends! what would christian or mr. sercombe say to shooting, actually shooting a fox!" "you treat him as if he were red gold!" said the chief. "we build temples neither to reynard nor mammon here. we leave the men of the south to worship them!" "they don't worship them!" said mercy. "do they not respect the rich man because he is rich, and look down on the poor man because he is poor?" said ian. "though the rich be a wretch, they think him grand; though the poor man be like jesus christ, they pity him!" "and shouldn't the poor be pitied?" said christina. "not except they need pity." "is it not pitiable to be poor?" "by no means. it is pitiable to be wretched--and that, i venture to suspect, the rich are oftener than the poor.--but as to master reynard there--instead of shooting him, what would you have had us do with him?" "hunt him, to be sure." "would he like that better?" "what he would like is not the question. the sport is the thing." "that will show you why he is not sacred here: we do not hunt him. it would be impossible to hunt this country; you could not ride the ground. besides, there are such multitudes of holes, the hounds would scarcely have a chance. no; the only dog to send after the fellow is a leaden one." "there's another!" exclaimed the chief; "--there, sneaking away!--and your gun not loaded, ian!" "i am so glad!" said christina. "he at least will escape you!" "and some poor lamb in the spring won't escape him!" returned alister. "lambs are meant to be eaten!" said christina. "yes; but a lamb might think it hard to feed such a creature!" "if the fox is of no good in the world," said mercy, "why was he made?" "he can't be of no good," answered the chief. "what if some things are, just that we may get rid of them?" "could they be made just to be got rid of?" "i said--that we might get rid of them: there is all the difference in that. the very first thing men had to do in the world was to fight beasts." "i think i see what you mean," said mercy: "if there had been no wild beasts to fight with, men would never have grown able for much!" "that is it," said alister. "they were awful beasts! and they had poor weapons to fight them with--neither guns nor knives!" "and who knows," suggested ian, "what good it may be to the fox himself to make the best of a greedy life?" "but what is the good to us of talking about such things?" said christina. "they're not interesting!" the remark silenced the brothers: where indeed could be use without interest? but mercy, though she could hardly have said she found the conversation very interesting, felt there was something in the men that cared to talk about such things, that must be interesting if she could only get at it. they were not like any other men she had met! christina's whole interest in men was the admiration she looked for and was sure of receiving from them; mercy had hitherto found their company stupid. chapter xiii. the lake. silence lasted until they reached the shoulder of the hill that closed the view up the valley. as they rounded it, the sun went behind a cloud, and a chill wind, as if from a land where dwelt no life, met them. the hills stood back, and they were on the shore of a small lake, out of which ran the burn. they were very desolate-looking hills, with little heather, and that bloomless, to hide their hard gray bones. their heads were mostly white with frost and snow; their shapes had little beauty; they looked worn and hopeless, ugly and sad--and so cold! the water below was slaty gray, in response to the gray sky above: there seemed no life in either. the hearts of the girls sank within them, and all at once they felt tired. in the air was just one sign of life: high above the lake wheeled a large fish-hawk. "look!" said alister pointing; "there is the osprey that lives here with his wife! he is just going to catch a fish!" he had hardly spoken when the bird, with headlong descent, shot into the water, making it foam up all about. he reappeared with a fish in his claws, and flew off to find his mate. "do you know the very bird?" asked mercy. "i know him well. he and his wife have built on that conical rock you see there in the middle of the water many years." "why have you never shot him? he would look well stuffed!" said christina. she little knew the effect of her words; the chief hated causeless killing; and to hear a lady talk of shooting a high-soaring creature of the air as coolly as of putting on her gloves, was nauseous to him. ian gave him praise afterwards for his unusual self-restraint. but it was a moment or two ere he had himself in hand. "do you not think he looks much better going about god's business?" he said. "perhaps; but he is not yours; you have not got him!" "why should i have him? he seems, indeed, the more mine the higher he goes. a dead stuffed thing--how could that be mine at all? alive, he seems to soar in the very heaven of my soul!" "you showed the fox no such pity!" remarked mercy. "i never killed a fox to have him!" answered alister. "the osprey does no harm. he eats only fish, and they are very plentiful; he never kills birds or hares, or any creature on the land. i do not see how any one could wish to kill the bird, except from mere love of destruction! why should i make a life less in the world?" "there would be more lives of fish--would there not?" said mercy. "i don't want you to shoot the poor bird; i only want to hear your argument!" the chief could not immediately reply, ian came to his rescue. "there are qualities in life," he said. "one cannot think the fish-life so fine, so full of delight as the bird-life!" "no. but," said mercy, "have the fishes not as good a right to their life as the birds?" "both have the right given them by the maker of them. the osprey was made to eat the fish, and the fish, i hope, get some good of being eaten by the osprey." "excuse me, captain macruadh, but that seems to me simple nonsense!" said christina. "i hope it is true." "i don't know about being true, but it must be nonsense." "it must seem so to most people." "then why do you say it?" "because i hope it is true." "why should you wish nonsense to be true?" "what is true cannot be nonsense. it looks nonsense only to those that take no interest in the matter. would it be nonsense to the fishes?" "it does seem hard," said mercy, "that the poor harmless things should be gobbled up by a creature pouncing down upon them from another element!" "as the poor are gobbled up everywhere by the rich!" "i don't believe that. the rich are very kind to the poor." "i beg your pardon," said ian, "but if you know no more about the rich than you do about the fish, i can hardly take your testimony. the fish are the most carnivorous creatures in the world." "do they eat each other?" "hardly that. only the cats of kilkenny can do that." "i used a common phrase!" "you did, and i am rude: the phrase must bear the blame for both of us. but the fish are even cannibals--eating the young of their own species! they are the most destructive of creatures to other lives." "i suppose," said mercy, "to make one kind of creature live on another kind, is the way to get the greatest good for the greatest number!" "that doctrine, which seems to content most people, appears to me a poverty-stricken and selfish one. i can admit nothing but the greatest good to every individual creature." "don't you think we had better be going, mercy? it has got quite cold; i am afraid it will rain," said christina, drawing her cloak round her with a little shiver. "i am ready," answered mercy. the brothers looked at each other. they had come out to spend the day together, but they could not leave the ladies to go home alone; having brought them across the burn, they were bound to see them over it again! an imperceptible sign passed between them, and alister turned to the girls. "come then," he said, "we will go back!" "but you were not going home yet!" said mercy. "would you have us leave you in this wild place?" "we shall find our way well enough. the burn will guide us." "yes; but it will not jump over you; it will leave you to jump over it!" "i forgot the burn!" said christina. "which way were you going?" asked mercy, looking all around for road or pathway over the encircling upheaved wildernesses. "this way," answered ian. "good-bye." "then you are not coming?" "no. my brother will take care of you." he went straight as an arrow up the hill. they stood and watched him go. at what seemed the top, he turned and waved his cap, then vanished. christina felt disappointed. she did not much care for either of the very peculiar young men, but any company was better than none; a man was better than a woman; and two men were better than one! if these were not equal to admiring her as she deserved, what more remunerative labour than teaching them to do so? the thing that chiefly disappointed her in them was, that they had so little small talk. it was so stupid to be always speaking sense! always polite! always courteous!--"two sir charles grandisons," she said, "are two too many!" and indeed the history of sir charles grandison had its place in the small library free to them from childhood; but christina knew nothing of him except by hearsay. the young men had been brought up in a solemn school--had learned to take life as a serious and lovely and imperative thing. not the less, upon occasions of merry-making, would they frolic like young colts even yet, and that without the least reaction or sense of folly afterwards. at the same time, although ian had in the village from childhood the character, especially in the workshops of the carpenter, weaver, and shoemaker, of being 'full of humour, he was in himself always rather sad, being perplexed with many things: his humour was but the foam of his troubled sea. christina was annoyed besides that mercy seemed not indifferent to the opinion of the men. it was from pure inexperience of the man-world, she said to herself, that the silly child could see anything interesting in them! gentlemen she must allow them--but of such an old-fashioned type as to be gentlemen but by courtesy--not gentlemen in the world's count! she was of the world; they of the north of scotland! all day mercy had been on their side and against her! it might be from sheer perversity, but she had never been like that before! she must take care she did not make a fool of herself! it might end in some unhappiness to the young goose! assuredly neither her father nor mother would countenance the thing! she must throw herself into the breach! but which of them was she taking a fancy to? she was not so anxious about her sister, however, as piqued that she had not herself gathered one expression of homage, surprised one look of admiration, seen one sign of incipient worship in either. of the two she liked better the ploughman! the other was more a man of the world--but he was not of her world! with him she was a stranger in a very strange land! christina's world was a very small one, and in its temple stood her own image. ian belonged to the universe. he was a gentleman of the high court. wherever he might go throughout god's worlds, he would be at home. how could there be much attraction between christina and him? alister was more talkative on the way back than he had been all day. christina thought the change caused by having them, or rather her, to himself alone; but in reality it sprang from the prospect of soon rejoining his brother without them. some of the things he said, mercy found well worth hearing; and an old scotch ballad which he repeated, having learned it of a lowland nurse, appeared to her as beautiful as it was wild and strange. for christina, she despised the scotch language: it was vulgar! had alister informed her that beowulf, "the most important of all the relics of the pagan anglo-saxon, is written in undeniable scotch, the english of the period," it would have made no difference to christina! why should it? she had never yet cared for any book beyond the novels of a certain lady which, to speak with due restraint, do not tend to profitable thought. at the same time, it was not for the worst in them that she liked them; she did not understand them well enough to see it. but there was ground to fear that, when she came to understand, shocked at first, she would speedily get accustomed to it, and at length like them all the better for it. in mercy's unawakened soul, echoed now and then a faint thrill of response to some of the things alister said, and, oftener, to some of the verses he repeated; and she would look up at him when he was silent, with an unconscious seeking glance, as if dimly aware of a beneficent presence. alister was drawn by the honest gaze of her yet undeveloped and homely countenance, with its child-look in process of sublimation, whence the woman would glance out and vanish again, leaving the child to give disappointing answers. there was something in it of the look a dog casts up out of his beautiful brown eyes into the mystery of his master's countenance. she was on the edge of coming awake; all was darkness about her, but something was pulling at her! she had never known before that a lady might be lovely in a ballad as well as in a beautiful gown! finding himself so listened to, though the listener was little more than a child, the heart of the chief began to swell in his great bosom. like a child he was pleased. the gray day about him grew sweet; its very grayness was sweet, and of a silvery sheen. when they arrived at the burn, and, easily enough from that side, he had handed them across, he was not quite so glad to turn from them as he had expected to be. "are you going?" said christina with genuine surprise, for she had not understood his intention. "the way is easy now," he answered. "i am sorry to leave you, but i have to join ian, and the twilight will be flickering down before i reach the place." "and there will be no moon!" said mercy: "how will you get home through the darkness?" "we do not mean to come home to-night." "oh, then, you are going to friends!" "no; we shall be with each other--not a soul besides." "there can't surely be a hotel up there?" alister laughed as he answered, "there are more ways than one of spending a night on the hills. if you look from a window--in that direction," he said, pointing, "the last thing before you go to bed, you will see that at least we shall not perish with cold." he sprang again over the burn, and with a wave of his bonnet, went, like ian, straight up the hill. the girls stood for some time watching him climb as if he had been going up a flight of stairs, until he stood clear against the sky, when, with another wave of his bonnet, he too disappeared. mercy did not forget to look from her window in the direction alister had indicated. there was no room to mistake what he meant, for through the dark ran a great opening to the side of a hill, somewhere in the night, where glowed and flamed, reddening the air, a huge crescent of fire, slowly climbing, like a column of attack, up toward the invisible crest. "what does it mean?" she said to herself. "why do they make such a bonfire--with nobody but themselves to enjoy it? what strange men--out by themselves in the dark night, on the cold hill! what can they be doing it for? i hope they have something to eat! i should like to hear them talk! i wonder what they are saying about us! i am certain we bored them!" the brothers did speak of them, and readily agreed in some notion of their characters; but they soon turned to other things, and there passed a good deal that mercy could not have followed. what would she, for instance, have made of alister's challenge to his brother to explain the metaphysical necessity for the sine, tangent, and secant of an angle belonging to its supplement as well? when the ladies overtook them in the morning, alister was reading, from an old manuscript volume of his brother's which he had found in a chest, a certain very early attempt at humour, and now they disputed concerning it as they watched the fire. it had abundance of faults, and in especial lacked suture, but will serve to show something of lan's youthful ingenium. to a vagrant. gentle vagrant, stumping over several verdant fields of clover! subject of unnumbered knockings! tattered' coat and ragged stockings, slouching hat and roving eye, tell of settled vagrancy! wretched wanderer, can it be the poor laws have leaguered thee? hear'st thou, in thy thorny den, tramp of rural policemen, inly fancying, in thy rear coats of blue and buttons clear, while to meet thee, in the van stalks some vengeful alderman?-- each separate sense bringing a notion of forms that teach thee locomotion! beat and battered altogether, by fellow-men, by wind and weather; hounded on through fens and bogs, chased by men and bit by dogs: and, in thy weakly way of judging, so kindly taught the art of trudging; or, with a moment's happier lot, pitied, pensioned, and forgot-- cutty-pipe thy regium donum; poverty thy summum bonum; thy frigid couch a sandstone stratum; a colder grave thy ultimatum; circumventing, circumvented; in short, excessively tormented, everything combines to scare charity's dear pensioner! --say, vagrant, can'st thou grant to me a slice of thy philosophy? haply, in thy many trudgings, having found unchallenged lodgings, thy thoughts, unused to saddle-crupper, ambling no farther than thy supper-- thou, by the light of heaven-lit taper, mendest thy prospective paper! then, jolly pauper, stitch till day; let not thy roses drop away, lest, begrimed with muddy matter, thy body peep from every tatter, and men--a charitable dose-- should physic thee with food and clothes! nursling of adversity! 'tis thy glory thus to be sinking fund of raggery! thus to scrape a nation's dishes, and fatten on a few good wishes! or, on some venial treason bent, frame thyself a government, for thy crest a brirnless hat, poverty's aristocrat! nonne habeam te tristem, planet of the human system? comet lank and melancholic --orbit shocking parabolic-- seen for a little in the sky of the world of sympathy-- seldom failing when predicted, coming most when most restricted, dragging a nebulous tail with thee of hypothetic vagrancy-- of vagrants large, and vagrants small, vagrants scarce visible at all! matchless oracle of woe! anarchy in embryo! strange antipodes of bliss! parody on happiness! baghouse of the great creation! subject meet for strangulation, by practice tutored to condense the cautious inquiry for pence, and skilful, with averted eye, to hide thy latent roguery-- lo, on thy hopes i clap a stopper! vagrant, thou shalt have no copper! gather thy stumps, and get thee hence, unwise solicitor of pence! alister, who all but worshipped ian, and cherished every scrap from his pen, had not until quite lately seen this foolish production, as ian counted it, and was delighted with it, as he would have been had it been much worse. ian was vexed that he should like it, and now spent the greater part of an hour trying to show him how very bad in parts, even senseless it was. profusion of epithets without applicability, want of continuity, purposelessness, silliness, heartlessness--were but a few of his denunciations. alister argued it was but a bit of fun, and that anybody that knew ian, knew perfectly he would never amuse himself with a fellow without giving him something, but it was in vain; ian was bent on showing it altogether unworthy. so, not to waste the night, they dropped the dispute, and by the light of the blazing heather, turned to a chapter of boethius. chapter xiv. the wolves. my readers may remember that ian was on the point of acquainting his mother with an important event in his spiritual history, when they were interrupted by the involuntary call of the girls from the new house. the mother, as will readily be believed, remained desirous of listening to her son's story, though dreading it would not be of a kind to give her much satisfaction; but partly from preventions--favoured, it must be confessed by ian, and yet more from direct avoidance on his part, the days passed without her hearing anything more of it. ian had in truth almost repented his offer of the narrative: a certain vague assurance that it would not be satisfactory to her, had grown upon him until he felt it unkind to lay before her an experience whose narration would seem to ask a sympathy she could not give. but the mother was unable to let the thing rest. more than by interest she was urged by anxiety. in spite of her ungodlike theories of god, it was impossible she could be in despair about her noble ian; still, her hope was at best founded on the uncovenanted mercies of god, not on the security of his bond! she did not believe that god was doing and would do his best for every man; therefore she had no assurance that he would bring down the pride of ian, and compel his acceptance of terms worthy of an old roman father, half law-circumventing lawyer, half heartless tyrant. but her longing to hear what her son had proposed telling her, was chiefly inspired by the hope of getting nearer to him, of closer sympathy becoming possible between them through her learning more clearly what his views were. she constantly felt as if walking along the side of a thick hedge, with occasional thinnesses through which now and then she gained a ghostly glimpse of her heart's treasure gliding along the other side--close to her, yet so far that, when they spoke, they seemed calling across a gulf of dividing darkness. therefore, the night after that spent by her sons on the hill, all having retired some two hours before, the mother, finding herself unable to sleep, rose as she had often done ere now, and stole to the door of the little room under the thatch where ian lay. listening, and judging him awake, she went softly in, and sat down by his bedside. there had been such occasions on which, though son as well as mother was wide awake, neither spoke a word; but this time the mother could not be silent. "you never told me, ian, the story you began about something that made you pray!" ian saw he could not now draw back without causing, her more trouble than would the narration. "are you sure you will not take cold mother dear?" he said. "i am warmly clad, my son; and my heart, more than i can tell you, is longing to hear all about it." "i am afraid you will not find my story so interesting as you expect, mother!" "what concerns you is more interesting to me than anything else in the whole world, ian." "not more than god, mother?" said ian. the mother was silent. she was as honest as her sons. the question, dim-lucent, showed her, if but in shadow, something of the truth concerning herself--not so that she could grasp it, for she saw it as in a glimmer, a fluctuating, vanishing flash--namely, that she cared more about salvation than about god--that, if she could but keep her boy out of hell, she would be content to live on without any nearer approach to him in whom she had her being! god was to her an awe, not a ceaseless, growing delight! there are centuries of paganism yet in many lovely christian souls--paganism so deep, therefore so little recognized, that their earnest endeavour is to plant that paganism ineradicably in the hearts of those dearest to them. as she did not answer, ian was afraid she was hurt, and thought it better to begin his story at once. "it was one night in the middle of winter--last winter, near moscow," he began, "and the frost was very bitter--the worst night for cold i have ever known. i had gone with a companion into the depth of a great pine forest. on our way, the cold grew so intense, that we took refuge at a little public-house, frequented by peasants and persons of the lowest ranks. on entering i saw a scene which surpassed all for interest i had ever before witnessed. the little lonely house was crammed with russian soldiers, fierce-looking fellows, and i daresay their number formed our protection from violence. many of them were among the finest looking fellows i have ever seen. they were half drunk, and were dancing and singing with the wildest gesticulations and grimaces; but such singing for strange wildness and harmony combined i had never before listened to. one would keep up a solo for some minutes, when the whole company would join in a sort of chorus, dancing frantically about, but with the most perfect regularity of movement. one of them came up to me and with a low bow begged me in the name of the rest to give them some money. i accordingly gave them a silver ruble, upon which the whole party set up a shout, surrounded me, and in a moment a score of brawny fellows had lifted me in the air, where i was borne along in triumph. i took off my cap and gave three hip-hip-hurrahs as loud as my lungs could bawl, whereupon, with the profoundest expressions of gratitude, i was lowered from my elevation. one of them then who seemed to be the spokesman of the rest, seized me in his arms and gave me a hearty kiss on the cheek, on which i took my departure amid universal acclamation.--but all that's not worth telling you about; it was not for that i began--only the scene came up so clear before me that it drew me aside." "i don't need to tell you, ian," said his mother, with shining eyes, "that if it were only what you had to eat on the most ordinary day of your life, it would be interesting to me!" "thank you, mother dear; i seem to know that without being told; but i could never talk to you about anything that was not interesting to myself." here he paused. he would rather have stopped. "go on, go on, ian. i am longing to hear." "well--where was i?--we left at the inn our carriage and horses, and went with our guns far into the forest--all of straight, tall pines, up and up; and the little island-like tops of them, which, if there be a breath of wind, are sure to be swaying about like the motion of a dream, were as still as the big frosty stars in the deep blue overhead." "what did you want in such a lonely place at that time of the night?" asked the mother. she sat with firm-closed lips, and wide, night-filled eyes looking at her son, the fear of love in her beautiful face--a face more beautiful than any other that son had yet seen, fit window for a heart so full of refuge to look out of; and he knew how she looked though the darkness was between them. "wolves, mother," he answered. she shuddered. she was a great reader in the long winter nights, and had read terrible stories of wolves--the last of which in scotland had been killed not far from where they sat. "what did you want with the wolves, ian?" she faltered. "to kill them, mother. i never liked killing animals any more than alister; but even he destroys the hooded crow; and wolves are yet fairer game. they are the out-of-door devils of that country, and i fancy devils do go into them sometimes, as they did once into the poor swine: they are the terror of all who live near the forests. "there was no moon--only star-light; but whenever we came to any opener space, there was light enough from the snow to see all about; there was light indeed from the snow all through the forest, but the trees were thick and dark. far away, somewhere in the mystery of the black wood, we could now and then hear a faint howling: it came from the red throats of the wolves." "you are frightening me, ian!" said the mother, as if they had been two children telling each other tales. "indeed, mother, they are very horrible when they hunt in droves, ravenous with hunger. to kill one of them, if it be but one, is to do something for your kind. and just at that time i was oppressed with the feeling that i had done and was doing nothing for my people--my own humans; and not knowing anything else i could at the moment attempt, i resolved to go and kill a wolf or two: they had killed a poor woman only two nights before. "as soon as we could after hearing the noise of them, we got up into two trees. it took us some time to discover two that were fit for our purpose, and we did not get them so near each other as we should have liked. it was rather anxious work too until we found them, for if we encountered on foot a pack of those demons, we could be but a moment or two alive: killing one, ten would be upon us, and a hundred more on the backs of those. but we hoped they would smell us up in the trees, and search for us, when we should be able to give account of a few of them at least: we had double-barrelled guns, and plenty of powder and ball." "but how could you endure the cold--at night--and without food?" "no, mother; we did not try that! we had plenty to eat in our pockets. my companion had a bottle of vodki, and--" "what is that?" asked the mother with suspicion. "a sort of raw spirit--horrible stuff--more like spirits of wine. they say it does not hurt in such cold." "but, ian!" cried the mother, and seemed unable to say more. "don't be frightened, mother!" said ian, with a merry laugh. "surely you do not imagine _i_ would drink such stuff! true, i had my bottle, but it was full of tea. the russians drink enormous quantities of tea--though not so strong as you make it." "go on, then, ian; go on." "we sat a long time, and there was no sign of the wolves coming near us. it was very cold, but our furs kept in our warmth. by and by i fell asleep--which was not dangerous so long as i kept warm, and i thought the cold must wake me before it began to numb me. and as 'i slept i dreamed; but my dream did not change the place; the forest, the tree i was in, all my surroundings were the same. i even dreamed that i came awake, and saw everything about me just as it was. i seemed to open my eyes, and look about me on the dazzling snow from my perch: i was in a small tree on the border of a little clearing. "suddenly, out of the wood to my left, issued something, running fast, but with soundless feet, over the snow. i doubted in my dream whether the object were a live thing or only a shadow. it came nearer, and i saw it was a child, a little girl, running as if for her life. she came straight to the tree i sat in, and when close to it, but without a moment's halt, looked up, and i saw a sweet little face, white with terror--which somehow seemed, however, not for herself, but for me. i called out after her to stop, and i would take her into the tree beside me, where the wolves could not reach her; but she only shook her head, and ran on over the clearing into the forest. among the holes i watched the fleeting shape appear and disappear and appear again, until i saw it no more. then first i heard another kind of howl from the wolves--that of pursuit. it strengthened and swelled, growing nearer and nearer, till at last, through the stillness of the night and the moveless forest and the dead snow, came to my ear a kind of soft rushing sound. i don't know how to describe it. the rustle of dry leaves is too sharp; it was like a very soft heavy rain on a window--a small dull padding padding: it was the feet of the wolves. they came nearer and grew louder and louder, but the noise was still muffled and soft. their howling, however, was now loud and horrid. i suppose they cannot help howling; if they could, they would have too much power over poor creatures, coming upon them altogether at unawares; but as it is, they tell, whether they will or no, that they are upon the way. at length, dark as a torrent of pitch, out of the forest flowed a multitude of obscure things, and streamed away, black over the snow, in the direction the child had taken. they passed close to the foot of my tree, but did not even look up, flitting by like a shadow whose substance was unseen. where the child had vanished they also disappeared: plainly they were after her! "it was only a dream, mother! don't be so frightened," interrupted lan, for here his mother gave a little cry, almost forgetting what the narration was. "then first," he went on, "i seemed to recover my self-possession. i saw that, though i must certainly be devoured by the wolves, and the child could not escape, i had no choice but go down and follow, do what i could, and die with her. down i was the same instant, running as i had never run before even in a dream, along the track of the wolves. as i ran, i heard their howling, but it seemed so far off that i could not hope to be in time to kill one of them ere they were upon her. still, by their howling, it did not appear they had reached her, and i ran on. their noise grew louder and louder, but i seemed to run miles and miles, wondering what spell was upon me that i could not come up with them. all at once the clamour grew hideous, and i saw them. they were gathered round a tree, in a clearing just like that i had left, and were madly leaping against it, but ever falling back baffled. i looked up: in the top of the tree sat the little girl, her white face looking down upon them with a smile. all the terror had vanished from it. it was still white as the snow, but like the snow was radiating a white light through the dark foliage of the fir. i see it often, mother, so clear that i could paint it. i was enchanted at the sight. but she was not in safety yet, and i rushed into the heap of wolves, striking and stabbing with my hunting-knife. i got to the tree, and was by her in a moment. but as i took the child in my arms i woke, and knew that it was a dream. i sat in my own tree, and up against the stem of it broke a howling, surging black wave of wolves. they leaped at the tree-bole as a rock-checked billow would leap. my gun was to my shoulder in a moment, and blazed among them. howls of death arose. their companions fell upon the wounded, and ate them up. the tearing and yelling at the foot of the tree was like the tumult of devils full of hate and malice and greed. then for the first time i thought whether such creatures might not be the open haunts of demons. i do not imagine that, when those our lord drove out of the man asked permission to go into the swine, they desired anything unheard of before in the demon-world. i think they were not in the way of going into tame animals; but, as they must go out of the man, as they greatly dreaded the abyss of the disembodied, and as no ferocious animals fit to harbour them were near, they begged leave to go into such as were accessible, though unsuitable; whereupon the natural consequence followed: their presence made the poor swine miserable even to madness, and with the instinct of so many maniacs that in death alone lies their deliverance, they rushed straight into the loch." "it may be so, ian! but i want to hear how you got away from the wolves." "i fired and fired; and still they kept rushing on the tree-hole, heaping themselves against it, those behind struggling up on the backs of those next it, in a storm of rage and hunger and jealousy. not a few who had just helped to eat some of their fellows, were themselves eaten in turn, and not a scrap of them left; but it was a large pack, and it would have taken a long time to kill enough to satisfy those that remained. i killed and killed until my ammunition was gone, and then there was nothing for it but await the light. when the morning began to dawn, they answered its light with silence, and turning away swept like a shadow back into the wood. strange to tell, i heard afterwards that a child had been killed by them in the earlier part of that same night. but even now sometimes, as i lie awake, i grow almost doubtful whether the whole was not a hideous dream. "not the less for that was what i went through between the time my powder came to an end and the dawn of the morning, a real spiritual fact. "in the midst of the howling i grew so sleepy that the horrible noise itself seemed to lull me while it kept me awake, and i fell into a kind of reverie with which my dream came back and mingled. i seemed to be sitting in the tree with the little shining girl, and she was my own soul; and all the wrong things i had in me, and all the wrong things i had done, with all the weaknesses and evil tendencies of my nature, whether mine by fault or by inheritance, had taken shape, and, in the persons of the howling wolves below, were besieging me, to get at me, and devour me. suddenly my soul was gone. above were the still, bright stars, shining unmoved; beneath was the white, betraying snow, and the howling wolves; away through the forest was fleeting, ever fleeting, my poor soul, in the likeness of a white-faced child! all at once came a great stillness, as of a desert place, where breathed nor life of man nor life of beast. i was alone, frightfully alone--alone as i had never been before. the creatures at the foot of the tree were still howling, but their cry sounded far away and small; they were in some story i had been reading, not anywhere in my life! i was left and lost--left by whom?--lost by whom?--in the waste of my own being, without stay or comfort. i looked up to the sky; it was infinite--yet only a part of myself, and much too near to afford me any refuge from the desert of my lost self. it came down nearer; the limitless space came down, and clasped me, and held me. it came close to me--as if i had been a shape off which all nature was taking a mould. i was at once everything and nothing. i cannot tell you how frightful it was! in agony i cried to god, with a cry of utter despair. i cannot say whether i may believe that he answered me; i know this, that a great quiet fell upon me--but a quiet as of utter defeat and helplessness. then again, i cannot tell how, the quiet and the helplessness melted away into a sense of god--a feeling as if great space all about me was god and not emptiness. wolf nor sin could touch me! i was a wide peace--my very being peace! and in my mind--whether an echo from the bible, i do not know--were the words:--'i, even i, am he that comforteth thee. i am god, thy saviour!' whereas i had seemed all alone, i was with god, the only withness man can really share! i lifted my eyes; morning was in the east, and the wolves were slinking away over the snow." how to receive the strange experience the mother did not know. she ought to say something, for she sorely questioned it! not a word had he spoken belonging to the religion in which she had brought him up, except two--sin and god! there was nothing in it about the atonement! she did not see that it was a dream, say rather a vision, of the atonement itself. to ian her interpretation of the atonement seemed an everlasting and hopeless severance. the patience of god must surely be far more tried by those who would interpret him, than by those who deny him: the latter speak lies against him, the former speak lies for him! yet all the time the mother felt as in the presence of some creature of a higher world--one above the ordinary race of men--whom the powers of evil had indeed misled, but perhaps not finally snared. she little thought how near she was to imagining that good may come out of evil--that there is good which is not of god! she did not yet understand that salvation lies in being one with christ, even as the branch is one with the vine;--that any salvation short of knowing god is no salvation at all. what moment a man feels that he belongs to god utterly, the atonement is there, the son of god is reaping his harvest. the good mother was not, however, one of those conceited, stiff-necked, power-loving souls who have been the curse and ruin of the church in all ages; she was but one of those in whom reverence for its passing form dulls the perception of unchangeable truth. they shut up god's precious light in the horn lantern of human theory, and the lantern casts such shadows on the path to the kingdom as seem to dim eyes insurmountable obstructions. for the sake of what they count revealed, they refuse all further revelation, and what satisfies them is merest famine to the next generation of the children of the kingdom. instead of god's truth they offer man's theory, and accuse of rebellion against god such as cannot live on the husks they call food. but ah, home-hungry soul! thy god is not the elder brother of the parable, but the father with the best robe and the ring--a god high above all thy longing, even as the heavens are high above the earth. chapter xv. the gulf that divided. when ian ceased, a silence deep as the darkness around, fell upon them. to ian, the silence seemed the very voice of god, clear in the darkness; to the mother it was a darkness interpenetrating the darkness; it was a great gulf between her and her boy. she must cry to him aloud, but what should she cry? if she did not, an opportunity, perhaps the last, on which hung eternal issues, would be gone for ever! each moment's delay was a disobedience to her conscience, a yielding to love's sinful reluctance! with "sick assay" she heaved at the weight on her heart, but not a word would come. if ian would but speak again, and break the spell of the terrible stillness! she must die in eternal wrong if she did not speak! but no word would come. something in her would not move. it was not in her brain or her lips or her tongue, for she knew all the time she could speak if she would. the caitiff will was not all on the side of duty! she was not for the truth!--could she then be of the truth? she did not suspect a divine reluctance to urge that which was not good. not always when the will works may we lay hold of it in the act: somehow, she knew not how, she heard herself speaking. "are you sure it was god, ian?" she said. the voice she heard was weak and broken, reedy and strained, like the voice of one all but dead. "no, mother," answered ian, "but i hope it was." "hopes, my dear hoy, are not to be trusted." "that is true, mother; and yet we are saved by hope." "we are saved by faith." "i do not doubt it." "you rejoice my heart. but faith in what?" "faith in god, mother." "that will not save you." "no, but god will." "the devils believe in god, and tremble." "i believe in the father of jesus christ, and do not tremble." "you ought to tremble before an unreconciled god." "like the devils, mother?" "like a sinful child of adam. whatever your fancies, ian, god will not hear you, except you pray to him in the name of his son." "mother, would you take my god from me? would you blot him out of the deeps of the universe?" "ian! are you mad? what frightful things you would lay to my charge!" "mother, i would gladly--oh how gladly! perish for ever, to save god from being the kind of god you would have me believe him. i love god, and will not think him other than good. rather than believe he does not hear every creature that cries to him, whether he knows jesus christ or not, i would believe there was no god, and go mourning to my grave." "that is not the doctrine of the gospel." "it is, mother: jesus himself says, 'every one that hath heard and learned of the father, cometh unto me.'" "why then do you not come to him, ian?" "i do come to him; i come to him every day. i believe in nobody but him. he only makes the universe worth being, or any life worth living!" "ian, i can not understand you! if you believe like that about him,--" "i don't believe about him, mother! i believe in him. he is my life." "we will not dispute about words! the question is, do you place your faith for salvation in the sufferings of christ for you?" "i do not, mother. my faith is in jesus himself, not in his sufferings." "then the anger of god is not turned away from you." "mother, i say again--i love god, and will not believe such things of him as you say. i love him so that i would rather lose him than believe so of him." "then you do not accept the bible as your guide?" "i do, mother, for it tells me of jesus christ. there is no such teaching as you say in the bible." "how little you know your new testament!" "i don't know my new testament! it is the only book i do know! i read it constantly! it is the only thing i could not live without!--no, i do not mean that! i could do without my testament! christ would be all the same!" "oh, ian! ian! and yet you will not give christ the glory of satisfying divine justice by his suffering for your sins!" "mother, to say that the justice of god is satisfied with suffering, is a piece of the darkness of hell. god is willing to suffer, and ready to inflict suffering to save from sin, but no suffering is satisfaction to him or his justice." "what do you mean by his justice then?" "that he gives you and me and everybody fair play." the homeliness of the phrase offended the moral ear of the mother. "how dare you speak lightly of him in my hearing!" she cried. "because i will speak for god even to the face of my mother!" answered ian. "he is more to me than you, mother--ten times more." "you speak against god, ian," she rejoined, calmed by the feeling she had roused. "no, mother. he speaks against god who says he does things that are not good. it does not make a thing good to call it good. i speak for him when i say lie cannot but give fair play. he knows he put rue where i was sure to sin; he will not condemn me because i have sinned; he leaves me to do that myself. he will condemn me only if i do not turn away from sin, for he has made me able to turn from it, and i do." "he will forgive sin only for christ's sake." "he forgives it for his own name's sake, his own love's sake. there is no such word as for christ's sake in the new testament--except where paul prays us for christ's sake to be reconciled to god. it is in the english new testament, but not in the greek." "then you do not believe that the justice of god demands the satisfaction of the sinner's endless punishment?" "i do not. nothing can satisfy the justice of god but justice in his creature. the justice of god is the love of what is right, and the doing of what is right. eternal misery in the name of justice could satisfy none but a demon whose bad laws had been broken." "i grant you that no amount of suffering on the part of the wicked could satisfy justice; but it is the holy one who suffers for our sins!" "oh, mother! justice do wrong for its own satisfaction! did jesus deserve punishment? if not, then to punish him was to wrong him!" "but he was willing; he consented;" "he yielded to injustice--but the injustice was man's, not god's. if justice, insisted on punishment, it would at least insist on the guilty, not the innocent, being punished! it would revolt from the idea of the innocent being punished for the guilty! mind, i say being punished, not suffering: that is another thing altogether. it is an eternal satisfaction to love to suffer for the guilty, but not to justice that innocence should be punished for the guilty. the whole idea of such atonement is the merest subterfuge, a figment of the paltry human intellect to reconcile difficulties of its own invention. once, when alister had done something wrong, my father said, 'he must be punished--except some one will be punished for him!' i offered to take his place, partly that it seemed expected of me, partly that i was moved by vanity, and partly that i foresaw what would follow." "and what did follow?" asked the mother, to whom the least word out of the past concerning her husband, was like news from the world beyond. at the same time it seemed almost an offence that one of his sons should know anything about him she did not know. "he scarcely touched me, mother," answered ian. "the thing taught me something very different from what he had meant to teach by it. that he failed to carry out his idea of justice helped me afterwards to see that god could not have done it either, for that it was not justice. some perception of this must have lain at the root of the heresy that jesus did not suffer, but a cloud-phantom took his place on the cross. wherever people speculate instead of obeying, they fall into endless error." "you graceless boy! do you dare to say your father speculated instead of obeying?" cried the mother, hot with indignation. "no, mother. it was not my father who invented that way of accounting for the death of our lord." "he believed it!" "he accepted it, saturated with the tradition of the elders before he could think for himself. he does not believe it now." "but why then should christ have suffered?" "it is the one fact that explains to me everything," said ian. "--but i am not going to talk about it. so long as your theory satisfies you, mother, why should i show you mine? when it no longer satisfies you, when it troubles you as it has troubled me, and as i pray god it may trouble you, when you feel it stand between you and the best love you could give god, then i will share my very soul with you--tell you thoughts which seem to sublimate my very being in adoration." "i do not see what other meaning you can put upon the statement that he was a sacrifice for our sins." "had we not sinned he would never have died; and he died to deliver us from our sins. he against whom was the sin, became the sacrifice for it; the father suffered in the son, for they are one. but if i could see no other explanation than yours, i would not, could not accept it--for god's sake i would not." "how can you say you believe in christ, when you do not believe in the atonement!" "it is not so, mother. i do not believe what you mean by the atonement; what god means by it, i desire to accept. but we are never told to believe in the atonement; we are told to believe in christ--and, mother, in the name of the great father who hears me speak, i do believe in him." "how can you, when you do not believe what god says about him?" "i do. god does not say those things about him you think he says. they are mere traditions, not the teaching of those who understood him. but i might believe all about him quite correctly, and yet not believe in him." "what do you call believing in him, then?" "obeying him, mother--to say it as shortly as i can. i try to obey him in the smallest things he says--only there are no small things he says--and so does alister. i strive to be what he would have me, nor do i hold anything else worth my care. let a man trust in his atonement to absolute assurance, if he does not do the things he tells him--the very things he said--he does not believe in him. he may be a good man, but he has not yet heard enough and learned enough of the father to be sent to jesus to learn more." "then i do not believe in him," said the mother, with a strange, sad gentleness--for his words awoke an old anxiety never quite at rest. ian was silent. the darkness seemed to deepen around them, and the silence grew keen. the mother began to tremble. "god knows," said ian at length, and again the broken silence closed around them. it was between god and his mother now! unwise counsellors will persuade the half crazy doubter in his own faith, to believe that he does believe!--how much better to convince him that his faith is a poor thing, that he must rise and go and do the thing that jesus tells him, and so believe indeed! when will men understand that it is neither thought nor talk, neither sorrow for sin nor love of holiness that is required of them, but obedience! to be and to obey are one. a cold hand grasping her heart, the mother rose, and went from the room. the gulf seemed now at last utterly, hopelessly impassable! she had only feared it before; she knew it now! she did not see that, while she believed evil things of god, and none the less that she called them good, oneness was impossible between her and any being in god's creation. the poor mother thought herself broken-hearted, and lay down too sick to know that she was trembling from head to foot. such was the hold, such the authority of traditional human dogma on her soul--a soul that scorned the notion of priestly interposition between god and his creature--that, instead of glorifying god that she had given birth to such a man, she wept bitterly because he was on the broad road to eternal condemnation. but as she lay, now weeping, now still and cold with despair, she found that for some time she had not been thinking. but she had not been asleep! whence then was this quiet that was upon her? something had happened, though she knew of nothing! there was in her as it were a moonlight of peace! "can it be god?" she said to herself. no more than ian could she tell whether it was god or not; but from that night she had an idea in her soul by which to reach after "the peace of god." she lifted up her heart in such prayer as she had never prayed before; and slowly, imperceptibly awoke in her the feeling that, if she was not believing aright, god would not therefore cast her off, but would help her to believe as she ought to believe: was she not willing? therewith she began to feel as if the gulf betwixt her and ian were not so wide as she had supposed; and that if it were, she would yet hope in the son of man. doubtless he was in rebellion against god, seeing he would question his ways, and refuse to believe the word he had spoken, but surely something might be done for him! the possibility had not yet dawned upon her that there could be anything in the new testament but those doctrines against which the best in him revolted. she little suspected the glory of sky and earth and sea eternal that would one day burst upon her! that she would one day see god not only good but infinitely good--infinitely better than she had dared to think him, fearing to image him better than he was! mortal, she dreaded being more just than god, more pure than her maker! "i will go away to-morrow!" said ian to himself. "i am only a pain to her. she will come to see things better without me! i cannot live in her sight any longer now! i will go, and come again." his heart broke forth in prayer. "o god, let my mother see that thou art indeed true-hearted; that thou dost not give us life by parings and subterfuges, but abundantly; that thou dost not make men in order to assert thy dominion over them, but that they may partake of thy life. o god, have pity when i cannot understand, and teach me as thou wouldst the little one whom, if thou wert an earthly father amongst us as thy son was an earthly son, thou wouldst carry about in thy arms. when pride rises in me, and i feel as if i ought to be free and walk without thy hand; when it looks as if a man should be great in himself, nor need help from god; then think thou of me, and i shall know that i cannot live or think without the self-willing life; that thou art because thou art, i am because thou art; that i am deeper in thee than my life, thou more to my being than that being to itself. was not that satan's temptation, father? did he not take self for the root of self in him, when god only is the root of all self? and he has not repented yet! is it his thought coming up in me, flung from the hollow darkness of his soul into mine? thou knowest, when it comes i am wretched. i love it not. i would have thee lord and love over all. but i cannot understand: how comes it to look sometimes as if independence must be the greater? a lie cannot be greater than the truth! i do not understand, but thou dost. i cannot see my foundations; i cannot dig up the roots of my being: that would be to understand creation! will the adversary ever come to see that thou only art grand and beautiful? how came he to think to be greater by setting up for himself? how was it that it looked so to him? how is it that, not being true, it should ever look so? there must be an independence that thou lovest, of which this temptation is the shadow! that must be how 'satan fell!--for the sake of not being a slave!--that he might be a free being! ah, lord, i see how it all comes! it is because we are not near enough to thee to partake of thy liberty that we want a liberty of our own different from thine! we do not see that we are one with thee, that thy glory is our glory, that we can have none but in thee! that we are of thy family, thy home, thy heart, and what is great for thee is great for us! that man's meanness is to want to be great out of his father! without thy eternity in us we are so small that we think ourselves great, and are thus miserably abject and contemptible. thou only art true! thou only art noble! thou wantest no glory for selfishness! thou doest, thou art, what thou requirest of thy children! i know it, for i see it in jesus, who casts the contempt of obedience upon the baseness of pride, who cares only for thee and for us, never thinking of himself save as a gift to give us! o lovely, perfect christ! with my very life i worship thee! oh, pray, christ! make me and my brother strong to be the very thing thou wouldst have us, as thy brothers, the children of thy father. thou art our perfect brother--perfect in love, in courage, in tenderness! amen, lord! good-night! i am thine." he was silent for a few moments, then resumed: "lord, thou knowest whither my thoughts turn the moment i cease praying to thee. i dared not think of her, but that i know thee. but for thee, my heart would be as water within me! oh, take care of her, come near to her! thou didst send her where she could not learn fast--but she did learn. and now, god, i do not know where she is! thou only of all in this world knowest, for to thee she lives though gone from my sight and knowledge--in the dark to me. pray, father, let her know that thou art near her, and that i love her. thou hast made me love her by taking her from me: thou wilt give her to me again! in this hope i will live all my days, until thou takest me also; for to hope mightily is to believe well in thee. i will hope in thee infinitely. amen, father!" chapter xvi. the clan christmas. by slow degrees, with infinite subdivisions and apparent reversals of change, the autumn had passed into winter indeed. cloud above, mire below, mist and rain all between, made up many days; only, like the dreariest life, they were broken through and parted, lest they should seem the universe itself, by such heavenly manifestations, such gleams and glimpses of better, as come into all lives, all winters, all evil weathers. what is loosed on earth is loosed first in heaven: we have often shared of heaven, when we thought it but a softening of earth's hardness. every relief is a promise, a pledge as well as a passing meal. the frost at length had brought with it brightness and persuasion and rousing. in the fields it was swelling and breaking the clods; and for the heart of man, it did something to break up that clod too. a sense of friendly pleasure filled all the human creatures. the children ran about like wild things; the air seemed to intoxicate them. the mother went out walking with the girls, and they talked of their father and christian and mr. sercombe, who were all coming together. for some time they saw nothing of their next neighbours. they had made some attempts at acquaintance with the people of the glen, but unhappily were nowise courteous enough for their ideas of good breeding, and offended both their pride and their sense of propriety. the manners and address of these northern peasants were blameless--nearly perfect indeed, like those of the irish, and in their own houses beyond criticism; those of the ladies conventional where not rudely condescending. if mistress conal was an exception to the rest of the clan, even she would be more civil to a stranger than to her chief whom she loved--until the stranger gave her offence. and if then she passed to imprecation, she would not curse like an ordinary woman, but like a poetess, gaining rather than losing dignity. she would rise to the evil occasion, no hag, but a largely-offended sibyl, whom nothing thereafter should ever appease. to forgive was a virtue unknown to mistress conal. its more than ordinary difficulty in forgiving is indeed a special fault of the celtic character.--this must not however be confounded with a desire for revenge. the latter is by no means a specially celtic characteristic. resentment and vengeance are far from inseparable. the heart that surpasses in courtesy, except indeed that courtesy, be rooted in love divine, must, when treated with discourtesy, experience the worse revulsion, feel the bitterer indignation. but many a celt would forgive, and forgive thoroughly and heartily, with his enemy in his power, who, so long as he remained beyond his reach, could not even imagine circumstances in which they might be reconciled. to a celt the summit of wrong is a slight, but apology is correspondingly potent with him. mistress conal, however, had not the excuse of a specially courteous nature. christina and mercy, calling upon her one morning, were not ungraciously received, but had the misfortune to remark, trusting to her supposed ignorance of english, upon the dirtiness of her floor, they themselves having imported not a little of the moisture that had turned its surface into a muddy paste. she said nothing, but, to the general grudge she bore the possessors of property once belonging to her clan, she now added a personal one; the offence lay cherished and smouldering. had the chief offended her, she would have found a score of ways to prove to herself that he meant nothing; but she desired no mitigation of the trespass of strangers. the people at the new house did not get on very well with any of the clan. in the first place, they were regarded not merely as interlopers, but almost as thieves of the property--though in truth it had passed to them through other hands. in the second place, a rumour had got about that they did not behave with sufficient respect to the chief's family, in the point of whose honour the clan was the more exacting because of their common poverty. hence the inhabitants of the glen, though they were of course polite, showed but little friendliness. but the main obstacle to their reception was in themselves: the human was not much developed in them; they understood nothing of their own beings; they had never had any difficulty with themselves:--how could they understand others, especially in circumstances and with histories so different from their own! they had not a notion how poor people feel, still less poor people poorer than before--or how they regard the rich who have what they have lost. they did not understand any huftian feeling--not even the silliness they called love--a godless, mindless affair, fit only for the doll-histories invented by children: they had a feeling, or a feeling had them, till another feeling came and took its place. when a feeling was there, they felt as if it would never go; when it was gone, they felt as if it had never been; when it returned, they felt as if it had never gone. they seldom came so near anything as to think about it, never put a question to themselves as to how a thing affected them, or concerning the phenomena of its passage through their consciousness! there is a child-eternity of soul that needs to ask nothing, because it understands everything: the ways of the spirit are open to it; but where a soul does not understand, and has to learn, how is it to do so without thinking? they knew nothing of labour, nothing of danger, nothing of hunger, nothing of cold, nothing of sickness, nothing of loneliness. the realities of life, in their lowest forms as in their highest, were far from them. if they had nearly gone through life instead of having but entered upon it, they would have had some ground for thinking themselves unfairly dealt with; for to be made, and then left to be worthless, unfit even for damnation, might be suspected for hard lines; but there is one who takes a perfect interest in his lowliest creature, and will not so spare it. they were girls notwithstanding who could make themselves agreeable, and passed for clever--christina because she could give a sharp answer, and sing a drawingroom-song, mercy because as yet she mostly held her tongue. that there was at the same time in each of them the possibility of being developed into something of inestimable value, is merely to say that they were human. the days passed, and christmas drew near. the gentlemen arrived. there was family delight and a bustling reception. it is amazing--it shows indeed how deep and divine, how much beyond the individual self are the family affections--that such gladness breaks forth in the meeting of persons who, within an hour or so of the joyous welcome, self getting the better of the divine, will begin to feel bored, and will each lay the blame of the disappointment on the other. coats were pulled off; mufflers were unwound; pretty hands were helping; strong hands were lifting and carrying; every room was bright with a great fire; tea was refused, and dinner welcomed. after dinner came the unpacking of great boxes; and in the midst of the resultant pleasure, the proposal came to be made--none but christina knew how--that the inhabitants of the cottage should be invited to dinner on christmas-eve. it was carried at once, and the next afternoon a formal invitation was sent. at the cottage it caused conference, no discussion. the lady of the new house had not called with her girls, it was true; but then neither had the lady of the castle--for that was the clanspeople's name for the whole ridge on which the cottage stood--called on the new-comers! if there was offence, it was mutual! the unceremonious invitation might indicate that it was not thought necessary to treat them as persons who knew the ways of society; on the other hand, if it meant that they were ready to throw aside formalities and behave heartily, it would be wrong not to meet them half-way! they resolved therefore to make a counter-proposal; and if the invitation came of neighbourliness, and not of imagined patronage, they would certainly meet it in a friendly spirit! answer was returned, sealed with no mere crest but with a coat of arms, to the effect that it had been the custom since time forgotten for the chief to welcome his people and friends without distinction on christmas-eve, and the custom could not be broken; but if the ladies and gentlemen of the new house would favour them with their company on the occasion, to dine and dance, the chief and his family would gratefully accept any later offer of hospitality mr. and mrs. peregrine palmer might do them, the honour to send. this reply gave occasion to a good deal of talk at the new house, not entirely of a sort which the friends of the chief would have enjoyed hearing. frequent were the bursts of laughter from the men at the assumption of the title of chief by a man with no more land than he could just manage to live upon. the village they said, and said truly, in which the greater number of his people lived, was not his at all--not a foot of the ground on which it stood, not a stone or sod of which it was built--but belonged to a certain canadian, who was about to turn all his territory around and adjacent into a deer forest! they could not see that, if there had ever been anything genuine in the patriarchal relation, the mere loss of the clan-property could no more cause the chieftainship to cease, than could the loss of the silver-hilted andrew ferrara, handed down from father to son for so many generations. there are dull people, and just as many clever people, who look upon customs of society as on laws of nature, and judge the worth of others by their knowledge or ignorance of the same. so doing they disable themselves from understanding the essential, which is, like love, the fulfilling of the law. a certain englishman gave great offence in an arab tent by striding across the food placed for the company on the ground: would any celt, irish or welsh, have been guilty of such a blunder? but there was not any overt offence on the present occasion. they called it indeed a cool proposal that they should put off their christmas party for that of a ploughman in shabby kilt and hob-nailed shoes; but on their amused indignation supervened the thought that they were in a wild part of the country, where it would be absurd to expect the savoir vivre of the south, and it would be amusing to see the customs of the land. by suggestion and seeming response, the clever christina, unsuspected even of mercy, was the motive power to bring about the acceptance of the chief's invitation. a friendly answer was returned: they would not go to dinner, they said, as it was their custom also to dine at home on christmas-eve; but they would dine early, and spend the evening with them. to the laird the presence of the lowland girls promised a great addition to the merry-making. during the last thirty years, all the gentlemen-farmers of the clan, and most of the humbler tacksmen as well, had vanished, and there was a wide intellectual space between all those left and the family of the chief. often when ian was away, would alister, notwithstanding his love to his people and their entire response, have felt lonely but for labour. there being in the cottage no room equal to the reception of a large company, and the laird receiving all the members of the clan--"poor," i was going to say, "and rich," but there were no rich--as well as any neighbour or traveller who chose to appear, the father of the present chief had had good regard to the necessities of entertainment in the construction of a new barn: companionship, large feasting, and dancing, had been even more considered than the storing and threshing of his corn. there are in these days many who will mock; but for my part i am proud of a race whose social relations are the last upon which they will retrench, whose latest yielded pleasure is their hospitality. it is a common feeling that only the well-to-do have a right to be hospitable: the ideal flower of hospitality is almost unknown to the rich; it can hardly be grown save in the gardens of the poor; it is one of their beatitudes. means in glenruadh had been shrinking for many years, but the heart of the chief never shrank. his dwelling dwindled from a castle to a house, from a house to a cottage; but the hospitality did not dwindle. as the money vanished, the show diminished; the place of entertainment from a hall became a kitchen, from a kitchen changed to a barn; but the heart of the chief was the same; the entertainment was but little altered, the hospitality not in the least. when things grow hard, the first saving is generally off others; the macruadh's was off himself. the land was not his, save as steward of the grace of god! let it not be supposed he ran in debt: with his mother at the head, or rather the heart of affairs, that could not be. she was not one to regard as hospitality a readiness to share what you have not! little did good doctor johnson suspect the shifts to which some of the highland families he visited were driven--not to feed, but to house him: and housing in certain conditions of society is the large half of hospitality. where he did not find his quarters comfortable, he did not know what crowding had to be devised, what inconveniences endured by the family, that he might have what ease and freedom were possible. be it in stone hall or thatched cottage, the chief must entertain the stranger as well as befriend his own! this was the fulfilling of his office--none the less that it had descended upon him in evil times. that seldom if ever had a chief been christian enough or strong enough to fill to the full the relation of father of his people, was nothing against the ideal fact in the existent relation; it was rather for it: now that the chieftainship had come to a man with a large notion of what it required of him, he was the more, not the less ready to aim at the mark of the idea; he was not the more easily to be turned aside from a true attempt to live up to his calling, that many had yielded and were swept along bound slaves in the triumph of mammon! he looked on his calling as entirely enough to fill full the life that would fulfil the calling. it was ambition enough for him to be the head of his family, with the highest of earthly relations to realize toward its members. as to the vulgar notion of a man's obligation to himself, he had learned to despise it. "rubbish!" ian would say. "i owe my self nothing. what has my self ever done for me, but lead me wrong? what but it has come between me and my duty--between me and my very father in heaven--between me and my fellow man! the fools of greed would persuade that a man has no right to waste himself in the low content of making and sharing a humble living; he ought to make money! make a figure in the world, forsooth! be somebody! 'dwell among the people!' such would say: 'bah! let them look after themselves! if they cannot pay their rents, others will; what is it to you if the rents are paid? send them about their business; turn the land into a deer-forest or a sheep-farm, and clear them out! they have no rights! a man is bound to the children of his body begotten; the people are nothing to him! a man is not his brother's keeper--except when he has got him in prison! and so on, in the name of the great devil!" whether there was enough in alister to have met and overcome the spirit of the world, had he been brought up at oxford or cambridge, i have not to determine; there was that in him at least which would have come to, repent bitterly had he yielded; but brought up as he was, he was not only able to entertain the exalted idea presented to him, but to receive and make it his. with joy he recognized the higher dignity of the shepherd of a few poor, lean, wool-torn human sheep, than of the man who stands for himself, however "spacious in the possession of dirt." he who holds dead land a possession, and living souls none of his, needs wake no curse, for he is in the very pit of creation, a live outrage on the human family. if alister macruadh was not in the highest grade of christianity, he was on his way thither, for he was doing the work that was given him to do, which is the first condition of all advancement. he had much to learn yet, but he was one who, from every point his feet touched, was on the start to go further. the day of the holy eve rose clear and bright. snow was on the hills, and frost in the valley. there had been a time when at this season great games were played between neighbour districts or clans, but here there were no games now, because there were so few men; the more active part fell to the women. mistress macruadh was busy all day with her helpers, preparing a dinner of mutton, and beef, and fowls, and red-deer ham; and the men soon gave the barn something of the aspect of the old patriarchal hall for which it was no very poor substitute. a long table, covered with the finest linen, was laid for all comers; and when the guests took their places, they needed no arranging; all knew their standing, and seated themselves according to knowledge. two or three small farmers took modestly the upper places once occupied by immediate relatives of the chief, for of the old gentry of the clan there were none. but all were happy, for their chief was with them still. their reverence was none the less that they were at home with him. they knew his worth, and the roughest among them would mind what the macruadh said. they knew that he feared nothing; that he was strong as the red stag after which the clan was named; that, with genuine respect for every man, he would at the least insolence knock the fellow down; that he was the best shot, the best sailor, the best ploughman in the clan: i would have said the best swordsman, but that, except ian, there was not another left to it. not many of them, however, understood how much he believed that he had to give an account of his people. he was far from considering such responsibility the clergyman's only. again and again had he expostulated with some, to save them from the slow gaping hell of drink, and in one case, he had reason to hope, with success. as they sat at dinner, it seemed to the young fellow who, with his help, had so far been victorious, that the chief scarcely took his eyes off him. one might think there was small danger where the hostess allowed nothing beyond water and milk but small ale; the chief, however, was in dread lest he should taste even that, and caught one moment the longing look he threw at the jug as it passed. he rose and went down the table, speaking to this one and that, but stopped behind the lad, and putting his arm round his shoulders, whispered in his ear. the youth looked up in his face with a solemn smile: had not the chief embraced him before them all! he was only a shepherd-lad, but his chief cared for him! in the afternoon the extemporized tables were cleared away, candles were fixed in rough sconces along the walls, not without precaution against fire, and the floor was rubbed clean--for the barn was floored throughout with pine, in parts polished with use. the walls were already covered with the plaids of the men and women, each kept in place by a stone or two on the top of the wall where the rafters rested. in one end was a great heap of yellow oat-straw, which, partly levelled, made a most delightful divan. what with the straw, the plaids, the dresses, the shining of silver ornaments, and the flash of here and there a cairngorm or an amethyst, there was not a little colour in the barn. some of the guests were poorly but all were decently attired, and the shabbiest behaved as ladies and gentlemen. the party from the new house walked through the still, star-watched air, with the motionless mountains looking down on them, and a silence around, which they never suspected as a presence. the little girls were of the company, and there was much merriment. foolish compliments were not wanting, offered chiefly on the part of mr. sercombe, and accepted on that of christina. the ladies, under their furs and hoods, were in their best, with all the jewels they could wear at once, for they had heard that highlanders have a passion for colour, and that poor people are always best pleased when you go to them in your finery. the souls of these sasunnachs were full of things. they made a fine show as they emerged from the darkness of their wraps into the light of the numerous candles; nor did the approach of the widowed chieftainess to receive them, on the arm of alister, with ian on her other side, fail in dignity. the mother was dressed in a rich, matronly black silk; the chief was in the full dress of his clan--the old-fashioned coat of the french court, with its silver buttons and ruffles of fine lace, the kilt of macruadh tartan in which red predominated, the silver-mounted sporan--of the skin and adorned with the head of an otter caught with, the bare hands of one of his people, and a silver-mounted dirk of length unusual, famed for the beauty of both hilt and blade; ian was similarly though less showily clad. when she saw the stately dame advancing between her sons, one at least of her visitors felt a doubt whether their condescension would be fully appreciated. as soon as their reception was over, the piper--to the discomfort of mr. sercombe's english ears--began his invitation to the dance, and in a few moments the floor was, in a tumult of reels. the girls, unacquainted with their own country's dances, preferred looking on, and after watching reel and strathspey for some time, altogether declined attempting either. but by and by it was the turn of the clanspeople to look on while the lady of the house and her sons danced a quadrille or two with their visitors; after which the chief and his brother pairing with the two elder girls, the ladies were astonished to find them the best they had ever waltzed with, although they did not dance quite in the london way. ian's dancing, christina said, was french; mercy said all she knew was that the chief took the work and left her only the motion: she felt as in a dream of flying. before the evening was over, the young men had so far gained on christina that mr. sercombe looked a little commonplace. chapter xvii. between dancing and supper. the dancing began about six o'clock, and at ten it was time for supper. it was ready, but there was no room for it except the barn; the dancing therefore had to cease for a while, that the table might again be covered. the ladies put on their furs and furry boots and gloves, and went out into the night with the rest. the laird and christina started together, but, far from keeping at her side, alister went and came, now talking to this couple, now to that, and adding to the general pleasure with every word he spoke. ian and mercy walked together, and as often as the chief left her side, christina joined them. mrs. palmer stayed with their hostess; her husband took the younger children by the hand; mr. sercombe and christian sauntered along in the company, talking now to one, now to another of the village girls. all through the evening christina and mercy noted how instantly the word of the chief was followed in the smallest matter, and the fact made its impression on them; for undeveloped natures in the presence of a force, revere it as power--understanding by power, not the strength to create, to harmonize, to redeem, to discover the true, to suffer with patience; but the faculty of having things one's own vulgar, self-adoring way. ian had not proposed to mercy that they should walk together; but when the issuing crowd had broken into twos and threes, they found themselves side by side. the company took its way along the ridge, and the road eastward. the night was clear, and like a great sapphire frosted with topazes--reminding ian that, solid as is the world under our feet, it hangs in the will of god. mercy and he walked for some time in silence. it was a sudden change from the low barn, the dull candles, and the excitement of the dance, to the awful space, the clear pure far-off lights, and the great stillness. both felt it, though differently. there was in both of them the quest after peace. it is not the banished demon only that wanders seeking rest, but souls upon souls, and in ever growing numbers. the world and hades swarm with them. they long after a repose that is not mere cessation of labour: there is a positive, an active rest. mercy was only beginning to seek it, and that without knowing what it was she needed. ian sought it in silence with god; she in crepitant intercourse with her kind. naturally ready to fall into gloom, but healthy enough to avoid it, she would rush at anything to do--not to keep herself from thinking, for she had hardly begun to think, but to escape that heavy sense of non-existence, that weary and restless want which is the only form life can take to the yet unliving, those who have not yet awakened and arisen from the dead. she was a human chicken that had begun to be aware of herself, but had not yet attacked the shell that enclosed her: because it was transparent, and she could see life about her, she did not know that she was in a shell, or that, if she did not put forth the might of her own life, she was sealing herself up, a life in death, in her antenatal coffin. many who think themselves free have never yet even seen the shell that imprisons them--know nothing of the liberty wherewith the lord of our life would set them free. men fight many a phantom when they ought to be chipping at their shells. "thou art the dreamer!" they cry to him who would wake them. "see how diligent we are to get on in the world! we labour as if we should never go out of it!" what they call the world is but their shell, which is all the time killing the infant christ that houses with them. ian looked up to the sky, and breathed a deep breath. mercy looked up in his face, and saw his strangely beautiful smile. "what are you thinking of, captain macruadh?" she said. "i was thinking," he answered, "that perhaps up there"--he waved his arm wide over his head--"might be something like room; but i doubt it, i doubt it!" naturally, mercy was puzzled. the speech sounded quite mad, and yet he could not be mad, he had danced so well! she took comfort that her father was close behind. "did you never feel," he resumed, "as if you could not anyhow get room enough?" "no," answered mercy, "never." ian fell a thinking how to wake in her a feeling of what he meant. he had perceived that one of the first elements in human education is the sense of space--of which sense, probably, the star-dwelt heaven is the first awakener. he believed that without the heavens we could not have learned the largeness in things below them, could not, for instance, have felt the mystery of the high-ascending gothic roof--for without the greater we cannot interpret the less; and he thought that to have the sense of largeness developed might be to come a little nearer to the truth of things, to the recognition of spiritual relations. "did you ever see anything very big?" he asked. "i suppose london is as big as most things!" she answered, after a moment. "did you ever see london?" he asked. "we generally live there half the year." "pardon me; i did not ask if you had ever been to london," said ian; "i asked if you had ever seen london." "i know the west end pretty well." "did it ever strike you as very large?" "perhaps not; but the west end is only a part of london." "did you ever see london from the top of st. paul's?" "no." "did you ever see it from the top of hampstead heath?" "i have been there several times, but i don't remember seeing london from it. we don't go to london for the sights." "then you have not seen london!" mercy was annoyed. ian did not notice that she was, else perhaps he would not have gone on--which would have been a pity, for a little annoyance would do her no harm. at the same time the mood was not favourable to receiving any impression from the region of the things that are not seen. a pause followed. "it is so delightful," said ian at length, "to come out of the motion and the heat and the narrowness into the still, cold greatness!" "you seemed to be enjoying yourself pretty well notwithstanding, captain macruadh!" "what made you think so?" he asked, turning to her with a smile. "you were so merry--not with me--you think me only a stupid lowland girl; but the other young persons you danced with, laughed very much at things you said to them." "you are right; i did enjoy myself. as often as one comes near a simple human heart, one's own heart finds a little room." ere she knew, mercy had said-- "and you didn't find any room with me?" with the sound of her words her face grew hot, as with a furnace-blast, even in the frosty night-air. she would have covered what she had said, but only stammered. ian turned, and looking at her, said with a gentle gravity-- "you must not be offended with me! i must answer you truly.--you do not give me room: have you not just told me you never longed for any yourself?" "one ought to be independent!" said mercy, a little nettled. "are you sure of that? what is called independence may really be want of sympathy. that would indicate a kind of loneliness anything but good." "i wish you would find a less disagreeable companion then!--one that would at least be as good as nobody! i am sorry i don't know how to give you room. i would if i could. tell me how." again ian turned to her: was it possible there were tears in her voice? but her black eyes were flashing in the starlight! "did you ever read zanoni?" he asked. "i never heard of it. what is it?" "a romance of bulwer's." "my father won't let us read anything of bulwer's. does he write very wicked books?" "the one i speak of," said ian, "is not wicked, though it is full of rubbish, and its religion is very false." whether mercy meant to take her revenge on him with consciously bad logic, i am in doubt. "captain macruadh! you astonish me! a scotchman speak so of religion!" "i spoke of the religion in that book. i said it was false--which is the same as saying it was not religion." "then religion is not all true!" "all true religion is true," said ian, inclined to laugh like one that thought to catch an angel, and had clutched a bat! "i was going on to say that, though the religion and philosophy of the book were rubbish, the story was fundamentally a grand conception. it puzzles me to think how a man could start with such an idea, and work it out so well, and yet be so lacking both in insight and logic. it is wonderful how much of one portion of our nature may be developed along with so little of another!" "what is the story about?" asked mercy. "what i may call the canvas of it, speaking as if it were a picture, is the idea that the whole of space is full of life; that, as the smallest drop of water is crowded with monsters of hideous forms and dispositions, so is what we call space full of living creatures,--" "how horrible!" "--not all monsters, however. there are among them creatures not altogether differing from us, but differing much from each other,--" "as much as you and i?" "--some of them lovely and friendly, others frightful in their beauty and malignity,--" "what nonsense!" "why do you call it nonsense?" "how could anything beautiful be frightful?" "i ought not to have said beautiful. but the frightfullest face i ever saw ought to have been the finest. when the lady that owned it spoke to me, i shivered." "but anyhow the whole thing is nonsense!" "how is it nonsense?" "because there are no such creatures." "how do you know that? another may have seen them though you and i never did!" "you are making game of me! you think to make me believe anything you choose!" "will you tell me something you do believe?" "that you may prove immediately that i do not believe it!" she retorted, with more insight than he had expected. "--you are not very entertaining!" "would you like me to tell you a story then?" "will it be nonsense?" "no." "i should like a little nonsense." "you are an angel of goodness, and as wise as you are lovely!" said ian. she turned upon him, and opened wide at him her great black eyes, in which were mingled defiance and question. "your reasoning is worthy of your intellect. when you dance," he went on, looking very solemn, "your foot would not bend the neck of a daisy asleep in its rosy crown. the west wind of may haunts you with its twilight-odours; and when you waltz, so have i seen the waterspout gyrate on the blue floor of the mediterranean. your voice is as the harp of selma; and when you look out of your welkin eyes--no! there i am wrong! allow me!--ah, i thought so!--dark as erebus!--but what!" for mercy, perceiving at last that he was treating her like the silliest of small girls, lost her patience, and burst into tears. "you are dreadfully rude!" she sobbed. ian was vexed with himself. "you asked me to talk nonsense to you, miss mercy! i attempted to obey you, and have done it stupidly. but at least it was absolute nonsense! shall i make up for it by telling you a pretty story?" "anything to put away that!" answered mercy, trying to smile. he began at once, and told her a wonderful tale--told first after this fashion by bob of the angels, at a winter-night gathering of the women, as they carded and spun their wool, and reeled their yarn together. it was one well-known in the country, but rob had filled it after his fancy with imaginative turns and spiritual hints, unappreciable by the tall child of seventeen walking by ian's side. there was not among the maidens of the poor village one who would not have understood it better than she. it took her fancy notwithstanding, partly, perhaps, from its unlikeness to any story she had ever heard before. her childhood had been starved on the husks of new fairy-tales, all invention and no imagination, than which more unnourishing food was never offered to god's children. the story ian told her under that skyful of stars, was as rob of the angels had dressed it for the clan matrons and maidens, only altered a very little for the ears of the lowland girl. end of vol. i. proofreading team. what's mine's mine by george macdonald in three volumes vol. ii. contents of vol. ii. chapter i. the story told by ian ii. rob of the angels iii. at the new house iv. the brothers v. the princess vi. the two pairs vii. an cabrach mor viii. the stag's head ix. annie of the shop x. the encounter xi. a lesson xii. nature xiii. granny angry xiv. change xv. love allodial xvi. mercy calls on grannie xvii. in the tomb whats's mine's mine. chapter i. the story told by ian. "there was once a woman whose husband was well to do, but he died and left her, and then she sank into poverty. she did her best; but she had a large family, and work was hard to find, and hard to do when it was found, and hardly paid when it was done. only hearts of grace can understand the struggles of the poor--with everything but god against them! but she trusted in god, and said whatever he pleased must be right, whether he sent it with his own hand or not. "now, whether it was that she could not find them enough to eat, or that she could not keep them warm enough, i do not know; i do not think it was that they had not gladness enough, which is as necessary for young things as food and air and sun, for it is wonderful on how little a child can be happy; but whatever was the cause, they began to die. one after the other sickened and lay down, and did not rise again; and for a time her life was just a waiting upon death. she would have wanted to die herself, but that there was always another to die first; she had to see them all safe home before she dared wish to go herself. but at length the last of them was gone, and then when she had no more to provide for, the heart of work went out of her: where was the good of working for herself! there was no interest in it! but she knew it was the will of god she should work and eat until he chose to take her back to himself; so she worked on for her living while she would much rather have worked for her dying; and comforted herself that every day brought death a day nearer. then she fell ill herself, and could work no more, and thought god was going to let her die; for, able to win her bread no longer, surely she was free to lie down and wait for death! but just as she was going to her bed for the last time, she bethought herself that she was bound to give her neighbour the chance of doing a good deed: and felt that any creature dying at her door without letting her know he was in want, would do her a great wrong. she saw it was the will of god that she should beg, so put on her clothes again, and went out to beg. it was sore work, and she said so to the priest. but the priest told her she need not mind, for our lord himself lived by the kindness of the women who went about with him. they knew he could not make a living for his own body and a living for the souls of so many as well, and the least they could do was to keep him alive who was making them alive. she said that was very true; but he was all the time doing everything for everybody, and she was doing nothing for anybody. the priest was a wise man, and did not tell her how she had, since ever he knew her, been doing the work of god in his heart, helping him to believe and trust in god; so that in fact, when he was preaching, she was preaching. he did not tell her that, i say, for he was jealous over her beauty, and would have christ's beloved sheep enter his holy kingdom with her wool white, however torn it might be. so he left her to think she was nobody at all; and told her that, whether she was worth keeping alive or not, whether she was worth begging for or not, whether it was a disgrace or an honour to beg, all was one, for it was the will of god that she should beg, and there was no word more to be said, and no thought more to be thought about it. to this she heartily agreed, and did beg--enough to keep her alive, and no more. "but at last she saw she must leave that part of the country, and go back to the place her husband took her from. for the people about her were very poor, and she thought it hard on them to have to help a stranger like her; also her own people would want her to bury. for you must know that in the clans, marriage was thought to be dissolved by death, so far at least as the body was concerned; therefore the body of a dead wife was generally carried back to the burial place of her own people, there to be gathered to her fathers. so the woman set out for her own country, begging her way thither. nor had she any difficulty, for there were not a few poor people on her way, and the poor are the readiest to help the poor, also to know whether a person is one that ought to be helped or not. "one night she came to a farm house where a rich miserly farmer dwelt. she knew about him, and had not meant to stop there, but she was weary, and the sun went down as she reached his gate, and she felt as if she could go no farther. so she went up to the door and knocked, and asked if she could have a nights lodging. the woman who opened to her went and asked the farmer. now the old man did not like hospitality, and in particular to such as stood most in need of it; he did not enjoy throwing away money! at the same time, however, he was very fond of hearing all the country rumours; and he thought with himself he would buy her news with a scrap of what was going, and a shake-down at the foot of the wall. so he told his servant to bring her in. "he received her not unkindly, for he wanted her to talk; and he let her have a share of the supper, such as it was. but not until he had asked every question about everybody he could think of, and drawn her own history from her as well, would he allow her to have the rest she so much needed. "now it was a poor house, like most in the country, and nearly without partitions. the old man had his warm box-bed, and slept on feathers where no draught could reach him, and the poor woman had her bed of short rumpled straw on the earthen floor at the foot of the wall in the coldest corner. yet the heart of the man had been moved by her story, for, without dwelling on her sufferings, she had been honest in telling it. he had indeed, ere he went to sleep, thanked god that he was so much better off than she. for if he did not think it the duty of the rich man to share with his neighbours, he at least thought it his duty to thank god for his being richer than they. "now it may well seem strange that such a man should be privileged to see a vision; but we do read in the bible of a prophet who did not even know his duty to an ass, so that the ass had to teach it him. and the man alone saw the vision; the woman saw nothing of it. but she did not require to see any vision, for she had truth in the inward parts, which is better than all visions. the vision was on this wise:--in the middle of the night the man came wide awake, and looking out of his bed, saw the door open, and a light come in, burning like a star, of a faint rosy colour, unlike any light he had ever before seen. another and another came in, and more yet, until he counted six of them. they moved near the floor, but he could not see clearly what sort of little creatures they were that were carrying them. they went up to the woman's bed, and walked slowly round it in a hovering kind of a way, stopping, and moving up and down, and going on again; and when they had done this three times, they went slowly out of the door again, stopping for a moment several times as they went. "he fell asleep, and waking not very early, was surprised to see his guest still on her hard couch--as quiet as any rich woman, he said to himself, on her feather bed. he woke her, told her he wondered she should sleep so far into the morning, and narrated the curious vision he had had. 'does not that explain to you,' she said, 'how it is that i have slept so long? those were my dead children you saw come to me. they died young, without any sin, and god lets them come and comfort their poor sinful mother. i often see them in my dreams. if, when i am gone, you will look at my bed, you will find every straw laid straight and smooth. that is what they were doing last night.' then she gave him thanks for good fare and good rest, and took her way to her own, leaving the farmer better pleased with himself than he had been for a long time, partly because there had been granted him a vision from heaven. "at last the woman died, and was carried by angels into abraham's bosom. she was now with her own people indeed, that is, with god and all the good. the old farmer did not know of her death till a long time after; but it was upon the night she died, as near as he could then make out, that he dreamed a wonderful dream. he never told it to any but the priest from whom he sought comfort when he lay dying; and the priest did not tell it till after everybody belonging to the old man was gone. this was the dream:-- "he was lying awake in his own bed, as he thought, in the dark night, when the poor woman came in at the door, having in her hand a wax candle, but not alight. he said to her, 'you extravagant woman! where did you get that candle?' she answered, 'it was put into my hand when i died, with the word that i was to wander till i found a fire at which to light it.' 'there!' said he, 'there's the rested fire! blow and get a light, poor thing! it shall never be said i refused a body a light!' she went to the hearth, and began to blow at the smouldering peat; but, for all she kept trying, she could not light her candle. the old man thought it was because she was dead, not because he was dead in sin, and losing his patience, cried, 'you foolish woman! haven't you wit enough left to light a candle? it's small wonder you came to beggary!' still she went on trying, but the more she tried, the blacker grew the peat she was blowing at. it would indeed blaze up at her breath, but the moment she brought the candle near it to catch the flame, it grew black, and each time blacker than before. 'tut! give me the candle,' cried the farmer, springing out of bed; 'i will light it for you!' but as he stretched out his hand to take it, the woman disappeared, and he saw that the fire was dead out. 'here's a fine business!' he said. 'how am i to get a light?' for he was miles from the next house. and with that he turned to go back to his bed. when he came near it, he saw somebody lying in it. 'what! has the carline got into my very bed?' he cried, and went to drive her out of the bed and out of the house. but when he came close, he saw it was himself lying there, and knew that at least he was out of the body, if not downright dead. the next moment he found himself on the moor, following the woman, some distance before him, with her unlighted candle still in her hand. he walked as fast as he could to get up with her, but could not; he called after her, but she did not seem to hear. "when first he set out, he knew every step of the ground, but by and by he ceased to know it. the moor stretched out endlessly, and the woman walked on and on. without a thought of turning back, he followed. at length he saw a gate, seemingly in the side of a hill. the woman knocked, and by the time it opened, he was near enough to hear what passed. it was a grave and stately, but very happy-looking man that opened it, and he knew at once it was st. peter. when he saw the woman, he stooped and kissed her. the same moment a light shone from her, and the old man thought her candle was lighted at last; but presently he saw it was her head that gave out the shining. and he heard her say, 'i pray you, st. peter, remember the rich tenant of balmacoy; he gave me shelter one whole night, and would have let me light my candle but i could not.' st. peter answered, 'his fire was not fire enough to light your candle, and the bed he gave you was of short straw!' 'true, st. peter,' said the woman, 'but he gave me some supper, and it is hard for a rich man to be generous! you may say the supper was not very good, but at least it was more than a cup of cold water!' 'yes, verily!' answered the saint, 'but he did not give it you because you loved god, or because you were in need of it, but because he wanted to hear your news.' then the woman was sad, for she could not think of anything more to say for the poor old rich man. and st. peter saw that she was sad, and said, 'but if he die to-night, he shall have a place inside the gate, because you pray for him. he shall lie there!' and he pointed to just such a bed of short crumpled straw as she had lain upon in his house. but she said, 'st. peter, you ought to be ashamed of yourself! is that the kind of welcome to give a poor new-dead man? where then would he have lain if i had not prayed for him?' 'in the dog-kennel outside there,' answered st. peter. 'oh, then, please, let me go back and warn him what comes of loving money!' she pleaded. 'that is not necessary,' he replied; 'the man is hearing every word you and i are this moment saying to each other.' 'i am so glad!' rejoined the woman; 'it will make him repent.' 'he will not be a straw the better for it!' answered the saint. 'he thinks now that he will do differently, and perhaps when he wakes will think so still; but in a day or two he will mock at it as a foolish dream. to gather money will seem to him common sense, and to lay up treasure in heaven nonsense. a bird in the hand will be to him worth ten in the heavenly bush. and the end will be that he will not get the straw inside the gate, and there will be many worse places than the dog-kennel too good for him!' with that he woke. "'what an odd dream!' he said to himself. 'i had better mind what i am about!' so he was better that day, eating and drinking more freely, and giving more to his people. but the rest of the week he was worse than ever, trying to save what he had that day spent, and so he went on growing worse. when he found himself dying, the terror of his dream came upon him, and he told all to the priest. but the priest could not comfort him." by the time the story was over, to which mercy had listened without a word, they were alone in the great starry night, on the side of a hill, with the snow high above them, and the heavens above the snow, and the stars above the heavens, and god above and below everything. only ian felt his presence. mercy had not missed him yet. she did not see much in the tale: how could she? it was very odd, she thought, but not very interesting. she had expected a tale of clan-feud, or a love-story! yet the seriousness of her companion in its narration had made some impression upon her. "they told me you were an officer," she said, "but i see you are a clergyman! do you tell stories like that from the pulpit?" "i am a soldier," answered ian, "not a clergyman. but i have heard my father tell such a story from the pulpit." ian imagined himself foiled in his attempt to interest the maiden. if he was, it would not be surprising. he had not the least desire to commend himself to the girl; and he would not talk rubbish even to a child. there is sensible and senseless nonsense, good absurdity and bad. as mercy recounted to her sister the story ian had told her, it certainly was silly enough. she had retained but the withered stalk and leaves; the strange flower was gone. christina judged it hardly a story for a gentleman to tell a lady. they returned almost in silence to find the table laid, a plentiful supper spread, and the company seated. after supper came singing of songs, saying of ballads, and telling of tales. i know with what incredulity many highlanders will read of a merry-making in their own country at which no horn went round, no punch-bowl was filled and emptied without stint! but the clearer the brain, the better justice is done to the more etherial wine of the soul. of several of the old songs christina begged the tunes, but was disappointed to find that, as she could not take them down, so the singers of them could not set them down. in the tales she found no interest. the hostess sang to her harp, and made to revering listeners eloquent music, for her high clear tones had not yet lost their sweetness, and she had some art to come in aid of her much feeling: loud murmurs of delight, in the soft strange tongue of the songs themselves, followed the profound silence with which they were heard, but christina wondered what there was to applaud. she could not herself sing without accompaniment, and when she left, it was with a regretful feeling that she had not distinguished herself. naturally, as they went home, the guests from the new house had much fun over the queer fashions and poverty--stricken company, the harp and the bagpipes, the horrible haggis, the wild minor songs, and the unintelligible stories and jokes; but the ladies agreed that the macruadh was a splendid fellow. chapter ii rob of the angels. among the peasantry assembled at the feast, were two that had neither danced, nor seated themselves at the long table where all were welcome. mercy wondered what might be the reason of their separation. her first thought was that they must be somehow, she could not well imagine how, in lower position than any of the rest--had perhaps offended against the law, perhaps been in prison, and so the rest would not keep company with them; or perhaps they were beggars who did not belong to the clan, and therefore, although fed, were not allowed to eat with it! but she soon saw she must be wrong in each conjecture; for if there was any avoiding, it was on the part of the two: every one, it was clear, was almost on the alert to wait upon them. they seemed indeed rather persons of distinction than outcasts; for it was with something like homage, except for a certain coaxing tone in the speech of the ministrants, that they were attended. they had to help themselves to nothing; everything was carried to them. now one, now another, where all were guests and all were servants, would rise from the table to offer them something, or see what they would choose or might be in want of, while they partook with the same dignity and self-restraint that was to be noted in all. the elder was a man about five-and-fifty, tall and lean, with a wiry frame, dark grizzled hair, and a shaven face. his dress, which was in the style of the country, was very poor, but decent; only his plaid was large and thick, and bright compared with the rest of his apparel: it was a present he had had from his clan-some giving the wool, and others the labour in carding, dyeing, and weaving it. he carried himself like a soldier-which he had never been, though his father had. his eyes were remarkably clear and keen, and the way he used them could hardly fail to attract attention. every now and then they would suddenly fix themselves with a gaze of earnest inquiry, which would either grow to perception, or presently melt away and let his glance go gently roving, ready to receive, but looking for nothing. his face was very brown and healthy, with marked and handsome features. its expression seemed at first a little severe, but soon, to reading eyes, disclosed patience and tenderness. at the same time there was in it a something indescribably unlike the other faces present-and indeed his whole person and carriage were similarly peculiar. had mercy, however, spent on him a little more attention, the peculiarity would have explained itself. she would have seen that, although everybody spoke to him, he never spoke in reply--only made signs, sometimes with his lips, oftener with hand or head: the man was deaf and dumb. but such was the keenness of his observation that he understood everything said to him by one he knew, and much from the lips of a stranger. his companion was a youth whose age it would have been difficult to guess. he looked a lad, and was not far from thirty. his clothing was much like his father's--poor enough, yet with the air of being a better suit than that worn every day. he was very pale and curiously freckled, with great gray eyes like his father's, which had however an altogether different expression. they looked dreamy, and seemed almost careless of what passed before them, though now and then a certain quick, sharp turn of the head showed him not devoid of attention. the relation between the two was strangely interesting. day and night they were inseparable. because the father was deaf, the son gave all his attention to the sounds of the world; his soul sat in his ears, ever awake, ever listening; while such was his confidence in his father's sight, that he scarcely troubled himself to look where he set his feet. his expression also was peculiar, partly from this cause, mainly from a deeper. it was a far-away look, which a common glance would have taken to indicate that he was "not all there." in a lowland parish he would have been regarded as little better than a gifted idiot; in the mountains he was looked upon as a seer, one in communion with higher powers. whether his people were of this opinion from being all fools together, and therefore unable to know a fool, or the lowland authorities would have been right in taking charge of him, let him who pleases judge or misjudge for himself. what his own thought of him came out in the name they gave him: "rob of the angels," they called him. he was nearly a foot shorter than his father, and very thin. some said he looked always cold; but i think that came of the wonderful peace on his face, like the quiet of a lake over which lies a thin mist. never was stronger or fuller devotion manifested by son to father than by rob of the angels to hector of the stags. his filial love and faith were perfect. while they were together, he was in his own calm elysium; when they were apart, which was seldom for more than a few minutes, his spirit seemed always waiting. i believe his notions of god his father, and hector his father, were strangely mingled--the more perhaps that the two fathers were equally silent. it would have been a valuable revelation to some theologians to see in those two what _love_ might mean. so gentle was rob of the angels, that all the women, down to the youngest maid-child, gave him a compassionate, mother-like love. he had lost his mother when he was an infant; the father had brought him up with his own hand, and from the moment of his mother's departure had scarce let him out of his sight; but the whole woman-remnant of the clan was as a mother to the boy. and from the first they had so talked to him of his mother, greatly no doubt through the feeling that from his father he could learn nothing of her, that now his mother seemed to him everywhere: he could not see god; why should not his mother be there though he could not see her! no wonder the man was peaceful! many would be inclined to call the two but poachers and vagabonds--vagabonds because they lived in houses not quite made with hands, for they had several dwellings that were mostly caves--which yet they contrived to make warm and comfortable; and poachers because they lived by the creatures which god scatters on his hills for his humans. let those who inherit or purchase, avenge the breach of law; but let them not wonder when those who are disinherited and sold, cry out against the breach of higher law! the land here had never, partly from the troubles besetting its owners, but more from their regard for the poor, of the clan, been with any care preserved; little notice was ever taken of what game was killed, or who killed it. at the same time any wish of the chief with regard to the deer, of which rob's father for one knew every antlered head, was rigidly respected. as to the parts which became the property of others-the boundaries between were not very definite, and sale could ill change habits, especially where owners were but beginning to bestir themselves about the deer, or any of the wild animals called game. hector and rob led their life with untroubled conscience and easy mind. in a world of the devil, where the justification of existence lay in money on the one side, and work for money on the other, there could be no justification of the existence of these men; but this world does not belong to the devil, though it may often seem as if it did, and father and son lived and enjoyed life, as in a manner so to a decree unintelligible to him who, without his money and its consolations, would know himself in the hell he has not yet recognized. neither of them could read or write; neither of them had a penny laid by for wet weather; neither of them would leave any memory beyond their generation; the will of neither would be laid up in doctors' commons; neither of the two would leave on record a single fact concerning one of the animals whose ways and habits they knew better than any other man in the highlands; that they were nothing, and worth nothing to anybody--even to themselves, would have been the judgment of most strangers concerning them; but god knew what a life of unspeakable pleasures it was that he had given them-a life the change from which to the life beyond, would scarce be distracting: neither would find himself much out of doors when he died. to bob of the angels tow could abraham's bosom feel strange, accustomed to lie night after night, star-melted and soft-breathing, or snow-ghastly and howling, with his head on--the bosom of hector of the stags-an abraham who could as ill do without his isaac, as his isaac without him! the father trusted his son's hearing as implicitly as his own sight. when he saw a certain look come on his face, he would drop on the instant, and crouch as still as if he had ears and knew what noise was, watching kob's face for news of some sound wandering through the vast of the night. it seemed at times, however, as if either he was not quite deaf, or he had some gift that went toward compensation. to all motion about him he was sensitive as no other man. i am afraid to say from how far off the solid earth would convey to him the vibration of a stag's footstep. bob sometimes thought his cheek must feel the wind of a sound to which his ear was irresponsive. beyond a doubt he was occasionally aware of the proximity of an animal, and knew what animal it was, of which rob had no intimation. his being, corporeal and spiritual, seemed, to the ceaseless vibrations of the great globe, a very seismograph. often would he make his sign to kob to lay his ear on the ground and listen, when no indication had reached the latter. i suspect the exceptional development in him of some sense rudimentary in us all. he had the keenest eyes in glenruadh, and was a dead shot. even the chief was not his equal. yet he never stalked a deer, never killed anything, for mere sport. i am not certain he never had, but for rob of the angels, he had the deep-rooted feeling of his chief in regard to the animals. what they wanted for food, they would kill; but it was not much they needed, for seldom can two men have lived on less, and they had positively not a greed of any kind between them. if their necessity was meal or potatoes, they would carry grouse or hares down the glen, or arrange with some farmer's wife, perhaps mrs. macruadh herself, for the haunches of a doe; but they never killed from pleasure in killing. of creatures destructive to game they killed enough to do far more than make up for all the game they took; and for the skins of ermine and stoat and fox and otter they could always get money's worth; money itself they never sought or had. if the little birds be regarded as earning the fruit and seed they devour by the grubs and slugs they destroy, then hector of the stags and rob of the angels also thoroughly earned their food. when a trustworthy messenger was wanted, and rob was within reach, he was sure to be employed. but not even then were his father and he quite parted. hector would shoulder his gun, and follow in the track of his fleet-footed son till he met him returning. for what was life to hector but to be with rob! was his mary's son to go about the world unattended! he had a yet stronger feeling than any of the clan that his son was not of the common race of mortals. to hector also, after their own fashion, would rob of the angels tell the tales that suggested the name his clanspeople gave him--wonderful tales of the high mountain-nights, the actors in them for the most part angels. whether rob believed he had intercourse with such beings, heard them speak, and saw them, do the things he reported, i cannot tell: it may be that, like any other poet of good things, he but saw and believed the things his tales meant, the things with which he represented the angels as dealing, and concerning which he told their sayings. to the eyes of those who knew him, rob seemed just the sort of person with whom the angels might be well pleased to hold converse: was he not simplicity itself, truth, generosity, helpfulness? did he not, when a child, all but lose his life in the rescue of an idiot from the swollen burn? did he not, when a boy, fight a great golden eagle on its nest, thinking to deliver the lamb it had carried away? knowing his father in want of a new bonnet, did not rob with his bare hands seize an otter at the mouth of its hole, and carry it home, laughing merrily over the wounds it had given him? his voice had in it a strangely peculiar tone, making it seem not of this world. especially after he had been talking for some time, it would appear to come from far away, not from the lips of the man looking you in the face. it was wonderful with what solemnity of speech, and purity of form he would tell his tales. so much in solitude with his dumb father, his speech might well be unlike the speech of other men; but whence the impression of cultivation it produced? when the christmas party broke up, most of the guests took the road toward the village, the chief and his brother accompanying them part of the way. of these were rob and his father, walking hand in hand, hector looking straight before him, rob gazing up into the heavens, as if holding counsel with the stars. "are you seeing any angels, rob?" asked a gentle girl of ten. "well, and i'm not sure," answered rob of the angels. "sure you can tell whether you see anything!" "oh, yes, i see! but it is not easy to tell what will be an angel and what will not. there's so much all blue up there, it might be full of angels and none of us see one of them!" "do tell us what you see, rob, dear rob," said the girl. "well, and i will tell you. i think i see many heads close together, talking." "and can you hear what they will be saying?" "some of it." "tell me, do tell me-some-just a little." "well then, they are saying, one to the other--not very plain, but i can hear--they are saying, 'i wonder when people will be good! it would be so easy, if only they would mean it, and begin when they are little!' that's what they are saying as they look down on us walking along." "that will be good advice, rob!" said one of the women. "and," he resumed, "they are saying now--at least that is what it sounds to me--'i wish women were as good as they were when they were little girls!'" "now i know they are not saying that!" remarked the woman. "how should the angels trouble themselves about us! rob, dear, confess you are making it up, because the child would be asking you." rob made no answer, but some saw him smile a curious smile. rob would never defend anything he had said, or dispute anything another said. after a moment or two, he spoke again. "shall i be telling you what i heard them saying to each other this last night of all?" he asked. "yes, do, do!" "it was upon dorrachbeg; and there were two of them. they were sitting together in the moon--in the correi on the side of the hill over the village. i was lying in a bush near them, for i could not sleep, and came out, and the night was not cold. now i would never be so bad-mannered as to listen where persons did not want me to hear." "what were they like, rob, dear?" interrupted the girl. "that does not matter much," answered rob; "but they were white, and their eyes not so white, but brighter; for so many sad things go in at their eyes when they come down to the earth, that it makes them dark." "how could they be brighter and darker both at once?" asked the girl, very pertinently. "i will tell you," answered rob. "the dark things that go in at their eyes, they have to burn them in the fire of faith; and it is the fire of that burning that makes their eyes bright; it is the fire of their faith burning up the sad things they see." "oh, yes! i understand now!" said the girl. "and what were their clothes like, rob?" "when you see the angels, you don't think much about their clothes." "and what were they saying?" "i spoke first--the moment i saw them, for i was not sure they knew that i was there. i said, 'i am here, gentlemen.' 'yes, we know that,' they answered. 'are you far from home, gentlemen?' i asked. 'it is all one for that,' they answered. 'well,' said i, 'it is true, gentlemen, for you seem as much at home here on the side of dorrachbeg, as if it was a hill in paradise!' 'and how do you know it is not?' said they. 'because i see people do upon it as they would not in paradise,' i answered. 'ah!' said one of them, 'the hill may be in paradise, and the people not! but you cannot understand these things.' 'i think i do,' i said; 'but surely, if you did let them know they were on a hill in paradise, they would not do as they do!' 'it would be no use telling them,' said he; 'but, oh, how they spoil the house!' 'are the red deer, and the hares, and the birds in paradise?' i asked. 'certain sure!' he answered. 'do they know it?' said i. 'no, it is not necessary for them; but they will know it one day.' 'you do not mind your little brother asking you questions?' i said. 'ask a hundred, if you will, little brother,' he replied. 'then tell me why you are down here to-night.' 'my friend and i came out for a walk, and we thought we would look to see when the village down there will have to be reaped.' 'what do you mean?' i said. 'you cannot see what we see,' they answered; 'but a human place is like a flower, or a field of corn, and grows ripe, or won't grow ripe, and then some of us up there have to sharpen our sickles.' 'what!' said i, for a great fear came upon me, 'they are not wicked people down there!' 'no, not very wicked, but slow and dull.' then i could say nothing more for a while, and they did not speak either, but sat looking before them. 'can you go and come as you please?' i asked at length. 'yes, just as we are sent,' they answered. 'would you not like better to go and come of yourselves, as my father and i do?' i said. 'no,' answered both of them, and something in their one voice almost frightened me; 'it is better than everything to go where we are sent. if we had to go and come at our own will, we should be miserable, for we do not love our own will.' 'not love your own will?' 'no, not at all!' 'why?' 'because there is one--oh, ever so much better! when you and your father are quite good, you will not be left to go and come at your own will any more than we are.' and i cried out, and said, 'oh, dear angel! you frighten me!' and he said, 'that is because you are only a man, and not a--' now i am not sure of the word he said next; bat i think it was christian; and i do not quite know what the word meant." "oh, rob, dear! everybody knows that!" exclaimed the girl. but rob said no more. while he was talking, alister had come up behind him, with annie of the shop, and he said-- "rob, my friend, i know what you mean, and i want to hear the rest of it: what did the angels say next?" "they said," answered rob, "--'was it your will set you on this beautiful hill, with all these things to love, with such air to breathe, such a father as you've got, and such grand deer about you?' 'no,' i answered. 'then,' said the angel, 'there must be a better will than yours, for you would never have even thought of such things!' 'how could i, when i wasn't made?' said i. 'there it is!' he returned, and said no more. i looked up, and the moon was shining, and there were no angels on the stone. but a little way off was my father, come out to see what had become of me." "now did you really see and hear all that, rob?" said alister. rob smiled a beautiful smile--with something in it common people would call idiotic--stopped and turned, took the chief's hand, and carried it to his lips; but not a word more would he speak, and soon they came where the path of the two turned away over the hill. "will you not come and sleep at our house?" said one of the company. but they made kindly excuse. "the hill-side would miss us; we are expected home!" said rob--and away they climbed to their hut, a hollow in a limestone rock, with a front wall of turf, there to sleep side by side till the morning came, or, as rob would have said, "till the wind of the sun woke them." rob of the angels made songs, and would sing one sometimes; but they were in gaelic, and the more poetic a thing, the more inadequate at least, if not stupid is its translation. he had all the old legends of the country in his head, and many stories of ghosts and of the second sight. these stories he would tell exactly as he had heard them, showing he believed every word of them; but with such of the legends as were plainly no other than poetic inventions, he would take what liberties he pleased--and they lost nothing by it; for he not only gave them touches of fresh interest, but sent glimmering through them hints of something higher, of which ordinary natures perceived nothing, while others were dimly aware of a loftier intent: according to his listeners was their hearing. in rob's stories, as in all the finer work of genius, a man would find as much as, and no more than, he was capable of. ian's opinion of rob was even higher than alister's. "what do you think, ian, of the stories rob of the angels tells?" asked alister, as they walked home. "that the lord has chosen the weak things of the world to confound the mighty," answered ian. "tut! rob confounds nobody." "he confounds me," returned ian. "does he believe what he tells?" "he believes all of it that is to be believed," replied ian. "you are as bad as he!" rejoined alister. "there is no telling, sometimes, what you mean!" "tell me this, alister: can a thing be believed that is not true?" "yes, certainly!" "i say, no. can you eat that which is not bread?" "i have seen a poor fellow gnawing a stick for hunger!" answered alister. "yes, gnawing! but gnawing is not eating. did the poor fellow eat the stick? that is just it! many a man will gnaw at a lie all his life, and perish of want. i mean lie, of course, the real lie--a thing which is in its nature false. he may gnaw at it, he may even swallow it, but i deny that he can believe it. there is not that in it which can be believed; at most it can but be supposed to be true. belief is another thing. truth is alone the correlate of belief, just as air is for the lungs, just as form and colour are for the sight. a lie can no more be believed than carbonic acid can be breathed. it goes into the lungs, true, and a lie goes into the mind, but both kill; the one is not breathed, the other is not believed. the thing that is not true cannot find its way to the home of faith; if it could, it would be at once rejected with a loathing beyond utterance; to a pure soul, which alone can believe, nothing is so loathsome as a pretence of truth. a lie is a pretended truth. if there were no truth there could be no lie. as the devil upon god, the very being of a lie depends on that whose opposite and enemy it is. but tell me, alister, do you believe the parables of our lord?" "with all my heart." "was there any real person in our lord's mind when he told that one about the unjust judge?" "i do not suppose there was; but there were doubtless many such." "many who would listen to a poor woman because she plagued them?" "well, it does not matter; what the story teaches is true, and that was what he wanted believed." "just so. the truth in the parables is what they mean, not what they say; and so it is, i think, with rob of the angels' stories. he believes all that can be believed of them. at the same time, to a mind so simple, the spirit of god must have freer entrance than to ours--perhaps even teaches the man by what we call the man's own words. his words may go before his ideas--his higher ideas at least--his ideas follow after his words. as the half-thoughts pass through his mind--who can say how much generated by himself, how much directly suggested by the eternal thought in which his spirit lives and breathes!--he drinks and is refreshed. i am convinced that nowhere so much as in the highest knowledge of all--what the people above count knowledge--will the fulfilment of the saying of our lord, "many first shall be last, and the last first," cause astonishment; that a man who has been leader of the age's opinion, may be immeasurably behind another whom he would have shut up in a mad-house. depend upon it, things go on in the soul of that rob of the angels which the angels, whether they come to talk with him or not, would gladly look into. of such as he the angels may one day be the pupils." a silence followed. "do you think the young ladies of the new house could understand rob of the angels, ian?" at length asked alister. "not a bit. i tried the younger, and she is the best.--they could if they would wake up." "you might say that of anybody!" "yes; but there is this among other differences--that some people do not wake up, because they want a new brain first, such as they will get when they die, perhaps; while others do not wake up, because their whole education has been a rocking of them to sleep. and there is this difference between the girls, that the one is full of herself, and the other is not. the one has a close, the other an open mind." "and yet," said alister, "if they heard you say so, the open mind would imagine itself the close, and the close never doubt it was the open!" chapter iii at the new house. the ladies of the new house were not a little surprised the next day when, as they sat waiting their guests, the door of the drawing-room opened, and they saw the young highlanders enter in ordinary evening dress. the plough-driving laird himself looked to christina very much like her patterns of grosvenor-square. it was long since he had worn his dress-coat, and it was certainly a little small for his more fully developed frame, but he carried himself as straight as a rush, and was nowise embarrassed with hands or feet. his hands were brown and large, but they were well shaped, and not ashamed of themselves, being as clean as his heart. out of his hazel eyes, looking in the candle-light nearly as dark as mercy's, went an occasional glance which an emergency might at once develop into a look of command. for ian, he would have attracted attention anywhere, if only from his look of quiet unselfness, and the invariable grace of the movement that broke his marked repose; but his entertainers would doubtless have honoured him more had they understood that his manner was just the same and himself as much at home in the grandest court of europe. the elder ladies got on together pretty well. the widow of the chief tried to explain to her hostess the condition of the country and its people; the latter, though knowing little and caring less about relations beyond those of the family and social circle, nor feeling any purely human responsibility, was yet interested enough to be able to seem more interested than she was; while her sweet smile and sweet manners were very pleasing to one who seldom now had the opportunity of meeting a woman so much on her own level. the gentlemen, too, were tolerably comfortable together. both alister and ian had plenty of talk and anecdote. the latter pleased the ladies with descriptions of northern ways and dresses and manners--perhaps yet more with what pleased the men also, tales of wolf-and bear-shooting. but it seemed odd that, when the talk turned upon the home-shooting called sport, both alister and ian should sit in unsmiling silence. there was in ian a certain playfulness, a subdued merriment, which made mercy doubt her ears after his seriousness of the night before. life seemed to flash from him on all sides, occasionally in a keen stroke of wit, oftener in a humorous presentation of things. his brother alone could see how he would check the witticism on his very lips lest it should hurt. it was in virtue of his tenderness toward everything that had life that he was able to give such narratives of what he had seen, such descriptions of persons he had met. when he told a story, it was with such quiet participation, manifest in the gleam of his gray eyes, in the smile that hovered like the very soul of psyche about his lips, that his hearers enjoyed the telling more than the tale. even the chief listened with eagerness to every word that fell from his brother. the ladies took note that, while the manners of the laird and his mother were in a measure old-fashioned, those of ian were of the latest: with social custom, in its flow of change, he seemed at home. but his ease never for a moment degenerated into the free-and-easy, the dry rot of manners; there was a stateliness in him that dominated the ease, and a courtesy that would not permit frendliness to fall into premature familiarity. he was at ease with his fellows because he respected them, and courteous because he loved them. the ladies withdrew, and with their departure came the time that tests the man whether he be in truth a gentleman. in the presence of women the polish that is not revelation but concealment preserves itself only to vanish with them. how would not some women stand aghast to hear but a specimen of the talk of their heroes at such a time! it had been remarked throughout the dinner that the highlanders took no wine; but it was supposed they were reserving their powers. when they now passed decanter and bottle and jug without filling their glasses, it gave offence to the very soul of mr. peregrine palmer. the bettered custom of the present day had not then made progress enough to affect his table; he was not only fond of a glass of good wine, but had the ambition of the cellar largely developed; he would fain be held a connaisseur in wines, and kept up a good stock of distinguished vintages, from which he had brought of such to glenruadh as would best bear the carriage. having no aspiration, there was room in him for any number of petty ambitions; and it vexed him not to reap the harvest of recognition. "but of course," he said to himself, "no highlander understands anything but whisky!" "you don't mean you're a teetotaler, macruadh!" he said. "no," answered the chief; "i do not call myself one; but i never drink anything strong." "not on christmas-day? of course you make an exception at times; and if at any time, why not on the merriest day of the year? you are under no pledge!" "if that were a reason," returned alister, laughing, "it would rather be one for becoming pledged immediately." "well, you surprise me! and highlanders too! i thought better of all highlanders; they have the reputation of good men at the bottle! you make me sorry to have brought my wine where it meets with no consideration.--mr. ian, you are a man of the world: you will not refuse to pledge me?" "i must, mr. palmer! the fact is, my brother and i have seen so much evil come of the drinking habits of the country, which always get worse in a time of depression, that we dare not give in to them. my father, who was clergyman of the parish before he became head of the clan, was of the same mind before us, and brought us up not to drink. throughout a whole siberian winter i kept the rule." "and got frost-bitten for your pains?" "and found myself nothing the worse." "it's mighty good of you, no doubt!" said the host, with a curl of his shaven lip. "you can hardly call that good which does not involve any self-denial!" remarked alister. "well," said mr. peregrine palmer, "what is the world coming to? all the pith is leaking out of our young men. in another generation we shall have neither soldiers nor sailors nor statesmen!" "on what do you found such a sad conclusion?" inquired ian. "on the growth of asceticism in the young men. believe me, it is necessary to manhood that men when they are young should drink a little, gamble a little, and sow a few wild oats--as necessary as that a nation should found itself by the law of the strongest. how else can we look for the moderation to follow with responsibilities? the vices that are more than excusable in the young, are very properly denied to the married man; the law for him is not the same as for the young man. i do not plead for license, you see; but it will never do for young men to turn ascetics! let the clergy do as they please; they are hardly to be counted men; at least their calling is not a manly one! depend upon it, young men who do not follow the dictates of nature--while they are young, i mean--will never make any mark in the world! they dry up like a nut, brain and all, and have neither spirit, nor wit, nor force of any kind. nature knows best! when i was a young man,--" "pray spare us confession, mr. palmer," said ian. "in our case your doctrine does not enter willing ears, and i should be sorry anything we might feel compelled to say, should have the appearance of personality." "do you suppose i should heed anything you said?" cried the host, betraying the bad blood in his breeding. "is it manners here to prevent a man from speaking his mind at his own table? i say a saint is not a man! a fellow that will neither look at a woman nor drink his glass, is not cut out for man's work in the world!" like a sledge-hammer came the fist of the laird on the table, that the crystal danced and rang. "my god!" he exclaimed, and rose in hugest indignation. ian laid his hand on his arm, and he sat down again. "there may be some misunderstanding, alister," said ian, "between us and our host!--pray, mr. palmer, let us understand each other: do you believe god made woman to be the slave of man? can you believe he ever made a woman that she might be dishonoured?--that a man might caress and despise her?" "i know nothing about god's intentions; all i say is, we must obey the laws of our nature." "is conscience then not a law of our nature? or is it below the level of our instincts? must not the lower laws be subject to the higher? it is a law--for ever broken, yet eternal--that a man is his brother's keeper: still more must he be his sister's keeper. therein is involved all civilization, all national as well as individual growth." mr. peregrine palmer smiled a contemptuous smile. the other young men exchanged glances that seemed to say, "the governor knows what's what!" "such may be the popular feeling in this out-of-the-way spot," said mr. peregrine palmer, "and no doubt it is very praiseworthy, but the world is not of your opinion, gentlemen." "the world has got to come to our opinion," said the laird--at which the young men of the house broke into a laugh. "may we join the ladies?" said ian, rising. "by all means," answered the host, with a laugh meant to be good-humoured; "they are the fittest company for you." as the brothers went up the stair, they heard their host again holding forth; but they would not have been much edified by the slight change of front he had made--to impress on the young men the necessity of moderation in their pleasures. there are two opposite classes related by a like unbelief--those who will not believe in the existence of the good of which they have apprehended no approximate instance, and those who will not believe in the existence of similar evil. i tell the one class, there are men who would cast their very being from them rather than be such as they; and the other, that their shutting of their eyes is no potent reason for the shutting of my mouth. there are multitudes delicate as they, who are compelled to meet evil face to face, and fight with it the sternest of battles: on their side may i be found! what the lord knew and recognized, i will know and recognize too, be shocked who may. i spare them, however, any more of the talk at that dinner-table. only let them take heed lest their refinement involve a very bad selfishness. cursed be the evil thing, not ignored! mrs. palmer, sweet-smiled and clear-eyed, never showed the least indignation at her husband's doctrines. i fear she was devoid of indignation on behalf of others. very far are such from understanding the ways of the all-pardoning, all-punishing father! the three from the cottage were half-way home ere the gentlemen of the new house rose from their wine. then first the mother sought an explanation of the early departure they had suggested. "something went wrong, sons: what was it she said?" "i don't like the men, mother; nor does ian," answered alister gloomily. "take care you are not unjust!" she replied. "you would not have liked mr. palmer's doctrine any better than we did, mother." "what was it?" "we would rather not tell you." "it was not fit for a woman to hear." "then do not tell me. i trust you to defend women." "in god's name we will!" said alister. "there is no occasion for an oath, alister!" said his mother. "alister meant it very solemnly!" said ian. "yes; but it was not necessary--least of all to me. the name of our lord god should lie a precious jewel in the cabinet of our hearts, to be taken out only at great times, and with loving awe." "i shall be careful, mother," answered alister; "but when things make me sorry, or glad, or angry, i always think of god first!" "i understand you; but i fear taking the name of god in vain." "it shall not be in vain, mother!" said the laird. "must it be a breach with our new neighbours?" asked the mother. "it will depend on them. the thing began because we would not drink with them." "you did not make any remark?" "not until our host's remarks called for our reasons. by the way, i should like to know how the man made his money." chapter iv. the brothers. events, then, because of the deeper things whence they came, seemed sorely against any cordial approach of the old and the new houses of glenruadh. but there was a sacred enemy within the stronghold of mr. peregrine palmer, and that enemy forbade him to break with the young highlanders notwithstanding the downright mode in which they had expressed their difference with him: he felt, without knowing it, ashamed of the things he had uttered; they were not such as he would wish proclaimed from the house-tops out of the midst of which rose heavenward the spire of the church he had built; neither did the fact that he would have no man be wicked on sundays, make him feel quite right in urging young men to their swing on other days. christian and sercombe could not but admire the straightforwardness of the brothers; their conventionality could not prevent them from feeling the dignity with which they acted on their convictions. the quixotic young fellows ought not to be cut for their behaviour! they could not court their society, but would treat them with consideration! things could not well happen to bring them into much proximity! what had taken place could not definitely influence the ideas, feelings, or opinions of the young ladies. their father would sooner have had his hand cut off than any word said over that fuliginous dessert reach the ears of his daughters. is it not an absolute damnation of certain evil principles, that many men would be flayed alive rather than let those they love know that they hold them? but see the selfishness of such men: each looks with scorn on the woman he has done his part to degrade, but not an impure breath must reach the ears of his children! another man's he will send to the devil! mr. palmer did, however, communicate something of the conversation to his wife; and although she had neither the spirit, nor the insight, nor the active purity, to tell him he was in the wrong, she did not like the young highlanders the worse. she even thought it a pity the world should have been so made that they could not be in the right. it is wonderful how a bird of the air will carry a matter, and some vaguest impression of what had occurred alighted on the minds of the elder girls--possibly from hints supposed unintelligible, passing between mr. sercombe and christian: something in the social opinions of the two highlanders made those opinions differ much from the opinions prevailing in society! now even mercy had not escaped some notion of things of which the air about her was full; and she felt the glow of a conscious attraction towards men--somehow, she did not know how--like old-fashioned knights errant in their relations to women. the attachment between the brothers was unusual both in kind and degree. alister regarded ian as his better self, through whom to rise above himself; ian looked up to his brother as the head of the family, uniting in himself all ancestral claims, the representative of an ordered and harmonious commonwealth. he saw in alister virtues and powers he did not recognize in himself. his love blossomed into the deeper devotion that he only had been sent to college: he was bound to share with his elder brother what he had learned. so alister got more through ian than he would have got at the best college in the world. for ian was a born teacher, and found intensest delight, not in imparting knowledge--that is a comparatively poor thing--but in leading a mind up to see what it was before incapable of seeing. it was part of the same gift that he always knew when he had not succeeded. in alister he found a wonderful docility--crossed indeed with a great pride, against which he fought sturdily. it is not a good sign of any age that it should find it hard to believe in such simplicity and purity as that of these young men; it is perhaps even a worse sign of our own that we should find it difficult to believe in such love between men. i am sure of this, that a man incapable of loving another man with hearty devotion, can not be capable of loving a woman as a woman ought to be loved. from each other these two kept positively nothing secret. alister had a great love of music, which however had had little development except from the study of the violin, with the assistance of a certain poor enough performer in the village, and what criticism his brother could afford him, who, not himself a player, had heard much good music. but alister was sorely hampered by the fact that his mother could not bear the sound of it. the late chief was one of the few clergymen who played the violin; and at the first wail of the old instrument in the hands of his son, his widow was seized with such a passion of weeping, that alister took the utmost care she should never hear it again, always carrying it to some place too remote for the farthest-travelling tones to reach her. but this was not easy, for sound will travel very far among the hills. at times he would take it to the room behind annie's shop, at times to the hut occupied by hector of the stags: there he would not excruciate his host at least, and rob of the angels would endure anything for his chief. the place which he most preferred was too distant to be often visited; but there, soon after christmas, the brothers now resolved to have a day together, a long talk, and a conference with the violin. on a clear frosty morning in january they set out, provided for a night and two days. the place was upon an upland pasture-ground, yet in their possession: no farm was complete without a range in some high valley for the sheep and cattle in summer. on the north of this valley stood a bare hilltop, whose crest was a limestone rock, rising from the heather about twenty feet. every summer they had spent weeks of their boyhood with the shepherds, in the society of this hill, and one day discovered in its crest a shallow cave, to which thereafter they often took their food, and the book they were reading together. there they read the english ossian, troubled by no ignorant unbelief; and there they made gaelic songs, in which alister excelled, while ian did better in english. when ian was at home in the university-vacations, they were fonder than ever of going to the hill. there ian would pour out to alister of the fullness of his gathered knowledge, and there and then they made their first acquaintance with shakspere. ian had bought some dozen of his plays, in smallest compass and cleanest type, at a penny a piece, and how they revelled in them the long summer evenings! ian had bought also, in a small thick volume, the poems of shelley: these gave them not only large delight, but much to talk about, for they were quite capable of encountering his vague philosophy. then they had their euclid and virgil--and even tried their mental teeth upon dante, but found the commedia without notes too hard a nut for them. every fresh spring, ian brought with him fresh books, and these they read in their cave. but i must not forget the cave itself, which also shared in the progress of its troglodytes. the same week in which they first ate and read in it, they conceived and began to embody the idea of developing the hollow into a house. foraging long ago in their father's library for mental pabulum, they had come upon belzoni's quarto, and had read, with the avidity of imaginative boys, the tale of his discoveries, taking especial delight in his explorations of the tombs of the kings in the rocks of beban el malook: these it was that now suggested excavation. they found serviceable tools about the place at home, and the rock was not quite of the hardest. not a summer, for the last seventeen years, had passed without a good deal being done, alister working alone when ian was away, and the cave had now assumed notable dimensions. it was called by the people uamh an ceann, the cave of the chief, and regarded as his country house. all around it was covered with snow throughout the winter and spring, and supplied little to the need of man beyond the blessed air, and a glorious vision of sea and land, mountain and valley, falling water, gleaming lake, and shadowy cliff. crossing the wide space where so lately they had burned the heather that the sheep might have its young shoots in the spring, the brothers stood, and gazed around with delight. "there is nothing like this anywhere!" said ian. "do you mean nothing so beautiful?" asked alister. "no; i mean just what i say: there is nothing like it. i do not care a straw whether one scene be more or less beautiful than another; what i do care for is--its individual speech to my soul. i feel towards visions of nature as towards writers. if a book or a prospect produces in my mind a mood that no other produces, then i feel it individual, original, real, therefore precious. if a scene or a song play upon the organ of my heart as no other scene or song could, why should i ask at all whether it be beautiful? a bare hill may be more to me than a garden of damascus, but i love them both. the first question as to any work of art is whether it puts the willing soul into any mood at all peculiar; the second, what that mood is. it matters to me little by whom our ossian was composed, and it matters nothing whoever may in his ignorance declare that there never was an ossian any more than a homer: here is a something that has power over my heart and soul, works upon them as not anything else does. i do not ask whether its power be great or small; it is enough that it is a peculiar power, one by itself; that it puts my spiritual consciousness in a certain individual condition, such in character as nothing else can occasion. either a man or a nation must have felt to make me so feel." they were now climbing the last slope of the hill on whose top stood their playhouse, dearer now than in their boyhood. alister occasionally went there for a few hours' solitude, and ian would write there for days at a time, but in general when they visited the place it was together. alister unlocked the door and they entered. unwilling to spend labour on the introductory, they had made the first chamber hardly larger than the room required for opening the door. immediately within, another door opened into a room of about eight feet by twelve, with two small windows. its hearth was a projection from the floor of the live stone; and there, all ready for lighting, was a large pile of peats. the chimney went up through the rock, and had been the most difficult part of their undertaking. they had to work it much wider than was necessary for the smoke, and then to reduce its capacity with stone and lime. now and then it smoked, but peat-smoke is sweet. the first thing after lighting the fire, was to fill their kettle, for which they had to take off the snow-lid of a small spring near at hand. then they made a good meal of tea, mutton-ham, oatcakes and butter. the only seats in the room were a bench in each of two of the walls, and a chair on each side of the hearth, all of the live rock. from this opened two rooms more--one a bedroom, with a bed in the rock-wall, big enough for two. dry heather stood thick between the mattress and the stone. the third room, of which they intended making a parlour, was not yet more than half excavated; and there, when they had rested a while, they began to bore and chip at the stone. their progress was slow, for the grain was close: never, even when the snow above was melting, had the least moisture come through. for a time they worked and talked: both talked better when using their hands. then alister stopped, and played while ian went on; ian stopped next, and read aloud from a manuscript he had brought, while his brother again worked. but first he gave alister the history of what he was going to read. it was suggested, he said, by that strange poem of william mayne's, called "the dead man's moan," founded on the silly notion that the man himself is buried, and not merely his body. "i wish i were up to straught my banes, and drive frae my face the cauld, dead air; i wish i were up, that the friendly rains micht wash the dark mould frae my tangled hair!" quoted ian, and added, "i thought i should like to follow out the idea, and see what ought to come of it. i therefore supposed a person seized by something of the cataleptic kind, from which he comes to himself still in the body, but unable to hold communication with the outer world. he thinks therefore that he is dead and buried. recovering from his first horror, he reflects that, as he did not make himself think and feel, nor can cease to think and feel if he would, there must be somewhere--and where but within himself?--the power by which he thinks and feels, a power whose care it must be, for it can belong to no other, to look after the creature he has made. then comes to him the prayer of job, 'oh that thou wouldst hide me in the grave till thy anger with me was past! then wouldst thou desire to see again the work of thy hands, the creature thou hadst made! then wouldst thou call, and i would answer.' so grandly is the man comforted thereby, that he breaks out in a dumb song of triumph over death and the grave. as its last tone dies in him, a kiss falls upon his lips. it is the farewell of the earth; the same moment he bursts the bonds and rises above the clouds of the body, and enters into the joy of his lord." having thus prepared alister to hear without having to think as well as attend, which is not good for poetry, ian read his verses. i will not trouble my reader with them; i am sure he would not think so well of them as did alister. what ian desired was sympathy, not admiration, but from alister he had both. few men would care to hear the talk of those two, for they had no interest in anything that did not belong to the reality of things. to them the things most men count real, were the merest phantasms. they sought what would not merely last, but must go on growing. at strife with all their known selfishness, they were growing into strife with all the selfishness in them as yet unknown. there was for them no question of choice; they must choose what was true; they must choose life; they must not walk in the way of death. they were very near to agreeing about everything they should ask. few men are capable of understanding such love as theirs, of understanding the love of david and jonathan, of shakspere to w. h., of tennyson and hallam. every such love, nevertheless, is a possession of the race; what has once been is, in possibility to come, as well as in fact that has come. a solitary instance of anything great is enough to prove it human, yea necessary to humanity. i have wondered whether the man in whom such love is possible, may not spring of an altogether happy conjunction of male and female--a father and mother who not only loved each other, but were of the same mind in high things, of the same lofty aims in life, so that their progeny came of their true man-and-woman-hood. if any unaccountable disruption or discord of soul appear in a man, it is worth while to ask whether his father and mother were of one aspiration. might not the fact that their marriage did not go deep enough, that father and mother were not of one mind, only of one body, serve to account for the rude results of some marriages of personable people? at the same time we must not forget the endless and unfathomable perpetuations of ancestry. but however these things may be, those two men, brothers born, were also brothers willed. they ceased quarrying, and returned to the outer room. ian betook himself to drawing figures on one of the walls, with the intention of carving them in dipped relief. alister proceeded to take their bedding from before the fire, and prepare for the night. chapter v. the princess. while they were thus busied, ian, with his face to the wall, in the dim light of the candle by which he was making his first rough sketches, began the story of his flight from russia. long ere he ended, alister came close behind him, and there stood, his bosom heaving with emotion, his eyes burning with a dry fire. ian was perfectly composed, his voice quiet and low. i will not give his tale in the first person; and will tell of it only as much as i think it necessary my reader should know. having accepted a commission of the czar, he was placed in a post of trust in the palace. in one apartment of it, lived an imperial princess, the burden of whose rank had not even the alleviation of society. her disclosure of a sympathy with oppressed humanity had wakened a doubt as to her politics, and she was virtually a prisoner, restricted to a corner of the huge dwelling, and allowed to see hardly any but her women. her father had fallen into disgrace before her, and her mother was dead of grief. all around her were spies, and love was nowhere. gladly would she have yielded every rag of her rank, to breathe the air of freedom. to be a peasant girl on her father's land, would be a life of rapture! she knew little of the solace books might have given her. with a mind capable of rapid development, she had been ill taught except in music; and that, alone, cannot do much for spiritual development; it cannot enable the longing, the aspiration it rouses, to understand itself; it cannot lead back to its own eternal source. she knew no one in whom to trust, or from whom to draw comfort; her confessor was a man of the world, incapable of leading her to any fountain of living water; she had no one to tell her of god and his fatherhood, the only and perfect refuge from the divine miseries of loneliness. a great corridor went from end to end of one of the wings of the palace, and from this corridor another passage led toward the apartment of the princess, consisting of some five or six rooms. at certain times of the day, ian had to be at the beginning of the corridor, at the head of a huge stair with a spacious hall-like landing. along the corridor few passed, for the attendants used a back stair and passages. as he sat in the recess of a large window, where stood a table and chair for his use, ian one morning heard a cry--whence, he never knew--and darted along the corridor, thinking assistance might be wanted. when about halfway down, he saw a lady enter, near the end of it, and come slowly along. he stood aside, respectfully waiting till she should pass. her eyes were on the ground, but as she came near she raised them. the sadness of them went to his heart, and his soul rushed into his. the princess, i imagine, had never before met such an expression, and misunderstood it. lonely, rejected, too helpless even to hope, it seemed full of something she had all her life been longing for--a soul to be her refuge from the wind, her covert from the tempest, her shadow as of a great rock in the weary land where no one cared for her. she stood and gazed at him. ian at once perceived who she must be, and stood waiting for some expression of her pleasure. but she appeared fascinated; her eyes remained on his, for they seemed to her to be promising help. her fascination fascinated him, and for some moments they stood thus, regarding each other. ian felt he must break the spell. it was her part to speak, his to obey, but he knew the danger of the smallest suspicion. if she was a princess and he but a soldier on guard, she was a woman and he was a man: he was there to protect her! "how may i serve your imperial highness?" he asked. she was silent yet a moment, then said, "your name?" he gave it. "your nation?" he stated it. "when are you here?" he told her his hours. "i will see you again," she said, and turned and went back. from that moment she loved him, and thought he loved her. but, though he would willingly have died for her, he did not love her as she thought. alister wondered to hear him say so. at such a moment, and heart-free, alister could no more have helped falling in love with her than he could help opening his eyes when the light shone on their lids. ian, with a greater love for his kind than even alister, and with a tenderness for womankind altogether infinite, was not ready to fall in love. accessible indeed he was to the finest of nature's witcheries; ready for the response as of summer lightnings from opposing horizons; all aware of loveliest difference, of refuge and mysterious complement; but he was not prone to fall in love. the princess, knowing the ways of the house, contrived to see him pretty often. he talked to her of the hest he knew; he did what he could to lighten her loneliness by finding her books and music; best of all, he persuaded her--without difficulty--to read the new testament. in their few minutes of conference, he tried to show her the master of men as he showed himself to his friends; but their time together was always so short, and their anxiety for each other so great, seeing that discovery would be ruin to both, that they could not go far with anything. at length came an occasion when at parting they embraced. how it was ian could not tell. he blamed himself much, but alister thought it might not have been his fault. the same moment he was aware that he did not love her and that he could not turn back. he was ready to do anything, everything in honour; yet felt false inasmuch as he had given her ground for believing that he felt towards her as he could not help seeing she felt towards him. had it been in his power to order his own heart, he would have willed to love, and so would have loved her. but the princess doubted nothing, and the change that passed upon her was wonderful. the power of human love is next to the power of god's love. like a flower long repressed by cold, she blossomed so suddenly in the sunshine of her bliss, that ian greatly dreaded the suspicion which the too evident alteration might arouse: the plain, ordinary-looking young woman with fine eyes, began to put on the robes of beauty. a softest vapour of rose, the colour of the east when sundown sets it dreaming of sunrise, tinged her cheek; it grew round like that of a girl; and ere two months were gone, she looked years younger than her age. but ian could never be absolutely open with her; while she, poor princess, happy in her ignorance of the shows of love, and absorbed in the joy of its great deliverance, jealoused nothing of restraint, nothing of lack, either in his words or in the caresses of which he was religiously sparing. he was haunted by the dread of making her grieve who had already grieved so much, and was but just risen from the dead. one evening they met as usual in the twilight; in five minutes the steps of the man would be heard coming to light the lamps of the corridor, his guard would be over, and he must retire. few words passed, but they parted with more of lingering tenderness than usual, and the princess put a little packet in his hand. the same night his only friend in the service entered his room hurriedly, and urged immediate flight: something had been, or was imagined to be discovered, through which his liberty, perhaps his life, was compromised; he must leave at once by a certain coach which would start in an hour: there was but just time to disguise him; he must make for a certain port on the baltic, and there lie concealed until a chance of getting away turned up! ian refused. he feared nothing, had done nothing to be ashamed of! what was it to him if they did take his life! he could die as well as another! anxious about the princess, he persisted in his refusal, and the coach went without him. every passenger in that coach was murdered. he saw afterward the signs of their fate in the snow. in the middle of the night, a company of men in masks entered his room, muffled his head, and hurried him into a carriage, which drove rapidly away. when it stopped, he thought he had arrived at some prison, but soon found himself in another carriage, with two of the police. he could have escaped had he been so minded, but he could do nothing for the princess, and did not care what became of him. at a certain town his attendants left him, with the assurance that if he did not make haste out of the country, he would find they had not lost sight of him. but instead of obeying, he disguised himself, and took his way to moscow, where he had friends. thence he wrote to his friend at st. petersburg. not many letters passed ere he learned that the princess was dead. she had been placed in closer confinement, her health gave way, and by a rapid decline she had gained her freedom. all the night through, not closing their eyes till the morning, the brothers, with many intervals of thoughtful silence, lay talking. "i am glad to think," said alister, after one of these silences, "you do not suffer so much, ian, as if you had been downright in love with her." "i suffer far more," answered ian with a sigh; "and i ought to suffer more. it breaks my heart to think she had not so much from me as she thought she had." they were once more silent. alister was full of trouble for his brother. ian at length spoke again. "alister," he said, "i must tell you everything! i know the truth now. if i wronged her, she is having her revenge!" by his tone alister seemed through the darkness to see his sad smile. he was silent, and alister waited. "she did not know much," ian resumed. "i thought at first she had nothing but good manners and a good heart; but the moment the sun of another heart began to shine on her, the air of another's thought to breathe upon her, the room of another soul to surround her, she began to grow; and what more could god intend or man desire? as i told you, she grew beautiful, and what sign of life is equal to that!" "but i want to know what you mean by her having her revenge on you?" said alister. "whether i loved her then or not, and i believe i did, beyond a doubt i love her now. it needed only to be out of sight of her, and see other women beside the memory of her, to know that i loved her.--alister, i love her!" repeated ian with a strange exaltation. "oh, ian!" groaned alister; "how terrible for you!" "alister, you dear fellow!" returned ian, "can you understand no better than that? do you not see i am happy now? my trouble was that i did not love her--not that she loved me, but that i did not love her! now we shall love each other for ever!" "how do you know that, ian?" "by knowing that i love her. if i had not come to know that, i could not have said to myself i would love her for ever." "but you can't marry her, ian! the lord said there would be no marrying there!" "did he say there would be no loving there, alister? most people seem to fancy he did, for how else could they forget the dead as they do, and look so little for their resurrection? few can be said really to believe in any hereafter worth believing in. how many go against the liking of the dead the moment they are gone-behave as if they were nowhere, and could never call them to account! their plans do not recognize their existence; the life beyond is no factor in their life here. if god has given me a hope altogether beyond anything i could have generated for myself, beyond all the likelihoods and fulfilments around me, what can i do but give him room to verify it--what but look onward! some people's bodies get so tired that they long for the rest of the grave; it is my soul that gets tired, and i know the grave can give that no rest; i look for the rest of more life, more strength, more love. but god is not shut up in heaven, neither is there one law of life there and another here; i desire more life here, and shall have it, for what is needful for this world is to be had in this world. in proportion as i become one with god, i shall have it. this world never did seem my home; i have never felt quite comfortable in it; i have yet to find, and shall find the perfect home i have not felt this world, even my mother's bosom to be. nature herself is not lovely enough to satisfy me. nor can it be that i am beside myself, seeing i care only for the will of god, not for my own. for what is madness but two or more wills in one body? does not the 'bible itself tell us that we are pilgrims and strangers in the world, that here we have no abiding city? it is but a place to which we come to be made ready for another. yet i am sure those who regard it as their home, are not half so well pleased with it as i. they are always grumbling at it. 'what wretched weather!' they say. 'what a cursed misfortune!' they cry. 'what abominable luck!' they protest. health is the first thing, they say, and cannot find it. they complain that their plans are thwarted, and when they succeed, that they do not yield the satisfaction they expected. yet they mock at him who says he seeks a better country!--but i am keeping you awake, alister! i will talk no more. you must go to sleep!" "it is better than any sleep to hear you talk, ian," returned alister. "what a way you are ahead of me! i do love this world! when i come to die, it will tear my heart to think that this cave which you and i have dug out together, must pass into other hands! i love every foot of the earth that remains to us--every foot that has been taken from us. when i stand on the top of this rock, and breathe the air of this mountain, i bless god we have still a spot to call our own. it is quite a different thing from the love of mere land; i could not feel the same toward any, however beautiful, that i had but bought. this, our own old land, i feel as if i loved in something the same way as i love my mother. often in the hot summer-days, lying on my face in the grass, i have kissed the earth as if it were a live creature that could return my caresses! the long grass is a passion to me, and next to the grass i love the heather, not the growing corn. i am a fair farmer, i think, but i would rather see the land grow what it pleased, than pass into the hands of another. place is to me sacred almost as body. there is at least something akin between the love we bear to the bodies of our friends, and that we bear to the place in which we were born and brought up." "that is all very true, alister. i understand your feeling perfectly; i have it myself. but we must be weaned, i say only weaned, from that kind of thing; we must not love the outside as if it were the inside! everything comes that' we may know the sender-of whom it is a symbol, that is, a far-off likeness of something in him; and to him it must lead us-the self-existent, true, original love, the making love. but i have felt all you say. i used to lie in bed and imagine the earth alive and carrying me on her back, till i fell asleep longing to see the face of my nurse. once, the fancy turned into a dream. i will try to recall a sonnet i made the same night, before the dream came: it will help you to understand it. i was then about nineteen, i believe. i did not care for it enough to repeat it to you, and i fear we shall find it very bad." stopping often to recall and rearrange words and lines, ian completed at last the following sonnet:-- "she set me on my feet with steady hand, among the crowding marvels on her face, bidding me rise, and run a strong man's race; swathed mo in circumstance's swaddling band; fed me with her own self; then bade me stand myself entire,--while she was but a place hewn for my dwelling from the midst of space, a something better than her sea or land. nay, earth! thou bearest me upon thy back, like a rough nurse, and i can almost feel a touch of kindness in thy bands of steel, although i cannot see thy face, and track an onward purpose shining through its black, instinct with prophecy of future weal. "there! it is not much, is it?" "it is beautiful!" protested alister. "it is worth nothing," said ian, "except between you and me-and that it will make you understand my dream. that i shall never forget. when a dream does us good we don't forget it. "i thought i was home on the back of something great and strong-i could not tell what; it might be an elephant or a great eagle or a lion. it went sweeping swiftly along, the wind of its flight roaring past me in a tempest. i began to grow frightened. where could this creature of such awful speed be carrying me? i prayed to god to take care of me. the head of the creature turned to me, and i saw the face of a woman, grand and beautiful. never with my open eyes have i seen such a face! and i knew it was the face of this earth, and that i had never seen it before because she carries us upon her back. when i woke, i knew that all the strangest things in life and history must one day come together in a beautiful face of loving purpose, one of the faces of the living god. the very mother of the lord did not for a long time understand him, and only through sorrow came to see true glory. alister, if we were right with god, we could see the earth vanish and never heave a sigh; god, of whom it was but a shimmering revelation, would still be ours!" in the morning they fell asleep, and it was daylight, late in the winter, when alister rose. he roused the fire, asleep all through the night, and prepared their breakfast of porridge and butter, tea, oat-cake, and mutton-ham. when it was nearly ready, he woke ian, and when they had eaten, they read together a portion of the bible, that they might not forget, and start the life of the day without trust in the life-causing god. "all that is not rooted in him," ian would say, "all hope or joy that does not turn its face upward, is an idolatry. our prayers must rise that our thoughts may follow them." the portion they read contained the saying of the lord that we must forsake all and follow him if we would be his disciples. "i am sometimes almost terrified," said ian, "at the scope of the demands made upon me, at the perfection of the self-abandonment required of me; yet outside of such absoluteness can be no salvation. in god we live every commonplace as well as most exalted moment of our being. to trust in him when no need is pressing, when things seem going right of themselves, may be harder than when things seem going wrong. at no time is there any danger except in ourselves, and the only danger is of trusting in something else than the living god, and so getting, as it were, outside of god. oh alister, take care you do not love the land more than the will of god! take care you do not love even your people more than the will of god." they spent the day on the hill-top, and as there was no sign of storm, remained till the dark night, when the moon came to light them home. "perhaps when we are dead," said alister as they went, "we may be allowed to come here again sometimes! only we shall not be able to quarry any further, and there is pain in looking on what cannot go on." "it may be a special pleasure," returned ian, "in those new conditions, to look into such a changeless cabinet of the past. when we are one with our life, so that no prayer can be denied, there will be no end to the lovely possibilities." "so i have the people i love, i think i could part with all things else, even the land!" said alister. "be sure we shall not have to part with them. we shall yet walk, i think, with our father as of old, where the setting sun sent the shadows of the big horse-gowans that glowed in his red level rays, trooping eastward, as if they would go round the world to meet the sun that had banished them, and die in his glory; the wind of the twilight will again breathe about us like a thought of the living god haunting our goings, and watching to help us; the stars will yet call to us out of the great night, 'love and be fearless.' 'be independent!' cries the world from its' great bible of the belly;-says the lord of men, 'seek ye first the kingdom of god and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.' our dependence is our eternity. we cannot live on bread alone; we need every word of god. we cannot live on air alone; we need an atmosphere of living souls. should we be freer, alister, if we were independent of each other? when i am out in the world, my heart is always with mother and you. we must be constantly giving ourselves away, we must dwell in houses of infinite dependence, or sit alone in the waste of a godless universe." it was a rough walk in the moonlight over the hills, but full of a rare delight. and while they walked the mother was waiting them, with the joy of st. john, of the saviour, of god himself in her heart, the joy of beholding how the men she loved loved each other. chapter vi. the two pairs. the next morning, on the way to the village, the brothers overtook christina and mercy, and they walked along together. the young men felt inclined to be the more friendly with the girls, that the men of their own family were so unworthy of them. a man who does not respect a woman because she is a woman, cannot have thorough respect for his own mother, protest as he pleases: he is incapable of it, and cannot know his own incapacity. alas for girls in a family where the atmosphere of vile thinking, winnowed by the carrion wings of degraded and degrading judgments, infolds them! one of the marvels of the world is, that, with such fathers and brothers, there are so few wicked women. type of the greater number stands ophelia, poor, weak, and not very refined, yet honest, and, in all her poverty, immeasurably superior to father and brother. christina's condescension had by this time dwindled almost to the vanishing-point, and her talk was in consequence more natural: the company, conversation, and whole atmosphere of the young men, tended to wake in the girls what was best and sweetest. reality appeals at once to the real, opens the way for a soul to emerge from the fog of the commonplace, the marsh of platitude, the sahara of lies, into the colour and air of life. the better things of humanity often need the sun of friendship to wile them out. a girl, well-bred, tolerably clever, and with some genius of accommodation, will appear to a man possessed of a hundred faculties of which she knows nothing; but his belief will help to rouse them in her. a young man will see an angel where those who love her best see only a nice girl; but he sees not merely what she might be, but what one day she must be. christina had been at first rather taken with the ploughman, but she turned her masked batteries now mainly on the soldier. during the dinner she had noted how entirely ian was what she chose to call a man of the world; and it rendered him in her eyes more worthy of conquest. besides, as elder sister, must she not protect the inexperienced mercy? what is this passion for subjugation? this hunger for homage? is it of hell direct, or what is there in it of good to begin with? apparently it takes possession of such women as have set up each herself for the object of her worship: she cannot then rest from the effort to bring as many as possible to worship at the same shrine; and to this end will use means as deserving of the fire as any witchcraft. christina stopped short with a little cry, and caught ian's arm. "i beg your pardon," she said, "but i cannot bear it a moment longer! something in my boot hurts me so!" she limped to the road-side, sat down, accepted the service of ian to unlace her boot, and gave a sigh of relief when he pulled it off. he inverted and shook it, then searched and found a nail which must have hurt her severely. but how to get rid of the cruel projection! ian's slender hand could but just reach with its finger-tips the haunted spot. in vain he tried to knock it down against a stone put inside. alister could suggest nothing. but mistress conal's cottage was near: they might there find something to help! only christina could not be left behind, and how was she to walk in a silk stocking over a road frozen hard as glass? the chief would have carried her, but she would not let him. ian therefore shod her with his glengarry bonnet, tying it on with his handkerchief. there was much merriment over the extemporized shoe, mingled with apologetic gratitude from christina, who, laughing at her poulticed foot, was yet not displeased at its contrast with the other. when the chief opened the door of the cottage, there was no one to be seen within. the fire was burning hot and flameless; a three-footed pot stood half in it; other sign of presence they saw none. as alister stooped searching for some implement to serve their need, in shot a black cat, jumped over his back, and disappeared. the same instant they heard a groan, and then first discovered the old woman in bed, seemingly very ill. ian went up to her. "what is the matter with you, mistress conal?" he asked, addressing her in english because of the ladies. but in reply she poured out a torrent of gaelic, which seemed to the girls only grumbling, but was something stronger. thereupon the chief went and spoke to her, but she was short and sullen with him. he left her to resume his search. "let alone," she cried. "when that nail leaves her brog, it will be for your heart." ian sought to soothe her. "she will bring misery on you all!" she insisted. "you have a hammer somewhere, i know!" said alister, as if he had not heard her. "she shall be finding no help in my house!" answered the old woman in english. "very well, mistress conal!" returned the chief; "the lady cannot walk home; i shall have to carry her!" "god forbid!" she cried. "go and fetch a wheelbarrow." "mistress conal, there is nothing for it but carry her home in my arms!" "give me the cursed brog then. i will draw the nail." but the chief would not yield the boot; he went out and searched the hill-side until he found a smooth stone of suitable size, with which and a pair of tongs, he beat down the nail. christina put on the boot, and they left the place. the chief stayed behind the rest for a moment, but the old woman would not even acknowledge his presence. "what a rude old thing she is! this is how she always treats us!" said christina. "have you done anything to offend her?" asked alister. "not that we know of. we can't help being lowlanders!" "she no doubt bears you a grudge," said ian, "for having what once belonged to us. i am sorry she is so unfriendly. it is not a common fault with our people." "poor old thing! what does it matter!" said christina. a woman's hate was to her no more than the barking of a dog. they had not gone far, before the nail again asserted itself; it had been but partially subjugated. a consultation was held. it resulted in this, that mercy and the chief went to fetch another pair of boots, while ian remained with christina. they seated themselves on a stone by the roadside. the sun clouded over, a keen wind blew, and christina shivered. there was nothing for it but go back to the cottage. the key was in the door, ian turned it, and they went in. certainly this time no one was there. the old woman so lately groaning on her bed had vanished. ian made up the fire, and did what he could for his companion's comfort. she was not pleased with the tone of his attentions, but the way she accepted them made her appear more pleased than ian cared for, and he became colder and more polite. piqued by his indifference, she took it nevertheless with a sweetness which belonged to her nature as god made it, not as she had spoiled it; and even such a butterfly as she, felt the influence of a man like ian, and could not help being more natural in his presence. his truth elicited what there was of hers; the true being drew to the surface what there was of true in the being that was not true. the longer she was in his company, the more she was pleased with him, and the more annoyed with her failure in pleasing him. it is generally more or less awkward when a young man and maiden between whom is no convergent rush of spiritual currents, find themselves alone together. ian was one of the last to feel such awkwardness, but he thought his companion felt it; he did his best, therefore, to make her forget herself and him, telling her story after story which she could not but find the more interesting that for the time she was quieted from self, and placed in the humbler and healthier position of receiving the influence of another. for one moment, as he was narrating a hair's-breadth escape he had had from a company of tartar soldiers by the friendliness of a young girl, the daughter of a siberian convict, she found herself under the charm of a certain potency of which he was himself altogether unconscious, but which had carried away hearts more indifferent than hers. in the meantime, alister and mercy were walking toward the new house, and, walking, were more comfortable than those that sat waiting. mercy indeed had not much to say, but she was capable of asking a question worth answering, and of understanding not a little. thinking of her walk with ian on christmas day,-- "would you mind telling me something about your brother?" she said. "what would you like to know about him?" asked alister. "anything you care to tell me," she answered. now there was nothing pleased alister better than talking about ian; and he talked so that mercy could not help feeling what a brother he must be himself; while on his part alister was delighted with the girl who took such an interest in ian: for ian's sake he began to love mercy. he had never yet been what is called in love--had little opportunity indeed of falling in love. his breeding had been that of a gentleman, and notwithstanding the sweetness and gentleness of the maidens of his clan, there were differences which had as yet proved sufficient to prevent the first approaches of love, though, once entertained, they might have added to the depth of it. at the same time it was by no means impossible for alister to fall in love with even an uneducated girl--so-called; neither would he, in that case, have felt any difficulty about marrying her; but the fatherly relation in which he stood toward his clan, had tended rather to prevent the thing. many a youth falls to premature love-making, from the lack in his daily history of the womanly element. matrons in towns should be exhorted to make of their houses a refuge. too many mothers are anxious for what they count the welfare of their own children, and care nothing for the children of other women! but can we wonder, when they will wallow in meannesses to save their own from poverty and health, and damn them into comfort and decay. alister told mercy how ian and he used to spend their boyhood. he recounted some of their adventures in hunting and herding and fishing, and even in going to and from school, a distance of five miles, in all weathers. then he got upon the poetry of the people, their legends, their ballads and their songs; and at last came to the poetry of the country itself--the delights of following the plough, the whispers and gleams of nature, her endless appeal through every sense. the mere smell of the earth in a spring morning, he said, always made him praise god. "everything we have," he went on, "must be shared with god. that is the notion of the jewish thank-offering. ian says the greatest word in the universe is one; the next greatest, all. they are but the two ends of a word to us unknowable--god's name for himself." mercy had read mrs. barbauld's hymns, and they had been something to her; but most of the little poetry she had read was only platitude sweetened with sound; she had never read, certainly never understood a real poem. who can tell what a nature may prove, after feeding on good food for a while? the queen bee is only a better fed working bee. who can tell what it may prove when it has been ploughed with the plough of suffering, when the rains of sorrow, the frosts of pain, and the winds of poverty have moistened and swelled and dried its fallow clods? mercy had not such a sweet temper as her sister, but she was not so selfish. she was readier to take offence, perhaps just because she was less self-satisfied. before long they might change places. a little dew from the eternal fountain was falling upon them. christina was beginning to be aware that a certain man, neither rich nor distinguished nor ambitious, had yet a real charm for her. not that for a moment she would think seriously of such a man! that would be simply idiotic! but it would be very nice to have a little innocent flirtation with him, or perhaps a "platonic friendship! "--her phrase, not mine. what could she have to do with plato, who, when she said i, was aware only of a neat bundle of foolish desires, not the god at her heart! mercy, on the other hand, was being drawn to the big, strong, childlike heart of the chief. there is always, notwithstanding the gulf of unlikeness between them, an appeal from the childish to the childlike. the childish is but the shadow of the childlike, and shadows are little like the things from which they fall. but to what save the heavenly shall the earthly appeal in its sore need, its widowhood, its orphanage? with what shall the childish take refuge but the childlike? to what shall ignorance cry but wisdom? mercy felt no restraint with the chief as with ian. his great, deep, yet refined and musical laugh, set her at ease. ian's smile, with its shimmering eternity, was no more than the moon on a rain-pool to mercy. the moral health of the chief made an atmosphere of conscious safety around her. by the side of no other man had she ever felt so. with him she was at home, therefore happy. she was already growing under his genial influence. every being has such influence who is not selfish. when christina was re-shod, and they were leaving the cottage, ian, happening to look behind him, spied the black cat perched on the edge of the chimney in the smoke. "look at her," he said, "pretending innocence, when she has been watching you all the time!" alister took up a stone. "don't hurt her," said ian, and he dropped it. chapter vii. an cabrach mor. i have already said that the young men had not done well as hunters. they had neither experience nor trustworthy attendance: none of the chief's men would hunt with them. they looked on them as intruders, and those who did not share in their chiefs dislike to useless killing, yet respected it. neither christian nor sercombe had yet shot a single stag, and the time was drawing nigh when they must return, the one to glasgow, the other to london. to have no proof of prowess to display was humbling to sercombe; he must show a stag's head, or hide his own! he resolved, therefore, one of the next moonlit nights, to stalk by himself a certain great, wide-horned stag, of whose habits he had received information. at oxford, where valentine made his acquaintance, sercombe belonged to a fast set, but had distinguished himself notwithstanding as an athlete. he was a great favourite with a few, not the best of the set, and admired by many for his confidence, his stature, and his regular features. these latter wore, however, a self-assertion which of others made him much disliked: a mean thing in itself, it had the meanest origin--the ability, namely, to spend money, for he was the favourite son of a rich banker in london. he knew nothing of the first business of life--self-restraint, had never denied himself anything, and but for social influences would, in manhood as infancy, have obeyed every impulse. he was one of the merest slaves in the universe, a slave in his very essence, for he counted wrong to others freedom for himself, and the rejection of the laws of his own being, liberty. the most righteous interference was insolence; his likings were his rights, and any devil that could whisper him a desire, might do with him as he pleased. from such a man every true nature shrinks with involuntary recoil, and a sick sense of the inhuman. but i have said more of him already than my history requires, and more than many a reader, partaking himself of his character to an unsuspected degree, will believe; for such men cannot know themselves. he had not yet in the eyes of the world disgraced himself: it takes a good many disgraceful things to bring a rich man to outward disgrace. his sole attendant when shooting was a clever vagabond lad belonging to nowhere in particular, and living by any crook except the shepherd's. from him he heard of the great stag, and the spots which in the valleys he frequented, often scraping away the snow with his feet to get at the grass. he did not inform him that the animal was a special favourite with the chief of clanruadh, or that the clan looked upon him as their live symbol, the very stag represented as crest to the chief's coat of arms. it was the same nancy had reported to her master as eating grass on the burn-side in the moonlight. christian and sercombe had stalked him day after day, but without success. and now, with one poor remaining hope, the latter had determined to stalk him at night. to despoil him of his life, his glorious rush over the mountain side, his plunge into the valley, and fierce strain up the opposing hill; to see that ideal of strength, suppleness, and joyous flight, lie nerveless and flaccid at his feet; to be able to call the thicket-like antlers of the splendid animal his own, was for the time the one ambition of hilary sercombe; for he was of the brood of mephistopheles, the child of darkness, whose delight lies in undoing what god has done--the nearest that any evil power can come to creating. there was, however, a reason for the failure of the young hunters beyond lack of skill and what they called their ill-luck. hector of the stags was awake; his keen, everywhere-roving eyes were upon them, seconded by the keen, all-hearkening ears of bob of the angels. they had discovered that the two men had set their hearts on the big stag, an cabrach mor by right of excellence, and every time they were out after him, hector too was out with his spy-glass, the gift of an old sea-faring friend, searching the billowy hills. while, the southrons would be toiling along to get the wind of him unseen, for the old stag's eyes were as keen as his velvety nose, the father and son would be lying, perhaps close at hand, perhaps far away on some hill-side of another valley, watching now the hunters, now the stag. for love of the macruadh, and for love of the stag, they had constituted themselves his guardians. again and again when one of them thought he was going to have a splendid chance--perhaps just as, having reached a rock to which he had been making his weary way over stones and bogs like satan through chaos, and raised himself with weary slowness, he peeped at last over the top, and lo, there he was, well within range, quietly feeding, nought between the great pumping of his big joyous heart and the hot bullet but the brown skin behind his left shoulder!--a distant shot would forestall the nigh one, a shot for life, not death, and the stag, knowing instantly by wondrous combination of sense and judgment in what quarter lay the danger, would, without once looking round, measure straight a hundred yards of hillocks and rocks between the sight-taking and the pulling of the trigger. another time it would be no shot, but the bark of a dog, the cry of a moorfowl, or a signal from watching hind that started him; for the creatures understand each the other's cries, and when an animal sees one of any sort on the watch to warn covey or herd or flock of its own kind, it will itself keep no watch, but feed in security. to christian and sercombe it seemed as if all the life in the glen were in conspiracy to frustrate their hearts' desire; and the latter at least grew ever the more determined to kill the great stag: he had begun to hate him. the sounds that warned the stag were by no means always what they seemed, those of other wild animals; they were often hut imitations by bob of the angels. i fear the animal grew somewhat bolder and less careful from the assurance thus given him that he was watched over, and cultivated a little nonchalance. not a moment, however, did he neglect any warning from quarter soever, but from peaceful feeder was instantaneously wind-like fleer, his great horns thrown back over his shoulders, and his four legs just touching the ground with elastic hoof, or tucking themselves almost out of sight as he skipped rather than leaped over rock and gully, stone and bush--whatever lay betwixt him and larger room. great joy it was to his two guardians to see him, and great game to watch the motions of his discomfited enemies. for the sake of an cabrach hector and bob would go hungry for hours. but they never imagined the luxurious sasunnach, incapable, as they thought, of hardship or sustained fatigue, would turn from his warm bed to stalk the lordly animal betwixt snow and moon. one night, hector of the stags found he could not sleep. it was not for cold, for the night was for the season a mild one. the snow indeed lay deep around their dwelling, but they owed not a little of its warmth to the snow. it drifted up all about it, and kept off the terrible winds that swept along the side of the hill, like sharp swift scythes of death. they were in the largest and most comfortable of their huts--a deepish hollow in the limestone rock, lined with turf, and with wattles filled in with heather, the tops outward; its front a thick wall of turf, with a tolerable door of deal. it was indeed so snug as to be far from airy. here they kept what little store of anything they had--some dried fish and venison; a barrel of oat-meal, seldom filled full; a few skins of wild creatures, and powder, ball, and shot. after many fruitless attempts to catch the still fleeting vapour sleep, raising himself at last on his elbow, hector found that rob was not by his side. he too had been unable to sleep, and at last discovered that he was uneasy about something-what, he could not tell. he rose and went out. the moon was shining very clear, and as there was much snow, the night, if not so bright as day, was yet brighter than many a day. the moon, the snow, the mountains, all dreaming awake, seemed to rob the same as usual; but presently he fancied the hillside opposite had come nearer than usual: there must be a reason for that! he searched every yard of it with keenest gaze, but saw nothing. they were high above glenruadh, and commanded parts of it: late though it was, rob thought he saw some light from the new house, which itself he could not see, reflected from some shadowed evergreen in the shrubbery. he was thinking some one might be ill, and he ought to run down and see whether a messenger was wanted, when his father joined him. he had brought his telescope, and immediately began to sweep the moonlight on the opposite hill. in a moment he touched rob on the shoulder, and handed him the telescope, pointing with it. rob looked and saw a dark speck on the snow, moving along the hill-side. it was the big stag. now and then he would stop to snuff and search for a mouthful, but was evidently making for one of his feeding-places--most likely that by the burn on the chief's land. the light! could it imply danger? he had heard the young men were going to leave: were they about to attempt a last assault on the glory of the glen? he pointed out to his father the dim light in the shadow of the house. hector turned his telescope thitherward, immediately gave the glass to bob, went into the hut, and came out again with his gun. they had not gone far when they lost sight of the stag, but they held on towards the castle. at every point whence a peep could be had in the direction of the house, they halted to reconnoitre: if enemies were abroad, they must, if possible, get and keep sight of them. they did not stop for more than a glance, however, but made for the valley as fast as they could walk: the noise of running feet would, on such a still night, be heard too far. the whole way, without sound uttered, father and son kept interchanging ideas on the matter. from thorough acquaintance with the habits of the animal, they were pretty certain he was on his way to the haunt aforementioned: if he got there, he would be safe; it was the chiefs ground, and no one would dare touch him. but he was not yet upon it, and was in danger; while, if he should leave the spot in any westward direction, he would almost at once be out of sanctuary! if they found him therefore at his usual feed, and danger threatening, they must scare him eastward; if no peril seemed at hand, they would watch him a while, that he might feed in safety. swift and all but soundless on their quiet brogs they paced along: to startle the deer while the hunter was far off, might be to drive him within range of his shot. they reached the root of the spur, and approached the castle; immediately beyond that, they would be in sight of the feeding ground. but they were yet behind it when rob of the angels bounded forward in terror at the sound of a gun. his father, however, who was in front, was off before him. neither hearing anything, nor seeing rob, he knew that a shot had been fired, and, caution being now useless, was in a moment at full speed. the smoke of the shot hung white in the moonlight over the end of the ridge. no red bulk shadowed the green pasture, no thicket of horns went shaking about over the sod. no lord of creation, but an enemy of life, stood regarding his work, a tumbled heap of death, yet saying to himself, like god when he made the world, "it is good." the noble creature lay disformed on the grass; shot through the heart he had leaped high in the air, fallen with his head under him, and broken his neck. rage filled the heart of hector of the stags. he could not curse, but he gave a roar like a wild beast, and raised his gun. but rob of the angels caught it ere it reached his shoulder. he yielded it, and, with another roar like a lion, bounded bare-handed upon the enemy. he took the descent in three leaps, and the burn in one. it was not merely that the enemy had killed an cabrach mor, the great stag of their love; he had killed him on the chief's own land! under the very eyes of the man whose business it was to watch over him! it was an offence unpardonable! an insult as well as a wrong to his chief! in the fierce majesty of righteous wrath he threw himself on the poacher. sercombe met him with a blow straight from the shoulder, and he dropped. rob of the angels, close behind him, threw down the gun. the devil all but got into rob of the angels. his knife flashed pale in the moonlight, and he darted on the sasunnach. it would then have gone ill with the bigger man, for bob was lithe as a snake, swift not only to parry and dodge but to strike; he could not have reached the body of his antagonist, but sercombe's arm would have had at least one terrible gash from his skean-dhu, sharp as a razor, had not, at the moment, from the top of the ridge come the stern voice of the chief. rob's knife, like excalibur from the hand of sir bedivere, "made lightnings in the splendour of the moon," as he threw it from him, and himself down by his father. then hector came to himself and rose. rob rose also; and his father, trembling with excitement, stood grasping his arm, for he saw the stalwart form of his chief on the ridge above them. alister had been waked by the gun, and at the roar of his friend hector, sprang from his bed. when he saw his beloved stag dead on his pasture, he came down the ridge like an avalanche. sercombe stood on his defence, wondering what devil was to pay, but beginning to think he might be in some wrong box. he had taken no trouble to understand the boundaries between mr. peregrine palmer's land and that of the chief, and had imagined himself safe on the south side of the big burn. alister gazed speechless for a moment on the slaughtered stag, and heaved a great sigh. "mr. sercombe," he said, "i would rather you had shot my best horse! are you aware, sir, that you are a poacher?" "i had supposed the appellation inapplicable to a gentleman!" answered sercombe, with entire coolness. "but by all means take me before a magistrate." "you are before a magistrate." "all i have to answer then is, that i should not have shot the animal had i not believed myself within my rights." "on that point, and on this very ground, i instructed you myself!" said the chief. "i misunderstood you." "say rather you had not the courtesy to heed what i told you-had not faith enough to take the word of a gentleman! and for this my poor stag has suffered!" he stood for some moments in conflict with himself, then quietly resumed. "of course, mr. sercombe, i have no intention of pushing the matter!" he said. "i should hope not!" returned sercombe scornfully. "i will pay whatever you choose to set on the brute." it would be hard to say which was less agreeable to the chief-to have his stag called a brute, or be offered blood-money for him. "stag ruadh priced like a bullock!" he said, with a slow smile, full of sadness; "--the pride of every child in the strath! not a gentleman in the county would have shot clanruadh's deer!" sercombe was by this time feeling uncomfortable, and it made him angry. he muttered something about superstition. "he was taken when a calf," the chief went on, "and given to a great-aunt of mine. but when he grew up, he took to the hills again, and was known by his silver collar till he managed to rid himself of it. he shall be buried where he lies, and his monument shall tell how the stranger sasunnach served the stag of clanruadh!" "why the deuce didn't you keep the precious monster in a paddock, and let people know him for a tame animal?" sneered sercombe. "my poor euadh!" said the chief; "he was no tame animal! he as well as i would have preferred the death you have given him to such a fate. he lived while he lived! i thank you for his immediate transit. shot right through the heart! had you maimed him i should have been angrier." sercombe felt flattered, and, attributing the chief's gentleness to a desire to please him, began to condescend. "well, come now, macruadh!" he began; but the chief turned from him. hector stood with his arm on rob's shoulder, and the tears rolling down his cheeks. he would not have wept but that the sobs of his son shook him. "rob of the angels," alister said in their mother-tongue, "you must make an apology to the sasunnach gentleman for drawing the knife on him. that was wrong, if he had killed all the deer in benruadh." "it was not for that, macruadh," answered rob of the angels. "it was because he struck my father, and laid a better man than himself on the grass." the chief turned to the englishman. "did the old man strike you, mr. sercombe?" "no, by jove! i took a little care of that! if he had, i would have broke every bone in his body!" "why did you strike him then?" "because he rushed at me." "it was his duty to capture a poacher!--but you did not know he was deaf and dumb!" alister added, as some excuse. "the deaf makes no difference!" protested bob. "hector of the stags does not fight with his hands like a woman!" "well, what's done is done!" laughed sercombe. "it wasn't a bad shot anyhow!" "you have little to plume yourself upon, mr. sercombe!" said the chief. "you are a good shot, but you need not have been so frightened at an old man as to knock him down!" "come, come, macruadh! enough's enough! it's time to drop this!" returned sercombe. "i can't stand much more of it!--take ten pounds for the head!--come!" the chief made one great stride towards him, but turned away, and said, "come along, rob! tell your father you must not go up the hill again to-night." "no, sir," answered bob; "there's nothing now to go up the hill for! poor old buadh! god rest his soul!" "amen!" responded the chief; "but say rather, 'god give him room to run!'" "amen! it is better.--but," added kob, "we must watch by the body. the foxes and hooded crows are gathering already--i hear them on the hills; and i saw a sea-eagle as white as silver yesterday! we cannot leave ruadh till he is under god's plaid!" "then one of you come and fetch food and fire," said the chief. "i will be with you early." father and son communicated in silence, and rob went with the chief. "they worship the stag, these peasants, as the old egyptians the bull!" said sercombe to himself, walking home full of contempt. chapter viii. the stag's head. alister went straight to his brother's room, his heart bursting with indignation. it was some time before ian could get the story from him in plain consecution; every other moment he would diverge into fierce denunciations. "hadn't you better tell your master what has happened?" at length said ian. "he ought to know why you curse one of your fellows so bitterly." alister was dumb. for a moment he looked aghast. "ian!" he said: "you think he wants to be told anything? i always thought you believed in his divinity!" "ah!" returned ian, "but do you? how am i to imagine it, when you go on like that in his hearing? is it so you acknowledge his presence?" "oh, ian! you don't know how it tortures me to think of that interloper, the low brute, killing the big stag, the macruadh stag-and on my land too! i feel as if i could tear him in pieces. but for him i would have killed him on the spot! it is hard if i may not let off my rage even to you!" "let it off to him, alister; he will give you fairer play than your small brother; he understands you better than i." "but i could not let it off to him that way!" "then that is not a good way. the justice that, even in imagination, would tear and destroy and avenge, may be justice, but it is devil's justice. come, begin now, and tell me all quietly-as if you had read it in a book." "word for word, then, with all the imprecations!" returned alister, a little cooler; and ian was soon in possession of the story. "now what do you think, ian?" said the chief, ending a recital true to the very letter, and in a measure calm, but at various points revealing, by the merest dip of the surface, the boiling of the floods beneath. "you must send him the head, alister," answered ian. "send-what-who-i don't understand you, ian!" returned the chief, bewildered. "oh, well, never mind!" said ian. "you will think of it presently!" and therewith he turned his face to the wall, as if he would go to sleep. it had been a thing understood betwixt the brothers, and that from so far back in the golden haze of childhood that the beginning of it was out of sight, that, the moment one of them turned his back, not a word more was to be said, until he who thus dropped the subject, chose to resume it: to break this unspoken compact would have been to break one of the strands in the ancient bond of their most fast brotherhood. alister therefore went at once to his room, leaving ian loving him hard, and praying for him with his face to the wall. he went as one knowing well the storm he was about to encounter, but never before had he had such a storm to meet. he closed the door, and sat down on the side of his bed like one stunned. he did not doubt, yet could hardly allow he believed, that ian, his oracle, had in verity told him to send the antlers of his cabrach mor, the late live type of his ancient crest, the pride of clanruadh, to the vile fellow of a sasunnach who had sent out into the deep the joyous soul of the fierce, bare mountains. there were rushings to and fro in the spirit of alister, wild and terrible, even as those in the valley of the shadow of death. he never closed his eyes, but fought with himself all the night, until the morning broke. could this thing be indeed his duty? and if not his duty, was he called to do it from mere bravado of goodness? how frightfully would not such an action be misunderstood by such a man! what could he take it for but a mean currying of favour with him! why should he move to please such a fellow! ian was too hard upon him! the more he yielded, the more ian demanded! every time it was something harder than the last! and why did he turn his face to the wall? was he not fit to be argued with! was he one that would not listen to reason! he had never known ian ungenerous till now! but all the time there lay at his door a thing calling out to be done! the thing he did not like was always the thing he had to do! he grumbled; but this thing he hated doing! it was abominable! what! send the grand head, with its horns spread wide like a half-moon, and leaning--like oaks from a precipice--send it to the man that made it a dead thing! never! it must not be left behind! it must go to the grave with the fleet limbs! and over it should rise a monument, at sight of which every friendly highlandman would say, feiich an cabracli mor de clanruadli! what a mockery of fate to be exposed for ever to the vulgar cockney gaze, the trophy of a fool, whose boast was to kill! such a noble beast! such a mean man! to mutilate his remains for the pride of the wretch who killed him! it was too horrible! he thought and thought--until at last he lay powerless to think any more. but it is not always the devil that enters in when a man ceases to think. god forbid! the cessation of thought gives opportunity for setting the true soul thinking from another quarter. suddenly alister remembered a conversation he had had with ian a day or two before. he had been saying to ian that he could not understand what jesus meant when he said, "whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also;" and was dissatisfied with the way ian had answered him. "you must explain it to yourself," ian said. he replied, "if i could do that, i should not have to ask you." "there are many things," ian rejoined, "--arithmetic is one--that can be understood only in the doing of them." "but how can i do a thing without understanding it?" objected alister. "when you have an opportunity of doing this very thing," said ian, "do it, and see what will follow!" at the time he thought ian was refusing to come to the point, and was annoyingly indefinite and illogical; but now it struck him that here was the opportunity of which he had spoken. "i see!" he said to himself. "it is not want of understanding that is in the way now! a thing cannot look hateful and reasonable at the same moment! this may be just the sort of thing jesus meant! even if i be in the right, i have a right to yield my right--and to him i will yield it. that was why ian turned his face to the wall: he wanted me to discover that here was my opportunity! how but in the name of jesus christ could he have dared tell me to forgive ruadh's death by sending his head to his murderer! it has to be done! i've got to do it! here is my chance of turning the other cheek and being hurt again! what can come of it is no business of mine! to return evil is just to do a fresh evil! it may make the man ashamed of himself! it cannot hurt the stag; it only hurts my pride, and i owe my pride nothing! why should not the fellow have what satisfaction he may--something to show for his shot! he shall have the head." thereupon rushed into his heart the joy of giving up, of deliverance from self; and pity, to leaven his contempt, awoke for sercombe. no sooner had he yielded his pride, than he felt it possible to love the man--not for anything he was, but for what he might and must be. "god let the man kill the stag," he said; "i will let him have the head." again and yet again swelled afresh the tide of wrath and unwillingness, making him feel as if he could not carry out his resolve; but all the time he knew the thing was as good as done--absolutely determined, so that nothing could turn it aside. "to yield where one may, is the prerogative of liberty!" he said to himself. "god only can give; who would be his child must yield! abroad in the fields of air, as paul and the love of god make me hope, what will the wind-battling ruadh care for his old head! would he not say, 'let the man have it; my hour was come, or the some one would not have let him kill me!'?" thus argued the chief while the darkness endured--and as soon as the morning began to break, rose, took spade and pick and great knife, and went where hector and rob were watching the slain. it was bitterly cold. the burn crept silent under a continuous bridge of ice. the grass-blades were crisp with frost. the ground was so hard it met iron like iron. he sent the men to get their breakfast from nancy: none but himself should do the last offices for ruadh! with skilful hand he separated and laid aside the head--in sacrifice to the living god. then the hard earth rang with mighty blows of the pickaxe. the labour was severe, and long ere the grave was deep enough, hector and rob had returned; but the chief would not get out of it to give them any share in the work. when he laid hold of the body, they did not offer to help him; they understood the heart of their chief. not without a last pang that he could not lay the head beside it, he began to shovel in the frozen clods, and then at length allowed them to take a part. when the grave was full, they rolled great stones upon it, that it might not be desecrated. then the chief went back to his room, and proceeded to prepare the head, that, as the sacrifice, so should be the gift. "i suppose he would like glass eyes, the ruffian!" he muttered to himself, "but i will not have the mockery. i will fill the sockets and sew up the eyelids, and the face shall be as of one that sleeps." haying done all, and written certain directions for temporary treatment, which he tied to an ear, he laid the head aside till the evening. all the day long, not a word concerning it passed between the brothers; but when evening came, alister, with a blue cotton handkerchief in his hand, hiding the head as far as the roots of the huge horns, asked ian to go for a walk. they went straight to the new house. alister left the head at the door, with his compliments to mr. sercombe. as soon as they were out of sight of the house, ian put his arm through his brother's, but did not speak. "i know now about turning the other cheek!" said alister. "--poor euadh!" "leave him to the god that made the great head and nimble feet of him," said ian. "a god that did not care for what he had made, how should we believe in! but he who cares for the dying sparrow, may be trusted with the dead stag." "truly, yes," returned alister. "let us sit down," said ian, "and i will sing you a song i made last night; i could not sleep after you left me." without reply, alister took a stone by the wayside, and ian one a couple of yards from him. this was his song. love's history. love, the baby, toddled out to pluck a flower; one said, "no, sir;" one said, "maybe, at the evening hour!" love, the boy, joined the boys and girls at play; but he left them half his joy ere the close of day. love, the youth, roamed the country, lightning-laden; but he hurt himself, and, sooth, many a man and maiden! love, the man, sought a service all about; but he would not take their plan, so they cast him out. love, the aged, walking, bowed, the shadeless miles, bead a volume many-paged, full of tears and smiles. love, the weary, tottered down the shelving road: at its foot, lo, night the starry meeting him from god! "love, the holy!" sang a music in her dome, sang it softly, sang it slowly, "--love is coming home!" ere the week was out, there stood above the dead stag a growing cairn, to this day called carn a' cabrach mor. it took ten men with levers to roll one of the boulders at its base. men still cast stones upon it as they pass. the next morning came a note to the cottage, in which sercombe thanked the macruadh for changing his mind, and said that, although he was indeed glad to have secured such a splendid head, he would certainly have stalked another deer, had he known the chief set such store by the one in question. it was handed to alister as he sat at his second breakfast with his mother and ian: even in winter he was out of the house by six o'clock, to set his men to work, and take his own share. he read to the end of the first page with curling lip; the moment he turned the leaf, he sprang from his seat with an exclamation that startled his mother. "the hound!--i beg my good dogs' pardon, one and all!" he cried. "--look at this, ian! see what comes of taking your advice!" "my dear fellow, i gave you no advice that had the least regard to the consequence of following it! that was the one thing you had nothing to do with." "reada," insisted alister, as he pranced about the room. "no, don't read the letter; it's not worth, reading. look at the paper in it." ian looked, and saw a cheque for ten pounds. he burst into loud laughter. "poor ruadh's horns! they're hardly so long as their owner's ears!" he said. "i told you so!" cried the chief. "no, alister! you never suspected such a donkey!" "what is it all about?" asked the mother. "the wretch who shot ruadh," replied alister, "--to whom i gave his head, all to please ian,--" "alister!" said ian. the chief understood, and retracted. "--no, not to please ian, but to do what ian showed me was right:--i believe it was my duty!--i hope it was!--here's the murdering fellow sends me a cheque for ten pounds!--i told you, ian, he offered me ten pounds over the dead body!" "i daresay the poor fellow was sorely puzzled what to do, and appealed to everybody in the house for advice!" "you take the cheque to represent the combined wisdom of the new house?" "you must have puzzled them all!" persisted ian. "how could people with no principle beyond that of keeping to a bargain, understand you otherwise! first, you perform an action such persons think degrading: you carry a fellow's bag for a shilling, and then himself for nothing! next, in the very fury of indignation with a man for killing the finest stag in the country on your meadow, you carry him home the head with your own hands! it all comes of that unlucky divine motion of yours to do good that good may come! that shilling of mistress conal's is at the root of it all!" ian laughed again, and right heartily. the chief was too angry to enter into the humour of the thing. "upon my word, ian, it is too bad of you! what are you laughing at? it would become you better to tell me what i am to do! am i free to break the rascal's bones?" "assuredly not, after that affair with the bag!" "oh, damn the bag!--i beg your pardon, mother." "am i to believe my ears, alister?" "what does it matter, mother? what harm can it do the bag? i wished no evil to any creature!" "it was the more foolish." "i grant it, mother. but you don't know what a relief it is sometimes to swear a little!--you are quite wrong, ian; it all comes of giving him the head!" "you wish you had not given it him?" "no!" growled alister, as from a pent volcano. "you will break my ears, alister!" cried the mother, unable to keep from laughing at the wrath in which he went straining through the room. "think of it," insisted ian: "a man like could not think otherwise without a revolution of his whole being to which the change of the leopard's spots would be nothing.--what you meant, after all, was not cordiality; it was only generosity; to which his response, his countercheck friendly, was an order for ten pounds!--all is right between you!" "now, really, ian, you must not go on teasing your elder brother so!" said the mother. alister laughed, and ceased fuming. "but i must answer the brute!" he said. "what am i to say to him?" "that you are much obliged," replied ian, "and will have the cheque framed and hung in the hall." "come, come! no more of that!" "well, then, let me answer the letter." "that is just what i wanted!" ian sat down at his mother's table, and this is what he wrote. "dear sir,--my brother desires me to return the cheque which you unhappily thought it right to send him. humanity is subject to mistake, but i am sorry for the individual who could so misunderstand his courtesy. i have the honour to remain, sir, your obedient servant, ian macruadh." as ian guessed, the matter had been openly discussed at the new house; and the money was sent with the approval of all except the two young ladies. they had seen the young men in circumstances more favourable to the understanding of them by ordinary people. "why didn't the chief write himself?" said christian. "oh," replied sercombe, "his little brother had been to school, and could write better!" christina and mercy exchanged glances. "i will tell you," mercy said, "why mr. lau answered the note: the chief had done with you!" "or," suggested christina, "the chief was in such a rage that he would write nothing but a challenge." "i wish to goodness he had! it would have given me the chance of giving the clodhopper a lesson." "for sending you the finest stag's head and horns in the country!" remarked mercy. "i shot the stag! perhaps you don't believe i shot him!" "indeed i do! no one else would have done it. the chief would have died sooner!" "i'm sick of your chief!" said christian. "a pretty chief without a penny to bless himself! a chief, and glad of the job of carrying a carpet-bag! you'll be calling him my lord, next!" "he may at least write baronet after his name when he pleases," returned mercy. "why don't he then? a likely story!" "because," answered christina, "both his father and himself were ashamed of how the first baronet got his title. it had to do with the sale of a part of the property, and they counted the land the clan's as well as the chief's. they regarded it as an act of treachery to put the clan in the power of a stranger, and the chief looks on the title as a brand of shame." "i don't question the treachery," said christian. "a highlander is treacherous." christina had asked a friend in glasgow to find out for her anything known among the lawyers concerning the macruadhs, and what she had just recounted was a part of the information she had thereby received. thenceforward silence covered the whole transaction. sercombe neither returned the head, sent an apology, nor recognized the gift. that he had shot the stag was enough! but these things wrought shaping the idea of the brothers in the minds of the sisters, and they were beginning to feel a strange confidence in them, such as they had never had in men before. a curious little halo began to shimmer about the heads of the young men in the picture-gallery of the girls' fancy. not the less, however, did they regard them as enthusiasts, unfitted to this world, incapable of self-protection, too good to live--in a word, unpractical! because a man would live according to the laws of his being as well as of his body, obeying simple, imperative, essential human necessity, his fellows forsooth call him unpractical! of the idiotic delusions of the children of this world, that of being practical is one of the most ludicrous. here is a translation, made by ian, of one of alister's gaelic songs. the sun's daughter. a bright drop of water in the gold tire of a sun's daughter was laughing to her sire; and from all the flowers about, that never toiled or spun, the soul of each looked out, clear laughing to the sun. i saw them unfolding their hearts every one! every soul holding within it the sun! but all the sun-mirrors vanished anon; and their flowers, mere starers, grew dry in the sun. "my soul is but water, shining and gone! she is but the daughter," i said, "of the sun!" my soul sat her down in a deep-shaded gloom; her glory was flown, her earth was a tomb, till night came and caught her, and then out she shone; and i knew her no daughter of that shining sun-- till night came down and taught her of a glory yet unknown; and i knew my soul the daughter of a sun behind the sun. back, back to him that wrought her my soul shall haste and run; straight back to him, his daughter, to the sun behind the sun. chapter ix. annie of the shop. at the dance in the chief's barn, sercombe had paired with annie of the shop oftener than with any other of the girls. that she should please him at all, was something in his favour, for she was a simple, modest girl, with the nicest feeling of the laws of intercourse, the keenest perception both of what is in itself right, and what is becoming in the commonest relation. she understood by a fine moral instinct what respect was due to her, and what respect she ought to show, and was therefore in the truest sense well-bred. there are women whom no change of circumstances would cause to alter even their manners a hair's-breadth: such are god's ladies; there are others in whom any outward change will reveal the vulgarity of a nature more conscious of claim than of obligation. i need not say that sercomhe, though a man of what is called education, was but conventionally a gentleman. if in doubt whether a man be a gentleman or not, hear him speak to a woman he regards as his inferior: his very tone will probably betray him. a true gentleman, that is a true man, will be the more carefully respectful. sercombe was one of those who regard themselves as respectable because they are prudent; whether they are human, and their brother and sister's keeper, they have never asked themselves. to some minds neither innocent nor simple, there is yet something attractive in innocence and simplicity. perhaps it gives them a pleasing sense of their superiority--a background against which to rejoice in their liberty, while their pleasure in it helps to obscure the gulf between what the man would fain hold himself to be, and what in reality he is. there is no spectre so terrible as the unsuspected spectre of a man's own self; it is noisome enough to the man who is ever trying to better it: what must it appear to the man who sees it for the first time! sercombe's self was ugly, and he did not know it; he thought himself an exceptionally fine fellow. no one knows what a poor creature he is but the man who makes it his business to be true. the only mistake worse than thinking well of himself, is for a man to think god takes no interest in him. one evening, sorely in lack of amusement, sercombe wandered out into a star-lit night, and along the road to the village. there he went into the general shop, where sat annie behind the counter. now the first attention he almost always paid a woman, that is when he cared and dared, was a compliment--the fungus of an empty head or a false heart; but with annie he took no such initiative liberty, and she, accustomed to respectful familiarity from the chief and his brother, showed no repugnance to his friendly approach. "upon my word, miss annie," said sercombe, venturing at length a little, "you were the best dancer on the floor that night!" "oh, mr. sercombe! how can you say so--with such dancers as the young ladies of your party!" returned annie. "they dance well," he returned, "but not so well as you." "it all depends on the dance--whether you are used to it or not." "no, by jove! if you had a lesson or two such as they have been having all their lives, you would dance out of their sight in the twinkling of an eye. if i had you for a partner every night for a month, you would dance better than any woman i have ever seen--off the stage--any lady, that is." the grosser the flattery, the surer with a country girl, he thought. but there was that in his tone, besides the freedom of sounding her praises in her own ears, which was unpleasing to annie's ladyhood, and she held her peace. "come out and have a turn," he said thereupon. "it is lovely star-light. have you had a walk to-day?" "no, i have not," answered annie, casting how to get rid of him. "you wrong your beauty by keeping to the house." "my beauty," said annie, flushing, "may look after itself; i have nothing to do with it--neither, excuse me, sir, have you." "why, who has a right to be offended with the truth! a man can't help seeing your face is as sweet as your voice, and your figure, as revealed by your dancing, a match for the two!" "i will call my mother," said annie, and left the shop. sercombe did not believe she would, and waited. he took her departure for a mere coquetry. but when a rather grim, handsome old woman appeared, asking him--it took the most of her english--"what would you be wanting, sir?" as if he had just come into the shop, he found himself awkwardly situated. he answered, with more than his usual politeness, that, having had the pleasure of dancing with her daughter at the chief's hall, he had taken the liberty of looking in to inquire after her health; whereupon, perplexed, the old woman in her turn called annie, who came at once, but kept close to her mother. sercombe began to tell them about a tour he had made in canada, for he had heard they had friends there; but the mother did not understand him, and annie more and more disliked him. he soon saw that at least he had better say nothing more about a walk, and took himself off, not a little piqued at repulse from a peasant-girl in the most miserable shop he had ever entered. two days after, he went again--this time to buy tobacco. annie was short with him, but he went yet again and yet sooner: these primitive people objected to strangers, he said; accustomed to him she would be friendly! he would not rest until he had gained some footing of favour with her! annie grew heartily offended with the man. she also feared what might be said if he kept coming to the shop--where mistress conal had seen him more than once, and looked poison at him. for her own sake, for the sake of lachlan, and for the sake of the chief, she resolved to make the young father of the ancient clan acquainted with her trouble. it was on the day after his rejection of the ten-pound note that she found her opportunity, for the chief came to see her. "was he rude to you, annie?" he asked. "no, sir--too polite, i think: he must have seen i did not want his company.--i shall feel happier now you know." "i will see to it," said the chief. "i hope it will not put you to any trouble, sir!" "what am i here for, annie! are you not my clanswoman! is not lachlan my foster-brother!--he will trouble you no more, i think." as alister walked home, he met sercombe, and after a greeting not very cordial on either side, said thus: "i should be obliged to you, mr. sercombe, if you would send for anything you want, instead of going to the shop yourself. annie macruadh is not the sort of girl you may have found in such a position, and you would not wish to make her uncomfortable!" sercombe was, ashamed, i think; for the refuge of the fool when dissatisfied with himself, is offence with his neighbour, and sercombe was angry. "are you her father--or her lover?" he said. "she has a right to my protection--and claims it," rejoined alister quietly. "protection! oh!--what the devil would you protect her from?" "from you, mr. sercombe." "protect her, then." "i will. force yourself on that young woman's notice again, and you will have to do with me." they parted. alister went home. sercombe went straight to the shop. he was doing what he could to recommend himself to christina; but whether from something antagonistic between them, or from unwillingness on her part to yield her position of advantage and so her liberty, she had not given him the encouragement he thought he deserved. he believed himself in love with her, and had told her so; but the truest love such a man can feel, is a poor thing. he admired, and desired, and thought he loved her beauty, and that he called being in love with her! he did not think much about her money, but had she then been brought to poverty, he would at least have hesitated about marrying her. in the family he was regarded as her affianced, although she did not treat him as such, but merely went on bewitching him, pleased that at least he was a man of the world. while one is yet only in love, the real person, the love-capable, lies covered with the rose-leaves of a thousand sleepy-eyed dreams, and through them come to the dreamer but the barest hints of the real person of whom is the dream. a thousand fancies fly out, approach, and cross, but never meet; the man and the woman are pleased, not with each other, but each with the fancied other. the merest common likings are taken for signs of a wonderful sympathy, of a radical unity--of essential capacity, therefore, of loving and being loved; at a hundred points their souls seem to touch, but their contacts are the merest brushings as of insect-antennae; the real man, the real woman, is all the time asleep under the rose-leaves. happy is the rare fate of the true--to wake and come forth and meet in the majesty of the truth, in the image of god, in their very being, in the power of that love which alone is being. they love, not this and that about each other, but each the very other--a love as essential to reality, to truth, to religion, as the love of the very god. where such love is, let the differences of taste, the unfitnesses of temperament be what they may, the two must by and by be thoroughly one. sercombe saw no reason why a gentleman should not amuse himself with any young woman he pleased. what was the chief to him! he was not his chief! if he was a big man in the eyes of his little clan, he was nothing much in the eyes of hilary sercombe. chapter x the encounter. annie came again to her chief, with the complaint that mr. sercombe persisted in his attentions. alister went to see her home. they had not gone far when sercombe overtook them, and passed. the chief told annie to go on, and called after him, "i must have a word or two with you, mr. sercombe!" he turned and came up with long steps, his hands in his coat-pockets. "i warned you to leave that girl alone!" said the chief. "and i warn you now," rejoined sercombe, "to leave me alone!" "i am bound to take care of her." "and i of myself." "not at her expense!" "at yours then!" answered sercombe, provoking an encounter, to which he was the more inclined that he saw ian coming slowly up the ridge. "it was your deliberate intention then to forget the caution i gave you?" said the chief, restraining his anger. "i make a point of forgetting what i do not think worth remembering." "i forget nothing!" "i congratulate you." "and i mean to assist your memory, mr. sercombe." "mr. macruadh!" returned sercombe, "if you expect me not to open my lips to any hussy in the glen without your leave,--" his speech was cut short by a box on the ear from the open hand of the chief. he would not use his fist without warning, but such a word applied to any honest woman of his clan demanded instant recognition. sercomhe fell back a step, white with rage, then darting forward, struck straight at the front of his adversary. alister avoided the blow, but soon found himself a mere child at such play with the englishman. he had not again touched sercombe, and was himself bleeding fast, when ian came up running. "damn you! come on!" cried sercombe when he saw him; "i can do the precious pair of you!" "stop!" cried ian, laying hold of his brother from behind, pinning his arms to his sides, wheeling him round, and taking his place. "give over, alister," he went on. "you can't do it, and i won't see you punished when it is he that deserves it. go and sit there, and look on." "you can't do it, ian!" returned alister. "it is my business. one blow in will serve. he jumps about like a goat that i can't hit him!" "you are blind with blood!" said ian, in a tone that gave sercombe expectation of too easy a victory. "sit down there, i tell you!" "mind, i don't give in!" said alister, but turning went to the bank at the roadside. "if he speak once again to annie, i swear i will make him repent it!" sercombe laughed insultingly. "mr. sercombe," said ian, "had we not better put off our bout till to-morrow? you have fought already!" "damn you for a coward, come on!" "would you not like to take your breath for a moment?" "i have all i am likely to need." "it is only fair," persisted ian, "to warn you that you will not find my knowledge on the level of my brother's!" "shut up," said sercombe savagely, "and come on." for a few rounds ian seemed to alister to be giving sercombe time to recover his wind; to sercombe he seemed to be saving his own. he stood to defend, and did not attempt to put in a blow. "mr. sercombe," he said at length, "you cannot serve me as you did my brother." "i see that well enough. come on!" "will you give your word to leave annie of the shop alone?" sercombe answered with a scornful imprecation. "i warn you again, i am no novice in this business!" said ian. sercombe struck out, but did not reach his antagonist. the fight lasted but a moment longer. as his adversary drew back from a failed blow, alister saw ian's eyes flash, and his left arm shoot out, as it seemed, to twice its length. sercombe neither reeled nor staggered but fell supine, and lay motionless. the brothers were by his side in a moment. "i struck too hard!" said ian. "who can think about that in a fight!" returned alister. "i could have helped it well enough, and a better man would. something shot through me--i hope it wasn't hatred; i am sure it was anger--and the man went down! what if the devil struck the blow!" "nonsense, ian!" said alister, as they raised sercombe to carry him to the cottage. "it was pure indignation, and nothing to blame in it!" "i wish i could be sure of that!" they had not gone far before he began to come to himself. "what are you about?" he said feebly but angrily. "set me down." they did so. he staggered to the road-side, and leaned against the bank. "what's been the row?" he asked. "oh, i remember!--well, you've had the best of it!" he held out his hand in a vague sort of way, and the gesture invaded their soft hearts. each took the hand. "i was all right about the girl though," said sercombe. "i didn't mean her any harm." "i don't think you did," answered alister; "and i am sure you could have done her none; but the girl did not like it." "there is not a girl of the clan, or in the neighbourhood, for whom my brother would not have done the same." said ian. "you're a brace of woodcocks!" cried sercombe. "it's well you're not out in the world. you would be in hot water from morning to night! i can't think how the devil you get on at all!" "get on! where?" asked ian with a smile. "come now! you ain't such fools as you want to look! a man must make a place for himself somehow in the world!" he rose, and they walked in the direction of the cottage. "there is a better thing than that," said ian! "what?" "to get clean out of it." "what! cut your throats?" "i meant that to get out of the world clean was better than to get on in it." "i don't understand you. i don't choose to think the man that thrashed me a downright idiot!" growled sercombe. "what you call getting on," rejoined ian, "we count not worth a thought. look at our clan! it is a type of the world itself. everything is passing away. we believe in the kingdom of heaven." "come, come! fellows like you must know well enough that's all bosh! nobody nowadays--nobody with any brains--believes such rot!" "we believe in jesus christ," said ian, "and are determined to do what he will have us do, and take our orders from nobody else." "i don't understand you!" "i know you don't. you cannot until you set about changing your whole way of life." "oh, be damned! what an idea! a sneaking, impossible idea!" "as to its being an impossible idea, we hold it, and live by it. how absurd it must seem to you, i know perfectly. but we don't live in your world, and you do not even see the lights of ours." "'there is a world beyond the stars'!--well, there may be; i know nothing about it; i only know there is one on this side of them,--a very decent sort of world too! i mean to make the best of it." "and have not begun yet!" "indeed i have! i deny myself nothing. i live as i was made to live." "if you were not made to obey your conscience or despise yourself, you are differently made from us, and no communication is possible between us. we must wait until what differences a man from a beast make its appearance in you." "you are polite!" "you have spoken of us as you think; now we speak of you as we think. taking your representation of yourself, you are in the condition of the lower animals, for you claim inclination as the law of your life." "my beast is better than your man!" "you mean you get more of the good of life!" "right! i do." the brothers exchanged a look and smile. "but suppose," resumed ian, "the man we have found in us should one day wake up in you! suppose he should say, 'why did you make a beast of me?'! it will not be easy for you to answer him!" "that's all moonshine! things are as you take them." "so said lady macbeth till she took to walking in her sleep, and couldn't get rid of the smell of the blood!" sercombe said no more. he was silent with disgust at the nonsense of it all. they reached the door of the cottage. alister invited him to walk in. he drew back, and would have excused himself. "you had better lie down a while," said alister. "you shall come to my room," said ian. "we shall meet nobody." sercombe yielded, for he felt queer. he threw himself on ian's bed, and in a few minutes was fast asleep. when he woke, he had a cup of tea, and went away little the worse. the laird could not show himself for several days. after this annie had no further molestation. but indeed the young men's time was almost up--which was quite as well, for annie of the shop, after turning a corner of the road, had climbed the hill-side, and seen all that passed. the young ladies, hearing contradictory statements, called upon annie to learn the truth, and the intercourse with her that followed was not without influence on them. through annie they saw further into the character of the brothers, who, if they advocated things too fine for the world the girls had hitherto known, did things also of which it would by no means have approved. they valued that world and its judgment not a straw! chapter xi. a lesson. all the gentlemen at the new house left it together, and its ladies were once more abandoned to the society of nature, who said little to any of them. for, though she recognized her grandchildren, and did what she could for them, it was now time they should make some move towards acquaintance with her. a point comes when she must stand upon her dignity, for it is great. if you would hear her wonderful tales, or see her marvellous treasures, you must not trifle with her; you must not talk as if you could rummage her drawers and cabinets as you pleased. you must believe in her; you must reverence her; else, although she is everywhere about the house, you may not meet her from the beginning of one year to the end of another. to allude to any aspect of nature in the presence of the girls was to threaten to bore them; and i heartily confess to being bored myself with common talk about scenery; but these ladies appeared unaware of the least expression on the face of their grand-mother. doubtless they received some good from the aspect of things--that they could not help; there grannie's hidden, and therefore irresistible power was in operation; but the moment they had their thoughts directed to the world around them, they began to gape inwardly. even the trumpet and shawm of her winds, the stately march of her clouds, and the torrent-rush of her waters, were to them poor facts, no vaguest embodiment of truths eternal. it was small wonder then that verse of any worth should be to them but sounding brass and clanging cymbals. what they called society, its ways and judgments, its decrees and condemnations, its fashions and pomps and shows, false, unjust, ugly, was nearly all they cared for. the truth of things, without care for which man or woman is the merest puppet, had hitherto been nothing to them. to talk of nature was sentimental. to talk of god was both irreverent and ill-bred. wordsworth was an old woman; st. paul an evangelical churchman. they saw no feature of any truth, but, like all unthinkers, wrapped the words of it in their own foolishness, and then sneered at them. they were too much of ladies, however, to do it disagreeably; they only smiled at the foolish neighbour who believed things they were too sensible to believe. it must, however, be said for them, that they had not yet refused anything worth believing--as presented to them. they had not yet actually looked upon any truth and refused it. they were indeed not yet true enough in themselves to suspect the presence of either a truth or a falsehood. a thaw came, and the ways were bad, and they found the time hang yet heavier on their unaided hands. an intercourse by degrees established itself between mrs. macruadh and the well-meaning, handsome, smiling mrs. palmer, and rendered it natural for the girls to go rather frequently to the cottage. they made themselves agreeable to the mother, and subject to the law of her presence showed to better advantage. with their love of literature, it was natural also that the young men should at such times not only talk about books, but occasionally read for their entertainment from some favourite one; so that now, for the first time in their lives, the young ladies were brought under direct teaching of a worthy sort--they had had but a mockery of it at school and church--and a little light began to soak through their unseeking eyes. among many others, however, less manifest, one obstruction to their progress lay in the fact that christina, whose perceptions in some directions was quick enough, would always make a dart at the comical side of anything that could be comically turned, so disturbing upon occasion the whole spiritual atmosphere about some delicate epiphany: this to both alister and ian was unbearable. she offended chiefly in respect of wordsworth--who had not humour enough always to perceive what seriously meant expression might suggest a ludicrous idea. one time, reading from the excursion, ian came to the verse--not to be found, i think, in later editions-- "perhaps it is not he but some one else":-- "awful idea!" exclaimed christina, with sepulchral tone; "--'some one else!' think of it! it makes me shudder! who might it not have been!" ian closed the book, and persistently refused to read more that day. another time he was reading, in illustration of something, wordsworth's poem, "to a skylark," the earlier of the two with that title: when he came to the unfortunate line,-- "happy, happy liver!"-- "oh, i am glad to know that!" cried christina. "i always thought the poor lark must have a bad digestion--he was up so early!" ian refused to finish the poem, although mercy begged hard. the next time they came, he proposed to "read something in miss palmer's style," and taking up a volume of hood, and avoiding both his serious and the best of his comic poems, turned to two or three of the worst he could find. after these he read a vulgar rime about an execution, pretending to be largely amused, making flat jokes of his own, and sometimes explaining elaborately where was no occasion. "ian!" said his mother at length; "have you bid farewell to your senses?" "no, mother," he answered; "what i am doing is the merest consequence of the way you brought us up." "i don't understand that!" she returned. "you always taught us to do the best we could for our visitors. so when i fail to interest them, i try to amuse them." "but you need not make a fool of yourself!" "it is better to make a fool of myself, than let miss palmer make a fool of--a great man!" "mr. ian," said christina, "it is not of yourself but of me you have been making a fool.--i deserved it!" she added, and burst into tears. "miss palmer," said ian, "i will drop my foolishness, if you will drop your fun." "i will," answered christina. and ian read them the poem beginning-- "three years she grew in sun and shower." scoffing at what is beautiful, is not necessarily a sign of evil; it may only indicate stupidity or undevelopment: the beauty is not perceived. but blame is often present in prolonged undevelopment. surely no one habitually obeying his conscience would long be left without a visit from some shape of the beautiful! chapter xii. nature. the girls had every liberty; their mother seldom interfered. herself true to her own dim horn-lantern, she had confidence in the discretion of her daughters, and looked for no more than discretion. hence an amount of intercourse was possible between them and the young men, which must have speedily grown to a genuine intimacy had they inhabited even a neighbouring sphere of conscious life. almost unknown to herself, however, a change for the better had begun in mercy. she had not yet laid hold of, had not yet perceived any truth; but she had some sense of the blank where truth ought to be. it was not a sense that truth was lacking; it was only a sense that something was not in her which was in those men. a nature such as hers, one that had not yet sinned against the truth, was not one long to frequent such a warm atmosphere of live truth, without approach to the hour when it must chip its shell, open its eyes, and acknowledge a world of duty around it. one lovely star-lit night of keen frost, the two mothers were sitting by a red peat-fire in the little drawing-room of the cottage, and ian was talking to the girls over some sketches he had made in the north, when the chief came in, bringing with him an air of sharp exhilaration, and proposed a walk. "come and have a taste of star-light!" he said. the girls rose at once, and were ready in a minute. the chief was walking between the two ladies, and ian was a few steps in front, his head bent as in thought. suddenly, mercy saw him spread out his arms toward the starry vault, with his face to its serrated edge of mountain-tops. the feeling, almost the sense of another presence awoke in her, and as quickly vanished. the thought, is he a pantheist? took its place. had she not surprised him in an act of worship? in that wide outspreading of the lifted arms, was he not worshipping the whole, the pan? sky and stars and mountains and sea were his god! she walked aghast, forgetful of a hundred things she had heard him say that might have settled the point. she had, during the last day or two, been reading an article in which pantheism was once and again referred to with more horror than definiteness. recovering herself a little, she ventured approach to the subject. "macruadh," she said, "mr. ian and you often say things about nature that i cannot understand: i wish you would tell me what you mean by it." "by what?" asked alister. "by nature" answered mercy. "i heard mr. ian say, for instance, the other night, that he did not like nature to take liberties with him; you said she might take what liberties with you she pleased; and then you went on talking so that i could not understand a word either of you said!" while she spoke, ian had turned and rejoined them, and they were now walking in a line, mercy between the two men, and christina on ian's right. the brothers looked at each other: it would be hard to make her understand just that example! something more rudimentary must prepare the way! silence fell for a moment, and then ian said-- "we mean by nature every visitation of the outside world through our senses." "more plainly, please mr. ian! you cannot imagine how stupid i feel when you are talking your thinks, as once i heard a child call them." "i mean by nature, then, all that you see and hear and smell and taste and feel of the things round about you." "if that be all you mean, why should you make it seem so difficult?" "but that is not all. we mean the things themselves only for the sake of what they say to us. as our sense of smell brings us news of fields far off, so those fields, or even the smell only that comes from them, tell us of things, meanings, thoughts, intentions beyond them, and embodied in them." "and that is why you speak of nature as a person?" asked mercy. "whatever influences us must be a person. but god is the only real person, being in himself, and without help from anybody; and so we talk even of the world which is but his living garment, as if that were a person; and we call it she as if it were a woman, because so many of god's loveliest influences come to us through her. she always seems to me a beautiful old grandmother." "but there now! when you talk of her influences, and the liberties she takes, i do not know what you mean. she seems to do and be something to you which certainly she does not and is not to me. i cannot tell what to make of it. i feel just as when our music-master was talking away about thorough bass: i could not get hold, head or tail, of what the man was after, and we all agreed there was no sense in it. now i begin to suspect there must have been too much!" "there is no fear of her!" said ian to himself. "my heart told me the truth about her!" thought alister jubilant. "now we shall have talk!" "i think i can let you see into it, miss mercy," said ian. "imagine for a moment how it would be if, instead of having a roof like 'this most excellent canopy the air, this brave o'erhanging, this majestical roof, fretted with golden fire,'--" "are you making the words, or saying them out of a book?" interrupted mercy. "ah! you don't know hamlet? how rich i should feel myself if i had the first reading of it before me like you!--but imagine how different it would have been if, instead of such a roof, we had only clouds, hanging always down, like the flies in a theatre, within a yard or two of our heads!" mercy was silent for a moment, then said, "it would be horribly wearisome." "it would indeed be wearisome! but how do you think it would affect your nature, your being?" mercy held the peace which is the ignorant man's wisdom. "we should have known nothing of astronomy," said christina. "true; and the worst would have been, that the soul would have had no astronomy--no notion of heavenly things." "there you leave me out again!" said mercy. "i mean," said ian, "that it would have had no sense of outstretching, endless space, no feeling of heights above, and depths beneath. the idea of space would not have come awake in it." "i understand!" said christina. "but i do not see that we should have been much the worse off. why should we have the idea of more than we want? so long as we have room, i do not see what space matters to us!" "ah, but when the soul wakes up, it needs all space for room! a limit of thousands of worlds will not content it. mere elbow-room will not do when the soul wakes up!" "then my soul is not waked up yet!" rejoined christina with a laugh. ian did not reply, and christina felt that he accepted the proposition, absurd as it seemed to herself. "but there is far more than that," he resumed. "what notion could you have had of majesty, if the heavens seemed scarce higher than the earth? what feeling of the grandeur of him we call god, of his illimitation in goodness? for space is the body to the idea of liberty. liberty is--god and the souls that love; these are the limitless room, the space, in which thoughts, the souls of things, have their being. if there were no holy mind, then no freedom, no spiritual space, therefore no thoughts; just as, if there were no space, there could be no things." ian saw that not even alister was following him, and changed his key. "look up," he said, "and tell me what you see.--what is the shape over us?" "it is a vault," replied christina. "a dome--is it not?" said mercy. "yes; a vault or a dome, recognizable at the moment mainly by its shining points. this dome we understand to be the complement or completing part of a correspondent dome on the other side of the world. it follows that we are in the heart of a hollow sphere of loveliest blue, spangled with light. now the sphere is the one perfect geometrical form. over and round us then we have the one perfect shape. i do not say it is put there for the purpose of representing god; i say it is there of necessity, because of its nature, and its nature is its relation to god. it is of god's thinking; and that half-sphere above men's heads, with influence endlessly beyond the reach of their consciousness, is the beginning of all revelation of him to men. they must begin with that. it is the simplest as well as most external likeness of him, while its relation to him goes so deep that it represents things in his very nature that nothing else could." "you bewilder me," said mercy. "i cannot follow you. i am not fit for such high things!" "i will go on; you will soon begin to see what i mean: i know what you are fit for better than you do yourself, miss mercy.--think then how it would be if this blue sky were plainly a solid. men of old believed it a succession of hollow spheres, one outside the other; it is hardly a wonder they should have had little gods. no matter how high the vault of the inclosing sphere; limited at all it could not declare the glory of god, it could only show his handiwork. in our day it is a sphere only to the eyes; it is a foreshortening of infinitude that it may enter our sight; there is no imagining of a limit to it; it is a sphere only in this, that in no one direction can we come nearer to its circumference than in another. this infinitive sphere, i say then, or, if you like it better, this spheric infinitude, is the only figure, image, emblem, symbol, fit to begin us to know god; it is an idea incomprehensible; we can only believe in it. in like manner god cannot by searching be found out, cannot be grasped by any mind, yet is ever before us, the one we can best know, the one we must know, the one we cannot help knowing; for his end in giving us being is that his humblest creature should at length possess himself, and be possessed by him." "i think i begin," said mercy--and said no more. "if it were not for the outside world," resumed ian, "we should have no inside world to understand things by. least of all could we understand god without these millions of sights and sounds and scents and motions, weaving their endless harmonies. they come out from his heart to let us know a little of what is in it!" alister had been listening hard. he could not originate such things, but he could understand them; and his delight in them proved them his own, although his brother had sunk the shaft that laid open their lode. "i never heard you put a thing better, ian!" he said. "you gentlemen," said mercy, "seem to have a place to think in that i don't know how to get into! could you not open your church-door a little wider to let me in? there must be room for more than two!" she was looking up at alister, not so much afraid of him; ian was to her hardly of this world. in her eyes alister saw something that seemed to reflect the starlight; but it might have been a luminous haze about the waking stars of her soul! "my brother has always been janitor to me," replied alister; "i do not know how to open any door. but here no door needs to be opened; you have just to step straight into the temple of nature, among all the good people worshipping." "there! that is what i was afraid of!" cried mercy: "you are pantheists!" "bless my soul, mercy!" exclaimed christina; "what do you mean?" "yes," answered ian. "if to believe that not a lily can grow, not a sparrow fall to the ground without our father, be pantheism, alister and i are pantheists. if by pantheism you mean anything that would not fit with that, we are not pantheists." "why should we trouble about religion more than is required of us!" interposed christina. "why indeed?" returned ian. "but then how much is required?" "you require far more than my father, and he is good enough for me!" "the master says we are to love god with all our hearts and souls and strength and mind." "that was in the old law, ian," said alister. "you are right. jesus only justified it--and did it." "how then can you worship in the temple of nature?" said mercy. "just as he did. it is nature's temple, mind, for the worship of god, not of herself!" "but how am i to get into it? that is what i want to know." "the innermost places of the temple are open only to such as already worship in a greater temple; but it has courts into which any honest soul may enter." "you wouldn't set me to study wordsworth?" "by no means." "i am glad of that--though there must be more in him than i see, or you couldn't care for him so much!" "some of nature's lessons you must learn before you can understand them." "can you call it learning a lesson if you do not understand it?" "yes--to a certain extent. did you learn at school to work the rule of three?" "yes; and i was rather fond of it." "did you understand it?" "i could work sums in it." "did you see how it was that setting the terms down so, and working out the rule, must give you a true answer. did you perceive that it was safe to buy or sell, to build a house, or lay out a garden, by the rule of three?" "i did not. i do not yet." "then one may so far learn a lesson without understanding it! all do, more or less, in dame nature's school. not a few lessons must be so learned in order to be better learned. without being so learned first, it is not possible to understand them; the scholar has not facts enough about the things to understand them. keats's youthful delight in nature was more intense even than wordsworth's, but he was only beginning to understand her when he died. shelley was much nearer understanding her than keats, but he was drowned before he did understand her. wordsworth was far before either of them. at the same time, presumptuous as it may appear, i believe there are regions to be traversed, beyond any point to which wordsworth leads us." "but how am i to begin? do tell me. nothing you say helps me in the least." "i have all the time been leading you toward the door at which you want to go in. it is not likely, however, that it will open to you at once. i doubt if it will open to you at all except through sorrow." "you are a most encouraging master!" said christina, with a light laugh. "it was wordsworth's bitter disappointment in the outcome of the french revolution," continued ian, "that opened the door to him. yet he had gone through the outer courts of the temple with more understanding than any who immediately preceded him.--will you let me ask you a question?" "you frighten me!" said mercy. "i am sorry for that. we will talk of something else." "i am not afraid of what you may ask me; i am frightened at what you tell me. i fear to go on if i must meet sorrow on the way!" "you make one think of some terrible secret society!" said christina. "tell me then, miss mercy, is there anything you love very much? i don't say any person, but any thing." "i love some animals." "an animal is not a thing. it is possible to love animals and not the nature of which we are speaking. you might love a dog dearly, and never care to see the sun rise!--tell me, did any flower ever make you cry? "no," answered mercy, with a puzzled laugh; "how could it?" "did any flower ever make you a moment later in going to bed, or a moment earlier in getting out of it?" "no, certainly!" "in that direction, then, i am foiled!" "you would not really have me cry over a flower, mr. ian? did ever a flower make you cry yourself? of course not! it is only silly women that cry for nothing!" "i would rather not bring myself in at present," answered ian smiling. "do you know how chaucer felt about flowers?" "i never read a word of chaucer." "shall i give you an instance?" "please." "chaucer was a man of the world, a courtier, more or less a man of affairs, employed by edward iii. in foreign business of state: you cannot mistake him for an effeminate or sentimental man! he does not anywhere, so far as i remember, say that ever he cried over a flower, but he shows a delight in some flowers so delicate and deep that it must have a source profounder than that of most people's tears. when we go back i will read you what he says about the daisy; but one more general passage i think i could repeat. there are animals in it too!" "pray let us hear it," said christina. he spoke the following stanzas--not quite correctly, but supplying for the moment's need where he could not recall:-- a gardein saw i, full of blosomed bowis, upon a river, in a grene mede, there as sweetnesse evermore inough is, with floures white, blewe, yelowe, and rede, and cold welle streames, nothing dede, that swommen full of smale fishes light, with finnes rede, and scales silver bright. on every bough the birdes heard i sing, with voice of angell, in hir armonie, that busied hem, hir birdes forth to bring, the little pretty conies to hir play gan hie, and further all about i gan espie, the dredeful roe, the buck, the hart, and hind, squirrels, and beastes small, of gentle kind. of instruments of stringes in accorde, heard i so play, a ravishing swetnesse, that god, that maker is of all and lorde, ne heard never better, as i gesse, therewith a wind, unneth it might be lesse, made in the leaves grene a noise soft, accordant to the foules song on loft. the aire of the place so attempre was, that never was ther grevance of hot ne cold, there was eke every noisome spice and gras, ne no man may there waxe sicke ne old, yet was there more joy o thousand fold, than i can tell or ever could or might, there is ever clere day, and never night. he modernized them also a little in repeating them, so that his hearers missed nothing through failing to understand the words: how much they gained, it were hard to say. "it reminds one," commented ian, "of dante's paradise on the top of the hill of purgatory." "i don't know anything about dante either," said mercy regretfully. "there is plenty of time!" said ian. "but there is so much to learn!" returned mercy in a hopeless tone. "that is the joy of existence!" ian replied. "we are not bound to know; we are only bound to learn.--but to return to my task: a man may really love a flower. in another poem chaucer tells us that such is his delight in his books that no other pleasure can take him from them-- save certainly, when that the month of may is comen, and that i heare the foules sing, and that the floures ginnen for to spring, farwell my booke, and my devotion! poor people love flowers; rich people admire them." "but," said mercy, "how can one love a thing that has no life?" ian could have told her that whatever grows must live; he could further have told her his belief that life cannot be without its measure of consciousness; but it would have led to more difficulty, and away from the end he had in view. he felt also that no imaginable degree of consciousness in it was commensurate with the love he had himself for almost any flower. his answer to mercy's question was this:-- "the flowers come from the same heart as man himself, and are sent to be his companions and ministers. there is something divinely magical, because profoundly human in them. in some at least the human is plain; we see a face of childlike peace and confidence that appeals to our best. our feeling for many of them doubtless owes something to childish associations; but how did they get their hold of our childhood? why did they enter our souls at all? they are joyous, inarticulate children, come with vague messages from the father of all. if i confess that what they say to me sometimes makes me weep, how can i call my feeling for them anything but love? the eternal thing may have a thousand forms of which we know nothing yet!" mercy felt ian must mean something she ought to like, if only she knew what it was; but he had not yet told her anything to help her! he had, however, neither reached his end nor lost his way; he was leading her on--gently and naturally. "i did not mean," he resumed, "that you must of necessity begin with the flowers. i was only inquiring whether at that point you were nearer to nature.--tell me--were you ever alone?" "alone!" repeated mercy, thinking. "--surely everybody has been many times alone!" "could you tell when last you were alone?" she thought, but could not tell. "what i want to ask you," said ian, "is--did you ever feel alone? did you ever for a moment inhabit loneliness? did it ever press itself upon you that there was nobody near--that if you called nobody would hear? you are not alone while you know that you can have a fellow creature with you the instant you choose." "i hardly think i was ever alone in that way." "then what i would have you do," continued ian, "is--to make yourself alone in one of nature's withdrawing-rooms, and seat yourself in one of grannie's own chairs.--i am coming to the point at last!--upon a day when the weather is fine, go out by yourself. tell no one where you are going, or that you are going anywhere. climb a hill. if you cannot get to the top of it, go high on the side of it. no book, mind! nothing to fill your thinking-place from another's! people are always saying 'i think,' when they are not thinking at all, when they are at best only passing the thoughts of others whom they do not even know. "when you have got quite alone, when you do not even know the nearest point to anybody, sit down and be lonely. look out on the loneliness, the wide world round you, and the great vault over you, with the lonely sun in the middle of it; fold your hands in your lap, and be still. do not try to think anything. do not try to call up any feeling or sentiment or sensation; just be still. by and by, it may be, you will begin to know something of nature. i do not know you well enough to be sure about it; but if you tell me afterwards how you fared, i shall then know you a little better, and perhaps be able to tell you whether nature will soon speak to you, or not until, as henry vaughan says, some veil be broken in you." they were approaching the cottage, and little more was said. they found mrs. palmer prepared to go, and mercy was not sorry: she had had enough for a while. she was troubled at the thought that perhaps she was helplessly shut out from the life inhabited by the brothers. when she lay down, her own life seemed dull and poor. these men, with all their kindness, respect, attention, and even attendance upon them, did not show them the homage which the men of their own circle paid them! "they will never miss us!" she said to herself. "they will go on with their pantheism, or whatever it is, all the same!" but they should not say she was one of those who talk but will not do! that scorn she could not bear! all the time, however, the thing seemed to savour more of spell or cast of magic than philosophy: the means enjoined were suggestive of a silent incantation! chapter xiii. granny angry. it must not be supposed that all the visiting was on the part of those of the new house. the visits thence were returned by both matron and men. but somehow there was never the same freedom in the house as in the cottage. the difference did not lie in the presence of the younger girls: they were well behaved, friendly, and nowise disagreeable children. doubtless there was something in the absence of books: it was of no use to jump up when a passage occurred; help was not at hand. but it was more the air of the place, the presence of so many common-place things, that clogged the wheels of thought. neither, with all her knowledge of the world and all her sweetness, did mrs. palmer understand the essentials of hospitality half so well as the widow of the late minister-chief. all of them liked, and confessed that they liked the cottage best. even christina felt something lacking in their reception. she regretted that the house was not grand enough to show what they were accustomed to. mrs. palmer seldom understood the talk, and although she sat looking persistently content, was always haunted with a dim feeling that her husband would not be hest pleased at so much intercourse between his rich daughters and those penniless country-fellows. but what could she do! the place where he had abandoned them was so dull, so solitary! the girls must not mope! christina would wither up without amusement, and then good-bye to her beauty and all that depended upon it! in the purity of her motherhood, she more than liked the young men: happy mother she would think herself, were her daughters to marry such men as these! the relations between them and their mother delighted her: they were one! their hearts were together! they understood each other! she could never have such bliss with her sons! never since she gave them birth had she had one such look from either of hers as she saw pass every now and then from these to their mother! it would be like being born again to feel herself loved in that way! for any danger to the girls, she thought with a sigh how soon in london they would forget the young highlanders. was there no possibility of securing one of them? what chance was there of mercy's marrying well! she was so decidedly plain! was the idea of marrying her into an old and once powerful family like that of the macruadh, to her husband inconceivable? could he not restore its property as the dowry of his unprized daughter! it would be to him but a trifle!--and he could stipulate that the chief should acknowledge the baronetcy and use his title! mercy would then be a woman of consequence, and peregrine would have the bible-honour of being the repairer of the breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in!--such were some of the thoughts that would come and go in the brain of the mother as she sat; nor were they without a share in her readiness to allow her daughters to go out with the young men: she had an unquestioning conviction of their safety with them. the days went by, and what to christina had seemed imprisonment, began to look like some sort of liberty. she had scarce come nearer to sympathy with those whose society consoled her, but their talk had ceased to sound repulsive. she was infinitely more than a well-modelled waxflower, and yet hardly a growing plant. more was needed to wake her than friends awake. it is wonderful how long the sleeping may go with the waking, and not discover any difference between them. but grannie nature was about to interfere. the spring drew gently on. it would be long ere summer was summer enough to show. there seemed more of the destructive in the spring itself than of the genial--cold winds, great showers, days of steady rain, sudden assaults of hail and sleet. still it was spring, and at length, one fine day with a bright sun, snow on the hills, and clouds in the east, but no sign of any sudden change, the girls went out for a walk, and took the younger girls with them. a little way up the valley, out of sight of the cottage, a small burn came down its own dell to join that which flowed through the chiefs farm. its channel was wide, but except in time of rain had little water in it. about half a mile up its course it divided, or rather the channel did, for in one of its branches there was seldom any water. at the fork was a low rocky mound, with an ancient ruin of no great size-three or four fragments of thick walls, within whose plan grew a slender birch-tree. thither went the little party, wandering up the stream: the valley was sheltered; no wind but the south could reach it; and the sun, though it could not make it very warm, as it looked only aslant on its slopes, yet lighted both sides of it. great white clouds passed slowly across the sky, with now and then a nearer black one threatening rain, but a wind overhead was carrying them quickly athwart. ian had seen the ladies pass, but made no effort to overtake them, although he was bound in the same direction: he preferred sauntering along with a book of ballads. suddenly his attention was roused by a peculiar whistle, which he knew for that of hector of the stags: it was one of the few sounds he could make. three times it was hurriedly repeated, and ere the third was over, ian had discovered hector high on a hill on the opposite side of the burn, waving his arms, and making eager signs to him. he stopped and set himself to understand. hector was pointing with energy, but it was impossible to determine the exact direction: all that ian could gather was, that his presence was wanted somewhere farther on. he resumed his walk therefore at a rapid pace, whereupon hector pointed higher. there on the eastern horizon, towards the north, almost down upon the hills, ian saw a congeries of clouds in strangest commotion, such as he had never before seen in any home latitude--a mass of darkly variegated vapours manifesting a peculiar and appalling unrest. it seemed tormented by a gyrating storm, twisting and contorting it with unceasing change. now the gray came writhing out, now the black came bulging through, now a dirty brown smeared the ashy white, and now the blue shone calmly out from eternal distances. at the season he could hardly think it a thunderstorm, and stood absorbed in the unusual phenomenon. but again, louder and more hurried, came the whistling, and again he saw hector gesticulating, more wildly than before. then he knew that someone must be in want of help or succour, and set off running as hard as he could: he saw hector keeping him in sight, and watching to give him further direction: perhaps the ladies had got into some difficulty! when he arrived at the opening of the valley just mentioned, hector's gesticulations made it quite plain it was up there he must go; and as soon as he entered it, he saw that the cloudy turmoil was among the hills at its head. with that he began to suspect the danger the hunter feared, and almost the same instant heard the merry voices of the children. running yet faster, he came in sight of them on the other side of the stream,--not a moment too soon. the valley was full of a dull roaring sound. he called to them as he ran, and the children saw and came running down toward him, followed by mercy. she was not looking much concerned, for she thought it only the grumbling of distant thunder. but ian saw, far up the valley, what looked like a low brown wall across it, and knew what it was. "mercy!" he cried, "run up the side of the hill directly; you will be drowned--swept away if you do not." she looked incredulous, and glanced up the hill-side, but carne on as if to cross the burn and join him. "do as i tell you," he cried, in a tone which few would have ventured to disregard, and turning darted across the channel toward her. mercy did not wait his coming, but took the children, each by a hand, and went a little way up the hill that immediately bordered the stream. "farther! farther!" cried ian as he ran. "where is christina?" "at the ruin," she answered. "good heavens!" exclaimed ian, and darted off, crying, "up the hill with you! up the hill!" christina was standing by the birch-tree in the ruin, looking down the burn. she had heard ian calling, and saw him running, but suspected no danger. "come; come directly; for god's sake, come!" he cried. "look up the burn!" he added, seeing her hesitate bewildered. she turned, looked, and came running to him, down the channel, white with terror. it was too late. the charging water, whose front rank was turf, and hushes, and stones, was almost upon her. the solid matter had retarded its rush, but it was now on the point of dividing against the rocky mound, to sweep along both sides, and turn it into an island. ian bounded to her in the middle of the channel, caught her by the arm, and hurried her back to the mound as fast as they could run: it was the highest ground immediately accessible. as they reached it, the water broke with a roar against its rocky base, rose, swelled--and in a moment the island was covered with a brown, seething, swirling flood. "where's mercy and the children?" gasped christina, as the water rose upon her. "safe, safe!" answered ian. "we must get to the ruin!" the water was halfway up his leg, and rising fast. their danger was but beginning. would the old walls, in greater part built without mortar, stand the rush? if a tree should strike them, they hardly would! if the flood came from a waterspout, it would soon be over--only how high it might first rise, who could tell! such were his thoughts as they struggled to the ruin, and stood up at the end of a wall parallel with the current. the water was up to christina's waist, and very cold. here out of the rush, however, she recovered her breath in a measure, and showed not a little courage. ian stood between her and the wall, and held her fast. the torrent came round the end of the wall from both sides, but the encounter and eddy of the two currents rather pushed them up against it. without it they could not have stood. the chief danger to christina, however, was from the cold. with the water so high on her body, and flowing so fast, she could not long resist it! ian, therefore, took her round the knees, and lifted her almost out of the water. "put your arms up," he said, "and lay hold of the wall. don't mind blinding me; my eyes are of little use at present. there--put your feet in my hands. don't be frightened; i can hold you." "i can't help being frightened!" she panted. "we are in god's arms," returned ian. "he is holding us." "are you sure we shall not be drowned?" she asked. "no; but i am sure the water cannot take us out of god's arms." this was not much comfort to christina. she did not know anything about god--did not believe in him any more than most people. she knew god's arms only as the arms of ian--and they comforted her, for she felt them! how many of us actually believe in any support we do not immediately feel? in any arms we do not see? but every help i from god; ian's help was god's help; and though to believe in ian was not to believe in god, it was a step on the road toward believing in god. he that believeth not in the good man whom he hath seen, how shall he believe in the god whom he hath not seen? she began to feel a little better; the ghastly choking at her heart was almost gone. "i shall break your arms!" she said. "you are not very heavy," he answered; "and though i am not so strong as alister, i am stronger than most men. with the help of the wall i can hold you a long time." how was it that, now first in danger, self came less to the front with her than usual? it was that now first she was face to face with reality. until this moment her life had been an affair of unrealities. her selfishness had thinned, as it were vaporized, every reality that approached her. solidity is not enough to teach some natures reality; they must hurt themselves against the solid ere they realize its solidity. small reality, small positivity of existence has water to a dreaming soul, half consciously gazing through half shut eyes at the soft river floating away in the moonlight: christina was shivering in its grasp on her person, its omnipresence to her skin; its cold made her gasp and choke; the push and tug of it threatened to sweep her away like a whelmed log! it is when we are most aware of the factitude of things, that we are most aware of our need of god, and most able to trust in him; when most aware of their presence, the soul finds it easiest to withdraw from them, and seek its safety with the maker of it and them. the recognition of inexorable reality in any shape, or kind, or way, tends to rouse the soul to the yet more real, to its relations with higher and deeper existence. it is not the hysterical alone for whom the great dash of cold water is good. all who dream life instead of living it, require some similar shock. of the kind is every disappointment, every reverse, every tragedy of life. the true in even the lowest kind, is of the truth, and to be compelled to feel even that, is to be driven a trifle nearer to the truth of being, of creation, of god. hence this sharp contact with nature tended to make christina less selfish: it made her forget herself so far as to care for her helper as well as herself. it must be remembered, however, that her selfishness was not the cultivated and ingrained selfishness of a long life, but that of an uneducated, that is undeveloped nature. her being had not degenerated by sinning against light known as light; it had not been consciously enlightened at all; it had scarcely as yet begun to grow. it was not lying dead, only unawaked. i would not be understood to imply that she was nowise to blame--but that she was by no means so much to blame as one who has but suspected the presence of a truth, and from selfishness or self-admiration has turned from it. she was to blame wherever she had not done as her conscience had feebly told her; and she had not made progress just because she had neglected the little things concerning which she had promptings. there are many who do not enter the kingdom of heaven just because they will not believe the tiny key that is handed them, fit to open its hospitable gate. "oh, mr. ian, if you should be drowned for my sake!" she faltered with white lips. "you should not have come to me!" "i would not wish a better death," said ian. "how can you talk so coolly about it!" she cried. "well," he returned, "what better way of going out of the world is there than by the door of help? no man cares much about what the idiots of the world call life! what is it whether we live in this room or another? the same who sent us here, sends for us out of here!" "most men care very much! you are wrong there!" "i don't call those who do, men! they are only children! i know many men who would no more cleave to this life than a butterfly would fold his wings and creep into his deserted chrysalis-case. i do care to live--tremendously, but i don't mind where. he who made this room so well worth living in, may surely be trusted with the next!" "i can't quite follow you," stammered christina. "i am sorry. perhaps it is the cold. i can't feel my hands, i am so cold." "leave the wall, and put your arms round my neck. the change will rest me, and the water is already falling! it will go as rapidly as it came!" "how do you know that?" "it has sunk nearly a foot in the last fifteen minutes: i have been carefully watching it, you may be sure! it must have been a waterspout, and however much that may bring, it pours it out all at once." "oh!" said christina, with a tremulous joyfulness; "i thought it would go on ever so long!" "we shall get out of it alive!--god's will be done!" "why do you say that? don't you really mean we are going to be saved?" "would you want to live, if he wanted you to die?" "oh, but you forget, mr. ian, i am not ready to die, like you!" sobbed christina. "do you think anything could make it better for you to stop here, after god thought it better for you to go?" "i dare not think about it." "be sure god will not take you away, if it be better for you to live here a little longer. but you will have to go sometime; and if you contrived to live after god wanted you to go, you would find yourself much less ready when the time came that you must. but, my dear miss palmer, no one can be living a true life, to whom dying is a terror." christina was silent. he spoke the truth! she was not worth anything! how grand it was to look death in the face with a smile! if she had been no more than the creature she had hitherto shown herself, not all the floods of the deluge could have made her think or feel thus: her real self, her divine nature had begun to wake. true, that nature was as yet no more like the divine, than the drowsy, arm-stretching, yawning child is like the merry elf about to spring from his couch, full of life, of play, of love. she had no faith in god yet, but it was much that she felt she was not worth anything. you are right: it was odd to hold such a conversation at such a time! but ian was an odd man. he actually believed that god was nearer to him than his own consciousness, yet desired communion with him! and that jesus christ knew what he said when he told his disciples that the father cared for his sparrows. only one human being witnessed their danger, and he could give no help. hector of the stags had crossed the main valley above where the torrent entered it, and coming over the hill, saw with consternation the flood-encompassed pair. if there had been help in man, he could have brought none; the raging torrent blocked the way both to the village and to the chief's house. he could only stand and gaze with his heart in his eyes. beyond the stream lay mercy on the hillside, with her face in the heather. frozen with dread, she dared not look up. had she moved but ten yards, she would have seen her sister in ian's arms. the children sat by her, white as death, with great lumps in their throats, and the silent tears rolling down their cheeks. it was the first time death had come near them. a sound of sweeping steps came through the heather. they looked up: there was the chief striding toward them. the flood had come upon him at work in his fields, whelming his growing crops. he had but time to unyoke his bulls, and run for his life. the bulls, not quite equal to the occasion, were caught and swept away. they were found a week after on the hills, nothing the worse, and nearly as wild as when first the chief took them in hand. the cottage was in no danger; and nancy got a horse and the last of the cows from the farm-yard on to the crest of the ridge, against which the burn rushed roaring, just as the water began to invade the cowhouse and stable. the moment he reached the ridge, the chief set out to look for his brother, whom he knew to be somewhere up the valley; and having climbed to get an outlook, saw mercy and the girls, from whose postures he dreaded that something had befallen them. the girls uttered a cry of welcome, and the chief answered, but mercy did not lift her head. "mercy," said alister softly, and kneeling laid his hand on her. she turned to him such a face of blank misery as filled him with consternation. "what has happened?" he asked. she tried to speak, but could not. "where is christina?" he went on. she succeeded in bringing out the one word "ruin." "is anybody with her?" "ian." "oh!" he returned cheerily, as if then all would be right. but a pang shot through his heart, and it was as much for himself as for mercy that he went on: "but god is with them, mercy. if he were not, it would be bad indeed! where he is, all is well!" she sat up, and putting out her hand, laid it in his great palm. "i wish i could believe that!" she said; "but you know people are drowned sometimes!" "yes, surely! but if god be with them what does it matter! it is no worse than when a mother puts her baby into a big bath." "it is cruel to talk like that to me when my sister is drowning!" she gave a stifled shriek, and threw herself again on her face. "mercy," said the chief--and his voice trembled a little, "you do not love your sister more than i love my brother, and if he be drowned i shall weep; but i shall not be miserable as if a mocking devil were at the root of it, and not one who loves them better than we ever shall. but come; i think we shall find them somehow alive yet! ian knows what to do in an emergency; and though you might not think it, he is a very strong man." she rose immediately, and taking like a child the hand he offered her, went up the hill with him. the girls ran before them, and presently gave a scream of joy. "i see chrissy! i see chrissy!" cried one. "yes! there she is! i see her too!" cried the other. alister hurried up with mercy. there was christina! she seemed standing on the water! mercy burst into tears. "but where's ian?" she said, when she had recovered herself a little; "i don't see him!" "he is there though, all right!" answered alister. "don't you see his hands holding her out of the water?" and with that he gave a great shout:-- "ian! ian! hold on, old boy! i'm coming!" ian heard him, and was filled with terror, but had neither breath nor strength to answer. along the hillside went alister bounding like a deer, then turning sharp, shot headlong down, dashed into the torrent--and was swept away like a cork. mercy gave a scream, and ran down the hill. he was not carried very far, however. in a moment or two he had recovered himself, and crept out gasping and laughing, just below mercy. ian did not move. he was so benumbed that to change his position an inch would, he well knew, be to fall. and now hector began to behave oddly. he threw a stone, which went in front of ian and christina. then he threw another, which went behind them. then he threw a third, and christina felt her hat caught by a bit of string. she drew it toward her as fast as numbness would permit, and found at the end a small bottle. she managed to get it uncorked, and put it to ian's lips. he swallowed a mouthful, and made her take some. hector stood on one side, the chief on the other, and watched the proceeding. "what would mother say, alister!" cried ian across the narrowing water. in the joy of hearing his voice, alister rushed again into the torrent; and, after a fierce struggle, reached the mound, where he scrambled up, and putting his arms round ian's legs with a shout, lifted the two at once like a couple of babies. "come! come, alister! don't be silly!" said ian. "set me down!" "give me the girl then." "take her!" christina turned on him a sorrowful gaze as alister took her. "i have killed you!" she said. "you have done me the greatest favour," he replied. "what?" she asked. "accepted help." she burst out crying. she had not shed a tear before. "get on the top of the wall, ian, out of the wet," said alister. "you can't tell what the water may have done to the foundations, alister! i would rather not break my leg! it is so frozen it would never mend again!" as they talked, the torrent had fallen so much, that hector of the stags came wading from the other side. a few minutes more, and alister carried christina to mercy. "now," he said, setting her down, "you must walk." ian could not cross without hector's help; he seemed to have no legs. they set out at once for the cottage. "how will your crops fare, alister?" asked ian. "part will be spoiled," replied the chief; "part not much the worse." the torrent had rushed half-way up the ridge, then swept along the flank of it, and round the end in huge bulk, to the level on the other side. the water lay soaking into the fields. the valley was desolated. what green things had not been uprooted or carried away with the soil, were laid flat. everywhere was mud, and scattered all over were lumps of turf, with heather, brushwood, and small trees. but it was early in the year, and there was hope! i will spare the description of the haste and hurrying to and fro in the little house--the blowing of fires, the steaming pails and blankets, the hot milk and tea! mrs. macruadh rolled up her sleeves, and worked like a good housemaid. nancy shot hither and thither on her bare feet like a fawn--you could not say she ran, and certainly she did not walk. alister got ian to bed, and rubbed him with rough towels--himself more wet than he, for he had been rolled over and over in the torrent. christina fell asleep, and slept many hours. when she woke, she said she was quite well; but it was weeks before she was like herself. i doubt if ever she was quite as strong again. for some days ian confessed to an aching in his legs and arms. it was the cold of the water, he said; but alister insisted it was from holding christina so long. "water could not hurt a highlander!" said alister. chapter xiv change. christina walked home without difficulty, but the next day did not leave her bed, and it was a fortnight before she was able to be out of doors. when ian and she met, her manner was not quite the same as before. she seemed a little timid. as she shook hands with him her eyes fell; and when they looked up again, as if ashamed of their involuntary retreat, her face was rosy; but the slight embarrassment disappeared as soon as they began to talk. no affectation or formality, however, took its place: in respect of ian her falseness was gone. the danger she had been in, and her deliverance through the voluntary sharing of it by ian, had awaked the simpler, the real nature of the girl, hitherto buried in impressions and their responses. she had lived but as a mirror meant only to reflect the outer world: something of an operative existence was at length beginning to appear in her. she was growing a woman. and the first stage in that growth is to become as a little child. the child, however, did not for some time show her face to any but ian. in his presence christina had no longer self-assertion or wile. without seeking his notice she would yet manifest an almost childish willingness to please him. it was no sudden change. she had, ever since their adventure, been haunted, both awake and asleep, by his presence, and it had helped her to some discoveries regarding herself. and the more she grew real, the nearer, that is, that she came to being a person, the more she came under the influence of his truth, his reality. it is only through live relation to others that any individuality crystallizes. "you saved my life, ian!" she said one evening for the tenth time. "it pleased god you should live," answered ian. "then you really think," she returned, "that god interfered to save us?" "no, i do not; i don't think he ever interferes." "mr. sercombe says everything goes by law, and god never interferes; my father says he does interfere sometimes." "would you say a woman interfered in the management of her own house? can one be said to interfere where he is always at work? he is the necessity of the universe, ever and always doing the best that can be done, and especially for the individual, for whose sake alone the cosmos exists. if we had been drowned, we should have given god thanks for saving us." "i do not understand you!" "should we not have given thanks to find ourselves lifted out of the cold rushing waters, in which we felt our strength slowly sinking?" "but you said drowned! how could we have thanked god for deliverance if we were drowned?" "what!--not when we found ourselves above the water, safe and well, and more alive than ever? would it not be a dreadful thing to lie tossed for centuries under the sea-waves to which the torrent had borne us? ah, how few believe in a life beyond, a larger life, more awake, more earnest, more joyous than this!" "oh, _i_ do! but that is not what one means by life; that is quite a different kind of thing!" "how do you make out that it is so different? if i am i, and you are you, how can it be very different? the root of things is individuality, unity of idea, and persistence depends on it. god is the one perfect individual; and while this world is his and that world is his, there can be no inconsistency, no violent difference, between there and here." "then you must thank god for everything--thank him if you are drowned, or burnt, or anything!" "now you understand me! that is precisely what i mean." "then i can never be good, for i could never bring myself to that!" "you cannot bring yourself to it; no one could. but we must come to it. i believe we shall all be brought to it." "never me! i should not wish it!" "you do not wish it; but you may be brought to wish it; and without it the end of your being cannot be reached. no one, of course, could ever give thanks for what he did not know or feel as good. but what is good must come to be felt good. can you suppose that jesus at any time could not thank his father for sending him into the world?" "you speak as if we and he were of the same kind!" "he and we are so entirely of the same kind, that there is no bliss for him or for you or for me but in being the loving obedient child of the one father." "you frighten me! if i cannot get to heaven any other way than that, i shall never get there." "you will get there, and you will get there that way and no other. if you could get there any other way, it would be to be miserable." "something tells me you speak the truth; but it is terrible! i do not like it." "naturally." she was on the point of crying. they were alone in the drawing-room of the cottage, but his mother might enter any moment, and ian said no more. it was not a drawing toward the things of peace that was at work in christina: it was an urging painful sense of separation from ian. she had been conscious of some antipathy even toward him, so unlike were her feelings, thoughts, judgments, to his: this feeling had changed to its opposite. a meeting with ian was now to christina the great event of day or week; but ian, in love with the dead, never thought of danger to either. one morning she woke from a sound and dreamless sleep, and getting out of bed, drew aside the curtains, looked out, and then opened her window. it was a lovely spring-morning. the birds were singing loud in the fast greening shrubbery. a soft wind was blowing. it came to her, and whispered something of which she understood only that it was both lovely and sad. the sun, but a little way up, was shining over hills and cone-shaped peaks, whose shadows, stretching eagerly westward, were yet ever shortening eastward. his light was gentle, warm, and humid, as if a little sorrowful, she thought, over his many dead children, that he must call forth so many more to the new life of the reviving year. suddenly as she gazed, the little clump of trees against the hillside stood as she had never seen it stand before--as if the sap in them were no longer colourless, but red with human life; nature was alive with a presence she had never seen before; it was instinct with a meaning, an intent, a soul; the mountains stood against the sky as if reaching upward, knowing something, waiting for something; over all was a glory. the change was far more wondrous than from winter to summer; it was not as if a dead body, but a dead soul had come alive. what could it mean? had the new aspect come forth to answer this glow in her heart, or was the glow in her heart the reflection of this new aspect of the world? she was ready to cry aloud, not with joy, not from her feeling of the beauty, but with a sensation almost, hitherto unknown, therefore nameless. it was a new and marvellous interest in the world, a new sense of life in herself, of life in everything, a recognition of brother-existence, a life-contact with the universe, a conscious flash of the divine in her soul, a throb of the pure joy of being. she was nearer god than she had ever been before. but she did not know this--might never in this world know it; she understood nothing of what was going on in her, only felt it go on; it was not love of god that was moving in her. yet she stood in her white dress like one risen from the grave, looking in sweet bliss on a new heaven and a new earth, made new by the new opening of her eyes. to save man or woman, the next thing to the love of god is the love of man or woman; only let no man or woman mistake the love of love for love! she started, grew white, stood straight up, grew red as a sunset:--was it--could it be?--"is this love?" she said to herself, and for minutes she hardly moved. it was love. whether love was in her or not, she was in love--and it might get inside her. she hid her face in her hands, and wept. with what opportunities i have had of studying, i do not say understanding, the human heart, i should not have expected such feeling from christina--and she wondered at it herself. till a child is awake, how tell his mood?--until a woman is awaked, how tell her nature? who knows himself?--and how then shall he know his neighbour? for who can know anything except on the supposition of its remaining the same? and the greatest change of all, next to being born again, is beginning to love. the very faculty of loving had been hitherto repressed in the soul of christina--by poor education, by low family and social influences, by familiarity with the worship of riches, by vanity, and consequent hunger after the attentions of men; but now at length she was in love. at breakfast, though she was silent, she looked so well that her mother complimented her on her loveliness. had she been more of a mother, she might have seen cause for anxiety in this fresh bourgeoning of her beauty. chapter xv. love allodial. while the chief went on in his humble way, enjoying life and his lowly position; seeming, in the society of his brother, to walk the outer courts of heaven; and, unsuspicious of the fact, growing more and more in love with the ill educated, but simple, open, and wise mercy, a trouble was gathering for him of which he had no presentiment. we have to be delivered from the evils of which we are unaware as well as from those we hate; and the chief had to be set free from his unconscious worship of mammon. he did not worship mammon by yielding homage to riches; he did not make a man's money his pedestal; had he been himself a millionaire, he would not have connived at being therefore held in honour; but, ever consciously aware of the deteriorating condition of the country, and pitifully regarding the hundred and fifty souls who yet looked to him as their head, often turning it over in his mind how to shepherd them should things come to a crisis, his abiding, ever-recurring comfort was the money from the last sale of the property, accumulating ever since, and now to be his in a very few years: he always thought, i say, first of this money and not first of god. he imagined it an inexhaustible force, a power with which for his clan he could work wonders. it is the common human mistake to think of money as a force and not as a mere tool. but he never thought of it otherwise than as belonging to the clan; never imagined the least liberty to use it save in the direct service of his people. and all the time, the very shadow of this money was disappearing from the face of the earth! it had scarcely been deposited where the old laird judged it as safe as in the bank of england, when schemes and speculations were initiated by the intrusted company which brought into jeopardy everything it held, and things had been going from bad to worse ever since. nothing of this was yet known, for the directors had from the first carefully muffled up the truth, avoiding the least economy lest it should be interpreted as hinting at any need of prudence; living in false show with the very money they were thus lying away, warming and banqueting their innocent neighbours with fuel and wine stolen from their own cellars; and working worse wrong and more misery under the robe of imputed righteousness, that is, respectability, than could a little army of burglars. unawares to a trusting multitude, the vacant eyes of loss were drawing near to stare them out of hope and comfort; and annihilation had long closed in upon the fund which the chief regarded as the sheet-anchor of his clan: he trusted in mammon, and mammon had played him one of his rogue's-tricks. the most degrading wrong to ourselves, and the worst eventual wrong to others, is to trust in any thing or person but the living god: it was an evil thing from which the chief had sore need to be delivered. even those who help us we must regard as the loving hands of the great heart of the universe, else we do god wrong, and will come to do them wrong also. and there was more yet of what we call mischief brewing in another quarter to like hurt. mr. peregrine palmer was not now so rich a man as when he bought his highland property; also he was involved in affairs of doubtful result. it was natural, therefore, that he should begin to think of the said property not merely as an ornament of life, but as something to fall back upon. he feared nothing, however, more unpleasant than a temporary embarrassment. had not his family been in the front for three generations! had he not a vested right in success! had he not a claim for the desire of his heart on whatever power it was that he pictured to himself as throned in the heavens! it never came into his head that, seeing there were now daughters in the family, it might be worth the while of that power to make a poor man of him for their sakes; or that neither he, his predecessors, nor his sons, had ever come near enough to anything human to be fit for having their pleasures taken from them. but what i have to do with is the new aspect his scotch acres now put on: he must see to making the best of them! and that best would be a deer-forest! he and his next neighbour might together effect something worth doing! therefore all crofters or villagers likely to trespass must be got rid of--and first and foremost the shepherds, for they had endless opportunities of helping themselves to a deer. where there were sheep there must be shepherds: they would make a clearance of both! the neighbour referred to, a certain mr. brander, who had made his money by sharp dealing in connection with a great russian railway, and whom mr. peregrine palmer knew before in london, had enlightened him on many things, and amongst others on the shepherds' passion for deer-stalking. being in the company of the deer, he said, the whole day, and the whole year through, they were thoroughly acquainted with their habits, and were altogether too much both for the deer and for their owners. a shepherd would take the barrel of his gun from the stock, and thrust it down his back, or put it in a hollow crook, and so convey it to the vicinity of some spot frequented by a particular animal, to lie hidden there for his opportunity. in the hills it was impossible to tell with certainty whence came the sound of a shot; and no rascal of them would give information concerning another! in short, there was no protecting the deer without uprooting and expelling the peasantry! the village of the clanruadh was on mr. brander's land, and was dependent in part on the produce of small pieces of ground, the cultivators of which were mostly men with other employment as well. some made shoes of the hides, others cloth and clothes of the wool of the country. some were hinds on neighbouring farms, but most were shepherds, for there was now very little tillage. almost all the land formerly cultivated had been given up to grass and sheep, and not a little of it was steadily returning to that state of nature from which it had been reclaimed, producing heather, ling, blueberries, cnowperts, and cranberries. the hamlet was too far from the sea for much fishing, but some of its inhabitants would join relatives on the coast and go fishing with them, when there was nothing else to be done. but many of those who looked to the sea for help had lately come through a hard time, in which they would have died but for the sea-weed and shellfish the shore afforded them; yet such was their spirit of independence that a commission appointed to inquire into their necessity, found scarcely one willing to acknowledge any want: such was the class of men and women now doomed, at the will of two common-minded, greedy men, to expulsion from the houses and land they had held for generations, and loved with a love unintelligible to their mean-souled oppressors. ian, having himself learned the lesson that, so long as a man is dependent on anything earthly, he is not a free man, was very desirous to have his brother free also. he could not be satisfied to leave the matter where, on their way home that night from the tomb, as they called their cave-house, their talk had left it. alister's love of the material world, of the soil of his ancestral acres, was, ian plainly saw, not yet one with the meaning and will of god: he was not yet content that the home of his fathers should fare as the father of fathers pleased. he was therefore on the outlook for the right opportunity of having another talk with him on the subject. that those who are trying to be good are more continuously troubled than the indifferent, has for ages been a puzzle. "i saw the wicked spreading like a green bay tree," says king david; and he was far from having fathomed the mystery when he got his mind at rest about it. is it not simply that the righteous are worth troubling? that they are capable of receiving good from being troubled? as a man advances, more and more is required of him. a wrong thing in the good man becomes more and more wrong as he draws nearer to freedom from it. his friends may say how seldom he offends; but every time he offends, he is the more to blame. some are allowed to go on because it would be of no use to stop them yet; nothing would yet make them listen to wisdom. there must be many who, like dives, need the bitter contrast between the good things of this life and the evil things of the next, to wake them up. in this life they are not only fools, and insist on being treated as fools, but would have god consent to treat them as if he too had no wisdom! the laird was one in whom was no guile, but he was far from perfect: any man is far from perfect whose sense of well-being could be altered by any change of circumstance. a man unable to do without this thing or that, is not yet in sight of his perfection, therefore not out of sight of suffering. they who do not know suffering, may well doubt if they have yet started on the way to be. if clouds were gathering to burst in fierce hail on the head of the chief, it was that he might be set free from yet another of the cords that bound him. he was like a soaring eagle from whose foot hung, trailing on the earth, the line by which his tyrant could at his will pull him back to his inglorious perch. to worship truly is to treat according to indwelling worth. the highest worship of nature is to worship toward it, as david and daniel worshipped toward the holy place. but even the worship of nature herself might be an ennobling idolatry, so much is the divine present in her. there is an intense, almost sensuous love of nature, such as the chief confessed to his brother, which is not only one with love to the soul of nature, but tends to lift the soul of man up to the lord of nature. to love the soul of nature, however, does not secure a man from loving the body of nature in the low mammon-way of possession. a man who loves the earth even as the meek love it, may also love it in a way hostile to such possession of it as is theirs. the love of possessing as property, must, unchecked, come in time to annihilate in a man the inheritance of the meek. a few acres of good valley-land, with a small upland pasturage, and a space of barren hill-country, had developed in the chief a greater love of the land as a possession than would have come of entrance upon an undiminished inheritance. he clave to the ground remaining to him, as to the last remnant of a vanishing good. one day the brothers were lying on the westward slope of the ridge, in front of the cottage. a few sheep, small, active, black-faced, were feeding around them: it was no use running away, for the chief's colley was lying beside him! the laird every now and then buried his face in the short sweet mountain-grass-like that of the clowns in england, not like the rich sown grass on the cultivated bank of the burn. "i believe i love the grass," he said, "as much, ian, as your chaucer loved the daisy!" "hardly so much, i should think!" returned ian. "why do you think so?" "i doubt if grass can be loved so much as a flower." "why not?" "because the one is a mass, the other an individual." "i understand." "i have a fear, alister, that you are in danger of avarice," said ian, after a pause. "avarice, ian! what can you mean?" "you are as free, alister, from the love of money, as any man i ever knew, but that is not enough. did you ever think of the origin of the word avarice?" "no." "it comes--at least it seems to me to come--from the same root as the verb have. it is the desire to call things ours--the desire of company which is not of our kind--company such as, if small enough, you would put in your pocket and carry about with you. we call the holding in the hand, or the house, or the pocket, or the power, having; but things so held cannot really be had; having is but an illusion in regard to things. it is only what we can be with that we can really possess--that is, what is of our kind, from god to the lowest animal partaking of humanity. a love can never be lost; it is a possession; but who can take his diamond ring into the somewhere beyond?--it is not a possession. god only can be ours perfectly; nothing called property can be ours at all." "i know it--with my head at least," said alister; "but i am not sure how you apply it to me." "you love your country--don't you, alister?" "i do." "what do you mean by loving your country?" "it is hard to say all at once. the first thing that comes to me is, that i would rather live in it than in any other." "would you care to vaunt your country at the expense of any other?" "not if it did not plainly excel--and even then it might be neither modest nor polite!" "would you feel bound to love a man more because he was a fellow-countryman?" "other things being equal, i could not help it." "other things not being equal,--?" "i should love the best man best--scotsman or negro." "that is as i thought of you. for my part, my love for my own people has taught me to love every man, be his colour or country what it may. the man whose patriotism is not leading him in that direction has not yet begun to be a true patriot. let him go to st. paul and learn, or stay in his own cellar and be an idiot.--but now, from loving our country, let us go down the other way:--do you love the highlands or the lowlands best? you love the highlands, of course, you say. and what district do you like best? our own. what parish? your father's. what part of the parish? why this, where at this moment we are lying. now let me ask, have you, by your love for this piece of the world, which you will allow me to call ours, learned to love the whole world in like fashion?" "i cannot say so. i do not think we can love the whole world in the same way as our own part of it--the part where we were born and bred! it is a portion of our very being." "if your love to what we call our own land is a love that cannot spread, it seems to me of a questionable kind--of a kind involving the false notion of having? the love that is eternal is alone true, and that is the love of the essential, which is the universal. we love indeed individuals, even to their peculiarities, but only because of what lies under and is the life of them--what they share with every other, the eternal god-born humanity which is the person. without this humanity where were your friend? mind, i mean no abstraction, but the live individual humanity. do you see what i am driving at? i would extend my love of the world to all the worlds; my love of humanity to all that inhabit them. i want, from being a scotsman, to be a briton, then a european, then a cosmopolitan, then a dweller of the universe, a lover of all the worlds i see, and shall one day know. in the face of such a hope, i find my love for this ground of my father's--not indeed less than before, but very small. it has served its purpose in having begun in me love of the revelation of god. wherever i see the beauty of the lord, that shall be to me his holy temple. our lord was sent first to the lost sheep of the house of israel:-how would you bear to be told that he loved them more than africans or scotsmen?" "i could not bear it." "then, alister, do you not see that the love of our mother earth is meant to be but a beginning; and that such love as yours for the land belongs to that love of things which must perish? you seem to me not to allow it to blossom, but to keep it a hard bud; and a bud that will not blossom is a coffin. a flower is a completed idea, a thought of god, a creature whose body is most perishable, bat whose soul, its idea, cannot die. with the idea of it in you, the withering of the flower you can bear. the god in it is yours always. every spring you welcome the daisy anew; every time the primrose departs, it grows more dear by its death. i say there must be a better way of loving the ground on which we were born, than that whence the loss of it would cause us torture." alister listened as to a prophecy of evil. "rather than that cottage and those fields should pass into the hands of others," he said, almost fiercely, "i would see them sunk in a roaring tide!" ian rose, and walked slowly away. alister lay clutching the ground with his hands. for a passing moment ian felt as if he had lost him. "lord, save him from this demon-love," he said, and sat down among the pines. in a few minutes, alister came to him. "you cannot mean, ian," he said-and his face was white through all its brown, "that i am to think no more of the fields of my fathers than of any other ground on the face of the earth!" "think of them as the ground god gave to our fathers, which god may see fit to take from us again, and i shall be content--for the present," answered ian. "do not be vexed with me," cried alister. "i want to think as well as do what is right; but you cannot know how i feel or you would spare me. i love the very stones and clods of the land! the place is to me as jerusalem to the jews:--you know what the psalm says:-- thy saints take pleasure in her stones, her very dust to them is dear!" "they loved their land as theirs," said ian, "and have lost it!" "i know i must be cast out of it! i know i must die and go from it; but i shall come back and wander about the fields and the hills with you and our father and mother!" "and how about horse and dog?" asked ian, willing to divert his thoughts for a moment. "well! daoimean and luath are so good that i don't see why i should not have them!" "no more do i!" responded ian. "we may be sure god will either let you have them, or show you reason to content you for not having them. no love of any thing is to be put in the same thought-pocket with love for the poorest creature that has life. but i am sometimes not a little afraid lest your love for the soil get right in to your soul. we are here but pilgrims and strangers. god did not make the world to be dwelt in, but to be journeyed through. we must not love it as he did not mean we should. if we do, he may have great trouble and we much hurt ere we are set free from that love. alister, would you willingly walk out of the house to follow him up and down for ever?" "i don't know about willingly," replied alister, "but if i were sure it was he calling me, i am sure i would walk out and follow him." "what if your love of house and lands prevented you from being sure, when he called you, that it was he?" "that would be terrible! but he would not leave me so. he would not forsake me in my ignorance!" "no. having to take you from everything, he would take everything from you!" alister went into the house. he did not know how much of the worldly mingled with the true in him. he loved his people, and was unselfishly intent on helping them to the utmost; but the thought that he was their chief was no small satisfaction to him; and if the relation between them was a grand one, self had there the more soil wherein to spread its creeping choke-grass roots. in like manner, his love of nature nourished the parasite possession. he had but those bare hill-sides, and those few rich acres, yet when, from his eyry on the hill-top, he looked down among the valleys, his heart would murmur within him, "from my feet the brook flows gurgling to water my fields! the wild moors around me feed my sheep! yon glen is full of my people!" even with the pure smell of the earth, mingled the sense of its possession. when, stepping from his cave-house, he saw the sun rise on the outstretched grandeur of the mountain-world, and felt the earth a new creation as truly as when adam first opened his eyes on its glory, his heart would give one little heave more at the thought that a portion of it was his own. but all is man's only because it is god's. the true possession of anything is to see and feel in it what god made it for; and the uplifting of the soul by that knowledge, is the joy of true having. the lord had no land of his own. he did not care to have it, any more than the twelve legions of angels he would not pray for: his pupils must not care for things he did not care for. he had no place to lay his head in-had not even a grave of his own. for want of a boat he had once to walk the rough galilean sea. true, he might have gone with the rest, but he had to stop behind to pray: he could not do without that. once he sent a fish to fetch him money, but only to pay a tax. he had even to borrow the few loaves and little fishes from a boy, to feed his five thousand with. the half-hour which alister spent in the silence of his chamber, served him well: a ray as of light polarized entered his soul in its gloom. he returned to ian, who had been all the time walking up and down the ridge. "you are right, ian!" he said. "i do love the world! if i were deprived of what i hold, i should doubt god! i fear, oh, i fear, ian, he is going to take the land from me!" "we must never fear the will of god, alister! we are not right until we can pray heartily, not say submissively, 'thy will be done!' we have not one interest, and god another. when we wish what he does not wish, we are not more against him than against our real selves. we are traitors to the human when we think anything but the will of god desirable, when we fear our very life." it was getting toward summer, and the days were growing longer. "let us spend a night in the tomb!" said ian; and they fixed a day in the following week. chapter xvi. mercy calls on grannie. although the subject did not again come up, mercy had not forgotten what ian had said about listening for the word of nature, and had resolved to get away the first time she could, and see whether grannie, as ian had called her, would have anything to do with her. it were hard to say what she expected--something half magical rather than anything quite natural. the notions people have of spiritual influence are so unlike the facts, that, when it begins they never recognize it, but imagine something common at work. when the lord came, those who were looking for him did not know him:--was he not a man like themselves! did they not know his father and mother! it was a fine spring morning when mercy left the house to seek an interview with nature somewhere among the hills. she took a path she knew well, and then struck into a sheep-track she had never tried. up and up she climbed, nor spent a thought on the sudden changes to which at that season, and amongst those hills, the weather is subject. with no anxiety as to how she might fare, she was yet already not without some awe: she was at length on her pilgrimage to the temple of isis! not until she was beyond sight of any house, did she begin to feel alone. it was a new sensation, and of a mingled sort. but the slight sense of anxiety and fear that made part of it, was soon overpowered by something not unlike the exhilaration of a child escaped from school. this grew and grew until she felt like a wild thing that had been caught, and had broken loose. now first, almost, she seemed to have begun to live, for now first was she free! she might lie in the heather, walk in the stream, do as she pleased! no one would interfere with her, no one say don't! she felt stronger and fresher than ever in her life; and the farther she went, the greater grew the pleasure. the little burn up whose banks, now the one and now the other, she was walking, kept on welcoming her unaccustomed feet to the realms of solitude and liberty. for ever it seemed coming to meet her, hasting, running steep, as if straight out of the heaven to which she was drawing nearer and nearer. the wind woke now and then, and blew on her for a moment, as if tasting her, to see what this young psyche was that had floated up into the wild thin air of the hills. the incessant meeting of the brook made it a companion to her although it could not go her way, and was always leaving her. but it kept her from the utter loneliness she sought; for loneliness is imperfect while sound is by, especially a sing-sound, and the brook was one of nature's self--playing song--instruments. but she came at length to a point where the ground was too rough to let her follow its path any more, and turning from it, she began to climb a steep ridge. the growing and deepening silence as she went farther and farther from the brook, promised the very place for her purpose on the top of the heathery ridge. but when she reached it and looked behind her, lo, the valley she had left lay at her very feet! the world had rushed after and caught her! she had not got away from it! it was like being enchanted! she thought she was leaving it far behind, but the nature she sought to escape that she might find nature, would not let her go! it kept following her as if to see that she fell into no snare, neither was too sternly received by the loftier spaces. she could distinguish one of the laird's men, ploughing in the valley below: she knew him by his red waistcoat! almost fiercely she turned and made for the next ridge: it would screen her from the world she had left; it should not spy upon her! the danger of losing her way back never suggested itself. she had not learned that the look of things as you go, is not their look when you turn to go back; that with your attitude their mood will have altered. nature is like a lobster-pot: she lets you easily go on, but not easily return. when she gained the summit of the second ridge, she looked abroad on a country of which she knew nothing. it was like the face of an utter stranger. not far beyond rose yet another ridge: she must see how the world looked from that! on and on she went, crossing ridge after ridge, but no place invited her to stay and be still. she found she was weary, and spying in the midst of some short heather a great stone, sat down, and gave herself up to the rest that stole upon her. though the sun was warm, the air was keen, and, hot with climbing, she turned her face to it, and drank in its refreshing with delight. she looked around; not a trace of humanity was visible-nothing but brown and gray and green hills, with the clear sky over her head, and in the north a black cloud creeping up from the horizon. another sense than that of rest awoke in her; now first in her life the sense of loneliness absolute began to possess her. and therewith suddenly descended upon her a farther something she had never known; it was as if the loneliness, or what is the same thing, the presence of her own being without another to qualify and make it reasonable and endurable, seized and held her. the silence gathered substance, grew as it were solid, and closing upon her, imprisoned her. was it not rather that the soul of nature, unprevented, unthwarted by distracting influences, found a freer entrance to hers, but she, not yet in harmony with it, felt its contact as alien-as bondage therefore and not liberty? she was nearer than ever she had been to knowing the presence of the god who is always nearer to us than aught else. yea, something seemed, through the very persistence of its silence, to say to her at last, and keep saying, "here i am!" she looked behind her in sudden terror: form was there. she sent out her gaze to the horizon: the huge waves of the solid earth stood up against the sky, sinking so slowly she could not see them sink: they stood mouldering away, biding their time. they were of those "who only stand and wait," fulfilling the will of him who set them to crumble till the hour of the new heavens and the new earth arrive. there was no visible life between her and the great silent mouldering hills. on her right hand lay a blue segment of the ever restless sea, but so far that its commotion seemed a yet deeper rest than that of the immovable hills. she sat and sat, but nothing came, nothing seemed coming to her. the hope ian had given her was not to be fulfilled! for here there was no revelation! she was not of the kind nature could speak to! she began to grow uncomfortable--to feel as if she had done something wrong--as if she was a child put into the corner--a corner of the great universe, to learn to be sorry for something. certainly something was wrong with her-but what? why did she feel so uncomfortable? was she so silly as mind being alone? there was nothing in these mountains that would hurt her! the red deer were sometimes dangerous, but none were even within sight! yet something like fear was growing in her! why should she be afraid? everything about her certainly did look strange, as if she had nothing to do with it, and it had nothing to do with her; but that was all! ian macruadh must be wrong! how could there be any such bond as he said between nature and the human heart, when the first thing she felt when alone with her, was fear! the world was staring at her! she was the centre of a fixed, stony regard from all sides! the earth, and the sea, and the sky, were watching her! she did not like it! she would rise and shake off the fancy! but she did not rise; something held her to her thinking. just so she would, when a child in the dark, stand afraid to move lest the fear itself, lying in wait like a tigress, should at her first motion pounce upon her. the terrible, persistent silence!--would nothing break it! and there was in herself a response to it--something that was in league with it, and kept telling her that things were not all right with her; that she ought not to be afraid, yet had good reason for being afraid; that she knew of no essential safety. there must be some refuge, some impregnable hiding-place, for the thing was a necessity, and she ought to know of it! there must be a human condition of never being afraid, of knowing nothing to be afraid of! she wondered whether, if she were quite good, went to church twice every sunday, and read her bible every morning, she would come not to be afraid of-she did not know what. it would be grand to have no fear of person or thing! she was sometimes afraid of her own father, even when she knew no reason! how that mountain with the horn kept staring at her! it was all nonsense! she was silly! she would get up and go home: it must be time! but things were not as they should be! something was required of her! was it god wanting her to do something? she had never thought whether he required anything of her! she must be a better girl! then she would have god with her, and not be afraid! and all the time it was god near her that was making her unhappy. for, as the son of man came not to send peace on the earth but a sword, so the first visit of god to the human soul is generally in a cloud of fear and doubt, rising from the soul itself at his approach. the sun is the cloud-dispeller, yet often he must look through a fog if he would visit the earth at all. the child, not being a son, does not know his father. he may know he is what is called a father; what the word means he does not know. how then should he understand when the father comes to deliver him from his paltry self, and give him life indeed! she tried to pray. she said, "oh g--od! forgive me, and make me good. i want to be good!" then she rose. she went some little way without thinking where she was going, and then found she did not even know from what direction she had come. a sharp new fear, quite different from the former, now shot through her heart: she was lost! she had told no one she was going anywhere! no one would have a notion where to look for her! she had been beginning to feel hungry, but fear drove hunger away. all she knew was that she must not stay there. here was nowhere; walking on she might come somewhere--that is, among human beings! so out she set on her weary travel from no-where to somewhere, giving nature little thanks. she did not suspect that her grandmother had been doing anything for her by the space around her, or that now, by the tracklessness, the lostness, she was doing yet more. on and on she walked, climbing the one hillside and descending the other, going she knew not whither, hardly hoping she drew one step nearer home. all at once her strength went from her. she sat down and cried. but with her tears came the thought how the chief and his brother talked of god. she remembered she had heard in church that men ought to cry to god in their troubles. broken verses of a certain psalm came to her, saying god delivered those who cried to him even from things they had brought on themselves, and she had been doing nothing wrong! she tried to trust in him, but could not: he was as far from her as the blue heavens! true, it bent over all, but its one great eye was much too large to see the trouble she was in! what did it matter to the blue sky if she fell down and withered up to bones and dust! she well might-for here no foot of man might pass till she was a thing terrible to look at! if there was nobody where seemed to be nothing, how fearfully empty was the universe! ah, if she had god for her friend! what if he was her friend, and she had not known it because she never spoke to him, never asked him to do anything for her? it was horrible to think it could be a mere chance whether she got home, or died there! she would pray to god! she would ask him to take her home! a wintery blast came from the north. the black cloud had risen, and was now spreading over the zenith. again the wind came with an angry burst and snarl. snow carne swept upon it in hard sharp little pellets. she started up, and forgot to pray. some sound in the wind or some hidden motion of memory all at once let loose upon her another fear, which straight was agony. a rumour had reached the new house the night before, that a leopard had broken from a caravan, and got away to the hills. it was but a rumour; some did not believe it, and the owners contradicted it, but a party had set out with guns and dogs. it was true! it was true! there was the terrible creature crouching behind that stone! he was in every clump of heather she passed, swinging his tail, and ready to spring upon her! he must be hungry by this time, and there was nothing there for him to eat but her! by and by, however, she was too cold to be afraid, too cold to think, and presently, half-frozen and faint for lack of food, was scarce able to go a step farther. she saw a great rock, sank down in the shelter of it, and in a minute was asleep. she slept for some time, and woke a little refreshed. the wonder is that she woke at all. it was dark, and her first consciousness was ghastly fear. the wind had ceased, and the storm was over. little snow had fallen. the stars were all out overhead, and the great night was round her, enclosing, watching her. she tried to rise, and could just move her limbs. had she fallen asleep again, she would not have lived through the night. but it is idle to talk of what would have been; nothing could have been but what was. mercy wondered afterwards that she did not lose her reason. she must, she thought, have been trusting somehow in god. it was terribly dreary. sure never one sorer needed god's help! and what better reason could there be for helping her than that she so sorely needed it! perhaps god had let her walk into this trouble that she might learn she could not do without him! she--would try to be good! how terrible was the world, with such wide spaces and nobody in them! and all the time, though she did not know it, she was sobbing and weeping. the black silence was torn asunder by the report of a gun. she started up with a strange mingling of hope and terror, gave a loud cry, and sank senseless. the leopard would be upon her! her cry was her deliverance. chapter xvii. in the tomb. the brothers had that same morning paid their visit to the tomb, and there spent the day after their usual fashion, intending to go home the same night, and as the old moon was very late in rising, to take the earlier and rougher part of the way in the twilight. just as they were setting out, however, what they rightly judged a passing storm came on, and they delayed their departure. by the time the storm was over, it was dark, and there was no use in hurrying; they might as well stop a while, and have the moon the latter part of the way. when at length they were again on the point of starting, they thought they heard something like sounds of distress, but the darkness making search difficult and unsatisfactory, the chief thought of firing his gun, when mercy's cry guided them to where she lay. alister's heart, at sight of her, and at the thought of what she must have gone through, nearly stood still. they carried her in, laid her on the bed, and did what they could to restore her, till she began to come to herself. then they left her, that she might not see them without preparation, and sat down by the fire in the outer room, leaving the door open between the two. "i see how it is!" said alister. "you remember, ian, what you said to her about giving nature an opportunity of exerting her influence? mercy has been following your advice, and has lost her way among the hills!" "that was so long ago!" returned ian thoughtfully. "yes-when the weather was not fit for it. it is not fit now, but she has ventured!" "i believe you are right! i thought there was some reality in her!-but she must not hear us talking about her!" when mercy came to herself, she thought at first that she lay where she had fallen, but presently perceived that she was covered, and had something hot at her feet: was she in her own bed? was it all a terrible dream, that she might know what it was to be lost, and think of god? .she put out her arm: her hand went against cold stone. the dread thought rushed in-that she was buried-was lying in her grave-to lie there till the trumpet should sound, and the dead be raised. she was not horrified; her first feeling was gladness that she had prayed before she died. she had been taught at church that an hour might come when it would be of no use to pray-the hour of an unbelieving death: it was of no use to pray now, but her prayer before she died might be of some avail! she wondered that she was not more frightened, for in sooth it was a dreary prospect before her: long and countless years must pass ere again she heard the sound of voices, again saw the light of the sun! she was half awake and half dreaming; the faintness of her swoon yet upon her, the repose following her great weariness, and the lightness of her brain from want of food, made her indifferent-almost happy. she could lie so a long time, she thought. at length she began to hear sounds, and they were of human voices. she had companions then in the grave! she was not doomed to a solitary waiting for judgment! she must be in some family-vault, among strangers. she hoped they were nice people: it was very desirable to be buried with nice people! then she saw a reddish light. it was a fire--far off! was she in the bad place? were those shapes two demons, waiting till she had got over her dying? she listened:--"that will divide her between us," said one. "yes," answered the other; "there will be no occasion to cut it!" what dreadful thing could they mean? but surely she had heard their voices before! she tried to speak, but could not. "we must come again soon!" said one. "at this rate it will take a life-time to carve the tomb." "if we were but at the roof of it!" said the other. "i long to tackle the great serpent of eternity, and lay him twining and coiling and undulating all over it! i dream about those tombs before ever they were broken into-royally furnished in the dark, waiting for the souls to come back to their old, brown, dried up bodies!" here one of them rose and came toward her, growing bigger and blacker as he came, until he stood by the bedside. he laid his hand on her wrist, and felt her pulse. it was ian! she could not see his face for there was no light on it, but she knew his shape, his movements! she was saved! he saw her wide eyes, two great spiritual nights, gazing up at him. "all, you are better, miss mercy!" lie said cheerily. "now you shall have some tea!" something inside her was weeping for joy, but her outer self was quite still. she tried again to speak, and uttered a few inarticulate sounds. then came alister on tip-toe, and they stood both by the bedside, looking down on her. "i shall be all right presently!"' she managed at length to say. "i am so glad i'm not dead! i thought i was dead!" "you would soon have been if we had not found you!" replied alister. "was it you that fired the gun?" "yes." "i was so frightened!" "it saved your life, thank god! for then you cried out." "fright was your door out of fear!" said ian. "i thought it was the leopard!" "i did bring my gun because of the leopard," said alister. "it was true about him then?" "he is out." "and now it is quite dark!" "it doesn't signify; we'll take a lantern; i've got my gun, and ian has his dirk!" "where are you going then?" asked mercy, still confused. "home, of course." "oh, yes, of course! i will get up in a minute." "there is plenty of time," said ian. "you must eat something before you get up. we, have nothing but oat-cakes, i am sorry to say!" "i think you promised me some tea!" said mercy. "i don't feel hungry." "you shall have the tea. when did you eat last?" "not since breakfast." "it is a marvel you are able to speak! you must try to eat some oat-cake." "i wish i hadn't taken that last slice of deer-ham!" said alister, ruefully. "i will eat if i can," said mercy. they brought her a cup of tea and some pieces of oat-cake; then, having lighted her a candle, they left her, and closed the door. she sipped her tea, managed to eat a little of the dry but wholesome food, and found herself capable of getting up. it was the strangest bedroom! she thought. everything was cut out of the live rock. the dressing-table might have been a sarcophagus! she kneeled by the bedside, and tried to thank god. then she opened the door. the chief rose at the sound of it. "i'm sorry," he said, "that we have no woman to wait on you." "i want nothing, thank you!" answered mercy, feeling very weak and ready to cry, but restraining her tears. "what a curious house this is!" "it is a sort of doll's house my brother and i have been at work upon for nearly fifteen years. we meant, when summer was come, to ask you all to spend a day with us up here." "when first we went to work on it," said ian, "we used to tell each other tales in which it bore a large share, and alister's were generally about a lost princess taking refuge in it!" "and now it is come true!" said alister. "what an escape i have had!" "i do not like to hear you say that!" returned ian. "you have been taken care of all the time. if you had died in the cold, it would not have been because god had forgotten you; you would not have been lost." "i wanted to know," said mercy, "whether nature would speak to me. it was of no use! she never came near me!" "i think she must have come without your knowing her," answered ian. "but we shall have a talk about that afterwards, when you are quite rested; we must prepare for home now." mercy's heart sank within her--she felt so weak and sleepy! how was she to go back over all that rough mountain-way! but she dared not ask to be left-with the leopard about! he might come down the wide chimney! she soon found that the brothers had never thought of her walking. they wrapt her in ian's plaid. then they took the chiefs, which was very strong, and having folded it twice lengthwise, drew each an end of it over his shoulders, letting it hang in a loop between them: in this loop they made her seat herself, and putting each as arm behind her, tried how they could all get on. after a few shiftings and accommodations, they found the plan likely to answer. so they locked the door, and left the fire glowing on the solitary hearth. to mercy it was the strangest journey--an experience never to be forgotten. the tea had warmed her, and the air revived her. it was not very cold, for only now and then blew a little puff of wind. the stars were brilliant overhead, and the wide void of the air between her and the earth below seemed full of wonder and mystery. now and then she fancied some distant sound the cry of the leopard: he might be coming nearer and nearer as they went! but it rather added to the eerie witchery of the night, making it like a terrible story read in the deserted nursery, with the distant noise outside of her brothers and sisters at play. the motion of her progress by and by became pleasant to her. sometimes her feet would brush the tops of the heather; but when they came to rocky ground, they always shortened the loop of the plaid. to mercy's inner ear came the sound of words she had heard at church: "he shall give his angels charge over thee, and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone." were not these two men god's own angels! they scarcely spoke, except when they stopped to take breath, but went on and on with a steady, rhythmic, silent trudge. up and down the rough hill, and upon the hardly less rough hill-road, they had enough ado to heed their steps. now and then they would let her walk a little way, but not far. she was neither so strong nor so heavy as a fat deer, they said. they were yet high among the hills, when the pale, withered, waste shred of the old moon rose above the upheaved boat-like back of one of the battlements of the horizon-rampart. with disconsolate face, now lost, now found again, always reappearing where mercy had not been looking for her, she accompanied them the rest of their journey, and the witch-like creature brought out the whole character of the night. booked in her wonderful swing, mercy was not always quite sure that she was not dreaming the strangest, pleasantest dream. were they not fittest for a dream, this star and moon beset night-this wind that now and then blew so eerie and wild, yet did not wake her-this gulf around, above, and beneath her, through which she was borne as if she had indeed died, and angels were carrying her through wastes of air to some unknown region afar? except when she brushed the heather, she forgot that the earth was near her. the arms around her were the arms of men and not angels, but how far above this lower world dwelt the souls that moved those strong limbs! what a small creature she was beside them! how unworthy of the labour of their deliverance! her awe of the one kept growing; the other she could trust with heart as well as brain; she could never be afraid of him! to the chief she turned to shadow her from ian. when they came to the foot of the path leading up to mistress conal's cottage, there, although it was dark night, sat the old woman on a stone. "it's a sorrow you are carrying home with you, chief!" she said in gaelic. "as well have saved a drowning man!" she did not rise or move, but spoke like one talking by the fireside. "the drowning man has to be saved, mother!" answered the chief, also in gaelic; "and the sorrow in your way has to be taken with you. it won't let you pass!" "true, my son!" said the woman; "but it makes the heart sore that sees it!" "thank you for the warning then, but welcome the sorrow!" he returned. "good night." "good night, chiefs sons both!" she replied. "you're your father's anyway! did he not one night bring home a frozen fox in his arms, to warm him by his fire! but when he had warmed him--he turned him out!" it was quite clear when last they looked at the sky, but the moment they left her, it began to rain heavily. so fast did it rain, that the men, fearing for mercy, turned off the road, and went down a steep descent, to make straight across their own fields for the cottage; and just as they reached the bottom of the descent, although they had come all the rough way hitherto without slipping or stumbling--once, the chief fell. he rose in consternation; but finding that mercy, upheld by ian, had simply dropped on her feet, and taken no hurt, relieved himself by unsparing abuse of his clumsiness. mercy laughed merrily, resumed her place in the plaid, and closed her eyes. she never saw where they were going, for she opened them again only when they stopped a little as they turned into the fir-clump before the door. "where are we?" she asked; but for answer they carried her straight into the house. "we have brought you to our mother instead of yours," said alister. "to get wet would have been the last straw on the back of such a day. we will let them know at once that you are safe." lady macruadh, as the highlanders generally called her, made haste to receive the poor girl with that sympathetic pity which, of all good plants, flourishes most in the celtic heart. mercy's mother had come to her in consternation at her absence, and the only comfort she could give her was the suggestion that she had fallen in with her sons. she gave her a warm bath,-put her to bed, and then made her eat, so preparing her for a healthful sleep. and she did sleep, but dreamed of darkness and snow and leopards. as men were out searching in all directions, alister, while ian went to the new house, lighted a beacon on the top of the old castle to bring them back. by the time ian had persuaded mrs. palmer to leave mercy in his mother's care for the night, it was blazing beautifully. in the morning it was found that mercy had a bad cold, and could not be moved. but the cottage, small as it was, had more than one guest-chamber, and mrs. macruadh was delighted to have her to nurse. end of vol. ii. aldarondo, charles franks warlock o' glenwarlock. a homely romance. by george macdonald. author of "annals of a quiet neighborhood", "a sea-board parish", etc. contents chapter. . castle warlock . the kitchen . the drawing-room . an afternoon sleep . the school . grannie's cottage . dreams . home . the student . peter simon . the new schooling . grannie's ghost story . the storm-guest . the castle inn . that night . through the day . that same night . a winter idyl . an "interlunar cave" . catch yer naig . the watchmaker . that luminous night . at college . a tutorship . the gardener . lost and found . a transformation . the story of the knight who spoke the truth . new experience . charles jermyn, m. d. . cosmo and the doctor . the naiad . the garden-house . catch your horse . pull his tail . the thick darkness . the dawn . the shadow of death . the labourer . the schoolmaster grannie and the stick . obstruction . grizzie's rights . another harvest . the final conflict . a rest . help . a common miracle . defiance . discovery and confession . it is naught saith the buyer . an old story . a small discovery . a greater discovery . a great discovery . mr. burns . too sure comes too late . a little life well rounded . a breaking up . repose . the third harvest . a duet, trio, and quartette chapter i. castle warlock. a rough, wild glen it was, to which, far back in times unknown to its annals, the family had given its name, taking in return no small portion of its history, and a good deal of the character of its individuals. it lay in the debatable land between highlands and lowlands; most of its inhabitants spoke both scotch and gaelic; and there was often to be found in them a notable mingling of the chief characteristics of the widely differing celt and teuton. the country produced more barley than wheat, more oats than barley, more heather than oats, more boulders than trees, and more snow than anything. it was a solitary, thinly peopled region, mostly of bare hills, and partially cultivated glens, each with its small stream, on the banks of which grew here and there a silver birch, a mountain ash, or an alder tree, but with nothing capable of giving much shade or shelter, save cliffy banks and big stones. from many a spot you might look in all directions and not see a sign of human or any other habitation. even then however, you might, to be sure, most likely smell the perfume--to some nostrils it is nothing less than perfume--of a peat fire, although you might be long in finding out whence it came; for the houses, if indeed the dwellings could be called houses, were often so hard to be distinguished from the ground on which they were built, that except the smoke of fresh peats were coming pretty freely from the wide-mouthed chimney, it required an experienced eye to discover the human nest. the valleys that opened northward produced little; there the snow might some years be seen lying on patches of oats yet green, destined now only for fodder; but where the valley ran east and west, and any tolerable ground looked to the south, there things put on a different aspect. there the graceful oats would wave and rustle in the ripening wind, and in the small gardens would lurk a few cherished strawberries, while potatoes and peas would be tolerably plentiful in their season. upon a natural terrace in such a slope to the south, stood castle warlock. but it turned no smiling face to the region whence came the warmth and the growth. a more grim, repellant, unlovely building would be hard to find; and yet, from its extreme simplicity, its utter indifference to its own looks, its repose, its weight, and its gray historical consciousness, no one who loved houses would have thought of calling it ugly. it was like the hard-featured face of a scotch matron, suggesting no end of story, of life, of character: she holds a defensive if not defiant face to the world, but within she is warm, tending carefully the fires of life. summer and winter the chimneys of that desolate-looking house smoked; for though the country was inclement, and the people that lived in it were poor, the great, sullen, almost unhappy-looking hills held clasped to their bare cold bosoms, exposed to all the bitterness of freezing winds and summer hail, the warmth of household centuries: their peat-bogs were the store-closets and wine-cellars of the sun, for the hoarded elixir of physical life. and although the walls of the castle, as it was called, were so thick that in winter they kept the warmth generated within them from wandering out and being lost on the awful wastes of homeless hillside and moor, they also prevented the brief summer heat of the wayfaring sun from entering with freedom, and hence the fires were needful in the summer days as well--at least at the time my story commences, for then, as generally, there were elderly and aged people in the house, who had to help their souls to keep their bodies warm. the house was very old. it had been built for more kinds of shelter than need to be thought of in our days. for the enemies of our ancestors were not only the cold, and the fierce wind, and the rain, and the snow; they were men also--enemies harder to keep out than the raging storm or the creeping frost. hence the more hospitable a house could be, the less must it look what it was: it must wear its face haughty, and turn its smiles inward. the house of glenwarlock, as it was also sometimes called, consisted of three massive, narrow, tall blocks of building, which showed little connection with each other beyond juxtaposition, two of them standing end to end, with but a few feet of space between, and the third at right angles to the two. in the two which stood end to end, and were originally the principal parts, hardly any windows were to be seen on the side that looked out into the valley; while in the third, which, though looking much of the same age, was of later build, were more windows, but none in the lowest story. narrow as were these buildings, and four stories high, they had a solid, ponderous look, suggesting a thickness of the walls such as to leave little of a hollow within for the indwellers--like great marine shells for a small mollusk. on the other side was a kind of a court, completed by the stables and cowhouses, and towards this court were most of the windows--many of them for size more like those in the cottages around, than suggestive of a house built by the lords of the soil. the court was now merely that of a farmyard. there must have been at one time outer defences to the castle, but they were no longer to be distinguished by the inexperienced eye; and indeed the windowless walls of the house itself seemed strong enough to repel any attack without artillery--except indeed the assailants had got into the court. there were however some signs of the windows there having been enlarged if not increased at a later period. in the block that stood angle-wise to the rest, was the kitchen, the door of which opened immediately on the court; and behind the kitchen, in that part which had no windows to the valley, was the milk-cellar, as they called the dairy, and places for household storage. a rough causeway ran along the foot of the walls, connecting the doors in the different blocks. of these, the kitchen door for the most part stood open: sometimes the snow would be coming fast down the wide chimney, with little soft hisses in the fire, and the business of the house going on without a thought of closing it, though from it you could not have seen across the yard for the falling flakes. but when my story opens, the summer held the old house and the older hills in its embrace. the sun was pouring torrents of light and heat into the valley, and the slopes of it were covered with green. the bees were about, contenting themselves with the flowers, while the heather was getting ready its bloom for them, and a boy of fourteen was sitting in a little garden that lay like a dropped belt of beauty about the feet of the grim old walls. this was on the other side--that to the south, parting the house from the slope where the corn began--now with the ear half-formed. the boy sat on a big stone, which once must have had some part in the house itself, or its defences, but which he had never known except as a seat for himself. his back leaned against the hoary wall, and he was in truth meditating, although he did not look as if he were. he was already more than an incipient philosopher, though he could not yet have put into recognizable shape the thought that was now passing through his mind. the bees were the primary but not the main subject of it. it came thus: he thought how glad the bees would be when their crop of heather was ripe; then he thought how they preferred the heather to the flowers; then, that the one must taste nicer to them than the other; and last awoke the question whether their taste of sweet was the same as his. "for," said he, "if their honey is sweet to them with the same sweetness with which it is sweet to me, then there is something in the make of the bee that's the same with the make of me; and perhaps then a man might some day, if he wanted, try the taste of being a bee all out for a little while." but to see him, nobody would have thought he was doing anything but basking in the sun. the scents of the flowers all about his feet came and went on the eddies of the air, paying my lord many a visit in his antechamber, his brain; the windy noises of the insects, the watery noises of the pigeons, the noises from the poultry yard, the song of the mountain river, visited, him also through the portals of his ears; but at the moment, the boy seemed lost in the mere fundamental satisfaction of existence. neither, although broad summer was on the earth, and all the hill-tops, and as much of the valleys as their shadows did not hide, were bathed in sunlight, although the country was his native land, and he loved it with the love of his country's poets, was the consciousness of the boy free from a certain strange kind of trouble connected with, if not resulting from the landscape before him. a celt through many of his ancestors, and his mother in particular, his soul, full of undefined emotion, was aware of an ever recurring impulse to song, ever checked and broken, ever thrown back upon itself. there were a few books in the house, amongst them certain volumes of verse--a copy of cowly, whose notable invocation of light he had instinctively blundered upon; one of milton; the translated ossian; thomson's seasons--with a few more; and from the reading of these, among other results, had arisen this--that, in the midst of his enjoyment of the world around him, he found himself every now and then sighing after a lovelier nature than that before his eyes. there he read of mountains, if not wilder, yet loftier and more savage than his own, of skies more glorious, of forests of such trees as he knew only from one or two old engravings in the house, on which he looked with a strange, inexplicable reverence: he would sometimes wake weeping from a dream of mountains, or of tossing waters. once with his waking eyes he saw a mist afar off, between the hills that ramparted the horizon, grow rosy after the sun was down, and his heart filled as with the joy of a new discovery. around him, it is true, the waters rushed well from their hills, but their banks had little beauty. not merely did the want of trees distress him, but the nature of their channel; most of them, instead of rushing through rocks, cut their way only through beds of rough gravel, and their bare surroundings were desolate without grandeur--almost mean to eyes that had not yet pierced to the soul of them. nor had he yet learned to admire the lucent brown of the bog waters. there seemed to be in the boy a strain of some race used to a richer home; and yet all the time the frozen regions of the north drew his fancy tenfold more than italy or egypt. his name was cosmo, a name brought from italy by one of the line who had sold his sword and fought for strangers. not a few of the younger branches of the family had followed the same evil profession, and taken foreign pay--chiefly from poverty and prejudice combined, but not a little in some cases from the inborn love of fighting that seems to characterize the celt. the last soldier of them had served the east india company both by sea and land: tradition more than hinted that he had chiefly served himself. since then the heads of the house had been peaceful farmers of their own land, contriving to draw what to many farmers nowadays would seem but a scanty subsistence from an estate which had dwindled to the twentieth part of what it had been a few centuries before, though even then it could never have made its proprietor rich in anything but the devotion of his retainers. growing too hot between the sun and the wall, cosmo rose, and passing to the other side of the house beyond the court-yard, and crossing a certain heave of grass, came upon one unfailing delight in his lot--a preacher whose voice, inarticulate, it is true, had, ever since he was born, been at most times louder in his ear than any other. it was a mountain stream, which, through a channel of rock, such as nearly satisfied his most fastidious fancy, went roaring, rushing, and sometimes thundering, with an arrow-like, foamy swiftness, down to the river in the glen below. the rocks were very dark, and the foam stood out brilliant against them. from the hill-top above, it came, sloping steep from far. when you looked up, it seemed to come flowing from the horizon itself, and when you looked down, it seemed to have suddenly found it could no more return to the upper regions it had left too high behind it, and in disgust to shoot headlong to the abyss. there was not much water in it now, but plenty to make a joyous white rush through the deep-worn brown of the rock: in the autumn and spring it came down gloriously, dark and fierce, as if it sought the very centre, wild with greed after an absolute rest. the boy stood and gazed, as was his custom. always he would seek this endless water when he grew weary, when the things about him put on their too ordinary look. let the aspect of this be what it might, it seemed still inspired and sent forth by some essence of mystery and endless possibility. there was in him an unusual combination of the power to read the hieroglyphic internal aspect of things, and the scientific nature that bows before fact. he knew that the stream was in its second stage when it rose from the earth and rushed past the house, that it was gathered first from the great ocean, through millions of smallest ducts, up to the reservoirs of the sky, thence to descend in snows and rains, and wander down and up through the veins of the earth; but the sense of its mystery had not hitherto begun to withdraw. happily for him, the poetic nature was not merely predominant in him, but dominant, sending itself, a pervading spirit, through the science that else would have stifled him. accepting fact, he found nothing in its outward relations by which a man can live, any more than by bread; but this poetic nature, illuminating it as with the polarized ray, revealed therein more life and richer hope. all this was as yet however as indefinite as it was operative in him, and i am telling of him what he could not have told of himself. he stood gazing now in a different mood from any that had come to him before: he had begun to find out something fresh about this same stream, and the life in his own heart to which it served as a revealing phantasm. he recognized that what in the stream had drawn him from earliest childhood, with an infinite pleasure, was the vague sense, for a long time an ever growing one, of its mystery--the form the infinite first takes to the simplest and liveliest hearts. it was because it was always flowing that he loved it, because it could not stop: whence it came was utterly unknown to him, and he did not care to know. and when at length he learned that it came flowing out of the dark hard earth, the mystery only grew. he imagined a wondrous cavity below in black rock, where it gathered and gathered, nobody could think how--not coming from anywhere else, but beginning just there, and nowhere beyond. when, later on, he had to shift its source, and carry it back to the great sky, it was no less marvellous, and more lovely; it was a closer binding together of the gentle earth and the awful withdrawing heavens. these were a region of endless hopes, and ever recurrent despairs: that his beloved, an earthly finite thing, should rise there, was added joy, and gave a mighty hope with respect to the unknown and appalling. but from the sky, he was sent back to the earth in further pursuit; for, whence came the rain, his books told him, but from the sea? that sea he had read of, though never yet beheld, and he knew it was magnificent in its might; gladly would he have hailed it as an intermediate betwixt the sky and the earth--so to have the sky come first! but, alas! the ocean came first in order. and then, worse and worse! how was the ocean fed but from his loved torrent? how was the sky fed but from the sea? how was the dark fountain fed but from the sky? how was the torrent fed but from the fountain? as he sat in the hot garden, with his back against the old gray wall, the nest of his family for countless generations, with the scent of the flowers in his nostrils, and the sound of the bees in his ears, it had begun to dawn upon him that he had lost the stream of his childhood, the mysterious, infinite idea of endless, inexplicable, original birth, of outflowing because of essential existence within! there was no production any more, nothing but a mere rushing around, like the ring-sea of saturn, in a never ending circle of formal change! like a great dish, the mighty ocean was skimmed in particles invisible, which were gathered aloft into sponges all water and no sponge; and from this, through many an airy, many an earthy channel, deflowered of its mystery, his ancient, self-producing fountain to a holy merry river, was fed--only fed! he grew very sad, and well he might. moved by the spring eternal in himself, of which the love in his heart was but a river-shape, he turned away from the deathened stream, and without knowing why, sought the human elements about the place. chapter ii. the kitchen. he entered the wide kitchen, paved with large slabs of slate. one brilliant gray-blue spot of sunlight lay on the floor. it came through a small window to the east, and made the peat-fire glow red by the contrast. over the fire, from a great chain, hung a three-legged pot, in which something was slowly cooking. between the fire and the sun-spot lay a cat, content with fate and the world. at the corner of the fire sat an old lady, in a chair high-backed, thick-padded, and covered with striped stuff. she had her back to the window that looked into the court, and was knitting without regarding her needles. this was cosmo's grandmother. the daughter of a small laird in the next parish, she had started in life with an overweening sense of her own importance through that of her family, nor had she lived long enough to get rid of it. i fancy she had clung to it the more that from the time of her marriage nothing had seemed to go well with the family into which she had married. she and her husband had struggled and striven, but to no seeming purpose; poverty had drawn its meshes closer and closer around them. they had but one son, the present laird, and he had succeeded to an estate yet smaller and more heavily encumbered. to all appearance he must leave it to cosmo, if indeed he left it, in no better condition. from the growing fear of its final loss, he loved the place more than any of his ancestors had loved it, and his attachment to it had descended yet stronger to his son. but although cosmo the elder wrestled and fought against encroaching poverty, and with little success, he had never forgot small rights in anxiety to be rid of large claims. what man could he did to keep his poverty from bearing hard on his dependents, and never master or landlord was more beloved. such being his character and the condition of his affairs, it is not very surprising that he should have passed middle age before thinking seriously of marriage. nor did he then fall in love, in the ordinary sense of the phrase; he reflected with himself that it would be cowardice so far to fear poverty as to run the boat of the warlocks aground, and leave the scrag end of a property and a history without a man to take them up, and possibly bear them on to redemption; for who could tell what life might be in the stock yet! anyhow, it would be better to leave an heir to take the remnant in charge, and at least carry the name a generation farther, even should it be into yet deeper poverty than hitherto. a warlock could face his fate. thereupon, with a sense of the fitness of things not always manifested on such occasions, he had paid his addresses to a woman of five and thirty, the daughter of the last clergyman of the parish, and had by her been accepted with little hesitation. she was a capable and brave woman, and, fully informed of the state of his affairs, married him in the hope of doing something to help him out of his difficulties. a few pounds she had saved up, and a trifle her mother had left her, she placed unreservedly at his disposal, and he in his abounding honesty spent it on his creditors, bettering things for a time, and, which was of much more consequence, greatly relieving his mind, and giving the life in him a fresh start. his marriage was of infinitely more salvation to the laird than if it had set him free from all his worldly embarrassments, for it set him growing again--and that is the only final path out of oppression. whatever were the feelings with which he took his wife home, they were at least those of a gentleman; and it were a good thing indeed, if, at the end of five years, the love of most pairs who marry for love were equal to that of cosmo warlock to his middle-aged wife; and now that she was gone, his reverence for her memory was something surpassing. from the day almost of his marriage the miseries of life lost half their bitterness, nor had it returned at her death. instinctively he felt that outsiders, those even who respected him as an honest man, believed that, somehow or other, they could only conjecture how, he must be to blame for the circumstances he was in--either this, or providence did not take care of the just man. such was virtually the unuttered conclusion of many, who nevertheless imagined they understood the book of job, and who would have counted warlock's rare honesty, pride or fastidiousness or unjustifiable free-handedness. hence they came to think and speak of him as a poor creature, and soon the man, through the keen sensitiveness of his nature, became aware of the fact. but to his sense of the misprision of neighbours and friends, came the faith and indignant confidence of his wife like the closing and binding up and mollifying of a wound with ointment. the man was of a far finer nature than any of those who thus judged him, of whom some would doubtless have got out of their difficulties sooner than he--only he was more honorable in debt than they were out of it. a woman of strong sense, with an undeveloped stratum of poetry in the heart of it, his wife was able to appreciate the finer elements of his nature; and she let him see very plainly that she did. this was strength and a lifting up of the head to the husband, who in his youth had been oppressed by the positiveness, and in his manhood by the opposition, of his mother, whom the neighbours regarded as a woman of strength and faculty. and now, although, all his life since, he had had to fight the wolf as constantly as ever, things, even after his wife's death, continued very different from what they had been before he married her; his existence looked a far more acceptable thing seen through the regard of his wife than through that of his neighbours. they had been five years married before she brought him an heir to his poverty, and she lived five years more to train him--then, after a short illness, departed, and left the now aging man virtually alone with his little child, coruscating spark of fresh vitality amidst the ancient surroundings. this was the cosmo who now, somewhat sore at heart from the result of his cogitations, entered the kitchen in search of his kind. another woman was sitting on a three-legged stool, just inside the door, paring potatoes--throwing each, as she cut off what the old lady, watching, judged a paring far too thick, into a bowl of water. she looked nearly as old as her mistress, though she was really ten years younger. she had come with the late mistress from her father's house, and had always taken, and still took her part against the opposing faction--namely the grandmother. a second seat--not over easy, but comfortable enough, being simply a wide arm-chair of elm, with a cushion covered in horse-hair, stood at the opposite corner of the fire. this was the laird's seat, at the moment, as generally all the morning till dinner-time, empty: cosmo, not once looking up, walked straight to it, diagonally across the floor, and seated himself like one verily lost in thought. now and then, as she peeled, grizzie would cast a keen glance at him out of her bright blue eyes, round whose fire the wrinkles had gathered like ashes: those eyes were sweet and pleasant, and the expression of her face was one of lovely devotion; but otherwise she was far from beautiful. she gave a grim smile to herself every time she glanced up at him from her potatoes, as much as to say she knew well enough what he was thinking, though no one else did. "he'll be a man yet!" she said to herself. the old lady also now and then looked over her stocking at the boy, where he sat with his back to the white deal dresser, ornate with homeliest dishes. "it'll be lang or ye fill that chair, cossie, my man!" she said at length,--but not with the smile of play, rather with the look of admonition, as if it was the boy's first duty to grow in breadth in order to fill the chair, and restore the symmetry of the world. cosmo glanced up, but did not speak, and presently was lost again in the thoughts from which his grandmother had roused him as one is roused by a jolt on the road. "what are you dreaming about, cossie?" she said again, in a tone wavering but imperative. her speech was that of a gentlewoman of the old time, when the highest born in scotland spoke scotch. not yet did cosmo reply. reverie does not agree well with manners, but it would besides have been hard for him to answer the old lady's question--not that he did not know something at least of what was going on in his mind, but that, he knew instinctively, it would have sounded in her ears no hair better than the jabber of jule sandy. "mph!" she said, offended at his silence; "ye'll hae to learn manners afore ye're laird o' glenwarlock, young cosmo!" a shadow of indignation passed over grizzie's rippled, rather than wrinkled face, but she said nothing. there was a time to speak and a time to be silent; nor was grizzie indebted to solomon, but to her own experience and practice, for the wisdom of the saw. only the pared potatoes splashed louder in the water as they fell. and the old lady knew as well what that meant, as if the splashes had been articulate sounds from the mouth of the old partisan. the boy rose, and coming forward, rather like one walking in his sleep, stood up before his grandmother, and said, "what was ye sayin', gran'mamma?" "i was sayin' what ye wadna hearken till, an that's enouch," she answered, willing to show offence. "say 't again, gran'mamma, if you please. i wasna noticin'." "na! is' warran' ye frae noticin'! there ye winna gang, whaur yer ain fule fancy does na lead the w'y. cosmo, by gie ower muckle tether to wull thoucht, an' someday ye'll be laid i' the dub, followin' what has naither sense intil't, nor this warl's gude. --what was ye thinkin' aboot the noo?--tell me that, an' is' lat ye gang." "i was thinkin' aboot the burnie, gran'mamma." "it wad be tellin' ye to lat the burnie rin, an' stick to yer buik, laddie!" "the burnie wull rin, gran'mamma, and the buik 'ill bide," said cosmo, perhaps not very clearly understanding himself. "ye're gettin' on to be a man, noo," said his grandmother, heedless of the word of his defence, "an' ye maun learn to put awa' bairnly things. there's a heap depen'in' upo' ye, cosmo. ye'll be the fift o' the name i' the family, an' i'm feart ye may be the last. it's but sma' honour, laddie, to ony man to be the last; an' gien ye dinna gaither the wit ye hae, and du the best ye can, ye winna lang be laird o' glenwarlock. gien it wasna for grizzie there, wha has no richt to owerhear the affairs o' the family, i micht think the time had come for enlichtenin' ye upo' things it's no shuitable ye should gang ignorant o'. but we'll put it aff till a mair convenient sizzon, atween oor ain twa lanes." "an' a mair convanient spokesman, i houp, my leddy," said grizzie, deeply offended. "an' wha sud that be?" rejoined her mistress. "ow, wha but the laird himsel'?" answered grizzie, "wha's to come atween father an' son wi' licht upo' family-affairs? no even the mistress hersel' wad hae prezhunt upo' that?" "keep your own place, grizzie," said the old lady with dignity. and grizzie, who, had gone farther in the cause of propriety, than propriety itself could justify, held her peace. only the potatoes splashed yet louder in the bowl. her mistress sat grimly silent, for though she had had the last word and had been obeyed, she was rebuked in herself. cosmo, judging the specialty of the interview over, turned and went back to his father's chair; but just as he was seating himself in it, his father appeared in the doorway. the form was that of a tall, thin man, a little bent at the knees and bowed in the back, who yet carried himself with no small dignity, cloaked in an air of general apology--as if he would have said, "i am sorry my way is not yours, for i see very well how wrong you must think it." he wore large strong shoes--i think a description should begin with the feet rather than the head--fit for boggy land; blue, ribbed, woollen stockings; knee-breeches of some home-made stuff: all the coarser cloth they wore, and they wore little else, was shorn from their own sheep, and spun, woven, and made at home; an old blue dress coat with bright buttons; a drab waistcoat which had once been yellow; and to crown all, a red woollen nightcap, hanging down on one side with a tassel. "weel, grizzie!" he said, in a gentle, rather sad voice, as if the days of his mourning were not yet ended, "i'm ower sune the day!" he never passed grizzie without greeting her, and grizzie's devotion to him was like that of slave and sister mingled. "na, laird," she answered, "ye can never be ower sune for yer ain fowk, though ye may be for yer ain stamack. the taties winna be lang bilin' the day. they're some sma'." "that's because you pare them so much, grizzie," said the grandmother. grizzie vouchsafed no reply. the moment young cosmo saw whose shadow darkened the doorway, he rose in haste, and standing with his hand upon the arm of the chair, waited for his father to seat himself in it. the laird acknowledged his attention with a smile, sat down, and looked like the last sitter grown suddenly old. he put out his hand to the boy across the low arm of the chair, and the boy laid his hand in his father's, and so they remained, neither saying a word. the laird leaned back, and sat resting. all were silent. notwithstanding the oddity of his dress, no one who had any knowledge of humanity could have failed to see in cosmo warlock, the elder, a high bred gentleman. his face was small, and the skin of it was puckered into wrinkles innumerable; his mouth was sweet, but he had lost his teeth, and the lips had fallen in; his chin, however, was large and strong; while his blue eyes looked out from under his narrow high forehead with a softly piercing glance of great gentleness and benignity. a little gray hair clustered about his temples and the back of his head--the red nightcap hid the rest. there was three days' growth of gray beard on his chin, for now that he had nobody, he would say, he had not the heart to shave every morning. for some time he sat looking straight before him, smiling to his mother's hands as they knitted, she casting on him now and then a look that seemed to express the consciousness of blame for not having made a better job of him, or for having given him too much to do in the care of himself. for neither did his mother believe in him farther than that he had the best possible intentions in what he did, or did not do. at the same time she never doubted he was more of a man than ever his son would be, seeing they had such different mothers. "grizzie," said the laird, "hae ye a drappy o' soor milk? i'm some dry." "ay, that hae i, sir!" answered grizzie with alacrity, and rising went into the darker region behind the kitchen, whence presently she emerged with a white basin full of rich milk--half cream, it was indeed. without explanation or apology she handed it to her master, who received and drank it off. "hoots, woman!" he said, "ye wad hae me a shargar (a skin-and-bone calf)! that's no soor milk!" "i'm vexed it's no to yer taste, laird!" returned grizzie coolly, "but i hae nane better." "ye tellt me ye had soor milk," said the laird--without a particle of offence, rather in the tone of apology for having by mistake made away with something too good for him. "weel, laird," replied grizzie, "it's naething but the guidman's milk; an' gien ye dinna ken what's guid for ye at your time o' life, it's weel there sud be anither 'at does. what has a man o' your 'ears to du drinkin' soor milk--eneuch to turn a' soor thegither i' the inside o' ye! it's true i win' ye weel a sma' bairn i' my leddy's airms-- "ye may weel du that!" interrupted her mistress. "i wasna weel intil my teens, though, my leddy!" returned grizzie. "an' i'm sure," she added, in revenge for the insinuation as to her age, "it wad ill become ony wuman to grudge a man o' the laird's stan'in a drap o' the best milk in's ain cellar!" "who spoke of refusing it to him?" said his mother. "ye spak yersel' sic an' siclike," answered grizzie. "hoots, grizzie! haud yer tongue, my wuman," said the laird, in the gentlest tone, yet with reproof in it. "ye ken weel it's no my mother wad grudge me the milk ye wad gie me. it was but my'sel' 'at didna think mysel' worthy o' that same, seein' it's no a week yet sin' bonny hawkie dee'd!" "an' wad ye hae the lord's anintit depen' upo' hawkie?" cried grizzie with indignation. the contest went no farther, and grizzie had had the best of it, as none knew better than she. in a minute or two the laird rose and went out, and cosmo went with him. before cosmo's mother died, old mrs. warlock would have been indignant at the idea of sitting in the kitchen, but things had combined to bring her to it. she found herself very lonely seated in state in the drawing-room, where, as there was no longer a daughter-in-law to go and come, she learned little or nothing of what was doing about the place, and where few that called cared to seek her out, for she had never been a favourite with the humbler neighbours. also, as time went on, and the sight of money grew rarer and rarer, it became more desirable to economize light in the winter. they had not come to that with firing, for, as long as there were horses and intervals of less labour on the farm, peats were always to be had--though at the same time, the drawing-room could not be made so warm as the kitchen. but for light, even for train-oil to be burned in the simplest of lamps, money had to be paid--and money was of all ordinary things the seldomest seen at castle warlock. from these operative causes it came by degrees, that one winter, for the sake of company, of warmth, of economy, mistress warlock had her chair carried to the kitchen; and the thing once done, it easily and naturally grew to a custom, and extended itself to the summer as well; for she who had ceased to stand on ceremony in the winter, could hardly without additional loss of dignity reascend her pedestal only because it was summer again. to the laird it was a matter of no consequence where he sat, ate, or slept. when his wife was alive, wherever she was, that was the place for him; when she was gone, all places were the same to him. there was, besides, that in the disposition of the man which tended to the homely:--any one who imagines that in the least synonymous with the coarse, or discourteous, or unrefined, has yet to understand the essentials of good breeding. hence it came that the other rooms of the house were by degrees almost neglected. both the dining-room and drawing-room grew very cold, cold as with the coldness of what is dead; and though he slept in the same part of the house by choice, not often did the young laird enter either. but he had concerning them, the latter in particular, a notion of vastness and grandeur; and along with that, a vague sense of sanctity, which it is not quite easy to define or account for. it seems however to have the same root with all veneration for place--for if there were not a natural inclination to venerate place, would any external reason make men capable of it? i think we shall come at length to feel all places, as all times and all spaces, venerable, because they are the outcome of the eternal nature and the eternal thought. when we have god, all is holy, and we are at home. chapter iii. the drawing-room. as soon as they were out of the kitchen-door, the boy pushed his hand into his father's; the father grasped it, and without a word spoken, they walked on together. they would often be half a day together without a word passing between them. to be near, each to the other, seemed enough for each. cosmo had thought his father was going somewhere about the farm, to see how things were getting on; but, instead of crossing to the other side of the court, where lay the sheds and stables, etc., or leaving it by the gate, the laird turned to the left, and led the way to the next block of building, where he stopped at a door at the farther end of the front of it. it was a heavy oak door, studded with great broad iron knobs, arranged in angular patterns. it was set deep in the thick wall, but there were signs of there having been a second, doubtless still stronger, flush with the external surface, for the great hooks of the hinges remained, with the deep hole in the stone on the opposite side for the bolt. the key was in the lock, for, except to open the windows, and do other necessary pieces of occasional tendance, it was seldom anybody entered the place, and grizzie generally turned the key, and left it in the lock. she would have been indignant at the assertion, but i am positive it was not always taken out at night. in this part of the castle were the dining and drawing rooms, and immediately over the latter, a state bedroom in which nobody had slept for many years. it was into a narrow passage, no wider than itself, the door led. from this passage a good-sized hall opened to the left--very barely furnished, but with a huge fireplace, and a great old table, that often had feasted jubilant companies. the walls were only plastered, and were stained with damp. against them were fixed a few mouldering heads of wild animals--the stag and the fox and the otter--one ancient wolf's-head also, wherever that had been killed. but it was not into this room the laird led his son. the passage ended in a stone stair that went up between containing walls. it was much worn, and had so little head-room that the laird could not ascend without stooping. cosmo was short enough as yet to go erect, but it gave him always a feeling of imprisonment and choking, a brief agony of the imagination, to pass through the narrow curve, though he did so at least twice every day. it was the oldest-looking thing about the place--that staircase. at the top of it, the laird turned to the right, and lifted the latch--all the doors were latched--of a dark-looking door. it screaked dismally as it opened. he entered and undid a shutter, letting an abiding flash of the ever young light of the summer day into the ancient room. it was long since cosmo had been in it before. the aspect of it affected him like a withered wall-flower. it was a well-furnished room. a lady with taste must at one time at least have presided in it--but then withering does so much for beauty--and that not of stuffs and things only! the furniture of it was very modern compared with the house, but not much of it was younger than the last james, or queen anne, and it had all a stately old-maidish look. such venerable rooms have been described, and painted, and put on the stage, and dreamed about, tens of thousands of times, yet they always draw me afresh as if they were as young as the new children who keep the world from growing old. they haunt me, and if i miss them in heaven, i shall have one given me. on the floor was an old, old carpet, wondrously darned and skilfully patched, with all its colours faded into a sweet faint ghost-like harmony. several spider-legged, inlaid tables stood about the room, but most of the chairs were of a sturdier make, one or two of rich carved work of india, no doubt a great rarity when first brought to glenwarlock. the walls had once had colour, but it was so retiring and indistinct in the little light that came through the one small deep-set window whose shutter had been opened, that you could not have said what it was. there were three or four cabinets--one of them old japanese; and on a table a case of gorgeous humming birds. the scarlet cloth that covered the table was faded to a dirty orange, but the birds were almost as bright as when they darted like live jewels through the tropical sunlight. exquisite as they were however, they had not for the boy half the interest of a faded old fire-screen, lovelily worked in silks, by hands to him unknown, long ago returned to the earth of which they were fashioned. a variety of nick-nacks and ornaments, not a few of which would have been of value in the eyes of a connoisseur, crowded the chimney-piece--which stood over an iron grate with bulging bars, and a tall brass fender. how still and solemn-quiet it all was in the middle of the great triumphant sunny day--like some far-down hollow in a rock, the matrix of a gem! it looked as if it had done with life--as much done with life as if it were a room in egyptian rock, yet was it full of the memories of keenest life, and cosmo knew there was treasure upon treasure of wonder and curiosity hid in those cabinets, some of which he had seen, and more he would like to see. but it was not to show him any of these that his father had now brought him to the room. not once yielding the right hand of the boy which was clasped to and in his own, the laird closed the door of the room, and advancing the whole length of it, stopped at a sofa covered with a rich brocade, and seating himself thereon, slowly, and with a kind of care, drew him between his thin knees, and began to talk to him. now there was this difference between the relation of these two and that of most fathers and sons, that, thus taken into solemn solitude by his old father, the boy felt no dismay, no sense of fault to be found, no troubled expectation of admonition. reverence and love held about equal sway in his feeling towards his father. and while the grandmother looked down on cosmo as the son of his mother, for that very reason his father in a strange lovely way reverenced his boy: the reaction was utter devotion. cosmo stood and looked in his father's eyes--their eyes were of the same colour.--that bright sweet soft norwegian blue--his right hand still clasped in his father's left, and his left hand leaning gently on his father's knee. then, as i say, the old man began to talk to the young one. a silent man ordinarily, it was from no lack of the power of speech, for he had a celtic gift of simple eloquence. "this is your birthday, my son." "yes, papa." "you are now fourteen." "yes, papa." "you are growing quite a man." "i don't know, papa." "so much of a man, at least, my cosmo, that i am going to treat you like a man this day, and tell you some things that i have never talked about to any one since your mother's death.--you remember your mother, cosmo?" this question he was scarcely ever alone with the boy without asking--not from forgetfulness, but from the desire to keep the boy's remembrance of her fresh, and for the pure pleasure of talking of her to the only one with whom it did not seem profane to converse concerning his worshipped wife. "yes, papa, i do." the laird always spoke scotch to his mother, and to grizzie also, who would have thought him seriously offended had he addressed her in book-english; but to his marion's son he always spoke in the best english he had, and cosmo did his best in the same way in return. "tell me what you remember about her," said the old man. he had heard the same thing again and again from the boy, yet every time it was as if he hoped and watched for some fresh revelation from the lips of the lad--as if, truth being one, memory might go on recalling, as imagination goes on foreseeing. "i remember," said the boy, "a tall beautiful woman, with long hair, which she brushed before a big, big looking-glass." the love of the son, kept alive by the love of the husband, glorifying through the mists of his memory the earthly appearance of the mother, gave to her the form in which he would see her again, rather than that in which he had actually beheld her. and indeed the father saw her after the same fashion in the memory of his love. tall to the boy of five, she was little above the middle height, yet the husband saw her stately in his dreams; there was nothing remarkable in her face except the expression, which after her marriage had continually gathered tenderness and grace, but the husband as well as the children called her absolutely beautiful. "what colour were her eyes, cosmo?" "i don't know; i never saw the colour of them; but i remember they looked at me as if i should run into them." "she would have died for you, my boy. we must be very good that we may see her again some day." "i will try. i do try, papa." "you see, cosmo, when a woman like that condescends to be wife to one of us and mother to the other, the least we can do, when she is taken from us, is to give her the same love and the same obedience after she is gone as when she was with us. she is with her own kind up in heaven now, but she may be looking down and watching us. it may be god lets her do that, that she may see of the travail of her soul and be satisfied--who can tell? she can't be very anxious about me now, for i am getting old, and my warfare is nearly over; but she may be getting things ready to rest me a bit. she knows i have for a long time now been trying to keep the straight path, as far as i could see it, though sometimes the grass and heather has got the better of it, so that it was hard to find. but you must remember, cosmo, that it is not enough to be a good boy, as i shall tell her you have always been: you've got to be a good man, and that is a rather different and sometimes a harder thing. for, as soon as a man has to do with other men, he finds they expect him to do things they ought to be ashamed of doing themselves; and then he has got to stand on his own honest legs, and not move an inch for all their pushing and pulling; and especially where a man loves his fellow man and likes to be on good terms with him, that is not easy. the thing is just this, cosmo--when you are a full-grown man, you must be a good boy still--that's the difficulty. for a man to be a boy, and a good boy still, he must be a thorough man. the man that's not manly can never be a good boy to his mother. and you can't keep true to your mother, except you remember him who is father and mother both to all of us. i wish my marion were here to teach you as she taught me. she taught me to pray, cosmo, as i have tried to teach you--when i was in any trouble, just to go into my closet, and shut to the door, and pray to my father who is in secret--the same father who loved you so much as to give you my marion for a mother. but i am getting old and tired, and shall soon go where i hope to learn faster. oh, my boy! hear your father who loves you, and never do the thing you would be ashamed for your mother or me to know. remember, nothing drops out; everything hid shall be revealed. but of all things, if ever you should fail or fall, don't lie still because you are down: get up again--for god's sake, for your mother's sake, for my sake--get up and try again. "and now it is time you should know a little about the family of which you come. i don't doubt there have been some in it who would count me a foolish man for bringing you up as i have done, but those of them who are up there don't. they see that the business of life is not to get as much as you can, but to do justly, and love mercy, and walk humbly with your god--with your mother's god, my son. they may say i have made a poor thing of it, but i shall not hang my head before the public of that country, because i've let the land slip from me that i couldn't keep any more than this weary old carcase that's now crumbling away from about me. some would tell me i ought to shudder at the thought of leaving you to such poverty, but i am too anxious about yourself, my boy, to think much about the hardships that may be waiting you. i should be far more afraid about you if i were leaving you rich. i have seen rich people do things i never knew a poor gentleman do. i don't mean to say anything against the rich--there's good and bad of all sorts; but i just can't be so very sorry that i am leaving you to poverty, though, if i might have had my way, it wouldn't have been so bad. but he knows best who loves best. i have struggled hard to keep the old place for you; but there's hardly an acre outside the garden and close but was mortgaged before i came into the property. i've been all my life trying to pay off, but have made little progress. the house is free, however, and the garden; and don't you part with the old place, my boy, except you see you ought. but rather than anything not out and out honest, anything the least doubtful, sell every stone. let all go, if you should have to beg your way home to us. come clean, my son, as my marion bore you." here cosmo interrupted his father to ask what mortgaged meant. this led to an attempt on the part of the laird to instruct him in the whole state of the affairs of the property. he showed him where all the papers were kept, and directed him to whom to go for any requisite legal advise. weary then of business, of which he had all his life had more than enough, he turned to pleasanter matters, and began to tell him anecdotes of the family. "what in mercy can hae come o' the laird, think ye, my leddy?" said grizzie to her mistress. "it's the yoong laird's birthday, ye see, an' they aye haud a colloguin' thegither upo' that same, an' i kenna whaur to gang to cry them till their denner." "run an' ring the great bell," said the grandmother, mindful of old glories. "'deed, is' du naething o' the kin'," said grizzie to herself; "it's eneuch to raise a regiment--gien it camna doon upo' my heid." but she had her suspicion, and finding the great door open, ascended the stair. the two were sitting at a table, with the genealogical tree of the family spread out before them, the father telling tale after tale, the son listening in delight. i must confess, however--let it tell against the laird's honesty as it may--that, his design being neither to glorify his family, nor to teach records, but to impress all he could find of ancestral nobility upon his boy, he made a choice, and both communicated and withheld. so absorbed were they, that grizzie's knock startled them both a good deal. "yer denners is ready, laird," she said, standing erect in the doorway. "verra weel, grizzie, i thank ye," returned the laird.--"cosmo, we'll take a walk together this evening, and then i'll tell you more about that brother of my grandfather's. come along to dinner now.--i houp ye hae something in honour o' the occasion, grizzie," he added in a whisper when he reached the door, where the old woman waited to follow them. "i teuk it upo' me, laird," answered grizzie in the same tone, while cosmo was going down the stair, "to put a cock an' a leek thegither, an' they'll be nane the waur that ye hae keepit them i' the pot a whilie langer.--cosmo," she went on when they had descended, and overtaken the boy, who was waiting for them at the foot, "the lord bless ye upo' this bonnie day! an' may ye be aye a comfort to them 'at awes ye, as ye hae been up to this present." "i houp sae, grizzie," responded cosmo humbly; and all went together to the kitchen. there the table was covered with a clean cloth of the finest of homespun, and everything set out with the same nicety as if the meal had been spread in the dining-room. the old lady, who had sought to please her son by putting on her best cap for the occasion, but who had in truth forgot what day it was until reminded by grizzie, sat already at the head of the table, waiting their arrival. she made a kind speech to the boy, hoping he would be master of the place for many years after his father and she had left him. then the meal commenced. it did not last long. they had the soup first, and then the fowl that had been boiled in it, with a small second dish of potatoes--the year's baby kidneys, besides those grizzie had pared. delicate pancakes followed--and dinner was over--except for the laird, who had a little toddy after. but as yet cosmo had never even tasted strong drink--and of course he never desired it. leaving the table, he wandered out, pondering some of the things his father had been telling him. chapter iv. an afternoon sleep. presently, without having thought whither he meant to go, he found himself out of sight of the house--in a favourite haunt, but one in which he always had a peculiar feeling of strangeness and even expatriation. he had descended the stream that rushed past the end of the house, till it joined the valley river, and followed the latter up, to where it took a sudden sharp turn, and a little farther. then he crossed it, and was in a lonely nook of the glen, with steep braes about him on all sides, some of them covered with grass, others rugged and unproductive. he threw himself down in the clover, a short distance from the stream, and straightway felt as if he were miles from home. no shadow of life was to be seen. cottage-chimney nor any smoke was visible--no human being, no work of human hands, no sign of cultivation except the grass and clover. now whether it was that in childhood he had learned that here he was beyond his father's land, or that some early sense of loneliness in the place had been developed by a brooding fancy into a fixed feeling, i cannot well say; but certainly, as often as he came--and he liked to visit the spot, and would sometimes spend hours in it--he felt like a hermit of the wilderness cut off from human society, and was haunted with a vague sense of neighbouring hostility. probably it came of an historical fancy that the nook ought to be theirs, combined with the sense that it was not. but there had been no injury done ab extra: the family had suffered from the inherent moral lack of certain of its individuals. this sense of away-from-homeness, however, was not strong enough to keep cosmo from falling into such a dreamful reverie as by degrees naturally terminated in slumber. seldom is sleep far from one who lies on his back in the grass, with the sound of waters in his ears. and indeed a sleep in the open air was almost an essential ingredient of a holiday such as cosmo had been accustomed to make of his birthday: constantly active as his mind was, perhaps in part because of that activity, he was ready to fall asleep any moment when warm and supine. when he woke from what seemed a dreamless sleep, his half roused senses were the same moment called upon to render him account of something very extraordinary which they could not themselves immediately lay hold of. though the sun was yet some distance above the horizon, it was to him behind one of the hills, as he lay with his head low in the grass; and what could the strange thing be which he saw on the crest of the height before him, on the other side of the water? was it a fire in a grate, thinned away by the sunlight? how could there be a grate where there was neither house nor wall? even in heraldry the combination he beheld would have been a strange one. there stood in fact a frightful-looking creature half consumed in light--yet a pale light, seemingly not strong enough to burn. it could not be a phoenix, for he saw no wings, and thought he saw four legs. suddenly he burst out laughing, and laughed that the hills echoed. his sleep-blinded eyes had at length found their focus and clarity. "i see!" he said, "i see what it is! it's jeames grade's coo 'at's been loupin' ower the mune, an's stucken upo' 't!" in very truth there was the moon between the legs of the cow! she did not remain there long however, but was soon on the cow's back, as she crept up and up in the face of the sun. he bethought him of a couplet that grizzie had taught him when he was a child: whan the coo loups ower the mune, the reid gowd rains intil men's shune. and in after-life he thought not unfrequently of this odd vision he had had. often, when, having imagined he had solved some difficulty of faith or action, presently the same would return in a new shape, as if it had but taken the time necessary to change its garment, he would say to himself with a sigh, "the coo's no ower the mune yet!" and set himself afresh to the task of shaping a handle on the infinite small enough for a finite to lay hold of. grizzie, who was out looking for him, heard the roar of his laughter, and, guided by the sound, spied him where he lay. he heard her footsteps, but never stirred till he saw her looking down upon him like a benevolent gnome that had found a friendless mortal asleep on ground of danger. "eh, cosmo, laddie, ye'll get yer deid o' caul'!" she cried. "an' preserve's a'! what set ye lauchin' in sic a fearsome fashion as yon? ye're surely no fey!" "na, i'm no fey, grizzie! ye wad hae lauchen yersel' to see jeames gracie's coo wi' the mune atween the hin' an' the fore legs o' her. it was terrible funny." "hoots! i see naething to lauch at i' that. the puir coo cudna help whaur the mune wad gang. the haivenly boadies is no to be restricket." again cosmo burst into a great laugh, and this time grizzie, seriously alarmed lest he should be in reality fey, grew angry, and seizing hold of him by the arm, pulled lustily. "get up, i tell ye!" she cried. "here's the laird speirin' what's come o' ye,'at ye come na hame to yer tay." but cosmo instead of rising only laughed the more, and went on until at length grizzie made use of a terrible threat. "as sure's sowens!" she said, "gien ye dinna haud yer tongue wi' that menseless-like lauchin', i'll no tell ye anither auld-warld tale afore marti'mas." "will ye tell me ane the nicht gien i haud my tongue an' gang hame wi' ye?" "ay, that wull i--that's gien i can min' upo' ane." he rose at once, and laughed no more. they walked home together in the utmost peace. after tea, his father went out with him for a stroll, and to call on jeames gracie, the owner of the cow whose inconstellation had so much amused him. he was an old man, with an elderly wife, and a grand-daughter--a weaver to trade, whose father and grandfather before him had for many a decade done the weaving work, both in linen and wool, required by "them at the castle." he had been on the land, in the person of his ancestors, from time almost immemorial, though he had only a small cottage, and a little bit of land, barely enough to feed the translunar cow. but poor little place as jeames's was, if the laird would have sold it the price would have gone a good way towards clearing the rest of his property of its encumbrances. for the situation of the little spot was such as to make it specially desirable in the eyes of the next proprietor, on the border of whose land it lay. he was a lord of session, and had taken his title from the place, which he inherited from his father; who, although a laird, had been so little of a gentleman, that the lordship had not been enough to make one of his son. he was yet another of those trim, orderly men, who will sacrifice anything--not to beauty--of that they have in general no sense--but to tidiness: tidiness in law, in divinity, in morals, in estate, in garden, in house, in person--tidiness is in their eyes the first thing--seemingly because it is the highest creative energy of which they are capable. naturally the dwelling of james gracie was an eyesore to this man, being visible from not a few of his windows, and from almost anywhere on the private road to his house; for decidedly it was not tidy. neither in truth was it dirty, while to any life--loving nature it was as pleasant to know, as it was picturesque to look at. but the very appearance of poverty seems to act as a reproach on some of the rich--at least why else are they so anxious to get it out of their sight?--and lord lickmyloof--that was not his real title, but he was better known by it than by the name of his land: it came of a nasty habit he had, which i need not at present indicate farther--lord lickmyloof could not bear the sight of the cottage which no painter would have consented to omit from the landscape. it haunted him like an evil thing. [illustration with caption: cosmo on his way to school.] chapter v. the school. the next morning, by the steep farm road, and the parish road, which ran along the border of the river and followed it downward, cosmo, on his way to school, with his books in a green baize bag, hung by the strings over his shoulder, came out from among the hills upon a comparative plain. but there were hills on all sides round him yet--not very high--few of them more than a couple of thousand feet--but bleak and bare, even under the glow of the summer sun, for the time of heather was not yet, when they would show warm and rich to the eye of poet and painter. most of the farmers there, however, would have felt a little insulted by being asked to admire them at any time: whatever their colour or shape or product, they were incapable of yielding crops and money! in truth many a man who now admires, would be unable to do so, if, like those farmers, he had to struggle with nature for little more than a bare living. the struggle there, what with early, long-lasting, and bitter winters, and the barrenness of the soil in many parts, was a severe one. leaving the river, the road ascended a little, and joined the highway, which kept along a level, consisting mostly of land lately redeemed from the peat-moss. it went straight for two miles, fenced from the fields in many parts by low stone walls without mortar, abhorrent to the eye of cosmo; in other parts by walls of earth, called dykes, which delighted his very soul. these were covered with grass for the vagrant cow, sprinkled with loveliest little wild flowers for the poet-peasant, burrowed in by wild bees for the adventurous delight of the honey-drawn school-boy. glad i am they had not quite vanished from scotland before i was sent thither, but remained to help me get ready for the kingdom of heaven: those dykes must still be dear to my brothers who have gone up before me. some of the fields had only a small ditch between them and the road, and some of them had no kind of fence at all. it was a dreary road even in summer, though not therefore without its loveable features--amongst which the dykes; and wherever there is anything to love, there is beauty in some form. a short way past the second milestone, he came to the first straggling houses of the village. it was called muir of warlock, after the moor on which it stood, as the moor was called after the river that ran through it, and that named after the glen, which took its name from the family--so that the warlocks had scattered their cognomen all around them. a somewhat dismal-looking village it was--except to those that knew its people: to some of such it was beautiful--as the plainest face is beautiful to him who knows a sweet soul inside it. the highway ran through it--a broad fine road, fit for the richest country under the sun; but the causeway along its edges, making of it for the space a street, was of the poorest and narrowest. some of the cottages stood immediately upon the path, some of them receded a little. they were almost all of one story, built of stone, and rough-cast-harled, they called it there, with roofs of thick thatch, in which a half smothered pane of glass might hint at some sort of room beneath. as cosmo walked along, he saw all the trades at work; from blacksmith to tailor, everybody was busy. now and then he was met by a strong scent, as of burning leather, from the oak-bark which some of the housewives used for fuel, after its essence had been exhausted in the tan-pit, but mostly the air was filled with the odour of burning peat. cosmo knew almost everybody, and was kindly greeted as he went along--none the less that some of them, hearing from their children that he had not been to school the day before, had remarked that his birthday hardly brought him enough to keep it with. the vulgarity belonging to the worship of mammon, is by no means confined to the rich; many of these, having next to nothing, yet thought profession the one thing, money, houses, lands the only inheritances. it is a marvel that even world-loving people should never see with what a load they oppress the lives of the children to whom, instead of bringing them up to earn their own living, and thus enjoy at least the game of life, they leave a fortune enough to sink a devil yet deeper in hell. was it nothing to cosmo to inherit a long line of ancestors whose story he knew--their virtues, their faults, their wickedness, their humiliation?--to inherit the nobility of a father such as his? the graciousness of a mother such as that father caused him to remember her? was there no occasion for the laird to rejoice in the birth of a boy whom he believed to have inherited all the virtues of his race, and left all their vices behind? but none of the villagers forgot, however they might regard the holiday, that cosmo was the "yoong laird" notwithstanding the poverty of his house; and they all knew that in old time the birthday of the heir had been a holiday to the school as well as to himself, and remembered the introduction of the change by the present master. indeed, throughout the village, although there were not a few landed proprietors in the neighbourhood whose lands came nearer, all of whom of course were lairds, and although the village itself had ceased to belong to the family, glenwarlock was always called _the_ laird; and the better part in the hearts of even the money-loving and money-trusting among its inhabitants, honoured him as the best man in the country, "thof he hed sae little skeel at haudin' his ain nest thegither;" and though, besides, there is scarce a money-making man who does not believe poverty the cousin, if not the child of fault; and the more unscrupulous, _within the law_, a man has been in making his money, the more he regards the man who seems to have lost the race he has won, as somehow or other to blame: "people with naught are naughty." nor is this judgment confined to the morally unscrupulous. few who are themselves permitted to be successful, care to conjecture that it may be the will of the power, that in part through their affairs, rules men, that some should be, in that way, unsuccessful: better can be made of them by preventing the so-called success. some men rise with the treatment under which others would sink. but of the inhabitants of muir of warlock, only a rather larger proportion than of the inhabitants of mayfair would have taken interest in such a theory of results. they all liked, and those who knew him best, loved the young laird; for if he had no lands, neither had he any pride, they said, and was as happy sitting with any old woman, and sharing her tea, as at a lord's table. nor was he less of a favourite at school, though, being incapable of self-assertion, his inborn consciousness of essential humanity rendering it next to impossible for him to _claim_ anything, some of the bigger boys were less than friendly with him. one point in his conduct was in particular distasteful to them: he seemed to scorn even an honest advantage. for in truth he never could bring himself, in the small matters of dealing that pass between boys at school, to make the least profit. he had a passion for fair play, which, combined with love to his neighbour, made of an advantage, though perfectly understood and recognized, almost a physical pain: he shrank from it with something like disgust. i may not, however, conceal my belief, that there was in it a rudimentary tinge of the pride of those of his ancestors who looked down upon commerce, though not upon oppression, or even on robbery. but the true man will change to nobility even the instincts derived from strains of inferior moral development in his race--as the oyster makes, they say, of the sand-grain a pearl. greeting the tailor through his open window, where he sat cross-legged on his table, the shoemaker on his stool, which, this lovely summer morning, he had brought to the door of his cottage, and the smith in his nimbus of sparks, through the half-door of his smithy, and receiving from each a kindly response, the boy walked steadily on till he came to the school. there, on the heels of the master, the boys and girls were already crowding in, and he entered along with them. the religious preliminaries over, consisting in a dry and apparently grudging recognition of a sovereignty that required the homage, and the reading of a chapter of the bible in class, the secular business was proceeded with; and cosmo was sitting with his books before him, occupied with a hard passage in caesar, when the master left his desk and came to him. "you'll have to make up for lost time to-day, cosmo," he said. now if anything was certain to make cosmo angry, it was the appearance, however slight, or however merely implied, of disapproval of anything his father thought, or did, or sanctioned. his face flushed, and he answered quickly, "the time wasn't lost, sir." this reply made the master in his turn angry, but he restrained himself. "i'm glad of that! i may then expect to find you prepared with your lessons for to-day." "i learned my lessons for yesterday," cosmo answered; "but my father says it's no play to learn lessons." "your father's not master of this school." "he's maister o' me," returned the boy, relapsing into the mother-tongue, which, except it be spoken in good humour, always sounds rude. the master took the youth's devotion to his father for insolence to himself. "i shall say no more," he rejoined, still using the self-command which of all men an autocrat requires, "till i find how you do in your class. that you are the best scholar in it, is no reason why you should be allowed to idle away hours in which you might have been laying up store for the time to come."--it was a phrase much favoured by the master--in present application foolish.--"but perhaps your father does not mean to send you to college?" "my father hasna said, an' i haena speirt," answered cosmo, with his eyes on his book. still misinterpreting the boy, the conceit and ill-temper of the master now overcame him, and caused him to forget the proprieties altogether. "haud on that gait, laddie, an' ye'll be as great a fule as yer father himsel'," he said. cosmo rose from his seat, white as the wall behind him, looked in the master's eyes, caught up his caesar, and dashed the book in his face. most boys would then have made for the door, but that was not cosmo's idea of bearing witness. the moment the book left his hand, he drew himself up, stood still as a statue, looked full at the master, and waited. not by a motion would he avoid any consequence of his act. he had not long to wait. a corner of the book had gone into the master's eye; he clapped his hand to it, and for a moment seemed lost in suffering. the next, he clenched for the boy a man's fist, and knocked him down. cosmo fell backward over the form, struck his head hard on the foot of the next desk, and lay where he fell. a shriek arose, and a girl about sixteen came rushing up. she was the grand-daughter of james grade, befriended of the laird. "go to your seat, agnes!" shouted the master, and turning from her, stood, with his handkerchief to one eye, looking down on the boy. so little did he know him, he suspected him of pretending to be more hurt than he was. "touch me gien ye daur," cried agnes, as she stooped to remove his legs from the form. "leave him alone," shouted the master, and seizing her, pulled her away, and flung her from him that she almost fell. but by this time the pain in his eye had subsided a little, and he began to doubt whether indeed the boy was pretending as he had imagined. he began also to feel not a little uneasy as to the possible consequences of his hasty act--not half so uneasy, however, as he would have felt, had the laird been as well-to-do as his neighbour, lord lickmyloof--who would be rather pleased than otherwise, the master thought, at any grief that might befall either cosmo or the lass gracie. therefore, although he would have been ready to sink had the door then opened and the laird entered, he did not much fear any consequences to be counted serious from the unexpected failure of his self-command. he dragged the boy up by the arm, and set him on his seat, before agnes could return; but his face was as that of one dead, and he fell forward on the desk. with a second great cry, agnes again sprang forward. she was a strong girl, accustomed to all kinds of work, out-door and in-door. she caught cosmo round the waist from behind, pulled him from the seat, and drew him to the door, which because of the heat stood open. the master had had enough of it, and did not attempt to hinder her. there she took him in her arms, and literally ran with him along the street. chapter xvi. grannie's cottage. but she had not to pass many houses before she came to that of her grandfather's mother, an aged woman, i need not say, but in very tolerable health and strength nevertheless. she sat at her spinning wheel, with her door wide open. suddenly, and, to her dulled sense, noiselessly, aggie came staggering in with her burden. she dropped him on the old woman's bed, and herself on the floor, her heart and lungs going wildly. "i' the name o' a'!" cried her great-grandmother, stopping her wheel, breaking her thread, and letting the end twist madly up amongst the revolving iron teeth, emerging from the mist of their own speed, in which a moment before they had looked ethereal as the vibration-film of an insect's wings. she rose with a haste marvellous for her years, and approaching, looked down on the prostrate form of the girl. "it can never be my ain aggie," she faltered, "to rush intil my quaiet hoose that gait, fling a man upo' my bed, an' fa' her len'th upo' my flure!" but agnes was not yet able to reply. she could only sign with her hand to the bed, which she did with such energy that her great-grandmother--grannie, she called her, as did the whole of the village--turned at once thitherward. she could not see well, and the box-bed was dark, so she did not at first recognize cosmo, but the moment she suspected who it was, she too uttered a cry--the cry of old age, feeble and wailful. "the michty be ower's! what's come to my bairn?" she said. "the maister knockit him doon," gasped agnes. "eh, lassie! rin for the doctor." "no," came feebly from the bed. "i dinna want ony notice ta'en o' the business." "are ye sair hurtit, my bairn?" asked the old woman. "my heid's some sair an' throughither-like; but i'll just lie still a wee, and syne i'll be able to gang hame. i'm some sick. i winna gang back to the school the day." "na, my bonnie man, that ye sanna!" cried grannie, in a tone mingled of pity and indignation. a moment more, and agnes rose from the earth, for earth it was, quite fresh; and the two did all they could to make him comfortable. aggie would have gone at once to let his father know; she was perfectly able, she said, and in truth seemed nothing the worse for her fierce exertion. but cosmo said, "bide a wee, aggie, an' we'll gang hame thegither. i'll be better in twa or three minutes." but he did not get better so fast as he expected, and the only condition on which grannie would consent not to send for the doctor, was, that agnes should go and tell his father. "but eh, aggie!" said cosmo, "dinna lat him think there's onything to be fleyt aboot. it's naething but a gey knap o' the heid; an' i'm sure the maister didna inten' duin me ony sarious hurt.--but my father's sure to gie him fair play!--he gies a' body fair play." agnes set out, and cosmo fell asleep. he slept a long time, and woke better. she hurried to glenwarlock, and in the yard found the laird. "weel, lassie!" he said, "what brings ye here this time o' day? what for are ye no at the school? ye'll hae little eneuch o' 't by an' by, whan the hairst 's come." "it's the yoong laird!" said aggie, and stopped. "what's come till 'im?" asked the laird, in the sharpened tone of anxiety. "it's no muckle, he says himsel'. but his heid's some sair yet." "what maks his heid sair? he was weel eneuch whan he gaed this mornin'." "the maister knockit 'im doon." the laird started as if one had struck him in the face. the blood reddened his forehead, and his old eyes flashed like two stars. all the battle-fury of the old fighting race seemed to swell up from ancient fountains amongst the unnumbered roots of his being, and rush to his throbbing brain. he clenched his withered fist, drew himself up straight, and made his knees strong. for a moment he felt as in the prime of life and its pride. the next his fist relaxed, his hand fell by his side, and he bowed his head. "the lord hae mercy upo' me!" he murmured. "i was near takin' the affairs o' ane o' his into my han's!" he covered his face with his wrinkled hands, and the girl stood beside him in awe-filled silence. but she did not quite comprehend, and was troubled at seeing him stand thus motionless. in the trembling voice of one who would comfort her superior, she said, "dinna greit, laird. he'll be better, i'm thinkin', afore ye win till 'im. it was grannie gart me come--no him." speechless the laird turned, and without even entering the house, walked away to go to the village. he had reached the valley-road before he discovered that agnes was behind him. "dinna ye come, aggie," he said; "ye may be wantit at hame." "ye dinna think i wad ley ye, laird!--'cep' ye was to think fit to sen' me frea ye. i'm maist as guid's a man to gang wi' ye--wi' the advantage o' bein' a wuman, as my mither tells me:"--she called her grandmother, mother.--"ye see we can daur mair nor ony man--but, guid forgie me!--no mair nor the yoong laird whan he flang his caesar straucht i' the maister's face this verra mornin'." the laird stopped, turned sharply round, and looked at her. "what did he that for?" he said. "'cause he ca'd yersel' a fule," answered the girl, with the utmost simplicity, and no less reverence. the laird drew himself up once more, and looked twenty years younger. but it was not pride that inspired him, nor indignation, but the father's joy at finding in his son his champion. "mony ane's ca'd me that, i weel believe, lassie, though no to my ain face or that a' my bairn. but whether i deserve't or no, nane but ane kens. it's no by the word o' man i stan' or fa'; but it's hoo my maister luiks upo' my puir endeevour to gang by the thing he says. min' this, lassie--lat fowk say as they like, but du ye as he likes, an', or a' be dune, they'll be upo' their k-nees to ye. an' sae they'll be yet to my bairn--though i'm some tribbled he sud hae saired the maister--e'en as he deserved." "what cud he du, sir? it was na for himsel' he strack! an' syne he never muved an inch, but stud there like a rock, an' liftit no a han' to defen' himsel', but jist loot the maister tak his wull o' 'im." the pair tramped swiftly along the road, heeding nothing on either hand as they went, aggie lithe and active, the laird stooping greatly in his forward anxiety to see his injured boy, but walking much faster "than his age afforded." before they reached the village, the mid-day recess had come, and everybody knew what had happened. loud were most in praise of the boy's behaviour, and many were the eyes that from window and door watched the laird, as he hurried down the street to "grannie's," where all had learned the young laird was lying. but no one spoke, or showed that he was looking, and the laird walked straight on with his eyes to the ground, glancing neither to the right hand nor the left; and as did the laird, so did aggie. the door of the cottage stood open. there was a step down, but the laird knew it well. turning to the left through a short passage, in the window of which stood a large hydrangea, over two wooden pails of water, he lifted the latch of the inner door, bowed his tall head, and entered the room where lay his darling. with a bow to grannie, he went straight up to the bed, speedily discovered that cosmo slept, and stood regarding him with a full heart. who can tell but him who knows it, how much more it is to be understood by one's own, than by all the world beside! by one's own one learns to love all god's creatures, and from one's own one gets strength to meet the misprision of the world. the room was dark though it was summer, and although it had two windows, one to the street, and one to the garden behind: both ceiling and floor were of a dark brown, for the beams and boards of the one were old and interpenetrated with smoke, and the other was of hard-beaten clay, into which also was wrought much smoke and an undefinable blackness, while the windows were occupied with different plants favoured of grannie, so that little light could get in, and that little was half-swallowed by the general brownness. a tall eight-day clock stood in one corner, up to which, whoever would learn from it the time, had to advance confidentially, and consult its face on tip-toe, with peering eyes. beside it was a beautifully polished chest of drawers; a nice tea-table stood in the centre, and some dark-shiny wooden chairs against the walls. a closet opened at the head of the bed, and at the foot of it was the door of the room and the passage, so that it stood in a recess, to which were wooden doors, seldom closed. a fire partly of peat, partly of tan, burned on the little hearth. cosmo opened his eyes, and saw those of his father looking down upon him. he stretched out his arms, and drew the aged head upon his bosom. his heart was too full to speak. "how do you find yourself, my boy?" said the father, gently releasing himself. "i know all about it; you need not trouble yourself to tell me more than just how you are." "better, father, much better," answered cosmo. "but there is one thing i must tell you. just before it happened we were reading in the bible-class about samson--how the spirit of the lord came upon him, and with the jaw-bone of an ass he slew ever so many of the philistines; and when the master said that bad word about you, it seemed as if the spirit of the lord came upon me; for i was not in a rage, but filled with what seemed a holy indignation; and as i had no ass's jaw-bone handy, i took my caesar, and flung it as hard and as straight, as i could in the master's face. but i am not so sure about it now." "tak ye nae thoucht anent it, cosmo, my bairn," said the old woman, taking up the word; "it's no a hair ayont what he deserved 'at daured put sic a word to the best man in a' the country. by the han' o' a babe, as he did goliah o' gath, heth the lord rebuked the enemy.--the lord himsel' 's upo' your side, laird, to gie ye siccan a brave son." "i never kent him lift his han' afore," said the laird, as if he would fain mitigate judgment on youthful indiscretion,--"excep' it was to the kirkmalloch bull, when he ran at him an' me as gien he wad hae pitcht 's ower the wa' o' the warl'." "the mair like it was the speerit o' the lord, as the bairn himsel' was jaloosin," remarked grannie, in a tone of confidence to which the laird was ready enough to yield;--"an' whaur the speerit o' the lord is, there's leeberty," she added, thinking less of the suitableness of the quotation, than of the aptness of words in it. glenwarlock stooped and kissed the face of his son, and went to fetch the doctor. before he returned, cosmo was asleep again. the doctor would not have him waked. from his pulse and the character of his sleep he judged he was doing well. he had heard all about the affair before, but heard all now as for the first time, assured the laird there was no danger, said he would call again, and recommended him to go home. the boy must remain where he was for the night, he said, and if the least ground for uneasiness should show itself, he would ride over, and make his report. "i don't know what to think," returned the laird: "it would be trouble and inconvenience to grannie." "'deed, laird, ye sud be ashamt to say sic a thing: it'll be naething o' the kin'!" cried the old woman." here he s' bide--wi' yer leave, sir, an' no muv frae whaur he lies! there's anither bed i' the cloaset there. but, troth, what wi' the rheumatics, an'--an'--the din o' the rottans, we s' ca' 't, mony's the nicht i gang to nae bed ava'; an' to hae the yoong laird sleepin' i' my bed, an' me keepin' watch ower 'im,'ill be jist like haein' an angel i' the hoose to luik efter. i'll be somebody again for ae nicht, i can tell ye! an' oh! it's a lang time, sir, sin' i was onybody i' this warl'! i houp sair they'll hae something for auldfowk to du i' the neist." "hoots, mistress forsyth," returned the laird, "the' 'll be naebody auld there!" "hoo am i to win in than, sir? i'm auld, gien onybody ever was auld! an' hoo's yersel' to win in, sir--for ye maun be some auld yersel' by this time, thof i min' weel yer father a bit loonie in a tartan kilt." "what wad ye say to be made yoong again, auld frien'?" suggested the laird, with a smile of wonderful sweetness. "eh, sir! there's naething to that effec' i' the word." "hoot!" rejoined the laird, "wad ye hae me plaguit to tell the laddie there a' thing i wad du for him, as gien he hadna a hert o' his ain to tell 'im a score o'things--ay, hun'ers o' things? dinna ye ken 'at the speerit o' man's the can'le o' the lord?" "but sae mony for a' that follows but their ain fancies!--that ye maun alloo, laird; an' what comes o' yer can'le than?" "that' sic as never luik whaur the licht fa's, but aye some ither gait, for they carena to walk by the same. but them 'at orders their wy's by what licht they hae, there's no fear o' them. even sud they stummle, they sanna fa'." "'deed, laird, i'm thinkin' ye may be richt. i hae stummlet mony's the time, but i'm no doon yet; an' i hae a guid houp 'at maybe, puir dissiple as i am, the maister may lat on 'at he kens me, whan that great and terrible day o' the lord comes." cosmo began to stir. his father went to the bed-side, and saw at a glance that the boy was better. he told him what the doctor had decreed. cosmo said he was quite able to get up and go home that minute. but his father would not hear of it. "i can't bear to think of you walking back all that way alone, papa," objected cosmo. "ye dinna think, cosmo," interposed aggie, "'at i'm gauin to lat the laird gang hame himlane, an' me here to be his body-gaird! i ken my duty better nor that." but the laird did not go till they had all had tea together, and the doctor had again come and gone, and given his decided opinion that all cosmo needed was a little rest, and that he would be quite well in a day or two. then at length his father left him, and, comforted, set out with aggie for glenwarlock. chapter vii. dreams. the gloamin' came down much sooner in grannie's cottage than on the sides of the eastward hills, but the old woman made up her little fire, and it glowed a bright heart to the shadowy place. though the room was always dusky, it was never at this season quite dark any time of the night. it was not absolutely needful, except for the little cooking required by the invalid--for as such, in her pride of being his nurse, grannie regarded him--but she welcomed the excuse for a little extra warmth to her old limbs during the night watches. then she sat down in her great chair, and all was still. "what for arena ye spinnin', grannie?" said cosmo. "i like fine to hear the wheel singin' like a muckle flee upo' the winnock. it spins i' my heid lang lingles o' thouchts, an' dreams, an' wad-be's. neist to hearin' yersel' tell a tale, i like to hear yer wheel gauin'. it has a w'y o' 'ts ain wi' me!" "i was feart it micht vex ye wi' the soomin' o' 't," answered grannie, and as she spoke she rose, and lighted her little lamp, though she scarcely needed light for her spinning, and sat down to her wheel. for a long unweary time cosmo lay and listened, an aerial amphion, building castles in the air to its music, which was so monotonous that, like the drone of the bag-pipes, he could use it for accompaniment to any dream-time of his own. when a man comes to trust in god thoroughly, he shrinks from castle-building, lest his faintest fancy should run counter to that loveliest will; but a boy's dreams are nevertheless a part of his education. and the true heart will not leave the blessed conscience out, even in its dreams. those of cosmo were mostly of a lovely woman, much older than himself, who was kind to him, and whom he obeyed and was ready to serve like a slave. these came, of course, first of all, from the heart that needed and delighted in the thought of a mother, but they were bodied out from the memory, faint, far-off, and dim, of his own mother, and the imaginations of her roused by his father's many talks with him concerning her. he dreamed now of one, now of another beneficent power, of the fire, the air, the earth, or the water--each of them a gracious woman, who favoured, helped, and protected him, through dangers and trials innumerable. such imaginings may be--nay must be unhealthy for those who will not attempt the right in the face of loss and pain and shame; but to those who labour in the direction of their own ideal, dreams will do no hurt, but foster rather the ideal. when at length the spinning-wheel ceased with its hum, the silence was to cosmo like the silence after a song, and his thoughts refused to do their humming alone. the same moment he fell--from a wondrous region where he dwelt with sylphs in a great palace, built on the tree-tops of a forest ages old; where the buxom air bathed every limb, and was to his ethereal body as water--sensible as a liquid; whose every room rocked like the baby's cradle of the nursery rime, but equilibrium was the merest motion of the will; where the birds nested in its cellars, and the squirrels ran up and down its stairs, and the woodpeckers pulled themselves along its columns and rails by their beaks; where the winds swung the whole city with a rhythmic roll, and the sway as of tempest waves, music-ruled to ordered cadences; where, far below, lower than the cellars, the deer, and the mice, and the dormice, and the foxes, and all the wild things of the forest, ran in its caves--from this high city of the sylphs, watched and loved and taught by the most gracious and graceful and tenderly ethereal and powerful of beings, he fell supine into grannie's box-bed, with the departed hum of her wheel spinning out its last thread of sound in his disappointed brain. in after years when he remembered the enchanting dreams of his boyhood, instead of sighing after them as something gone for ever, he would say to himself, "what matter they are gone? in the heavenly kingdom my own mother is waiting me, fairer and stronger and real. i imagined the elves; god imagined my mother." the unconscious magician of the whole mystery, who had seemed to the boy to be spinning his very brain into dreams, rose, and, drawing near the bed, as if to finish the ruthless destruction, and with her long witch-broom sweep down the very cobwebs of his airy phantasy, said, "is ye waukin', cosmo my bairn?" "ay am i," answered cosmo, with a faint pang, and a strange sense of loss: when should he dream its like again! "soon, soon, cosmo," he might have heard, could he have interpreted the telephonic signals from the depths of his own being; "wherever the creative pneuma can enter, there it enters, and no door stands so wide to it as that of the obedient heart." "weel, ye maun hae yer supper, an' syne ye maun say yer prayers, an' hae dune wi' tyseday, an' gang on til' wudens-day." "i'm nae wantin' ony supper, thank ye," said the boy. "ye maun hae something, my bonny man; for them 'at aits ower little, as weel's them 'at aits ower muckle, the night-mear rides--an' she's a fearsome horse. ye can never win upo' the back o' her, for as guid a rider as ye're weel kent to be, my bairn. sae wull ye hae a drappy parritch an' ream? or wad ye prefar a sup of fine gruel, sic as yer mother used to like weel frae my han', whan it sae happent i was i' the hoose?" the offer seemed to the boy to bring him a little nearer the mother whose memory he worshipped, and on the point of saying, for the sake of saving her trouble, that he would have the porridge, he chose the gruel. he watched from his nest the whole process of its making. it took a time of its own, for one of the secrets of good gruel is a long acquaintance with the fire.--many a time the picture of that room returned to him in far different circumstances, like a dream of quiet and self-sustained delight--though his one companion was an aged woman. when he had taken it, he fell asleep once more, and when he woke again, it was in the middle of the night. the lamp was nearly burned out: it had a long, red, disreputable nose, that spoke of midnight hours and exhausted oil. the old lady was dozing in her chair. the clock had just struck something, for the sound of its bell was yet faintly pulsing in the air. he sat up, and looked out into the room. something seemed upon him--he could not tell what. he felt as if something had been going on besides the striking of the clock, and were not yet over--as if something was even now being done in the room. but there the old woman slept, motionless, and apparently in perfect calm! it could not, however, have been perfect as it seemed, for presently she began to talk. at first came only broken sentences, occasionally with a long pause; and just as he had concluded she would say nothing more, she would begin again. there was something awful to the fancy of the youth in the issuing of words from the lips of one apparently unconscious of surrounding things; her voice was like the voice of one speaking from another world. cosmo was a brave boy where duty was concerned, but conscience and imagination were each able to make him tremble. to tremble, and to turn the back, are, however, very different things: of the latter, the thing deserving to be called cowardice, cosmo knew nothing; his hair began to rise upon his head, but that head he never hid beneath the bed-clothes. he sat and stared into the gloom, where the old woman lay in her huge chair, muttering at irregular intervals. presently she began to talk a little more continuously. and now also cosmo's heart had got a little quieter, and no longer making such a noise in his ears, allowed him to hear better. after a few words seemingly unconnected, though probably with a perfect dependence of their own, she began to murmur something that sounded like verses. cosmo soon perceived that she was saying the same thing over and over, and at length he had not only made out every word of the few lines, but was able to remember them. this was what he afterwards recalled--by that time uncertain whether the whole thing had not been a dream: catch yer naig an' pu' his tail: in his hin' heel ca' a nail; rug his lugs frae ane anither--stan' up, an' ca' the king yer brither. when first he repeated them entire to himself, the old woman still muttering them, he could not help laughing, and the noise, though repressed, yet roused her. she woke, not, like most young people, with slow gradation of consciousness, but all at once was wide awake. she sat up in her chair. "was i snorin', laddie,'at ye leuch?" she asked, in a tone of slight offence. "eh, na!" replied cosmo. "it was only 'at ye was sayin' something rale funny--i' yer sleep, ye ken--a queer jingle o' poetry it was." therewith he repeated the rime, and grannie burst into a merry laugh--which however sobered rather suddenly. "i dinna won'er i was sayin' ower thae fule words," she said, "for 'deed i was dreamin' o' the only ane i ever h'ard say them, an' that was whan i was a lass--maybe aboot thirty. onybody nicht hae h'ard him sayin' them--ower and ower til himsel', as gien he cudna weary o' them, but naebody but mysel' seemed to hae ta'en ony notice o' the same. i used whiles to won'er whether he fully un'erstude what he was sayin'--but troth! hoo cud there be ony sense in sic havers?" "was there ony mair o' the ballant?" asked cosmo. "gien there was mair; i h'ard na't," replied grannie. "an' weel i wat! he was na ane to sing, the auld captain.--did ye never hear tell o' 'im, laddie?" "gien ye mean the auld brither o' the laird o' that time, him 'at cam hame frae his sea-farin' to the east indies--" "ay, ay; that's him! ye hae h'ard tell o' 'im! he hed a ship o' 's ain, an' made mony a voyage afore ony o' 's was born, an' was an auld man whan at len'th hame cam he, as the sang says--ower auld to haud by the sea ony more. i'll never forget the luik o' the man whan first i saw him, nor the hurry an' the scurry, the rinnin' here, an' the routin' there,'at there was whan the face o' 'm came in at the gett! ye see they a' thoucht he was hame wi' a walth ayont figures--stowed awa' somewhaur--naebody kent whaur. eh, but he was no a bonny man, an' fowk said he dee'd na a fairstrae deith: hoo that may be, i dinna weel ken: there war unco things aboot the affair--things 'at winna weel bide speykin' o'. ae thing's certain, an' that is,'at the place has never thriven sin syne. but, for that maitter, it hedna thriven for mony a lang afore. an' there was a fowth o' awfu' stories reengin' the country, like ghaists 'at naebody cud get a grip o'--as to hoo he had gotten the said siller, an' sic like--the siller 'at naebody ever saw; for upo' that siller, as i tell ye, naebody ever cuist an e'e. some said he had been a pirate upo' the hie seas, an' had ta'en the siller in lumps o' gowd frae puir ships 'at hadna men eneuch to haud the grip o' 't; some said he had been a privateer; an' ither some said there was sma' differ atween the twa. an' some wad hae't he was ane o' them 'at tuik an' sauld the puir black fowk,'at cudna help bein' black, for as ootlandish as it maun luik--i never saw nane o' the nation mysel'--ony mair nor a corbie can help his feathers no bein' like a doo's; an' gien they turnt black for ony deevilry o' them 'at was their forbeirs, i kenna an' it maks naething to me or mine, --i wad fain an' far raither du them a guid turn nor tak an' sell them; for gien their parents had sinned, the mair war they to be pitied. but as i was sayin', naebody kent hoo he had gethert his siller, the mair by token 'at maybe there was nane, for naebody, as i was tellin' ye, ever had the sma'est glimp o' siller aboot 'im. for a close-loofed near kin o' man he was, gien ever ony! aye ready was he to borrow a shillin' frae ony fule 'at wad len' him ane, an' lang had him 'at len't it forgotten to luik for 't, er' he thoucht o' peyin' the same. it was mair nor ae year or twa 'at he leeved aboot the place, an' naebody cared muckle for his company, though a' body was ower feart to lat him ken he was na welcome here or there; for wha cud tell he micht oot wi' the swoord he aye carriet, an' mak an' en' o' 'im! for 'deed he fearna god nor man, ony mair nor the jeedge i' the scriptur'. he drank a heap--as for a' body at he ca'd upo' aye hed oot the whisky-bottle well willun' to please the man they war feart at." the voice of the old woman went sounding in the ears of the boy, on and on in the gloom, and through it, possibly from the still confused condition of his head, he kept constantly hearing the rimes she had repeated to him. they seemed to have laid hold of him as of her, perhaps from their very foolishness, in an odd inexplicable way:-- catch yer naig an' pu' his tail; in his hin' heel ca' a nail; rug his lugs frae ane anither--stan' up, an' ca' the king yer brither. on and on went the rime, and on and on went the old woman's voice. "weel, there cam' a time whan an english lord begud to be seen aboot the place, an' that was nae comon sicht i' oor puir country. he was a frien' fowk said, o' the yoong markis o' lossie, an' that was hoo 'he cam to sicht. he gaed fleein' aboot, luikin' at this, an' luikin' at that; an' whaur or hoo he fell in wi' him, i dinna ken, but or lang the twa o' them was a heap thegither. they playt cairts thegither, they drank thegither, they drave oot thegither--for the auld captain never crossed beast's back--an' what made sic frien's o' them nobody could imaigine. for the tane was a rouch sailor chield, an' the tither was a yoong lad, little mair, an' a fine gentleman as weel's a bonny man. but the upshot o' 't a' was an ill ane; for, efter maybe aboot a month or sae o' sic friendship as was atween them, there cam a nicht 'at brouchtna the captain hame; for ye maun un'erstan', wi' a' his rouch w'ys, an' his drinkin', an' his cairt-playin', he was aye hame at nicht, an' safe intil's bed, whaur he sleepit i' the best chaumer i' the castle. ay, he wad come hame, aften as drunk as man cud be, but hame he cam. sleep intil the efternune o' the neist day he wad, but never oot o' 's nain bed--or if no aye in his ain nakit bed, for i fan' him ance mysel' lyin' snorin' upo' the flure, it was aye intil 's ain room, as i say, an' no in ony strange place drunk or sober. sae there was some surprise at his no appearin', an' fowk spak o' 't, but no that muckle, for naebody cared i' their hert what cam o' the man. still whan the men gaed oot to their wark, they bude to gie a luik gien there was ony sign o' 'm. it was easy to think 'at he micht hae been at last ower sair owertaen to be able to win hame. but that wasna it, though whan they cam upo' 'm lyin' on's back i' the howe yon'er 'at luiks up to my daughter's bit gerse for her coo', they thoucht he bude to hae sleepit there a' nicht. sae he had, but it was the sleep 'at kens no waukin--at least no the kin' o' waukin' 'at comes wi' the mornin'!" cosmo recognized with a shudder his favourite spot, where on his birthday, as on many a day before, he had fallen asleep. but the old woman went on with her story. "deid was the auld captain--as deid as ever was man 'at had nane left to greit for him. but thof there was nae greitin', no but sic a hullabaloo as rase upo' the discovery! they rade an' they ran; the doctor cam', an' the minister, an' the lawyer, an' the grave-digger. but whan a man's deid, what can a' the warl' du for 'im but berry 'im? puir hin'er en' thof it be to him' at draws himsel' up, an' blaws himsel' oot! there was mony a conjectur as to hoo he cam by his deith, an' mony a doobt it wasna by fair play. some said he dee'd by his ain han', driven on til't by the enemy; an' it was true the blade he cairriet was lyin' upo' the grass aside 'im; but ither some 'at exem't him, said the hole i' the side o' 'im was na made wi' that. but o' a' 'at cam to speir efter 'im, the english lord was nane. he hed vainished the country. the general opinyon sattled doon to this,'at they twa bude till hae fa'en oot at cairts, an' fouchten it oot, an' the auld captain, for a' his skeel an' exparience, had had the warst o' 't, an' so there they faun' 'im.--but i reckon, cosmo, yer father 'ill hae tellt ye a' aboot the thing, mony's the time, or noo, an' i'm jist deivin' ye wi' my clavers, an haudin 'ye ohn sleepit!" "na, grannie," answered cosmo, "he never tellt me what ye hae tellt me noo. he did tell me 'at there was sic a man, an' the ill en' he cam til; an' i think he was jist gaein' on to tell me mair, whan grizzie cam to say the denner was ready. that was only yesterday--or the day afore, i'm thinkin', by this time.--but what think ye could hae been in's heid wi' yon jingle aboot the horsie?" "ow! what wad be intil't but jist fulish nonsense? ye ken some fowk has a queer trick o' sayin' the same thing ower an' ower again to themsel's, wi'oot ony sense intil't. there was the auld laird himsel'; he was ane o' sic. aye an' ower again he wad be sayin' til himsel','a hun'er poun'! ay, a hun'er poun'!' it maittered na what he wad be speikin' aboot, or wha til, in it wad come!--i' the middle o' onything, ye cudna tell whan or whaur,--'a hun'er poun'!' says he;'ay, a hun'er poun'!' fowk leuch at the first, but sune gat used til't, an' cam hardly to ken 'at he said it, for what has nae sense has little hearin'. an' i doobtna thae rimes wasna even a verse o' an auld ballant, but jist a cletter o' clinkin' styte (_nonsense_),'at he had learnt frae some blackamore bairn, maybe, an' cudna get oot o' 's heid ony ither gait, but bude to say't to hae dune wi' 't--jist like a cat whan it gangs scrattin' at the door, ye hae to get up, whether ye wull or no, an' lat the cratur oot." cosmo did not feel quite satisfied with the explanation, but he made no objection to it. "i maun alloo, hooever," the old woman went on, "'at ance ye get a haud o' them, they tak a grip o' you, an' hae a queer w'y o' hauntin' ye like, as they did the man himsel', sae 'at ye canna yet rid o' them. it comes only at noos an' thans, but whan the fit's upo' me, i canna get them oot o' my heid. the verse gangs on tum'lin' ower an' ower intil 't, till i'm jist scunnert wi' 't. awa' it wanna gang, maybe for a haill day, an' syne it mayna come again for months." true enough, the rime was already running about in cosmo's head like a mouse, and he fell asleep with it ringing in the ears of his mind. before he woke again, which was in the broad daylight, he had a curious dream. he dreamed that he was out in the moonlight. it was a summer night--late. but there was something very strange about the night: right up in the top of it was the moon, looking down as if she knew all about it, and something was going to happen. he did not like the look of her--he had never seen her look like that before! and he went home just to get away from her. as he was going up the stairs to his chamber, something moved him--he could not tell what--to stop at the door of the drawing-room, and go in. it was flooded with moonlight, but he did not mind that, so long as he could keep out of her sight. still it had a strange, eerie look, with its various pieces of furniture casting different shadows from those that by rights belonged to them. he gazed at this thing and that, as if he had never seen it before. the place seemed to cast a spell over him, so that he could not leave it. he seated himself on the ancient brocaded couch, and sat staring, with a sense, which by degrees grew dreadful, that he was where he would not be, and that if he did not get up and go, something would happen. but he could not rise--not that he felt any physical impediment, but that he could not make a resolve strong enough--like one in irksome company, who wants to leave, but waits in vain a fit opportunity. delay grew to agony, but still he sat. he became aware that he was not alone. his whole skin seemed to contract with a shuddering sense of presence. gradually, as he gazed straight in front of him, slowly, in the chair on the opposite side of the fire-place, grew visible the form of a man, until he saw it quite plainly--that of a seafaring man, in a blue coat, with a red sash round his waist, in which were pistols, and a dagger. he too sat motionless, fixing on him the stare of fierce eyes, black, yet glowing, as if set on fire of hell. they filled him with fear, but something seemed to sustain him under it. he almost fancied, when first on waking he thought over it, that a third must have been in the room--for his protection. the face that stared at him was a brown and red and weather--beaten face, cut across with a great scar, and wearing an expression of horror trying not to look horrible. his fear threatened to turn him into clay, but he met it with scorn, strove against it, would not and did not yield. still the figure stared, as if it would fascinate him into limpest submission. slowly at length it rose, and with a look that seemed meant to rivet the foregone stare--a look of mingled pain and fierceness, turned, and led the way from the room, whereupon the spell was so far broken or changed, that he was able to rise and follow him: even in his dreams he was a boy of courage, and feared nothing so much as yielding to fear. the figure went on, nor ever turned its head, up the stair to the room over that they had left--the best bedroom, the guest-chamber of the house--not often visited, and there it entered. still following, cosmo entered also. the figure walked across the room, as if making for the bed, but in the middle of the floor suddenly turned, and went round by the foot of the bed to the other side of it, where the curtains hid it. cosmo followed, but when he reached the other side, the shade was nowhere to be seen, and he woke, his heart beating terribly. by this time grannie was snoring in her chair, or very likely, in his desire to emerge from its atmosphere, he would have told her his dream. for a while he lay looking at the dying fire, and the streak from the setting moon, that stole in at the window, and lay weary at the foot of the wall. slowly he fell fast asleep, and slept far into the morning: long after lessons were begun in the school, and village-affairs were in the full swing of their daily routine, he slept; nor had he finished his breakfast, when his father entered. "i'm quite well, papa," answered the boy to his gentle yet eager inquiry;--"perfectly able to go to school in the afternoon." "i don't mean you to go again, cosmo," replied his father gravely. "it could not be pleasant either for yourself or for the master. the proper relation between you is destroyed." [illustration: cosmo's dream.] "if you think i was wrong, papa, i will make an apology." "if you had done it for yourself, i should unhesitatingly say you must. but as it was, i am not prepared to say so." "what am i to do then? how am i to get ready for college?" the laird gave a sigh, and made no answer. alas! there were more difficulties than that in the path to college. he turned away, and went to call on the minister, while cosmo got up and dressed: except a little singing in his head when he stooped, he was aware of no consequences of the double blow. grannie was again at her wheel, and cosmo sat down in her chair to await his father's return. "whaur said ye the captain sleepit whan he was at the castle?" he inquired across the buzz and whiz and hum of the wheel. through the low window, betwixt the leaves of the many plants that shaded it, he could see the sun shining hot upon the bare street; but inside was soft gloom filled with murmurous sound. "whaur but i' the best bedroom?" answered grannie. "naething less wad hae pleased him, i can assure ye. for ance 'at there cam the markis to the hoose--whan things warna freely sae scant aboot the place as they hae been sin' yer father cam to the throne--there cam at his back a fearsome storm, sic as comes but seldom in a life lang as mine, an' sic 'at his lordship cudna win awa'. thereupon yer father, that is, yer gran'father,--or it wad be yer grit-gran'father--i'm turnin' some confused amo' ye: ye aye keep comin'!--onyhoo, he gae the captain a kent like,'at he wad du weel to offer his room til's lordship. but wad he, think ye? na, no him! he grew reid, an' syne as white's the aisse, an' luikit to be i' the awfu'est inside rage 'at mortal wessel cud weel hand. sae yer gran'father, no 'at he was feart at 'im, for is' be bun' he never was feart afore the face o' man, but jest no wullin' to anger his ain kin, an' maybe no willin' onybody sud say he was a respecter o' persons, heeld his tongue an' said nae mair, an' the markis hed the second best bed, for he sleepit in glenwarlock's ain." cosmo then told her the dream he had had in the night, describing the person he had seen in it as closely as he could. now all the time grannie had been speaking, it was to the accompaniment of her wheel, but cosmo had not got far with his narrative when she ceased spinning, and sat absorbed--listening as to a real occurrence, not the feverish dream of a boy. when he ended, "it maun hae been the auld captain himself!" she said under her breath, and with a sigh; then shut up her mouth, and remained silent, leaving cosmo in doubt whether it was that she would take no interest in such a foolish thing, or found in it something to set her thinking; but he could not help noting that there seemed a strangeness about her silence; nor did she break it until his father returned. chapter viii. home. cosmo was not particularly fond of school, and he was particularly fond of holidays; hence his father's resolve that he should go to school no more, seemed to him the promise of an endless joy. the very sun seemed swelling in his heart as he walked home with his father. a whole day of home and its pleasures was before him--only the more welcome that he had had a holiday so lately, and that so many more lay behind it. every shadow about the old place was a delight to him. never human being loved more the things into which he had been born than did cosmo. the whole surrounding had to him a sacred look, such as jerusalem, the temple, and its vessels, bore to the jews, even those of them who were capable of loving little else. there was hardly anything that could be called beauty about the building--strength and gloom were its main characteristics--but its very stones were dear to the boy. there never were such bees, there never were such thick walls, there never were such storms, never such a rushing river, as those about his beloved home! and this although, all the time, as i have said, he longed for more beauty of mountain and wood than the country around could afford him. then there were the books belonging to the house!--was there any such a collection in the world besides! they were in truth very few--all contained in a closet opening out of his father's bedroom; but cosmo had a feeling of inexhaustible wealth in them--partly because his father had not yet allowed him to read everything there, but restricted him to certain of the shelves--as much to cultivate self-restraint in him as to keep one or two of the books from him,--partly because he read books so that they remained books to him, and he believed in them after he had read them, nor imagined himself capable of exhausting them. but the range of his taste was certainly not a limited one. while he revelled in the arabian nights, he read also, and with no small enjoyment, the night thoughts--books, it will be confessed, considerably apart both in scope and in style. but while thus, for purest pleasure, fond of reading, to enjoy life it was to him enough to lie in the grass; in certain moods, the smell of the commonest flower would drive him half crazy with delight. on a holiday his head would be haunted with old ballads like a sunflower with bees: on other days they would only come and go. he rejoiced even in nursery rimes, only in his head somehow or other they got glorified. the swing and hum and bizz of a line, one that might have to him no discoverable meaning, would play its tune in him as well as any mountain-stream its infinite water-jumble melody. one of those that this day kept--not coming and going, but coming and coming, just as grannie said his foolish rime haunted the old captain, was that which two days before came into his head when first he caught sight of the moon playing bo-peep with him betwixt the cows legs: whan the coo loups ower the mune, the reid gowd rains intil men's shune. i think there must at one time have been a poet in the glenwarlock nursery, for there were rimes, and modifications of rimes, floating about the family, for which nobody could account. cosmo's mother too had been, in a fragmentary way, fond of verse; and although he could not remember many of her favourite rimes, his father did, and delighted in saying them over and over to her child--and that long before he was capable of understanding them. here is one: make not of thy heart a casket, opening seldom, quick to close; but of bread a wide-mouthed basket, and a cup that overflows. here is another: the gadfly makes the horse run swift: "speed," quoth the gadfly, "is my gift." one more, and it shall be the last for the present: they serve as dim lights on the all but vanished mother, of whom the boy himself knew so little. in god alone, the perfect end, wilt thou find thyself or friend. cosmo's dream of life was, to live all his days in the house of his forefathers--or at least and worst, to return to it at last, how long soever he might have been compelled to be away from it. in his castle-building, next to that of the fairy-mother-lady, his fondest fancy was--not the making of a fortune, but the returning home with one, to make the house of his fathers beautiful, and the heart of his father glad. about the land he did not think so much yet: the country was open to him as if it had been all his own. still, he had quite a different feeling for that portion which yet lay within the sorely contracted marches; to have seen any smallest nook of that sold, would have been like to break his heart. in him the love of place was in danger of becoming a disease. there was in it something, i fear, of the nature, if not of the avarice that grasps, yet of the avarice that clings. he was generous as few in the matter of money, but then he had had so little--not half enough to learn to love it! nor had he the slightest idea of any mode in which to make it. most of the methods he had come in contact with, except that of manual labour, in which work was done and money paid immediately for it, repelled him, as having elements of the unhandsome where not the dishonest: he was not yet able to distinguish between substance and mode in such matters. the only way in which he ever dreamed of coming into possession of money--it was another of his favourite castles--was finding in the old house a room he had never seen or heard of before, and therein a hoard of riches incredible. such things had been--why might it not be? as they walked, his father told him he had been thinking all night what it would be best to do with him, now that the school was closed against him; and that he had come to the conclusion to ask his friend peter simon--the wits of the neighbourhood called him simon peter--to take charge of his education. "he is a man of peculiar opinions," he said, "as i daresay you may have heard; but everything in him is, practice and theory, on a scale so grand, that to fear harm from him would be to sin against the truth. a man must learn to judge for himself, and he will teach you that. i have seen in him so much that i recognize as good and great, that i am compelled to believe in him where the things he believes appear to me out of the way, or even extravagant." "i have heard that he believes in ghosts, papa!" said cosmo. his father smiled, and made him no answer. he had been born into an age whose incredulity, taking active form, was now fast approaching its extreme, and becoming superstition; and the denial of many things that had long been believed in the country had penetrated at last even to the remote region where his property lay: like that property, his mind, because of the age, lay also in a sort of border-land, an active believer in the care and providence of god, with no conscious difficulty in accepting any miracle recorded in the bible, he was, where the oracles were dumb, in a measure inclined to a scepticism, which yet was limited to the region of his intellect;--his imagination turned from its conclusions, and cherished not a little so-called weakness for the so-called supernatural--so far as any glimmer of sense or meaning or reason would show itself therein. and in the history of the world, the imagination has, i fancy, been quite as often right as the intellect, and the things in which it has been right, have been of much the greater importance. only, unhappily, wherever pegasus has shown the way through a bog the pack-horse which follows gets the praise of crossing it; while the blunders with which the pack-horse is burdened, are, the moment each is discovered, by the plodding leaders of the pair transferred to the space betwixt the wings of pegasus, without regard to the beauty of his feathers. the laird was therefore unable to speak with authority respecting such things, and was not particularly anxious to influence the mind of his son concerning them. happily, in those days the platitudes and weary vulgarities of what they call spiritualism, had not been heard of in those quarters, and the soft light of imagination yet lingered about the borders of that wide region of mingled false and true, commonly called superstition. it seems to me the most killing poison to the imagination must be a strong course of "spiritualism." for myself, i am not so set upon entering the unknown, as, instead of encouraging what holy visitations faith, not in the spiritual or the immortal, but in the living god, may bring, to creep through the sewers of it to get in. i care not to encounter its mud-larkes, and lovers of garbage, its thieves, impostors, liars, and canaille, in general. that they are on the other side, that they are what men call dead, does not seem to me sufficient reason for taking them into my confidence, courting their company, asking their advice. a well-attested old-fashion ghost story, where such is to be had, is worth a thousand seances. "do you believe in ghosts, papa?" resumed cosmo, noting his father's silence, and remembering that he had never heard him utter an opinion on the subject. "the master says none but fools believe in them now; and he makes such a face at anything he calls superstition, that you would think it must be somewhere in the commandments." "mr. simon remarked the other day in my hearing," answered his father, "that the dread of superstition might amount to superstition, and become the most dangerous superstition of all." "do you think so, papa?" "i could well believe it. besides, i have always found mr. simon so reasonable, even where i could not follow him, that i am prejudiced in favor of anything he thinks." the boy rejoiced to hear his father talk thus, for he, had a strong leaning to the marvellous, and hitherto, from the schoolmaster's assertion and his father's silence, had supposed nothing was to be accepted for belief but what was scientifically probable, or was told in the bible. that we live in a universe of marvels of which we know only the outsides,--and which we turn into the incredible by taking the mere outsides for all, even while we know the roots of the seen remain unseen--these spiritual facts now began to dawn upon him, and fell in most naturally with those his mind had already conceived and entertained. he was therefore delighted at the thought of making the closer acquaintance of a man like mr. simon--a man of whose peculiarities even, his father could speak in such terms. all day long he brooded on the prospect, and in the twilight went out wandering over the hills. there was no night there at this season, any more than all the year through in heaven. indeed we have seldom real positive night in this world--so many provisions have been made against it. every time we say, "what a lovely night!" we speak of a breach, a rift in the old night. there is light more or less, positive light, else were there no beauty. many a night is but a low starry day, a day with a softened background against which the far-off suns of millions of other days show themselves: when the near vision vanishes the farther hope awakes. it is nowhere said of heaven, there shall be no twilight there, chapter ix. the student. the twilight had not yet reached the depth of its mysteriousness, when cosmo, returning home from casting a large loop of wandering over several hills, walked up to james gracie's cottage, thinking whether they would not all be in bed. but as he passed the window, he saw a little light, and went on to the door and knocked: had it been the daytime, he would have gone straight in. agnes came, and opened cautiously, for there were occasionally such beings as tramps about. "eh! it's you?" she cried with a glad voice, when she saw the shape of cosmo in the dimness. "there's naething wrang i houp," she added, changing her tone. "na, naething," answered cosmo. "i only wantit to lat ye ken 'at i wasna gaein' back to the schuil ony mair." "weel, i dinna won'er at that!" returned agnes with a little sigh. "efter the w'y the maister behaved til ye, the laird cud ill lat ye gang there again. but what's he gaein' to du wi' ye, maister cosmo, gien a body micht speir 'at has nae richt to be keerious?" "he's sen'in' me to maister simon," answered cosmo. "i wuss i was gaein' tu," sighed aggie. "i'm jist feart 'at i come to hate the maister efter ye're no to be seen there, cosmo. an' we maunna hate, for that, ye ken,'s the hin 'er en' o' a' thing. but it wad be a heap easier no to hate him, gien i had naething tu du wi' him." "that maun be confest," answered cosmo.--"but," he added, "the hairst-play 'ill be here sune, an' syne the hairst itsel'; an' whan ye gang back ye'll hae won ower't." "na, i doobt no," cosmo; for, ye sae, as i hae h'ard my father say, the gracies are a' terrible for min'in'. na, there's no forgettin' o' naething. what for sud onything be forgotten? it's a cooardly kin' o' a' w'y, to forget." "some things, i doobt, hae to be forgotten," returned cosmo, thoughtfully. "gien ye forgie a body for enstance, ye maun forget tu--no sae muckle, i'm thinkin', for the sake o' them 'at did ye the wrang, for wha wad tak up again a fool (foul) thing ance it was drappit?--but for yer ain sake; for what ye hae dune richt, my father says, maun be forgotten oot 'o sight for fear o' corruption, for naething comes to stink waur nor a guid deed hung up i' the munelicht o' the memory. "eh!" exclaimed aggie, "but ye're unco wice for a lad o' yer 'ears." "i wad be an nuco gowk," remarked cosmo, "gien i kent naething, wi' sic a father as yon o' mine. what wad ye think o' yersel' gien the dochter o' jeames gracie war nae mair wice-like nor meg scroggie?" agnes laughed, but made no reply, for the voice of her mother came out of the dark: "wha's that, aggie, ye're haudin' sic a confab wi' in the middle o' the night? ye tellt me ye had to sit up to yer lessons!" "i was busy at them, mither, whan maister cosmo chappit at the door." "weel, what for lat ye him stan' there? ye may hae yer crack wi' him as lang's ye like--in rizzon, that is. gar him come in." "na, na, mistress gracie," answered cosmo; "i maun awa' hame; i hae had a gey long walk. it's no 'at i'm tired, but i'm gey and sleepy. only i was sae pleased 'at i was gaein' to learn my lessons wi' maister simon,'at i bude to tell aggie. she micht ha' been won'erin', an' thinkin' i wasna better, gien she hadna seen me at the schuil the morn." "is' warran' her ohn gane to the schuil ohn speirt in at the castle the first thing i' the mornin', an' seein' gien the laird had ony eeran' to the toon. little cares she for the maister, gien onybody at the hoose be in want o' her!" "is there naething i cud help ye wi', aggie, afore i gang?" asked cosmo. "somebody tellt me ye was tryin' yer han' at algebra." "naebody had ony business to tell ye ony sic a thing," returned aggie, rather angrily. "it's no at the schuil i wad think o' sic a ploy. they wad a' lauch fine! but i wad fain ken what's intil the thing. i cannot un'erstan' hoo fowk can coont wi' letters an' crosses an' strokes in place o' figgers. i hae been at it a haillook noo--by mysel', ye ken--an' i'm nane nearer til 't yet. i can add an' subtrac', accordin' to the rules gien, but that's no un'erstan'in', an' un'erstan' i canna." "i'm thinkin' it's something as gien x was a horse, an' y was a coo, an' z was a cairt, or onything ither ye micht hae to ca' 't; an' ye bargain awa' aboot the x an' the y and the z, an' ley the horse i' the stable, the coo i' the byre, an' the cairt i' the shed, till ye hae sattlet a'." "but ye ken aboot algebra"--she pronounced the word with the accent on the second syllable--"divna ye, maister cosmo?" "na, no the haif, nor the hun'ert pairt. i only ken eneuch to haud me gaein' on to mair. a body maun hae learnt a heap o' onything afore the licht breaks oot o' 't. ye maun win throuw the wa' first. i doobt gien onybody un'erstan's a thing oot an' oot, sae lang's he's no ready at a moment's notice to gar anither see intil the hert o' 't; an' i canna gar ye see what's intil 't the minute ye speir't at me!" "i'm thinkin', hooever, cosmo, a body maun be nearhan' seein' o' himsel' afore anither can lat him see onything." "ye may be richt there," yielded cosmo."--but jist lat me see whaur ye are," he went on. "i may be able to help ye, though i canna lat ye see a' at once. it wad be an ill job for them 'at needs help, gien naebody could help them but them 'at kent a' aboot a thing." [illustration: no title] without a word, aggie turned and led the way to the "but-end." an iron lamp, burning the coarsest of train oil, hung against the wall, and under that she had placed the one movable table in the kitchen, which was white as scouring could make it. upon it lay a slate and a book of algebra. "my cousin willie lent me the buik," said aggie. "what for didna ye come to me to len'ye ane? i could hae gien ye a better nor that," expostulated cosmo. aggie hesitated, but, open as the day, she did not hesitate long. she turned her face from him, and answered, "i wantit to gie ye a surprise, maister cosmo. divna ye min' tellin' me ance 'at ye saw no rizzon hoo a lassie sudna un'erstan' jist as weel's a laddie. i wantit to see whether ye was richt or wrang; an' as algebra luiket the maist oonlikly thing, i thoucht i wad taikle that, an' sae sattle the queston at ance. but, eh me! i'm sair feart ye was i' the wrang, cosmo!" "i maun du my best to pruv mysel' i' the richt," returned cosmo. "i never said onybody cud learn a' o' themsel's, wantin' help, ye ken. there's nae mony laddies cud du that, an' feower still wad try." they sat down together at the table, and in half an hour or so, aggie had begun to see the faint light of at least the false dawn, as they call it, through the thickets of algebra. it was nearly midnight when cosmo rose, and then aggie would not let him go alone, but insisted on accompanying him to the gate of the court. it was a curious relation between the two. while agnes looked up to cosmo, about two years her junior, as immeasurably her superior in all that pertained to the intellect and its range, she assumed over him a sort of general human superiority, something like that a mother will assert over the most gifted of sons. one has seen, with a kind of sacred amusement, the high priest of many literary and artistic circles, set down with rebuke by his mother, as if he had been still a boy! and i have heard the children of this world speak with like superiority of the child of light whom they loved--allowing him wondrous good, but regarding him as a kind of god's chicken: nothing is so mysterious to the children of this world as the ways of the children of light, though to themselves they seem simple enough. that agnes never treated cosmo with this degree of protective condescension, arose from the fact that she was very nearly as much a child of light as he; only, being a woman, she was keener of perception, and being older, felt the more of the mother that every woman feels, and made the most of it. it was to her therefore a merely natural thing to act his protector. indeed with respect to the warlock family in general, she counted herself possessed of the right to serve any one of them to the last drop of her blood. from infancy she had heard the laird spoken of--without definite distinction between the present and the last--as the noblest, best, and kindest of men, as the power which had been for generations over the family of the gracies, for their help and healing; and hence it was impressed upon her deepest consciousness, that one of the main reasons of her existence was her relation to the family of glenwarlock. notwithstanding the familiarity i have shown between them--agnes had but lately begun to put the master before cosmo's name, and as often forgot it--the girl, as they went towards the castle, although they were walking in deep dusk, and entirely alone, kept a little behind the boy--not behind his back, but on his left hand in the next rank. no spy most curious could have detected the least love-making between them, and their talk, in the still, dark air, sounded loud all the way as they went. strange talk it would have been counted by many, and indeed unintelligible, for it ranged over a vast surface, and was the talk of two wise children, wise not above their own years only, but immeasurably above those of the prudent. riches indubitably favour stupidity; poverty, where the heart is right, favours mental and moral development. they parted at the gate, and cosmo went to bed. but, although his father allowed him such plentiful liberty, and would fain have the boy feel the night holy as the day--so that no one ever asked where he had been, or at what hour he had come home--a question which, having no watch, he would have found it hard to answer--not an eye was closed in the house until his entering footsteps were heard. the grandmother lay angry at the unheard of liberty her son gave his son; it was neither decent nor in order; it was against all ancient rule of family life; she must speak about it! but she never did speak about it, for she was now in her turn afraid of the son who, without a particle of obstinacy in his composition, yet took what she called his own way. grizzie kept grumbling to herself that the laddie was sure to come to "mischief;" but the main forms of "mischief" that ruled in her imagination were tramps, precipices, and spates. the laird, for his part, spent most of the time his son's absence kept him awake, in praying for him--not that he might be the restorer of the family, but that he might be able to accept the will of god as the best thing for family as for individual. if his boy might but reach the spirit-land unsoiled and noble, his prayers were ended. in such experiences, the laird learned to understand how the catholics come to pray to their saints, and the chinese to their parents and ancestors; for he frequently found himself, more especially as drowsiness began to steal upon his praying soul, seeming to hold council with his wife concerning their boy, and asking her help towards such strength for him as human beings may minister to each other. but cosmo went up to bed without a suspicion that the air around him was full of such holy messengers heavenward for his sake. he imagined none anxious about him--either with the anxiety of grandmother or of servant-friend or of great-hearted father. as he passed the door of the spare room, immediately above which was his own, his dream, preceded by a cold shiver, came to his memory. but he scorned to quicken his pace, or to glance over his shoulder, as he ascended the second stair. without any need of a candle, in the still faint twilight which is the ghosts' day, he threw off his clothes, and was presently buried in the grave of his bed, under the sod of the blankets, lapt in the death of sleep. the moment he woke, he jumped out of bed: a new era in his life was at hand, the thought of which had been subjacently present in his dreams, and was operative the instant he became conscious of waking life. he hurried on his clothes without care, for this dressing was but temporary. going down the stairs like a cataract, for not a soul slept in that part but himself, and there was no fear of waking any one, then in like manner down the hill, he reached the place where, with a final dart, the torrent shot into the quiet stream of the valley, in whose channel of rock and gravel it had hollowed a deep basin. this was cosmo's bath--and a splendid one. his clothes were off again more quickly than he put them on, and head foremost he shot like the torrent into the boiling mass, where for a few moments he yielded himself the sport of the frothy water, and was tossed and tumbled about like a dead thing. soon however, down in the heart of the boil, he struck out, and shooting from under the fall, rose to the surface beyond it, panting and blowing. to get out on the bank was then the work of one moment, and to plunge in again that of the next. half a dozen times, with scarce a pause between, he thus plunged, was tossed and overwhelmed, struggled, escaped, and plunged again. then he ran for a few moments up and down the bank to dry himself--he counted the use of a towel effeminacy, and dressing again, ran home to finish his simple toilet. if after that he read a chapter of his bible, it was no more than was required by many a parent of many a boy who got little good of the task; but cosmo's father had never enjoined it, on him; and when next he knelt down at his bedside, he did not merely "say his prayers." then he took his slate, to try after something aggie had made him know he did not understand:--for the finding of our own intellectual defects, nothing is like trying to teach another. but before long, certain sensations began, to warn him there was an invention in the world called breakfast, and laying his slate aside, he went to the kitchen, where he found grizzie making the porridge. "min' ye pit saut eneuch in't the day, grizzie," he said. "it was unco wersh yesterday." "an' what was't like thestreen (yestere'en), cosmo?" asked the old woman, irritated at being found fault with in a matter wherein she counted herself as near perfection as ever mortal could come. "i had nane last nicht, ye min'," answered cosmo, "i was oot a' the evenin'." "an' whaur got ye yer supper?" "ow, i didna want nane. hoot! i'm forgettin'! aggie gied me a quarter o' breid as i cam by, or rather as i cam awa', efter giein' her a han' wi' her algebra." "what ca' ye that for a lass bairn to be takin' up her time wi'! i never h'ard o' sic a thing! what's the natur' o' 't, cosmo?" he tried to give her some far-off idea of the sort of thing algebra was, but apparently without success, for she cried at length, "na, sirs! i hae h'ard o' cairts, an' bogles, an' witchcraft, an' astronomy, but sic a thing as this ye bring me noo, i never did hear tell o'! what can the warl' be comin' till!--an' dis the father o' ye, laddie, ken what ye spen' yer midnicht hoors gangin' teachin' to the lass-bairns o' the country roon'?" she was interrupted by the entrance of the laird, and they sat down to breakfast. the grandmother within the last year had begun to take hers in her own room. grizzie was full of anxiety to know what the laird would say to the discovery she had just made, but she dared not hazard allusion to the conduct of his son, and must therefore be content to lead the conversation in the direction of it, hoping it might naturally appear. so, about the middle of cosmo's breakfast, that is about two minutes after he had attacked his porridge, she approached her design, if not exactly the object she desired, with the remark, "did ye never hear the auld saw, sir-- "whaur's neither sun nor mune, laich things come abune--?" "i 'maist think i have, grizzie," answered the laird. "but what gars ye come ower 't noo?" "i canna but think, sir," returned grizzie, "as i lie i' the mirk, o' the heap o' things 'at gang to nae kirk, oot an' aboot as sharp as a gled, whan the young laird is no in his bed--oot wi' 's algibbry an' astronomy, an' a' that kin' o' thing!'deed, sir, it wadna be canny gien they cam to ken o' 't." "wha come to ken o' what, grizzie?" asked the laird with a twinkle in his eye, and a glance at cosmo, who sat gazing curiously at the old woman. "them 'at the saw speyks o', sir," said grizzie, answering the first part of the double question, as she placed two boiled eggs before her master. the laird smiled: he was too kind to laugh. not a few laughed at old grizzie, but never the laird. "did ye never hear the auld saw, grizzie," he said: "throu the heather an' how gaed the creepin' thing, but abune was the waught o' an angel's wing--?" "ay, i hae h'ard it--naegait 'cep' here i' this hoose," answered grizzie: she would disparage the authority of the saying by a doubt as to its genuineness. "but, sir, ye sud never temp' providence. wha kens what may be oot i' the nicht?" "to him, grizzie, the nicht shineth as the day." "weel, sir," cried grizzie, "ye jist pit me 'at i dinna ken mysel'! is't poassible ye hae forgotten what's sae weel kent to a' the cuintry roon'?--the auld captain,'at canna lie still in's grave, because o'--because o' whatever the rizzon may be? onygait he's no laid yet; an' some thinks he's doomed to haunt the hoose till the day o' jeedgment." "i suspec' there winna be muckle o' the hoose left for him to haunt 'gen that time, grizzie," said the laird. "but what for sud ye put sic fule things intil the bairn's heid? an' gien the ghaist haunt the hoose, isna he better oot o' 't? wad ye hae him come hame to sic company?" this posed grizzie, and she held her peace for the time. "come, cosmo," said the laird rising; and they set out together for mr. simon's cottage. chapter x. peter simon. this man was not a native of the district, but had for some two years now been a dweller in it. report said he was the son of a small tradesman in a city at no great distance, but, to those who knew him, he made no secret of the fact, that he had been found by such a man, a child of a few months, lying on a pavement of that city, one stormy, desolate christmas-eve, when it was now dark, with the wind blowing bitterly from the north, and the said tradesman seemingly the one inhabitant of the coldest city in scotland who dared face it. he had just closed his shop, had carried home to one of his customers a forgotten order, and was returning to his wife and a childless hearth, when he all but stumbled over the infant. before stooping to lift him, he looked all about to see if there was nobody to do it instead. there was not a human being, or even what comes next to one, a dog in sight, and the wind was blowing like a blast from a frozen hell. there was no help for it: he must take up the child! he did, and carried it home, grumbling all the way. what right had the morsel to be lying there, a trap and a gin for his character, in the dark and the cold? what would his wife say? and what would the neighbours think? all the way home he grumbled. [illustration: he carried it home.] what happened there, how his wife received him with his burden, how she scolded and he grumbled, how it needed but the one day--the christmas day, in which nothing could well be done--to reconcile them to the gift, and how they brought him up, blessing the day when they found him, would be a story fit to make the truehearted of my readers both laugh and cry; but i have not room or time for it. of course, as they were in poor circumstances, hardly able indeed, not merely to make both ends meet, but to bring them far enough round the parcel of their necessities to let them see each other, their friends called their behaviour in refusing to hand over the brat to the parish authorities--which they felt as a reflection upon all who in similar circumstances would have done so--utter folly. but when the moon-struck pair was foolish enough to say they did not know that he might not have been sent them instead of the still-born child that had hitherto been all their offspring, this was entirely too much for the nerves of the neighbours in general--that peculiar people always better acquainted with one's affairs, down to his faults and up to his duties, than he is himself. it was rank superstition! it was a flying in the face of providence! how could they expect to prosper, when they acted with so little foresight, rendering the struggle for existence severer still! they did not reckon what strength the additional motive, what heart the new love, what uplifting the hope of help from on high, kindled by their righteous deed, might give them--for god likes far better to help people from the inside than from the outside. they did not think that this might be just the fresh sting of life that the fainting pair required. to mark their disapproval, some of them immediately withdrew what little custom they had given them: one who had given them none, promised them the whole of hers, the moment they sent the child away; while others, with equal inconsistency, doubled theirs, and did what they could to send them fresh customers: they were a pair of good-natured fools, but they ought not to be let starve! from that time they began to get on a little better. and still as the boy grew, and wanted more, they had the little more. for it so happened that the boy turned out to be one of god's creatures, and it looked as if the maker of him, who happened also to be the ruler of the world, was not altogether displeased with those who had taken him to their hearts, instead of leaving him to the parish. the child was the light of the house and of the shop, a beauty to the eyes, and a joy in the heart of both. but perhaps the best proof that they had done right, lay in the fact that they began to love each other better from the very next day after they took him in, for, to tell the truth, one cause of their not getting on well, had been that they did not pull well together. thus we can explain the improvement in their circumstances by reference to merest "natural causes," without having recourse to the distasteful idea that a power in the land of superstition, with a weakness called a special providence, was interested in the matter. but foolishness such as theirs is apt to increase with years; and so they sent the foundling to the grammar-school, and thence to college--not a very difficult affair in that city. at college he did not greatly distinguish himself, for his special gifts, though peculiar enough, were not of a kind to distinguish a man much, either in that city or in this world. but he grew and prospered nevertheless, and became a master in one of the schools. his father and mother, as he called them, would gladly have made a minister of him, but of that he would never hear. he lived with them till they died, always bringing home to them his salary, minus only the little that he spent on books. his life, his devotion and loving gratitude, so wrought upon them, that the kingdom of heaven opened its doors to them, and they were the happiest old couple in that city. of course this was all an accident, for the kingdom of heaven being but a dream, the dignity of natural cause can scarcely consent to work to the end of delusion; but the good natured pair were foolish enough to look upon their miserable foundling as a divine messenger, an angel entertained not for long unawares, and the cause of all the good luck that followed his entrance. they never spent a penny of his salary, but added to it, and saved it up, and when they went, very strangely left all they had to this same angel of a beggar, instead of to their own relations, who would have been very glad of it, for they had a good deal more of their own. the foundling did not care to live longer in any city, but sought a place as librarian, and was successful. in the family of an english lord he lived many years, and when time's changes rendered it necessary he should depart, he retired to the cottage on the warlock. there he was now living the quietest of quiet lives, cultivating the acquaintance of but a few--chiefly that of the laird, james gracie, and the minister of the parish. among the people of the neighbourhood he was regarded as "no a'thegither there." this judgment possibly arose in part from the fact that he not unfrequently wandered about the fields from morning to night, and sometimes from night to morning. then he never drank anything worthy of the name of drink--seldom anything but water or milk! that he never ate animal food was not so notable where many never did so from one year's end to another's. as he was no propagandist, few had any notion of his opinions, beyond a general impression that they were unsound. cosmo had heard some of the peculiarities attributed to him, and was filled with curious expectation as to the manner of man he was about to meet, for, oddly enough, he had never yet seen him except at a distance; but anxiety, not untinged with awe, was mingled with his curiosity. mr. simon's cottage was some distance up the valley, at an angle where it turned westward. it stood on the left bank of the warlock, at the foot of a small cliff that sheltered it from the north, while in front the stream came galloping down to it from the sunset. the immediate bank between the cottage and the water was rocky and dry, but the ground on which the cottage stood was soil washed from the hills. there mr. simon had a little garden for flowers and vegetables, with a summer seat in which he smoked his pipe of an evening--for, however inconsistent the habit may seem with the rest of the man, smoke he did: slowly and gently and broodingly did the man smoke, thinking a great deal more than he smoked, and making his one pipe last a long time. his garden was full of flowers, but of the most ordinary kinds; rarity was no recommendation to him. some may think that herein he was unlike himself, seeing his opinions were of the rarest; but in truth never once did peter simon, all his life, adopt an opinion because of its strangeness. he never adopted an opinion at all; he believed--he loved what seemed to him true: how it looked to others he concerned himself little. the cottage was of stone and lime, nowise the less thoroughly built that the stones were unhewn. it was harled, that is rough-cast, and shone very white both in sun and moon. it contained but two rooms and a closet between, with one under the thatch for the old woman who kept house for him. altogether it was a very ordinary, and not very promising abode. but when they were shown ben to the parlour, cosmo was struck with nothing less than astonishment: the walls from floor to ceiling were covered with books. not a square foot all over was vacant. even the chimney-piece was absorbed, assimilated, turned into a book-shelf, and so obliterated. mr. simon's pipe lay on the hob; and there was not another spot where it could have lain. there was not a shelf, a cupboard to be seen. books, books everywhere, and nothing but books! even the door that led to the closet where he slept, was covered over, and, like the mantleshelf, obliterated with books. they were but about twelve hundred in all; to the eyes of cosmo it seemed a mighty library--a treasure-house for a royal sage. there was no one in the room when they entered, and cosmo was yet staring in mute astonishment, when suddenly mr. simon was addressing his father. but the door had not opened, and how he came in seemed inexplicable. to the eyes of the boy the small man before him assumed gigantic proportions. but he was in truth below the middle height, somewhat round-shouldered, with long arms, and small, well-shaped hands. his hair was plentiful, grizzled, and cut short. his head was large and his forehead wide, with overhanging brows; his eyes were small, dark, and brilliant; his nose had a certain look of decision--but a nose is a creature beyond description; his mouth was large, and his chin strong; his complexion dark, and his skin rugged. the only fine features about him were his two ears, which were delicate enough for a lady. his face was not at first sight particularly attractive; indeed it was rather gloomy--till he smiled, not a moment after; for that smile was the true interpreter of the mouth, and, through the mouth, of the face, which was never the same as before to one that had seen it. after a word or two about the book he had borrowed, the laird took his departure, saying the sooner he left master and pupil to themselves the better. mr. simon acquiesced with a smile, and presently cosmo was facing his near future, not without some anxiety. chapter xi. the new schooling. without a word, mr. simon opened a drawer, and taking from it about a score of leaves of paper, handed one of them to cosmo. upon it, in print, was a stanza--one, and no more. "read that," he said, with a glance that showed through his eyes the light burning inside him, "and tell me if you understand it. i don't want you to ponder over it, but to say at a reading whether you know what it means." cosmo obeyed and read. "i dinna mak heid nor tail o' 't, sir," he answered, looking over the top of the paper like a prisoned sheep. mr. simon took it from him, and handed him another. "try that," he said. cosmo read, put his hand to his head, and looked troubled. "don't distress yourself," said mr. simon. "the thing is of no consequence for judgment; it is only for discovery." the remark conveyed but little consolation to the pupil, who would gladly have stood well in his own eyes before his new master. one after another mr. simon handed him the papers he held. about the fifth or sixth, cosmo exclaimed, "i do understand that, sir." "very well," returned mr. simon, without showing any special satisfaction, and immediately handed him another. this was again a non-luminous body, and indeed cast a shadow over the face of the embryo student. one by one mr. simon handed him all he held. out of the score there were three cosmo said he understood, and four he thought he should understand if he were allowed to read them over two or three times. but mr. simon laid them all together again, and back into the drawer. "now i shall know what i am about," he said. "tell me what you have been doing at school." were my book a treatise on education, it might be worth while to give some account of peter simon's ways of furthering human growth. but intellectual development is not my main business or interest, and i mean to say little more concerning cosmo's than that, after about six weeks' work, the boy one day begged mr. simon to let him look at those papers again, and found to his delight that he understood all but three or four of them. that first day, mr. simon gave him an ode of horace, and a poem by wordsworth to copy--telling him to put in every point as it was in the book exactly, but to note any improvement he thought might be made in the pointing. he told him also to look whether he could see any resemblance between the two poems. as he sat surrounded by the many books, cosmo felt as if he were in the heart of a cloud of witnesses. that first day was sufficient to make the heart of the boy cleave to his new master. for one thing mr. simon always, in anything done, took note first of the things that pleased him, and only after that proceeded to remark on the faults--most of which he treated as imperfections, letting cosmo see plainly that he understood how he had come to go wrong. such an education as mr. simon was thus attempting with cosmo, is hardly to be given to more than one at a time; and indeed there are not a great many boys on whom it would be much better than lost labour. cosmo, however, was now almost as eager to go to his lessons, as before to spend a holiday. mr. simon never gave him anything to do at home, heartily believing it the imperative duty of a teacher to leave room for the scholar to grow after the fashion in which he is made, and that what a boy does by himself is of greater import than what he does with any master. such leisure may indeed be of comparatively small consequence with regard to the multitude of boys, but it is absolutely necessary wherever one is born with his individuality so far determined, as to be on the point of beginning to develop itself. when cosmo therefore went home, he read or wrote what he pleased, wandered about at his will, and dreamed to his heart's content. nor was it long before he discovered that his dreams themselves were becoming of greater import to him--that they also were being influenced by mr. simon. and there were other witnesses there, quite as silent as those around him in the library, and more unseen, who would not remain speechless or invisible always. one day cosmo came late, and to say there were traces of tears on his cheeks would hardly be correct, for his eyes were swollen with weeping. his master looked at him almost wistfully, but said nothing until he had settled for a while to his work, and was a little composed. he asked him then what was amiss, and the boy told him. to most boys it would have seemed small ground for such heart-breaking sorrow. amongst the horses on the farm, was a certain small mare, which, although she worked as hard as any, was yet an excellent one to ride, and cosmo, as often as there was not much work doing, rode her where he would, and boy and mare were much attached to each other. sometimes he would have her every day for several weeks, and that would be in the prime of the summer weather, when the harvest was drawing nigh, and the school had its long yearly holiday. summer, the harvest--"play," and linty!--oh, large bliss! my heart swells at the thought. they would be out for hours together, perhaps not far from home all the time--on the top of a hill it might be, whence cosmo could see when he would the castle below. there, the whole sleepy afternoon, he would lie in the heather, with linty, the mare, feeding amongst it, ready to come at his call, receive him on her back, and carry him where he would! but alas! though supple and active, linty was old, and the day could not be distant when they must part company: she was then nine and twenty. and now--the night before, she had been taken ill: there was a disease about amongst the horses. the men had been up with her all night, and grizzie too: she had fetched her own pillow and put under her head, then sat by it for hours. when cosmo left, she was a little better, but great fears were entertained as to the possibility of her recovery. "she's sae terrible aul'! ye see, sir," said cosmo, as he ended his tale of woe, and burst out crying afresh. "cosmo," said mr. simon,--and to a southern ear the issuing of such sweet solemn thoughts in such rough northern speech, might have seemed strange, though, to be sure, the vowels were finely sonorous if the consonants were harsh,--"cosmo, your heart is faithful to your mare, but is it equally faithful to him that made your mare?" "i ken it's his wull," answered cosmo:--his master never took notice whether he spoke in broad scotch or bastard english--"i ken mears maun dee, but eh! she was sic a guid ane!--sir! i canna bide it." "ye ken wha sits by the deein' sparrow?" said mr. simon, himself taking to the dialect. "cosmo there was a better nor grizzie, an' nearer to linty a' the lang nicht. things warna gangin' sae ill wi' her as ye thoucht. life's an awfu' mystery, cosmo, but it's jist the ae thing the maker o' 't can haud nearest til, for it's nearest til himsel' i' the mak o' 't.--fowk may tell me," he went on, more now as if he were talking to himself than to the boy, "'at i sud content mysel' wi' what i see an' hear, an' lat alane sic eeseless speculations! wi' deein' men an' mears a' aboot me, hoo can i! they're onything but eeseless to me, for gien i had naething but what i see an' hear, gran' an' bonny as a heap o' 't is, i wad jist smore for want o' room." "but what's the guid o' 't a', whan i'll never see her again?" sobbed cosmo. "wha says sic a thing, laddie?" "a' body," answered cosmo, a good deal astonished at the question. "maister a' body has a heap o' the gawk in him yet, cosmo," replied his master. "infac' he's scarce mair nor an infant yet, though he wull speyk as gien the haill universe o' wisdom an' knowledge war open til 'im! there's no a word o' the kin' i' the haill bible, nor i' the hert o' man--nor i' the hert o' the maker, do i, i' the hert o' me, believe cosmo, can ye believe 'at that wee bit foal o' an ass 'at carriet the maister o' 's, a' alang yon hill-road frae bethany to jerus'lem, cam to sic an ill hin 'er en' as to be forgotten by him he cairriet? no more can i believe that jist 'cause it carriet him it was ae hair better luiket efter nor ony ither bit assie foalt i' the lan' o' isr'el." "the disciples micht hae min't it til the cratur, an' liukit efter him for't," suggested cosmo. his master looked pleased. "they could but work the will o' him that made the ass," he said, "an does the best for a' thing an' a' body. na, na, my son! gien i hae ony pooer to read the trowth o' things, the life 'at's gien is no taen; an' whatever come o' the cratur, the love it waukent in a human breist,'ill no more be lost than the objec' o' the same. that a thing can love an' be loved--an' that's yer bonnie mearie, cosmo--is jist a' ane to savin' 'at it's immortal, for god is love, an' whatever partakes o' the essence o' god canna dee, but maun gang on livin' till it please him to say haud, an' that he'll never say." by this time the face of the man was glowing like an altar on which had descended the fire of the highest heaven. his confidence entered the heart of cosmo, and when the master ceased, he turned, with a sigh of gladness and relief, to his work, and wept no more. the possible entrance of linty to an enlarged existence, widened the whole heaven of his conscious being; the well-spring of personal life within him seemed to rush forth in mighty volume; and through that grief and its consolation, the boy made a great stride towards manhood. one day in the first week of his new schooling, cosmo took occasion to mention aggie's difficulty with her algebra, and her anxiety to find whether it was true that a girl could do as well as a boy. mr. simon was much interested, and with the instinct of the true hunter, whose business it is to hunt death for the sake of life, began to think whether here might not be another prepared to receive. he knew her father well, but had made no acquaintance with agnes yet, who indeed was not a little afraid of him, for he looked as if he were always thinking about things nobody else knew of, although, in common with every woman who saw it, she did find his smile reassuring. no doubt the peculiar feeling of the neighbours concerning him had caused her involuntarily to associate with him the idea of something "no canny." not the less, when she heard from cosmo what sort of man his new master was, would she have given all she possessed to learn of him. and before long, she had her chance. old dorothy, mr. simon's servant and housekeeper was one day taken ill, and cosmo mentioning the fact in aggie's hearing, she ran, with a mere word to her mother, and not a moments' cogitation, to offer her assistance till she was better. it turned out that "auld dorty," as the neighbours called her, not without some hint askance at the quality of her temper, was not very seriously ailing, yet sufficiently so to accept a little help for the rougher work of the house; and while aggie was on her knees washing the slabs of the passage that led through to the back door, the master, as she always called him now that cosmo was his pupil, happened to come from his room, and saw and addressed her. she rose in haste, mechanically drying her hands in her apron. "how's the algebra getting on, agnes?" he said. "naething's gettin' on verra weel sin' maister cosmo gaed frae the schuil, sir. i dinna seem to hae the hert for the learnin' 'at i had sae lang as he was there, sae far aheid o' me, but no a'thegither oot 'o my sicht, like.--it soon's a conceitit kin' o' a thing to say, but i'm no meanin' onything o' that natur', sir." "i understand you very well, agnes," returned the master. "would you like to have some lessons with me? i don't say along with cosmo; you would hardly be able for that at present, i fancy--but at such times as you could manage to come--odd times, when you were not wanted." "there's naething upo' the airth, sir," said aggie, "'at i wad like half sae weel. thae jist a kin' o' a hoonger upo' me forun'erstan'in' things. its frae bein' sae muckle wi' maister cosmo, i'm thinkin'--ever sin' he was a bairn, ye ken, sir; for bein' twa year aul'er nor him, i was a kin' o' a wee nursie til him; an' ever sin' syne we hae had nae secrets frae ane anither; an' ye ken what he's like--aye wantin' to win at the boddom o' things, an' that's infeckit me, sae 'at i canna rist whan i see onybody un'erstan'in' a thing, till i set aboot gettin' a grip o' 't mysel'." "a very good infection to take, agnes," replied the master, with a smile of thorough pleasure, "and one that will do more for you than the cow-pox. come to me as often as you can--and as you like. i think i shall be able to tell you some things to make you happier." "'deed, sir. i'm in no want o' happiness! o' that i hae full mair nor i deserve; but i want a heap for a' that. i canna say what it is, for the hoonger is for what i haena." "another of god's children!" said the master to himself, "and full of the groanings of the spirit! the wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them." he often quoted scripture as the people of the new testament did--not much minding the original application of the words. those that are filled with the spirit, have always taken liberties with the letter. that very evening before she went home, they had a talk about algebra, and several other things. agnes went no more to school, but almost every day to see the master, avoiding the hours when cosmo would be there. chapter xii. grannie's ghost story. things went on very quietly. the glorious days of harvest came and went, and left the fields bare for the wintry revelling of great blasts. the potatoes were all dug up, and again buried--deeper than before, in pits, with sheets of straw and blankets of earth to protect them from the biting of the frost. their stalks and many weeds with them were burned, and their ashes scattered. some of the land was ploughed, and some left till the spring. before the autumn rains the stock of peats was brought from the hill, where they had been drying through the hot weather, and a splendid stack they made. coal was carted from the nearest sea-port, though not in such quantity as the laird would have liked, for money was as scarce as ever, and that is to put its lack pretty strongly. everything available for firewood was collected, and, if of any size, put under saw and axe, then stored in the house. good preparation was thus made for the siege of the winter. in their poverty, partly no doubt from consideration, they seemed to be much forgotten. the family was like an old thistle-head, withering on its wintry stalk, alone in a wind-swept field. all the summer through not a single visitor, friend or stranger, had slept in the house. a fresh face was more of a wonder to cosmo than to desert-haunting abraham. the human heart, like the human body, can live without much variety to feed on, but its house is built on a lordly scale for hospitality, and is capable of welcoming every new face as a new revelation. steadily cosmo went to his day's work with the master, steadily returned to his home; saw nothing new, yet learned day by day, as he went and came, to love yet more, not the faces of the men and women only, but the aspects of the country in which he was born, to read the lines and shades of its varying beauty: if it was not luxuriant enough to satisfy his ideal, it had yet endless loveliness to disclose to him who already loved enough to care to understand it. when the autumn came, it made him sad, for it was not in harmony with the forward look of his young life, which, though not ambitious, was vaguely expectant. but when the hoar frosts appeared, when the clouds gathered, when the winds began to wail, and the snows to fall, then his spirits rose to meet the invading death. the old castle grew grayer and grayer outside, but ruddier and merrier within. oh, that awful gray and white scottish winter--dear to my heart as i sit and write with window wide open to the blue skies of italy's december! cosmo kept up his morning bath in "the pot" as long as he could, but when sleet and rain came, and he could no longer dry himself by running about, he did not care for it longer, but waited for the snow to come in plenty, which was a sure thing, for then he had a substitute. it came of the ambition of hardy endurance, and will scarcely seem credible to some of my readers. in the depth of the winter, when the cold was at its strongest, provided only the snow lay pretty deep, he would jump from his warm bed with the first glimmer of the morning, and running out, in a light gray with the grayness of what is frozen, to a hollow on the hillside a few yards from the house, there pull off his night-garment, and roll in the snow, kneading handfuls of it, and rubbing himself with it all over. thus he believed he strengthened himself to stand the cold of the day; and happily he was strong enough to stand the strengthening, and so increased his hardihood: what would have been death to many was to him invigoration. he knew nothing of boxing, or rowing, or billiards, but he could run and jump well, and ride very fairly, and, above all, he could endure. in the last harvest he had for the first time wielded a scythe, and had held his own with the rest, though, it must be allowed, with a fierce struggle. the next spring--i may mention it here--he not only held the plough, but by patient persistence and fearless compulsion trained two young bulls to go in it, saving many weeks' labour of a pair of horses. it filled his father with pride, and hope for his boy's coming fight with the world. even the eyes of his grandmother would after that brighten at mention of him; she began to feel proud that she had a share in the existence of the lad: if he did so well when a hobbledehoy, he might be something by the time he was a man! but one thing troubled her: he was no sportsman; he never went out to hunt the otter, or to shoot hares or rabbits or grouse or partridges! and that was unnatural! the fact was, ever since that talk with the master about linty, he could not bear to kill anything, and was now and then haunted by the dying eyes of the pigeon he shot the first time he handled a gun. the grandmother thought it a defect in his manhood that he did not like shooting; but, woman, and old woman as she was, his heart was larger and tenderer than hers, and got in the way of the killing. his father had never troubled his young life with details concerning the family affairs; he had only let him know that, for many years, through extravagance and carelessness in those who preceded his father, things had been going from bad to worse. but this was enough to wake in the boy the desire, and it grew in him as he grew, to rescue what was left of the estate from its burdens, and restore it to independence and so to honour. he said nothing of it, however, to his father, feeling the presumption of proposing to himself what his father had been unable to effect. he went oftener to the village this winter than before, and rarely without going to see mistress forsyth, whom he, like the rest, always called grannie. she suffered much from rheumatism, which she described as a sorrow in her bones. but she never lost her patience, and so got the good of a trouble which would seem specially sent as the concluding discipline of old people for this world, that they may start well in the next. before the winter set in, the laird had seen that she was provided with peats--that much he could do, because it cost him nothing but labour; and indeed each of the several cart-loads cosmo himself had taken, with mare linty between the shafts. but no amount of fire could keep the frost out of the old woman's body, or the sorrow out of her bones. hence she had to be a good deal in bed, and needed her great-grandchild, agnes, to help her to bear her burden. when the bitter weather came, soon after christmas, agnes had to be with her almost constantly. she had grown a little graver, but was always cheerful, and, except for anxiety lest her mother should be overworked, or her father take cold, seemed as happy with her grandmother as at home. one afternoon, when the clouds were rising, and the wind blew keen from the north, cosmo left glenwarlock to go to the village--mainly to see grannie. he tramped the two miles and a half in all the joy of youthful conflict with wind and weather, and reached the old woman's cottage radiant. the snow lay deep and powdery with frost, and the struggle with space from a bad footing on the world had brought the blood to his cheeks and the sparkle to his eyes. he found grannie sitting up in bed, and aggie getting her tea--to which cosmo contributed a bottle of milk he had carried her--an article rare enough in the winter when there was so little grass for the cows. aggie drew the old woman's chair to the fire for him, and he sat down and ate barley-meal scons, and drank tea with them. grannie was a little better than usual, for every disease has its inconsistencies, and pain will abate before an access; and so, with storm at hand, threaded with fiery flying serpents for her bones, she was talking more than for days previous. her voice came feebly from the bed to cosmo's ears, while he leaned back in her great chair, and aggie was removing the tea-things. "did ye ever dream ony mair aboot the auld captain, cosmo?" she asked: from her tone he could not tell whether she spoke seriously, or was amusing herself with the idea. "no ance," he answered. "what gars ye speir, grannie?" she said nothing for a few minutes, and cosmo thought she had dismissed the subject. aggie had returned to her seat, and he was talking with her about euclid, when she began again; and this time her voice revealed that she was quite in earnest. "ye're weel nigh a man noo, cosmo," she said. "a body may daur speyk to ye aboot things a body wadna be wullin' to say till a bairn for fear o' frichtin' o' 'im mair nor the bit hert o' 'm cud stan'. whan a lad can warstle wi' a pair o' bills, an' get the upper han' o' them, an' gar them du his biddin', he wadna need to tak fricht at--" there she paused. this preamble was enough in itself--not exactly to bring cosmo's heart into his mouth, but to send a little more of his blood from his brain to his heart than was altogether welcome there. his imagination, however, was more eager than apprehensive, and his desire to hear far greater than his dread of the possible disclosure. neither would he have turned his back on any terror, though he knew well enough what fear was. he looked at aggie as much as to say, "what can be coming?" and she stared at him in turn with dilated pupils, as if something dreadful were about to be evoked by the threatened narrative. neither spoke a word, but their souls got into their ears, and there sat listening. the hearing was likely to be frightful when so prefaced by grannie. "there's no guid ever cam' o' ca'in' things oot o' their ain names," she began, "an" it's my min' 'at gien ever ae man was a willain, an' gien ever ae man had rizzon no to lie quaiet whan he was doon, that man was your father's uncle--his gran' uncle, that is, the auld captain, as we ca'd him. fowk said he saul' his sowl to the ill ane: hoo that may be, i wadna care to be able to tell; but sure i am 'at his was a sowl ill at ease,--baith here an' herefter. them 'at sleepit aneth me, for there was twa men-servan's aboot the hoose that time--an' troth there was need o' them an' mair, sic war the gangin's on! an' they sleepit whaur i'm tauld ye sleep noo, cosmo--them 'at sleepit there tellt me 'at never a nicht passed 'at they h'ardna soons 'aneth them 'at there was no mainner o' accoontin' for nor explainin', as fowks sae set upo' duin' nooadays wi' a'thing. that explainin' i canna bide: it's jist a love o' leasin', an' taks the bluid oot o' a'thing, lea'in' life as wersh an' fusionless as kail wantin' saut. them 'at h'ard it tellt me 'at there was no accoontin', as i tell you, for the reemish they baith h'ard--whiles douf-like dunts, an' whiles speech o' mou', beggin' an' groanin' as gien the enemy war bodily present to the puir sinner." "he micht hae been but jabberin' in's sleep," cosmo, with his love of truth, ventured to suggest: aggie gave him a nudge of warning. "ay micht it," returned the old woman with calm scorn; "an' it micht nae doobt hae been snorin', or a cat speykin' wi' man's tongue, or ony ane o' mony things 'cep' the trowth 'at ye're no wullin' to hear." "i am wullin'--to hear the warst trowth ye daur tell me, grannie," cried cosmo, terrified lest he had choked the fountain. he was more afraid of losing the story than of hearing the worst tale that could be told even about the room he slept in last night, and must go back to sleep in again to-night. grannie was mollified, and went on. "as i was sayin', he micht weel be ill at ease, the auld captain, gien ae half was true 'at was said o' 'im; but i 'maist think yer father coontit it priven 'at he had led a deevilich life amo' the pirates. only, gien he did, whaur was the wauges o' his ineequity? nae doobt he got the wauges 'at the apostle speyks o', whilk is, as ye well ken, deith--'the wauges o' sin is deith.' but, maistly, sic-like sinners get first wauges o' anither speckle frae the maister o' them. for troth! he has no need to be near in's dealin's wi' them, seein' there's nae buyin' nor sellin' whaur he is, an' a' the gowd he has doon yon'er i' the booels o' the yird, wad jist lie there duin' naething, gien he sent na 't up abune, whaur maist pairt it works his wull. na, he seldom scrimps 't to them 'at follows his biddin'. but i' this case, whaur, i say, was the wauges? natheless, he aye carriet himsel' like ane 'at cud lay doon the law o' this warl', an cleemt no sma' consideration; yet was there never sign or mark o' the proper fundation for sic assumption o' the richt to respec'. "it turnt oot, or cam to be said,'at the englishman 'at fowk believed to hae killt him, was far-awa' sib to the faimily, an' the twa had come thegither afore, somewhaur i' foreign pairts. but that's naither here nor there, nor what for he killed him, or wha's faut was that same: aboot a' that, naething was ever kent for certain. "weel, it was an awfu' like thing, ye may be sure, to quaiet fowk, sic as we was a'--'cep' for the drinkin' an' sic like, sin' ever the auld captain cam, wi' his reprobat w'ys--it was a sair thing, i'm sayin', to hae a deid man a' at ance upo' oor han's; for, lat the men du 'at they like, the warst o' 't aye comes upo' the women. lat a bairn come to mischance, or the guidman turn ower the kettle, an' it's aye,'rin for jean this, or bauby that,' to set richt what they hae set wrang. even whan a man kills a body, it's the women hae to mak the best o' 't, an' the corp luik dacent. an' there's some o' them no that easy to mak luik dacent! troth, there's mony ane luiks bonnier deid nor alive, but that wasna the case wi' the auld captain, for he luikit as gien he had dee'd cursin', as he bude to du, gien he dee'd as he lived. his moo' was drawn fearfu', as gien his last aith had chokit him. nae doobt they said 'at wad hae't they kent,'at hoo that's the w'y wi' deith frae slayin' wi' the swoord; but i wadna hear o' 't; i kenned better. an' whether he had fair play or no, the deith he dee'd was a just ane; for them 'at draws the swoord maun periss by the swoord. whan they faun' 'im, the richt ban' o' the corp was streekit oot, as gien he was cryin' to somebody rinnin' awa' to bide an' tak 'im wi' 'im. but there was anither at han' to tak 'im wi' 'im. only, gien he tuik 'im that same nicht, he cudna hae carried him far. 'deed, maybe, the auld sinner was ower muckle aven for him. "they brocht him hame, an' laid the corp o' him upo' his ain bed, whaur, i reckon, up til this nicht, he had tried mair nor he had sleepit. an' that verra nicht, wha sud i see--but i'm jist gaein' to tell ye a' aboot it, an' hoo it was, an' syne ye can say yersel's. sin' my ain auld mither dee'd, i haena opent my moo' to mortal upo' the subjec'." the eyes of the two listeners were fixed upon the narrator in the acme of expectation. a real ghost-story, from the lips of one they knew, and must believe in, was a thing of dread delight. like ghosts themselves, they were all-unconscious of body, rapt in listening. "ye may weel believe," resumed the old woman after a short pause, "at nane o' 's was ower wullin' to sit wi' the corp oor lane, for, as i say, he wasna a comely corp to be a body's lane wi'. sae auld auntie jean an' mysel', we agreed 'at we wad tak the thing upo' oorsel's, for, huz twa, we cud lippen til ane anither no to be ower feart to min' 'at there was twa o' 's. there hadna been time yet for the corp to be laid intil the coffin, though, i' the quaiet o' the mirk, we thoucht, as we sat, we cud hear the tap-tappin' as they cawed the braiss nails intil't, awa' ower in geordie lumsden's chop, at the muir o' warlock, a twa mile, it wad be. we war sittin', auntie jean an' mysel', i' the mids o' the room, no wi' oor backs til the bed, nor yet wi' oor faces, for we daurna turn aither o' them til't. i' the ae case, wha cud tell what we micht see, an' i' the ither, wha cud tell what micht be luikin' at hiz! we war sittin', i say, wi' oor faces to the door o' the room, an' auntie was noddin' a wee, for she was turnin' gey an' auld, but _i_ was as wide waukin' an ony baudrins by a moose-hole, whan suddent there came a kin' o' a dirlin' at the sneck,'at sent the verra sowl o' me up intil the garret o' my heid; an' afore i had time to ken hoo sair frichtit i was, the door begud to open; an', glower as i wad, no believin' my ain e'en, open that door did, langsome, langsome, quaiet, quaiet, jist as my auld grannie used to tell o' the deid man comin' doon the lum, bit an' bit, an' jinin' thegither upo' the flure. i was turnt to stane, like,'at i didna believe i cud hae fa'en frae the cheir gien i had swarfed clean awa'. an' eh but it tuik a time to open that door! but at last, as sure as ye sit there, you twa, an' no anither,--"--at the word, cosmo's heart came swelling up into his throat, but he dared not look round to assure himself that they were indeed two sitting there and not another--"in cam the auld captain, ae fit efter anither! speir gien i was sure o' 'im! didna i ken him as weel as my ain father--as weel's my ain minister--as weel as my ain man? he cam in, i say, the auld captain himsel'--an' eh, sic an evil luik!--the verra luik deith--frozen upo' the face o' the corp! the live bluid turned to dubs i' my inside. he cam on an' on, but no straucht for whaur we sat, or i dinna think the sma' rizzon i had left wad hae bidden wi' me, but as gien he war haudin' for 's bed. to tell god's trowth, for i daurna lee, for fear o' haein' to luik upo' 's like again, my auld auntie declaret efterhin 'at she saw naething. she bude til hae been asleep, an' a mercifu' thing it was for her, puir body! but she didna live lang efter. he made straucht for the bed, as i thoucht.' the lord preserve's!' thoucht i,' is he gaein to lie doon wi' 's ain corp?' but he turnt awa', an' roon' the fit o' the bed to the ither side o' 't, an' i saw nae mair; an' for a while, auntie jean sat her lane wi' the deid, for i lay upo' the flure, an' naither h'ard nor saw. but whan i came to mysel', wasna i thankfu' 'at i wasna deid, for he micht hae gotten me than, an' there was nae sayin' what he micht hae dune til me! but, think ye, wad auntie jean believe 'at i had seen him, or that it was onything but a dream 'at had come ower me, atween waukin' an' sleepin'! na, no she! for she had sleepit throu' 't hersel'!" for some time silence reigned, as befitted the close of such a story. nothing but the solemn tick of the tall clock was to be heard. on and on it went, as steady as before. ghosts were nothing special to the clock: it had to measure out the time both for ghosts and unghosts. "but what cud the ghaist hae been wantin'? no the corp, for he turnt awa', ye tell me, frae hit," cosmo ventured at length to remark. "wha can say what ghaists may be efter, laddie! but, troth to tell, whan ye see live fowk sae gien ower to the boady,'at they're never happy but whan they're aitin' or drinkin' or sic like--an' the auld captain was seldom throu' wi' his glaiss,'at he wasna cryin' for the whisky or the het watter for the neist--whan the boady's the best half o' them, like, an' they maun aye be duin' something wi' 't, ye needna won'er 'at the ghaist o' ane sic like sud fin' himsel' geyan eerie an' lonesome like, wantin' his seck to fill, an' sae try to win back to hae a luik hoo it was weirin'." "but he gaed na to the corp," cosmo insisted. "'cause he wasna alloot," said grannie. "he wad hae been intil't again in a moment, ye may be certain, gien it had been in his pooer. but the deevils cudna gang intil the swine wantin' leave." "ay, i see," said cosmo. "but jist ye speir at yer new maister," grannie went on, "what he thinks aboot it, for i ance h'ard him speyk richt wise words to my gudeson, james gracie, anent sic things. i min' weel 'at he said the only thing 'at made agen the viouw i tiuk--though i spakna o' the partic'lar occasion--was,'at naebody ever h'ard tell o' the ghaist o' an alderman, wha they say's some grit lon'on man, sair gien to the fillin' o' the seck." chapter xiii. the storm-guest. again a deep silence descended on the room. the twilight had long fallen, and settled down into the dark. the only thing that acknowledged and answered the clock was the red glow of the peats on the hearth. to cosmo, as he sat sunk in thought, the clock and the fire seemed to be holding a silent talk. presently came a great and sudden blast of wind, which roused cosmo, and made him bethink himself that it was time to be going home. and for this there was another reason besides the threatening storm: he had the night before begun to read aloud one of sir walter's novels to the assembled family, and grizzie would be getting anxious for another portion of it before she went to bed. "i'm glaid to see ye sae muckle better, grannie," he said. "i'll say gude nicht noo, an' luik in again the morn." "weel, i'm obleeged to ye," replied the old woman. "there's been but feow o' yer kin, be their fau'ts what they micht, wad forget ony 'at luikit for a kin' word or a kin' deed!--aggie, lass, ye'll convoy him a bittock, willna ye?" all the few in whom yet lingered any shadow of retainership towards the fast-fading chieftainship of glenwarlock, seemed to cherish the notion that the heir of the house had to be tended and cared for like a child--that was what they were in the world for. doubtless a pitying sense of the misfortunes of the family had much to do with the feeling. "there's nae occasion," and "i'll du that," said the two young people in a breath. cosmo rose, and began to put on his plaid, crossing it over back and chest to leave his arms free: that way the wind would get least hold on him. agnes went to the closet for her plaid also--of the same tartan, and drawing it over her head and pinning it under her chin, was presently ready for the stormy way. then she turned to cosmo, and was pinning his plaid together at the throat, when the wind came with a sudden howl, rushed down the chimney, and drove the level smoke into the middle of the room. it could not shake the cottage--it was too lowly: neither could it rattle its windows--they were not made to open; but it bellowed over it like a wave over a rock, and as in contempt blew its smoke back into its throat. "it'll be a wull nicht, i'm doobtin', cosmo," said agnes; "an' i wuss ye safe i' the ingle-neak wi' yer fowk." cosmo laughed. "the win' kens me," he said. "guid farbid!" cried the old woman from the bed. [illustration: the clock and the pipe seemed to be holding a silent talk.] "kenna ye wha's the prence o' 't, laddie? makna a jeist o' the pooers 'at be." "gien they binna ordeent o' god, what are they but a jeist?" returned cosmo. "eh, but ye wad mak a bonny munsie o' me, grannie, to hae me feart at the deil an' a'! i canna a' thegither help it wi' the ghaists, an' i'm ashamed o' mysel' for that; but i am not gaein to heed the deil. i defy him an' a' his works. he's but a cooerd, ye ken, grannie, for whan ye resist him, he rins." she made no answer. cosmo shook hands with her, and went, followed by agnes, who locked the door behind her, and put the key in her pocket. it was indeed a wild night. the wind was rushing from the north, full of sharp stinging pellicles, something between snow-flakes and hail-stones. down the wide village street it came right in their faces. through it, as through a thin shifting sheet, they saw on both sides the flickering lights of the many homes, but before them lay darkness, and the moor, a chaos, a carnival of wind and snow. worst of all the snow on the road was not binding, and their feet felt as if walking on sand. as long as the footing is good, one can get on even in the face of a northerly storm; but to heave with a shifting fulcrum is hard. nevertheless cosmo, beholding with his mind's eye the wide waste around him, rejoiced; invisible through the snow, it was not the less a presence, and his young heart rushed to the contest. there was no fear of ghosts in such a storm! the ghosts might be there, but there was no time to heed them, and that was as good as their absence--perhaps better, if we knew all. "bide a wee, cosmo," cried agnes, and leaving him in the middle of the street where they were walking, she ran across to one of the houses, and entered--lifting the latch without ceremony. no neighbour troubled another to come and open the door; if there was no one at home, the key in the lock outside showed it. cosmo turned his back to the wind, and stood waiting. from the door which aggie opened, came through the wind and snow the sound of the shoemaker's hammer on his lapstone. "cud ye spare the mistress for an hoor, or maybe twa an' a half, to haud grannie company, john nauchty?" said agnes. "weel that," answered the sutor, hammering away. he intended no reflection on the bond that bound the mistress and himself. "i dinna see her," said aggie. "she'll be in in a minute. she's run ower the ro'd to get a doup o' a can'le," returned the man. "gien she dinna the speedier, she'll hae to licht it to fin' her ain door," said agnes merrily, to whom the approaching fight with the elements was as welcome as to cosmo. she had made up her mind to go with him all the way, let him protest as he might. "ow na! she'll hearken, an' hear the hemmer," replied the shoemaker. "weel, tak the key, an' ye winna forget, john?" said aggie, laying the key amongst his tools. "grannie's lyin' there her lee-lane, an' gien the hoose was to tak fire, what wad come o' her?" "guid forbid onybody sud forget grannie!" rejoined the man heartily; "but fire wad hae a sma' chance the nicht." agnes thanked and left him. all the time he had not missed a single stroke of his hammer on the benleather between it and his lapstone. when she rejoined cosmo, where he stood leaning his back against the wind in the middle of the road, "come nae farther, aggie," he said. "it's an ill nicht, an' grows waur. there's nae guid in't naither, for we winna hear ane anither speyk ohn stoppit, an' turnt oor backs til't. gang to yer grannie; she'll be feart aboot ye." "nae a bit. i maun see ye oot o' the toon." they fought their way along the street, and out on the open moor, the greater part of which was still heather and swamp. peat-bog and ploughed land was all one waste of snow. creation seemed but the snow that had fallen, the snow that was falling, and the snow that had yet to fall; or, to put it otherwise, a fall of snow between two outspread worlds of snow. "gang back, noo, aggie," said cosmo again. "what's the guid o' twa whaur ane only need be, an' baith hae to fecht for themsel's?" "i'm no gaein' back yet," persisted aggie. "twa's better at onything nor ane himblane. the sutor's wife's gaein' in to see grannie, an' grannie 'll like her cracks a heap better nor mine. she thinks i hae nae mair brains nor a hen,'cause i canna min' upo' things at war nearhan' forgotten or i was born." cosmo desisted from useless persuasion, and they struggled on together, through the snow above and the snow beneath. at this aggie was more than a match for cosmo. lighter and smaller, and perhaps with larger lungs in proportion, she bored her way through the blast better than he, and the moment he began to expostulate, would increase the distance between them, and go on in front where he knew she could not hear a word he said. at last, being then a little ahead, she turned her back to the wind, and waited for him to come up. "noo, ye've had eneuch o' 't!" he said. "an' i maun turn an' gang back wi' you, or ye'll never win hame." aggie broke into a loud laugh that rang like music through the storm. "a likly thing!" she cried; "an' me wi' my back a' the ro'd to the win'! gang back yersel', cosmo, an' sit by grannie's fire, an' i'll gang on to the castle, an' lat them ken whaur ye are. gien ye dinna that, i tell ye ance for a', i'm no gaein' to lea' ye till i see ye safe inside yer ain wa's." "but aggie," reasoned cosmo, with yet greater earnestness, "what'll ye gar fowk think o' me,'at wad hae a lassie to gang hame wi' me, for fear the win' micht blaw me intil the sea? ye'll bring me to shame, aggie." "a lassie! say ye?" cried aggie,--"i think i hear ye!--an' me auld eneuch to be yer mither! is' tak guid care there s' be nae affront intil 't. haud yer hert quaiet, cosmo; ye'll hae need o' a' yer breath afore ye win to yer ain fireside." as she spoke, the wind pounced upon them with a fiercer gust than any that had preceded. instinctively they grasped each other, as if from the wish, if they should be blown away, to be blown away together. "eh, that's a rouch ane!" said cosmo, and again aggie laughed merrily. while they stood thus, with their backs to the wind, the moon rose. far indeed from being visible, she yet shed a little glimmer of light over the plain, revealing a world as wild as ever the frozen north outspread--as wild as ever poet's despairing vision of desolation. i see it! i see it! but how shall i make my reader see it with me? it was ghastly. the only similitude of life was the perplexed and multitudinous motion of the drifting, falling flakes. no shape was to be seen, no sound but that of the wind to be heard. it was like the dream of a delirious child after reading the ancient theory of the existence of the world by the rushing together of fortuitous atoms. wan and thick, tumultuous, innumerable to millions of angels, an interminable tempest of intermingling and indistinguishable vortices, it stretched on and on, a boundless hell of cold and shapelessness--white thinned with gray, and fading into gray blackness, into tangible darkness. the moment the fury of the blast abated, agnes turned, and without a word, began again her boring march, forcing her way through the palpable obstructions of wind and snow. unable to prevent her, cosmo followed. but he comforted himself with the thought, that, if the storm continued he would get his father to use his authority against her attempting a return before the morning. the sutor's wife was one of grannie's best cronies, and there was no fear of her being deserted through the night. aggie kept the lead she had taken, till there could be no more question of going on, and they were now drawing near the road that struck off to the left, along the bank of the warlock river, leading up among the vallies and low hills, most of which had once been the property of the house of warlock, when she stopped suddenly, this time without turning her back to the wind, and cosmo was immediately beside her. "what's yon, cosmo?" she said--and cosmo fancied consternation in the tone. he looked sharply forward, and saw what seemed a glimmer, but might be only something whiter in the whiteness. no! it was certainly a light--but whether on the road he could not tell. there was no house in that direction! it moved!--yet not as if carried in human hand! now it was gone! there it was again! there were two of them--two huge pale eyes, rolling from side to side. grannie's warning about the prince of the power of the air, darted into cosmo's mind. it was awful! but anyhow the devil was not to be run from! that was the easiest measure, no doubt, yet not the less the one impossible to take. and now it was plain that the something was not away on the moor, but on the road in front of them, and coming towards them. it came nearer and nearer, and grew vaguely visible--a huge blundering mass--animal or what, they could not tell, but on the wind came sounds that might be human--or animal human--the sounds of encouragement and incitation to horses. and now it approached no more. with common impulse they hastened towards it. it was a travelling carriage--a rare sight in those parts at any time, and rarer still in winter. both of them had certainly seen one before, but as certainly, never a pair of lighted carriage-lamps, with reflectors to make of them fiendish eyes. it had but two horses, and, do what the driver could, which was not much, they persisted in standing stock-still, refusing to take a single step farther. indeed they could not. they had tried and tried, and done their best, but finding themselves unable to move the carriage an inch, preferred standing still to spending themselves in vain struggles, for all their eight legs went slipping about under them. cosmo looked up to the box. the driver was little more than a boy, and nearly dead with cold. already aggie had a forefoot of the near horse in her hand. cosmo ran to the other. "their feet's fu' o' snaw," said aggie. "ay; it's ba'd hard," said cosmo. "they maun hae come ower a saft place: it wadna ba' the nicht upo' the muir." "hae ye yer knife, cosmo?" asked aggie. here a head was put out of the carriage-window. it was that of a lady in a swansdown travelling-hood. she had heard an unintelligible conversation--and one intelligible word. they must be robbers! how else should they want a knife in a snowstorm? why else should they have stopped the carriage? she gave a little cry of alarm. aggie dropped the hoof she held, and went to the window. "what's yer wull, mem?" she asked. "what's the matter?" the lady returned in a trembling voice, but not a little reassured at the sight, as she crossed the range of one of the lamps, of the face of a young girl. "why doesn't the coachman go on?" "he canna, mem. the horse canna win throu the snaw. they hae ba's o' 't i' their feet, an' they canna get a grip wi' them, nae mair nor ye cud yersel', mem, gien the soles o' yer shune war roon' an' made o'ice. but we'll sune set that richt.--hoo far hae ye come, mem, gien i may speir? aigh, mem, its an unco nicht!" the lady did not understand much of what aggie said, for she was english, returning from her first visit to scotland, but, half guessing at her question, replied, that they had come from cairntod, and were going on to howglen. she told her also, now entirely reassured by aggie's voice, that they had been much longer on the way than they had expected, and were now getting anxious. "i doobt sair gien ye'll win to howglen the nicht," said aggie.-- "but ye're not yer lone? "she added, trying to summon her english, of which she had plenty of a sort, though not always at hand. "my father is with me," said the lady, looking back into the dark carriage, "but i think he is asleep, and i don't want to wake him while we are standing still." peeping in, aggie caught sight of somebody muffled, leaning back in the other corner of the carriage, and breathing heavily. to aggie's not altogether unaccustomed eye, it seemed he might have had more than was good for him in the way of refreshment. cosmo was busy clearing the snow from the horses' hoofs. the driver, stupid or dazed, sat on the box, helpless as a parrot on a swinging perch. "you'll never win to howglen to-night, mem," said aggie. "we must put up where we can, then," answered the lady. "i dinna know of a place nearer, fit for gentlefowk, mem." "what are we to do then?" asked the lady, with subdued, but evident anxiety. "what's the guid o' haein' a father like that--sleepin' and snorin' whan maist ye're in want o' 'im!" thought aggie to herself; but what she replied was, "bide, mem, till we hear what cosmo has to say til't." "that is a peculiar name!" remarked the lady, brightening at the sound of it, for it could, she thought, hardly belong to a peasant. "it's the name the lairds o' glenwarlock hae borne for generations," answered aggie; "though doobtless it's no a name, as the maister wad say, indigenous to the country. ane o' them broucht it frae italy, the place whaur the pop' o' rom' bides." "and who is this cosmo whose advice you would have me ask?" "he's the yoong laird himsel', mem:--eh! but ye maun be a stranger no to ken the name o' warlock." "indeed i am a stranger--and i can't help wishing, if there is much more of this weather between us and england, that i had been more of a stranger still." "'deed, mem, we hae a heap o' weather up here as like this as ae snow-flake is til anither. but we tak what's sent, an' makna mony remarks. though to be sure the thing's different whan it's o' a body's ain seekin'." this speech--my reader may naturally think it not over-polite--was happily not over-intelligible to the lady. aggie, a little wounded by the reflection on the weather of her country, had in her emotion aggravated her scottish tone. "and where is this cosmo? how are we to find him?" "he'll come onsoucht, mem. it's only 'at he's busy cleanin' oot yer puir horse' hivs 'at hedisna p'y his respec's to ye. but he'll be blythe eneuch!" "i thought you said he was a lord!" remarked the lady. "na, i saidna that, mem. he's nae lord. but he's a laird, an' some lairds is better nor 'maist ony lords--an' he's warlock o' glenwarlock--at least he wull be--an' may it be lang or come the day." hard as the snow was packed in them, all the eight hoofs were now cleared out with cosmo's busy knife, which he had had to use carefully lest he should hurt the frog. the next moment his head appeared, a little behind that of aggie, and in the light of the lamp the lady saw the handsome face of a lad seemingly about sixteen. "here he is, mem! this is the yoong laird. ye speir at him what ye're to du, and du jist as he tells ye," said aggie, and drew back, that cosmo might take her place. "is that girl your sister?" asked the lady, with not a little abruptness, for the _best bred_ are not always the most polite. "no, my lady," answered cosmo, who had learned from the lad on the box her name and rank; "she is the daughter of one of my father's tenants." lady joan scudamore thought it very odd that the youth should be on such familiar terms with the daughter of one of his father's tenants--out alone with her in the heart of a hideous storm! no doubt the girl looked up to him, but apparently from the same level, as one sharing in the pride of the family! should she take her advice, and seek his? or should she press on for howglen? there was, alas! no counsel to be had from her father just at present: if she woke him, he would but mutter something not so much unlike an oath as it ought to be, and go to sleep again! "we want very much to reach howglen--i think that is what you call the place," she said. "you can't get there to-night, i'm afraid," returned cosmo. "the road is, as you see, no road at all. the horses would do better if you took their shoes off, i think--only then, if they came on a bit of frozen dub, it might knock their hoofs to pieces in, such a frost." the lady glanced round at her sleeping companion with a look expressive of no small perplexity. "my father will make you welcome, my lady," continued cosmo, "if you will come with us. we can give you only what english people must think poor fare, for we're not--" she interrupted him. "i should be glad to sit anywhere all night, where there was a fire. i am nearly frozen." "we can do a little better for you than that, though not so well as we should like. perhaps, as we can't make any show, we are the more likely to do our best for your comfort." their pinched circumstances had at one time and another given rise to conversation in which the laird and his son sought together to sound the abysses of hospitality: the old-fashioned sententiousness of the boy had in it nothing of the prig. "you are very kind. i will promise to be comfortable," said the lady. she began to be a trifle interested in this odd specimen of the scotch calf. "welcome then to glenwarlock!" said cosmo. "come, aggie; tak ane o' them by the heid: they're gaein' wi' 's.--we must turn the horses' heads, my lady. i fear they won't like to face the wind they've only had their backs to yet. i can't make out whether your driver is half dead or half drunk or more than half frozen; but aggie and i will take care of them, and if he tumble off, nobody will be the worse." "what a terrible country!" said the lady to herself. "the coachmen get drunk! the boys are prigs! there is no distinction between the owners of the soil and the tenants who farm it! and it snows from morning to night, and from one week's end to another!" aggie had taken the head of the near horse, and cosmo took that of the off one. their driver said nothing, letting them do as they pleased. with some difficulty, for they had to be more than ordinarily cautious, the road being indistinguishable from the ditches they knew here bounded it on both sides, they got the carriage round. but when the weary animals received the tempest in their faces, instead of pulling they backed, would have turned again, and for some time were not to be induced to front it. agnes and cosmo had to employ all their powers of persuasion, first to get them to stand still, and then to advance a little. gradually, by leading, and patting, and continuous encouraging in language they understood, they were coaxed as far as the parish road, and there turning their sides to the wind, and no longer their eyes and noses, they began to move with a little will of their own; for horses have so much hope, that the mere fact of having made a turn is enough to revive them with the expectation of cover and food and repose. they reached presently a more sheltered part of the road, and if now and then they had to drag the carriage through deeper snow, they were no longer buffeted by the cruel wind or stung by its frost-arrows. all this time the gentleman inside slept--nor was it surprising; for, lunching at the last town, and not finding the wine fit to drink, he had fallen back upon an accomplishment of his youth, and betaken himself to toddy. that he had found that at least fit to drink was proved by the state in which he was now carried along. they reached at last the steep ascent from the parish road to castle warlock. the two conductors, though they had no leisure to confer on the subject, were equally anxious as to whether the horses would face it; but the moment their heads came round, whether only that it was another turn with its fresh hope, or that the wind brought some stray odour of hay or oats to their wide nostrils, i cannot tell, but finding the ground tolerably clear, they took to it with a will, and tore up with the last efforts of all but exhausted strength, cosmo and aggie running along beside them, and talking to them all the way. the only difficulty was to get the lad on the box to give them their heads. chapter xiv. the castle inn. the noise of their approach, heard from the bottom of the ascent, within the lonely winter castle, awoke profound conjecture, and grizzie proceeded to light the lanthern that she might learn the sooner what catastrophe could cause such a phenomenon: something awful must have taken place! perhaps they had cut off the king's head as they did in france! but such was the rapidity of the horses' ascent in the hope of rest, and warmth, and supper, that the carriage was in the close, and rattling up to the door, ere she had got the long wick of the tallow candle to acknowledge the dominion of fire. the laird rose in haste from his arm-chair, and went to the door. there stood the chaise, in the cloud of steam that rose from the quick-heaving sides of the horses. and there were cosmo and agnes at the door of it, assisting somebody to descend. the laird was never in a hurry. he was too thorough a gentleman to trouble approach by uneasy advance, and he had no fear of anything cosmo had done. he stood therefore in the kitchen door, calmly expectant. a long-cloaked lady got down, and, turning from the assistant hand of his son, came towards him--a handsome lady, tall and somewhat stately, but weary, and probably in want of food as well as rest. he bowed with old-fashioned worship, and held out his hand to welcome her. she gave him hers graciously, and thanked him for the hospitality his son had offered them. "come in, come in, madam," said the old man. "the fireside is the best place for explanations. welcome to a poor house but a warm hearth! so much we can yet offer stranger-friends." he led the way, and she followed him into the kitchen. on a small piece of carpet before the fire, stood the two chairs of state, each protected by a large antique screen. from hers the grandmother rose with dignified difficulty, when she perceived the quality of the entering stranger. "mother," said the laird, "it is not often we have the pleasure of visitors at this time of the year!" "the more is the rare foot welcome," answered she, and made lady joan as low a courtesy as she dared: she could not quite reckon on her power of recovery. lady joan returned her salute, little impressed with the honour done her, but recognizing that she was in the presence of a gentlewoman. she took the laird's seat at his invitation, and, leaning forward, gazed wearily at the fire. the next moment, a not very pleasant-looking old man entered, supported on one side by cosmo and on the other by agnes. they had had no little difficulty in waking him up, and he entered vaguely supposing they had arrived at an inn where they were to spend the night. if his grumbling and swearing as he advanced was sotto voce, the assuagement was owing merely to his not being sufficiently awake to use more vigour. the laird left the lady and advanced to meet him, but he took no notice of him, regarding his welcome as the obsequiousness of a landlord, and turned shivering towards the fire, where grizzie was hastening to set him a chair. "the fire's the best flooer i' the gairden, an' the pig's the best coo i' the herdin', my lord," she said--an old saw to which his lordship might have been readier to respond, had he remembered that the pig sometimes meant the stone jar that held the whisky. as soon as lord mergwain was seated, cosmo drew his father aside, told him the names of their guests, and in what difficulty he had found them, and added that the lady and the horses were sober enough, but for the other two he would not answer. "we have been spending some weeks at canmore castle in ross-shire, and are now on our way home," said lady joan to mistress warlock. "you have come a long way round," remarked the old lady, not so pleased with the manners of her male visitor, on whom she kept casting, every now and then, a full glance. "we have," replied lady joan. "we turned out of our way to visit an old friend of papa's, and have been storm-bound till he--i mean papa--could bear it no longer. we sent our servants on this morning. they are, i hope, by this time, waiting us at howglen." the fire had been thawing the sleep out of lord mergwain, and now at length he was sufficiently awake to be annoyed that his daughter should hold so much converse with the folk of the inn. "can't you show us to a room?" he said gruffly, "and get us something to eat?" "we are doing the best we can for your lordship," replied the laird. "but we were not expecting visitors, and one of the rooms you will have to occupy, has not been in use for some time. in such weather as this, it will take two or three hours of a good fire to render it fit to sleep in. but i will go myself, and see that the servant is making what haste she can." he put on his hat over his night-cap, and made for the door. "that's right, landlord," cried his lordship; "always see to the comfort of your guests yourself--but bless me! you don't mean we have to go out of doors to reach our bedrooms?" "i am afraid we cannot help it," returned the laird, arresting his step. "there used to be a passage connecting the two houses, but for some reason or other--i never heard what--it was closed in my father's time." "he must have been an old fool!" remarked the visitor. "my lord!" "i said your father must have been an old fool," repeated his lordship testily. "you speak of my husband!" said mistress warlock, drawing herself up with dignity. "i can't help that. _i_ didn't give you away. let's have some supper, will you? i want a tumbler of toddy, and without something to eat it might make me drunk." lady joan sat silent, with a look half of contempt, half of mischievous enjoyment on her handsome face. she had too often to suffer from her father's rudeness not to enjoy its bringing him into a scrape. but the laird was sharper than she thought him, and seeing both the old man's condition and his mistake, humoured the joke. his mother rose, trembling with indignation. he gave her his arm, and conducted her to a stair which ascended immediately from the kitchen, whispering to her on the way, that the man was the worse of drink, and he must not quarrel with him. she retired without leave-taking. he then called cosmo and agnes, who were talking together in a low voice at the other end of the kitchen, and taking them to grizzie in the spare room, told them to help her, that she might the sooner come and get the supper ready. "i am afraid, my lord," he said, returning, "we are but poorly provided for such guests as your lordship, but we will do what we can." "a horrible country!" growled his lordship; "but look you, i don't want jaw--i want drink." "what drink would your lordship have? if it be in my power--" "i doubt, for all your talk, if you've got anything but your miserable whisky!" interrupted lord mergwain. now the laird had some remnants of old wine in the once well stored cellar, and, thankless as his visitor seemed likely to turn out, his hospitality would not allow him to withhold what he had. "i have a few bottles of claret," he said, "--if it should not be over-old!--i do not understand much about wine myself." "let's have it up," cried his lordship. "we'll see. if you don't know good wine, i do. i'm old enough for any wine." the laird would have had more confidence in recommending his port, which he had been told was as fine as any in scotland, but he thought claret safer for one in his lordship's condition--one who having drunk would drink again. he went therefore to the wine cellar, which had once been the dungeon of the castle, and brought thence a most respectable-looking magnum, dirty as a burrowing terrier, and to the eye of the imagination hoary with age. the eyes of the toper glistened at the sight. eagerly he stretched out both hands towards it. they actually trembled with desire. hardly could he endure the delay of its uncorking. no sooner did the fine promissory note of the discharge of its tompion reach his ear, than he cried out, with the authority of a field-officer at least: "decant it. leave the last glass in the bottom." the laird filled a decanter, and set it before him. "haven't you a mangum-jug?" "no, my lord." "then fill another decanter, and mind the last glass." "i have not another decanter, my lord." "not got two decanters, you fool?" sneered his lordship, enraged at not having the whole bottle set down to him at once. "but after all," he resumed, "it mayn't be worth a rush, not to say a decanter. bring the bottle. set it down. here!--carefully! bring a glass. you should have brought the glasses first. bring three; i like to change my glass. make haste, will you!" the laird did make haste, smiling at the exigence of his visitor. lord mergwain listened to the glug-glug in the long neck of the decanter as if it had been a song of love, and the moment it was over, was holding the glass to his nose. "humph! not much aroma here!" he growled, "i ought to have made the old fool"--the laird must have been some fifteen years younger than he.--"set it down before the fire--only what would have become of me while it was thawing? it's no wonder though! by the time i've been buried as long, i shall want thawing too!" the wine, however, turned out more satisfactory to the palate of the toper than to his nostrils--which in truth, so much had he drunk that day, were at present incapable of doing it justice--and he set himself to enjoy it. how that should be possible to a man for whom the accompanying dried olives of memory could do so little, i find it difficult to understand. one would think, to enjoy his wine alone, a man must have either good memories or good hopes: lord mergwain had forgotten the taste of hope; and most men would shrink from touching the spring that would set a single scene of such a panorama unrolling itself, as made up the past of lord mergwain. however there he sat, and there he drank, and, truth to tell, now and then smiled grimly. the laird set a pair of brass candlesticks on the table--there were no silver utensils any more in the house of glenwarlock; years ago the last of them had vanished--and retired to a wooden chair at the end of the hearth, under the lamp that hung on the wall. but on his way he had taken from a shelf an old, much-thumbed folio which mr. simon had lent him--the journal of george fox, and the panorama which then for a while kept passing before his mind's eye, was not a little different from that passing before lord mergwain's. what a study to a spirit able to watch the unrolling of the two side by side! in a few minutes grizzie entered, carrying a fowl newly killed, its head almost touching the ground at the end of its long, limp neck. she seated herself on a stool, somewhere about the middle of the large space, and proceeded to pluck, and otherwise prepare it for the fire. having, last of all, split it open from end to end, turning it into something like an illegible heraldic crest, she approached the fire, the fowl in one hand, the gridiron in the other. "i doobt i maun get his lordship to sit a wee back frae the fire," she said. "i maun jist bran'er this chuckie for his supper." lady joan had taken mrs. warlock's chair, and her father had taken the laird's, and pulled it right in front of the fire, where a small deal table supported his bottle, his decanter, and his three glasses. "what does the woman mean?" said his lordship. "--oh! i see; a spread-eagle!--but is my room not ready yet? or haven't you one to sit in? i don't relish feasting my nose so much in advance of my other senses." "ow! nae fear o' yer lordship's nose,'cep' it be frae yer lordship's hose, my lord!" said grizzie, "for i doobt ye're birstlin' yer lordship's shins! i'll tak the cratur oot to the cairt-shed, an' sing' 't there first. but 'deed i wadna advise ye to gang to yer room a minute afore ye need, for it winna be that warm the nicht. i hae made a fire 'at's baith big an' bricht, an' fit to ro'st belzebub--an' i beg your pardon, laird--but it's some days--i micht say ooks--sin' there was a fire intil 't, an' the place needs time to tak the heat intil its auld neuks." she might have said years not a few, instead of some weeks, but her truthfulness did not drive her so far. she turned, and left the house, carrying with her the fowl to singe. "here," said his lordship to his host, "move back this table and chair a bit, will you? i don't relish having the old witch fussing about my knees. what a mistake it is not to have rooms ready for whoever may come!" the laird rose, laid his book down, and moved the table, then helped his guest to rise, moved his chair, and placed the screen again betwixt him and the door. lord mergwain re-settled himself to his bottle. in the meantime, in the guest-chamber, which had for so long entertained neither friend nor stranger, cosmo and aggie were busy--too busy to talk much--airing the linen, dusting the furniture, setting things tidy, and keeping up a roaring fire. for this purpose the remnants of an old broken-down cart, of which the axle was anciently greasy, had been fetched from the winter-store, and the wood and peats together, with a shovelful of coal to give the composition a little body, had made a glorious glow. but the heat had hardly yet begun to affect sensibly the general atmosphere of the place. it was a large room, the same size as the drawing-room immediately under it, and still less familiar to cosmo. for, if the latter filled him with a kind of loving awe, the former caused him a kind of faint terror, so that, in truth, even in broad daylight, at no time was he willing to enter it. now and then he would open the door in passing, and for a moment stand peering in, with a stricken, breath-bating enjoyment of the vague atmosphere of dread, which, issuing, seemed to envelope him in its folds; but to go in was too much, and he neither desired nor endured even the looking in for more than a few seconds. for so long it was to him like a page in a book of horrors: to go to the other end of it, and in particular to approach the heavily curtained bed, was more than he cared to do without cogent reason. at the same time he rejoiced to think there was such a room in the house, and attached to it an idea of measureless value--almost as if it had a mysterious window that looked out upon the infinite. the cause of this feeling was not to himself traceable. until old grannie's story, he had heard no tale concerning it that he remembered: he may have heard hints--a word dropped may have made its impression, and roused fancies outlasting the memory of their origin; for feelings, like memories of scents and sounds, remain, when the related facts have vanished. what it was about the room that scared him, he could not tell, but the scare was there. with a companion like aggie, however, even after hearing grannie's terrible reminiscence, he was able to be in the room without experiencing worse than that same milder, almost pleasant degree of dread, caused by the mere looking through the door into the strange brooding silence of the place. but, i must confess, this applies only to the space on the side of the bed next the fire. the bed itself--not to mention the shadowy region beyond it--on which the body of the pirate had lain, he could not regard without a sense of the awfully gruesome: itself looked scared at its own consciousness of the fact, and of the feeling it caused in the beholder. [illustration: cosmo and aggie dusting] in the strength of aggie's presence, he was now able to take a survey of the room such as never before. over walls, floor, and ceiling, his eyes were wandering, when suddenly a question arose on which he desired certainty: "is there," he said to himself, "a door upo' the ither side o' the bed?" "did grannie mak mention o' sic a door?" he asked himself next, and could not be certain of the answer. he gazed around him, and saw no door other than that by which they had entered, but at the head of the bed, on the other side, was a space hidden by the curtain: it might be there! when they went to put the sheets on the bed, he would learn! he dared not go till then! "dare not!" he repeated to himself--and went at once. he saw and trembled. it was the strangest feeling. if it was not fear, it was something very like it, but with a mixture of wondrous pleasure: there was the door! the curtains hid aggie, and for a moment he felt as if he were miles alone, and must rush back to the refuge of her presence. but he would not yield to the folly--compelled himself to walk to the door. whether he was more disappointed or relieved, he could not, the first instant, have told: instead of a door, scarcely leaning against the wall, was an old dark screen, in stamped leather, from which the gilding was long faded. disappointment and not relief was then his only sense. "aggie," he called, still on the farther side of the bed--he called gently, but trembled at the sound of his own voice--"did ye ever hear--did grannie mak mention o' a door 'at the auld captain gaed oot at?" "whisht, whisht!" cried aggie, in a loud hissing whisper, which seemed to pierce the marrow of cosmo's bones, "i rede ye say nae thing aboot that i' this chaumer. bide till we're oot o' 't: i hae near dune. syne we'll steek the door, an' lat the fire work. it'll hae eneuch adu afore it mak the place warm; the cauld intil this room's no a coamon ane. there's something by ord'nar intil 't." cosmo could no longer endure having the great, old, hearse-like bed between him and aggie. with a shiver in the very middle of his body, he hastened to the other side: there lay the country of air, and fire, and safe earthly homeliness: the side he left was the dank region of the unknown, whose march-ditch was the grave. they hurried with the rest of their work. aggie insisted on being at the farther side of the bed when they made it. not another word was spoken between them, till they were safe from the room, and had closed its door behind them. they went up to cosmo's room, to make it something fitter for a lady's bower. opening a certain chest, they took from it--stored there by his mother, cosmo loved to think--another set of curtains, clean blankets, fine sheets, and a counterpane of silk patchwork, and put them all on the bed. with these, a white toilet-cover, and a chair or two from the drawing-room, they so changed the room that cosmo declared he would not have known it. they then filled the grate with as much fuel as it would hold, and running fast down the two stairs, went again to the kitchen. at the door of it, however, aggie gave her companion the slip, and set out to go back to her grannie at muir o' warlock. cosmo found the table spread for supper, the english lord sitting with his wine before him, and the lady in his grandmother's chair, leaning back, and yawning wearily. lord mergwain looked muddled, and his daughter cast on him now and then a look that had in it more of annoyance than affection. he was not now a very pleasant lord to look on, whatever he might once have been. he was red-faced and blear-eyed, and his nose, partly from the snuff which he took in large quantity, was much injured in shape and colour: a closer description the historical muse declines. his eyes had once been blue, but tobacco, potations, revellings day and night--everything but tears, had washed from them almost all the colour. it added much to the strange unpleasantness of his appearance, that he wore a jet-black wig, so that to the unnatural came the untimely, and enhanced the withered. his mouth, which was full of false teeth, very white, and ill-fitting, had a cruel expression, and death seemed to look out every time he grinned. as soon as he and lady joan were seated at the supper-table, with grizzie to wait upon them, the laird and cosmo left the kitchen, and went to the spare-room, for the laird judged that, in the temper and mistake her father was in, the lady would be more comfortable in their absence. "cosmo," he said, standing with his back to the fire, when he had again made it up, "i cannot help feeling as if i had known that man before. but i can recall no circumstances, and it may be a mere fancy. you have never seen him before, my boy, have you?" "i don't think i have, papa; and i don't care if i never see him again," answered cosmo. "the lady is pretty, but not very pleasant, i think, though she is a lord's daughter." "ah, but such a lord, cosmo!" returned his father. "when a man goes on drinking like that, he is no better than a cheese under the spigot of a wine-cask; he lives to keep his body well soaked--that it may be the nicer, or the nastier for the worms. cosmo, my son, don't you learn to drown your soul in your body, like the poor duke of clarence in the wine-butt." the material part of us ought to keep growing gradually thinner, to let the soul out when its time comes, and the soul to keep growing bigger and stronger every day, until it bursts the body at length, as a growing nut does its shell; when, instead, the body grows thicker and thicker, lessening the room within, it squeezes the life out of the soul, and when such a man's body dies, his soul is found a shrivelled thing, too poor to be a comfort to itself or to anybody else. cosmo, to see that man drink, makes me ashamed of my tumbler of toddy. and now i think of it, i don't believe it does me any good; and, just to make sure that i am in earnest, from this hour i will take no more.--"then," he added, after a short pause, "i shall be pretty sure you will not take it." "oh, papa!" cried cosmo, "take your toddy all the same: i promise you--and a warlock will not break his word--never to taste strong drink while i live." "i should prefer the word of a man to that of a warlock," said his father. "a warlock is nothing except he be a man. some warlocks have been men." from that day, i may here mention, the laird drank nothing but water, much to the pleasure of peter simon, who was from choice a water-drinker. "what a howling night it is, cosmo!" he resumed. "if that poor old drinker had tried to get on to howglen, he would have been frozen to death; when the drink is out of the drunkard, he has nothing to resist with." by this time lord mergwain had had his supper, and had begun to drink again. grizzie wanted to get rid of him, that she might "redd up" her kitchen. but he would not move. he was quite comfortable where he was, he said, and though it was the kitchen! he wouldn't stir a peg till he had finished the magnum. my lady might go when she pleased; the magnum was better company than the whole houseful! grizzie was on the point of losing her temper with him altogether, when the laird returned to the kitchen. he found her standing before him with her two hands on her two hips, and lingered a moment at the door to hear what she was saying. "na, na, my lord!" expostulated grizzie, "i canna lea' ye here. yer lordship'll sune be past takin' care o' yersel--no 'at ye wad be a witch at it this present! ye wad be thinkin' ye was i' yer bed whan ye was i' the mids' o' the middin', or pu'in' the blankets o' the denk dub ower yer heid! lord! my lord, yet micht set the hoose o' fire, an' burn a', baith stable an' byre, an' horses an' cairts, an' cairt-sheds, an' hiz a' to white aisse in oor nakit beds!" "hold your outlandish gibberish," returned his lordship. "go and fetch me some whisky. this stuff is too cold to go to sleep on in such weather." "deil a drap or drap o' whusky, or oucht else, yer lordship's hae fra my han' this nicht--nae mair nor gien ye war a bairn 'at wantit poother to blaw himsel' up wi'! ye hae had ower muckle a'ready, gien ye war but cawpable o' un'erstan'in', or failin' that, o' believin' an honest wuman 'at kens what state ye are in better nor ye du yersel'.--a bonny lordship!" she muttered to herself as she turned from him. the laird thought it time to show himself, and went forward. lord mergwain had understood not the half of what grizzie said; but had found sufficient provocation in the tone, and was much too angry for any articulate attempt at speech beyond swearing. "my lord," said the laird, "i think you will find your room tolerably comfortable now: shall i have the pleasure of showing you the way?" "no, indeed! i'm not going to stir. fetch me a bottle of your whisky--that's pretty safe to be good." "indeed, my lord, you shall have no more drink to-night," said the laird, and taking the bottle, which was nearly empty, carried it from the table. though nearly past everything else, his guest was not yet too far gone to swear with vigour, and the volley that now came pouring from his outraged heart was such, that, for the sake of grizzie and cosmo, the laird took the bottle again in his hand, and said, that, if his lordship would drink it in his own room, he should have what was left of it. not too drunk to see where his advantage lay, lord mergwain yielded; the thunder of imprecation from bellowing sank to growling, then to muttering, and the storm gradually subsided. the laird gave him one arm, cosmo another, and grizzie came behind, ready to support or push, and so in procession they moved from the kitchen along the causeway, his lordship grumbling and slipping, hauled, carried, and shoved--through the great door, as they called it, up the stairs, past the drawing-room, and into "the muckle chaumer." there he was deposited in an easy chair, before the huge fire, and was fast asleep in a moment. lady joan had followed them, and while they were in her father's room, had passed up to her own, so that when they re-entered the kitchen, there was nobody there. with a sigh of relief the laird sank into his mother's. chair. after a little while, he sent cosmo to bed, and, rejoicing in the quiet, got again the journal of george fox, and began to read. when grizzie had pottered about for a while, she too went to bed, and the laird was alone. when he had read about an hour, he thought it time to see after his guest, and went to his room. he found him still asleep in his chair before the fire; but he could not be left there through such a night, for the fire would go out, and then a pack of wolves would hardly be worse than the invading cold. it was by no means an easy task to rouse him, however, and indeed remained in large measure unaccomplished--so far so, that, after with much labour and contrivance relieving him of his coat and boots, the laird had to satisfy his hospitality with getting him into bed in the remainder of his clothes. he then heaped fresh fuel on the fire, put out the candles, and left him to what repose there might be for him. returning to his chair and his book, the laird read for another hour, and then went to bed. his room was in the same block, above that of his mother. chapter xv. that night. cosmo's temporary quarters were in one of two or three chambers above his own, formerly occupied by domestics, when there were many more of them about the place. he went to bed, but, after about three hours, woke very cold--so cold that he could not go to sleep again. he got up, heaped on his bed everything protective he could find, and tried again. but it was of no avail. cosmo could keep himself warm enough in the open air, or if he could not, he did not mind; but to be cold in bed was more than he would willingly endure. he got up again--with an idea. why should he not amuse himself, rather than lie shivering on couch inhospitable? when anything disturbed him of a summer night, as a matter of course he got up and went out; and although naturally he was less inclined on such a night as this, when the rooks would be tumbling dead from the boughs of the fir-trees, he yet would, rather than lie sleepless with cold. on the opposite side of the court, in a gap between the stable and the byre, the men had heaped up the snow from the rest of the yard, and in the heap cosmo had been excavating. for snow-balling he had little inclination, but the snow as a plastic substance, a thing that could be compelled into shapes, was an endless delight to him, and in connection with this mound he had conceived a new fancy, which, this very night, but for the interruption of their visitors, he would already have put to the test. into the middle of the mound he had bored a tunnel, and then hollowed out what i may call a negative human shape--the mould, as it were, of a man, of life-size, with his arms thrown out, and his feet stretched straight, like one that had fallen, and lay in weariness. his object was to illuminate it, in the hope of "a man all light, a seraph man," shining through the snow. that very night he had intended, on his return from muir of warlock, to light him up; and now that he was driven out by the cold, he would brave, in his own den, in the heart of the snow, the enemy that had roused him, and make his experiment. he dressed himself, crept softly out, and, for a preparation, would have a good run. he trotted down the hill, beating his feet hard, until he reached the more level road, where he set out at full speed, and soon was warm as any boy need care to be. about three o'clock in the morning, the laird woke suddenly, without knowing why. but he was not long without knowing why he should not go to sleep again. from a distance, as it seemed, through the stillness of the night, in rapid succession, came three distinct shrieks, one close on the other, as from the throat of a human being in mortal terror. never had such shrieks invaded his ears. whether or not they came from some part of his own house, he could not tell. he sprung upon the floor, thinking first of his boy, and next of the old man whom he had left drunk in his bed, and dressed as fast as he could, expecting every moment a fresh assault of horrible sound. but all he heard was the hasty running of far off feet. he hurried down, passing carefully his mother's door, but listening as he passed, in the hope of finding she had not been disturbed. he heard nothing, and went on. but in truth the old lady lay trembling, too terrified to move or utter a sound. in the next room he heard grizzie moving, as if, like himself, getting up with all speed. down to the kitchen he ran, in haste to get out and reach the great door. but when he opened the kitchen door, a strange sight met his eyes, and for a moment arrested him. the night was dark as pitch, for, though the snow had ceased to fall, great clouds of it yet filled the vault of the sky, and behind them was no moon from which any smallest glimmer might come soaking through. but, on the opposite side of the court, the heap of snow familiar to his eyes was shining with an unknown, a faint, phosphorescent radiance. the whole heap was illuminated, and was plainly visible: but the strangest thing was, that the core of the light had a vague shadowy resemblance--if one may use the word of a shape of light--to the form of a man. there were the body and out-stretched limbs of one who had cast himself supine in sorest weariness, ready for the grave which had found him. the vision flickered, and faded and revived, and faded again, while, in his wonder forgetting for one brief moment the cries that had roused him, the laird stood and gazed. it was the strangest, ghostliest thing he had ever seen! surely he was on the point of discovering some phenomenon hitherto unknown! what grizzie would have taken it for, unhappily we do not know, for, just as the laird heard her footsteps on the stair, and he was himself starting to cross the frozen space between, the light, which had been gradually paling, suddenly went out. with its disappearance he bethought himself, and hurried towards the great door, with grizzie now at his heels. he opened it. all was still. feeling his way in the thick darkness, he went softly up the stair. cosmo had but just left the last remnants of his candle-ends burning, and climbed glowing to his room, delighted with the success of his experiment, when those quick-following, hideous sounds rent the night, like flashes from some cloud of hellish torture. his heart seemed to stand still. without knowing why, involuntarily he associated them with what he had been last about, and for a moment felt like a murderer. the next he caught up his light, and rushed from the room, to seek, like his father, that of their guest. as he reached the bottom of the first stair, the door of his own room opened, and out came lady joan, with a cloak thrown over her night-gown, and looking like marble, with wide eyes. but cosmo felt it was not she who had shrieked, and passing her without a second look, led the way down, and she followed. when the laird opened the door of the guest-chamber, there was his boy in his clothes, with a candle in his hand, and the lady in her night-gown, standing in the middle of the floor, and looking down with dismayed countenances. there lay lord mergwain!--or was it but a thing of nought--the deserted house, of a living soul? the face was drawn a little to one side, and had a mingled expression, of horror--which came from within, and of ludicrousness, which had an outside formal cause. upon closer investigation, the laird almost concluded he was dead; but on the merest chance something must be done. cosmo seemed dazed, and lady joan stood staring with lost look, more of fright than of sorrow, but there was grizzie, peeping through between them, with bright searching eyes! on her countenance was neither dismay, anxiety, nor distraction. she nodded her head now and then as she gazed, looking as if she had expected it all, and here it was. "rin an' fess het watter as fest's ye can, grizzie," said the laird. "my dear lady joan, go and dress, or you will be frozen to death. we will do all we can. cosmo, get the fire up as quickly as possible--it is not quite out. but first you and i must get him into bed, and cover him up warm, and i will rub his hands and feet till the hot water comes." as the laird said, everyone did. a pail of hot water was soon brought, the fire was soon lighted, and the lady soon returned more warmly clad. he made grizzie put the pail on a chair by the bed-side, and they got his feet in without raising him, or taking him out of the blankets. before long he gave a deep sigh, and presently showed other signs of revival. when at length he opened his eyes, he stared around him wildly, and for a moment it seemed to all of them he had lost his reason. but the laird said he might not yet have got over the drink he had taken, and if he could be got to sleep, he would probably wake better. they therefore removed some more of his clothes, laid him down again, and made him as comfortable as they could, with hot bottles about him. the laird said he would sit with him, and call lady joan if needful. to judge by her behaviour, he conjectured such a catastrophe was not altogether strange to her. she went away readily, more like one relieved than anxious. but there had arisen in the mind of the laird a fear: might not cosmo unwittingly have had some share in the frightful event? when first he entered the room, there was cosmo, dressed, and with a light in his hand: the seeming phosphorescence in the snow must have been one of his ploys, and might not that have been the source of the shock to the dazed brain of the drinker? his lordship was breathing more softly and regularly, though every now and then half waking with a cry--a dreadful thing to hear from a sleeping old man. they drew their chairs close to the fire and to each other, and cosmo, as was usual with him, laid his hand on his father's knee. "did you observe that peculiar appearance in the snow-heap, on the other side of the court, cosmo?" asked the laird. "yes, papa," replied the boy: "i made it myself." and therewith he told him all about it. "you're not vexed with me, are you, papa?" he added, seeing the laird look grave. "no, my son," answered his father; "i am only uneasy lest that should have had anything to do with this sad affair." "how could that be, papa?" asked cosmo. "he may have looked out of the window and seen it, and, in the half-foolish state he was in, taken it for something supernatural." "but why should that have done him any harm?" "it may have terrified him." "why should it terrify him?" said cosmo. "there may be things we know nothing of," replied his father, "to answer that question. i cannot help feeling rather uneasy about it." "did you see anything frightful about my man of light, papa?" inquired cosmo. "no," answered his father, thoughtfully; "but the thing, you see, was in the shape of a man--a man lying at full length as if he were dead, and indeed in his grave: he might take it for his wraith--an omen of his coming end." "but he is an englishman, papa, and the english don't believe in the second sight." "that does make it less likely.--few lowlanders do." "do you believe in it, papa?" "well, you see," returned the laird, with a small smile, "i, like yourself, am neither pure highlander nor pure lowlander, and the natural consequence is, i am not very sure whether i believe in it or not. i have heard stories difficult to explain." "still," said cosmo, "my lord would be more to blame than me, for no man with a good conscience would have been so frightened as that, even if it had been his wraith." "that may be true;--still, a man cannot help being especially sorry anything should happen to a stranger in his house. you and i, cosmo, would have our house a place of refuge.--but you had better go to bed now. there is no reason in tiring two people, when one is enough." "but, papa, i got up because i was so cold i could not sleep. if you will let me, i would much rather sit with you. i shall be much more comfortable here." that his son should have been cold in the night distressed the laird. he felt as if, for the sake of strangers, he had neglected his own--the specially sent. he would have persuaded cosmo to go to his father's bed, which was in a warmer room, but the boy begged so to be allowed to remain that he yielded. they had talked in a low voice for fear of disturbing the sleeper, and now were silent. cosmo rolled himself in his plaid, lay down at his father's feet, and was soon fast asleep: with his father there, the chamber had lost all its terrors, and was just like any other home-feeling room of the house. many a time in after years did that night, that room, that fire, and the feeling of his father over his head, while the bad lord lay snoring within the dark curtains, rise before him; and from the memory he would try to teach himself, that, if he were towards his great father in his house as he was then towards his earthly father in his, he would never fear anything. to know one's-self as safe amid storm and darkness, amid fire and water, amid disease and pain, even during the felt approach of death, is to be a christian, for that is how the master felt in the hour of darkness, because he knew it a fact. all night long, at intervals, the old man moaned, and every now and then would mutter sentences unintelligible to the laird, but sown with ugly, sometimes fearful words. in the gray of the morning he woke. "bring me brandy," he cried in a voice of discontent. the laird rose and went to him. when he saw the face above him, a horror came upon his--a look like that they found frozen on it. "who are you?" he gasped. "where am i?" "you came here in the storm last night, my lord," said the laird. "cursed place! i never had such horrible dreams in my life. where am i--do you hear? why don't you answer me?" "you are at castle warlock, my lord," replied the laird. at this he shrieked, and, throwing off the clothes, sprung from the bed. "i entreat you, my lord, to lie down again. you were very ill in the night," expostulated the laird. "i don't stop another hour in the blasted hole!" roared his guest, in a fierce quaver. out of my way you fool! where's joan? tell her to get up and come directly. i'm off, tell her. i'd as soon go to bed in the drifts as stop another hour in this abominable old lime-kiln. the laird let him rave on: it was useless to oppose him. he flew at his clothes to dress himself, but his poor old hands trembled with rage, fear, drink, and eagerness. the laird did his best to help him, but he seemed nowise recognizant. "i will get you some hot water, my lord," he said at length, and was moving towards the door. "no,--you!--everybody!" shrieked the old man. "if you go out of that door, i will throw myself out of this window." the laird turned at once, and in silence waited on him like a servant. "he must be in a fit of delirium tremens!" he said to himself. he poured him out some cold water, but he would not use it. he would neither eat nor drink nor wash till he was out of the horrible dungeon, he said. the next moment he cried for water, drank three mouthfuls eagerly, threw the tumbler from him, and broke it on the hearth. the instant he was dressed, he dropped into the great chair and closed his eyes. "your lordship must allow me to fetch some fuel," said the laird; "the room is growing cold." "no, i tell you!" cried lord mergwain, opening his eyes and sitting up. "when i'm cold i'll go to--. if you attempt to leave the room, i'll send a bullet after you.--god have mercy! what's that at my feet?" "it is only my son," replied the laird gently. "we have been with you all night--since you were taken ill, that is." "when was that? what do you mean by that?" he said, looking up sharply, with a face of more intelligence than he had yet shown. "your lordship had some sort of fit in the night, and if you do not compose yourself, i dread a return of it." "you well may, if i stop here," he returned--then, after a pause, "did i talk?" he asked. "yes, my lord--a good deal." "what did i say?" "nothing i could understand, my lord." "and you did your best, i don't doubt!" rejoined his lordship with a sneer. "but you know nothing is to be made of what a man says in a fit." "i have told your lordship i heard nothing." "no matter; i don't sleep another night under your roof." "that will be as it may, my lord." "what do you mean?" "look at the weather, my lord.--cosmo!" the boy was still asleep, but at the sound of his name from his father's lips, he started at once to his feet. "go and wake grizzie," said the laird, "and tell her to get breakfast ready as fast as she can. then bring some peat for the fire, and some hot water for his lordship." cosmo ran to obey. grizzie had been up for more than an hour, and was going about with the look of one absorbed in a tale of magic and devilry. her mouth was pursed up close, as if worlds should not make her speak, but her eyes were wide and flashing, and now and then she would nod her head, as for the q. e. d. to some unheard argument. whatever cosmo required, she attended to at once, but not one solitary word did she utter. he went back with the fuel, and they made up the fire. lord mergwain was again lying back exhausted in his chair, with his eyes closed. "why don't you give me my brandy--do you hear?" all at once he cried. "--oh, i thought it was my own rascal! get me some brandy, will you?" "there is none in the house, my lord," said his host. "what a miserable sort of public to keep! no brandy!" "my lord, you are at castle warlock--not so good a place for your lordship's needs." "oh, that's it, yes! i remember! i knew your father, or your grandfather, or your grandson, or somebody--the more's my curse! out of this i must be gone, and that at once! tell them to put the horses to. little i thought when i left cairntod where i was going to find myself! i would rather be in--and have done with it! lord! lord! to think of a trifle like that not being forgotten yet! are there no doors out? give me brandy, i say. there's some in my pocket somewhere. look you! i don't know what coat i had on yesterday! or where it is!" he threw himself back in his chair. the laird set about looking if he had brought the brandy of which he spoke; it might be well to let him have some. not finding it, he would have gone to search the outer garments his lordship had put off in the kitchen; but he burst out afresh: "i tell you--and confound you, i say that you have to be told twice--i will not be left alone with that child! he's as good as nobody! what could he do if--" here he left the sentence unfinished. "very well, my lord," responded the laird, "i will not leave you. cosmo shall go and look for the brandy-flask in your lordship's greatcoat." "yes, yes, good boy! you go and look for it. you're all cosmos, are you? will the line never come to an end! a cursed line for me--if it shouldn't be a rope-line! but i had the best of the game after all!--though i did lose my two rings. confounded old cheating son of a porpus! it was doing the world a good turn, and glenwarlock a better to--look you! what are you listening there for!--ha! ha! ha! i say, now--would you hang a man, laird--i mean, when you could get no good out of it--not a ha'p'orth for yourself or your family?" "i've never had occasion to consider the question," answered the laird. "ho! ho! haven't you? let me tell you it's quite time you considered it. it's no joke when a man has to decide without time to think. he's pretty sure to decide wrong." "that depends, i should think, my lord, on the way in which he has been in the habit of deciding." "come now! none of your scotch sermons to me! you scotch always were a set a down-brown hypocrites! confound the whole nation!" "to judge by your last speech, my lord,--" "oh, by my last speech, eh? by my dying declaration? then i tell you 'tis fairer to judge a man by anything sooner than his speech. that only serves to hide what he's thinking. i wish i might be judged by mine, though, and not by my deeds. i've done a good many things in my time i would rather forget, now age has clawed me in his clutch. so have you; so has everybody. i don't see why i should fare worse than the rest." here cosmo returned with the brandy-flask, which he had found in his greatcoat. his lordship stretched out both hands to it, more eagerly even than when he welcomed the cob-webbed magnum of claret--hands trembling with feebleness and hunger for strength. heedless of his host's offer of water and a glass, he put it to his mouth, and swallowed three great gulps hurriedly. then he breathed a deep breath, seemed to say with macbeth, "ourselves again!" drew himself up in a chair, and glanced around him with a look of gathering arrogance. a kind of truculent question was in his eyes--as much as to say, "now then, what do you make of it all? what's your candid notion about me and my extraordinary behaviour?" after a moment's silence,-- "what puzzles me is this," he said, "how the deuce i came, of all places, to come just here! i don't believe, in all my wicked life, i ever made such a fool of myself before--and i've made many a fool of myself too!" receiving no answer, he took another pull at his flask. the laird stood a little behind and watched him, harking back upon old stories, putting this and that together, and resolving to have a talk with old grannie. a minute or two more, and his lordship got up, and proceeded to wash his face and hands, ordering cosmo about after the things he wanted, as if he had been his valet. "richard's himself again!" he said in a would-be jaunty voice, the moment he had finished his toilet, and looked in a crow-cocky kind of a way at the laird. but the latter thought he saw trouble still underneath the look. "now, then, mr. warlock, where's this breakfast of yours?" he said. "for that, my lord," replied the laird, "i must beg you to come to the kitchen. the dining-room in this weather would freeze the very marrow of your bones." "and look you! it don't want freezing," said his lordship, with a shudder. "the kitchen to be sure!--i don't desire a better place. i'll be hanged if i enter this room again!" he muttered to himself--not too low to be heard. "my tastes are quite as simple as yours, mr. warlock, though i have not had the same opportunity of indulging them." he seemed rapidly returning to the semblance of what he would have called a gentleman. he rose, and the laird led the way. lord mergwain followed; and cosmo, coming immediately behind, heard him muttering to himself all down the stairs: "mere confounded nonsense! nothing whatever but the drink!--i must say i prefer the day-light after all.--yes! that's the drawing-room.--what's done's done--and more than done, for it can't be done again!" it was a nipping and an eager air into which they stepped from the great door. the storm had ceased, but the snow lay much deeper, and all the world seemed folded in a lucent death, of which the white mounds were the graves. all the morning it had been snowing busily, for no footsteps were between the two doors but those of cosmo. when they reached the kitchen, there was a grand fire on the hearth, and a great pot on the fire, in which the porridge grizzie had just made was swelling in huge bubbles that burst in sighs. old grizzie was bright as the new day, bustling and deedy. her sense of the awful was nowise to be measured by the degree of her dread: she believed and did not fear--much. she had an instinctive consciousness that a woman ought to be, and might be, and was a match for the devil. "i am sorry we have no coffee for your lordship," said the laird, "to tell the truth, we seldom take anything more than our country's porridge. i hope you can take tea? our grizzie's scons are good, with plenty of butter." his lordship had in the meantime taken another pull at the brandy-flask, and was growing more and more polite. "the man would be hard to please," he said, "who would not be enticed to eat by such a display of good victuals. tea for me, before everything!--how am i to pretend to swallow the stuff?" he murmured, rather than muttered, to himself.--"but," he went on aloud, "didn't that cheating rascal leave you--" he stopped abruptly, and the laird saw his eyes fixed upon something on the table, and following their look, saw it was a certain pepper-pot, of odd device--a piece of old china, in the shape of a clumsily made horse, with holes between the ears for the issue of the pepper. "i see, my lord," he said, "you are amused with the pepper-pot. it is a curious utensil, is it not? it has been in the house a long time--longer than anybody knows. which of my great-grandmothers let it take her fancy, it is impossible to say; but i suppose the reason for its purchase, if not its manufacture, was, that a horse passant has been the crest of our family from time immemorial." "curse the crest, and the horse too!" said his lordship. the laird started. his guest had for the last few minutes been behaving so much like a civilized being, that he was not prepared for such a sudden relapse into barbarity. but the entrance of lady joan, looking radiant, diverted the current of things. the fact was, that, like not a few old people, lord mergwain had fallen into such a habit of speaking in his worse moods without the least restraint, that in his better moods, which were indeed only good by comparison, he spoke in the same way, without being aware of it, and of himself seldom discovering that he had spoken. the rest of the breakfast passed in peace. the visitors had tea, oatcake, and scons, with fresh butter and jam; and lady joan, for all the frost and snow, had yet a new-laid egg--the only one; while the laird and cosmo ate their porridge and milk--the latter very scanty at this season of the year, and tasting not a little of turnip--and grizzie, seated on a stool at some distance from the table, took her porridge with treacle. mrs. warlock had not yet left her room. when the meal was over, lord mergwain turned to his host, and said, "will you oblige me, mr. warlock, by sending orders to my coachman to have the horses put to as quickly as possible: we must not trespass more on your hospitality.--confound me if i stop an hour longer in this hole of a place, though it be daylight!" "papa!" cried lady joan. his lordship understood, looked a little confused, and with much readiness sought to put the best face on his blunder. "pardon me, mr. warlock," he said; "i have always had a bad habit of speech, and now that i am an old man, i don't improve on it." "don't mention it, my lord," returned the laird. "i will go and see about the carriage; but i am more than doubtful." he left the kitchen, and cosmo followed him. lord mergwain turned to his daughter and said, "what does the man mean? i tell you, joan, i am going at once. so don't you side with him if he wants us to stop. he may have his reasons. i knew this confounded place before you were born, and i hate it." "very good, papa!" replied lady joan, with a slight curl of her lip. "i don't see why you should fancy i should like to stop." they had spoken aloud, regardless of the presence of grizzie. "may it be lang afore ye're in a waun an' a warmer place, my lord an' my lady," said the old woman, with the greatest politeness of manner she knew how to assume. when people were rude, she thought she had a right to be rude in return. but they took no more notice than if they had not heard. chapter xvi. through the day. it was a glorious morning. the wind had fallen quite, and the sun was shining as if he would say, "keep up your hearts; i am up here still. i have not forgotten you. by and by you shall see more of me." but nature lay dead, with a great white sheet cast over face and form. not dead?--just as much dead as ever was man, save for the inner death with which he kills himself, and which she cannot die. it is only to the eyes of his neighbours that the just man dies: to himself, and to those on the other side, he does not die, but is born instead: "he that liveth and believeth in me shall never die." but the poor old lord felt the approaching dank and cold of the sepulchre as the end of all things to him--if indeed he would be permitted to lie there, and not have to get up and go to worse quarters still. "i am sorry to have to tell you, my lord," said the laird, re-entering, "that both our roads and your horses are in such a state that it is impossible you should proceed to-day." his guest turned white through all the discoloration of his countenance. his very soul grew too white to swear. he stood silent, his pendulous under lip trembling. "though the wind fell last night," resumed the laird, "the snow came on again before the morning, and it seems impossible you should get through. to attempt it would be to run no small risk of your lives." "joan," said lord mergwain, "go and tell the rascal to put the horses to." lady joan rose at once, took her shawl, put it over her head, and went. cosmo ran to open the door for her. the laird looked on, and said not a word: the headstrong old man would find the thing could not be done! "will you come and find the coachman for me, cosmo?" said lady joan when they reached the door--with a flash of her white teeth and her dark eyes that bewitched the boy. then first, in the morning light, and the brilliance of the snow-glare, he saw that she was beautiful. when the shadows were dark about her, the darkness of her complexion obscured itself; against the white sheen she stood out darkly radiant. specially he noted the long eyelashes that made a softening twilight round the low horizon-like luminousness of her eyes. through the deep snow between the kitchen and the stable, were none but his father's footsteps. he cast a glance at her small feet, daintily shod in little more than sandals: she could not put down one of them anywhere without sinking beyond her ankle! "my lady," he said, "you'll get your feet soaking wet! they're so small, they'll just dibble the snow! please ask your papa if i mayn't go and give his message. it will do just as well." "i must go myself," she answered. "sometimes he will trust nobody but me." "stop then a moment," said cosmo. "just come to the drawing-room. i won't keep you more than two minutes. the path there, you see, is pretty well trodden." he led the way, and she followed. the fire was alight, and burning well; for grizzie, foreseeing how it must be, and determined she would not have strangers in the kitchen all day, had lighted it early. lady joan walked straight to it, and dropped, with a little shiver, into a chair beside it. to cosmo the sight of the blaze brought a strange delight, like the discover of a new loveliness in an old friend. to lady joan the room looked old-fashioned dreariness itself, to cosmo an ancient marvel, ever fresh. he left her, and ran to his own room, whence presently he returned with a pair of thick woollen stockings, knitted in green and red by the hands of his grandmother. these he carried to lady joan, where she sat on the low chair, and kneeling before her, began, without apology or explanation, to draw one of them over the dainty foot placed on the top of the other in front of the fire. she gave a little start, and half withdrew her foot; then looking down at the kneeling figure of service before her, recognized at once the utterly honest and self-forgetful earnestness of the boy, and submitted. carefully he drew the stockings on, and she neither opposed nor assisted him. when he had done, he looked up in her face with an expression that seemed to say--"there now! can't i do it properly?" but did not speak. she thanked him, rose, and went out, and cosmo conducted her to the stable, where he heard the coachman, as she called him, not much better than a stable-boy, whistling. she gave him her father's order. . . [illustration: "cosmo conducted her to the stable."] the lad stared with open mouth, and pointed to one of the stalls. there stood an utterly wretched horse, swathed in a cloth, with his head hanging down, heedless of the food before him. it was clear no hope lay there. she turned and looked at cosmo. "the better for us, my lady!" replied cosmo to her look; "we shall have your beautiful eyes the longer! they were lost in the dark last night, because they are made out of it, but now we see them, we don't want to part with them." she looked at him and smiled, saying to herself the boy would be dangerous by and by, and together they went back to the kitchen, where since they left not a word had been spoken. grizzie was removing the breakfast things; lord mergwain was seated by the fire, staring into it; and the laird had got his journal of george fox, and was reading diligently: when nothing was to be done, the deeper mind of the laird grew immediately active. when lady joan entered, her father sat up straight in his chair: he expected opposition! "one of the horses, my lord, is quite unfit," she said. "then, by my soul! we'll start with the other," he replied, in a tone that sounded defiance to heaven or earth or whatever said him nay. "as your lordship pleases," returned joan. "my lord," said the laird, lowering his book to his knee, "if i thought four cart-horses would pull you through to howglen to-night, you should have them; but you would simply stick fast, horses and all, in the snow-wreaths." the old man uttered an exclamation with an awful solemnity, and said no more, but collapsed, and sat huddled up, staring into the fire. "you must just make the best of your quarters here; they are entirely at your service, my lord," said the laird. "we shall not starve. there are sheep on the place, pigs and poultry, and plenty of oatmeal, though very little flour. there is milk too--and a little wine, and i think we shall do well enough." lord mergwain made no answer, but in his silence seemed to be making up his mind to the ineludible. "have you any more of that claret?" he asked. "not much, i am sorry to say," answered the laird, "but it is your lordship's while it lasts." "if this lasts, i shall drink your cellar dry," rejoined his lordship with a feeble grin. "i may as well make a clean breast of it. from my childhood i have never known what it was not to be thirsty. i believe thirst to be the one unfailing birth-mark of the family. i was what the methodists call a drunkard before i was born. my father died of drink. so did my grandfather. you must have some pity on me, if i should want more than seems reasonable. the only faculty ever cultivated in our strain was drinking, and i am sorry to say it has not been brought to perfection yet. perfection is to get drunk and never know it; but i have bad dreams, sir! i have bad dreams! and the worst of it is, if once i have a bad dream, i am sure to have it again; and if it come first in a strange place, it will come every night until i leave that place. i had a very bad one last night, as you know. i grant it came because i drank too much yesterday, but that won't keep it from coming again to-night." he started to his feet, the muscles of his face working frightfully. "send for your horses, mr. warlock," he cried. "have them put to at once. four of them, you said. at once--at once! out of this i must go. if it be to--itself, go i must and will." "my lord," said the laird, "i cannot send you from my house in this weather. as my guest, i am bound to do my best for you; especially as i understand the country, and you do not. i said you should have my horses if i thought they could take you through, but i do not think it. besides, the change, in my judgment, is a deceitful one, and this night may be worse than the last. poor as your accommodation is, it is better than the open road between this and howglen; though, doubtless, before to-morrow morning you would be snug in the heart of a snow--wreath." "look here, sir," said lord mergwain, and rising, he went up to the laird, and laid his hand on his shoulder; "if i stop, will you give me another room, and promise to share it with me to-night? i am aware it is an odd request to make, but, as i tell you, we have been drinking for generations, and my nerves are the worse for it. it's rather hard that the sins of the fathers should be visited on the children! before god, i have enough to do with my own, let alone my fathers'! every one should bear his own burden. i can't bear mine. if i could, it's not much my fathers' would trouble me!" "my lord, i will do anything i can for you--anything but consent to your leaving castle warlock to-day." "you will spend the night with me then?" "i will." "but not in that room, you know." "anywhere you please in the house, my lord, except my mother's room." "then i'll stop.--joan, you may amuse yourself; we are not going till to-morrow." the laird smiled; he could not flatter himself with the hope of so speedy a departure. joan turned to cosmo. "will you take me about the place?" she said. "if you mean in-doors," interposed the laird. "it is a curious old house, and might interest you a little." "i should like nothing better. may i go with cosmo?" "certainly: he will be delighted to attend your ladyship.--here are the keys of the cabinets in the drawing-room, cosmo. her ladyship may like to look at some of their contents." "i hardly know enough about them," returned cosmo. "won't you come yourself, father, and show them to us?" it was the first time the boy used the appellation. "if they are not worth looking at in themselves, the facts about them cannot be of much consequence, my boy," answered the laird. he was unwilling to leave lord mergwain. lady joan and cosmo went without him. "perhaps we may follow you by and by," said the laird. "is the place very old, cosmo?" asked lady joan on their way. "nobody knows how old the oldest part of it is," answered cosmo, "though dates are assigned to the most of what you will see to-day. but you must ask my father; i do not know much of the history of it. i know the place itself, though, as well as he does. i fancy i know nearly every visible stone of it." "you are very fond of it, then?" "there never could be any place like it to me, my lady. i know it is not very beautiful, but i love it none the less for that. i sometimes think i love it the more for its ruggedness--ugliness, if you please to call it so. if my mother had not been beautiful, i should love her all the same."--"and think there wasn't anybody like her," he was going to add, but checked himself, remembering that of course there was not. arrived in the drawing-room, whither cosmo led her first, lady joan took her former place by the fire, and sat staring into it. she did not know what to make of what she saw and heard. how could people be happy, she thought, in such a dreary, cold, wretched country, with such poverty-stricken home-surroundings, and nothing to amuse them from one week's end to another? yet they seemed to be happy to a degree she knew nothing of! for alas, her home was far from a blessed one; and as she had no fountain open in herself, but looked entirely to foreign supply for her life-necessities, and as such never can be so supplied, her life was not a flourishing one. there are souls innumerable in the world, as dry as the sahara desert--souls which, when they look most gay and summer-like, are only flaunting the flowers gathered from other people's gardens, stuck without roots into their own unproducing soil. oh, the dreariness, the sandy sadness of such poor arid souls! they are hungry, and eat husks; they are thirsty, and drink hot wine; their sleep is a stupor, and their life, if not an unrest, then a yielded decay. only when praised or admired do they feel as if they lived! but joan was not yet of such. she had had too much discomfort to have entered yet into their number. there was water not yet far from the surface of her consciousness. with no little pleasure and some pride, cosmo proceeded to take the family treasures from their shelves; but, alas! most of them were common to the eyes of one who also had a family and a history, lived in a much larger, if not half so old a house, and had had amongst her ancestors more than one with a liking for antiquities, oddities, and bibelots. lady joan regarded them listlessly, willing to seem to attend to the boy, but, with her thoughts far away, while now and then she turned a weary gaze towards the next window: all she saw thence was a great, mounded country, dreary as sunshine and white cold could make it. storm, driving endless whirls of spectral snow, would have been less dreary to her than the smiling of this cold antagonism. it was a picture of her own life. evil greater than she knew had spread a winter around her. if her father suffered for the sins of his fathers, she suffered for his, and had for them to dwell in desolation and loneliness. one thing after another cosmo brought her, but none of them seemed much to interest her. she knew the sort of most of them. "this is said to be solid silver," he remarked, as he laid on a chair beside her a curious little statuette of a horse, trapped and decorated in indian graving, and having its whole surface covered with an involved and rich ornamental design. its eyes were, or seemed to be rubies, and saddle and bridle and housing were studded with small gems. there was little merit in the art of it beyond the engraving, but cosmo saw the eyes of the lady fixed upon it, with a strange look in them. "that is the only thing they say the old captain ever gave his brother, my great-grand-father," said cosmo. "but i beg your pardon," he added, "i have never told you the story of the old captain!" the boy already felt as if he had known their guest of a night for years; the hearts of the young are divinely hospitable, which is one of the things that make children the such of the kingdom of heaven. lady joan took the horse in her hand, and looked at it more closely. "it is very heavy!" she remarked. "it is said to be solid silver," repeated cosmo. she laid it down, and put her hand to her forehead, but said nothing. they heard the steps and voices of the two gentlemen ascending the stair. lady joan caught up the horse, rose hastily, and holding it out to cosmo, said, "quick! quick! put it away. don't let my father see it." cosmo cast on her one look of surprise, and obeyed at once, restored it to its place, and had just closed the doors of the cabinet, when lord mergwain and his father entered the room. they, were a peculiar-looking pair--lord mergwain in antiquated dress, not a little worn, and neither very clean nor in very good condition--a snuffy, dilapidated, miserable, feeble old man, with a carriage where doubt seemed rooted in apprehension, every other moment casting about him a glance of enquiry, as if an evil spirit came running to the mouth of his eye-caves, looked out, and retreated; and the laird behind him, a head higher, crowned with his red night-cap, and dressed as i have already described, looking older than his years, but bearing on his face the repose of discomfort accepted, his eye keen and clear, and, when turned on his guest, filled with compassion rather than hospitality. he was walking more erect than usual, either in recognition of the lady's presence, or from a feeling of protection towards her father. "now, my lord," he said, as they advanced from the door, "we will set you in a warm corner by the fire, and you must make the best of it. we can't have things all as we should like them. that is not what the world was made for." his lordship returned him no answer, but threw a queer look from under his black wig--a look of superior knowledge--of the wisdom of this world. "you are an old fool," it said; "but you are master here! ah! how little you know!" he walked tottering to the fire where cosmo had already set for him a chair. something in the look of it displeased him. he glanced round the room. "fetch me that chair, my boy," he said, not unkindly, and cosmo hastened to substitute the one he indicated. the laird placed a tall screen behind it. his lordship dropped into the chair, and began to rub his knees with his hands, and gaze into the fire. lady joan rearranged her skirts, and for a moment the little circle looked as if each was about to settle down to some mild enjoyment of the others. cosmo drew a chair as near lady joan as he judged politeness would permit. the laird made up the fire, and turned away, saying he must go and see the sick horse. "mr. warlock!" said lord mergwain, and spoke with a snarl, "you will not deprive us of the only pleasure we have--that of your company?" "i shall be back in a few minutes, my lord," replied his host; and added, "i must see about lunch too." "that was wonderful claret!" said his lordship, thoughtfully. "i shall see to the claret, my lord." "if i might suggest, let it be brought here. a gentle airing under my own eye, just an introduction to the fire, would improve what is otherwise perfect.--and look here," he added, as, with a kindly bow of assent, the laird was going, "--you haven't got a pack of cards, have you?" "i believe there is a pack somewhere in the house," replied the laird, "but it is very old, and i fear too much soiled for your lordship's hands." "oh, confound the dirt!" said his lordship. "let us have them. they're the only thing to make the time pass." "have you a library?" asked lady joan--mainly to say something, for she was not particularly fond of books; like most people she had not yet learned to read. "what do you want with a library?" growled her father. "books are nothing but a pack of lies, not half so good for killing time as a pack of cards. you're going to play a rubber, not to read books!" "with pleasure, papa," responded lady joan. "_i_ don't want to kill the time. i should like to keep it alive for ever," said cosmo, with a worshipping look at the beautiful lady--a summer-bird of heaven that had strayed into their lonely winter. "hold your tongue; you are an idiot!" said his lordship angrily. "--old and young," he went on, unaware of utterance, "the breed is idiotic. 'tis time it were played out." cosmo's eyes flashed. but the rudesby was too old to be served as he had served the schoolmaster! he was their guest too, and the father of the lady by his side! the hand of the lady stole to his, and patting it gently, said, as plainly as if it had been her mouth, "don't mind him; he is an old man, and does not know what he is saying." he looked up in her face, and his anger was gone. "come with me," he said, rising; "i will show you what books we have. there may be one you would like another time. we shall be back before the cards come." "joan!" cried her father, "sit still." she glanced an appeal for consideration to cosmo, and did not move. cosmo sat down again. a few minutes passed in silence. father and daughter stared into the fire. so did cosmo. but into what different three worlds did the fire stare! the old man rose and went to the window. "i must get away from this abominable place," he said, "if it cost me my life." he looked out and shuddered. the world seemed impassable as a dead world on which the foot of the living could take no hold, could measure no distance, make no progress. not a print of man or of beast was visible. it was like a world not yet discovered. "i am tied to the stake; i hear the fire roaring!" he muttered. "my fate has found me--caught me like a rat, and is going to make an end of me! in my time nobody believed such things! now they seem to be coming into fashion again!" whoever would represent what is passing in a mind, must say more than the man himself knows how to say. the laird re-entered. "well, have you brought the cards?" said lord mergwain, turning from the window. "i have, my lord. i am sorry it is such a poor pack, but we never play.--i think, cosmo, you had better come with me." "hold you, laird, we're going to have a rubber!" "cosmo does not understand the game." "i will teach him," said lady joan. "he shall be live dummy for a few rounds; that will be enough." "my lord will not care to play for counters," persisted the laird, "and we cannot play for money." "i don't care what the points are," said lord mergwain, "--sixpence, if you like--so long as it is money. none but a fool cares for victory where nothing is to be got by it." "i am sorry to disappoint your lordship," returned the laird, "but play for money neither my son nor myself will. but perhaps you would like a game of draughts, or backgammon?" "will you bet on the game or the gammon?" "on nothing, my lord." "oh, confound you!" he turned again and went to the window. "this is frightful!" he said to himself. "nothing whatever to help one to forget! if the day goes on like this, i shall out with everything.--maybe i had better!--how the clodpoles would stare! i believe i should laugh in the middle of it.--and that fellow lurking somewhere all the time about the place, watching his chance when the night comes!--it's horrible. i shall go mad!" this last he spoke aloud. "papa!" said his daughter sharply. lord mergwain started, and looked troubled. what he might have uttered, he could not tell. "a rubber, then," he said, approaching the fire again, "--on any terms, or no terms at all!" he took up the cards. "ha, there's blood on them," he cried, and dashing them on the table, turned once more to the window. he was like a bird in a cage that knows he cannot get out, and yet keeps trying, as if he dared not admit the impossibility. twenty times that morning he went to the window, saying, "i must get out of this!" and returned again to his seat by the fire. the laird had removed the pack, and he said nothing more about a rubber. lady joan tried to talk, and cosmo did his best to amuse her. the laird did his endeavour with his lordship, but with small success. and so the morning crept away. it might have been a pleasant one to the rest, but for the caged lord's misery. at last came grizzie. "sir, an' my lord," she said, "come ye doon the stair. the kail's het, an' the cheirs is set, an' yer denner's waitin' ye there." it may have been already observed, that to grizzie came not unfrequently an odd way of riming what she said. she was unaware of this peculiarity. the suggestion of sound by sound was as hidden from her as it was deep-seated in her and strong. and this was not all: the riming might have passed unperceived by others too, but for the accompanying tendency to rhythm as well. nor was this by any means all yet: there was in her a great leaning to poetic utterance generally, and that arising from a poetic habit of thought. she had in her everything essential to the making of a poetess; yet of the whole she was profoundly ignorant; and had any one sought to develop the general gift, i believe all would have shrunk back into her being. the laird rose and offered his arm to lady joan. lord mergwain gave a grunt, and looked only a little pleased at the news: no discomfort or suffering, mental or spiritual, made him indifferent to luncheon or dinner--for after each came the bottle; but the claret had not been brought to the drawing-room as he had requested! when they reached the kitchen, he looked first eagerly, then uneasily round him: no bottle, quart or magnum was to be seen! a cloud gathered, lowering and heavy, on the face of the toper. the laird saw it, remembered that, in his anxiety to amuse him, he had forgotten his dearest delight, and vanished in the region behind. mrs. warlock, according to her custom, was already seated at the head of the table. she bowed just her head to his lordship, and motioned him to a chair on her right hand. he took it with a courteous acknowledgment, of which he would hardly have been capable, had he not guessed on what errand his host was gone: he had no recollection of having given her offence. "i hope your ladyship is well this morning?" he said. "ye revive an auld custom, my lord," returned his hostess, not without sign of gratification, "--clean oot o' fashion noo-a-days, excep' amang the semple. a laird's wife has no richt to be ca'd my leddy,'cep' by auncient custom." "oh, if you come to that," returned his lordship, "three fourths of the titles in use are merely of courtesy. joan there has no more right than yourself to be called my lady. neither has my son borland the smallest right to the title; it is mine, and mine only, as much as mergwain." the old lady turned her head, and fixed a stolen but searching gaze on her guest, and to the end of the meal took every opportunity of regarding him unobserved. her son from the other end of the table saw her looks, and guessed her suspicions; saw also that she did not abate her courtesy, but little thought to what her calmness was owing. mrs. warlock, ready to welcome anything marvellous, had held with grizzie much conference concerning what had passed in the night--one accidental result of which was the disappearance for the time of all little rivalries and offences between them in the common interest of an awful impending denouement. she had never heard, or had forgotten the title to which lord borland of the old time was heir; and now that all doubt as to the identity of the man was over, although, let her strain her vision as she might, she could not, through the deformation of years, descry the youthful visage, she felt that all action on the part of the generation in possession was none the less forestalled and precluded by the presence of one in the house who had evidently long waited his arrival, and had certainly but begun his reprisals. more would be heard ere the next dawn, she said to herself; and with things in such a train she would not interfere by the smallest show of feud or offence. who could tell how much that certain inmate of the house--she hesitated to call him a member of the family--and, in all righteous probability, of a worse place as well, had to do with the storm that drove borland thither, and the storms that might detain him there! already there were signs of a fresh onset of the elements! the wind was rising; it had begun to moan in the wide chimney; and from the quarter whence it now blew, it was certain to bring more storm, that is snow! the dinner went on. the great magnum before the fire was gathering genial might from the soft insinuation of limpid warmth, renewing as much of its youth as was to be desired in wine; and redeveloping relations, somewhat suppressed, with the slackening nerves and untwisting fibres of an old man's earthly being! but there was not a drop to drink on the table, except water; and the toper found it hard to lay solid foundation enough for the wine that was to follow, and grumbled inwardly. the sight of the bottle before the fire, however, did much to enable him, not to be patient, but to suppress the shows of impatience. he eyed it, and loved it, and held his peace. he saw the water at his elbow, and hated it the worse that it was within his reach--hated its cold staring rebuke as he hated virtue--hated it as if its well were in the churchyard where the old captain was buried sixty years ago. --confound him! why wouldn't he lie still? he made some effort to be polite to the old hag, as he called her, in that not very secret chamber of his soul, whose door was but too ready to fall ajar, and allow its evil things to issue. he searched his lumber-room for old stories to tell, but found it difficult to lay hold on any fit for the ears present, though one of the ladies was an old woman--old enough, he judged, not to be startled at anything, and the other his own daughter, who ought to see no harm when her father made the company laugh! it was a miserable time for him, but, like a much enduring magician awaiting the moment of power, he kept eying the bottle, and gathering comfort. grizzie eyed him from behind, almost as he eyed the bottle. she eyed him as she might the devil caught in the toils of the arch-angel; and if she did not bring against him a railing accusation, it was more from cunning than politeness. "ah, my fine fellow!" her eyes said, "he is after you! he will be here presently!" grizzie afforded a wonderfully perfect instance of a relation which is one of the loveliest in humanity--absolute service without a shade of servility. she would have died for her master, but even to him she must speak her mind. her own affairs were nothing to her, and those of her master as those of the universe, but she was vitally one of his family, as the toes belong to the head! in truth, she was of the family like a poor relation, with few privileges, and no end of duties; and she thought ten times more of her duties than her privileges. she would have fed, and sometimes did feed with perfect satisfaction on the poorest scraps remaining from meals, but a doubt of the laird's preference of her porridge to that of any maker in broad scotland, would have given her a sore heart. she would have wept bitter tears had the privilege of washing the laird's feet been taken from her. if reverence for the human is an essential element of greatness, then at least greatness was possible to grizzie. she dealt with no abstractions; she worshipped one living man, and that is the first step toward the love of all men; while some will talk glowingly about humanity, and be scornful as a lap-dog to the next needy embodiment of it that comes in their way. such as grizzie will perhaps prove to be of those last foredoomed to be first. with the tenderness of a ministering angel and mother combined, her eyes waited upon her master. she took her return beforehand in the assurance that the laird would follow her to the grave, would miss her, and at times think nobody could do something or other so much to his mind as old grizzie. and if, like the old captain, she might be permitted to creep about the place after night-fall, she desired nothing better than the chance of serving him still, if but by rolling a stone out of his way. the angels might bear him in their hands--she could not aspire to that, but it would be much the same whether she got the stone out of the way of his foot, or they lifted his foot above the stone! dinner over, the laird asked his guest whether he would take his wine where he was, or have it carried to the drawing-room. the offering of this alternative the old lady, to use an elizabethan phrase, took in snuff; for although she never now sat in the drawing-room, and indeed rarely crossed its threshold, it was her room; and, ladies having been banished from the dining-room while men drank, what would be left them if next, bottle in hand, the men invaded the drawing--room? but happily their guest declined the proposal, and that on the very ground of respect for her ladyship's apartment; the consequence of which was that she very nearly forgave him the murder of which she never doubted him guilty, saying to herself that, whatever he might be when disguised, poor man--and we all had our failings--he knew how to behave when sober, and that was more than could be said for everybody! so the old lord sat in the kitchen and drank his wine; and the old lady sat by the fire and knitted her stocking, went to sleep, and woke up, and went to sleep again a score of times, and enjoyed her afternoon. not a word passed between the two: now, in his old age, lord mergwain never talked over his bottle; he gave his mind to it. the laird went and came, unconsciously anxious to be out of the way of his guest, and consciously anxious not to neglect him, but nothing was said on either side. the old lady knitted and dozed, and his lordship sat and drank, now and then mingling the aesthetic with the sensual, and holding his glass to the light to enjoy its colour and brilliancy,--doing his poor best to encourage the presence of what ideas he counted agreeable, and prevent the intrusion of their opposites. and still as he drank, the braver he grew, and the more confident that the events of the past night were but the foolish consequences of having mingled so many liquors, which, from the state of the thermometer, had grown cold in his very stomach, and bred rank fancies! "with two bottles like this under my belt," he said to himself, "i would defy them all, but this wretched night-capped curmudgeon of a host will never fetch me a second! if he had not been so niggardly last night, i should have got through well enough!" lady joan and cosmo had been all over the house, and were now sitting in the drawing-room, silent in the firelight. lady joan did not yet find cosmo much of a companion, though she liked to have him beside her, and would have felt the dreariness more penetrating without him. but to cosmo her presence was an experience as marvellous and lovely as it was new and strange. he had never save in his dreams before been with one who influenced him with beauty; and never one of his dreams came up to the dream--like reality that now folded him about with bliss. for he sat, an isolating winter stretched miles and miles around him, in the old paradise of his mother's drawing-room, in the glorious twilight of a peat and wood fire, the shadows flickering about at their own wild will over all the magic room, at the feet of a lady, whose eyes were black as the night, but alive with a radiance such as no sun could kindle, whose hand was like warm snow, whose garments were lovely as the clouds that clothe a sunset, and who inhabited an atmosphere of evanescent odours that were themselves dreams from a region beyond the stars, while the darkness that danced with the firelight played all sorts of variations on the theme of her beauty. how long he had sat lost in the dream-haunted gorgeous silence he did not know, when suddenly he bethought himself that he ought to be doing something to serve or amuse, or at least interest the heavenly visitant. strangers and angels must be entertained, nor must the shadow of loneliness fall upon them. now to that end he knew one thing always good, always at hand, and specially fitting the time. "shall i tell you a story, my lady?" he said, looking up to her from the low stool on which he had taken his place at her feet. "yes, if you please," she answered, finding herself in a shoal of sad thoughts, and willing to let them drift. "then i will try. but i am sorry i cannot tell it so well as grizzie told it me. her old-fashioned way suits the story. and then i must make english of it for your ladyship, and that goes still worse with it." alas! alas! the speech of every succeeding generation is a falling away from the pith and pathos of the preceding. speech gains in scope, but loses in intensity. "there was once a girl in the highlands," began cosmo, "--not very far from here it was, who was very beautiful, so that every young man in the neighbourhood fell in love with her. she was as good as she was beautiful, and of course would not let more than one be her lover, and said no to every one else; and if after that they would go on loving her, she could not help it. she was the daughter of a sheep--farmer, who had a great many sheep that fed about over the hills, and she helped her father to look after them, and was as good and obedient as any lamb of his flock. and her name was mary. her other name i do not know. "now her father had a young shepherd, only a year or two older than mary, and he of course was in love with her as well as the rest, and more in love with her than any of them, because he was the most to be trusted of all in that country-side. he was very strong and very handsome, and a good shepherd. he was out on the hills all day, from morning to night, seeing that the sheep did their duty, and ate the best grass, so as to give plenty of good wool, and good mutton when it was wanted.--that's the way grizzie tells the story, my lady, though not so that you would understand her.--when any of the lambs were weakly or ill, they were brought home for mary to nurse, and that was how the young shepherd came to know mary, and mary to know him. and so it came to pass that they grew fond of each other, and saw each other as often as they could; and mary promised, if her father would let her, she would marry alister. but her father was too well-off to show favour to a poor shepherd lad, for his heart had got so full of his money that there was not room enough for the blood in it. if alister had had land and sheep like himself, he would have had no objection to giving him mary; but a poor son-in-law, however good he might be, would make him feel poor, whereas a rich son-in-law, if he were nothing but an old miser, would make him feel rich! he told alister, therefore, that he had nothing to say to him, and he and mary must have nothing to say to each other. mary felt obliged to do what her father told her, but in her heart she did not give up alister, and felt sure alister did not give up her, for he was a brave and honest youth. "of course alister was always wanting to see mary, and often he saw her when nobody, not even mary herself, knew it. one day she was out rather late on the hill, and when the gloaming came down, sat wishing in her heart that out of it alister would come, that she might see him, though she would not speak to him. she was sitting on a stone, grizzie says, with the gloamin' coming down like a gray frost about her; and by the time it grew to a black frost, out of it came some one running towards her. "but it was not alister; it was a farmer who wanted to marry her. he was a big, strong man, rich and good-looking, though twice mary's age. her father was very friendly to him. but people said he was a coward. "now just at that time, only it had not yet reached the glen, a terrible story was going about the country, of a beast in the hills, that went biting every living thing he could get at, and whatever he bit went raving-mad. he never ate any creature he attacked, never staid to kill it, but just came up with a rush, bit it, and was out of sight in a moment. it was generally in the twilight he came. he appeared--nobody ever saw from where--made his gnash, and was gone. there was great terror and dismay wherever the story was heard, so that people would hardly venture across their thresholds after sun-down, for terror lest the beast should dash out of the borders of the dark upon them, and leave his madness in them. some'said it was a sheep-dog, but some who thought they had seen it, said it was too large for any collie, and was, they believed, a mad wolf; for though there are no wolves in scotland now, my lady, there were at one time, and this is a very old story." lady joan gaped audibly. "i am wearying you, my lady!" said cosmo, penitently. "no, no! dear boy," answered lady joan, sorry, and a little ashamed. "it is only that i am very weary. i think the cold tires one." "i will tell you the rest another time," said cosmo cheerily. "you must lie down on the sofa, and i will cover you up warm." "no, no; please go on. indeed i want to hear the rest of it." "well," resumed cosmo, "the news of this wolf, or whatever it was, had come to the ears of the farmer for the first time that day at a fair, and he was hurrying home with his head and his heart and his heels full of it, when he saw mary sitting on the white stone by the track, feeling as safe as if she were in paradise, and as sad as if she were in purgatory.--that's how grizzie tells it--i suppose because some of her people are papists.--but, for as much as he wanted to marry her, you could hardly say he was in love with her--could you, lady joan?--when i tell you that, instead of stopping and taking her and her sheep home, he hurried past her, crying out, 'gang hame, mary. there's a mad beast on the hill. rin, rin--a' 't ye can. never min' yer sheep.' his last words came from the distance, for he never stayed a step while he spoke. "mary got up at once. but you may be sure, my lady, a girl like that was not going to leave her sheep where she dared not stop herself. she began to gather them together to take them out of harm's way, and was just setting out with them for home, when a creature like a huge dog came bounding upon her out of the edge of the night. the same instant, up from behind a rock, a few yards away, jumped alister, and made at the beast with his crook; and just as the wolf was upon mary, for alister was not near enough to get between the beast and her, he heaved a great blow at him, which would have knocked him down anyhow. but that instant mary threw herself towards alister, and his terrible blow came down upon her, and not upon the wolf, and she fell dead in his arms--that's what grizzie says--and away went the wolf, leaping and bounding, and never uttering a cry. "what alister did next, grizzie never says--only that he came staggering up to her father's door with dead mary in his arms, carried her in, laid her on the bed, and went out again. they found the blow on on her head, and when they undressed her, they found also the bite of the wolf; and they soon guessed how it had been, and said it was well she had died so, for it was much better than going mad first: it was kind of death, they said, to come and snatch her away out of the arms of madness. but the farmer, because he hated alister, and knew that alister must have seen him running away, gave it out, that he himself was rushing to defend mary, and that the blow that killed her was meant for him. nobody however believed him. "what people might think, was, however, a matter of little consequence to alister, for from that day he never spoke to human being, never slept under a roof. he left his shepherding, and gave himself to the hunting of the mad wolf: such a creature should not be allowed to live, and he must do some good thing for mary's sake. mary was so good, that any good thing done would be a thing done for her. so he followed and followed, hunting the horrible creature to destroy him. some said he lived on his hate of the wolf, and never ate anything at all. but some of the people on the hills, when they heard he had been seen, set out of their doors at night milk and cakes; and in the morning, sometimes, they would be gone, and taken as if by a human being, and not an animal. "by and by came a strange story abroad. for a certain old woman, whom some called a witch, and whom all allowed to have the second sight, told that, one night late, as she was coming home from her daughter's house, she saw alister lying in the heather, and another sitting with him; alister she saw plainly with her first or bodily eyes; but with her second eyes, in which lay the second sight, she saw his head lying on a woman's lap--and that woman was mary, whom he had killed. he was fast asleep, and whether he knew what pillow he had, she could not tell; but she saw the woman as plainly as if with her bodily eyes,--only with the difference which there always was, she said, and which she did not know how to describe, between the things seen by the one pair of eyes, and the things seen by the other. she stood and regarded them for some time, but neither moved. it was in the twilight, and as it grew darker she could see alister less and less clearly, but always mary better and better--till at last the moon rose, and then she saw alister again, and mary no more. but, through the moonlight, three times she heard a little moan, half very glad, and half a little sad. "now the people had mostly a horror of alister, and had shunned him--even those who did not believe him to blame for what he had done--because of his having killed a human being, one made like himself, and in the image of god; but when they heard the wise woman's story, they began to feel differently towards alister, and to look askance upon mary's father, whose unkindness had kept them asunder. they said now it had all come through him, and that god had sent the wolf to fetch mary, that he might give her and alister to each other in spite of him--for god had many a way of doing a thing, every one better than another. "but that did not help alister to find the wolf. the winter came, however, and that did help him, for the snow let him see the trail, and follow faster. the wonder was that the animal, being mad, lived so long; but some said that, although the wolf was mad, he was not mad in any ordinary way--if he had been, he would indeed have been dead long ago; he was a wolf into which an evil spirit had entered; and had he been a domestic animal, or one for the use of man, he would immediately have destroyed himself; but, being a wild and blood-thirsty animal, he went on very much like his natural self, without knowing what sort of a fellow-tenant he had with him in the house. "at last, one morning in the month of december, when the snow lay heavy on the ground, some men came upon a track which they all agreed must be that of the wolf. they went and got their weapons, and set out in chase. they followed, and followed, and better than followed, and the trail led them high into the hills, wondering much at the huge bounds with which the beast had galloped up the steepest places. they concluded that alister had been after him, and that the beast knew it, and had made for the most inaccessible spot he was acquainted with. they came at length to a point where a bare-foot human track joined that of the wolf for a little way, and after that they came upon it again and again. up and up the mountain they went--sometimes losing the track from the great springs the wolf took--now across a great chasm which they had to go round the head of, now up the face of a rock too steep for the snow to lie upon, so that there was no print of his horrid feet. "but at last, almost at the top of the mountain, they saw before them two dark spots in a little hollow, and when they reached it, there was the wolf, dead in a mass of frozen blood and trampled snow. it was a huge, gaunt, gray, meagre carcass, with the foam frozen about its jaws, and stabbed in many places, which showed the fight had been a close one. all the snow was beaten about, as if with many feet, which showed still more plainly what a tussle it had been. a little farther on lay alister, as if asleep, stretched at full length, with his face to the sky. he had been dead for many hours, they thought, but the smile had not faded which his spirit left behind as it went. all about his body were the marks of the brute's teeth--everywhere almost except on his face. that had been bespattered with blood, but it had been wiped away. his dirk was lying not far off, and his skene dhu close by his hand. "there is but one thing more--and i think that is just the thing that made me want to tell you the story. the men who found alister declared when they came home, and ever after when they told the story--grizzie says her grandmother used always to say so--that, when they lifted him to bring him away, they saw in the snow the mark of the body, deep--pressed, but only as far as the shoulders; there was no mark of his head whatever. and when they told this to the wise woman, she answered only,'of coorse! of coorse!--gien i had been wi' ye, lads, i wad hae seen mair.' when they pressed her to speak more plainly, she only shook her head, and muttered, 'dull--hertit gowks!'--that's all, my lady." in the kitchen, things were going on even more quietly than in the drawing-room. in front of the fire sat the english lord over his wine; mistress warlock sat in her arm-chair, knitting and dozing--between her evanescent naps wide awake, and ever and anon sliding her eyes from the stocking which did not need her attention to the guest who little desired it; the laird had taken his place at the other corner, and was reading the journal of george fox; and grizzie was bustling about with less noise than she liked, and wishing heartily she were free of his lordship, that she might get on with her work. scarcely a word was spoken. it began to grow dark; the lid of the night was closing upon them ere half a summer-day would have been over. but it mattered little: the snow had stayed the work of the world. grizzie put on the kettle for her mistress's tea. the old lady turned her forty winks into four hundred, and slept outright, curtained in the shadows. all at once his lordship became alive to the fact that the day was gone, shifted uneasily in his chair, poured out a bumper of claret, drank it off hurriedly, and hitched his chair a little nearer to the fire. his hostess saw these movements with satisfaction: he had appeased her personal indignation, but her soul was not hospitable towards him, and the devil in her was gratified with the sight of his discomposure: she hankered after talion, not waited on penitence. her eyes sought those of grizzie. "gang to the door, grizzie," she said, "an' see what the nicht's like. i'm thinkin' by the cry o' the win', it 'll be a wull mirk again.--what think ye, laird?" her son looked up from his book, where he had been beholding a large breadth of light on the spiritual sky, and answered, somewhat abstractedly, but with the gentle politeness he always showed her. "i should not wonder if it came on to snow again!" lord mergwain shifted uneasily. grizzie returned from her inspection of the weather. "it's black theroot, an' dingin' 'oot, wi' great thuds o' win'," she said, quite unaware as usual of the style of her utterance. "god bless me!" murmured his lordship, "what an abominable country!" "had we not better go to the drawing-room, my lord?" said the laird. "i think, grizzie," he went on, "you must get supper early. --and, grizzie," he added, rising, "mind you bring lady joan a cup of tea--if your mistress will excuse her," he concluded, with a glance to his mother. mistress warlock was longing for a talk with grizzie, and had no wish for lady joan's presence at tea. "an old woman is bare company for a young one, cosmo," she said. his lordship sat as if he did not mean to move. "will you not come, lord mergwain?" said the laird. "we had better go before the night gets worse." "i will stay where i am." "excuse me, my lord, that can hardly be. come, i will carry your wine. you will finish your bottle more at your ease there, knowing you have not to move again." "the bottle is empty," replied his lordship, gruffly, as if reproaching his host for not being aware of the fact, and having another at hand to follow. "then--" said the laird, and hesitated. "then you'll fetch me another!" adjoined his lordship, as if answering an unpropounded question that ought not to be put. seeing, however, that the laird stood in some hesitation still, he added definitively, "i don't stir a peg without it. get me another bottle--another magnum, i mean, and i will go at once." yet a moment the laird reflected. he said to himself that the wretched man had not had nearly so much to drink that day as he had the day before; that he was used to soaking, and a great diminution of his customary quantity might in its way be dangerous; and that anyhow it was not for him to order the regimen of a passing guest, to whom first of all he owed hospitality. "i will fetch it, my lord," he said, and disappeared in the milk-cellar, from which a steep stone-stair led down to the ancient dungeon. "the maister's gane wantin' a licht," muttered grizzie; "i houp he winna see onything." it was an enigmatical utterance, and angered lord mergwain. "what the deuce should he see, when he has got to feel his way with his hands?" he snarled. "there's some things, my lord,'at can better affoord to come oot i' the dark nor the licht," replied grizzie. his lordship said nothing in rejoinder, but kept looking every now and then towards the door of the milk-cellar--whether solely in anxiety for the appearance of the magnum, may be doubtful. the moment the laird emerged from his dive into darkness, bearing with him the pearl-oyster of its deep, his lordship rose, proud that for an old man he could stand so steady, and straightened himself up to his full height, which was not great. the laird set down the bottle on the table, and proceeded to wrap him in a plaid, that he might not get a chill, nor heeded that his lordship, instead of showing recognition of his care, conducted himself like an ill-conditioned child, to whom his mother's ministrations are unwelcome. but he did not resist, he only grumbled. as soon as the process was finished, he caught up the first bottle, in which, notwithstanding his assertion, he knew there was yet a glass or two, while the laird resumed the greater burden of the second, and gave his guest an arm, and grizzie, leaving the door open to cast a little light on their way, followed close behind, to see them safe in. when they reached the drawing-room, his lordship out of breath with the long stair, they found lady joan teaching and cosmo learning backgammon, which they immediately abandoned until they had him in his former chair, with a small table by him, on it the first bottle, and the fresh one at his feet before the fire: with the contents of one such inside him, and another coming on, he looked more cheerful than since first he entered the house. but a fluctuating trouble was very visible in his countenance notwithstanding. a few poverty-stricken attempts at conversation followed, to which lord mergwain contributed nothing. lost in himself, he kept his eyes fixed on the ripening bottle, waiting with heroic self-denial, nor uttering a single audible oath, until the sound of its opening should herald the outbursting blossom of the nightly flower of existence. the thing hard to bear was, that there were no fresh wine-glasses on the table--only the one he had taken care to bring with the old bottle. presently grizzie came with the tea-things, and as she set them down, remarked, with cunningly devised look of unconsciousness: "it's a gurly nicht; no a pinch o' licht; an' the win' blawin' like deevils; the pooer o' the air, he's oot wi' a rair, an' the snaw rins roon' upo' sweevils." "what do you mean, woman? would you drive me mad with your gibberish?" cried his lordship, getting up, and going to the window. "ow, na, my lord!" returned grizzie quietly; "mad's mad, but there's waur nor mad." "grizzie!" said the laird, and she did not speak again. lurking in grizzie was the suspicion, less than latent in the minds of the few who had any memory of the old captain, that he had been robbed as well as murdered--though nothing had ever been missed that was known to belong to him, except indeed an odd walking-stick he used to carry; and if so, then the property, whatever it was, had been taken to the loss of his rightful heir, warlock o' glenwarlock. hence mainly arose grizzie's desire to play upon the fears of the english lord; for might he not be driven by terror to make restitution? therefore, although, obedient to the will of her master, she left the room in silence, she cast on the old man, as she turned away, a look, which, in spite of the wine he had drunk, and the wine he hoped to drink, he felt freeze his very vitals--a look it was of inexplicable triumph, and inarticulate doom. the final effect of it on her victim, however, was different from what she intended. for it roused suspicion. what if, he thought with himself, he was the victim of a conspiracy? what if the something frightful that befell him the night before, of which he had but a vague recollection, had been contrived and executed by the people of the house? this horrible old hag might remember else-forgotten things? what if they had drugged his wine? the first half of the bottle he had yesterday was decanted!--but the one he had just drunk had not been touched! and this fresh one before the fire should not be carried from his sight! he would not take his eyes off it for a moment! he was safe so far as these were concerned! only if after all--if there should be no difference--if something were to happen again all the same--ah, then indeed!--then it would only be so much the worse!--better let them decant the bottle, and then he would have the drug to fall back upon! just as he heard the loud bang of grizzie's closure of the great door, the wind rushed all at once against the house, with a tremendous bellow, that threatened to drive the windows into the room. an immediate lull followed, through which as instantly came strange sounds, as of a distant staccato thunder. the moment the laird heard the douf thuds, he started to his feet, and made for the door, and cosmo rose to follow. "stop! stop!" shouted lord mergwain, in a quavering, yet, through terror, imperative voice, and looked as if his hair would have stood on end, only that it was a wig. lady joan gave cosmo a glance of entreaty: the shout was ineffectual, the glance was not. the laird scarcely heard his visitor's cry, and hastened from the room, taking huge strides with his long thin legs; but cosmo resumed his seat as if nothing were the matter. lord mergwain was trembling visibly; his jaw shook, and seemed ready to drop. "don't be alarmed, my lord," said cosmo; "it is only one of the horses kicking against his stall." "but why should the brute kick?" said his lorship, putting his hand to his chin, and doing his best to hide his agitation. "my father will tell us. he will soon set things right. he knows all about horses. jolly may have thrown his leg over his halter, and got furious. he's rather an ill-tempered horse." lord mergwain swallowed a great glass of wine, the last of the first bottle, and gave a little shiver. "it's cold! cold!" he said. the wine did not seem to be itself somehow this evening! the game interrupted, lady joan forgot it, and stared into the fire. cosmo gave his eyes a glorious holiday on her beautiful face. it was some time before the laird returned. he brought the news that one of the strange horses was very ill. "i thought he looked bad this morning," said cosmo. "only it's not the same horse, my boy," answered his father. "i believe he has been ill all day; the state of the other has prevented its being noticed. he was taken suddenly with violent pain; and now he lies groaning. they are doing what they can for him, but i fear, in this weather, he will not recover. evidently he has severe inflammation; the symptoms are those of the worst form of the disease now about." "hustled here in the dark to die like a rat!" muttered his lordship. "don't make a trap of the old place, my lord," said the laird cheerily. "the moment the roads will permit, i will see that you have horses." "i don't doubt you'll be glad enough to get rid of me." "we shall not regret your departure so much, my lord, as if we had been able to make your lordship comfortable," said the laird. with that there came another great howling onset of wind. lord mergwain started almost to his feet, but sat down instantly, and said with some calmness, "i should be obliged, mr. warlock, if you would order a wine-glass or two for me. i am troublesome, i know, but i like to change my glass; and the wine will be the worse every moment more it stands there.--i wish you would drink! we should make a night of it." "i beg your pardon, my lord," said the laird. "what was i thinking of!--cosmo, run and fetch wine-glasses--and the cock-screw." but while cosmo was returning, he heard the battery of iron shoes recommence, and ran to the stable. just as he reached the door of it, the horse half reared, and cast himself against the side of his stall. with a great crash it gave way, and he fell upon it, and lay motionless. "he's deid!" cried one of the men, and cosmo ran to tell his father. while he was gone, the time seemed to the toper endless. but the longer he could be kept from his second magnum, the laird thought it the better, and was not troubled at cosmo's delay. a third terrible blast, fiercer and more imperious than those that preceded it, shook the windows as a dog shakes a rat: the house itself it could shake no more than a primeval rock. the next minute cosmo entered, saying the horse was dead. "what a beastly country!" growled his lordship. but the wine that was presently gurgling from the short neck of the apoplectic magnum, soon began to console him. he liked this bottle better than the last, and some composure returned to him. the laird fetched a book of old ballads, and offered to read one or two to make the time pass. lord mergwain gave a scornful grunt; but lady joan welcomed the proposal: the silent worship of the boy, again at her feet, was not enough to make her less than very weary. for more than an hour, the laird read ballad after ballad; but nobody, not even himself, attended much--the old lord not at all. but the time passed. his lordship grew sleepy, began to nod, and seemed to forget his wine. at length he fell asleep. but when the laird would have made him more comfortable, with a yell of defiance he started to his feet wide awake. coming to himself at once, he tried to laugh, and said from a child he had been furious when waked suddenly. then he settled himself in the chair, and fell fast asleep. still the night wore on, and supper-time came. his lordship woke, but would have no supper, and took to his bottle again. lady joan and cosmo went to the kitchen, and the laird had his porridge brought to the drawing-room. at length it was time to go to bed. lady joan retired. the laird would not allow cosmo to sit up another night, and he went also. the lord and the laird were left together, the one again asleep, and dreaming who knows what! the other wide awake, but absorbed in the story of a man whose thoughts, fresh from above, were life to himself, and a mockery to his generation. chapter xvii. that same night. the wind had now risen to a hurricane--a rage of swiftness. the house was like a rock assaulted by the waves of an ocean-tempest. the laird had closed all the shutters, and drawn the old curtains across them: through windows and shutters, the curtains waved in the penetrating blasts. the sturdy old house did not shake, for nothing under an earthquake could have made it tremble. the snow was fast gathering in sloped heaps on the window-sills, on the frames, on every smallest ledge where it could lie. in the midst of the blackness and the roaring wind, the house was being covered with spots of silent whiteness, resting on every projection, every roughness even, of the building. in his own house as he was, a sense of fierce desolation, of foreign invasion and siege, took possession of the soul of the laird. he had made a huge fire, and had heaped up beside it great store of fuel, but, though his body was warm and likely to be warm, his soul inside it felt the ravaging cold outside--remorseless, and full of mock, the ghastly power of negation and unmaking. he had got together all the screens he could find, and with them inclosed the fireplace, so that they sat in a citadel within a fortress. by the fire he had placed for his lordship the antique brocade-covered sofa, that he might lie down when he pleased, and himself occupied the great chair on the other side. from the centre of this fire-defended heart, the room itself outside looked cold and waste: it demanded almost courage to leave the stockade of the screens, and venture into the campaign of the floor beyond. and then the hell of wind and snow that raved outside that! and the desert of air surrounding it, in which the clouds that garnered the snow were shaken by mad winds, whirled and tossed and buffeted, to make them yield their treasures! lord mergwain heard it, and drank. the laird listened, and lifted up his heart. not much passed between them. the memories of the english lord were not such as he felt it fit to share with the dull old scotchman beside him, who knew nothing of the world--knew neither how pitilessly selfish, nor how meanly clever a man of this world might be, and bate not a jot of his self admiration! men who salute a neighbour as a man of the world, paying him the greatest compliment they know in acknowledging him of their kind, recoil with a sort of fear from the man alien to their thoughts, and impracticable for their purposes. they say "he is beyond me," and despise him. so is there a great world beyond them with which they hold a frightful relationship--that of unrecognized, unattempted duty! lord mergwain regarded the odd-looking laird as a fool; the laird looked on him with something of the pity an angel must feel for the wretch to whom he is sent to give his last chance, ere sorer measures be taken in which angels are not the ministers. but the wine was at last beginning to work its too oft repeated and now nearly exhausted influence on the sagging and much frayed nerves of the old man. a yellowish remnant of withered rose began to smear his far-off west: he dared not look to the east; that lay terribly cold and gray; and he smiled with a little curl of his lip now and then, as he thought of this and that advantage he had had in the game of life, for alas! it had never with him risen to the dignity of a battle. he was as proud of a successful ruse, as a hero of a well fought and well won field. "i had him there!" stood with him for the joy of work done and salvation wrought. it was a repulsive smile--one that might move even to hatred the onlooker who was not yet divine enough to let the outrushing waves of pity swamp his human judgment. it only curled the cruel-looking upper lip, while the lower continued to hang thick, and sensual, and drawn into a protuberance in the middle. gradually he seemed to himself, as he drank, to be recovering the common sense of his self-vaunted, vigorous nature. he assured himself that now he saw plainly the truth and fact of things--that his present outlook and vision were the true, and the horrors of the foregone night the weak soul-gnawing fancies bred of a disordered stomach. he was a man once more, and beyond the sport of a foolish imagination. alas for the man who draws his courage from wine! the same alas for the man whose health is its buttress! the touch of a pin on this or that spot of his mortal house, will change him from a leader of armies, or a hunter of tigers in the jungle, to one who shudders at a centipede! that courage also which is mere insensibility crumbles at once before any object of terror able to stir the sluggish imagination. there is a fear, this for one, that for another, which can appall the stoutest who is not one with the essential. lord mergwain emerged from the influence of his imagination and his fears, and went under that of his senses and himself. he took his place beside the christian in his low, common moods, when the world, with its laws and its material insistence, presses upon him, and he does not believe that god cares for the sparrow, or can possibly count the hairs of his head; when the divine power, and rule, and means to help, seem nowhere but in a passed-away fancy of the hour of prayer. only the christian is then miserable, and lord mergwain was relieved; for did he not then come to himself? and did he know anything better to arrive at than just that wretched self of his? a glass or two more, and he laughed at the terror by night. he had been a thorough fool not to go to bed like other people, instead of sitting by the fire with a porridge-eating scotchman, who regarded him as one of the wicked, afraid of the darkness. the thought may have passed from his mind to that of his host, for the self-same moment the laird spoke: "don't you think you had better go to bed when you have finished your bottle, my lord?" with the words, a cold swell, as from the returning tide of some dead sea, so long ebbed that men had ploughed and sown and built within its bed, stole in, swift and black, filling every cranny of the old man's conscious being. "my god!" he cried; "i thought better of you than that, laird! i took you for a man of your word! you promised to sit up with me!" "i did, my lord, and am ready to keep my promise. i only thought you looked as if you might have changed your mind; and in such a night as this, beyond a doubt, bed is the best place for everybody that has got one to go to." "that depends," answered his lordship, and drank. the laird held his peace for a time, then spoke again: "would your lordship think me rude if i were to take a book?" "i don't want a noise. it don't go well with old wine like this: such wine wants attention! it would spoil it. no, thank you." "i did not propose to read aloud, my lord--only to myself." "oh! that alters the matter! that i would by no means object to. i am but poor company!" the laird got his "journal," and was soon lost in the communion of a kindred soul. by and by, the boat of his lordship's brain was again drifting towards the side of such imagination as was in him. the half-tide restoring the physical mean was past, and intoxication was setting in. he began to cast uneasy glances towards the book the laird was reading. the old folio had a look of venerable significance about it, and whether it called up some association of childhood, concerned in some fearful fancy, or dreamfully he dreaded the necromancer's art, suggested by late experience, made him uneasy. "what's that you are reading?" he said at length. "it looks like a book of magic." "on the contrary," replied the laird, "it is a religious book of the very best sort." "oh, indeed! ah! i have no objection to a little religion--in its own place. there it is all right. i never was one of those mockers--those jacobins, those sans-culottes! arrogant fools they always seemed to me!" "would your lordship like to hear a little of the book, then?" "no, no; by no means! things sacred ought not to be mixed up with things common--with such an uncommon bottle of wine, for instance. i dictate to no one, but for my own part i keep my religion for church. that is the proper place for it, and there you are in the mood for it. do not mistake me; it is out of respect i decline." he drank, and the laird dropt back into the depths of his volume. the night wore on. his lordship did not drink fast. there was no hope of another bottle, and the wine must cover the period of his necessity: he dared not encounter the night without the sustaining knowledge of its presence. at last he began to nod, and by slow degrees sank on the sofa. very softly the laird covered him, and went back to his book. the storm went raging on, as if it would never cease. the sense of desolation it produced in the heart of the laird when he listened to it was such, that with an inward shudder he closed his mind against it, and gave all his attention to george fox, and the thoughts he roused. the minutes crawled slowly along. he lost all measure of time, because he read with delight, and at last he found himself invaded by that soft physical peace which heralds the approach of sleep. he roused himself; he wanted to read: he was in one of the most interesting passages he had yet come to. but presently the sweet enemy was again within his outworks. once more he roused himself, heard the storm raving on--over buried graves and curtained beds, heedless of human heeding--fell a-listening to its shriek-broken roar, and so into a soundless and dreamless sleep. he woke so suddenly that for a moment he knew himself only for somebody he knew. there lay upon him the weight of an indefinable oppression--the horror of a darkness too vague to be combated. the fire had burned low, and his very bones seemed to shiver. the candle-flames were down in the sockets of the candlesticks, and the voice of the storm was like a scream of victory. had the cold then won its way into the house? was it having its deathly will of them all? he cast his eyes on his guest. sleeping still, he half lay, half leaned in the corner of the sofa, breathing heavily. his face was not to be well seen, because of the flapping and flickering of the candle-flames, and the shadows they sent waving huge over all, like the flaunting of a black flag. through the flicker and the shadow the laird was still peering at him, when suddenly, without opening his eyes, the old man raised himself to a sitting posture--all of a piece, like a figure of wood lifted from behind. the laird then saw his face, and upon it the expression as of one suffering from some horrible nightmare--so terrified was it, so wrathful, so disgusted, all in one--and rose in haste to rouse him from a drunken dream. but ere he reached him he opened his eyes, and his expression changed--not to one of relief, but to utter collapse, as if the sleep-dulled horrors of the dream had but grown real to him as he woke. his under lip trembled like a dry yellow leaf in a small wind; his right arm rose slowly from the shoulder and stuck straight out in the direction of his host, while his hand hung from the wrist; and he stared as upon one loosed from hell to speak of horrors. but it did not seem to the laird that, although turned straight towards him, his eyes rested on him; they did not appear to be focused for him, but for something beyond him. it was like the stare of one demented, and it invaded--possessed the laird. a physical terror seized him. he felt his gaze returning that of the man before him, like to like, as from a mirror. he felt the skin of his head contracting; his hair was about to stand on end! the spell must be broken! he forced himself forward a step to lay his hand on lord mergwain, and bring him to himself. but his lordship uttered a terrible cry, betwixt a scream and a yell, and sank back on the sofa. the same instant the laird was himself again, and sprang to him. lord mergwain lay with his mouth wide open, and the same look with which they found him the night before prostrate in the guest-chamber. his arm stuck straight out from his body. the laird pressed it down, but it rose again as soon as he left it. he could not for a moment doubt the man was dead; there was that about him that assured him of it, but what it was he could not have told. the first thought that came to him was, that his daughter must not see him so. he tied up his jaw, laid him straight on the sofa, lighted fresh candles, left them burning by the dead, and went to call grizzie: a doctor was out of the question. he felt his way down the dark stair, and fought it through the wind to the kitchen, whence he climbed to grizzie's room. he found she was already out of bed, and putting on her clothes. she had not been asleep, she said, and added something obscure, which the laird took to mean that she had been expecting a summons. "whan ane's oot, there's nane in!" she said. "hoo's the auld reprobat, laird--an' i beg yer pardon?" "he's gane til's accoont, grizzie," answered the laird, in a trembling voice. "say ye sae, laird?" returned grizzie with perfect calmness. "oh, sirs!" not a single remark did she then offer. if she was cool, she was not irreverent before the thought of the awful thing that lay waiting her. "ye winna wauk the hoose, will ye, sir?" she added presently. "i dinna think it wad be ony service to died or livin'." "i'll no du that, grizzie; but come ye an' luik at him," said the laird, "an' tell me what ye think. i makna a doobt he's deid, but gien ye hae ony, we'll du what we can; an' we'll sit up wi' the corp thegither, an' lat yoong an' auld tak the rist they hae mair need o' nor the likes o' you an' me." it was a proud moment in grizzie's life, one never forgotten, when the laird addressed her thus. she was ready in a moment, and they went together. "the prince is haein' his ain w'y the nicht!" she murmured to herself, as they bored their way through the wind to the great door. when she came where the corpse lay, she stood for some moments looking down upon it without uttering a sound, nor was there any emotion in the fixed gaze of her eye. she had been brought up in a stern and nowise pitiful school. she made neither solemn reflection, nor uttered hope which her theology forbade her to cherish. "ye think wi' me 'at he's deid--dinna ye, grizzie?" said the laird, in a voice that seemed to himself to intrude on the solemn silence. she removed the handkerchief, and the jaw fell. "he's gane til's accoont," she said. "it's a great amoont; an' mair on ae side nor he'll weel bide. it's sair eneuch, laird, whan we hae to gang at the lord's call, but whan the messenger comes frae the laich yett (low gate), we maun jist lat gang an' forget. but sae lang's he's a man, we maun do what we can--an' that's what we did last nicht; sae i'll rin an' get het watter." she did so, and they used every means they could think of for his recovery, but at length gave it up, heaped him over with blankets, for the last chance of spontaneous revival, and sitting down, awaited the slow-travelling, feeble dawn. after they had sat in silence for nearly an hour, the laird spoke: "we'll read a psalm thegither, grizzie," he said. "ay, du ye that, laird. it'll haud them awa' for the time bein', though it can profit but little i' the him 'er en'." the laird drew from his pocket a small, much worn bible which had been his marion's, and by the body of the dead sinner, in the heart of the howling storm and the waste of the night, his voice, trembling with a strange emotion, rose upborne upon the glorious words of the ninety-first psalm. when he ended, they were aware that the storm had begun to yield, and by slow degrees it sank as the morning came on. till the first faintest glimmer of dawn began to appear nothing more was said between them. but then grizzie rose in haste, like one that had overslept herself, and said: "i maun to my wark, laird--what think ye?" the laird rose also, and by a common impulse they went and looked at the corpse--for corpse it now was, beyond all question, cold as the snow without. after a brief, low-voiced conference, they proceeded to carry it to the guest-chamber, where they laid it upon the bed, and when grizzie had done all that custom required, left it covered with a sheet, dead in the room where it dared not sleep, a mound cold and white as any snow-wreath outside. it looked as if winter had forced his way into the house, and left this one drift, in signal of his capture. grizzie went about her duties, and the laird back to his book. a great awe fell upon cosmo when he heard what visit and what departure had taken place in the midst of the storm and darkness. lady joan turned white as the dead, and spoke not a word. a few tears rolled from the luminous dark of her eyes, like the dew slow-gathering in a night of stars, but she was very still. the bond between her and her father had not been a pleasant one; she had not towards him that reverence which so grandly heightens love. she had loved him pitifully--perhaps, dreadful thought! a little contemptuously. the laird persuaded her not to see the body; taking every charge concerning it. all that day things went on in the house much as usual, with a little more silence where had been much. the wind lay moveless on the frozen earth; the sun shone cold as a diamond; and the fresh snow glittered and gleamed and sparkled like a dead sea of lightning. the laird was just thinking which of his men to send to the village, when the door opened and in came agnes. grannie had sent her, she said, to enquire after them. grannie had had a troubled night, and the moment she woke began to talk about the laird, and his visitors, and what the storm must have been round lonely castle warlock. the drifts were tremendous, she said, but she had made her way without much difficulty. so the laird, partly to send cosmo from the house of death into the world of life, told him to go with aggie, and give directions to the carpenter, for the making of a coffin. how long the body might have to lie with them, no one could tell, for the storm had ceased in a hard frost, and there could be no postal communication for many days. the laird judged it better, therefore, as soon as the shell arrived, to place the body in a death-chapel prepared for it by nature herself. with their spades he and cosmo fashioned the mound, already hollowed in sport, into the shape of a hugh sarcophagus, then opened wide the side of it, to receive the coffin as into a sepulchre in a rock. the men brought it, laid it in, and closed the entrance again with snow. where cosmo's hollow man of light had shone, lay the body of the wicked old nobleman. chapter xviii. a winter idyll. lady joan the same day wrote to her brother borland, now mergwain, telling him what had taken place. but it must be some time before she received his answer, for the post from england reached the neighbouring city but intermittently, and was there altogether arrested, so far as howglen and muir o' warlock were concerned. the laird told her she must have patience, and assured her that to them her presence was welcome. and now began for cosmo an episode of enchantment, as wondrous as any dream of tree-top, or summer wave city--for if it was not so full of lighter marvel around, it had at the heart of it a deeper marvel, namely a live and beautiful lady. she was a girl of nearly eighteen, but looked older--shapely, strong, and graceful. but both her life-consciousness and her spirits--in some only do the words mean the same thing--had been kept down by the family relations in which she found herself. her father loved her with what love was in him, and therefore was jealous; trusted, and therefore enslaved her; could make her useful, and therefore oppressed her. since his health began to decline he would go nowhere without her, though he spoke seldom a pleasant, and often a very unpleasant word to her. he never praised her to her face, but swore deeply to her excellence in ears that cared little to hear of it. when at home she must always be within his reach, if not within his call; but he was far from slow to anger with her, and she dreaded his anger, not so much from love or fear as from nicety, because of the ugly things he would say when he was offended with her. one hears of ruling by love and ruling by fear, but this man ruled by disgust. at home he lived much as we have seen him in the house of another, cared for nobody's comfort but his own, and was hard to keep in good humour--such good humour as was possible to him. he paid no attention to business or management: his estates had long been under trustees; lolled about in his room, diverting himself with a horrible monkey which he taught ugly tricks; drank almost constantly; and would throw dice by himself for an hour together--doing what he could, which was little, towards the poor object of killing time. he kept a poor larder but a rich cellar; almost always without money, he yet contrived to hold his bins replenished, and that from the farther end: he might have been expecting to live to a hundred and twenty for of visitors he had none, except an occasional time-belated companion of his youth, whom the faint, muddled memories of old sins would bring to his door, when they would spend a day or two together, soaking, and telling bad stories, at times hardly restrained until joan left the room--that is, if her brother was not present, before whom her father was on his good behaviour. the old man was in bad repute with the neighbours, and they never called upon him--which they would have found it hard to justify, seeing some who were not better were quite respectable. no doubt he was the dilapidated old reprobate they counted him, but if he had not made himself poor, they would have found his morals no business of theirs. they pitied the daughter, or at least spoke pityingly of her, but could not for her sake countenance the father! neglecting their duty towards her, they began to regard her with a blame which was the shadow of their neglect, thinking of her as defiled in her father's defilement. the creeping things--those which god hath not yet cleansed--call the pure things unclean. but it was better to be so judged than to run the risk of growing after the pattern of her judges. i suspect the man who leads a dissolute, and the man who leads a commonly selfish life, will land from the great jump pretty nearly in the same spot. what if those who have despised each the other's sins, are set down to stare at them together, until each finds his own iniquity to be hateful. of the latter, the respectably selfish class, was borland her brother. he knew his presence a protection to his sister, yet gave himself no trouble to look after her. as the apple of his eye would he cherish the fluid in which he hoped to discover some secret process of nature; but he was not his sister's keeper, and a drop of mud more or less cast into her spirit was to him of no consequence. yet he would as soon have left a woman he wanted to marry within reach of the miasms that now and then surrounded joan, as unwarned in the dark by the cage of a tiger. at home, therefore, because of the poverty of the family, the ill-repute of her father, and the pride and self-withdrawal of her brother, she led a lonely life where everything around her was left to run wild. the lawn was more of a meadow than a lawn, and the park a mere pasture for cattle. the shrubbery was an impassable tangle, and the flower garden a wilderness. she could do nothing to set things right, and lived about the place like a poor relation. at school, which she left at fifteen, she had learned nothing so as to be of any vital use to her--possibly left it a little less capable than she went. for some of her natural perceptions could hardly fail to be blunted by the artificial, false, and selfish judgments and regards which had there surrounded her. without a mother, without a companion, she had to find what solace, what pastime she could. in the huge house there was not a piano fit to play upon; and her only source of in-door amusement was a library containing a large disproportion of books in old french bindings, with much tarnished gilding on the backs. but a native purity of soul kept her lovely, and capable of becoming lovelier. [illustration: cosmo and lady joan climbing.] the mystery of all mysteries is the upward tendency of so many souls through so much that clogs and would defile their wings, while so many others seem never even to look up. then, having so begun with the dust, how do these ever come to raise their eyes to the hills? the keenest of us moral philosophers are but poor, mole-eyed creatures! one day, i trust, we shall laugh at many a difficulty that now seems insurmountable, but others will keep rising behind them. lady joan did not like ugly things, and so shrank from evil things. she was the less in danger from liberty, because of the disgust which certain tones and words of her father had repeatedly occasioned her. she learned self-defence early--and alone, without even a dog to keep her company, and help her to the laws of the world outside herself. with none of the conventionalities of society, lady joan saw no reason for making a difficulty when, the day after that on which her father died, cosmo proposed a walk in the snow. he saw her properly provided for what seemed to her an adventure--with short skirts, and stockings over her shoes--and they set out together, in the brilliant light of a sun rapidly declining toward the western horizon, though it had but just passed the low noon. the moment she stepped from the threshold, joan was invaded by an almost giddy sense of freedom. the keen air and the impeding snow sent the warm blood to her cheeks, and her heart beat as if new-born into a better world. she was annoyed with herself, but in vain she called herself heartless; in vain she accused herself of indifference to the loss of her father, said to herself she was a worthless girl: there was the sun in the sky--not warm, but dazzling-bright and shining straight into her very being! while the air, instinct with life, was filling her lungs like water drunk by a thirsty soul, and making her heart beat like the heart of eve when first she woke alive, and felt what her maker had willed! life indeed was good! it was a blessed thing for the eyes to behold the sun!--let death do what it can, there is just one thing it cannot destroy, and that is life. never in itself, only in the unfaith of man, does life recognize any sway of death.--a fresh burst of healthy vigour seemed born to answer each fresh effort. over the torrent they walked on a bridge of snow, and listening could hear, far down, below the thick white blanket, the noise of its hidden rushing. away and up the hill they went; the hidden torrent of joan's blood flowed clearer; her heart sang to her soul; and everything began to look like a thing in a story--herself a princess, and her attendant a younger brother, travelling with her to meet the tide of in-flowing lovely adventure. such a brother was a luxury she had never had--very different from an older one. he talked so strangely too--now like a child, now like an old man! she felt a charm in both, but understood neither. capable, through confidence in his father, of receiving wisdom far beyond what he could have thought out for himself, he sometimes said things because he understood them, which seemed to most who heard them beyond his years. some people only understand enough of a truth to reject it, but cosmo's reception by faith turned to sight, as all true faith does at last, and formed a soil for thought more immediately his own. they had been climbing a steep ascent, very difficult in the snow, and had at length reached the top, where they stood for a moment panting, with another ascent beyond them. "aren't you always wanting to climb and climb, lady joan?" said the boy. "call me joan, and i will answer you." "then, joan,--how kind you are! don't you always want to be getting up?--up higher than you are?" "no; i don't think i do." "i believe you do, only you don't know it. when i get on the top of yon hill there, it always seems to me such a little way up!--and mr. simon tells me i should feel much the same, if it were the top of the highest peak in the himmalays." lady joan did not reply, and cosmo too was silent for a time. "don't you think," he began again, "though life is so very good--to me especially with you here--you would get very tired if you thought you had to live in this world always--for ever and ever and ever, and never, never get out of it?" "no, i don't," said joan. "i can't say i find life so nice as you think it, but one keeps hoping it may turn to something better." she was amused with what she counted childish talk for a boy of his years--so manly too beyond his years! "that is very curious!" he returned. "now i am quite happy; but this moment i should feel just in a prison, if i thought i should never get to another world; for what you can never get out of, is your prison--isn't it?" "yes--but if you don't want to get out?" "ah, that is true! but as soon as that comes to a prisoner, it is a sign that he is worn out, and has not life enough in him to look the world in the face. i was talking about it the other day with mr. simon, else i shouldn't have got it so plain. the blue roof so high above us there, is indeed very different from the stone vault of a prison, for there is no stop or end to it. but if you can never get away from under it, never get off the floor at the bottom of it, i feel as if it might almost as well be something solid that held me in. there would be no promise in the stars then: they look now like promises, don't they? i do not believe god would ever show us a thing he did not mean to give us." "you are a very odd boy, cosmo. i am almost afraid to listen to you. you say such presumptuous things!" cosmo laughed a little gentle laugh. "how can you love god, joan, and be afraid to speak before him? i should no more dream of his being angry with me for thinking he made me for great and glad things, and was altogether generous towards me, than i could imagine my father angry with me for wishing to be as wise and as good as he is, when i know it is wise and good he most wants me to be." "ah, but he is your father, you know, and that is very different!" "i know it is very different--god is so much, much more my father than is the laird of glenwarlock! he is so much more to me, and so much nearer to me, though my father is the best father that ever lived! god, you know, joan, god is more than anybody knows what to say about. sometimes, when i am lying in my bed at night, my heart swells and swells in me, that i hardly know how to bear it, with the thought that here i am, come out of god, and yet not out of him--close to the very life that said to everything be, and it was! --you think it strange that i talk so?" "rather, i must confess! i don't believe it can be a good thing at your age to think so much about religion. there is a time for everything. you talk like one of those good little children in books that always die--at least i have heard of such books--i never saw any of them." cosmo laughed again. "which of us is the merrier--you or me? which of us is the stronger, joan? the moment i saw you, i thought you looked like one that hadn't enough of something--as if you weren't happy; but if you knew that the great beautiful person we call god, was always near you, it would be impossible for you to go on being sad." joan gave a great sigh: her heart knew its own bitterness, and there was little joy in it for a stranger to intermeddle with. but she said to herself the boy would be a gray-haired man before he was twenty, and began to imagine a mission to help him out of these morbid fancies. "you must surely understand, cosmo," she said, "that, while we are in this world, we must live as people of this world, not of another." "but you can't mean that the people of this world are banished from him who put them in it! he is all the same, in this world and in every other. if anything makes us happy, it must make us much happier to know it for a bit of frozen love--for the love that gives is to the gift as water is to snow. ah, you should hear our torrent sing in summer, and shout in the spring! the thought of god fills me so full of life that i want to go and do something for everybody. i am never miserable. i don't think i shall be when my father dies." "oh, cosmo!--with such a good father as yours! i am shocked." her words struck a pang into her own heart, for she felt as if she had compared his father and hers, over whom she was not miserable. cosmo turned, and looked at her. the sun was close upon the horizon, and his level rays shone full on the face of the boy. "lady joan," he said slowly, and with a tremble in his voice, "i should just laugh with delight to have to die for my father. but if he were taken from me now, i should be so proud of him, i should have no room to be miserable. as god makes me glad though i cannot see him, so my father would make me glad though i could not see him. i cannot see him now, and yet i am glad because my father is--away down there in the old castle; and when he is gone from me, i shall be glad still, for he will be somewhere all the same--with god as he is now. we shall meet again one day, and run at each other." it was an odd phrase with which he ended, but lady joan did not laugh. the sun was down, and the cold, blue gray twilight came creeping from the east. they turned and walked home, through a luminous dusk. it would not be dark all night, though the moon did not rise till late, for the snow gave out a ghostly radiance. surely it must be one of those substances that have the power of drinking and hoarding the light of the sun, that with their memories of it they may thin the darkness! i suspect everything does it more or less. far below were the lights of the castle, and across an unbroken waste of whiteness the gleams of the village. the air was keen as an essence of points and edges, and the thought of the kitchen fire grew pleasant. cosmo took joan's hand, and down the hill they ran, swiftly descending what they had toilsomely climbed. as she ran, the thought that one of those lights was burning by the body of her father, rebuked joan afresh. she was not glad, and she could not be sorry! if cosmo's father were to die, cosmo would be both sorry and glad! but the boy turned his face, ever and again as they ran, up to hers--she was a little taller than he--and his every look comforted her. an attendant boy-angel he seemed, whose business it was to rebuke and console her. if he were her brother, she would be well content never more to leave the savage place! for the strange old man in the red night-cap was such a gentleman! and this odd boy, absolutely unnatural in his goodness, was nevertheless charming! she did not yet know that goodness is the only nature. she regarded it as a noble sort of disease--as something at least which it was possible to have too much of. she had not a suspicion that goodness and nothing else is life and health--that what the universe demands of us is to be good boys and girls. to judge religion we must have it--not stare at it from the bottom of a seeming interminable ladder. when she reached the door, she felt as if waking out of a dream, in which she had been led along strange paths by a curious angel. but not to himself was cosmo like an angel! for indeed he was a strong, viguorous, hopeful, trusting boy of god's in this world, and would be just such a boy in the next--one namely who did his work, and was ready for whatever was meant to come. when, from all that world of snow outside, joan entered the kitchen with its red heart of fire, she knew for a moment how a little bird feels when creeping under the wing of his mother. those old hebrews--what poets they were! holy and homely and daring, they delighted in the wings of the almighty; but the son of the father made the lovely image more homely still, likening himself to the hen under whose wings the chickens would not creep for all her crying and calling. then first was joan aware of simple confidence, of safety and satisfaction and loss of care; for the old man in the red nightcap would see to everything! nought would go amiss where he was at the head of affairs! and hardly was she seated when she felt a new fold of his protection about her: he told her he had had her room changed, that she might be near his mother and grizzie, and not have to go out to reach it. cosmo heard with delight that his father had given up his room to lady joan, and would share his. to sleep with his father was one of the greatest joys the world held for him. such a sense of safety and comfort--of hen's wings--was nowhere else to be had on the face of the great world! it was the full type of conscious well-being, of softness and warmth and peace in the heart of strength. his father was to him a downy nest inside a stone-castle. they all sat together round the kitchen fire. the laird fell into a gentle monologue, in which, to joan's thinking, he talked even more strangely than cosmo. things born in the fire and the smoke, like the song of the three holy children, issued from the furnace clothed in softest moonlight. joan said to herself it was plain where the boy got his oddity; but what she called oddity was but sense from a deeper source than she knew the existence of. he read them also passages of the book then occupying him so much: joan wondered what attraction such a jumble of good words and no sense could have for a man so capable in ordinary affairs. then came supper; and after that, for the first time in her life, joan was present when a man had the presumption to speak to his maker direct from his own heart, without the mediation of a book. this she found odder than all the rest; she had never even heard of such a thing! so peculiar, so unfathomable were his utterances, that it never occurred to her the man might be meaning something; farther from her still was the thought, that perhaps god liked to hear him, was listening to him and understanding him, and would give him the things he asked. she heard only an extraordinary gibberish, supposed suitable to a religious observance--family prayers, she thought it must be! she felt confused, troubled, ashamed--so grievously out of her element that she never knew until they rose, that the rest were kneeling while she sat staring into the fire. then she felt guilty and shy, but as nobody took any notice, persuaded herself they had not observed. the unpleasantness of all this, however, did not prevent her from saying to herself as she went to bed, "oh, how delightful it would be to live in a house where everybody understood, and loved, and thought about everybody else!" she did not know that she was wishing for nothing more, and something a little less, than the kingdom of heaven--the very thing she thought the laird and cosmo so strange for troubling their heads about. if men's wishes are not always for what the kingdom of heaven would bring them, their miseries at least are all for the lack of that kingdom. that night joan dreamed herself in a desert island, where she had to go through great hardships, but where everybody was good to everybody, and never thought of taking care except of each other; and that, when a beautiful ship came to carry her away, she cried, and would not go. three weeks of all kinds of weather, except warm, followed, ending with torrents of rain, and a rapid thaw; but before that time joan had got as careless of the weather as cosmo, and nothing delighted her more than to encounter any sort of it with him. nothing kept her in-doors, and as she always attended to grizzie's injunctions the moment she returned, she took no harm, and grew much stronger. it is not encountering the weather that is dangerous, but encountering it when the strength is not equal to the encounter. these two would come in wet from head to foot, change their clothes, have a good meal, sleep well, and wake in the morning without the least cold. they would spend the hours between breakfast and dinner ascending the bank of a hill-stream, dammed by the snow, swollen by the thaw, and now rushing with a roar to the valley; or fighting their way through wind and sleet to the top of some wild expanse of hill-moorland, houseless for miles and miles--waste bog, and dry stony soil, as far as eye could reach, with here and there a solitary stock or bush, bending low to the ground in the steady bitter wind--a hopeless region, save that it made the hope in their hearts glow the redder; or climbing a gully, deep-worn by the few wheels of a month but the many of centuries, and more by the torrents that rushed always down its trench when it rained heavily, or thawed after snow--hearing the wind sweep across it above their heads, but feeling no breath of its pres--ence, till emerging suddenly upon its plane, they had to struggle with it for very foot-hold upon the round earth. in such contests lady joan delighted. it was so nice, she said, to have a downright good fight, and nobody out of temper! she would come home from the windy war with her face glowing, her eyes flashing, her hair challenging storm from every point of the compass, and her heart merry with very peacefulness. her only thoughts of trouble were, that her father's body lay unburied, and that borland would come and take her away. when the thaw came at last, the laird had the coffin brought again into the guest-chamber, and there placed on trestles, to wait the coming of the new lord mergwain. outstripping the letter that announced his departure, he arrived at length, and with him his man of business. lady joan's heart gave a small beat of pleasure at sight of him, then lay quiet, sad, and apprehensive: the cold proper salute he gave her seemed, after the life she had of late been living, to belong rather to some sunless world than the realms of humanity. he uttered one commonplace concerning his father's death, and never alluded to it again; behaved in a dignified, recognizant manner to the laird, as to an inferior to whom he was under more obligation than he saw how to wipe out; and, after the snub with which he met the boy's friendly approach, took no farther notice of cosmo. seated three minutes, he began to require the laird's assistance towards the removal of the body; could not be prevailed upon to accept refreshment; had a messenger dispatched instantly to procure the nearest hearse and four horses; and that same afternoon started for england, following the body, and taking his sister with him. chapter xix. an "interlunar cave." and so the moon died out of cosmo's heaven. but it was only the moon. the sun remained to him--his father--visible type of the great sun, whose light is too keen for souls, and heart and spirit only can bear. but when he had received joan's last smile, when she turned away her face, and the ungenial, who had spoiled everything at glenwarlock, carried her away, then indeed for a moment a great cloud came over the light of his life, and he sought where to hide his tears. it was a sickening time, for suddenly she had come, suddenly entered his heart, and suddenly departed. but such things are but clouds, and cannot but pass. ah, reader! it may be your cloud has not yet passed, and you scorn to hear it called one, priding yourself that your trouble is eternal. but just because you are eternal, your trouble cannot be. you may cling to it, and brood over it, but you cannot keep it from either blossoming into a bliss, or crumbling to dust. be such while it lasts, that, when it passes, it shall leave you loving more, not less. there was this difference between cosmo and most young men of clay finer than ordinary, that, after the first few moments of the seemingly unendurable, he did not wander about moody, nursing his sorrow, and making everybody uncomfortable because he was uncomfortable; but sought the more the company of his father, and of mr. simon, from whom he had been much separated while lady joan was with them. for such a visit was an opportunity most precious in the eyes of the laird. with the sacred instinct of a father he divined what the society of a lady would do for his boy--for the ripening of his bloom, and the strengthening of his volition. two days had not passed before he began to be aware of a softening and clearing of his speech; of greater readiness and directness in his replies; of an indescribable sweetening of the address, that had been sweet, with a rose-shadow of gentle apology cast over every approach; of a deepening of the atmosphere of his reverence, which yet as it deepened grew more diaphanous. and when now the episode of angelic visitation was over, with his usual wisdom he understood the wrench her abrupt departure must have given his whole being, and allowed him plenty of time to recover himself from it. once he came upon him weeping: not with faintest overshadowing did he rebuke him, not with farthest hint suggest weakness in his tears. he went up to him, laid his hand gently on his head, stood thus a moment, then turned without a word, and left him. nowise because of his sorrow did he regret the freedom he had granted their intercourse. he knew what the sharp things of life are to the human plant; that its frosts are as needful as its sunshine, its great passion-winds as its gentle rains; that a divine result is required, and that his son was being made divinely human; that in aid of this end the hand of man must humbly follow the great lines of nature, ready to withhold itself, anxious not to interfere. most people resist the marvellous process; call in the aid of worldly wisdom for low ends; and bring the experience of their own failures to bear for the production of worse. but there is no escaping the mill that grinds slowly and grinds small; and those who refuse to be living stones in the living temple, must be ground into mortar for it. the next day, of his own choice, cosmo went to mr. simon. he also knew how to treat the growing plant. he set him such work as should in a measure harmonize with his late experience, and so drew him gently from his past: mere labour would have but driven him deeper into it. yesterday is as much our past as the bygone century, and sheltering in it from an uncongenial present, we are lost to our morrow. thus things slid gently back with him into their old grooves. an era of blessedness had vanished, but was not lost; it was added to his life, gathered up into his being; it was dissolved into his consciousness, and interpenetrated his activity. where there is no ground of regret, or shame, or self-reproach, new joy casts not out the old; and now that the new joy was old, the older joys came softly trooping back to their attendance. nor was this all. the departing woman left behind her a gift that had never been hers--the power of verse: he began to be a poet. the older i grow the more am i filled with marvel at the divine idea of the mutual development of the man and the woman. many a woman has made of a man, for the time at least, and sometimes for ever, a poet, caring for his verses never a cambric handkerchief or pair of gloves! a wretched man to whom a poem is not worth a sneer, may set a woman singing to the centuries! any gift of the nature of poetry, however poor or small, is of value inestimable to the development of the individual, ludicrous even though it may show itself, should conceit clothe it in print. the desire of fame, so vaunted, is the ruin of the small, sometimes of the great poet. the next evil to doing anything for love of money, is doing it for the love of fame. a man may have a wife who is all the world to him, but must he therefore set her on a throne? cosmo, essentially and peculiarly practical, never thought of the world and his verses together, but gathered life for himself in the making of them. these children of his, like all real children, strengthened his heart, and upheld his hands. in them truth took to him shape; in them she submitted herself to his contemplation. he grew faster, and from the days of his mourning emerged more of a man, and abler to look the world in the face. from that time also he learned and understood more rapidly, though he never came to show any great superiority in the faculties most prized of this world, whose judgment differs from that of god's kingdom in regard to the comparative value of intellectual gifts almost as much as it does in regard to the relative value of the moral and the intellectual. not the less desirable however did it seem in the eyes of both his father and his tutor, that, if it could anyhow be managed, he should go the next winter to college. as to how it could be managed, the laird took much serious thought, but saw no glimmer of light in the darkness of apparent impossibility. an unsuspected oracle was however at hand. old servants of the true sort, have, i fancy, a kind of family instinct. from the air about them almost, from the personal carriage, from words dropped that were never meant for them, from the thoughtful, troubled, or eager look, and the sought or avoided conference, they get possessed by a notion both of how the wind is blowing, and of how the ship wants to sail. but grizzie was capable of reasoning from what she saw. she marked the increase of care on the brow of her master; noted that it was always greater after he and mr. simon had had a talk at which cosmo, the beloved of both, was not present; and concluded that their talk, and the laird's trouble, must be about cosmo. she noted also that both were as much pleased with him as ever, and concluded therefore it was his prospects and not his behaviour that caused the uneasiness. then again she noted how fervently at prayers her master entreated guidance to do neither more nor less than the right thing; and from all put together, and considered in the light of a tolerably accurate idea of the laird's circumstances, grizzie was able not only to arrive at a final conclusion, but to come to the resolution of offering--not advice--that she would never have presumed upon--but a suggestion. chapter xx catch yer naig. one night the laird sat in the kitchen revolving in his mind the whole affair for the many hundredth time. was it right to spend on his son's education what might go to the creditors? was it not better for the world, for the creditors, and for all, that one of cosmo's vigour should be educated? was it not the best possible investment of any money he could lay hold of? as to the creditors, there was the land! the worst for him was the best for them; and for the boy it was infinitely better he should go without land than without education! but, all this granted and settled, where was the money to come from? that the amount required was small, made no difference, when it was neither in hand, nor, so far as he could see, anywhere near his hand. he sat in his great chair, with his book open upon his knees. his mother and cosmo were gone to bed, and grizzie was preparing to follow them: the laird was generally the last to go. but grizzie, who had been eying him at intervals for the last half hour, having now finished her preparations for the morning, drew near, and stood before him, with her hands and bare arms under her apron. her master taking no notice of her, she stood thus in silence for a moment, then began. it may have been noted that the riming tendency appeared mostly in the start of a speech, and mostly vanished afterwards. "laird," she said, "ye're in trouble, for ye're sittin' double, an' castna a leuk upo' yer buik. gien ye wad lat a body speyk 'at kens naething,'cep' 'at oot o' the moo' o' babes an' sucklin's--an'troth i'm naither babe nor sucklin' this mony a lang, but i'm a muckle eneuch gowk to be ane o' the lord's innocents, an' hae him perfec' praise oot o' the moo' o' me!--" she paused a moment, feeling it was time the laird should say something-which immediately he did. "say awa', grizzie," he answered; "i'm hearin' ye. there's nane has a better richt to say her say i' this hoose; what ither hae ye to say't intil!" "i hae no richt," retorted grizzie, almost angrily, "but what ye alloo me', laird; and i wadna wuss the lord to gie me ony mair. but whan i see ye in tribble--eh, mony's the time i haud my tongue till my hert's that grit it's jist swallin' in blobs an' blawin' like the parritch whan its dune makin', afore tak it frae the fire! for i hae naething to say, an' naither coonsel nor help intil me. but last nicht, whan i leukit na for't, there cam a thoucht intil my heid, an' seein' it was a stranger, i bad it walcome. it micht hae come til a far wysser heid nor mine, but seein' it did come to mine, it wad luik as gien the lord micht hae pitten' t' there--to the comfort an' consolation o' ane,'at, gien she be a gowk, is muckle the same as the lord made her wi' 's ain bliss-it han'. sae, quo' i, is' jist submit the thing to the laird. he'll sune discern whether it be frae the lord or mysel'!" "say on, grizzie," returned the laird, when again she paused. "it sud surprise nane to get a message frae the lord by the mou' o' ane o' his handmaidens." "weel, it's this, laird.--i hae often been i' the gran' drawin' room, when ye wad be lattin' the yoong laird, or somebody or anither ye wantit to be special til, see the bonny things ye hae sic a fouth o' i' the caibnets again the wa's; an' i hae aye h'ard ye say o' ane o' them--yon bonny little horsie, ye ken,'at they say the auld captain,'at 's no laid yet, gied to yer gran'father--i hae aye h'ard ye say o' that,'at hoo it was solid silver--'said to be,' ye wad aye tack to the tail o' 't." "true! true!" said the laird, a hopeful gleam beginning to break upon his darkness. "we'll, ye see, laird," grizzie went on, "i'm no sic a born idiot as think ye wad set the possession o' sic a playock again the yoong laird's edication; sae ye maun hae some rizzon for no meltin' 't doon--seem' siller maun aye be worth siller,--an' gowd, gien there be eneuch o' 't. sae, like the minister, i come to the conclusion--but i hae yer leave, laird, to speyk?" "gang on, gang on, grizzie," said the laird, almost eagerly. "weel, laird--i winna say feart, for i never saw yer lairdship" --she had got into the way of saying lordship, and now not unfrequently said lairdship!--"feart afore bull or bully, but i cud weel believe ye wadna willin'ly anger ane 'at the lord lats gang up and doon upo' the earth, whan he wad be far better intil't, ristin' in 's grave till the resurrection--only he was never ane o' the sancts! but anent that, michtna ye jist ca' to min', laird,'at a gi'en gift's yer ain, to du wi' what ye like; an' i wad na heed man, no to say a cratur 'at belangs richtly to nae warl' ava','at wad play the bairn, an' want back what he had gi'en. for him, he's a mere deid man 'at winna lie still. mony a bairn canna sleep, 'cause he's behavet himsel' ill the day afore! but gi'en, by coortesy like, he hed a word i' the case, he cudna objec'--that is, gien he hae onything o' the gentleman left intil him, which nae doobt may weel be doobtfu'--for wasna he a byous expense wi' his drink an' the gran' ootlandish dishes he bude to hae! aften hae i h'ard auld grannie say as muckle, an' she kens mair aboot that portion o' oor history nor ony ither, for, ye see, i cam raither late intil the faimily mysel'. sae, as i say, it wad be but fair the auld captain sud contreebit something to the needcessities o' the hoose, war it his to withhaud, which i mainteen it is not." "weel rizzont, grizzie!" cried the laird. "an' i thank ye mair for yer thoucht nor yer rizzons; the tane i was in want o', the tither i was na. the thing sall be luikit intil, an' that the first thing the morn's mornin'! the bit playock cam never i' my heid! i maun be growin' auld, grizzie, no to hae thoucht o' a thing sae plain! but it's the w'y wi' a' the best things! they're sae guid whan ye get a grip o' them,'at ye canna un'erstan' hoo ye never thoucht o' them afore." "i'm aul'er nor you, sir; sae it maun hae been the lord himsel' 'at pat it intil me." "we'll see the morn, grizzie. i'm no that sure there's onything mair intil't nor a mere fule word. for onything i ken, the thing may be nae better nor a bit o' braiss. i hae thoucht mony a time it luikit, in places, unco like braiss. but is' tak it the morn's mornin' to jeemie merson. we'll see what he says til 't. gien ony body i' these pairts hae ony authority in sic maitters, it's jeemie. an' i thank ye hertily, grizzie." but grizzie was not well pleased that her master should so lightly pass the reasoned portion of her utterance; like many another prophet, she prized more the part of her prophecy that came from herself, than the part that came from the lord. "sae plain as he cam an' gaed, laird, i thoucht ye micht hae been considerin' him." the laird replied to her tone rather than her words. "hoots, grizzie, wuman!" he said, "was na ye jist tellin' me no to heed him a hair? an' no ae hair wad i heed him,'cep' it wad gie ony rist til's puir wan'erin' sowl." "i but thoucht the thing worth a thoucht, laird," said grizzie, humbly and apologetically; and with a kind "guid nicht to ye, laird," turned away, and went up the stairs to her room. the moment she was gone, the laird fell on his knees, and gave god thanks for the word he had received by his messenger--if indeed it pleased him that such grizzie should prove to be. "o lord," he said, "with thee the future is as the present, and the past as the future. in the long past it may be thou didst provide this supply for my present need--didst even then prepare the answer to the prayers with which thou knewest i should assail thine ear. never in all my need have i so much desired money as now for the good of my boy. but if this be but one of my hopes, not one of thy intents, give me the patience of a son, o father." with these words he rose from his knees, and taking his book, read and enjoyed into the dead of the night. that same night, cosmo, who, again in his own chamber, was the more troubled with the trouble of his father that he was no longer with him in his room, dreamed a very odd, confused dream, of which he could give himself but little account in the morning--something about horses shod with shoes of gold, which they cast from their heels in a shoe-storm as they ran, and which anybody might have for the picking up. and throughout the dream was diffused an unaccountable flavour of the old villain, the sea-captain, although nowhere did he come into the story. chapter xxi the watcmaker when he came down to breakfast, his father told him, to his delight, that he was going to muir of warlock, and would like him to go with him. he ran like a hare up the waterside to let mr. simon know, and was back by the time his father was ready. it was a lovely day. there would be plenty of cold and rough weather yet, but the winter was over and gone, and even to that late region of the north, the time of the singing of birds was come. the air was soft, with streaks of cold in it. the fields lay about all wet, but there was the sun above them, whose business it was to dry them. there were no leaves yet on the few trees and hedges, but preparations had long been made, and the sap was now rising in their many stems, like the mercury in all the thermometers. up also rose the larks, joy fluttering their wings, and quivering their throats. they always know when the time to praise god is come, for it is when they begin to feel happy: more cannot be expected of them. and are they not therein already on the level of most of us christians who in this mood and that praise god? and indeed are not the birds and the rest of the creatures christians in the same way as the vast mass of those that call themselves such? do they not belong to the creation groaning after a redemption they do not know? men and women groan in misery from not being yet the sons and daughters of god, who regard nothing else as redemption, but the getting of their own way, which the devil only would care to give them. as they went, the laird told cosmo what was taking him to the village, and the boy walked by his father's side as in a fairy tale; for had they not with them a strange thing that might prove the talismanic opener of many doors to treasure-caves? they went straight to the shop, if shop it could be called, of jeames merson, the watchmaker of the village. there all its little ornamental business was done--a silver spoon might be engraved, a new pin put to a brooch, a wedding ring of sterling gold purchased, or a pair of earings of lovely glass, representing amethyst or topaz. there a second-hand watch might be had, with choice amongst a score, taken in exchange from ploughmen or craftsmen. jeames was poor, for there was not much trade in his line, and so was never able to have much of a stock; but he was an excellent watchmaker--none better in the great city--so at least his town-folk believed, and in a village it soon appears whether a watchmaker has got it in him. he was a thin, pale man, with a mixed look of rabbit and ferret, a high narrow forehead, and keen gray eyes. his work-shop and show-room was the kitchen, partly for the sake of his wife's company, partly because there was the largest window the cottage could boast. in this window was hung almost his whole stock, and a table before it was covered with his work and tools. he was stooping over it, his lens in his eye, busy with a watch, of which several portions lay beside him protected from the dust by footless wine-glasses, when the laird and cosmo entered. he put down pinion and file, pushed back his chair, and rose to receive them. "a fine mornin', jeames!" said the laird. "i houp ye're weel, and duin' weel." "muckle the same as usual, laird, an' i thank ye," answered jeames, with a large smile. "i'm no jist upo' the ro'd to be what they ca' a millionaire, an' i'm no jist upon the perris--something atween the twa, i'm thinkin'." "i doobt there's mair o' ane's in like condition, jeames," responded the laird, "or we wad na be comin' to tax yer skeel at this present." "use yer freedom, laird; i'm yer heumble servan'. it wadna be a watch for the yoong laird? i kenna--" he stopped, and cast an anxious eye towards the window. "na, na," interrupted the laird, sorry to have raised even so much of a vain hope in the mind of the man, "i'm as farfrae a watch as ye are frae the bank. but i hae here i' my pooch a bit silly playock,'at's been i' the hoose this mony a lang; an' jist this last nicht it was pitten intil my heid there micht be some guid intl the chattel, seein' i' the tradition o' the faimily it's aye been hauden for siller. for my ain pairt i hae my doobts; but gien onybody here aboot can tell the trowth on't, yersel' maun be the man; an' sae i hae brought it, to ken what ye wad say til 't." "i'll du my best to lowse yer doobt, laird," returned jeames. "lat's hae a luik at the article." the laird took the horse from his pocket, and handed it to him. jeames regarded it for some time with interest, and examined it with care. "it's a bonny bit o' carved work," he said; "--a bairnly kin' o' a thing for shape--mair like a timmer horsie; but whan ye come to the ornamentation o' the same, it's o' anither character frae the roon' spots o' reid paint--an' sae's the sma' rubies an' stanes intil 't. this has taen a heap o' time, an' painsfu' labour--a deal mair nor some o' 's wad think it worth, i doobt! it's the w'y o' the haithens wi' their graven eemages, but what for a horsie like this, i dinna ken. hooever, that's naither here nor there: ye didna come to me to speir hoo or what for it was made; it's what is 't made o' 's the question. it's some yallow-like for siller; an' it's unco black, which is mair like it--but that may be wi' dirt.--an' dirt i'm thinkin' it maun be, barkit intil the gravin'," he went on, taking a tool and running the point of it along one of the fine lines. "troth ohn testit, i wadna like to say what it was. but it's an unco weicht!--i doobt--na, i mair nor doobt it canna be siller." so saying he carried it to his table, put it down, and went to a corner-cupboard. thence he brought a small stoppered phial. he gave it a little shake, and took out the stopper. it was followed by a dense white fume. with the stopper he touched the horse underneath, and looked closely at the spot. he then replaced the stopper and the bottle, and stood by the cupboard, gazing at nothing for a moment. then turning to the laird, he said, with a peculiar look and a hesitating expression: "na, laird, it's no siller. aquafortis winna bite up' 't. i wad mix 't wi' muriatic, an' try that, but i hae nane handy, an' forby it wad tak time to tell. ken ye whaur it cam frae?--ae thing i'm sure o'--it's no siller!" "i'm sorry to hear it," rejoined the laird, with a faint smile and a little sigh.--"well, we're no worse off than we were, cosmo!--but poor grizzie! she'll be dreadfully disappointed.--gie me the bit horsie, jeames; we'll e'en tak' him hame again. it's no his fau't, puir thing,'at he 's no better nor he was made!" "wad ye no tell me whaur the bit thing cam frae, or is supposit to hae come frae, sir; h'ard ye it ever said, for enstance,'at the auld captain they tell o' had broucht it?" "that's what i hae h'ard said," answered the laird. "weel, sir," returned jeames, "gien ye had nae objection, i wad fain mak' oot what the thing _is_ made o'." "it matters little," said the laird, "seein' we ken what it 's _no_ made o'; but tak' yer wull o' 't, jeames." "sit ye doon than, laird, gien ye hae naething mair pressin', an' see what i mak' o' 't," said the watchmaker, setting him a chair. "wullin'ly," replied the laird, "--but i dinna like takin' up yer time." "ow, my time's no sae dooms precious! i can aye win throu' wi' my work ohn swatten," said jeames, with a smile in which mingled a half comical sadness. "an' it wad set me to waur't (puzzle me to spend it) better to my ain min' nor servin' yersel', i' the sma'est, sir." the laird thanked him, and sat down. cosmo placed himself on a stool beside him. "i hae naething upo' han' the day," jeames merson went on, "but a watch o' jeames gracie's, up at the know--ane o' yer ain fowk, laird. he tells me it was your gran'father, sir, gied it til his gran'father. it's a queer auld-fashiont kin' o' a thing--some complicat; an'whiles it's 'maist ower muckle for me. ye see auld age is aboot the warst disease horses an' watches can be ta'en wi': there's sae little left to come an' gang upo'!" while the homely assayer thus spoke, he was making his preparations. "what for no men as weel's horses an' watches?" suggested the laird. "i wadna meddle wi' men. i lea' them to the doctors an' the ministers," replied jeames, with another wide, silent laugh. by this time he had got a pair of scales carefully adjusted, a small tin vessel in one of them, and balancing weights in the other. then he went to the rack over the dresser, and mildly lamenting his wife's absence and his own inability to lay his hand on the precise vessels he wanted, brought thence a dish and a basin. the dish he placed on the table with the basin in it and filled the latter with water to the very brim. he then took the horse, placed it gently in the basin, which was large enough to receive it entirely, and set basin and horse aside. taking then the'dish into which the water had overflowed, he poured its contents into the tin vessel in the one scale, and added weights to the opposite until they balanced each other, upon which he made a note with a piece of chalk on the table. next, he removed everything from the scales, took the horse, wiped it in his apron, and weighed it carefully. that done, he sat down, and leaning back in his chair, seemed to his visitors to be making a calculation, only the conjecture did not quite fit the strange, inscrutable expression of his countenance. the laird began to think he must be one of those who delight to plaster knowledge with mystery. "weel, laird," said jeames at length, "the weicbt o' what ye hae laid upo' me, maks me doobtfu' whaur nae doobt sud be. but i'mb'un' to say, ootside the risk o' some mistak, o' the gr'un's o' which i can ken naething, for else i wadna hae made it,'at this bit horsie o' yours, by a' 'at my knowledge or skeel, which is naither o' them muckle, can tell me--this bit horsie--an' gien it binna as i say, i cannot see what for it sudna be sae--only, ye see, laird, whan we think we ken a'thing, there's a heap ahint oor a'thing; an' feow ken better, at least feow hae a richt to ken better, nor i du mysel', what a puir cratur is man, an hoo liable to mak mistaks, e'en whan he's duin' his best to be i' the richt; an for oucht 'at i ken, there may hae been grit discoveries made, ohn ever come to my hearin','at upsets a'thing i ever was gien to tak, an' haud by for true; an' yet i daurna withhaud the conclusion i'm driven til, for maybe whiles the hert o' man may gang the wrang. gait by bein' ower wise in its ain conceit o' expeckin' ower little, jist as weel's in expeckin' ower muckle, an' sae i'm b'un' to tell ye, laird,'at yer expectations frae this knot o'metal,--for metal we maun alloo it to be, whatever else it be or bena--yer expectations, i say, are a'thegither wrang, for it's no more siller nor my wife's kitchie-poker." "weel, man!" said the laird, with a laugh that had in it just a touch of scorn, "gien the thing be sae plain, what gars ye gang that gait aboot the buss to say't? du ye tak me and cosmo here for bairns 'at wad fa' a greetin' gien ye tellt them their ba-lamb wasna a leevin' ane-naething but a fussock o' cotton-'oo', rowed roon' a bit stick? we're naither o' 's complimentit.--come, cosmo. --i'm nane the less obleeged to ye, jeames," he added as he rose, "though i cud weel wuss yer opingon had been sic as wad hae pitten't 'i my pooer to offer ye a fee for't." "the less said aboot that the better, laird.'" replied jeames with imperturbability, and his large, silent smile; "the trowth's the trowth, whether it's paid for or no. but afore ye gang it's but fair to tell ye--only i wadna like to be hauden ower strickly accoontable for the opingon, seein' its no my profession, as they ca' 't, but i hae dune my best, an gien i be i' the wrang, i naither hae nor had ony ill design intil' 't.--" "bless my soul!" cried the laird, with more impatience than cosmo had ever seen him show, "is the man mad, or does he take me for a fool?" "there's some things, laird," resumed jeames, "that hae to be approcht oontil, wi' circumspection an' a proaper regaird to the impression they may mak. noo, disclaimin' ony desire to luik like an ill-bred scoon'rel, whilk i wad raither luik to onybody nor to yersel', laird, i ventur to jaloose 'at maybe the maitter o' a feow poun's micht be o' some consequence to ye,-" "ilka fule i' the country kens that 'at kens glenwarlock," interrupted the laird, and turned hastily. "come, cosmo." cosmo went to open the door, troubled to see his father annoyed with the unintelligibility of the man. "weel, gien ye well gang," said jeames, "i maun jist tak my life i' my ban', an'--" "hoot, man! tak yer tongue i' yer teeth; it'll be mair to the purpose," cried the laird laughing, for he had got over his ill humour already. "my life i' my han', quo' he!-man, i haena carriet a dirk this mony a day! i laid it aff wi' the kilt." "weel, it micht be the better 'at ye hadna, gien ye binna gaein hame afore nicht, for i saw some cairds o' the ro'd the day.--ance mair, gien ye wad but hearken til ane 'at confesses he oucht to ken, even sud he be i' the wrang, i tell ye that horsie is not siller--na, nor naething like it." "plague take the man!--what is it, then?" cried the laird. "what for didna ye speir that at me afore?" rejoined jeames. "it wad hae gien me leeberty to tell ye--to the best o' my abeelity that is. whan i'm no cocksure--an' its ower muckle a thing to be cocksure aboot--i wadna volunteer onything. i wadna say naething till i was adjured like an evil speerit." "weel," quoth the laird, entering now into the humour of the thing, "herewith i adjure thee, thou contrairy and inarticulate speerit, that thou tell me whereof and of what substance this same toy-horse is composed, manufactured, or made up." "toy here, toy there!" returned jeames; "sae far as ony cawpabeelity o' mine, or ony puir skeel i hae, will alloo o' testimony--though min' ye, laird, i winna tak the consequences o' bein' i' the wrang--though i wad raither tak them, an' ower again, nor be i' the wrang,--" the laird turned and went out, followed by cosmo. he began to think the man must have lost his reason. but when the watchmaker saw them walking steadily along the street in the direction of home, he darted out of the cloor and ran after them. "gien ye wad gang, laird," he said, in an injured tone, "ye mecht hae jist latten me en' the sentence i had begun!" "there's nae en' to ony o' yer sentences, man!" said the laird; "that's the only thing i' them 'at was forgotten,'cep' it was the sense." "weel, guid day to ye laird!" returned jeames. "only," he added, drawing a step nearer, and speaking in a subdued confidential voice, "dinna lat yer harsie rin awa' upo' the ro'd hame, for i sweir til ye, gien there be only trowth i' the laws o' natur, he's no siller, nor onything like it--" "hoots!" said the laird, and turning away, walked off with great strides. "but," the watchmaker continued, almost running to keep up with him, and speaking in a low, harsh, hurried voice, as if thrusting the words into his ears, "naither mair nor less nor solid gowd--pure gowd, no a grain o' alloy!" that said, he turned, went back at the same speed, shot himself into his cottage, and closed the door. the father and son stopped, and looked at each other for a moment. then the laird walked slowly on. after a minute or two, cosmo glanced up in his face, but his father did not return the glance, and the boy saw that he was talking to another. by and by he heard him murmur to himself, "the gifts of god are without repentance." not a word passed between them as they went home, though all the time it seemed to both father and son that they were holding closest converse. the moment they reached the castle, the laird went to his room--to the closet where his few books lay, and got out a volume of an old cyclopaedia, where he read all he could find about gold. thence descending to the kitchen, he rummaged out a rusty old pair of scales, and with their help arrived at the conclusion that the horse weighed about three pounds avoirdupois: it might be worth about a hundred and fifty pounds. ready money, this was a treasure in the eyes of one whose hand had seldom indeed closed upon more than ten pounds at once. here was large provision for the four years of his boy's college life! nor was the margin it would leave for his creditors by any means too small for consideration! it is true the golden horse, hoofs, and skin, and hair of jewels, could do but little towards the carting away of the barrow of debt that crushed glenwarlock; but not the less was it a heavenly messenger of good will to the laird. there are who are so pitiful over the poor man, that, finding they cannot lift him beyond the reach of the providence which intends there shall always be the poor on the earth, will do for him nothing at all. "where is the use?" they say. they treat their money like their children, and would not send it into a sad house. if they had themselves no joys but their permanent ones, where would the hearts of them be? can such have a notion of the relief, the glad rebound of the heart of the poor man, the in-burst of light, the re-creation of the world, when help, however temporary, reaches him? a man like the laird of glenwarlock, capable of a large outlook, one that reaches beyond the wide-spread skirts of his poverty, sees in it an arc of the mighty rainbow that circles the world, a well in the desert he is crossing to the pastures of red kine and woolly sheep. it is to him a foretaste of the final deliverance. while the rich giver is saying, "poor fellow, he will be just as bad next month again!" the poor fellow is breathing the airs of paradise, reaping more joy of life in half a day than his benefactor in half a year, for help is a quick seed and of rapid growth, and bourgeons in a moment into the infinite aeons. everything in this world is but temporary: why should temporary help be undervalued? would you not pull out a drowning bather because he will bathe again to-morrow? the only question is--does it help? jonah might grumble at the withering of his gourd, but if it had not grown at all, would he ever have preached to nineveh? it set the laird on a pisgah-rock, whence he gazed into the promised land. the rich, so far as money-needs are concerned, live under a cloudless sky of summer--dreary rather and shallow, it seems to me, however lovely its blue light; when for the poor man a breach is made through a vaporous firmament, he sees deeper into the blue because of the framing clouds--sees up to worlds invisible in the broad glare. i know not how the born-rich, still less those who have given themselves with success to the making of money, can learn that god is the all in all of men, for this world's needs as well as for the eternal needs. i know they may learn it, for the lord has said that god can even teach the rich, and i have known of them who seemed to know it as well as any poor man; but speaking generally, the rich have not the same opportunity of knowing god--nor the same conscious need of him--that the poor man has. and when, after a few years, all, so far as things to have and to hold are concerned, are alike poor, and all, as far as any need of them is concerned, are alike rich, the advantage will all be on the side of such as, neither having nor needing, do not desire them. in the meantime, the rich man who, without pitying his friend that he is not rich also, cheerfully helps him over a stone where he cannot carry him up the hill of his difficulty, rejoicing to do for him what god allows, is like god himself, the great lover of his children, who gives a man infinitely, though he will not take from him his suffering until strength is perfected in his weakness. the laird called cosmo, and they went out together for a walk in the fields, where they might commune in quiet. there they talked over the calculation the laird had made of the probable worth of the horse; and the father, unlike most prudent men, did not think it necessary to warn his son against too sure an expectation, and so prepare him for the consequence of a possible mistake; he did not imagine that disappointment, like the small-pox, requires the vaccination of apprehension--that a man, lest he should be more miserable afterwards, must make himself miserable now. in matters of hope as well as fear, he judged the morrow must look after itself; believed the god who to-day is alive in to-morrow, looks after our affairs there where we cannot be. i am far from sure that the best preparation for a disappointment is not the hope that precedes it. friends, let us hold by our hopes. all colours are shreds of the rainbow. there is a rainbow of the cataract, of the paddle-wheel, of the falling wave: none of them is the rainbow, yet they are all of it; and if they vanish, so does the first, the arch-rainbow, the bow set in the cloud, while that which set it there, and will set it again, vanishes never. all things here pass; yet say not they are but hopes. it is because they are not the thing hoped for that they are precious--the very opals of the soul. by our hopes are we saved. there is many a thing we could do better without than the hope of it, for our hopes ever point beyond the thing hoped for. the bow is the damask flower on the woven tear-drops of the world; hope is the shimmer on the dingy warp of trouble shot with the golden woof of god's intent. nothing almost sees miracles but misery. cosmo never forgot that walk in the fields with his father. when the money was long gone after the melted horse, that hour spent chiefly amongst the great horse-gowans that adorned the thin soil of one of the few fields yet in some poor sense their own, remained with him--to be his for ever--a portion of the inheritance of the meek. the joy had brought their hearts yet closer to each other, for one of the lovelinesses of true love is that it may and must always be more. in a gravelly hollow, around which rose hillocks, heaped by far off tides in times afar, they knelt together on the thin grass, among the ox-eyes, and gave god thanks for the golden horse on which cosmo was to ride to the temple of knowledge. after, they sat a long time talking over the strange thing. all these years had the lump of gold been lying in the house, ready for their great need! for what was lands, or family, or ancient name, to the learning that opens doors, the hand-maiden of the understanding, which is the servant of wisdom, who reads in the heart of him who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and the fountains of water and the conscience of man! then they began to imagine together how the thing had come to pass. it could hardly be that the old captain did not know what a thing he gave! doubtless he had intended sometime, perhaps in the knowledge of approaching death, to say something concerning it, and in the meantime, probably, with cunning for its better safety, had treated it as a thing of value, but of value comparatively slight! how had it come into existence, they next asked each other. either it had belonged to some wealthy prince, they concluded, or the old captain had got it made for himself, as a convenient shape in which to carry with him, if not ready money, yet available wealth. cosmo suggested that possibly, for better concealment, it had been silvered; and the laird afterwards learned from the jeweller to whom he sold it, that such was indeed the case. i may mention also that its worth exceeded the laird's calculation, chiefly because of the tiny jewels with which it was studded. cosmo repeated to his father the rime he had learned from dreaming grannie, and told him how he heard it that time he lay a night in her house, and what grannie herself said about it, and now the laird smiled, and now he looked grave; but neither of them saw how to connect the rime with the horse of gold. for one thing, great as was the wealth it brought them, the old captain could hardly have expected it to embolden any one to the degree of arrogance specified. what man would call the king his brother on the strength of a hundred and fifty pounds? when grizzie learned the result of her advice, she said "praise be thankit!" and turned away. the next moment cosmo heard her murmuring to herself, "whan the coo loups ower the mune, the reid gowd rains intil men's shune." chapter xxii. the luminous night. that night cosmo could not sleep. it was a warm summer night, though not yet summer--a soft dewy night, full of genial magic and growth--as if some fire-bergs of summer had drifted away out into the spring, and got melted up in it. he dressed himself, and went out. it was cool, deliciously cool, and damp, but with no shiver. the stars were bright-eyed as if they had been weeping, and were so joyously consoled that they forgot to wipe away their tears. they were bright but not clear--large and shimmering, as if reflected from some invisible sea, not immediately present to his eyes. the gulfs in which they floated were black blue with profundity. there was no moon, but the night was yet so far from dark, that it seemed conscious throughout of some distant light that illumined it without shine. and his heart felt like the night, as if it held a deeper life than he could ever know. he wandered on till he came to the field where he had so lately been with his father. he was not thinking; any effort would break the world-mirror in which he moved! for the moment he would be but a human plant, gathering comfort from the soft coolness and the dew, when the sun had ceased his demands. the coolness and the dew sank into him, and made his soul long for the thing that waits the asking. he came to the spot where his father and he had prayed together, and there kneeling lifted up his face to the stars. oh mighty, only church! whose roof is a vaulted infinitude! whose lights come burning from the heart of the maker! church of all churches--where the son of man prayed! in the narrow temple of herod he taught the people, and from it drove the dishonest traders; but here, under the starry roof, was his house of prayer! church where not a mark is to be seen of human hand! church that is all church, and nothing but church, built without hands, despised and desecrated through unbelief! church of god's building! thou alone in thy grandeur art fitting type of a yet greater, a yet holier church, whose stars are the burning eyes of unutterable, self-forgetting love, whose worship is a ceaseless ministration of self-forgetting deeds--the one real ideal church, the body of the living christ, built of the hearts and souls of men and women out of every nation and every creed, through all time and over all the world, redeemed alike from judaism, paganism, and all the false christianities that darken and dishonor the true. cosmo, i say, knelt, and looked up. then will awoke, and he lifted up his heart, sending aloft his soul on every holy sail it could spread, on all the wings it could put forth, as if, through the visible, he would force his way to the invisible. softly through the blue night came a gentle call: "cosmo." he started, not with fear, looked round, but saw no one. "cosmo!" came the call again. the sky was shining with the stars, and that other light that might be its own; other than the stars and the sky he saw nothing. he looked all round his narrow horizon, the edge of the hollow between him and the sky, where the heaven and the earth met among the stars and the grass, and the stars shimmered like glow-worms among the thin stalks: nothing was there; its edge was unbroken by other shape than grass, daisies, ox-eyes, and stars. a soft dreamy wind came over the edge, and breathed once on his cheek. the voice came again-- "cosmo!" it seemed to come from far away, so soft and gentle was it, and yet it seemed near. "it has called me three times!" said cosmo, and rose to his feet. there was the head of simon peter, as some called him, rising like a dark sun over the top of the hollow! in the faint light cosmo knew him at once, gave a cry of pleasure, and ran to meet him. "you called so softly," said cosmo, "i did not know your voice." "and you are disappointed! you thought it was a voice from some region beyond this world! i am sorry. i called softly, because i wanted to let you know i was coming, and was afraid of startling you." [illustration: a vaulted infinitude] "i confess," replied cosmo, "a little hope was beginning to flutter, that, perhaps i was called from somewhere in the unseen--like samuel, you know; but i was too glad to see you to be much disappointed. i do sometimes wonder though, that, if there is such a world beyond as we sometime talk about, there should be so little communication between it and us. when i am out in the still time of this world, and there is nothing to interfere,--when i am not even thinking, so as to close my doors, why should never anything come? never in my life have i had one whisper from that world." "you are saying a great deal more than you can possibly know, cosmo," answered mr. simon. "you have had no communication recognized by you as such, i grant. and i, who am so much older than you, must say the same. if there be any special fitness in the night, in its absorbing dimness, and isolating silence, for such communication--and who can well doubt it?--i have put myself in the heart of it a thousand times, when, longing after an open vision, i should have counted but the glimpse of a ghostly garment the mightiest boon, but never therefrom has the shadow of a feather fallen upon me. yet here i am, hoping no less, and believing no less! the air around me may be full of ghosts--i do not know; i delight to think they may somehow be with us, for all they are so unseen; but so long as i am able to believe and hope in the one great ghost, the holy ghost that fills all, it would trouble me little to learn that betwixt me and the visible centre was nothing but what the senses of men may take account of. if there be a god, he is all in all, and filleth all things, and all is well. what matter where the region of the dead may be? nowhere but here are they called the dead. when, of all paths, that to god is alone always open, and alone can lead the wayfarer to the end of his journey, why should i stop to peer through the fence either side of that path? if he does not care to reveal, is it well i should make haste to know? i shall know one day, why should i be eager to know now?" "but why might not something show itself once--just for once, if only to give one a start in the right direction?" said cosmo. "i will tell you one reason," returned mr. simon, "--the same why everything is as it is, and neither this nor that other way--namely, that it is best for us it should be as it is. but i think i can see a little way into it. suppose you saw something strange--a sign or a wonder--one of two things, it seems tome likely, would follow:--you would either doubt it the moment it had vanished, or it would grow to you as one of the common things of your daily life--which are indeed in themselves equally wonderful. evidently, if visions would make us sure, god does not care about the kind of sureness they can give, or for our being made sure in that way. a thing that gained in one way, might be of less than no value to us, gained in another, might, as a vital part of the process, be invaluable. god will have us sure of a thing by knowing the heart whence it comes; that is the only worthy assurance. to know, he will have us go in at the great door of obedient faith; and if anybody thinks he has found a backstair, he will find it land him at a doorless wall. it is the assurance that comes of inmost beholding of himself, of seeing what he is, that god cares to produce in us. nor would he have us think we know him before we do, for thereby thousands walk in a vain show. at the same time i am free to imagine if i imagine holily--that is, as his child. and i imagine space full of life invisible; imagine that the young man needed but the opening of his eyes to see the horses and chariots of fire around his master, an inner circle to the horses and chariots that encompassed the city to take him. as i came now through the fields, i lost myself for a time in the feeling that i was walking in the midst of lovely people i have known, some in person, some by their books. perhaps they were with me--are with me--are speaking to me now. for if all our thoughts, from whatever source, whether immediately from god, or through ourselves, seem to enter the chamber of our consciousness by the same door, why may it not be so with some that come to us from other beings? why may not the dead speak to me, and i be unable to distinguish their words from my thoughts? the moment a thought is given me, my own thought rushes to mingle with it, and i can no more part them. some stray hints from the world beyond may mingle even with the folly and stupidity of my dreams." "but if you cannot distinguish, where is the good?" cosmo ventured to ask. "nowhere for deductive certainty. nor, if the things themselves are not worth remembering, or worthy of influencing us, is there any good in enquiring concerning them? shall i mind a thing that is not worth minding, because it came to me in a dream, or was told me by a ghost? it is the quality of a thing, not how it arrived, that is the point. but true things are often mingled with things grotesque. for aught i know, at one and the same time, a spirit may be taking advantage of the door set ajar by sleep, to whisper a message of love or repentance, and the troubled brain or heart or stomach may be sending forth fumes that cloud the vision, and cause evil echoes to mingle with the hearing. when you look at any bright thing for a time, and then close your eyes, you still see the shape of it, but in different colours. this figure has come to you from the outside world, but the brain has altered it. even the shape itself is reproduced with but partial accuracy: some imperfection in the recipient sense, or in the receptacle, sends imperfection into the presentation. in a way something similar may our contact with the dwellers beyond fare in our dreams. my unknown mother may be talking to me in my sleep, and up rises some responsive but stupid dream-cloud of my own, and mingles with and ruins the descended grace. but it is well to remind you again that the things around us are just as full of marvel as those into which you are so anxious to look. our people in the other world, although they have proved these earthly things before, probably now feel them strange, and full of a marvel the things about them have lost." "all is well. the only thing worth a man's care is the will of god, and that will is the same whether in this world or in the next. that will has made this world ours, not the next; for nothing can be ours until god has given it to us. curiosity is but the contemptible human shadow of the holy thing wonder. no, my son, let us make the best we can of this life, that we may become able to make the best of the next also." "and how make the best of this?" asked cosmo. "simply by falling in with god's design in the making of you. that design must be worked out--cannot be worked out without you. you must walk in the front of things with the will of god--not be dragged in the sweep of his garment that makes the storm behind him! to walk with god is to go hand in hand with him, like a boy with his father. then, as to the other world, or any world, as to the past sorrow, the vanished joy, the coming fear, all is well; for the design of the making, the loving, the pitiful, the beautiful god, is marching on towards divine completion, that is, a never ending one. yea, if it please my sire that his infinite be awful to me, yet will i face it, for it is his. let your prayer, my son, be like this:'o maker of me, go on making me, and let me help thee. come, o father! here i am; let us go on. i know that my words are those of a child, but it is thy child who prays to thee. it is thy dark i walk in; it is thy hand i hold.'" the words of his teacher sank into the heart of cosmo, for his spirit was already in the lofty condition of capacity for receiving wisdom direct from another. it is a lofty condition, and they who scorn it but show they have not reached it--nor are likely to reach it soon. such as will not be taught through eye or ear, must be taught through the skin, and that is generally a long as well as a painful process. all cosmo's superiority came of his having faith in those who were higher than he. true, he had not yet been tried; but the trials of a pure, honest, teachable youth, must, however severe, be very different from those of one unteachable. the former are for growth, the latter for change. chapter xxiii. at college. the summer and autumn had yet to pass before he left home for the university of the north. he spent them in steady work with mr. simon. but the steadier his work, and the greater his enjoyment of it, the dearer was his liberty, and the keener his delight in the world around him. he worked so well that he could afford to dream too; and his excursions and his imaginings alike took wide and wider sweeps; while for both, ever in the near or far distance, lay the harbour, the nest of his home. it drew him even when it lay behind him, and he returned to it as the goal he had set out to seek. it was as if, in every excursion or flight, he had but sought to find his home afresh, to approach it by a new path. but--the wind-fall?--nay, the god-send of the golden horse, gave him such a feeling of wealth and freedom, that he now began to dream in a fresh direction, namely, of things he would do if he were rich; and as he was of a constructive disposition, his fancies in this direction turned chiefly on the enlarging and beautifying of the castle--but always with the impossibility understood of destroying a feature of its ancient dignity and historic worth. a portion of the early summer he spent in enlarging the garden on the south side or back of the house. one portion of the ground there seemed to him to have been neglected--the part which lay between the block in which was the kitchen, and that in which was the drawing-room. these stood at right angles to each other, their gables making two sides of a square. but he found the rock so near the surface, that he could not utilize much of it. this set him planning how the space might be used for building. in the angle, the rock came above ground entirely, and had been made the foundation of a wall connecting the two corners, to defend the court--a thick strong wall of huge stones, that seemed as solid as the rock. he grew fond of the spot, almost forsaking for it his formerly favoured stone, and in the pauses of his gardening would sit with his back against this wall, dreaming of the days to come. here also he would bring his book, and read or write for hours, sometimes drawing plans of the changes and additions he would make, of the passages and galleries that might be contrived to connect the various portions of the house, and of the restoration of old defences. the whole thing was about as visionary as his dream of tree-top-city, but it exercised his constructive faculty, and exercise is growth, and growth in any direction, if the heart be true, is growth in all directions. the days glided by. the fervid summer slid away round the shoulder of the world, and made room for her dignified matron sister; my lady autumn swept her frayed and discoloured train out of the great hall-door of the world, and old brother winter, who so assiduously waits upon the house, and cleans its innermost recesses, was creeping around it, biding his time, but eager to get to his work. the day drew near when cosmo must leave the house of his fathers, the walls that framed almost all his fancies, the home where it was his unchanging dream to spend his life, until he went to his mother in heaven. i will not follow his intellectual development. the real education of the youth is enough for my narrative. his mind was too much filled with high hopes and lofty judgments, to be tempted like a common nature in the new circumstances in which he found himself. there are not a few who, believing of others as they are themselves, and teaching as they practise, represent the youth of the nation as necessarily vile; but let not the pure thence imagine there is no one pure but himself. there is life in our nation yet, and a future for her yet, none the less that the weak and cowardly and self-indulgent neither enter into the kingdom of god, nor work any salvation in the earth. cosmo left the university at least as clean as he went to it. he had few companions. those whom he liked best could not give him much. they looked up to him far more than he knew, for they had avague suspicion that he was a genius; but they ministered almost only to his heart. the unworthy amongst his fellow-students scorned him with looks askance, and called him baby warlock--for on more than one of them he had literally turned his back when his conversation displeased him. none of them however cared to pick a quarrel with him. the devil finds it easier to persuade fools that there is dignity in the knowledge of evil, and that ignorance of it is contemptible, than to give them courage. truly, if ignorance is the foundation of any man's goodness, it is not worth the wind that upsets it, but in its mere self, ignorance of evil is a negative good. it is those who do not love good that require to be handed over to evil. the grinders did not care about cosmo, for neither was he of their sort. now and then, however, one of them would be mildly startled by a request from him for assistance in some passage, which, because he did not go in for what they counted scholarship, they could hardly believe him interested. cosmo regarded everything from amidst associations of which they had none. in his instinctive reach after life, he assimilated all food that came in his way. his growing life was his sole impulsive after knowledge. and already he saw a glimmer here and there in regions of mathematics from which had never fallen a ray into the corner of an eye of those grinding men. that was because he read books of poetry and philosophy of which they had never heard. for the rest, he passed his examinations creditably, and indeed, in more than one case, with unexpected as unsought distinction. i must mention, however, that he did all his set work first, and thoroughly, before giving himself what he hungered after. of society in the city he had no knowledge. amongst the tradespeople he made one or two acquaintances. his father had been so much pleased with the jeweller to whom he parted with the golden horse, that he requested cosmo to call upon him as soon as he was settled. cosmo found him a dignified old gentleman--none the less of a gentleman, and all the more of a man, that he had in his youth worked with his own hands. he took a liking to cosmo, and, much pleased with his ready interest in whatever he told him, for cosmo was never tired of listening to anyone who talked of what he knew, made him acquainted with many things belonging to his trade, and communicated many of his experiences. indifferent to the opinion of any to whom he had not first learned to look up, nobody ever listened better than cosmo to any story of human life, however humble. everybody seemed to him of his own family. the greater was the revulsion of his feeling when he came upon anything false in character or low in behaviour. he was then severe, even to utter breach. incapable of excusing himself, he was incapable also of excusing others. but though gentleness towards the faults of others is an indispensable fruit of life, it is perhaps well it should be a comparatively late one: there is danger of foreign excuse reacting on home conduct. excuse ought to be rooted in profoundest obedience, and outgoing love. to say anything is too small to matter, is of the devil; to say anything is too great to forgive, is not of god. he who would soonest die to divide evil and his fellows, will be the readiest to make for them all honest excuse. cosmo liked best to hear mr. burns talk about precious stones. there he was great, for he had a passion for them, and cosmo was more than ready to be infected with it. by the hour together would he discourse of them; now on the different and comparative merits of individual stones which had at one time and another passed through his hands, and on the way they were cut, or ought to have been cut; now on the conditions of size, shape, and water, as indicating the special best way of cutting them; now on the various settings, as bringing out the qualities of different kinds and differing stones. one day he came upon the subject of the weather in relation to stones: on such a sort of day you ought to buy this or that kind of stone; on such another you must avoid buying this or that kind, and seek rather to sell. up to this moment, and the mention of this last point, cosmo had believed mr. burns an immaculate tradesman, but here the human gem was turned at that angle to the light which revealed the flaw in it. there are tradesmen not a few, irreproachable in regard to money, who are not so in regard to the quality of their wares in relation to the price: they take and do not give the advantage of their superior knowledge; and well can i imagine how such a one will laugh at the idea that he ought not: to him every customer is more or less of a pigeon. "if i could but buy plenty of such sapphires," said mr. burns, "on a foggy afternoon like this, when the air is as yellow as a cairngorm, and sell them the first summer-like day of spring, i should make a fortune in a very few years." "but you wouldn't do it, mr. burns?" cosmo ventured to suggest, in some foreboding anxiety, caused by the tone in which the man had spoken: he would fain have an express repudiation of the advantage thus to be obtained. "why not?" rejoined mr. burns, lifting his keen gray eyes, with some wonder in them, and looking cosmo straight in the face. his mind also was crossed by a painful doubt: was the young man a mere innocent? was he "no a' there?" "because it is not honest," replied cosmo. "not honest!" exclaimed the jeweller, in a tone loud with anger, and deep with a sense of injury--whether at the idea that he should be capable of a dishonest thing, or at the possibility of having, for honesty's sake, to yield a money-making principle, i do not know; "i present the thing as it is, and leave my customer to judge according to his knowledge. is mine to be worth nothing to me? there is no deception in the affair. a jeweller's business is not like a horse-dealer's. the stone is as god made it, and the day is as god made it, only my knowledge enables me to use both to better purpose than my neighbour can." "then a man's knowledge is for himself alone--for his own behoof exclusively--not for the common advantage of himself and his neighbour?" said cosmo. "mine is so far for my neighbour, that i never offer him a stone that is not all i say it is. he gets the advantage of his knowledge, let us say, in selling me wine, which he understands to fit my taste with; and i get the advantage of my knowledge in selling him the ring that pleases him. both are satisfied. neither asks the other what he paid for this or that. but why make any bones about it; the first acknowledged principle in business is, to buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest." "where does the love of your neighbour come in then?" "that has nothing to do with business; it belongs to the relations of social life. no command must be interpreted so as to make it impossible to obey it. business would come to a stand-still--no man could make a fortune that way." "you think then that what we are sent here for is to make a fortune?" "most people do. i don't know about sent for. that's what, i fancy, i find myself behind this counter for. anyhow the world would hardly go on upon any other supposition." "then the world had better stop. it wasn't worth making," said cosmo. "young man," rejoined mr. burns, "if you are going to speak blasphemy, it shall not be on my premises." bewildered and unhappy, cosmo turned away, left the shop, and for years never entered it again. mr. burns had been scrupulous to half a grain in giving mr. warlock the full value of his gold and of his stones. nor was this because of the liking he had taken to the old gentleman. there are not a few who will be carefully honest, to a greater or less compass, with persons they like, but leave those they do not like to protect themselves. but mr. burns was not of their sort. his interest in the laird, and his wounded liking for cosmo, did, however, cause him to take some real concern in the moral condition of the latter; while, at the same time, he was willing enough to think evil of him who had denounced as dishonest one of his main principles in the conduct of affairs. it but added venom to the sting of cosmo's words that although the jeweller was scarcely yet conscious of the fact, he was more unwilling to regard as wrong the mode he had defended, than capable of justifying it to himself. that same evening he wrote to the laird that he feared his son must have taken to keeping bad company, for he had that day spoken in his shop in a manner most irreverent and indeed wicked--so as he would never, he was certain, have dared to speak in his father's hearing. but college was a terrible place for ruining the good principles learned at home. he hoped mr. warlock would excuse the interest he took in his son's welfare. nothing was more sad than to see the seed of the righteous turning from the path of righteousness--and so on. the laird made reply that he was obliged to mr. burns for his communication and the interest he took in his boy, but could only believe there had been some mistake, for it was impossible his boy should have been guilty of anything to which his father would apply the epithets used by mr. burns. and so little did the thing trouble the laird, that he never troubled cosmo with a word on the matter--only, when he came, home asked him what it meant. but in after days cosmo repented of having so completely dropped the old gentleman's acquaintance; he was under obligation to him; and if a man will have to do only with the perfect, he must needs cut himself first, and go out of the world. he had learned a good deal from him, but nothing of art: his settings were good, but of the commonest ideas. in the kingdom of heaven tradesmen will be teachers, but on earth it is their business to make fortunes! but a stone, its colour, light, quality, he enjoyed like a poet. many with a child's delight in pure colours, have no feeling for the melodies of their arrangement, or the harmonies of their mingling. so are there some capable of delight in a single musical tone, who have but little reception for melody or complicate harmony. whether a condition analogical might not be found in the moral world, and contribute to the explanation of such as mr. burns, i may not now enquire. the very rainbow was lovelier to cosmo after learning some of the secrets of precious stones. their study served also his metaphysico-poetic nature, by rousing questions of the relations between beauty fixed and beauty evanescent; between the beauty of stones and the beauty of flowers; between the beauties of art, and the beauties of sunsets and faces. he saw that where life entered, it brought greater beauty, with evanescence and reproduction,--an endless fountain flow and fall. many were the strange, gladsome, hopeful, corrective thoughts born in him of the gems in mr. burns's shop, and he owed the reform much to the man whose friendship he had cast from him. for every question is a door-handle. cosmo lived as simply as at home--in some respects more hardly, costing a sum for his maintenance incredibly small. some may hint that the education was on a par with the expense; and, if education consists in the amount and accuracy of facts learned, and the worth of money in that poor country be taken into the account, the hint might be allowed to pass. but if education is the supply of material to a growing manhood, the education there provided was all a man needed who was man enough to aid his own growth; and for those who have not already reached that point, it is matter of infinite inconsequence what they or their parents find or miss. but i am writing of a period long gone by. in his second year, willing to ease his father how--ever little, he sought engagements in teaching; and was soon so far successful that he had two hours every day occupied--one with a private pupil, and the other in a public school. the master of that school used afterwards to say that the laird of glenwarlock had in him the elements of a real teacher. but indeed cosmo had more teaching power than the master knew, for not in vain had he been the pupil of peter simon--whose perfection stood in this, that he not only taught, but taught to teach. life is propagation. the perfect thing, from the spirit of god downwards sends itself onward, not its work only, but its life. and in the reaction cosmo soon found that, for making a man accurate, there is nothing like having to impart what he possesses. he learned more by trying to teach what he thought he knew, than by trying to learn what he was sure he did not know. in his third year it was yet more necessary he should gain what money he could. for the laird found that his neighbour, lord lick-my-loof, had been straining every means in his power to get his liabilities all into his own hands, and had in great part succeeded. the discovery sent a pang to the heart of the laird, for he could hardly doubt his lordship's desire was to foreclose every mortgage, and compel him to yield the last remnant of the possessions of his ancestors. he had refused him james grade's cottage, and he would have his castle! but the day was not yet come; and as no one knew what was best for his boy, no one could foretell what would come to pass, or say what deliverance might not be in store for them! the clouds must break somehow, and then there was the sun! so, as a hundred times before, he gathered heart, and went on, doing his best, and trusting his hardest. the summers at home between the sessions, were times of paradise to cosmo. now first he seemed to himself to begin to understand the simple greatness of his father, and appreciate the teaching of mr. simon. he seemed to descry the outlines of the bases on which they stood so far above him. and now the question came up, what was cosmo to do after he had taken his degree. it was impossible he should remain at home. there was nothing for him to do there, except the work of a farm labourer. that he would have undertaken gladly, had the property been secure, for the sake of being with his father; but the only chance of relieving the land was to take up some profession. the only one he had a leaning to was that of chemistry. this science was at the time beginning to receive so much attention in view of agricultural and manufacturing purposes, that it promised a sure source of income to the man who was borne well in front upon its rising tide. but alas, to this hope, money was yet required! a large sum must yet be spent on education in that direction, before his knowledge would be of money-value, fit for offer in the scientific market! he must go to germany to liebig, or to edinburgh to gregory! there was no money, and the plan was not, at least for the present, to be entertained. there was nothing left but go on teaching. chapter xxiv. a tutorship. it cannot but be an unpleasant change for a youth, to pass from a house and lands where he is son--ah, how much better than master! and take a subordinate position in another; but the discipline is invaluable. to meet what but for dignity would be humiliation, to do one's work in spite of misunderstanding, and accept one's position thoroughly, entrenching it with recognized duty, is no easy matter. as to how cosmo stood this ordeal of honesty, i will only say that he never gave up trying to do better. his great delight and consolation were his father's letters, which he treasured as if they had been a lover's, as indeed they were in a much deeper and truer sense than most love-letters. the two wrote regularly, and shared their best and deepest with each other. the letters also of mr. simon did much to uplift him, and enable him to endure and strive. nobody knows what the relation of father and son may yet come to. those who accept the christian revelation are bound to recognize that there must be in it depths infinite, ages off being fathomed yet. for is it not a reproduction in small of the loftiest mystery in human ken--that of the infinite father and infinite son? if man be made in the image of god, then is the human fatherhood and sonship the image of the eternal relation between god and jesus. one happy thing was that he had a good deal of time to himself. he set his face against being with the children beyond school hours, telling their parents it would be impossible for him otherwise to do his work with that freshness which was as desirable for them as for him. the situation his friends of the university had succeeded in finding for him, was in the south of scotland, almost on the borders. his employers were neither pleasant nor interesting--but more from stupidity than anything worse. had they had some knowledge of cosmo's history, they would have taken pains to be agreeable to him, for, having themselves nothing else, they made much of birth and family. but cosmo had no desire to come nearer where it was impossible to be near, and was content with what they accorded him as a poor student and careful teacher. they lived in the quietest way; for the heir of the house, by a former marriage, was a bad subject, and kept them drained of more than the superfluous money about the place. cosmo remained with them two years, and during that time did not go home, for so there was the more money to send; but as he entered his third year, he began to feel life growing heavy upon him, and longed unspeakably after his father. one day, the last of the first quarter, mr. baird sent a message, desiring his presence, and with some hesitation and difficulty informed him that, because of certain circumstances over which unhappily he had no control, he was compelled to dispense with his services. he regretted the necessity much, he said, for the children were doing well with him. he would always be glad to hear from him, and know that he was getting on. a little indignant, for his father's sake more than his own, cosmo remarked that it was customary, he believed, to give a tutor a quarter's notice, which brought the reply, that nothing would please mr. baird better than that he should remain another quarter--if it was any convenience to him; but he had had great misfortunes within the last month, and had no choice but beg him to excuse some delay in the payment of his quarter's salary now due. in these circumstances he had thought it the kindest thing to let him look out for another situation. hearing this, cosmo was sorry, and said what he could to make the trouble, so far as he was concerned, weigh lightly. he did not know that what he had fairly earned went to save a rascal from the punishment he deserved--the best thing man could give him. mr. baird judged it more for the honour of his family to come betweenthe wicked and his deserts, than to pay the workman his wages. of that money cosmo never received a farthing. the worst of it to to him was, that he had almost come to the bottom of his purse--had not nearly enough to take him home. [illustration] he went to his room in no small perplexity. he could not, would not trouble his father. there are not a few sons, i think, who would be more considerate, were they trusted like cosmo from the first, and allowed to know thoroughly the circumstances of their parents. the sooner mutual confidence is initiated the better. a servant knocked at the door, and, true to the day, came the expected letter from his father--this time enclosing one from lady joan. the warlocks and she had never had sight of each other since the dreary day she left them, but they had never lost hearing of each other. lady joan retained a lively remembrance of her visit, and to both father and son the occasional letter from her was a rare pleasure. some impression of the dignity and end of life had been left with joan from their influences, old man as was the one, and child as was the other; and to the imagination of cosmo she was still the type of all beauty--such as his boyish eyes had seen her, and his boyish heart received her. but from her letters seemed to issue to the inner ear of the laird a tone of oppression for which they gave him no means of accounting; while she said so little concerning her outward circumstances, hardly ever even alluding to her brother, that he could not but fear things did not go well with her at home. the one he had now sent was even sad, and had so touched his heart, that in his own he suggested the idea of cosmo's paying her a visit in his coming holidays. it might comfort her a little, he said, to see one who cared so much, though he could do so little for her. cosmo jumped up, and paced about the room. what better could he do than go at once! he had not known what to do next, and here was direction! he was much more likely to find a situation in england than in scotland! and for his travelling expenses, he knew well how to make a little go a great way! he wrote therefore to his father telling him what had occurred, and saying he would go at once. the moment he had dispatched his letter, he set about his preparations. like a bird the door of whose cage had been opened, he could hardly endure his captivity one instant longer. to write and wait a reply from joan was simply impossible. he must start the very next morning. alas, he had no wings either real or symbolic, and must foot it! it would take him days to reach yorkshire, on the northern border of which she lived, but the idea of such a journey, with such a goal before him, not to mention absolute release from books and boys, was entrancing. to set out free, to walk on and on for days, not knowing what next would appear at any turn of the road--it was like reading a story that came to life as you read it! and then in the last chapter of it to arrive at the loveliest lady in the world, the same whose form and face mingled with his every day-dream--it was a chain of gold with a sapphire at the end of it--a flowery path to the gate of heaven! that night he took his leave of the family, to start early in the morning. the father and mother were plainly sorry; the children looked grave, and one of them cried. he wrote to mr. baird once after, but had no answer--nor ever heard anything of them but that they had to part with everything, and retire into poverty. it was a lovely spring morning when with his stick and his knapsack he set out, his heart as light as that of the sky-lark that seemed for a long way to accompany him. it was one after another of them that took up the song of his heart and made it audible to his ears. better convoy in such mood no man could desire. he walked twenty miles that day for a beginning, and slept in a little village, whose cocks that woke him in the morning seemed all to have throats of silver, and hearts of golden light. he increased his distance walked every day, and felt as if he could go on so for years. but before he reached his destination, what people call a misfortune befell him. i do not myself believe there is any misfortune; what men call such is merely the shadow-side of a good. he had one day passed through a lovely country, and in the evening found himself upon a dreary moorland. as night overtook him, it came on to rain, and grew very cold. he resolved therefore to seek shelter at the first house he came to; and just ere it was quite dark, arrived at some not very inviting abodes on the brow of the descent from the moor, the first of which was an inn. the landlady received him, and made him as comfortable as she could, but as he did not find his quarters to his taste, he rose even earlier than he had intended, and started in a pouring rain. he had paid his bill the night before, intending to break his fast at the first shop where he could buy a loaf. the clouds were sweeping along in great gray masses, with yellow lights between, and every now and then they would let the sun look out for a moment, and the valley would send up the loveliest smile from sweetest grass or growing corn, all wet with the rain that made it strong for the sun. he saw a river, and bridges, and houses, and in the distance the ugly chimneys of a manufacturing town. still it rained and still the sun would shine out. he had grown very hungry before at length he reached a tiny hamlet, and in it a cottage with a window that displayed loaves. he went in, took the largest he saw, and was on the point of tearing a great piece out of it, when he thought, it would be but polite to pay for it first, and put his hand in his pocket. it was well he did so, for in his pocket was no purse! either it had been stolen at the inn, or he had lost it on the way. he put down the loaf. "i am very sorry," he said, "but i find i have lost my purse." the woman looked him in the face with keen enquiring eyes; then apparently satisfied with her scrutiny, smiled, and said, "ne'er trouble yoursel', sir. yo can pey mo as yo coom back. awhope you 'n lost noan so mich?" "not much, but all i had," answered cosmo. "i am much obliged to you, but i'm not likely ever to be this way again, so i can't accept your kindness. i am sorry to have troubled you, but after all, i have the worst of it," he added, smiling, "for i am very hungry." [illustration: cosmo proposes to work for his dinner.] as he spoke, he turned away, and had laid his hand on the latch of the door, when the woman spoke again. "tak th' loaf," she said; "it'll be aw the same in less than a hunder year." she spoke crossly, almost angrily. cosmo seemed to himself to understand her entirely. had she looked well-to-do, he would have taken the loaf, promising to send the money; but he could not bring himself to trouble the thoughts of a poor woman, possibly with a large family, to whom the price of such a loaf must be of no small consequence. he thanked her again, but shook his head. the woman looked more angry than before: having constrained herself to give, it was hard to be refused. "yo micht tak what's offered yo!" she said. cosmo stood thinking: was there any way out of the difficulty? almost mechanically he began searching his pockets: he had very few things either in his pockets or anywhere else. all his fingers encountered was a penknife too old and worn to represent any value, a stump of cedar-pencil, and an ancient family-seal his father had given him when he left home. this last he took out, glanced at it, felt that only the duty of saving his life could make him part with it, put it back, turned once more, said "good morning," and left the shop. he had not gone many steps when he heard the shop-bell ring; the woman came running after him. her eyes were full of tears. what fountain had been opened, i cannot tell; perhaps only that of sympathy with the hungry youth. "tak th' loaf," she said again, but in a very different voice this time, and held it out to him. "dunnot be vexed with a poor woman. sometimes hoo dunnot knaw wheer to get the bread for her own." "that's why i wouldn't take it," rejoined cosmo. "if i had thought you were well off, i would not have hesitated." "oh! aw'm noan so pinched at present," she answered with a smile. "tak th' loaf, an' welcome, an' pey mo when yo' can." cosmo put down her name and address in his pocket-book, and as he took the loaf, kissed the toil-worn hand that gave it him. she uttered a little cry of remonstrance, threw her apron over her head, and went back to the house, sobbing. the tide rose in cosmo's heart too, but he left the hamlet eating almost ravenously. another might have asked himself where dinner was to come from, and spared a portion; but that was not cosmo's way. he would have given half his loaf to any hungry man he met, but he would not save the half of it in view of a possible need that might never come. every minute is a to-morrow to the minute that goes before it, and is bound to it by the same duty-roots that make every moment one with eternity; but there is no more occasion to bind minute to minute with the knot-grass of anxiety, than to ruin both to-day and the grand future with the cares of a poor imaginary to-morrow. to-day's duty is the only true provision for to-morrow; and those who are careful about the morrow are but the more likely to bring its troubles upon them by the neglect of duty which care brings. some say that care for the morrow is what distinguishes the man from the beast; certainly it is one of the many things that distinguish the slave of nature from the child of god. cosmo ate his loaf with as hearty a relish as ever grizzie's porridge, and that is saying as much for his appetite, if not necessarily for the bread, as words can. he had swallowed it almost before he knew, and felt at first as if he could eat another, but after a drink of water from a well by the road-side, found that he had had enough, and strode on his way, as strong and able as if he had had coffee and eggs and a cutlet, and a dozen things besides. he was passing the outskirts of the large manufacturing town he had seen in the distance, leaving it on one hand, when he became again aware of the approach of hunger. one of the distinguishing features of cosmo's character, was a sort of childlike boldness towards his fellow-men; and coming presently to a villa with a smooth-shaven lawn, and seeing a man leaning over the gate that opened from the road, he went up to him and said, "do you happen to have anything you want done about the place, sir? i want my dinner and have no money." the man, one with whom the world seemed to have gone to his wish, looked him all over. "a fellow like you ought to be ashamed to beg," he said. "that is precisely what i was not doing," returned cosmo, "--except as everybody more or less must be a beggar. it is one thing to beg for work, and another to beg for food. i didn't ask you to make a job for me; i asked if there was any work about the place you wanted done. good morning, sir." he turned, and the second time that day was stopped as he went. "i say!--if you can be as sharp with your work min' as you are with your tongue, i don't care if i give you a job. look here: my coachman left me in a huff this morning, and it was time too, as i find now he is gone. the stable is in a shocking mess: if you clean it out, and set things to rights--but i don't believe you can--i will give you your dinner." "very well, sir," returned cosmo. "i give you warning i'm very hungry; only on the other hand, i don't care what i have to eat." "look here," said the man: "your hands look a precious sight more like loafing than work! i don't believe your work will be worth your dinner." "then don't give me any," rejoined cosmo, laughing. "if the proof of the pudding be in the eating, the proof of the stable must be in the cleaning. let me see the place." much pondering what a fellow scouring the country with a decent coat and no money could be, the dweller in the villa led the way to his stable. in a mess that stable certainly was. "the new man is coming this evening," said the man, "and i would rather he didn't see things in such a state. he might think anything good enough after this! the rascal took to drink--and that, young man," he added in a monitory tone, "is the end of all things." "i'll soon set the place to rights," said cosmo. "let's see--where shall i find a graip?" "a grape? what the deuce do you want with grapes in a stable?" "i forgot where i was, sir," answered cosmo, laughing. "i am a scotchman, and so i call things by old-fashioned names. that is what we call a three or four-pronged fork in my country. the word comes from the same root as the german greifen, and our own grip, and gripe, and grope, and grab--and grub too!" he added, "which in the present case is significant." "oh, you are a scholar--are you? then you are either a scotch gardener on the tramp after a situation, or a young gentleman who has made a bad use of his privileges!" "do you found that conclusion on my having no money, or on my readiness to do the first honest piece of work that comes to my hand?" asked cosmo, who having lighted on a tool to serve his purpose, was already at work. "--but never mind! here goes for a clean stable and a good dinner." "how do you know your dinner will be good?" "because i am so ready for it." "if you're so sharp set, i don't mind letting you have a snack before you go further," said his employer. "no, thank you, sir," replied cosmo; "i am too self-indulgent to enjoy my food before i have finished my work." "not a bad way of being self-indulgent, that!" said the man. "--but what puzzles me is, that a young fellow with such good principles should be going about the country like--" "like a tinker--would you say, sir--or like abraham of old when he had no abiding city?" "you seem to know your bible too!--come now, there must be some reason for your being adrift like this!" "of course there is, sir; and if i were sure you would believe me, i would tell you enough to make you understand it." "a cautious scotchman!" "yes. whatever i told you, you would doubt; therefore i tell you nothing." "you have been doing something wrong!" said the man. "you are rude," returned cosmo quietly, without stopping his work. --"but," he resumed, "were you never in any difficulty? have you always had your pockets full when you were doing right? it is not just to suspect a man because he is poor. the best men have rarely been rich." receiving no reply, cosmo raised his head. the man was gone. "somebody has been telling him about me!" he said to himself, and went. for the stable cosmo was then cleaning out, the horses that lived in it, and the house to which it belonged, were the proceeds of a late judicious failure. he finished his job, set everything right as far as he could, and going to the kitchen door, requested the master might be invited to inspect his work. but the master only sent orders to the cook to give the young man his dinner, and let him go about his business. cosmo ate none the less heartily, for it was his own; and cook and maid were more polite than their master. he thanked them and went his way, and in the strength of that food walked many miles into the night--for now he set no goal before him but the last. it was a clear, moonless, starry night, cold after the rain, but the easier to walk in. the wind now and then breathed a single breath and ceased; but that breath was piercing. he buttoned his coat, and trudged on. the hours went and went. he could not be far from cairncarque, and hoped by break of day to be, if not within sight of it, at least within accurate hearing of it. midnight was not long past when a pale old moon came up, and looked drearily at him. for some time he had been as if walking in a dream; and now the moon mingled with the dream right strangely. scarce was she above the hill when an odd-shaped cloud came upon her; and cosmo's sleep-bewildered eyes saw in the cloud the body and legs of james gracie's cow, straddling across the poor, withered heel-rind of the moon. then another cloud, high among the stars, began to drop large drops of rain upon his head. "that's the reid gowd rainin'," he said to himself. he was gradually sinking under the power of invading sleep. every now and then he would come to himself for the briefest instant, and say he must seek some shelter. the next moment he was asleep again. he had often wondered that horses could get over the road and sleep: here he was doing it himself and not wondering at all! the wind rose, and blew sharp stings of rain in his face, which woke him up a little. he looked about him. had he been going through a town, who would have taken him in at that time of the midnight-morning? and here he was in a long lane without sign of turning! to him it had neither beginning nor end, like a lane in a dream. it might be a lane in a dream! he could remember feeling overwhelmed with sleep in a dream! still he did not think he was dreaming: for one thing, he had never been so uncomfortable in a dream! the lane at last opened on a triangular piece of sward, looking like a village green. in the middle of it stood a great old tree, with a bench round it. he dropped on the bench and was asleep in a moment. the wind blew, and the rain fell. cold and discomfort ruled his dim consciousness, but he slept like one of the dead. when the sun rose, it found him at full length on the bare-worn earth at the foot of the tree. but, shining full upon him, it did not for a long time break his sleep. when at last it yielded and he came to himself, it was to the consciousness of a body that was a burden, of a tabernacle that ached as if all its cords were strained, yet all its stakes loosened. with nightmare difficulty he compelled his limbs to raise him, and then was so ill able to govern them, that he staggered like a drunken man, and again and again all but dropped. such a night's-rest after such a day's-weariness had all but mastered him. [illustration: "he dropped on the bench."] seeing a pond in the green, he made for it, and having washed his face, felt a little revived. on the other side of the green, he saw a little shop, in the unshuttered window of which was bread. mechanically he put his hand in his pocket. to his surprise, he found there sixpence: the maid that waited on him at dinner had dropped it in. rejoiced by the gift, he tried to run, to get some warmth into his limbs, but had no great success. the moment the shop was opened, he spent his sixpence, and learned that he was but about three miles off the end of his journey. he set out again therefore with good courage; but alas! the moment he tried to eat, mouth and throat and all refused their office. he had no recollection of any illness, but this was so unlike his usual self, that he could not help some apprehension. as he walked he got a little better, however, and trudged manfully on. by and by he was able to eat a bit of bread, and felt better still. but as he recovered, he became aware that with fatigue and dirt his appearance must be disreputable in the extreme. how was he to approach lady joan in such a plight? if she recognized him at once, he would but be the more ashamed! what could she take him for but a ne'er-do-weel, whose character had given way the moment he left the guardianship of home, and who now came to sponge upon her! and if he should be ill! he would rather lie down and die on the roadside than present himself dirty and ill at cairncarque!--rather go to the workhouse, than encounter even the momentary danger of such a misunderstanding! these reflections were hardly worthy of the faith he had hitherto shown, but he was not yet perfect, and unproved illness had clouded his judgment. coming to a watering-place for horses on the roadside, he sat down by it, and opening his bag, was about to make what little of a toilet was possible to him--was thinking whether he might venture, as it seemed such a lonely road, to change his shirt, when round a near corner came a lady, walking slowly, and reading as she came. it was she! and there he stood without coat or waistcoat! to speak to her thus would be to alarm her! he turned his back, and began to wash in the pool, nor once dared look round. he heard her slowly pass, fancied he heard her stop one step, felt her presence from head to foot, and washed the harder. when he thought she was far enough off, he put on the garments he had removed, and hastened away, drying himself as he went. at the turn of the road, all at once rose the towers of cairncarque. there was a castle indeed!--something to call a castle!--with its huge square tower at every corner, and its still huger two towers in the middle of its front, its moat, and the causeway where once had been its drawbridge!--yes! there were the spikes of the portcullis, sticking down from the top of the gateway, like the long upper teeth of a giant or ogre! that was a real castle--such as he had read of in books, such as he had seen in pictures! castle warlock would go bodily into half a quarter of it--would be swallowed up like a mouthful, and never seen again! castle warlock was twice as old--that was something! but why had not lady joan told him hundreds of stories about cairncarque, instead of letting him gabble on about their little place? but she could not love her castle as he did his, for she had no such father in it! that must be what made the difference! that was why she did not care to talk about it! was he actually going to see her again? and would she be to him the same as before? for him, the years between had vanished; the entrancing shadows of years far away folded him round, and he was no more a man, but the boy who had climbed the wintry hills with her, and run down them again over the snow hand in hand with her. but as he drew nigh the great pile, which grew as he approached it, his heart sank within him. his head began to ache: a strange diffidence seized him; he could not go up to the door. he would not mind, he said to himself, if joan would be there the moment the door opened. but would any servant in england admit a fellow like him to the presence of a grand lady? how could he walk up to the great door in the guise of one who had all night had his lodging on the cold ground! he would reconnoitre a little, find some quiet way of approaching the house, perhaps discover some shelter where he might rectify what was worst in his personal appearance! he turned away therefore from the front of the castle, and following the road that skirted the dilapidated remnants of fortification, passed several farmlike sheds, and arrived at a door in a brick wall, apparently that of a garden--ancient, and green and gray with lichens. looking through it with the eyes of his imagination, he saw on the other side the loveliest picture of warmth, order, care, and ancient peace,--regions stately with yews and cedars, fruit-trees and fountains, clean-swept walks and shady alleys. the red wall, mottled and clouded with its lichens, and ruffed with many a thready weed, looked like the reverse of some bit of gorgeous brocade, on the sunny side of which must hang blossoming peaches and pears, nectarines and apricots and apples, on net-like trees, that spread out great obedient arms and multitudinous twigs against it, holding on by it, and drinking in the hot sunshine it gathered behind them. ah, what it would be to have such a garden at glenwarlock! he turned to the door, with difficulty opened it, and the vision vanished. not a few visions vanish when one takes them for fact, and not for the vision of fact that has to be wrought out with the energy of a god-born life. [illustration: 'he turned to the door'] chapter xxv. the gardener. there was a garden indeed, but a garden whose ragged, ugly, degraded desolation looked as if the devil had taken to gardening in it. rather than a grief, it was a pain and disgust to see. fruit-trees there were on the wall, but run wild with endless shoots, which stuck like a hog's mane over the top of it, and out in every direction from the face of it with a look of impertinent daring. all the fastenings were broken away, and only the old branches, from habit, kept their places against it. everything all about seemed striving back to a dear disorder and salvage liberty. the walks were covered with weeds, and almost impassable with unpruned branches, while here lay a heap of rubbish, there a smashed flower-pot, here a crushed water-pot, there a broken dinner-plate. following a path that led away from the wall, he came upon a fountain without any water, in a cracked basin dry as a lizard-haunted wall, a sundial without a gnomon, leaning wearily away from the sun, a marble statue without a nose, and streaked about with green: like an army of desolation in single file, they revealed to cosmo the age-long neglect of the place. next appeared a wing built out from the back of the inner court of the castle--in a dilapidated, almost dangerous condition. then he came to a great hedge of yew, very lofty, but very thin, like a fence of old wire that had caught cart-loads of withered rubbish in its meshes. here he heard the sound of a spade, and by the accompanying sounds judged the implement was handled by an old man. he peeped through the hedge, and caught sight of him. old he was--bent with years, but tough, wiry, and sound, and it seemed to cosmo that the sighs and groans, or rather grunts, which he uttered, were more of impatience and discontent than oppression or weakness. as he stood regarding him for a moment, anxious to discover with what sort of man he had to deal, he began to mutter. presently he ceased digging, drew himself up as straight as he could, and, leaning on his spade, went on, as if addressing his congregation of cabbages over the book-board of a pulpit. and now his muttering took, to the ears of cosmo, an indistinct shape like this: "wha cares for an auld man like me? i kenna what for there sud be auld men made! the banes o' me micht melt i' the inside o' me, an' never a sowl alive du mair for me nor berry me to get rid o' the stink! no 'at i'm that dooms auld i' mysel' them 'at wad hae my place wad hae me!" here was a chance for him, cosmo thought; for at least here was a fellow-countryman. he went along the hedge therefore until he found a place where he could get through, and approached the man, who had by this time resumed his work, though after a listless fashion, turning over spadeful after spadeful, as if neither he nor the cabbages cared much, and all would be in good time if done by the end of the world. as he came nearer, cosmo read peevishness and ill-temper in every line of his countryman's countenance, yet he approached him with confidence, for scotchmen out of their own country are of good report for hospitality to each other. "hoo's a' wi' ye?" he cried, sending his mother-tongue as a pursuivant in advance. "wha's speirin? an' what richt hae ye to speir?" returned the old man in an angry voice, and lifting himself quickly, though with an aching sigh, looked at him with hard blue eyes. "a countryman o' yer ain," answered cosmo. "mony ane's that 'at's naething the better nor the walcomer. gie an accoont o' yersel', or the doags'll be lowsed upo' ye here in a jiffey. haith, this is no the place for lan'loupers!" "hae ye been lang aboot the place?" asked cosmo. "langer nor ye're like to be, i'm thinkin', gien ye keep na the ceeviler tongue i' yer heid, my man--whaur come ye frae?" the old man had dropt his spade; cosmo took it up, and began to dig. "lay doon that spaud," cried its owner, and would have taken it from him, but cosmo delayed rendition. "hoot, man!" he said, "i wad but lat ye see i'm nae lan'louper, an' can weel han'le a spaud. stan' ye by a bit, an' rist yer banes, till i caw throuw a trifle o' yer wark." "an' what du ye expec' to come o' that? ye're efter something, as sure's the deevil at the back yelt, though ye're nae freely sae sure to win at it." "what i expec,' it wad be ill to say; but what i dinna expec' is to be traitit like a vaggabon. come, i'll gie ye a guid hoor's wark for a place to wash mysel', an' put on a clean sark." "hae ye the sark?" "_i_ hae't here i' my bag." "an' what du ye want to put on a clean sark for? what'll ye du whan ye hae't on?" "gie ye anither hoor's wark for the heel o' a loaf an' a drink o' watter." "ye'll be wantin' to be taen on, i s' wad (wager) ye a worm!" "gien ye cud gie me a day's wark, or maybe twa,--" began cosmo, thinking how much rather he would fall in with lady joan about the garden than go up to the house. "i weel thoucht there sud be mair intil't nor appeart! ye wad fain hae the auld man's shune, an' mak sur o' them afore he kickit them frae him! ay! it's jist like the likes o' ye! mine's a place the like o' you's keen set efter! ye think it's a' ait an' play! gang awa' wi' ye, an' latna me see the face o' ye again, or i s' ca' to them 'at 'll tak accoont o' ye." "hoot, man!" returned cosmo, and went on turning the ground over, "ye're unco hard upon a neebor!" "neebor! ye're no neebor o' mine! gang awa' wi' ye, i tell ye!" "did naebody never gie' you a helpin' han','at ye're sae dooms hard upo' ane 'at needs ane?" "gien onybody ever did, it wasna you." "but dinna ye think ye're a kin' o' b'un' to du the like again?" "ay, to him 'at did it--but i tell ye ye're no the man; sae gang aboot yer business." "someday ye may want somebody ance mair to du ye a guid turn!" "i hae dune a heap to gie me a claim on consideration. i hae grown auld upo' the place. what hae ye dune, my man?" "i wadna hae muckle chance o' duin' onything, gien a' body was like you. but did ye never hear tell o' ane 'at said:'ye wad du naething for nane o' mine, sae ye refeesed mysel'?" "deed, an' i wull refeese yersel'," returned the old man. "sic a chield for jaw an'cheek--saw i never nane--as the auld sang says! whaur on this earth cam ye frae?" as he spoke, he gave cosmo a round punch on the shoulder next him that made him look from his work, and then began eying him up and down in the most supercilious manner. he was a small, withered, bowed man, with a thin wizened face, crowned by a much worn fur cap. his mouth had been so long drawn down at each corner as by weights of discontent, that it formed nearly a half-circle. his eyebrows were lifted as far as they would go above his red-lidded blue eyes, and there was a succession of ripply wrinkles over each of them, which met in the middle of his forehead, so that he was all over arches. under his cap stuck out enormous ears, much too large for his face. huge veiny hands hung trembling by his sides, but they trembled more from anger than from age. "i tellt ye a'ready," answered cosmo; "i come frae the auld country." "deil tak the auld country! what care i for the auld country! it's a braid place, an' langer nor it's braid, an' there's mony ane intil't an' oot on't 'at's no warth the parritch his mither pat intil 'im. eh, the fowth o' fushionless beggars i hae seen come to me like yersel'!--ow ay! it was aye wark they wad hae!--an' cudna du mair nor a flee amo' triacle!--what coonty are ye frae, wi' the lang legs an' the lang back-bane o' ye?" cosmo told him. the hands of the old man rose from his sides, and made right angles of his elbows. "weel," he said slowly, "that's no an ill coonty to come frae. i may say that, for i belang til't my--sel'. but what pairt o' 't ran ye frae whan ye cam awa'?" "i ran frae nae pairt, but i cam frae hame i' the north pairt o' that same," answered cosmo, and bent again to his work. the man came a step nearer, and cosmo, without looking up, was aware he was regarding him intently. "ay! ay!" he said at last, in a tone of reflection mingled with dawning interest, "i ance kent a terrible rascal cam frae owerby that gait: what ca' they the perris ye're frae?" cosmo told him. "lord bless me!" cried the old man, and came close up to him.--"but na!" he resumed, and stepped a pace back, "somebody's been tellin ye!" cosmo gave him no answer. he stood a moment expecting one, then broke out in a rage. "what for mak ye nae answer whan a body speirs ye a queston? that wasna mainners whan i was a bairn. lord! ye micht as weel be ceevil! isna it easy eneuch to lee?" "i would answer no man who was not prepared to believe me," said cosmo quietly. the dignity of his english had far more effect on the man than the friendliness of their mother-tongue. "maybe ye wadna objec' to mak mention by name o' the toon nearest to ye whan ye was at hame?" said the old man, and from his altered manner and tone cosmo felt he might reply. "it was ca'd muir o' warlock," he answered. "lord, man! come into the hoose. ye maun be sair in need o' something to put intil ye! a' the gait frae muir o' warlock! a toonsman o' my ain! scot--lan' 's a muckle place--but muir o' warlock! guid guide's! come in, man; come in!" so saying he took the spade from cosmo's hands, threw it down with a contemptuous cast, and led the way towards the house. the old man had a heart after all! strange the power of that comparatively poor thing, local association, to bring to light the eternal love at the root of the being! wonderful sign also of the presence of god wherever a child may open eyes! this man's heart was not yet big enough to love a scotsman, but it was big enough to love a muir-o'-warlock-man; and was not that a precious beginning? --a beginning as good as any? it matters nothing where or how one begins, if only one does begin! there are many, doubtless, who have not yet got farther in love than their own family; but there are others who have learned that for the true heart there is neither frenchman nor englishman, neither jew nor greek, neither white nor black--only the sons and daughters of god, only the brothers and sisters of the one elder brother. there may be some who have learned to love all the people of their own planet, but have not yet learned to look with patience upon those of saturn or mercury; while others there must be, who, wherever there is a creature of god's making, love each in its capacity for love--from the arch-angel before god's throne, to the creeping thing he may be compelled to destroy--from the man of this earth to the man of some system of worlds which no human telescope has yet brought within the ken of heaven-poring sage. and to that it must come with every one of us, for not until then are we true men, true women--the children, that is, of him in whose image we are made. cosmo followed very willingly, longing for water and a clothes-brush rather than for food. the cold and damp, fatigue and exposure of the night were telling upon him more than he knew, and all the time he was at work, he had been cramped by hitherto unknown pains in his limbs. the gardener brought him to the half-ruinous wing already mentioned, to a small kitchen, opening under a great sloping buttress, and presented him to his wife, an english woman, some ten years younger than himself. she received him with a dignified retraction of the feelers, but the moment she understood his needs, ministered to them, and had some breakfast ready for him by the time he had made his toilet. he sat down by her little fire, and drank some tea, but felt shivery, and could not eat. in dread lest, if he yielded a moment to the invading sickness, it should at once overpower him, he made haste to get out again into the sun, and rejoined the old man, who had gone back to his cabbage-ground. there he pulled off his coat, and once more seized the spade, for work seemed the only way of meeting his enemy hand to hand. but the moment he began, he was too hot, and the moment he took breath he was ready to shiver. as long as he could stand, however, he would not give in. "how many years have you been gardener here?" he asked, forcing himself to talk. "five an' forty year, an' i'm nearhan' tired o' 't." "the present lord is a young man, is he not?" "ay; he canna be muckle ayont five an' thirty." "what sort of a man is he?" "weel, it's hard to say. he's ane o' them 'at naebody says weel o', an' naebody's begud to say ill o'--yet." "there can't be much amiss with him then, surely!"' "weel, i wadna gang freely sae far as say that, you 'at's a man o' sense, maun weel un'erstan', gien it was only frae yer carritchis (catechism), 'at there's baith sins o' o-mission, an' sins o' co-mission. noo, what sins o' co-mission may lie at my lord's door, i dinna ken, an' feow can ken, an' we're no to jeedge; but for the o-mission, ye hae but to see hoo he neglects that bonny sister o' his, to be far eneuch frae thinkin' a sant o' 'im." silence followed. cosmo would go no farther in that direction: it would be fair neither to lady joan nor the gardener, who spoke as to one who knew nothing of the family. "noo the father," resumed his new friend, "--puir man, he's deid an' damned this mony a day!--an' eh, but he was an ill ane!--but as to leddy joan, he wad hardly bide her oot o' his sicht. he cudna be jist that agreeable company to the likes o' her, puir leddy! for he was a rouch-spoken, sweirin' auld sinner as ever lived, but sic as he had he gae her, an' was said to hae been a fine gentleman in's yoong days. some wad hae 't he cheenged a' thegither o' a suddent. an' they wad hae 't it cam o' bluid-guiltiness--for they said he had liftit the reid han' agen his neebor. an' they warnt me, lang as it was sin' i left it, no to lat 'im ken i cam frae yon pairt o' the country, or he wad be rid o' me in a jiffey, ae w'y or anither. --ay, it was a gran' name that o' warlock i' thae pairts! though they tell me it gangs na for sae muckle noo. i hae h'ard said,'at ever sin' the auld lord here made awa' wi' the laird o' glen--warlock, the faimily there never had ony luck. i wad like to ken what you, as a man o' sense, think o' that same. it appears to me a' some queer kin' o' justice! no' 'at i'm daurin' or wad daur to say a word agen the w'y 'at the warl's goverrnt, but there's some things 'at naebody can un'erstan'--i defy them!--an' yon's ane o' them--what for, cause oor graceless auld lord--he was yoong than--tuik the life o' the laird o' glenwarlock, the faimily o' warlock sud never thrive frae that day to this!--read me that riddle, yoong man, gien ye can." "maybe it was to haud them 'at cam efter frae ony mair keepin' o' sic ill company," cosmo ventured to suggest; for, knowing what his father was, and something also of what most of those who preceded him were, he could see no such inscrutable dispensation in the fact mentioned. "that wad be hard lines, though," insisted the gardener, unwilling to yield the unintelligibility of the ways of providence. "but," said cosmo, "they say doon there, it was a brither o' the laird, no the laird himsel','at the english lord killt." "na, na; they're a' wrang there, whaever says that. for auld jean, wham i min' a weel faured wuman, though doobtless no sae bonny as whan he broucht her wi' 'im a yoong lass--maybe to gar her haud her tongue--auld jean said as i say. but that was lang efter the thing was ower auld to be ta'en ony notice o' mair. forby, you 'at's a man o' sense, gien it wasna the laird himsel' 'at he killt, hoo wad there, i' that case, be onything worthy o' remark i' their no thrivin' efter't? i' that case, the no thrivin' cud hae had naething ava to du wi' the killin'. na, na, it was the laird himsel' 'at the maisier killt--the father o' the present laird, i'm thinkin'. what aged-man micht he be--did ye ever hear tell?" "he's a man well on to seventy," answered cosmo, with a pang at the thought. "ay; that'll be aboot it! there can be no doobt it was his father oor lord killt--an' as little 'at efter he did it he gaed doon the braid ro'd to the deevil as fest's ever he cud rin. it was jist like as wi' judas--he maun gang till's ain. some said he had sellt himsel' to the deevil, but i'm thinkin' that wasna necessar'. he was to get him ony gait! an' wad ye believe't, it's baith said and believt--'at he cam by's deith i' some exterordnar w'y, no accoontable for, but plainly no canny. ae thing's sure as deith itsel', he was ta'en suddent, an' i' the verra hoose whaur, mony a lang year afore, he commitit the deed o' darkness!" a pause followed, and then the narrator, or rather commentator, resumed. "i'm thinkin' whan he begud to ken himsel' growin' auld, his deed cam back upon 'im fresh-like, an' that wad be hoo he cudna bide to hae my lady oot o' the sicht o' his een, or at least ayont the cry o' his tongue. troth! he wad whiles come aboot the place efter her, whaur i wad be at my wark, as it micht be the day, cursin' an' sweirin' as gien he had sellt his sowl to a' the deevils thegither, an' sae micht tak his wull o' onything he cud get his tongue roon'! but i never heedit him that muckle, for ye see it wasna him 'at peyt me--the mair by token 'at gien it had been him 'at had the peyin' o' me, it's never a baubee wad i hae seen o' my ain siller; but the trustees peyt me, ilka plack, an' sae i was indepen'ent like, an' luit him say his say. but it was aye an oonsaitisfactory kin' o' a thing, for the trustees they caredna a bodle aboot keepin' the place dacent, an' tuik sae sma' delicht in ony pleesurin' o' the auld lord,'at they jist allooed him me, an' no a man mair nor less--to the gairden, that is. that's hoo the place comes to be in sic a disgracefu' condeetion. gien it hadna been for rizzons o' my ain, i wad hae gane, mony's the time, for the sicht o' the ruin o' things was beyon' beirin'. but i bude to beir't; sae i bore't an' bore't till i cam by beirin' o' 't to tak it verra quaiet, an' luik upo' the thing as the wull o' a providence 'at sudna be meddlet wi'. i broucht mysel' in fac' to that degree o' submission,'at i gae mysel' no trouble more, but jist confint my ainergies to the raisin' o' the kail an' cabbage, the ingons an' pitawtas wantit aboot the place." "and are things no better," asked cosmo, "since the present lord succeeded?" "no a hair--'cep' it be 'at there's no sae mony ill words fleein' aboot the place. my lord never sets his nose intil the gairden, or speirs--no ance in a twal--month, hoo's things gangin' on. he does naething but rowt aboot in 's boaratory as he ca's 't--bore-a-whig, or bore-a-tory, it's little to me--makin' stinks there fit to scomfish a whaul, an' gar 'im stick his nose aneth the watter for a glamp o' fresh air. he's that hard-hertit 'at he never sae muckle as aits his denner alongside o' his ain sister,'cep' it be whan he has company, an' wad luik like ither fowk. gien it gaedna ower weel wi' her i' the auld man's time, it gangs waur wi' her noo; for sae lang as he was abune the yird there was aye somebody to ken whether she was livin' or deid. to see a bonnie lass like her strayin' aboot the place nae better companied nor wi' an auld buik--it's jist eneuch to brak a man's hert, but that age kills rage." "do the neighbours take no notice of her?" "nane o' her ain dignity, like. ye see she's naething but bonny. she has naething. an' though she's as guid a cratur as ever lived, the cauld grun' o' her poverty gaithers the fog o' an ill report. troth, for her faimily, the ill's there, report or no report; but, a' the same, gien she had been rich, an' her father--i'll no say the hangman, but him 'at he last hangt, there wad be fowth (plenty) o' coonty-fowk wad hae her til her denner wi' them. an' i'm thinkin' maybe she's the prooder for her poverty, an' winna gang til her inferriors sae lang as her aiquals dinna invete her. she gangs whiles to the doctor's--but he's a kin' o' a freen' o' the yerl's,'cause he likes stinks--but that's the yoong doctor." "does her brother never go out to dinner anywhere, and take her with him?" "naebody cares a bodle aboot his lordship i' the haill country-side, sae far as i can learn. there's ane or twa--great men, i daursay--whiles comes doon frea lon'on, to smell hoo he's gettin' on wi' 's stinks, but deil a neebor comes nigh the hoose. ow, he's a great man, i mak nae doobt, awa' frae hame! he's aye writin' letters to the newspapers, an' they prent them--aboot this an' aboot that--aboot beasties i' the watter, an' lectreesity, an' i kenna what a'; an' some says 'at hoo he'll be a rich man some day, the moment he's dune fin'in' oot something or ither he's beenwarslin' at for the feck o' a ten year or sae; but the gentry never thinks naething o' a man sae lang as he's only duin' his best--or his warst, as the case may be--to lay his han' upo' the siller 'at's fleein' aboot him like a snaw-drift. bide ye a bit, though! whan he's gotten't, it's doon they're a' upo' their k-nees til 'im thegither. but gien they be prood, he's prooder, an' lat him ance get his heid up, an' rid o' the trustees, an' fowk upo' their marrow--banes til 'im, haith, he'll lat them sit there, or i'm mistaen in 'im." "then has my lady no companions at all?" "she gangs whiles to see the doctor's lass, an' whiles she comes here an' has her denner wi' her, themsel's twa: never anither comes near the place." all this time, cosmo had been turning over the cabbage-ground, working the harder that he still hoped to work off the sickness that yet kept growing upon him. the sun was hot, and his head, which had been aching more or less all day, now began to throb violently. the spade dropt from his hands, and he fell on his face in the soft mould. "what's this o' 't?" cried the old man, going up to him in a fright. he caught hold of him by an arm, and turned him on his back. his face was colourless, and the life seemed to have gone out of him. chapter xxvi. lost and found. when cosmo came to himself, he had not a notion where he was, hardly indeed knew what he was. his chief consciousness was of an emptiness and a weight combined, that seemed to paralyze him. he would have turned on his side, but felt as if a ponderous heap of bed-clothes prevented him from even raising an arm--and yet he was cold. he tried to think back, to find what he knew of himself last, but could for a long time recall only a confused dream of multitudinous discomfort and painful effort. at last, however, came the garden, the spade-work, and the old man's talk; and then it seemed as if the cracked complaining voice had never left his ears. "i've been ill!" he said to himself. "perhaps i dropped down. i hope they haven't buried me!" with a straining agony of will he got in motion an arm, which was lying like that of another man outside the coverlid, and felt feebly about him. his hand struck against something solid, and what seemed a handful of earth fell with a hollow rumble. alas, this seemed ominous! where could he be but in his coffin? the thought was not a pleasant one, certainly, but he was too weak, and had been wandering too long in the miserable limbo of vain fancies, to be much dismayed. he said to himself he would not have to suffer long--he must soon go to sleep, and so die. fatigued with that one movement, he lay for some time motionless. his eyes were open, though he did not know it, and by and by he became aware of light. thin, dim, darkly gray, a particle at a time, it grew about him. for some minutes his eyes seemed of themselves, without any commission from him, to make inquiry of his surroundings. they discovered that, if he was in a coffin, or even in a sepulchre without a coffin, it was a large one: there was a wall--miles away! the light grew, and with it the conviction that he was in no sepulchre. but there the consolation ceased, for the still growing light revealed no sign of ministration or comfort. above him was a bare, dirty, stained ceiling, with a hole in it, through which stuck skeleton ribs of lath; around him were bare, dirty-white walls, that seemed to grow out of the gray light of a wet morning as the natural deposit from such a solution. two slender poles, meant to support curtains, but without a rag of drapery upon them, rose at his feet, like the masts of a charon's boat. was he indeed in the workhouse he had pre--ferred to cairncarque? it could hardly be, for there was the plaster fallen in great patches from the walls as well as the ceiling, and surely no workhouse would be allowed to get into such a disrepair! he tried again, and this time succeeded in turning on his side, discovering in the process how hard the bed was, and how sharp his bones. a wooden chair stood a little beyond his reach, and upon it a bottle and teacup. not another article could he discover. right under the hole in the ceiling a board was partly rotted away in the floor, and a cold, damp air, smelling of earth, and decaying wood, seemed to come steaming up through it. a few minutes more, he said to himself, and he would get up, and out of the hideous place, but he must lie a little longer first, just to come to himself!--now he would try!--what had become of his strength? was it gone utterly? could one night's illness have reduced him thus? he seemed to himself unable to think, yet the profoundest thought went on as if thinking itself in him. where had his strength lain before he lost it? could that ever have been his which he could not keep? if a thing were ours, nothing could ever take it from us! was his strength ever his then? yes, for god had given it him. then he could not have lost it! he had it still! the branches of it were gone, but the root remained, hid in god. all was well. if god chose that his child should lie there, for this day, and to-morrow, or till the next year, or if it pleased him that he should never rise again with the same body, was that a thing to trouble him? he turned his back on the ugly room, and was presently fast asleep again. not a few read the poems of a certain king brought up a shepherd lad. from sunday to sunday they read them. amongst them, in their turn, they read these: "i will both lay me down in peace and sleep, for thou, lord, only makest me to dwell in safety." yet not only do these readers never have such a feeling in their own hearts in consequence, but they never even imagine that david really had it in his. deeper and grander things still, uttered by this same shepherd-warrior, do they read, and yet in their wisdom will declare it preposterous that any scotch lad should have such a feeling towards god as i have represented! "doth god care for oxen?" says st. paul. doth god care for kings? i ask, or for jew-shepherds? or does he not care all over for all of us--oxen and kings and sparrows and scotch lairds? according to such blind seers, less is to be expected of humanity since the son of david came, than it was capable of in his father david. such men build stone houses, but never a spiritual nest. they cannot believe the thing possible which yet another man does. nor ever may they believe it before they begin to do it. i wonder little at so many rejecting christianity, while so many would-be champions of it hold theirs at arm's length--in their bibles, in their theories, in their church, in their clergyman, in their prayer-books, in the last devotional page they have read--a separable thing--not in their hearts on their beds in the stillness; not their comfort in the night-watches; not the strength of their days, the hope and joy of their conscious being! god is nearer to me than the air i breathe, nearer to me than the heart of wife or child, nearer to me than my own consciousness of myself, nearer to me than the words in which i speak to him, nearer than the thought roused in me by the story of his perfect son--or he is no god at all. the unbelievers might well rejoice in the loss of such a god as many chris--tians would make of him. but if he be indeed the father of our lord christ, of that jew who lived and died doing the will of his father, and nothing but that will, then, to all eternity, "amen, thy will be done, o god! and nothing but thy will, in or through me!" cosmo had been ill a whole week--in fever and pain, and was now helpless almost as an infant. the old man had gone for his wife, and between them they had persuaded him, though all but unconscious, to exert himself sufficiently to reach the house. this effort he could recall, in the shape of an intermina--ble season during which he supported the world for atlas, that he might get a little sleep; but it was only the aching weight of his own microcosm that he urged atlanlean force to carry. they took him direct to the room where he now lay, for they had them--selves but one chamber, and if they took him there, what would become of the old bones to which the gardener was so fond of referring in his colloquies with himself? also, it might be some fever he had taken, and their own lives were so much the more precious that so much of them was gone! like most of us, they were ready to do their next best for him. they spared some of their own poor comforts to furnish the skeleton bed for him; and there he lay, like one adrift in a rotten boat on the ebbing ocean of life, while the old woman trudged away to the village to tell the doctor that there was a young scotch gardener taken suddenly ill at their quarters in the castle. the doctor sent his son, a man about thirty, who after travelling some years as medical attendant to a nobleman, had settled in his native village as his father's partner. he prescribed for cosmo, and gave hope that there was nothing infectious about the case. every day during the week he had come to see him, and the night before had been with him from dark to dawn. the gardener's wife had informed lady joan that a young scotchman who had come to her husband seeking employment, had been taken suddenly ill, and was lying in a room in the old wing; and lady joan had said she would speak to the housekeeper to let her have whatever she wanted for him. the doctor saw lady joan most every time he came to see cosmo, and she would enquire how his patient was going on; she would also hear the housekeeper's complaints of the difficulty she had in getting wine from the butler--of which there was no lack, only he grudged it, for he was doing his best to drink up the stock the old lord had left behind him, intending to take his departure with the last bottle--but she took no farther interest in the affair. the castle was like a small deserted village, and there was no necessity for a person in one part of it knowing what was taking place in another. but that same morning she had a letter from the laird, saying he was uneasy about his boy. he had been so inconsiderate, he informed her, as to set out to visit her without asking her leave, or even warning her of his intent; and since the letter announcing his immediate departure, received a fortnight before, he had not heard of or from him. this set joan thinking. and the immediate result was, that she went to the gardener's wife, and questioned her concerning the appearance of her patient. in the old woman's answers she certainly could recognize no likeness to cosmo; but he must have altered much in seven years, and she could not be satisfied without seeing the young man. cosmo lay fast asleep, and dreaming--but pleasant dreams now, for the fever gone, life was free to build its own castles. he thought he was dead, and floating through the air at his will, volition all that was necessary to propel him like a dragon-fly, in any direction he desired to take. he was about to go to his father, to receive his congratulations on his death, and to say to him that now the sooner he too died the better, that the creditors might have the property, everybody be paid, and they two and his mother be together for always. but first, before he set out, he must have one sight of lady joan, and in that hope was now hovering about the towers of the castle. he was slowly circling the two great ones of the gateway, crossing a figure of eight over the gallery where stood the machinery of the portcullis, when down he dropped, and lay bruised and heavy, unable by fiercest effort of the will to move an inch from the spot. he was making the reflection how foolish it was to begin to fly before assuring himself that he was dead, and was resolving to be quite prudent another time, when he felt as if a warm sunny cloud came over him, which made him open his eyes. they gradually cleared, and above him he saw the face of his many dreams--a little sadder than it was in them, but more beautiful. cosmo had so much of the childlike in him that illness made him almost a very child again, and when he saw joan's face bending over him like a living sky, just as any child might have done, he put his arms round her neck, and drew her face down to his. hearts get uppermost in illness, and people then behave as they would not in health. more is in it than is easily found. there is such a dumb prayer in the spirit to be _taken_! till he opened his eyes lady joan had been unable to satisfy herself whether the pale, worn, yet grand-looking youth could indeed be the lad cosmo, and was not at all prepared for such precipitate familiarity: the moment she was released, she drew back with some feeling, if not of offence, yet of annoyance. but such a smile flooded cosmo's face, mingled with such a pleading look of apology and excuse, which seemed to say, "how _could_ i help it?" that she was ashamed of herself. it was the same true face as the boy's, with its old look of devotion and gentle worship! to make all right she stooped of her own accord, and kissed his forehead. "thank you," murmured cosmo, his own voice sounding to him like that of another. "don't be vexed with me. i am but a baby, and have no mother. when i saw you, it was as if heaven had come down into hell, and i did not think to help it. how beautiful you are! how good of you to come to me!" "oh, cosmo!" cried lady joan--and now large silent tears were running down her cheeks--"to think of the way you and your father took me and mine in, and here you have been lying ill--i don't know how long--in a place not fit for a beggar!" "that's just what i am!" returned cosmo with a smile, feeling already almost well. "i have such a long story to tell you, joan! i remember all about it now." "why didn't you write,--?" said joan, and checked herself, for alas! if he had written, what would she not have found herself compelled to do!--"why didn't you send for me at once? they told me there was a young gardener lying ill, and of course i never dreamed it could be you. but i know if you had heard at castle warlock that a stranger was lying ill somewhere about the place, you would have gone to him at once! it was very wrong of me, and i am sorely punished!" "never mind," said cosmo; "it's all right now. i have you, and it makes me well again all at once. when i see you standing there, looking just as you used, all the time between is shrivelled up to nothing, and the present joins right on to the past. but you look sad, joan!--i may call you joan still, mayn't i?" "surely, cosmo. what else? i haven't too many to call me joan!" "but what makes you look sad?" "isn't it enough to think how i have treated you?" "you didn't know it was me," said cosmo. "that is true. but if, as your father taught you, i had done it to him--" "well, there's one thing, joan--you'll do differently another time." "i can't be sure of that, for my very heart grows stupid, living here all alone." "anyhow, you will have trouble enough with me for awhile, fast as your eyes can heal me," said cosmo, who began to be aware of a reaction. lady joan's face flushed with pleasure, but the next moment grew pale again at the thought of how little she could do for him. "the first thing," she said, "is to write to your father. when he knows i have got you, he won't be uneasy. i will go and do it at once." almost the moment she left him, cosmo fell fast asleep again. but now was lady joan, if not in perplexity, yet in no small discomfort. it made her miserable to think of cosmo in such a place, yet she could not help saying to herself it was well he had not written, for she must then have asked him not to come: now that he was in the house, she dared not tell her brother; and were she to move him to any comfortable room in the castle, he would be sure to hear of it from the butler, for the less faith carried, the more favour curried! one thing only was in her power: she could make the room he was in comparatively comfortable. as soon, therefore, as she had written a hurried letter to the laird, she went hastily through some of the rooms nearest the part in which cosmo lay, making choice of this and of that for her purpose: in the great, all but uninhabited place there were naturally many available pieces of stuff and of furniture. these she then proceeded, with her own hands, and the assistance of the gardener and his wife, to carry to his room; and when she found he was asleep, she put forth every energy to get the aspect of the place altered before he should wake. with noiseless steps she entered and left the room fifty times; and by making use of a door which had not been opened for perhaps a hundred years, she avoided attracting the least attention. chapter xxvii. a transformation. when cosmo the second time opened his eyes, he was afresh bewildered. which was the dream--that vision of wretchedness, or this of luxury? if it was not a dream, how had they moved him without once disturbing his sleep? it was as marvellous as anything in the arabian nights! could it be the same chamber? not a thing seemed the same, yet in him was a doubtful denial of transportance. yes, the ceiling was the same! the power of the good fairy had not reached to the transformation of that! but the walls! instead of the great hole in the plaster close by the bed, his eyes fell on a piece of rich old tapestry! curtains of silk damask, all bespotted with quaintest flowers, each like a page of chaucer's poetry, hung round his bed, quite other than fit sails for the stygian boat. they had made the bed as different as the vine in summer from the vine in winter. a quilt of red satin lay in the place of the patchwork coverlid. everything had been changed. he thought the mattress felt soft under him--but that was only a fancy, for he saw before the fire the feather-bed intended to lie between him and it. he felt like a tended child, in absolute peace and bliss--or like one just dead, while yet weary with the struggle to break free. he seemed to recall the content, of which some few vaguest filaments, a glance and no more, still float in the summer-air of many a memory, wherein the child lies, but just awaked to consciousness and the mere bliss of being, before wrong has begun to cloud its pure atmosphere. for cosmo had nothing on his conscience to trouble it; his mind was stored with lovely images and was fruitful in fancies, because in temperament, faith, and use, he was a poet; the evil vapours of fever had just lifted from his brain, and were floating away, in the light of the sun of life; he felt the pressure of no duty--was like a bird of the air lying under its mother's wing, and dreaming of flight; his childhood's most cherished dream had grown fact: there was the sylph, the oriad, the naiad of all his dreams, a living lady before his eyes--nor the less a creature of his imagination's heart; from her, as the centre of power, had all the marvellous transformation proceeded; and the lovely strength had kissed him on the forehead! the soul of cosmo floated in rapturous quiet, like the evening star in a rosy cloud. but i return to the earthly shore that bordered this heavenly sea. the old-fashioned, out-swelling grate, loose and awry in its setting, had a keen little fire burning in it, of which, summer as it was, the mustiness of the atmosphere, and the damp of the walls, more than merely admitted. the hole in the floor had vanished under a richly faded turkey carpet; and a luxurious sofa, in blue damask, faded almost to yellow, stood before the fire, to receive him the moment he should cease to be a chrysalis. and there in an easy chair by the corner of the hearth, wonder of all loveliest wonders, sat the fairy-godmother herself, as if she had but just waved her wand, and everything had come to her will!--the fact being, however, that the poor fairy was not a little tired in legs and arms and feet and hands and head, and preferred contemplating what she had already done, to doing anything more for the immediate present. cosmo lay watching her. he dared not move a hand, lest she should move; for, though it might be to rise and come to him, would it not be to change what he saw?--and what he saw was so much enough, that he would see it forever, and desired nothing else. she turned her eyes, and seeing the large orbs of the youth fixed upon her, smiled as she had not smiled before, for a great weight was off her heart now that the room gave him a little welcome. true, it was after all but a hypocrite of a room,--a hypocrite, however, whose meaning was better than its looks! he put out his hand, and she rose and came and laid hers in it. suddenly he let it go. "i beg your pardon," he said. "i don't know when my hands were washed! the last i remember is digging in the garden. i wish i might wash my face and hands!" "you mustn't think of it! you can't sit up yet," said lady joan. "but never mind: some people are always clean. you should see my brother's hands sometimes! i will, if you like, bring you a towel with a wet corner. i dare say that will do you good." she poured water into a basin from a kettle on the hob, and dipping the corner of a towel in it, brought it to him. he tried to use it, but his hands obeyed him so ill that she took it from him, and herself wiped with it his face and hands, and then dried them--so gently, so softly, he thought that must be how his mother did with him when he was a baby. all the time, he lay looking up at her with a grateful smile. she then set about preparing him some tea and toast, during which he watched her every motion. when he had had the tea, he fell asleep, and when he woke next he was alone. an hour or so later, the gardener's wife brought him a basin of soup, and when he had taken it, told him she would then leave him for the night: if he wanted anything, as there was no bell, he must pull the string she tied to the bed-post. he was very weary, but so comfortable, and so happy, his brain so full of bright yet soft-coloured things, that he felt as if he would not mind being left ages alone. he was but two and twenty, with a pure conscience, and an endless hope--so might he not well lie quiet in his bed? by the middle of the night, however, the tide of returning health showed a check; there came a strong reaction, with delirium; his pulse was high, and terrible fancies tormented him, through which passed continually with persistent recurrence the figure of the old captain, always swinging a stick about his head, and crooning to himself the foolish rime, "catch yer naig an' pu' his tail; in his hin' heel caw a nail; rug his lugs frae ane' anither; stan' up, an' ca' the king yer brither." at last, at the moment when once more his persecutor was commencing his childish ditty, he felt as if, from the top of a mountain a hundred miles away, a cold cloud came journeying through the sky, and descended upon him. he opened his eyes: there was joan, and the cold cloud was her soft cool hand on his forehead. the next thing he knew was that she was feeding him like a child. but he did not know that she never left him again till the morning, when, seeing him gently asleep, she stole away like a ghost in the gray dawn. the next day he was better, but for several nights the fever returned, and always in his dreams he was haunted by variations on the theme of the auld captain; and for several days he felt as if he did not want to get better, but would lie forever a dreamer in the enchanted palace of the glamoured ruin. but that was only his weakness, and gradually he gained strength. every morning and every afternoon lady joan visited him, waited on him, and staid a longer or shorter time, now talking, now reading to him; and seldom would she be a whole evening absent--then only on the rare occasion when lord mergwain, having some one to dine with him of the more ordinary social stamp, desired her presence as lady of the house. even then she would almost always have a peep at him one time or another. she did not know much about books, but would take up this or that, almost as it chanced to her hand in the library; and cosmo cared little what she read, so long as he could hear her voice, which often beguiled him into the sweetest sleep with visions of home and his father. if the story she read was foolish, it mattered nothing; he would mingle with it his own fancies, and weave the whole into the loveliest of foolish dreams, all made up of unaccountably reasonable incongruities: the sensible look in dreams of what to the waking mind is utterly incoherent, is the most puzzling of things to him who would understand his own unreason. and the wild mr chenhaft lovelinesses that fashioned themselves thus in his brain, outwardly lawless, but inwardly so harmonious as to be altogether credible to the dreamer, were not lost in the fluttering limbo of foolish invention, but, in altered shape and less outlandish garments, appeared again, when, in after years, he sought vent for the all but unspeakable. during this time he would often talk verse in his sleep, such as to lady joan, at least, sometimes seemed lovely, though she never could get a hold of it, she said; for always, just as she seemed on the point of understanding it, he would cease, and her ears would ache with the silence. one warm evening, when now a good deal better, and able to sit up a part of the day, cosmo was lying on the sofa, watching her face as she read. through the age-dusted window came the glowing beams of the setting sun, lined and dulled and blotted. they fell on her hands, and her hands reflected them, in a pale rosy gleam, upon her face. "how beautiful you are in the red light, joan!" said cosmo. "that's the light, not me," she returned. "yes, it is you. the red light shows you more as you are. in the dark even you do not look beautiful. then you may say if you like, 'that is the dark, not me.' don't you remember what portia says in the merchant of venice," 'the crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark when neither is attended; and i think the nightingale, if she should sing by day when every goose is cackling, would be thought no better a musician than the wren. how many things by reason reasoned are to their right praise and true perfection!' "you see he says, not that beautiful things owe their beauty, but the right seeing of their beauty, to circumstance. so the red light makes me see you more beautiful--not than you are--that could not be--but than i could see you in another light--a gray one for instance." "you mustn't flatter me, cosmo. you don't know what harm you may do me." "i love you too much to flatter you," he said. she raised the book, and began to read again. cosmo had gone on as he began--had never narrowed the channels that lay wide and free betwixt his soul and his father and mr. simon; lady joan had no such aqueducts to her ground, and many a bitter wind blew across its wastes; it ought not therefore to be matter of surprise that, although a little younger, cosmo should be a good way ahead of joan both in knowledge and understanding. hence the conversations they now had were to joan like water to a thirsty soul--the hope of the secret of life, where death had seemed waiting at the door. she would listen to the youth, rendered the more enthusiastic by his weakness, as to a messenger from the land of truth. in the old time she had thought cosmo a wonderful boy, saying the strangest things like common things everybody knew: now he said more wonderful things still, she thought, but as if he knew they were strange, and did his best to make it easier to receive them. she wondered whether, if he had been a woman with a history like hers, he would have been able to keep that bright soul shining through all the dreariness, to see through the dusty windows the unchanged beauty of things, and save alive his glorious hope. she began to see that she had not begun at the beginning with anything, had let things draw her this way and that, nor put forth any effort to master circumstance by accepting its duty. on cosmo's side, the passion of the believer in the unseen had laid hold upon him; and as the gardener awaits the blossoming of some strange plant, of whose loveliness marvellous tales have reached his ears, so did he wait for something entrancing to issue from the sweet twilight sadnesses of her being, the gleams that died into dusk, the deep voiceless ponderings into which she would fall. they talked now about any book they were reading, but it mattered little more what it was, for even a stupid book served as well as another to set their own fountains flowing. that afternoon joan was reading from one partly written, partly compiled, in the beginning of the century, somewhat before its time in england. it might have been the work of an imitator at once of de la motte fouque, and the old british romancers. and this was what she read. chapter xxviii. the story of the knight who spoke the truth. there was once a country in which dwelt a knight whom no lady of the land would love, and that because he spake the truth. for the other knights, all in that land, would say to the ladies they loved, that of all ladies in the world they were the most beautiful, and the most gracious, yea in all things the very first; and thereby the ladies of that land were taught to love their own praise best, and after that the knight who was the best praiser of each, and most enabled her to think well of herself in spite of doubt. and the knight who would not speak save truly, they mockingly named sir verity, which name some of them did again miscall severity,--for the more he loved, the more it was to him impossible to tell a lie. and thus it came about that one after another he was hated of them all. for so it was, that, greedy of his commendation, this lady and that would draw him on to speak of that wherein she made it her pleasure to take to herself excellences; but nowise so could any one of them all gain from him other than a true judgment. as thus: one day said unto him a lady, "which of us, think you, sir verity, hath the darkest eyes of all the ladies here at the court of our lord the king?" and he thereto made answer, "verily, methinketh the queen." then said she unto him, "who then hath the bluest eyes of all the ladies at the court of our lord the king?"--for that her own were of the colour of the heavens when the year is young. and he answered, "i think truly the lady coryphane hath the bluest of all their blue eyes." then said she, "and i think truly by thine answer, severity, that thou lovest me not, for else wouldst thou have known that mine eyes are as blue as coryphane's." "nay truly," he answered; "for my heart knoweth well that thine eyes are blue, and that they are lovely, and to me the dearest of all eyes, but to say they are the bluest of all eyes, that i may not, for therein should i be no true man." therewith was the lady somewhat shamed, and seeking to cover her vanity, did answer and say, "it may well be, sir knight, for how can i tell who see not mine own eyes, and would therefore know of thee, of whom men say, some that thou speakest truly, other some that thou speakest naughtily. but be the truth as it may, every knight yet saith to his own mistress that in all things she is the paragon of the world." "then," quoth the knight, "she that knoweth that every man saith so, must know also that only one of them all saith the thing that is true. not willingly would i add to the multitude of the lies that do go about the world!" "now verily am i sure that thou dost not love me," cried the lady; "for all men do say of mine eyes--" thereat she stayed words, and said no more, that he might speak again. "lady," said sir verity, and spake right solemnly, "as i said before i do say again, and in truth, that thine eyes are to me the dearest of all eyes. but they might be the bluest or the blackest, the greenest or the grayest, yet would i love them all the same. for for none of those colours would they be dear to me, but for the cause that they were thine eyes. for i love thine eyes because they are thine, not thee because thine eyes are or this or that." then that lady brake forth into bitter weeping, and would not be comforted, neither thereafter would hold converse with the knight. for in that country it was the pride of a lady's life to lie lapt in praises, and breathe the air of the flatteries blown into her ears by them who would be counted her lovers. then said the knight to himself, "verily, and yet again, her eyes are not the bluest in the world! it seemeth to me as that the ladies in this land should never love man aright, seeing, alas! they love the truth from no man's lips; for save they may each think herself better than all the rest, then is not life dear unto them. i will forsake this land, and go where the truth may be spoken nor the speaker thereof hated." he put on his armour, with never lady nor squire nor page to draw thong or buckle spur, and mounted his horse and rode forth to leave the land. and it came to pass, that on his way he entered a great wood. and as he went through the wood, he heard a sobbing and a crying in the wood. and he said to himself, "verily, here is some one wronged and lamenteth greatly! i will go and help." so about he rode searchingly, until he came to the place whither he was led. and there, at the foot of a great oak, he found an old woman in a gray cloak, with her face in her hands, and weeping right on, neither ceased she for the space of a sigh. "what aileth thee, good mother?" he said. "i am not good, and i am not thy mother," she answered, and began again to weep. "ah!" thought the knight, "here is one woman that loveth the truth, for she speaks the truth, and would not that aught but the truth be spoken!"-- "howcan i help thee, woman," he said then, "although in truth thou art not my mother, and i may not call thee good?" "by taking thyself from me," she answered. "then will i ride on my way," said the knight, and turning, rode on his way. then rose the woman to her feet, and followed him. "wherefore followest thou me," said the knight, "if i may do nothing to serve thee?" "i follow thee," she answered him, "because thou speakest the truth, and because thou art not true." "if thou speakest the truth, in a mystery speakest thou it," said he. "wherefore then ridest thou about the world?" she asked. and he replied, "verily, to succour them that are oppressed, for i have no mistress to whom i may do honour." "nay, sir knight," said she, "but to get thee a name and great glory, thou ridest about the world. verily thou art a man who loveth not the truth." at these words of the woman the knight clapped spurs to his horse, and would have ridden from her, for he loved not to be reviled, and so he told her. but she followed him, and kept by his stirrup, and said to him as she ran, "yea, thine own heart whispereth unto thee that i speak but the truth. it is from thyself thou wouldst flee." then did the knight listen, and, lo! his own heart was telling him that what the woman said was indeed so. then drew he the reins of his bridle, and looked down upon the woman and said to her, "verily thou hast well spoken, but if i be not true, yet would i be true. come with me. i will take thee upon my horse behind me, and together we will ride through the world; thou shalt speak to me the truth, and i will hear thee, and with my sword will plead what cause thou hast against any; so shall it go well with thee and me, for fain would i not only love what is truly spoken, but be in myself the true thing." then reached he down his hand, and she put her hand in his hand, and her foot upon his foot, and so sprang lightly up behind him, and they rode on together. and as they rode, he said unto her, "verily thou art the first woman i have found who hath to me spoken the truth, as i to others. only thy truth is better than mine. truly thou must love the truth better than i!" but she returned him no answer. then said he to her again, "dost thou not love the truth?" and again she gave him no answer, whereat he marvelled greatly. then said he unto her yet again, "surely it may not be thou art one of those who speak the truth out of envy and ill-will, and on their own part love not to hear it spoken, but are as the rest of the children of vanity! woman, lovest thou the truth, nor only to speak it when it is sharp?" "if i love not the truth," she answered, "yet love i them that love it. but tell me now, sir knight, what thinkest thou of me?" "nay," answered the knight, "that is what even now i would fain have known from thyself, namely what to think of thee." "then will i now try thee," said she, "whether indeed thou speakest the truth or no.--tell me to my face, for i am a woman, what thou thinkest of that face." then said the knight to himself, "never surely would i, for the love of pity, of my own will say to a woman she was evil-favoured. but if she will have it, then must she hear the truth." "nay, nay!" said the woman, "but thou wilt not speak the truth." "yea, but i will," answered he. "then i ask thee again," she said, "what thinkest thou of me?" and the knight replied, "truly i think not of thee as of one of the well-favoured among women." "dost thou then think," said she, and her voice was full of anger, which yet it seemed as she would hide, "that i am not pleasant to look upon? verily no man hath yet said so unto me, though many have turned away from me, because i spoke unto them the truth!" "now surely thou sayest the thing that is not so!" said the knight, for he was grieved to think she should speak the truth but of contention, and not of love to the same, inasmuch as she also did seek that men should praise her. "truly i say that which is so," she answered. then was the knight angered, and spake to her roughly, and said unto her, "therefore, woman, will i tell thee that which thou demandest of me: verily i think of thee as one, to my thinking, the worst favoured, and least to be desired among women whom i have yet looked upon; nor do i desire ever to look upon thee again." then laughed she aloud, and said to him, "nay, but did i not tell thee thou didst not dare speak the thing to my face? for now thou sayest it not to my face, but behind thine own back!" and in wrath the knight turned him in his saddle, crying, "i tell thee, to thy ill-shaped and worse-hued countenance, that--" and there ceased, and spake not, but with open mouth sat silent. for behind him he saw a woman the glory of her kind, more beautiful than man ever hoped to see out of heaven. "i told thee," she said, "thou couldst not say the thing to my face!" "for that it would be the greatest lie ever in this world uttered," answered the knight, "seeing that verily i do believe thee the loveliest among women, god be praised! nevertheless will i not go with thee one step farther, so to peril my soul's health, except, as thou thyself hast taught me to inquire, thou tell me thou lovest the truth in all ways, in great ways as well as small." "this much will i tell thee," she answered, "that i love thee because thou lovest the truth. if i say not more, it is that it seemeth to me a mortal must be humble speaking of great things. verily the truth is mighty, and will subdue my heart unto itself." "and wilt thou help me to do the truth?" asked the knight. "so the great truth help me!" she answered. and they rode on together, and parted not thereafter. here endeth the story of the knight that spoke the truth. lady joan ceased, and there was silence in the chamber, she looking back over the pages, as if she had not quite understood, and cosmo, who had understood entirely, watching the lovely, dark, anxious face. he saw she had not mastered the story, but, which was next best, knew she had not. he began therefore to search her difficulty, or rather to help it to take shape, and thereon followed a conversation neither of them ever forgot concerning the degrees of truth: as cosmo designated them--the truth of fact, the truth of vital relation, and the truth of action. chapter xxix new experience. soon cosmo began to recover more rapidly--as well he might, he told joan, with such a heavenly servant to wait on him! the very next day he was up almost the whole of it. but that very day was joan less with him than hitherto, and therefrom came not so often and stayed a shorter time. she would bring him books and leave them, saying he did not require a nurse any more now that he was able to feed himself. and cosmo, to his trouble, could not help thinking sometimes that her manner towards him was also a little changed. what could have come between them he asked himself twenty times a day. had he hurt her anyhow? had he unconsciously put on the schoolmaster with her? had he presumed on her kindness? with such questions he plagued himself, but found to them no answer. at times he could even have imagined her a little cross with him, but that never lasted. yet still when they met, joan seemed farther off than when they parted the day before. it is true they almost always seemed to get back to nearly the same place before they parted again, and cosmo tried to persuade himself that any change there might be was only the result of growing familiarity; but not the less did he find himself ever again mourning over something that was gone--a delicate colour on the verge of the meeting sky and sea of their two natures. but how differently the hours went when she was with him, and when he lay thinking whether she was coming! his heart swelled like a rose-bud ready to burst into a flaming flower when she drew near, and folded itself together when she went, as if to save up all its perfume and strength for her return! everything he read that pleased him, must be shared with joan--must serve as an atmosphere of thought in which to draw nigh to each other. everything beautiful he saw twice--with his own eyes namely, and as he imagined it in the eyes of joan: he was always trying to see things as he thought she would see them. not once while recovering did he care to read a thing he thought she would not enjoy--though everything he liked, he said to himself, she must enjoy some day. soon he made a discovery concerning himself that troubled him greatly: not once since he was ill had he buried himself in the story of jesus! not once had he lost himself in prayer! not once since finding joan had he been flooded with a glory as from the presence of the living one, or had any such vision of truth as used every now and then to fill him like the wine of the new world which is the old! lady joan saw that he was sad, and questioned him. but even to her he could not open his mind on such a matter: near as they were, they had not yet got near enough to each other for that. in the history, which is the growth, of the individual man, epochs of truth and moods of being follow in succession, the one for the moment displacing the other, until the mind shall at length have gained power to blend the new at once with the preceding whole. but this can never be until our idea of the absolute life is large enough and intense enough to fill and fit into every necessity of our nature. a new mood is as a dry well for the water of life to fill. the man who does not yet understand god as the very power of his conscious as well as unconscious being, as more in him than intensest consciousness of bliss or of pain, must have many a treeless expanse, many a mirage-haunted desert, many an empty cistern and dried up river, in the world of his being! there was not much of this kind of waste in cosmo's world, but god was not yet inside his growing love to joan--that is, consciously to him--and his spirit was therefore of necessity troubled. was it not a dreadful thing, he thought with himself, and was right in so thinking, that love to any lovely thing--how much more to the loveliest being god had made!--whose will is the soul of all loveliness, should cause him, in any degree, or for any time, to forget him and grow strange to the thought of him? the lack was this, that, having found his treasure, he had not yet taken it home to his father! jesus, himself, after he was up again, could not be altogether at home with his own, until he had first been home to his father and their father, to his god and their god. for as god is the source, so is he the bond of all love. there are christians who in portions of their being, of their life, their judgments, and aims, are absolute heathens, for with these, so far as their thought or will is concerned, god has nothing to do. there god is not with them, for there they are not with god. do they heed st. paul when he says, "whatsoever is not of faith is sin"? so, between these two, an unrest had come in, and they were no more sure of ease in each other's presence, although sometimes, for many minutes together, thought and word would go well between them, and all would be as simple and shining as ever. chapter xxx. charles jermyn, m. d. the only house in the neighbouring village where lady joan sometimes visited, was, as the gardener had told cosmo, that of the doctor, with whose daughter she had for some years, if not cultivated, yet admitted a sort of friendship. their relation however would certainly have been nothing such, so different were the two, had it not been that joan had no other acquaintance of her own age, and that miss jermyn had reasons for laying herself out to please her--the principal of which was that her brother, a man about thirty, had a great admiration for lady joan, and to please him his sister would do almost anything. their father also favoured his son's ambition, for he hated the earl, and would be glad of his annoyance, while he liked lady joan, and was far from blind to the consequence his family would gain by such an alliance. but he had no great hope, for experience, of which few have more than a country doctor, had taught him that, in every probability, his son's first advance would be for lady joan the signal to retire within the palisades of her rank; for there are who will show any amount of familiarity and friendliness with agreeable inferiors up to the moment when the least desire of a nearer approach manifests itself: that moment the old adam, or perhaps rather the old satan, is up in full pride like a spiritual turkey-cock, with swollen neck, roused feathers, and hideous gabble. his experience however did not bring to his mind in the company of this reflection the fact that such a reception was precisely that which he had himself given to a prayer for the hand of his daughter from one whom he counted her social inferior. but the younger man, who also had had his experiences, reflected that the utter isolation of lady joan, through the ill odour of her family, the disgraceful character of her father, the unamiability of her brother, and the poverty into which they had sunk, gave him incalculable advantages. the father had been for many years the medical adviser of the house; and although lord mergwain accorded the medical practice of his day about the same relation to a science of therapeutics that old alchemy had to modern chemistry, yet the moment he felt ill, he was sure to send for young jermyn. charles had also attended lady joan in several illnesses, for she had not continued in such health as when she used to climb hills in snow with cosmo. it is true she had on these occasions sent for the father, but for one reason and another, more likely to be false than true, he had always, with many apologies, sent his son in his stead. she was at first annoyed, and all but refused to receive him; but from dislike of seeming to care, she got used to his attendance, and to him as well. he gained thus the opportunity of tolerably free admission to her, of which he made use with what additional confidence came of believing that at least he had no rival. nor indeed was there anything absurd in his aspiring in those her circumstances to win her. he was a man of good breeding, and more than agreeable manners--with a large topographical experience, and a social experience far from restricted, for, as i have already mentioned, he had travelled much, and in the company of persons of high position; and had joan been less ignorant of things belonging to her proper station, she would have found yet more to interest her in him. but being a man of some insight, and possessed also of considerable versatility, so that, readily discovering any perculiarity, he was equally ready to meet it, he laid himself out to talk to her of the things, and in the ways, which he thought she would like. to discover, however, is not to understand. no longer young enough, as he said to himself, to be greatly interested in anything but getting on, he could yet, among the contents of the old property-room in his brain, easily lay his hands on many things to help him in the part he chose as the fittest to represent himself. the greater part of conventionally honest men try to look the thing they would like to be--that being at the same time the way they would like others to see them; others, along with what they would like to be, act that which they would only like to appear; the downright rascal cares only to look what will serve his purpose; and the honest man thinks only of being, and of being to his fellows. but even had jermyn only taken upon him to imagine himself in love with a woman like lady joan, he must soon have become, more or less, actually in love with her. this did not however destroy his caution; and so far as his attentions had gone, they were pleasant to her;--they were at least a break in the ennui of her daily life, helping her to reach the night in safety. she was not one of those who, unable to make alive the time, must kill it lest it kill them; but neither was she of those who make their time so living, that the day is too short for them. hence it came when he called, that by and by she would offer him tea, and when he went, would walk with him into the garden, and at length even accompany him as far as the lodge on his way home. charles jermyn was a tall, well-made man, with a clever and refined face, which, if not much feeling, expressed great intelligence. by the ladies of the neighbourhood he was much admired, by some of them pronounced very manly and good-looking, by others declared to be beautiful. certain of them said he was much too handsome for a doctor. he had a jolly air with him, which was yet far from unrefined, and a hearty way of shaking hands which gave an impression of honesty; and indeed i think honesty would have been comparatively easy to him, had he set himself to cultivate it; but he had never given himself trouble about anything except "getting on." you might rely on his word if he gave it solemnly, but not otherwise. absolute truth he would have felt a hindrance in the exercise of his profession, neither out of it did he make his yea yea, and his nay nay. his oath was better than his word, and that is a human shame. women, even more than men, i presume, see in any one who interests them, not so much what is there, as a reflection of what they construct from the hints that have pleased them. some of them it takes a miserable married lifetime to undeceive; for some, not even that will serve; they continue to see, if not an angel, yet a very pardonable mortal, therefore altogether loveable man, in the husband in whom everybody else sees only a vile rascal. whether sometimes the wife or the world be nearer the truth, will one day come out: the wife may be a woman of insight, and see where no one else can. in his youth the doctor had read a good deal of poetry, and enjoyed it in a surface-sort of fashion: discovering that lady joan had a fine taste in verse, he made use of his acquaintance there; and effected the greater impression, that one without experience is always ready to take familiarity as indicative of real knowledge, and think that he, for instance, who can quote largely, must have vital relation with the things he quotes. but it had never entered the doctor's head that poetry could have anything to do with life--even in the case of the poet himself--how much less in that of his admirer! never once had it occurred to him to ask how he could be such a fool as enjoy anything false--beingless save in the brain of the poet--a mere lie! for that which has nothing to do with life, what can it be but a lie? not the less jermyn got down book after book, for many a day undusted on his shelves, and read and re-read many a passage which had once borne him into the seventh heaven of feeling, suggesting somewhere a better world, in which lovely things might be had without too much trouble: now as he read, he was struck with a mild surprise at finding how much had lost even the appearance of the admirable; how much of what had seemed bitter, he could thoroughly accept. he did not ask whether the change came of a truer vision or a sourer judgment, put all down to the experience that makes a man wise, none to a loss within. he was not able to imagine himself in anything less than he had been, in anything less than he would be. yet poetry was to him now the mere munition of war! mere feathers for the darts of cupid! --that was how the once poetic man to himself expressed himself! he was laying in store of weapons, he said! for when a man will use things in which he does not believe, he cannot fail to be vulgar. but lady joan saw no vulgarity in the result--it was hid in the man himself. to her he seemed a profound lover of poetry, who knew much of which she had never even heard. once he contrived to spend a whole afternoon with her in the library, for of the outsides of books, their title-pages, that is, he had a good deal of knowledge, and must make opportunity to show it. one of his patients, with whom he first travelled, then for a time resided, was a book-collector, and with him he learned much, chiefly from old-book-catalogues. with lady joan this learning, judiciously poured out, passed for a marvellous knowledge of books, and the country doctor began to assume in her eyes the proportions of a man of universal culture. he knew at least how to bring all he had into use, and succeeded in becoming something in the sweet lonely life, so ignorant and unsupported. he could play the violin too, and that with no mean expression--believing only in the expression, nowise in the feeling expressed: this accomplishment also he contrived she should, as if by accident, become acquainted with. in the judgment of most who knew him, he was an excellent and indeed admirable man. "no nonsense about him, don't you know?--able to make himself agreeable, but not losing sight of the main chance either!" men would say; and "a thorough family-doctor, knowing how to humour patients out of their fancies!" would certain mammas add, who, instead of being straight-forward with their children, were always scheming, and dodging, and holding private confabulations about them with doctor and clergyman. in that part of his professional duty which bordered on that of the nurse, the best that was in jermyn came out. few men could handle a patient at the same time so firmly and tenderly as he; few were less sparing of self in the endeavour to make him comfortable. and from the moment when the simple-minded cosmo became aware of his attendance and ministration, his heart went out to him--from the moment, that is, when, in the afternoon of the same day on which joan transformed his chamber, he lifted him in his arms that the gardener and his wife might place a feather-bed and mattress under him, obliterating in softness the something which had seemed to find out every bone in his body: as soon as he was laid down again, his spirit seemed to rise on clouds of ease to thank his minister. and cosmo was one in whom the gratitude was as enduring as ready. next to the appearance of lady joan, all the time he was recovering, he looked for the daily visit of the doctor. nor did the doctor ever come without receiving his reward in an interview with the lady. and herein jermyn gained another advantage. for joan found herself compelled to take him into her confidence concerning her brother's ignorance of the presence of cosmo in the house; and so he shared a secret with her. he did not, of course, altogether relish the idea of this scotch cousin, but plainly he was too young for joan, and he would soon find out whether there was any need to beware of him, by which time he would know also what to do with him, should action be necessary. for the first week or so joan did not mind how often the doctor found her with cosmo, but after that she began to dislike it, she could scarcely have told why, and managed to be elsewhere when he came. after the third time the doctor began to cherish suspicion, and called cunning to his aid. having mentioned an hour at which he would call the next day, he made his appearance an hour earlier, and with an excuse on his lips for the change he had been "compelled to make," walked into the room without warning, as of course he might without offence, where his patient was a young man. there, as he had feared, he found lady joan. but she had heard or felt his coming, and as he entered she was handing cosmo the newspaper, with the words, "there! you are quite able to read to yourself to-day. i will go and have another search for the book you wanted;" and with that she turned, and gave a little start, for there stood the doctor! "oh, doctor jermyn!" she exclaimed, "i did not know you were there!" and held out her hand. "our patient is going on wonderfully now. you will let me see you before you leave the castle?" therewith she left the room, and hastening to her own, saw in the mirror the red of a lie, said to herself, "what will cosmo think?" and burst into tears--the first she had shed since the day she found him. the doctor was not taken in, but cosmo was troubled and puzzled. in jermyn's talk, however, and his own simplicity, he soon forgot the strangeness of this her behaviour. chapter xxxi. cosmo and the doctor. to the eyes of jermyn, cosmo appeared, mainly from his simplicity, younger than he was, while the doctor's manners, and his knowledge of the world, made cosmo regard him as a much greater man than, in any sense or direction, he really was. his kindness having gained the youth's heart, he was ready to see in him everything that love would see in the loved. "you are very good to me, doctor jermyn," he said, one day,"--so good, that i am the more sorry though the less unwilling--"--the doctor could not keep his hold of the thread of cosmo's speach, yet did not interrupt him--"to tell you what is now weighing on my mind: i do not know how or when i shall be able to hand you your fees. i hope you will not come to see me once more than is necessary; and the first money i earn, you shall be paid part at least of what i owe you." the doctor laughed. it was such a school-boy speech, he thought! it was a genuine relief to cosmo to find him take the thing so lightly. "you were robbed on the way, lady joan tells me," jermyn said. "i am not sure that i was robbed," returned cosmo; "but in any case, even had i brought every penny i started with, i could not have paid you. my father and i are very poor, mr. jermyn." "and my father and i are pretty well to do," said the doctor, laughing again. "but," resumed cosmo, "neither condition is a reason why you should not be paid. mine is only the cause why you are not paid at once." "my dear fellow," said the doctor, laying his hand on the boy's, "i am not such a very old man--it is not so very long since i was a student myself--in your country too--at edinburgh--that i should forget what it is to be a student, or how often money is scarce in the midst of every other kind of plenty and refinement." "but i am not exactly a student now. i have been making a little money as tutor; only--" "don't trouble your head about it, i beg of you," interrupted the doctor. "it is the merest trifle. besides, i should never have thought of taking a fee from you! i am well paid in the pleasure of making your acquaintance.--but there is one way," he added, "in which you could make me a return." "what is that?" asked cosmo eagerly. "to borrow a little money of me for a few months? i am not at all hard up at present. i had to borrow many a time when i was in edinburgh." the boy-heart of cosmo swelled in his bosom, and for a time he could not answer. he thought with himself, "here is a man of the true sort!--a man after my father's own heart! who in the ground of his rights plants fresh favours, and knows the inside of a fellow's soul as well as his body! this is a rare man!" but he felt it would be to do joan a wrong to borrow money from the doctor and not from her. so with every possible acknowledgment he declined the generous offer. now the doctor was quite simple in behaving thus to cosmo. he was a friendly man and a gentleman, and liked cosmo as no respectable soul could help liking him. it had not yet entered into him to make him useful. that same night, however, he began to ask himself whether he might not make cosmo serve instead of hindering his hope, and very soon had thought the matter out. he was by no means too delicate to talk at once about his love, but would say nothing of it until he had made more sure of cosmo, and good his ground by sowing another crop first: he must make himself something in the eyes of the youth, plant himself firmly in his estimation, cause his idea of him to blossom; and for the sake of this he must first of all understand the boy! nor was it long before the doctor imagined he did understand the boy; and indeed, sceptical as both his knowledge of himself and of the world had made him, he did so far understand him as to believe him as innocent of evil as the day he was born. his eyes could not shine so, his mouth could not have that childlike--the doctor called it childish--smile otherwise. he put out various feelers to satisfy himself there was no pretence, and found his allusions either passed over him like a breath of merest air, or actually puzzled him. it was not always that cosmo did not know what the suggestion might mean, but that he could not believe jermyn meant that; and perceiving this, the doctor would make haste to alter the shadow into something definitely unobjectionable. jermyn had no design of corrupting the youth; he was above that, even could he have fancied anything to be gained by it, whereas his interest lay in the opposite direction, his object being to use the lad unconsciously to himself. he discovered also concerning him that he had lofty ideas of duty in everything; that he was very trusting, and unready to doubt; and that with him poetry was not, as with lady joan, a delight, but an absolute passion. after such discoveries, he judged it would not be hard to make for. himself, as for an idol, a high place in the imagination of the boy. for this end he brought to bear upon him his choicest fragments of knowledge, and all his power to interest; displayed in pleasing harmonies his acquaintance with not a few of the more delicate phases of humanity, and his familiarity with the world of imagination as embodied in books; professed much admiration he did not feel, in the line of cosmo's admiration, going into raptures, for instance, over milton's profoundest gems, whose beauty he felt only in a kind of reflected cold-moony way, through the external perfection of their colour and carving; brought to his notice wordsworth's happy warrior, of which he professed, and truly, that he had pasted it on his wall when a student, that at any moment he might read it; and introduced him to the best poems of shelley, a favour for which alone cosmo felt as if he must serve him for life. cosmo was so entire, so utterly honest, so like a woman, that he could not but regard the channel through which anything reached him, as of the nature of that which came to him through it; how could that serve to transmit which was not one in spirit with the thing transmitted? to his eyes, therefore, jermyn sat in the reflex glory of shelley, and of every other radiant spirit of which he had widened his knowledge. how could cosmo for instance regard him as a common man through whom came to him first that thrilling trumpet-cry, full of the glorious despair of a frustrate divinity, beginning, o wild west wind, thou breath of autumn's being, --the grandest of all pagan pantheistic utterances he was ever likely to hear! the whole night, and many a night after, was cosmo haunted with the aeolian music of its passionate, self-pitiful self-abandonment. and in his dreams, the "be thou me, impetuous one!" of the poem, seemed fulfilled in himself--for he and the wind were one, careering wildly along the sky, combing out to their length the maned locks of the approaching storm, and answering the cry of weary poets everywhere over the world. as he sat by his patient's bed, jermyn would also tell him about his travels, and relate passages of adventure in various parts of the world; and he came oftener, and staid longer, and talked more and more freely, until at length in cosmo's vision, the more impressible perhaps from his weakness, the doctor seemed a hero, an admirable crichton; a paragon of doctors. in all this, jermyn, to use his own dignified imagery, was preparing an engine of assault against the heart of the lady. he had no very delicate feeling of the relation of man and woman, neither any revulsion from the loverly custom in low plays of making a friend of the lady's maid, and bribing her to chaunt the praises of the briber in the ears of her mistress. in his intercourse with lady joan, something seemed always to interfere and prevent him from showing himself to the best advantage--which he never doubted to be the truest presentation; but if he could send her a reflection of him in the mind of such an admirer as he was making of cosmo, she would then see him more as he desired to be seen, and as he did not doubt he was. chapter xxxii. the naiad. at length cosmo was able to go out, and joan did not let him go by himself. for several days he walked only a very little, but sat a good deal in the sun, and rapidly recovered strength. at last, one glorious morning of summer, they went out together, intending to have a real little walk. lady joan had first made sure that her brother was occupied in his laboratory, but still she dared not lead her patient to any part of the garden or grounds ever visited by him. she took him, therefore, through walks, some of them wide, and bordered with stately trees, but all grown with weeds and moss, to the deserted portion with which he had already made a passing acquaintance. there all lay careless of the present, hopeless of the future, and hardly dreaming of the past. it was long since foot of lady had pressed these ancient paths, long since laugh or merry speech had been heard in them. nothing is lovelier than the result of the half-neglect which often falls upon portions of great grounds, when the owner's fancy has changed, and his care has turned to some newer and more favoured spot; when there is moss on the walks, but the weeds are few and fine; when the trees stand in their old honour, yet no branch is permitted to obstruct a path; when flowers have ceased to be sown or planted, but those that bloom are not disregarded; while yet it is only through some stately door that admission is gained, and no chance foot is free to stray in. but here it was altogether different. that stage of neglect was long past. the place was ragged, dirty, overgrown. there was between the picture i have drawn and this reality, all the painful difference between stately and beautiful matronhood, and the old age that, no longer capable of ministering to its own decencies, has grown careless of them. "at this time of the day there is plenty of sun here." said his nurse, in a tone that seemed to savour of apology. "i think," said cosmo, "the gardener told me some parts of the grounds were better kept than this." "yes," answered joan, "but none of them are anything like what they should be. my brother is so poor." "i don't believe you know what it is to be poor," said cosmo. "oh, don't i!" returned joan with a sigh. "you see constantine requires for his experiments all the little money the trustees allow." [illustration] "i know this part," said cosmo. "i made acquaintance with it the last thing as i was growing ill. it looks to me so melancholy! if i were here, i should never rest till i had with my own hands got it into some sort of order." "are you as strong as you used to be, cosmo--i mean when you are well?" asked joan, willing to change the direction of the conversation. "a good deal stronger, i hope," answered cosmo. "but i am glad it is not just this moment, for then i should have no right to be leaning on you, joan." "do you like to lean on me, cosmo?" "indeed i do; i am proud of it!--but tell me why you don't take me to a more cheerful part." she made him no answer. he looked in her face. it was very pale, and tears were in her eyes. "must i tell you, cosmo?" she said. "no, certainly, if you would rather not." "but you might think it something wrong." "i should never imagine you doing anything wrong, joan." "then i must tell you, lest it should be wrong.--my brother does not know that you are here." now cosmo had never imagined that lord mergwain did not know he was at the castle. it was true he had not come to see him, but nothing was simpler if lord mergwain desired to see cosmo as little as cosmo desired, from his recollection of him at castle warlock, to see lord mergwain. it almost took from him what little breath he had to learn that he had been all this time in a man's house without his knowledge. no doubt, in good sense and justice, the house was joan's too, however little the male aristocracy may be inclined to admit such a statement of rights, but there must be some one at the head of things, and, however ill he might occupy it, that place was naturally his lordship's, and he had at least a right to know who was in the house. huge discomfort thereupon invaded cosmo, and a restless desire to be out of the place. his silence frightened joan. "are you very angry with me, cosmo," she said. "angry! no, joan! how could i be angry with you? only it makes me feel myself where i have no business to be--rather like a thief in fact." "oh, i am so sorry! but what could i do? you don't know my brother, or you would not wonder. he seems to have a kind of hatred to your family!--i do not in the least know why. could my father have said anything about you that he misunderstood?--but no, that could not be!--and yet my father did say he knew your house many years before!" "i don't care how lord mergwain regards me," said cosmo; "what angers me is that he should behave so to you that you dare not tell him a thing. now i am sorry i came without writing to you first!--i don't know though!--and i can't say i am sorry i was taken ill, for all the trouble i have been to you; i should never have known otherwise how beautiful and good you are." "i'm not good! and i'm not beautiful!" cried joan, and burst into tears of humiliation and sore--heartedness. what a contrast was their house and its hospitality, she thought, to those in which cosmo lived one heart and one soul with his father! "but," she resumed the next moment, wiping away her tears, "you must not think i have no right to do anything for you. my father left all his personal property to me, and i know there was money in his bureau, saved up for me--i know it; and i know too that my brother took it! i said never a word about it to him or any one--never mentioned the subject before; but i can't have you feeling as if you had been taking what i had no right to give!" they had come to the dry fountain, with its great cracked basin, in the centre of which stood the parched naiad, pouring an endless nothing from her inverted vase. forsaken and sad she looked. all the world had changed save her, and left her a memorial of former thoughts, vanished ways, and forgotten things: she, alas! could not alter, must be still the same, the changeless centre of change. all the winters would beat upon her, all the summers would burn her; but never more would the glad water pour plashing from her dusty urn! never more would the birds make showers with their beating wings in her cool basin! the dead leaves would keep falling year after year to their rest, but she could not fall, must, through the slow ages, stand, until storm and sunshine had wasted her atom by atom away. on the broad rim of the basin they sat down. cosmo turned towards the naiad, such thoughts as i have written throbbing in his brain like the electric light in an exhausted receiver, joan with her back to the figure, and her eyes on the ground, thinking cosmo brooded vexed on his newly discovered position. it was a sad picture. the two were as the type of nature and art, the married pair, here at strife--still together, but only the more apart--oberon and titania, with ruin all about them. through the straggling branches appeared the tottering dial of time where not a sun-ray could reach it; for time himself may well go to sleep where progress is but disintegration. time himself is nothing, does nothing; he is but the medium in which the forces work. time no more cures our ills, than space unites our souls, because they cross it to mingle. had cosmo suspected joan's thought, he would have spoken; but the urn of the naiad had brought back to him his young thoughts and imaginations concerning the hidden source of the torrent that rushed for ever along the base of castle warlock: the dry urn was to him the end of all life that knows not its source--therefore, when the water of its consciousness fails, cannot go back to the changeless, ever renewing life, and unite itself afresh with the self-existent, parent spring. a moment more and he began to tell joan what he was thinking--gave her the whole metaphysical history of the development in him of the idea of life in connection with the torrent and its origin ever receding, like a decoy-hope that entices us to the truth, until at length he saw in god the one only origin, the fountain of fountains, the father of all lights--that is, of all things, and all true thoughts. "if there were such an urn as that," he said, pointing to the naiad's, "ever renewing the water inside it without pipe or spring, there would be what we call a miracle, because, unable to follow the appearance farther back, we should cease thought, and wonder only in the presence of the making god. and such an urn would be a true picture of the heart of god, ever sending forth life of itself, and of its own will, into the consciousness of us receiving the same." he grew eloquent, and talked as even joan had never heard him before. and she understood him, for the lonely desire after life had wrought, making her capable. she felt more than ever that he was a messenger to her from a higher region, that he had come to make it possible for her to live, to enlarge her being, that it might no more be but the half life of mere desire after something unknown and never to be attained. suddenly, with that inexplicable breach in the chain of association over which the electric thought seems to leap, as over a mighty void of spiritual space, cosmo remembered that he had not yet sent the woman whose generous trust had saved him from long pangs of hunger, the price of her loaf. he turned quickly to joan: was not this a fresh chance of putting trust in her? what so precious thing between two lives as faith? it is even a new creation in the midst of the old. would he not be wrong to ask it from another? and ask it he must; for there was the poor woman, on whom he had no claim of individual, developed friendship, in want of her money! would he not feel that joan wronged him, if she asked some one else for any help he could give her? he told her therefore the whole story of his adventures on his way to her, and ending said, "lend me a half-sovereign--please--to put in a letter for the first woman. i will find something for the girl afterwards." joan burst into tears. it was some time before she could speak, but at last she told him plainly that she had no money, and dared not ask her brother, because he would want to know first what she meant to do with it. "is it possible?" cried cosmo. "why, my father would never ask me what i wanted a little money for!" "and you would be sure to tell him without his asking!" returned joan. "but i dare not tell constantine. last week i could have asked him, because then, for your sake, i would have told a lie; but i dare not do that now." she did not tell him she gave her last penny to a beggar on the road the day he came, or that she often went for months without a coin in her pocket. cosmo was so indignant he could not speak; neither must he give shape in her hearing to what he thought of her brother. she looked anxiously in his face. "dear cosmo," she said, "do not be angry with me. i will borrow the money from the housekeeper. i have never done such a thing, but for your sake i will. you shall send it to-morrow." "no, no, dearest joan!" cried cosmo. "i will not hear of such a thing. i should be worse than lord mergwain to lay a feather on the burden he makes you carry." "i shouldn't mind it much. it would be sweet to hurt my pride for your sake." "joan, if you do," said cosmo, "i will not touch it. don't trouble your dear heart about it. god is taking care of the woman as well as of us. i will send it afterwards." they sat silent--cosmo thinking how he was to escape from this poverty-stricken grandeur to his own humble heaven--as poor, no doubt, but full of the dignity lacking here. he knew the state of things at home too well to imagine his father could send him the sum necessary without borrowing it, and he knew also how painful that would be to him who had been so long a borrower ever struggling to pay. joan's eyes were red with weeping when at length she looked pitifully in his face. like a child he put both his arms about her, seeking to comfort her. sudden as a flash came a voice, calling her name in loud, and as it seemed to cosmo, angry tones. she turned white as the marble on which they sat, and cast a look of agonized terror on cosmo. "it is constantine!" said her lips, but hardly her voice. the blood rushed in full tide from cosmo's heart, as it had not for many a day, and coloured all his thin face. he drew himself up, and rose with the look of one ready for love's sake to meet danger joyously. but joan threw her arms round him now, and held him. "no, no!" she said; "--this way! this way!" and letting him go, darted into the pathless shrubbery, sure he would follow her. cosmo hated turning his back on any person or thing, but the danger here was to joan, and he must do as pleased her. he followed instantly. chapter xxxiii. the garden-house. she threaded and forced her way swiftly through the thick-grown shrubs, regardless of thorns and stripping twigs. it was a wilderness for many yards, but suddenly the bushes parted, and cosmo saw before him a neglected building, overgrown with ivy, of which it would have been impossible to tell the purpose, for it was the product of a time when everything was made to look like something else. the door of it, thick with accumulated green paint, stood half open, as if the last who left it had failed in a feeble endeavour to shut it. like a hunted creature joan darted in, and up the creaking stair before her. cosmo followed, every step threatening to give way under him. the place was two degrees nearer ruin than his room. great green stains were on the walls; plaster was lying here and there in a heap; the floors, rotted everywhere with damp, were sinking in all directions. yet there had been no wanton destruction, for the glass in the windows was little broken. merest neglect is all that is required to make of both man and his works a heap; for will is at the root of well-being, and nature speedily resumes what the will of man does not hold against her. at the top of the stair, joan turned into a room, and keeping along the wall, went cautiously to the window, and listened. "i don't think he will venture here," she panted. "the gardener tells me his lordship seems as much afraid of the place as he and the rest of them. i don't mind it much--in the daytime.--you are never frightened, cosmo!" as she spoke, she turned on him a face which, for all the speed she had made, was yet pale as that of a ghost. "i don't pretend never to be frightened," said cosmo; "all i can say is, i hope god will help me not to turn my back on anything, however frightened i may be." but the room he was in seemed to him the most fearful place he had ever beheld. his memory of the spare room at home, with all its age and worn stateliness and evil report, showed mere innocence beside this small common-looking, square room. if a room dead and buried for years, then dug up again, be imaginable, that is what this was like. it was furnished like a little drawing-room, and many of the niceties of work and ornament that are only to be seen in a lady's room, were yet recognizable here and there, for everything in it was plainly as it had been left by the person who last occupied it. but the aspect of the whole was indescribably awful. the rottenness and dust and displacement by mere decay, looked enough to scare even the ghosts, if they had any scare left in them. no doubt the rats had at one time their share in the destruction, but it was long since they had forsaken the house. there was no disorder. the only thing that looked as if the room had been abandoned in haste, was the door of a closet standing wide open. the house had a worse repute than ghost could give it--worse than joan knew, for no one had ever told her what must add to her father's discredit. something in a corner of the closet just mentioned, caught cosmo's eye, and he had taken one step towards it, when a sharp moan from the lips of his companion arrested him. he turned, saw her face agonized with fresh fear, and was rushing to the window, when she ran at him, pushed him back, and stood shaking. he thought she would have fallen, and supported her. they stood listening speechless, with faces like two moons in the daytime. presently cosmo heard the rustling of twigs, and the sounds of back-swinging branches. these noises came nearer and nearer. joan gazed with expanding eyes of terror in cosmo's face, as if anywhere else she must see what would kill her. "joan!" cried the same voice cosmo had heard in the garden. she shook, and held so to cosmo's arm that she left as sure marks of her fingers there as ever did ghost. the sympathy of her fear invaded him. he would have darted to meet the enemy, but she would not let him go. the shudder of a new resolve passed through her, and she began to pull him towards the closet. involuntarily for a moment he resisted, for he feared the worse risk to her; but her action and look were imperative, and he yielded. they entered the closet and he pulled the door to close it upon them. it resisted; he pulled harder; a rusted hinge gave way, and the door dropped upon its front corner, so that he had partly to lift it to get it to. just as he succeeded, joan's name on the voice of her fear echoed awfully through the mouldy silences of the house. in the darkness of the closet, where there was just room for two to stand, she clung like a child to cosmo, trembling in his arms like one in a fit of the ague. it is mournful to think what a fear many men are to the women of their house. the woman-fear in the world is one of its most pitiful outcries after a saviour. hesitating steps were heard below. they went from one to another of the rooms, then began to ascend the stair. "now, joan," said cosmo, holding her to him, "whatever you do, keep quiet. don't utter a sound. please god, i will take care of you." she pressed his shoulder, but did not speak. the steps entered the room. both cosmo and joan seemed to feel the eyes that looked all about it. then the steps came towards the closet. now was the decisive moment! cosmo was on the point of bursting out, with the cry of a wild animal, when something checked him, and suddenly he made up his mind to keep still to the very last. he put a hand on the lock, and pressed the door down against the floor. in the faint light that came through the crack at the top of it, he could see the dark terror of joan's eyes fixed on his face. a hand laid hold of the lock, and pulled, and pulled, but in vain. probably then mergwain saw that the door was fallen from its hinge. he turned the key, and the door had not altered its position too far for his locking them in. then they heard him go down the stair, and leave the house. "he's not gone far!" said cosmo. "he will have this closet open presently. you heard him lock it! we must get out of it at once! please, let me go, joan, dear! i must get the door open." she drew back from him as far as the space would allow. he put his shoulder to the door, and sent it into the middle of the room with a great crash, then ran and lifted it. "come, joan! quick!" he cried. "help me to set it up again." the moment something was to be done, joan's heart returned to her. in an instant they had the door jammed into its place, with the bolt in the catch as mergwain had left it. "now," said cosmo, "we must get down the stair, and hide somewhere below, till he passes, and comes up here again." they ran to the kitchen, and made for a small cellar opening off it. hardly were they in it when they heard him re-enter and go up the stair. the moment he was safely beyond them, they crept out, and keeping close to the wall of the house, went round to the back of it, and through the thicket to a footpath near, which led to the highway. it was a severe trial to cosmo's strength, now that the excitement of adventure had relaxed, and left him the weaker. again and again joan had to urge him on, but as soon as she judged it safe, she made him sit, and supported him. "i believe," she said, "that wretched man of his has put him up to it. constantine has found out something. i would not for the world he should learn all! you don't know--you are far too good to know what he would think--yes, and tell me to my face! it was not an easy life with my father, cosmo, but i would rather be with him now, wherever he is, than go on living in that house with my brother." "what had we better do?" said cosmo, trying to hide his exhaustion. "i am going to take you to the jermyns'. they are the only friends i have. julia will be kind to you for my sake. i will tell them all about it. young dr. jermyn knows already." alas, it was like being let down out of paradise into purgatory! but when we cannot stay longer in paradise, we must, like our first parents, make the best of our purgatory. "you will be able to come and see me, will you not, joan," he said sadly. "yes, indeed!" she answered. "it will be easier in some ways than before. at home i never could get rid of the dread of being found out. as soon as i get you safe in, i must hurry home. oh, dear! how shall i keep clear of stories! only, when you are safe, i shall not care so much." in truth, although she had seemed to fear all for herself, her great dread had been to hear cosmo abused. "what you must have gone through for me!" said cosmo. "it makes me ache to think of it!" "it will be only pleasant to look back upon, cosmo," returned joan with a sad smile. "but oh for such days again as we used to have on the frozen hills! there are the hills again every winter, but will the old days ever come again, cosmo?" "the old days never come again," answered cosmo. "but do you know why, joan?" "no," murmured joan, very sadly. "because they would be getting in the way of the new better days, whose turn it is," replied cosmo. "you tell god, joan, all about it; he will give us better days than those. to some, no doubt, it seems absurd that there should be a great hearing life in the world; but it is what you and i need so much that we don't see how, by any possibility, to get on without it! it cannot well look absurd to us! and if you should ever find you cannot pray any more, tell me, and i will try to help you. i don't think that time will ever come to me. i can't tell--but always hitherto, when i have seemed to be at the last gasp, things have taken a turn, and it has grown possible to go on again." "ah, you are younger than me, cosmo!" said joan, more sadly than ever. cosmo laughed. "don't you show me any airs on that ground," he said. "leave that to agnes. she is two years older than i, and used always to say when we were children, that she was old enough to be my mother." "but i am more than two years older than you, cosmo," said joan. "how much, then--exactly?" asked cosmo. "three years and a whole month," she answered. "then you must be old enough to be my grandmother! but i don't mean to be sat upon for that. agnes gave me enough of that kind of thing!" whether joan began to feel a little jealous of agnes, or only more interested in her, it would be hard to say, but cosmo had now to answer a good many questions concerning her; and when joan learned what a capable girl agnes was, understanding euclid and algebra, as mr. simon said, better than any boy, cosmo himself included, he had ever had to teach, the earl's daughter did feel a little pain at the heart because of the cotter's. they reached at last the village and the doctor's house, where, to joan's relief, the first person they met was charles, to whom at once she told the main part of their adventure that day. he proposed just what joan wished, and was by no means sorry at the turn things had taken--putting so much more of the game, as he called it, into his hands. things were speedily arranged, all that was necessary told his father and sister, and joan invited to stay to lunch, which was just ready. this she thought it better to do, especially as jermyn and his sister would then walk home with her. what the doctor would say if he saw mergwain, she did not venture to ask: she knew he would tell any number of stories to get her out of a scrape, while cosmo would only do or endure anything, from thrashing her brother to being thrashed himself. a comfortable room was speedily prepared for cosmo, and jermyn made him go to bed at once. nor did he allow him to see joan again, for he told her he was asleep, and she had better not disturb him--which was not true--but might have been, for all the doctor knew as he had not been to see. joan did not fall in with her brother for a week, and when she saw him he did not allude to the affair. what was in his mind she did not know for months. always, however, he was ready to believe that the mantle of the wickedness of his fathers, which he had so righteously refused to put on, had fallen upon his sister instead. only he had no proof. chapter xxxiv. catch your horse. when cosmo was left alone in his room, with orders from the doctor to put himself to bed, he sank wearily on a chair that stood with its back to the light; then first his eye fell upon the stick he carried. joan had brought him his stick when he was ready to go into the garden, but this was not that stick. he must have caught it up somewhere instead of his own! where could it have been? he had no recollection either of laying down his own, or of thinking he took it again. after a time he recalled this much, that, in the horrible room they had last left, at the moment when joan cried out because of the sound of her brother's approach, he was walking to the closet to look at something in it that had attracted his attention--seeming in the dusk, from its dull shine, the hilt of a sword. the handle of the walking stick he now held must be that very thing! but he could not tell whether he had caught it up with any idea of defence, or simply in the dark his hand had come into contact with it and instinctively closed upon it, he could not even conjecture. but why should he have troubled his head so about a stick? because this was a notably peculiar one: the handle of that stick was in form a repetition of the golden horse that had carried him to the university! their common shape was so peculiar, that not only was there no mistaking it, but no one who saw the two could have avoided the conviction that they had a common origin, and if any significance, then a common one. there was an important difference however: even if in substance this were the same as the other, it could yet be of small value: the stick thus capped was a bamboo, rather thick, but handle and all, very light. proceeding to examine it, cosmo found that every joint was double-mounted and could be unscrewed. of joints there were three, each forming a small box. in the top one were a few grains of snuff, in the middle one a little of something that looked like gold dust, and the third smelt of opium. the top of the cane had a cap of silver, with a screw that went into the lower part of the horse, which thus made a sort of crutch-handle to the stick. he had screwed off, and was proceeding to replace this handle, when his eye was arrested, his heart seemed to stand still, and the old captain's foolish rime came rushing into his head. he started from his chair, took the thing to the window, and there stood regarding it fixedly. beyond a doubt this was his great grand-uncle's, the auld captain's, stick, the only thing missed when his body was found! but whence such an assured conviction? and why did the old captain's rime, whose application to the golden horse his father and he had rejected, return at sight of this one, so much its inferior? in a word, whence the eagerness of curiosity that now possessed cosmo? in turning the handle upside down, he saw that from one of the horse's delicately finished shoes, a nail was missing, and its hole left empty. it was a hind shoe too! "caitch yer naig, an' pu' his tail; in his bin' heel caw a nail!" "i do believe," he said to himself, "this is the horse that was in the old villain's head every time he uttered the absurd rime!" there must then be in the cane a secret, through which possibly the old man had overreached himself! had that secret, whatever it was, been discovered, or did it remain for him now to discover? a passion of curiosity seized him, but something held him back. what was it? the stick was not his property; any discovery concerning or by means of it, ought to be made with the consent and in the presence of the owner of it--her to whom the old lord had left his personal property! and now cosmo had to go through an experience as strange as it was new, for, in general of a quietly expectant disposition, he had now such a burning desire to conquer the secret of the stick, as appeared to him to savour of possession. it was so unlike himself, that he was both angry and ashamed. he set it aside and went to bed. but the haunting eagerness would not let him rest; it kept him tossing from side to side, and was mingled with strangest fears lest the stick should vanish as mysteriously as it had come--lest when he woke he should find it had been carried away. he got out of bed, unscrewed the horse, and placed it under his pillow. but there it tormented him like an aching spot. it went on drawing him, tempting him, mocking him. he could not keep his hands from it. a hundred times he resolved he would not touch it again, and of course kept his resolution so long as he thought of it; but the moment he forgot it, which he did repeatedly in wondering why joan did not come, the horse would be in his hand. every time he woke from a moment's sleep, he found it in his hand. on his return from accompanying lady joan, jermyn came to him, found him feverish, and prescribed for him. disappointed that joan was gone without seeing him, his curiosity so entirely left him that he could not recall what it was like, and never imagined its possible return. nor did it reappear so long as he was awake, but all through his dreams the old captain kept reminding him that the stick was his own. "do it; do it; don't put off," he kept saying; but as often as cosmo asked him what, he could never hear his reply, and would wake yet again with the horse in his hand. in the morning he screwed it on the stick again, and set it by his bed-side. chapter xxxv. pull his tail. about noon, when both the doctors happened to be out, joan came to see him, and was more like her former self than she had been for many days. hardly was she seated when he took the stick, and said, "did you ever see that before, joan?" "do you remember showing me a horse just like that one, only larger?" she returned. "it was in the drawing-room." "quite well," he answered. "it made me think of this," she continued, "which i had often seen in that same closet where i suppose you found it yesterday." cosmo unscrewed the joints and showed her the different boxes. "there's nothing in them," he said; "but i suspect there is something about this stick more than we can tell. do you remember the silly scotch rime i repeated the other day, when you told me i had been talking poetry in my sleep?" "yes, very well," she answered. "those are words an uncle of my father, whom you may have heard of as the old captain, used to repeat very often."--at this joan's face turned pale, but her back was to the light, and he did not see it.--"i will say them presently in english, that you may know what sense there may be in the foolishness of them. now i must tell you that i am all but certain this stick once belonged to that same great uncle of mine--how it came into your father's possession i cannot say--and last night, as i was looking at it, i saw something that made me nearly sure this is the horse, insignificant as it looks, that was in my uncle's head when he repeated the rime. but iwould do nothing without you." "how kind of you, cosmo!" "not kind; i had no right; the stick is yours." "how can that be, if it belonged to your great uncle?" said joan, casting down her eyes. "because it was more than fifty years in your father's possession, and he left it to you. besides, i cannot be absolutely certain it is the same." "then i give it to you, cosmo." "i will not accept it, joan--at least before you know what it is you want to give me.--and now for this foolish rime--in english!" "catch your horse and pull his tail; in his hind heel drive a nail; pull his ears from one another: stand up and call the king your brother!" "what's to come of it, i know no more than you do, joan," continued cosmo; "but if you will allow me, i will do with this horse what the rime says, and if they belong to each other, we shall soon see." "do whatever you please, cosmo," returned joan, with a tremble in her voice. cosmo began to screw off the top of the stick. joan left her chair, drew nearer to the bed, and presently sat down on the edge of it, gazing with great wide eyes. she was more moved than cosmo; there was a shadow of horror in her look; she dreaded some frightful revelation. her father's habit of muttering his thoughts aloud, had given her many things to hear, although not many to understand. when the horse was free in cosmo's hand, he set the stick aside, looked up, and said, "the first direction the rime gives, is to pull his tail." with that he pulled the horse's tail--of silver, apparently, like the rest of him--pulled it hard; but it seemed of a piece with his body, and there was no visible result. the first shadow of approaching disappointment came creeping over him, but he looked up at joan, and smiled as he said, "he doesn't seem to mind that! we'll try the next thing--which is, to drive a nail in his hind heel.--now look here, joan! here, in one of his hind shoes, is a hole that looks as if one of the nails had come out! that is what struck me, and brought the rime into my head! but how drive a nail into such a hole as that?" "perhaps a tack would go in," said joan, rising. "i shall pull one out of the carpet." "a tack would be much too large, i think," said cosmo. "perhaps a brad out of the gimp of that chair would do.--or, stay, i know! have you got a hair-pin you could give me?" joan sat down again on the bed, took off her bonnet, and searching in her thick hair soon found one. cosmo took it eagerly, and applied it to the hole in the shoe. nothing the least larger would have gone in. he pushed it gently, then a little harder--felt as if something yielded a little, returning his pressure, and pushed a little harder still. something gave way, and a low noise followed, as of a watch running down. the two faces looked at each other, one red, and one pale. the sound ceased. they waited a little, in almost breathless silence. nothing followed. "now," said cosmo, "for the last thing!" "not quite the last," returned joan, with what was nearly an hysterical laugh, trying to shake off the fear that grew upon her; "the last thing is to stand up and call the king your brother." "that much, as non-essential, i daresay we shall omit," replied cosmo.--"the next then is, to pull his ears from each other." he took hold of one of the tiny ears betwixt the finger and thumb of each hand, and pulled. the body of the horse came asunder, divided down the back, and showed inside of it a piece of paper. cosmo took it out. it was crushed, rather than folded, round something soft. he handed it to joan. "it is your turn now, joan," he said; "you open it. i have done my part." cosmo's eyes were now fixed on the movements of joan's fingers undoing the little parcel, as hers had been on his while he was finding it. within the paper was a piece of cotton wool. joan dropped the paper, and unfolded the wool. bedded in the middle of that were two rings. the eyes of cosmo fixed themselves on one of them--the eyes of joan upon the other. in the one cosmo recognized a large diamond; in the other joan saw a dark stone engraved with the mergwain arms. "this is a very valuable diamond," said cosmo, looking closely at it. "then that shall be your share, cosmo," returned joan. "i will keep this if you don't mind." "what have you got?" asked cosmo. "my father's signet-ring, i believe," she answered. "i have often heard him--bemoan the loss of it." lord mergwain's ring in the old captain's stick! things began to put themselves together in cosmo's mind. he lay thinking. the old captain had won these rings from the young lord and put them for safety in the horse; borland suspected, probably charged him with false play; they fought, and his lordship carried away the stick to recover his own; but had failed to find the rings, taking the boxes in the bamboo for all there was of stowage in it. it was by degrees, however, that this theory formed itself in his mind; now he saw only a glimmer of it here and there. in the meantime he was not a little disappointed. was this all the great mystery of the berimed horse? it was as if a supposed opal had burst, and proved but a soap-bubble! joan sat silent, looking at the signet-ring, and the tears came slowly in her eyes. "i may keep this ring, may i not, cosmo?" she said. "my dear joan!" exclaimed cosmo, "the ring is not mine to give anybody, but if you will give me the stick, i shall be greatly obliged to you." "i will give it you on one condition, cosmo," answered joan, "--that you take the ring as well. i do not care about rings." "i do," answered cosmo; "but sooner than take this from you, joan, i would part with the hope of ever seeing you again. why, dear joan, you don't know what this diamond is worth!--and you have no money!" "neither have you," retorted joan. "--what is the thing worth?" "i do not like to say lest i should be wrong. if i could weigh it, i should be better able to tell you. but its worth must anyhow be, i think--somewhere towards two hundred pounds." "then take it, cosmo. or if you won't have it, give it to your father, with my dear love." "my father would say to me--'how could you bring it, cosmo!' but i will not forget to give him the message. that he will be delighted to have." "but, cosmo! it is of no use to me. how could i get the money you speak of for it? if i were to make an attempt of the kind, my brother would be sure to hear of it. it would be better to give it him at once." "that difficulty is easily got over," answered cosmo. "when i go, i will take it with me; i know where to get a fair price for it--not always easy for anything; i will send you the money, and you will be quite rich for a little while." "my brother opens all my letters," replied joan. "i don't think he cares to read them, but he sees who they are from." "do you have many letters, joan?" "not many. perhaps about one a month, or so." "i could send it to dr. jermyn." joan hesitated a moment, but did not object. the next instant they heard the doctor's step at the door, and his hand on the lock. joan rose hastily, caught up her bonnet, and sat down a little way off. cosmo drew the ring and the pieces of the horse under the bed-clothes. jermyn cast a keen glance on the two as he entered, took for confusion the remains of excitement, and said to himself he must make haste. he felt cosmo's pulse, and pronounced him feverish, then, turning to joan, said he must not talk, for he had not got over yesterday; it might be awkward if he had a relapse. joan rose at once, and took her leave, saying she would come and see him the next morning. jermyn went down with her, and sent cosmo a draught. when he had taken it, he felt inclined to sleep, and turned himself from the light. but the stick, which was leaning against the head of the bed, slipped, and fell on a part of the floor where there was no carpet; the noise startled and roused him, and the thought came that he had better first of all secure the ring--for which purpose undoubtedly there could be no better place than the horse! there, however, the piece of cotton wool would again be necessary, for without it the ring would rattle. he put the ring in the heart of it, replaced both in the horse, and set about discovering how to close it again. this puzzled him not a little. spring nor notch, nor any other means of attachment between the two halves of the animal, could he find. but at length he noted that the tail had slipped a little way out, and was loose; and experimenting with it, by and by discovered that by holding the parts together, and winding the tail round and round, the horse--how, he could not tell--was restored to its former apparent solidity. and now where would the horse be safest? clearly in its own place on the stick. he got out of bed therefore to pick the stick up, and in so doing saw on the carpet the piece of paper which had been round the cotton. this he picked up also, and getting again into bed, had begun to replace the handle of the bamboo, when his eyes fell again on the piece of paper, and he caught sight of crossing lines on it, which looked like part of a diagram of some sort. he smoothed it out, and saw indeed a drawing, but one quite unintelligible to him. it must be a sketch or lineation of something--but of what? or of what kind of thing? it might be of the fields constituting a property; it might be of the stones in a wall; it might be of an irregular mosaic; or perhaps it might be only a school-boy's exercise in trigonometry for land-measuring. it must mean something; but it could hardly mean anything of consequence to anybody! still it had been the old captain's probably--or perhaps the old lord's: he would replace it also where he had found it. once more he unscrewed the horse from the stick, opened it with joan's hair-pin, placed the paper in it, closed all up again, and lay down, glad that joan had got such a ring, but thinking the old captain had made a good deal of fuss about a small matter. he fell fast asleep, slept soundly, and woke much better. in the evening came the doctor, and spent the whole of it with him, interesting and pleasing him more than ever, and displaying one after another traits of character which cosmo, more than prejudiced in his favour already, took for additional proofs of an altogether exceptional greatness of character and aim. nor am i capable of determining how much or how little jermyn may have deceived himself in regard of the same. now that joan had this ring, and his personal attachment to the doctor had so greatly increased, cosmo found himself able to revert to the offer jermyn once made of lending him a little money, which he had then declined. he would take the ring to mr. burns on his way home, and then ask joan to repay dr. jermyn out of what he sent her for it. he told jermyn therefore, as he sat by his bed-side, that he found himself obliged after all to accept the said generous proposal, but would return the money before he got quite home. the doctor smiled, with reasons for satisfaction more than cosmo knew, and taking out his pocket-book, said, as he opened it, "i have just cashed a cheque, fortunately, so you had better have the money at once.--don't bother yourself about it," he added, as he handed him the notes; "there is no hurry. i know it is safe." "this is too much," said cosmo. "never mind; it is better to have too much than too little; it will be just as easy to repay." cosmo thanked him, and put the money under his pillow. the doctor bade him good night, and left him. the moment he was alone, a longing greater than he had ever yet felt, arose in his heart to see his father. the first hour he was able to travel, he would set out for home! his camera obscura haunted with flashing water and speedwells and daisies and horse-gowans, he fell fast asleep, and dreamed that his father and he were defending the castle from a great company of pirates, with the old captain at the head of them. chapter xxxvi. the thick darkness. the next day he was still better, and could not think why the doctor would not let him get up. as the day went on, he wondered yet more why joan did not come to see him. not once did the thought cross him that it was the doctor's doing. if it had, he would but have taken it for a precaution--as indeed it was, for the doctor's sake, not his. jermyn would have as little intercourse between them as might be, till he should have sprung his spiritual mine. but he did all he could to prevent him from missing her, and the same night opened all his heart to cosmo--that is, all the show-part of it. [illustration: the next day he was still better.] in terms extravagant, which he seemed to use because he could not repress them, he told his frozen listener that his whole nature, heart and soul, had been for years bound up in lady joan; that he had again and again been tempted to deliver himself by death from despair; that if he had to live without her, he would be of no use in the world, but would cease to care for anything. he begged therefore his friend cosmo warlock, seeing he stood so well with the lady, to speak what he honestly could in his behalf; for if she would not favour him, he could no longer endure life. his had never been over full, for he had had a hard youth, in which he had often been driven to doubt whether there was indeed a god that cared how his creatures went on. he must not say all he felt, but life, he repeated, would be no longer worth leading without at least some show of favour from lady joan. at any former time, such words would have been sufficient to displace jermyn from the pedestal on which cosmo had set him. what! if all the ladies in the world should forsake him, was not god yet the all in all? but now as he lay shivering, the words entering his ears seemed to issue from his soul. he listened like one whom the first sting has paralyzed, but who feels the more every succeeding invasion of death. it was a silent, yet a mortal struggle. he held down his heart like a wild beast, which, if he let it up for one moment, would fly at his throat and strangle him. nor could the practiced eye of the doctor fail to perceive what was going on in him. he only said to himself--"better him than me! he is young and will get over it better than i should." he read nobility and self-abnegation in every shadow that crossed the youth's countenance, telling of the hail mingled with fire that swept through his universe; and said to himself that all was on his side, that he had not miscalculated a hair's-breadth. he saw at the same time cosmo's heroic efforts to hide his sufferings, and left him to imagine himself successful. but how cosmo longed for his departure, that he might in peace despair!--for such seemed to himself his desire for solitude. what is it in suffering that makes man and beast long for loneliness? i think it is an unknown something, more than self, calling out of the solitude--"come to me!--come!" how little of the tenderness our human souls need, and after which consciously or unconsciously they hunger, do we give or receive! the cry of the hurt heart for solitude, seems to me the call of the heart of god--changed by the echo of the tiny hollows of the heart of his creature--"come out from among them: come to me, and i will give you rest!" he alone can give us the repose of love, the peace after which our nature yearns. hurt by the selfishness and greed of men, to escape from which we must needs go out of the world, worse hurt by our own indignation at their wrong, and our lack of patience under it, we are his creatures and his care still. the right he claims as his affair, and he will see it done; but the wrong is by us a thousand times well suffered, if it but drive us to him, that we may learn he is indeed our very lover. that was a terrible night for cosmo--a night billowy with black fire. it reminded him afterwards of nothing so much as that word of the lord--the power of darkness. it was not merely darkness with no light in it, but darkness alive and operative. he had hardly dared suspect the nature, and only now knew the force, and was about to prove the strength of the love with which he loved joan. great things may be foreseen, but they cannot be known until they arrive. his illness had been ripening him to this possibility of loss and suffering. his heart was now in blossom: for that some hearts must break;--i may not say in full blossom, for what the full blossom of the human heart is, the holiest saint with the mightiest imagination cannot know--he can but see it shine from afar. it was a severe duty that was now required of him--i do not mean the performance of the final request the doctor had made--that cosmo had forgotten, neither could have attempted with honesty; for the emotion he could not but betray, would have pleaded for himself, and not for his friend; it was enough that he must yield the lady of his dreams, become the lady as well of his waking and hoping soul. perhaps she did not love jermyn--he could not tell; but jermyn was his friend and had trusted in him, confessing that his soul was bound up in the lady; one of them must go to the torture chamber, and when the question lay between him and another, cosmo knew for which it must be. he alone was in cosmo's hands; his own self was all he held and had power over, all he could offer, could yield. mr. simon had taught him that, as a mother gives her children money to give, so god gives his children selves, with their wishes and choices, that they may have the true offering to lay upon the true altar; for on that altar nothing else will burn than selves. "very hard! a tyrannical theory!" says my reader? so will it forever appear to the man who has neither the courage nor the sense of law to enable him to obey. but that man shall be the eternal slave who says to duty _i_ will not. nor do i care to tell such a man of the "thousand fold"--of the truth concerning that altar, that it is indeed the nest of god's heart, in which the poor, unsightly, unfledged offering shall lie, until they come to shape and loveliness, and wings grow upon them to bear them back to us divinely precious. cosmo thought none of all this now--it had vanished from his consciousness, but was present in his life--that is, in his action: he did not feel, he did it all--did it even when nothing seemed worth doing. how much greater a man than he was jermyn! how much more worthy of the love of a woman like joan! how good he had been to him! what a horrible thing it would be if jermyn had saved his life that he might destroy jermyn's! perhaps joan might have come one day to love him; but in the meantime how miserable she was with her brother, and when could he have delivered her! while here was one, and a far better than he, who could, the moment she consented, take her to a house of her own where she would be a free woman! for him to come in the way, would be to put his hand also to the rack on which the life of joan lay stretched! again i say i do not mean that all this passed consciously through the mind of cosmo during that fearful night. his suffering was too intense, and any doubt concerning duty too far from him, to allow of anything that could be called thought; but such were the fundamental facts that lay below his unselfquestioned resolve--such was the soil in which grew the fruits, that is, the deeds, the outcome of his nature. for himself, the darkness billowed and rolled about him, and life was a frightful thing. for where was god this awful time? nowhere within the ken of the banished youth. in his own feeling cosmo was outside the city of life--not even among the dogs--outside with bare nothingness--cold negation. alas for him who had so lately offered to help another to pray, thinking the hour would never come to him when he could not pray! it had come! he did not try to pray. the thought of prayer did not wake in him! let no one say he was punished for his overconfidence--for his presumption! there was no presumption in the matter; there was only ignorance. he had not learned--nor has any one learned more than in part--what awful possibilities lie the existence we call we. he had but spoken from what he knew--that hitherto life for him had seemed inseparable from prayer to his father. and was it separable? surely not. he could not pray, true--but neither was he alive. to live, one must chose to live. he was dead with a death that was heavy upon him. there is a far worse death--the death that is content and suffers nothing; but annihilation is not death--is nothing like it. cosmo's condition had no evil in it--only a ghastly imperfection--an abyssmal lack--an exhaustion at the very roots of being. god seemed away, as he could never be and be god. but every commonest day of his life, he who would be a live child of the living has to fight with the god-denying look of things, and believe that in spite of that look, seeming ever to assert that god has nothing to do with them, god has his own way--the best, the only, the live way, of being in everything, and taking his own pure, saving will in them; and now for a season cosmo had fallen in the fight, and god seemed gone, and things rushed in upon him and overwhelmed him. it was death. he did not yet know it--but it was not the loss of joan, but the seeming loss of his god, that hollowed the last depth of his misery. but that is of all things the surest to pass; for god changing not, his life must destroy every false show of him. cosmo was now one of those holy children who are bound hand and foot in the furnace, until the fire shall have consumed their bonds that they may pace their prison. stifled with the smoke and the glow, he must yet for a time lie helpless; not yet could he lift up his voice and call upon the ice and the cold, the frost and the snow to bless the lord, to praise and exalt him forever. but god was not far from him. feelings are not scientific instruments for that which surrounds them; they but speak of themselves when they say, "i am cold; i am dark." perhaps the final perfection will be when our faith is utterly and absolutely independent of our feelings. i dare to imagine this the final victory of our lord, when he followed the cry of why hast thou forsaken me? with the words, father, into thy hands _i_ commend my spirit. shall we then bemoan any darkness? shall we not rather gird up our strength to encounter it, that we too from our side may break the passage for the light beyond? he who fights with the dark shall know the gentleness that makes man great--the dawning countenance of the god of hope. but that was not for cosmo just yet. the night must fulfil its hours. men are meant and sent to be troubled--that they may rise above the whole region of storm, above all possibility of being troubled. chapter xxxvii. the dawn. strange to say, there was no return of his fever. he seemed, through the utter carelessness of mental agony, so to have abandoned his body, that he no longer affected it. a man must have some hope, to be aware of his body at all. as the darkness began to yield he fell asleep. then came a curious dream. for ages joan had been persuading him to go with her, and the old captain to go with him--the latter angry and pulling him, the former weeping and imploring. he would go with neither, and at last they vanished both. he sat solitary on the side of a bare hill, and below him was all that remained of castle warlock. he had been dead so many years, that it was now but a half--shapeless ruin of roofless walls, haggard and hollow and gray and desolate. it stood on its ridge like a solitary tooth in the jaw of some skeleton beast. but where was his father? how was it he had not yet found him, if he had been so long dead? he must rise and seek him! he must be somewhere in the universe! therewith came softly stealing up, at first hardly audible, a strain of music from the valley below. he listened. it grew as it rose, and held him bound. like an upward river, it rose, and grew with a strong rushing, until it flooded all his heart and brain, working in him a marvellous good, which yet he did not understand. and all the time, his eyes were upon the dead home of his fathers. wonder of wonders, it began to change--to grow before his eyes! it was growing out of the earth like a plant! it grew and grew until it was as high as in the old days, and then it grew yet higher! a roof came upon it, and turrets and battlements--all to the sound of that creative music; and like fresh shoots from its stem, out from it went wings and walls. like a great flower it was rushing visibly on to some mighty blossom of grandeur, when the dream suddenly left him, and he woke. but instead of the enemy coming in upon him like a flood as his consciousness returned, to his astonishment he found his soul as calm as it was sad. god had given him while he slept, and he knew him near as his own heart! the first thought that came was, that his god was joan's god too, and therefore all was well; so long as god took care of her, and was with him, and his will was done in them both, all was on the way to be well so as nothing could be better. and with that he knew what he had to do--knew it without thinking--and proceeded at once to do it. he rose, and dressed himself. it was still the gray sunless morning. the dream, with its dream-ages of duration, had not crossed the shallows of the dawn. quickly he gathered his few things into his knapsack--fortunately their number had nowise increased--took his great-uncle's bamboo, saw that his money was safe, stole quietly down the stair, and softly and safely out of the house, and, ere any of its inhabitants were astir, had left the village by the southward road. when he had walked about a mile, he turned into a road leading eastward, with the design of going a few miles in that direction, and then turning to the north. when he had travelled what to his weakness was a long distance, all at once, with the dismay of a perverse dream, rose above the trees the towers of cairncarque. was he never to escape them, in the body any more than in the spirit? he turned back, and again southwards. but now he had often to sit down; as often, however, he was able to get up and walk. coming to a village he learned that a coach for the north would pass within an hour, and going to the inn had some breakfast, and waited for it. finding it would pass through the village he had left, he took an inside place; and when it stopped for a moment in the one street of it, saw charles jermyn cross it, evidently without a suspicion that his guest was not where he had left him. when he had travelled some fifty miles, partly to save his money, partly because he felt the need of exercise, not to stifle thought, but to clear it, he left the coach, and betook himself to his feet. alternately walking and riding, he found his strength increase as he went on; and his sorrow continued to be that of a cloudy summer day, nor was ever, so long as the journey lasted, again that of the fierce wintry tempest. at length he drew nigh the city where he had spent his student years. on foot, weary, and dusty, and worn, he entered it like a returning prodigal. few scotchmen would think he had made good use of his learning! but he had made the use of it god required, and some scotchmen, with and without other learning, have learned to think that a good use, and in itself a sufficient success--for that man came into the world not to make money, but to seek the kingdom and righteousness of god. he walked straight into mr. burns's shop. the jeweller did not know him at first; but the moment he spoke, recognized him. cosmo had been dubious what his reception might be--after the way in which their intimacy had closed; but mr. burns held out his hand as if they had parted only the day before, and said, "i thought of the two you would be here before death! man, you ought to give a body time." "mr. burns," replied cosmo, "i am very sorry i behaved to you as i did. i am not sorry i said what i did, for i am no less sure about that than i was then; but i am sorry i never came again to see you. perhaps we did not quite understand on either side." "we shall understand each other better now, i fancy," said mr. burns. "i am glad you have not changed your opinion, for i have changed mine. if it weren't for you, i should be retired by this time, and you would have found another name over the door. but we'll have a talk about all that. allow me to ask you whither you are bound." "i am on my way home," answered cosmo. "i have not seen my father for several--for more than two years." "you'll do me the honour to put up at my house to-night, will you not? i am a bachelor, as you know, but will do my best to make you comfortable." cosmo gladly assented; and as it was now evening, mr. burns hastened the shutting of his shop; and in a few minutes they were seated at supper. as soon as the servant left them, they turned to talk of divine righteousness in business; and thence to speak of the jeweller's; after which cosmo introduced that of the ring. giving a short narrative of the finding of it, and explaining the position of lady joan with regard to it, so that his host might have no fear of compromising himself, he ended with telling him he had brought it to him, and with what object. "i am extremely obliged to you, mr. warlock," responded the jeweller, "for placing such confidence in me, and that notwithstanding the mistaken principles i used to advocate. i have seen a little farther since then, i am happy to say; and this is how it was: the words you then spoke, and i took so ill, would keep coming into my mind, and that at the most inconvenient moments, until at last i resolved to look the thing in the face, and think it fairly out. the result is, that, although i daresay nobody has recognized any difference in my way of doing business, there is one who must know a great difference: i now think of my neighbour's side of the bargain as well as of my own, and abstain from doing what it would vex me to find i had not been sharp enough to prevent him from doing with me. in consequence, i am not so rich this day as i might otherwise have been, but i enjoy life more, and hope the days of my ignorance god has winked at." cosmo could not reply for pleasure. mr. burns saw his emotion, and understood it. from that hour they were friends who loved each other. "and now for the ring!" said the jeweller. cosmo produced it. mr. burns looked at it as if his keen eyes would pierce to the very heart of its mystery, turned it every way, examined it in every position relative to the light, removed it from its setting, went through the diamond catechism with it afresh, then weighed it, thought over it, and said, "what do you take the stone to be worth, mr. warlock?" "i can only guess, of course," replied cosmo; "but the impression on my mind is, that it is worth more nearly two hundred than a hundred and fifty pounds." "you are right," answered mr. burns, "and you ought to have followed my trade; i could make a good jeweller of you. this ring is worth two hundred guineas, fair market-value. but as i can ask for no one more than it is absolutely worth, i must take my profit off you: do you think that is fair?" "perfectly," answered cosmo. "then i must give you only two hundred pounds for it, and take the shillings myself. you see it may be some time before i get my money again, so i think five per cent on the amount is not more than the fair thing." "it seems to me perfectly fair, and very moderate," replied cosmo. as soon as dinner was over, he sat down to write to joan. while there was nothing that must be said, he had feared writing. this was what he wrote: "my dearest joan, "as you have trusted me hitherto, so trust me still, and wait for an explanation of my peculiar behaviour in going away without bidding you good-by, till the proper time comes--which must come one day, for our master said, more than once, that there was nothing covered which should not be revealed, neither hid that should not be known. i feel sure therefore, of being allowed to tell you everything sometime. "i herewith send you a cheque as good as bank-notes, much safer to send, and hardly more difficult for dr jermyn to turn into sovereigns. "i borrowed of him fifteen pounds--a good deal more than i wanted. i have therefore got mr. burns, my friend, the jeweller, in this city, to add five pounds to the two hundred which he gives for the ring, and beg you, joan, for the sake of old times, and new also, to pay for me the fifteen pounds to dr. jermyn, which i would much rather owe to you than to him. the rest of it, the other ten pounds, i will pay you when i can--it may not be in this world. and in the next--what then, joan? why then--but for that we will wait--who more earnestly than i? "to all the coming eternity, dear joan, i shall never cease to love you--first for yourself, then for your great lovely goodness to me. may the only perfection, whose only being is love, take you to his heart--as he is always trying to do with all of us! i mean to let him have me out and out. "dearest joan, your far-off cousin, but near friend, "cosmo warlock." chapter xxxviii. home again. early the next day, while the sun was yet casting huge diagonal shadows across the wide street, cosmo climbed to the roof of the defiance coach, his heart swelling at the thought of being so soon in his father's arms. it was a lovely summer morning, cool and dewy, fit for any sunday--whence the eyes and mind of cosmo turned to the remnants of night that banded the street, and from them he sank into metaphysics, chequered with the champing clank of the bits, the voices of the ostlers, passengers, and guard, and the perpendicular silence of the coachman, who sat like a statue in front of him. how dark were the shadows the sun was casting! absurd! the sun casts no shadows--only light. how so? were the sun not shining, would there be one single shadow? yes; there would be just one single shadow; all would be shadow. there would be none of those things we call shadows. true; all would be shade; there would be no shadows. by such a little stair was cosmo landed at a door of deep question. for now evil took the place of shadow in his solo disputation, and the law and the light and the shadow and the sin went thinking about with each other in his mind; and he saw how the jews came to attribute evil to the hand of god as well as good, and how st. paul said that the law gave life to sin--as by the sun is the shadow. he saw too that in the spiritual world we need a live sun strong enough to burn up all the shadows by shining through the things that cast them, and compelling their transparency--and that sun is the god who is light, and in whom is no darkness at all--which truth is the gospel according to st. john. and where there is no longer anything covered or hid, could sin live at all? these and such like thoughts held him long--till the noisy streets of the granite city lay far behind. swiftly the road flew from under the sixteen flashing shoes of the thorough-breds that bore him along. the light and hope and strength of the new-born day were stirring, mounting, swelling--even in the heart of the sad lover; in every honest heart more or less, whether young or old, feeble or strong, the new summer day stirs, and will stir while the sun has heat enough for men to live on the earth. surely the live god is not absent from the symbol of his glory! the light and the hope are not there without him! when strength wakes in my heart, shall i be the slave to imagine it comes only as the sap rises in the stem of the reviving plant, or the mercury in the tube of the thermometer? that there is no essential life within my conscious life, no spirit within my spirit? if my origin be not life, i am the poorest of slaves! cosmo had changed since first he sat behind such horses, on his way to the university; it was the change of growth, but he felt it like that of decay--as if he had been young then and was old now. little could he yet imagine what age means! devout youth as he was, he little understood how much more than he his father felt his dependence on, that is his strength in god. many years had yet to pass ere he should feel the splendour of an existence rooted in changeless life ripening through the growing weakness of the body! it is the strength of god that informs every muscle and arture of the youth, but it is so much his own--looks so natural to him--as it well may, being god's idea for him--that, in the glory of its possession, he does not feel it as the presence of the making god. but when weakness begins to show itself,--a shadow-back-ground, against which the strength is known and outlined--when every movement begins to demand a distinct effort of the will, and the earthly house presses, a conscious weight, not upon its own parts only, but upon the spirit within, then indeed must a man have god, believe in him with an entireness independent of feeling, and going beyond all theory, or be devoured by despair. in the growing feebleness of old age, a man may well come to accept life only because it is the will of god; but the weakness of such a man is the matrix of a divine strength, whence a gladness unspeakable shall ere long be born--the life which it is god's intent to share with his children. cosmo was on the way to know all this, but now his trouble sat sometimes heavy upon him. indeed the young straight back, if it feels the weight less, feels the irksomeness of the burden more than the old bowed one. with strength goes the wild love of movement, and the cross that prevents the free play of a single muscle is felt grievous as the fetter that chains a man to the oar. but this day--and what man has to do with yesterday or to-morrow? --the sun shone as if he knew nothing, or as if he knew all, and knew it to be well; and cosmo was going home, and the love of his father was a deep gladness, even in the presence of love's lack. seldom is it so, but between the true father, and true son it always will be so. when he came within a mile of muir of warlock, he left the coach, and would walk the rest of the way. he desired to enjoy, in gentle, unruffled flow, the thoughts that like swallows kept coming and going between him and his nest as he approached it. everything, the commonest, that met him as he went, had a strange beauty, as if, although he had known it so long, now first was its innermost revealed by some polarized light from source unseen. how small and poor the cottages looked--but how home-like! and how sweet the smoke of their chimneys! how cold they must be in winter--but how warm were the hearts inside them! there was jean elder's sunday linen spread like snow on her gooseberry bushes; there was the shoemaker's cow eating her hardest, as if she would devour the very turf that made a border to the road--held from the corn on the other side of the low fence by a strong chain in the hand of a child of seven; and there was the first dahlia of the season in jonathan japp's garden! as he entered the village, the road, which was at once its street and the queen's highway, was empty of life save for one half--grown pig--"prospecting," a hen or two picking about, and several cats that lay in the sun. "there must be some redemption for the feline races," thought cosmo, "when the cats have learned so much to love the sun!--but, alas! it is only his heat, not his light they love!" he looked neither on this side nor that as he walked, for he was in no mood for the delay of converse, but he wondered nevertheless that he saw nobody. it was the general dinner hour, true, but that would scarcely account for the deserted look of the street! any passing stranger was usually enough to bring people to their doors--their windows not being of much use for looking out of! sheltered behind rose-trees or geraniums or hydrangeas, however, not a few of whom he saw nothing were peering at him out of those windows as he passed. the villagers had learned from some one on the coach that the young laird was coming. but, strange to say, a feeling had got abroad amongst them to his prejudice. they had looked to hear great things of their favourite, but he had not made the success they expected, and from their disappointment they imagined his blame. it troubled them to think of the old man, whom they all honoured, sending his son to college on the golden horse, whose history had ever since been the cherished romance of the place, and after all getting no good of him! so when they saw him coming along, dusty and shabby--not so well dressed indeed as would have contented one of themselves on a sunday, they drew back from their peep--holes with a sigh, let him pass, and then looked again. nothing of all this however did cosmo suspect, but held on his way unconscious of the regards that pursued him as a prodigal returning the less satisfactorily that he had not been guilty enough to repent. chapter xxxvii. the shadow of death. every step cosmo took after leaving the village, was like a revelation and a memory in one. when he turned out of the main road, the hills came rushing to meet and welcome him, yet it was only that they stood there changeless, eternally the same, just as they had been: that was the welcome with which they met the heart that had always loved them. when first he opened his eyes, they were as the nursing arms the world spread out to take him; and now, returning from the far countries where they were unknown, they spread them out afresh to receive him home. the next turn was home itself, for that turn was at the base of the ridge on which the castle stood. the moment he took it, a strange feeling of stillness came over him, and as he drew nearer, it deepened. when he entered the gate of the close, it was a sense, and had grown almost appalling. with sudden inroad his dream returned! was the place empty utterly? was there no life in it? not yet had he heard a sound; there was no sign from cow-house or stable. a cart with one wheel stood in the cart-shed; a harrow lay, spikes upward, where he had hollowed the mound of snow. the fields themselves had an unwonted, a haggard sort of look. a crop of oats was ripening in that nearest the close, but they covered only the half of it: the rest was in potatoes, and amongst them, sole show of labour or life, he saw aggie: she was pulling the plums off their stems. the doors were shut all round the close--all but the kitchen-door; that stood as usual wide open. a sickening fear came upon cosmo: it was more than a week since he had heard from home! in that time his father might be dead, and therefore the place be so desolate! he dared not enter the house. he would go first into the garden, and there pray, and gather courage. he went round the kitchen-tower, as the nearest block was called, and made for his old seat, the big, smooth stone. some one was sitting there, with his head bent forward on his knees! by the red night-cap it must be his father, but how changed the whole aspect of the good man! his look was that of a worn-out labourer--one who has borne the burden and heat of the day, and is already half asleep, waiting for the night. motionless as a statue of weariness he sat; on the ground lay a spade which looked as if it had dropped from his hand as he sat upon the stone; and beside him on that lay his marion's bible. cosmo's heart sank within him, and for a moment he stood motionless. but the first movement he made forward, the old man lifted his head with an expectant look, then rose in haste, and, unable to straighten himself, hurried, stooping, with short steps, to meet him. placing his hands on his son's shoulders, he raised himself up, and laid his face to his; then for a few moments they were silent, each in the other's arms. the laird drew back his head and looked his son in the face. a heavenly smile crossed the sadness of his countenance, and his wrinkled old hand closed tremulous on cosmo's shoulder. "they canna tak frae me my son!" he murmured--and from that time rarely spoke to him save in the mother-tongue. then he led him to the stone, where there was just room enough for two that loved each other, and they sat down together. the laird put his hand on his son's knee, as, when a boy, cosmo used to put his on his father's. "are ye the same, cosmo?" he asked. "are ye my ain bairn?" "father," returned cosmo, "gien it be possible, i loe ye mair nor ever. i'm come hame to ye, no to lea' ye again sae lang as ye live. gien ye be in ony want, i s' better 't gien i can, an' share 't ony gait. ay, i may weel say i'm the same, only mair o' 't." "the lord's name be praist!" murmured the laird. "--but du ye loe him the same as ever, cosmo?" again he asked. "father, i dinna loe him the same--i loe him a heap better. he kens noo 'at he may tak his wull o' me. naething' at i ken o' comes 'atween him an' me." the old man raised his arm, and put it round his boy's shoulders: he was not one of the many scotch fathers who make their children fear more than love them. "then, lord, let me die in peace," he said, "for mine eyes hae seen thy salvation!--but ye dinna luik freely the same, cosmo!--hoo is 't?" "i hae come throuw a heap, lately, father," answered cosmo. "i hae been ailin' in body, an' sair harassed in hert. i'll tell ye a' aboot it, whan we hae time--and o' that we'll hae plenty, i s' warran', for i tell ye i winna lea' ye again; an' gien ye had only latten me ken ye was failin', i wad hae come hame lang syne. it was sair agen the grain 'at i baid awa'." "the auld sudna lie upo' the tap o' the yoong, cosmo, my son." "father, i wad willin'ly be a bed to ye to lie upo', gien that wad ease ye; but i'm thinkin' we baith may lie saft upo' the wull o' the great father, e'en whan that's hardest." "true as trowth!" returned the laird. "--but ye're luikin' some tired-like, cosmo!" "i am some tired, an' unco dry. i wad fain hae a drink o' milk." the old man's head dropped again on his bosom, and so for the space of about a minute he sat. then he lifted it up, and said, looking with calm clear eyes in those of his son, "i winna greit, cosmo; i'll say yet, the will o' the lord be dune, though it be sair upo' me the noo, whan i haena a drap o' milk aboot the place to set afore my only-begotten son whan he comes hame to me frae a far country!--eh, lord! whan yer ain son cam hame frae his sair warstle an' lang sojourn amo' them 'at kenned na him nor thee, it wasna til an auld shabby man he cam hame, but til the lord o' glory an' o' micht! an' whan we a' win hame til the father o' a', it'll be to the leevin' stren'th o' the universe.--cosmo, the han' o' man's been that heavy upo' me 'at coo efter coo's gane frae me, an' the last o' them, bonny yally, left only thestreen. ye'll hae to drink cauld watter, my bairn!" again the old man's heart overcame him; his head sank, and he murmured,--"lord, i haena a drap o' milk to gie my bairn--me 'at wad gie 'im my hert's bluid! but, lord, wha am i to speyk like that to thee, wha didst lat thine ain poor oot his verra sowl's bluid for him an' me!" "father," said cosmo, "i can du wi' watter as weel's onybody. du ye think i'm nae mair o' a man nor to care what i pit intil me? gien ye be puirer nor ever, i'm prooder nor ever to share wi' ye. bide ye here, an' i'll jist rin an' get a drink, an' come back to ye." "na; i maun gang wi' ye, man," answered the laird, rising. "grizzie's a heap taen up wi' yer gran'mither. she's been weirin' awa' this fortnicht back. she's no in pain, the lord be praised! an' she'll never ken the straits her hoose is com till! cosmo, i hae been a terrible cooard--dreidin' day an' nicht yer hame-comin', no submittin' 'at ye sud see sic a broken man to the father o' ye! but noo it's ower, an' here ye are, an' my hert's lichter nor it's been this mony a lang!" cosmo's own sorrow drew back into the distance from before the face of his father's, and he felt that the business, not the accident of his life, must henceforth be to support and comfort him. and with that it was as if a new well of life sprung up suddenly in his being. "father," he said, "we'll haud on thegither i' the stret ro'd. there's room for twa abreist in't--ance ye're in!" "ay! ay!" returned the laird with a smile; "that's the bonniest word ye cud hae come hame wi' til me! we maun jist perk up a bit, an' be patient, that patience may hae her perfe't wark. i s' hae anither try--an' weel i may, for the licht o' my auld e'en is this day restored til me!" "an' sae gran'mother's weirin awa', father!" "to the lan' o' the leal, laddie." "wull she ken me?" "na, she winna ken ye; she'll never ken onybody mair i' this warl'; but she'll ken plenty whaur she's gaein'!" he rose, and they walked together towards the kitchen. there was nobody there, but they heard steps going to and fro in the room above. the laird made haste, but before he could lay his hand on a vessel, to get for cosmo the water he so much desired, grizzie appeared on the stair, descending. she hurried down, and across the floor to cosmo, and seizing him by the hand, looked him in the face with the anxiety of an angel-hen. her look said what his father's voice had said just before--"are ye a' there--a' 'at there used to be?" "hoo's gran'mamma?" asked cosmo. "ow, duin' weel eneuch, sir--weirin awa' bonny. she has naither pang nor knowledge o' sorrow to tribble her. the lord grant the sowls o' 's a' sic anither lowsin'!" "hae ye naething better nor cauld watter to gie 'im a drink o', grizzie, wuman?" asked the laird, but in mere despair. "nae 'cep he wad condescen' til a grainie meal intil 't," returned grizzie mournfully, and she looked at him again, with an anxious deprecating look now, as if before the heir she was ashamed of the poverty of the house, and dreaded blame."--but laird, "she resumed, turning to her master, "ye hae surely a drap o' something i' yer cellar! weel i wat ye hae made awa' wi' nane o' 't yersel!" "weel, there ye wat wrang, grizzie, my bonny wuman!" replied the laird, with the flicker of a humourous smile on his wrinkled face, "for i sellt the last bottle oot o' 't a month ago to stronach o' the distillery. i thought it cudna du muckle ill there, for it wadna make his nose sae reid as his ain whusky. whaur, think ye, wad the sma' things ye wantit for my mother hae come frae, gien i hadna happent to hae that property left? we're weel taen care o', ye see, grizzie! that wad hae tried my faith, to hae my mother gang wi'oot things! but he never suffers us to be tried ayont what we're able to beir; an' sae lang as my faith hauds the grup, i carena for back nor belly! cosmo, i can bide better 'at ye sud want. ye're mair like my ain nor even my mother, an' sae we bide it thegither. it maun be 'cause ye're pairt o' my mar'on as weel 's o' mysel'. eh, man! but this o' faimilies is a won'erfu' godlike contrivance! gien he had taen ony ither w'y o' makin' fowk, whaur wad i hae been this day wantin' you, cosmo?" while he spoke, cosmo was drinking the water grizzie had brought him--with a little meal on the top of it--the same drink he used to give his old mare, now long departed to the place prepared for her, when they were out spending the day together. "there's this to be said for the watter, father," he remarked, as he set down the wooden bowl in which grizzie had thought proper to supply it, "that it comes mair direc' frae the han' o' god himsel'--maybe nor even the milk. but i dinna ken; for i doobt organic chemistry maun efter a' be nearer his han' nor inorganic! ony gait, i never drank better drink; an' gien ae day he but saitisfee my sowl's hunger efter his richteousness as he has this minute saitisfeed my body's drowth efter watter, i s' be a happier man nor ever sat still ohn danced an' sung." "it's an innocent cratur' at gies thanks for cauld watter--i hae aye remarkit that!" said grizzie. "but i maun awa' to my bairn up the stair; an' may it please the lord to lift her or lang, for they maun be luikin for her yont the burn by this time. whan she wauks i' the mornin', the' 'ill be nae mair scornin'!" this was grizzie's last against her mistress. the laird took no notice of it: he knew grizzie's devotion, and, well as he loved his mother, could not but know also that there was some ground for her undevised couplet. scarcely a minute had passed when the voice of the old woman came from the top of the stair, calling aloud and in perturbation, "laird! laird! come up direc'ly. come up, lairds baith! she's comin' til hersel'!" they hastened up, cosmo helping his father, and approached the bed together. with smooth, colourless face, unearthly to look upon, the old lady lay motionless, her eyes wide open, looking up as if they saw something beyond the tester of the bed, her lips moving, but uttering no sound. at last came a murmur, in which cosmo's ears alone were keen enough to discern the articulation. "mar'on, mar'on," she said, "ye're i' the lan' o' forgiveness! i hae dune the lad no ill. he'll come hame to ye nane the waur for ony words o' mine. we're no' a' made sae guid to begin wi' as yersel', mar'on!" here her voice became a mere murmur, so far as human ears could distinguish, and presently ceased. a minute or so more and her breathing grew intermittent. after a few long respirations, at long intervals, it stopped. "she'll be haein' 't oot wi' my ain mistress or lang!" remarked grizzie to herself as she closed her eyes. "mother! mother!" cried the laird, and kneeled by the bedside. cosmo kneeled also, but no word of the prayers that ascended was audible. the laird was giving thanks that another was gone home, and cosmo was praying for help to be to his father a true son, such as the son of man was to the father of man. they rose from their knees, and went quietly down the stair; and as they went from the room, they heard grizzie say to herself, "she's gang whaur there's mair--eneuch an' to spare!" the remains of lady joan's ten pounds was enough to bury her. they invited none, but all the village came to her funeral. chapter xxxix. the labourer. such power had been accumulated and brought to bear against glenwarlock, that at length he was reduced almost to the last extremity. he had had to part with his horses before even his crops were all sown, and had therefore dismissed his men, and tried to sell what there was as it stood, and get some neighbouring farmer to undertake the rest of the land for the one harvest left him; but those who might otherwise have bought and cultivated were afraid of offending lord lick-my-loof, whose hand was pretty generally seen in the turn of affairs, and also of involving themselves in an unsecure agreement. so things had come to a bad pass with the laird and his household. a small crop of oats and one of potatoes were coming on, for which the laird did what little he could, assisted by grizzie and aggie at such times when they could leave their respective charges, but in the meantime the stock of meal was getting low, and the laird did not see where more was to come from. he and grizzie had only porridge, with a little salt butter, for two, and not unfrequently the third also of their daily meals. grizzie for awhile managed to keep alive a few fowls that picked about everywhere, finally making of them broth for her invalid, and persuading the laird to eat the little that was not boiled away, till at length there was neither cackle nor crow about the place, so that to cosmo it seemed dying out into absolute silence--after which would come the decay and the crumbling, until the castle stood like the great hollow mammoth-tooth he had looked down upon in his dream. at once he proceeded to do what little could yet be done for the on-coming crops, resolving to hire himself out for the harvest to some place later than glenwarlock, so that he might be able to mow the oats before leaving, when his father and grizzie with the help of aggie would secure them. nothing could now prevent the closing of the net of the last mortgage about them; and the uttermost cosmo could hope for thereafter was simply to keep his father and grizzie alive to the end of their natural days. shelter was secure, for the castle was free. the winter was drawing on, but there would be the oats and the potatoes, with what kail the garden would yield them, and they had, he thought, plenty of peats. yet not unfrequently, as he wandered aimless through the dreary silence, he would be speculating how long, by a judiciously ordered consumption of the place, he could keep his father warm. the stables and cow-houses would afford a large quantity of fuel; the barn too had a great deal of heavy wood-work about it; and there was the third tower or block of the castle, for many years used for nothing but stowage, whose whole thick floors he would thankfully honour, burning them to ashes in such a cause. in the spring there would be no land left them, but so long as he could save the house and garden, and find means of keeping his two alive in them, he would not grieve over that. agnes was a little shy of cosmo--he had been away so long! but at intervals her shyness would yield and she would talk to him with much the same freedom as of old when they went to school together. in his rambles cosmo would not pass her grandfather's cottage without going in to inquire after him and his wife, and having a little chat with aggie. her true-hearted ways made her, next to his father and mr. simon, the best comforter he had. she was now a strong, well-grown, sunburnt woman, with rough hands and tender eyes. occasionally she would yet give a sharp merry answer, but life and its needs and struggles had made her grave, and in general she would, like a soft cloud, brood a little before she gave a reply. she had by nature such a well balanced mind, and had set herself so strenuously to do the right thing, that her cross seemed already her natural choice, as indeed it always is--of the deeper nature. in her cosmo always found what strengthened him for the life he had now to lead, though, so long as at any hour he could have his father's company, and saw the old man plainly reviving in his presence, he could not for a moment call or think it hard, save in so far as he could not make his father's as easy as he would. when the laird heard that his son, the heir of glenwarlock, had hired himself for the harvest on a neighbouring farm, he was dumb for a season. it was heavy both on the love and the pride of the father, which in this case were one, to think of his son as a hired servant--and that of a rough, swearing man, who had made money as a butcher. the farm too was at such distance that he could not well come home to sleep! but the season of this dumbness, measured by the clock, at least, was but of a few minutes duration; for presently the laird was on his knees thanking god that he had given him a son who would be an honour to any family out of heaven: in there, he knew, every one was an honour to every other! before the harvest on the farm of stanewhuns arrived, cosmo, to his desire, had cut their own corn, with grizzie to gather, aggie to bind, and his father to stook, and so got himself into some measure of training. he found it harder, it is true, at stanewhuns, where he must keep up with more experienced scythe-men, but, just equal to it at first, in two days he was little more than equal, and able to set his father's heart at ease concerning his toil. with all his troubles, it had been a blessed time so long as he spent most of the day and every evening in his father's company. not unfrequently would mr. simon make one, seated with them in the old drawing-room or on some hillside, taking wisest share in every subject of talk that came up. in the little council cosmo represented the rising generation with its new thought, its new consciousness of need, and its new difficulties; and was delighted to find how readily his notions were received, how far from strange they were to his old-fashioned friends, especially his preceptor, and how greatly true wisdom suffices for the hearing and understanding of new cries after the truth. for what all men need is the same--only the look of it changes as its nature expands before the growing soul or the growing generation, whose hunger and thirst at the same time grow with it. and, coming from the higher to the lower, it must be ever in the shape of difficulty that the most precious revelations first appear. even mary, to whom first the highest revelation came, and came closer than to any other, had to sit and ponder over the great matter, yea and have the sword pass through her soul, ere the thoughts of her heart could be revealed to her. but cosmo of the new time, found himself at home with the men of the next older time, because both he and they were true; for in the truth there is neither old nor new; the well instructed scribe of the kingdom is familiar with the new as well as old shapes of it, and can bring either kind from his treasury. there was not a question cosmo could start, but mr. simon had something at hand to the point, and plenty more within digging-scope of his thought-spade. but now that he had to work all day, and at night see no one with whom to take sweet counsel, cosmo did feel lonely--yet was it an unfailing comfort to remember that his father was within his reach, and he would see him the next sunday. and the one thing he had dreaded was spared him--namely, having to share a room with several other men, who might prove worse than undesirable company. for the ex-butcher, the man who was a byword in the country-side for his rough speech, in this showed himself capable of becoming a gentleman, that he had sympathy with a gentleman: he would neither allow cosmo to eat with the labourers--to which cosmo himself had no objection, nor would hear of his sleeping anywhere but in the best bedroom they had in the house. also, from respect to the heir of a decayed family and valueless inheritance, he modified even his own habits so far as almost to cease swearing in his presence. appreciating this genuine kindness, cosmo in his turn tried to be agreeable to those around him, and in their short evenings, for, being weary, they retired early, would in his talk make such good use of his superior knowledge as to interest the whole family, so that afterwards most of them declared it the pleasantest harvest-time they had ever had. perhaps it was a consequence that the youngest daughter, who had been to a boarding-school, and had never before appeared in any harvest-field, betook herself to that in which they were at work towards the end of the first week, and gathered behind cosmo's scythe. but cosmo was far too much occupied--thinking to the rhythmic swing of his scythe, to be aware of the honour done him. still farther was he from suspecting that it had anything to do with the appearing of agnes one afternoon, bringing him a letter from his father, with which she had armed herself by telling him she was going thitherward, and could take a message to the young laird. the harvest began upon a monday, and the week passed without his once seeing his father. on the sunday he rose early, and set out for castle warlock. he would have gone the night before, but at the request of his master remained to witness the signing of his will. as he walked he found the week had given him such a consciousness of power as he had never had before: with the labour of his own hands he knew himself capable of earning bread for more than himself; while his limbs themselves seemed to know themselves stronger than hitherto. on the other hand he was conscious in his gait of the intrusion of the workman's plodding swing upon the easy walk of the student. his way was mostly by footpaths, often up and down hill, now over a moor, now through a valley by a small stream. the freshness of the morning he found no less reviving than in the old boyish days, and sang as he walked, taking huge breaths of the life that lay on the heathery hill-top. and as he sang the words came--nearly like the following. he had never wondered at the powers of the improvvisatore. it was easy to him to extemporize. win' that blaws the simmer plaid, ower the hie hill's shouthers laid, green wi' gerse, an' reid wi' heather, welcome wi' yer soul-like weather! mony a win' there has been sent oot 'aneth the firmament; ilka ane its story has; ilka ane began an' was; ilka ane fell quaiet an' mute whan its angel wark was oot. first gaed ane oot ower the mirk, whan the maker gan to work; ower it gaed and ower the sea, an' the warl' begud to be. mony ane has come an' gane sin' the time there was but ane: ane was great an' strong, an' rent rocks an' mountains as it went afore the lord, his trumpeter, waukin' up the prophet's ear; ane was like a steppin' soun' i' the mulberry taps abune; them the lord's ain steps did swing, walkin' on afore his king; ane lay doon like scoldit pup at his feet an' gatna up, whan the word the maister spak drave the wull-cat billows back; ane gaed frae his lips, an' dang to the earth the sodger thrang; ane comes frae his hert to mine, ilka day, to mak it fine. breath o' god, oh! come an' blaw frae my hert ilk fog awa'; wauk me up, an' mak me strang, fill my hert wi' mony a sang, frae my lips again to stert, fillin' sails o' mony a hert, blawin' them ower seas dividin' to the only place to bide in. "eh, mr. warlock! is that you singin' o' the sawbath day?" said the voice of a young woman behind him, in a tone of gentle raillery rather than expostulation. cosmo turned and saw elspeth, his master's daughter already mentioned. "whaur's the wrang o' that, miss elsie?" he answered. "arena we tellt to sing an' mak melody to the lord?" "ay, but i' yer hert, no lood oot--'cep' it be i' the kirk. that's the place to sing upo' sundays. yon wasna a psalm-tune ye was at!" "maybe no. maybe i was a bit ower happy for ony tune i' the tune-buiks, an' bude to hae ane 'at cam o' 'tsel'!" "an' what wad mak ye sae happy--gien a body micht speir?" asked elspeth, peeping from under long lashes, with a shy, half frightened, sidelong glance at the youth. she was a handsome girl of the milkmaid type, who wore a bonnet with pretty ribbons, thought of herself as a young lady, and had many admirers, whence she had grown a little bold, without knowing it. "ye haena ower muckle at hame to make ye blithe, gien a' be true," she added sympathetically. "i hae a'thing at hame to make me blithe--'cep' it be a wheen mair siller," answered cosmo; "but maybe that'll come neist--wha kens?" "ay! wha kens?" returned the girl with a sigh. "there's mony ane doobtless wad be ready eneuch wi' the siller anent what ye hae wantin' 't!" "i hae naething but an auld hoose--no sae auld as lat the win' blaw through't, though," said cosmo, amused. "but whaur are ye for sae ear, miss elsie?" "i'm for the muir o' warlock, to see my sister, the schuilmaister's wife. puir man! he's been ailin' ever sin' the spring. i little thoucht i was to hae sic guid company upo' the ro'd! ye hae made an unco differ upo' my father, mr. warlock. i never saw man sae altert. in ae single ook!" she had heard cosmo say he much preferred good scotch to would-be english, and therefore spoke with what breadth she could compass. in her head, not-withstanding, she despised everything homely, for she had been to school in the city, where, if she had learned nothing else, she had learned the ambition to appear; of being anything she had no notion. she had a loving heart, though--small for her size, but lively. of what really goes to make a lady--the end of her aspiration--she had no more idea than the swearing father of whom, while she loved him, as did all his family, she was not a little ashamed. she was an honest girl too in a manner, and had by nature a fair share of modesty; but now her heart was sadly fluttered, for the week that had wrought such a change on her father, had not been without its effect upon her--witness her talking vulgar, broad scotch! "your father is very kind to me. so are you all," said cosmo. "my father will be grateful to you for being so friendly to me." "some wad be gien they daured!" faltered elspeth. "was ye content wi' my getherin' to ye--to your scythe, i mean, laird?" "wha could hae been ither, miss elsie? try 'at i wad, i couldna lea' ye ahin' me." "did ye want to lea' me ahin' ye?" rejoined elsie, with a sidelong look and a blush, which cosmo never saw. "i wadna seek a better to gether til.--but maybe ye dinna like my han's!" so far as i can see, the suggestion was entirely irrelevant to the gathering, for what could it matter to the mower what sort of hands the woman had who gathered his swath. but then miss elspeth had, if not very pretty, at least very small hands, and smallness was the only merit she knew of in a hand. what cosmo might have answered, or in what perplexity between truth and unwillingness to hurt she might have landed him before long, i need not speculate, seeing all danger was suddenly swept away by a second voice, addressing cosmo as unexpectedly as the first. they had just passed a great stone on the roadside, at the foot of which aggie had been for some time seated, waiting for cosmo, whom she expected with the greater confidence that, having come to meet him the night before, and sat where she now was till it was dark, she had had to walk back without him. recognizing the voices that neared her, she waited until the pair had passed her shelter, and then addressed cosmo with a familiarity she had not used since his return--for which aggie had her reasons. "cosmo!" she called, rising as she spoke, "winna ye bide for me? ye hae a word for twa as weel's for ane. the same sairs whaur baith hae lugs." the moment cosmo heard her voice, he turned to meet her, glad enough. "eh, aggie!" he said, "i'm pleased to see ye. it was richt guid o' ye to come to meet me! hoo's your father, an' hoo's mine?" "they're baith brawly," she answered, "an' blithe eneuch, baith, at the thoucht o' seein' ye. gien ye couldna luik in upo' mine the day, he wad stap doon to the castle. sin' yesterday mornin' the laird, grizzie tells me, hasna ristit a minute in ae place,'cep' in his bed. what for camna ye thestreen?" as he was answering her question, aggie cast a keen searching look at his companion: elsie's face was as red as fire could have reddened it, and tears of vexation were gathering in her eyes. she turned her head away and bit her lip. the two girls were hardly acquainted, nor would elsie have dreamed of familiarity with the daughter of a poor cotter. aggie seemed much farther below her, than she below the young laird of glenwarlock. yet here was the rude girl addressing him as cosmo--with the boldness of a sister, in fact! and he taking it as matter of course, and answering in similar style! it was unnatural! indignation grew fierce within her. what might she not have waked in him before they parted but for this shameless hussey! "ye'll be gaein' to see yer sister, miss elsie?" said agnes, after a moment's pause. elspeth kept her head turned away, and made her no answer. aggie smiled to herself, and reverting to cosmo, presently set before him a difficulty she had met with in her algebra, a study which, at such few times as she could spare, she still prosecuted with the help of mr. simon. so elsie, who understood nothing of the subject, was thrown out. she dropped a little behind, and took the role of the abandoned one. when cosmo saw this, he stopped, and they waited for her. when she came up, "are we gaein' ower fest for ye, miss elsie?" he said. "not at all;" she answered, english again; "i can walk as fast as any one." cosmo turned to aggie and said, "aggie, we're i' the wrang. we had no richt to speik aboot things 'at only twa kent, whan there was three walkin' thegither.--ye see, miss elsie, her an' me was at the schuil thegither, an' we happent to tak' up wi' the same kin' o' thing, partic'larly algebra an' geometry, an' can ill haud oor tongues frae them whan we forgather. the day, it's been to the prejudice o' oor mainners, an' i beg ye to owerluik it." "i didn't think it was profitable conversation for the sabbath day," said elsie, with a smile meant to be chastened, but which aggie took for bitter, and laughed in her sleeve. a few minutes more and the two were again absorbed, this time with a point in conic sections, on which aggie professed to require enlightenment, and again elsie was left out. nor did this occur either through returning forgetfulness on the part of aggie; or the naturally strong undertow of the tide of science in her brain. once more elsie adopted the neglected role, but being allowed to play it in reality, dropped farther and farther behind, until its earnest grew heavy on her soul, and she sat down by the roadside and wept--then rising in anger, turned back, and took another way to the village. poor girl-heart! how many tears do not fancies doomed to pass cost those who give them but as it were a night's lodging! and the tears are bitter enough, although neither the love, nor therefore the sorrow, may have had time to develop much individuality. one fairest soap-bubble, one sweetly devised universe vanishes with those tears; and it may be never another is blown with so many colours, and such enchanting changes! what is the bubble but air parted from the air, individualized by thinnest skin of slightly glutinous water! does not swift comfort and ready substitution show first love rather, the passion between man and woman than between a man and a woman? how speedily is even a romeo consoled to oblivion for the loss of a rosaline by the gain of a juliet! and yet i mourn over even such evanishment; mourn although i know that the bubble of paradise, swift revolving to annihilation, is never a wasted thing: its influence, its educating power on the human soul, which must at all risks be freed of its shell and taught to live, remains in that soul, to be, i trust, in riper worlds, an eternal joy. at the same time therefore i would not be too sad over such as elsie, now seated by a little stream, in a solitary hollow, alone with her mortification--bathing her red eyes with her soaked handkerchief, that she might appear without danger of inquisition before the sister whom marriage had not made more tender, or happiness more sympathetic. but how is it that girls ready to cry more than their eyes out for what they call love when the case is their own, are so often hard-hearted when the case is that of another? there is something here to be looked into--if not by an old surmiser, yet by the young women themselves! why are such relentless towards every slightest relaxation of self restraint, who would themselves dare not a little upon occasion? here was agnes, not otherwise an ill-natured girl, positively exultant over elsie's discomfiture and disappearance! the girl had done her no wrong, and she had had her desire upon her: she had defeated her, and was triumphant; yet this was how she talked of her to her own inner ear: "the impident limmer!--makin' up til a gentleman like oor laird 'at is to be! cudna he be doon a meenute but she maun be upon 'im to devoor 'im! --an' her father naething but the cursin' flesher o' stanedyhes! --forby 'at a'body kens she was promised to jock rantle, the mason lad, an wad hae hed him, gien the father o' her hadna sworn at them that awfu' 'at naither o' them daured gang a fit further! gien i had loed a lad like jock, wad i hae latten him gang for a screed o' ill words! they micht hae sworn 'at likit for me! i wad ha latten them sweir! na, na! cosmo's for elsie's betters!" elsie appeared no more in any field that season--staid at muir o' warlock, indeed, till the harvest was over. but what a day was that sunday to cosmo! labour is the pursuivant of joy to prepare the way before him. his father received him like a king come home with victory. and was he not a king? did not the lord say he was a king, because he came into the world to bear witness to the truth? they walked together to church--and home again as happy as two boys let out of school--home to their poor dinner of new potatoes and a little milk, the latter brought by aggie with her father's compliments "to his lairdship," as grizzie gave the message. what! was i traitor bad enough to call it a poor dinner? truth and scotland forgive me, for i know none so good! and after their dinner immediately, for there was no toddy now for the laird, they went to the drawing-room--an altogether pleasant place now in the summer, and full of the scent of the homely flowers grizzie arranged in the old vases on the chimney-piece--and the laird laid himself down on the brocade-covered sofa, and cosmo sat close beside him on a low chair, and talked, and told him this and that, and read to him, till at last the old man fell asleep, and then cosmo, having softly spread a covering upon him, sat brooding over things sad and pleasant, until he too fell asleep, to be with joan in his dreams. at length the harvest was over, and cosmo went home again, and in poverty-stricken castle warlock dwelt the most peaceful, contented household imaginable. but in it reigned a stillness almost awful. so great indeed was the silence that grizzie averred she had to make much more noise than needful about her affairs that she might not hear the ghosts. she did not mind them, she said, at night; they were natural then; but it was ugsome to hear them in the daytime! the poorer their fare, the more pains grizzie took to make it palatable. the gruel the laird now had always for his supper, was cooked with love rather than fuel. with what a tender hand she washed his feet! what miracles of the laundress-art were the old shirts he wore! now that he had no other woman to look after him, she was to him like a mother to a delicate child, in all but the mother's familiarity. but the cloud was cold to her also; she seldom rimed now; and except when unusually excited, never returned a sharp answer. chapter xl. the schoolmaster. it is time i told my readers something about joan. but it is not much i have to tell. cosmo received from her an answer to his letter concerning the ring within a week; and this is what she wrote: "my dear cosmo, of course i cannot understand why you went away as you did. it makes me very unhappy, lest i should be somehow to blame. but i trust you entirely. i too hope for the day when it will be impossible to hide anything. i always find myself when i wake in the morning, trying to understand why you went away so, and one reason after another comes, but i have not got the real one yet--at least i think not. i will pay dr. jermyn the money with all my heart. i cannot pay him just yet, because the same day you left he was called to london upon medical business, and has not yet returned. give my love to your father. i hope you are safe and happy with him by this time. i wish i were with you! will that day ever come again? i cannot tell you how i miss you. it is not wonderful, if you will only think of it. i hope, dear cosmo, it was not my fault that you went away. i know my behaviour was such as to most people would have seemed very strange, but you are not most people, and i did and do think you understood it, and made all the allowance for me that could be made. i had almost forgot to thank you for the money. i do thank you, cosmo, but i should have been much more grateful had you kept it. it is all so stupid--and next to no use without you or your father! and to know i have such a large sum in the house that my brother knows nothing about, quite frightens me sometimes. i wish you had left me the horse to hide it in. i feel very much like a thief, and i am sure my brother would think of me as one if he knew. i feel sometimes as if there were an evil imp in the drawer where it lies. mind you do not make the slightest allusion to it in any of your letters, and ask your father not to do so either. it has just one comfort in it--that i could now, if driven to it, run away. my love to your father. your loving cousin, joan." long before this letter arrived, cosmo had told his father everything; and he, although he could not believe there was anything between joan and the doctor, quite approved of his conduct. "wait upon the lord," he said, after listening with the excitement of a young heart, the ache of an old one, and the hope of a strong one, to his son's narrative; "wait patiently on him, and he will give thee thy heart's desire." they waited, and patiently. what was there now that cosmo could do to make a little money? with mr. simon he held many an anxious conference on the matter, but nothing could either think of except the heart-wearing endeavour after favour with one or other of the magazines--involving an outlay of much time, a sick deferment of hope, and great discouragement; for how small were the chances of his work proving acceptable to this or that man who, with the best intentions for the success of the magazine in his charge, and a keen enough perception of the unworthy in literature, had most likely no special love for the truth, or care to teach it, and was besides under the incapacitating influence, the deadening, debilitating, stupefying effect of having continually to judge--not to mention the enervating hopelessness that at length falls, i presume, upon every editor of a popular magazine, of finding one pearl among the cartloads of oysters sent him by unknown divers in the gulf of literature--filling him with amazement that there should be so many to write so well, and so few to write better. mr. simon nevertheless encouraged cosmo to make the attempt, seeing that to one who had nothing else to do, it involved no loss, and would be certain gain to both head and heart, with just the possibility as well of a little return in money. so he set to work, and wrote, and wrote, and sent, and--sent, but heard nothing and nothing. the weeks came and went, and the frosts came and went, and then came and staid: and the snow fell and melted, and then fell and lay; and winter settled down with moveless rigour upon castle warlock. nor had it lasted long, before it became evident that the natural powers of the laird had begun to fail more rapidly. but sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof, and that in the matter of death as well as of life; if we are not to forestall the difficulties of living, surely we are not to forestall the sorrows of dying. there was one thing, however, that did trouble him: the good old man's appetite had begun to fail, and how was he to get for him what might tempt him to eat? he was always contented, nor ever expressed a desire for anything not in the house; but this was what sent cosmo on his knees oftenest of all--oftener even than his own spiritual necessities. never surely did household, even in scotland, live upon less! cosmo had to watch grizzie to know that she ate at all, and once came nearly to the conclusion that she ate only dry meal. he would have had his father take his grandmother's room now she was gone, but he would not leave the one he had last occupied with his wife. from that he would go, he said, as she had gone. so cosmo took his grandmother's, and there wrote and read--and when his father could not, in the very cold weather, leave his bed, was within the call of the slightest knock upon his floor. but every now and then, when the cold would abate a little, the laird would revive, and hope grow strong in the mind of his son: his father was by no means an old man yet, he would persuade himself, and might be intended to live many years; and thereupon he would set to work with fresh vigour. but it is hard to labour without encouragement, or apparent prospect of result. many a time did the gracies go without milk that they might send for the laird the little their cow gave; but, though cosmo never refused their kindness, as indeed he had no right, it went to his heart that the two old people should go without what was as needful for them as for his father. mr. simon too would every now and then send something from his house or from the village--oftener than cosmo knew, for he had taken grizzie into his confidence, and she was discreet. but now at length fell a heavenly crumb to keep the human sparrows picking. the schoolmaster at the muir, he who had behaved so insolently to the warlocks, father and son, had returned to his duties at the end of the hairst-play, but had been getting worse for some time, and was at length unable to go on. he must therefore provide a substitute, and cosmo heard that he was on the outlook for one. now cosmo knew that, if he had desired to be made parish-schoolmaster, the influence of lord lick-my-loof would have been too strong against him, but it seemed possible that his old master might have so far forgotten by-gones as to be willing to employ him. he went to him therefore the same hour, and being shown into the room where he sat wrapt in blankets, laid before him his petition. now the schoolmaster, although both worldly in his judgment, and hasty in his temper, was not a heartless man. keen feelings are not always dissociated from brutality even. one thing will reach the heart that another will not; and much that looks like heartlessness, may be mainly stupidity. he had never ceased, after the first rush of passion, to regret he had used the word that incensed the boy; and although he had never to his own heart confessed himself wrong in knocking down the violator of the sacredness of the master's person, yet, unconsciously to himself, he had for that been sorry also. had he been sorrier, his pride would yet have come between him and confession. when the boy, then, on whom for years he had not set his eyes, stood unexpectedly before him, a fine youth, down in the world, and come, as he anticipated the moment he saw him, to beg a favour--behold an opportunity, not only of making reparation without confession, but of induing the dignity of forgiveness! he received cosmo, therefore, with the stiffness of a condescending inferior, it is true, but with kindness notwithstanding, and, having heard his request, accorded immediately a gracious assent, which so filled cosmo with gratitude that he could not help showing some emotion, whereupon the heart of the schoolmaster in its turn asserted itself; and from that moment friendly relations were established between them. things were soon arranged. cosmo was to be paid by the week, and should commence his work the next morning. he returned therefore in great consolation, carrying with him for his father one or two simple luxuries the village afforded. that night he hardly could sleep for joy. he set about his new duties with zeal. teaching itself is far from easy work to anyone anxious to make it genuine; and cosmo had besides to leave home early in all kinds of wintry weather, and walk to it through the bitterness of black frost, the shifting toil of deep snow, or the assault of fierce storm. but he thought nothing of the labour or its accessories of discomfort; the only thing he felt hard was having to leave his father all the winter-day alone, for it was generally five o'clock before he got back to him. and now in the heart of the laird arose a fresh gratitude for the son god had given him. his hours passed mainly in devotion and anticipation. every time he received his son from the arms of the winter to his own, it was like the welcoming of one lost and found again. into the stern weather of their need had stolen a summer-day to keep hope alive. cosmo gave up his writing, and spent all the time he had at home in waiting with mind and body upon his father. he read to him--sometimes his own poetry,--and that his father liked best of all, because therein he came nearer to his boy; now and then, when he was too weary for thought, he would play backgammon with him; and sometimes, when he was himself more tired than usual, would get grizzie to come and tell yet again the stories she used to tell him when he was a child--some of which his father enjoyed the more that he remembered having heard them when he was himself a child. upon one of these occasions, grizzie brought from her treasury a tale which the laird remembered his grandmother's saying she too had heard when she was a child, and therewith it came into cosmo's head to write it out, as nearly as he could, in grizzie's words, and try a magazine with it. for the first time he received an answer--the most agreeable part of which was a small cheque, and the next most agreeable the request that he would send another paper of like character. grizzie's face, when she learned in what way, and how largely, as it seemed to her, she had commenced contributing to the income of the family, was a sight worth a good deal more than a good dinner to both father and son. at first she imagined cosmo was making game of her, and stood upon the dignity of her legends; but convinced at length of the fact of the case, she stared into nowhere for a minute, and then said, "eh, sirs! oot o' the moo' o' babes an' sucklin's! the lord be praist, whan herts is raist!" "amen, grizzie!" responded the laird. "eh, wuman? gien ever ane wana place in a faimily, her ain by foreordeenment o' the fatherly providence 'at luiks efter the faimilies o' men, grizzie, ye're that wuman!" word to please grizzie better the laird could not have found. it sunk in and in, for her pleasure could make no show, there being no room for any growth in the devotion of her ministrations. and now cosmo would take no more of the gracies' milk, but got aggie to go every day to a farm near, and buy what was required for his father, and aggie was regular as the clock, sunshine or storm. but there was another thing in which she was not quite so regular, but which yet she never missed when she could help it; so that, as often as three and occasionally four times in the week, cosmo would find her waiting for him somewhere on his way home, now just outside the village, now nearer glenwarlock, according to the hour when she had got through her work. the village talked, and aggie knew it, but did not heed it; for she had now in her own feeling recovered her former position towards him; and it was one of the comforts of cosmo's labour, when the dulness or contrariety of the human animal began to be too much for him, to think of the talk with agnes he might hope was waiting him. under mr. simon she had made much progress, and was now a companion fit for any thinking man. the road home was not half the length to cosmo when agnes walked it too. thinking inside, and labouring outside, she was, in virtue of the necessities of her life, such a woman as not the most vaunted means of education, without the weight and seeming hindrances of struggle, can produce. one of the immortal women she was--for she had set out to grow forevermore--for whom none can predict an adequate future, save him who knows what he is making of her. her behaviour to cosmo was that of a half sister, who, born in a humbler position, from which she could not rise, was none the less his sister, and none the less loved him. whether she had anything to struggle with in order to keep this position, i am not prepared to say; but i have a suspicion that the behaviour of elspeth, which so roused her scorn, had something to do with the restoring of the old relation between them. the most jealous of reasonable mothers could hardly have complained of her behaviour in cosmo's company, however much she might have disapproved of her seeking it as she did. but it is well that god, and not even reasonable mothers, has the ordering of those things in which they consider themselves most interested, and are not unfrequently intrusive. next to his father and mr. simon, agnes gracie was the most valued of cosmo's friends. mr. burns came next. for lady joan, he never thought of her by the side of anybody else. if he had not learned to love her, i think he might now very well have loved agnes. and if cosmo had asked her now, when marriage was impossible, to marry him when he could marry, i do not know what agnes might have answered. but he did not, and they remained the best of trusting friends. chapter xli grannie and the stick. this winter, the wind that drops the ripened fruit not plucked before, blew hard upon old grannie, who had now passed her hundredth year. for some time agnes had not been able to do much for her, but another great-grandchild, herself a widow and a mother, was spending the winter with her. on his way to or from school, cosmo every day looked in to see or enquire after her; and when he heard she had had a bad night he would always think how with her would fail the earthly knowledge of not a little of the past of his family, and upon one of these occasions resolved that he would at least find out whether she remembered the bamboo he had brought from cairncarque. calling when school was over, he heard she was a little better, and the next morning brought with him the cane. in the afternoon he learned that she had had a better night, and going in found her in her chair by the fireside, and took his place by her so that the light from the window at her back should fall upon the stick. he had not sat more than a minute, when he saw her eyes fixed upon the horse. "what's that ye hae there, cosmo?" she said. "this?" returned cosmo. "it's a cane i pickit up upo' my traivels. what think ye o' 't?" he held it out to her, but she did not move her hand towards it. "whaur got ye't?" she asked, her eyes growing larger as she looked. "what gars ye speir, grannie?" he returned, with assumed indifference. "i dinna believe there was anither like the ane that's like," she replied. "in which case," rejoined cosmo, "it maun be the same. ken ye onything aboot it?" "ay; an' sae du ye, or ye hae less sense nor i wad hae mintit o' a warlock. that stick's no a stick like ither sticks, an' i wuss i was nearer hame." "ye dinna mean, grannie, there's onything no canny aboot the stick?" said cosmo. "i wadna like to think him near me 'at aucht it." she replied. "wha auchit it, grannie?" "rive't a' to bits, laddie; there's something by ordnar aboot it. the auld captain made o' 't as gien it had been his graven image. that was his stick ye hae i' yer han', whaurever ye got it; an' it was seldom oot o' his frae mornin' till nicht. some wad hae't hetuik it til's bed wi' him. i kenna aboot that; but gien by ony accident he set it oot frae 'atween his knees, it was never oot o' the sicht o' his e'en. i hae seen him mysel', missin' 't like, luik up o' a suddent as gien his sowl hed been requiret o' 'im, an' grip at it as gien it hed been his proadigal son come hame oonexpeckit." cosmo told her where he had found it. "i tellt ye sae!" she cried. "the murderin' villian cairriet it wi' him, weel kennin what was intil 't!" cosmo showed her the joints and their boxes, telling her he had searched them all, but had found nothing. she shook her head. "ower late! ower late!" she murmured. "the rievin' english lord was aforehan' wi' the heir!" she seemed then to fall into a kind of lethargic musing, and as cosmo had not yet made up his mind to show her the paper he had found in the top of the cane, and ask her opinion concerning it, for the present he bade her good-night--little thinking he was not to see her again in this world. for that same night she died. and now when his opportunity was over, and he could learn no more from her, the mind of cosmo was exercised afresh concerning the bamboo. according to grannie, its owner habitually showed anxiety for its safety, and had it continually under his eye. it did not seem likely that the rings had been in it long when it was taken from him, neither that at any time he would have chosen to carry like valuables about with him in such a receptacle. it could hardly therefore be because of those or of similar precious things concealed in it, that he was always so watchful over it. it was possible, indeed, that from often using it for temporary concealment, he had come to regard it with constant anxiety; but the conjecture did not satisfy cosmo. and as often as he turned the thing over in his mind, his speculation invariably settled on the unintelligible paper. it was true the said paper had seemed not so much there for its own safety, as by chance employment for the protection of the jewels round which it was, after all, rather squeezed than folded; but a man may crumple up his notes and thrust them in his pocket, yet care more for them than for anything else in the same place. thinking of the thing one night after he was in bed, it occurred to him suddenly to ask himself what he had done with the paper, for he could not remember when he had last seen it. he got up, took the stick, which being joan's gift he always carried to his room, and opening the horse, which he could now do without his eyes, found it empty. this made him uneasy, and he lay down again to think what he could have done with it. it was dark night, and his anxiety was not so great but that sleep presented its claim upon him. he resisted it however, unwilling to yield until he had at least thought of some probability with regard to the paper. but, like a soundless tide, sleep kept creeping upon him, and he kept starting from it with successive spur-pricks of the will which had not yet consented to the nightly annihilation. bethinking himself in one of these revivals that he might have put it in his pocket-book, he stretched his hand to the chair beside the bed on which lay his clothes. then came a gap in his consciousness, and the next thing he knew was the pocket-book in his hand, with the memory or the dream, he could not afterwards tell which, of having searched it in vain. he now felt so anxious that he could rest no longer, but must get up and look for the paper until he found it. he rose and lighted his candle, went down the stair to the kitchen, and out of the house--then began to doubt whether he was awake, but, like one compelled, went on to the great door, and up to the drawing-room, when first he became aware that the moon was shining, and all at once remembered a former dream, and knew it was coming to him again: there it was!--the old captain, seated in his chair, with the moon on his face, and a ghastly look! he felt his hair about to stand on end with terror, but resisted with all his might. the rugged, scarred countenance gazed fixedly at him, and he did his best to return the gaze. the appearance rose, and walked from the room, and cosmo knew he had to follow it to the room above, which he had not once entered since his return. there, as before, it went to the other side of the bed, and disappeared. but this time the dream went a little farther. despite his fear, cosmo followed, and in the wall, by the head of the bed, saw an open door. he hurried up to it, but seemed to strike against the wall, and woke. he was in bed, but his heart was beating a terribly quick march. his pocket-book was in his hand: he struck a light, and searching in it, found the missing paper. the next night, he told his dream to his father and mr simon, and they had a talk about dreams and apparitions; then all three pored over the paper, but far from arriving at any conclusion, seemed hardly to get a glimpse of anything that could be called light upon its meaning. chapter xlii. obstruction. all this time cosmo had never written again to joan; both his father and he thought it better the former only should for the present keep up the correspondence. but months had passed without their hearing from her. the laird had written the third time, and received no answer. the day was now close upon them when the last of their land would be taken, leaving them nothing but the kitchen-garden--a piece of ground of about half an acre, the little terraced flower-garden to the south of the castle, and the croft tenanted by james gracie. they applied to lord lick-my-loof to grant them a lease of the one field next the castle, which the laird with the help of the two women had cultivated the spring before, but he would not--his resentment being as strong as ever, and his design deeper than they saw. the formal proceedings took their legal course; and upon and after a certain day lord lick-my-loof might have been seen from not a few of the windows of the castle, walking the fields to the north and east, and giving orders to his bailiff concerning them. within a fortnight those to the north were no more to be entered from the precincts of the castle except by climbing over a dry-stane dyke; and before many additional days were gone by, they found him more determined than they could have imagined, to give them annoyance. he had procured a copy of an old plan of the property, and therein discovered, as he had expected and hoped, that that part of the road from the glen of the warlock which passed the gate of the castle, had been made by the present laird only about thirty years before; whereupon--whether he was within his legal rights or not, i do not know, but everybody knew the laird could not go to law--he gave orders that it should be broken up from the old point of departure, and a dry dyke built across the gate. but the persons to whom the job was committed, either ashamed or afraid, took advantage of an evening on which cosmo had a class for farm-labourers, to do the work after dark; whence it came that, plodding homewards without a suspicion, he found himself as he approached the gate all at once floundering among stones and broken ground, and presently brought up standing, a man built out from his own house by a mushroom wall--the entrance gone which seemed to him as old as the hills around it, for it was older than his earthly life. with a great shove he hurled half the height of it over, and walking in, appeared before his father in such a rage as bewildered and troubled him far more than any insolence of lord lick-my-loof could have done. "the scoundrel!" cried cosmo; "i should like to give him a good drubbing--only he's an old man! but i'll make him repent it--and heartily, too!" "cosmo, my boy," said the old man, "you are meddling with what does not belong to you." "i know it's your business, father, not mine; but--" "it's no more my business than yours, my son!'vengeance is mine, saith the lord.'--an' the best o' 't is," he went on, willing, by a touch of humour in the truth he had to speak, to help turn the tide of cosmo's wrath, "he'll tak' no more than's guid for the sinner; whereas yersel', cosmo, i' the tune ye're in noo, wad damn puir auld lick-my-loof for ever and ever! man, he canna hurt me to the worth o' sic a heap o' firin'!" then changing his tone to absolute seriousness, "min' ye tu, cosmo," he went on, "'at the maister never threatent but aye left the thing, whatever it was, to him 'at judges richteously. ye want nothing but fair play, my son, an' whether ye get it frae lick-my-loof or no, there's ane winna haud it frae ye. ye 's get it, my son; ye 's get it! the maister 'll hae a' thing set richt at the lang last; an' gien he binna in a hurry, we may weel bide. for mysel', the man has smitten me upo' the tae cheek, an' may hae the tither to lat drive at whan he likes. it's no worth liftin' my auld airm to haud aff the smack." he laughed, and cosmo laughed too--but grimly and out of tune. then the laird told him that just that piece of the road was an improvement of his own, and had cost him a good bit of blasting: it used to cross the stream twice before it got to the yard-gate. he hardly thought, he said, that his lordship would like to have to restore it; for, besides the expense, it would cost him so much out of one of his best fields. in the meantime they must contrive how to connect themselves with that part of the road which he dared not touch. the worst of it was that there was no longer any direct communication across the fields with james gracie's cottage. to follow the road was to make a tremendous round. grizzie being already in bed when cosmo came home, learned nothing that night of the evil news. at break of day cosmo was up to see what could be done, and found that a few steps cut in the rocky terraces of the garden would bring one with ease to the road. he set about it immediately, and before breakfast-time had finished the job. the rage and indignation of grizzie when she learned what had been done, far surpassed cosmo's, and served to secure him from any return of the attack. the flood of poetic abuse that she poured out seemed inexhaustible, sweeping along with it tale after tale to the prejudice of "that leein' lick-my-loof." but, poetic as was her speech, not a single rime did she utter for the space of an hour during which she thus unloaded her heart. "ay!" she concluded, and thereafter sank into smouldering silence, "there was a futpath there afore ye was born, laird, blast or no blast; an' to that i can fess them 'at can beir testimony, ane o' them bein' nane ither nor jeames gracie himsel', wha's ten lang years aheid o' yer lairdship! an' lat me see man or dog 'at 'll haud me ohn taen my wull o' my richts intil't! they canna hang me, and for less i carena." the schoolmaster was at length fit to resume his labours, and about a week after the event just recorded, cosmo ceased to attend the school in his stead. chapter xliii. grizzie's rights. in those days mistress gracie fell sick, and though for a while neither husband nor grand-daughter thought seriously of her ailment, it proved more than her age, worn with labour, could endure, and she began to sink. then grizzie must go and help nurse her, for, cosmo being at home all day long, the laird could well enough spare her. father and son were now seldom out of each other's sight. when cosmo was writing, the laird would be reading in the same room; and when, after their dinner, the laird slept, cosmo would generally read his new-testament beside him, and as often as he woke fresh from his nap, the two would talk about what the one had been reading, and cosmo would impart what fresh light the greek had given him. the capacity of the old man for taking in what was new, was wonderful, and yet not to be wondered at, seeing it was the natural result of the constant practice of what he learned--for all truth understood becomes duty. to him that obeys well, the truth comes easy; to him who does not obey, it comes not, or comes in forms of fear and dismay. the true, that is the obedient man, cannot help seeing the truth, for it is the very business of his being--the natural concern, the correlate of his soul. the religion of these two was obedience and prayer; their theories only the print of their spiritual feet as they walked homeward. the road which lord lick-my-loof had broken up, went nearly straight from castle warlock to the cottage of the gracies, where it joined the road that passed his lodge. and now came grizzie's call to action! the moment she found her services required for mistress gracie, she climbed the gate of the close, from the top of it stepped upon the new wall, thence let herself down on the disfeatured road, and set out to follow its track, turn for turn, through the ploughed land. in the evening she came back the same way, scrambled over the wall and the gate, and said never a word, nor was asked a question. to visit his tenants the laird himself went a mile about, but most likely he was not prepared to strain his authority with grizzie, and therefore was as one who knew nothing. before the week was out, her steps, and hers alone, had worn a visible and very practicable footpath across the enemy's field; and whether lord lick-my-loof was from home, or that he willed the trespass to assume its most defined form and yield personal detection ere he moved in the matter, the week went by without notice taken. on the sunday morning however, as grizzie was on her way to the cottage, she suddenly spied, over the edge of a hollow through which her path ran, the head of lord lick-my-loof: he was following the track she had made, and would presently meet her. wide spread her nostrils, like those of the war-horse, for she too smelt the battle from afar. "here's auld belzebub at last!'gaein to an' fro i' the earth, an' walkin' up an' doon intil 't!" she said to herself. "noo's for me to priv the trowth 'o scriptur! whether he'll flee or no, we'll see: i s' resist him. it's no me 'at'll rin, ony gait!" his lordship had been standing by his lodge on the outlook, and when he saw grizzie approaching, had started to encounter her. as she drew near he stopped, and stood in the path motionless. on she came till within a single pace of him. he did not move. she stopped. "i doobt, my lord," she said, "i'll hae to mak the ro'd a bit wider. there's hardly room for yer lordship an' anither. but i'm gettin' on fine!" "is the woman an idiot!" exclaimed his lordship. "muckle siclike 's yersel', my lord!" answered grizzie;--"no that muckle wit but i might hae mair, to guide my steps throuw the wilderness ye wad mak o' no an ill warl'." "are you aware, woman, that you have made yourself liable to a heavy fine for trespass? this field is mine!" "an' this fitpath's mine, my lord--made wi' my ain feet, an' i coonsel ye to stan' aside, an' lat me by." "woman, you are insolent." "troth, i needna yer lordship to tell me that! nane the less ae auld wife may say 'at she likes til anither." "i tell you there is no thoroughfare here." "an' i tell you there is a thoroughfare, an' ye hae but to wull the trowth to ken 'at there is. there was a ro'd here lang or yer lordship's father was merried upo' yer lordship's mither, an' the law--what o' 't yer lordship hasna the makin' o'--is deid agen ye: that i can priv. hae me up: i can tak my aith as weel's onybody whan i'm sure." "i will do so; but in the meantime you must get off my property." "weel, stan' by, an' i s' be aff o' 't in less time nor yer lordship." "you must go back." "hooly an' fairly! bide till the gloamin', an' i s' gang back--never fear. i' the mids o' the meantime i'm gaein' aff o' yer property the nearest gait--an' that's straucht efter my nose." she tried, for the tenth time or so, to pass, but turn as she might, he confronted her. she persevered. he raised the stick he carried, perhaps involuntarily, perhaps thinking to intimidate her. then was the air rent with such an outcry of assault as grievously shook the nerves of his lordship. "hold your tongue, you howling jade!" he cried--and the epithet sufficed to destroy every possible remnant of forbearance in the mind of grizzie. "there's them 'at tells me, my lord," she said with sudden calm, "'at that's hoo ye misca'd annie fyfe, puir lass, whan she cam efter ye, fifty year ago, to yer father's hoose, an' gat na a plack to haud her an' her bairn frae the roadside! ye needna girn like that, my lord! spare yer auld teeth for the gnashin' they'll hae to du. --though ye fear na god nor regaird man, yer hoor 'll come, an' yer no like to bid it walcome." beside himself with rage, lord lick-my-loof would have laid hold of her, but she uttered a louder cry than before--so loud that james grade's deaf colley heard her, and, having a great sense of justice, more courage than teeth, and as little regard to the law of trespass as grizzie herself, came, not bounding, but tearing over the land to her rescue, as if a fox were at one of his sheep. he made straight for his lordship. now this dog was one of the chief offences of the cottage, for he had the moral instinct to know and hate a bad man, and could not abide lord lick-my-loof. he had never attacked him, for the colley cultivated self-restraint, but he had made his lordship aware that there was no friendship in his heart towards him. silent almost as swift, he was nearly on the enemy before either he or grizzie saw him. his lordship staggered from the path, and raised his stick with trembling hand. "boon wi' ye! doon, covenant! doon, ye tyke!" cried grizzie. "haud yer teeth gien ye wad keep the feow ye hae! deil a bite but banes is there i' the breeks o' 'im!" the dog had obeyed, and now stood worshipping her with his tail, while with his eyes he watched the enemy and his stick. "hark ye, covenant," she went on, "whan his sowl he selled him, the deevil telled him,'at never mair sud he turn a hair at cry or moanin' in highway or loanin', for greitin' or sweirin' or grane o' despair. haud frae him, covenant, my fine fallow, haud frae him." grizzie talked to the dog nor lifted her eyes. when she looked up, lord lick-my-loof was beyond the hollow, hurrying as if to fetch help. in a few minutes she was safe in the cottage, out of breath, but in high spirits; and even the dying woman laughed at her tale of how she had served his lordship. "but ye ken, grizzie," suggested jeames, "we're no to return evil for evil, nor flytin' for flytin'!" "ca' ye that flytin'?" cried grizzie. "ye sud hear what i didna say! that was flytin'! we'll be tried by what we can do, no by what we canna! an' for returnin' evil, did i no haud the dog frae the deithshanks o' 'im?" the laird and cosmo had spent as usual a quiet and happy sunday. it was now halfway down the gloamin' towards night, and they sat together in the drawing-room, the laird on the sofa, and cosmo at one of the windows. the sky was a cold clear calm of thin blue and translucent green, with a certain stillness which in my mind will more or less for ever be associated with a scotch sunday. a long low cloud of dark purple hung like a baldachin over the yet glimmering coals on the altar of sunset, and the sky above it was like a pale molten mass of jewels that had run together with heat, and was still too bright for the stars to show. they were both looking out at the sky, and a peace as of the unbeginnings of eternity was sinking into their hearts. the laird's thoughts were with his marion in the region beyond the dream; cosmo's with joan in the dream that had vanished into itself. if love be religion, what matter whether its object be in heaven or on the earth! love itself is the only true nearness. he who thinks of his saviour as far away can have made little progress in the need of him; and he who does not need much cannot know much, any more than he who is not forgiven much can love much. they sat silent, their souls belonging rather to the heaven over their heads than the earth under their feet, when suddenly the world of stillness was invaded with hideous discord, above which almost immediately rose the well known voice of grizzie in fierce opposition. they rushed out. overthe gate and obstructing wall they descried, indistinct in the dull light, several heads, and hurrying thither, found grizzie in the grasp of lord lick-my-loof's bailiff, and his lordship looking on with his hands in his pockets and the smile that was his own. but it was not for her own sake grizzie cried out: there were two more in the group--two of the dog-kind, worrying each other with all the fierceness of the devotion which renders a master's quarrel more than the dog's own. they were, however, far from equally matched, and that was the cause of grizzie's cry; for the one was the somewhat ancient colley named covenant, whose teeth were not what they had been, and the other a mastiff belonging to lord lick-my-loof, young and malevolent, loosed from the chain the first time that night for a month. it looked ill for covenant, but he was a brave dog, incapable of turning his back on death itself when duty called him, and what more is required of dog or man! both the dogs were well bred each in its kind; covenant was the more human, dander the more devilish; and the battle was fierce. the moment cosmo descried who the combatants were, he knew that covenant had no fair chance, and was over the wall, and had thrown himself upon them to part them; whereupon the bailiff, knowing his master desired the death of covenant, let grizzie go, and would have rushed upon cosmo. but it was grizzie's turn now, and she clung to the bailiff like an anaconda. he cursed and swore; nor were there lacking on grizzie's body the next day certain bruises of which she said nothing except to aggie; but she had got hold of his cravat, and did her best to throttle him. cosmo did the same for the mastiff with less effect, and had to stun him with a blow on the head from a great stone, when he caught up covenant in his arms, and handed him over the wall and the gate to his father. the same moment the bailiff got away from grizzie, and made at him, calling to the mastiff. but the dog, only half recovered from the effects of cosmo's blow, either mistaking through bewilderment, or moved by some influence ill explicable, instead of attacking cosmo, rushed at his master. rage recalls dislike, and it may be he remembered bygone irritations and teasings. his lordship, however, suddenly became aware of his treacherous intent, and in a moment his legs had saved themselves over wall, and gate, and he stood panting and shaking beside the laird, in his turn the trespasser. the dog would have been over after him, had not cosmo, turning his back on the bailiff, who had not observed his master's danger, knocked the dog, in the act of leaping, once more to the earth, when a rush of stones that came with him, and partly fell upon him, had its share in cowing him. "haud him! haud him! haud the deevil, ye brute! haud the brute, ye deevil!" cried his lordship. "it's yer ain dog, my lord," said the bailiff, whatever consolation there might be in the assurance, as he took him by the collar. "am i to be worriet 'cause the dog's my ain? haud him the sickerer. he s' be ayont mischeef the morn!" "he's the true dog 'at sides wi' the richt; he'll be in bliss afore his maister," said grizzie, as she descended from the gate, and stood on her own side of the fence. but the laird was welcoming his lordship with the heartiness of one receiving an unexpected favour in the visit. "weel loupen, my lord!" he said. "come in an' rist yersel' a bit, an' i s' tak ye back on to yer ain property an easier gait nor ower a dry stane-dyke." "gien it be my property," returned his lordship, "i wad be obleeged to ye, laird, to haud yer fowk aff o' 't!" "grizzie, wuman," said the laird, turning to her, "ye dinna surely want to bring me to disgrace! the lan' 's his lordship's--bought and paid for, an' i hae no more richt ower 't nor jeames gracie's colley here, puir beast!" "ye may be richt aboot the lan', laird, the mair's the pity!" answered grizzie; "but the futpath, beggin' the pardon o' baith lairdship and lordship, belangs to me as muckle as to aither o' ye. here i stan', alane for mysel'! that ro'd 's my neebor, an' i'm bun' to see til 't, for it wad be a sair vex to mony a puir body like mysel' to louse the richt til 't." "you'll have to prove what you say, woman," said his lordship. "surely, grizzie," expostulated the laird, "his lordship maun un'erstan' affairs o' this natur', as well 's you or me!" "as to the un'erstan'in' o' them, laird, i mak nae doobt," returned grizzie; "an' as little 'at he's o' the wrang side o' the wa' this time." "na, grizzie--for he's upo' my side o' 't, an' walcome." "he's jist as walcome, naither mair nor less, to the path i made wi' my ain feet throuw the rouchest pleughed lan' i ever crossed." therewith grizzie, who hated compromise, turned away, and went into the kitchen. "come this way, my lord," said the laird. "take the dog home," said his lordship to the bailiff. "have him shot the first thing to-morrow-morning. if it weren't the sabbath, i'd have it done to-night." "he's good watch, my lord," interceded the man. "he may be a good watch, but he's a bad dog," replied his lordship. "i'll have neither man nor dog about me that doesn't know his master. you may poison him if you prefer it." "come awa', come awa', my lord!" said the laird. "this, as ye hae said,'s the sabbath-nicht, an' the thoucht o' 't sud mak us mercifu'. i hae naething to offer ye but a cheir to rist ye in, an syne we'll tak the ro'd like neebors thegither an' i'll shaw ye the w'y hame." his lordship yielded, for his poor thin legs were yet trembling with the successful effort they had made under the inspiration of fear, and now that spur was gone, the dyke seemed a rampart insurmountable, and he dared not attempt it. "what are you keeping that cursed dog there for?" he said, catching sight, as he turned, of cosmo, who held covenant by the back of the neck. "i am only waiting till your lordship's mastiff is out of the way," answered cosmo. "that you may set him at me again, as that old hag of yours did this morning!" as he spoke they had neared the kitchen-door, open as usual, and grizzie heard what he said. "that's as big a lee as ever your lordship h'ard tell i' the coort," she cried. "it's the natur o' dougs to tak scunners. they see far ben. fess the beast in here, cosmo; i s' be answerable for 'im. the puir animal canna bide my lord." "hoot, hoot, grizzie," began the laird anew, with displeasure in his tone, but already the dog was in, and the kitchen-door closed. "leave her alone, mr. warlock, if you don't want to have the worst of it," said his lordship, trying to laugh. "but seriously, laird," he went on, "it is not neighbourly to treat me like this. oblige me by giving orders to your people not to trespass on my property. i have paid my money for it, and must be allowed to do with it as i please." "my lord," returned the laird, "i have not given, and will not give you the smallest annoyance in my own person.--i hope yet to possess the earth," he interjected, half unconsciously, to himself, but aloud. "but--" "hey! hey!" said his lordship, thinking the man was sending his reason after his property. "but," continued the laird, "i cannot interfere with the rights of my neighbours. if grizzie says she has a right of way--and i think very probably she knows what she is about--i have no business to interfere." "confound your cant!" cried his lordship. "you care no more for your neighbours than i do. you only want to make yourself unpleasant to me. show me the way out, and be damned." "my lord," said cosmo, "if you weren't an old man, i would show you the quickest way out! how dare you speak so to a man like my father!" "hold your tongue, you young fool! you stand up for your father! --idling about at home and eating him up! why don't you list? with your education you could work your way up. i warn you, if you fall into my hands, i will not spare you. the country will be better to live in when such as you are scarcer." "cosmo," said his father, "do not answer him. show his lordship the way out, and let him go." as they went through the garden, lord lick-my-loof sought to renew the conversation, but cosmo maintained a stern silence, and his lordship went home incensed more than ever with the contumacious paupers. but the path in which grizzie gloried as the work of her own feet, hardened and broadened, and that although she herself had very little foot in it any more. for the following week mistress gracie died; and the day after she was buried, the old cotter came to the laird, and begged him to yield, if he pleased, the contested point, and part with the bit of land he occupied. for all the neighbours knew his lordship greatly coveted it, though none of them were aware what a price he had offered for it. "ye see, sir," he said, "noo 'at she's gane, it maitters naething to aggie or me whaur we are or what comes o' 's." "but wadna she hae said the same, gien it had been you 'at was gane, jeames?" asked the laird. "'deed wad she! she was aye a' thing for ither fowk, an' naething for hersel'! the mair cause she sud be considered the noo!" "an' ca' ye that considerin' her--to du the minute she's gane the thing wad hae grieved her by ordinar' whan she was wi' ye?" "whan we war thegither," returned jeames with solemnity, "there was a heap o' things worth a hantle; noo 'at we're pairted there's jist nearhan' as mony 'at 's no worth a strae." "weel du i un'erstan' ye, jeames!" returned the laird with a sigh. "but what wad come o' yersel' an' aggie wi'oot, a place to lay yer heid? we're no to mak oorsel's a' sae ill aff as was the maister; we maun lea' that to his wull. ye wadna hae her luik doon an' see ye in less comfort nor whan she was wi' ye!" "thereanent, sir, i had a word o' proposal to mak," rejoined jeames. "ye hae nae men noo aboot the place: what for sudna aggie an' me come and bide i' the men's quarters, and be at han' to len' a han' whan it was wantit? aggie an' me wad help to get mair oot o' the gairden; i wad hae mair time for weyvin'; an' ye wad get a heap for the bit grun' fra lick-my loof. it wadna be an ill muv, i do believe, laird, for aither pairt. consider o' 't, sir." the laird saw that they might at least be better accommodated at the castle than the cottage. he would consult his son, he said. cosmo in his turn consulted aggie, and was satisfied. in the winter the wind blew through the cottage bitterly, she said. as soon as it was settled, cosmo went to call on his lordship, and was shown into his library. his lordship guessed his errand, for his keen eye had that same morning perceived signs of change about the cottage. he received him with politeness, and begged to know wherein he could serve him. from his changed behaviour cosmo thought he must be sorry for the way he had spoken to the laird. "my father sent me," he said, "to inform your lordship that he is now at length in a position to treat with your lordship concerning the proposal to purchase james gracie's croft." "i am greatly obliged to your father," replied lord lick-my-loof, softly wiping one hand with the other, "for his attention, but i have no longer any desire to secure the land. it has been so long denied me, that at length i have grown indifferent to the possession of it. that is a merciful provision of the creator, that the human mind should have the faculty of accommodating itself to circumstances, even of positive nuisance." cosmo rose. "as soon as you have made up your mind," added his lordship, rising also, "to part with what remains of the property, including the castle, i should be glad to have the refusal of that. it would make a picturesque ruin from certain points of view on the estate." cosmo bowed, and left his lordship grinning with pleasure. chapter xliv. another harvest. the harvest brought again the opportunity of earning a pound or two, and cosmo was not the man to let it slip. but he would not go so far from home again, for, though his father never pined or complained, cosmo could see that his days shrunk more rapidly when he was not with him: left alone, he began at once to go home the faster--as if another dragging anchor were cast loose, and he was drawn the more swiftly whither sets the tide of life. to the old and weary man the life to come showed as rest; to the young and active cosmo it promised more work. it is all one; what we need for rest as well as for labour is life; more life we want, and that is everything. that which is would be more. the eternal root causes us to long for more existence, more being, more of god's making, less of our own unmaking. our very desire after rest comes of life, life so strong that it recoils from weariness. the imperfect needs to be more--must grow. the sense of growth, of ever enlarging existence, is essential to the created children of an infinite father; for in the children the paternal infinite goes on working--by them recognizable, not as infinitude, but as growth. the best thing in sight for both father and son seemed to cosmo a place in lord lick-my-loof's harvest--an engagement to reap, amongst the rest, the fields that had so lately been his own. he would then be almost within sight of his father when not with him. he applied, therefore, to the grieve, the same man with whom he had all but fought that memorable sunday of trespass. though of a coarse, the man was not of a spiteful nature, and that he had quarrelled with another was not to him sufficient rea--son for hating him ever after; yet, as he carried the application to his lordship, for he dared not without his master's leave engage to his service the man he counted his enemy, it gave him pleasure to see what he called poor pride brought to the shame of what he called beggary--as if the labour of a gentleman's hands were not a good deal further from beggary than the living upon money gained anyhow by his ancestors! lord lick-my-loof smouldered awhile before giving an answer. the question was, which would most gratify the feelings he cherished towards the man of old blood, high station, and evil fortunes--to accept or refuse the offered toil. his deliberation ended in his giving orders to the bailiff to fee the young laird, but to mind he did not pay workmen's wages for gentleman's work--which injunction the bailiff allowed to reach cosmo's ears. the young laird, as they all called him, was a favourite with his enemy's men--partly, that they did not love their master, and were the more ready to side with the man he oppressed; partly, because they admired the gentleman who so cheerfully descended to their level, and, showing neither condescension nor chagrin, was in all simplicity friendly with them; and partly, because some of them had been to his evening-school the last winter, and had become attached to him. no honest heart indeed could be near cosmo long and not love him--for the one reason that humanity was in him so largely developed. to him a man was a man whatever his position or calling; he beheld neither in the great man a divinity, nor in the small man a slave; but honoured in his heart every image of the living god it had pleased that god to make--honoured every man as, if not already such in the highest sense, yet destined to be one day a brother of jesus christ. in the arrangement of the mowers, the grieve placed cosmo last, as presumably the least capable, that he might not lower the rate of the field. but presently cosmo contrived to make his neighbour in front a little uneasy about his legs, and when the man humourously objected to having them cut off, asked him, for the joke of the thing, to change places with him. the man at once consented; the rest behaved with equal courtesy, showing no desire to contest with him the precedence of labour; before the end of the long bout, cosmo swung the leading scythe; and many were the compliments he received from his companions, as they stood sharpening for the next, in which they were of one mind he must take the lead, some begging him however to be considerate, as they were not all so young as he, while others warned him that, if he went on as he had begun, he could not keep it up, but the first would be the last before the day was over. cosmo listened, and thereafter restrained himself, having no right to overwork his companions; yet notwithstanding he had cause, many a time in after life, to remember the too great exertion of that day. even in the matter of work a man has to learn that he is not his own, but has a master, whom he must not serve as if he were a hard one. when our will goes hand in hand with god's, then are we fellow-workers with him in the affairs of the universe--not mere discoverers of his ways, watching at the outskirts of things, but labourers with him at the heart of them. the next day lord lick-my-loof's shadow was upon the field, and there he spent some time watching how things went. now grizzie and aggie, irrespective of cosmo's engagement, of which at the time they were unaware, had laid their heads together, and concluded that, although they could not both be at once away from the castle, they might between them, with the connivance of the bailiff, do a day's work and earn a day's wages; and although the grieve would certainly have listened to no such request from grizzie in person, he was incapable of refusing it to aggie. hence it followed that grizzie, in her turn that morning, was gathering to cosmo's scythe, hanging her labour on that of the young laird with as devoted a heart as if he had been a priest at the high altar, and she his loving acolyte. i doubt if his lordship would have just then approached cosmo, had he noted who the woman was that went stooping along behind the late heir of the land, now a labourer upon it for the bread of his household. "weel, glenwarlock!" said the old man, giving a lick to the palm of his right hand as he stopped in front of the nearing mower, "ye're a famous han' at the scythe! the corn boos doon afore ye like the stooks to joseph." "i hae a guid arm an' a sharp scythe, my lord," answered cosmo cheerily. "whisht, whisht, my lord!" said grizzie. "gien the corn hear ye, it'll stan' up again an' cry out. hearken til 't." the morning had been very still, but that moment a gust of wind came and set all the corn rustling. "what! you here!--crawford, you rascal!" cried his lordship, looking round, "turn this old cat out of the field." but he looked in vain; the grieve was nowhere in sight. "the deil sew up yer lordship's moo' wi' an awn o' beer!" (a beard of barley) cried grizzie. "haith, gien i be a cat, ye s' hear me curse!" his lordship bethought himself that she would certainly disgrace him in the hearing of his labourers if he provoked her further, for a former encounter had revealed that she knew things not to his credit. they were all working away as if they had not an ear amongst them, but almost all of them heard every word. "hoots, wuman!" he said, in an altered tone, "canna ye tak a jeist?" "na; there's ower mony o' ye lordship's jeists hae turnt fearsome earnest to them at tuik them!" "what mean ye, wuman?" "wuman! quo' he? my name's grisel grant. wha kens na auld grizzie, 'at never turnt her back on freen' or foe? but i'm no gaein til affront yer lordship wi' the sicht o' yersel' afore fowk--sae long, that is, as ye haud a quaiet souch. but gie the yoong laird there ony o' the dirt ye're aye lickin' oot o' yer loof, an' the auld cat 'll be cryin' upo' the hoose-tap!" "grizzie! grizzie!" cried cosmo, ceasing his work and coming back to where they stood, "ye'll ruin a'!" "what is there to ruin 'at he can ruin mair?" returned grizzie. "whan yer back's to the wa', ye canna fa'. an angry chiel' 'ill ca' up the deil; but an angry wife 'll gar him rin for's life. when i'm angert, i fear no aiven his lordship there!" lord lick-my-loof turned and went, and grizzie set to work like a fury, probably stung by the sense that she had gone too far. old woman as she was, she had soon overtaken cosmo, but he was sorely vexed, and did not speak to her. when after a while the heat of her wrath was abated, grizzie could not endure the silence, for in every motion of cosmo's body before her she read that she had hurt him grievously. "laird!" she cried at last, "my stren'th's gane frae me. gien ye dinna speyk to me, i'll drap." cosmo stopped his scythe in mid swing, and turned to her. how could he resist such an appeal! "grizzie," he said, "i winna deny 'at ye hae vext me,--" "ye needna; i wadna believe ye. but ye dinna ken yon man as i du, or ye wadna be sae sair angert at onything wuman cud say til 'im. gien i was to tell ye what i ken o' 'im, ye wad be affrontit afore me, auld wife as i am. haith, ye wadna du anither stroke for 'im!" "it's for the siller, no for him, grizzie. but gien he war as ill as ye ca' 'im, a' the same, as ye weel ken, the lord maks his sun to rise on the evil an' on the good, an' sen's rain on the just an' on the unjust!" "ow ay! the lord can afoord it!" remarked grizzie. "an' them 'at wad be his, maun afoord it tu, grizzie!" returned cosmo. "whaur's the guid o' ca'in' ill names,'uman?" "ill's the trowth o' them 'at's ill. what for no set ill names to ill duers?" "cause a christian 's b'un' to destroy the warks o' the evil ane; an' ca'in' names raises mair o' them. the only thing 'at maks awa' wi' ill, is the man himsel' turnin' again' 't, an' that he'll never du for ill names. ye wad never gar me repent that gait, grizzie. hae mercy upo' the auld sinner,'uman." the pace at which they were making up for lost time was telling upon grizzie, and she was silent. when she spoke again it was upon another subject. "i cud jest throttle that grieve there!" she said. "to see 'im the nicht afore last come hame to the verra yett wi' aggie, was enouch to anger the sanct 'at i'm no." jealousy sent a pang through the heart of cosmo. was not aggie one of the family--more like a sister to him than any other could ever be? the thought of her and a man like crawford was unendurable. "she cudna weel help hersel'," he rejoined; "an' whaur's the maitter, sae lang as she has naething to say til 'im?" "an' wha kens hoo lang that may be?" returned grizzie. "the hert o' a wuman's no deceitfu' as the buik says o' a man 's, an' sae 's a heap the easier deceivt. the chield's no ill-luikin'! an' i s' warran' he's no sae rouch wi' a yoong lass as wi' an auld wife." "grizzie, ye wadna mint 'at oor aggie's ane to be ta'en wi' the luiks o' a man!" "what for no--whan it's a' the man has! a wuman's hert's that saft, whiles,'at she'll jist tak 'im, no to be sair upon 'im. i wadna warran' ony lass! gien the fallow cairry a fair face, she'll sweir her conscience doon he maun hae a guid hert." thus grizzie turned the tables upon cosmo, and sheltered herself behind them. scarcely a word did he speak the rest of the morning. at noon, when toil gladly made way for dinner, they all sat down among the stooks to eat and drink--all except grizzie, who, appropriating an oatcake the food she and aggie had a right to between them, carried it home, and laid the greater part aside. cosmo ate and drank with the rest of the labourers, and enjoyed the homely repast as much as any of them. by the time the meal was over, aggie had arrived to take grizzie's place. it was a sultry afternoon; and what with the heat and the annoyance of the morning from grizzie's tongue and her talk concerning agnes, the scythe hung heavy in cosmo's hands, nor had aggie to work her hardest to keep up with him. but she was careful to maintain her proper distance from him, for she knew that the least suspicion of relaxing effort would set him off like a thrashing machine. he led the field, nevertheless, at fair speed; his fellow labourers were content; and the bailiff made no remark. but he was so silent, and prolonged silence was so unusual between them, that aggie was disquieted. "are ye no weel, cosmo?" she asked. "weel eneuch, aggie," he answered. "what gars ye speir?" "ye're haudin' yer tongue sae sair.--and," she added, for she caught sight of the bailiff approaching, "ye hae lost the last inch or twa o' yer stroke." "i'll tell ye a' aboot it as we gang hame," he answered, swinging his scythe in the arc of a larger circle. the bailiff came up. "dinna warstle yersel' to death, aggie," he said. "i maun haud up wi' my man," she replied. "he's a het man at the scythe--ower het! he'll be fit for naething or the week be oot. he canna haud on at this rate!" "ay can he--fine that! ye dinna ken oor yoong laird. he's worth twa ordinar' men. an' gien ye dinna think me fit to gather til' 'im, i s' lat ye see ye're mistaen, mr. crawford." and aggie went on gathering faster and faster. "hoots!" said the bailiff, going up to her, and laying his hand on her shoulder, "i ken weel ye hae the spunk to work till ye drap. but there's na occasion the noo. sit ye doon an' tak yer breath ameenute--here i' the shaidow o' this stook. whan glenwarlock's at the tither en', we'll set tu thegither an' be up wi' him afore he's had time to put a fresh edge on's scythe. come, aggie! i hae lang been thinkin' lang to hae a word wi' ye. ye left me or i kent whaur i was the ither nicht." "my time's no my ain," answered aggie. "whause is 't than?" "while's it's the laird's, an' while's it's my father's, an' noo it's his lordship's." "it's yer ain sae lang's i'm at the heid o' 's lordship's affairs." "na; that canna be. he's boucht my time, an' he'll pey me for 't, an' he s' hae his ain." "ye needna consider 'im mair nor rizzon: he's been nae freen' to you or yours." "what's that to the p'int?" "a' thing to the p'int--wi' me here to haud it richt atween ye." "ca' ye that haudin' o' 't richt, to temp' me to wrang 'im?" said aggie, going steadily on at her gathering, while the grieve kept following her step by step. "ye're unco short wi' a body, aggie!" "i weel may be, whan a body wad hae me neglec' my paid wark." "weel, i reckon ye're i' the richt o' 't efter a', sae i'll jist fa' tu, an' len' ye a han'." he had so far hindered her that cosmo had gained a little; and now in pretending to help, he contrived to hinder her yet more. still she kept near enough to cosmo to prevent the grieve from saying much, and by and by he left her. when they dropped work for the night, he would have accompanied her home, but she never left cosmo's side, and they went away together. "aggie," said cosmo, as soon as there was no one within hearing, "i dinna like that chield hingin' aboot ye--glowerin' at ye as gien he wad ate ye." "he winna du that, cosmo; he's ceevil eneuch." "ye sud hae seen sae rouch as he was to grizzie!" "grizzie's some rouch hersel' whiles," remarked aggie quietly. "that's ower true," assented cosmo; "but a man sud never behave like that til a wuman." "say that to the man," rejoined aggie. "the wuman can haud aff o' hersel'." "grizzie, i grant ye,'s mair nor a match for ony man; but ye're no sae lang i' the tongue, aggie." "think ye a lang tongue 's a lass's safety, cosmo? i wad awe nane til 't! but what's ta'en ye the nicht,'at ye speyk to me sae? i ken no occasion." "aggie, i wadna willinl'y say a word to vex ye," answered cosmo; "but i hae notit an h'ard 'at the best 'o wuman whiles tak oonaccootable fancies to men no fit to haud a can'le to them." aggie turned her head aside. "i wad ill like you, for instance, to be drawn to yon crawford," he went on. "it's eneuch to me 'at he's been lang the factotum o' an ill man." a slight convulsive movement passed across aggie's face, leaving behind it a shadow of hurtless resentment, yielding presently to a curious smile. "i micht mak a better man o' 'im," she said, and again looked away. "they a' think that, i'm thinkin'!" returned cosmo with a sad bitterness. "an' sae they wull, to the warl's en'.--but, aggie," he added, after a pause, "ye ken ye're no to be oonaiqually yokit." "that's what i hae to heed, i ken," murmured aggie. "but what do ye un'erstan' by 't, cosmo? there's nae 'worshippers o' idols the noo, as i' the days whan the apostle said that." "there's idols visible, an' idols invisible," answered cosmo. "there's heaps o' idols amo' them 'at ca's themsel's an' 's coontit christians. gien a man set himsel' to lay by siller, he's the worshipper o' as oogly an idol as gien he said his prayers to the fish-tailt god o' the philistines." "weel i wat that!" returned agnes, and a silence followed. "you an' me's aye been true til ane anither, aggie," resumed cosmo at length, "an' i wad fain hae a promise frae ye--jist to content me." "what aboot, cosmo?" "promise, an' i'll tell ye, as the bairnies say." "but we're no bairnies, cosmo, an' i daurna--even to you 'at i wad trust like the bible. tell me what it is, an' gien i may, i wull." "it's no muckle atween you an' me, aggie. it's only this--'at gien ever ye fa' in love wi' onybody, ye'll let me ken." agnes was silent for a moment; then, with a tremble in her voice, which in vain she sought to smooth out, and again turning her head away, answered: "cosmo, i daurna." "i want naething mair," said cosmo, thinking she must have misapprehended, "nor the promise 'at what ye ken i sail ken. i wad fain be wi' ye at sic a time." "cosmo," said. aggie with much solemnity, "there's ane at's aye at han', ane that sticketh closer nor a brither. the thing ye require o' me, micht be what a lass could tell to nane but the father o' her--him 'at 's in haiven." cosmo was silenced, as indeed it was time and reason he should be; for had she been his daughter, he would have had no right to make such a request of her. he did it in all innocence, and might well have asked her to tell him, but not to promise to tell him. he did not yet understand however that he was wrong, and was the more troubled about her, feeling as if, for the first time in their lives, aggie and he had begun to be divided. they entered the kitchen. aggie hastened to help grizzie lay the cloth for supper. her grandfather looked up with a smile from the newspaper he was reading in the window. the laird, who had an old book in his hand, called out, "here, cosmo! jist hearken to this bit o' wisdom, my man--frae a hert doobtless praisin' god this mony a day in higher warl's:--'he that would always know before he trusts, who would have from his god a promise before he will expect, is the slayer of his own eternity.'" the words mingled strangely with what had just passed between him and agnes. both they and that gave him food for thought, but could not keep him awake. the bailiff continued to haunt the goings and comings of agnes, but few supposed his attentions acceptable to her. cosmo continued more and less uneasy. the harvest was over at length, and the little money earned mostly laid aside for the sad winter, once more on its way. but no good hope dies without leaving a child, a younger and fresher hope, behind it. the year's fruit must fall that the next year's may come, and the winter is the only way to the spring. chapter xlv. the final conflict. as there was no more weekly pay for teaching, and no extra hands were longer wanted for farm-labour, cosmo, hearing there was a press of work and a scarcity of workmen in the building-line, offered his services, at what wages he should upon trial judge them worth, to sandy shand, the mason, then erecting a house in the village for a certain mr. pennycuik--a native of the same, who, having left it long ago, and returned from india laden with riches, now desired, if not to end, yet to spend his days amid the associations of his youth. upon this house, his offer accepted, cosmo laboured, now doing the work of a mason, now of a carpenter, and receiving fair wages, until such time when the weather put a stop to all but in-door work of the kind. but the strange thing was, that, instead of reaping golden opinions for his readiness to turn his hand to anything honest by which he could earn a shilling, cosmo became in consequence the object of endless blame--that a young man of his abilities, with a college-education, should spend his time--waste it, people said--at home, pottering about at work that was a disgrace to a gentleman, instead of going away and devoting himself to some honourable calling. "look at mr. pennycuik!" they said. "see how he has raised himself in the social scale, and that without one of the young laird's advantages! there he stands, a rich man and employer of labour, while the poor-spirited gentleman is one of his hired labourers!" such is the mean idea most men have of the self-raising that is the duty of a man! they speak after their kind, putting ambition in the place of aspiration. not knowing the spirit they were of, these would have had cosmo say to his father, korban. they knew nothing of, and were incapable of taking into the account certain moral refinements and delicate difficulties entailed upon him by that father, such as might indeed bring him to beggary, but could never allow him to gather riches like those of mr. pennycuik. like his father he had a holy weakness for the purity that gives arms of the things within us. if there is one thing a christian soul recoils from, it is meanness--of action, of thought, of judgment. what a heaven some must think to be saved into! at the same time cosmo would not have left his father to make a fortune the most honourable. through stress of weather, cosmo was therefore thrown back once more upon his writing. but still, whether it was that there was too little of grizzie or too much of himself in these later stories, his work seemed to have lost either the power or the peculiarity that had recommended it. things therefore did not look promising. but they had a fair stock of oatmeal laid in, and that was the staff of life, also a tolerable supply of fuel, which neighbours had lent them horses to bring from the peat-moss. with the cold weather the laird began again to fail, and cosmo to fear that this would be the last of the good man's winters. as the best protection from the cold he betook himself to bed, and cosmo spent his life almost in the room, reading aloud when the old man was able to listen, and reading to himself or writing when he was not. the other three of the household were mostly in the kitchen, saving fuel, and keeping each other company. and thus the little garrison awaited the closer siege of the slow-beleaguering winter, most of them in their hearts making themselves strong to resist the more terrible enemies which all winter-armies bring flying on their flanks--the haggard fiends of doubt and dismay--which creep through the strongest walls. to trust in spite of the look of being forgotten; to keep crying out into the vast whence comes no voice, and where seems no hearing; to struggle after light, where is no glimmer to guide; at every turn to find a door-less wall, yet ever seek a door; to see the machinery of the world pauseless grinding on as if self-moved, caring for no life, nor shifting a hair's-breadth for all entreaty, and yet believe that god is awake and utterly loving; to desire nothing but what comes meant for us from his hand; to wait patiently, willing to die of hunger, fearing only lest faith should fail--such is the victory that overcometh the world, such is faith indeed. after such victory cosmo had to strive and pray hard, sometimes deep sunk in the wave while his father floated calm on its crest: the old man's discipline had been longer; a continuous communion had for many years been growing closer between him and the heart whence he came. "as i lie here, warm and free of pain," he said once to his son, "expecting the redemption of my body, i cannot tell you how happy i am. i cannot think how ever in my life i feared anything. god knows it was my obligation to others that oppressed me, but now, in my utter incapacity, i am able to trust him with my honour, and my duty, as well as my sin." "look here, cosmo," he said another time; "i had temptations such as you would hardly think, to better my worldly condition, and redeem the land of my ancestors, and the world would have commended, not blamed me, had i yielded. but my god was with me all the time, and i am dying a poorer man than my father left me, leaving you a poorer man still, but, praised be god, an honest one. be very sure, my son, god is the only adviser to be trusted, and you must do what he tells you, even if it lead you to a stake, to be burned by the slow fire of poverty.--o my father!" cried the old man, breaking out suddenly in prayer, "my soul is a flickering flame of which thou art the eternal, inextinguishable fire. i am blessed because thou art. because thou art life, i live. nothing can hurt me, because nothing can hurt thee. to thy care i leave my son, for thou lovest him as thou hast loved me. deal with him as thou hast dealt with me. i ask for nothing, care for nothing but thy will. strength is gone from me, but my life is hid in thee. i am a feeble old man, but i am dying into the eternal day of thy strength." cosmo stood and listened with holy awe and growing faith. for what can help our faith like the faith of the one we most love, when, sorely tried, it is yet sound and strong! but there was still one earthy clod clinging to the heart of cosmo. there was no essential evil in it. yet not the less it held him back from the freedom of the man who, having parted with everything, possesses all things. the place, the things, the immediate world in which he was born and had grown up, crowded with the memories and associations of childhood and youth, amongst them the shadowy loveliness of lady joan, had a hold of his heart that savoured of idolatry. the love was born in him, had come down into him through generation after generation of ancestors, had a power over him for whose existence he was not accountable, but for whose continuance, as soon as he became aware of its existence, he would know himself accountable. for cosmo was not one of those weaklings who, finding in themselves certain tendencies with whose existence they had nothing to do, and therefore in whose presence they have no blame, say to themselves, "i cannot help it," and at once create evil, and make it their own, by obeying the inborn impulse. inheritors of a lovely estate, with a dragon in a den, which they have to kill that the brood may perish, they make friends with the dragon, and so think to save themselves trouble. but i would not be misunderstood: i do not think cosmo loved his home too much; i only think he did not love it enough in god. to love a thing divinely, is to be ready to yield it without a pang when god wills it; but to cosmo, the thought of parting with the house of his fathers and the rag of land that yet remained to it, was torture. this hero of mine, instead of sleeping the perfect sleep of faith, would lie open-eyed through half the night, hatching scheme after scheme--not for the redemption of the property--even to him that seemed hopeless, but for the retention of the house. might it not at least go to ruin under eyes that loved it, and with the ministration of tender hands that yet could not fast enough close the slow-yawning chasms of decay? his dream haunted him, and he felt that, if it came true, he would rather live in the dungeon wine-cellar of the mouldering mammoth-tooth, than forsake the old stones to live elsewhere in a palace. the love of his soul for castle warlock was like the love of the psalmist for jerusalem: when he looked on a stone of its walls, it was dear to him. but the love of jerusalem became an idolatry, for the jews no longer loved it because the living god dwelt therein, but because it was theirs, and then it was doomed, for it was an idol. the thing was somewhat different with cosmo: the house was almost a part of himself--an extension of his own body, as much his as the shell of a snail is his. but because into this shell were not continued those nerves of life which give the consciousness of the body, and there was therefore no reaction from it of those feelings of weakness and need which, to such a man as cosmo, soon reveal the fact that he is not lord of his body, that he cannot add to it one cubit, or make one hair white or black, and must therefore leave the care of it to him who made it, he had to learn in other ways that his castle of stone was god's also. his truth and humility and love had not yet reached to the quickening of the idea of the old house with the feeling that god was in it with him, giving it to him. not yet possessing therefore the soul of the house, its greatest bliss, which nothing could take from him, he naturally could not be content to part with it. it seemed an impossibility that it should be taken from him--a wrong to things, to men, to nature, that a man like lick-my-loof should obtain the lordship over it. as he lay in the night, in the heart of the old pile, and heard the wind roaring about its stone-mailed roofs, the thought of losing it would sting him almost to madness,--hurling him from his bed to the floor, to pace up and down the room, burning, in the coldest midnight of winter, like one of the children in the fiery furnace, only the furnace was of worse fire, being the wrath which worketh not the righteousness of god. suddenly one such night he became aware that he could not pray--that in this mood he never prayed. in every other trouble he prayed--felt it the one natural thing to pray! why not in this? something must be wrong--terribly wrong! it was a stormy night; the snow-burdened wind was raving; and cosmo would have been striding about the room but that now he was in his father's, and dreaded disturbing him. he lay still, with a stone on his heart, for he was now awake to the fact that he could not say, "thy will be done." he tried sore to lift up his heart, but could not. something rose ever between him and his god, and beat back his prayer. a thick fog was about him--no air wherewith to make a cry! in his heart not one prayer would come to life; it was like an old nest without bird or egg in it. it was too terrible! here was a schism at the very root of his being. the love of things was closer to him than the love of god. between him and god rose the rude bulk of a castle of stone! he crept out of bed, laid himself on his face on the floor, and prayed in an agony. the wind roared and howled, but the desolation in his heart made of the storm a mere play of the elements. how few of my readers will understand even the possibility of such a state! how many of them will scorn the idea of it, as that of a man on the high road to insanity! "god," he cried, "i thought i knew thee, and sought thy will; and i have sought thy will in greater things than this wherein i now lie ashamed before thee. i cannot even pray to thee. but hear thou the deepest will in me, which, thou knowest, must bow before thine, when once thou hast uttered it. hear the prayer i cannot offer. be my perfect father to fulfil the imperfection of thy child. be god after thy own nature, beyond my feeling, beyond my prayer--according to that will in me which now, for all my trying, refuses to awake and arise from the dead. o christ, who knowest me better a thousand times than i know myself, whose i am, divinely beyond my notions of thee and me, hear and save me eternally, out of thy eternal might whereby thou didst make me and give thyself to me. make me strong to yield all to thee. i have no way of confessing thee before men, but in the depth of my thought i would confess thee, yielding everything but the truth, which is thyself; and therefore, even while my heart hangs back, i force my mouth to say the words--take from me what thou wilt, only make me clean, pure, divine. to thee i yield the house and all that is in it. it is thine, not mine. give it to whom thou wilt. i would have nothing but what thou choosest shall be mine. i have thee, and all things are mine." thus he prayed, thus he strove with a reluctant heart, forcing its will by the might of a deeper will, that would be for god and freedom, in spite of the cleaving of his soul to the dust. then for a time thought ceased in exhaustion. when it returned, lo! he was in peace, in the heart of a calm unspeakable. how it came he could not tell, for he had not been aware of its approach; but the contest was over, and in a few minutes he was fast asleep--ten times his own because a thousand times another's--one with him whom all men in one could not comprehend, whom yet the heart of every true child lays hold upon and understands. i would not have it supposed that, although the crisis was past, there was no more stormy weather. often it blew a gale--often a blast would come creeping in--almost always in the skirts of the hope that god would never require such a sacrifice of him. but he never again found he could not pray. recalling the strife and the great peace, he made haste to his master, compelling the refractory slave in his heart to be free, and cry, "do thy will, not mine." then would the enemy withdraw, and again he breathed the air of the eternal. when a man comes to the point that he will no longer receive anything save from the hands of him who has the right to withhold, and in whose giving alone lies the value of possession, then is he approaching the inheritance of the saints in light, of those whose strength is made perfect in weekness. but there are those who for the present it is needless to trouble any more than the chickens about the yard. their hour will come, and in the meantime they are counted the fortunate ones of the earth. chapter xlvi a rest. but now james gracie fell sick. they removed him therefore from the men's quarters, and gave him cosmo's room, that he might be better attended to, and warmer than in his own. cosmo put up a bed for himself in his father's room, and grizzie and aggie slept together; so now the household was gathered literally under one roof--that of the kitchentower, as it had been called for centuries. james's attack was serious, requiring much attention, and involving an increase of expenditure which it needed faith to face. but of course cosmo did not shrink from it: so long as his money lasted, his money should go. james himself objected bitterly to such waste, as he called it, saying what remained of his life was not worth it. but the laird, learning the mood the old man was in, rose, and climbed the stair, and stood before his bed, and said to him solemnly, "jeames, wha are ye to tell the lord it's time he sud tak ye? what kin' o' faith is 't, to refuse a sup,'cause ye see na anither spunefu' upo' the ro'd ahin' 't?" james hid his old face in his old hands. the laird went back to his bed, and nothing more ever passed on the subject. the days went on, the money ran fast away, no prospect appeared of more, but still they had enough to eat. one morning in the month of january, still and cold, and dark overhead, a cheerless day in whose bosom a storm was coming to life, cosmo, sitting at his usual breakfast of brose, the simplest of all preparations of oatmeal, bethought himself whether some of the curiosities in the cabinets in the drawing-room might not, with the help of his friend the jeweller, be turned to account. not waiting to finish his breakfast, for which that day he had but little relish, he rose and went at once to examine the family treasures in the light of necessity. the drawing-room felt freezing-dank like a tomb, and looked weary of its memories. it was so still that it seemed as if sound would die in it. not a mouse stirred. the few pictures on the walls looked perishing with cold and changelessness. the very shine of the old damask was wintry. but cosmo did not long stand gazing. he crossed to one of the shrines of his childhood's reverence, opened it, and began to examine the things with the eye of a seller. once they had seemed treasures inestimable, now he feared they might bring him nothing in his sore need. scarce a sorrow at the thought of parting with them woke in him, as one after another he set those aside, and took these from their places and put them on a table. he was like a miner searching for golden ore, not a miser whom hunger had dominated. the sole question with him was, would this or that bring money. when he had gone through the cabinet, he turned from it to regard what he had found. there was a dagger in a sheath of silver of raised work, with a hilt cunningly wrought of the same; a goblet of iron with a rich pattern in gold beaten into it; a snuff-box with a few diamonds set round a monogram in gold in the lid: these, with several other smaller things that had an air of promise about them, he thought it might be worth while to make the trial with, and packed them carefully, thinking to take them at once to muir of warlock, and commit them to the care of the carrier. but when he returned to his father, he found he had been missing him, and put off going till the next day. as the sun went down, the wind rose, and the storm in the bosom of the stillness came to life--the worst of that winter. it reminded both father and son of the terrible night when lord mergwain went out into the deep. the morning came, fierce with gray cold age, a tumult of wind and snow. there seemed little chance the carrier would go for days to come. but the storm might have been more severe upon their hills than in the opener country, and cosmo would go and see. certain things too had to be got for the invalids. it was with no small difficulty he made his way through the snow to the village, and there also he found it so deep, that the question would have been how to get the cart out of the shed, not whether the horses were likely to get it through the glens o' fowdlan. he left the parcel therefore with the carrier's wife, and proceeded, somewhat sad at heart, to spend the last of his money, amounting to half-a--crown. having done so, he set out for home, the wind blowing fierce, and the snow falling thick. just outside the village he met a miserable-looking woman, with a child in her arms. how she came to be there he could not think. she moved him with the sense of community in suffering: hers was the greater share, and he gave her the twopence he had left. prudence is but one of the minor divinities, if indeed she be anything better than the shadow of a virtue, and he took no counsel with her, knowing that the real divinity, love, would not cast him out for the deed. the widow who gave the two mites was by no means a prudent person. upon a certain ancient cabinet of carved oak is represented charity, gazing at the child she holds on her arm, and beside her prudence, regarding herself in a mirror. cosmo had not gone far, battling with wind and snow above and beneath, before he began to feel his strength failing him. it had indeed been failing for some time. grizzie knew, although he himself did not, that he had not of late been eating so well; and he had never quite recovered his exertions in lord lick-my-loof's harvest-fields. now, for the first time in his life, he began to find his strength unequal to elemental war. but he laughed at the idea, and held on. the wind was right in his face, and the cold was bitter. nor was there within him, though plenty of courage, good spirits enough to supply any lack of physical energy. his breath grew short, and his head began to ache. he longed for home that he might lie down and breathe, but a long way and a great snowy wind were betwixt him and rest. he fell into a reverie, and seemed to get on better for not thinking about the exertion he had to make. the monotony of it at the same time favoured the gradual absorption of his thoughts in a dreamy meditation. alternately sunk in himself for minutes, and waking for a moment to the consciousness of what was around him, he had walked, as it seemed, for hours, and at length, all notion of time and distance gone, began to wonder whether he must not be near the place where the parish-road turned off. he stood, and sent sight into his eyes, but nothing was to be seen through the drift save more drift behind it. was he upon the road at all? he sought this way and that, but could find neither ditch nor dyke. he was lost! he knew well the danger of sitting down, knew on the other hand that the more exhausted he was when he succumbed, the sooner would the cold get the better of him, and that even now he might be wandering from the abodes of men, diminishing with every step the likelihood of being found. he turned his back to the wind and stood--how long he did not know, but while he stood thus 'twixt waking and sleeping, he received a heavy blow on the head--or so it seemed--from something soft. it dazed him, and the rest was like a dream, in which he walked on and on for ages, falling and rising again, following something, he never knew what. there all memory of consciousness ceased. he came to himself in bed. aggie was the first to get anxious about him. they had expected him home to dinner, and when it began to grow dark and he had not come, she could bear it no longer, and set out to meet him. but she had not far to go, for she had scarcely left the kitchen-door when she saw some one leaning over the gate. through the gathering twilight and the storm she could distinguish nothing more, but she never doubted it was the young laird, though whether in the body or out of it she did doubt not a little. she hurried to the gate, and found him standing between it and the wall. she thought at first he was dead, for there came no answer when she spoke; but presently she heard him murmur something about conic sections. she opened the gate gently. he would have fallen as it yielded, but she held him. her touch seemed to bring him a little to himself. she supported and encouraged him; he obeyed her, and she succeeded in getting him into the house. it was long ere grizzie and she could make him warm before the kitchen-fire, but at last he came to himself sufficiently to walk up the stairs to bed, though afterwards he remembered nothing of it. he was recovering before they let the laird understand in what a dangerous plight aggie had found him, but the moment he learned that his son was ailing, the old man seemed to regain a portion of his strength. he rose from his bed, and for the two days and three nights during which cosmo was feverish and wandering, slept only in snatches. on the third day cosmo himself persuaded him to return to his bed. the women had now their hands full--all the men in the house laid up, and they two only to do everything! the first night, when they had got cosmo comfortable in bed, and had together gone down again to the kitchen, in the middle of the floor they stopped, and looked at each other: their turn had come! they understood each other, and words were needless. each had saved a little money--and now no questions would be asked! aggie left the room and came back with her store, which she put into grizzie's hand. grizzie laid it on the table, went in her turn to her box, brought thence her store, laid it on the other, took both up, closed her hands over them, shook them together, murmured over them, like an incantation, the words, "it's nae mair mine, an' it's nae mair thine, but belangs to a', whatever befa'," and put all in her pocket under her winsey petticoat. thence, for a time, the invalids wanted, nothing--after the moderate ideas of need, that is, ruling in the house. when cosmo came to himself on the third day, he found that self possessed by a wondrous peace. it was as if he were dead, and had to rest till his strength, exhausted with dying, came back to him. bodiless he seemed, and without responsibility of action, with that only of thought. those verses in the ancient mariner came to him as if he spoke them for himself: "i thought that i had died in sleep, and was a blessed ghost." his soul was calm and trusting like that of a bird on her eggs, who knows her one grand duty in the economy of the creation is repose. how it was he never could quite satisfy himself, but, remembering he had spent their last penny, he yet felt no anxiety; neither, when grizzie brought him food, felt inclination to ask her how she had procured it. the atmosphere was that of the fairy-palace of his childish--visions, only his feelings were more solemn, and the fairy, instead of being beautiful, was--well, was dear old grizzie. his sole concern was his father, and the cheerful voice that invariably answered his every inquiry was sufficient reassurance. for three days more he lay in a kind of blessed lethargy, with little or no suffering. he fancied he could not recover, nor did he desire to recover, but to go with his father to the old world, and learn its ways from his mother. in his half slumbers he seemed ever to be gently floating down a great gray river, on which thousands more were likewise floating, each by himself, some in canoes, some in boats, some in the water without even an oar; every now and then one would be lifted and disappear, none saw how, but each knew that his turn would come, when he too would be laid hold of; in the meantime all floated helpless onward, some full of alarm at the unknown before them, others indifferent, and some filled with solemn expectation; he himself floated on gently waiting: the unseen hand would come with the hour, and give him to his mother. on the seventh day he began to regard the things around him with some interest, began to be aware of returning strength, and the approach of duty: presently he must rise, and do his part to keep things going! still he felt no anxiety, for the alarum of duty had not yet called him. and now, as he lay passive to the influences of restoring strength, his father from his bed would tell him old tales he had heard from his grandmother; and sometimes they made grizzie sit between the two beds, and tell them stories she had heard in her childhood. her stock seemed never exhausted. now one, now the other would say, "there, grizzie! i never heard that before!" and grizzie would answer, "i daursay no, sir. hoo sud ye than? i had forgotten't mysel'!" here is one of the stories grizzie told them. "in a cauld how, far amo' the hills, whaur the winter was a sair thing, there leevit an honest couple, a man 'at had a gey lot o' sheep, an' his wife--fowk weel aff in respec' o' this warl's gear, an' luikit up til amo' the neebours, but no to be envyed, seein' they had lost a' haill bonny faimily, ane efter the ither, till there was na ane left i' the hoose but jist ae laddie, the bonniest an' the best o' a', an' as a maitter o' coorse, the verra aipple o' their e'e.--amo' the three o' 's laird," here grizzie paused in her tale to remark, "ye'll be the only ane 'at can fully un'erstan' hoo the hert o' a parent maun cleave to the last o' his flock.--weel, whether it was 'at their herts was ower muckle wrappit up i' this ae human cratur for the growth o' their sowls, i dinna ken--there bude to be some rizzon for't--this last ane o' a' begud in his turn to dwine an' dwin'le like the lave; an' whaurever thae twa puir fowk turnt themsel's i' their pangs, there stude deith, glowerin' at them oot o' his toom e'en. pray they did, ye may be sure, an' greit whan a' was mirk, but prayers nor tears made nae differ; the bairn was sent for, an' awa' the bairn maun gang. an' whan at len'th he lay streekit in his last clean claes till the robe o' richteousness 'at wants na washin' was put upon 'im, what cud they but think the warl' was dune for them! "but the warl' maun wag, though the hert may sag; an' whan the deid lies streekit, there's a hoose to be theekit. an' the freens an' the neebours gatithert frae near an' frae far, till there was a heap o' fowk i' the hoose, come to the beeryin' o' the bonny bairn. an' fowk maun ait an' live nane the less 'at the maitter they come upo' be deith; an' sae the nicht afore the yerdin', their denner the neist day whan they cam back frae the grave, had to be foreordeent. "it was i' the spring-time o' the year, unco late i' thae pairts. the maist o' the lambs hed come, but the storms war laith to lea' the laps o' the hills, an' lang efter it begud to be something like weather laicher doon, the sheep cudna be lippent oot to pick their bit mait for themsel's, but had to be keepit i' the cot. sae to the cot the gudeman wad gang, to fess hame a lamb for the freens an' the neebours' denners. an' as it fell oot, it was a fearsome nicht o' win' an' drivin' snaw--waur, i wad reckon, nor onything we hae hereawa'. but he turnt na aside for win' or snaw, for little cared he what cam til 'im or o' 'im, wi' sic a how in his hert. o' the contrar', the storm was like a freenly cloak til's grief, for upo' the ro'd he fell a greitin' an' compleenin' an' lamentin' lood, jeedgin' nae doobt, gien he thoucht at a', he micht du as he likit wi' naebody nigh. to the sheep cot, i say, he gaed wailin' an' cryin' alood efter bonny bairn, the last o' his flock, oontimeous his taen. "half blin' wi' the nicht an' the snaw an' his ain tears, he cam at last to the door o' the sheep-cot. an' what sud he see there but a man stan'in' afore the door--straucht up, an' still i' the mirk! it was 'maist fearsome to see onybody there--sae far frae ony place--no to say upo' sic a nicht! the stranger was robed in some kin' o' a plaid, like the gude--man himsel', but whether a lowlan' or a hielan' plaid, he cudna tell. but the face o' the man--that was ane no to be forgotten--an' that for the verra freenliness o' 't! an' whan he spak, it was as gien a' the v'ices o' them 'at had gane afore, war made up intil ane, for the sweetness an' the pooer o' the same. "'what mak ye here in sic a storm, man?' he said. an' the soon' o' his v'ice was aye safter nor the words o' his mooth. "'i come for a lamb,' answered he. "'what kin' o' a lamb?' askit the stranger. "'the verra best i can lay my han's upo' i' the cot,' answered he, 'for it's to lay afore my freens and neebours. i houp, sir, ye'll come hame wi' me an' share o' 't. ye s' be welcome.' "'du yer sheep mak ony resistance whan ye tak the lamb? or when it's gane, du they mak an ootcry!' "'no, sir--never.' "the stranger gae a kin' o' a sigh, an' says he, "'that's no hoo they trait me! whan i gang to my sheep-fold, an' tak the best an' the fittest, my ears are deavt an' my hert torn wi' the clamours--the bleatin', an' ba'in' o' my sheep--my ain sheep! compleenin' sair agen me;--an' me feedin' them, an' cleedin' them, an' haudin' the tod frae them, a' their lives, frae the first to the last! it's some oongratefu', an' some sair to bide.' "by this time the man's heid was hingin' doon; but whan the v'ice ceased, he luikit up in amaze. the stranger was na there. like ane in a dream wharvin he kenned na joy frae sorrow, or pleesur' frae pain, the man gaed into the cot, an' grat ower the heids o' the 'oo'y craters 'at cam croodin' aboot 'im; but he soucht the best lamb nane the less, an' cairriet it wi' 'im. an' the next day he came hame frae the funeral wi' a smile upo' the face whaur had been nane for mony a lang; an' the neist sunday they h'ard him singin' i' the kirk as naebody had ever h'ard him sing afore. an' never frae that time was there a moan or complaint to be h'ard frae the lips o' aither o' the twa. they hadna a bairn to close their e'en whan their turn sud come, but whaur there's nane ahin', there's the mair to fin'." grizzie ceased, and the others were silent, for the old legend had touched the deepest in them. many years after, cosmo discovered that she had not told it quite right, for having been brought up in the lowlands, she did not thoroughly know the ancient customs of the highlands. but she had told it well after her own fashion, and she could not have had a fitter audience. [footnote: see mrs. grant's essays on the superstitions of the highlanders.] "it's whiles i' the storm, whiles i' the desert, whiles i' the agony, an' whiles i' the calm, whaurever he gets them richt them lanes,'at the lord visits his people--in person, as a body micht say," remarked the laird, after a long pause. cosmo did not get well so fast as he had begun to expect. nothing very definite seemed the matter with him; it was rather as if life itself had been checked at the spring, therefore his senses dulled, and his blood made thick and slow. a sleepy weariness possessed him, in which he would lie for hours, supine and motionless, desiring nothing, fearing nothing, suffering nothing, only loving. the time would come when he must be up and doing, but now he would not think of work; he would fancy himself a bird in god's nest--the nest into which the great brother would have gathered all the children of jerusalem. poems would come to him--little songs and little prayers--spiritual butterflies, with wings whose spots matched; sometimes humorous little parables concerning life and its affairs would come; but the pity was that none of them would stay; never, do what he might, could he remember so as to recall one of them, and had to comfort himself with the thought that nothing true can ever be lost; if one form of it go, it is that a better may come in its place. he doubted if the best could be forgotten. a thing may be invaluable, he thought, and the form in which it presents itself worth but little, however at the moment it may share the look of the invaluable within it. but happy is the half-sleeper whose brain is a thoroughfare for lovely things--all to be caught in the nets of life, for life is the one miser that never loses, never can lose. when he was able to get up for a while every day, grizzie yielded a portion of her right of nursing to aggie, and now that he was able to talk a little, the change was a pleasant one. and now first the laird began to discover how much there was in aggie, and expressing his admiration of her knowledge and good sense, her intellect and insight, was a little surprised that cosmo did not seem so much struck with them as himself. cosmo, however, explained that her gifts were no discovery to him, as he had been aware of them from childhood. "there are few like her, father," he said. "mony's the time she's hauden me up whan i was ready to sink." "the lord reward her!" responded the laird. all sicknesses are like aquatic plants of evil growth: their hour comes, and they wither and die, and leave the channels free. life returns--in slow, soft ripples at first, but not the less in irresistible tide, and at last in pulses of mighty throb through every pipe. death is the final failure of all sickness, the clearing away of the very soil in which the seed of the ill plant takes root and prevails. by degrees cosmo recovered strength, nor left behind him the peace that had pervaded his weakness. the time for action was at hand. for weeks he had been fed like the young ravens in the nest, and, knowing he could do nothing, had not troubled himself with the useless how; but it was time once more to understand, that he might be ready to act. mechanically almost, he opened his bureau: there was not a penny there. he knew there could not be--except some angel had visited it while he lay, and that he had not looked for. he closed it, and sat down to think. there was no work to be had he knew off there was little strength to do it with, had there been any. as the spring came on, there would be labour in the fields, and that he would keep in view, but the question was of present or all but present need. one thing only he would not do. there were many in the country around on friendly terms with his father and himself, but his very soul revolted from any endeavour to borrow money while he saw no prospect of repaying it. he would carry the traditions of his family no further in that direction. literally, he would rather die. but rather than his father should want, he would beg. "where borrowing is dishonest," he said to himself, "begging may be honourable. the man who scorns to accept a gift of money, and does not scruple to borrow, knowing no chance of repaying, is simply a thief; the man who has no way of earning the day's bread, has a divine right to beg." in cosmo's case, however, there was this difficulty: he could easily make a living of some sort, would he but leave his father, and that he was determined not to do. before absolute want could arrive, they must have parted with everything, and then he would take him to some city or town, where they two would live like birds in a cage. no; he was not ready yet to take his pack and make the rounds of the farm-houses to receive from each his dole of a handful of meal! something must be possible! but then again, what? once more he fell a thinking; but it was only to find himself again helplessly afloat where no shore of ways or means was visible. nothing but beggary in fact, and that for the immediate future, showed in sight. could it be that god verily intended for him this last humiliation of all? but again, would such humiliation be equal to that under which they had bowed for so many long years--the humiliation of owing and not being able to pay? what a man gives, he gives, but what a man lends, he lends expecting to be repaid! a begger may be under endless obligation, but a debtor who cannot pay is a slave! he may be god's free man all the while--that depends on causes and conditions, but not the less is he his fellow's slave! his slavery may be to him a light burden, or a sickening misery, according to the character of his creditor--but, except indeed there be absolute brotherhood between them, he is all the same a slave! again the immediately practical had vanished, lost in reasoning, and once more he tried to return to it. but it was like trying to see through a brick wall. no man can invent needs for others that he may supply them. to write again to mr. burns would be too near the begging on which he had not yet resolved. he never suspected that the parcel he had left at the carrier's house was lying there still--safe in his wife's press, under a summer-shawl! he could not go to mr. simon, for he too was poor, and had now for some time been far from well, fears being by the doctor acknowledged as to the state of his lungs. he would go without necessaries even to help them, and that was an insurmountable reason against acquainting him with their condition! all at once a thought came to him: why should he not, for present need, pledge the labour of his body in the coming harvest? that would be but to act on a reasonable probability, nor need he be ashamed to make the offer to any man who knew him enough to be friendly. he would ask but a part of the fee in advance, and a charitable or kindly disposed man would surely venture the amount of risk involved! true, when the time came he might be as much in want of money as he was now, and there would be little or none to receive, but on the other hand, if he did not have help now, he could never reach that want, and when he did, there might be other help! better beg then than now! he would make the attempt, and that the first day he was strong enough to walk the necessary distance! in the meantime, he would have a peep into the meal-chest! it stood in a dark corner of the kitchen, and he had to put his hand in to learn its condition. he found a not very shallow layer of meal in the bottom. how there could be so much after his long illness, he scarcely dared imagine. he must ask grizzie, he said to himself, but he shrank in his heart from questioning her. there came now a spell of warm weather, and all the invalids improved. cosmo was able to go out, and every day had a little walk by himself. naturally he thought of the only other time in his life when he first walked out after an illness. joan had been so near him then it scarce seemed anything could part them, and now she seemed an eternity away! for months he had heard nothing of her. she must be married, and, knowing well his feelings, must think it kinder not to write! then the justice of his soul turned to the devotion of the two women who had in this trouble tended him, though the half of it he did not yet know; and from that he turned to the source of all devotion, and made himself strong in the thought of the eternal love. from that time, the weather continuing moderate, he made rapid progress, and the week following judged himself equal to a long walk. chapter xlvii. help. he had come to the resolve to carry his petition first to the farmer in whose fields he had laboured the harvest before the last. the distance was rather great, but he flattered himself he would be able to walk home every night. in the present state of his strength, however, he found it a long trudge indeed; and before the house came in sight, was very weary. but he bore up and held on. "i was almost as ill-off," he said to himself, "when i came here for work the first time, yet here i am--alive, and likely to work again! it's just like going on and on in a dream, wondering what we are coming to next." he was shown into the parlour, and had not waited long when the farmer came. he scarcely welcomed him, but by degrees his manner grew more cordial. still the coldness with which he had been received caused cosmo to hesitate, and a pause ensued. the farmer broke it. "ye didna gie's the fawvour o' yer company last hairst!" he said. "i wad hae thought ye micht hae f'un' yersel' fully mair at hame wi' the like o' us nor wi' that ill-tongued vratch, lord lick-my-loof! nane o' 's tuik it ower weel 'at ye gied na's the chance o' yer guid company." this explained his reception, and cosmo made haste in his turn to explain his conduct. "ye may be sure," he answered, "it gaed some agen the grain to seek wark frae him, an' i had no rizzon upon earth for no comin' to you first but that i didna want to be sae far, at nicht especially, frae my father. he's no the man he was." "verra nait'ral!" responded the farmer heartily, and wondered in himself whether any of his sons would have considered him so much. "weel," he went on, "i'm jist relieved to un'erstan' the thing; for the lasses wad hae perswaudit me i hed gien ye some offence wi' my free-spoken w'y, whan i'm sure naething cud hae been far'er frae the thoucht o' my hert." "indeed," said cosmo, half rising in his eagerness, "i assure you, mr. henderson, there is not a man from whom i should be less ready to imagine offence than yourself. i do not know how to express my feeling of the kindness with which you always treated me. nor could i have given you a better proof that i mean what i say than by coming to you first, the moment i was able for the walk, with the request i have now to make. will you engage me for the coming harvest, and pay me a part of the fee in advance? i know it is a strange request, and if you refuse it, i doubt if there is another to whom i shall venture to make it. i confess also that i have been very ill, but i am now fairly on the mend, and there is a long time to recover my strength in before the harvest. to tell you the truth, we are much in want of a little money at the castle. we are not greatly in debt now, but we have lost all our land; and a house, however good, won't grow corn. something in my mind tells me that my father, unlikely as it may seem, will yet pay everything; and anyhow we want to hold on as long as we can. i am sure, if you were in our place, you would not be willing to part with the house a moment before you were absolutely compelled." "but, laird," said the farmer, who had listened with the utmost attention, "hoo can the thing be,'at amo' a' the great fowk ye hae kent, there sud be nane to say,'help yersel'? i canna un'erstan' hoo the last o' sic an auld faimily sud na hae a han' held oot to help them!" "it is not so very hard to explain," replied cosmo. "almost all my father's old friends are dead or gone, and a man like him, especially in straitened circumstances, does not readily make new friends. almost the only person he has been intimate with of late years is mr. simon, whom i daresay you know. then he has what many people count peculiar notions--so peculiar, indeed, that i have heard of some calling him a fool behind his back because he paid themselves certain moneys his father owed them. i believe if he had rich friends they would say it was no use trying to help such a man." "weel!" exclaimed the farmer, "it jist blecks me to ken hoo there can be ony trowth i' the bible, whan a man like that comes sae near to beggin' his breid!" "he is very near it, certainly," assented cosmo, "but why not he as well as another?" "'cause they tell me the bible says the richteous man sall never come to beg his breid." "well, near is not there. but i fancy there must be a mistake. the writer of one of the psalms--i do not know whether david or another, says he never saw the righteous forsaken or his seed begging bread; but though he may not have seen it, another may." "weel, i fancy gien he hed, he wadna hae been lang in puttin' a stop til 't! laird, gien a sma' maitter o' fifty poun' or sae wad tide ye ower the trible--weel, ye cud pay me whan ye likit." it was a moment or two before cosmo could speak. a long conversation followed, rising almost to fierceness, certainly to oaths, on the part of the farmer, because of cosmo's refusal to accept the offered loan. "i do see my way," persisted cosmo, "to paying for my wages with my work, but i see it to nothing more. lend me two pounds, mr. henderson, on the understanding that i am to work it out in the harvest, and i shall be debtor to your kindness to all eternity; but more i cannot and will not accept." grumbling heavily, the farmer at length handed him the two pounds, but obstinately refused any written acknowledgment or agreement. neither of them knew that, all the time the friendly altercation proceeded, there was elsie listening at the door, her colour coming and going like the shadows in a day of sun and wind. entering at its close she asked cosmo to stop and take tea with them, and the farmer following it up, he accepted the invitation, and indeed was glad to make a good meal. elsie was sorely disappointed that her father had not succeeded in making him his debtor to a larger extent, but the meal passed with pleasure to all, for the relief of having two pounds in his pocket, and those granted with such genuine kindness, put cosmo in great spirits, and made him more than usually agreeable. the old farmer wondered admiringly at the spirit of the youth who in such hardship could yet afford to be merry. but i cannot help thinking that a perfect faith would work at last thorough good spirits, as well as everything else that is good. cosmo sat with his kind neighbours till the gloaming began to fall. when he rose to go, they all rose with him, and accompanied him fully half-way home. when they took their leave of him, and he was again alone, his heart grew so glad that, weak as he yet was, and the mists rising along his path, he never felt the slightest chill, but trudged cheerily on, praying and singing and making all the way, until at length he was surprised to find how short it had been. for a great part of it, after his friends left him, he had glimpses now and then of some one before him that looked like aggie, but the distance between them gradually lengthened, and before he reached home he had lost sight of her. when he entered the kitchen, aggie was there. "was yon you upo' the ro'd afore me, aggie?" he said. "ay, was't." "what for didna ye bide?" "ye had yer company the first half o' the ro'd, an' yer sangs the last, an' i didna think ye wantit me." so saying she went up the stair. as cosmo followed, he turned and put his hand into the meal-chest. it was empty! there was not enough to make their supper. he smiled in his heart, and said to himself, "the links of the story hold yet! when one breaks, the world will drift." going up to his father, he had to pass the door of his own room, now occupied by james gracie. as he drew near it, he heard the voice of aggie speaking to her grandfather. what she said he did not know, but he heard the answer. "lassie," said the old man, "ye can never see by (past) the lord to ken whaur he's takin' ye. ye may jist as weel close yer e'en. his garment spreads ower a' the ro'd, an' what we hae to du is to haud a guid grip o' 't--no to try an' see ayont it." cosmo hastened up, and told his father what he had overheard. "there's naething like faith for makin' o' poets, cosmo!" said the laird. "jeames never appeart to me to hae mair o' what's ca'd intellec' nor an ord'nar' share; but ye see the man 'at has faith he's aye growin', an' sae may come to something even i' this warl'. an' whan ye think o' the ages to come, truly it wad seem to maitter little what intellec' a man may start wi'. i kenned mysel' ane 'at in ord'nar' affairs was coontit little better nor an idiot,'maist turn a prophet whan he gaed doon upo' his knees. ay! fowk may lauch at what they haena a glimp o', but it'll be lang or their political economy du sae muckle for sic a man! the economist wad wuss his neck had been thrawn whan he was born." here cosmo heard grizzie come in, and went down to her. she was sitting in his father's chair by the fire, and did not turn her face when he spoke. she was either tired or vexed, he thought. aggie was also now in the kitchen again. "here, grizzie!" said cosmo, "here's twa poun'; an' ye'll need to gar't gang far'er nor it can, i'm thinkin', for i dinna ken whaur we're to get the neist." "ken ye whaur ye got the last?" muttered grizzie, and made haste to cover the words: "whaur got ye that, cosmo?" she said. "what gien i dinna tell ye, grizzie?" he returned, willing to rouse her with a little teazing. "that's as ye see proper, sir," she answered. "naebody has a richt to say til anither 'whaur got ye that?' 'cep' they doobt ye hae been stealin'." it was a somewhat strange answer, but there was no end to the strange things grizzie would say: it was one of her charms! cosmo told her at once where and how he had got the money; for with such true comrades, although not yet did he know how true, he felt almost that a secret would be a sin. but the moment grizzie heard where cosmo had engaged himself, and from whom on the pledge of that engagement he had borrowed money, she started from her chair, and cried, with clenched and outstretched hand, "glenwarlock, yoong sir, ken ye what ye're duin'?--the lord preserve's! he's an innocent!" she added, turning with an expression of despair to aggie, who regarded the two with a strange look. "grizzie!" cried cosmo, in no little astonishment, "what on earth gars ye luik like that at the mention o' ane wha has this moment helpit us oot o' the warst strait ever we war in!" "gien there had been naebody nearer hame to help ye oot o' waur straits, it's waur straits ye wad be in. an' it's waur ye'll be in yet, gien that man gets his wull o' ye!" "he's a fine, honest chiel'! an' for waur straits, grizzie--are na ye at the verra last wi' yer meal?" as he spoke he turned, and, in bodily reference to fact, went to the chest into which he had looked but a few minutes before. to his astonishment, there was enough in it for a good many meals! he turned again, and stared at grizzie. but she had once more seated herself in his father's chair, with her back to him, and before he could speak she went on thus: "shame fa' him, say i,'at made his siller as a flesher i' the wast wyn' o' howglen, to ettle at a gentleman o' a thoosan' year for ane o' his queans! but, please the lord, we's haud clear o' 'im yet!" "hootoot, grizzie! ye canna surely think ony sic man wad regaird the like o' me as worth luikin' efter for a son-in-law! he wadna be sic a gowk!" "gowk here, gowk there! he kens what ye are an' what ye're worth--weel that! hasna he seen ye at the scythe? disna he ken there's ten times mair to be made o' ae gentleman like you, wi'siller at his back, nor ten common men sic as he's like to get for his dothers? weel kens he it's nae faut o' you or yours 'at ye're no freely sae weel aff as some 'at oucht an' wull be waur, gien it be the lord's wull, or a' be dune! disna he ken 'at castle warlock itsel' wad be a warl's honour to ony leddy--no to say a lass broucht up ower a slauchter-hoose? shame upo' him an' his!" "weel, grizzie," rejoined cosmo, "ye may say 'at ye like, but i dinna believe he wad hae dune what he has dune" "cha!" interrupted grizzie; "what has he dune? disna he ken the word o' a warlock's as guid as gowd? disna he ken _your_ wark, what wi' yer pride an' what wi' yer ill-placed graititude,'ill be worth til 'im that o' twa men? the man's nae coof! he kens what he's aboot! haith, ye needna waur (_spend_) muckle graititude upo' sic benefactions!" "to show you, grizzie, that you are unfair to him, i feel bound to tell you that he pressed on me the loan of fifty pounds." "i tell ye sae!" screamed grizzie, starting again to her feet. "god forbid ye took 'im at his offer!" "i did not," answered cosmo; "but all the same--" "the lord be praised for his abundant an' great mercy!" cried grizzie, more heartily than devoutly. "we may contrive to win ower the twa poun', even sud ye no work it oot; but _fifty!_--the lord be aboot us frae ill! so sure's deith, ye wad hae had to tak the lass!--cosmo, ye canna but ken the auld tale o' muckle-moo'd meg?" "weel that," replied cosmo. "but ye'll alloo, grizzie, times are altert sin' the day whan the laird cud gie a ch'ice atween a wife an' the wuddie! mr. hen'erson canna weel hang me gien. i sud say no." "say ye no, come o' the hangin' what like," rejoined grizzie. "but, grizzie," said cosmo, "i wad fain ken whaur that meal i' the kist cam frae. there was nane intil 't an hoor ago." with all her faults of temper and tongue, there was one evil word grizzie could not speak. in the course of a not very brief life she had tried a good many times to tell a lie, but had never been able; and now, determined not to tell where the meal had come from, she naturally paused unprepared. it was but for a moment. out came the following utterance. "some fowk says, sir,'at the age o' mirracles is ower. for mysel' i dinna preten' to ony opingon; but sae lang as the needcessity was the same, i wad be laith to think providence wadna be consistent wi' itsel'. ye maun min' the tale, better nor i can tell't ye, concernin' yon meal-girnel--muckle sic like, i daursay, as oor ain, though it be ca'd a barrel i' the buik--hit 'at never wastit, ye ken, an'the uily-pig an' a'--ye'll min' weel--though what ony wuman in her senses cud want wi' sic a sicht o' ile's mair nor i ever cud faddom! eh, but a happy wuman was she 'at had but to tak her bowl an' gang to the girnel, as i micht tak my pail an' gang to the wall! an' what for michtna the almighty mak a meal-wall as weel's a watter-wall, i wad like to ken! what for no a wall 'at sud rin ile--or say milk, which wad be mair to the purpose? ae thing maun be jist as easy to him as anither--jist as ae thing's as hard to us as anither! eh, but we're helpless creturs!" "i' your w'y, grizzie, ye wad keep us as helpless as ever, for ye wad hae a' thing hauden to oor han', like to the bairnie in his mither's lap! it's o' the mercy o' the lord 'at he wad mak men an' women o' 's--no haud's bairns for ever!" "it may be as ye say, cosmo; but whiles i cud maist wuss i was a bairn again, an' had to luik to my mither for a' thing." "an' isna that siclike as the lord wad hae o' 's, grizzie? we canna aye be bairns to oor mithers--an' for me i wasna ane lang--but we can an' maun aye be bairns to the great father o' 's." "i hae an ill hert, i doobt, cosmo, for i'm unco hard to content. an' i'm ower auld noo, i fear, to mak muckle better o'. but maybe some kinily body like yersel' 'ill tak me in han' whan i'm deid, an' put some sense intil me!" "ye hae sense eneuch, grizzie, an' to spare, gien only ye wad--" "guide my tongue a wee better, ye wad say! but little ye ken the temptation o' ane 'at has but ae solitary wapon, to mak use o' that same! an' the gift ye hae ye're no to despise; ye maun turn a' til acoont." cosmo did not care to reason with her further, and went back to his father. grizzie had gained her point; which was to turn him aside from questions about the meal. for a little while they had now wherewith to live; and if it seem to my reader that the horizon of hope was narrowing around them, it does not follow that it must have seemed so to them. for what is the extent of our merely rational horizon at any time? but for faith and imagination it would be a narrow one indeed! even what we call experience is but a stupid kind of faith. it is a trusting in impetus instead of in love. and those days were fashioning an eternal joy to father and son, for they were loving each other a little more ere each day's close, and were thus putting time, despite of fortune, to its highest use. chapter xlviii a common miracle. until he was laid up, cosmo had all the winter, and especially after his old master was taken ill, gone often to see mr. simon. the good man was now beginning, chiefly from the effects of his complaint, to feel the approach of age; but he was cheerful and hopeful as ever, and more expectant. as soon as he was able cosmo renewed his visits, but seldom stayed long with him, both because mr. simon could not bear much talking, and because he knew his father would be watching for his return. one day it had rained before sunrise, and a soft spring wind had been blowing ever since, a soothing and persuading wind, that seemed to draw out the buds from the secret places of the dry twigs, and whisper to the roots of the rose-trees that their flowers would be wanted by and by. and now the sun was near the foot of the western slope, and there was a mellow, tearful look about earth and sky, when grizzie, entering the room where cosmo was reading to his father, as he sat in his easy chair by the fireside, told them she had just heard that mr. simon had had a bad night and was worse. the laird begged cosmo to go at once and inquire after him. the wind kept him company as he walked, flitting softly about him, like an attendant that needed more motion than his pace would afford, and seemed so full of thought and love, that, for the thousandth time, he wondered whether there could be anything but spirit, and what we call matter might not be merely the consequence of our human way of looking at the wrong side of the golden tissue. then came the thought of the infinitude of our moods, of the hues and shades and endless kinds and varieties of feeling, especially in our dreams; and he said to himself "how rich god must be, since from him we come capable of such inconceivable differences of conscious life!" "how poor and helpless," he said to himself, "how mere a pilgrim and a stranger in a world over which he has no rule, must he be who has not god all one with him! not otherwise can his life be free save as moving in loveliest harmony with the will and life of the only freedom--that which wills and we are!" "how would it be," he thought again, "if things were to come and go as they pleased in my mind and brain? would that not be madness? for is it not the essence of madness, that things thrust themselves upon one, and by very persistence of seeming, compel and absorb the attention, drowning faith and will in a false conviction? the soul that is empty, swept, and garnished, is the soul which adorns itself, where god is not, and where therefore other souls come and go as they please, drawn by the very selfhood, and make the man the slave of their suggestions. oneness with the mighty all is at the one end of life; distraction, things going at a thousand foolish wills, at the other. god or chaos is the alternative; all thou hast, or no christ!" and as he walked thinking thus, the stream was by his side, tumbling out its music as it ran to find its eternity. and the wind blew on from the moist west, where the gold and purple had fallen together in a ruined heap over the tomb of the sun. and the stars came thinking out of the heavens, and the things of earth withdrew into the great nest of the dark. and so he found himself at the door of the cottage, where lay one of the heirs of all things, waiting to receive his inheritance. but the news he heard was that the master was better; and the old woman showed him at once to his room, saying she knew he would be glad to see him. when he entered the study, in which, because of his long illness and need of air, mr. simon lay, the room seemed to grow radiant, filled with the smile that greeted him from the pillow. the sufferer held out his hand almost eagerly. "come, come!" he said; "i want to tell you something--a little experience i have just had--an event of my illness. outwardly it is nothing, but to you it will not be nothing.--it was blowing a great wind last night." "so my father tells me," answered cosmo, "but for my part i slept too sound to hear it." "it grew calm with the morning. as the light came the wind fell. indeed i think it lasted only about three hours altogether. "i have of late been suffering a good deal with my breathing, and it has always been worst when the wind was high. last night i lay awake in the middle of the night, very weary, and longing for the sleep which seemed as if it would never come. i thought of sir philip sidney, how, as he lay dying, he was troubled, because, for all his praying, god would not let him sleep: it was not the want of the sleep that troubled him, but that god would not give it him; and i was trying hard to make myself strong to trust in god whatever came to me, sleep or waking weariness or slow death, when all at once up got the wind with a great roar, as if the prince of the power of the air were mocking at my prayers. and i thought with myself,'it is then the will of god that i shall neither sleep nor lie at peace this night!' and i said,'thy will be done!' and laid myself out to be quiet, expecting, as on former occasions, my breathing would begin to grow thick and hard, and by and by i should have to struggle for every lungsful. so i lay waiting. but still as i waited, i kept breathing softly. no iron band ringed itself about my chest; no sand filled up the passages of my lungs! "the cottage is not very tight, and i felt the wind blowing all about me as i lay. but instead of beginning to cough and wheeze, i began to breathe better than before. soon i fell fast asleep, and when i woke i seemed a new man almost, so much better did i feel. it was a wind of god, and had been blowing all about me as i slept, renewing me! it was so strange, and so delightful! where i dreaded evil, there had come good! so, perchance, it will be when the time which the flesh dreads is drawing nigh: we shall see the pale damps of the grave approaching, but they will never reach us; we shall hear ghastly winds issuing from the mouth of the tomb, but when they blow upon us they shall be sweet--the waving of the wings of the angels that sit in the antechamber of the hall of life, once the sepulchre of our lord. and when we die, instead of finding we are dead, we shall have waked better!" it was an experience that would have been nothing to most men beyond its relief, but to peter simon it was a word from the eternal heart, which, in every true and quiet mood, speaks into the hearts of men. when we cease listening to the cries of self-seeking and self-care, then the voice that was there all the time enters into our ears. it is the voice of the father speaking to his child, never known for what it is until the child begins to obey it. to him who has not ears to hear god will not reveal himself: it would be to slay him with terror. cosmo sat a long time talking with his friend, for now there seemed no danger of hurting him, so much better was he. it was late therefore when he rose to return. chapter xlix. defiance. aggie was in the kitchen when he entered. she was making the porridge. "what's come o' grizzie?" asked cosmo. "ye dinna like my parritch sae weel as hers!" returned agnes. "jist as weel, aggie," answered cosmo. "dinna ye tell grizzie that." "what for no?" "she wad be angert first, an' syne her hert wad be like to brak." "there's nae occasion to say't," conceded cosmo. "but what's come o' her the nicht?" he went on. "it's some dark, an' i doobt she'll--" "the ro'd atween this an' the muir's no easy to lowse," said aggie. but the same instant her face flushed hotter than ever fire or cooking made it; what she had said was in itself true, but what she had not said, yet meant him to understand, was not true, for grizzie had gone nowhere near muir o' warlock. aggie had never told a lie in her life, and almost before the words were out of her mouth, she felt as if the solid earth were sinking from under her feet. she left the spurtle sticking in the porridge, and dropped into the laird's chair. "what's the maitter wi' ye, aggie?" said cosmo, hastening to her in alarm, for her face was now white, and her head was hanging down. "this is no to be borne!" she cried, and started to her feet. "--cosmo, i tellt ye a lee." "aggie!" cried cosmo, dismayed, "ye never tellt me a lee i' yer life." "never afore," she answered; "but i hae tellt ye ane noo--no to live through! grizzie's no gane to muir o' warlock." "what care i whaur grizzie's gane!" rejoined cosmo. "tell me or no tell me as ye like." aggie burst into tears. "haud yer tongue, aggie," said cosmo, trying to soothe her, himself troubled with her trouble, for he too was sorry she should almost have told him a lie, and his heart was sore for her misery. well he knew how she must suffer, having done a thing so foreign to her nature! "it could be little mair at the warst," he went on, "than a slip o' the wull, seein' ye made sic haste to set it richt again. for mysel', i s' bainish the thoucht o' the thing." "i thank ye, cosmo. ye wad aye du like the lord himsel'. but there's mair intil't. i dinna ken what to du or say. it's a sair thing to stan' 'atween twa, an' no ken what to du ohn dune mischeef--maybe wrang!--there's something it 'maist seems to me ye hae a richt to ken, but i canna be sure; an yet--" she was interrupted by the hurried opening of the door. grizzie came staggering in, with a face of terror. "tu wi' the door!" she cried, almost speechless, and sank in her turn upon a chair, gasping for breath, and dropping at her feet a canvas bag, about the size of a pillow-case. cosmo closed the door as she requested, and aggie made haste to get her some water, which she drank eagerly. after a time of panting and sighing, she seemed to come to herself, and rose, saying, as if nothing had happened, "i maun see to the supper." cosmo stooped and would have taken up the bag, but she pounced upon it, and carried it with her to the corner of the fire, where she placed it beyond her. in the meantime the porridge had begun to burn. "eh, sirs!" she cried, "the parritch'll be a' sung--no to mention the waste o' guid meal! aggie, hoo cud ye be sae careless!" "it was eneuch to gar onybody forget the pot to see ye come in like that, grizzie!" said cosmo. "an' what'll ye say to the tale i bring ye!" rejoined grizzie, as she turned the porridge into a dish, careful not to scrape too hard on the bottom of the pot. "tell's a' aboot it, grizzie, an' bena lang aither, for i maun gang to my father." "gang til 'im. here's naebody wad keep ye frae 'im!" cosmo was surprised at her tone, for although she took abundant liberty with the young laird, he had not since boyhood known her rude to him. "no till i hear yer tale, grizzie," he answered. "an' i wad fain ken what ye'll say til't, for ye never wad alloo o' kelpies; an' there's me been followed by a sure ane, this last half-hoor--or it may be less!" "hoo kenned ye it was a kelpie--it's maist as dark's pick?" "kenned! quo' he? didna i hear the deevil ahin' me--the tramp o' a' the fower feet o' 'im, as gien they had been fower an' twinty!" "i won'er he didna win up wi' ye than, grizzie!" suggested cosmo. "guid kens hoo he didna; i won'er mysel'. but i trow i ran; an' i tak ye to witness i garred ye steik the door." "but they say," objected cosmo, who could not fail to perceive from what aggie said that there was something going on which it behooved him to know, "that the kelpie wons aye by some watter--side." "weel, cam i no by the tarn o' the tap o' stieve know?" "what on earth was ye duin' there efter dark, grizzie?" "what was i duin'? i saidna i was there efter dark, but the cratur micht hae seen me pass weel eneueh. wasna i ower the hill to my ain fowk i' the how o' hap? an' didna i come hame by luck's lift? mair by token, wadna the guidman o' that same hae me du what i haena dune this twae year, or maybe twenty--tak a dram? an' didna i tak it? an' was i no in need o' 't? an' didna i come hame a' the better for 't?" "an' get a sicht o' the kelpy intil the bargain--eh, grizzie?" suggested cosmo. "hoots! gang awa up to the laird, an' lea' me to get my breath an' your supper thegither," said grizzie, who saw to what she had exposed herself. "an' i wuss ye may see the neist kelpy yersel'! only whatever ye du, cosmo, dinna m'unt upo' the back o' 'im, for he'll cairry ye straucht hame til 's maister; an' we a' ken wha he is." "i'm no gaein'," said cosmo, as soon as the torrent of her speech allowed him room to answer, "till i ken what ye hae i' that pock o' yours." "hoot!" cried grizzie, and snatching up the bag, held it behind her back, "ye wad never mint at luikin' intil an auld wife's pock! what ken ye what she michtna hae there?" "it luiks to me naither mair nor less nor a meal--pock," said cosmo. "meal-pock!" returned grizzie with contempt: "what neist!" he made another movement to seize the bag, but she caught the sprutle from the empty porridge-pot and showed fight with it, in genuine earnest beyond a doubt for the defence of her pock. whatever the secret was, it looked as if the pock were somehow connected with it. cosmo began to grow very uncomfortable. so strange were his nascent suspicions that he dared not for a time allow them to take shape in his brain lest they should thereby start at once into the life of fact. his mind had, for the last few days, been much occupied with the question of miracles. why, he thought with himself, should one believing there is in very truth a live, thinking, perfect power at the heart and head of affairs, count it impossible that, in their great and manifest need, their meal-chest should be supplied like that of the widow of zarephath? if he could believe the thing was done then, there could be nothing absurd in hoping the thing might be done now. if it was possible once, it was possible in the same circumstances always. it was impossible, however, for him or any human being to determine concerning any circumstances whether they were or were not the same. wherever the thing was not done, did it not follow that the circumstances could not be the same? one thing he was able to see--that, in the altered relations of man's mind to the facts of nature, a larger faith is necessary to believe in the constantly present and ordering will of the father of men, than in the unusual phenomenon of a miracle. in the meantime it was a fact that they had all hitherto had their daily bread. but now this strange behaviour of grizzie set him thinking of something very different. and why did not the jeweller make some reply to his request concerning the things he had sent him? he said to himself for the hundredth time that he must have found it impossible to do anything with them, and have delayed writing from unwillingness to cause him disappointment, but he could not help a growing soreness that his friend should take no notice of the straits he had confessed himself in. the conclusion of the whole matter was, that it must be the design of providence to make him part with the last clog that fettered him; he was to have no ease in life until he had yielded the castle! if it were so, then the longer he delayed the greater would be the loss. to sell everything in it first would but put off the evil day, preparing for them so much the more poverty when it should come; whereas if he were to part with the house at once, and take his father where he could find work, they would be able to have some of the old things about them still, to tincture strangeness with home. the more he thought the more it seemed his duty to put a stop to the hopeless struggle by consenting in full and without reserve to the social degradation and heart-sorrow to which it seemed the will of god to bring them. then with new courage he might commence a new endeavour, no more on the slippery slope of descent, but with the firm ground of the valley of humiliation under their feet. long they could not go on as now, and he was ready to do whatever was required of him, only he wished god would make it plain. the part of discipline he liked least--a part of which doubtless we do not yet at all understand the good or necessity--was uncertainty of duty, the uncertainty of what it was god's will he should do. but on the other hand, perhaps the cause of that uncertainty was the lack of perfect readiness; perhaps all that was wanted to make duty plain was absolute will to do it. these and other such thoughts went flowing and ebbing for hours in his mind that night, until at last he bethought himself that his immediate duty was plain enough--namely, to go to sleep. he yielded his consciousness therefore to him from whom it came, and did sleep. chapter l. discovery and confession. in the morning he woke wondering whether god would that day let him know what he had to do. he was certain he would not have him leave his father; anything else in the way of trouble he could believe possible. the season was now approaching the nominal commencement of summer, but the morning was very cold. he went to the window. air and earth had the look of a black frost--the most ungenial, the most killing of weathers. alas! that was his father's breathing: his bronchitis was worse! he made haste to fetch fuel and light the fire, then leaving him still asleep, went down stairs. he was earlier than usual, and grizzie was later; only aggie was in the kitchen. her grandfather was worse also. everything pointed to severer straitening and stronger necessity: this must be how god was letting him know what he had to do! he sat down and suddenly, for a moment, felt as if he were sitting on the opposite bank of the warlock river, looking up at the house where he was born and had spent his days--now the property of another, and closed to him forever! within those walls he could not order the removal of a straw! could not chop a stick to warm his father! "the will of god be done!" he said, and the vision was gone. aggie was busy getting his porridge ready--which cosmo had by this time learned to eat without any accompaniment--and he bethought himself that here was a chance of questioning her before grizzie should appear. "come, aggie," he said abruptly, "i want to ken what for grizzie was in sic a terror aboot her pock last nicht. i'm thinkin' i hae a richt to ken." "i wish ye wadna speir," returned aggie, after but a moment's pause. "aggie," said cosmo, "gien ye tell me it's nane o' my business, i winna speir again." "ye _are_ guid, cosmo, efter the w'y i behaved to ye last nicht," she answered, with a tremble in her voice. "dinna think o' 't nae mair, aggie. to me it is as gien it had never been. my hert's the same to ye as afore--an' justly. i believe i un'erstan' ye whiles 'maist as weel as ye du yersel'." "i houp whiles ye un'erstan' me better," answered aggie. "sair do i m'urn 'at the shaidow o' that lee ever crossed my rain'." "it was but a shaidow," said cosmo. "but what wad ye think o' yersel', gien it had been you 'at sae near--na, i winna nibble at the trowth ony mair--gien it had been you, i wull say't,'at lee'd that lee--sic an' ae sas it was?" "i wad say to mysel' 'at wi' god's help i was the less lik'ly ever to tell a lee again; for that noo i un'erstude better hoo a temptation micht come upon a body a' at ance, ohn gien 'im time to reflec'--an' sae my responsibility was the greater." "thank ye, cosmo," said aggie humbly, and was silent. "but," resumed cosmo, "ye haena tellt me yet 'at it's nane o' my business what grizzie had in her pock last nicht." "na, i cudna tell ye that,'cause it wadna be true. it is yer business." "what was i' the pock than?" "weel, cosmo, ye put me in a great diffeeculty; for though i never said to grizzie i wadna tell, i made nae objection--though at the time i didna like it--whan she tellt me what she was gaein' to du; an' sae i canna help fearin' it may be fause to her to tell ye. besides, i hae latten 't gang sae lang ohn said a word,'at the guid auld body cud never jaloose i wad turn upon her noo an' tell!" "you are dreadfully mysterious, aggie," said cosmo, "and in truth you make me more than a little uncomfortable. what can it be that has been going on so long, and had better not be told me! have i a right to know or have i not?" "ye hae a richt to ken, i do believe, else i wadna tell ye," answered aggie. "i was terrified, frae the first, to think what ye wad say til 't! but ye see, what was there left? you, an' the laird, an' my father was a' laid up thegither, heaps o' things wantit, the meal dune, an' life depen'in' upo' fowk haein' what they cud ait an' drink!" as she spoke, shadowy horror was deepening to monster presence; the incredible was gradually assuming shape and fact; the hair of cosmo's head seemed rising up. he asked no more questions, but sat waiting the worst. "dinna be ower hard upo' grizzie an'me, cosmo," aggie went on. "it wasna for oorsel's we wad hae dune sic a thing; an' maybe there was nane but them we did it for 'at we wad hae been able to du't for. but i hae no richt to say we. blame, gien there be ony, i hae my share o'; but praise, gien there be ony, she has't a'; for, that the warst michtna come to the warst, at the last she tuik the meal-pock," said aggie, and burst into tears as she said it, "an' gaed oot wi' 't." "good god!" cried cosmo, and for some moments was dumb. "lassie!" he said at length, in a voice that was not like his own, "didna ye ken i' yer ain sowl we wad raither hae dee'd?" "there'tis! that's jist what for grizzie wadna hae ye tellt! but dinna think she gaed to ony place whaur she was kent," sobbed agnes, "or appeart to ony to be ither than a puir auld body 'at gaed aboot for hersel'. dinna think aither 'at ever she tellt a lee, or said a word to gar fowk pity her. she had aye afore her the possibility o' bein' ca'd til accoont some day. but i'm thinkin' gien ye had applyt to her an' no to me, ye wad hae h'ard anither mak o' a defence frae mine! ae thing ye may be sure o'--there's no a body a hair the wiser." "what difference does that make?" cried cosmo. "the fact remains." "hoot, cosmo!" said agnes, with a revival of old authority, "ye're takin' the thing in a fashion no worthy o' a philosopher--no to say a christian. ye tak it as gien there was shame intil 't! an' gien there wasna shame, i daur ye to priv there can be ony disgrace! gien ye come to that wi' 't, hoo was the lord o' a' himself supportit whan he gaed aboot cleanin' oot the warl'? wasna it the women 'at gaed wi' 'im 'at providit a' thing?" "true; but that was very different! they knew him, all of them, and loved him--knew that he was doing what no money could pay for; that he was working himself to death for them and for their people--that he was earning the whole world. or at least they had a far off notion that he was doing as never man did, for they knew he spake as never man spake. besides there was no begging there. he never asked them for anything."--here aggie shook her head in unbelief, but cosmo went on.--"and those women, some of them anyhow, were rich, and proud to do what they did for the best and grandest of men. but what have we done for the world that we should dare look to it to help us?" "for that maitter, cosmo, are na we a' brithers an' sisters? a' body's brithers an' sisters wi' a' body. it's but a kin' o' a some mean pride 'at wadna be obleeged to yer ain fowk, efter ye hae dune yer best. cosmo! ilka han'fu' o' meal gi'en i' this or ony hoose by them 'at wadna in like need accep' the same, is an affront frae brither to brither. them 'at wadna tak, i say, has no richt to gie." "but nobody knew the truth of where their handful of meal was going. they thought they were giving it to a poor old woman, when they were in fact giving it to men with a great house over their heads. it's a disgrace, an' hard to beir, aggie!" "'deed the thing's hard upon 's a'! but whaur the disgrace is, i will not condescen' to see. men in a muckle hoose! twa o' them auld, an' a' three i' their beds no fit to muv! div ye think there's ane o' them 'at gied to grizzie,'at wad hae gi'en less--though what less nor the han'fu' o' meal, which was a' she ever got, it wad be hard to imaigine--had they kent it was for the life o' auld glenwarlock--a name respeckit, an' mair nor respeckit, whaurever it's h'ard?--or for the life o' the yoong laird, vroucht to deith wi' labourers' wark, an' syne 'maist smoored i' storm?--or for auld jeames gracie,'at's led a god-fearin' life till he's 'maist ower auld to live ony langer? i say naething aboot grizzie an' me, wha cud aye tak care o' oorsel's gien we hadna three dowie men to luik efter. we did oor best, but whan a' oor ain siller was awa' efter the lave, we cudna win awa' oorsel's to win mair. gien you three cud hae dune for yersel's, we wad hae been sen 'in' ye hame something." "you tell me," said cosmo, as if in a painful dream, through which flashed lovely lights, "that you and grizzie spent all your own money upon us, and then grizzie went out and begged for us?" "'deed there's no anither word for't--nor was there ae thing ither to be dune!" aggie drew herself up, and went on with solemnity. "div ye think, cosmo, whaur heid or hert or fit or han' cud du onything to waur aff want or tribble frae you or the laird,'at grizzie or mysel' wad be wantin' that day? i beg o' yer grace ye winna lay to oor chairge what we war driven til. as grizzie says, we war jist at ane mair wi' desperation." cosmo's heart was full. he dared not speak. he came to aggie, and taking her hand, looked her in the face with eyes full of tears. she had been pale as sun-browned could be, but now she grew red as a misty dawn. her eyes fell, and she began to pull at the hem of her apron. grizzie's step was on the stair, and cosmo, not quite prepared to meet her, walked out. the morning was neither so black nor so cold as he had imagined it. he went into the garden, to the nook between the two blocks, there sat down, and tried to think. the sun was not far above the horizon, and he was in the cold shade of the kitchen-tower, but he felt nothing, and sat there motionless. the sun came southward, looked round the corner, and found him there. he brought with him a lovely fresh day. the leaves were struggling out, and the birds had begun to sing. ah! what a day was here, had the hope of the boy been still swelling in his bosom! but the decree had gone forth! no doubt remained! no refuge of uncertainty was left! the house must follow the land! castle warlock and the last foothold of soil must go, that wrong should not follow ruin! were those divine women to spend money, time, and labour, that he and his father should hold what they had no longer any right to hold? or in beggary, were they to hide themselves in the yet lower depth of begging by proxy, in their grim stronghold, living upon unacknowledged charity, as their ancestors on plunder! he dared not tell his father what he had discovered until he had taken at least the first step towards putting an end to the whole falsehood. to delay due action was of all things what cosmo dreaded; and as the loss mainly affected himself, the yielding of the castle must primarily be his deed and not his father's. he rose at once to do it. the same moment the incubus of grizzie's meal-pock was lifted from his bosom. the shame was, if shame was any, that they should have been living in such a house while the thing was done. when the house was sold, let people say what they would! in proportion as a man cares to do what he ought, he ceases to care how it may be judged. of all things why should a true man heed the unjust judgment? "if there be any stain upon us," he said to himself, "god will see that we have the chance of wiping it out!" with that he got over gate and wall, and took his way along grizzie's path, once more, for the time at least, an undisputed possession of the people. but while he was thinking in the garden, grizzie, who knew from aggie that her secret was such no more, was in dire distress in the kitchen, fearing she had offended the young laird beyond remedy. in great anxiety she kept going every minute to the door, to see if he were not coming in to have his breakfast. but the first she saw of him was his back, as he leaped from the top of the wall. she ran after him to the gate. "sir! sir!" she cried, "come back; come back, an' i'll gang doon upo' my auld knees to beg yer pardon." cosmo turned the moment he heard her, and went back. when he reached the wall, over the top of the gate he saw grizzie on her knees upon the round paving stones of the yard, stretching up her old hands to him, as if he were some heavenly messenger just descended, whose wrath she deprecated. he jumped over wall and gate, ran to her, and lifted her to her feet, saying, "grizzie, wuman, what are ye aboot! bless ye, grizzie, i wad 'maist as sune strive wi' my ain mither whaur she shines i' glory, as wi' you!" grizzie's face began to work like that of a child in an agony between pride and tears, just ere he breaks into a howl. she gripped his arm hard with both hands, and at length faltered out, gathering composure as she proceeded, "cosmo, ye're like an angel o' god to a' 'at hae to du wi' ye! eh, sic an accoont o' ye as i'll hae to gie to the mither o' ye whan i win to see her! for surely they'll lat me see her, though they may weel no think me guid eneuch to bide wi' her up there, for as lang as we was thegither doon here! tell me, sir, what wad ye hae me du. but jist ae thing i maun say:--gien i hadna dune as i did du, i do not see hoo we cud hae won throu' the winter." "grizzie," said cosmo, "i ken ye did a' for the best, an' maybe it was the best. the day may come, grizzie, whan we'll gang thegither to ca' upo' them 'at pat the meal i' yer pock, an' return them thanks for their kin'ness." "eh, na, sir! that wad never du! what for sud they ken onything aboot it! they war jist kin'-like at lairge, an' to naebody in partic'lar, like the man wi' his sweirin'. they gae to me jist as they wad to ony unco beggar wife. it was to me they gae't, no to you. lat it a' lie upo' me." "that canna be, grizzie," said cosmo. "ye see ye're ane o' the faimily, an' whatever ye du, i maun haud my face til." "god bless ye, sir!" exclaimed grizzie, and turned towards the house, entirely relieved and satisfied. "but eh, sir!" she cried, turning again, "ye haena broken yer fast the day!" "i'll be back in a feow minutes, an' mak a brakfast o' 't by or'nar'," answered cosmo, and hastened away up the hill. chapter li. it is naught, saith the buyer. when cosmo reached the gate of his lordship's policy, he found it closed, and although he rang the bell, and called lustily to the gate-keeper, no one appeared. he put a hand on the top of the gate, and lightly vaulted over it. but just as he lighted, who should come round a bend in the drive a few yards off, but lord lick-my-loof himself, out for his morning walk! his irritable cantankerous nature would have been annoyed at sight of anyone treating his gate with such disrespect, but when he saw who it was that thus made nothing of it--clearing it with as much contempt as a lawyer would a quibble not his own--his displeasure grew to indignation and anger. "i beg your pardon, my lord," said cosmo, taking the first word that apology might be immediate, "i could make no one hear me, and therefore took the liberty of describing a parabola over your gate." "a verra ill fashiont parabola in my judgment, mr. warlock! i fear you have been learning of late to think too little of the rights of property." "if i had put my foot on your new paint, my lord, i should have been to blame; but i vaulted clean over, and touched nothing more than if the gate had been opened to me." "i'll have an iron gate!" "not on my account, my lord, i hope; for i have come to ask you to put it out of my power to offend any more, by enabling me to leave glenwarlock." "well?" returned his lordship, and waited. "i find myself compelled at last," said cosmo, not without some tremor in his voice, which he did his best to quench, "to give you the refusal, according to your request, of the remainder of my father's property." "house and all?" "everything except the furniture." "which i do not want." a silence followed. "may i ask if your lordship is prepared to make me an offer?--or will you call on my father when you have made up your mind?" "i will give two hundred pounds for the lot." "two hundred pounds!" repeated cosmo, who had not expected a large offer, but was unprepared for one so small; "why, my lord, the bare building material would be worth more than that!" "not to take it down. i might as well blast it fresh from the quarry. i know the sort of thing those walls of yours are! vitrified with age, by george! but i don't want to build, and standing the place is of no use to me. i should but let it crumble away at its leisure!" cosmo's dream rose again before his mind's eye; but it was no more with pain; for if the dear old place was to pass from their hands, what other end could be desired for it! "but the sum you mention, my lord, would not, after paying the little we owe, leave us enough to take us from the place!" "that i should be sorry for; but as to paying, many a better man has never done that. you have my offer: take it or leave it. you'll not get half as much if it come to the hammer. to whom else would it be worth anything, bedded in my property? if i say i don't want it, see if anybody will!" cosmo's heart sank afresh. he dared not part with the place off hand on such terms, but must consult his father: his power of action was for the time exhausted; he could do no more alone--not even to spare his father. "i must speak to the laird," he said. "i doubt if he will accept your offer." "as he pleases. but i do not promise to let the offer stand. i make it now--not to-morrow, or an hour hence." "i must run the risk," answered cosmo. "will you allow me to jump the gate?" but his lordship had a key, and preferred opening it. when cosmo reached his father's room, he found him not yet thinking of getting up, and sat down and told him all--to what straits they were reduced; what grizzie had felt herself compelled to do in his illness; how his mind and heart and conscience had been exercised concerning the castle; how all his life, for so it seemed now, the love of it had held him to the dust; where and on what errand he had been that morning, with the result of his interview with lord lick-my-loof. he had fought hard, he said, and through the grace of god had overcome his weakness--so far at least that it should no more influence his action; but now he could go no further without his father. he was equal to no more. "i would not willingly be left out of your troubles, my son," said the old man, cheerfully. "leave me alone a little. there is one, you know, who is nearer to each of us than we are to each other: i must talk to him--your father and my father, in whom you and i are brothers." cosmo bowed in reverence, and withdrew. after the space of nearly half an hour, he heard the signal with which his father was in the habit of calling him, and hastened to him. the laird held out his old hand to him. "come, my son," he said, "and let us talk together as two of the heirs of all things. it's unco easy for me to regaird wi' equanimity the loss o' a place i am on the point o' leavin' for the hame o' a' hames--the dwellin' o' a' the loves, withoot the dim memory or foresicht o' which--i'm thinkin' they maun be aboot the same thing--we could never hae lo'ed this auld place as we du, an' whaur, ance i'm in, a'thing doon here maun dwindle ootworthied by reason o' the glory that excelleth--i dinna mean the glory o' pearls an' gowd, or even o' licht, but the glory o' love an' trowth. but gien i've ever had onything to ca' an ambition, cosmo, it has been that my son should be ane o' the wise, wi' faith to believe what his father had learned afore him, an' sae start farther on upo' the narrow way than his father had startit. my ambition has been that my endeavours and my experience should in such measure avail for my boy, as that he should begin to make his own endeavours and gather his own experience a little nearer that perfection o' life efer which oor divine nature groans an' cries, even while unable to know what it wants. blessed be the voice that tells us we maun forsake all, and take up ovir cross, and follow him, losing our life that we may find it! for whaur wad he hae us follow him but til his ain hame, to the verra bosom o' his god an' oor god, there to be ane wi' the love essential!" such a son as cosmo could not listen to such a father saying such things, and not drop the world as if it were no better than the burnt out cinder of the moon. "when men desire great things, then is god ready to hear them," he said; "and so it is, i think, father, that he has granted your desires for me: i desire nothing but to fulfil my calling." "then ye can pairt wi' the auld hoose ohn grutten?" "as easy, father, as wi' a piece whan i wasna hungry. i do not say that another mood may not come, for you know the flesh lusteth against the spirit as well as the spirit against the flesh; but in my present mood of light and peace, i rejoice to part with the house as a victory of the spirit. shall i go to his lordship at once and accept his offer? i am ready." "do, my son. i think i have not long to live, and the money, though little, is large in this, that it will enable me to pay the last of my debts, and die in the knowledge that i leave you a free man. you will easily provide for yourself when i am gone, and i know you will not forget grizzie. for jeames gracie, he maun hae his share o' the siller because o' the croft: we maun calculate it fairly. he'll no want muckle mair i' this warl'. aggie 'ill be as safe's an angel ony gait. an', cosmo, whatever god may mean to du wi' you i' this warl', ye'll hae an abundant entrance ministered to ye intil the kingdom' o' oor lord an' saviour. wha daur luik for a better fate nor that o' the lord himsel'! but there was them 'at by faith obtained kingdoms, as weel as them wha by faith were sawn asunder: they war baith martyrdoms; an' whatever god sen's, we s' tak." "then you accept the two hundred for croft and all, father?" "dinna ettle at a penny more; he micht gang back upo' 't. regaird it as his final offer." cosmo rose and went, strong-hearted, and without a single thought that pulled back from the sacrifice. there was even a certain pleasure in doing the thing just because in another and lower mood it would have torn his heart: the spirit was rejoicing against the flesh. to be rid of the castle would be to feel, far off, as the young man would have felt had he given all to the poor and followed the master. with the strength of a young giant he strode along. when he reached the gate, there was my lord leaning over it. "i thought you would be back soon! i knew the old cock would have more sense than the young one; and i didn't want my gate scrambled over again," he said, but without moving to open it. "my father will take your lordship's offer," said cosmo. "i was on the point of making a fool of myself, and adding another fifty to be certain of getting rid of you; but i came to the conclusion it was a piece of cowardice, and that, as i had so long stood the dirty hovel at my gate because i couldn't help it, i might just as well let you find your own way out of the parish." "i am sure from your lordship's point of view you were right," said cosmo. "we shall content ourselves, anyhow, with the two hundred." "indeed you will not! did i not tell you i would not be bound by the offer? i have changed my mind, and mean to wait for the sale." "i beg your pardon. i did not quite understand your lordship." "you do now, i trust!" "perfectly, my lord," replied cosmo, and turning away left his lordship grinning over the gate. but he had a curious look, almost as if he were a little ashamed of himself--as if he had only been teasing the young fellow, and thought perhaps he had gone too far. for cosmo, in such peace was his heart, that he was not even angry with the man. on his way home, the hope awoke, and began once more to whisper itself, that they might not be able to sell the place at all; that some other way would be provided for their leaving it; and that, when he was an old man, he would be allowed to return to die in it. but up started his conscience, jealously watchful lest hope should undermine submission, or weaken resolve. god might indeed intend they should not be driven from the old house! but he kept abraham going from place to place, and never let him own a foot of land, except so much as was needful to bury his dead. and there was our lord: he had not a place to lay his head, and had to go out of doors to pray to his father in secret! the only things to be anxious about were, that god's will should be done, and that it should not be modified by any want of faith or obedience or submission on his part. then it would be god's, very own will that was done, and not something composite, in part rendered necessary by his opposition. if god's pure will was done, he must equally rejoice whether that will took or gave the castle! and so he returned to his father. when he told him the result of his visit, the laird expressed no surprise. "he maketh the wrath o' man to praise him," he said. "this will be for our good." the whole day after, there was not between them another allusion to the matter. cosmo read to his father a ballad he had just written. the old man was pleased with it; for what most would have counted a great defect in cosmo's imagination was none to him--this namely, that he never could get room for it in this world; to his way of feeling, the end of things never came here; what end, or seeming end came, was not worth setting before his art as a goal for which to make; in its very nature it was no finis at all, only the merest close of a chapter. this was the ballad, in great part the result of a certain talk with mr. simon. the miser he lay on his lonely bed, life's candle was burning dim, his heart in his iron chest was hid, under heaps of gold and a well locked lid, and whether it were alive or dead, it never troubled him. slowly out of his body he crept, said he, "i am all the same! only i want my heart in my breast; i will go and fetch it out of the chest." swift to the place of his gold he stept-- he was dead but had no shame! he opened the lid--oh, hell and night! for a ghost can see no gold; empty and swept--not a coin was there! his heart lay alone in the chest so bare! he felt with his hands, but they had no might to finger or clasp or hold! at his heart in the bottom he made a clutch-- a heart or a puff-ball of sin? eaten with moths, and fretted with rust, he grasped but a handful of dry-rotted dust: it was a horrible thing to touch, but he hid it his breast within. and now there are some that see him sit in the charnel house alone, counting what seems to him shining gold, heap upon heap, a sum ne'er told: alas, the dead, how they lack of wit! they are not even bits of bone! another miser has got his chest, and his painfully hoarded store; like ferrets his hands go in and out, burrowing, tossing the gold about; and his heart too is out of his breast, hid in the yellow ore. which is the better--the ghost that sits counting shadowy coin all day, or the man that puts his hope and trust in a thing whose value is only his lust? nothing he has when out he flits but a heart all eaten away. that night, as he lay thinking, cosmo resolved to set out on the morrow for the city, on foot, and begging his way if necessary. there he would acquaint mr. burns with the straits they were in, and require of him his best advice how to make a living for himself and his father and grizzie. as for james and agnes, they might stay at the castle, where he would do his best to help them. as soon as his father had had his breakfast, he would let him know his resolve, and with his assent, would depart at once. his spirits rose as he brooded. what a happy thing it was that lord lick-my-loof had not accepted their offer! all the time they saw themselves in a poor lodging in a noisy street, they would know they had their own strong silent castle waiting to receive them, as soon as they should be able to return to it! then the words came to him: "here we have no continuing city, but we seek one to come." the special discipline for some people would seem to be that they shall never settle down, or feel as if they were at home, until they are at home in very fact. "anyhow," said cosmo to himself, "such a castle we have!" to be lord of space, a man must be free of all bonds to place. to be heir of all things, his heart must have no things in it. he must be like him who makes things, not like one who would put everything in his pocket. he must stand on the upper, not the lower side of them. he must be as the man who makes poems, not the man who gathers books of verse. god, having made a sunset, lets it pass, and makes such a sunset no more. he has no picture-gallery, no library. what if in heaven men shall be so busy growing, that they have not time to write or to read! how blessed cosmo would live, with his father and grizzie and his books, in the great city--in some such place as he had occupied when at the university! the one sad thing was that he could not be with his father all day; but so much the happier would be the home-coming at night! thus imagining, he fell fast asleep. he dreamed that he had a barrow of oranges, with which he had been going about the streets all day, trying in vain to sell them. he was now returning home, the barrow piled, as when he set out in the morning, with the golden fruit. he consoled himself however with the thought, that his father was fond of oranges, and now might have as many as he pleased. but as he wheeled the barrow along, it seemed to grow heavier and heavier, and he feared his strength was failing him, and he would never get back to his father. heavier and heavier it grew, until at last, although he had it on the pavement--for it was now the dead of the night--he could but just push it along. at last he reached the door, and having laboriously wheeled it into a shed, proceeded to pick from it a few of the best oranges to take up to his father. but when he came to lift one from the heap, lo, it was a lump of gold! he tried another and another: every one of them was a lump of solid gold. it was a dream-version of the golden horse. then all at once he said to himself, nor knew why, "my father is dead!" and woke in misery. it was many moments before he quite persuaded himself that he had but dreamed. he rose, went to his father's bed-side, found him sleeping peacefully, and lay down comforted, nor that night dreamed any more. "what," he said to himself, "would money be to me without my father!" some of us shrink from making plans because experience has shown us how seldom they are realized. not the less are the plans we do make just as subject to overthrow as the plans of the most prolific and minute of projectors. it was long since cosmo had made any, and the resolve with which he now fell asleep was as modest as wise man could well cherish; the morning nevertheless went differently from his intent and expectation. chapter lii. an old story. he was roused before sunrise by his father's cough. after a bad fit, he was very weary and restless. now, in such a condition, cosmo could almost always put him to sleep by reading to him, and he therefore got a short story, and began to read. at first it had the desired effect, but in a little while he woke, and asked him to go on. the story was of a king's ship so disguising herself that a pirate took her for a merchant-man; and cosmo, to whom it naturally recalled the old captain, made some remark about him. "you mustn't believe," said his father, "all they told you when a boy about that uncle of ours. no doubt he was a rough sailor fellow, but i do not believe there was any ground for calling him a pirate. i don't suppose he was anything worse than a privateer, which, god knows, is bad enough. i fancy, however, for the most of his sea-life he was captain of an east indiaman, probably trading on his own account at the same time. that he made money i do not doubt, but very likely he lost it all before he came home, and was too cunning, in view of his probable reception, to confess it." "i remember your once telling me an amusing story of an adventure--let me see--yes, that was in an east indiaman: was he the captain of that one?" "no--a very different man--a cousin of your mother's that was. i was thinking of it a minute ago; it has certain points, if not of resemblance, then of contrast with the story you have just been reading." "i should like much to hear it again, when you are able to tell it." "i have got it all in writing. it was amongst my marion's papers. you will find, in the bureau in the book-closet, in the pigeon-hole farthest to the left, a packet tied with red tape: bring that, and i will find it for you." cosmo brought the bundle of papers, and his father handed him one of them, saying, "this narrative was written by a brother of your mother's. the captain macintosh who is the hero of the story, was a cousin of her mother, and at the time of the event related must have been somewhat advanced in years, for he had now returned to his former profession after having lost largely in an attempt to establish a brewery on the island of st. helena!" cosmo unfolded the manuscript, and read as follows: "'an incident occurring on the voyage to india when my brother went out, exhibits captain macintosh's character very practically, and not a little to his professional credit. "'on a fine evening some days after rounding the cape of good hope, sailing with a light breeze and smooth water, a strange sail of large size hove in sight, and apparently bearing down direct upon the "union," captain macintosh's ship; evidently a ship of war, but showing no colours--a very suspicious fact. all english ships at that time trading to and from india, by admiralty rules, were obliged to carry armaments proportioned to their tonnage, and crew sufficient to man and work the guns carried. the strange sail was nearing them, or "the big stranger," as the seamen immediately named her. my brother, many years afterwards, more than once told me, that the change, or rather the transformation, which captain macintosh underwent, was one of the most remarkable facts he had ever witnessed; more bordering on the marvellous, than anything else. when he had carefully and deliberately viewed the "big stranger," and deliberately laying down his glass, his eyes seemed to have catched fire! and his whole countenance lighted up; a new spirit seemed to possess him, while he preserved the utmost coolness: advancing deliberately to what is called the poop railing, and steadily looking forward--"boatswain! pipe to quarters." muster roll called.--"now, my men, we shall fight! i know you will do it well!--clear ship for action!" i have certainly but my brother's word and judgment upon the fact, who had never been under fire; but his opinion was, that no british ship of war could have been more speedily, or more completely cleared for action, both in rigging, decks, and guns,--guns double shotted and run out into position. "the big stranger" was now nearing,--no ports opened, and no colours shewn--all, increased cause of suspicion that there was some ill intent in the wind--and it was very evident, from the size of "the big stranger "--nearly thrice the size of the little "union,"--that, one broad side from the former, might send the latter at once to the bottom:--the whole crew, my brother related, were in the highest spirits, more as if preparing for a dance, than for work of life and death. suddenly, the captain gives the command,--"boarders,--prepare to board! --lower away, boarding boats "--and no sooner said than done. the stranger was now at musket-shot. it was worthy the courage of a nelson or a cochrane, to think of boarding at such odds;--a mere handful of men, to a full complement of a heavy frigate's crew! the idea was altogether in keeping with the best naval tactics and skill. foreseeing that one broadside from such an enemy would sink him, he must anticipate such a crisis. boarding would at least divert the enemy from their guns; and he knew what british seamen could do, in clearing an enemy's decks! there was british spirit in those days. let us hope it shall again appear, should the occasion arise. the captain himself was the first in the foremost boarding boat--and the first in the enemy's main chains, and to set his foot on the enemy's main deck! when a most magic-like scene saluted the boarders; but did not yet allay suspicion:--not a single enemy on deck!--here, a characteristic act of a british tar--the union's boatswain,--must not be omitted--an old man of war's man:--no sooner had his foot touched the enemy's deck, than rushing aft--(or towards the ship's stern)--to the wheel,--the only man on deck being he at the wheel,--a big, lubberly looking man,--the union's boatswain in less than a moment had his hands to the steersman's throat,--and with one fell shove, sent him spinning, heels over head--all the full length of the ship's quarter-deck, to land on the main deck;--one may suppose rather astonished! the manly boatswain himself was the only man hurt in the affair--his boarding pistol, by some untoward accident, went off,--its double shot running up his fore-arm, and lodging in the bones of his elbow. amputation became necessary; and the dear old fellow soon afterwards died. "'but what did all this hullybaloo come to? breathe--and we shall hear! "the big stranger" turned out to be a large, heavy armed portuguese frigate!--actually the war-ship solitary of the portuguese navy then afloat!--a fine specimen of portuguese naval discipline, no doubt!--not a watch even on deck!--they had seen immediately on seeing her, that the "union" was english, and a merchant ship--which a practised seaman's eye can do at once; and they had quietly gone to take their siesta, after their country's fashion--portugal, at that time, being one of britain's allies, and not an enemy;--a grievous disappointment to the crew of the 'union."' "my uncle seems to have got excited as he went on," said cosmo, "to judge by the number of words he has underlined!" "he enters into the spirit of the thing pretty well for a clergyman!" said the laird. chapter liii a small discovery. when they had had a little talk over the narrative, the laird desired cosmo to replace the papers, and rising he went to obey. as he approached the closet, the first beams of the rising sun were shining upon the door of it. the window through which they entered was a small one, and the mornings of the year in which they so fell were not many. when he opened the door, they shot straight to the back of the closet, lighting with rare illumination the little place, commonly so dusky that in it one book could hardly be distinguished from another. it was as if a sudden angel had entered a dungeon. when the door fell to behind him, as was its custom, the place felt so dark that he seemed to have lost memory as well as sight, and not to know where he was. he set it open again, and having checked it so, proceeded to replace the papers. but the strangeness of the presence there of such a light took so great a hold on his imagination, and it was such a rare thing to see what the musty dingy little closet, which to cosmo had always been the treasure--chamber of the house, was like, that he stood for a moment with his hand on the cover of the bureau, gazing into the light-invaded corners as if he had suddenly found himself in a department of aladdin's cave. old to him beyond all memory, it yet looked new and wonderful, much that had hitherto been scarcely known but to his hands now suddenly revealed in radiance to his eyes also. amongst other facts he discovered that the bureau stood, not against a rough wall as he had imagined, but against a plain surface of wood. in mild surprise he tapped it with his knuckles, and almost started at the hollow sound it returned. "what can there be ahin' the bureau, father?" he asked, re-entering the room. "i dinna ken o' onything," answered the laird. "the desk stan's close again' the wa', does na't?" "ay, but the wa' 's timmer, an' soon's how." "it may be but a wainscotin'; an' gien there was but an inch atween hit an' the stane, it wad soon' like that." "i wad like to draw the desk oot a bit, an' hae a nearer luik. it fills up a' the space,'at i canna weel win at it." "du as ye like, laddie. the hoose is mair yours nor mine. but noo ye hae putten't i' my held, i min' my mother sayin' 'at there was ance a passage atween the twa blocks o' the hoose: could it be there? i aye thoucht it had been atween the kitchen an' the dinin' room. my father, she said, had it closed up." said cosmo, who had been gazing toward the closet from where he stood by the bedside, "it seems to gang farther back nor the thickness o' the wa'!" he went and looked out of the western window, then turned again towards the closet. "i canna think," he resumed, with something like annoyance in his tone, "hoo it cud be 'at i never noticed that afore! a body wad think i had nae heid for what i prided mysel' upo'--an un'erstan'in' o' hoo things are putten thegither, specially i' the w'y o' stane an' lime! the closet rins richt intil the great blin' wa' atween the twa hooses! i thoucht that wa' had been naething but a kin' o' a curtain o' defence, but there may weel be a passage i' the thickness o' 't!" so saying he re-entered the closet, and proceeded to move the bureau. the task was not an easy one. the bureau was large, and so nearly filled the breadth of the closet, that he could attack it nowhere but in front, and had to drag it forward, laying hold of it where he could, over a much-worn oak floor. the sun had long deserted him before he got behind it. "i wad sair like to brak throu the buirds, father?" he said, going again to the laird. "onything ye like, i tell ye, laddie! i'm growin' curious mysel'," he answered. "i'm feart for makin' ower muckle din, father." "nae fear, nae fear! i haena a sair heid. the lord be praist, that's a thing i'm seldom triblet wi'. gang an' get ye what tools ye want, an' gang at it, an' dinna spare. gien the hole sud lat in the win', ye'll mar nae mair, i'm thinkin', nor ye'll be able to mak again. what timmer is 't o'?" "only deal, sae far as i can judge." cosmo went and fetched his tool-basket, and set to work. the partition was strong, of good sound pine, neither rotton nor worm-eaten--inch-boards matched with groove and tongue, not quite easy to break through. but having, with a centre-bit and brace, bored several holes near each other, he knocked out the pieces between, and introducing a saw, soon made an opening large enough to creep through. a cold air met him. as if from a cellar, and on the other side he seemed in another climate. feeling with his hands, for there was scarcely any light, he discovered that the space he had entered was not a closet, inasmuch as there was no shelf, or anything in it, whatever. it was certainly most like the end of a deserted passage. his feet told him the floor was of wood, and his hands that the walls were of rough stone without plaster, cold and damp. with outstretched arms he could easily touch both at once. advancing thus a few paces, he struck his head against wood, felt panels, and concluded a door. there was a lock, but the handle was gone. he went back a little, and threw himself against it. lock and hinges too gave way, and it fell right out before him. he went staggering on, and was brought up by a bed, half-falling across it. he was in the spare room, the gruesome centre of legend, the dwelling of ghostly awe. not yet apparently had its numen forsaken it, for through him passed a thrill at the discovery. from his father's familiar room to this, was like some marvellous transition in a fairy-tale; the one was home, a place of use and daily custom; the other a hollow in the far-away past, an ancient cave of time, full of withering history. its windows being all to the north and long unopened, it was lustreless, dark, and musty with decay. cosmo stood motionless a while, gazing about him as if, from being wide awake, he suddenly found himself in a dream. then he turned as if to see how he had got into it. there lay the door, and there was the open passage! he lifted the door: the other side of it was covered with the same paper as the wall, from which it had brought with it several ragged pieces. he went back, crept through, and rejoined his father. in eager excitement, he told him the discovery he had made. "i heard the noise of the falling door," said his father quietly. "i should not wonder now," he added, "if we discovered a way through to the third block." "oh, father," said cosmo with a sigh, "what a comfort this door would have so often been! and now, just as we are like to leave the house forever, we first discover it!" "how well we have got on without it!" returned his father. "but what could have made grandfather close it up?" "there was, i believe, some foolish ghost-story connected with it--perhaps the same old grannie told you." "i wonder grandmamma never spoke of it!" "my impression is she never cared to refer to it." "i daresay she believed it." "weel, i daursay! i wadna won'er!" "what for did ye ca' 't foolish, father?" "jist for thouchtlessness, i doobt, but wha could hae imagined to kep a ghaist by paperin' ower a door, whan, gien there be ony trowth i' sic tales, the ghaist gangs throu a stane wa' jist as easy's open air! but surely o' a' fules a ghaist maun be the warst 'a things on aboot a place!" "maybe it's to haud away frae a waur. the queer thing, father, to me wad be 'at the ghist, frae bein' a fule a' his life, sud grow a wise man the minute he was deid! michtna it be a pairt o' his punishment to be garred see hoo things gang on efter he's deid! what could be sairer, for instance, upon a miser, nor to see his heir gang to the deevil by scatterin' what he gaed to the deevil by gatherin'?" "'deed ye're richt eneuch, there, my son!" answered the old man. then after a pause he resumed. "it's aye siller or banes 'at fesses them back. i can weel un'erstan' a great reluctance to tak their last leave o' the siller, but for the banes--eh, but i'll be unoo pleased to be rid o' mine!" "but whaur banes are concernt, hasna there aye been fause play?" suggested cosmo. "wad it be revenge, than, think ye?" "it micht be: maist o' the stories o' that kin' en' wi' bringin' the murderer an' justice acquant. but the human bein' seems in a' ages to hae a grit dislike to the thoucht o' his banes bein' left lyin' aboot. i hae h'ard gran'mamma say the dirtiest servan' was aye clean twa days o' her time--the day she cam an' the day she gaed." "ye hae thoucht mair aboot it nor me, laddie! but what ye say wadna haud wi' the parsees, 'at lay oot their deid to be devoored by the birds o' the air." "they swipe up their banes at the last. an', though the livin' expose the deid, the deid mayna like it." "i daursay. ony gait it maun be a fine thing to lea' as little dirt as possible ahin' ye, an' tak nane wi' ye. i wad frain gang clean an' lea' clean!" "gien onybody gang clean an' lea' clean, father, ye wull." "i luik to the lord, my son.--but noo, whan a body thinks o' 't," he went on after a pause, "there wad seem something curious i' thae tales concernin' the auld captain! sometime we'll tak grizzie intil oor coonsel, an' see hoo mony we can gaither, an' what we can mak o' them whan we lay them a' thegither. gien the lord hae't in his min' to keep 's i' this place, yon passage may turn oot a great convanience." "ye dinna think it wad be worth while openin' 't up direc'ly?" "i wad bide for warmer weather. i think the room's jist some caller now by rizzon o' 't." "i'll close't up at ance," said cosmo. in a few minutes he had screwed a box-lid over the hole in the partition, and shut the door of the closet. "noo," he said, "i'll gang an' set up the door on the ither side." before he went however, he told his father what he had been thinking of, saying, if he approved and was well enough, he should like to go the next day. "it's no an ill idea," said the laird; "but we'll see what the morn may be like." when cosmo entered the great bedroom of the house from the other side, he stood for a moment staring at the open passage and prostrate door as if he saw them for the first time, then proceeded to examine the hinges. they were broken; the half of each remained fast to the door-post, the other half to the door. new hinges were necessary; in the meantime he must prop it up. this he did; and before he left the room, as it was much in want of fresh air, he opened all the windows. his father continuing better through that day, he went to bed early that he might start at sunrise. chapter liv. a greater discovery. in the middle of the night he was wakened by a loud noise. its nature he had been too sound asleep to recognize; he only knew it had waked him. he sprang out of bed, was glad to find his father undisturbed, and stood for a few moments wondering. all at once he remembered that he had left the windows of the best bedroom open; the wind had risen, and was now blowing what sailors would call a gale: probably something had been blown down! he would go and see. taking a scrap of candle, all he had, he crept down the stair and out to the great door. as he approached that of the room he sought, the faint horror he felt of it when a boy suddenly returned upon him as fresh as ever, and for a moment he hesitated, almost doubting whether he were not dreaming: was he actually there in the middle of the night? but, with an effort he dismissed the folly, was himself again, entering the room, if not with indifference yet with composure. there was just light enough to see the curtains of the terrible bed waving wide in the stream of wind that followed the opening of the door. he shut the windows, lighted his candle, and then saw the door he had set up so carefully flat on the floor: the chair he had put against it for a buttress, he thought, had not proved high enough, and it had fallen down over the top of it. he placed his candle beside it, and proceeded once more to raise it. but, casting his eyes up to mark the direction, he caught a sight which made him lay it down again and rise without it. the candle on the floor shone halfway into the passage, lighting up a part of one wall of it, and showing plainly the rough gray stones of which it was built. something in the shapes and arrangement of the stones drew and fixed cosmo's attention. he took the candle, examined the wall, came from the passage with his eyes shining, and his lips firmly closed, left the room, and went up a story higher to that over it, still called his. there he took from his old secretary the unintelligible drawing hid in the handle of the bamboo, and with beating heart unfolded it. certainly its lines did, more or less, correspond with the shapes of those stones! he must bring them face to face! down the stair he went again. it was the dead of the night, but every remnant of childhood's awe was gone in the excitement of the hoped discovery. he stood once more in the passage, the candle in one hand, the paper in the other, and his eyes going and coming steadily between it and the wall, as if reading the rough stones by some hieroglyphic key. the lines on the paper and the joints of the stones corresponded with almost absolute accuracy. but another thing had caught his eye--a thing yet more promising, though he delayed examining it until fully satisfied of the correspondence he sought to establish: on one of the stones, one remarkable neither by position nor shape, he spied what seemed the rude drawing of a horse, but as it was higher than his head, and the candle cast up shadows from the rough surfaces, he could not see it well. now he got a chair, and, standing on it, saw that it was plainly enough a horse, like one a child might have made who, with a gift for drawing, had had no instruction. it was scratched on the stone. beneath it, legible enough to one who knew them so well, were the lines-- catch your nag, & pull his tail in his hind hele caw a nail rug his lugs frae ane anither stand up, & ca' the king yer brither how these directions were to be followed with such a horse astheoneon the flat before him would be scanned! probably the wall must be broken into at that spot. in the meantime he would set up the door again, and go to bed. for he was alarmed at the turmoil the sight of these signs caused in him. he dreaded possession by any spirit but the one. whatever he did now he must do calmly. therefore to bed he went. but before he gave himself up to sleep, he prayed god to watch him, lest the commotion in his heart and the giddiness of hope should make something rise that would come between him and the light eternal. the man in whom any earthly hope dims the heavenly presence and weakens the mastery of himself, is on the by-way through the meadow to the castle of giant despair. in the morning he rose early, and went to see what might be attempted for the removing of the stone. he found it, as he had feared, so close-jointed with its neighbours that none of his tools would serve. he went to grizzie and got from her a thin old knife; but the mortar had got so hard since those noises the servants used to hear in the old captain's room, that he could not make much impression upon it, and the job was likely to be a long one. he said to himself it might be the breaking through of the wall of his father's prison and his own, and wrought eagerly. as soon as his father had had his breakfast, he told him what he had discovered during the dark hours. the laird listened with the light of a smile, not the smile itself, upon his face, and made no answer; but cosmo could see by the all but imperceptible motion of his lips that he was praying. "i wish i were able to help you," he said at length. "there is na room for mair nor ane at a time, father," answered cosmo; "an' i houp to get the stane oot afore i'm tired. you can be moses praying, while i am joshua fighting." "an' prayin' again' waur enemies nor ever joshua warstled wi'," returned his father; "for whan i think o' the rebound o' the spirit, even in this my auld age, that cudna but follow the mere liftin' o' the weicht o' debt, i feel as gien my sowl wad be tum'led aboot like a bledder, an' its auld wings tak to lang slow flaggin' strokes i' the ower thin aether o' joy. the great god protec' 's frae his ain gifts! wi'oot him they're ten times waur nor ony wiles o' the deevil's ain. but i'll pray, cosmo; i'll pray." the real might of temptation is in the lower and seemingly nearer loveliness as against the higher and seemingly farther. cosmo went back to his work. but he got tired of the old knife--it was not tool enough, and had to fashion on the grindstone a screw-driver to a special implement. with that he got on better. the stone,--whether by the old captain's own' hands, his ghost best knew--was both well fitted and fixed, but after cosmo had worked at it for about three hours his tool suddenly went through. it was then easy to knock away from the edge gained, and on the first attempt to prize it out, it yielded so far that he got a hold with his fingers, and the rest was soon done. it disclosed a cavity in the wall, but the light was not enough to let him see into it, and he went to get a candle. now grizzie had a curious dislike to any admission of the poverty of the house even to those most interested, and having but one small candle-end left, was unwilling both to yield it, and to confess it her last. "them 'at burns daylicht, sune they'll hae nae licht!" she said. "what wad ye want wi' a can'le? i'll haud a fir-can'le to ye, gien ye like." "grizzie," repeated cosmo, "i want a can'le." she went grumbling, and brought him the miserable end. "hoot, grizzie!" he expostulated, "dinna be sae near. ye wadna, gien ye kenned what i was aboot." "eh! what are ye aboot, sir?" "i'm no gaein' to tell ye yet. ye maun hae patience, an' i maun hae a can'le." "ye maun tak what's offert ye." "grizzie, i'm in earnest." "'deed an' sae am i! ye s' hae nae mair nor that--no gien it was to scrape the girnel--an' that's dune lang syne, an' twise ower!" "grizzie, i'm feart ye'll anger me." "ye s' get nae mair!" cosmo burst out laughing. "grizzie," he said, "i dinna believe ye nae an' inch mair can'le i' the hoose!" "it needs na a warlock to tell that! gien i had it, what for sud na ye hae't 'at has the best richt?" cosmo took his candle, and was as sparing of it as grizzie herself could have wished. chapter lv. a great discovery. the instant the rays of the candle-end were thrown into the cavity, he saw what, expectant as he was, made him utter a cry. he seemed to be looking through a small window into a toy-stable--a large one for a toy. immediately before him was a stall, in which stood ahorse, with his tail towards the window. he put in his hand and felt it over. for a toy it would have been of the largest size below a rocking horse. it was covered with a hairy skin. so far all was satisfactory, but alas! more stones must be removed ere it could be taken from its prison stall, where, like the horses of charlemagne, it had been buried so many years. he extinguished the precious candle-end, and set to work once more with a will and what light the day afforded. nor was the task much easier than before. every one of the stones was partly imbedded in the solid of the wall, projecting but a portion of its bulk over the hollow of the stable. the old captain must indeed have worked hard! for assuredly he was not the man to call for help where he desired secrecy--though doubtless it was his sudden death, and the nature of it, which prevented him from making disclosure concerning the matter before he left the world: the rime, the drawing, the scratches on the stone, all indicated the intention. cosmo took pleasure in thinking that, if indeed his ghost did "walk," as grannie and others had affirmed, it must be more from desire to reveal where his money was hid, than from any gloating over the imagined possession of it. but it was now dinner-time, and he must rest, for he was tired as well as hungry--and no wonder, the work having been so awkward as well as continuous! he locked the door of the room, went first to tell his father what he had further found, and then made haste over his meal, for the night was coming, and there were no candles. persistently he laboured; "the toil-drops fell from his brow like rain;" and at last he laid hold of the patient animal by the hind legs, with purpose to draw it gently from the stall. a little way it came, then no farther, and he had to light the candle. peeping into the stall he perceived a chain stretching from its head to where the manger might be. this he dared not try to break, lest he might injure the mechanism he hoped to find in it. but clearly the horse could not have been so fastened as the stall then stood. the stall must have been completed after the horse was thus secured. more than ever he now needed a candle--and indeed one held for him; but he was not prepared either to take grizzie into his confidence, or to hurt her by perferring agnes. he therefore examined the two stones forming the sides of the stall, and led by the appearance of one of them, proceeded to attempt its removal almost in the dark, compelled indeed now and then to feel for the proper spot where to set his tool before he struck it. for some time he seemed to make, little or no progress; but who would be discouraged with the end in sight! the stone at length moved, and in a minute he had it out. for the last time he lighted his candle, and there was just enough of it left to show him how the chain was fastened. with a pair of pincers he detached it from the wall--and i may mention that his life after he wore it at his watch. and now he had the horse in his arms and would have borne it straight to his father, in whose presence it must be searched, but that, unwilling to carry it through the kitchen, he must first go to the other end of the passage and open that way. the laird was seated by the fire when cosmo went through, and returning with the horse, placed it on a chair beside him. they looked it all over, wondering whether the old captain could have made it himself, and cosmo thought his father prolonged the inquiry from a wish to still his son's impatience. but at length he said, "noo, cosmo, i' the name o' god, the giver o' ilka guid an' perfec' gift, see gien ye can win at the entrails o' the animal. it cannabe fu' o' men like the trojan horse, or they maun be enchantit sma', like the deevils whan they war ower mony for the cooncil ha'; but what's intil 't may carry a heap waur danger to you an' me nor ony nummer o' airmit men!" "ye min' the rime, father?" asked cosmo. "no sae weel as the twenty-third psalm," replied the laird with a smile. "weel, the first line o' 't is,'catch yer naig, an' pu' his tail.' wi' muckle diffeeclety we hae catcht him, an' noo for the tail o' 'im!--there! that's dune!--though there's no muckle to shaw for 't. the neist direction is--'in his hin' heel caw a nail:' we s' turn up a' his fower feet thegither,'cause they're cooperant; an' noo lat 's see the proper spot whaur to caw the said nail!" the horse's shoes were large, and the hole where a nail was missing had not to be sought. cosmo took a fine bradawl, and pushed it gently into the hoof. a loud, whirring noise followed, but with no visible result. "the next direction," said cosmo, "is--'rug his lugs frae ane anither.' noo, father, god be wi' 's! an' gien it please him we be dis-ap'intit, may he gie 's grace to beir 't as he wad hae 's beir 't.' "i pray the same," said the laird. cosmo pulled the two ears of the animal in opposite directions. the back began to open, slowly, as if through the long years the cleft had begun to grow together. he sprang from his seat. the laird looked after him with a gentle surprise. but it was not to rush from the room, nor yet to perform a frantic dance with the horse for a partner. one of the windows looked westward into the court, and at this season of the year, the setting sun looked in at that window. he was looking in now; his rays made a glowing pool of light in the middle of the ancient carpet. beside this pool cosmo dropped on the floor like a child with his toy, and pulled lustily at its ears. all at once into the pool of light began to tumble a cataract as of shattered rainbows, only brighter, flashing all the colours visible to human eye. it ceased. cosmo turned the horse upside down, and a few stray drops followed. he shook it, and tapped it, like grizzie when she emptied the basin of meal into the porridge-pot, then flung it from him. but the cataract had not vanished. there it lay heaped and spread, a storm of conflicting yet harmonious hues, with a foamy spray of spiky flashes, and spots that ate into the eyes with their fierce colour. in every direction shot the rays from it, blinding; for it was a mound of stones of all the shapes into which diamonds are fashioned. it makes my heart beat but to imagine the glorious show of deep-hued burning, flashing, stinging light! the heaviest of its hues was borne light as those of a foam-bubble on the strength of its triumphing radiance. there pulsed the mystic glowing red, heart and lord of colour; there the jubilant yellow, light-glorified to ethereal gold; there the loveliest blue, the truth unfathomable, profounder yet than the human red; there the green, that haunts the brain with nature's soundless secrets! all together striving, yet atoning, fighting and fleeing and following, parting and blending, with illimitable play of infinite force and endlessly delicate gradation. scattered here and there were a few of all the coloured gems--sapphires, emeralds, and rubies; but they were scarce of note in the mass of ever new-born, ever dying colour that gushed from the fountains of the light-dividing diamonds. cosmo rose, left the glory where it lay, and returning to his father, sat down beside him. for a few moments they regarded in silence the shining mound, where, like an altar of sacrifice, it smoked with light and colour. the eyes of the old man as he looked seemed at once to sparkle with pleasure, and quail with some kind of fear. he turned to cosmo and said, "cosmo, are they what they luik?" "what luik they, father?" asked cosmo. "bonny bits o' glaiss they luik," answered the old man. "but," he went on, "i canna but believe them something better, they come til's in sic a time o' sair need. but, be they this or be they that, the lord's wull be done--noo an' for ever, be it, i say, what it like!" "i wuss it, father!" rejoined cosmo. "but i ken something aboot sic-like things, frae bein' sae muckle in mr. burns's shop, an' hauding a heap o' conference wi' im about them; an' i tell ye, sir, they're maistly a' di'mon's; an' the nummer o' thoosan' poun' they maun be worth gien they be worth a saxpence, i daurna guess!" "they'll be eneuch to pey oor debts ony gait, ye think, cosmo?" "ay, that wull they--an' mony a hun'er times ower. they're maistly a guid size, an' no a feow o' them lairge." "cosmo, we're ower lang ohn thankit. come here, my son; gang down upo' yer knees, an lat's say to the lord what we're thinkin'." cosmo obeyed, and knelt at his father's knee, and his father laid his hand upon his head that so they might pray more in one. "lord," he said, "though naething a man can tak in his han's can ever be his ain, no bein' o' his nature, that is, made i' thy image, yet, o lord, the thing 'at's thine, made by thee efter thy holy wull an' pleesur, man may touch an' no be defiled. yea, he may tak pleesur baith in itsel' an' in its use, sae lang as he han'les 't i' the how o' thy han', no grippin' at it an' ca'in' 't his ain, an' lik a rouch bairn seekin' to snap it awa' 'at he may hae his fule wull o' 't. o god, they're bonny stanes an' fu' o' licht: forbid 'at their licht sud breed darkness i' the hert o' cosmo an' me. o god, raither nor we sud du or feel ae thing i' consequence o' this they gift, that thoo wadna hae us do or feel, we wad hae thee tak again the gift; an' gien i' thy mercy, for it's a' mercy wi' thee, it sud turn oot, efter a','at they're no stanes o' thy makin', but coonterfeit o' glaiss, the produc' o' airt an' man's device, we'll lay them a' thegither, an' keep them safe, an' luik upon them as a token o' what thoo wad hae dune for 's gien it hadna been 'at we warna yet to be trustit wi' sae muckle, an' that for the safety an' clean-throuness o' oor sowls. o god, latna the sunshiny mammon creep intil my cosmo's hert an' mak a' mirk; latna the licht that is in him turn to darkness. god hae mercy on his wee bairns, an' no lat the play ocks he gies them tak their e'en aff o' the giein' han'! may the licht noo streamin' frae the hert o' the bonny stanes be the bodily presence o' thy speerit, as ance was the doo 'at descendit upo' the maister, an' the buss 'at burned wi' fire an' wasna consumed. thoo art the father o' lichts, an' a' licht is thine. garoor herts burn like them--a' licht an' nae reek! an' gien ony o' them cam in at a wrang door, may they a' gang oot at a richt ane. thy wull be dune, which is the purifyin' fire o' a' thing, an' a' sowl! amen." he ceased, and was silent, praying still. nor did cosmo yet rise from his knees: the joy, and yet more the relief at his heart filled him afresh with fear, lest, no longer spurred by the same sense of need, he should the less run after him from whom help had come so plentifully. alas! how is it with our hearts that in trouble they cry, and in joy forget! that we think it hard of god not to hear, and when he has answered abundantly, turn away as if we wanted him no more! when cosmo rose from his knees, he looked his father in the face with wet eyes. "oh, father!" he said, "how the fear and oppression of ages are gone like a cloud swallowed up of space. oh, father! are not all human ills doomed thus to vanish at last in the eternal fire of the love-burning god?--an' noo, father, what 'll we du neist?" resumed cosmo after a pause, turning his eyes again on the heap of jewels. the sunrays had now left them, and they lay cold and almost colourless, though bright still: even in the dark some of them would shine! "it pleases me, father," he went on, "to see nane o' them set. it pruvs naething, but maks 't jist a wheen mair likly he got them first han' like. eh, the queer things! sae hard, an' yet 'maist bodiless! naething but skinfu's o' licht!" "hooever they war gotten," rejoined the laird, there can be no question but the only w'y o' cleansin' them is to put them to the best use we possibly can." "an' what wad ye ca' the best use, father?" "whatever maks o' a man a neebour. a true life efter god's notion is the sairest bash to sawtan. to gie yer siller to ither fowk to spread is to jink the wark laid oot for ye. i' the meantime hadna ye better beery yer deid again? they maun lie i' the dark, like human sowls, till they're broucht to du the deeds o' licht." "dinna ye think," said cosmo, "i micht set oot the morn efter a', though on a different eeran', an' gang straucht to mr. burns? he'll sune put's i' the w'y to turn them til accoont. they're o' sma' avail as they lie there." "ye canna du better, my son," answered the old man. so cosmo gathered the gems together into the horse, lifting them in handfuls. but, peeping first into the hollow of the animal, to make sure he had found all that was in it, he caught sight of a bit of paper that had got stuck, and found it a bank of england note for five hundred pounds. this in itself would have been riches an hour ago--now it was only a convenience. "it's queer to think," said cosmo, "'at though we hae a' this siller, i maun tramp it the morn like ony caird. wha is there in muir o' warlock could change't, an' wha wad i gang til wi' 't gien he could?" his father replied with a smile, "it brings to my min' the words o' the apostle--'noo i say, that the heir, sae lang as he's but a bairn, differeth naething frae a servan', though he be lord o' a'.' eh, cosmo, but the word admits o' curious illustration!" cosmo set the horse, as soon as he had done giving him his supper of diamonds, again in his old stall, and replaced the stones that had shut him in as well as he could. then he wedged up the door, and having nothing to make paste, glued the paper again to the wall which it had carried with it. he next sought the kitchen and grizzie. chapter lvi mr. burns. "grizzie," he said, "i'm gaein' a lang tramp the morn, an' i'll need a great poochfu' o' cakes." "eh, sirs! an' what's takin' ye frae hame this time, sir?" returned grizzie. "i'm no gaein' to tell ye the nicht, grizzie. it's my turn to hae a secret noo! but ye ken weel it's lang sin' there's been onything to be gotten by bidin' at hame." "eh, but, sir! ye're never gaein' to lea' the laird! bide an' dee wi' him, sir." "god bless ye, grizzie! hae ye ony baubees?" "ay; what for no! i hae sax shillin's, fower pennies, an' a baubeefardin'!" answered grizzie, in the tone of a millionaire. "weel, ye maun jist len' me half a croon o' 't." "half a croon!" echoed grizzie, staggered at the largeness of the demand. 'haith, sir, ye're no blate (bashful)!" "i dinna think it's ower muckle," said cosmo, "seein' i hae to tramp five an' thirty mile the morn. but bake ye plenty o' breid, an' that'll haud doon the expence. only, gien he can help it, a body sudna be wantin' a baubee in 's pooch. gien ye had nane to gie me, i wad set oot bare. but jist as ye like, grizzie! i cud beg to be sure--noo ye hae shawn the gait," he added, taking the old woman by the arm with a laugh, that she might not be hurt, "but whan ye ken ye sudna speir, an' whan ye hae, ye hae no richt to beg." "weel, i'll gie ye auchteen pence, an' considerin' a' 'at 's to be dune wi' what's left, ye'll hae to grant it 's no an oonfair portion." "weel, weel, grizzie! i'm thinkin' i'll hae to be content." "'deed, an' ye wull, sir! ye s' hae nae mair." that night the old laird slept soundly, but cosmo, ever on the brink of unconsciousness, was blown back by a fresh gust of gladness. the morning came golden and brave, and his father was well enough to admit of his leaving him. so he set out, and in the strength of his relief walked all the way without spending a half-penny of grizzie's eighteen pence: two days before, he would consult his friend how to avoid the bitterest dregs of poverty; now he must find from him how to make his riches best available! he did not tell mr. burns, however, what his final object was--only begged him, for the sake of friendship and old times, to go with him for a day or two to his father's. "but, mr. warlock," objected the jeweller, "that would be taking the play, and we've got to be diligent in business." "the thing i want you for is business," replied cosmo. "but what's to be done with the shop? i have no assistant i can trust." "then shut it up, and give your men a holiday. you can put up a notice informing the great public when you will be back." "such a thing was never heard of!" "it is quite time it should be heard of then. why, sir, your business is not like a doctor's, or even a baker's. people can live without diamonds!" "don't speak disrespectfully of diamonds, mr. warlock. if you knew them as i do, you would know they had a thing or two to say." "speak of them disrespectfully you never heard me, mr. burns." "never, i confess. i was only talking from the diamond side. like all things else, they give us according to what we have. to him that hath shall be given. the fine lady may see in her fine diamonds only victory over a rival; the philosopher may read embodied in them law inexorably beautiful; and the christian poet--oh, i have read my spenser, mr. warlock!--will choose the diamond for its many qualities, as the best and only substance wherein to represent the shield of the faith that overcometh the world. like the gospel itself, diamonds are a savour of life unto life, or a savour of death unto death, according to the character of them that look on them." "that is true enough. every gift of god is good that is received with faith and thanksgiving, and whatsoever is not of faith is sin. but will you come?" mr. burns did at length actually consent to close his shop for three days, and go with cosmo. "it will not be a bad beginning," he said, as if in justification of himself to himself, "towards retiring from business altogether--which i might have done long ago," he added, "but for you, sir!" "it is very well for me you did not," rejoined cosmo, but declined to explain. this piqued mr. burns's curiosity, and he set about his preparations at once. in the mean time things went well at castle warlock, with--shall i say?--one exception: grizzie had a severe fit of repentance, mourning bitterly that she had sent away the youth she worshipped with only eighteen pence in his pocket. "he's sure to come to grief for the want o' jist that ae shillin' mair!" she said over and over to herself; "an' it'll be a' an' only my wite! what gien we never see 'im again! eh, sirs! it's a terrible thing to be made sae contrairy! what'll come o' me in the neist warl', it wad be hard for onybody to say!" on the evening of the second day, however, while she was "washing up" in the gloomiest frame of mind, in walked cosmo, and a gentleman after him. "hoo's my father, grizzie?" asked cosmo. "won'erfu' weel, sir," answered grizzie, with a little more show ofrespect than usual. "this is grizzie, mr. burns," said cosmo. "i have told you about grizzie that takes care of us all!" "how do you do, grizzie?" said mr. burns, and shook hands with her. "i am glad to make your acquaintance." "here, grizzie!" said cosmo; "here's the auchteen pence ye gae me for expences: say ye're pleased i haena waured it.--jist a word wi' ye, grizzie!--luik here--only dinna tell!" he had drawn her aside to the corner where stood the meal-chest, and now showed her a bunch of banknotes. so many she had never seen--not to say in a bunch, but scattered over all her life! he took from the bunch ten pounds and gave her. "mr. burns," he said aloud, "will be staying over to-morrow, i hope." grizzie glowered at the money as if such a sum could not be canny, but the next moment, like one suddenly raised to dignity and power, she began to order aggie about as if she were her mistress, and an imperious one. within ten minutes she had her bonnet on, and was setting out for muir o'warlock to make purchases. but oh the pride and victory that rose and towered and sank weary, only to rise and tower again in grizzie's mind, as she walked to the village with all that money in her pocket! the dignity of the house of warlock had rushed aloft like a sudden tidal wave, and on its very crest grizzie was borne triumphing heavenwards. from one who begged at strange doors for the daily bread of a decayed family, all at once she was the housekeeper of the most ancient and honourable castle in all scotland, steering the great ship of its fortunes! with a reserve and a dignity as impressive as provoking to the gossips of the village, from one shop to another she went, buying carefully but freely, rousing endless curiosity by her look of mystery, and her evident consciousness of infinite resource. but when at last she went to the warlock arms, and bought a half dozen of port at the incredible price of six shillings a bottle, there was not a doubt left in the muir that "the auld laird" had at last and somehow come in for a great fortune. grizzie returned laden herself, and driving before her two boys carrying a large basket between them. now she was equal to the proper entertainment of the visitor, for whom, while she was away, aggie, obedient to her orders, was preparing the state bedroom--thinking all the time of that night long ago when she and cosmo got it ready for lord mergwain. cosmo and mr. burns found the laird seated by the fire in his room; and there cosmo recounted the whole story of the finding of the gems, beginning far back with the tales concerning the old captain, as they had come to his knowledge, just touching on the acquisition of the bamboo, and the discovery of its contents, and so descending to the revelations of the previous two days. but all the time he never gave the jeweller a hint of what was coming. in relating the nearer events, he led him from place to place, acting his part in them, and forestalling nothing, never once mentioning stone or gem, then suddenly poured out the diamonds on the rug in the firelight. leaving the result to the imagination of my reader, i will now tell him a thing that took place while cosmo was away. chapter lvii too sure comes too late. the same day cosmo left, lord lick-my-loof sent to the castle the message that he wanted to see young mr. warlock. the laird returned the answer that cosmo was from home, and would not be back till the day following. in the afternoon came his lordship, desiring an interview with the laird; which, not a little against his liking, the laird granted. "set ye doon, my lord," said grizzie, "an' rist yer shins. the ro'd atween this an' the ludge, maun be slithery." his lordship yielded and took the chair she offered, for he would rather propitiate than annoy her, seeing he was more afraid of grizzie than aught in creation except dogs. and grizzie, appreciating his behaviour, had compassion upon him and spared him. "his lairdship," she said, "maunna be hurried puttin' on his dressin'-goon. he's no used to see onybody sae ear'. i s' gang an' see gien i can help him; he never wad hae a man aboot 'im 'cep' the yoong laird himsel'." relieved by her departure, his lordship began to look about the kitchen, and seeing aggie, asked after her father. she replied that he was but poorly. "getting old!" "surely, my lord. he's makin' ready to gang." "poor old man!" "what wad yer lordship hae? ye wadna gang on i' this warl' for ever?" "'deed and i would have no objection--so long as there were pretty girls like you in it." "suppose the lasses had a ch'ice tu, my lord?" "what would they do?" "gang, i'm thinkin'." "what makes you so spiteful, aggie? i never did you any harm that i know of." "ye ken the story o' the guid samaritan, my lord?" said aggie. "i read my bible, i hope." "weel, i'll tell ye a bit mair o' 't nor ye'll get there. the levite an' the pharisee--naebody ever said yer lordship was like aither o' them--" "no, thank god! nobody could." "--they gaed by o' the ither side, an' loot him lie. but there was ane cam up, an' tuik 'im by the legs,'cause he lay upo' his lan', an'wad hae pu'dhim aff. but jist i' the nick o' time by cam the guid samaritan, an' set him rinnin'. sae it was sune a sma' maitter to onybody but the ill neebour, wha couldna weel gang straucht to paradise. abraham wad hae a fine time o' 't wi' sic a bairn in 's bosom!" "damn the women! young and old they're too many for me!" said his lordship to himself,--and just then grizzie returning invited him to walk up to the laird's room, where he made haste to set forth the object of his visit. "i said to your son, glenwarlock, when he came to me the other morning, that i would not buy." "yes, my lord." "i have however, lawyer though i be, changed my mind, and am come to renew my offer." "in the meantime, however, we have changed our minds, my lord, and will not sell." "that's very foolish of you." "it may seem so, my lord; but you must allow us to do the best with what modicum of judgment we possess." "what can have induced you to come to such a fatal resolution! i am thoroughly acquainted with the value of the land all about here, and am convinced you will not get such a price from another, be he who he may." "you may be right, my lord, but we do not want to sell." "nobody, i repeat, will make you a better--i mean an equal offer." "i could well believe it might not be worth more to anyone else--so long, that is, as your lordship's property shuts it in on every side; but to your lordship--" "that is my affair; what it is worth to you is the question. "it is worth more to us than you can calculate." "i daresay, where sentiment sends prices up! but that is not in the market. take my advice and a good offer. you can't go on like this, you know. you will lose your position entirely. why, what are you thinking of!" "i am thinking, my lord, that you have scarcely been such a neighbour as to induce us to confide our plans to you. i have said we will not sell--and as i am something of an invalid--" lord lick-my-loof rose, feeling fooled--and annoyed with himself and everybody in "the cursed place." "good morning, glenwarlock," he said. "you will live to repent this morning." "i hope not, my lord. i have lived nearly long enough. good morning!" his lordship went softly down the stair, hurried through the kitchen, and walked slowly home, thinking whether it might not be worth his while to buy up glenwarlock's few remaining debts. chapter lviii. a little life well rounded. "pirate or not, the old gentleman was a good judge of diamonds!" said mr. burns, laying down one of the largest. "not an inferior one in all i have gone over! your uncle was a knowing man, sir: diamonds are worth much more now than when he brought them home. these rough ones will, i trust, turn out well: we cannot be so sure of them." "how much suffering the earlier possession of them would have prevented!" said the laird. "and now they are ten times more welcome that we have the good of that first." "sapphires and all of the finest quality!" continued mr. burns, in no mood for reflection. "i'll tell you what you must do, mr. cosmo: you must get a few sheets of tissue paper, and wrap every stone up separately--a long job, but the better worth doing! there must be a thousand of them!" "how can they hurt, being the hardest things in the world?" said cosmo. "put them in any other company you please--wheel them to the equator in a barrowful of gravel, or line their box with sand-paper, and you may leave them naked as they were born! but, bless thy five wits! did you never hear the proverb,'diamond cut diamond'? they're all of a sort, you see! i'd as soon shut up a thousand game-cocks in the same cellar. if they don't scratch each other, they may, or they might, or they could, or they would, or at any rate they should scratch each other. it was all very well so long as they lay in the wall of this your old diamond-mine. but now you'll be for ever playing with them! no, no! wrap each one up by itself, i say." "we're so far from likely to keep fingering them, mr. burns," said cosmo, "that our chief reason for wishing you to see them was that you might, if you would oblige us, take them away, and dispose of them for us!" "a-ah!" rejoined mr. burns, "i fear i am getting too old for a transaction of such extent! i should have to go to london--to paris--to amsterdam--who knows where?--that is, to make the best of them--perhaps to america! and here was i thinking of retiring!" "then let this be your last business-transaction. it will not be a bad one to finish up with. you can make it a good thing for yourself as well as for us." "if i undertake it, it shall be at a fixed percentage." "ten?" suggested cosmo. "no; there is no risk, only labour in this. when i took ten for that other diamond, i paid you the money for it, you will remember: that makes a difference. i wish you would come with me; i could help you to see a little of the world." "i should like it greatly, but i could not leave my father." mr. burns was a little nervous about the safety of the portmanteau that held such a number of tiny parcels in silver paper, and would not go inside the coach although it rained, but took a place in sight of his luggage. i will not say what the diamonds brought. i would not have my book bristle with pounds like a french novel with francs. they more than answered even mr. burns's expectations. when he was gone, and all hope for this world vanished in the fruition of assured solvency, the laird began to fail. while cosmo was yet on the way with mr. burns and the portmanteau to meet the coach, he said to his faithful old friend, "i'm tired, grizzie; i'll gang to my bed, i think. gien ye'll gie me a han', i winna bide for cosmo." "eh, sir, what for sud ye be in sic a hurry to sleep awa' the bonny daylicht?" remonstrated grizzie, shot through with sudden fear, nor daring allow to herself she was afraid. "bide till the yoong laird comes back wi' the news: he winna be lang." "gien ye haena time, grizzie, i can manage for mysel'. gang yer wa's, lass. ye hae been a richt guid freen' to yer auld mistress! ye hae dune yer best for him 'at she left!" "eh, sir! dinna speyk like that. it's terrible to hearken til!--i' the verra face o' the providence 'at's been takin' sic pains to mak up to ye for a' ye hae gang throu'--noo whan a 's weel, an' like to be weel, to turn roon' like this, an' speyk o' gaein' to yer bed! it's no worthy o' ye, laird!" he was so amused with her expostulation that he laughed heartily, brightened up, and did not go to bed before cosmo came--kept up, indeed, a good part of the day, and retired with the sun shining in at his western window. the next day, however, he did not rise. but he had no suffering to speak of, and his face was serene as the gathering of the sunrays to go down together; a perfect yet deepening peace was upon it. cosmo scarcely left him, but watched and waited, with a cold spot at his heart, which kept growing bigger and bigger, as he saw his father slowly drifting out on the ebb-tide of this earthly life. cosmo had now to go through that most painful experience of all--when the loved seem gradually withdrawing from human contact and human desires, their cares parting slowly farther and farther from the cares of those they leave--a gulf ever widening between, already impassable as lapsing ages can make it. but when final departure had left the mind free to work for the heart, cosmo said to himself--"what if the dying who seem thus divided from us, are but looking over the tops of insignificant earthly things? what if the heart within them is lying content in a closer contact with ours than our dull fears and too level outlook will allow us to share? one thing their apparent withdrawal means--that we must go over to them; they cannot retrace, for that would be to retrograde. they have already begun to learn the language and ways of the old world, begun to be children there afresh, while we remain still the slaves of new, low--bred habits of unbelief and self-preservation, which already to them look as unwise as unlovely. but our turn will come, and we shall go after, and be taught of them. in the meantime let us so live that it may be the easier for us in dying to let the loved ones know that we are loving them all the time." the laird ceased to eat, and spoke seldom, but would often smile--only there was in his smile too that far-off something which troubled his son. one word he often murmured--peace. two or three times there came as it were a check in the drift seaward, and he spoke plainly. this is very near what he said on one of these occasions: "peace! peace! cosmo, my son, ye dinna ken hoo strong it can be! naebody can ken what it's like till it comes. i hae been troubled a' my life, an' noo the verra peace is 'maist ower muckle for me! it's like as gien the sun wad put oot the fire. i jist seem whiles to be lyin' here waitin' for ye to come intil my peace, an' be ane wi' me! but ye hae a lang this warl's life afore ye yet. eh! winna it be gran' whan it's weel ower, an' ye come! you an' me an' yer mother an' god an' a'! but somehoo i dinna seem to be lea'in' ye aither--no half sae muckle as whan ye gaed awa' to the college, an' that although ye're ten times mair to me noo than ye war than. deith canna weel be muckle like onything we think aboot it; but there maun surely be a heap o' fowk unco dreary an' fusionless i' the warl' deith taks us til; an' the mair i think aboot it, the mair likly it seems we'll hae a heap to du wi' them--a sair wark tryin' to lat them ken what they are, an' whaur they cam frae, an' hoo they maun gang to win hame--for deith can no more be yer hame nor a sair fa' upo' the ro'd be yer bed. there may be mony ane there we ca'd auld here,'at we'll hae to tak like a bairn upo' oor knees an' bring up. i see na anither w'y o' 't. the lord may ken a better, but i think he's shawn me this. for them 'at are christ's maun hae wark like his to du, an' what for no the personal ministrations o' redemption to them 'at are deid, that they may come alive by kennin' him? auld bairns as weel as yoong hae to be fed wi' the spune." the day before that on which he went, he seemed to wake up suddenly, and said,-- "cosmo, i'm no inclined to mak a promise wi'regaird to ony possible communication wi' ye frae the ither warl', nor do i the least expec' to appear or speyk to ye. but ye needna for that conclude me awa' frae ye a' thegither. fowk may hae a hantle o' communication ohn aither o' them kent it at the time, i'm thinkin'. min' this ony gait: god's oor hame, an' gien ye be at hame an' i be at hame, we canna be far sun'ert!" as the sun was going down, closing a lovely day of promise, the boat of sleep, with a gentle wind of life and birth filling its sail, bore, softly gliding, the old pilgrim across the faint border between this and that. it may be that then, for a time, like a babe new-born, he needed careful hands and gentle nursing; and if so, there was his wife, who must surely by now have had time to grow strong. cosmo wept and was lonely, but not broken-hearted; for he was a live man with a mighty hope and great duties, each of them ready to become a great joy. such a man i do not think even diamonds could hurt, although, where breathes no wind of life, those very crystals of light are amongst the worst in beelzebub's army to fly-blow a soul into a thing of hate and horror. chapter lix. a breaking up. things in the castle went on in the same quiet way as before for some time. cosmo settled himself in his father's room, and read and wrote, and pondered and aspired. the household led the same homely simple life, only fared better. the housekeeping was in grizzie's hands, and she was a liberal soul--a true bread-giver. james gracie did not linger long behind his friend. his last words were, "i won'er gien i hae a chance o' winnin' up wi' the laird!" on the morning that followed his funeral, as soon as breakfast was over, aggie sought cosmo, where he sat in the garden with a book in his hand. "whaur are ye gaein', aggie?" he said, as she approached prepared for walking. "my hoor's come," she answered. "it's time i was awa'." "i dinna un'erstan' ye, aggie," he returned. "hoo sud ye, sir? ilka body kens, or sud ken, what lies to their ain han'. it lies to mine to gang. i'm no wantit langer. ye wadna hae me ait the breid o' idleness?" "but, aggie," remonstrated cosmo, "ye're ane o' the faimily! i wad as sune think o' seein' my ain sister, gien i had ane, gang fra hame for sic a nae rizzon at a'!" the tears rose in her eyes, and her voice trembled: "it canna be helpit; i maun gang," she said. cosmo was dumb for many moments; he had never thought of such a possibility; and aggie stood silent before him. "what hae ye i' yer heid, aggie? what thoucht ye o' duin' wi' yersel'?" he asked at length, his heart swelling so that he could scarcely bring out the words. "i'm gaein' to luik for a place." "but, aggie, gien it canna be helpit; and gang ye maun, ye ken i'm rich, an' _i_ ken there's naebody i' the warl' wi' a better richt to share in what i hae: wadna ye like to gang til a ladies' school, an' learn a heap o' things?" "na, i wadna. it's hard wark i need to haud me i' the richt ro'd. i can aye learn what i hunger for, an' what ye dinna desire ye'll never learn. thanks to yersel' an' maister simon, ye hae putten me i' the w'y o' that! it's no kennin' things--it's kennin' things upo' the ro'd ye gang,'at 's o' consequence to ye. the lave i mak naething o'." "but a time micht come whan ye wad want mony a thing ye micht hae learnt afore." "whan that time comes, i'll learn them than, wi' half the trouble, an' in half the time,--no to mention the pleesur o' learnin' them. noo, they wad but tak me frae the things i can an' maun mak use o'. na, cosmo, i'm b'un' to du something wi' what i hae, an' no bide till i get mair. i'll be aye gettin'." "weel, aggie, i daurna temp' ye to bide gien ye oucht to gang; an' ye wad but despise me gien i was fule eneuch to try 't. but ye canna refuse to share wi' me. that wadna be like ane 'at had the same father an' the same maister. tak a thoosan' poun' to begin wi', an' gang an'--an' du onything ye like, only dinna work yersel' to deith wi' rouch wark. i canna bide to think o' 't." "a thoosan' poun'! no ae baubee! cosmo, i wad hae thoucht ye had mair sense! what wad baudrins (pussy-cat) there du wi' a silk goon? ye can gie me the twa poun' ten i gae to grizzie to help haud the life in 's a'. a body maun hae something i' their pooch gien they can, an' gien they canna, they maun du wi' naething. it's won'erfu' hoo little 's railly wantit!" cosmo felt miserable. "ye winna surely gang ohn seein' maister simon!" "i tried to see him last nicht, but auld dorty wadna lat me near him. i wad fain say fareweel til him." "weel, put aff gaein' awa' till the morn, an' we'll gang thegither the nicht an' see him. dorty winna haud me oot." aggie hesitated, thought, and consented. leaving cosmo more distressed than she knew, she went to the kitchen, took off her bonnet, and telling grizzie she was not going till the morrow, sat down, and proceeded to pare the potatoes. "ance mair," said grizzie, resuming an unclosed difference, "what for ye sud gang's clean 'ayont me. it's true the auld men are awa', but here's the auld wife left, an' she'll be a mither to ye, as weel's she kens hoo, an' a lass o' your sense is easy to mither. i' the name o' god i say't, the warl' micht as weel objec' to twa angels bidin' i' h'aven thegither as you an' the yoong laird in ae hoose! say 'at they like, ye're but a servan' lass, an' here am i ower ye! aggie, i'm grouin' auld, an' railly no fit to mak a bed my lane--no to mention scoorin' the flure! it's no considerate o' ye, aggie!--jist 'cause yer father--hoots, he was but yer gran'father! --'s deid o' a guid auld age, an' gaithert til his fathers, to gang an' lea' me my lane! whaur am i to get a body i cud bide to hae i' my sicht, an' you awa'--you 'at's been like bane o' my bane to me! it's no guid o' ye, aggie! there maun be temper intil 't! i'm sure i ken no cause ever i gae ye." aggie said not a word; she had said all she could say, over and over; so now she pared her potatoes, and was silent. her heart was sore, but her mind was clear, and her will strong. up and down the little garden cosmo walked, revolving many things. "what is this world and its ways," he said, "but a dream that dreams itself out and is gone!" the majority of men, whether they think or not, worship solidity and fact: to such cosmo's conclusion must seem both foolish and dangerous--though a dream may be filled with truth, and a fact be a mere shred for the winds of the limbo of vanities. everything that can pass belongs to the same category with the dream. the question is whether the passing body leaves a live soul; whether the dream has been dreamed, the life lived aright. for there is a reality beyond all facts of suns and systems; solidity itself is but the shadow of a divine necessity; and there may be more truth in a fable than in a whole biography. where life and truth are one, there is no passing, no dreaming more. to that waking all dreams truly dreamed are guiding the dreamer. but the last thing--and this was the conclusion of cosmo's meditation--any dreamer needs regard, is the judgment of other dreamers upon his dreams. the all-pervading, ill-odoured phantom called society is but the ghost of a false god. the fear of man, the trust in man, the deference to the opinion of man, is the merest worship of a rag-stuffed idol. the man who seeks the judgment of god can well smile at the unsolicited approval or condemnation of self-styled society. there is a true society--quite another thing. doubtless the judgment of the world is of even moral value to those capable of regarding it. to deprive a thief of the restraining influence of the code of thieves' honour, would be to do him irreparable wrong; so with the tradesman whose law is the custom of the trade; but god demands an honesty, a dignity, a beauty of being, altogether different from that demanded by man of his fellow; and he who is taught of god is set out of sight above such law as that of thieves' honour, trade-custom, or social recognition--all of the same quality--subjected instead to a law which obeyed is liberty, disobeyed is a hell deeper than society's attendant slums. "here is a woman," said cosmo to himself, "who, with her earnings and her labour both, ministered to the very bodily life of my father and myself! she has been in the house the angel of god--the noblest, truest of women! she has ten times as much genuine education as most men who have been to college! her brain is second only to her heart!--if it had but pleased god to make her my sister! but there is a way of pulling out the tongue of slander!" the evening was mr. simon's best time, and they therefore let the sun go down before they left the castle to visit him. on their way they had a right pleasant talk about old things, now the one now the other bringing some half faded event from the store-closet of memory. "i doobt ye winna min' me takin' ye oot o' the warlock ae day there was a gey bit o' a spait on?" said agnes at length, looking up in cosmo's face. "eh, i never h'ard o' that, aggie!" replied cosmo. "i canna think to this day hoo it was ye fell in," she went on: "i hadna the chairge o' ye at the time. ye maun hae run oot o' the hoose, an' me efter ye. i was verra near taen awa' wi' ye. hoo we wan oot o' the watter i canna un'erstan'. a' 'at i ken is 'at whan i cam to mysel', we war lyin' grippit til ane anither upon a laich bit o' the bank." "but hoo was't 'at naebody ever said a word aboot it efterhin'?" asked cosmo. "i never tellt onybody, an' ye wasna auld eneuch no to forget a' aboot it." "what for didna ye tell?" "i was feart they wad think it my wite, an' no lat me tak chairge o' ye ony mair, whauras i kent ye was safer wi' me nor wi' ony ither aboot the place. gien it had been my wite, i cudna hae hauden my tongue; but as it was, i didna see i was b'un' to tell." "hoo did ye hide it?" "i ran wi' he hame to oor ain hoose. there was naebody there. i tuik aff yer weet claes, an' pat ye intil my bed till i got them dry." "an' hoo did ye wi' yer ain?" "by the time yours was dry, mine was dry tu." when they arrived at the cottage, dorty demurred, but her master heard cosmo's voice and rang his bell. "i little thought your father would have gone before me," said mr. simon. "i think i was aware of his death. i saw nothing, heard nothing, neither was i thinking about him at the moment; but he seemed to come to me, and i said to myself,'he is on his way home.' i shall have a talk with him by and by." agnes told him she had come to bid him good-bye; she was going after a place. "well," he answered, after a thoughtful pause, "so long as we obey the light in us, and that light is not darkness, we can't go wrong. if we should mistake, he will turn things round for us; and if we be to blame, he will let us see it." he was weak, and they did not stay long. "don't judge my heart by my words, my dear scholars," he said. "my heart is right toward you, but i am too weary to show it. god bless you both. i may not see you again, agnes, but i shall think of you there, and if i can do anything for you, be sure i will." when they left the cottage, the twilight was halfway towards the night, and a vague softness in the east prophesied the moon. cosmo led agnes through the fields to the little hollow where she had so often gone to seek him. there they sat down in the grass, and waited for the moon. cosmo pointed out the exact spot where she rose that night she looked at him through the legs of the cow. "ye min' grizzie's rime," he said: "'whan the coo loups ower the mune, the reid gowd rains intil men's shune'? "i believe grizzie took the queer sicht for a guid omen. it's unco strange hoo fowk 'll mix up god an' chance, seein' there could hardly be twa mair contradictory ideas! i min' ance hearin' a man say,'it's almost a providence!'" "i doobt wi' maist fowk," said aggie, "it's only 'there's almost a god.' for my pairt i see nae room atween no believin' in him at a', an' believin' in him a' thegither an' lattin him du what he likes wi' 's." "i'm o' your min' there, aggie, oot an' oot," responded cosmo. as he spoke the moon came peering up, and, turning to agnes to share the sight with her, he saw the yellow light reflected from tears. "aggie! aggie!" he said, in much concern, "what are ye greitin' for?" she made no answer, but wiped away her tears, and tried to smile. after a little pause, "ony body wad think, cosmo," she said, "'at gien i believed in a god, he maun be a sma' ane! what for sud onybody greit 'at has but a far awa' notion o' sic a god as you an' the laird an' maister simon believes in!" "ye may weel say that, aggie!" rejoined cosmo--yet sighed as he said it, for he thought of lady joan. a long pause followed, and then he spoke again. "aggie," he said, "there canna weel be twa i' this warl' 'at ken ane anither better nor you an' me. we hae been bairns thegither; we hae been to the schuil thegither; we hae had the same maister; we hae come throu dour times thegither--i doobt we hae been hungry thegither, though ye saidna a word; we hae warstlet wi' poverty, an' maybe wi' unbelief; we loe the same fowk best; an' abune a' we set the wull o' god. it wad be sair upo' baith o' 's to pairt--an' to me a vex forby 'at the first thing w'alth did for me sud be to tak you awa'. it wad 'maist brak my hert to think 'at her 'at cam throu the lan' o' drowth wi' me--ay, tuik me throu' 't' for, wantin' her, i wad hae fa'en to rise nae mair, sud gang on climmin' the dry hill-ro'd, an' me lyin' i' the bonny meadow-gerse at the fut o' 't. it canna be rizzon, aggie! what for sud ye gang? merry me, aggie, an' bide--bide an' ca' the castel yer ain." "hoots! wad ye merry yer mither!" cried agnes, and to cosmo's fresh dismay burst into laughter and tears together. i believe it was the sole time in her life she ever gave way to discordant emotion. cosmo stared speechless. it was as if an angel had made a poor human joke! he was much too bewildered to feel hurt, especially as he was aware of no committed absurdity. but aggie was not pleased with herself. she choked her tears, crushed down her laughter, and conquered. she took his hand in hers. "i beg yer pardon, cosmo," she said; "i shouldna hae lauchen. lauchin', i'm sure,'s far eneuch frae my hert! i kenna hoo i cam to du 't. but ye're sic a bairn, cosmo! ye dinna ken what ye wad hae! an' bein' a kin' o' a mither to ye a' yer life, i maun lat ye see what ye're aboot--i wadna insist owersair upo' the years atween 's, though that's no a sma' maitter, but surely ye haena to be tellt at this time o' day,'at for fowk to merry 'at dinna loe ane anither, is little gien it be onything short o' a sin." "_i_ hae aye loed you, aggie," said cosmo, with some reproach in his tone. "weel du i ken that. an ill hert wad be mine gien it didna tell me that! but, cosmo, whan ye said the word, didna your hert tell ye ye meant by 't something no jist the verra same as ye inten' it me to un'erstan' by 't?" "aggie, aggie!" sighed cosmo, "i wad aye loe ye better an' better." "ay, ye wad, gien ye cud, cosmo. but ye're ower honest to see throu' yersel'; an' i'm no sae honest but i can see throu' you. ye wad merry me 'cause ye're no wullin' to pairt wi' me, likin' me better nor ony but ane, an' her ye canna get! gien i was a leddy, cosmo, maybe i michtna be ower prood to tak ye upo' thae terms, but no bein' what i am. it wad need love as roon's a sphere for that. eh, but there micht come a time o' sair repentance! ance merried upo' you, gien i war to tak it intil my heid 'at i was ae hair i' yer gait, or 'at ye was ae hair freer like wi me oot o' yer sicht, i wad be like to rin to the verra back-wa' o' creation! na; it was weel eneuch as we hae been, but merried! ye wad be guid to me aye, i ken that, but i wad be aye wantin' to be deid,'at ye micht loe me a wee better. i say naething o' what the warl' wad say to the laird o' glenwarlock merryin' his servan' lass; for ye care as little for the warl' as i du, an' we're baith some wiser nor it. but efter a', cosmo, i wad be some oot o' my place--wadna i noo? the hen-birds nae doobt are aye the soberer to luik at, an' haena the gran' colours nor the gran' w'ys wi' them 'at the cocks hae; but still there's a measur in a' thing: it wad ill set a common hen to hae a peacock for her man. my sowl, i ken, wad gang han' in han', in a heumble w'y, wi' yours, for i un'erstan' ye, cosmo; an' the day may come whan i'll luik fitter for yer company nor i can the noo; but wha like me could help a sense o' unfitness, gien it war but gaein' to the kirk side by side wi' you? luik at the twa o' 's noo i' the munelicht thegither! dinna ye see 'at we dinna match?" "a' that wad be naething gien ye loed me, aggie." "gien ye loed me, say, cosmo--loed me eneuch to be prood o' me! but that ye dinna. exem' yer ain hert, an' ye'll see 'at ye dinna.--an' what for sud ye!" here aggie broke down. a burst of silent weeping, like that of one desiring no comfort, followed. suddenly she ceased and rose, and they walked home without a word. when cosmo came down in the morning, aggie was gone. chapter lx. repose. cosmo had no need of a very searching examination of his heart to know that it was mainly the wish to make her some poor return for her devotion, conjoined with the sincere desire to retain her company, that had influenced him in the offer she had been too wise and too genuinely loving to accept. he did not fall into any depths of self-blame, for, whatever its kind, his love was of quality pure and good. the only bitterness his offer bore was its justification of agnes's departure. but grizzie saw no justification of it anywhere. "what i'm to du wantin' her, i div not ken. no becomin', quo' he, for a lass like her to bide wi' a bachelor like himsel'! "h'ard ever onybody sic styte! as gien she had been a lady forsooth! i micht wi' jist as muckle sense objec' to bidin' wi' him mysel'! but is' du what i like, an' lat fowk say 'at they like, sae lang as i'm na fule i' my ain e'en!" "i'm ower white, mr. gled, for you. ow na! ye're no that, bonny doo." but by degrees cosmo grew gently ashamed of himself that he had so addressed agnes. he saw in the thing a failure in respect, a wrong to her dignity. that she had taken it so sweetly did not alter its character. seeming at the time to himself to be going against the judgment of the world, and treating it with the contempt it always more or less deserves, he had in reality been acting in no small measure according to it! for had there not been in him a vague condescension operant all the time? had he not been all but conscious of the feeling that his position made up for any want in his love? had she been conventionally a lady, instead of an angel in peasant form, would he have been so ready to return her kindness with an offer of marriage? there was little conceit in supposing that some, even of higher position than his own, would have accepted the offer on lower terms; but knowing aggie as he did, he ought not to have made it to her: she was too large and too fine for such an experiment. this he now fully understood; and had he not been brought up with her from childhood as with an elder sister, she might even now have begun to be a formidable rival to the sweet memories of joan's ladyhood. for he saw in her that which is at the root, not only of all virtue, but of all beauty, of all grandeur, of all growth, of all attraction. every charm--in its essence, in its development, in its embodiment, is a flower of the tree of life, whose root is the truth. i see the smile of the shallow philosopher, thinking of a certain lady to him full of charm, who has no more love for the truth than a mole for the light. but that lady's charm does not spring out of her; it has been put upon her, and she will soon destroy it. it comes of truth otherwhere, and will one day leave her naked and not lovely. the truth was in agnes merely supreme. to have asked such a one to marry him for reasons lower than the highest was good ground for shame. not therefore even then was he painfully ashamed, for he felt safe with agnes, as with the elder sister that pardons everything. it was some little time before they had any news of her; but they heard at last that she had rented grannie's cottage from her grand-daughter, her own aunt, and was going to have a school there for young children. cosmo was greatly pleased, for the work would give scope to some of her highest gifts and best qualities, while it would keep her within reach of possible service. nothing however can part those who are of the true mind towards the things that are. cosmo betook himself heartily to study, and not only read but wrote regularly every day--no more with the design of printing, but in the hope of shaping more thoroughly and so testing more truly his contemplations and conclusions. i scorn the idea that a man cannot think without words, but cosmo thus improved his thinking, and learned to utter accurately, that is, to say the thing he meant, and keep from saying the thing he did not mean. the room over the kitchen, which had first in his memory been his grandmother's, then became his own, and returned to his disposal when james gracie died, he made his study; and from it to the drawing-room, with the assistance of a village mason, excavated a passage--for it was little less than excavation--in the wall connecting the two blocks, under the passage in which had lain the treasure. the main issue grizzie's new command of money found was in a torrent of cleaning. if she could have had her way, i think she would have put up scaffolds all over the outside of the house, and scrubbed it down from chimneys to foundations. on the opposite side of the warlock river, the laird rented a meadow, and there grizzie had the long disused satisfaction of seeing two cows she could call hers, the finest cows in the country, feeding with a vague satisfaction in the general order of things. the stable housed a horse after cosmo's own heart, on which he made excursions into the country round, partly in the hope of coming upon some place not too far off where there was land to be bought. all that was known of the change in his circumstances was that he had come into a large fortune by the death--date not mentioned--of a relative with whom his father had not for years had communication, and cosmo never any. lord lick-my-loof, after repeated endeavours to get some information about this relative, was perplexed, and vaguely suspicious. how the spending of the money thus committed to him was to change the earthly issues of his life, cosmo had not yet learned, and was waiting for light on the matter. for a man is not bound to walk in the dark, neither must, for the sake of doing something, run the risk of doing wrong. he that believeth shall not make haste; and he that believeth not shall come no speed. he had nothing of the common mammonistic feeling of the enormous importance of money, neither felt that it laid upon him a heavier weight of duty than any other of the gifts of god. and if a poet is not bound to rush into the world with his poem, surely a rich man is not bound to rush into the world with his money. rather set a herd of wild horses loose in a city! a man must know first how to use his money, before he begin to spend it. and the way to use money is not so easily discovered as some would think, for it is not one of god's ready means of doing good. the rich man as such has no reason to look upon himself as specially favoured. he has reason to think himself specially tried. jesus, loving a certain youth, did him the greatest kindness he had in his power, telling him to give his wealth to the poor, and follow him in poverty. the first question is not how to do good with money, but how to keep from doing harm with it. whether rich or poor, a man must first of all do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with his god; then, if he be rich, god will let him know how to spend. there must be ways in which, even now, a man may give the half, or even the whole of his goods to the poor, without helping the devil. cosmo, i repeat, was in no haste: it is not because of god's poverty that the world is so slowly redeemed. not the most righteous expenditure of money will save it, but that of life and soul and spirit--it may be, to that, of nerve and muscle, blood and brain. all these our lord spent--but no money. therefore i say, that of all means for saving the world, or doing good, as it is called, money comes last in order, and far behind. out of the loneliness in which his father left him, grew a great peace and new strength. more real than ever was the other world to him now. his father could not have vanished like a sea-bubble on the sand! to have known a great man--perhaps i do not mean such a man as my reader may be thinking of--is to have some assurance of immortality. one of the best of men said to me once that he did not feel any longing after immortality, but, when he thought of certain persons, he could not for a moment believe they had ceased. he had beheld the lovely, believed therefore in the endless. castle warlock was scarcely altered in appearance. in its worst poverty it had always looked dignified. there was more life about it and freedom, but not so much happiness. the diamonds had come, but his father was gone, aggie was gone, mr. simon was going, and joan would not come! cosmo had scarce a hope for this world; yet not the less did he await the will of the will. what that was, time would show, for god works in time. chapter lxi. the third harvest. as the days went by, cosmo saw his engagement to mr. henderson drawing near, nor had the smallest inclination to back out of it. the farmer would have let him off at once, no doubt, but he felt, without thinking, that it would be undignified, morally speaking, to avoid, because he was now in plenty, the engagement granted by friendship to his need. nor was this all, for, so doing, he would seem to allow that, driven by necessity, he had undertaken a thing unworthy, or degrading; for cosmo would never have allowed that any degree of hunger could justify a poor man in doing a thing disgraceful to a rich man. no true man will ever ask of fellow creature, man or woman, on terms however extravagant, the doing of a thing he could not do himself without a sense of degradation. there is no leveller like christianity--but it levels by lifting to a lofty table-land, accessible only to humility. he only who is humble can rise, and rising lift. in thus holding to what he had undertaken, a man of lower nature might have had respect to the example he would so give: cosmo thought only of honourable and grateful fulfilment of his contract. not only would it have been a poor return for mr. henderson's kindness to treat his service as something beneath him now, but, worst of all, it would have been to accept ennoblement at the hands of mammon, as of a power able to alter his station in god's world. to change the spirit of one's ways because of money, is to confess onesself a born slave, a thing of outsides, a knight of riches, with a maggot for his crest. when the time came, therefore, cosmo presented himself. with a look of astonishment shadowed by disappointment, the worthy farmer held out his hand. "laird," he said, "i didna expec' you!" "what for no?" returned cosmo. "haena i been yer fee'd man for months!" "ye put me in a kin' o' a painfu' doobt, laird. fowk tellt me ye had fa'en heir til a sicht o' siller!" "but allooin', hoo sud that affec' my bargain wi' you mr. henderson? siller i' the pooch canna tak obligation frae the back." "drivin' things to the wa', nae doobt!" returned the farmer. "i micht certainly hae ta'en the law o' ye, failin' yer appearance. but amo' freen's, that cudna be; an' 'deed, mr. warlock, gien a body wad be captious, michtna he say it wad hae been mair freen'ly to beg aff?" "a bargain's a bargain," answered cosmo; "an' to beg aff o' ane 'cause i was nae langer i' the same necessity as whan i made it, wad hae been a mere shame. gien my father hed been wi' me, an' no weel eneuch to like me oot o' 's sicht, i wad hae beggit aff fest eneuch, but wi' no rizzon it wad hae been ill-mainnert, no to say dishonest an' oongratefu'. gien ye hae spoken to ony ither i' my place, he s' hae the fee, an' is' hae the wark. lat things stan', mr. henderson." "laird!" answered the farmer, not a little moved, "there's no a man i wad raither see at my wark nor yersel'. a' o' them, men an' women, work the better whan ye're amo' them. they wad be affrontit no to haud up wi' a gentleman! sae come awa' an' walcome!--ye'll tak something afore we fa'tu?" cosmo accepted a jug of milk, half cream, from the hand of elsie. the girl was much improved, having partially unlearned a good deal of the nonsense gathered at school, and come to take a fair share with her sisters in the work of the house and farm--enlightened thereto doubtless by her admiration for cosmo. it is not from those they marry people always learn most. when cosmo reached the end of the first bout, and stood to sharpen his scythe, he was startled to see, a little way off, gathering after one of the scythes, a form he could not mistake. she had known he would keep his troth! she did not look up, but he knew her figure and every motion of it too well to take her for another than aggie. that she thus exposed herself to misrepresentation, aggie was well enough aware, but with the knowledge of how things stood between her and cosmo, she was far above heeding the danger. those who do the truth are raised even above defying the world. defiance betrays a latent respect, but aggie gave herself no more trouble about the opinion of the world than that of a lower animal. those who are of the world may defy, but they cannot ignore it. she had declined being a party to cosmo's marrying his mother, but was not therefore prepared to expose him undefended to any one whatever who might wish to take him, even should she be of age unobjectionable; and she knew one who would at least be hampered by no scruples arising from conscious unfitness. agnes might well have thought it better he should marry the cottar's than the farmer's daughter! anyhow she was resolved to keep an eye on the young woman so long as cosmo was within her swoop. he was chivalrous and credulous, and who could tell what elsie might not dare! her refusal to be his wife did not deprive her of antecedent rights. and there she was, gathering behind cosmo, as two years ago! the instant she was free, aggie set out for home, not having exchanged a word with cosmo, but intending to linger on the way in the hope of his overtaking her. the hendersons would have had him stay the night, but he had given his man orders to wait him with his horse at a certain point on the road; and aggie had not gone far before he got up with her. whatever was or had been the state of her feelings towards cosmo, she had never mistaken his towards her; neither had she failed to see that his heart was nowise wounded by her refusal of his offer: it would have been a little comfort to her, having to be severe with herself, to see some sign of suffering in him, but she had got over much, and now was nowise annoyed at the cheery unembarrassed tone in which he called out when he saw her, and turning greeted him with the same absence of constraint. "an' sae ye're gaein' to tak the bairnies un'er yer wing, aggie!" said cosmo, as they walked along. "they're lucky little things 'at'll gang to your schuil! what pat it i' yer heid?" "mr. simon advised it," answered aggie; "but i believe i pat it in his heid first, sayin' hoo little was dune for the bairnies jist at the time they war easiest to guide. rouch wark maks the han's rouch, and rouch words maks the hert rouch." "the haill country-side 'ill be gratefu' to ye, aggie.--ye'll lat me come an' see ye whiles?" "nane sae welcome," answered aggie. "but wull ye be bidin' on, noo 'at ye haena him 'at's gane? winna ye be gaein' awa', to write buiks, an' gar fowk fin' oot what's the maitter wi' them?" "i dinna ken what i'm gaein' to du," answered cosmo. "but for writin' buiks, i could do that better at hame nor ony ither gait, wi' a'thing min'in' me o' my father, an' you nearhan' to gie me coonsel." "i hae aye been yours to comman', cosmo," replied aggie, looking down for one moment, then immediately up again in his face. "an' ye're no angert wi' me, aggie?" _"angert!"_ repeated aggie, and looked at him with a glow angelic in her honest, handsome face, and her eyes as true as the heavens. "it was only 'at ye didna ken what ye war aboot, an' bein' sae muckle yoonger nor mysel', i was b'un' to tak care o' ye; for a wuman as weel's a man maun be her brither's keeper. ye see yersel' i was richt!" "ay was ye, aggie," answered cosmo, ashamed and almost vexed at having to make the confession. he did not see the heave of aggie's bosom, nor how she held back and broke into nothing the sigh that would have followed. "but," she resumed, after a moment's pause, "a' lasses michtna ken sae weel what was fittin' them, nor care sae muckle what was guid for you; naebody livin' can ken ye as i du! an' gien ye war to lat a lass think ye cared aboot her--it micht be but as a freen', but she micht be sae ta'en' wi' ye--'at--'at maybe she micht gar ye think 'at hoo she cudna live wantin' ye--an' syne, what ye du than, cosmo?" it was a situation in which cosmo had never imagined himself, and he looked at aggie a little surprised. "i dinna freely un'erstan' ye," he said. "na, i reckon no! hoo sud ye! ye're jist ower semple for this warl', cosmo! but i'll put it plainer:--what wad ye du gien a lass was to fa' a greitin', an' a wailin', an' fling hersel' i' yer airms, an' mak as gien she wad dee?--what wad ye du wi' her, cosmo?" "'deed i dinna ken," replied cosmo with some embarrassment. "what wad ye hae me du, aggie?" "i wad hae ye set her doon whaur ye stude, gien upo' the ro'd, than upo' the dyke, gien i' the hoose, than upo' the nearest chair, and tak to yer legs an' rin. bide na to tak yer bonnet, but rin an' rin till ye're better nor sure she can never win up wi' ye. an' specially gien the name o' the lass sud begin wi' an' e an' gang on till an l, i wad hae ye rin as gien the auld captain was efter ye." "i hae had sma' occasion," said cosmo, "to rin fra him." and therewith, partly to change the subject, for he now understood aggie, and did not feel it right to talk about any girl as if she could behave in the manner supposed, partly because he had long desired an opportunity of telling her, he began, and gave her the whole history of the discovery of the diamonds, omitting nothing, even where the tale concerned lady joan. before he got to the end of it, they were at the place where the man was waiting with his horse, and as that was the place where aggie had to turn off to go to muir o' warlock, there they parted. chapter lxii. a duet, trio, and quartet. the next day things went much the same, only that elsie was not in the field. cosmo, who had been thinking much over what aggie had said, and was not flattered that she should take him for the goose he did not know himself to be, could hardly wait for the evening to have another talk with her. "aggie," he said, as he overtook her in a hollow not many yards from the verge of the farm, "i dinna like ye to think me sic a gowk! what gars ye suppose a lass could hae her wull o' me in sic a w'y 's you? no 'at i believe ony lass wad behave like that! it's no like yersel' to fancy sae ill o' yer ain kin'! i'm sure ye didna discover thae things i' yerain hert! there's nae sic a lass." "what maitter whether there be sic a lass or no, sae lang as gien there was ane, she wad be ower muckle for ye?" "that's ower again what i'm compleenin' o'! an' gien it war onybody but yersel' 'at has a richt, i wad be angry, aggie." "cosmo," said agnes solemnly, "ye're ower saft-hertit to the women-fowk. i do believe--an' i tell ye't again in as mony words--ye wad merry onylass raither nor see her in trible on your accoont." "ance mair, aggie, what gies ye a richt to think sae ill o' me?" demanded cosmo. "jist the w'y ye behaved to mysel'." "ye never tellt me ye couldna du wantin' me!" "i houp no, for it wadna hae been true. i can du wantin' ye weel eneuch. but ye allooed ye wasna richt!" "ay--it was a presumption." "ay! but what made it a presumption?" cosmo could not bear to say plainly to the girl he loved so much, that he had not loved her so as to have a right to ask her to marry him. he hesitated. "ye didna loe me eneuch," said aggie, looking up in his face. "aggie," returned cosmo, "i'm ready to merry ye the morn gien ye'll hae me!" "there noo!" exclaimed aggie, in a sort of provoked triumph, "didna i tell ye! there ye are, duin' 't a' ower again! wasna i richt? ye're fit to tak care o' onybody but yersel'--an' the lass 'at wad fain hae ye! eh, but sair ye need a sensible mitherly body like mysel' to luik efter ye!" "tak me, than, an' luik efter me at yer wull, aggie; i mean what i say!" persisted cosmo, bewildered with embarrassment and a momentary stupidity. "ance mair, cosmo, dinna be a gowk," said agnes with severity. "ye loe me ower little, an' i loe you ower muckle for that." "ye're no angry at me, aggie?" said cosmo, almost timidly. "angry at ye, my bonny lad!" cried aggie, and looking up with a world of tenderness in her eyes, and a divine glow of affection, for hers was the love so sure of itself that it maketh not ashamed, she threw her two strong, shapely honest arms round his neck; he bent his head, she kissed him heartily on the mouth, and burst into tears. surely but for that other love that lay patient and hopeless in the depth of cosmo's heart, he would now have loved aggie in a way to satisfy her, and to justify him in saying he loved her! and to that it might have come in time, but where is the use of saying what might have been, when all things are ever moving towards the highest and best for the individual as well as for the universe! --not the less that hell may be the only path to it for some--the hell of an absolute self-loathing. just at that moment, who should appear on the top of a broken mound of the moorland, where she stood in the light of the setting sun, but elsie, neatly dressed, glowing and handsome! a moment she stood, then descended, a dark scorn shadowing in her eyes, and a smile on her mouth showing the whitest of teeth. "mr. warlock," she said, and took no notice of his humble companion, "my father sent me after you in a hurry as you may see," --and she heaved a deep breath--"to say he doesn't think the bear o' the gowan brae,'ill be fit for cutting this two days, an' they'll gang to the corn upo' the heuch instead. he was going to tell you himself, but ye was in such a hurry!" "i'm muckle obleeged to ye, miss elsie," replied cosmo. "it'll save me a half-mile i' the mornin'." "an' my father says," resumed elsie, addressing agnes, "yer wark's no worth yer wages." aggie turned upon her with flashing eyes and glowing face. "i dinna believe ye, miss elsie," she said. "i dinna believe yer father said ever sic a word. he kens my wark's worth my wages whatever he likes to set me til. mair by token he wad hae tellt me himsel'! i s' jist gang straucht back an' speir." she turned, evidently in thorough earnest, and set off at a rapid pace back towards the house. cosmo glanced at elsie. she had turned white--with the whiteness of fear, not of wrath. she had not expected such action on the part of aggie. she would be at once found out! her father was a man terrible in his anger, and her conscience told her he would be angry indeed, angrier than she had ever seen him! she stood like a statue, her eyes fixed on the retreating form of the indignant agnes, who reached the top of the rising ground, and was beginning to disappear, before the spell of her terror gave way. she turned with clasped hands to cosmo, and murmured, her white lips hardly able to fashion the words, "mr. warlock, for god's sake, cry her back. dinna lat her gang to my father." "was the thing ye said no true?" asked cosmo. "weel," faltered elsie, searching inside for some escape from admission, "maybe he didna jist say the verra words,--" "aggie maun gang," interrupted cosmo. "she maunna lat it pass." "it was a lee! it was a lee!" gasped elsie. cosmo ran, and from the top of the rise called aloud, "aggie! aggie! come back." beyond her he saw another country girl approaching, but took little heed of her. aggie turned at his call, and came to him quickly. "she confesses it's a lee, aggie," he said. "she wadna, gien she hadna seen i was gaein' straucht til her father!" returned agnes. "i daursay; but god only kens hoo to mak the true differ 'atween what we du o' oorsel's, an' what we're gart. we maun hae mercy, an' i' the meantime she's ashamed eneuch. at least she has the luik o' 't." "it's ae thing to be ashamed 'cause ye hae dune wrang, an' anither to be ashamed 'cause ye're f'un' oot!" "ay; but there compassion comes in to fill up; an' whan ye treat a body wi' generosity, the hert wauks up to be worthy o' 't." "cosmo, ye ken maist aboot the guid in fowk, an' i ken maist aboot the ill," said aggie. here the young woman who had been nearing them scarce observed while they talked, came up, and they turning to go back to elsie, where she still stood motionless, followed them at her own pace behind. "i beg yer pardon, aggie," said elsie, holding out her hand. "i was ill-natert, an' said the thing wasna true. my father says there isna a better gatherer i' the countryside nor yersel'." aggie took her offered hand and said, "lat by-ganes be by-ganes. be true to me an' i'll be true to you. an' i winna lee whether or no." here the stranger joined them. she was a young woman in the garb of a peasant, but with something about her not belonging to the peasant. to the first glance she was more like a superior servant out for a holiday, but a second glance was bewildering. she stopped with a half timid but quiet look, then dropped her eyes with a flush. "will you please tell me if i am on the way to castle warlock?" she said, with a quiver about her mouth which made her like a child trying not to smile. cosmo had been gazing at her: she reminded him very strangely of joan; but the moment he heard her voice, which was as different from that of a scotch peasant as tennyson's verse is from that of burns, he gave a cry, and was on his knees before her. "joan!" he gasped, and seizing her hand, drew it to his lips, and held it there. she made no sound or movement. her colour went and came. her head drooped. she would have fallen, but cosmo received her, and rising with her, as one might with a child in his arms, turned, and began to walk swiftly homeward. aggie had a short fierce struggle with her rising heart, then turned to elsie, and said quietly, "ye see we're no wantit!" "i see," returned elsie. "but eh! she's a puir cratur." "no sae puir!" answered aggie. "wad ye dress up like a gran' leddy to gang efter yer yoong man?" "ay wad i--fest eneuch!" answered elsie with scorn. aggie saw her mistake. "did ye tak notice o' her han's?" she said. "no, i didna." "ye never saw sic han's! did ye tak notice o' her feet?" "no, i didna." "ye never saw sic feet! yon's ane 'at canna gather, nor stock, nor bin', but she's bonny a' throu', an' her v'ice is a sang, an' she'll gang throu' fire an' waiter ohn blinkit for her love's sake. yon's the lass for oor laird! the like o' you an' me sud trible heid nor hert aboot the likes o' him." "speyk for yersel', lass," said elsie. "i tellt ye," returned aggie, quietly but with something like scorn, "'at gien ye wad be true to me, i wad be true to you; but gie yersel' airs, an' i say guid nicht, an' gang efter my fowk." she turned and departed, leaving elsie more annoyed than repentant: it may take a whole life to render a person capable of shame, not to say sorrow, for the meanest thing of many he has done. and now, aggie's heart lying stone-like within her as she followed cosmo with his treasure, her brain was alive and active for his sake. joan was herself again, cosmo had set her down, and they were walking side by side. "what are they going to do?" thought aggie. "are they going straight home together? why does she come now the old laird is gone?" such and many other questions she kept asking herself in her carefulness over cosmo. they passed the turning aggie would have taken to go home; she passed it too, following them steadily.--that old grizzie was no good! she must go home with them herself! if the reason for which she left the castle was a wise one, she must now, for the same reason, go back to it! those two must not be there with nobody to make them feel comfortable and taken care of! they must not be left to feel awkward together! she must be a human atmosphere about them, to shield them, and make home for them! love itself may be too lonely. it needs some reflection of its too lavish radiation. --this was practically though not altogether in form what agnes thought. in the meantime, the first whelming joy-wave having retired, and life and thought resumed their operations, they had begun to talk. "where have you come from?" asked cosmo. "from cairntod, the place i came from that wild winter night," answered joan. "but you are. . . . when were you. . . . how long. . . . have you been married?" "married!" echoed joan. "cosmo, how could you!" she looked up in his face wild and frightened. "well, you never wrote! and--" "it was you never wrote!" "_i_ did not, but my father did, and got no answer." "i wrote again and again, and begged for an answer, but none came. if it hadn't been for the way i dreamed about you, i don't know what would have become of me!" "the devil has been at old tricks, joan!" "doubtless--and i fear i have hardly to discover his agent." "and mr. jermyn?" said cosmo, with a look half shy, half fearful, as if after all some bolt must be about to fall. "i can tell you very little about him. i have scarcely seen him since he brought me the money." "then he didn't. . . . ?" "well, what didn't he?" "i have no right to ask." "ask me anything." "didn't he ask you to marry him?" joan laughed. "i had begun to be afraid he had something of the kind in his head, when all at once i saw no more of him." "how was that?" "i can only guess: he may have spoken to my brother, and that was enough." "didn't you miss him?" "life was a little duller." "if he had asked you to marry him, joan?" "well?" "would you?" "cosmo!" "you told me i might ask you anything!" she stood, turned to the roadside, and sat down on the low earth-dyke. her face was white. "joan! joan!" cried cosmo, darting to her side; "what is it, joan?" "nothing; only a little faintness. i have walked a long way and am getting tired." "what a brute i am!" said cosmo, "to let you walk! i will carry you again." "indeed you will not!" she answered, moving a little from him. "do you think you could ride on a man's saddle?" "i think so. i could well enough if i were not tired. but let me be quiet a little." they were very near the place where cosmo's horse must be waiting him. he ran to take him and send the groom home with a message. to joan it was a terrible moment. had she, most frightful of thoughts! been acting on a holy faith that yet had no foundation? she had come to a man who asked her whether she would not have married his friend! she had taken so much for understood that had not been understood! when joan sat down agnes stopped--a good way off: till the moment of service arrived she would be nothing. several times she started to run to her, for she feared something had gone wrong, but checked herself lest she should cause more mischief by interfering. when she saw her sink sideways on the dyke, she did run, but seeing cosmo hurrying back to her, stopped again. before cosmo reached her joan had sat up. the same faith, or perhaps rather hope, which had taken shape in her dreams, now woke to meet the necessity of the hour. she rose as cosmo came near, saying she felt better now, and let him put her on the horse. but now joan was determined to face the worst, to learn her position and know what she must do. "has the day not come yet, cosmo?" she said. "cannot you now tell me why you left me so suddenly?" "it may come with your answer to the question i put to you," replied cosmo. "you are cruel, cosmo!" "am i? how? i do not understand." this was worse and worse, and joan grew rather more than almost angry. it is so horrid when the man you love will be stupid! she turned her face away, and was silent. a man must sometimes take his life in his hand, and at the risk of even unpardonable presumption, suppose a thing yielded, that he may know whether it be or not. but cosmo was something of the innocent aggie took him for. "joan, i don't see how i am wrong, after the permission you gave me," persisted he, too modest. "agnes would have answered me straight out." he forgot. "how do you know that? what have you ever asked her?" joan, for one who refused an answer, was tolerably exacting in her questions. and as she spoke she moved involuntarily a step farther from him. "i asked her to marry me," replied cosmo. "you asked her to marry you!" "yes, but she wouldn't." "why wouldn't she?" joan's face was now red as fire, and she was biting her lip hard. "she had more reasons against it than one. oh, joan, she is so good!" "and you are going to marry her?" instead of answering her question, cosmo turned and called to agnes, some thirty yards behind them: "come here, aggie." agnes came quickly. "tell lady joan," he said, "what for ye wadna merry me." "'deed, my lady," said agnes, her face also like a setting sun, "ye may believe onything he tells ye, jist as gien it war gospel. he disna ken hoo to mak a lee." "i know that as well as you," replied lady joan. "na, ye canna du that,'cause ye haena kent him sae lang." "will you tell me why you would not marry him?" "for ae thing,'cause he likit you better nor me, only he thoucht ye was merried, an' he didna like lattin' me gang frae the hoose." "thank you, agnes," said joan, with a smile nothing less than heavenly. "he was so obstinate!" and with that she slipped from the saddle, threw her arms round aggie's neck, and kissed her. aggie returned her embrace with simple truth, then drawing gently away, said, putting her hand before her eyes as if she found the sun too strong, "it's verra weel for you, my lady; but it's some sair upo' me; for i tellt him he sudna merry his mither, an' ye're full as auld as i am." joan gave a sigh. "i am a year older, i believe," she answered, "but i cannot help it. nor would i if i could, for three years ago i was still less worthy of him than i am now; and after all it is but a trifle." "na, my leddy, it's no a trifle, only some fowk carry their years better nor ithers." here cosmo set joan up again, and a full explanation followed between them, neither thinking of suppression because of aggie's presence. she would indeed have fallen behind again, but joan would not let her, so she walked side by side with them, and amongst the rest of the story heard cosmo tell how he had yielded joan because poor jermyn loved her. agnes both laughed and cried as she listened, and when cosmo ceased, threw her arms once more around him, saying, "cosmo, ye're worth it a'!" then releasing him, turned to joan and said, "my lady, i dinna grudge him to ye a bit. noo 'at he's yours, an' a' 's come roon' as it sud, i'll be mysel' again--an' that ye'll see! but ye'll mak allooance, my lady; for ye hae a true hert, an' maun ken 'at whan a wuman sees a man beirin' a'thing as gien it was naething,'maist like a god, no kennin' he's duin' onything by or'nar,' she can no more help loein' him nor the mither 'at bore her, or the god 'at made her. an' mair, my lady, i mean to loe him yet; but, as them 'at god has j'ined man nor wuman maunna sun'er, i winna pairt ye even in my min'; whan i think o' the tane, it'll be to think o' the tither, an' the love 'at gangs to him 'ill aye rin ower upo' you--forby what i beir ye on yer ain accoont. noo ye'll gang on thegither again, an' i'll come ahin'." it was now to aggie as if they were all dead and in the blessed world together, only she had brought with her an ache which it would need time to tune. all pain is discord. "ye see, my lady," she said, as she turned aside and sat down on the bordering turf, "i hae been a mither til 'im!" who will care to hear further explanation!--how joan went to visit distant relatives who had all at once begun to take notice of her; how she had come with them, more gladly than they knew, on a visit to cairntod; and how such a longing seized her there that, careless of consequences, she donned a peasant's dress and set out for castle warlock; how she had lost her way, and was growing very uneasy when suddenly she saw cosmo before her! "but what am i to do now, cosmo?" she said. "what account of myself can i give my people?" "you can tell them you met an old lover, and finding him now a rich man, like a prudent woman, consented at once to marry him." "i must not tell a story." "pray who asks you to tell a story?" "you do, telling me to say i have a rich lover." "i do not. i am rich." "not in money?" "yes, in money." "why didn't you tell me before?" "i forgot. how could i think of riches with you filling up all the thinking-place!" "but what am i to do to-night?" "to-night?--oh!--i hadn't thought of that!--we'll ask aggie." so aggie was once more called, and consulted. she thought for a minute, then said,-- "cosmo, as sune's ye're hame, ye'll sen' yer manstrauchtawa'upo'the horse to lat my lady's fowk ken. she better write them a bit letter, an' tell them she's fa'en in wi' an auld acquaintance, a lass ca'd agnes gracie, a dacent yoong wuman, an' haein' lost her ro'd an' bein' unco tired, she's gaein' hame wi' her to sleep; an' the laird o' glenwarlock was sae kin' 's to sen' his man upo' his horse to cairry the letter. that w'y there'll be nae lees tellt, an' no ower muckle o' the trowth." cosmo began to criticise, but joan insisted it should be as aggie said. when they arrived at the castle, grizzie was not a little scandalized to see her young master with a country lass on his horse, and making so much of her. but when she came to understand who she was, and that she had dressed up to get the easier to castle warlock she was filled with approbation even to delight. "eh, but ye're a lass to mak a man prood! i cudna hae dune better mysef' gien i had been a gran' lady wi' a' the wits o' a puir wife! sit ye doon, my lady, an' be richt walcome! eh, but ye're bonny, as ever was ony! an' eh, but ye're steady as never was leddy! may the lord bless ye, an' the laird kiss ye!" this outbreak of benediction rather confused cosmo, but joan laughed merrily, being happy as a child. aggie turned her face to grizzie in dread of more; but the true improviser seldom, i fancy, utters more than six lines. they had supper, and then a cart came rumbling to the door, half full of straw, into which joan got with aggie. a few things the latter had borrowed of grizzie to help make the former comfortable, were handed in and they set out for muir o' warlock. in the morning lady joan declared she had never slept better than in old grannie's box-bed. they were married almost immediately, and nobody's leave asked. cosmo wrote to acquaint lord mergwain with the event, and had in return, from his lordship's secretary, an acknowledgment of the receipt of his letter. of what they had to tell each other, of the way they lived, of how blessed they were even when not altogether happy--of these matters i say nothing, leaving them to the imagination of him who has any, while for him who has none i grudge the labour, thinking too he would very likely rather hear how much cosmo got for his diamonds, and whether, if lord mergwain should not marry, cairncarque will come to lady joan. but such things even he is capable of employing his fancy upon, and it would be a pity to prevent him from doing what he can. i will close my book with a little poem that cosmo wrote--not that night, but soon after. the poet may, in the height of joy, give out an extempore flash or two, but he writes no poem then. the joy must have begun to be garnered, before the soul can sing about it. how we shall sing when we absolutely believe that our life is hid with christ in god! here is my spiritual colophon. all things are shadows of thee, lord; the sun himself is but a shade; my soul is but the shadow of thy word, a candle sun-bedayed! diamonds are shadows of the sun; they drink his rays and show a spark: my soul some gleams of thy great shine hath won, and round me slays the dark. all knowledge is but broken shades-- in gulfs of dark a wandering horde: together rush the parted glory-grades-- and lo, thy garment, lord! my soul, the shadow, still is light, because the shadow falls from thee; i turn, dull candle, to the centre bright, and home flit shadowy. shine, shine; make me thy shadow still-- the brighter still the more thy shade; my motion be thy lovely moveless will i my darkness, light delayed! (the end.) legendary tales of the highlands. a sequel to highland rambles. by sir thomas dick lauder, bart. author of "lochandhu," "the wolfe of badenoch," "the moray floods," etc. in three volumes. volume ii. london: henry colburn, publisher, great marlborough street. m.dccc.xli. contents of the second volume. page the legend of charley stewart tÀillear-crubach, a tempest, the legend, &c.--continued, an unwelcome visitor, the legend, &c.--continued, an old friend with a new face, the legend, &c.--continued, the author floored, a day bad for one thing may be very good for another, origin of the name of inchrory, comforts of a fireside, illustrations. the better part of valour is discretion, the howlet, highland rambles. the legend of charley stewart tÀillear-crubach. there is a long, low, flat-topped, and prettily wooded eminence, that rises out of the middle of the bonny haughs of kilmaichly, at some distance below the junction of the rivers aven and livat. i don't remember that it has any particular name, but it looks, for all the world, like the fragment of some ancient plain, that must have been of much higher level than that from which it now rises, which fragment had been left, after the ground on each side of it had been worn down to its present level, by the changeful operations of the neighbouring streams. but whatever you geology gentlemen might say, as to what its origin might have been, every lover of nature must agree, that it is a very beautiful little hill, covered as its slopes are with graceful weeping birches, and other trees. the bushes that still remain, show that, in earlier times, it must have been thickly wooded with great oaks, which probably gave shelter to the ould auncient druids, when engaged in their superstitious mysteries. at the period to which the greater part of my story belongs--that is, in and about that of the reign of king james the iii.--the blue smoke that curled up from among the trees betrayed the existence of a cottage, that sat perched upon the brow of its western extremity, looking towards the castle of drummin. this little dwelling was much better built, and, in every respect, much neater than any of those in the surrounding district; and its interior exhibited more comforts as to furniture and plenishing of all sorts, and those too of a description, superior to any thing of the kind which a mere cottager might have been reasonably expected to have possessed. the inhabitants of this snug little dwelling were, a very beautiful woman, of some four or five and twenty years of age, named alice asher, and her son, a handsome noble looking boy, who, from certain circumstances affecting his birth, bore the name of charles stewart. there was a well doing and brave retainer of the house of clan-allan, called macdermot, who had lived a little way up in glen livat, and who, for several years, had done good service to the sir walter stewart, who was then chieftain of the clan, as son and heir of that sir patrick whom my last legend left so happily married to the lady catherine forbes, and quietly settled at drummin. this man macdermot died bravely in a skirmish, leaving a widow and an infant daughter. it happened that some few months after the death of her husband, the good woman bessy macdermot went out to shear one of those small patches of wretched corn, which were then to be seen, almost as a wonder, scattered here and there, in these upland glens, and which belonged in run-rig, or in alternate ridges, to different owners, being so disposed, as you probably know gentlemen, that all might have an equal interest, and consequently an equal inducement, to assemble for its protection in the event of the sudden appearance of an enemy. charley stewart, then a fine, kind-hearted boy of some nine or ten years of age, had taken a great affection for the little rosa, the child of bessy macdermot; and this circumstance had induced the mother to ask permission of alice asher, to be allowed to take her son with her on this occasion to the harvest-field, that, whilst she went on with her work, he might watch the infant. charley was delighted with his employment; and accordingly she laid the babe carefully down by him to leeward of one of the stooks of sheaves. many an anxious glance did the fond mother throw behind her, as the onward progress of her work slowly but gradually increased her distance from charley and his precious charge. the thoughts of her bereft and widowed state saddened her heart, and made it heavy, and rendered her eyes so moist from time to time, that ever and anon she was compelled to rest for an instant from her labour, in order to wipe away the tears with her sleeve. her little rosa was now all the world to her. the anxiety regarding the child which possessed her maternal bosom was always great; but, at the present moment, she had few fears about her safety, for, ever as she looked behind her, she beheld charley stewart staunchly fixed at his post, and busily employed in trying to catch the attention of the infant, and to amuse it by plucking from the sheaves those gaudy flowered weeds, of various kinds and hues, which nature brought up everywhere so profusely among the grain, and which the rude and unlearned farmers of those early times took no pains to extirpate. whilst the parties were so occupied, the sun was shining brightly upon the new shorn stubble, that stretched away before the eyes of charley stewart, when its flat unbroken field of light was suddenly interrupted by a shadow that came sailing across it. he looked up into the air, and beheld a large bird hovering over him. inexperienced as he was, and by no means aware that its apparent size was diminished by the height at which it was flying, he took it for a kite, or a buzzard, and it immediately ceased to occupy his attention. round and round sailed the shadow upon the stubble, increasing in magnitude at every turn it made, but totally unheeded by the boy amid the interesting occupation in which he was engaged. at length a loud shriek reached him from the very farther end of the ridge. charley started up from his sitting position, and beheld bessy macdermot rushing towards him, tossing her arms, and screaming as if she were distracted. she was yet too far off from him to enable him to gather her words, amidst the alarm that now seized him; and, accordingly, believing that she had been stung by some viper, or that she had cut herself desperately with the reaping-hook, he abandoned his charge, and ran off to meet her, that he might the sooner render her assistance; but, by the time they had approached near enough to each other to enable him to catch up the import of her cries, he halted--for they made his little heart faint within him. "the eagle! the eagle!" wildly screamed bessy macdermot. "oh, my child! my child!" turning round hastily, charley stewart now saw that the very bird which he had so recently regarded with so little alarm, had now grown six times larger than he had believed it really to be. it was in the very act of swooping down upon the infant. charley ran towards the spot, mingling his shrieks with those of the frantic mother; but ere their feet had carried them over half the distance towards it, they heard the cries of the babe, as the fell eagle was flapping his broad wings, in his exertions to lift it from the ground; and, ere they could reach it, the bird was already flying, heavily encumbered with his burden, over the surface of the standing corn, from which he gradually rose, as his pinions gained more air, and greater way, till he finally soared upwards, and then held on his slow, but strong course, towards his nest in the neighbouring mountains. "oh, my babe! my babe!" cried the agonized bessy macdermot, her eyes starting from their very sockets, in her anxiety to keep sight of the object of her affections, and her terrors. but she did not follow it with her eyes alone. she paused not for a moment, but darted off through the standing corn, and over moor and moss, hill and heugh, and through woods, and rills, and bogs, in the direction which the eagle was taking, without once thinking of poor little charley stewart, who kept after her as hard as his active little legs could carry him; and, great as the distance was which they had to run, the eagle, impeded as he was in his flight by the precious burden he carried, was still within reach of the eyes of the panting and agonized mother, when a thinner part of the wood enabled her to see, from a rising ground, the cliff where he finally rested, and where he deposited the child in his nest, that was well known to hang on a ledge in the face of the rock, a little way down from its bare summit. on ran the frantic mother, with redoubled energy,--for she remembered that an old man lived by himself, in a little cot hard by the place, and she never rested till she sank down, faint and exhausted, at his door. "oh, peter, peter!--my baby, my baby!" was all she could utter, as the old man came hobbling out, to learn what was the matter. "what has mischanced your baby, mrs. macdermot?" demanded peter. "oh, the eagle! the eagle!" cried the distracted mother. "oh, my child! my child!" "holy saints be about us! has the eagle carried off your child?" cried peter, in horror. "och, yes, yes!" replied bessy. "oh my baby, my baby!" "st. michael be here!" exclaimed peter. "what can an old man like me do to help thee?" "ropes! ropes!" cried little charley stewart, who at this moment came up, so breathless and exhausted that he could hardly speak. "ropes!" said peter; "not a rope have i. there's a bit old hair-line up on the baulks there, to be sure, that my son donald used for stretching his hang-net; but it has been so much in the water, that i have some doubt if it would stand the weight of a man, even if we could get a man to go down over the nose of the craig;--and there is not a man but myself, that i know of, within miles of us." "you have forgotten me," cried charley stewart, who had now somewhat recovered his wind. "i will go down over the craig. come, then, peter!--get out your hair-line. it will not break with my weight." "by the rood but thou art a gallant little chield!" said peter. "oh, the blessings of the virgin on thee, my dearest charley!" cried bessy macdermot, embracing him. "and yet," added she, with hesitation, "why should i put alice asher's boy to such peril, even to save mine own child? oh, canst thou think of no other means? i cannot put charley stewart in peril." "nay," said peter, "i know of no means; and, in truth, the poor bairn is like enough to have been already half devoured by the young eagles." "merciful mother of god!" cried poor bessy, half fainting at the horrible thought. "oh, my baby, my baby!" "come, old man," cried charley stewart, with great determination, "we have no time to waste--we have lost too much already. where is the hair-line you spake of?--tut, i must seek for it myself;" and rushing into the cot, he leaped upon a table, made one spring at the rafters, and, catching hold of them, he hoisted himself up, gained a footing on them, and ran along them like a cat, till he found the great bundle of hair-line. "now," said he, throwing it down, and jumping after it; "come away, good peter, as fast as thy legs can carry thee." having reached the summit of the crag by a circuitous path, they could now descry the two eagles, to which the nest belonged, soaring aloft at a great distance. they looked over the brow of the cliff, as far as they could stretch with safety, but although old peter was so well acquainted with the place where the nest was built, as at once to be able to fix on the very spot whence the descent ought to be made, the verge of the rock there projected itself so far over the ledge where the nest rested, as to render it quite invisible from above. they could only perceive the thick sea of pine foliage that rose up the slope below, and clustered closely against the base of the precipice. a few small stunted fir trees grew scattered upon the otherwise bare summit where they stood. old peter sat himself down behind one of these, and placed a leg on each side of it, so as to secure himself from all chance of being pulled over the precipice by any sudden jerk, whilst charley's little fingers were actively employed in undoing the great bundle of hair-line, and in tying one end of it round his body, and under his armpits. the unhappy mother was now busily assisting the boy, and now moving restlessly about, in doubtful hesitation whether she should yet allow him to go down. now she was gazing at the distant eagles, and wringing her hands in terror lest they should return to their nest; and torn as she was between her cruel apprehensions for her infant on the one hand, and her doubts and fears about charley stewart on the other, she ejaculated the wildest and most incoherent prayers to all the saints for the protection and safety of both. "now," said charley stewart at length; "i'm ready. keep a firm hold, peter, and lower me gently." "stay, stay, boy!" cried the old man. "stick my skian dhu into your hoe. if the owners of the nest should come home, by the rood, but thou will't need some weapon to make thee in some sort a match for them, in the welcome they will assuredly give thee." charley stewart slipped the skian dhu into his hoe, and went boldly but cautiously over the edge of the cliff. he was no sooner fairly swung in air than the hair rope stretched to a degree so alarming that bessy macdermot stood upon the giddy verge, gnawing her very fingers, from the horrible dread that possessed her, that she was to see it give way and divide. peter sat astride against the root of the tree, carefully eyeing every inch of the line ere he allowed it to pass through his hands, and every now and then pausing--hesitating, and shaking his head most ominously, as certain portions of it, here and there, appeared to him to be of doubtful strength. meanwhile, charley felt himself gradually descending, and turning round and round at the end of the rope, by his own weight, his brave little heart beating, and his brain whirling, from the novelty and danger of his daring attempt--the screams of the young eagles sounding harshly in his ears, and growing louder and louder as he slowly neared them. by degrees he began distinctly to hear the faint cries of the child, and his courage and self-possession were restored to him, by the conviction that she was yet alive. in a few moments more he had the satisfaction to touch the ledge of rock with his toes, and he was at last enabled to relieve the rope from his weight, by planting himself upon its ample, but fearfully inclined surface. he shouted aloud, to make peter aware that the line had so far done its duty, and then he cautiously approached the nest, where, to his great joy, he found the infant altogether uninjured, except by a cross cut upon her left cheek, which she seemed to have received from some accidental movement of the beak or talons of one of the two eaglets, between which she had been deposited by the old eagle. had she not been placed between two so troublesome mates, and in a position so dangerous, nothing could have been more snug or easy than the bed in which the little rosa was laid. the nest was about two yards square. it was built on the widest and most level part of the ledge, and it was composed of great sticks, covered with a thick layer of heather, over which rushes were laid to a considerable depth. fortunately for the infant, the eaglets had been already full gorged ere she had been carried thither, and there yet lay beside them the greater part of the carcass of a lamb, and also a mountain hare, untouched, together with several moorfowl, and an immense quantity of bones and broken fragments of various animals. charley stewart did not consume much time in his examination of the nest. being at once satisfied that it would be worse than hazardous to trust the hair-line with the weight of the child, in addition to his own, he undid it from his body. approaching the nest, he gently lifted the crying infant from between its two screeching and somewhat pugnacious companions. the moment he had done so, the little innocent became quiet, and instantly recognising him, she held out her hands, and smiled and chuckled to him, at once oblivious of all her miseries. charley kissed his little favourite over and over again, and then he proceeded to tie the rope carefully around and across her, so as to guard against all possibility of its slipping. having accomplished this, he shouted to peter to pull away--kissed the little rosa once more, and then committed her to the vacant air. nothing could equal the anxiety he endured whilst he beheld her slowly rising upwards. and when he beheld the mother's hands appear over the edge of the rock, and snatch her from his sight, nothing could match the shout of delight which he gave. the maternal screams of joy which followed, and which came faintly down to his ears, were to him a full reward for all the terrors of his desperate enterprise. for that instant he forgot the perilous situation in which he then stood, and the risk that he had yet to run ere he could hope to be extricated from it. but a few moments only elapsed ere all thoughts of any thing else but his own self preservation were banished from his mind. the angry screams of the two old eagles came fearfully through the air, and he beheld them approaching the rock, cleaving the air with furious flight. he cast one look upwards, and saw the rope rapidly descending to him--but the eagles were coming still faster, and he had only time to wrench out a large stick from the nest, to aid him in defending himself, when they were both upon him. he had nothing for it but to crouch as close in under the angle of the rock as he could, and there he planted himself, with the stick in his right hand, and the skian dhu in his left, resolved to make the best fight he could of it. they commenced their attack on him whilst still on the wing, by flying at him, and striking fiercely at him with their talons, each returning alternately to the assault after making a narrow circuit in the air. whilst thus engaged, charley neither lost courage nor presence of mind, but contrived to deal to each of them a severe blow now and then with the rugged stick, as they came at him in succession. finding that they could make no impression upon him in this way, sheltered as he was by his position under the projecting rock, they seemed at once to resolve, as if by mutual consent, to adopt a more resolute mode of attack. alighting on the ledge of rock at the same moment, one on each side of the place where he was crouching, both the eagles now assailed him at once with inconceivable ferocity. half fronting that one which was to his right, he laid a severe blow on it, which somewhat staggered it in its onset. but whilst he was thus occupied with it, the other, which was to his left, tore open his cheek, with a blow of his talons, that had nearly stunned him. more from mechanical impulse, than from any actual design, he struck a back-handed blow with his skian dhu. fortunately for him it proved most effectual, for it penetrated the eagle to the very heart, laid it fluttering on its back, and, in the violence of its struggles, it rolled over the inclined ledge, and fell dead to the bottom of the crag. but poor charley had no leisure to rejoice over this piece of success. he looked anxiously to the hair-line, which hung dangling within reach of his grasp; but, ere he could seize it, his other enemy was at him again. as if it had profited by the severe lessons it had gotten, the strokes of this second eagle were given with so much rapidity and caution, that close as charley stewart was obliged to keep into the angle of the rock, and stupified as he was, in some degree, by the wound he had received, he was able to do little more than to defend his own person from injury, whilst he was obliged slowly to give ground before his feathered assailant. whilst retreating and fighting in this manner, one blow of his stick, better directed than the rest, struck the eagle on the side of the skull, close to its juncture with the neck, and it went fluttering down over the rock, in the pangs of death, after its fellow. but alas! poor charley stewart's victory cost him dear. the two listeners above, who had seen the approach of the eagles, were dreadfully alarmed by the noise of the terrific conflict that was going on upon the ledge below. in vain did they shout to terrify the birds. in vain did old peter frequently try the hair-line, by pulling gently at it, in the hope of finding that the weight of charley's body was attached to it. they were tortured by anxious uncertainty regarding him, until a piercing shriek came upwards from him, and all was quiet. winged by terror, bessy macdermot rushed, with her child in her arms, down the winding path, to a point whence she could command a view of the ledge. the boy was no longer there!--she rubbed her dimmed eyes, gave one more intent gaze. from the very nature of the place, it was impossible that he could be there unseen by her, from the point she now occupied, and she was thus too certainly assured that he was gone. uttering a despairing scream, she flew franticly down to look for him among the trees at the bottom of the cliff. there she sought all along the base of it, dreading every moment to have her eyes shocked with the sight of his mangled remains, and uttering the most doleful lamentations that she had murdered her dear friend's gallant boy. she found both the dead eagles indeed, but she could see nothing of charley stewart. old peter then came hobbling after her, to join her in her search, and both of them went over the ground again and again in vain. a faint hope began at length to arise in the minds of both, that he might, after all, be still on the ledge above, though, perhaps, lying wounded, or in a swoon; and, although both felt it to be almost against all reason to indulge in it, they instantly prepared to return, to endeavour more perfectly to ascertain the fact; and, if it could be done no otherwise, bessy macdermot resolved to run and rouse the country, in order to procure strong ropes, and men to go down to examine the ledge itself. full of these intentions, they were in the act of quitting the bottom of the cliff, when a faint voice arrested their steps. they stopped to listen, and, after a little time, they were aware that it came down from over their heads. they looked up, but, seeing nothing, they became more than ever convinced, that it was charley's voice calling to them from the ledge, and they again turned to hurry away to assure him of help. but the voice came again, and so much stronger, as to satisfy them that the speaker could be at no very great distance from them. "peter!--bessy!--i am here in the tree," said charley stewart, "for the love of saint michael, stop and take me down!" some minutes elapsed before they could catch a glimpse of the poor boy. at length they discovered him, half way up a tall pine tree, hanging by his little coat to the knag of a broken branch. i may as well tell you at once how he came there. whilst he was in the very act of dealing that last well directed blow of the stick, that proved so fatal to the second eagle, his foot slipped on the narrower and more inclined part of the ledge, to which he had been gradually driven back during the combat, and uttering that despairing scream which rang like his knell in the affrighted ears of bessy macdermot, and peter, he fell through the air, and crashed down among the dense foliage of the pine-tops below. one of his legs was broken across a bough, which it met with in his descent through the tree, but his head, and all his other vital parts, had luckily escaped injury; and the knag, which so fortunately caught his clothes, and kept him suspended, had been the providential means of saving him from that death, which he must have otherwise inevitably met with on coming to the ground. but how were they to get poor charley down from the tree? old peter could not climb it; but, seeing that it was furnished with branches nearly to its root, bessy macdermot gave her child into the hands of the old man, and, taking a double end of the hair-line with her, she clambered up the stem to the place where the boy was hanging. tenderly relieving him from his distressing position, she quickly passed two or three double folds of the rope around him, and then lowered him gently down to peter. so patient had charley been under his sufferings, excruciating as they were, that it was not until they were about to move him from the ground, that they discovered the injury that his limb had received. "oh, what shall i do?" cried bessy macdermot, wringing her hands; "oh, how can i face alice asher, after thus causing so sad a mischance to her darling, her beautiful boy?" "tut, bessy, never mind me!" said charley faintly, but with a gentle smile, that sorted but ill with his wounded and bloody countenance; "i shall soon get the better of all this; but if it had been twice as bad with me, bessy, nay, if i had been killed outright, i should have well deserved it, for quitting my poor little rosa there, as i did upon the harvest rig." "nay, nay, my dearest boy, charley," said mrs. macdermot, kissing him, and weeping fondly over him; "thou did'st thy part faithfully. had it not been for my foolish fright, and my silly screams when i first saw the eagle, thou wouldst never have left my child, and nought of these sad mischances could have happened." with some difficulty, and not without bessy macdermot's help, old peter managed to carry charley stewart down to his hut, whence he was afterwards moved home, when proper assistance could be procured. alice asher was overpowered with grief, when the darling of her heart was brought to her in this melancholy and maimed condition. but she readily forgave bessy macdermot for the innocent share she had had in producing it; and after charley's wounds were dressed, the bones of his fractured limb set, and that she was satisfied that his life was perfectly safe, she not only felt grateful to god that he had been so wonderfully preserved, but she began to regard him with honest pride for the gallant action he had performed. "well hast thou proved thyself, my boy, to be a true clan-allan stewart!" said she to him, with a deep blush on her countenance, as she sat fondly watching by the bed where charley was quietly sleeping, from the effects of the drugs that had been given to him, till the tears began to follow one another fast from her eyelids. "well might thy father now, methinks, make thee his lawful son, by extending to me those holy rites, the false hope of obtaining which betrayed mine innocent and simple youth! thou at least ought not to suffer for thine unhappy mother's fault, which now nearly nine years of sorrow, of remorse, and of heart-felt penitence, and prayer, and penance, have not yet expiated! but god's holy will be done!" poor afflicted alice asher had occasion to repeat these last words of pious resignation to the will of god, more than once after the recovery of her son. she was deeply grateful to heaven indeed, that his life had been spared to her, and that his health and strength were completely restored to him, but his handsome countenance had been greatly and permanently disfigured, by the deep cross-like scar that remained upon his left cheek, and the grace of his person had been much destroyed by the limping of his left leg, occasioned by the bad surgery of the rude practitioner who had set the broken bones. she bore this affliction, as she did all others, with meek submission, as a divine chastisement which her sin had well merited, though she wept to think that she had been visited by it through the suffering of her innocent boy. some eight or nine long years passed away, during which sir walter stewart of drummin was liberal in providing richly for the wants of the mother, as well as for the education of her son, though he strictly avoided seeing either of them. the story of charley's brave achievement, and severe accident, reached him not, for he was at that time abroad upon his travels in foreign lands; and, ere he returned home, the talk about it had died away, so that it had never been permitted to exercise any influence upon him whatsoever. passing over these years, then, we find alice asher, paler and thinner than before, but still most beautiful, sitting one morning, at the window of her cottage, that looked towards the tower of drummin, which was partially seen from it, through between the thick stems of the trees. her elbow rested on the window-sill, and supported her head, which was surrounded by a broad fillet of black silk, from beneath which her hair clustered in fair ringlets around her finely formed features, and fell in long tresses over her neck and shoulders. her close fitting kirtle, and her loose and flowing gown, were of sad-coloured silk, and the embroidered bosom of her snow-white smock was fastened with a golden brooch, that sparkled with precious stones, and more than one of her fingers glittered with rings of considerable value. alice was not always wont to be so adorned; but, ornamented as she thus was, beyond the simplicity of that attire which she usually wore, her countenance bore no corresponding expression of gladness upon it. she sat gazing silently towards the distant stronghold of the clan-allan stewarts, sighing deeply from time to time, until the thoughts that filled her heart gradually dimmed her large blue eyes, and the tears swelled over her eyelids, and ran down her cheeks, and she finally began to relieve the heaviness of her soul, by thinking aloud in broken and unconscious soliloquy. "aye! he is going to-day!" said she, in a melancholy tone. "he is going to the court, to mix with the great, the proud, the gay, and the beautiful; and i shall not see him ere he goes! yet the vow of separation which we mutually took, had a saving condition in it. he might have come--he may at any time approach me--aye, and honourably too--when the object of his visit may be to do me and my boy justice. but, after so many years have passed away in disappointment, why should my fond and foolish heart still cling to deceitful hope? a hope, too, that wars with those of a purer and holier nature, which may yet ally me, a penitent sinner, to heaven. then, what have i to do with those glittering gauds that would better become a bride? yet they are his pledges, if not of love, at least of kindness and of friendship, sent to me from time to time, to show me that i am not altogether forgotten; and surely there can be no harm in my wearing them? and then to-day--to-day, methought that he might have come. but if he had ever intended to come, would he have sent, as he has done, for charley? oh, my boy! would that he could but think of doing thee justice, and thy poor sinful mother would die contented! but, if he is pleased with the youth, may he not yet come hither along with him? how my silly heart beats at the very thought! what sound was that i heard? can it be them?--no, no, no, he will never come more to me!--alas, alas! my poor boy's face and person have suffered too much to win a father's eye, and he knows not the virtues that lie so modestly concealed within them. but what is that i see yonder?--the bustle of the horsemen before the gate, with their pampered steeds and their gay attire--their pennons fluttering, and the sun glancing from the broad blades of their highland spears?--what!--was that a distant bugle blast i heard?--again!--then they are moving--aye, indeed! they are now galloping off along the terrace!--alas, alas, they are gone! and my vain and foolish hopes have gone with them!" these last words were uttered in the deepest tone of anguish, and alice drew hastily back into the darkest recess of the apartment, where she seated herself, covered her face with the palms of her hands, and wept aloud. having thus given full vent to her feelings, she retired to the privacy of her closet, where she endeavoured to divert her mind by holy exercise from the sorrows that oppressed her. at length, a gentle tap at the door informed her that her son had returned from his visit to drummin, and tremblingly anxious to know the result of it, she immediately admitted him. "mother! my dearest mother!" said charley stewart, tenderly embracing her, and with a manifest effort to subdue certain emotions that were working within him; "why hast thou been weeping?" "alas! i weep often, my beloved, my darling boy!" replied she, warmly responding to his caresses; "i weep, and i deserve to weep! but hast thou aught of tidings for me, that may give me a gleam of joy?--say--how wert thou received?" "why, well, mother!" replied charley, endeavouring to assume a lively air; "i was well and kindly received, though neither, forsooth, with parade of arms, nor with flourish of trumpets, nor of clarions; but sir walter received me kindly." "did he embrace thee, dear charley?" demanded his mother, with great anxiety of expression. "um----aye," replied her son, with some degree of hesitation; "he did embrace me, though hardly indeed with the same fervour that thou art wont to do, dearest mother. but then thou knowest, mother, that sir walter is a courtly knight of high degree, and they tell me that the fashion of such folks allows them not to yield themselves altogether, as we humbler people are wont to do, to the feelings that are within us." "alas! thou say'st that which is but too true!" replied alice, in a desponding tone; "but go on, boy." "sir walter put his hand on my shoulder, and turned me round," continued charley. "then he made me walk a step or two, and eyed me narrowly from top to toe, pretty much as if he had been scanning the points and paces of a new horse.--'how camest thou so lame and so disfigured?' demanded he.--'by a fall i had in climbing to an eagle's nest,' replied i.--'a silly cause,' said sir walter; 'and yet, perhaps, the bold blood that is in thee must bear the blame. but know, boy, that fate hath not given to all the power to climb into the eyry of the eagle.' and having said this much he changed the subject of his talk." "would that thou could'st but have gathered courage enow to have told him all the circumstances of that adventure!" "nay, mother, i had courage for any thing but to speak aught that might have sounded like mine own praise," replied charley. "would that he but knew thee as thou art!" said alice, with a sigh. "would that he but knew the soul that is within thee! with all his faults--and perhaps they are light, save that which concerns thee alone--he hath a generous spirit himself, and he could not but prize a generous spirit in one so kindred to him. but tell me all that passed. did--did he--did he ask thee for tidings of me?" "he did question me most particularly about thee," replied charley. "he questioned me as if he would have fain gathered from me the appearance and condition of every, the minutest feature of thy face, and of every line of thy form. he questioned as if with the intent of limning thy very portrait on the tablet of his mind; and, as if he would have traced it beside some picture, which he still wore in fresh and lively colours there, for the purpose, as it seemed to me, of making close and accurate comparison between them. thus he would pause at times during his questioning of me; and, after a few moments of deep abstraction, he would say, as if forgetful of my presence, and in converse with himself alone, 'strange! aye, but she was then but fifteen, scarce ripened into woman--the change is nothing more than natural--the same loveliness, but more womanly;' and so he went on, now to question, and now to talk of thee, for a good half hour or so." "and he!" cried alice, with unwonted animation; "say, boy, looked he well? i mean in health; for of his manly beauty, his tall and well knit form, his graceful air, his noble bearing, and his eagle eye! how could i have lived till now, without hearing from those who have seen and admired him? alas!" added she, in a melancholy and subdued tone, "of such things i have perhaps inquired too much!" "sir walter had all the ruddy hue, as well as the firmness of vigorous health, dear mother," replied the youth. "thanks be to all the saints!" exclaimed alice fervently; "then, come boy--tell me what passed between you?" "after all his questions touching thee and thy health were done," said charley, "and that we had talked of other matters of no import, he sat him down, and thus gravely addressed me as i stood before him: 'i have been thinking how best to provide for thee, boy. i can see that thou art but ill fitted for hardy service, or the toils of war. and, by the rood, it is well for thee that, in these times, there are other ways of winning to high fortune, yea, and to royal favour even, besides that which leads to either by doughty deeds of arms, where so many perish ere they have half completed the toilsome and perilous journey. thou must content thee, then, with some peaceful trade. let me see--let me see. ah! i have it. now-a-days, men have more chance to push themselves forward by the point of the needle, than by the point of the lance. what thinkest thou of master hommil, the king's tailor, who, as all men say, hath a fair prospect of shaping such a garb for himself, as may yet serve him to wear for a peer's robes, if he doth but use his sheers with due discretion? this is the very thing for thee, and it is well that i have so luckily hit on it. i'll have thee apprenticed to a tailor, and, when thy time is out, i'll have thee so taught in all the more curious mysteries of thine art, by its very highest professors, that none in the whole land shall be found to equal thee. thou shalt travel to france for learning in the nicer parts of thy trade, and then, i will set thee up, close under the royal eye, with such a stock of rarest articles in thy shop, as shall make it a very campvere, for the variety and richness of its merchandize. but thou must begin thy schooling under master jonathan junkins here, who, though but a country cultivator of cabbage, hath an eye towards the cut of a cloak or doublet, that might well beget the jealousy of the mighty hommil himself. i once wore a rose-coloured suit of jonathan's make, that did excite the envy, yea, and the anger, too, of that great master, by the commendations that royalty himself was heard to pass upon it. though there were some there, who, from malice, no doubt, did say, that the merit lay more in the shape of the wearer, than in that of the garments. but i am trifling. i have some orders to give ere i mount, and this, as to thy matter with junkins, shall be one; and time wears, boy, and thou, too, hast some little way before thee to limp home; therefore, god keep thee. bear my love, or, as she would herself have it to be, my friendship, to thy mother. and, see here; give her this ring as a fresh remembrance of me. farewell--i shall see that all be well arranged regarding thee ere i go; and i trust that thou wilt not idly baulk the prudent plans i have laid down for thee, or the good intentions i have towards thee; and so again, farewell, my boy!'--and thus, my dearest mother, was i dismissed." "well, god's will be done!" said alice, with a deep sigh, after a long pause, and after having betrayed a variety of emotions during her son's narrative. "i had hoped better things for thee, my boy, but god's will be done! thou hast no choice but to submit, charley. forget not that sir walter stewart is thy father, and that thou art bound by the law of nature to obey him." "it is because i do not forget that sir walter stewart is my father, that i find it so hard a thing to obey him in this," said charley, with a degree of excitement, which all his earnestly exerted self-command was, for the moment, unable entirely to control. "but, as it happens, that it is just because he is bound to me by the law of nature, and by no other law, that he thus condemns me to be nailed down to the shop-board of a tailor, instead of giving me a courser to ride, and a lance to wield, so, as thou most truly sayest dear mother, by the law of nature, but by that law alone, am i compelled to submit to this bitter mortification, and to obey him." "nay, nay, dearest charley, talk not thus!" cried alice, throwing her arms around her son's neck, and fondly kissing him; "talk not thus frowardly if thou lovest me!" "love thee, my dearest mother!" cried charley, returning her embraces with intense fervour, and weeping from the overpowering strength of his feelings; "nay, nay, thou canst not doubt my love to thee; thou canst not doubt that, on thy weal, or thy woe, hangs the happiness or the misery of your poor boy. be not vexed, dearest mother, for though i have spoken thus idly, trust me that a father's word shall ever be with me as the strictest law, which i, so far as my nature can support me, shall never wilfully contravene." charley stewart again tenderly embraced his mother, and, scarcely aware that he was leaving her to weep, he hurried away to seek some consolation for himself, in a quarter where he never failed to find it. this was at the cottage of bessy macdermot, whither he was wont frequently to wander, for the purpose of listening to the innocent prattle of his young plaything rosa, who, having now seen some eight or nine summers, was fast ripening into a very beautiful girl. as charley approached the widow's premises on the present occasion, he found rosa by the side of a clear spring, that bubbled and sparkled out from beneath a large mossy stone, that projected from the lower part of the slope of a flowery bank, under the pensile drapery of a grove of weeping birches. the moment she beheld him, she came tripping to meet him, with a rustic wreath of gay marsh marigolds and water-lilies in her hand. "where have you been all this long, long morning, dearest charley?" cried rosa; "i have been so dull without you; and see what a wreath i have made for your bonnet! but i have a great mind to wear it myself, for you don't deserve to have it, for being so long in coming to me." "i have been over at the castle, rosa," said charley, stooping to embrace her, as she innocently held up her lips to be kissed by him. "i have been over at drummin, looking at the grand array of steeds and horsemen. but what are these flowers?--water-lilies, as i hope to be saved! holy virgin! rosa, how didst thou come by them?" "i got them from the pool," replied rosa, hesitating, and gently tapping his cheek with a few stray flowers which she held in her hand; "i got them in the same way that you pulled them for me the other day, that is with a long hazle rod, with a crook at the end of it." "from the pool, rosa?" cried charley; "what could tempt thee to risk thy life for such trifles? if thou hadst slipt over the treacherous brink, where there was no one by to save thee--thou wert gone! irrecoverably gone! how couldst thou be so rash? my very flesh creeps to think on't!" "don't be angry with me, charley!" said rosa coaxingly--"what risk would i not run to give thee pleasure?" "but you have given me any thing but pleasure in this matter, rosa," said charley; "i tremble too much to think of the hazard thou hast run, to look with pleasure on any thing that could have occasioned it." "so thou wilt not let me put the wreath on thy bonnet, then?" said rosa, with a tear half disclosing itself in her eye-lid; "come, come, charley! sit down--sit down on this bank, and do let me put it upon thy bonnet." "if it will pleasure thee to make a fool of me, rosa," said charley, smiling on her, and kissing her; "thou shalt do with me as thou mayest list." "that is a dear kind charley," cried rosa, her moist eyes sparkling with delight, and throwing her arms around his neck; "i'll make no fool of thee: i'll make thee so handsome!" "handsome!" exclaimed charley, laughing. "why rosa, it is making a fool of me, indeed, to say that thou can'st make me handsome, with this ugly deep cross-mark on my cheek." "that cross-mark on your cheek, charley!" cried the little girl, with an intensity of feeling much beyond anything which her years might have warranted; "to me that cross-mark is beautiful! i love that noble brow of thine--those eyes, that whenever they look upon me, tell me that i am dear to thee--those lips, that so often kiss me, and instruct me, and say kind things to me--but that mark of the cross on thy cheek--oh, that hath to me a holy influence in't; it reminds me that, but for thy noble courage which earned it for thee, i should have been food for the young eagles of the craig. charley! i could not fail to love thee, for thy kindness to me; but i never could have loved thee as i do love thee, but for these living marks which you bear of all that you suffered for thine own little rosa. kiss me my dear, dear charley!" "my little wifey!" cried charley, clasping the innocent girl in his arms, and smothering her with kisses. "aye," said rosa, artlessly, "i am thy little wifey. all the gossips say that i am fated to be so; for you know i have got my cross mark as well as you, aye, and on my left cheek too. the eagles did that kind turn for me. they marked us both with the cross alike. see! you can see my cross here quite plain." "i do see it," said charley, kissing the place. "but thanks be to the virgin thy beauty hath not suffered one whit by it. i can just discern that the mark is there, and that is all; and i trust that it will altogether disappear as you grow up to be a woman." "the virgin forbid!" cried rosa energetically. "the gossips say that we have been so miraculously signed with the cross expressly for each other, and i would not lose so happy a mark, no, not to be made a queen! but do let me put on thy chaplet, dear charley. i hope to see thee some day with a grand casque on thy head--a tilting spear in thy hand--bestriding a noble steed, and riding at the ring with the best of them." "alas, rosa!" said charley, with a deep sigh, "that will never be my fate!" "why not?" demanded rosa; "surely sir walter stewart may make thee his esquire?" "alas, no!" said charley, despondingly. "the casque he dooms me to is a tailor's cowl--the shield a thimble--the lance a needle--and the gallant steed i am to mount is a tailor's shop-board, and if ever i tilt with silk, velvet, or gold, it will be to convert them into cloaks and doublets for my betters!" "a tailor!" exclaimed rosa, with astonishment; "surely thou art jesting, charley." "i'faith, it is too serious a matter to jest about," replied charley. "truly i am doomed to handle the goosing iron of master jonathan junkins." "ha, ha, ha, ha!" shouted rosa--"ha, ha, ha, ha!--what an odd fancy of sir walter!" "nay, laugh not at my misery, rosa," said charley, gravely, and somewhat piteously. "i cannot bear the thought of such a life! what think you, rosa, of being a tailor's wife?" "so that thou wilt always call me thine own dear little wifey, i care not what thou art," replied rosa, tenderly, and throwing her arms around his neck. "and why, after all, mayest thou not be quite happy as a tailor? old johnny junkins sings at his task from morning till night. besides, he hath no risk of being killed in battle, as my poor father was. he always sleeps in a whole skin, save when his wife janet beats him with the ell-wand, and surely thou wouldst have no fears that i should do that for thee, dear charley?" it was now charley's turn to laugh, which he did very heartily, and having thus gained a temporary victory over his chagrin, he improved upon it by immediately taking a small missal from his sporran, and commencing his daily occupation of giving instructions to rosa, who greedily learned from him all that he could impart. i mean now to give you some little account of sir walter stewart, gentlemen. you must know that he was one of the prettiest and most accomplished men of his time, and a great favourite at court. his perfection in all warlike exercises--his fondness for horses--and his fearless riding, were qualifications which fitted him for being the companion of the king's brothers, the spirited alexander duke of albany, and the tall and graceful john earl of mar, whilst his skill in fencing--his proficiency in music--and his taste in dress, secured for him a high place in the good graces of that elegant, but weak monarch, james the third. with young ramsay of balmain, afterwards created earl of bothwell, he was in the best habits of intimacy. but with the lower minions of the king, i mean, with such as cochran the mason--rogers the musician--leonard the smith--hommil the tailor--torfefan the fencing-master, and andrew the flemish astrologer, he was more polite than familiar. with the ladies of the court sir walter stewart was an object of admiration, nay, he was the theme of the praise of every one of them, from the beautiful, fascinating, and virtuous queen margaret herself, down to the humblest of her maids of honour. it is no wonder, then, that sir walter was induced to spend more of his time at court than among the wilds of his native mountains. on the occasion of which i am now speaking, he was on his way to the castle of stirling, where james the third was at that time residing, and after a long and tiresome journey, he and his attendants entered the city, and rode up to their hostel in the main street, at such an hour of the evening, as made it neither very seemly nor very convenient for him to report himself to his majesty. sir walter stewart was too well known not to command immediate attention from every one belonging to the inn. the horse-boys, who were grooming the numerous steeds, that were hooked up to various parts of the walls surrounding the yard, made way respectfully, not only for himself, but also for his people and their animals, and the cattle of some persons of less note and consideration, were turned out of their stalls for the accommodation of his horses. meanwhile, the knight was ushered up stairs into the common room, by mine host in person, who, with his portly figure, stripped to his close yellow jacket and galligaskins, and with a fair linen towel hanging from his girdle, puffed and sweated up the steps before him, his large rubicund visage vying in the brightness of its scarlet, with the fiery coloured cap of coarse red cloth which he wore. sir walter found the large apartment surrounded by oaken tables and chairs, which were occupied by various guests, some eating, and some drinking, whilst the rattling of trenchers, the clinking of cans, the buzz of voices, and the hum of tongues, were so loud and continuous, as to render it difficult for him to detect a word of the conversation that was going on any where, except the clamorous calls for fresh supplies of provender, ale, or wine, which the bustling serving men and tapsters were hurrying to and fro to satisfy. as the host showed sir walter to an unoccupied table at the upper end of the place, most of the guests arose and saluted him as he passed by them. to some of these he gave a condescending bow of recognition, whilst to others he hardly deigned to bestow more than a dignified acknowledgment of their courtesy. but he was no sooner seated, than he was left to his own reflections, for each man again turned his attention to his own particular comforts, and the knight was not sorry to be very soon enabled to do the same thing for himself, by paying his own addresses to the smoking pasty that was placed on the table before him. he had but just finished his meal, when the host entered, ushering in a very elegant young man, the richness of whose attire, as well as the perfection of its make, together with his noble air, at once showed him to be a gentleman of the court. his rose-coloured jacket, and amber trewse, were of the richest silk, and made to fit tight, so as to show off, to the greatest advantage, his very handsome person. his girdle-belt of black velvet, together with the pouch of the same material, sparkled with gems, as did also the sheaths and hilts of his sword and dagger. several rich chains of gold were hung about his neck; his shoes had those long thin points, which were worn at that period, though they were not, in his instance, carried to any very absurd extravagance. his cloak was of blue velvet richly bordered with silver, and his broad jewelled hat, of scarlet stuff of the same material, was drawn over one side of his head, as a necessary precaution of counterpoise to the weight of the long feathers of green, blue, red, and yellow, which stretched out from it so far as to threaten to overbalance it on the other. from beneath this his brown hair hung down, curling over his ample brow, and spread itself in wide profusion over his shoulders. "what, ramsay!" exclaimed sir walter stewart, rising to meet him with a cordial salutation, which again silenced the clatter of the trenchers and cans, and brought all eyes for some moments upon the two gentlemen. "this is a lucky meeting indeed." "lucky!" replied ramsay, smiling jocularly; "what a boorish phrase!--it is indeed well worthy of one, who hath been rusticating so long amidst northern moors and mountains." "cry your mercy, my lord of the court," said sir walter stewart, laughing. "nay," continued ramsay; "i know not whether thy clownish expression be most discourteous to me, or to thyself,--to me, as it would deny me all credit for this mine expressly purposed visit to thee,--or to thyself, for supposing that such a preux-chevalier, as thou art, could be, for the smallest fraction of time, within the atmosphere of the court, without being run after by those who love thee." "thank thee! thank thee, my dear ramsay," replied sir walter, shaking him cordially by the hand, and laughing heartily; "then will i say, that it was most kind of thee to find me out so soon, and to come thus purposely to take a stoup of french claret with me, and to pour thine agreeable talk into mine ear, so as to fill the empty vessel of mine ignorance, to a level with that of thine own full knowledge of courtly affairs, and of all the interesting occurrents which have chanced about the court since i last left it. so, sit thee down, i pray thee. we shall be private enow at this table, which is well out of ear-shot of all those noisy gormandizers and guzzlers." "nay," replied ramsay, as he seated himself beside his friend; "thine emptiness is of too vast a profundity for me to be able to fill it at this time. on some other occasion i shall do my best to replenish thee, when we can have leisure for a longer talk together, than we can look to have to-night. i came hither only to carry thee away with me." "whither wouldst have me go?" demanded sir walter. "trust me, i am more disposed, at this moment, to enjoy mine ease in mine inn, than to move any where else." "but i must have thee," replied ramsay; "rustic as thou art, thou must submit to be led by me for some little time, like a blind man who hath but newly recovered his eyesight, lest thou shouldst stumble amidst the blaze of courtly sunshine. i came to bring thee to a small supper, at the lodging of sir william rogers, that most cunning fingerer of the lute and harp, and whose practice thereupon," continued he, sinking his voice almost to a whisper, "seems to have taught him a most marvellous power, of bringing what music may be most profitable for himself, out of that strange and many-stringed instrument called a royal sovereign." "hush, hush, ramsay!" replied sir walter. "thy talk is dangerous in such a place as this. but say, does the king go to this party?" "no," replied ramsay; "he is to be employed to-night in the occult science, to which he hath of late so much addicted himself. he is to be occupied with that knave andrew the astrologer, in regarding and reading the stars." "then, what boots it for us to go to the party of this empty piece of sounding brass?" demanded sir walter. "much, much, my dear stewart," replied ramsay. "in the first place, thou shalt be introduced to his niece, who hath lately arrived from england. thou shalt see and hear that fair philomela, yclept juliet manvers, who plays and sings to admiration. though here it behoves me, as thy friend, to bid thee take care of thy heart, for the uncle seems to have imported her, with the wise intent, of marrying her to some one of the court, and mine own heart hath already been very sorely assailed." "a dangerous siren, truly!" said sir walter, laughing; "yet methinks i may safely enough bid defiance to her enchantment." "we shall see," replied ramsay, with a doubtful nod of his head; "but be that as it may, my second reason for taking thee thither, is that, with exception of our host himself, we may at least spend one tolerably pleasant evening undrugged and unencumbered, with the base society of those vulgar fellows, whom the king, with so much mistaken judgment, hath chosen to associate in his favour, with two such well-born gentlemen as you and me. cochran, that man whom nature hath built up of stone and mortar, and who would yet ape the graces of a finished lord of the court, as a bear would copy the gambols of a well educated italian greyhound." "hommil!" cried sir walter, laughing, and following up his friend's humour. "hommil! that thread-paper, whose sword and dagger would be better removed, to have their places supplied by his shears and his bodkin." "leonard!" cried ramsay, "leonard! that man of iron, whose very face is a perfect forge, his chin being the stithy, his mouth the great bellows, his eyes the ignited charcoal, his nose the fore-hammer, and his brows the broken and smoke begrimmed pent-house that hangs over all." "torfefan!" continued stewart; "torfefan! that bully of the backsword, rapier, and dagger, who, except when he is pot-valiant, is always so wise in his steel-devouring courage, as to spread it forth like the tail of a turkey-cock, always the wider, the weaker the adversary he may have to deal with." "bravo! bravo!" cried ramsay, absolutely shouting in his mirth; "bravo! bravo! and then, last of all, andrew, that solemn and mysterious knave, who seems as if he would pluck the stars from the skies, as i would the daisies from a flower border, and who, if i mistake not, will yet contrive to weave a good rich garland of fate out of them for himself, whatever he may do for others. to be compelled to keep such company, stewart, is to pay a severe penalty for the daily converse and favour of a king. but this night, the monarch being engaged, as i told thee, each of these precious fellows hath gone on his own private amusement, for, as thou knowest, there is no such great love among them, as to make any two of them much desire to company together, so, to get rid for one single night of the whole of them but rogers, whom we must admit to be by far the least offensive and most tolerable individual among them, is certainly a matter upon which we may very well congratulate ourselves." "true," replied sir walter; "but i see no reason why we should not rid ourselves of rogers, as well as of the rest, by staying and spending the evening together over this excellent wine. i must confess that i am somewhat travel-worn, and but little inclined for any such entertainment as he may give us." "nay, that cannot be," said ramsay; "i gave my promise to him, ere i knew of thy coming, and when i heard of thine arrival, i pledged my word to bring thee with me. so, now, thou must not abandon me. besides, as i told thee, the fellow is the best of these minions, and his music, not to mention that of his niece, is always some recompense for the endurance of his company. so haste thee to doff thy travelling weeds, and pink thyself out in such attire, as may make thee pleasing in the eyes of the fair and philomela-voiced juliet. be quick! for i shall wait for thee here." sir walter stewart, rather unwillingly, summoned his servants--was lighted to his chamber, and soon returned, in a dress, which was in no wise put to shame by that of his friend, and they proceeded together to the lodgings of sir william rogers. the apartments of this favourite minstrel of the king were not extensive, but, as the custom was, down to a very late period of our history, even the principal bed-room, which purposely contained a richly carved aud highly ornamented bed, was thrown open, and all were lighted up with a blaze of lamps. the furniture was gorgeous and gaudy. the serving-men numerous, but not always expert, and the company was small, and chiefly composed of such persons as were likely to be willing to scrape their way up into favour at court, by grasping the skirt, and scrambling after the footsteps, of any one, however worthless, who might be rising there. the entrance of two gallants so distinguished as ramsay and sir walter stewart produced just such an effect as one might look for from the sudden arrival of two noble peacocks, in full glory of plumage, in the midst of a vulgar flock of turkeys. each small individual present vainly endeavoured to hobble-gobble itself into notice, whilst the two greater and grander birds permitted their own agreeable admiration of themselves, to be but little interrupted by the ruffling and noise of the creatures around them. to sir william rogers himself, however, court policy induced them to yield a full and respectful attention. he was a good looking, and rather stoutish man, with more of talent than of gentility in his face, for though his brows were heavy, his large eyes were always ready to respond, with powerful expression, to the varied feelings which music never failed to awaken within him. in music he was an enthusiast, but when not under the excitement which it invariably produced in him, his whole features betrayed that dull, sordid, self-complacency, only to be disturbed when his own immediate interest moved him. the musical knight came forward to receive the two friends, with manifest satisfaction, as persons who raised the tone of his little society, and gave him additional consequence in the eyes of his other guests. he presented sir walter, without delay, to his fair niece, who arose gracefully from the harp, over which she had just begun to run her fingers in a prelude, and returned his salute with condescending smiles. she was very beautiful; but, although she appeared to be young, her beauty seemed, somehow, to want the freshness of youth. she looked like a gay garment, which, though neither soiled nor worn, had lost somewhat of that glossy newness of surface, with which it first came forth from the tailor's shop. whilst her regards were turned towards ramsay, or sir walter stewart, her countenance was covered with the most winning smiles she could wear; but when they chanced to wander round among the meaner personages of the company, it assumed a degree of haughtiness, that was not unmingled with contempt. this proceeded from her very expressive eyes, which beamed forth warm rays, when half veiled by her long dark eyelashes, and were quite in harmony with the mildness of her oval face, her polished forehead, and her dark and finely arched eye-brows. but when their orbs were broadly displayed by the rise of her full eye-lid, the fires that shot from them were too formidable to be altogether agreeable. as was the fashion with ladies of any distinction in those days, her hair was but little seen--the greater part of it being capped up under a very tall, steeple-looking head-dress, which was of a shape much resembling an overgrown pottle-basket. this was of crimson velvet, ornamented with gold embroidery, and from the taper top of it descended a number of streamers of different colours, which hung down behind, and floated over three-fourths of her person. she wore a rich robe, of the same material and colour as the cap. this was made to fit her tightly, as low as the waist, where it was confined by a richly wrought girdle of gold, from which it flowed loosely down, and swept the ground in a wide train, that covered a large extent of the floor around her, but which was so looped up at the sides, as to display a deep cherry-coloured silk petticoat flowered with gold. "better had it been for thee, juliet, to have sung when i first asked thee," said sir william rogers to her; "thy minstrelsy might have passed well enough with our good friends here: but now, thou must undergo the severe ordeal, of the nicely critical ears, of these our honoured and highly accomplished guests of the court. sir walter stewart here, especially, is well known to be a master of the divine art of music--as, with his gracious favour, you may perchance by and bye hear." "alas! uncle, i know too well how silly i have been, in allowing myself to be thus caught, and i feel too surely i am about to be punished for it!" replied the lady, with a sigh, accompanied by a languishing glance at sir walter; "for who hath not heard of the exquisite science of sir walter stewart? the fame of his accomplishments have made the proudest gallants of england envious. but his eye hath too much benevolence in it, to leave me to doubt, that he will pity and pardon the faults that may spring from this trembling weakness of hand, and fluttering of heart, which his presence hath so suddenly brought upon me." the lady, quite accidentally no doubt, then assumed that attitude which was best calculated to display her person to advantage, and began to run her fingers over the chords, with a boldness and strength of touch, that proved her to be a very perfect mistress indeed of the instrument she handled, since she could thus make it discourse such music, under circumstances which she had herself declared to be so unfavourable. notwithstanding the overawing presence of sir walter stewart, whose critical powers she had declared she so much dreaded, she commenced a beautiful love-ballad, in a full, firm, and clear voice, with which she very speedily whirled away the musical soul of the knight of the aven, who, in spite of his boast to the contrary, was immediately drawn towards her chair, over which he continued to hang during all the time of her performance. song after song was sung by this siren, in a style so superior to any thing which he had ever heard before, that he was perfectly enraptured. he was called upon to play and to sing in his turn, and the praises which he received, in terms of no very limited measure, from both uncle and niece, and which, if fame does not belie him, were not altogether unmerited, were re-echoed by the whole flock of gobbling turkeys who pressed around them. the lady then joined her voice to his, in a tender and melting lay,--and thus the evening passed away, till sir walter was called upon to hand her to the table, where an ample feast was spread, and where her very agreeable talk was rendered even yet more spirited, by the rich wines, which enlivened the imagination of both speaker and listener. the hours fled most agreeably; and, before sir walter took his leave, he readily entered into certain arrangements with the lovely juliet, by which it was settled that next day was to be the first of a series of meetings, for mutual practice in the art in which both so much delighted, their studies being of course to be carried on under the direction of sir william rogers himself. "well, julietta," said the uncle to the niece, after they were left alone, "how likest thou this new instrument, now that thou hast run the fingers of thy fancy over his stops?" "the instrument is a handsome instrument enough," replied juliet. "the strings sound melodiously too. but much of mine affection must rest on the gold with which it may be enriched, and the value of the case which may contain it. is this stewart wealthy, i pray thee; and are his possessions ample enough for my desires?" "i know that thy desires are ample enough," replied rogers; "but report speaks well of the wealth and possessions of this sir walter." "some where in the bleak north, are they not?" said juliet. "by all the saints, the cold and barren sod of this northern clime had hardly ever been pressed by my foot at all, had i not hoped to have mated me with some of its most wealthy nobles!" "thou hadst little chance of any such noble match where thou wert, julietta," replied rogers; "and, let me tell thee, the fates are quite as much against any such chance for thee here. these proud and dogged scottish nobles scorn to grace a court, where the king makes so little account of them. and truly there is little wonder that they should thus take offence, seeing that the places in the royal favour, which by inheritance belong to them, should be filled by such beasts as leonard--torfefan--hommil--andrew--aye, and that prince of brutes, cochran, too." "they are all beasts, as thou sayest, uncle," replied juliet; "though, if i were obliged to choose among them, i should rather tie myself to that coarse, clumsy elephant whom thou hast last named as king of these brutes, than to any of the others. he is the man, depend on't, who hath the true and proper art to raise the edifice of his own fortunes; and, by using his broad shoulders as a scaffold, a bold woman might thereby mount, methinks, to wealth and honours." "he is a pestilent, pushing, proud, overbearing, ignorant, vulgar beast, i tell thee," replied her uncle, much excited. "the brute despises music! depend upon it, he will never rise to any thing but to the garret story of one of his own buildings, from which, if some kind devil would but throw him down, to the dislocation of that accursed bull neck of his, i should cheerfully compose an especial jubilate. oh, apollo and terpsichore! that a man of my musical science and learning, should be compelled to associate with so vile a piler of stones, and compounder of mortar!" "i have a shrewd suspicion, that the measure of thy rage against cochran, is but that of thy fears for his outstripping thee in thine ascent of the lofty tower of ambition," replied juliet. "but spurn him not, good uncle, if thou art wise; for his ladder is long, and strong; and might, with proper management, be useful to thee." "i should be right glad to see it so, july, could i but kick down both the ladder and its owner, after i should have so used them," said rogers. "but methinks thou wouldst fain carry ladder, hod and mortar and all, to the very top of the tower, on thine own shoulders, rather than lose the man they belong to." "thou art grievously mistaken, uncle," replied juliet, keenly. "to rise into a high and wealthy station, and the higher and wealthier the better, would certainly be my desire; but i should much prefer youth, and beauty, and accomplishment, in the instrument which i might use for the gratification of mine ambition. if fate denies me all these indeed, then would i embrace age, and deformity itself, rather than fail of mine object. nay, thou canst hardly as yet guess to what means i should resort to secure its completion. as for cochran, i know he loves me; for, in his great condescension, he hath vouchsafed to tell me so. nor have i altogether kept the bear aloof. to wed myself to him would be to speculate, and that too with but an ungainly and unloveable subject. but if i could read the book of his fate, and find fortune and honours therein, it would not be the coarse edifice of his body, supported as it is upon such rustic pillars, and crowned by so vulgar and heavy a capital, that would deter me from embracing it. yet 'tis but a speculation; and, being so, i must confess that i am disposed, rather to grasp at this handsome corinthian column of the stewart, than to tie myself to that clumsy cochran, whose clay image might, after all, crumble to pieces, and suffocate me in its dirty dust." "i am right glad that thou hast so determined, juliet," said rogers. "i have no jealousy of this well-born knight, who hath, moreover, a greater feeling for the divine art of music than any of his cold countrymen with whom i have yet met, without even excepting royalty itself. but i might as well see thee built up into a stone wall, as see thee the wife of cochran! to see thy great musical genius tied to this most unmelodious and croaking chisseler of stones, and compounder of lime, sand, and cow's-hair! i quaver at the very thought! but get thee to bed, my girl. now that i know my ground-notes, i shall wonder if i work thee not out a piece that shall not only win thee this instrument of thy more recent desires, but enable thee to play upon it too, according as thou wilt, with thine own variations." whilst this precious conversation was going on between the uncle and niece, sir walter stewart gave the convoy to ramsay as far as the royal castle-gate, after which he returned towards his hostel. as he was pursuing his solitary way thither, he heard the clashing of swords; and, on moving quickly down the deserted street, he discovered, by the faint light that came from a new moon, two men pressing hard in fence against one, who was defending himself with great courage, with his back to a wall. though he had no knowledge of the combatants, he could not stand by and see such foul play. "for shame! for shame, gentlemen!" cried he. "what! two upon one!" "gentlemen, indeed!" cried he that was assailed, in a contemptuous tone, during the moment of breathing afforded him by sir walter's interference--"gentlemen indeed!--tailors and scaramouches, else am i not the earl of huntly!" "again dost thou dare so to miscal the gentlemen of the court of his most royal majesty of scotland?" cried one of the individuals, whom sir walter immediately discovered to be the pot-valiant torfefan. "by all the gods of fire, thunder, and battle, thou shalt eat this good bilboa of mine. have at thee, then, earl, or carl, or devil, if thou likest it!" "nay, then, my lord of huntly, i will myself relieve thee of this bold bird," cried the knight; "do thou deal with the other." "thanks for thy rescue, sir walter stewart," replied huntly, now recognizing his friend. "but thou hast left naught to me but the very shred of the skirt of the garment of this broil--the vile cabbage--the very tailor himself." "trust me, thy man, though but the ninth-part of one, is as good as mine," replied sir walter. the combat was now renewed upon fairer terms, and, in a few moments, torfefan's sword was sent spinning into the air, and, falling from its flight, it rang upon the stones of the causeway, and was shivered into pieces, whilst its owner was prostrated on his back by his over-anxiety to withdraw from the fury of his adversary's onset. sir walter's sword-point was immediately at his throat; and, at that very moment the weapon of his noble ally had pierced a fleshy part of his opponent, as he had turned to run away, which act of discretion, however, it did not prevent, for it rather pricked him on to a more active exertion of speed. "spare my life, good sir walter stewart!" cried torfefan, in an agony of fear. "most noble knight, spare the life of a fellow-courtier!" "get up, sir; i have no intention of taking it," replied sir walter. "'tis enow for me that i have thus exorcised the spirit of the pottle-pot out of thee. 'twas that which made thine otherwise peaceful sword leap from its scabbard against thy betters. get thee up, i say, and go home." "thou art right, sir knight," replied torfefan, rising humbly upon his knees, and gradually gaining his legs. "i am at all times mild and peaceful, as so brave a man, and so perfect a master of fence ought to be, save when the flask hath somewhat inflamed my brain, and then, indeed, i am as dangerous as a devil. 'twas well that thou camest, else my lord of huntly, whom otherwise i so highly respect, had certainly died by my murderous hand." "'twas well, indeed, that thy bloody bacchanalian rage was staid in time," said sir walter stewart, ironically. "in this bout, thou hast so well proved thy title to bravery, as well as to science in fence, that who shall dare henceforth to deny these thy perfections? so take the advice of a friend, signor torfefan, and get thee straightway to bed, lest the dregs of that same pottle-pot, working in thee still, should draw down upon thee some more serious fracture than that of thy bilboa-blade." "ha! true," said torfefan; "that was a loss indeed! but murderers will suffer at last; and if thou didst but know the blood which that same lethal weapon hath shed in my hands, and the lives which it hath sacrificed, thou would'st say, sir knight----" "i would say that thou should'st forthwith hasten to thy bed," interrupted sir walter. "if the king should hear of this brawl----" "gad so, that's true, sir walter!" cried torfefan; "thank thee for the hint. were those reptiles, cochran, rogers, and the rest, to hear of this, they might work mine absolute destruction. ah, that's the worst feature of our king's court, sir walter! the worst misfortune that has happened, i say, to us gentlemen of the court, is the admission to it of such vile scum as these cochrans, and rogers, and leonards, and such like base mechanics. my very broil this blessed night, may be said to be owing to my permitting that lily-livered hog in armour, hommil, to company with me. but while i am prating, these villains may get sight of me, and make their own story out of me. so i'll tarry here no longer. good night, sir walter stewart; you are a brave gentleman, well fitted to company with the king." "what a cowardly boasting knave!" said sir walter, after he was gone. "yet, to such vermin are all the crumbs of royal favour thrown, to the utter starvation of those who are of noble breed!" cried huntly, with bitterness. "i would fain drink one flask of wine with thee, stewart, at thy hostel, ere i go home, to wash down the indignation and loathing, which the very sight of these scoundrel caitiffs hath brought into my throat. let me go thither with thee straightway." "willingly, my lord," replied sir walter, and, arm and arm together, they proceeded to the hostel. "stewart," said the earl of huntly, after they were seated at their wine, and leaning across the table to address his friend in a half whisper, though they were the only guests in the room at that late hour; "thou hast so much of the good will of great and small, that no one grudges thee the favour the king shows to thee; and there are few who have much jealousy of ramsay either, seeing that he was whipping-boy to james, and, moreover, that he is a gentleman of good descent. but neither lords nor commons, knights nor burgesses, can long tolerate the undue elevation and preferment of wretches, so worthless, as those who block up the royal presence from the approach of better men." "'tis unfortunate that it should be so," said sir walter; "but has it never occurred to your lordship, that the nobles of scotland may have some small share of the blame, by absenting themselves from court as they do, so that the king lacks all opportunity of having their several merits brought under his eye." "you would not have the high-blooded war-steed to throw himself down in the same stye with obscene swine?" replied the earl. "i would as soon thrust myself into a den of badgers, as sit down to partake of a king's feast, with such company as that arrogant mason cochran, and the other dunghill companions whom james so much delights to honour. the court must be cleared of all such, aye, and swept, and garnished, and perfumed too, before i shall dare to trust my nostrils within its precincts." "no one can say that such feelings are not quite natural, my lord," replied sir walter stewart; "but yet, i fear that the indulgence of them, can do nothing else but increase the disease which you would so fain cure. 'tis pity that some few of the nobles do not so far overcome them, as to appear now and then at court. as a soft answer turneth away wrath, so gentle conduct will often effect that which may defy the sternest boldness." "nay, but how are we used when we do appear?" demanded the earl. "even albany and mar are treated as aliens; and if the very royal brothers of the monarch are scarcely noticed, in comparison with those nauseous toads who crawl about the king's footstool, what can we of the humbler peerage expect?" "there is great reason in what you say, my lord," observed sir walter; "but hush! who comes here?" a tall thin figure, in black trewse, with a doublet of black, slashed with flame-coloured silk, the body strangely covered with silver stars, and having the signs of the zodiac on the broad belt that confined it, with a black cloak hanging from his shoulders, which had on it the sun and moon and seven stars, and his head shaded by a broad hat, that bore a large plume of feathers, all of the same gloomy hue, stalked into the common room. from the small quantity of illumination which the single lamp, that burned on their table, threw around it, the person that came was but indistinctly visible, in the obscurity that especially prevailed at the lower end of the apartment; but when he came slowly forward within the influence of the light, sir walter stewart, and his friend the earl of huntly, recognised the pale, thin, sharp, and prominent features, the cadaverous hue, the dark eyebrows, the piercing eyes, and the long black locks and beard of andrew the flemish astrologer. he came as if in a walking dream; he stopped within a few feet of the table where they sat--started, as if suddenly returning to the consciousness of the realities around him--darted an inquiring look, first at lord huntly, and then at sir walter stewart, and then slowly inclining his head in silent and sombre salutation, he turned from them, and stalked away, without uttering a syllable. the earl, and the knight, could not for some time shake off the superstitious dread, that involuntarily crept over both of them at the sight of this man, who had thus so strangely and mysteriously visited them. his deep knowledge of the science, to which he pretended, was admitted by all, and his powers were supposed to extend over other regions besides those of the heavens. their hearts were so chilled by his very aspect, that both felt quite unfitted for renewing their conversation; and, without making one single remark on this strange intrusion, each drained the full cup that stood before him, and, bidding one another good night, the serving men of the hostel were called, and they separated, to seek their respective places of repose. a tempest. clifford.--what a dreadful tempest out of doors?--forgive my interruption, serjeant; but ere you go farther with your interesting story, i think we had better get in some more wood and peats, lest the fire should get hopelessly low, a thing that is very likely to happen where people are so engaged as we are. grant.--the serjeant's stories might well make one forget every thing else. clifford.--come, mister serjeant, whilst the fire is mending, and the earl and the knight are retiring to their repose, you may have leisure to wet your whistle a little. serjeant.--i shall not be sorry to do that, sir; my mouth is a little dry to be sure. keep us all, such a night of wind and rain! how the blast thuds against the windows!--that is awful indeed! god help the poor man that may be out in such a night! 'tis well for us to be in bigged land. grant.--as you say, it is well for us to be under a roof, archy; and yet i wish that the roof of this old house may not be blown away. how furiously the tempest howls along! author.--'tis fearful to listen to it; yet i suspect that this is nothing to the blasts which its walls must sometimes endure. serjeant.--ou! bless you, sir! the wind comes down the trough of this glen, at times, enough, one would think, to blow every house and living thing out of it, stones and rocks and all, like peas out of a pop-gun. but this house has stood many a blast, and i hope it will weather out this one yet. author.--it came on very suddenly. it is not half an hour ago since all was quiet, and hear how the wind rages and the rain rattles now. clifford.--our friend willox must be abroad with his kelpie's bridle. author.--aye--or andrew the flemish astrologer may have done it. clifford.--andrew the astrologer! yes, i daresay he was quite equal to kicking up such a rumpus among the elements. i would fain know more of that fellow. serjeant.--be assured, sir, i shall tell you all i know about him in due course of time. meanwhile i am ready to take up the clue of my discourse whenever you please. clifford.--you may do so when you like, serjeant; for, as i suppose that this terrible night puts all hope of an early start in the morning out of the question, we may e'en sit up as late as we like. serjeant.--if the rain holds on at this rate, the rivers will all be up, and the mosses swimming, so that our travelling further to-morrow will be impossible. clifford.--come away, then, serjeant, proceed with your legend, and let the storm roar and rattle as it will. the legend of charley stewart tÀillear-crubach continued. sir walter stewart was received next day, by king james, with all that kindness which he was used to lavish upon his favourites, among whom the accomplished knight held by no means the lowest place in his estimation. apartments were immediately allotted to him near the royal person, and his time became almost entirely occupied by his duties as a courtier. he failed not, however, to take all opportunities that occurred, of cultivating his talent for music, under the auspices of sir william rogers, and his fascinating niece. notwithstanding the knight's bold confidence to the contrary, the lady's designs against his heart might have been very rapidly successful, had not the baseness of her motives inclined her to waver from time to time, between the balance of rival advantages, which were offered to her by an encouragement of cochran, who had declared himself to be her lover. thus it was that she often scared sir walter stewart at the very moment when, to all appearance, he seemed most likely unconsciously to gorge the bait, and thus it was that several years glided imperceptibly away, without the lady finding herself one bit nearer to the attainment of either of her objects. still, however, sir walter would ever and anon return within the sphere of her attraction, and the fair juliet always the more easily managed to conjure him back thither, that they were frequently brought together, to sing and to play in presence of the royal pair, in those little private meetings which were held almost nightly in the queen's apartment. as for sir william rogers, he did all he could to fix his niece's determination towards securing an alliance with sir walter stewart, not only from his unconquerable abhorrence of the unrefined mason, on the one hand, but also from his conviction, that his own ambitious views were fully as likely to be helped forward by the lady's union with the gallant knight, for whom moreover he had an especial respect, because of his genius and accomplishment in that divine art, to which he was himself so enthusiastically attached. the royal party was one night assembled, as usual, in the apartment of queen margaret, who, seated in a gorgeous chair, richly attired, as became her station, and attended by ramsay, and some of her maids of honour, and with her angelic countenance lighted up with unfeigned rapture, listened to the mingled voices and minstrelsy of sir william rogers, sir walter stewart, and the lovely juliet manvers. the king was engaged with cochran, at a table at one end of the room, in looking over some plans, which had reference to the buildings then going on within the castle. any one who had witnessed them, whilst so employed, would have said that neither his majesty, nor his architect, were much occupied in the subject which was the ostensible object of their consideration, for whilst the ears of the monarch seemed ever and anon to draw off his attention to the music, the heavy eyes of cochran were perpetually wandering towards the person of the songstress. ere the music had been long continued, each of them yielded to the irresistible impulse which had moved him, and, whilst the king drew a chair, and seated himself opposite to the performers, cochran placed himself behind it, and, with that vulgar and unpolished air, which the magnificence of his dress rendered only the more apparent, leaned awkwardly over the back of it, and rivetted his gloating gaze upon the lady's charms. the piece had come to its close, and the royal pair were bestowing their commendations liberally upon those who had executed it, when three loud and solemn taps were heard at the door of the chamber. king james started, and at once assumed an air of intense and serious anxiety, and the queen, and all present, were more or less disturbed at this interruption. "i had forgotten!" exclaimed the king, as if speaking to himself alone.--"enter! thou art at all times welcome!" the door slowly opened at his word, and the tall thin figure of andrew the flemish astrologer stood in the doorway, habited as he has been already described, and with a long white rod in his right hand. with his left hand upon his breast, he made a low and solemn reverence to the king, and then pointing his rod over his shoulder, he seemed silently to indicate his desire that his majesty should follow him. "lead on!" cried the king, with an awe-stricken voice and air, whilst he arose from his chair, and hastily put on his hat and cloak. "if we are called by the stars, we are at all times ready to give due obedience to them," and, with these words, he immediately retired with the astrologer. ramsay, stewart, rogers, and juliet manvers, made their several reverences to the queen, in which they were clumsily joined by cochran, and all took their leave. they were no sooner out of the royal presence, than cochran, rudely thrusting himself before ramsay and sir walter stewart, bustled busily up to the lady, as she hung on her uncle's arm, so as to engage the unoccupied place next her, to the exclusion of every one else. sir walter was somewhat chafed at this rudeness, and might have forgotten himself, had not his rising anger been checked by the voice of one of the queen's ladies, who called him by his name. the knight stopped to ascertain what she wanted. "sir walter stewart," said the lady, "the queen commands thee to return, for a brief space, to her apartment, that she may again hear thee sing that french ballad of thine own composition, which so much pleased her majesty two nights ago. her majesty would fain have the words, and catch the notes of it." "i humbly obey her majesty's command," replied the knight, returning with the lady immediately. on entering the queen's apartment, he made his reverence to her majesty; and she, having again signified her wishes to him in a very gracious manner, she motioned him to take up a lute, and seat himself on a stool near her chair; and after having done as she desired, he began to sing the ballad she had named, and to accompany himself on the instrument. in the meanwhile the king followed the solemn, step and apparition-like figure of the astrologer till he brought his majesty to an angular part of the castle-wall that, skirting the giddy precipice of lofty rock on which the fortress stands, looked out over the country to the south and west. but that which was an extensive and magnificent prospect by day, was at this moment shrouded in the shades of night. there he took his stand, and pointed upwards with his rod. the moon was in its second quarter, and shed a pale and partial light. a strange and portentous arch of black and very opaque clouds, rested its extremities on the verges of the northern and southern horizon, and spanned the heavens through the zenith. behind this, all to the eastward, was one dark vault, impenetrable to the eye, whilst the western edge of the arch was tinged with bright rain-bow hues, and the whole sky below it, upon that side, was serene and cloudless. as the king gazed upwards in wonder, not unmingled with dread, a bright flash of lightning suddenly illumined the whole of the black and solid concave of clouds behind them, and the walls of the castle were shaken by a tremendous peal of thunder. the heart of the royal james quailed within him. the peal was reverberated from the bold front of dumyot, with a harsh and crashing sound, and then, after visiting and rousing up every echo among the ochills, it rolled fearfully away up the valley of the forth, until it died amid the distant western mountains. filled with superstitious dread, the king grasped the left arm of the astrologer, who stood unmoved, with his rod extended in his right hand. "holy virgin mother, messire andrew! what do these dread signs portend?" cried james, with deep anxiety of voice and manner. "these!" exclaimed andrew, in french, and in a wild and enthusiastic tone, that would have sounded as contemptuous in the king's ear, but for the intensity of his desire to have his fears and doubts put to rest; "these are but the mere auxiliaries of heaven's appalling oratory. see!--know you not yonder stars which now approach each other to a conjunction so threatening?" "mars and venus approaching to strange and fearful conjunction indeed," replied the king, shuddering. "what can it bode?" "and see ye not that they are in the ascendant, whilst jupiter is sinking fast?--now, they are almost in contact--and now!" "heaven in its mercy defend us, what a dreadful peal!" cried the king, as the thunder again burst terribly over his head. "and see, the thick and inky veil begins to rend asunder into separate clouds, like some vast army breaking its general mass into its several legions. and behold now, how they divide and subdivide, careering swiftly like squadrons of horsemen over the vault of the heavens. and now, look how strangely and capriciously the broken-up clouds have here veiled, and there revealed, the different portions of the sky!" "aye!" said the astrologer, solemnly, "and now the mystic dance is done. each several fragment of vapour hath taken his place. the characters are fixed; and now 'tis man's fault if he read not enough of heaven's will in so wide-spread and so plainly written a book. there we can see the hydra, and there the greyhounds--there the greater, and there the lesser dog. but where is the lion? and where the northern crown?" "alas, messire andrew! thou lookest as if thou wer't dismayed by these fearful prodigies," exclaimed the king again, with an anxiously inquiring eye. "what is it that you dread they may portend?" "it is grievous for me to translate to your majesty the meaning of these direfully ominous portents," replied andrew, gravely, after a long pause, during which he seemed gradually to call down his spirit from the heavens, where it had been soaring for sometime amid all the wonders they displayed. "yet is it better for you to know their fearful warnings, so far as mortals may interpret them," continued he, rising into a wild kind of inspiration. "danger is threatened to the king!--to the king of scotland! beware of the princes and lords of the land! those in whom thou takest the most pleasure may prove thy greatest bane! commotions and wars are to be looked for and dreaded! beware! beware! oh, king! lest the scottish lion be devoured by its whelps!" "the scottish lion devoured by its whelps!" re-echoed the king, in the muttered voice of dismay. "danger from the princes and nobles of the land! danger from those in whom we take most pleasure! what doth all this import? and in especial, what meaneth this last strange enigma?--what!--the queen!--speak messire andrew? or would it point at those who most enjoy my favour?--why dost thou not answer me?--wars and commotions--the powerful influence of mars is plain--but that of venus!--say!--speak! surely, surely that doth not touch the loyalty of our queen?" "the moment of divination has passed away for this night," said the cunning astrologer, in a low hollow voice, like that produced from an over-exhausted spirit. "i am now weak and blind as other men. yet said i nothing of her most gracious majesty queen margaret, whom god long preserve! the planet your majesty speaks of hath two several and distinct influences--one, the which may operate as touching things more immediately under the dominion of woman's passion, and the other, as denoting a mere point of time. this latter interpretation would seem to me, at this moment, to be by far the more likely, for, as mars would predict battles, his conjunction with the star of evening would rather appear to me to mark that they will arise in the evening of your majesty's reign, which may god and st. andrew render long and prosperous!" "nay, but cans't thou not yet inquire more closely, messire andrew?" demanded the king, impatiently. "these doubts are worse than ignorance." "another time we may find fit opportunity to solve them, good my liege," replied the astrologer, with a low reverence. "the spirit of divination hath passed from me, and i am now no more than a weak and blind mortal. and see! even the heavens have refused to yield up farther knowledge of future events to the sons of earth, for they have wrapped themselves up in one dark and impenetrable veil of cloud. to-night the book of fate is shut!--saw ye that! the elements themselves forbid all farther question." as he spoke, a terrible glare of lightning blazed around them, momentarily illuminating every feature of the grand scenery by which they were surrounded. a fearful clap of thunder again burst over their heads with awful magnificence, and rolled terribly away. a furious wind began to blow, and large drops of rain descended, a tempest was approaching, and the king, sunk, disheartened, and unsatisfied, was driven in by the natural results of those threatenings in the sky, which he had been so attentively watching, to brood upon those fanciful horrors and dangers with which they, in reality, had no connection. he returned towards the queen's apartment in deep thought, and he had entered it fully, before the notes of the music that still sounded in it had power to rouse him from his abstraction. sir walter stewart still sat near the queen's footstool, singing to the accompaniment of his lute, and her majesty and her maids of honour were still eagerly occupied in listening. "ha!" cried king james, as he recovered perfect consciousness of the scene before him, and speaking with a highly disturbed air and tone; "methought our privacy had been relieved from all further interruption for this night?" "pardon, my liege!--my love!" cried the queen, rising from her chair, and affectionately taking his arm. "pardon, if we have done aught to displeasure thee! i and my maidens had a mind to hear again that sweet ballad of sir walter stewart's making, which he sang so pleasantly to us the other night, as you may remember. he was brought back, therefore, in obedience to my command, and if there be aught of blame in this, it is all mine own. that he hath staid so long after he did return, if fault in that there be, it must be charged against his own pleasing minstrelsy, which did so enchain the ears of his hearers, that time passed by unheeded." "permit me, your majesty, to take my leave," said sir walter, making his wonted obeisance to the king as he retired. "good night," said the king, with more of condescension, but with less of warmth than he was accustomed to use towards one whom he so much favoured. all that night the royal mind was vexed by frightful waking visions, that haunted it to the exclusion of sleep. in vain did his majesty try to embody them into any thing like a clear and connected picture of coming events. but dark though the ground was upon which he worked, certain prominent lights continually started from it, and remained stationary before him, so as ultimately to fix themselves in some degree upon him as probable truths. the most stimulating of these might be guessed at, from the royal orders which were issued on the following morning. the court was hastily and unexpectedly removed to edinburgh castle; and soon afterwards, the two princes of the blood-royal, the duke of albany, and the earl of mar, were, to the astonishment of all men, seized and made prisoners. mar was confined in craigmillar castle. but of albany, the king seemed anxious to take especial care, for he was committed to custody in edinburgh castle itself, where he might be more particularly guarded under the royal eye. yet all this did not seem to have relieved james' mind from the terrors which had taken possession of it. the approach of the nobles to the royal person was less encouraged than it had ever been. the king's favourites, though still permitted to have their usual intercourse with him, were all in their turns looked upon at times with an eye of doubt. sir walter stewart sensibly felt, that he was subjected to a greater portion of the effects of this suspicious temper than any of the others. an excuse had been found for his being deprived of such apartments in the castle of edinburgh, as he had had in that of stirling, and he was obliged to hire lodgings within the walls of the city. his presence at the private parties in the queen's apartment was rarely, if ever, required. the musical meetings there were of themselves less frequent, and when they did take place, he was not among the number of the performers. to make amends for this, he spent more of his time in the pursuit of his favourite science, with the fair juliet manvers, in the apartments of sir william rogers, and as the lady seemed to be making, day after day, greater inroads upon his heart, so did sir walter stewart himself rise every day more and more in the estimation of the musical knight. with such a source of amusement, sir walter was less affected by the coldness which he experienced at court, than might have been naturally supposed. but he felt deeply for the confinement of the princes, with whom he had been admitted into habits of intimacy that bordered upon the warmth of friendship. yet, much as he was personally attached to them, and anxiously as he would have wished to have befriended them, he knew enough to convince him that he could make no effort in their behalf, that would not have a certain tendency to lead to some fatal issue, both as regarded them and himself. but the death of the earl of mar, which happened soon afterwards, and which was most suspiciously given out as having taken place suddenly, by apoplexy, in a warm bath, so roused his feelings, that he resolved to take the first opportunity of making some attempt to save albany, and to this he was more immediately stimulated by something that occurred to him one night, as he was walking and ruminating on the castle-hill. "sir walter stewart," said a man, who stood muffled up in a cloak, to him, as he was striding slowly past, unconscious that there was any one near him, "wilt thou not halt for a moment to speak to an old friend?" "my lord huntly!" cried sir walter, in astonishment, after approaching the figure, and ascertaining who it was that spoke. "hush!--name me not so loudly!" replied huntly. "the very air hath ears, yea, and eyes too. i am here in secret and in disguise. were i discovered, my life might pay for it. come farther this way into the shadow. i would speak with thee about matters which no one else must hear, and my time is short. we must save albany!" "most willingly would i aid in doing so," replied sir walter. "but how is his safety to be secured?" "thou canst be eminently useful," replied huntly. "i know thy zeal in a friend's behalf, and although thou mightest have shown some unwillingness to take part with us, when our grievances amounted to nothing more than royal neglect, yet perhaps thou mayest now be more sharpened to our purpose, when thou seest that the murderous knife hath already been drawn upon us, that the first victim hath been already sacrificed, and that victim too a high and noble prince of the blood royal, who was, moreover, thy friend." "nay, surely thou dost not believe that my lord mar died other than a natural death?" said sir walter. "a natural death!" exclaimed huntly.--"aye, a death naturally occurring from a weak and cruel brother's jealousy. that species of natural death, to wit, which the sheep may very naturally receive from the hand of the butcher!" "why, they say he died in a bath;" said sir walter. "and in so saying they say truly," replied huntly. "of a truth he died in a bath--a hot bath, into which he was kindly put to recover him from a deep cut in the main artery of his arm, given him by one of the royal executioners." "'tis horrible, if true!" said sir walter, shuddering. "'tis as true as it is horrible," continued huntly. "and now methinks i may trust to your being less scrupulous in listening to the grievances of the lords, than thou wert when i last touched the topic with thee at stirling." "my lord," replied sir walter, "i will honestly tell thee, that to save albany, a man whom i honour as a royal prince and a highly accomplished knight, and whom, moreover, i hold in deep affection as a friend, i am willing to put mine own life to utmost peril, and this the more too, that if i can save him i shall think that my so doing will be the preserving of the right arm of scotland. but in any thing that may touch my fealty directly to the person of king james, i must be held excused, seeing that i have already received too much kindness from his majesty, to permit me to prove in anywise a rebel to him,--but in this matter of the duke of albany, my judgment tells me that i shall, by saving him, be doing good service to my king as well as to my country." "then let us leave all else at present, and talk of this matter in hand," said huntly. "thou art well versed in the customs and affairs of france, and canst speak its tongue. couldst thou not contrive to discover, whether some barque may not be soon looked for from thence with merchandize?" "so far, my lord, i can answer thee here upon the spot," replied sir walter. "it so chances that i look daily for the arrival of a captain, well known to me, who trades in wine. he is the bearer of certain casks for me, and i can therefore go to inquire regarding him without much suspicion. it shall be done to-morrow." "this is most lucky," said huntly. "so now let us consider well as to our plans. knowest thou how the duke is guarded?" "i do not lodge within the castle," replied sir walter. "nor am i so often within its walls as i wont to be. but this i know, that the duke is guarded most strictly. the captain of the guard himself keeps the key of the apartment where he is imprisoned, and where, to make all things secure, his chamberlain is locked up with him, and no one is allowed to go in or out who is not in the first place most narrowly examined. but yet will i scrupulously observe, and make myself master of the whole circumstances, and of the exact position of things, and it will go hard with me if i cannot find some way of baffling their vigilance." "then let us part to-night, lest we be observed," said huntly. "that accursed astrologer, flemish andrew, may again start up before us, like the devil in our path." "um," replied sir walter, doubtingly; "thou mayest not be very far from the truth in thy evil suspicions of him, my lord. i liked not his last visit." "well, no matter," said the earl; "to-morrow night we may meet again." "aye, to-morrow night--here, and at the same hour," replied sir walter. "but if i come not, my lord, i would have thee believe, that if not unwillingly detained by the king, i may perhaps be employing myself more usefully elsewhere." "i shall so believe," replied huntly; "then farewell till our next meeting, be that when it may." the friends then parted, and took different ways, to avoid all chance of being seen together, and sir walter stewart was about to enter the head of the close where his lodging was situated, when he was accosted by a person who came limping up to him, with all the appearance of a jaded foot traveller, and who addressed him in humble, but by no means clownish, salutation. "sir knight," said he, "wilt thou vouchsafe to pardon me, a stranger, and deign to tell me whether thou canst direct me to the lodging of sir walter stewart of stradawn?" "surely i have heard that voice before," said the knight, without replying to the question. "sir walter!--my father!" exclaimed the other in great surprise. "what!" exclaimed sir walter, in no less astonishment, and in any thing but a gracious tone, "charley stewart! in the name of all that is wonderful what hath brought thee to edinburgh?--this is not well. methought i had arranged all things to thy heart's content, for thy proper employment in thine own native district. but i forget how time flies. doubtless ere this thou art as learned in thine art, and in the use of the goose, needles, shears, and bodkin, as the great and accomplished mr. jonathan junkins himself." "i crave your pardon, sir knight," replied charley. "ill as the spirit of the stewart that is within me might brook such mean drudgery, i struggled hard to break it into the destiny which thou hadst been pleased to assign me. but the rude caitiff churls that worked in junkins' shop, and some of the boorish neighbours too, presuming on my youth, fastened on me the offensive nickname of tàillear-crubach, or the lame tailor. this i could not bear; and after having well pummelled some dozen or so of them, one after the other, i deemed it as well to secure peace for the future, by giving up all just claim to so ignominious a title." "by saint michael, my boy," cried sir walter, cordially taking charley's hand; "i cannot say but thou didst well. what a strapping burly chield thou hast grown! but what hast thou been doing with thyself then, since thou gavest up tailoring?" "i have learned to ride, and to use a sword and a lance indifferent well," said charley. "bravo!" cried sir walter. "by the rood, thou art mine own very flesh and blood! trust me, had i guessed that thou wert made of such metal, i should never have thought of tying thee to a tailor's board, i promise thee. would i had known this sooner! but now!--how fares it with thy mother, boy?" "well, sir walter," replied charley with a deep sigh. "she was well when i last saw her." "would that i had sooner known thy merits, charley!" said sir walter, with a depth of feeling which he had not yet displayed. "i might then have----but now i fear i am too far involved with another----the fates have been cruelly against thee, boy." "they have indeed!" said charley, with an emotion which almost choked him. "well! well!" said sir walter, affectionately squeezing his hand. "come--cheer up, charley! i may yet have it in my power to do something for thee.--and by saint andrew," continued the knight, after a short pause, "now i think on't, thou hast come to me in the very nick of time. thine aid will be most useful to me. but this is neither the time nor the place to talk about such matters. come, let us to my lodging, that i may procure you refreshment and rest; for your pale face, hollow eyes, and clinging cheeks, would seem to say that thou greatly lackest both; and as thou mayest require to be up betimes, i shall delay farther questioning of thee till a fitter opportunity." but as you will hardly wish to wait, gentlemen, until charley stewart has had such necessary restoration of exhausted nature, as shall enable him to tell his own story, i shall hastily sketch, at somewhat greater length than he had time to do, what took place with him during those years that have elapsed since we last heard of him. a few months had sufficed to sicken him, as we have seen, of the shop-board of mister jonathan junkins. for a time he lived quietly with his mother, soothing her sorrow with all the tenderness of the kindest of hearts, following out his learning under the kind instruction of the then priest of dounan, who had taken an especial favour for him; and, lastly, occupying himself in the delightful task of communicating to rosa macdermot, that knowledge which he thus gained. now and then, to be sure, spite of his lameness, he took pleasure in exercising himself in athletic feats; and in this practice, he was much aided by an accidental acquaintance, which he chanced to make with a certain sir piers gordon, a small landholder in a neighbouring glen, who, himself a dependant of the earl of huntly, was glad to collect a few retainers about him, in any way, to help him to uphold his dignity. under the auspices of this well-trained soldier, charley became an expert handler of the claymore, a fearless horseman, and no very contemptible wielder of a lance; and he had more than once had the satisfaction, of making one of the party who accompanied his patron, in some of those skirmishes or minor movements of warfare between clans, which the wild and unsettled state of the country rendered much too common in those days to be always particularized, far less to be chronicled. charley was one day seated, with rosa macdermot, on their favourite flowery bank, by the side of the same spring i formerly described as gushing from below a mossy stone, under the grove of weeping birches, where we last heard of them together. but rosa was now grown almost a woman, being tall of her age, and of very handsome person; and the scar of the crossmark on her cheek had now become so slight, that so far from being a deformity, it rather gave an interesting expression to her otherwise blooming and richly beautiful countenance. her love for charley, and his for her, had grown with every day they had lived. but maiden modesty on her part, and delicacy on his, had made both of them somewhat more reserved, and more guarded in giving way to the expression of it. she no longer talked of being his wifey; and when he, hurried on by the feelings of the moment, was led to allude to their future union, when future prospects should smile more kindly upon them, her words, though tender, were few, whilst her eyes and her blushes spoke volumes. they were intently engaged in converse together, when they were interrupted by a most unseemly looking object that appeared before them. if they had never beheld it until that moment, they might have had doubts as to which of the sexes it belonged to. the face was hideous, the nose being very prominent and hooked, so as to project over the mouth, which was hardly perceptible. the eyes, when open, were great, round, and fiery, and they were covered by eyelids of an unnatural largeness, so that the strange and regular alternation of the muscular motion, which was exerted in the dropping and raising of them, produced the most fearful effect. enveloped as the head was in an old soiled red tartan plaid, which was twisted around it, and fell in large folds over half the person, after being knotted behind over the back, the whole body had a bunchy bird-like appearance, which was rendered still more uncouth, by its being supported on the bare, wirey, dirt-begrimmed shanks, and claw-like talons, which sprawled out beneath a short grey petticoat. the real name of this strange, unearthly looking monster, was lost in her antiquity. she had appeared in that district many years before, no one knew from whence; and as all her marks were then the same as i have described them now, it is not wonderful that she should have acquired, from the rude people, the name of the howlet, from her extreme likeness to that ill-omened bird. and tired as she had long been of kicking against the scorn of the world, and callous as she had been rendered under all the miseries it had heaped upon her, she now answered to that appellation, with the same readiness which she might probably have shown in the more sunny days of her youth, when she cheerfully replied to her own proper name, and to the fond endearments of a father and a mother. yet, let it not be imagined that she, miserably abandoned as she had so long been to all that was wretched in human existence, had not her moments of reflection on happier days, long since gone by, the recollection of which only the more embittered the present. nor is it to be supposed that, much as she had suffered, she herself had been bereft of all the better feelings of humanity. her external appearance was enough to endow her, in the estimation of the vulgar, with all the attributes of malignity, as well as with the dread powers of sorcery. but although her approach never failed to produce a certain sensation of awe in the gentle mind of rosa macdermot, it was always mingled with a very large share of pity for the poor creature's penury and distress; and this was fully participated by the good hearted charley stewart. "poor howley!" cried rosa, the moment she beheld her; "it is long since i have seen thee. where hast thou been wandering during this many a day?" "some food for charity's sake!" said the howlet, in that half shooting, half whistling tone of voice, which strangely carried out her otherwise remarkable similarity to the bird she was called after. "i am starving! i am famished!--some food for charity's sake!" "poor howley, thou shalt never want it whilst i can help thee to it!" said the compassionate girl. "though hard-heartedness and scorn may meet me at every other door in this weary and wicked world," said the howlet, "i still find charity here." "sit down then on the bank there," said rosa, "and i will run and bring thee food in a moment." "god's blessing be upon thee, fair maiden!" said the howlet, with deep feeling. "thou canst bless, then!" said charley stewart gravely, after rosa was gone. "i can pray to god to bless!" replied the howlet; "and, unlike the men of this world, a god of all goodness will not refuse to listen to such a prayer, because it comes from the heart of a poor outcast, the scorn of this heartless world, clothed in rags, and starving for food. and who should i pray for, if i did not pray for blessings on that angel?" "she is an angel, howley!" cried charley, with ecstacy--"an angel in soul as well as in form. see how she comes tripping with her basket and pitcher, as if she hardly trod the earth!" the old woman fastened her long hands greedily on the viands, the moment they came within her reach, her eyes glaring wide, and shutting alternately, and her ravenous hunger urged her to devour her food so fast, that it was fearful to behold her; and then, as she did so, she went on muttering in her whistling voice, "the holy virgin bless thee, my fair maiden!--och! och! what pain it is to swallow. three days have i been denied food by my flinty-hearted fellow creatures! yet may god, in his mercy, forgive them!--three days! three whole days! the blessing of heaven, its best blessings on thee, thou angel!--och, such pain! thou shalt be a landed lady yet! och, och! thou shalt marry a man with a knight's spur at his heel! och! such a pang at my heart! och! oh!"-- rosa and charley stewart, who had both been swallowing her words, with as much avidity as she had been devouring the food that had been given her, now both started up in dire alarm, and ran towards the old woman. her eyes rolled dreadfully for a moment, and then they became fixed; the basket she held dropped from her hands; her arms and limbs stretched themselves out in rigid convulsion; her head fell stiffly back on the bank, and, when they essayed to raise it up, they found that she was dead. it was many a long day before rosa macdermot could shake off the horrible impression which this scene had made upon her young mind, so far as to be able to recall it with anything approaching to tranquillity. charley, however, had often pondered deeply on the words which had fallen from the old woman, and he was impatient till the time did come, when he felt that he might venture to allude to them. "charley," said rosa anxiously, and tenderly taking his hand, as they were one day sitting together on their favourite spot; "something grieves thee in secret. thou wert not wont to conceal a thought from me; why shouldst thou do so now? why shouldst thou deny me my share of that sadness, which, being thine, ought to belong to both of us?" "rosa," replied charley, fervently returning her gentle pressure; "i will honestly confess my folly. those idle words of the poor howlet have clung to my soul with a heaviness which i cannot shake off." "idle words they were, indeed," replied rosa; "words idly uttered by the poor crazy creature in the delirium of starvation. but, idle or not, they boded no evil to me; and is it by charley stewart that they are to be grudged to me?" "think of their import, rosa," replied charley, gravely; "and then you will see that i can scarcely be expected calmly to contemplate them." "what!" exclaimed rosa, smiling--"that i am to be a landed lady? is that a matter that should give thee pain to think of?" "reflect, rosa, by what means it was said that thou art to become so," replied charley, with a sigh. "by marrying a man with a knight's spurs at his heels! ran not the old woman's words so? and canst thou believe that i can coolly contemplate the probable accomplishment of any such prophecy?" "charley!" cried rosa, with great feeling, whilst tears swelled from under her beautiful eyelids, "canst thou believe it possible that i should ever forget all i owe to thee? canst thou believe that i can forget my often repeated vows? canst thou believe that those infant affections which have grown up with me, strengthening as they grew, until they have now ripened with me in womanhood, can ever perish but with my life? my life is thine, for to thee i owe it. my soul is thine, for to thee i am indebted for that culture and expansion which may best fit it for heaven. my heart is thine, for it is to thee that i have been indebted for stocking it with its best and purest sympathies. canst thou then doubt that i ever could be any other's than thine?" "may the virgin ever bless thee for thy words, my love!" cried charley, with ecstasy. "i am satisfied of the truth of thine affection. yet had i been better pleased if that old woman had never given utterance to those idle dreams of hers. at such a time too!--so awful!--just before her vexed and worn out spirit took its flight from its wretched earthly tenement!" "it was awful, indeed!" said rosa, solemnly. "but methinks," added she, after a pause, and in a more cheerful tone--"methinks the poor howlet's words might bear a more pleasing interpretation than thou wouldst seem inclined to put upon them; yea, and to my fancy, much more natural withal." "as how?" demanded charley, eagerly. "marry, that thou mayest be the man with the knight's spurs at his heels," said rosa, dropping her voice and her eyes, and blushing deeply. "what!" exclaimed charley, energetically. "by all the saints in the calendar, but that were an interpretation indeed! i thank thee, rosa, for thy augury. trust me, if it lacks accomplishment, in due time, it shall not be my fault. though i have been turned over into the dirt, by him to whom i should have looked for countenance and support, to encourage me in a nobler career--by him to whom i reasonably looked for the education befitting a soldier,--thanks to mine honest patron, sir piers, i am not now altogether in want of it. thanks, moreover, be to god, that i have never done anything which may, with reason, make my father ashamed of me. and, with the blessing of saint andrew on this arm of mine, i may yet live to earn those honours, which his indifference towards me would have denied me." rosa did not altogether enjoy perfect ease of mind after charley stewart had left her. she thought, with some pride to be sure, of the nobleness of that spirit which she had thus seen blaze up within him. but she felt that she had now the dread responsibility of having thus roused it; and all a woman's fears for the consequences were awakened in her bosom. nor was the happiness of the days that followed increased by this accidental conversation. for now, she rarely or ever saw him, in whose society her whole life had hitherto glided on with so much felicity. alice asher too, had her complaints to make of her son's frequent and long absence from her; and the only consolation the maiden had, was in frequently visiting the mother of charley stewart--to talk over his merits--a theme of which neither of them were very likely to tire--and to sigh for his presence. meanwhile charley was almost constant in his attendance upon sir piers gordon; and he very soon distinguished himself so much in all the accomplishments of a soldier, that he became the most cherished and favoured of the old soldier's followers. but this was not all; for, unknown to himself, and altogether without any effort on his part, he found especial favour in the sight of marcella gordon, niece, and acknowledged heiress of his patron, sir piers. this was a lady, by no means uncomely, though of most uncommonly masculine manners and mind, who, at any time, would have much preferred to witness a fray, or even to take her share in it, than to sit down to a feast, or to mix in a dance or a masking party. she became smitten with charley stewart for his martial acquirements, bold bearing in his saddle, and hardihood at all times; and for all these he well merited her admiration. sir piers gordon and his party were one day returning from an expedition, which had been suddenly undertaken in pursuit of some catteranes, whom, as being public marauders, and general enemies to all, he had, without scruple, followed across the territories of the stewart of stradawn. he passed at no great distance from the humble dwelling of mrs. macdermot. "so please thee, sir knight," said charley stewart to sir piers, "i will turn aside a brief space to yonder cottage, to say a few words to an old friend, whom i have not seen for many a day; and i will join thee again ere thou hast ridden a long mile." "i care not if i go with thee, charley," said sir piers; "that is, if thy friend's house can furnish me with a draught of any thing better than water, for my throat is parched like a mountain corry in the dog-days." "such as that humble roof may afford, i think i may venture to promise thee," replied charley, somewhat disappointed at being so attended. "i shall go with thee too," said marcella gordon, who, on this occasion, had followed her uncle in his expedition. the men-at-arms having been halted by the road-side, charley led the way to the widow's cottage. as he rode forth from among the trees of the birch-grove, that flanked one side of the house, and partly shaded half its front, rosa's quick eyes caught his figure--her heart bounded with joy, and in a moment she was at the door, and, from the first irresistible impulse of her heart, she almost sprang into his arms; but immediately perceiving that her lover was not alone, she blushed, and hastily retreated within doors. "is that your sister, young man?" demanded the lady marcella. "no, lady," replied charley, in some confusion; "but she is a very old friend of mine." "a very young friend of thine, methinks!" said sir piers. "she is very beautiful." mrs. macdermot now appeared, and ushered the strangers into the house with well-blended humility and kindness, and proceeded to do the little hospitalities of her unpretending roof. charley was himself abashed and baulked; but yet he conversed with rosa, though in that chastened manner that more than any thing else betrays the consciousness of lovers, in the eyes of those who may be observing them. no eyes were more penetrating than those of marcella gordon. they shot basilisks at the pair. the visit was necessarily short, and the parting between rosa and charley was doubly severe to both, since they were thus compelled by the presence of others, to conceal their emotions. "by all the saints, but thou art a happy fellow, stewart!" said sir piers gordon to charley, as they turned away to join the party. "that is the prettiest young creature i have seen for many a long day." "i see little to admire about her," said the lady marcella, with a scornful air; "a waxen child! a smock-faced red and white pippin!" "nay, marcella, women are no judges of beauty in their own sex," replied sir piers. "i say she is very lovely; and i say again thou art a happy fellow, stewart; for, judging from appearances, thou seem'st to be right well established in her affections." "we have known one another since her childhood," said charley stewart hurriedly. "and so now thou wouldst fain convert her from thy playmate into thy wife," said sir piers, laughing. "my wife, sir piers!" said charley, in great confusion. "what could i do with a wife, who am so poor and unknown? i must e'en follow fortune for some time as my mistress, and court her till she smiles upon me." "fear not that she will refuse to smile upon one of thy merit," said the lady marcella. "one who can ride, and wield his weapons as thou canst, may well look to fortune providing something better for him than the obscure and low-bred orphan of a common man-at-arms." charley stewart was silent, but sir piers was not altogether so blind as not to perceive how matters stood with his niece. he had observed the lady marcella's manner,--was struck with her words,--and a strong conviction entered his mind that she had allowed herself to fall in love with charley stewart. now his affection for charley had waxed so strong, that, knowing the good blood that was in him, he would have rejoiced to have seen him the husband of marcella. but feeling that it would be prudent, before giving encouragement to any such scheme, that he should privately satisfy himself as to the suspicions he entertained of an existing attachment between charley and rosa macdermot, and, having failed in one attempt to lead charley to be explicit, he privately resolved in his own mind, secretly to visit mrs. macdermot herself, from whom he looked to receive clearer and more ready information. having accordingly ridden over to her house alone, the very next morning, he soon learned from the worthy woman the whole history of the lovers. he was not a little disappointed to find that he had made so shrewd a guess, and that, to so honest and honourable a mind as his, there thus remained no fair hope of the completion of that alliance, which would have been so agreeable to him, as well as to his niece. all that he had learned from the widow regarding charley, had only served to increase his admiration of him, and to make his regret the greater. but being now in possession of the fact, he thought it his duty to deal plainly with the lady marcella, and he accordingly embraced the very first opportunity he could command of speaking with her in private. "marcella," said he to her abruptly, "what think ye of charley stewart?" "a proper young man, i promise thee," replied the lady, with the same want of ceremony. "his lameness is unfortunate,--it mars his appearance much," said sir piers. "and that cross scar on his cheek is any thing but ornamental." "pshaw!" cried the lady; "a fico for his scar! i hope, ere he dies, to see his manly face seamed by many a deeper ornament of the same sort, gained in tough fight, man to man. and as to his lameness! shew me one that will vault into his saddle with him, or ride with him, or hold a lance with him after he is in it! charley stewart is a prince of a fellow!" "all that is very true, niece," said sir piers; "but methinks thou speakest of him with unusual warmth. pray heaven thou be'st not in love with the young man!" "nay, uncle, since i must needs say so, that is already past praying for," replied marcella, with a sigh; which, as it was the first that ever in her life escaped her, was a precious deep one. "i am sorry to hear thee say so, niece," said sir piers; "for thy case is hopeless, seeing that thou hast already a rival, to whom he is not only attached, but affianced." "what, uncle!" exclaimed the lady, in a supercilious tone; "dost thou think so very meanly of thy niece, as to suppose that the whey-faced orphan of a miserable man-at-arms, can have any chance with me, when i, the heiress of thy lands, choose to enter the lists?" "i think and hope too well of my niece and heiress," said sir piers gravely, "to believe, that, for her own gratification, she will try to divide two hearts already united by the tenderest vows that affection can form." "affection!" exclaimed the lady; "tush, nonsense, uncle! the affection of children! the brotherly and sisterly affection of babes, for such was the sort of affection of which stewart himself spoke, and his words are all we have yet to go upon." "pardon me," said her uncle, calmly; "i have yet better information than any thing we have gathered from him. suspecting that charley stewart's merits were beginning to render him not altogether without interest in your eyes, i deemed it to be my duty to know the truth regarding this attachment between him and rosa macdermot. with this view i visited the widow macdermot herself, and from her i learned, that the bond between the pair, lacks nothing to complete it, but the holy sacrament that may fasten the tie for ever." "and until that tie be fixed, it is nothing," said the lady. "yet what sort of evidence would you bring me, truly, of this same attachment?--that of an old woman, who, in her folly, sees every thing just according to the way her wishes may lead her fancy. i will believe stewart himself before a dozen such crones, especially where self-interest, and the interest of her girl, must so evidently sway her. let me but try my influence on him, and thou shalt see how soon he will forget this peasant maid. thou shalt see"---- "i grieve to find that thou art so resolved to blind thyself, niece!" interrupted sir piers, very seriously; "but it is alike my duty to see that you neither run into hopeless misery, nor try to convert that misery into happiness, by unjustly and cruelly ruining the peace of another. i shall again visit the widow's cottage, this very afternoon. i shall see and converse with the daughter herself, after which i shall hold plainer converse than i have ever yet done with stewart. if i find that you have judged correctly, and that there is nothing more in this matter than that the mother hath allowed her judgment to be warped by her wishes, my best endeavours shall not be wanting to accomplish those desires which thou hast so clearly exposed to me. but i tell thee honestly, that if, on the other hand, i find that the widow has judged and reported truly, i shall, for your sake, as well as for that of stewart, do all i can to promote his union with rosa macdermot." "say'st thou so, old man?" muttered the lady marcella to herself, after her uncle had left her; "then must i act--aye, and act quickly, and boldly too." after a moment's thought, she clapped her hands for her page, and sent him directly to entreat that stewart would favour her with a private interview immediately. he came at her summons; and, after the usual salutations were over, she, with a face that, spite of her determined and dauntless character, absolutely burned, from the very nature of the communication she had resolved to make, entered upon it in a low yet steady and unbroken tone. "i take it for granted, stewart," said she, "that the few words i let fall, the other day, when we were returning from our pursuit after the caitiff catteranes, were not thrown away upon one of your quick wit. they were not uttered without intention; and they have, i trust, proved to thee that thy rare merits have not escaped my notice, and that i take no common interest in thee." the lady marcella paused for an answer; and the astonished charley stewart, having mumbled some confused and ill-connected expressions of gratitude for her good opinion, she continued in a yet calmer and more collected tone. "i have thus sent for thee, honestly to confess to thee, that the interest i take in thee is of a nature, which could not permit me to see unmoved, one, who is so manifestly born for better fortunes, ignorantly to mar them from too humble an estimation of his own merits, and, without looking higher, blindly to tie himself down from all chance of rising, by rashly binding himself to baseness and poverty. if ever a desire of turning the issues of fate into their proper course, might be an excuse for a woman speaking out more openly and plainly than tyrant custom has permitted her sex to do, certain i am it might be reasonably held to be in the present case. but, were it otherwise, thou hast already seen enough of me to know, that i am no ordinary woman; and i, who have dared much, would dare this too--yea, and ten times more, to secure mine own peace, and thy happiness. reflect, then, on the words i uttered as we returned from our expedition. know, that fortune hath not refused to shine on thy deserts, for she now offers thee the hand and fortune of her who addresses thee." "lady!" exclaimed charley stewart, staggering back with absolute amazement, and altogether unable to answer coherently, from the confusion he was thrown into--"i have been foolishly reserved, lady. i have been strangely and grievously misconceived. yet i thought i had spoken plainly enough.--i--i--i am altogether unworthy of any one of thy station. i am already pledged to another." "i was not altogether unprepared for some such confession," said the lady, with a self-possession, arising from the circumstance, that she spoke truly. "i had heard, and i did see enough to make me aware that something had passed between thee and the silly girl macdermot. but these were childish ties, entered into when thou couldst have no foreknowledge of thine own fortunes; and they must, of stern necessity, yield to that expediency which now demands thine exaltation." "lady," replied stewart, who by this time began to be somewhat more master of his faculties, "i have learned enough to know that true exaltation can never be purchased by treachery, perfidy, and cruelty. rosa macdermot and i loved one another whilst she was yet a child, it is true, but we have loved one another ever since with a growing affection, which has produced vows of the most solemn nature between us. i love her more than i do life itself; and not for all the wealth or honours that this world could bestow, would i cease to love her." "so great a constancy, and so true a heart, proves but the more how much thou wert born for knighthood," said the lady, calmly. "and perhaps, entangled as thou seemest to have been, it might have been due to such honour as might befit a knight, to have clung to engagements so made. but to render such a case of so great self devotion rational, it would at least be requisite that it should be mutual. hast thou proof that it is really so? hast thou never had doubts on that score? no suspicions?" "proof of the love of rosa macdermot, lady?" exclaimed charley, with astonishment. "doubts of rosa? i should as soon ask for proof that the blessed sun gives light, or have doubts that the glorious orb might drop from the firmament." "other men before thee have been as honestly confiding, and yet have been deceived," said the lady. "the humble soil where thou hast rooted thine affections, is not always that which produces the most virtuous fruits." "what wouldst thou hint, lady?" demanded charley, in a disturbed and agitated tone. "i grieve to tell thee," replied the lady. "it pains me to be compelled to undeceive thee, by withdrawing thee from thy pleasing dreams, to look boldly on the afflicting truth. yet i must tell thee, that thy heroic constancy hath not been met by a like unshaken return of it." "say--what?--holy saints protect me!" cried charley stewart, in a greatly agitated and excited manner. "what wouldst thou insinuate lady? rosa unfaithful?--oh! impossible!--where is the liar who hath thus abused thine ear regarding her who is purity and truth itself? tell me his name, that i may make my sword drink his base black heart's blood!" "be calm, stewart," replied the lady, with imperturbable placidity of manner. "thou wilt gain nothing by yielding thyself up to blind rage. i trust thou wilt see that it is no ordinary affection in me that can prompt me to the disclosure that i am now about to make to thee." "speak on, lady. oh keep me not in suspense!" cried charley stewart, wildly breaking in on her mysterious pause. "stewart," said the lady, solemnly, "thou wert prepared to withstand all temptation that might be calculated to break the rash vows of youthful ignorance. but she for whom you made them--she for whose sake thou wouldst have so honourably maintained them to the sacrifice of wealth and advancement--she, i fear, has had less resolution to resist their allurements. be not too much astonished or shocked, for i must tell thee, that mine uncle, sir piers gordon, is the favoured lover of rosa macdermot." "thine uncle sir piers, lady?" cried charley, petrified with surprise. "impossible! it cannot be!" "strange as it may seem to thee, and strange as it unquestionably is," replied the lady marcella, "it is in reality but too true that she favours his visits for her own purposes. he has already found his way to the widow's cottage more than once, and he has even ventured to hint to myself that he has not been coldly received--and then, stewart----" "lady," interrupted charley, impatiently and violently, "i would not believe even sir piers himself if he were to tell me this!----and yet," added he, after a pause, during which he struck his forehead with the palm of his hand, and seemed to be immersed in deep thought, "and yet, he was strangely struck with her when first they met!--but the time is so short--so very short since then--she!--rosa! oh, rosa never could have been brought, in so short a time, to forget the days of her childhood, and her oft repeated vows to me!" "reflect, stewart," said the lady, "that mine uncle is a landed laird, and a belted knight, with spurs at his heels!" "what!" exclaimed charley stewart, in an intense agony of excited feeling, and with a half choked voice, "landed laird, saidst thou! a belted knight, with spurs at his heels! can it be? oh! that accursed prophecy of that most accursed hag! but art thou sure of what thou sayest, lady? how canst thou satisfy me? by all the holy saints i must be satisfied!" "nay," replied marcella, coolly, "i can satisfy thee no otherwise than by saying that i have his own word for it, and--" "his own word!" cried charley; "oh, wicked, wicked, and most deceitful man, thus wilfully to undermine me! though i was less open in thy presence, lady, yet i said enough to him afterwards, to have enabled even a fool and a dotard, to have read my meaning." "so indeed he hinted," replied marcella; "but then his apology for the interpretation which he hath found it convenient to put upon thy words is, that he has been encouraged by the girl herself. and as he was with her but yesterday, if he had not spoken truly as to this, he would have hardly hurried back again thither so soon as he has now done." "back, didst thou say, lady?" exclaimed stewart, growing black with rage and jealousy. "back!--whither?--when?--how?--oh, my brain is burning! back, didst thou say?" "yea," replied the lady marcella, with perfect calmness, "mine uncle, sir piers, hath gone to visit rosa macdermot this very afternoon. he parted from me for that purpose but a few minutes before thou camest in hither. he is on his way thither now. go!--convince thyself! but be prudent. act not rashly. forget not that a knight, such as he is, hath a natural belief in him that he is entitled to some little license, where the matter concerns those only of such low degree as the girl rosa macdermot can boast of." charley stewart listened to those words of the lady marcella with a fixedness of eye, and of aspect, that was almost too fearful for her, bold as she was, to look upon. he seemed intent upon devouring every syllable she uttered. and yet, his intentness of gaze was more like that of a maniac, than of a rational man. she had no sooner finished than he ground his teeth, clenched his hands, struck them both with violence upon his bosom, and then rushed from the chamber, without giving utterance to a word. "i have stung him to the quick," muttered the lady marcella, in soliloquy, after he was gone. "and now," added she, bitterly, "my prudent uncle has some chance of learning, to his cost, that it were better to face the lean and starving lioness, when preying for food for her famished whelps, than to step between a woman and her love. i never meant to have brought this upon him. he hath brought it altogether upon himself; and now let him look to it, that his heritage be not mine, some few good years before he would have had it descend upon me. should the plot chance to work so, my triumph over this youth will be easy and certain." the honest old knight, sir piers gordon, had ridden quietly over the hill, attended only by two of his people, and having left them to take charge of his horse, in the wood, at no great distance from the widow's cottage, he had walked up thither alone. mrs. macdermot had been too much gratified by his friendly talk, during his former visit to her, not to have made her daughter acquainted with all that passed. though his present call was unlooked for, rosa was already so far prepared to expect that his visit was a visit of kindness, that she readily obeyed the request, which he conveyed to her through her mother, to favour him with her presence. he spoke to her with all the kindness of a father, and, in answer to his inquiries, she blushingly unbosomed herself to him, as if he had stood to her in that degree of relationship. she felt, indeed, that he was the patron and the benefactor of him who was all in this world to her, and she was, from this cause, already prepared to love and reverence him. he was full of benevolent plans for the accomplishment of their union, and the furtherance of their happiness, and he sat with her on the turf-seat at the cottage door, expounding them to her, with her hand affectionately in his, and with his face eagerly turned towards her, in the earnestness of his conversation, till the sun, which shed his parting radiance upon them, was just about to sink behind the opposite mountain. even the sound of a furiously galloping horse, which came thundering towards them, failed to arouse them from their interesting talk. suddenly it burst out from the woodland, foaming and panting upon the green, within a few yards of the spot where they were sitting together, and a man, more like a maniac than a rational being, threw himself from the saddle. his naked sword was gleaming in his hand, ere his feet had well touched the ground. it was charley stewart. "traitor!" cried he in a hoarse choking voice, "up and defend thy vile life!" "charley! charley!" cried rosa, springing towards him, "harm not a hair of his head!" "what! perjured girl!" cried charley, pushing her from him so rudely, as to extend her at some distance from him, nearly senseless on the green; "wouldst thou whet the very edge of my sword against him, by thy base entreaties for him? come on, traitor!" "stewart, are ye mad?" cried the knight; "listen to reason." "cowardly traitor that thou art, i will listen to nothing from thee," cried charley stewart, gnashing his teeth and foaming at the mouth with fury. "draw and defend thyself; or, by heaven, i will forthwith rid thee of thy vile dastard life! draw, i say!" "nay, he must be mad!" cried sir piers. "yet i must defend my life, though it should be to the peril of his." but sir piers, who sought only to protect himself from charley's furious assault, accidentally failed in his very first guard. the weight of his assailant's blow broke through it, and falling upon the knight's head, which had then nothing on it but a bonnet, it stretched him motionless on the sward. charley stewart stood for a moment to look with horror upon his work--the blood was gushing forth from the wound, and dying the white hair of him who had been his patron and friend. from that he turned and gazed upon the prostrate figure of rosa macdermot, who still lay in a kind of half-swoon from the effects of his violence. he felt as if his bursting heart would have forced its way through his side. roused from his trance by the screams of the widow macdermot, he heard the galloping of horses approaching, and, rushing mechanically into the thickest part of the wood, he made his way towards the mountains, where night soon overtook him. still he continued to wander on, however, without fixed intention or direction; and it was only on finding, at day-break, that he had already fled far towards the south, that, after having given due way to his affliction, he resolved to travel towards edinburgh, to seek his father, where, as we have already seen, he ultimately arrived, weary and woe-begone. the next morning, after charley stewart's appearance in edinburgh, his father, sir walter stewart, aroused him from the deep sleep into which his fatigue of body had thrown him, and which, as it was nearly the first he had had since the sad events which had driven him from the north, even their cruel influence upon his mind could not disturb. in reply to sir walter's inquiries, he gave him a brief statement of his history and his misfortunes, and his wounded spirit was soothed by the kind sympathy which sir walter manifested towards him. "charley," said he, "thy fate hath been a cruel one, truly; but thou must bestir thee to shake off thy sorrows. nothing better, as a cure for melancholy, than action. i have an emprise on hand, that is for thee the very medicine that thou lackest, and as it may speedily end with thee in a journey to france, as the esquire of a knight whom it will do thee much honour to serve, it is, of all others, the very best chance that could befal thee under present circumstances. but the morning wears, and we must go to work without farther loss of time." sir walter stewart having disguised himself, and his son charley, in broad slouched hats and cloaks, they sallied forth together. at the head of the close, they found two hacknies in the high street, held by a single groom. they leaped into their saddles, and, without any inquiry or explanation as to whither they were bound, they rode forth together, at a gentle pace, from the southern part of the city, as if they had been bent more upon pleasure than business. they had not gone farther in that direction than just beyond the burgh loch, a piece of water which then occupied that extent of flat low ground now known by the name of the meadows, when sir walter turned his horse's head to the westward, and, spurring forward, he and charley galloped together through the woodland, the groves, and the thickets, which partially covered the burgh muir, and gradually sweeping round at a point considerably to the westward of the castle rock, they then pushed forward at a furious pace in a northerly direction, making straight for that part of the shore of the firth of forth, lying immediately to the westward of the citadel of leith. that which is now a continuous town, was then almost a wilderness of sandy hillocks, which stretched considerably farther into the sea than the land now does, its waters having since much encroached on that part of the coast during the lapse of ages. taking up a position on a bare elevated spot, sir walter looked with anxious eyes towards the road-stead. there were but few vessels there; but one seemed to be slowly coming up to her anchorage, with a fair breeze from the east, but with her sails so curtailed as betokened caution in those on board. sir walter seemed to eye her with peculiar interest for some time, and then he addressed a rough red-faced pilot, who was standing below on the beach, beside his boat, watching the vessel stedfastly, as if he wished to make out what sort of craft she might be. "is not that a foreign barque, friend?" demanded sir walter. "aye, aye, sir," replied the pilot; "she is a furrenner. if i'm not far mista'en it's the garron of burdy, captain davy trummel, with wine aboard. i think i kenn her rig--and a clever rig it is, let me tell ye." "she seems a goodly sea-boat, well fitted to fly quickly over so long a voyage," replied sir walter carelessly. "that she is, i'll be sworn sir," answered the pilot. "few in the trade can match her, i promise ye. but what strange mortals them french munseers are after all: why they should call a vessel a garron, the which is the swiftest bit of a craft my eyes ever came across, i can't nowise reasonably comprehend, unless it be out of a mere spirit of contradiction. but i must call out the lads, and be off to her, for there's the signal flying for me." "thou shalt take me aboard with thee, and have something for thy guerdon," said sir walter. "i would taste this frenchman's wines, ere the palates of the good burghers become acquainted with them." "willingly will i do thy pleasure, sir," replied the man; and, running towards a solitary cottage which stood upon a bank hard by, he began shouting out, "jemmy!" and "harry!" till two lads, who were his sons and assistants, appeared. "thou must tarry here with the horses, till i return from on board, charles," said sir walter. "this is the very vessel i looked for--the garonne of bordeaux, captain de tremouille. he is an old friend of mine, and i would fain have some talk with him." sir walter was speedily rowed on board by the pilot and his two sons. the barque took up her proper ground, under the directions which the helmsman received from the experienced old sailor. the anchor was let go, and she swung round to her moorings. charley stewart passed a considerable time in walking the horses about ere he saw the boat leave the barque. at length he beheld it pulling towards the shore, and sir walter again joined him, bearing two large bundles, which were stowed away behind their saddles, in such a manner as to be covered by their cloaks as they rode, and following the same circuitous route which they had taken in their way out, they returned to the city, and regained the knight's lodgings without observation. an unwelcome visitor. clifford.--stop one moment, serjeant. see how the rain has made its way through the chinks of the window, and deluged the floor. serjeant.--mercy on me, so it has, sir! well, i'm sure it's no wonder. such a blast as that which is rairding without, would drive it through a stone wall. grant.--call the girl from the kitchen, like a good man. serjeant.--here, lassie!--we're like to be all drowned at this end of the house. bring some cloths, will ye, and dish-clouts, and dry up this deluge here. lassie.--keep us a', siccana sight! but we're no one hair better in the other end o' the house. clifford.--aye, that's a good girl. now lay some of these cloths along the window here. aye, that will do. i think that ought to make us water-tight. now, heap some more wood and peats on the fire before you go. thank ye--that's glorious. now, let the storm howl as it likes. grant.--do go on with your story, serjeant. you were interrupted in a most interesting part of it. clifford.--"blow, winds, and crack your cheeks!"--i beg your pardon, sergeant; pray proceed. author.--aye, pray do proceed. i am anxious to know what sir walter stewart's plans are, and how he succeeded in carrying them into effect. this part of the history is well known; but the minuter details are nowhere told in any book i am acquainted with, and i am curious to hear them. serjeant--(taking a long draught from his punch-jug.)--you shall be satisfied immediately, sir. the legend of charley stewart tÀillear-crubach continued. soon after his return home, from his visit to the barque garonne, sir walter stewart got rid of his disguise, put on a courtier's attire, and hastened to the castle, to pay his usual attendance of ceremony on the king. this he made a point of never neglecting, notwithstanding the marked curtailment which his private, and more familiar intercourse with his majesty had received. whilst within the walls of the fortress, he contrived, quietly and without suspicion, to make himself master of the state of the roster of the officers of the royal guard. to his no small satisfaction, he discovered that the captain of the guard, for the next day, was to be a certain individual of the name of strang, whom he knew to be a worthless, reckless, hard-drinking, gaming fellow. he then made all the observations that circumstances permitted, and, pleased with the information he had acquired, he returned to his lodging, in order fully to acquaint charley with it, as well as with the whole of his plans, and with the manner in which he proposed to carry them into execution, so as to make him perfectly comprehend the part which he intended that he should play in them. to lull all after surmise regarding himself, as much as possible, he that evening appeared in the apartments of sir william rogers, and bore his share in the performance of the music that was given there. he then kept his appointment with the earl of huntly, in order to tell him that all was prepared, and, after a hasty interview, shortened by their apprehensions of being detected together, a circumstance which might have been ruinous to their projects, sir walter retired to his lodging for the night. some little time after guard-mounting, next morning, the bundles which they had brought from the french vessel were opened, and the knight, and his son, proceeded to disguise themselves, by putting on the attire of french sailors, which they contained; and so perfectly did sir walter succeed in this operation, that his most intimate friend could not have known him. wrapped up in cloaks, they then took their stand within the dark threshold of a deep doorway, that opened from the obscure entrance of the close where sir walter lodged. this was a position from which they could see every one who passed up or down the high street, without a chance of their being themselves seen. they had not stood long there, until their ears caught the distant, but unceasing jabber of the french tongue, coming up the high street. it came from half a-dozen or more voices at once, all being talkers and none listeners. the noise grew louder and louder, until sir walter, by stretching out his neck from his lurking-place, espied the captain or skipper of the french barque, approaching with some eight or ten of his crew. they came walking along close to the houses on his side of the way. they carried two small casks of wine, each of them slung on a pole between two men, who were changed from time to time as they required relief, whilst another man carried a little runlet on his shoulders. sir walter gave a particular whistle, and in a moment the whole party turned in under the covered entrance of the close, and laid down their burdens as if to rest themselves. in an instant, sir walter and charley stewart threw off their cloaks, and transferred them to two of the french sailors, who immediately retired into the knight's lodgings, whilst he and his son succeeded to the burdens they had carried. having effected this change, sir walter held some private talk with captain de tremouille, after which the party moved on up the street, and so up the castle-hill, until they came to the castle gate. there the french skipper, in broken english, told the sentinel that he would fain speak a word to the captain of the guard, for whom he was the bearer of a small present of wine, and he and his whole party were speedily admitted. "i do ave von leetil praisaint of vine for you, sare," said the skipper, boldly addressing the scarlet-visaged captain of the guard. "dis leetil cask for your own taste.--de richest vine in de varld." "thou art an especial good fellow, sir," replied the captain, clumsily returning the exquisite bow which the frenchman had made him, whilst, at the same time, he eyed the runlet, and immediately consigned it to the particular care of one of his own people. "nothing could possibly come more opportunely, and i am most grateful for thy courtesy. it must be confessed that you frenchmen are the most perfect gentlemen in the world, and know how to do a thing genteelly." "ah, sare, dat is too mosh compliment for me as van frainchman," replied the skipper, with a smile and a bow yet lower than his former one. "and de compliment is more bettaire dat she come from van so grait hero as de capitaine strang! admirasion for de fame of him, did make me ave de grait desire to honnaire myself wid praisant him vid dis leetil gift, for vitch liberty i do hope he is not offend." "offended, my dear fellow!" cried captain strang; "thy runlet comes to me as welcome as the very flowers in may! but how the pest dost thou chance to know my name, sir skipper?" "de name and de fame of de grat hero, is alvaise know by all men all over de varld," replied the skipper, with another most obsequious reverence. "by st. andrew, but this is a curious marvel though," said the captain. "who would have thought that my name could have been known in france as a hero! yet certain it is that i have done some small deeds in my time, that these french mooshies may have heard of." "deeds, monsieur le capitaine!" cried de tremouille, with feigned astonishment; "vondaires in battaile! meeracailes in de feelde! van achille of scotlande! but all dat is nossing at all compare to de fame of monsieur le capitaine for his vonderful taste for de good vine! ven dey do talk of good vine in france, dey do alvaise say--aha! dis is vine fit for de pallait of van empereur; bot dis 'ere is more bettaire, dis is fit for de pallait of de famous scottish hero, de capitaine strang, dat do know good vine more bettaire dan any oder man in de varld." "by all the saints, that is wonderful!" said the captain; "and yet that i can more easily understand. yes, yes; few people can match me there. and then, to be sure, these wine-dealers in france must know some little of those who are judges of the good stuff, and who, moreover, like myself, do so much to encourage their trade. but hark ye, mr. skipper! what do ye with those other two casks which those fellows of thine are carrying?" "ah hah! dat is von praisant pour de duc d'albanie," replied the skipper. "ha!" cried the captain of the guard, with a certain air of suspicion; "the duke of albany, saidst thou? how comest thou to have a present for the duke of albany?" "oh yaes, sare!" replied the imperturbable skipper, with great apparent innocence, "de vine is von cadeau, vat you do call praisant from de marchand at bordeaux, vid de expectation dat de squisite taste of him may make mi lor duc to ave mor of him pour de l'argent, and prevail on de royal king, his broder, to ave some too also." "um--aye," said the captain of the guard, with hesitation; "likely story enough--though there be but little chance of the king drinking ought of the duke's providing, whatever liquor the duke may by and bye drink of his majesty's brewing. but 'twas natural enow in the merchant to think so, mooshie. as for the duke, he is no bad customer to his own fist, when he is well set with a jolly boon companion, such as myself for instance. so thou mayest as well leave thy twin-casks in my charge, friend; and i shall see that they are properly delivered.--at least," added he, in an under voice, aside, "i shall take care most conscientiously to deliver them in due time of their contents." "tank you--very mosh tank you, sare," replied the skipper. "mais i not trobil you. de marchand did ordaire me to see dem in de royal hand of de duc heemself. if i not do dat, i most take heem back again. jean! françois! il faut----" "um!--don't be so hasty, man," interrupted the captain of the guard, by no means willing to lose sight of the casks, and hesitating, and cogitating within himself, that if the wine was taken back, he would lose all chance of tasting it; whereas, if it was once lodged with the duke, he had a fair prospect of being invited to share in it. "you mooshies are as pestilent hasty as a bit of touch paper. thou shalt deliver the wine thyself to the duke. here, laurence--the keys of the duke's apartments! now, mooshie, do thou and three of thy fellows quickly shoulder the casks and follow me." the skipper immediately took up one end of the pole that swung one of the casks, and addressing sir walter stewart by the name of jean, he called to him roughly, in french, to take up the other end. charley stewart and a sailor hoisted up the second cask; and so they followed the captain of the guard up to the duke's apartments. when the doors were opened, which gave access to the royal prisoner, they found the duke of albany sitting at a table in conversation with his chamberlain, his manly and somewhat stern countenance deprived of much of its wonted bloom and sunshine, from the confinement to which he had been subjected, and the melancholy anticipations which possessed his mind, though nothing had as yet been able to overpower his indomitable resolution. it was only when he arose from his chair, to ascertain what his visitors came about, that his powerful and well-proportioned person, and his broad chest, were fully exhibited. "what is all this?" cried the duke, somewhat impatiently. "so please your highness' grace, this french mooshie skipper is the bearer of a present of that which he states to be very choice wine of his country's growth," said captain strang, with a low obeisance. "who can have thus remembered me in my misfortunes?" demanded the duke. "nay," replied strang, "i question if either the giver of the gift, or he that hath it in charge, know ought of the position in which your royal highness is now placed. but stand forth, sir mooshie, and tell thine own tale." "eh bien," cried the skipper, advancing, and bowing three or four times to the ground; "je le----" "hold! hold! mooshie!" interrupted captain strang; "none of thine own outlandish language, dost thou hear? thou canst speak our tongue well enow for all purposes, so keep to that, if it so please thee." "very vell, monsieur le capitaine string," replied the skipper, with a shrug, and a grimace, that showed his disappointment in being thus prevented from speaking to the duke, in a language which would have veiled all he said from the apprehension of the captain of the guard--"very vell, monsieur le capitaine; i vill make van attente to make onderstand de bad englis of me to his royal highness de duc d'albanie.--i ave been send vid dis two cask of vin, as van cadeau from de marchand beauvilliers at bordeaux, to his highness royal de duc d'albanie, vid de ope dat de magnifique flaveur of de vine may please heem, and procure for de marchand van large ordaire from his highness royal, and from his royal broder, his majesty de king." "i can promise nothing for his majesty, friend," replied the duke; "but for myself, i would have ye thank monsieur beauvilliers from me, and say to him, that if the wine liketh me well, i shall send him an order; that is to say, if there be aught of likelihood of my being alive to drink of it when it comes to hand.--but what sort of wine is it that thou hast brought me?" "in dat cask dere is shoise vine of gascony," said the skipper, pointing to that which charley stewart had helped to bear; "bot, goot as it is, i am force to tink dat de oder vine, in dis cask, vill give more plaisir to son altesse royale." "sir," said sir walter, bringing forward the cask, and speaking to the skipper in french, as if he were merely applying to him for orders, but in a tone so loud and distinct as to insure that the duke should catch every word that fell from him--"do not show surprise at what i say, or recognise me, if you discover me.--we are all friends. this cask contains the means of escape, with instructions how you are to effect it. let not the captain of the guard depart without an invitation to supper; the contents of this cask will tell you why." "sacre cochon!" cried the skipper, with an angry air, and at the same time bestowing a smart blow of a rattan on the shoulders of sir walter. "sacre cochon que vous estes!" "what did the fellow say to thee, friend skipper?" demanded the captain of the guard; "and what didst thou say to him?" "mine got! monsieur le capitaine string," replied the skipper, "dis crew of mine is so great idil vans, dat dey vear out de patience of van job heemself. i not be come to dis place ardly van moment, and bifore i decharge my cargo, ven dey must vant to leif me alone, and to go to run all over de cite, after de dance, and de scottis preetee lasses. be gar, monsieur jean, you sall vork more vork pour dis, dat i do tell you, mon garçon." "fear nothing, sir," said sir walter, again in french, and humbly bowing to the skipper, as if making an earnest and contrite apology to his master; "act boldly; remember the south-western side--there thou shalt find friends beyond the walls." "aha, coquin!" cried the skipper; "mais vous avez joué votre role à merveille----" "what said the fellow? and what was thine answer to him?" demanded the captain of the guard again. "par bleu, monsieur le capitaine string, i ave make heem bon garçon at last," replied the skipper; "i do ave make heem cry peccavée." "was that all?" said the captain, gruffly. "then come away, mooshie, let us clear out of this. thou and thy fellows have been long enough here." "before thou goest, i would speak with thee, captain strang," said the duke. "if fame and mine own experience belie thee not, thou art great in thy judgment of wines. wilt thou lend me thy company to-night at supper, that we may taste the stuff which this fellow hath brought me, of the rare quality of which he makes so great a boast?" "your royal highness's grace does me too much honour," replied strang, with a most obsequious bow. "my taste is but a poor and uncultivated taste; but i shall be proud to perfect it under your royal highness's superior judgment and instruction." "then let us have supper at four, good captain," said the duke; "and as my chamberlain here would fain invite those three poor knaves who guard the door, to watch for once within side of it, and to partake of his table, i would have thee see that, at my expense, enough of the best viands be provided for all." "your highness is too considerate," replied strang. "yet, since your royal will runs so, it shall be obeyed to the letter. the supper shall be such as shall content you." and then retiring, and shutting and locking the door upon his prisoners, he descended the outer steps, muttering to himself,--"the supper may well be a good one indeed, and thou mayest well eat and drink thy fill; for, if i be not far mistaken, it may be the last supper thou mayest eat, and the last wine thou mayest swallow." the skipper and his party now left the castle, without farther question; and as they passed by the mouth of the close where sir walter stewart lived, on their way down the high street, the knight and his son were replaced by the two french sailors, in the same adroit manner in which the change had been formerly effected; and they gained their lodgings, and got rid of their disguise, without having subjected themselves to the least suspicion, whilst the skipper continued his way out of the city, with the same number of followers as he had always had with him. no sooner was the duke of albany free from the chance of interruption, than he and his chamberlain proceeded to wrench up the end of that cask which sir walter stewart had so ingeniously and so particularly indicated, as the important one to the royal captive. they found it altogether devoid of wine; but, to their no small joy, they found within it a long coil of rope, and a large roll of wax. their first care was to replace the rope, and to shut up the cask again, and then to roll it into the corner, where they set it on end immediately in rear of that which contained the wine. they then hastily opened the roll of wax, and discovered that it contained a letter from sir walter, explaining the whole plan for their escape. having studied this again and again, so as fully to possess themselves of its contents, they committed it to the ample fire-place, where it was immediately consumed, and then they sat down together to resolve and arrange all the minor parts and details of their plot. whilst they were so employed, captain strang was unable to resist the devil that tempted him to taste his little runlet. it was excellent wine. he boldly, and with great determination, put in the spigot again, and gallantly retreated from it. but again and again was he drawn to it by an attraction as strong as that which the loadstone exerts over the needle. again and again he drew the spigot, and sipped moderately. he would have drank deeply, had not economy whispered him that he had better preserve it for a future opportunity, seeing that he had the prospect of that night drinking so largely at another's expense. but still he sipped and sipped from time to time, so that, although far from drunk when he appeared in the duke of albany's apartment--nay, i may say, far from being even what is usually called half seas over--he had so whetted his thirst as to be ready to drink oceans; and the foundation he had laid was quite enough for a superstructure of perfect intoxication. as the supper was to be partaken of by him and his people at the duke's expense, the captain of the guard had taken especial care to see that it was a good one. his royal highness sat at a small table near the huge fire-place, with captain strang upon his left hand. there they were first served by the chamberlain, and the three men of the guard, with all the delicacies they chose to call for; and large beakers of the new wine being placed before them, the captain gave full way to his bacchanalian inclinations. by and bye they began to play at dice and tables, whilst the chamberlain and his three guests were supping. though already not a little affected by the wine he had swallowed, the captain preserved enough of his cunning and knavish brains, to enable him to cheat most villainously. this did not escape the duke, but he took care not to appear to perceive it--cursed his ill luck--and went on to lose, much to the satisfaction of his opponent, whilst the knavish strang was secretly congratulating himself upon his own wonderful strength of head, which had so far prevailed over the comparative weakness of his royal adversary. meanwhile the chamberlain was busily employed in supplying the captain, as well as his own peculiar guests, with wine, in the greatest abundance. by degrees, strang became so much elevated, as to lose much of that obsequious respect with which he had at first treated his royal host. "delicious wine!" cried he, smacking his lips, after a long draught of it, which left his cup empty. "by the holy virgin, delicious wine indeed! but--aw--aw--its goodness inflames me--aw--aw--with a furious desire to taste--aw--aw--to taste, i say, that other cask the french knave spoke of--aw--aw--that, i mean, which stands yonder, behind--aw--aw--behind the barrel from which we have--aw--aw--been tasting; that, i mean--aw--aw--of which the french mooshie spake so largely." the chamberlain darted a look of agony at his master; but the duke preserved a perfect composure. "thou shalt taste it forthwith, sir captain," said the duke, giving, at the same time, a private signal to the chamberlain. "go, use thy wimble, and bring us a flask of that other wine." the chamberlain, understanding his master, went to the barrels, and concealing them as much as he could by stooping over both of them, he fumbled with the wimble at the second cask; and, whilst he pretended to fill the can from it, he slyly drew its contents from the same which had been running all night, and then he poured out two sparkling goblets, and set them down on the table. "well, sir captain," said the duke, after strang had taken a long draught of the wine, "what sayest thou to it? is it as good as that which thou hast been all night drinking?" "that which we have been drinking all night--aw--aw--is but as hog's wash compared to it," cried the captain, his eyes beginning to goggle in his head, and emphatically dashing his empty cup down on the table. "no, no--aw--aw--my palate--aw--aw--is--aw--too true to be deceived that way. this, look ye, is a wine of--aw--aw--of superior growth, flavour, and body, not to be matched--not to be--aw--aw--matched, i tell ye--not to be matched." "it is, indeed, excellent, as thou sayest," replied the duke--"absolute nectar!--come, fill our goblets again." "by the rood, but this is--aw--aw--wine indeed!" cried the captain of the guard again, after emptying his goblet for the second time. "it grows--aw--aw--better and better--aw--aw." "i feel it whizzing in my very brain," said the duke. "i doubt that thou wilt have but an easy conquest of me now, sir captain. but come, nevertheless, play away, for i will have my revenge." "what, ho, sir chamberlain," cried the captain, getting more and more inebriated, and becoming, at the same time, still more and more convinced of his own strength of brain and sobriety, and his superiority, in these respects, over the duke, exemplified, as it was, by his still farther gains. "what ho!--aw--aw--more wine--more wine and--aw--aw--from the same cask, dost thou hear, sir chamberlain--aw--aw--from the self-same virtuous cask. why the fiend did'st thou not draw from that cask--aw--aw--at first? come, wine, i tell thee!--aw--aw--aw--pour us out more of that nectar; my throat--aw--aw--is parched, and--aw--aw--the more i drink--aw--aw--the more i would drink. wine!--aw--aw--wine, i say, sir chamberlain!" the chamberlain spared not to fill and refill his goblet, nor was he less assiduous in filling those of the three men of the guard, until overcome by the soporific effects of the oceans of wine which they poured down, combined with those arising from the overwhelming heat of the rousing fire that had been purposely kept up, an irresistible drowsiness fell upon the captain and his men, and they, one after another, dropped into a deep sleep. the duke, and his chamberlain, now armed themselves with knives from the table, and self-preservation having steeled up their minds to this bloody alternative, they sprang upon their defenceless victims. the work of death was speedy; all were despatched in a few moments. the keys were taken from the captain's girdle-belt. the corpses were piled one over the other in the huge fire-place, and more fuel was heaped upon them, in order to consume them. the coil of rope was secured. the doors were opened with the greatest caution, and, having slipped silently down the outer stair, they stole away to a lonely corner of the rampart, on the south-western side of the fortress, where the height and precipitous nature of the rock had been supposed to have rendered sentinels unnecessary; and where, though the descent might be more dangerous in itself, than at many other points in the vicinity, there was less risk of their being surprised and frustrated in their attempt. at the foot of the castle rock, under that part of the walls which i have now indicated, sir walter stewart, and his son charles, had been waiting impatiently ever since the day-light had disappeared. the night was starry, but there was little moon. that they might the better observe the walls, they climbed up the steep rock, immediately below the point where they knew that the attempt was likely to be made, till they came to the perpendicular part of the cliff, under the base of which they silently lay down to watch the event. after long and tedious expectation, during which they were often deceived by their fancy, they at length perceived a dark looking object getting over the top of the wall of the rampart, directly above them. they watched it with intense anxiety, as it began slowly to descend on them, till, as it neared them, they could distinguish it to be a human being, and the figure slowly grew upon their sight. the head and shoulders of another man thrust over the wall above, seemed anxiously to watch the success of him who was lowering himself. for a moment the descending figure rested on the narrow ledge of the rock at the foundation of the wall, and then it again began to come down gently over the perpendicular face of the cliff, until it was within some ten or fifteen feet of them. their hope was now high, when all at once the figure seemed to be arrested in its progress downward, and swung to and fro for a time. "what stops you?" demanded sir walter stewart, in a distinct but subdued voice. "if this be all the rope, it is too short," said the person above them, in the same tone; "i have nothing now for it, but to take my chance and drop." "fear not!" said sir walter; "we shall try to catch thee in our cloaks. now! drop boldly!" "now then!" said the man in the air. but although the united strength of sir walter stewart and his son enabled them so to receive him, as to save him from utter destruction, the shock of his fall was so great, as to crush both of them down, and it was with difficulty that they prevented him and themselves from rolling down the rocky slope below them. "how fares it with thee?" demanded sir walter. "but indifferent well," replied the other, unable to rise, and manifestly in great pain. "i fear i have broken my thigh-bone." "holy saint andrew, what a misfortune!" exclaimed sir walter stewart. "call it not a misfortune," said the attached and devoted chamberlain. "it was good that i tried it before the duke, else might this accident have happened to him, and that indeed would have been a misfortune." "what hath happened?" demanded a faint voice, that came from the duke, whose head and shoulders still appeared over the wall above. "a small accident, but not a fatal one," replied the chamberlain. "i am down; but beware, my gracious master, the rope is too short." "how much may it want?" demanded the duke. "about four or five ells, or so;" replied sir walter. "tarry till i return then," said the duke again. "but, hush! i must hide. here come the rounds." the tramp of feet, and the clink of arms, now came faintly on their ears, as they lay, drawn in as much as possible, under the rock. voices, too, were heard, but at such a distance above them, that they could not tell whether they uttered sounds of jocularity, or of strife and contention. at last they passed away--but whether the royal duke had been detected or not, they had no means of knowing. a very considerable time elapsed, during which their eyes were fixed intently, and most anxiously, on that part of the top of the wall whence the head of the royal captive had last been seen to disappear. the pain of the chamberlain's fractured limb was excruciating, yet to him it was as nothing, compared to the agony of that suspense which was suffered by the whole three who waited for the result. at length, to their inexpressible relief, they beheld the duke's figure getting over the wall above them,--and down he came, slowly and gradually, till his toes touched the rocky ground on which they stood. warm, though not loud, were the congratulations he received, and heartfelt were the thanks which he poured out upon his preservers--and deep was the grief which he uttered for the painful accident which had befallen his faithful servant. they learned from his highness, that ere the rounds had approached near enough to observe him, he had laid himself down at length on the ground, within the deep shadow that prevailed under the wall; that they had passed within a few yards of him, talking and joking with each other, and most fortunately without observing him. they were no sooner fairly gone to the other parts of the walls, than he had stolen back to his prison, cut his blankets into ropes, and by this means supplied what was wanting of the length of that which had been furnished to him. altogether unmindful of his own safety, the duke of albany's first desire was to provide for the proper care of his maimed chamberlain. it was with no small difficulty that they got him conveyed down the craggy slope, and when they reached the valley below, they halted, and held a consultation as to what was best to be done with him. the chamberlain himself proposed that they should carry him to the house of a friend of his own, near at hand, where he knew he would be concealed, and well cared for, and where he thought he could remain in safety until his broken limb should be so effectually cured as to enable him to make his escape. "i will carry thee thither myself," said the duke of albany. "i can by no means flee hence, until i am assured of the safety of a servant, who hath ever been so devotedly faithful to me, and who is now, by the perversity of my fate, to be so painfully separated from me, when i most need his friendship." "nay, i do entreat your royal highness to flee without a moment's delay," said sir walter stewart; "every moment is precious to you. leave him to me, and, trust me, i will take every care of him." "nay, i cannot consent to that," said the duke. "thou must not be seen nor suspected to have had aught to do in this matter. thou hast already periled thyself enough. the house he speaks of is but a little farther along this hollow way, i will carry him thither myself." sir walter yielded to reason. they assisted the duke to carry the chamberlain to a conveniently short distance from the house in question, the sufferer was then hoisted on his royal master's back, who speedily bore him safely into his place of concealment. "now," said sir walter to the duke, when he had again joined them, a little way on beyond the house, "your royal highness must fly with all haste to the sea-side. this young man, who is a son of mine, will guide you to the spot where you will find a boat, which is ready waiting to convey you to the vessel that is prepared to carry you to france. he must supply the loss of your faithful chamberlain. take him with you, my lord, and let him return to me when it may suit your convenience to part with him." "he shall be mine especial esquire," said the duke.--"would i had a station to put him into, worthier of son of thine, and of one of his own apparent merits." "your royal highness is too kind," said sir walter. "yet is the lad no disgrace to me, as i trust that you may find that he will prove none to you. may saint andrew give you safety and a prosperous breeze!--and here, charley, take this ring as a pledge of a father's affection, and let the sight of it be ever to thee as a monitor to make thee do thy duty like a man." their parting was now warm, but brief. the duke and his new attendant reached the sea-side in safety. sir walter, who had hastened around the shores of the north loch, and climbed the calton hill, waited impatiently upon its summit till the first dawn of day-break. then it was that he rejoiced to descry the white sail of the french barque, swoln by a merry and favourable breeze, pressing gallantly down the firth, and he continued to watch it, until it was lost amidst the ruddy haze of the sunrise. he then walked slowly down the eastern slope of the hill, towards holyrood, and, making a wide circuit, he passed between arthur seat and salisbury craigs, through the hollow wooded valley, which, though now devoid of trees, is still well known by the name of the hunter's bog, and then, turning his steps towards the southern gates of the city, he muffled himself well up in his cloak, and entered it, unnoticed, amid the crowds of market people who were passing inwards at the port of the kirk of field; and so he gained his lodging without observation. there he soon afterwards heard of the astonishment, mortification, and dismay, which had possessed the king on learning this strange event, which he could not bring himself to believe until he went to see, with his own eyes, the half-consumed corpses of the captain of the guard and his men, and the rope which still hung dangling over the wall of the castle. sir walter stewart seemed to remain altogether unsuspected of any share in the escape of the duke of albany, though every one was agreed in believing that his royal highness must have been aided from without the walls. but whether it was that ideal suspicion that conscience of itself begets, or whether there really were some grounds for it, the knight could not help feeling persuaded that the king looked colder than ever upon him. he failed not, however, on that account, to pay his duties at court most unremittingly, though, frequent as were his visits there, they were comparatively small in number to those which he paid to the house of sir william rogers, where he now worshipped, more fervently than ever, at the shrine of that enchantress, the fair juliet manvers. he now found himself so irretrievably the captive of her charms, that he had for some time ceased to struggle in her net, and it was not long after the escape of albany, that he sought an audience of king james, that he might humbly communicate his contemplated nuptials to him, and crave his royal leave for their consummation, as well as for his retirement for a time from court, that he might carry his lady to visit his own territories in stradawn, of which he was to make her the mistress. from all that had lately passed, he was not much surprised that the king received his communication with apparent satisfaction, but he was very much astonished to find, that it procured for him the sudden and unexpected restoration of all that familiar cordiality of manner, which he had formerly, for so long a period, been in the constant habit of receiving from his majesty. "what!--marry!" cried the king. "and is this really so?--and a long attachment saidst thou?" "an attachment that has grown since first we met, so please your gracious majesty," replied sir walter. "strange!" said the king, as if pondering within himself--"strange that all this should have escaped me. and yet, now i think on't, i might have seen it.--we have done thee but scrimp justice, sir walter stewart, but now, be assured, that we wish thee joy with all our heart. thou hast indeed chosen a lovely bride. we--yea, and our queen too--shall honour the wedding with our presence; and thy fair and accomplished lady shall not lack such royal gifts, as may befit us to bestow, and thy wife to receive.--trust me, that this wise step of thine hath much relieved--nay, we would say that it hath given us unfeigned joy." thus reassured of the king's favour, though from what cause he could not by any means divine, sir walter stewart was happy. his marriage took place with great pomp of circumstances, in presence of king james and his queen. some months passed quickly and pleasantly away over the heads of the newly-married couple, who were especially detained at court, from one week to another, by the royal mandate,--and i need not tell you, that the lady basked with peculiar delight under the sunshiny smiles that fell upon her from the royal pair. cochran was the only one about court who had reason to be dissatisfied with the match, seeing that he had himself shewn pretensions to juliet manvers, and had been in no little degree encouraged by her. but whether real or feigned, he manifested an especial cordiality towards sir walter, and he availed himself of every possible opportunity of frequenting his society, and that of his lady. to the lady, indeed, he was at all times most particularly attentive, so much so, in fact, that sir walter hardly relished his uncalled for complaisance. moreover, he thought he began to detect a certain relaxation of that earnest desire to please him, which, for her own purposes, juliet had so long displayed towards him before their union. she had now less occasion for dissimulation, since her object was gained, and so it happened, that on more occasions than one, when impelled by the humour of the moment beyond the full restraint of her dissimulative powers, she had unveiled enough of her real character to make him doubt, whether her acceptance of him as her husband had been altogether the result of a disinterested affection for him. the seeds of unhappiness were thus thickly sown within his breast, and they began to vegetate so fast, that he at length came to the sudden resolution of carrying off his wife to his castle of drummin. "if thou art resolved to quit our court for a season," said king james, when sir walter made his intentions known to his majesty, "thou hast our royal permission, most unwillingly granted to thee, so to do. but say, what sort of habitation hast thou in the north?" "'tis but a rude dwelling, so please your majesty," replied sir walter; "and somewhat the worse perhaps for the warfare which hath been waged against it by time and weather." "then shalt thou take cochran, our architect, thither with thee, to plan and to order its amendment," replied the king.--"'twas but the other day we were talking of thy concerns together, when he voluntarily offered to yield thee his best services." "'twas kind of him," said sir walter, biting his lips, "but i can in nowise think of so troubling him.--indeed, for the present, i cannot well brook the expense of building, and i must e'en remain as i am for a time." "that shall be no hindrance to thee, stewart," said the king. "the stream of our royal bounty hath been untowardly diverted from thee for a time; it behooves us now to refresh thy parched roots, so that thou mayest again raise thy drooping head. the means shall be found from our royal treasury for thy building, and cochran shall go with thee to drummin--so let us think no more of this matter, seeing i have so settled it." willingly would sir walter stewart have dispensed with this most prominent mark of royal favour, but it was now impossible to decline it. cochran received his majesty's command, to hold himself in readiness to accompany sir walter stewart and his lady to stradawn, with secret delight, though he appeared to do so with that servile submission merely, with which he always bowed to the royal will, and for which he made himself ample amends by the arrogance with which he domineered over others. to sir walter stewart he took especial care to be always smiling, pleasant, and accommodating; and although he complained, upon this occasion, that this northern journey was a severe obstruction to the prosecution of those architectural plans on which he pretended to rest his fame, he went down to drummin with the intention of spinning out his visit to as great a length as he could decently make it extend. sir walter stewart, for his part, had no sooner fairly set his foot on his own threshold, than a thousand recollections connected with the tower of drummin, and its neighbouring scenery, crowded upon his mind. this return to the abode of his early days, recalled the remembrance of his young affections, and the contrast which thus arose, in spite of him, between those which he felt persuaded were bestowed on a creature who was innocent, natural, and true, and those which the sacrament of the holy church now demanded of him, as due to her whom he had so much reason to fear might turn out to be artful, artificial, and false, awakened certain unpleasant qualms within him, that he had failed to make that reparation to alice asher, which he once had it in his power to have made; and that now, by some strange witchery and infatuation, he had been led to shut the door against that, and his own peace of mind, by one rash and irrevocable act. a direful dread now fell upon him, that he was about to be severely punished for his neglect of one, whose only sin might, with more justice, have been said to have been his--as it was incurred for him, and whose devotion to him, and whose whole conduct since her first and only error, had so well merited a different treatment at his hands. he could not trust his mind to think how much happier he might have now been with her. nor did the image of his gallant charley fail to haunt his imagination, and to fill him with self-reproaches. now it was that his soul winced under the wholesome, though sharp stings of conscience, and the fair visions of ambition, which had so continually flitted through his brain, lost their sunshine, and disappeared for a time, amid the dull and damp mists of self-dissatisfaction that settled down upon it. he felt that though the trial must necessarily be a painful one, it might probably be productive of a certain degree of after-relief to him, if he could procure an interview with alice asher. a vow existed between them--a vow that she had extracted from him, immediately previous to the birth of charley stewart, that they should never again meet, except in the event of an approach to her on the part of sir walter, for the purpose of offering her his hand in marriage. that, alas, was a reason which he could not urge now! but, on the ground of having to speak to her on the subject of her son, he sent for the good priest who was her confessor, and procured from him a dispensation from their mutual vow, so far as to admit of one short meeting between them. it took place; and, as you may easily imagine, their conference was of the tenderest, though purest description. it had more in it of tears than of smiles. reproaches were there, it is true; but they came not from the meek, penitent, and forgiving alice asher; they were numerously and largely heaped by sir walter stewart on his own devoted head. the parting was a scene which i could not venture to describe; and far less could i convey to you the slightest notion of that accumulation of anguish which choked up the heart of sir walter, after having had this opportunity of more truly and perfectly knowing the full value of that gentle and devoted spirit, the innocent confidence of whose youth he had so abused, and whom he had so recklessly excluded from his bosom, in order to take home thither that cold and selfish heart which now legally possessed it. full of such agonizing thoughts as these, he had as yet got but a short way on his return from the dwelling of alice, when his musing walk was suddenly broken in upon by cochran, who came unexpectedly out upon him from a side-path that emerged from the wood, into that along which he was then going. "that cottage, so prettily perched up yonder among the wood, on the brow of the hill you have this moment descended, belongs doubtless to some favourite forester of thine, sir walter," said cochran; "marry, the fellow is lodged in a palace, compared to those dens, scarcely fit for swine, in which the rude and savage inhabitants of this northern wilderness are seen to burrow themselves, like urchins, and which are hardly to be distinguished from the sterile and heath-covered soil on which they stand." "it is a neat cottage," replied sir walter hastily; and, immediately changing the subject, he went on talking rapidly, and at random, until he got rid of cochran, on their arrival at drummin; and, from the very dread of all farther impertinent questioning, he threw himself upon a horse, and rode away up the valley, under the pretence of some urgent business, and with the vain hope of shaking off his griefs. "now," said cochran, as he freely entered the lady stradawn's private apartment; "now, i can tell thee, that my suspicions are this very day verified. now thou mayst have no grudge that thou hast at last restored to me some of that love, which was mine of right, and which should have always been mine, had not the scrannel pipe of this sir walter so unfairly whistled it from me." "what wouldst thou insinuate?" demanded the lady, in some degree of surprise. "i would only delicately hint, that thy husband sir walter is more in tune with another, than with thee," replied cochran, with a coarse laugh. "i have told thee so before, and now i have proof of the truth of what i told thee." "proof, saidst thou?" cried the lady keenly. "what proof, i pray thee?" "did i not tell thee i had found him out?" said cochran. "did i not tell thee that he visits the cottage that stands on the brow of the wooded hill yonder? i have this day proved that i was right, for i dogged his steps thither, saw him enter it, and watched him patiently, for two good hours, till he again issued forth. nay, i know more. i know that she who inhabits it is an ancient sweetheart of his; but though an ancient lover, she is young,--aye! and moreover she is beautiful; for as i hovered about the place some two or three days ago, i chanced to get such a glimpse of her, as satisfied me of all that." "base villain!" cried the lady, in a rage; "i will be revenged of him, and of her too.--but," added she, again assuming the command of her feelings, "i shall take mine own time." "thou canst not be too speedy with thy vengeance as regards thy husband, if thou wouldst have me to help thee," said cochran, with a vulgar leer--"for, hark ye!--a secret in thine ear--i must go to-morrow--my time hath been long enough uselessly wasted here,--thanks to thine obduracy; and then this building is so far advanced towards completion, as hardly longer to require my master eye, so that little apology now remains for me for longer stay. nor do i now will it much, seeing that it is of none effect; so i shall e'en hasten back to the court, to look after this earldom of mar, which the king hath been talking of bestowing upon me, as a successor, much more worthy of it, than his traitorous brother who held it. 'tis well for me to be on the spot; yet couldst thou but think of giving me back that love, of which this false sir walter so wickedly robbed me, i might still contrive to stay awhile to help thee to thy revenge." "my vengeance must be deeply satiated ere any such passion as love can find room in this heart of mine," said the lady, with eyes that darted lightnings. "at this moment it is overcharged with hate, which nothing can diminish till it is poured out in one vast flood of vengeance on those who have produced it. go then, my good lord, for to that title thy fortune doth now most securely lead; go--and push it boldly on to the pinnacle of that glory to which it so clearly points. when we meet again, we may have better will, as well as better leisure, to unfold our mutual thoughts and wishes. meanwhile, believe that mine are ever for thy welfare, and for that honourable advancement to thee, to which the elegance of thy person, as well as thy superiority in mind and manners, doth so well and amply entitle thee." "thanks, lady! thy discernment is great and penetrating!" cried cochran, whose vanity was so blown up by her extravagant praises of him, that, ere she wist, he, by way of an act of gallantry, and in a manner quite suited to the vulgarity of his character, threw his great coarse arms around her delicate neck, and snatched a rude embrace. but though it brought the colour indignantly into her face, she had too much cunning to resent it. when sir walter stewart returned home that evening, cochran told him that he could be his guest no longer, seeing that he had received certain communications from his majesty, which demanded his immediate departure from drummin for the court. sir walter was by no means much afflicted at this intelligence. he exerted himself, however, to do cochran all manner of hospitality, and to shew him every kindness, and every mark of respect in his power, ere he went. he arose early next morning, therefore, to perform the last duties of a host to a parting guest, and, after cochran and his escort were mounted, he walked by the side of the architect's horse, talking with him by way of civil convoy, for more than a mile of the road, as in those days it was the usual custom of all hosts to do. as they were going up a little hill above drummin, called the calton, they espied a hawk perched upon the very top of a tall tree. sir walter had a birding piece in his hand, with which he had been for some time wont to practise. "there is a fine fair shot for thee to try thy new-fangled weapon against, sir walter," said cochran, pointing to the hawk; "i wager thee five gold pieces that thou canst not bring him down." "the distance is great," said sir walter, pointing his piece at the bird; "but i accept your wager." "he is safe," said cochran. "no!" cried sir walter exultingly, after discharging his piece, the bullet from which brought the bird fluttering to the ground. "he's gone, an' he were a king!" "a good shot, truly!" said cochran, treasuring up sir walter's careless expression for his own future use and purpose. "marry, but that is a dangerous piece of thine, sir knight. take good care how you handle it, else may it perchance do thee a mischief. but i will keep thee no longer trudging thus by my horse's side; so again i bid thee commend me to thy lady." and so saying, he rode away more abruptly than might have very well beseemed any man of better breeding. cochran finished his journey to stirling, where the king then was, and immediately presented himself at court. he was gratified by the reception he met with from james, who manifested no little joy at the return of his creature. but all mankind are misers, when taking account of the favours of the great, on whom they depend. unmindful of the large ones they receive themselves, they look only with envious eyes on those, however small, that may be bestowed upon others. thus it was with the unrighteous haman, and thus it was with cochran; for, all the kindness which the king showed to him, in this his first interview, became as nothing, when weighed against the eagerness which his majesty manifested in his inquiries after sir walter stewart. these were as gall and verjuice to cochran. in vain did he try to make trifling and oblique insinuations against the knight of stradawn, his royal master was in no humour to listen to them at the time, and they were each of them in succession lost to his ear, in the eagerness with which he put his next question. james put question after question as to all the particulars of his occupation at drummin, as well as regarding the progress of the work, and it was only when he had come down to the day of his departure, that the insidious favourite contrived to catch the royal attention, by relating the story of the birding-piece. "sir walter stewart is undoubtedly a pretty gentleman, and of very various accomplishment," said cochran, "aye, and few know his qualifications better than he does himself." "he knows not his own accomplishments better than we do," replied the king, in rather a dissatisfied tone. "pardon me," replied cochran, obsequiously, "i never ventured to say that he was vain of them. but your majesty's perception and judgment are unrivalled. yet much as you have seen and observed of sir walter stewart, i may venture to question, whether you have chanced to witness aught of his great skill and marvellous accuracy of eye in shooting with a birding-piece?" "a birding-piece!" exclaimed the king, "we knew not that he ever used any such new-fashioned tool." "he hath not used it till of late," said cochran; "but it would seem that he hath lost no time in perfecting himself in the use of it, now that he hath taken it in hand. your majesty would be surprised to behold how expertly he can employ it. the last shot i saw him make with it was just as we were about to part, and it astonished me and all those who were in my company." "we shall ourselves see him use this strange weapon, the very first visit he may make to court," said the king. "but what of this famous shot of his?" "so please your majesty, a sparrow-hawk sat on the very top of a straight upright pine tree, of immense height. he was perched there so proudly and confidently in his lofty position, and, as he thought, so safely too, that he looked down as carelessly on our cavalcade below as if he had been the weather-cock on the needle point of some lofty church-spire.--'there's a shot for you, sir walter,' said i, and i straightway offered to gage five gold unicorns that he could do nought against it.--'i take thy wager,' said he; and with that he raised his piece, and without saying a word more, he presented it at the over-confident bird, and, to the astonishment of all present, down it came tumbling.--'he's gone!' cried he." "aye, and your gold was gone too," interrupted james, laughing heartily. "nay, your majesty, i minded not my gold," replied the wily cochran; "and had but these words of his been all the speech he uttered, i had been well contented to have lost a larger wager." "what said he else?" demanded james. "so please your most gracious majesty, i had rather leave the rest unsaid," replied cochran, with great affectation of discretion. "nay, but we would hear it all from thee," cried the king, impatiently. "if your most gracious majesty commands, your faithful servant must obey," replied cochran. "yet true as mine ears are wont to be to their office, i could hardly believe that i heard the words which they then conveyed to me." "we would have thee keep us no longer in suspense," cried the king. "what words did sir walter stewart utter?" "as the bird fell," replied cochran, with a gravity and a seriousness of aspect that would have seemed to imply a heavy charge against the knight of stradawn, "as the bird fell, sir walter, as i have already signified to your majesty, exclaimed, 'he's gone!' and then turning aside, he added, in a somewhat lower voice, 'he's gone!--would he were the king!' so, and please your majesty, did mine ears report his words." "ha!" exclaimed james, with an air of great dissatisfaction, "ar't sure that he so spake? from all that thou hast seen, as well as heard at drummin, it would seem to us that both thine eyes and thine ears have been wonderfully sharp to pick up evil against sir walter stewart. was it likely that he should have thus wantonly spouted forth foul treason in the ears of so many witnesses, some of whom it would appear were sufficiently willing to report to us whatever might be turned to his prejudice?--go to, sir! i like not this! those accurate ears of thine must have failed of their honest duty for once. or if, for some object of thine own, thou hadst wilfully misinterpreted that which they did truly hear, we can tell thee that thou hast not hit thy mark with the same skill or success that sir walter stewart did his. but we shall judge of him in person, and that right speedily, for already hath he received our royal command, borne to him by an especial messenger, to present himself at court by a certain day, in order to be present at the grand tournament which it is our royal will to hold, that we may for once essay to bring our sullen and iron-sinewed nobles around us." "i humbly crave your majesty's most gracious pardon," said cochran, much abashed, and with a cringing reverence. "your majesty's matchless wisdom hath put this matter into so clear a light, that i begin to believe that my doubts--i mean the strong doubts i entertained of it at the time--were correct, and that the words must have some how or other come to mine ear awry. i appeal to all the saints, and to the blessed virgin to boot, that i would rather hide than publish aught against any one so much in your majesty's favour as sir walter stewart would seem to be, especially one for whom i have, as i may say, so high a respect, and regard, and admiration." "we are satisfied," replied the king. "'tis clear, that in this instance thine ears have deceived thee. none but one demented could have so spoken in such hearing; and sir walter stewart is no madman. but we would talk no more of this. we would now confer with thee as to those plans at which we last looked ere thou wentest.----" "i will go seek them straightway, your most gracious majesty," replied cochran, and making more than ordinarily low and fawning obeisances, he gladly retired to breathe more freely, and to recover from the alarm of that danger which his very unwonted imprudence had brought upon him, and which had so nearly hurled him into the very pit which he had digged for another. but we must now return to drummin.----though the---- an old friend with a new face. grant.--who, in the name of wonder, can that be, who knocks so loudly at the outer door, in this lone place, at such an hour? serjeant.--some belated drover, i'll warrant. what an awful night the poor man has had to travel in! clifford.--if there be, as philosophers say, no happiness equal to that of being relieved from misery, i think that he who knocks, whoever he may be, is to be envied for the sudden transition he is about to make from all the horrors of night, rain, tempest, and bogs, and swollen burns, to the comforts of this room, such as they are, and especially to this glorious fire. author.--what a time they are losing in letting him in! serjeant.--i suspect they will have enough ado to get the door opened, without being knocked down by the blast. author.--they have let him in at last. whoever he may be, we must make room for the poor fellow at our fireside. grant.--certainly; i'll go and bring him in here: nay, i see i need not, for here he comes. clifford.--what a figure the poor man is! he looks like a newly landed river-god, or like behemoth himself, come forth from the mighty deeps. serjeant.--whoever he may be, his own father could not know him, were he to see him at this moment, with his whole clothes so bedraggled, and that face of his so clatched up with moss-dirt, that not a feature of it can be seen. clifford.--he is like a moving peat-bog, i declare. author.--bless me, how the poor wretch shivers! serjeant.--he shakes as if he had an ague-fit. clifford.--'tis absolutely like an earthquake shaking the globe.--here, sir; pray swallow some of this warm punch--it will bring life into you. stranger--(in a perfect palsy of cold.)--och! it's most reveeving indeed, though the taste of it is just altogether poisoned with the moss that's in my mouth. clifford--(with astonishment.)--mr. macpherson! author.--is it possible? grant.--where, in the name of all goodness, can you have dropped from, my worthy sir? clifford.--though we know not where he has dropped from, we may see plainly enough, from the foul streams that drop from him, that he has dropped himself, head over heels, into some black peat-hag. here--get towels, that we may rub the dirt out of his eyes. dominie.--ech, sirs! give me another drop of yon comfortable stuff, and let me see a bit glisk of the fire.--aye.--hech me! i'm much the better of that. clifford.--sit down here, sir. sit down in this chair close to the fire; but first take off that streaming coat of thine. it reminds me of some of those vast black highland mosses, the very drainings of which give origin to some dozen of rivers. now, take another pull at this hot stuff, and then tell us your adventures if you can. dominie.--oh, dear me, that is good! why, gentlemen, my story is short, though my way has been long and weary enough. the fack is, that when i got to my brother ewan's house, i found that he was away to the low country to make some bargain about the buying of a stock of iron, and that he was not to be home again for a fortnight. you may believe i was much disappointed at this intelligence, after the long tramp i had all the way from caithness, to come and see him. but it would appear, that my letter to him must have somehow miscarried. be that as it may, i had no sooner been satisfied that i had no chance of seeing ewan for a time, than my heart began to yearn after those with whom i had so lately and so sorrowfully parted. so, thinks i to myself, i'll just take my foot in my hand, and after the gentlemen. i'll catch them at inchrory. if the night had been good and clear, i should have been here good two hours ago. but on came the tempest; and the wind, and the rain, and the darkness together, so bamboozled and dumbfounded me, that, as i was fighting along with might and main, i fell souse over head and ears into a deep peat-pot, instabilis tellus, innabilis unda, out of which it is the mercy of providence that i was at length able to swatter, after dooking and diving in it like a wild-duck for the better part of a quarter of an hour, till i was nearly drowned in clean mud. clifford.--clean mud, mr. macpherson! the mud you have been in would seem to me to have been anything but clean. dominie.--true, mr. clifford; but i used a phrase of our vernacular, meaning that there was nothing else there but mud--a truth i can speak to by having gone faithfully throughout every corner of the big hole into which i fell without finding any.--clean, truly!--such a fearsome sight i am!--i declare i am worse than serjeant john smith must have been, when he fell into the moss-hole about the time of the battle of culloden.--would you like to hear that story, gentlemen? clifford.--much, mr. macpherson, but not now, for several reasons. first, we must contrive to get you into dry clothes of some sort, to prevent your dying of cold or fever; secondly, you must have something to eat before you are permitted to talk; and thirdly, there is another serjeant, one serjeant archy stewart, who is at this moment on duty, and who was in the middle of a long story when your appearance interrupted him. we must have that out first; but, in my capacity of secretary, i shall take care to book you for producing your serjeant john smith, when his time comes in the roster. dominie.--eh, i'm sorry that i should have stopped the flow of my friend serjeant archy's narration. clifford.--how could it have been otherwise, my good man? why, what flow could have possibly stood against such a flow as that which now streams from your wet garments, mr. macpherson? you have already made a lake in the room. dominie.--keep me, so i have! serjeant.--here lassie! bring cloths and swab up the floor. clifford.--you had better not sit longer in that condition, mr. macpherson; come away with me up to the garret, where we are to sleep, and then i shall go and see what i can prevail on mrs. shaw to do for you, to rig you out. there was a waggish twinkle in clifford's eye, as he left the room with mr. macpherson. they were not long gone, and when they did return, our young friend appeared leading in the dominie, clad in a short-gown, and a blue flannel petticoat, both belonging to our hostess. the scottish garment called the short-gown, is a sort of loose jacket, covering one half the person only, and when tied tight round the waist, it is admirably calculated to show off the mould of a handsome woman to the best advantage. on the present occasion, it was with some difficulty confined round the bulky dominie, by a red cotton handkerchief, so as fully to display his shape; and as the petticoat reached but a little way below his knees, it exhibited the full proportions of his herculean legs, enlarged as they were by a pair of the thickest grey worsted hose, and brogues of enormous size, accidentally left there by a highland drover. over his head was placed one of mrs. shaw's tartan shawls, which clifford had recommended to be tied under his chin, as a precaution against toothache, to which he declared himself to be frequently a martyr. such a woman, as the dominie appeared to make, is never to be seen on the face of this earth, except in some exaggerated specimen of those marine, or rather amphibious animals, to be found on the sea-coasts of britain, and which are called bathing women. we were all so much taken by surprise with his appearance, that to control our laughter was a matter of utter impossibility. clifford.--gentlemen, allow me to introduce to you the great princess rustifusti. dominie--(striding in like a grenadier.)--truly, gentlemen, i am ashamed to appear among you in this unbecoming disguise. but my worthy and kind friend mr. clifford is so careful of me--mercy on me, what would my boys say if they beheld me? grant.--they would be astonished, no doubt, mr. macpherson. but come, sit down--here is something comfortable for you to eat. i am sure you must require food by this time. dominie.--i must honestly confess to you that i am downright ravenous. clifford.--nay, now, do not disgrace the delicate feminine character which you are at present supporting, by eating like a masculine creature. dominie.--masculine, feminine, or neuter, i am so famished, that i must eat liker, i fear, unto a male wolf, than a delicate leddy, such as fortune has this night forced me to represent. clifford.--nay, then, if that be your way, i must cease to be your chaperon. so do you take charge of your own delicate self, and go on, if you must do so, to disgrace the lovely sex to which you now belong, by your immoderate eating and drinking, whilst i call upon serjeant archy stewart to proceed with his narrative. the legend of charley stewart tÀillear-crubach continued. although the jealous dreamings of king james had led him rather to desire the absence of sir walter stewart from his court, whilst the knight was yet a bachelor, he was no sooner fairly married, than all such fancies were dissipated from the royal mind. the renewed enjoyment in sir walter's society, which the monarch had experienced, previous to the departure of the newly married pair for stradawn, only served to render the after absence of his favourite the more insufferable, and he soon began to weary for the return of so accomplished a companion. sir walter had sufficient opportunity of being rendered sensible of the satisfactory alteration in the king's manner towards him, before he left the court; but, notwithstanding all this, he was in no small degree surprised, as well as delighted, with the arrival of the special messenger, who was the bearer of the royal command for him, to attend his majesty at the tournament, which reached him the very day after cochran had left him. sir walter being one of the best equestrians of his time, he was naturally extremely fond of horses. his great passion was to possess himself of the most beautiful steeds that could possibly be procured, and he spared neither pains nor expense in the gratification of this knight-like fancy. some time before the period we are now speaking of, he chanced to have acquired some piebald horses, which were of a white colour, marked in a very extraordinary manner with large patches of a sort of bluish tinge. this circumstance led him to indulge the whim of collecting more of the same description, and having, from time to time, procured individual animals, from all quarters, and a considerable addition to their numbers having recently arrived, he now at length found himself enabled to mount a large troop of his attendants on creatures of a similar description, and of the most exquisite symmetry of form. prepared as he thus happened to be, the news of the tournament gave him particular gratification. his heart exulted, and his mind was all agog, at the prospect of such an opportunity of making so marvellous a display, before a more numerous, as well as more experienced, collection of eyes, than his own glens could afford him. accordingly, he began to busy himself, without loss of time, in making those arrangements, which were necessary to enable him to appear with that degree of splendour, which he always wished to exhibit on such occasions. mr. jonathan junkins, and all the tailors for many miles round, were put in requisition to make rich housings, and footmantles of scarlet cloth for the saddles, and everything else was got up in a proportionable style of splendour. but let us not imagine that this, his so minute attention to such fopperies, should lower sir walter stewart in our opinion, for we must remember, that all such trifles, being integral parts of chivalry, assumed the greatest importance in the eyes of every knight. for many reasons, sir walter stewart felt no great desire to take his wife with him to court, but he could find no good plea for leaving her behind. amongst other preparations, therefore, the lady's horse litter required to be new furbished up, seeing that she was now in a condition that made riding somewhat dangerous; but so great was the expedition used by all hands, that by the day previous to that fixed for departure, all the horses were duly trained, and all their equipments, as well as those for the men-at-arms, and all other things necessary for his expedition, were in the highest order. sir walter stewart retired to rest that night with the intention of being up with the earliest dawn, that he might himself see that nothing had been forgotten. upon reaching his lady's apartment, he found no one with her but her page, english tomkins, as he was familiarly called. this was a boy of great beauty of countenance, and of an intelligence of eye very superior to that which his years might have promised. he had followed the lady from england, and he was so strongly attached to his mistress, that, if he was at all deep in her confidence, he had prudence enough to keep all that he knew, strictly secret from every one with whom his situation brought him into contact. to all, except to her, he was reserved and distant, to an extent much beyond that, which might have been looked for from the natural carelessness and ingenuousness of youth, and even the good-humoured freedom which sir walter used with him, was never successful in breaking through the parchment case in which he seemed to wrap himself up. he was a most impenetrable youth, and no long time elapsed after the knight's marriage, before sir walter began to look upon the boy with a certain jealousy, and dislike, which he could neither account for nor overcome. "do it thine own way," said the lady to him with so great earnestness in her communication with him, that she perceived not sir walter's entrance. "do it thine own way, i tell thee, boy; but see that it be done, and that surely, and secretly too--for i could have no will to leave drummin, and no heart to enjoy the pleasures of the court, unless i knew that this was done ere i went." "what may this be, upon which so much of thy happiness depends?" demanded sir walter stewart, advancing. "holy virgin, what a start you gave me!" cried the lady; "such puerile tricks are hardly worthy of thee." "what tricks?" asked the knight, with utter simplicity. "such boyish tricks, i tell thee," said the lady, smoothing her angry countenance, and throwing over it a playful smile, and at the same time gently tapping his cheek, as if in the most perfect good humour. "i mean such boyish tricks as that which thou hast now used, by stealing thus to my chamber, and secreting thyself, that thou mightest startle me for thine idle amusement." "credit me, i am no such idle boy as thou wouldst suppose," said sir walter, gravely; "i have been guilty of no such silly conduct. i came, as i am ever wont to do, without either the intent or the thought of surprising thee. nay, i knew not that i had done so, until thou didst utter that scream of surprise." "well, well, i believe thee," said the lady; "and if thou hadst stolen upon my privacy, thou couldst have gained nothing that would have amounted to treason, seeing that i was but cautioning tomkins here, as to how he should execute a small deed of charity for me, ere we go to-morrow, which i could ill brook the neglect of. now, boy, thou may'st go," continued the lady; "and see that thou doest my bidding to the very letter." "your commands shall be strictly obeyed, lady," said the boy, bowing as he retired. the apartment in which the knight and his lady slept had a window in it which looked down the vale, formed by the combined waters of the aven and the livat. a faint but glowing red light shot through this window towards morning, and falling upon sir walter stewart's eyes, gradually unsealed their lids from the deep sleep in which they were closed. he started up at this appearance of approaching sunrise--hurried on his clothes, and hastened down stairs to the court-yard. there he found the men-at-arms, who had the watch, all at their posts; but none of the grooms, or the others whom he had expected to have found already busied with their preparations, were as yet astir. having expressed his surprise at their laziness, he learned from those on guard, that it yet wanted two good hours of day. being unwilling to retire again to his chamber, he walked forth beyond the walls, to the terrace on which the castle stands; and he had no sooner got there, than the cause of this his premature disturbance was made sufficiently manifest to him, for his eyes were immediately caught, and his attention fearfully arrested, by a column of fire that shot up from the cottage of alice asher, and inflamed the very clouds above. giving one loud shout of alarm to the people within the castle walls, he staid not for them, but rushed franticly down the green slope, and crossing a rustic foot-bridge that spanned the river livat, immediately under the fortalice, he flew towards the wooded hill, too accurately guided through the obscurity of the night, by the conflagration, the light from which blazed in his eyes. but whilst it thus served to direct him towards its object, it had also the effect of dazzling his vision; so that, in the furious precipitation of his speed, he ran against some living being that was coming hurriedly in the opposite direction. whatever it might be, his force was so tremendous, that he drove it aside from the path, like a ball from a bat, and then rolling forwards on the ground himself, and over and over, he lay for some moments senseless upon the grass. but, having soon afterwards recovered himself, he sprang again to his legs, and, his whole thoughts being absorbed at the moment by his agonizing anxiety for alice asher's safety, he stopped not to enquire what had become of the individual who had produced his accident, but rushed on again towards the burning house, on which he still kept his eyes fixed. long ere he gained the foot of the hill on which it stood, a momentary depression of the flame, followed by an equally sudden and very great increase of it, told him that the roof had fallen in, and that, if the inmates had not already fled for safety, they must now be beyond all reach of assistance. yet still he paused not; but, doubling his speed, he rushed breathless up through the wood on the side of the hill, and at length arrived at the cottage. what a sad spectacle did it now present! the walls alone were standing, like a huge grate, in which the inflammable materials of the heather-thatched roof, and the furniture, and interior wood-work, were rapidly consuming. the roses and woodbines that crept over the walls, or trailed in rude luxuriance over the porch, were now shrivelled up and scorched by the intense heat within, nay, even the shrubs and flowers that grew around, were dried up and killed by it. "oh, holy virgin mother, she is gone! she is gone!" cried sir walter, giving way to a paroxysm of grief. and now people came running together from the nearest cottages. eagerly did he enquire of all he met for some information, regarding alice asher; but no one could tell him aught of her. the men from the castle came crowding up the hill, bearing buckets of water. these were now useless. but still sir walter called on those who carried them to exert themselves, and, urged by his commands, they ran to and from a neighbouring pool, bearing water, and pouring it over the sinking flames, till they were finally extinguished, at least so far, that they were enabled to rake amid the red-hot embers with long poles, without danger to themselves. with what torturing anxiety did sir walter stewart stand, in the hope that no human remains would be found, by which circumstance he expected to satisfy himself that alice asher had escaped. but, alas! they had not searched far, when they found a body, or rather a half-consumed skeleton, in so fearful a state of mutilation, that although its size left no doubt that it was that of a woman, it was quite impossible to guess at the person. sir walter was frantic. but still hope lingered within his bosom. alice had a servant maid in the house. this skeleton was nearer, as he thought, to the size of the woman, than to that of the mistress. besides, these remains were found in a part of the house which this attendant inhabited. no doubt was left that they were hers; and sir walter's heart expanded with the temporary relief which it experienced. but the search went on. and now sir walter stewart's heart again fluttered betwixt torturing hope and fear,--till,--oh, wretched and bitterly afflicting sight! in that part of the cottage which alice asher more particularly occupied, another half-consumed body was found. this was also that of a woman; and, as it corresponded accurately to the size of her about whose fate he was so unhappily interested, every spark of hope was at once extinguished within him. his brain whirled in strange and bewildering confusion. he gasped for breath, and seemed to swallow down liquid fire; all consciousness left him for a time; and he sank down on an adjacent bank in a temporary fainting fit. i shall not attempt to describe the flood of strong and resistless feeling to which sir walter stewart, resolute as he might be, was compelled to give way, when his senses fully returned to him. those who were around him respected them in silence. the sun soon afterwards arose upon the melancholy scene; and then it was that the brave knight's countenance was observed by all, to bear powerfully-written testimony of the deep grief that had been at work upon it. making a strong and manly effort to subdue his affliction, he gave orders to his people to see that the remains, now so revolting to look upon, should be properly attended to; and, despatching a confidential person to the priest who had acted as father-confessor to alice asher, he besought him to do all that might be requisite to ensure that the last sad duties should be decently and reverentially paid, and every religious rite duly performed to her, whose life of contrition, and penitence, for a sin which he felt to have been his alone, had so fair a prospect of reconciling her to her maker. and, having made these arrangements, he slowly and silently, and with a sorrowful, heavy, and lacerated heart, bent his steps back to drummin. when sir walter stewart, and those who were with him, had reached the place where he had been so unaccountably thrown down, he was surprised to see a human figure lying a few yards off the footpath, with the head and shoulders crammed into a thicket. on approaching it, the dress at once informed him that it was his lady's page, english tomkins. having ordered some of his people to pull him forth from the bushes in which he was half hid, and to raise him up, he was discovered to be quite dead;--and his death was at once seen to have been occasioned, by his head having come against the thick and knotty trunk of an oak, which grew up from amidst the black thorns and honeysuckles, so that his skull had been dreadfully fractured, and instant extermination of life had ensued. "jesus have mercy on me!" cried sir walter, with great feeling. "i have been the innocent cause of this poor boy's death, by running against him in the dark;" and having said so, he proceeded to explain to his people the circumstances which had produced and attended the accident. "methinks he hardly merits to be much wailed for, sir knight, unless thou canst say that these strange articles can have been innocently carried by him," said one of the attendants, pulling, at the same time, from the bosom of the corpse, a small bundle of matches, and a tinder-box, with a flint and steel.--"marry, these would seem to say, that he had been better employed had he been in his bed." "what do i see?" cried sir walter stewart, filled with horror, and greatly agitated.--"what! was it murder then?--murder of the most horrible description? oh, holy mother of god, can there be such villainy upon earth?" "what shall we do with this wretched carcass?" demanded one of the people. "oh, most unlucky accident!" cried sir walter, without heeding him.--"would that i had but caught him in life! but, alas! strong as suspicion is against him, his secret has died with him! we cannot now wrench forth the truth from him either by spring or by screw. he is gone to his account, before that judge, at whose tribunal all secrets must appear. yet, bear him along with you, and see that you take especial care to preserve those dumb instances of his hellish art, till i may require thee to produce them." sir walter stewart now left his people to carry the body at their own leisure, and shot away ahead of them, at a pace so furious, as to correspond with the violence of those various stormy feelings which then agitated him. on reaching drummin, he hurried directly to his lady's chamber, where he found her putting the last finish to her travelling dress. "madam!" said he to her bower-woman, in a voice which sufficiently betrayed the disturbed state of his mind; "my lady will dispense with thine attendance for a brief space--we would be private." "what strange conduct is this, sir walter?" demanded the lady after her attendant was gone, whilst her voice and manner might have led any one to believe, that she too was not altogether well at ease. "why shouldst thou have thus sent jane so rudely forth, when she hath yet so much to pack and to prepare?" "because i would fain have some private converse with thee, lady," said the knight solemnly.--"dost thou usually send forth thy page tomkins on errands of charity so very early as several hours before sunrise?" "no!--no!" replied the lady in a voice of hesitation. "such are not indeed,--no, they are not his usual hours to be sent on such errands; but--but--the boy had some distance to go. and then--and--and--and then he hath so much to do ere we depart, that--that--but i wonder much that he is not returning by this time!" "he is returning now!" said sir walter, looking hard and somewhat sternly at her.--"but canst thou tell me what he did with a tinder-box, flint, and steel, and matches, concealed in his bosom?" "flint--flint--flint and steel saidst thou?" cried the lady, considerably agitated. "how can i say aught about it? boys are ever full of tricks, and so, i doubt not, is tomkins. but what hath he told thee himself? didst thou not question him?" "as yet he hath told us nothing," replied the knight, ambiguously. "then all is yet right!" cried the lady, from an energetic impulse of satisfaction, which she could not control. "what is right?" demanded sir walter, sternly. "i would say that--that--that if the boy hath confessed no evil, then 'tis most likely that no evil hath been done." "yea," replied sir walter, gravely, and with deep feeling, "but the direst evil hath been done--a deed which is hardly to be matched in cruelty--the firing of the house, and the burning to death of an innocent lady and her woman!" "an innocent lady!" exclaimed his wife, again forgetting herself for a moment. "but thou canst not suspect this boy of having done so foul a deed?" "most strongly do i suspect him," replied sir walter. "nay, nay, 'tis impossible," said the lady. "what could prompt him to so horrible an act?" "what could prompt him!" exclaimed sir walter, "nothing, methinks, in his own bosom; but canst thou not guess who could have prompted him?" "nay, nay, how could i guess?" said the lady, in great trepidation. "lady!" said sir walter, with great solemnity, after having seated her in one chair, and drawn one for himself close to her, where he sat for some moments looking steadily into her pallid and agitated countenance. "lady! are these the charitable errands on which thou art wont to send this boy?" "what mean ye, sir walter?" demanded the lady, in a state of trembling and alarm which she could not conceal. "the boy hath not basely accused me of aught." "sir walter, your pardon!" said jane, the lady's bower woman, bursting at that moment most inopportunely into the room, "ronald would fain know what you would have done with the corpse of poor tomkins?" "the corpse of tomkins!" cried the lady, starting up, and clapping her hands together, in an ecstacy of joy, which she could not hide. "then the boy is no longer alive!" "he was found dead, it seems, my lady," said the maid, "and his corpse hath this moment been brought in by ronald and the rest. 'tis fearsome to look upon him. he hath got a deadly contusion and gash on his head." "alas, poor boy!" cried the lady, wiping her dry eyes with her pocket handkerchief, and mustering up all the symptoms of sorrow she could command. "who can have murdered him? i shall never again meet with so faithful a page!" "faithful, indeed, madam," said sir walter, after showing the maid again out of the room, "faithful, indeed, readily to execute those most wicked and murderous orders with which thou didst charge him." "nay, nay, this is too much, sir walter," replied the lady, now gaining full boldness and command of herself, from having been thus unexpectedly certified that her page was dead, and that he could now tell no tales; "how canst thou dare to insinuate any thing against me?" "madam," said sir walter, in a hollow tone, and with considerable agitation of manner, "would it were so that thou couldst with truth speak thus boldly. but, alas! the words i heard thee utter last night to the page--the horrible catastrophe of this morning--the place where it pleased providence that he should meet with his accidental death--the direction in which he was running when he received it, and the implements of destruction which were found in his bosom, can leave no rational doubt in my mind as to the person who conceived and directed this most cruel tragedy; and though evidence may be yet lacking to bring the crime fully home to thee, yet, convinced and satisfied as i am of the justice of this charge against thee, i can no longer suffer the head of so foul a murderess to rest upon this bosom. i leave thee to the stings of thine own conscience, and to that repentance which they may produce, believing that god, in his own good time, will make the truth appear, so that thou mayst be made to expiate thy guilt," and so saying, sir walter stewart left the apartment. "leave me to my conscience!" cried the lady, with a laugh of derision, after the door was closed, "my conscience will sit easy enough within me, i trow, since my good fortune hath thus got me so innocently rid of mine instrument, after he had so well worked my will." sir walter's heart was torn by a thousand afflictions. he felt that he would be better any where else than at drummin. having now no reliance in the fidelity of his wife, he resolved to leave her behind him, and having hastily packed up the important charters of his lands, and some other valuables, he added them to his other baggage. the time now left was just sufficient to enable him to obey the king's command, to present himself before him on a certain day. his people were all waiting in readiness in the court-yard. without more thought he flung himself into the saddle, with a bleeding heart. he was distracted by his feelings, but giving the word "forward!" he dashed through the gateway at a furious pace, and his troop of men-at-arms and attendants went thundering after him. sir walter stewart was received in the kindest manner by both the king and queen. he was earnestly asked, especially by james, why he had not brought his lady with him. as he could not tell the whole truth, without making a deadly accusation against her, which he had no means of proving, he was compelled to say that he had left her somewhat indisposed, an answer that produced some good humoured raillery from james, delivered in his wonted familiar manner, and left him, for the time at least, sufficiently well satisfied. the tournament took place in that beautiful tilting-ground, in the rocky valley, close under the south-eastern side of the crag upon which stirling castle stands, and which is still pointed out by the citizens of the ancient town, as the place which was so used in those old times. though few or none of the discontented nobles appeared, it was yet a very glorious spectacle. the singularity and grandeur of sir walter stewart's retinue, and their whole appearance, mounted as they were upon the piebald horses, so richly caparisoned, presented by far the finest feature of the royal procession, and swallowed up every other theme of conversation. he was now perhaps the only one to whom it gave but little pleasure, heavy as his heart then was. "we would know from our queen, who, in her mind, was the prettiest gentleman that appeared at the show to-day," said the king, after all was over, and that he was in private with her. "how can your majesty hesitate one moment in coming to a judgment upon so plain and palpable a question?" demanded the queen, with great animation. "the ornament of the procession and pageant was undoubtedly sir walter stewart. who was there who came within an hundred degrees of him? the number of his attendants--the beauty of the animals on which they were mounted--creatures that would seem to have been conjured forth out of the land of faery itself--creatures that moved as if formed out of the rarer elements of nature--and then the splendour of their housings--and, above all, the rich and tasteful dress of the handsome and elegant owner of so much bravery, who is so full of grace and skill in the management of his steed, that he bore off the applause of all eyes and the love of all hearts! but what moves you, my sovereign lord? methinks that something hath displeased you?" "your praises of sir walter stewart would seem to us to be something extravagant," said the king, considerably disturbed. "was there no one else there who might have demanded a like portion of your approbation?" "if your majesty would have an honest answer from me, i must reply,--no one," said the queen. "even the gorgeous and glittering retinue of cochran, the budding earl of mar, who takes upon him as if your majesty had already dubbed him by that title, was but as gilded clay compared to the well conceived arrangements of the accomplished sir walter stewart, who outshone all others." "all others saidst thou, margaret? didst thou not think that we ourselves were of as fair a presence and appearance as thy minion sir walter stewart?" demanded the king, with a pettish and perturbed air and manner. "nay, my liege lord," replied the queen, very much distressed to discover that she had thus so innocently offended her husband. "in speaking thus of sir walter stewart, i never dreamed of bringing your royal person, or your royal retinue, into comparison with those of any subject, even with those of sir walter stewart himself, whose individual splendour, was but as a part of that glorious magnificence which was all thine own. do me not the injustice to judge me so harshly, or so hardly. could you for one moment suppose that i could compare sir walter stewart to thee, my royal liege and husband? believe me, that although sir walter stewart is much esteemed by me for his numerous merits, yet he is no minion of mine, and it were equally cruel and unjust in any one to call him so." "'tis at least well to hear thee say so," replied the king, in a sort of half satisfied tone,--and then turning coldly away, he left the apartment, with such an air and manner, that queen margaret burst into tears, which it required some thinking and reasoning within herself to enable her to dry up. now it was that the facile mind of king james, became prepared to imbibe all the villainies which the designing cochran could pour into it. nay, his majesty became the voluntary and the willing victim of them. he sent for cochran, made him recapitulate all the particulars of the story of the hawk, shot with the birding-piece, together with that expression of sir walter's which he had formerly so repudiated, but which he now listened to and received as most true and convincing; and the royal ears being thus so unexpectedly open to him, cochran now scrupled not to tell the king, that, to his certain knowledge, sir walter was faithless to his wife. to this story james listened with anxious attention and interest. he remembered the strange combination of venus with the other planets, and he shuddered at the recollection, as he put it beside his queen's declared approbation of sir walter stewart. his majesty's manner towards the knight became again estranged and cold, and his treatment of him unkind; and this being quickly observed by those sordid and selfish wretches, who, with the sagacity of the sharks that follow a diseased ship, or the rats that leave one that is no longer sea-worthy, are ever ready to watch and catch at such signs of a courtier's decaying influence, a regular bond of union was formed against him by all but sir william rogers, who could by no means be brought to see that he could benefit his niece by the ruin of her husband. this plot went on, for some considerable time, without producing the slightest suspicion on the part of sir walter stewart, though he could not fail to be sufficiently sensible of the king's alienation from him. he was sitting one night alone in his lodgings, when one, in the habit of a serving-man, was announced to him, as craving for a private audience of him, that he might deliver a particular message to him from a gentleman of the court. having ordered him to be admitted, he was surprised to see enter a person who appeared to be a stranger to him, with a light handsome figure, but having a nose of most unnatural length, hugeness, and redness. he examined him narrowly, yet he still remained satisfied that he had never seen any such person before; but they were no sooner left alone, than the stranger began to speak, and sir walter recognised him immediately. "trust me, stewart, it is not without some personal risk that i have thus adventured to hold communication with thee," said the stranger. "ramsay!" exclaimed sir walter stewart, in amazement. "in such a disguise as this, i should never have discovered thee, but for thy voice." "then must i take care to keep that under," said ramsay, in a half whisper. "but time is precious. thy life is sought for! to-morrow, nay, even an hour hence, all attempt to escape may be unavailing, and i, even i, may suffer for this my attempt to save a friend." "i well know the danger that attends such a duty," said sir walter, "and i would not for worlds that thou shouldst incur it." "aye, there thou hast said it," replied ramsay. "i know well enough what thou wouldst hint at,--thy service to albany! nay, start not! thy secret will never be the worse for me. but, nevertheless, that is one of the suspicions that is harboured against thee." "suspicions!" exclaimed sir walter, "what suspicions?" "in the first place, the king hath taken up a jealousy against thee regarding the queen," replied ramsay. "then some strange story hath reached his ears from cochran, who, by the way, hath been this day created earl of mar, regarding some treasonable words thou didst drop in his hearing in the shooting of a hawk with a birding-piece. besides this, torfefan, the master of fence, hath said, that thou didst once step in to save the earl of huntly from his just vengeance, for speaking treasonably of the king and his courtiers; whence it is argued, that thou art in secret league with the discontented nobles. this is corroborated by that rascal, hommil, the tailor, who says he was with torfefan at the time. to this accusation, touching thy consorting with the nobles, andrew, the astrologer, bears his support, for he says that he one night found thee and the earl in deep conference, alone in the hostel. and, finally, as i have already hinted, thou art, somehow or other, shrewdly suspected of having aided in, if not contrived the escape of the duke of albany from edinburgh castle. but besides all this, sir william rogers, who hath been long thy friend, hath at last gone over to those who are malecontent with thee, because he hath had letters from his niece, complaining that she had been disgracefully and cruelly treated by thee, and that, too, but a few days before she gave birth to thy son and heir; and that, in consequence of this thine evil treatment of her, she hath applied for divorce from thee. but what is all this, and why should i waste time in such a recapitulation of forgeries? thy life, my dear stewart, is sought for! ere to-morrow's dawn thou wilt be a prisoner, and how soon afterwards thou mayest be numbered with the dead, the fate of the last mar may teach thee. fly then, my dear friend, for thy life! i dare not tarry here longer. get into thy saddle with all manner of haste, and see that thou sparest not thy spurs! and so god give thee good speed till we meet in better times." ramsay gave him a warm embrace, and then hurried out of the room and the house. and sir walter stewart, after packing up his writings and other valuables, cautiously and quietly summoned his people, and, getting into their saddles, they rode slowly out of the gate of the town, and across the ancient bridge over the river forth, the guards readily believing them when they said they were bound on the king's business. but they no sooner found themselves on the wide and flat carse-lands to the north of the river forth, than they made the hoofs of their steeds thunder across them with the rapid sweep of a whirlwind. nor was this more than necessary either, for the distant shouts of people, and the trampling of horses in pursuit, were heard behind them. but the darkness of that night enabled them to throw them off, and, by forced journies, they in a few days reached huntly castle, where they were joyfully and hospitably received by sir walter's friend the earl. although the people who pursued them very soon returned without success, they were enabled to carry back certain information as to sir walter stewart's place of retreat; and this was no sooner known, than the newly made earl of mar, armed with the royal authority, dispatched an especial messenger, upon a fleet horse, to go directly to drummin, as the bearer of certain royal letters to the lady of stradawn, together with a private communication from himself, which was conceived in these terms:-- "to the lady juliet manvers, once called the lady stradawn, these, with speed. "most beauteous lady, and my soul's idol! thou wilt herewith receive the dispensation of his holiness pope sixtus the fourth, annulling thy marriage with that traitor, sir walter stewart of stradawn, so that thou mayest now look forward to be speedily raised to the high title and dignity of countess of mar, as well as to those yet more elevated honours, to which the growing edifice of my fortunes may yet uplift thee. but enough of this for the present. all will depend on thine own brave and steady deportment. thou hast herewith sent thee, moreover, the king's royal letters, strictly enjoining thee to defend the castle of drummin against all comers, and to hold it for his sovereign majesty; and, above all, on no account to admit the traitor, sir walter stewart, within its walls; the which, seeing that i built and repaired them, i full well know, are stout enough to resist any engine which he or others may be able to bring against them, when defended by so bold a heart as thine. to aid thee in this, and to enable thee to control the rebellious vassals of the strath, a picked body of men are already on their march, and will be with thee in a very few days after these presents come to thy hand. so use thine authority like one who is destined to the great honours that await thee, and thus show thyself worthy of him who is the architect of thy fortunes,--who is thy devoted adorer and slave, the deeply love-stricken "mar." of all this the gallant sir walter knew nothing, save that the proclamation of his being declared traitor, and the public annunciation of the dissolution of his marriage had been so generally diffused, that they came to him through the thousand mouths of common fame. it was this last piece of intelligence, that made him gather up his strength, from that dejection to which he had for sometime been disposed to yield. the very thought that his alliance with this now detested woman, was thus severed and annihilated for ever, gave him new life. but, alas! the recollection that she to whose wrongs, to whose sorrows, and to whose penitence, he would now have wished to have held out the right hand of consolation, was now no longer in life to receive it, gave him fresh pangs of grief and despondency. he was resolved, however, to proceed to dispossess the murderess from the hearth of his fathers, and to take possession of his own fortress, in defiance of the king's proclamation, being well aware that the same stout hands, and sharp claymores, in stradawn, which had ever proved so faithful to him, would still enable him, if once in possession of his little place of strength, to laugh at all the king's heralds and parchments throughout broad scotland. it was after a long and tedious march, that sir walter stewart and his followers were seen winding up the valley of the aven, one beautiful afternoon. the shouts of the thinly scattered population, rang through the woods from cottage to cottage, as the news spread that their own knight and chieftain was returning. all turned out, and crowded after him, to welcome himself, to talk with their friends in the ranks of his retinue, and to glut their eyes with the splendid pageant presented to them by his gallant array, and his richly caparisoned piebald horses. the castle arose before them upon its level and elevated green terrace, and his troop was moving slowly forward to ford the river livat, where it runs in a broad and shallow stream, along the base of the promontory on which the fortress stands, when they, and especially their horses, were suddenly startled by the loud roar of a falconet, fired from the walls, the echo from which ran thundering along the faces of the neighbouring mountains, whilst the bullet discharged from it whistled over their heads, and went crashing through the boughs of a great tree behind them. a small plump of spears appeared immediately afterwards without the walls, and ranged themselves along the edge of the terrace above. but although somewhat surprised by these warlike and hostile demonstrations, sir walter moved boldly onwards to the river side. "whosoever thou beest, thou hast already had one warning," cried a loud and hoarse voice from amid the spearmen on the terrace. "i bid thee beware of a second, till we know something of thee and of thy folk." "we would hold parley," replied the knight. "friends, ye know not whom ye war against. is sir walter stewart to be held as an enemy before his own castle of drummin?" "we know naught of sir walter," shouted the other. "we know not sir walter stewart, nay, nor any other stewart, save our liege lord and master, james stewart, the third of that name, king of scotland, in whose name we bid thee be warned and keep off." "who is he who so rudely challenges the castle of drummin?" exclaimed a shrill woman's voice from the walls. "if any one would have peaceful speech of us, let him advance with a moderate escort till he comes within earshot." "by'r lady, i would have thee beware, sir knight," said ronald, the especial esquire of sir walter's body. "if thou art bold enough to go nearer, thou mayest come within something more than earshot. i will advance and hold parley with them, and i shall be safe enow too, for they will see that they can make nothing by any deed of traitorie done against such an one as me." "no, no, ronald; i will take my chance," said sir walter in a melancholy tone. "my life is now but of little value to me. let you and one more go with me, and let the rest stand fast here till we return to them." sir walter stewart and his two attendants now separated from their party--forded the river, and rode their horses up the steep diagonal path that led up to the terrace on the promontory, whilst the plump of spearmen were called in, and the gates closed. on the outer wall of the barbican stood the lady of stradawn, with her baby in her arms, and surrounded by a group of faces which were altogether strange to the knight, or those who were with him. "how comes it, lady, that i, sir walter stewart, the rightful owner of this castle of drummin, should be thus delayed in entering within mine own walls?" demanded the knight. "give orders that instant entrance may be yielded to me and mine, that there may be no unseemly warring and blood between those who, if no longer one flesh, were at least once so united by the holy church." "i no longer know sir walter stewart!" cried the lady, in a lofty and imperious tone and manner. "i had indeed once the misfortune to be linked to him, of which union behold the sad fruits in this wretched babe! but my duty to my sovereign, as well as my duty to the earl of mar, who is soon to be my husband, requires that i should now know him no longer, save as a traitor to his king, as well as a traitor to me--alike disloyal to both. begone, then! this fortalice is now held by me for james third, king of scotland, and entrance herein thou shalt never have, whilst i live to bar thee out." "lady, thou art bold," replied sir walter, coolly, "but remember, that stoutly garrisoned and well provisioned as thou doubtless art, we can soon raise willing hearts and hands enew in stradawn, to force thee to a speedy surrender." "thou shalt do so then at the price of the murder of this thy child!" exclaimed the lady, lifting up the poor little innocent on high. "if but a single arrow be discharged against us, the tender flesh of this thy babe shall be the clout that shall receive it--and if but one burning brand be thrown, this shall be the very first food given to the conflagration. it is thy child. i hate it as being thine. no mother's feelings, therefore, shall hinder me from using its little body as the bulwark of our safety, and as the rampart of our security!" "fiend that thou art!" cried sir walter. "let not harm fall on the innocent babe of thy womb! give me but my child, and i shall retire and leave thee scaithless, and to such peace as thy guilty soul may command. oh, harm not the babe, but let me clasp it in these arms!" "ha, ha, ha! a pretty nurse thou wouldst have me provide for the urchin!" cried the lady, bitterly. "no, no, its body is our most potent shield, i tell thee, and thou shalt never win in here, till thou hast opened thy bloody way through the portal of its little heart. shoot, if thou wilt, then, for this shall be thy mark." "oh, fiend! oh, demon, in woman's shape!" cried sir walter, in anguish. "how was i ever inveigled into thy toils! terribly, indeed, am i punished for the sins of my youth! but thou wilt yet meet with thy reward! fiend that thou art, i say thou shalt----" "nay, then, thou shalt have thy reward, and that straightway!" cried the lady, interrupting him. "shoot, archers! let him have his reward, promptly and powerfully delivered from your well-strung bows!--shoot, i say, archers!" a flight of arrows instantly came whizzing about them. several of these rang upon their mail-shirts, others slightly wounded their horses, but one found its way through a faulty link, to the very heart of sir walter stewart's second attendant, who fell lifeless from his horse. again came the arrows thick upon them, their barbed points prying about them, as it were, like wasps, as if in search of any weaker part or interval, through which they might most easily and certainly sting them to death. there was no time to be lost. the faithful ronald seized sir walter stewart's rein, and urging on the knight's horse and his own at full speed, he gallopped straight off along the terrace, and so he succeeded in placing his master entirely beyond all hazard, ere yet the bewilderment of his keen and poignant feelings permitted him very well to know what had befallen him. and then, leading his horse in a slanting direction, down the steep and grassy slope, and across the river, they joined their party, and drew off under several ineffectual discharges of the ill-served and ill-directed falconet. with a heart depressed by grief and mortification, sir walter stewart had now nothing left for it, but to return on his way to huntly castle. as he moved down the valley, the roofless walls of poor alice asher's cottage arrested his eyes, rising bare and blackened from among the wood, on the brow of the isolated hill where they stood. the whole of the harrowing scene of that murderous burning recurred to his recollection. his soul was filled with affliction, and his heart became heavy, and sank within him, from the poignant admonitions of that conscience, which plainly and honestly told him, that if he had sown more honourable and virtuous conduct in his youth, he might now have been reaping pure and unalloyed happiness, instead of that misery, which threatened to cling to him, like a poisoned garment, to the end of his days. he felt that he had blighted the spring of his own life: that all sunshine had departed from him for ever; and that all now before him was dark and chilling winter. the only hope he could dare to cherish now, was that of obtaining mercy, through the merits of a blessed saviour, and a deep and heartfelt repentance. giving way to the full indulgence of such thoughts as these, his heart began to sicken at the world. in sorrow and in silence he pursued his way towards huntly castle; and, long ere he had reached the residence of his friend the earl, he had taken up his firm and unalterable resolution. acting upon this, he craved a private interview with the earl that very evening; and, having retired to his apartment with him, he unfolded his mind fully to his friendly ear--gave over to him the charge of all his papers and charters, and prepared every thing for executing a deed, by which his lordship was made sole trustee over his estates, for the behoof of his infant son, with full powers to manage and direct all matters belonging to them, and, at the same time, making the earl himself heir of all, in the event of the child's death. some days afterwards, he put the last formal signature and seal to all this,--not without great, but vain expostulation on the part of lord huntly,--and, having done so, he declared his fixed determination to depart the very next morning for the continent, where he had resolved to bury himself for ever within the cloisters of a monastery. that night, previous to sir walter stewart's departure, was a melancholy one for the two friends; and their parting next morning was still more sad. the knight's horses and attendants were already drawn up in the court-yard, and the earl's men were thronging around them to bid them farewell, when a horseman rode into it, bearing a woman on a pad behind his saddle. the lady was veiled, and muffled up in a mantle; but, though the form was sufficiently light and delicate, and that of the youth also much more compact and athletic than gross or heavy, the good grey steed that bore this double weight, showed unequivocal symptoms of the long, rapid, and distressing journey he had undergone. "ha! we are yet in time?" cried the young man in a tone of enquiry. "sir walter stewart is still here, is he not?" "he is still here; but he is on the very eve of his departure for a foreign land," replied the esquire, in a grave and pensive tone and manner. "i would fain speak a few words to him," said the youth, lighting down, and then lifting the lady from her pillion. "i fear that may hardly be," said the esquire; "these last minutes of parting converse between sir walter stewart and the earl of huntly, are, i warrant me, every one of them worth a purse of gold." "so are they all the more valuable to me for the doing of mine errand," said the youth, with an air of command, which seemed naturally to belong to him. "here, take this ring, so please thee. take it to sir walter stewart, and say that its owner bides without, and would fain have a short audience of him ere he goes." "i will do your bidding, fair sir," said the squire, courteously; "though i know not well how mine embassage may be received; for, if i mistake not, the earl and the knight are shut up alone together in deep and important conference." the esquire was in the right. the parting moments of these friends were precious, and occupied in most interesting talk. the earl of huntly had been using them in pouring out all his eloquence to induce sir walter stewart, even yet, at this the eleventh hour, to abandon his resolution of going into a monastery, and to prevail on him to remain at home, and to resume the rights and the control of his estates. he urged it upon him, that he owed it to his country, as well as to his own just vengeance against cochran, and the king's other favourites, to join with him and the rest of the nobles in the plots which they were hatching for their destruction. "it will be a sweet revenge for thee," said the earl; "a most sweet revenge, i say, for thee, to have james suing to thee for mercy, for the lives of those very minions who have so conspired together for thy ruin." "nay, press me not, dear huntly," replied sir walter stewart; "though the king hath been blind and fickle, yet i cannot forget his long-exerted kindness to me. and as for vengeance, i trust that the exercise to which i have subjected my soul for these last few nights, hath conjured all such unholy and unchristian passions forth from my bosom. but to extinguish in thee all farther vain hope that i may be brought to yield to thy friendly entreaty, i will now tell thee that i last night took a solemn vow, on my knees, with mine eyes upon the blessed crucifix, and my right hand upon the open evangile, that i would henceforth flee from the world, and dedicate myself to god." "with such a vow upon thee," replied huntly--"with a vow so solemnly taken, i can urge thee no more." "then let my parting words entreat thee not to harm the king," said sir walter stewart. "harm not the king, and hurt not one hair of the head of ramsay of balmain, for he is a gentleman, and my very dear friend, and one indeed to whose friendly warning i have owed my life!" "there is no intention of hurting james," said huntly, coldly; "and as for ramsay, thou hast said enough, in these last few words of thine, to make me sacrifice my life to save him, if he should be brought into peril." "thanks, thanks, my noble friend," said sir walter, "this promise of thine gives me comfort in the certainty of ramsay's safety." "who knocks there?" cried lord huntly. "did i not say that we must be private?" "a messenger with some errand of moment for sir walter stewart," replied the squire. "come in, and tell us who and what he may be," replied lord huntly. "he desired me to deliver this ring into sir walter's own hand," said the squire, entering and presenting it to the knight. "ha!" cried the knight, the moment he threw his eyes on it, "give him entrance without a moment's delay. my lord, this is my boy charley stewart, who went abroad in the service of the royal duke of albany. i thank the saints that he is alive! i rejoice that i shall once more behold him, for i feared that something fatal had befallen him. it is well that he hath thus come, so opportunely, else, in my bewilderment, he might have lost his share of that which he hath so well deserved at my hands." "it is well, indeed, that he hath come, then," replied the earl, "for, if i mistake not, he is a young man worthy of the stock he hath sprung from. the duke of albany, i remember, spoke well of him from france, some little time after his arrival there." "his highness vouchsafed to do so," replied sir walter. "but it is so long since, that now i burn to behold the boy once more, and to see, with mine own eyes, what improvement foreign nurture hath done on him." "and i," said the earl, "am especially curious to hear how his royal master the duke hath sped, and whether he may yet talk of returning to his country, and trusting his person to the protection of the scottish nobles. but here comes the youth." "charley, my boy!--my son! thank god that thou art alive! i rejoice to behold thee again once more!" cried sir walter, hurrying forward to embrace him, with deep emotion. "i am glad, most glad, thou art come!" "your blessing, father!" cried charley, who having entered the room with the veiled lady on his arm, quitted her at the door, and rushed forward to meet and to throw himself on his knees before sir walter. "thou hast it, boy!" replied the knight, raising him up, and clasping him tenderly to his breast. "thou hast it most sincerely. recent melancholy events have now made thee doubly dear to me. but say, why is it that i have heard nought of thee for so long a time? why is it that thou wert as silent in thy communication as if thou hadst been dead? often did i of late seek tidings of thee of de tremouille, but so much in vain did i seek them, that i more than half believed that some fatal calamity had befallen thee. come, say how hath it fared with thee and thy royal master, and where, and wherefore, hast thou left him?" "with your leave, dear father, and that of this noble earl," replied charley, "i shall hastily run over the outline of our history.--a fair wind bore us to france, where we were soon transported to paris. there we were well received, and well lodged, at the sign of the cock, in the street of st. martin, and all manner of expenses were defrayed from the french treasury, for the duke and his attendants, to the number of twelve persons. we lived a merry life, mingling in all the shows and pageants of the french court, and proving our horsemanship with the french cavaliers, with no manner of disgrace on my humble part, and with great honour on the part of my royal master. but soon after this, some paltry jealousies and suspicions broke out against us, fostered, no doubt, by certain scots, who had the secret ear of the king of france, and the secret authority of james of scotland. prudence led the royal duke to travel in the provinces for a time, and under the disguise of an errant knight, he wandered about, with me as his esquire, doing feats of arms every where. then it was that de tremouille could report nothing of me, for i was altogether in disguise, doing the most agreeable service to my high and most kind master." "how camest thou to leave so good and honourable a service then?" demanded the knight. "simply on this ground," replied charley. "a certain correspondence began to arise between my royal master and edward of england. whilst this was going on, the duke, who always showed most kindly towards me, took me one day into his private apartment, and told me in confidential secrecy, that a certain treaty was on foot between him and the english king, with the intent of their uniting to make war upon scotland. i was largely promised wealth and honours if i would follow his highness to england. but, albeit that i should have been fain to have followed him all over the world, i could in nowise bring myself to fight against the country of my birth, or against that country which held my father, and whose king i held to be my father's friend--that country which held her--a--a--that country, i mean, which was a--dear to me from many a tender recollection--and that country, above all, which held my much loved and most affectionate and most revered mother." "poor, kind, and amiable boy!" murmured sir walter stewart, groaning deeply, "little knowest thou what a shock thou hast yet to receive!" "i could not fight against such a land," continued charley, without observing this scarcely audible interruption. "and on my so declaring this, and setting forth my reasons before my royal master, he kindly, and, as he was pleased to say, with regret, gave me his princely licence to depart; and as he had little to bestow, he honoured me by putting this massive gold chain around my neck, and i parted from him, after receiving his gracious thanks for the fidelity of my services, and with many friendly commendations on the duke's part to you. i left him in the more honourable, yet not more faithful, hands, of monipeny and concressault, who are now with him. having taken ship and reached the shores of scotland, i made the best of my way to my native strath, and there, learning that thou hadst but recently left it, i hasted, with all speed, to follow thee hither." "thou hast well judged, and well acted, my dear boy!" said the knight, embracing him. "by mine honour, but thou dost prove, by thy words, that thy head hath gained as much in solid sense as thy person and manners have gathered in strength and grace. my lord of huntly, since charley hath thus, by god's mercy, turned up alive, thou must now see done for him, that which i, in such a case provided, as i already told thee. to thee then i leave it to see him duly enfeoffed in the place and lands of kilmaichly, on a part of which he was born, and this i have bestowed upon him and his heirs in property for ever." "be assured i shall see this desire of thine most strictly executed," said lord huntly. "thanks, thanks, most gracious father!" cried charles stewart, throwing himself again upon sir walter's neck. "yet would i consider it a far greater boon, to be allowed to follow thee in whatever emprise thou mayst now be bound to." "that which i am boune after, boy, is too solemn for thy years," replied sir walter stewart, gravely. "thou art as yet too young to quit the haunts of men, and sins hast thou but few to drive thee thence, unless mine be visited upon thee. but, hold! thou wouldst seem to have a fair companion there. tell me, i pray thee, hast thou brought a french wife with thee? alas, rash youth, thou knowest not what perils are to be found within the silken meshes of the toils of matrimony! hath not thine own past experience of the fickle nature of woman cured thee of love?" "nay, nay, my good and honoured father," replied charley, "so far as i am concerned, i have learned, to my great joy, though to my sad remorse and contrition, that woman's love, when pure and virtuous, is inextinguishable by all the storms and tides of adverse fate. my rosa was true, and she yet lives for me and me alone, and i was the rash insane tool of one who was more an evil spirit than a woman. thanks be to god, too, that i have not the crime of murder on my conscience, for i have learned that my benefactor, sir piers gordon, yet lives." "sir piers gordon!" exclaimed huntly, in surprise, "art thou then the youth who had so nearly deprived me of so valuable a kinsman and dependant? trust me, young man, had the blow been fatal, i could not easily have forgiven thee." "my lord, i could never have forgiven myself," said charley. "but now i hope to prove to sir piers my gratitude, as well as my penitence, if he will vouchsafe to pardon me, and to receive me again into his friendship." "i think thou mayest safely reckon upon him," said huntly, "especially with my intercession for thee." "is this thy rosa, then, boy?" demanded sir walter stewart, pointing to the veiled lady. "and is she already thy wedded wife? why all this mystery? lead her hither, that we may see and become acquainted with her." "it is not rosa," replied charley, solemnly, as he retired to the farther part of the room, and led forward the lady trembling beneath her veil. "it is not rosa, nor is rosa as yet my wife. she whom i would now introduce to you is no wife, nor hath she ever been bound by any such holy ties--yet would she crave thy blessing, and one kind word of comfort from thee," and with this he gently removed the veil from her head. "holy virgin, and sacred ministers of almighty providence, what do i behold!" exclaimed sir walter stewart, in amazement, "alice asher!--and in life! my beloved alice, can it indeed be thee?" and then rushing forward to embrace her, he cried--"it is, it is my alice!" "oh! this more than repays me for a life of wretchedness," said alice, weeping, and warmly responding to his emotions. "a mother's pride, which i have in my boy, would not let me remain behind him; and the priest gave me licence. i wished to behold him in his father's arms, and my fond and foolish heart hath been gratified beyond its deserts. may blessings be showered down upon thee for what thou hast done!" continued she, sinking on her knees before him, "may blessings here, and eternal happiness hereafter, be thy portion!" "rise, my fair, my beloved, my much injured alice!" cried the knight, raising her gently up, and again tenderly embracing her. "this is indeed a day of joy! but tell me how it is that mine eyes thus gladly behold thee, when they have now so long wept for thy supposed death by that murderous and traitorous fire?" "providence interfered to save my worthless life," replied alice. "it so happened, that, on the very evening before the burning, i chanced to go up into glen-livat to visit the good widow macdermot and her daughter rosa, whose society was always balm to me, and especially so because their favourite talk was ever of mine absent charley. as i was thus going away from home, my serving-maiden took in a girl, a friend of hers, to be company for her loneliness, and thus, both these innocent creatures perished, whilst i escaped. but the ways of heaven are inscrutable. thus it was that two half-consumed corpses were discovered, which led to the belief of my death; and then it was that terror for the lady of drummin made me dread to contradict the rumour, and compelled me to live in concealment." "enough it is that thou art yet alive, my beloved alice!" cried sir walter stewart, carried altogether away by the wildest feelings of joy. "dearest, we shall yet be happy!--thou shalt yet be----" "oh, say!--speak!" said alice, greatly agitated. "what--what wouldst thou say?" "what--what have i said?" continued sir walter, sinking in tone and manner into those of deep despondency. "what!--said i that we should yet be happy?--that thou shouldst yet be my wife. alas!--no, no, no--i forgot. it cannot be. my vow--my vow--my solemn vow, already registered in heaven! would that i had known all this ere i had made it! would that i had but known that thou wer't still alive! but now, even these regrets and repinings become sinful. the hand of providence is in it, and god's holy will be done. the vow--the solemn vow which i recorded in heaven must be fulfilled. alice, dearest of human beings, i cannot now be thine! i have henceforth dedicated myself to the service of the most high. i depart this very day to make good my vow, by throwing myself into a foreign monastery." "the will of the lord be done!" said alice asher, in a hollow voice of intense suffering, whilst, pale and trembling, she bowed her head and sank into a chair, where a deluge of tears gave vent to her emotions. "the will of the lord be done! and why should it be otherwise? i have more than deserved all those sufferings and trials, which god, in his justice and wisdom, hath been pleased to bring upon me, and why should i wickedly murmur? as thou sayest, the finger of god is in it. may he sanctify his chastisement for our salvation, and so let me cheerfully kiss the rod of his fatherly correction." "angel that thou art!" cried sir walter, greatly moved. "oh, what wouldst thou not have been, but for me, villain that i was! thy sin was mine. on my head must fall the whole of thy guilt. thou wert young and pure, as a creature of heaven. on my head must fall all the wrath of an offended god; and mine, therefore, must be the penance. return then to resume thine innocent and peaceful life. thou hast a firm and able protector in thy son, whose strong arm, and upright heart, shall shield thee from all harm. in due time, he must marry rosa macdermot, and thou mayst yet live happily to see thy grandchildren growing up, like goodly plants, around thee. pray for me in thy private hours of converse with the almighty, that he may yet extend his mercy to me, a repentant sinner. my orisons shall never cease to rise for thee. and now, this last holy kiss, may, without guilt, be permitted to us. may god for ever bless and preserve thee! and--now--now--farewell for ever!" alice flew into his arms with a frantic hysterical laugh; and after a long, a silent, and a last embrace, sir walter stewart, gently unfolding himself from her, rushed with a broken heart from the apartment, followed by his son and lord huntly, leaving alice asher, who sank helpless into a chair, pale, motionless, and silent, as if death had suddenly fallen upon her. the knight sprang into his saddle; huntly silently but warmly squeezed his hand; charley stewart embraced his manly limb, as he put his foot into the stirrup--and his father stooped from his seat, and tenderly kissed his brow, and blessed him, ere he dashed his spur-rowels into the sides of his steed, and galloped out of the court-yard, with his followers behind him. let us now return to the castle of drummin.--on that very night in which the depressed and repentant sir walter was solemnly dedicating himself, at huntly castle, to the service of god, she who had been his lady retired to rest in her chamber, with her infant child placed in a cradle beside her couch. a lamp, which burned on a table near her, enabled her to read over again the letter which she had received from cochran, the new earl of mar; and, after she had done so, she laid her head back upon the pillow to ruminate upon its contents, and to resign herself to the enjoyment of those visions of ambition to which it had given birth. by degrees, sleep overpowered her, and her waking thoughts began gradually to resolve themselves into wild, floating, and ill-connected dreams. after many strange and abrupt changes, she imagined that she was led to the altar by the earl of mar. both were dressed in all the pomp that befitted the rank of such a bridegroom and bride. the king and queen were present; and all things were prepared for the nuptial ceremony. but, when the marriage service proceeded, both the earl and lady made vain and ineffectual efforts to join hands. as she struggled to accomplish this, she suddenly perceived, that the gorgeous golden collar which surrounded the earl's neck, was changed into a halter of horse hair. she stared with wonder upon him; and, as she did so, his coarse, ruddy features became pale, and fixed, and corpse-like, and he was lifted slowly from before her, as if some powerful and unseen hand had raised him from the ground by the halter, until he disappeared altogether from her sight. she struggled fearfully. the priests, the king, and the queen, and the other personages who were present at the bridal, faded away before her. her heart grew cold within her from fear and very loneliness. suddenly the candles on the altar, and the other lights in the church, blazed up miraculously, till their pointed flames were blunted and flattened on the vaulted roof. she endeavoured to shriek aloud, but no utterance could she give to her voice, whilst horrid laughter echoed through the surrounding aisles, and demoniac faces mocked and gibbered at her from behind the massive pillars. a complete and most unaccountable change immediately took place; and she beheld a burning cottage before her. screams were heard from within the walls, and she would have fain shut her eyes from the sight, and stopped her ears from the sound; but she could do neither. she was in an agony which no human tongue can describe. at length, the figure of a woman, of angelic beauty and expression of countenance, and ethereal airiness of form, shot upwards, as if borne to heaven by the rising column of fire. the screams continued from within the burning walls. they pierced her ears horribly, and the flames darted around her on all sides, scorching her face and hands, and setting fire to her garments; and still all her efforts were vain to move herself from the spot, so as to withdraw from their influence. half suffocated, she struggled and toiled to escape from them; and being at last awakened by her efforts, she was, for one moment, conscious that she was in the midst of a real conflagration. in that one moment was concentrated the whole remorse of her wicked life--and it was terrible! she heard the cries of her perishing babe; and being herself so choked as to be unable for exertion, she speedily became an easy and helpless prey to the devouring element. the drapery of her bed, which she had put aside in order to read the letter, had fallen back into its place; and having thus caught fire from the lamp, the flames had thence communicated to the cradle and to the bed; and by the time the alarm of the conflagration had been given throughout the castle, and traced to its source, the lady and her innocent babe, and every thing within the apartment, had been consumed to ashes. after such an occurrence as this, it may easily be conceived that the gates of drummin were thrown open to the earl of huntly, the moment he appeared with a strong force before it. he staid but a few days there, to arrange such business as his new possessions demanded of him. the most prominent and important part of this was, to see charles stewart regularly infeoffed in his property of kilmaichly, after which he bestowed knighthood upon him; and having accomplished all this, the earl hastened southwards, to lend his powerful aid in perfecting those plots which were then ripening among the discontented nobles, and which terminated with the summary execution of cochran, and the other minions of king james the third, over the bridge of lauder. that the life or person of ramsay were preserved untouched, may have been in a great measure owing to the last parting injunctions of his friend sir walter stewart. the new knight of kilmaichly quickly proceeded to build himself a suitable dwelling, and that was no sooner in a habitable state, than he brought that courtship, which he began with rosa macdermot, before she was carried off from the harvest-rig by the eagle, to a proper period, by a mutual submission of the parties to that holy yoke, which was imposed upon them by the priest, who then lived at dounan. the poor old howlet's prophecy was thus verified, by rosa macdermot thus becoming a landed lady, and marrying a man with a knight's spurs at his heels, and this, too, precisely according to the happy interpretation which the lady kilmaichly had herself put upon it. among the few people who were bidden to the marriage, and certainly one who was by no means the least happy or jovial among the company, was the good old knight sir piers gordon. nor was his niece, the lady marcella, absent, though, strange to say, she was very much metamorphosed from what she once was. some time after those events, which caused the flight of charley stewart to edinburgh, and which deprived her of all farther hope of him, she was one day riding with her uncle's retainers, when they fell in accidentally with a party of catteranes. she charged them boldly at the head of her people, and, in the midst of the mellée, she had one eye scooped out by the point of a lance, and half of her nose, and a considerable portion of one cheek, carried off by the slash of a claymore, and, had it not been for the intrepidity of an honest, stalwart, broad-shouldered, and wide-chested man-at-arms, who came to her rescue, beat off the enemy single-handed, and then carried her off in his brawny arms, it is probable that she might have died gloriously upon the battlefield. recovering from her wounds, the bravery of this hero touched her heart; and, notwithstanding the loss of so many of her charms, the bold yeoman, declaring that there was quite enough left of her to make a very fine woman still, and being altogether undeterred by her amazonian temper, he had no scruple in buckling with the heiress of sir piers gordon. although a good-natured fellow, he was by no means a man to be bullied. a very great reformation was therefore speedily worked upon her disposition; and by the time she appeared as a guest at the marriage of sir charles stewart of kilmaichly, she exhibited the countenance of a gorgon, with a temper and spirit subdued and gentle as those of a lamb. i have little to add now, gentlemen, to this true history, except to recount to you a very curious occurrence, that took place soon after sir charles stewart and his lady were married, and comfortably settled at kilmaichly, and which threatened to interrupt the peacefulness of their lives for a time. a dispute arose between sir charles's people and those of the laird of ballindalloch, about the march between the farm of ballanluig, belonging to kilmaichly, and craigroy, which was the property of his powerful neighbour. the house of ballindalloch being likely to prove too strong for him, in a matter which he foresaw must probably be determined by the arm of force, the prudent sir charles took the precaution to send a messenger into athol, to his father's relative, the laird of fincastle, craving his aid. to his no small comfort, his petition was readily granted, and fincastle sent him sixty well-armed men, and a capital piper, to stir up their souls to battle. sir charles being now in every respect a match for his opponent, turned out bravely to make good his plea, whilst ballindalloch came with an equal force to dispute the point. each of the two parties reached its respective ground at night, with the intent of joining battle by the earliest dawn. that of sir charles stewart took up its position in and about a kiln, whilst ballindalloch's little army was similarly posted at or near a house at no great distance. both sides were breathing horrid war, and anticipating dreadful slaughter, when daylight should enable them to see each other, for the night was dark as pitch. some time before daybreak, the lightning flashed, and a fearful peal of thunder crashed suddenly over their heads, so that every man present was stricken with awe. a water-spout then broke upon the hills, and came down upon them so tremendously, as to produce a roaring noise, as if a sea had been descending upon them. both sides were appalled, and sinking in terror upon their knees, they remained in that position until the morning dawned. by that time the sky had cleared, and the sun rose smiling, and then it was, that they beheld by his light, that a large and frightful ravine had been cut out between them, by the water-spout, where nothing of the sort had existed before. both parties felt that providence had interfered to settle their dispute, and to save the effusion of human blood. accordingly the two leaders at once agreed, that the ravine thus strangely and miraculously opened, by the sudden descent of this transient torrent, from the hills, should be the march between their properties in all time coming; and thus, they who came to the ground as deadly foes, separated as sworn brethren and allies. thus it seemed, that heaven itself had ruled, that peace should be secured to those who so well merited it, and who so well knew how to enjoy it; and the felicity of sir charles stewart and his lady was complete. years rolled on, and still the sunshine of their countenances, aye, and the sunshine of the faces of their merry children, would often conjure up an angelic smile of gratitude, upon the pale and pensive features of alice asher. nor were the grateful feelings of this highly favoured family expended in barren expressions, for all around them were loud in praise of their hospitality, benevolence, and charity. in the course of some generations kilmaichly fell to an heiress, and the laird of ballindalloch having married her, she carried the estate into that family where it now remains. the author floored. it is not very easy to tell how we all bestowed ourselves after serjeant archy stewart's story of tàillear-crubach, but it was no sooner brought to a close, than each of us proceeded to exert his own ingenuity, in making up a bed for himself. some things there were indeed resembling beds in an upper room, but those who occupied them were perhaps not much more fortunate than those who chose a dry, and tolerably even corner of the floor, and there disposed of themselves, rolled up in their plaids. my own experience tells me, that sweeter, sounder, or more refreshing repose is nowhere to be enjoyed, than on such a bed as this, especially after fatigue; and the great proof of its excellence, upon the present occasion, was, that five minutes did not elapse, ere we had all succeeded in our courtship of that sleep which our day's walk, and the lateness of the hour, had conspired to make it no very difficult matter for us to woo. next morning, the roaring of the aven, now turbid and discoloured, and flowing wide over the haughs, the rain still drizzling on, and the wet air and gloomy sky, and the plashy footing on the meadow where clifford ventured out to experiment and explore, whilst we stood clustered within the door, with our heads out, to mark his proceedings, very speedily made us draw them back again, with a determined resolution to see a fairer promise of weather, before we should venture to thrust them forth to tempt our fate in travel. clifford (mincing his steps on tiptoe through a flock of ducklings rejoicing clamorously in the wet.)--fine weather for you young gentlemen, indeed! well, if the day will neither fish nor walk, we may be thankful that we are well provisioned with food both for the body and the mind. dominie.--that is a great consolation indeed, mr. clifford, and leaves us little to be pitied. clifford.--come, then, let us have breakfast; and, after that, let us resume our sitting of last night, and, since we cannot budge out, let us spend the day rationally, with legends and cigars, at inchrory. author.--pray, mr. serjeant, what is supposed to be the origin of the name of inchrory? sergeant.--why, sir, the place was so called from a certain rory mackenzie of turfearabrad, or fairburn, as it is called in modern language, who, about the sixteen hundred or so, was wont to drive great herds of cattle from his place in ross-shire to the south country markets, by this way up glen-aven. his story is a sad one. grant.--pray let us have it, archy. serjeant.--with your leave, sir, i'll rather tell it to you on our way up the glen, when we come near to the place where the cruel deed was done. you will be the better able to understand some of its most important circumstances. author.--you are right, serjeant. clifford (taking out his tablets.)--well, mr. serjeant, i'll book you for it, at all events.--rory mackenzie of turfearabrad. serjeant.--i'll not forget it, sir. but, in the meanwhile, gentlemen, i may tell you, that as this rory mackenzie used to bring his beasts up this glen, which, as i formerly mentioned, was so full of woods at that time as to make an open patch of pasture a thing of great value, he was so tempted by the fineness and richness of the grass on the meadow that lies hereabouts, all produced, as you will naturally see, from the marly matter brought down upon it by the streams from the hill, that he used to make a regular practice of lodging himself and his animals here for some days, in order to rest and refresh them for their journey; and so, at last, the place got its name from him. but there was no house here in his day. dominie.--we have vurra great reason to be thankful, serjeant, that we have so good a house over our heads now, then. clifford.--house! why in such weather, a house like this in the wilderness is as good as a palace in a city. soldier though i be, i by no means envy rory, the laird of turfearabrad, his sylvan bivouacks. what think you, mr. serjeant? serjeant.--troth, sir, i can lie out when i am obliged to do it. but i am grown old enough now to think, that, in an ill day, the nearer to the fire-side the better, and still better is it in an ill night. what say you to that, mr. macpherson? dominie.--if my last night's scramble hither, and the deep mud of that filthy peat pot into which i fell, has not convinced me of that truth, serjeant, i must be a stubborn bubo indeed. clifford.--truth is generally found at the bottom of a well, but to find it, as you seem to have done, at the bottom of a peat pot, is a new discovery, mr. macpherson. clifford (after all are done with breakfast.)--come, then, gentlemen, shall we adjourn to the fire, and commence our sitting? grant.--allons! author.--now, my good woman, take away these things, and make the room a little tidy, and then bring us plenty of peats. clifford.--aye, that will do. grant.--who is to be story-teller? clifford.--mr. macpherson is the man. now then, mr. macpherson, your serjeant john smith is the first for duty. he may mount guard as speedily as you please. dominie.--he shall obey the captain's orders without a moment's delay. end of volume second. legendary tales of the highlands. a sequel to highland rambles. by sir thomas dick lauder, bart. author of "lochandhu," "the wolfe of badenoch," "the moray floods," etc. in three volumes. volume i. london: henry colburn, publisher, great marlborough street. m.dccc.xli. contents of the first volume. dedication, vii introduction, xi strathdawn, the water-kelpie's bridle and the mermaid's stone, the dominie departs, history of serjeant archy stewart, gallantry of the seventy-first highland light infantry, legend of the clan-allan stewarts, fate of the ould auncient monuments, illustrations. summary justice of a highland chief, the tables turned, to his grace john duke of argyll. my dear duke, the permission which you have so kindly given me to dedicate these volumes to you, affords me a double source of gratification. in the first place, it recalls and strengthens the recollection of the first formation of that, which may now be called an old friendship between us; from the continuance of which i have, from time to time, derived so much valuable scientific and general information, as well as so much rational recreation of mind, and which has, moreover, produced some of the happiest hours of my life. secondly, i am thus allowed to attach to my highland legends the name of mac chailein mhòir, which is certainly, of all others, that most fitted to be associated with highland story. with my best thanks, therefore, and with every wish for your grace's health and happiness, as well as for those of all you hold dear, i beg that you will always believe me to be, with the highest respect and regard, my dear duke, most sincerely and affectionately yours, thos. dick lauder. the grange house, th march . note explanatory of the argyll patronimic of mac chailean mhoir. this patronimic of the noble family of argyll has been strangely changed by sir walter scott, and others, into maccallum more. the true orthography and reading of it is mac chailein, that is, the son or descendant of colin. mòr signifies great; and when used in the genitive case as above, it is written mhoir--pronounced vòr, or rather vore--having much the same sound as more in english. mac chailein mhoir, the son of the great colin, or mac chailean, is synonymous in gaelic with argyll; and mòr, great, makes it, in fact, the great argyll. calain mòr--so called from his stature or his actions--was the eighth knight of lochow of the name of campbell. he commanded the right wing of the scottish army at the battle of largs, in the year . his father archibald was in life at the time, though colin led on the men of argyll. colin mor was knighted by alexander iii. in the year . he was killed in a fight with john bachach (that is, lame john) macdougald of lorn about the year , in forcing a pass called the ath-dearg, or the bloody ford, in lorn. his remains were carried to kilchrennan, on lochow side, and interred in the parish churchyard, where his tombstone is still a conspicuous object. from him the family of argyll have the patronimic of mac chailean mhoir, or, as generally pronounced, mac calain mòr. the author has to thank the rev. dr. norman macleod of glasgow for having afforded him the information which has enabled him to give this explanation, and he is the more grateful for it from the interest he personally takes in the memory of the heroic sir colin, from whose great grand-daughter, alicia, he has himself the honour of being descended. to the reader. these three volumes of highland legends are published in continuation of those which appeared in , and in pursuance of a plan--long cherished by the author--of collecting, and preserving in print, all the more interesting of the traditional and local histories of the highlanders that yet remain, but which, to the regret of all antiquaries, are fast melting away. not a year passes over us, that does not see some ancient seanachaidh, whom perhaps we may have known as the venerable historian of the district where he lived,--to whose tales of love, strife, or peril, we may have often listened with eager attention,--borne to his silent grave in the simple churchyard of some lonely highland parish, where his snow-white head is consigned to its parent earth, and there left to moulder into dust and oblivion, together with all the legendary lore which it contained. the author has always had great pleasure in availing himself of every opportunity that occurred to him, of conversing with those living records of the glens, and he has never failed to write down whatsoever curious matter it may have been his good fortune to gather from them. by such means, as well as by the assistance of many kind friends, he has been enabled to make a very considerable collection of these traditions, from all parts of the highlands of scotland; and, like all other collectors, he has become only just so much the more insatiably avaricious to increase his store, the larger that he sees the heap becoming. such legends are not only curious and interesting in themselves, but they will often prove to be helps to history, from the little incidents which they furnish, that may throw light upon it. but, however they are to be estimated in this respect, they must always be considered as having some value, from the pictures which they afford of the manners of the times to which they belong. it is quite possible that many of these traditions, in the course of their long descent through successive ages, during which they have been distilled and redistilled through the poetical imaginations of so many narrators, may have undergone considerable alteration, and even, perhaps, in some instances, exaggeration. to many fervid minds such an effect produced by their antiquity, may not render them one whit less palatable; whilst people of a less romantic and more common-sense cast, will always be able to winnow out for themselves the more solid grains from the glittering but empty chaff. but any one, who, from the apparent improbability of some of their attendant circumstances, should assert that such legends have no foundation in fact, would fall, it is apprehended, into a very grievous error. the author thinks that no legend, however improbable, can have been created, without having had some foundation in reality,--some germ, in short, from which it had its origin,--and perhaps he cannot better illustrate this observation, or prove its truth, than by narrating a circumstance with the particulars of which he was favoured by his friend the venerable archdeacon williams, which shows this connexion in the strongest light. what he has to tell, it is true, belongs more particularly to the principality of wales, but it only furnishes a more than ordinarily curious and striking example of a class, of which many similar samples might be easily produced from the highlands of scotland, as well as from many other parts of the world. some of the welsh legendary historians tell us, that in the year , there flourished a renowned chief called benlli gawr. his usual residence was where the present town of mold now stands, and his hill-fort, or place of strength was erected on the highest of the clwydian range, nearly due west from mold, and about half way between that place and ruthin. the hill on which the remains of this fortalice still exist, is called moel benlli, or the conical hill of benlli, and it presents a conspicuous object from mold, ruthin, and denbigh. an immense carnedd or cairn of stones, which was still to be seen some years ago in an entire state in a field about half a mile from the town of mold, was supposed to have been the place of this hero's interment; and if we may believe what we read in the welsh verses on the graves of the warriors of the isle of britain, his son's place of sepulture was in a spot about eight miles distant, and is thus noticed in the following rhymes:-- "pian y bedhd yn y maes mawr, balen a law ar ei larn awr: bedhd beli ab benlli gawr." that is,-- "he who owns the grave in the large field, proud his hand on his blade: the grave of beli, son of benlli gawr." but to return to the great carnedd of benlli himself in the field near mold. it was always called tomen y r ellyllon, or the tumulus of the goblins, and for this reason, that from time immemorial it was believed that the grim ghost of benlli, in the form of a knight clad in splendid gear, and especially wearing a celain aur, or golden corselet, appeared after sunset, standing on the cairn, or walking round it, and that there he continued to maintain his cold post, till the scent of the morning air, or the crowing of the cock, drove him to the necessity of retiring from it to some more comfortable quarters. this legend had for generations so terrified the people, that no bribe could have tempted any one to have passed by that way after nightfall. yet, though nobody went thither, and that every possibility of having anything like direct evidence as to what the spectre knight's personal appearance and dress really were, had been thus precluded by the circumstance that every one shunned his dreaded presence, the most wonderful and incredible accounts of his stern countenance and terrific bearing, together with the most fearful stories of their effects upon people who had beheld them, continued to be propagated, although no one could specify the individuals who had seen them, or been so affected by them. towards the end of the year , it happened that the occupier of the field where the carnedd stood, took it into his head, that the stones of which it was composed might be of use for the construction of a road, or for filling drains, or for some such rural purpose. it was with some difficulty that he could procure workmen bold enough to make such an assault on the very castle of the goblin, even although it was to be carried on during the hours that the blessed sun was abroad. but having at last succeeded in obtaining these, he proceeded to work, and soon drove away some four or five hundred cart-loads of stones from the cairn, when, at last, the workmen came upon something of a strange shape, which was manifestly constructed of some sort of metal. it was with no little dread that they ventured to touch it, but their observation having led them to believe that it was some old brass pot-lid or frying-pan, it ceased to be an object either of dread or of interest in their unlearned eyes, and they threw it carelessly into a hedge, where it lay all night neglected. some person of education having come to the spot next morning, who had heard of such a thing having been found, was led by curiosity to examine it, when, to the astonishment of all who heard of it, the brazen frying-pan was discovered to be a lorica, or corselet of gold. the metal was found to be of about the same degree of purity as our present coin. it was so thin, that it weighed altogether no more than sixty sovereigns, and therefore it appears evident that it could not have been used as armour of defence in combat. it is more than probable that it must have been worn merely as an ornamental piece of armour on occasions of state or parade, in which case it was, very likely, originally lined with leather. it was embossed all over it, of a simple pattern, but it was not perforated. the obliging correspondent through whose kindness, and that of his friends, i have become possessed of these very remarkable facts, amuses himself by calculating the immense value which such a piece of dress must have had in the time of benlli-gawr, its wearer, that is, in the year . "this," says he, "may be done by referring to the ancient laws of wales, now publishing under the government commission. in these laws, the average price of a cow was five shillings, and allowing for the difference in the value of money, a cow would now cost about ten pounds. then one pound at that time would buy four cows, and the ten pounds would buy forty cows, and the sixty sovereigns would be the value of two hundred and forty cows, or two thousand four hundred pounds sterling." this curious and highly valuable morceau of antiquity was immediately claimed by the honourable edward mostyn lloyd mostyn as lord of the manor, and by colonel salusbury of gallbfarnan as the possessor of the field where it was found, and the law having determined that it should belong to the former gentleman, it is now in his possession. it is gratifying to the author to think, that it should have fallen into the hands of mr. mostyn, with whom he has since had the honour of becoming acquainted, during the welsh eisteddvod, held at liverpool, where, as president of that body, his high attainments--his courteous manners--and his ardent devotion to the cause of the preservation of welsh literature and antiquities, gave universal satisfaction to all present, and afforded a sufficient assurance for the safety of the interesting relic, of which an account has been given. this is certainly a very powerful instance of the soundness of the proposition, that legendary tales, however incredible many of their circumstances may be, have always some foundation in truth. it appears to be by no means difficult to speculate reasonably enough on the probabilities of the matter in this case; and it would seem that they have in all likelihood been these:--in the year or thereabouts, the renowned hero, benlli, died, and in obedience to his own last instructions, or of those of his son, beli, or of some other relative or friend, he was buried in the tumulus with his golden corselet on, and then the carnedd was heaped up over his remains. to prevent the risk of any avaricious follower or serf, or any other promiscuous pilferer, uncovering his body during the night, in order to possess himself of the glittering prize, his surviving friends circulate the story that his ghost, frowning fearfully, as such ghosts are wont, is seen nightly to guard the tumulus, girt in the golden armour. terror fills the superstitious minds of the inhabitants of the district, and no man for his life will venture to approach the carnedd after sunset. this lie protective is thus very naturally and innocently handed down from one generation of the superstitious people of the neighbourhood to that which succeeds it, and implicitly believed; and so the story is traditionally preserved for about fourteen hundred years, until it is now at last unravelled, in our own time, by the removal of the carnedd of stones, and the discovery of the golden corselet itself. let not any one refuse then to give credence to the main circumstances of these our highland legends, because they may perhaps be somewhat overlaid with circumstances of a romantic or doubtful nature, but let the judgment rather be exercised to discover, and to discriminate, between the thread of the true and original history, and those adventitious filaments of later manufacture which have from time to time been introduced and interwoven with it. this will generally be found to be no very difficult task, and there are many by whom it will be considered rather as an agreeable amusement, than as an irksome occupation. highland rambles. strathdawn. we left the highland village of tomantoul after an early breakfast, and proceeded to wend our way slowly up the pastoral valley of aven. the scenery as yet had nothing peculiarly striking about it, but our faces were turned towards the cairngorm group of mountains, and the closing in of the hills forming the termination of our present view, already excited interesting expectation regarding those higher regions which arose beyond them. this was especially the case with my fellow-travellers, who had not previously visited this elevated district. a certain air of tranquil repose that hung over every thing around us, and gave an indescribable charm to the simple features of nature, rather disposed our minds to quiet and passive enjoyment, so that we walked leisurely along for some time, less inclined to talk than to ruminate each within himself. our young friend clifford was the first to break silence. clifford.--what a beautiful little plain!--how animating the clear river that waters it, with its stream sparkling under the bright morning sun!--and see how appropriate the few figures that give life to it. those cattle there, so agreeably disposed, cropping the fresh herbage, with that boy so intent upon plaiting a cap of rushes for the innocent little girl who sits beside him. it would make a subject for a cuyp or a paul potter. what a scene of simple happiness, contentment, and peace! dominie macpherson.--it is indeed a quiet enough scene at this moment, sir. but peaceful as it is at this present time, it hath not been always so, for it hath more than once had its green turf trodden into black and dusty earth by the thundering hoof of the neighing battle-steed. the day has been, mr. clifford, when, as maro has it:-- -----------------------------------"agmine facto quadrupedante putrem sonitu quatit ungula campum." here it was, sir, that montrose encampit with his army in , alter having defeated the godly sons of the covenant in the bloody field of auldern, and before marching to glut his cruel spirit by massacring more of them at alford on the don. and, as if the soil of this fair spot had not been thus sufficiently polluted, it so chanced that, in june , the bloody clavers also cumbered it with himself and his followers on his way to the pass of killiecrankie, where, on the th of july thereafter, praise be to the lord, his wicked existence was at last put an end to. grant.--ha! these historical recollections do indeed give a new interest to the scene. clifford.--only fancy the motley troops, in the varied military costume of the time, drawn up here in their lines, the tents and huts stretching along yonder in regular order,--the mingled sounds arising from the busy camp followers,--the trumpets clanging,--and the bold dundee scampering across the plain on his gallant black charger! what a contrast to the figures which are now before us! dominie.--aye; and if all tales be true, he was but an uncanny beast that black hone of his. but, my certy! the beast and the man were well matched. clifford.--you seem to have a great distaste at the viscount dundee, mr. macpherson, and yet he was followed by the great mass of your highland clans. dominie.--that may be, mr. clifford; but that makes no odds to me, sir. i am in no ways answerable for the deeds of my forebears. if they turned out to support popery and yepiscopacy, that is not what i would have done. i reverence the manes of those sainted heroes who drew their good broadswords for god and the covenant, and who suffered all manner of tortures and all kinds of cruel deaths rather than abandon so glorious a cause,--a cause, let me tell you, with all due respeck to you, mr. clifford,--a cause in which i should be proud to die at this moment. clifford.--your enthusiasm is not only excusable, but honourable to you, mr. macpherson. but will you tell me the name of this spot, that i may endeavour to remember it? dominie.--it is called dell-a-vorar, or the lord's-haugh, a name which it got from one, or may be from both of these two lords i have named, though it is more probable that it was from clavers, seeing that the place in braemar to which he marched from here has ever since borne the same name. grant.--i know there is a place in braemar so called. author.--by the bye, mr. macpherson, does not the dwelling of willox the wizard lie somewhere in this neighbourhood? dominie.--yes, sir, it does. gaulrig, as the place is called, lies up beyond yon hollow in the hill on the right side of the glen which you see before us yonder, dipping into the valley of the aven from the north. clifford.--let us visit the old fellow by all means, mr. macpherson. dominie.--we may easily do that, sir, for the house is not much out of your way, and we are pretty sure of finding him, for he is too old now to be often or far from home. a walk of some couple of miles brought us to the place where we found the residence of this extraordinary man, standing on the sloping side of the northern hill, immediately below a small tributary ravine, which ancient popular superstition has very appropriately consigned to the dominion of the fairies, and other beings belonging to the world of spirits, and in which there is one of those green artificial-looking knolls called shians, from their being supposed to be places of especial fairy resort. his cottage hangs on the edge of the bank facing the aven, is of the most primitive architecture, composed of drystones and sods, and forms, with its humble out-houses, two sides of a small square. near one angle of the house there is a rude stone, on which the old warlock is in the habit of sitting to enjoy the sun. understanding that willox was at all times rather flattered by a visit from strangers, we made no scruple in requesting an interview with him; and, accordingly, he soon appeared from the door of his dwelling. notwithstanding all that mr. macpherson had said to the contrary, i had found it a difficult matter to persuade myself that i was not to see a vulgar countenance, strongly marked with that species of sordid cunning, which one might suppose sufficient to enable a knave, of the lowest description, to impose on the most ignorant class of rustics. the figure of the man, indeed, who now showed himself, had nothing about it to do away with this preconceived notion of mine. he was rather under the middle size, and was dressed in the ordinary hodden grey clothes, which have now so generally usurped the place of the gayer tartans, and more picturesque highland dress. but i at once perceived that his low stature was to be attributed to the decrepitude of old age, for he was probably above ninety. the moment he put forth his head from the threshold, and perceived those who sought for an interview with him, an inconceivable expression flashed from his eyes, which, i might almost say, threw over him a certain light of dignity. we were all of us at once convinced that this was no common man, and our regard was riveted upon him. it seemed as if the native lightnings of an uneducated, but naturally very powerful mind, were bursting through the obscurity of those grey orbs, which had been dimmed by the gathering mists of many a long year. the half dormant spirit appeared to have been suddenly summoned to the portal of the eye, by this anticipated interview with people whom he had never seen before, just as, in the olden time, the jealous captain of a fortress might have been brought to its barbican by the bugle call of some knight of doubtful mien who wished to hold parley. as he advanced to meet us, i was struck with the corselike paleness of his face, to which the glaze of his eyeballs, and the grizzly and tangled locks that strayed from beneath his bonnet, gave an inexpressibly ghastly effect. a transient gleam of electric fire shot from within his eyeballs into each of our countenances individually, as he was introduced to us in succession. we felt as if it had penetrated into the inmost recesses of our very souls. it appeared to us as if he had thereby been enabled, from long practice in the study of mankind, at once to read our several characters and thoughts, like so many lines of the great book of nature hastily skimmed over. to each of us in turn he bowed with a polished air, and a manner like that of a faded courtier of the age of louis quatorze, than the inhabitant of so humble a dwelling, in the simple and pastoral valley of strathdawn; and strangely indeed did it contrast with the coarseness and poverty of his dress, and the squalid impropreté of his whole personal appearance. after the usual preliminary salutations were over, i expressed a wish to see the far-famed magical kelpie's bridle and mermaid's stone, for the possession of which he is so celebrated in all the neighbouring districts. "you shall see them both, sir," said he, after eyeing me for a moment with a searching look. "to such gentlemen as you, i cannot refuse a sight of them, though they are hardly to be seen by vulgar eyes, and never to be handled by vulgar hands;" and, with a marked politeness of manner, he returned into the cottage to bring them out. "now," said i to my companions, "you must keep him in talk, whilst i endeavour to steal a sketch of him." "here are the wonderful implements of my art," said he, as he returned, holding them up to our observation. "they are very curious," said i; "perhaps you will have the goodness to allow me to make a hasty drawing of them. i hope it will have no effect in taking away their virtues. "their virtues cannot be taken away by human hands," replied willox, gravely. "you are welcome to draw them if you please, sir, and i shall hold them for you so that you may best see them." i thanked him, and proceeded instantly to my work. my friends followed my injunctions so well as fully to occupy his attention in replying to their cross fire of queries, whilst i was myself obliged to interject a question now and then, in order to get him to turn his countenance towards me. the wonderful expression i have already alluded to appeared even yet more striking, on these occasions, by his ghost-like features being brought so closely and directly opposite to my eyes. i then looked in as it were upon his spirit,--and it was manifestly a spirit which, in ancient days, when superstition brooded as much over the proud castle of the bold baron, as it did over the humble cot of the timid peasant, might well enough have domineered over the minds of nobles and princes, nay subjected even crowned heads to its powerful control. i did make sketches of the mermaid's stone and the water-kelpie's bridle, the two grand instruments of his art. as already described to us by mr. macpherson, we found the stone to be a circular and flattish lens, three inches diameter, of semi-opaque crystal, somewhat resembling, in shape and appearance, what is called a bull's eye, used for transmitting light through the deck of a vessel into its smaller apartments below. the water-kelpie's bridle consists of a flat piece of brass, annular in the middle, and having two lobe-like branches springing from it in two curves outwards, the wider part of each lobe being slightly recurved inwards, so that they present the appearance of two leaves when they are held flat. attached to the ring part, but loose upon it, are two long doubled pieces of flat brass, and, between these, a short leathern thong is attached by a fastening so intricate that it might have rivalled the gordian knot. it has not the most distant resemblance to any part of a bridle, and none of us could guess to what purpose, either useful or ornamental, it could have ever been applied. willox's own account of the acquirement of these two wonderful engines of his supernatural power, elicited by our repeated questions, was nearly as follows:-- the water-kelpie's bridle and the mermaid's stone. my grand-uncle macgregor, was so much devoted to the study of that mysterious and unpronounceable art which gives man control over the world of spirits, that he ultimately became a powerful adept in it. he lived on the banks of the river dulnan, in strathspey, and his fame went so much abroad, that his name was never mentioned without reverential awe. whilst involved in the pursuit of these studies, he was much used to take solitary walks, during which it was believed that he held high converse with beings rarely brought within the reach of human communing. he was walking one evening on the lonely shore of loch-an-dorbe. the sky was calm, but the air was hot and sulphurous, and the sun went down in a blood-red haze, that the gifted eye of macgregor knew to be portentous. wrapped in his plaid, he leaned against a huge stone, and stood earnestly gazing at the sinking orb till it had altogether disappeared. he read therein that some mighty deed was to be achieved, and he wound himself up to encounter whatever adventure might befall him. suddenly the black waters of the lake began to heave from their centre without any seeming cause. not a breath of wind stirred them, yet they came boiling outwards, so as at once to dash their waves on every part of the surrounding shores. a dark object was seen to bound forth upon the beach at no great distance from the spot where macgregor stood. a less strongly fortified heart would have quailed with fear, but his was armed with potent spells. he stretched his eyeballs towards the object, when, less to his astonishment than delight, he beheld a black horse, of immense size, and of beautiful proportions, approaching him through the lurid twilight. on he came, prancing proudly along the strand, pawing the ground from time to time, and neighing aloud with a voice of thunder, while blue lightnings were ever and anon darting from his expanded nostrils, and his eyes were shining like stars. it required not macgregor's skill to know that this was no ordinary horse, but his superhuman knowledge made him at once aware that it was the water-kelpie himself, and he watched his coming with a heart beating high with hope. well instructed as to the measures which it now became necessary for him to adopt, he stood aside behind the large stone, and employed certain charms which he knew would aid in his concealment; and as this terrific incarnation of the spirit of the waters was curvetting grandly past him, he sprang suddenly out upon him, and, seizing his bridle with his left hand, he raised aloft his gleaming claymore with his right, and cut it out of the water-kelpie's head at one blow. in an instant the terrible spirit was metamorphosed into the shape of a man of huge and very formidable appearance. "give me back my bridle, thou son of earth!" cried he, in a voice like the roaring of a cataract. "no!" said macgregor, boldly; "i have won it, and i shall keep it." "then," roared the enraged spirit, "you and it shall never enter your house together!" macgregor staid not to hear more, but ran off in the direction of his home, from which he was then distant a good many miles. the enraged spirit came roaring and howling after him. ten thousand floods pouring down over the rocky ridge of ben nevis could not have created so appalling a combination of terrific sounds. the hot breath of the fiend came about macgregor as he flew, as if it would have threatened suffocation. lucky was it for my granduncle that the kelpie, in losing his bridle, had also lost with it, for the time at least, the power of becoming a horse, else had his chance of escape been small indeed. as it was, however, it seemed as if macgregor had suddenly acquired a large proportion of those racing qualities which were derived from that magical virtue so strongly inherent in the bridle which he bore; for he appeared, even to himself, rather to skim than to run over the vast extent of moors, hills, and bogs that lay between him and his own home, scarcely bending the heather tops in his way, so lightly and rapidly did his feet fly over the ground. but great as was the supernatural speed he had acquired, that of the water-kelpie was so little short of it, that the wicked spirit was close at his heels when he reached his own house. with a presence of mind, and an adroitness, which no one but an experienced and expert adept in the management of a contest with powers naturally so superior to man, could have commanded or exercised, he avoided entering by the door, although it stood yawning temptingly wide to receive him. luckily a window was open. "hulloo!" cried he hastily to his wife, whom he happily observed within, "catch this in your apron!" and, throwing the bridle to her through the window, he cunningly avoided the denunciation which the kelpie had uttered against him. no sooner did the kelpie perceive that he was thus outwitted, than he shrieked so loud that all the hills of strathspey re-echoed again.--yes, you need not stare, gentlemen; i tell you that the mountains echoed again, as if the lofty craig ellachie had rent itself from its foundations, and rolled itself into the river spey. the water-kelpie disappeared, and, what is strange, he has never since been seen by mortal man. but my grand-uncle macgregor had his bridle, which, as you see, afterwards descended from him to me. the story of the acquirement of the mermaid's stone is no whit less extraordinary than that of the bridle. the stone came to me from my maternal grandfather, who gained it by the superhuman powers which he possessed; for in my veins two most potent streams of necromantic blood have united themselves, though it would ill become me to say that i have ever equalled my ancestors. after having made frequent visits to the sea coast, my grandfather at last found out the spot where a beautiful mermaid was wont to sport amid the shallows, and sit on a rock, to comb her long hair, and to sing the most exquisite melodies. long and anxiously did he watch her motions, till he perceived her one day combing her lovely tresses over her face and bosom, altogether unconscious that she was observed. arming himself with certain spells which he possessed, which gave him superhuman powers, he crept into the sea from the rocky point where he lay concealed, and wading silently towards the stone where she sat, he came behind her, and clasping her eagerly in his arms, he held her fast, and, in spite of all her wailings, her lamentations, and her struggles, he succeeded in carrying her on shore. when fairly on land, she became exceedingly helpless, so that he had no farther trouble with her, and, delighted with his fair prize, he brought her home in triumph. there he made a soft bed for her upon the rafters of the house; and although he was unwillingly compelled by prudence to make sure of her by subjecting her to the restraint of tying her to the couples of the roof, he in all other respects lavished the utmost kindness upon her. so very much, indeed, was my grandfather taken up with his new acquisition, that my grandmother began to grow jealous of his attentions to the fair sea nymph; and, more out of spite, perhaps, than from any real wickedness, she began to encourage the visits of a young man who had been formerly attached to her. now, strange as it may seem, it is no less true, that, great as were my grandfather's powers in the art magic, he was yet unable thereby to discover the fact, that his wife received the visits of this lover, on certain occasions, when his trifling affairs required his absence from home. now, it happened one day that my grandfather returned so suddenly, and so unexpectedly, that his wife was compelled to conceal the youth hastily behind a bed. the lady was in a terrible taking, you may believe; but she so far subdued her agitation as to receive her husband with every possible appearance of kindness and affection. "i dreamed a strange dream last night," said she, after fully recovering her presence of mind, and smiling gaily. "i dreamed that i put both my hands over your eyes, and yet you saw as well as if they had not been there." "come try, then!" replied her husband sportively, taking what she said as the mere prelude to some little innocent matrimonial frolic; "come try then, my dear. i believe i can see as far into a millstone as most people." "no doubt you can," said his spouse, laughing outright, and approaching him with a merry air, she clapped her hands so firmly over his eyes that he was completely blindfolded, "now can you see?" exclaimed she. "no!" replied the husband, "not one whit." "stay a little," cried his wife, laughing heartily again, "depend upon it this miraculous light will come to you at last!" "aye, aye!" cried he, struggling till he escaped from her hands, and then kissing her heartily, "i see now well enough." but, alas! my grandfather's vision had come too late, for the lover had availed himself of this brief opportunity, so cunningly afforded him, to make his escape. the mermaid, who was seated on the rafters above, laughed aloud with an unearthly laughter, as she witnessed the trick that had been played to my grandfather. to divert her husband's attention from a mirth that at first appalled her, the lady, with great presence of mind, threw down the girdle-stone, a flat stone, which in those primitive times was used for firing the oaten cakes, instead of the iron plate of that name, which now forms so important an article of furniture in the kitchen of every scottish cottage. the stone was broken to pieces, and the lady's loud lamentation for this apparently accidental misfortune, quickly diverted her husband's attention from the mysterious merriment of the mermaid, and having thus effected her purpose, she threw the fragments of the stone out on the dunghill. the poor mermaid pined and sighed for her native element, until she wrung the heart of her captor to pity. "take me but down to the sea," said she with her sweet voice, "take me but down to the sea, and put me but into the waves--but three yards from the shore--and it shall be better for thee than all the good thou can'st gain by keeping me here." softened to compliance at last, my grandfather did take her down from the rafters, and carrying her to the coast, he waded into the sea with her, the three yards she had specified, and put her gently down amid the waves, near the very stone where he had originally caught her. the joy of this beautiful marine spirit in finding herself thus again bathing in the invigorating waters of her own native ocean, after having been so long hung up, as it were, on the rafters of a highland cottage, to be smoked like an aberdeen haddock, or a kipper salmon, may be easily imagined. but, although wicked people might perhaps impute her parting speech more to that natural love of scandal which is said to belong to her sex, than to any strong feeling for my grandfather, yet we must say, that her words and her counsel shewed that her gratitude was no less abundant than her joy. turning to him who had treated her so compassionately, she passed her taper fingers gracefully through her long silken tresses, and thus addressed him with her siren tongue:-- "travel not so oft nor so far from home again! ill luck attends that home whence the master often wanders. dost thou remember my loud laugh on that day when thy wife broke the girdle stone? it was because she made a fool of thee by blinding thine eyes that her lover might escape unseen. be wiser in future, and never leave home; and when you go back now, look among the straw where the broken bits of the girdle stone were thrown, and you will find that which will be a treasure to you and to your children for ever." with these words she dived among the breakers and was seen by him no more. my grandfather returned home rather chopfallen; but on searching where the mermaid had indicated to him, he found that very stone, which has now, for three generations, been the agent in performing so many wonders. the dominie departs. soon after quitting the dwelling of the warlock, we were doomed to lose the company of one, with whom we were all much more unwilling to part. dominie macpherson.--i can hardly bring myself to tell you, gentlemen, that i must now--sore against my will--take my humble leave of you. my road to my brother's house lies north over the hill there. but ere i go, i am truly glad to have it in my power to put you under the guidance of my good friend, serjeant archy stewart. i sent him a message last night to come and meet us here; and there is the very man coming over the knoll, with his sabbath-day's jacket and bonnet on.--how is all with you, serjeant? my certy, i need not ask, for you look stout and hearty. serjeant archy stewart.--thank ye, mr. macpherson, i cannot complain. i am a little the worse for the wear--but my old legs, such as they be, are fit enough for the hill yet. i am glad to see you well back in the country again. dominie.--thank ye, serjeant. now, my good man, these are the three gentlemen you are to guide. three better gentlemen you never fell in with in all your travels. you must do all you can for them; and, above all things, be sure to give them plenty of your cracks. they like to hear all manner of auld-warld stories; so, as you must put on a budget of their provisions on your back--which, by the bye, will be like Æsop's burden, always growing less,--you may e'en lighten yourself as you go of as many of the auncient legends which you carry in your head as may help to ease your travel. serjeant.--uh! i'll not be slack at that, mr. macpherson, i promise ye, if it be the pleasure of the gentlemen. i shall not attempt to describe the scene of our parting with the worthy schoolmaster. it threw a gloom over us all. as for the good man himself, his voice trembled--his lip quivered--and his eyes filled with moisture, when he pronounced that most unpleasant of all words--farewell--and gave us the last cordial shake of the hand, pouring out his best wishes and blessings upon us. he then put his stick firmly to the ground, as if to help his failing resolution, and, as he took his way over the hill, he turned and waved--and turned and waved, twenty times at least, e'er he disappeared from our sight. our attention was now directed towards serjeant archy stewart, who was cheerfully occupying himself in shouldering a portion of our necessaries. he was a veteran of about sixty years of age, of middle size, and of a hardy, wiry, though not very robust frame. his fresh coloured countenance was lighted up by a pair of small, grey, and very intelligent eyes; and its bold forehead, aquiline nose, high cheek-bones, and prominent chin and lips, exhibited traits of a very undaunted and indomitable resolution, which his whole appearance showed had been well tried by hardships. all this, however, was tempered and sweetened with so perfect an expression of courtesy and good humour, pervading every line of his weather-beaten features, that he instantly gained the golden opinions of our party. after adjusting the wallet to his back, he pointed his hazel stick to the grass, and led the way before us with an activity much beyond his years. clifford.--capital fishing hereabouts, no doubt, mr. stewart? serjeant.--just grand, sir--no better in this, or any other country side. clifford.--you know the river well, i suppose? serjeant.--few should know it better, sir--for i've known it ever since i could look out over the nest. clifford.--you are a native of these mountains, then?--come! we have been told that you are full of their legendary lore, and we look to have much of it out of you ere we part. serjeant.--i am sure your honor is welcome to as much as you can take and i can give you. clifford.--come away then--you shall begin, if you please, by giving us your own history. serjeant.--oh troth, sir, my history is little worth; but, such as it is, you shall have it. i was born in this very glen here--for i am come of the clan-allan stewarts, who were the offspring of sir allan stewart, who was said to have been a natural son of the yearl of moray. author.--what earl of moray was that, archy? serjeant.--really and truly i cannot tell you, sir. but this i know well enough, that them clan-allan stewarts were a proud, powerful, domineering race, and always reported to have been very troublesome customers to those who happened to have any feud with them. i've heard say, indeed, that while they boore sway here away, fint a man of any other name dared to blow his nose throughout the whole of strathdawn without their leave being first asked and granted. wild chields they were, i'll warrant ye. author.--that may be, serjeant; but i shrewdly suspect that you are not altogether right in your genealogy. my belief is, that it does in reality go somewhat farther back than you suppose. serjeant.--do you think so, sir? well it may be so. author.--i am inclined to think that you must be come of the old stewarts, earls of atholl. serjeant.--aye, aye!--yearls of athol!--that would be strange. but what makes you think that, sir? author.--why, we know that it was through the marriage of alexander, third earl of huntly, with the lady johanna stewart, daughter of one of these earls, in , that strathdawn first came into the family of the gordons, with whom it still remains. it is therefore clear that sir allan, your ancestor, must have come here considerably before that period; and if your forefathers, the clan-allan stewarts, were such hard-headed, knock-me-down, domineering fellows as you would seem to say they were, it is by no means improbable that they may have managed, by the use of their swords, to bear sway here for many a long day, after the lands were chartered to the gordons. serjeant.--i have little doubt that your honor is perfectly right; and now i think on't, i remember an auncient legend of the stewarts of clan-allan, in which a speech of the old lord of cargarf strongly supports the very view of the matter which you have so well explained. i never could very well understand it before--but now, when i put that and that together, i see the truth as clear as day light. clifford (taking out his tablets and writing.)--i shall put you down for that same legend, mister serjeant; but in the meanwhile proceed with your own history, if you please. history of serjeant archy stewart. well, gentlemen--as i was telling you, i was born in strathdawn here--as pretty a glen as there is in all scotland. oh, what a bonny glen it was in my young days! you see plain enough, without my telling you, that there are no trees now in it to speak of--none, indeed, but a parcel of straggling patches and bushes of aller and birch and hazel about the bit water-runs and burnies, or hanging here and there on the brae sides. but when i was a boy, the hills were all one thick wood of tall trees, that gave shelter to great herds of deer in the winter. now, alas! the trees have fallen, and the deer, annoyed and persecuted by sheep, shepherds, and sheep-dogs, have longsyne retreated to the upper mountains and vallies of the cairngorms, save may be, at an anterin [ ] time, when severe weather on the heights, may drive an odd few of them down upon us for a short season. well, gentlemen--not to detain you with my school-boy days--(for i was at school, gentlemen--and not so bad a scholar neither)--when i grew up to be a stout lad, i left the glen, with six others of my own age, to go and seek for work in the south country. i shall never forget that day that we left it. we went off full of life and joy--for we thought but little of leaving our friends or the scenes of our youth, since we trusted that the same firm legs that were carrying us away could at any time bring us back to them the moment we had the will to return. we panted to see the world, and it was now opening before us. all the fanciful dreams of our boyhood were, as we thought, now about to be realized. light, i trow, were our hearts, and full were we of hopes, as we made our way across the grampians, and in a few days these hopes were realized, by our finding ourselves busily employed, and working hard, though at good wages, in a quarry near cupar in fife. there we continued for some time perfectly contented with our labour, as well as with the price of it, till john grant of lurg, grandson of the famous robert of lurg, well known by the nick-name of old stachcan, or the stubborn---- clifford (breaking in on the serjeant's narrative.)--what! the fierce looking fellow whose picture we saw at castle grant with a pistol in his hand? serjeant.--just exactly--the very same, sir--he has a pistol in his hand in the picture, and well, i promise you, did he know how to use it when he was in the body. well, it was his grandson, john of lurg, who, some how or other, smelt us out in the place where we then were in fife; and as he was at that time raising men for a company, you may well believe that his joy was not small when he thus came, like a setting dog, to a dead point on such a covey of stout young hillantmen in a quarry. he soon contrived to get about us altogether, and with a hantel of fair words, and mony a bonny speech about our hillant hills--hillant glens--hillant waters--hillant lasses--and, what was more to his purpose at the time, about hillant deeds of arms--all of which, observe ye, gentlemen, were made over a reeking bowl of punch that you might have swum in, he very soon succeeded in stirring up the fire of military ambition within our souls, until he ultimately so inflamed us, that, with all the ease in life, he quickly converted us, who were nothing unwilling, from hard-working quarriers, into gentlemen sodgers, by enlisting us, all in a bunch, into the ninety-seventh regiment, or inverness highlanders. i need not tell you all the outs-and-ins of adventures that befel me while i was in the ninety-seventh, in which corps i remained about two years and a half. but i may mention to you, that i was serving with it when i got my first wound--i mean this bit crack here, gentlemen--(and he pulled up his trews, and shewed his right leg immediately below the knee, which was shrunken up to half the thickness of the other, from having had the greater part of the muscles utterly destroyed.)--some way or another, they took it into their heads to put us on board of the orion, one of the ships of lord bridport's squadron, to act as marines--an odd sort of duty truly for hillantmen, and one, i'll assure you, that we by no means liked over much, seeing that, on board of a ship, we were obliged to stand to be peppered at like brancher crows on a tree, without the power of having our will out against the villains, by charging them with the baggonet, as we should have done had we been opposed to them on dry land; and, indeed, we soon felt the frost of this, when we came to be engaged in the action fought with the french fleet on the d of june . on that day, the french had twelve line-of-battle ships, besides a number of frigates and other smaller vessels. from all their manoeuvres it was very clear that they did not wish to face us--for they stole off in a very dignified manner, never looking over their shoulders all the time, as they were fain to have made us believe that they never saw us at all, or that we were quite beneath their notice. but it was no time for us to stand upon ceremony.--we after them full sail, and we soon made them condescend to attend to us. in spite of all they could do we brought them to action in l'orient bay. there we lethered them handsomely, and we very speedily took from them three great ships, the alexander, the formidable, and the tigger; and, if it had not been for the batteries on shore, there was no doubt that we should have had every keel of them. well, you see, gentlemen, a large splinter of oak--rent away from the ship's side by a cannon shot--took me just below the knee, and demolished the shape of my leg in the ugly fashion i showed you this moment. but i was young then, and hearty, and no very easily daunted or cast down, so that i was soon out of the doctor's list, and on duty again. but what was far worse than all the wounds that my body could have suffered, though it had been shot and drilled through and through like a riddle, was that which befel me at hilsea barracks after we returned to britain. you know very well, gentlemen, that the bible says, "a wounded speerit who can bear?" now, you may guess what were the wounds of my speerit, and, consequently, what were my sufferings, when i and some of my hillant comrades were told, that we were to be immediately drafted into the ninth, or east norfolk--an english regiment! it was with sore hearts, and no little indignation, that we heard of the odious order for this cruel separation from our beloved native regiment--a corps in which we had all been like bairns of the same family in the bosom of our common mother--where our officers had been more like elder brothers to us than superiors--cracking with us, at times, in gaelic, over all our old hillant stories--and enjoying, as much as we did, our hillant songs and hillant dances--and many of them, having known sundry individuals among us when at home in boyhood, were as familiar and easy with us, at any ordinary bye-hour, as you, gentlemen, are pleased to be with me at this precious moment--and yet the di'el ae bit was our discipline any the waur o' that, whatever his grace the gallant duke of wellington may say against such a system--and, for aught i know, he may be right enough as to the english, who have not been brought up as we were in the allowance of such liberties,--but, as for us, when the parade hour came, or the time for duty, all such familiarities ceased, and every one filled his own place, like the wheel of a watch, to be turned at the will of him who was above him.--you may easily conceive, then, that banishment, or even death itself, would have been better to us than the being thus torn from such a regiment for the express purpose of being joined to a corps composed of englishmen, with whom we could neither crack of our homes, nor of our hillant hills, nor sing gaelic songs, nor tell auncient stories, nor speak about ossian, nor hear the pipes play, nor dance the hillant-fling.--and then, instead of the kind and brotherly correction of our hillant officers, the very slightest sound of whose word of reproof brought the blush of shame into our cheeks, and was as effectual a punishment to us as if we had been brought to the halberts--think what it was to us to be snubbed by some cross tempered upsetting sassenach, who could know nothing of our nation's temper or disposition, and who might perhaps, of a morning, order our backs to be scored, with as little remorse as he would order a beef-steak to be brandered for his breakfast.--oh it was a terrible change!--our very speerits were just altogether broken at the very thought of it, and we actually ceased to be the same men. but, gentlemen, if this was the effect produced on our minds by the mere anticipation of this most bitter change in our fate, what think ye was the misery of body which we sustained, and, especially, what think ye was my misery, when i, who never wore aught else but a kilt from the day i was born till that accursed moment, was crammed, in spite of all i could say or do to the contrary, hip and thigh, into a pair of tight regimental small-clothes!--aye, you may laugh indeed gentlemen--but if anybody was to tie your legs together with birken woodies, as they have tied the fore-legs of yon pouny that you see feeding yonder in the bit meadow at the foot of the brae, and if you were then to be bidden to climb up the steepest face of ben-machduie, you could not be more helpless, or more ill at ease than i was. as for drilling, you might as well have set up a man in a sack to march. "step out!" cried they eternally--"why the devil don't you step out?" but it was just altogether ridiculous to cry out any such thing to me, for fint a step could i take at all, unless they had letten me step out of my breeks.--i was in perfect torture with them.--the very circulation of my blood was stopped--my nether man was rendered entirely numb and powerless. nay, had i been built up mid man into a brick-wall i might have stepped out just as well. now, i would have you to understand, gentlemen, that especially and above all things, the confounded articles grippit and pinched me most desperately over the henches. the joints of my henches were so bound together in their very sockets by their pressure as to be rendered altogether useless; and the torture i endured in these quarters became so great, that i felt i could bear it no longer. i sat down, therefore, to hold a consultation with myself what was best to be done; and, after as cool and calm a consideration of my lamentable case as my extreme state of misery would allow, i came, in my own private council of war, to the determination, that i had only three things to choose from, and these were,--to desert--to cut my throat--or to cut my breeches; and, after having much and duly weighed these different evil alternatives, i finally resolved to adopt the last of them. having come to this resolution, i then began, like a skilful engineer, narrowly to examine the horrid instruments of my sufferings, in order to ascertain how and where i could most easily make a breach in them, and one that was most likely to give the greatest ease to myself. a little farther thought and observation soon convinced me, that, as the parts most grievously afflicted, were those which your masters of fortification would have called the sailliant angles of my henches to right and left, and especially as on these hinged much of the motion of the whole man, it was clear that the proposed attempt to work myself relief should be first tried in those two points. i lost not a moment, therefore, in carrying my plan into execution. i immediately borrowed a pair of shears from a sodger's wife; and, sitting down regularly before my breeches, like an experienced general about to besiege a fortress, i fairly attacked the two sailliant angles of the bastion, and carried them by storm; and having, with the greatest nicety, cut out a round piece of the cloth of three or four inches in width, directly over each hip-joint, i ventured to thrust my limbs within the very garrison of my breeches; and really, gentlemen, the ease i obtained in consequence of this bold operation is not to be described. so innocent was i, and so utterly unconscious of even a suspicion that i had done any thing wrong, that when the drum beat, i went off to the private parade of the company i had been attached to, with my heart almost as much eased as my henches; nay, it was absolutely bounding with benevolence, and brimful with the earnest desire and intention of spreading the blessed discovery i had made, and making it widely known among my hillant comrades, so that all of them who might be in the same state of misery as i had been, might forthwith proceed to benefit themselves, as i had done, by the bright discovery i had made. rejoicing in my ease, therefore, i strode across the barrack-square, with a step so much wider and grander than any i had lately been able to use, that i felt a pride in the excellence of my invention which i cannot possibly describe. i halted for a moment--stretched out, first my right leg, and then my left, just as i have seen a fowl do upon its perch--and then, clapping my hand upon the new made hole on either side of me, i chuckled for joy. "hah!" cried i; "breeches do they call you? by my faith, then, but i have made you more like your name by these well-imagined breaches of my own contrivance, which i have so ingeniously opened through your accursed sides." i then bent myself down, and made a spring into the air; after which, being quite satisfied that a paring or two more off the edges of the round holes would make all nearly right, i walked on with an air of dignified self-satisfaction that was not to be mistaken. but i had not come within ten yards of the spot where the company was falling in, when i heard the serjeant exclaim,-- "my heyes! look at that ere ighland savage! i'm damned if he arn't been cutting big oles in his majesty's rigimental breeches!" a loud horse-laugh burst out from among the men, and the serjeant joined heartily in it. but it was no laughing matter to me; i was cut to the soul. all our horrible anticipations of english officers, halberds, and cat-o'-nine-tails, came smack upon me at once. i was overwhelmed--i grew dizzy--and, before i had well recovered myself, i was marched off to the guard-house under the charge of a corporal and a file of men, and a written crime was given in against me in these terms. "privut archbauld stewart of captin ketley's compnay, confined by order of sargunt nevett, for aving cut two big oles in the ipps of a pair of riggimental britches belonghing too is magesty king george the third." well, gentlemen, there was i left in the guard-house for some hours a prisoner. but if i was confined in one way, i took good care to put myself very much at my ease in another; for i pulled off my tormentors altogether, and sat quite coolly and comfortably without them. but i was sore enough at heart, for all that; for, independent of the fearful prospect of the unrelenting punishment that awaited me, the disgrace of confinement to which i had thus, for the first time in my life, been subjected, and that so unjustly, stung me to the very heart. for a good hour or more i could do nothing but grind my teeth with absolute vexation and rage; but at length i began to gather some command of myself, and to think of the necessity of making up my mind as to what was to be done. i recalled the three evil alternatives, from which i had already made that which had now proved to be so unfortunate a selection, and as that had so miserably failed me, i continued for sometime swinging backwards and forwards, like a bairn in a shuggy-shue, [ ] between the two that yet remained to be tried, and i had not yet made up my mind on the subject, when the serjeant appeared, and ordered me to put on my breeches and follow him. i obeyed like a man who gets up from his straw to go out and be hanged. but there was one great difference between such a poor wretch and me, very much in his favour, for as his fetters in such a case are taken off, i was on the contrary condemned to buckle on mine. i did follow the serjeant as he bade me, but notwithstanding the outlets i had made in the breeches for the joints of my hench bones, and the comparative ease i had thereby formerly enjoyed, yet the few hours i had had in the guardhouse of a freedom of limb resembling that which i was wont to enjoy in my old kilt, made me feel so strange upon thus recommitting my joints to the thraldom of the accursed garments, that i went shaughling along after him, as if they had undergone no improvement at all. he took me directly to captain ketley's quarters, and whilst i was on my way thither, i was compelled to bring my doubts to a hasty conclusion, and so i resolved that of the two plans now only remaining for me to choose from, desertion should be first tried, seeing that if it should fail me, i might cut my throat afterwards, for that if i should cut my throat first, i should not afterwards find it an easy matter to desert. i had no more time than just enough to settle this point with myself, when the serjeant rapped at our captain's door. "come in!" cried captain ketley, in what sounded in my ear like a tremendous voice. "privut archbauld stewart and his cut breeches, your honour!" cried the serjeant, ushering me without ceremony into the middle of the room. there i stood with my head up, and in the military attitude of attention, the which, as you will naturally observe, gentlemen, was, of all others, out of all sight the most convenient and best chosen attitude for me at the time; for, as you will understand, the palms of my two hands were thus exactly applied to the two holes i had made, though the size of the holes themselves was so great that i could by no means entirely cover them. but if i could have done so, this well conceived manoeuvre of mine would have been of no avail. "stand at ease!" cried the serjeant, giving me at the same time a smart tap on the back with his rattan cane. "serjeant," said i impatiently, "you know very well that it's not possible for me to stand at ease in thir fashious breeks of mine." i saw that captain ketley had a hard task of it to keep his gravity. "what is this which has been reported to me of you, sir?" demanded he with as stern a look as he could possibly assume; "how comes it that you have taken upon you to destroy a pair of new regimental breeches in that manner?" "captain," said i, now quite brought to bay, and making up my mind to go through with it, whatever the consequences might be; "captain, if your honor will but hear me, i will speak." "speak on then," said captain ketley, "provided you say nothing that as an officer i may not listen to. serjeant nevett, you may retire." "you need not fear that i shall offend you, captain ketley," said i, "i have been over long accustomed to speak to officers to forget the respect and duty i owe to them as a sodger, and since your honour is so kind, i will be as short as i can. i enlisted, you see, to serve in the inverness highlanders, and in so doing i covenanted to fight in company with my own countrymen, and in the freedom of a kilt. now, against all bargain--against all manner of justice--against my will--and against the very nature of a hillantman, i have been thrust, first into this english regiment, and then into this pair of english small clothes--well may they be so called, i'm sure. captain ketley, all this is most unreasonable. you might as well put a deer of the mountains into a breachame, and expect to plough the land with him, as to put a hillantman into such cruel harness as thir things, with the hope that he can do his work in them; and, although i am as wishful as any man that serves king george can be, to spend the last drop of my blood, as some of it has flowed already in the cause of his majesty, god bless him! and for our common country, yet i will just tell your honour plainly and honestly--though with all manner of respect--that i will not stay in this ninth regiment to be kept in the eternal torture of thir breeks, though i should see the men drawn out to shoot me for trying to desert--for death itself is desirable rather than that i should longer endure such misery as this. so i say again, that although i am quite willing to serve king george in any regiment he may be pleased to put me into that wears the kilt, yet i will take the first moment i can catch, to run away from such disgraceful and heartbreaking bondage as this to which i am now subjected." "no, no, my good fellow," said captain ketley, who had all this time had his own share of trouble in keeping himself from laughing, and who now gave way and laughed outright; "you must not run away from us, archy. we cannot afford to lose so good a man. we must do all we can to put you at your ease with us. your complaints are certainly not altogether unreasonable. but you should not have cut holes in your breeches--you should have come and stated your grievances to me. remember in future, that you will always find me ready to listen to any well-founded complaint you may have to make. meanwhile,--see here," said he, taking a pair of old loose trowsers out of his chest, and tossing them to me,--"wear these for a few days, till your limbs get somewhat accustomed to the thraldom of small clothes, and until we can get you fitted with a better and easier pair of your own. i shall see about your immediate release from confinement, and that you and your highland comrades be excused from duty until you are more at home in your new clothing. if you behave yourself well, you shall always find a friend in me." "god bless your honour!" cried i, with a joyful and grateful heart, and, if you will believe me, gentlemen, almost with the tears in my eyes; "your honour has spoken to me just like one of our own kind hillant officers of the ninety-seventh. i'll go all the world over with you, though my breeks were of iron!" well, gentlemen, captain ketley was as good as his word--he was a kind and steady friend to me as long as he lived. he inquired of me whether i could read and write; and, finding that i could do both--aye, and spell too--and that somewhat better, as i reckon, than serjeant nevett,--and, moreover, that i was not a bad hand at counting,--he got me made a corporal in less than a fortnight, and, very soon after that, a serjeant. but, woe's me! a few months had hardly passed away when captain ketley died. many were the salt tears i shed over his grave, after we had given him our parting vollies, and no wonder, for he was one of the best friends i ever had in my life. i cannot think of him, even yet, without regret. willingly would i have given my life for his at any time. but what is this miserable world, gentlemen, but a valley of sorrow? well, i got fond enough, after all, of the holy boys, as the old ninth lads were called. clifford (interrupting.)--how did they get that name, archy? serjeant.--oh, i'll tell you that, sir.--you see, when they came from the west indies, as a skeleton regiment, they were made up again with growing boys. colonel campbell of blythswood tried to do them some good by getting them schoolmasters and bibles. but the young rogues had been ill nurtured in the parent nest, and they used to barter their bibles for gin and gingerbread. the duke of york used to say of them, that they were every thing that was bad but bad sodgers--ha! ha! ha! and now, gentlemen, i believe i have little more to tell you about myself, except that i got my jaw broken in two places by a musket ball in holland, on the th of september . see what a queer kind of a mouth it has made me in the inside here. you see i had been out superintending the working party in the redoubts, and i had returned, tired as a dog, to the barn where the light company were quartered, and had just laid my head on my wife's knee to take a nap--for i was married by this time--when a terrible thumping came to the door, and corporal parrot ran to see who was there. now, it happened that one of our serjeants was sick, and the other had been killed.--it was adjutant orchard who knocked so loud. "where is serjeant stewart?" demanded he, in a terrible hurry, the moment he entered the place. "can't i do instead of him?" replied corporal parrot; "for he is just new out of the trenches." "no!" replied the adjutant; "if he was new out of hell, i must have him directly." "what's ado, sir?" demanded i, jumping up. "you know as much as i do," replied the adjutant; "but, depend upon it, we are not wanted to build churches. get you out the light bobs as fast as you can." well, i hurried about and got out the light company with as little delay as possible; and no very easy matter it was to get hold of the poor fellows, knocked up as they were. some of them i actually pulled out of hay stacks by the legs, as you would pull out periwinkles from their shells. the troops marched fifteen miles without a halt. we found the french and russians hard at it, blazing away so that we could see the very straws at our feet as we marched over the sand. the balls came whistling about us like hail as we advanced. first came one, and knocked away the hilt of my sword; then came another, and cracked off the iron head of my halberd. "if you go on at this rate, you villains," said i, "you'll disarm us altogether." then smack came another, whack through my canteen, and spilt all my brandy. "ye rascals!" said i, trying at the same time to save as much of it as i could in my mouth, "that is most uncivil. ye are no gentlemen, ye scoundrels, to spill a poor fellow's drop of comfort in this way." by and bye, half-a-dozen of balls or so went through the blanket i carried on my shoulders. "by my faith," said i, "it's time now that i should return you my compliments for all your civilities, you vagabonds." i stooped to take a musket from a dead russian for my own defence. the piece was a rifle, and it was yet warm in his hand from the last discharge. "by your leave, my poor fellow," said i, "i'll borrow your firelock for a shot or two, seeing that you have no farther use for it at this present time." but dead as he was, the last gripe of departing life had made him hold it so fast, that i was obliged to twist it round ere i could make him part with it. i took off his cartridge-box by pulling the belt over his head. he had fired but two cartridges, and eighteen still remained. i loaded and fired twice; and i was just in the act of biting off the end of my third cartridge to fire again, when a musket ball took me in the left cheek, and knocked me over as flat as a sixpence on the ground. the captain of the company looked behind him, and seeing that i was still able to move my hands, he very humanely ordered a file of men to carry me to the rear. they lifted me up from the ground, and the whole world seemed to be going round with me. they supported me under the arms, and i staggered along like a drunk man. they took me to a barn, where i lay insensible for some time, until coming to myself somewhat, as i lay there, i saw two surgeons employed with the wounded. "you will have little trouble with me, gentlemen," thought i within myself; "i shall be dead before you can get at me." just at this moment i heard one of the surgeons say to the other,-- "i believe i shall die of hunger." "i am like to faint from absolute want," said the other. i could not speak, but i beckoned. "by and bye," said one of the surgeons, shaking his head. "your turn is not come yet," said the other. i beckoned again, and pointed to the wallet at my side. "oh ho!" said the first surgeon crossing the place, and rapidly followed by the other,--"oh ho! i comprehend you now. let's see what you have got in your larder." he put his hand into the wallet, and found some balls of oatmeal, which my wife, honest woman, had made by rolling them up with water, and then giving them a roast among the ashes. the two gentlemen devoured them with great glee. they then looked at my chafts, put some lint into the wound, and bound it up. "well," thought i to myself, "a leaden ball made the wound, and a ball of oatmeal has doctored it. many thanks to my worthy wife, god bless her!" after the doctors left us, the place, which was pitch dark, became hot and pestiferous, and the groans that came from some of the poor wretches put me in mind of pandemonium. i was for some time feverish and restless. i tried to stretch myself out at length, but i felt some one at my feet who would not stir all i could do. though i could not speak, i was not sparing of my kicks, but still the person regarded me not. next to me was serjeant wilson with a broken leg, and he was pressed upon by some one at his side. but the serjeant had the full use of his tongue. "sir," said he to his neighbour, for he was noted for being a very polite man, "will you do me the favour to lie a little farther over, and take your elbow out of my stomach." his civil request was disregarded, and there was no reply. "oh!" said the serjeant, "perhaps the gentleman is a furreiner; but all them furreiners understands french, so i'll try my hand at that with him:--moushee wooly wous have the goodness to takee your elbow out of my guts. confound the fellow, what an edification he has had that he does not understand french. i've heard ensign flitterkin say that it is the language of europe. pray, sir, may i ax if you be a european? no answer,--by my soul then i may make bold to say that you are any thing but a civilian. sir," continued the serjeant, beginning now to lose patience altogether, and to wax very wroth, "i insist on your removing your elbow. i say, rascal! take your elbow out of my stomach this moment!" and so the serjeant went on from bad to worse, till he swore, and went on to swear, at the poor man more and more bloodily the whole night. but neither his swearing, nor my kicking, could rid either of us of our troublesome companions. and it was no great wonder indeed--for when the day-light came, we discovered that they were two dead russians! "this is a horrible place!" exclaimed the principal surgeon when he came back in the morning. "as near as i can guess, one hundred and fifty-two men have died in this wretched barn since last night!--we must have the wounded out of this." thanks to my wife's oatmeal balls, which the grateful surgeons had not forgotten, my wounds were dressed the very first man. we were soon afterwards carried on hand-barrows by a russian party down to the flat-bottomed boats, and so we were conveyed to the texel. i bore the bullet home in my chafts, and it was cut out by an english doctor in deal hospital. i was discharged on the d of june . but my pension was granted before pensions were so big as they are now-a-days, so that i am but ill off compared to some who have come home from the late wars. but, thank god, i am contented, since i cannot make a better of it. gallantry of the seventy-first highland light infantry. clifford.--how little known are the miseries to which the brave defenders of britain's glory are subjected!--and how meagre is their reward, and how poor is their harvest of individual fame!--our nelsons and our wellingtons, to be sure, are as certainly, as they are deservedly, destined to immortality of name. but is it not most painful to think that so many of our bravest hearts have gallantly fallen, to sleep in undistinguished oblivion? your scene in the old barn, serjeant, reminds me of an anecdote which i had from an officer of the ninety-first regiment.--it has never yet appeared in print, though it well deserves to be so recorded, as being worthy of that distinguished corps, the seventy-first highland light infantry, to which it belongs. the circumstances took place in , during the peninsular war. the seventy-first were at that time stationed with the fiftieth and the ninety-second, at st. pierre, on the main road between bayonne and st. jean-pied-de-port.--this was the key of lord hill's position on the river adour, and the fire of musquetry brought against its defenders on the th december, was such as the oldest veterans had never before witnessed. the corps under lord hill, indeed, were on that day attacked by soult's whole force. but so nobly did those fine regiments perform their duty, that the late lieutenant-general the honourable william stewart, next day gave out an order, which i remember treasuring up in my memory as a masterpiece of soldier-like diction. i think the very words were these:--"the second division has greatly distinguished itself, and its gallantry in yesterday's action is fully felt by the commander of the forces, and the allied army." and well indeed had they merited this highly creditable testimonial of their good behaviour. but the carnage was great, and there were many who, alas! did not survive to participate in the honour conferred by it. several of the wounded, belonging to the respective corps, were huddled together in the lower storey of an old house, that stood upon the very ground on which the thickest part of the contest had taken place. now it happened, that certain officers from different regiments had taken shelter in a room in the floor above, where they were refreshing themselves, after their fatigue, with such food and other restoratives as they could command, and among them was that officer of the ninety-first who told me the facts to which he was an ear-witness. the conversation of these gentlemen, though mingled now and then with many regrets for lost companions, had a certain temperate joy in it--a joy arising from a conviction that they had behaved like men--and which was tempered by strong feelings of gratitude to a kind providence, who had preserved them amidst all the perils of the fight. suddenly their talk was put an end to by the most heart-rending groans and shrieks of agony, that came up from the room below, through the old decayed floor. what mirth or joy there was among them, was altogether banished by the frequency and intensity of the screams, that betokened the mortal sufferings of a dying man. they sat for a time mutely, though deeply sympathizing, with the poor unfortunate from whom they came. at length they distinctly heard another faint, and apparently expiring voice, say, in a tone of rebuke,--"haud your tongue, james, and bear your fate like a man. we'll soon be baith at ease.--but, in the mean time, haud your tongue, for there are folk aboon us that may be hearin' you; and if you have no respect for yoursell, recollect what you owe to the gallant seventy-first hillant light infantry, to which we baith belong." this appeal had the desired effect. all that could now be heard, in the stillness of the night, was a low murmur. a surgeon, who was of the party, immediately went to administer what relief he might to the wretched sufferers. but in one short hour these heroic men had ceased to exist, and no one can now tell even the name of either of them. author.--a most touching anecdote!--what magnanimous fellows! grant.--their names should have been written by the hand of fame herself, in letters of the purest and most imperishable gold!--yet they have been allowed to sink into the sea of forgetfulness, and, "like the snow-falls in the river, a moment white, then gone for ever." they have melted into oblivion--so far, at least, as this world is concerned. clifford.--yes; they sleep unremembered, whilst every lily-livered cobler, or tailor, who has handled his awl, or his bodkin, with no more peril to his person than may have lain on the point of one or other of these formidable weapons, has his tombstone--his death's head and cross-bones--and his attendant cherubims--as well as his text and his epitaph. serjeant.--very true, sir--very true. what have such chields as these to do with fame? but for all that, we see fame arise to the silliest men, and from the most trifling causes. grant.--right, archy. for instance, i remember a certain highlander, who gained his fame in a way that may perhaps make you envious--for it is the tale of your unwhisperables that has brought him to my mind. serjeant.--aye, sir!--what was his story? grant.--why, the hero was a certain rory maccraw, who, despising the kilt which he had worn all his life, resolved, at all risks, to figure in a pair of those elegant emblems of civilization called breeches. at the present day, one may travel from the tweed to the pentland firth without seeing such a thing as a kilt; but at the time of which i am now speaking, anything in the shape of breeches was just as rarely to be seen as the kilt is now. rory had a pair made for him in some distant town, where, as they would say in ireland, he had not been by when his measure was taken, and having put them on, he left his glen to go to a market. it was observed by his neighbours, that he never before took so long a time to walk the same distance, and, from his strange and stately manner of strutting, they attributed this circumstance to the pride he felt in his new garments. arrived at the market, the expectation he had indulged in, that he was to excite the wonder and envy of all the people there, did not deceive him. he was followed, and stared at, and admired, and questioned wherever he went. if a dancing bear had waddled through the fair, he could not have had half the number of people after him. but like most of those who envy the lot of their neighbours, these good folks only saw the outside of things, and knew not the misery which was covered by this fair external show. in the midst of their admiration, poor rory was in torture. he would have given all he was worth, unmentionables and all, to have got rid of the admiring crowds that followed him; and at last, long before he had done half his business in the market--for as to pleasure, he could taste none of it--he, the envied, the observed of all observers, watched his opportunity to steal hobbling away down a back lane, whence he went limping in agony into the country. there, seating himself by the public way-side, regardless of what eyes might behold him, he pulled off the instruments of his suffering, and hanging them on the end of his staff, he placed it over his shoulder, and so trudged his way homeward, in defiance of the taunts, gibes, and laughter of the crowds which he fell in with by the way. but his fame was established; and ever afterwards he went by the name of peter breeks. clifford.--capital! author.--well, archy, to return to your own story, and the disappointment you have met with in the arrestment of your career of glory, i would fain comfort you with the old proverb, that a contented mind is better than riches. serjeant.--that is very true, sir; and i am very thankful that i am blessed with that same. and although i got but little in the army but hard knocks, yet i would take them all over again, rather than that i should not have seen the many things i did see, as well as the heaps of queer human beings i met with during the few years i served. what is man, gentlemen, unless he gets the rust of home, and the reek of his own fire-side rubbed off him by travel? he can never be expected to speculate on any thing but the ducks in the dubbs, or the hens on the midden-head. though i had a tolerable education for the like of me, what would i have been had i never been out of this valley? not much better, i trow, than one of the stirks that are bred in it. bless you, sirs, i saw a vast of human nature in my travels. grant.--and thought much and well on it too, archy, if i mistake not. serjeant.--may be i did, sir,--and a very curious nature it is, i'll assure you. but, gentlemen, we must cross the water at this wooden bridge here. author.--if you had not seen so much by going into the world as you have done, archy, i have great doubts whether that curiosity, which has since made you pick up that great store of your native legends which you are said to possess, might not have lain entirely dormant. serjeant.--oh, bless your honour, i should never have thought of such things. it was the seeing so much that roused up the spirit of enquiry within me. and so it happened, that after i came back from the sodgering trade, this spirit could not rest till i had gathered up all the curious stories i could get. and then i fell tooth and nail upon books, so that, when i was not working, i was always reading histories, novelles, magazines, newspapers, and such like, so that i am not just altogether that ill informed. but stop a moment, gentlemen; do you see yon bright green spot in the hollow of the hill-side yonder above us? grant.--yes; but what is there wonderful about that, archy? serjeant.--there is nothing very wonderful about itself, indeed, but it is worth your remarking for all that. it is what we call in this country a wallee, that is, the quaking bog out of which a spring wells forth. clifford.--tut, archy! there are few grouse shooters who have not experienced the treachery of these smooth-faced, flattering, but most deceitful water-traps. serjeant.--smooth-faced, flattering, and deceitful, indeed, sir. i've heard them compared by some to the fair sex, beauteous and smiling outside, and cruelly cold-hearted within. but i think any such comparison is most unjust, for my old woman never deceived me; and, as i have told you, if it had not been for her oatmeal balls i verily believe i should not have been here at this moment. clifford.--it would ill become you, indeed, to slander the fair sex, mister serjeant, and depend upon it, you will not catch me doing so. serjeant.--but about the wallee yonder; i was saying---- clifford.--aye, the wallee; i shall never forget the first cold-bath i had up to the neck in one of them. it was all owing to the spite of a cunning old moorcock, which i had severely wounded. out of revenge, i suppose, for the mortal injury i had done him, he chose to come fluttering down into the very middle of what i conceived to be a beautiful surface of hard green-sward. being but a young sportsman at the time, and very eager to secure my bird, who sat most provokingly tock-tock-tocking at me, as if he had bid me defiance, i ran down the bank, and made a bound towards him. in i went souse. i shiver yet to think of it--my very senses were congealed--and for a moment i verily believed that i had been suddenly transformed into the north pole, and that the cock-grouse that fluttered around me was captain parry come to explore me. and, i' faith, if it had not been for the light foot and strong arm of the gilly who was with me, i believe i might have been sticking upright there, preserved in ice till this moment. there was a moorish bath for you! serjeant.--they are most unchancy bits for strangers; that is certain, sir. clifford.--unchancy indeed! but if that is all you have to tell us about yonder place in the hill-side, mr. archy, you may save yourself the trouble of attempting to astonish me with your information; for, sassenach though i be, i promise you that i have been long ago initiated into the full depth of the mystery.--nymphs and naiads of the crystal aven, what a beautiful stream there is for fishing! serjeant.--'tis very good, indeed, sir. but yon wallee that i was speaking about would swallow a horse, with you on the top of it. many a time have i thrust a long pole down into it without reaching any thing the least like firm ground. it would swallow that fishing-wand of yours, sir. clifford.--(already employed in putting his rod together.)--plague choke it, i should be sorry indeed to see my rod go in any such way. it is one of the best bond ever made; and though adapted, by means of these different pieces, to any size of stream, it was never intended for such deep sea fishing as you would put it to. i shall apply it to another purpose, my good serjeant. with this sky, the trouts there will take a grey mallard's wing with a yellow silk body, in great style. serjeant.--but the wallee up yonder is worth your notice, because of an ould auncient monumental stone, that once stood on the dry bank beside it. grant.--ha! a monumental stone!--let us hear about that. serjeant.--it was about seven feet high, sir, and the tradition regarding it is, that it was set up there in memory of a sad story that is connected with it. author.--a story, said you? clifford.--then, my good fellow, serjeant stewart, just have the kindness to sit down there, and tell us the particulars of your sad story, while i give a few casts here over this most tempting stream. serjeant.--with all manner of pleasure, sir; i shall be happy to tell your honours all i have gathered about it. it is the very legend for which mr. clifford marked me down in his book. clifford immediately began to fish. grant and i seated ourselves on the daisied bank of the river, one on each side of the serjeant. the gilly stretched himself at length on the grass, and was soon asleep--the pony with the panniers grazed as far around him as the length of his halter would let him, and my newfoundland dog bronte sat watching the trouts leaping, whilst archy proceeded with his narrative, as nearly as i can recollect, in the following words; but if not always precisely in the serjeant's own language, at least i shall give it with a strict adherence to his facts. legend of the clan-allan stewarts. from the important correction which your honour has made upon my genealogy, i think i may now venture to say, with some confidence, that the time of my legend must be somewhere about the fifteenth century--how early in it i cannot say; but it is pretty clear that my ancestor, sir allan stewart, must have lived about that period. as i have already told you, the whole of this country, hill and glen, was then covered with forests, except in such spots as were kept open by the art of man for pasture or for tillage, but of the latter, even of the rudest kind, i suspect there was but little hereaway in those days. i take it for granted that the chief of the clan-allan must have had his stronghold at the old tower of drummin, though i do not mean to say that it was identically the same building that now exists there. it stands, as some of you perhaps know, gentlemen, a good way down the country from where we now are, on a point of table land considerably elevated above the valley, which is there rendered wider by the junction of the river livat with the river aven, and just in the angle between these two streams. when the noble old forests waved over the surrounding hills, leaving the quiet meadows below open in rich pasture, it must have been even yet a more beautiful place for man to dwell in than it is now,--and, let me tell you, that is saying a great deal. my history begins towards the end of the life of sir allan stewart, whose term of existence had been long, and no doubt boisterous enough, as you may very well guess. he was by this time so old as to be confined to his big oak chair, which was generally placed for him under the projection of the huge chimney of the ancient fire-place, or lumm, as we call it in scotland; and there he sat, propped up with pillows, crooning over old ballads, and muttering old saws from morn till night, as if he now cared for nothing in this life, but to drone away the last dull measure of his time, like the end of some drowsy ill-composed pibroch, if such a thing there can be. but the lively interest which he took when any stirring event occurred, which in any degree affected the honour or welfare of himself, his family or clan, sufficiently showed that all his martial fire was not extinguished; for then would it flash out from beneath his heavy eyelids--his bulky form would move impatiently on his seat, and he would turn his eyes restlessly towards his broadsword and targe, that hung conspicuously among the deers' heads, wolfs' skins, and the numerous warlike weapons that covered the walls, with an expression so animated, as very plainly to speak the ardour of his decaying spirit, which still, like that of the old war-horse, seemed thus to snuff up the battle from afar. sir allan had two tall strapping sons by his first marriage--walter and patrick, both of them pretty men. to walter, as the elder of the two, he looked as his successor, and, accordingly, he already acted in all things, and on all occasions, as his father's representative. after the death of their mother, sir allan had married a woman of lower degree, by whom he had a third son, called murdoch, whose naturally bad dispositions had been fostered by the doting fondness of his old father. murdoch's mother, at the time we are speaking of, was what we would call in our country phrase a handsome boardly-looking dame, of some forty years of age or so, whose smooth tongue and deceitful smile covered the blackest and most depraved heart. "see, father!" said walter stewart to old sir allan, as he and his brother patrick entered the hall one evening, followed by some of their people, with whom they had been all day engaged in the pursuit of a wolf, whose grinning countenance, attached to his shaggy skin, was borne triumphantly on the point of a hunting spear. "see here, father! we have got him at last. we have at last taken vengeance on the villain for his cruel slaughter of poor isabel's child. look at the spoils of the murdering caitiff who devoured the little innocent." "hath he not been a fell beast, father?" said patrick, holding up the hunting spear before sir allan, and shaking the trophy. "ah!" said sir allan, rousing himself up, "a fell beast indeed!--aye, aye--poor child, poor child!--bring his head nearer to me, boy! would i could have been with you! aye, aye--dear me--age will come upon us. but i have seen the day, boys--aye, aye--och, hey!" "ho, there!" cried walter stewart, "what means it that there are no signs of supper? by st. hubert, but we have toiled long enough and hard enough to-day with legs, arms, spears, spades, and mattocks, to have well earned our meal! where is brother murdoch?--where is the lady stradawn?" "aye, aye," said the querulous old sir allan, "it is ever thus now-a-days. i am always left to myself--weary, weary is my life i am sure--and i am hungry--very hungry. aye, aye." "thou shalt have thy supper very soon, father," said patrick, kindly taking his hand; "and walter and i will leave you but for a brief space, to rid us of these wet and soiled garments." the two brothers then hastened from the hall to go to their respective chambers. "whose draggle-tailed beast was that i saw tied up under the tree beyond the outer gateway as we came in?" demanded walter of his attendant, dugald roy. "i have seen the beast before," replied dugald. "if i am not far mista'en, it is the garron the proud priest of dalestie rides,--and a clever beast it would need to be, i am sure, for many a long, and late, and queer gate does it carry him, i trow." "how came the animal there, dugald?" demanded walter quickly. "if by your question, how the animal came there, you would ask what road he took, sir knight," replied dugald, "i must tell you that the man that could answer you would need to deal with the devil, for no one but the foul fiend himself could follow the priest of dalestie; for, unless he be most wickedly belied, his ways follow those of the evil one, as much as our good father, peter of dounan, is known to travel in the path of his blessed master." "nay, but i would know from thee, in plain terms, where thou judgest that the rider of the horse may be?" said sir walter, impatiently. "with your lady mother, the lady stradawn, i reckon," said dugald, sinking his voice to a half whisper. "call her not my lady mother!" said sir walter, angrily, "my lady step-mother, if thou wilt, or my step-mother without the lady, for that, in truth, would better befit her, disgrace as she hath been and still is to us all.--here, undo this buckle!--but what, i pr'ythee, hath she to do with the proud priest of dalestie, as thou hast so well named him?" "nay, nothing that i know of, sir walter, unless it be to confess her," replied dugald. "why, the good old father, peter of dounan, was here but yesterday, was he not?" exclaimed sir walter, "might he not have shriven her?" "father peter was here sure enough," replied dugald, "but it would seem that he is not to the lady's fancy." "beshrew her fancy!" cried sir walter, bitterly,--"where could she, or any one, find a worthier confessor than father peter of dounan? he is, indeed, a good and godly man, and, frail as he is in body, we know that he is always ready to run, as fast as his feeble limbs can carry him, wherever his pious duties or his charities may call him.--moreover, he is at all times within reach, what need, then, hath she to send so far a-field for one whose character is, by every one's report, so very questionable--give me my hose and sandals, donald.--now thou may'st go.--by the rood, i like not that pestilent and ill-famed fellow coming about our house! he hath more character for arrogance, and self-indulgence as a glutton and a toss-pot, than for sanctity.--it was an ill day for this country side when it was disgraced by his coming into it." after muttering this last sentence to himself, walter quickly descended the narrow stair, and approached the door of the lady's bower in another part of the building.--it was partially open.--he tapped gently, and, no answer being returned, he pushed it up, and great were his surprise and disgust at the scene which he beheld. the lady stradawn was sitting, or rather reclining in her arm-chair, with a pretty large round table before her, covered with good things.--a huge venison pasty occupied the centre of it, and around it stood several dishes, in no very regular order, containing different dainties. two well-used trenchers, showed that some one else had assisted her, in producing the havoc that appeared to have been wrought in the pie, and among the other viands--and a black-jack half full of ale--and a tall silver stoup, which, though now empty, still gave forth a potent odour of the spiced wine which it had contained--together with two mazers of the same metal, which bore the marks of having been used in the drinking of it, proved that the guest, who had just left the lady, must have been a noble auxiliary in this revel, which, judging from the fact of an over-turned drinking horn that lay on the floor, and one or two other circumstances that appeared, must have been a merry one. the deep sleep in which the lady lay, and her flushed countenance, left no doubt in sir walter's mind that she had enjoyed a full share of this private banquet. by the time he had leisure to make himself fully aware of all these particulars, the lady's bower-woman appeared at the chamber door. she started, and would have retreated--but sir walter seized her by the wrist, and adroitly put a question to her before she had time to recover from her confusion. "when did the priest of dalestie go forth from hence, jessy?" demanded he. "i have just come from seeing him to horse, sir knight," said the woman, trembling. "well, jessy, thou mayest go; i would speak with thy mistress in private," said sir walter, seeing her out, and shutting the chamber door; and then, turning to the lady stradawn, and shaking her arm till he had awakened her. "madam," said he, "what unseemly sight is this?" "sis--sis--sis--sight, sir priest?" replied the lady, with her eyes goggling; "sis--sight! what mean ye, sir priest? he! he! he!" "holy saint andrew grant me temper!" said sir walter. "madam, sir allan waits for thee to give him his evening meal: he is impatient. sir allan, i say!" "tut! hang sir allan," cried the lady, still unconscious as to whom she was addressing, and taking him by the arm; "hang sir allan, as thou thyself saidst but now, thou most merry conditioned mettlesome, sir priest. he! he! he! hang the old stobber-chops, and let's be jolly while we can. come; sit down--sit down, i say. you need not go yet. did i not tell thee that jessy keeps the door?" "i am not the priest, vile woman!" cried sir walter, with indignation, whilst, at the same time, he shook her off with a force and rudeness that seemed almost to bring her back to her senses. "did'st thou not now, alas! alas! to our shame, most unworthily fill that place once occupied by my sainted mother, and that thine exposure would prove but the greater dishonour to our house, by the holy rood, i would call up every thing that hath life within these walls, down to the very cat, that all eyes might behold thy disgrace, and then should'st thou be trundled forth, and rolled into the river, that the fishes might gorge themselves on thine obscene carcase!" bursting from the apartment, walter hastily sought the hall; and the evening meal having been by this time spread, he called to the retainers to be seated, and hastened to busy himself in attending to his father, in supplying him with the food prepared for him, and with such little matters as he knew the old man most liked--feeding him from time to time like a child. "aye, aye, that's good," said old sir walter. "thanks, thanks, my boy; you are a good boy. but where is bella? where is the lady stradawn? och hey, that's good,--but she is often away now; seldom it is, i am sure, that i see her. aye, aye, walter, boy, that is good--that is very good." when his father was satisfied, walter seated himself at the board, and ate and drank largely, from very vexation and ire, and in order to keep down the storm of rage which was secretly working within him. this, as well as the cause of it, he privately determined to conceal, even from his brother patrick, with whom he had been, upon all other occasions, accustomed to share his inmost thoughts. for the rest of the night he sat gloomy and abstracted, and at an earlier hour than usual he hurried off to his chamber. there, having summoned his attendant, dugald roy, he questioned him more particularly as to all he knew regarding the visits of the priest of dalestie to drummin, and having then dismissed him, with strict injunctions to maintain a prudent silence, he threw himself into bed, to pass a restless and perturbed night. the next morning saw the lady stradawn glide into the hall, to preside over the morning meal, gaily dressed, and covered as usual with chains, brooches, and rings of massive worth, which she procured no one knew how. her countenance beamed with her wonted smiles, as if nothing wrong had happened, or could have happened on her part. walter and patrick saluted her with that cold yet civil deference, which they had always been in the habit of using towards her, as the wife of their father, and in which walter took care that neither his brother, nor any one else, should perceive any shadow of change upon the present occasion. the manner of her salutation was as blythe, kind, free, and unconcerned as it ever was before. "wicked rogue, walter, that thou art!" said she in a tone of merry railery, "fie for shame on thee! to steal into thy lady mother's bower to catch her asleep in her arm-chair! in sooth i was not altogether well last night, else had i joined thee at the festive board, to rejoice with thee over the spoils of that grim gaffer wolf, whom they tell me thou hast so nobly slain." "thou did'st indeed seem somewhat indisposed, madam," said sir walter with a peculiarly significant emphasis, and with a penetrating look which she alone could understand. "i was very much indisposed as you say, walter," replied she, as if quite unconscious that he had intended to convey to her any covered meaning; "that foolish old woman, nancy, the miller's wife, took it into her wise head to come a plaguing me, to reckon with her about the kain fowls she had paid into the castle since last quarter-day; and she talks--holy virgin, how the woman does talk!" "truly the woman does talk marvellously," replied walter, biting his nether lip to keep down his vexation. "as thou say'st, son walter, she does e'en talk most marvellously. her tongue seems to have learned the art of wagging from the clapper of old john's mill. i protest i would as lieve sit listening to the one as to the other. my head aches still with the noise of her clatter." "i wonder not indeed that thy head should ache," replied sir walter. "and then, forsooth, i behoved to call up meat for the greedy cummer," continued the lady,--"holy mother, how the woman did swallow the eatables and drinkables!" "she must have swallowed enough of both sorts," said sir walter, with a meaning in his mode of speaking, that he began to suspect he might have made almost too plainly marked; and, hastening to change the subject, "madam," continued he, "i fear you have forgotten sir allan this morning." "holy saints, but so i have!" cried she, starting up from her seat,--"what have i been thinking of? my poor sir allan!" continued she, as she hastened to him with a covered silver dish, that contained the minced food the old man was wont to take; and, after making of him, with all the fuss and phrase she would have used to an infant, she put a napkin around his neck, and proceeded to feed him. "where is murdoch this morning?" demanded patrick of his brother. "i know not," replied walter, as he sat musing with a clouded brow. "he was not at supper last night," observed patrick again; "nay, i know not that i have seen him for these three days bypast." "he was not at supper," said sir walter, still absorbed by his own thoughts. "murdoch is an idle good-for-nothing," said the lady stradawn, joining in the conversation, from the place where she stood by the side of sir allan's chair. "though he be mine own son, i will say that for him, that it would be well for him to take a pattern by his elder brothers, and be killing wolves, or doing some such useful work, and not be staying out whole days and nights this way, at weddings and merry-makings, without ever showing us his face. i wish you would give him a good word of your brotherly advice, my dear son walter." "chut!--tut!" cried old sir allan,--"let the boy alone!--aye, aye--let the boy alone. the lad is young.--i was a wild slip myself once in a day--that i was. but old age will creep on--hech sirs!--aye, aye--what days i have seen!--och, hey!" "here, take this, my dear sir allan," said the lady,--"take this, dearest--'tis the last spoonful." "where art thou going, brother?" said patrick, rising to follow his brother sir walter, who had left the table, and was moving towards the door. "up the glen to look for a deer," replied walter. "then have with thee brother," said patrick. sir walter would have fain shaken himself free from his brother, for that morning at least; but he felt that he could not do so without a certain appearance of unkindness, which the warm affection that subsisted between them could not allow him to use, or that otherwise, he must have given him an explanation, which he was conscious that he could not have given him, consistently with those designs which he then privately cherished in his bosom. he was therefore compelled silently to assent to his accompanying him. they both accordingly assumed that humble garb, which they usually wore when bent upon the pursuit of the deer,--in which, but for their carriage and bearing, they might easily have been mistaken for the humblest of their party, and, after such preparation, they sallied forth. they were hardly gone, when the lady stradawn, leaving the old sir allan to entertain himself with his own dreamy musings and vacant thoughts, climbed to the bartizan of the tower to look out for her son, murdoch. it was yet early in the morning--but as her two step-sons had a walk of a good many miles before them, ere they could reach the place where they proposed hunting, they and their people were seen toiling up the valley, at a pace which corresponded with the violence of those feelings which then possessed sir walter, who was stretching away at the head of the party. "curses on ye both!" cried the lady, with intense bitterness, after having followed them with her malignant eyes, till they had wound out of sight behind a projecting spur of a wooded mountain that flanked the valley.--"curses!--black and withering curses on ye both, vile spawn that ye are, that stand between my boy and his prospects!--i fear that walter--my especial curse upon him!--for, with all his fair words, he is stern and ferocious as a wild cat when he is roused.--but, wild cat though he be, the wily viper may yet wind its folds silently around him, and sting him to the death ere he may have time to unglove his claws.--what can make my darling boy tarry so long.--he has now been absent for more than three days.--much as he hath enriched me with money and jewels, i like not the risk he runs.--but he will not be forbidden.--nature works in him, and perhaps it is as well that he should thus render himself hardy, seeing that he must one day--aye, and that soon too, if i have any cunning left in me--command the proud clan-allan. stay, did i not see tartans yonder, and arms glittering in yon farther lawnde, in the vale below, beyond those nearer woods? that must surely be murdoch and his men. the foolish boy will not surely bring them within nearer ken of the castle? ha!--i see one figure separate from the rest, whilst the main body seems to take to the woods on the hill-side. in sooth, there is no prudence lacking in the youth, nay, nor any cunning neither, as i well know, from the trouble it hath cost me to lull his suspicions regarding the priest of dalestie. but if murdoch hath cunning, he hath it from me, his mother; and it will be hard indeed if mine cannot match it. ah!--there he already bursts from the wood--i must hasten to meet him in my bower, that i may learn what luck he hath had." the lady hurried down to her bower--quickly found some errand on which to despatch her woman--and then she sat waiting impatiently, turning over the bunch of antique keys which hung at her girdle, until she heard her son's step in the passage, and his gentle tap at her door. "come in!" said the lady stradawn in a subdued voice--"come in, my son!" "ha!--i am glad that thou art here and alone, mother," said murdoch, a slim, handsome, dark-eyed youth, who, after cautiously entering, shut the door behind him, and carefully turned the huge key that locked it. "i am glad that you are here alone, for i have such treasure for you." "hush, hush, my darling," said the lady, almost in a whisper--"speak lower, i entreat you, lest any eaves-dropper should hear you.--quick!--how sped ye?--and what have you got?" "we have been all the way to banff again this time," replied murdoch. "seeing that we sped so well the last time we made thither, as thou well knowest we did, we thought we should try our luck there once more. we heard that there was a market in the brugh, and we sent a clever-witted spy among the packmen, to gather who among them might be best worth holding talk with. two of them we learned were to travel together for company's sake,--fellows who dealt in goldsmiths' work. but, marry! they travelled not far from the town-end till we met them, when, like good-natured civil fellows, we eased them of their heavy loads, under which they seemed to sweat so grievously; and that they might not trouble us here, and at the same time being loth to part two such friends, we set them both a travelling together on a journey to the next world." "speak not of the next world, murdoch!" said the lady, shuddering. "but they were sickerly sent thither, said'st thou?" "as surely as we shall one day go there ourselves, good mother," replied murdoch. "speak not of our going there, boy," said the lady. "'tis time enough yet. but there is little crime i wot, after all, in ridding this world of such cheating gangerels as those you tell me of." "crime!" replied murdoch, "why, mother, there is an absolute virtue in such a deed. have we not put an end to their rapacity and knavery? and have we not thereby saved many a foolish maiden from being cheated by them? by saint nicholas, but the doer of so good a deed deserves to be canonized!" "but come, boy, thy treasure," said the greedy and impatient dame. "quick,--what hast thou got to show me? haste thee to feast mine eyes with the spoil of these miscreants." "in the first place, then," said murdoch, "as at a feast we should always begin with the solids,--here is a small bag of broad pieces, which might well satisfy many a hungry man. secondly, here are your curious cates and delicacies, enow to bedizen out a dozen of lordlings' daughters!--see what a chain!--how exquisite the workmanship!--behold these rings,--see what sparkling gems! every one of them set, too, most rarely in a different fashion! here is one, for example, which would seem to have a curious posey in it; some ready-made love verse, i suppose. let me see,--'feare god and doe no evyle,'--eh! ha!--that--that is a good advice, which the last owner, as i take it, was too great a knave to profit by; but you and i, mother dear----" "have done with thy foolery, murdoch," said the lady, impatiently; "have done with thy foolery, and give me thy booty, without farther nonsense. now, leave me for a while, and go talk with the old man, whilst i bestow the treasure in a place of safety. thou knowest it will all go to deck thy bride, when thou canst find one." "leave me alone for that, mother," said murdoch, significantly. "i promise thee, i have mine eye on a good man's daughter, whom i shall have by foul or by fair means ere i die. but that is a secret i shall keep to myself till the time comes; so good day, good mother." "what can he mean?" said the lady stradawn, after he was gone. "but 'tis nothing, after all, but his wild talk. no, no; i must have my say with him when it comes to that!" now that the lady found herself alone, she doubly locked and bolted the door. she then spread the gold and the jewels on the table before her, and glutted her eyes for a time with the glittering sight. applying her keys to a cabinet which stood against the wall, she opened the leaves of it, and so exposed the front of a set of secret drawers, shallower above and deeper below. selecting other keys from the bunch, she began to open and to examine the drawers, one by one, from above downwards--her eyes successively surveying the riches they contained, whilst, with scrupulous attention, she from time to time selected articles from among the spoils on the table, and deposited them among the rest, as fancy led her to sort and arrange them, carefully locking each drawer ere she proceeded to open the next; and thus she went on until she found that she had disposed of the whole of the trinkets. "'twas no great things, after all," said she, musing; "i wonder when they will go forth again? but let me count the money.--aye, that is pretty well; and yet it might have been more for the death of two men. but there are other two men i know of, whose lives would be worth more!--hush!--did i not hear a noise?--quick--let me huddle the gold into this drawer in the cabinet, where i bestowed the broad pieces in the hurry i was taken with when the priest came in last night.--what!--nothing there!--ha!--can the man who--can the villain have robbed me?--yes; it could have been no one else.--i see clearly how it was. he asked me for money--i gave him two pieces from that very drawer. his greedy eyes saw what it contained, and, whilst my back was turned, he must have cleverly helped himself to the whole. it could have been nobody else, because i well remember that i carefully closed the leaves of the cabinet, locked them, and put the keys into my iron strong-box, before i called jessy to bring the refreshments.--what a consummate knave!--but what could i expect better of such a reprobate--a priest who glories as he does in his wickedness? it would have been well perhaps for me that i had never seen him.--and yet--but his share of his crime is his own.--wretch that he is, he might have had it all for the asking.--weak woman that i am, i could have refused him nothing.--well, i must e'en let it pass, and be more careful again.--but i shall look better after this bag of broad pieces. it shall be added to the heap i have here," continued she, unlocking a drawer of deeper and larger dimensions. "aye!" said she, eyeing the treasure it contained with avaricious delight,--"that is all safe; go thou, then, to increase the store, and may my darling boy soon fetch me other bags to bear these company in this their prison-house!" i must now return to the two brothers. walter, who usually directed every thing in all their expeditions, never halted until he found himself far up on these very mountains now before us. he sought for deer, it is true; but, whilst he did so, or rather, whilst he allowed his brother and his people to do so, his mind seemed to be occupied with something else than hunting. it was towards evening, when he and the rest of the party were still tracking their way through the forest without success, when, they at last found themselves in that part of it, which then covered the hill that hangs over the haugh of dalestie, some miles above this. partial breaks among the trees there gave sir walter, now and then, a view downwards into the valley below; and, as he walked and ruminated within himself, as if oppressed with some weighty matter, his secret musings were suddenly broken by the distant toll of the bell of a small chapel, which, if i am rightly informed, then stood near the bottom of the hill. the sound came mellowed over the intervening woods, and sir walter started as it reached his ear. he became deeply moved; but his emotion was not like that movement of piety which the note of the church-going bell should awaken. it more resembled that, which, when the hoarse trumpet has sounded, or the shrill pipes have struck up, i have myself seen convert the godlike countenance of man into that of a demon. sir walter stewart stamped upon the ground. "dugald!" cried he aloud; "what ho, dugald roy, i say. does that bell call to evening mass?" "it does, sir knight," replied dugald. "then get thee down through the wood," said sir walter; "get thee down through the wood ere it hath ceased to sound, and tell the proud priest of dalestie that i, walter stewart of clan-allan, am upon the hill, and that, if he dares to mumble a word, yea, or a syllable, before i come, his life shall pay for it." "stay, stay," cried patrick stewart, eagerly; "stay him, dear brother! what sudden fit is this that hath seized thee? a priest!--how canst thou think of sending such a message as this to a priest?" "dugald roy, begone, and obey thy master's bidding!" cried sir walter, sternly. "brother, i forgive thee this thine interference, though i cannot allow myself to be swayed by it. trust me, i have mine own good reasons for so acting, though this be no fitting time for making thee aware of them." patrick, whom affection, as well as habit had long disposed to show implicit deference and obedience to his brother walter's will, said no more, but followed his solemn footsteps down the mountain path that led to the chapel. they had not gone half the way till the bell had ceased to toll. and they had not gone two-thirds of the way till dugald roy met them. "thou hast not sped on thine errand, then?" said sir walter, with an expression in which more of satisfaction than of disappointment might have been read. "speak, dugald; how did the arrogant caitiff receive my message?" "since i must say it, sir knight," replied dugald, with some hesitation,--"he received it very scurvily.--'tell the proud stewart,' said he, 'that though he may be lord of the land, i am the king as well as the priest in mine own chapel.'--and so he straightway began the holy service, but rather, methought, as if he had been dighting himself for single combat, than for prayer, and in a manner altogether so irreverent, that the few people who were there, with faces full of dismay, quietly arose and left the chapel, as if some wicked thing had ta'en up the priest's surplice in mockery." "by the rood, but they were right if they so thought!" cried sir walter, quickening his pace--"he is a vile obscene wolf that hath crept like a thief into the fold.--but i'll speak to him anon." the rate at which sir walter now strode down the hill, kept his astonished brother patrick, and the whole party at their full bent. the trees grew thinner as they came nearer the level valley, and by and bye they ceased altogether, so that a full view was obtained of the haugh at the bottom. there the priest of dalestie was seen leaving the chapel to go homewards. "there he goes!" cried sir walter--"there he goes stalking along with an air and a gait, that might better befit a proud prince of the earth, than heaven's humble messenger of peace, as his profession ought to have made him.--what, ho, sir priest!--i would speak with thee." the priest started--looked suddenly back--halted, and drew himself up--then turned again, and moved a few paces slowly onwards, as if irresolute what he should do.--again he halted, and again he moved on, whilst sir walter's footsteps were hurrying fast up to him.--at length, he seemed to have made up his mind to abide that parley which he now saw he could not escape, and, turning sharp round to face the stewart, he planted himself firmly in the way before him. "what would'st thou with me, sir knight?" demanded he, in a haughty and determined tone.--"after the rude and unwonted message which thou hast just dared to send to me, a holy minister of the church, methinks that thou canst dare to approach me now, for no other purpose, than to sue penitently for pardon and absolution at my hands." "a holy minister of the church!" exclaimed sir walter.--"a minister of the holy church, if thou wilt--but thyself most unholy.--my sins, god pardon me!--are many.--but albeit that i am at all times ready to kneel in confession, and in humble penitence, before that true and godly servant of christ, the good and pious father, peter of dounan, or any other such as he, i will never bend the knee before one, whose wickedness has been the dishonour and reproach of the district, ever since it hath been cursed with his presence, and who yet profanely dares most impiously to approach the holy altar." "brother! brother walter!" cried patrick stewart, endeavouring to moderate sir walter's growing ire; "what madness is this! think of the sacred character he wears, however little common fame may give him credit for supporting it. think how----" "silence, i say, patrick!" cried sir walter, in an authoritative tone, which he had never before assumed to his brother. "again i say, thou knowest not the secret reasons which move me at this moment. that foul swine, whose sensual snout hath been in every man's dish, and who hath uprooted that very vineyard which hath been confided to his care, must be forthwith cast out. he must be no longer permitted to live. seize him and bind him!" "lay not a hand on me, good sirs, if you would avoid the thunders and excommunications of the church," cried the priest, now no longer proud, but trembling, and in an humble tone. "seize him and bind him, i say," cried sir walter. "if there be any one man among the clan-allan here--if there be one clan-allan stewart, i say, who in his conscience believes that he doth not deserve to die by fire, that man hath my leave to sit apart, and bear no faggot to the pile that is to consume him. who among you is there that doth not know his misdeeds? not a man answers. then is he condemned by all. let each man, then, get him to the wood, and bring a faggot of the driest fuel, and let him forthwith be brent, and his ashes scattered to the winds, so that the earth may be no longer polluted with his carcase, and that even the very memory of him may perish!" "brother, brother!" cried patrick stewart, in a tone of entreaty; "do not bring upon yourself the terrors of the church. his fame, indeed, is none of the best; but, whatever be his sins, bethink thee that 'twere better to let him be tried by that sacred tribunal to which he is naturally amenable." "by the holy rood, which this traitor to his crucified master has so wickedly profaned, he shall not live an hour," cried sir walter, rising in his rage. "i am but the executioner of god's justice on him; and he shall die, be the consequences what they may. see!--see how busily the fellows toil! their hearts are in the work. the labour is a pleasure to them. not a man hath stood aloof from it, far less hath any one dared to speak in his cause. why, then shouldst thou speak brother patrick? though thou knowest not all, thou knowest quite enough to know that he hath well earned the fate i have awarded him. but though thou art ignorant of all that now impelleth me, i tell thee that i have enough to satisfy bishop or pope, if need were, that i am now doing the church good service. but, be that as it may, i trust the time will never come when the chieftain of clan-allan shall not dare to deal with all within the bounds of stradawn, whether churchman or layman, as his pleasure may dictate. ha! see, the pile is already heaped high, and now they are preparing to set fire to it; that shows no want of good will; and see, of their own accord, they prepare to drag him to it!" "then, brother, though i am the younger, i must needs interfere," cried patrick stewart, rushing forward to throw himself between the men of the clan, and their terrified victim; "such a deed as this must never be done by thee, my brother." "patrick, dispute not mine authority," cried sir walter, his rage now beginning to get the better of him; "my father's weakness hath made me thy chieftain. stand back i tell thee! stand back! place thyself not between me and my just vengeance, or even the name of brother shall not hinder me from dashing thee to the ground." "nay, stand you back!" cried patrick, covering the priest with his body, whilst the clansmen retreated from the prisoner at his word. "walter, i would save this wretched man for another and a calmer tribunal; and, in thus saving him, i would save thee, my brother, from----" "stand from before his polluted carcase!" cried sir walter, collaring patrick, and casting him from him with a force that threw him several yards away from the spot where they were contending, and prostrated him headlong on the ground. "now, clan-allan! now do your duty to your chieftain! i'll see that my sentence--aye, and your sentence, is duly carried through!" "mercy, most noble knight!" cried the wretched man, as they dragged him along to the pile, deadly pale, and quailing with fear--his pride all gone, and the terrors of a horrible death upon him. "mercy! o spare me! spare me, most noble sir walter stewart! i confess that i have deeply sinned against you and yours; i confess that----" "silence, caitiff!" cried the stern sir walter, loudly and hastily interrupting him; "i am no priest--i want none of thy confessions. confess thyself inwardly to thine outraged maker. thou shalt have time for that. down on thy knees! confess thy sins in secret to him, and pray to him for mercy in the next world, for here all laws, human and divine, tell me that thou shouldst have none; and thou shalt have none from me." the miserable wretch, trembling, haggard, and conscience-stricken, knelt down at a short distance from the great heap of dry and decayed timber which they had prepared. by this time it was lighted, and it soon began to blaze up so high as widely to illuminate the broad faces of the wooded hills on both sides of the valley, arousing them from that gloom which had been already gradually deepening over them into shadow, since the sinking of the sun. neither his countenance nor his eyes were directed heavenwards; yet his lips moved, more like those of some one uttering an incantation, than of a penitent seeking of heaven to be shriven of his sins. full time was allowed him. but the stern sir walter stewart stood over him, as if jealous lest his fears or his agony of mind, might goad him on to utter some secret aloud before the clansmen, which he wished to see consumed, and for ever annihilated with all that was mortal of him who held it. and when he thought that he had given the wretched man enough of licence, he waved his hand--turned himself aside for a moment--heard one piercing shriek--and when he looked again the myriads of brilliant sparks that were rising into the air from the fall of a heavy body among the fuel, sufficiently proved to him, that the miserable object of his wrath had been thrown into the very midst of the burning heap. another, and a fainter cry, made sir walter again turn involuntarily towards the pile. there the head appeared, with the face contorted with torment, and fearfully illuminated. the body reared itself up for a moment, as if by one last struggling effort of life, and these half-stifled words were dolefully heard,-- "walter stewart!--thy grave is near!" the clan-allan men stood appalled. again the figure sank. more broken and decayed wood was thrown on the pile, and they continued to heap it up until all signs of a human form were obliterated. then it was that sir walter, calling his followers into a ring around him, swore them solemnly, on their chieftain's sword, to eternal secrecy; and then, sick at the thought of the work they had done, chieftain and clansmen slowly, and silently, left the place and began to wend their way down the glen. sir walter thought of his brother patrick as he went--he halted, and blew that bugle sound, which was well known as a private signal between them. but there was no note of reply. taking it for granted, therefore, that the stern act of justice, which circumstances had compelled him to see done on the priest, had been too much for the sensitive mind of patrick even to contemplate, and that, therefore, he had hurried away to avoid witnessing the horrible spectacle, sir walter pensively and moodily moved homewards. but the cause of the muteness of patrick stewart's bugle, was very different from that which his brother believed it to be. at the time that he had been dragged from before the priest, and thrown so violently to a distance, sir walter had been too much excited by rage to notice how he fell, or indeed whether he fell at all. nor in the fearful work in which they were all so intently, and with so much good will engaged, did any of the stewarts of clan-allan once think of him more. had sir walter known that his beloved brother had been stretched bleeding, and senseless, on the ground, by his rash hand, and that he was now leaving him to perish without help, his mind, during his homeward journey, would have been even less tranquil than his reflections on the past event permitted it to be. the truth was, that patrick stewart's bonnet, having been driven off by the furious force with which sir walter had hurled him from him, his unprotected head came into contact with a large stone, that projected out of the surface of the meadow-sward, with a sharp point, from which he received so severe a cut, and so rude a shock, that he never moved after it, but lay there as if he had been dead, in the midst of a pool of blood that flowed from the wound. how long he had remained in this situation, he had no means of guessing, but when his senses returned to him, he found himself seated, with his back leaning against the trunk of a great tree, near a fountain that welled out from the side of the hill. by the blaze of a bit of moss fir that a man held in his hand, he perceived that there were several people around him, who seemed to be busied in administering to him. one especially was anxiously supporting his head, staunching the blood that was still discharging itself from the cut in his temple, and holding a cup to his lips. "how fares it with thee now?" enquired this person eagerly; "how fares it with thee, my dear friend?" "arthur forbes of curgarf!" said patrick faintly. "holy st. macher be praised that thine eyes are opened, and that i once more hear thy voice!" cried arthur forbes, "i had mine own fears that thou wert done for. what, in the name of all that is marvellous, hath befallen thee? hast thou chanced to come into the hands of the catteranes, who are said to harbour sometimes among these mountains?" "where am i?" said patrick, turning his eyes around him, his brain still swimming in confusion. "ah! that fire yonder!" "aye, that fire!" said arthur forbes eagerly, "what knowest thou of that fire?" "nay nothing," replied patrick shuddering. "by the rood, but it brent boldly when we first saw it from the far hill-side yonder," said arthur, "though it hath now fallen somewhat lower. knowest thou at all who kindled it? we heard a bugle blast come faintly up from the bottom of the valley, as we came first within sight of it." "it was not burning when i fell," replied patrick guardedly. "how did you fall, i pray you?" demanded arthur forbes. "as i was hurrying through the haugh," replied patrick, "my foot tripped in the twilight against something in the grass, and i was thrown forward, with so much force, that it is no wonder i was stunned." "your head must have struck upon some sharp stone," said arthur forbes, "that gash in your temple is a very ugly one, and it still bleeds considerably. let me bathe it for you." "the ice-cold water is most reviving to me," said patrick, sitting up; "i am much better now. i think i am almost strong enough to walk." "shall we help thee down to the priest's house?" demanded arthur; "that, as thou knowest, is the nearest dwelling." "the priest's house!" said patrick, with an expression of horror which he could not restrain. "nay 'tis no wonder that thou should'st shudder at the very mention of that reprobate," said arthur forbes; "he is a scandal to the very name of priest." "i would rather go anywhere than to the priest's house," said patrick stewart. "nay," said arthur forbes, "it is a thousand to one that we should find him abroad on some of his unseemly nocturnal pranks; but you might at least repose thee for a time in his dwelling." "i should find no repose under the priest's roof," said patrick stewart quickly. "i would rather try to make the best of my way to drummin." "thou shalt never essay to go to drummin to-night," said arthur forbes. "and, now i think on't, why should you not go over the hill with me to curgarf? my sturdy fellows there shall carry you. and then, when you are there you know," continued he, sinking his voice to a whisper into patrick's ear, "my sister kate shall nurse thee." "your proposal is life to me," replied patrick, in the same tone. "i gladly accept your kind offer. but as to loading your poor men with the weight of my carcase, there will be no occasion for that. now that my head is bound up, i feel quite strong, and i know i shall get better every step of the hill i travel." "i thought that kate's very name would be a potent balsam for thy wound," whispered arthur forbes again. "thou wilt be better in the hands of kate, my friend, than in those of the catteranes. lucky was it for thee, truly, that those knaves did not find thee in thy swoon. they were the people, no doubt, who kindled yon rousing fire, from which they were probably driven away by our first appearance on the hill. thou wert lying scarcely half a cross-bow shot from the very spot where they must have been making merry, and if they had but stumbled on thee by accident, their cure for thy wound would have been a dirk-point. holy saint michael, what an escape thou hast made!" the way to curgarf was long and tiresome enough, for they had to cross over the very summit of the mountain-ridge--that, i mean, which now divides us from the water of don. but patrick stewart bore the fatigue of the walk better than any one could have expected, and there was no doubt that the prospect of seeing catherine forbes very much improved his animal powers. he was already known to his friend's father, who received him hospitably, though rather haughtily. the old lord of curgarf's coldness of carriage towards him was to be attributed to the suspicion he entertained of that which was in reality true, that a secret attachment existed between patrick stewart and his only daughter catherine. this he did not wish to encourage for many reasons. the clan-allan stewarts--to say nothing of what he considered their questionable origin--were a new race in the neighbouring strath; and although he had never been actually at war with them, there had yet been many petty grievances and heart-burnings between them and his people. these had not in the least shaken the friendship that had accidentally arisen, during their boyhood, between patrick stewart and arthur forbes; and you all know, gentlemen, that the affections of a woman's heart are but little swayed by any such circumstances. the bonny blue eyes of catherine forbes sparkled, and her bosom heaved with delight, when she saw patrick stewart enter the hall of curgarf, though she was compelled to keep down her emotions, and to receive him as a mere acquaintance. certain stolen glances did, however, pass between them; and when arthur mentioned the accident which had led to his bringing his friend to the castle, and made him exhibit his wound, catherine had an opportunity of giving way, in some degree, to her feelings, without the risk of being chargeable with any thing more than that compassion naturally to be expected from a lady, even towards a perfect stranger, who came under such circumstances. patrick was by this time satisfied that the wound was of no great moment. but his love for catherine, and the opportunity which it thus happily afforded him of being under the same roof with her, made him very cautious in contending that it was not severe, and he had no objection to admit, when he was much pressed, that the pain he suffered from the contusion which his head had received, was very considerable. patrick retired to his chamber that night, his mind filled with the lovely image of catherine forbes, his eyes having done little else, during the evening meal, than carefully to collect and treasure every minute beauty of her fair countenance, and graceful person, so as to deepen the lines of that portrait of her which had been for some time engraven on his heart. but fond as he was of dwelling upon so much loved an object, he felt it difficult to keep possession of her image, or to prevent it from being driven from his memory, by the frequent recurrence of that horrible scene, of which he had witnessed so much, previous to his being rendered unconscious, as well as to overcome the distressing recollection of his brother walter's violence towards himself, and he found it a very difficult matter, to control his mind so far, as to prevent his imagination from sketching out the revolting circumstances of the catastrophe that followed, with a degree of detail, and in colours, scarcely less appalling than those of the dreadful reality. patrick was next morning blessed with a short private interview with catherine forbes. it was short indeed, but it was long enough to give time for the ingenuity of lovers to arrange a plan for a more satisfactory meeting. it was agreed between them, that they should separately steal out in the evening, to a grove of ancient pine trees near the castle, where, if i mistake not, they had met with one another before, with the sanction of arthur forbes. there they hoped for leisure and privacy enough to enable them more fully to open their hearts to each other, and to talk of their future hopes and fears. contented with this arrangement, patrick submitted to the confinement which was imposed upon him in his character of an invalid, and spent the day in basking silently in the sunshine of his lady's eyes, in conversing with his friend arthur as the confidant of their loves, and in doing all that in him lay to thaw the icy politeness of the old lord of curgarf. an earnest desire to make one's self agreeable to another, will generally succeed, in some degree, in the long run; but patrick's success with the old lord was much beyond what he could have believed or expected. "truly thou art a pretty fellow, patrick!" said arthur forbes jocularly to him, at the first private moment which he chanced to catch. "judging by the proximity of the place where you were found lying last night, to the fire which had been kindled by the catteranes, there can be no doubt that you must have fallen among thieves. this being the case, i, like the good samaritan, pick thee up by the wayside, bring thee here in thy wretchedness, pour wine and oil into thy wounds, and see thee well fed and lodged; and how dost thou repay me, i prythee? why, not contented with carrying off my poor love-sick sister's heart, thou art likely to run away with the old man's too." "i rejoice to hear that i have any such chance," replied patrick; "i had feared that thy father's coldness towards me was invincible." "nay, promise me not to interfere with my birthright, by taking away half my father's lands with kate, and i will tell thee what he said of thee but half an hour ago." "i should be too happy to have thy treasure of a sister, with nothing but the sandals her fair feet tread on," said patrick, with enthusiasm. "tush, man!" replied arthur forbes, "be assured thou shalt have her some day or other; aye, and a bit of land, and some good purses of broad pieces with her to boot. but hear what the lord of curgarf said,--'arthur, do you know that friend of thine hath a mighty pleasant manner with him; yea, and his discourse is more worth listening to than a young man's talk usually is: moreover, he hath a certain noble air withal. i remember that, when i was a child, i was once taken to visit the old earl of athol. his appearance made so strong an impression on me, that i think i see him yet, and that patrick stewart is the very image of his progenitor.' there is for you, my gallant friend! as to finding thee agreeable, i marvel not much at that; for other people, both men and women too, have been before him in making that wonderful discovery; and then, seeing that thou didst listen so well to his talk, and agree with him in every thing he propounded, his finding that your conversation was good was all natural enough. but to discover that you bore so strong a resemblance to the old earl of athol--the person whom he is ever ready to cite as the pattern of every thing that was graceful and pleasing in days long gone by, and now never to be matched again--ha! that was something indeed to give thee a great stride into the citadel of his affection." "be the breach through which i may be allowed to march in thither, produced how it may," said patrick stewart, "i am not sorry at thine intelligence. but, much as i love the good lord of curgarf's converse, i must freely tell thee that i would fain slip away from it, for some half hour or so, before supper to-night, unperceived by him, to exchange it for that of thy sweet sister. we have not had above five words of private conference together since i entered the castle. so pray have the charity to keep thy worthy father in talk, while the lady catherine and i are out, for a brief space, on an evening walk." "a pretty use thou wouldst put me to, truly!" said arthur forbes, laughing. "but to pleasure thee, thou shalt be obeyed." the lovers waited with no little impatience for the hour which was to yield them the desired meeting. when it at length arrived, they stole out at different moments, and went by different ways to the trysting spot. no one but a lover can fully estimate the delight of such a stolen interview as this was. they felt it deeply; and the only difficulty they had was in estimating the lapse of time. the surly toned bell, that pealed from the tower of the castle at some distance, warned them to separate, ere, by their calculation, they had been more than a few short minutes together. "must we then part so soon?" said patrick, fondly. "how swiftly the moments have flown!" "i dare not tarry one instant longer," said the lady catherine; "my father, you well know,----" "alas! i do know," interrupted patrick; "yet have i now some hopes of working my way into his good favour. but i shall tell you more of this anon. we shall meet again to-morrow night, shall we not?" "yes, yes!" replied catherine, hurriedly. "at the same hour and place?" said patrick. "alas! till then i must be contented with such converse with thee as our eyes may yield us: and blessings on thine for the intelligence they convey to me." "i hope my father may not be able to read them so readily," replied catherine. "but i must go now." "stay for one moment, my sweetest heart," said patrick. "ere you go, let me fix thine arryssade more firmly over thy bosom." and, as he said so, he took from his sporran a golden brooch, formed of two entwined hearts, set with garnets. "wear this trifle for my sake over thy heart. and now may i say, what i dare not utter in thy father's hall--farewell, my love--my dearest catherine!" "farewell! farewell! my dearest patrick!" replied she, with a throbbing heart. "i shall never part with this thy gift whilst life or sense endures; and i shall wear it ever thus, as thou sayest, over this heart, which beats but for thee alone." thus they at last parted, with lingering reluctance; and each took a different and circuitous way to return to the castle. as patrick entered the hall, a significant nod passed between him and arthur forbes. soon afterwards, the retainers came crowding in, and the evening meal was placed on the board by the serving men. the piper had played his accustomed number of turns upon his walk, in the open gallery over the court-yard. all were ready to sit down. but there was one most important personage wanting; i mean, the fair lady catherine forbes. the fashion of the house, as well as of all well fashioned houses of the time, forbade their sitting down till the lady appeared. the lord of curgarf grew impatient. "go!" said he at length to one of the attendants; "go, and send some of the women to knock at the lady catherine's chamber door, to tell her that supper is served, and that we wait for her presence." again the company remained standing for some time. the old lord of curgarf arose from his arm chair, and took two or three turns on the large hearth before the fire place. meanwhile, arthur forbes stole an enquiring glance at patrick stewart, but could gather nothing in reply. at length the lady catherine's bower woman entered the hall, pale and trembling. "what wouldst thou say, girl?" cried the lord of curgarf. "what of my daughter? thy looks are ominous! she is not ill?" "no, my lord," replied the girl, "my lady is not ill; that is, she was quite well little more than an hour ago--but--but----" "but what?" cried arthur forbes, anxiously; "cannot the girl speak out?" "tempted by the balmy evening," replied the girl, "my lady threw her arryssade about her, and walked forth beyond the castle walls, as her custom sometimes is, to breathe the air a little while." "run!--fly all of you!--take lights, and search for her every where!" cried the lord of curgarf. "how provoking this is! how often have i tried in vain to cure her of this most foolish and pernicious custom! and then to go without an attendant too! and beyond the walls!--how very imprudent!" the two friends were among the first to hurry out, in obedience to these orders from the old man. both were extremely agitated; and, so far as this example went, it would have been difficult to have, from it, determined the question whether the affection of a loving brother or a tender lover, should be accounted the greater. arthur forbes was eager for some explanation from patrick stewart as to what he knew of the lady catherine. but, alas! patrick could give him no information beyond that which i have already detailed to you. leaving the crowd of the retainers to examine every hole and corner, bush and brake, immediately around the castle walls, arthur and patrick, from their knowledge of circumstances, pushed their search farther; and as they secretly knew the way that catherine had taken from the pine grove homewards, they looked diligently for her all along the path. of her, or any thing belonging to her, they discovered nothing. but at last, in one place, where the path ran through a thicket, where the ground was soft, they were struck with the appearance of numerous newly impressed prints of footsteps. on examining these more closely by means of a torch, they observed, among those of many a rude brogue and sandal, mixed and mingled together, and pointing in all directions, as if those who wore them had been engaged in hurried action--among all these, i say, they observed one tiny and delicate footprint, which was here and there perceptible, and which patrick stewart at once declared, could have belonged to no one but to the lady catherine forbes.--wild with dread and alarm, they returned to the castle. on questioning the warder, he admitted that he did remember having heard something like a woman's shriek, that came faintly from some distance in the direction of the thicket, but as it was immediately drowned by the first drone of the piper's warning, and had been heard by him no more, it had passed away altogether from his thoughts. not a doubt now remained in their minds, that the lady catherine had been carried off by some villains, who had been lurking about the castle. the old lord of curgarf was inconsolable.--he was quite unmanned, and unable to give an order as to what should be done. his son arthur, the master of forbes, lost no time in acting for him.--the retainers were hastily armed, and commanded to prepare for instant pursuit; and, being divided, at patrick stewart's request, into two bands, the friends determined each to take the command of one of them,--and accordingly, with such hasty refreshments as the men could snatch, and carry with them, they took leave of one another, and started off, each upon such a line of country as he, in his quickly summoned forethought, judged to be the most likely to bring his expedition to a successful termination. as we have already learned from the conversation of the master of forbes, when he first met patrick stewart after the accident which befell him near dalestie, it was pretty generally known in the country, at this time, that a gang of catteranes, or free-booters, from the west, were occasionally harboured somewhere among the neighbouring mountains, but no one could precisely tell whereabouts they most commonly secreted themselves. on this point, however, patrick stewart had some general suspicions, though he knew nothing that could lead him to guess--even within miles--as to the exact spot where their lurking place might be.--he took his way directly over the mountain that separates the upper part of the river don from the aven, and he descended towards the valley of the latter stream, through that precipitous ravine, that affords a course for the little tributary burn of cuachan-seirceag, down the face of the white cliffs that almost overhang the small house of inchvory, which, if we be all spared gentlemen, we shall see this night before we sleep. there is not a tree there now; but, at that period, the ravine was thickly shaded by such timber as could find footing, or nourishment among the rocks, and it therefore formed a good and well-known place of shelter. having fixed on it as the point of rendezvous, patrick took his way up the valley of the aven for some little distance, and then, dividing his people into two parties, he sent one of them off by the pass leading in the direction of loch builg, whilst he continued to lead the other up that which is more properly called glen aven, by the lynn of aven, where the river throws itself over the rocks in a fine wild fall. having then ascended the mountains, he began, by break of day, to march, and countermarch, over and across them, visiting, and carefully examining every retired nook or corner that he thought might be the least likely to be chosen, by such villains, as a hiding-place, until mid-day came without bringing him the least clue to the object of his search. then it was that he unwillingly halted his party in a hollow by the side of a spring, that the poor fellows might refresh themselves with food, and rest for a time. the serjeant halted for refreshment. clifford.--(interrupting the serjeant.)--gentlemen, i beg to remark, that i think it would be quite proper that we should refresh ourselves with food, whilst mr. patrick stewart and his party are engaged in doing so. we shall thus save time, as must be self-evident to all, seeing that the action of the story is thus brought, for a little while, to a state of repose. of bodily rest we have had enough, in all conscience--thanks to the length of mister archy's yarn. grant.--i beg to second the motion of our worthy secretary, which, in my mind, is most sensible. clifford.--methinks, then, that a slice or two from that cold round of beef, which i saw so carefully bestowed in the right hand pannier on the pony's back, would come well in as an episode to serjeant stewart's story. here davy, untruss, if you please. grant.--spread the cloth before us here on the grass, and then lay out the eatables. clifford.--now, methinks, we can more readily sympathise with patrick stewart and his people at their luncheon. but come, davy; we must have something potable too. author.--bring us one of those bottles from the pannier on the other side of the pony. clifford.--aye, that's right; something to wash the dust out of the serjeant's throat would considerably improve his voice. what say you to my prescription, archy? serjeant.--troth, sir, you're an excellent doctor. well, here's wishing all your good healths, gentlemen! author.--by the way, clifford, how many trouts have you caught? clifford.--none of your jokes, my good friend. why, you know very well that i have never made a single cast. before i had time to give one throw over the stream, archy hooked me here with the thread of his discourse, and here he has been reeling me out such a line, that i can plainly see it will be some time ere he can wind it up again so as to land me. fish!--no, no, i may as well put up my rod at once, that we may all hear his legend quietly to an end. author.--i think so, indeed. grant.--well archy, when you think that your patrick stewart and his party have had their luncheon, and that you have satisfied your own hunger and thirst, we shall all be ready to listen to you. serjeant.--i am well served now, sir, and quite ready to proceed. clifford.--spin away then, my gay fellow. legend of the clan-allan stewarts continued. with a view of multiplying the chances which might still remain of effecting the anxious object of his expedition, patrick stewart had no sooner started again from the heather where they had been seated, than he subdivided his party into several sections, under certain intelligent leaders, and having given to each of them such instructions as he deemed necessary for their guidance, he sent them off in different directions, with orders to meet together again, by nightfall, at the ravine of cuachan-seirceag. there they were all to wait till he should join them, unless in the event of the lady catherine being recovered by any of them, in which case they were to proceed in a body, without tarrying, to carry her straight to curgarf, leaving one of their number behind them to certify him of the agreeable intelligence. for his own part, he took with him a single attendant only, one of the curgarf retainers, called michael forbes, with whose superior sagacity and activity, some former circumstances had led him to be more particularly acquainted. after all the others had left them, patrick and his companion began a most particular and persevering search through the forest, and among the mountains, of that part of the country which he had especially marked out and reserved for himself, leaving no spot unexplored that had any thing the least suspicious connected with it. but the wilderness through which they wandered was so wide, and, in many places, so very thickly wooded, that they might have been employed for days in the same way, without his being one whit nearer his object. it is not wonderful, then, that the evening began to manifest its approach, whilst he was yet actively engaged in laborious travel, yet still he bore on with unremitting exertion, altogether unconscious of the wane of day. the wild scenery by which he was surrounded was beginning to grow dim in the increasing obscurity, when he arrived at the edge of a deep corry or ravine, in the steeply inclined side of a mountain. it was a place, of the existence of which, neither he nor his companion had ever been aware, well as they were both acquainted with the mountains. the precise position of it has been long ago forgotten; and indeed, if it could be guessed at, it is probably now so altered, and blocked up, by the fall of the mountain masses from time to time, as to be no longer in such a state as might admit of its being identified. but it was one of those rugged places of which there are plenty of examples among these mountains. the elevation on the mountain side was not greater than to have allowed nature, at that time, to have carried the forest partially up around it, and the wood, that in a great measure concealed it, was chiefly composed of the mountain pine. the trees, which were seen struggling against the wintry tempests that prevailed around the summits of the cliffs above, appeared twisted and stunted, yet they grew thickly and sturdily together, as if resolved, like bold highlanders in possession of a dangerous post, to put shoulder to shoulder for the determined purpose of maintaining their position, in defiance of the raging elements. their foliage was shorn, not thinned by the blast. on the contrary, it was thickened by it, from that very clipping to which the storms so continually subjected it, so that the shade which was formed by their tops overhead, was thereby rendered just so much the more dense and impenetrable. the narrow and inclined bottom of the immense gully below, was composed of enormous fragments, which had been wedged out by time and frosts from the faces of the overhanging crags, and piled one over the other to an unknown depth, whilst the ground, that sloped rapidly down into it, from the lower part of the abrupt faces of the precipices on either side, was covered with smaller and lighter materials of the same sort, mingled with a certain proportion of soil. there some scattered trees had been enabled to grow to a huge size, from the uninterrupted shelter which the place afforded; but whilst few of these had altogether escaped injury and mutilation from the frequent descent of the stony masses, many of them had been entirely uprooted and overturned, by the immense magnitude of some of those falling rocks which had swept down upon them, and there lay their enormous trunks, resting upon their larger limbs, or upon one another, the whole being tossed and tumbled together in most intricate confusion, so as to cover the rocky fragments beneath them, with one continued and almost impervious natural chevaux-de-frize. patrick stewart halted behind the bole of a tree, and, resting against it, so as to enable him to lean forward over the precipice, he surveyed the gulf below, as accurately as the evening twilight, and the intervening obstacles permitted him to do. he and michael forbes then stole slowly and silently along the very verge of it, in that direction that lay down the mountain side, using their eyes sharply and earnestly as they went, and peering anxiously everywhere, with the hope of discovering some track which might tend downwards into the ravine. while so occupied, patrick became suddenly sensible of the fresh smell of wood smoke. from the manner in which it was necessarily diffused, by the multiplied network of boughs through which it had to ascend, he looked for it in vain for some time, till he accidentally observed one or two bright fiery sparks mount upwards from below, such as may be often seen to arise from a cottage chimney top, when new fuel has been thrown upon the fire by the people within. marking, with great attention, the spot whence these had proceeded, he commenced a more narrow examination of the edge of the ravine, until he at length discovered a perforation in the brushwood, so small, that it might have been easily mistaken for the avenue leading to the den of some wild beast, but which, a closer inspection persuaded him, might have been used by human creatures, there being quite enough of room for one man at a time to creep through it in a stooping posture. at all events he was resolved to explore it, and accordingly, having first stationed his attendant, michael forbes, in a concealed place, near to its entrance, that he might watch and give him warning if any one approached from without, he bent himself down, and began his strange and hazardous enterprise. creeping along, with his bonnet off, and almost on his hands and knees, he found that the track, which inclined gently at first over the rounded edge of the ravine, became, as he proceeded, nearly as steep as an upright ladder, but it was less encumbered with branches than the first part of the way had been, though there was still enough of growth to aid him in his descent, and to take away all appearance of danger. it went diagonally down the face of the cliff, dropping from one narrow ledge of footing in the rock, to that beneath it, with considerable intervals between each. but to one accustomed, as patrick stewart was, to scramble like a goat, the difficulties it presented were as nothing. all his anxiety and care was exerted to guard, if possible, against surprise, as well as against making any noise that might betray his approach, to any one who might be harboured in the ravine below. having at last got to the foot of the precipice, he found it somewhat easier to descend the rugged slope that inclined downwards from its base, and, upon reaching the bottom, he discovered that the track continued to lead onwards under the arched limbs of an overthrown pine, the smaller branches and spray of which, appeared, on a minute examination, to have been evidently broken away by frequent passage through underneath it. this circumstance he had some difficulty in discovering, as the increasing darkness was rendered deeper here, by the overhanging shade of the rocks and trees high above him. bending beneath the boughs of the fir, he advanced with yet greater caution, and with some difficulty, over the rugged and angular fragments, until he suddenly observed something, that made it prudent for him to halt for a moment, that he might well consider his position. this abrupt stop was occasioned by his observing a faint gleam of light, that partially illumined the broad side, and moss-grown edge, of a large mass of stone, a little way in advance of the place where he then was. he hardly breathed, and he tried to listen--and, for a moment, he fancied he heard a murmur like that of human voices. again he stretched his ear, and again he felt persuaded that he heard the sound of the voices coming hollow on his ear, as if from some cavity, somewhere below the surface, at a little distance beyond him. resolving at last to proceed, he moved on gently, and upon a nearer approach to the great stone, on the broad edge of which the light fell, he found that it formed one side of a natural entrance to a passage, that led upwards under the enormous superincumbent masses, that had been piled up over it, in their fall from the shattered crags above. pausing again for a moment, he drew himself up behind a projecting part of another huge stone, that formed the dark side of the entrance, that he might again listen. he was now certain that he distinctly heard voices proceeding from within, though he was not yet near enough to the speakers to be able to make out their words. the smell of the wood smoke was exceedingly powerful, and his heart began to beat high, for he was now convinced that his adventure was drawing to a crisis. he plucked forth his dirk, and stooped to enter the place. he found the passage to be low, narrow, gently ascending, and running somewhat in an oblique direction, from the illuminated stone at the mouth, for a few paces inwards, till it met with another block of great size. the edges of this block glowed with a brighter light, that seemed to come directly upon it, at a right angle, from some fire, not then visible, but which was evidently blazing within, and which was again reflected from the side of this stone towards that of the stone at the entrance. having crept onwards to this second fragment of rock, where the passage took its new direction, he discovered that it led into a large, and very irregularly-shaped chamber, which was within a few feet only of the spot which he had now reached, but he had no accurate means of judging of the full extent of the cavern. he could now see the rousing fire that was burning in a recess, in the side of the rocky wall of the place, the smoke from which seemed to find its way upwards, through some natural crevice immediately over it, for the interior of this subterranean den was by no means obscured by any great accumulation of it. by the light of the fire, one or two dark holes were seen, apparently forming low passages of connection with other chambers. how many living beings the place might then contain, he had no means of knowing or guessing. all that came within the field of his vision were two persons, which he supposed were those whose voices he had heard. one of these was a slim youth, who was employed in feeding the fire from time to time with pieces of rotten wood and branches, and in attending to a large pot, that hung over it by an iron chain, depending from a strong hook fastened in the rock above. but the youth and his occupations were altogether disregarded by patrick stewart, in the intense interest and delight which he experienced in beholding the lady catherine forbes, the fair object of his toilsome search, who sat pensively and in tears, on a bundle of heather on the farther side of the fire. you will easily believe, gentlemen, that it was difficult for him to subdue his impatient feelings, so far as to restrain himself from at once rushing forward to snatch her to his arms. but prudence whispered him that her safety might depend on the caution he should use. ignorant as he was of the extent of the subterranean den, or how it might be tenanted, he felt the necessity of exerting his self-command, and to remain quietly where he was for a little time, until he might be enabled to form some judgment, from what he should see and hear, as to the probable force he should have to contend with, as well as to determine what might be his best plan of action. "if thou wouldst but listen to my entreaty," said catherine forbes, addressing the youth in an earnest tone of supplication, whilst the tears that ran down her cheeks roused patrick's feelings to an agonizing pitch of intensity--"if thou wouldst but fly with me, and take me to curgarf, my father would give thee gold enough to enrich thee and thine for all thy life." "i tell thee again that it is useless to talk of it, lady," replied the youth. "i have already told thee that i pity thee, but it were more than my life were worth to do as thou wouldst have me. and what is gold, i pray thee, compared to such a risk?" "methinks that, once out amidst these wide hills and forests, the risk would be but small indeed," said catherine. "that is all true," replied the youth. "the hills and forests are wide; but the men of the band well know every nook and turn of them. nay, they are every where, and come pop upon one at the very time when they are least looked for. holy virgin, an' we were to meet any of them as we fled!--my head sits uneasily on my neck at the very thought!--by the rood, but there would be a speedy divorce between them! and where would your gold be then, lady?" "then let me go try to explore mine own way without thee," said the lady catherine. "talk not of it, lady," replied the youth, impatiently. "my head would go for it, i tell thee.--it would go the moment they should return and find that thou hadst escaped. they may be already near at hand, too, if i mistake not the time of evening. therefore, teaze me no more, i pray thee." "spirits of mine ancestors, give me strength and boldness!" cried the lady catherine, starting up energetically, after a moment's pause, during which she seemed to have taken her resolution, and assuming a commanding attitude and air as she spoke.--"let me pass, young man!--give me way, i say!--or i will struggle with thee to the death, but i will force a passage!" "i have a sharp argument against that," said the youth, drawing his dirk, and planting himself in the gap before her.--"stand back!--or thou shalt have every inch of its blade." "out of the way, vermin!" cried patrick stewart, no longer able to contain his rage, and dashing down the youth before him as he entered. "patrick!--my dear patrick!" cried the lady catherine, flying into his arms with a scream of joy. "my dearest, dearest catherine!" said patrick, fondly--"this is indeed to be rewarded!--wretch!" cried he, grappling the youth by the throat, and putting the point of his dirk to his breast, as he was in the act of rising from the ground, apparently with the intention of making his escape--"wretch! our safety requires thy death." "oh, do not kill me, good sir knight!" cried the terrified youth piteously, and with a countenance as pale as a corpse. "spare him!--spare him!" cried catherine,--"his worthless life is unworthy of thy blade." "oh, mercy, mercy!" cried the youth again.--"spare me!--spare me!--oh, do not kill me!" "if i did kill thee, it would be no more than what thou hast well merited," said patrick.--"but, as thou sayest, catherine, my love, such worthless blood should never wantonly soil the steel of a brave man; and if i could but make him secure by any other means, i should be better contented." "bind me, if thou wilt, sir knight; but, oh, do not!--do not kill me!" cried the youth. "well then, i will spare thy life, though i half question the wisdom of so doing," said patrick. casting his eyes around the cave, he espied some ropes lying in a dark corner. catherine flew and brought them to him. he seized them, and quickly bound the youth neck and heel, in such a manner as to make it quite impossible for him to move body or limb, and then, lifting him in his arms, he groped his way with him into the farther end of one of those dark recesses that branched off from the main cavern, and there he deposited him. "now, let us fly, my love!" cried he, hastily returning to the lady catherine. "every moment we tarry here is fraught with danger.--follow me quickly!--i grieve to think of the fatigue you must undergo. but cheer up, and trust for your defence, from all danger, to this good arm of mine. above all things, be silent." "with thee as my protector i am strong and bold," said catherine. "thanks be to the virgin for this deliverance!" patrick now led the lady catherine forth into the open air. but before he ventured to proceed, he listened for a moment to ascertain that there was no one near. to his great horror, and to the lady's death-like alarm, they distinctly heard a footstep slowly and cautiously approaching. pushing catherine gently behind the dark mass of stone at the entrance, he placed himself before her in the shadow, that, whilst concealed by it himself, he might have a perfect view of whosoever came, the moment the person should advance into the light, that was reflected on the wall-like side of the rocky mass opposite to him, and fell on the ground for a little space beyond it. he listened, with attention so breathless, that he seemed to hear every beat of his own heart, as well as of that of his trembling companion. the footstep was that of one person only, and he felt as if his resolution was quite equal to an encounter with a dozen; but he knew not how many might be following, and he was fully conscious of the importance, as regarded the lady, of avoiding a conflict, unless rendered indispensable by circumstances. the step came on, falling gently, at intervals of several moments, as if the individual who approached was unwilling to make the least unnecessary noise. the dim figure of a man at length appeared, under the arched boughs of the fallen pine tree. he advanced, step by step, with increased caution. a dirk blade, which he held forward in his outstretched hand, first caught the stream of reflected light that came from the mouth of the cavern. the next step that the figure took brought his face under its influence; and, to the great relief of patrick stewart, displayed the features of michael forbes. patrick gave a low whistle. michael had at that moment stopped to listen, with a strange expression of dread and horror, to the complaints of the youth who was bound in the innermost recesses of the cavern, whence they came, reduced by its sinuosities, into a low wild moaning sound, that had something supernatural in it, so as to be quite enough to appal any superstitious mind. the whistle startled him. "michael!" said patrick in a low tone of voice, "why did'st thou desert thy post?" "holy virgin, is that you, sir knight?" said michael, in a voice which seemed to convey a doubt whether he was not holding converse with a spirit. "what could make you desert your post?" demanded patrick, angrily, and at the same time showing himself. "holy saints, i am glad that it is really you, sir knight," replied michael. "i crave your pardon, but your long delay led me to fear that something had befallen you, and that you might lack mine aid." "had an accident befallen me, michael," said patrick, "thine aid, i fear, would have been of little avail. but we have lost much time by this thy neglect of mine orders. quick! let us lose no more, and give me thy best help to aid thy mistress, the lady catherine." "the virgin be praised!" exclaimed michael, as catherine appeared; "then the lady is safe!" "but so for only," replied patrick stewart. "we have yet much peril to encounter; but our perils are increased every precious moment that we loiter here. get thee on quickly before us to the top of the path where it quits the ravine,--the spot, i mean, where i left thee, and see that you be sure to give me good warning, shouldst thou see or hear any thing to cause alarm." michael obeyed; and patrick, having led catherine out from under the boughs of the fallen pine, began to assist her in ascending the path. he had some difficulty in dragging her up the wild-cat's ladder that scaled the side of the cliff; but, by the assistance of his strongly nerved arm, she reached the summit without danger. she then forced her way through the narrow passage in the brushwood that grew over the top of the crags, until she had at length the satisfaction of being able to stand erect, to receive the cooling mountain breeze on her flushed cheek and throbbing temples. but this was no place for them to rest. patrick whistled softly, and michael appeared. "catherine, my love," said he, "this is no time for ceremony. give one arm to michael, and put the other firmly into mine--so. now take the best care you can of your footing, and lean well upon me as we go down the mountain side. oh, how i long to talk to thee! but, dearest, we must be silent as death, for we know not whom we may meet." after a long, rough, and slippery descent, they came at length into a narrow glen, where the trees grew taller and farther apart from each other. this was so far fortunate for them; for as the shadows of night became deeper here than they had been on the mountain side, they were compelled to move slower; and it required all the care of the lady catherine's supporters, to save her from the injuries she might have sustained from the numerous fallen branches, and other obstacles lying in their way. they had nearly reached the lower extremity of this lesser tributary glen, where it discharged a small rill into the wider glen and stream of the aven, when patrick stewart suddenly halted. "stop!" cried he; "i hear voices on the breeze, and they come this way too. we must up the bank, michael. courage, my dearest catherine! let me help thee to climb. trust me love, thou hast nothing to fear." "i fear nothing whilst thou art by my side," replied catherine, exerting herself to the utmost. "now," said patrick, after they had half carried her some thirty or forty paces up the steep slope; "we have time to go no farther. hark! they come! stretch thyself at length among this long heather, catherine, and let me throw my plaid over thee. nay, now i think on't, michael's green one is better, the red of mine might be more visible. there; that will do. now, michael, draw thy good claymore, as i do mine. here are two thick trunks which stand well placed in front of us. do thou take thy stand behind that one, whilst i post myself behind this, so that both of us may be between the lady and danger. they cannot come at her but by passing between us. and if they do! but see that thou dost not strike till i give thee the word. hush! they come!" they had hardly thus disposed of themselves, when the voices drew nearer, and the dusky figures were obscurely seen moving up the bottom of the little glen. they came loitering on, one after another, in what we of the army used to call indian files,--man following man along the track, where they knew that the footing was likely to be the best. this plan of march necessarily made them longer of passing by, but it relieved those who were lurking in the bank above from any great fear of being discovered by any stray straggler. two individuals of the party, who had probably some sort of command over the rest, were considerably in advance. these lingered on their way, and halted more than once to give time for those that followed to come up, so that patrick stewart caught a sentence or two of the conversation that fell from them. "he must be as cunning as the devil," said one of them to the other, in gaelic. "thou knowest that she has not yet seen his face," replied the other; "so that, when he comes to act the part of her deliverer, she will never suspect that it was to him she was indebted for her unwilling travel last night, and her present confinement. and then, you see, he thinks, in this way, to make his own, both of her and her old father, by his pretended gallantry in rescuing her from----" patrick stewart in vain stretched his ears to catch more, for on came the rest in closer lines, gabbling together so loudly about trifles, and with voices so commingled, that it was not possible to gather the least sense out of their talk. these all passed onwards; and, a little way behind them, came four other men, who walked very slowly, and stopped occasionally to converse in gaelic, like people, who were so travel-worn, that they were not sorry to halt now and then, and to rest against a tree for a few moments. "what made grigor beg stop behind allister?" demanded one. "hoo! you may well guess it was nothing but his old trick," replied the other. "the boddoch would have fain had me to tarry for him, that i might help him, by carrying a part of what load he might get. but i was no such fool. my shoulders ache enough already with carrying the rough rungs of that accursed litter last night, to let me wish for any new burden." "if thou hadst not been carrying the bonny lassie for another's pleasure, methinks you would maybe have thought less of it," said a third man. whilst attentively listening to this dialogue, patrick stewart observed some ill-defined object, coming stealing up the slope of the bank, in a diagonal line, from the place a little way down the glen, where the four men had halted. it came on noiselessly, but steadily pointing towards the spot where catherine lay. it stopped, and uttered a short bark, and patrick now saw that it was a large, rough, highland wolf-dog. again, with its long snout directed towards the plaid that covered catherine, it barked and snarled. "dermot, boy!--dermot!"--cried one of the men from the hollow below.--"what hast thou got there?" as if encouraged by its master's voice, the animal barked and snarled again yet more eagerly, and seemed to be on the very eve of springing upon the plaid. the blade of patrick stewart's claymore made one swift circuit in the air, and, descending like a flash of lightning on the neck of the creature, his head and his body rolled asunder into different parts of the heather, and again patrick took his silent but determined stand behind the tree. "dermot!--dermot, boy!"--cried the man again from below.--"what think ye is the beast at, lads?" "some foulmart or badger it may be," replied another. "can'st thou not go up and see, man?" said a third. "go thyself, my good man," said the dog's master.--"i am fond enough of the dog--aye, and, for that part, i am fond enough of travel too, but i am content with my share of fagg for this day without going up the brae there to seek for more. a man may e'en have his serving of the best haggis that ever came out of a pot. trust me, i am for going no foot to-night beyond what i can help.--dermot--dermot, boy!--see ye any thing of him at all, lads?" "the last sight that i had of him at all, was near yon dark looking hillock, a good way up the bank yonder," said another man. "i'm thinking that the brute has winded a passing roebuck," said the fourth man, "i thought i saw something like a glimmer just against the light cloud yonder above, as if it had been the dog darting over the height, the very moment after the last bark he gave." "dermot! whif-hoo-if!" cried the dog's master, and, at the same time, whistling shrilly upon his fingers. "tut! the fiend catch him for me! let him go! i'll be bound that he'll be home before us." "come, then, let's on!" said another, "i wonder much that grigor beg hath not come up with us ere this." "hulloah, grigor!" shouted one of them. "no, no, we'll not see him so soon, i'll warrant ye." "come! come away, lads!" said another, moving on with the rest following him. "i'll be bound that the boddoch hath got a swingeing load upon his back." "awell!" said one of the first speakers, "rather him than me. but we shan't be the worse of it when it's well broiled, for all that. i'm sure i wish i had a bit of it at this moment, for i'm famishing. i'm dead tired to-night; i hope that we may have some rest to-morrow. know ye aught that is to do?" "i heard the captain say that"----but the rest of the dialogue was cut off by the distance which the men had by this time reached. "thanks be to st. peter, they are gone at last!" said patrick stewart. "how my fingers itched to have a cut at the villains.--catherine," continued he, lifting the plaid, and assisting her to rise, "art thou not half dead with terror? but courage, my love. there lies the murderous four-footed savage, whose fell fangs had so nearly been busied with the plaid that covered thee. if we may trust to what we have just heard, there is but one man to come; and, judging by the name of beg [ ] which they gave him, he ought to be no very formidable person. michael, get thee on a few steps in front, and keep a good look out for him. were we but out of this narrow place, and fairly into the wider glen of the aven, we should have less to fear, and then we shall find means to carry thee." "thanks to the virgin, i am yet strong," said catherine. "let us fly, then, with all speed." a farther walk, of a few minutes only, brought them into glen aven, and they pursued its downward course, for a considerable length of way, until patrick stewart began to perceive something like fatigue in the lady catherine's step. he therefore halted, and made her sit down to rest a while. in the mean time, he and michael forbes contrived to hew down two small sapling fir trees, by the aid of their good claymores, and having tied their plaids between them, they, in this manner, very speedily constructed a tolerably easy litter for the lady to recline at length in. this they carried between them, by resting the ends of the poles upon their shoulders, patrick making michael forbes go foremost, and reserving the place behind for himself. i need hardly tell you that the stewart especially selected that position, for the obvious reason that he might be thereby enabled to cheer the lady catherine's spirits, and to lighten her fatigues, by now and then addressing a word or two of comfort to her as they went. in this manner they pursued their way down the glen, until the loud roar of many waters informed them that they were approaching the grand waterfall, called the lynn of aven. you will have ample opportunity of becoming intimately acquainted with all the details of this fine scene, gentlemen, as you go up the glen to-morrow. but in the meanwhile, i may tell you generally, that the whole of this large river, there precipitates itself headlong, through a comparatively narrow chasm in the rocks, into a long, wide, and extremely deep pool below. the sound increased as the bearers of the litter drew nearer to the waterfall, and the rocky and confined passage, over which they had to make their way, compelled them to walk at greater leisure, and to select their footing with more caution. fortunately they had now the advantage of the moon, which had been for some time shining favourably upon them, and they were already within a very few steps of coming immediately over the waterfall, when they were suddenly alarmed by a fearful and most unearthly shriek. it came apparently from the very midst of the descending column of water below them. "holy virgin mother!" cried michael forbes, halting, and backing like a restive horse, so unexpectedly, that the ends of the poles were nearly jerked from patrick stewart's shoulders, by the shock which was thus communicated to them. "holy mother, didst thou not hear that, sir knight?" "i did hear something," said stewart, not quite willing to increase that dread which he perceived was already quite sufficiently excited in his companion, and of which he could not altogether divest himself. "i did fancy that i heard something. but for the love of the virgin take care what thou dost. thou hadst almost shaken the poles from my shoulders by thy sudden start.--come! proceed man!" again, a louder, and more appalling shriek arose from the midst of the cataract, piercing their ears above all the roaring of its thunder. "for the love of all the saints, let us turn back, sir knight!" cried michael. "it is the water-kelpie himself!" "nay," said patrick stewart; "back we may not go, without the risk of falling again into the very jaws of the catteranes. they are no doubt hard on foot after us by this time.--forward then, and fear not!" again came the wild shriek, if possible louder and more terrible than before. "for the love of god, sir knight, back!" cried michael, now losing all command of himself, and forcing the litter so backwards upon patrick stewart, as to compel him, from the narrowness of the rocky shelf where they then stood, to retreat in a corresponding degree, to avoid the certain alternative of being precipitated over the giddy ledge into the boiling stream of the aven. "for the love of god, back, i say! were it but for a few paces, till we have leisure to lay down our burden, and cross ourselves." "merciful saints! what will become of us?" cried the lady catherine, in great alarm. "now," said patrick stewart, after yielding a few steps, "now, we may surely halt here till thy courage return to thee, michael. what a fiend hath so unmanned thee to-night? i thought thou hadst been brave as a lion." "a fiend indeed, sir knight," replied michael, as they were laying down the litter; "i trust that i lack not courage, at any time, to face any mortal foe that ever came before me. but," added he, eagerly crossing himself, "to meet with the devil thus in one's very path!--good angels be about us, heard ye not that scream again? have mercy upon us all!" "there is something very strange in this," said patrick stewart. "but this will never do. we cannot tarry here long without the certainty of being overtaken by the whole body of the catteranes. by this time they must be well on their way in pursuit of us." "holy virgin! what will become of us if we should fall into their hands?" cried the lady catherine, in an agony of distress. "fear not, my love!" said patrick stewart; "i will forthwith fathom this mystery. i will see whence these horrible screams proceed." "nay, sir patrick, tempt not thy fate," cried michael. "if thou dost, thou goest to thy certain destruction." "oh stir not, dear patrick!" cried the lady catherine, starting up from the litter, and endeavouring to detain him. "do not attempt so great, so dreadful a danger." "catherine, my dearest!" said patrick, fondly taking her hands in his; "listen to reason, i entreat thee. the danger that presses on us from behind is imminent, and more than what two swords, good as they may be, could by any means save thee from. and since god hath given us strength to flee from it, he will not forsake me in a conflict with the powers of hell, should they stand in my way. i go forward in his holy name, then; have no fear for me therefore. rest thine arm upon michael, dearest--tell thy beads, and may the blessed virgin hover over thee to protect thee! as for you, michael, draw your claymore, and stir not a step from the lady till i call thee." patrick stewart now crossed himself, and then strode, slowly and resolutely, along the narrow ledge of rock towards the roaring lynn, repeating a paternoster as he went. the moon was by this time high in the heavens, and its beams produced a faint tinge of the rainbow's hues, as they played among the mists that arose from the waterfall. the shrieks that came from below were now loud and incessant, and might have quailed the stoutest heart. but still patrick advanced firmly, till he stood upon a shelving rock, forming the very verge of the roaring cataract, whence he could throw his eyes directly downwards, through the shooting foam, into the abyss below. far down, in the midst of the rising vapour, and apparently suspended in it, close by the edge of the descending column of water, he could distinguish a dark object. new and more piercing screams arose from it. he bent forward, and looked yet more intently. to his no inconsiderable dismay, he beheld a fearful head rear itself, as it were from out of it; the long hair by which it was covered, and the immense beard that flowed from the chin, hanging down, drenched by the surrounding moisture, and the eyes glaring fearfully in the moonlight, whilst the terrific screams were inconceivably augmented. appalled as he was by this most unaccountable apparition, patrick was shifting his position, in order to lean yet more forward, that he might the better contemplate it, when the toe of his sandal grazed against something that had nearly destroyed his equilibrium, and sent him headlong over the rock. having, with some difficulty, recovered himself, he stooped down to ascertain what had tripped him, when he found, to his surprise, that it was a rope. he now remembered, that the feudal tenant of the neighbouring ground, who owed service to his father, sir allan, was accustomed to hang a conical creel, or large rude basket, by the edge of the fall, for the purpose of catching the salmon that fell into it, after failing in their vain attempts to leap up. "ho, there!" cried patrick stewart, in that voice of thunder, which he required to exert in order to overcome the continuous roar of the cataract. "oh, help! help! help!" cried the fearful head from below. "man or demon, i will see what thou art!" cried patrick, stooping down to lay hold of the rope, with the intention of making an attempt to pull up the creel. "for the love of saint andrew, lay not a hand on the rope, sir knight, as thou may'st value thy life!" said michael forbes, who, having heard patrick's loud shout, had been hurried off to his aid by the fears and the commands of the lady catherine. "why hast thou left the lady, caitiff?" demanded patrick stewart, angrily. "did i not tell thee to stay with her till i should call thee?" "we heard thee call loudly, sir knight," replied michael, trembling more from his proximity to the place whence the screams had issued, than from any thing that patrick had said. "true, i had forgotten," replied patrick; "i did call, though not on thee. but since thou art here, come lend me thy hand to pull up the basket." "nay, sir knight; surely thou art demented by devilish influence. for the love of all the saints!" cried michael, quaking from head to foot; "for the love of ----" "dastard, obey my command, or i will hurl thee over the rock!" cried patrick furiously, and with a manner that showed michael that it was time to obey. "now, pull--pull steadily and firmly; pull away, i say!" "have mercy on us! have mercy on our souls!" cried michael, pulling most unwillingly. "what a fiend are you afraid of? why don't you pull, i say?" cried the knight again. "jesu maria protect me! that i should have a hand in any such work!" muttered michael. "oh holy virgin! to have thus to deal with the devil himself!" "come! pull!--pull away, i tell ye--pull! aye, there!" cried patrick stewart, as the basket at last came to the top of the rock. "preserve us all!" cried michael; "the water-kelpie, sure enough! mercy on us, what a fearful red beard! what terrible fiery eyes! for the love of heaven, sir knight, let him down again!" "coward!" cried patrick, "if you let go the rope, i'll massacre thee! now, do you hear? pull the creel well out this way.--ha, that will do!--now i think it is safe." "oh, may the blessed saints reward thee!" said a little shred of a man, who now arose, shaking in a palsy of cold and wet, from the midst of at least a dozen large salmon, with which the creel was heaped up; "thou hast saved me from the most dreadful of deaths." "how camest thou there?" demanded patrick stewart; "answer quickly, for we are in haste." "oh, i know not well how i got there," said the little man, shivering so that he could hardly speak. "i stept aside from the path, just to take a look down to see if there were any salmon in the creel, when something took my foot, and over i went. oh, what a providence it was that ye came by! another hour, and i must have been dead from cold and wet, and buried in salmon, for they were flying in upon me like so many swallows. i thought they would have choked me." "here," said patrick stewart, taking out a flask, "take a sup of this cordial; it will speedily restore thee." "oh, blessings on thee, sir knight!" said the little man; "i will drink thy health with good will. but tell me thy name, i pray thee, that i may know, and never forget, who it was that saved my life." "i am patrick stewart of clan-allan," replied the knight carelessly. "come now, michael, we must tarry here no longer." "sure i am that i shall never forget the name of sir patrick stewart," said the little man, whilst he was following them along the narrow path, as they retraced it towards the place where they had left the lady catherine; "and if ever i can do thee a good turn i shall do it, though it were by the sacrifice of my life." catherine's fears were soon allayed by the explanation that was given her. she was again put into the litter, which was quickly shouldered by her protectors, the little man lending them a willing helping hand; and patrick and michael proceeded on their way, whilst the half-drowned wretch went up the glen, pouring out blessings upon them. without fear or interruption they now passed by the spot which had occasioned them so much dread and delay, and they soon left the roar of the lynn behind them, and at length reached the ravine of cuachan searceag, where, much to their relief, they found the whole of the party anxiously waiting for them. when the forbeses beheld patrick stewart, and, above all, when they beheld their young mistress, the daughter of their chief, safe and well among them, they rent the air with shouts of joy that made the whole glen ring again. "aye," said patrick stewart, as they sat down to rest a little while, and to take some hasty refreshment, "we may now make what noise we list, for, if the whole gang of these accursed catteranes should come upon us, we have brave hearts and keen claymores enow to meet them. but, for all that, we have too precious a charge with us to tarry for the mere pleasure of a conflict; so be stirring my men, and let us breast the hill as fast as may be." you may all well enough guess, gentlemen, how patrick stewart was received by the old lord of curgarf when he entered his hall, leading in his fair daughter safe and sound. the joy of the father was not the less, that his son, arthur the master of forbes, had returned but a brief space of time before, jaded, dispirited, and sorrowful, from his long, tiresome, and fruitless expedition. worn with anxiety, the old man had counted watch after watch of the night, and the day and the night again, until his son's arrival, and then he had sunk into the most overwhelming despair. after pouring forth thanks to heaven, and to all the saints, he now gave way to his joy. the midnight feast was spread, and all was revelry and gladness in the castle. patrick stewart was now viewed by him as his guardian angel. seeing this, arthur forbes took an opportunity of advising his friend to profit by the happy circumstance which had now placed him so high in his father's good opinion. he did so--and the result was, that he obtained the willing consent of the old lord of curgarf to his union with his daughter, the lady catherine, with the promise of a tocher which should be worthy of her. the happiness of the lovers was now complete, and the next day was spent in open and unrestrained converse between them. the time was fixed for the wedding, and then it was, after all these arrangements had been made, that patrick stewart first had leisure fully to recall to mind, all those afflicting circumstances which had taken place when he last saw his brother walter. he thought of his father--he felt the necessity of going immediately home, to relieve any anxiety which his father, sir allan, might have, in consequence of his unexplained absence, as well as to make him acquainted with his approaching marriage. he accordingly took a tender leave of his fair bride that evening, and, starting next morning, he made his way over the hills to drummin. patrick stewart was already within sight of home, when his attention was arrested by the blast of a bugle, which rang shrilly from the hill above him. it conveyed to him that private signal which was always used between his brother walter and himself. for the first time in his life it grated harshly in his ear, for it immediately brought back to his recollection those oppressively painful circumstances which had occurred at dalestie, which he had so studiously endeavoured to banish from his memory. but the strong tide of brotherly affection within him was too resistless not to sweep away every feeling connected with the past. he applied his bugle to his lips, and returned the call; and, looking up the side of the hill, he beheld walter, and a party of the clan-allan, hastening down through the scattered greenwood to meet him. "thanks be to heaven and good saint hubert that i see thee safe, my dearest patrick," said sir walter, hurrying towards him, and warmly embracing him. "hast thou forgiven a brother's anger and unkindness?" "could'st thou believe that i could for a moment remember it, my dear walter?" replied patrick, returning his embrace. "where in the name of wonder hast thou been wandering?" demanded sir walter. "where hast thou been since that night--that night of justice, yet of horror--when you disappeared so mysteriously? since that moment, when i returned home and found thee not, i have done little else, night or day, but travel about hither and thither, anxiously seeking for tidings of thee." "let us walk apart," said patrick in his ear, "and i will tell thee all that has befallen me." "willingly," said sir walter in the same tone; "for, in exculpation of myself, i would now fain pour into thy private ear all those circumstances which secretly urged me to execute that stern act of justice and necessity, which then thou could'st not comprehend, and against which thy recoiling humanity did naturally enough compel thee so urgently to protest." arm in arm the two brothers then walked on alone, at such a distance before their clansmen as might insure the perfect privacy of their talk, and long ere they reached drummin, they had fully communicated to each other all that they had mutually to impart. old sir allan had been querulous and impatient about patrick's absence, and he had been every now and then peevishly inquiring about him. but now that his son appeared, he seemed to have forgotten that he had not been always with him. he was pleased and proud when the contemplated marriage was communicated to him, and he enjoined sir walter to see to it, that every thing handsome should be done on the occasion. in this respect, sir walter's generosity required no stimulus; and if patrick was dissatisfied at all, it was with the over liberality which his brother manifested, which, in some particulars, he felt inclined to resist. "patrick," said sir walter aside to his brother, with a more than ordinarily serious air, "i give thee but thine own in advance. one day or other it will be all thine own. there is something within me that tells me that i am not long for this world. the last words of that wretch, delivered to me, as i told thee, from the midst of those flames that consumed him, were prophetic. but, be that as it may, i have never had thoughts of marrying, and now i am firmly resolved that i never shall marry, so that thou art the sole prop of our house." the entrance of the retainers, and the spreading of the evening meal, put a stop to all farther conversation between the brothers. patrick had not yet seen either the lady stradawn, or her son murdoch. on inquiry, he was told that murdoch had gone on some unknown expedition on the previous day, and that he had not yet returned. a circumstance, so common with him, excited no surprise. as for the lady stradawn, she now came swimming into the hall, with her countenance clothed in all its usual smiles. her salutation to her stepsons was full of well-dissembled warmth and affection. she hastened, with her wonted affectation of fondness, to bustle about sir allan, with the well-feigned pretence of anxiety to attend to his wants, after which she took her place at the head of the board. it was then that patrick's eyes became suddenly fixed upon her with a degree of astonishment, which, fortunately for him, the busy occupation of every one else at the table left them no leisure to observe. to his utter amazement, he beheld in her bosom that very garnet brooch which he had given to catherine forbes! his first impulse was to demand from her an explanation of the circumstances by which she had become possessed of it; but a little reflection soon enabled him to control his feelings, though he continued to sit gazing at the well-known jewel, altogether forgetful of the feast, until the lady arose to retire to her chamber. "my dearest sir allan," said she, going up to the old knight's chair to bestow her caresses on him ere she went; "my dearest sir allan, thou hast eaten nothing for these two days. what can i get for thee that may tickle thy palate into thy wonted appetite? said'st thou not something of a deer's heart, for which thou hadst a longing? 'tis a strange fancy, i'm sure." "oh, aye! very true,--a deer's heart!" said the doting old man. "very true, indeed, my love. i did dream--oh, aye--i dreamed, i say, bella, that i was eating the rosten heart of a stag--of a great hart of sixteen, [ ] killed by my boys on the hill of dalestie--aye, aye--and with arrows feathered from an eagle's wing. as i ate, and better ate, i always grew stronger and stronger, till at length i was able to rise from my chair as stoutly as ever i did in my life--ouch, aye! that day is gone! yet much would i like to eat the rosten heart of a deer; but it would need to be that of a great hart of sixteen." "my dear father, thou shalt not want that," said sir walter; "thou shalt have it ere i am a day older, if a hart of sixteen be to be found between this and loch aven." "aye, aye, walter boy, as thou sayest," said the old man; "a great hart of sixteen--else hath the heart of the beast no potency in't--aye, and killed with an arrow feathered from an eagle's wing--och, aye--hoch-hey!" though the two brothers were satisfied that this was nothing but the drivelling of age, they were not the less anxiously desirous to gratify their father's wish to the very letter. accordingly, the necessary orders were given, and the trusty dugald roy [ ] was forthwith summoned to prepare six arrows, which would have been easily supplied, with the small portions of feather which were necessary for them, from the eagle wing in sir walter's bonnet. but sir allan stopped him as he was about to tear it off. "what, sir!" exclaimed the old man testily, and in a state of agitation that shook every fibre of his frame like a palsy;--"what! wouldst thou shear the eagle plume of my boy walter, thou ill-omened bird that thou art? yonder hangs mine; it can never more appear bearing proudly forward in the foremost shock of the battle-field. och, hey, that is true! take that, thou raven! thou may'st rend it as ye list. but, my boy's!--the proud plume of mine eldest born boy!--thou shalt never take that!" "i crave your pardon, sir knight," replied dugald roy; "and now i think on't, i need not take either, for i have some spare wing feathers in my store that will do all the turn." the next morning saw sir walter and his brother patrick early on foot, dressed in their plainest hunting attire, stretching up the valley at the head of their attendants. each of the brothers had three of the eagle-winged arrows stuck into his belt; for, as both were dexterous marksmen, and as they had resolved to use their shafts against nothing else but a great hart of sixteen, they felt themselves to be thus most amply provided to insure success. fortune was somewhat adverse to them, however; for although they saw deer in abundance, they found themselves in this very part of the valley, when the day was already far spent, without having once had a chance of effecting their object. "look ye there, brother walter!" at length cried patrick stewart suddenly, as he pointed to a hart with a magnificent head, which was crossing to this side of the river, at the ford you see above yonder. "look ye there brother! there he goes at last!" "by the rood, but that is the very fellow we want," replied sir walter. "watch him! see!--he takes the hill aslant. he will not go far, if we may judge from his present pace." "i saw him walk over that open knoll in the wood high up yonder," said patrick, after some minutes of pause. "he has no mind to go farther than the dip of the hill above. i think that we are sure of finding him there. what say you brother?" "thou art right, patrick," said walter. "then do thou run on, and take the long hollow in the hill-side, beyond the big pine tree yonder. i will follow up the slack behind us here. let your sweep be wide, that we may be sure of stalking well in beyond him, so that, if we fail of getting proper vantage of him, we may be sure that we drive him not farther a-field. let us take no sleuth-hound, nor bratchet neither, lest, perchance, we cause him alarm. you, my merry men, will tarry here for us with the dogs." off went the two brothers, each in his own direction, and each with his bow in his hand, and his three arrows in his belt. in obedience to sir walter's directions, patrick hurried away to the great pine tree, and then began his ascent through the long hollow in the woody mountain's side with all manner of expedition. after a long and fatiguing climb, he began to use less speed and more caution, as he approached nearer to the somewhat less steep ground, where his hopes lay. then it was that he commenced making a long sweep around, stealing silently from tree to tree, and concealing himself, as much as he could, by keeping their thick trunks before him, and creeping along among the heather, where such a precaution was necessary. having completed his sweep to such an extent as led him to believe that he had certainly got beyond the hart, he was about to creep down the hill, in the hope of soon coming upon him, when he chanced to observe a great uprooted pine, which lay prostrated a little way farther on, and somewhat above the spot where he then was, its head rising above the heather like a great green hillock. thinking that he might as well have one peep beyond it before he turned downwards, and wishing to avail himself of its shade to mask his motions, he took a direct course towards it. but it so happened, that the hart had found it equally convenient for the same purpose, as well as for a place of outlook, for it had taken post close to it, on the farther side. descrying patrick stewart through an accidental opening in the foliage, and having no fancy to hold nearer converse with him, the creature moved slowly away. his quick and practised eye caught a view of it through the opening, as it was going away up the hill, as it happened, in a direct line. well experienced in woodcraft, he, in a loud voice, called out "hah!" as is common with red deer when in the woods, the hart made a sudden halt, and wheeled half round to listen, and in this way he placed his broadside to the hunter's eye. this was but for an instant, to be sure; but in that instant patrick stewart's arrow, passing through the break in the foliage of the pine, fixed itself deep into the shoulder of the hart. "clumsily done!" exclaimed patrick stewart from very vexation as he saw the hart bound off. "i'll warrant me the arrow-head is deep into his shoulder blade. one single finger's breadth more behind it would have made him mine own, and with all the cleverness of perfect woodcraft." patrick, baulked and disappointed, now extended his sweep, and crossed and re-crossed the ground, with the hope of meeting his brother sir walter; but as he did not succeed in falling in with him, he followed the track of the hart for some distance up the hill, until he lost every trace of his slot upon the dry summit, after which he returned with all manner of haste to make his way downwards to the party in the valley below. this he did, partly with the expectation of meeting his brother sir walter there, and partly with the intention of getting the dogs, that he might make an attempt to recover his wounded hart. there he found--not his brother sir walter--but his brother murdoch--who stood exulting over a dead stag. he was a great hart of sixteen, just such an one as he himself had been after. "thou see'st that i have the luck," said murdoch stewart triumphantly. "whence camest thou, murdoch? and how comes this?" demanded patrick. "all naturally enough, brother," replied murdoch stewart carelessly. "as i was wandering idly on the hill-side above there, i espied the people here below, so i came sauntering down to see what they were about, and to hear news of ye all. but, as my luck would have it, i had hardly been with them the pattering of a paternoster, when the very hart that thou wentest after came bang down upon me--my shaft fled--and there he lies. mark now, brother, is he not well and cleanly killed? observe--right through the neck you see. but, ha!--it would seem that thou hast spent an arrow too--for these fellows tell me that thou tookest three with thee, and methinks thou hast but twain left in thy belt." "i used one against the hart i went after," said patrick coldly. "and missed him, brother--is't not so?" said murdoch laughing. "well, i never hoped that i should live to wipe thine eye in any such fashion; for these varlets all say that this is the very hart that thou went'st after." "nay, then," replied patrick with an air of indifference; "if this be the hart i went after, i must have found another great hart of sixteen the very marrow of him; and him i have so marked, that i'll be sworn he will be known again; for i promise you that at this moment he beareth wood on his shoulder as well as on his head." "the hart thou sayest that thou sawest may be like saint hubert's stag for aught i know," said murdoch; "but it is clear, from all that these fellows say, that there lies the very hart that thou went'st forth to kill, and that is no arrow of thine that hath fixed itself in his gullet." "i did see a hart--draw my bow at a hart--and sorely wound a hart," said patrick, rather testily; "and were it not that the scent is cold, and the hour so late, i think that the sleuth-hounds there, would soon help me to prove to thee that he is as fine a hart of sixteen as this which thou hast slain." "cry your mercy, brother," said murdoch; "i knew not that such great harts of sixteen had been so rife hereabouts, as that one should start up as a butt for thine arrow the moment that the other had been lost to thee. yet it is clear that thou hast spent an arrow upon something.--ha!--by the way--where is our brother walter? they tell me that he went up the hill-side with thee." "after seeking for him on the hill-side in vain, i reckoned on finding him here," replied patrick. "but if he be within a mile of us i'll make him answer." he put his bugle to his lips, and awakened the echoes, with such sounds as were understood between sir walter and himself; but the echoes alone replied to him. "he may have met with a deer which may have led him off in pursuit over the hill," said patrick. "aye," said murdoch; "he may have fallen in with your hart of sixteen--yea, or another, for aught i know, seeing that harts of sixteen are now so rife on these hills." "fall in with what he might, he is not the man to give up his game easily," said patrick, somewhat keenly. "whatever may have befallen him," said murdoch, "we can hardly hope to see him hereabouts to-night." "i hope we may see him at drummin," said patrick; "for as the night is now drooping down so fast, he will most readily seek the straightest way thither. so, as thou hast now made sure of a great hart of sixteen for sir allan, we may as well turn our steps thitherward without more delay." on reaching drummin, patrick stewart's first inquiry was for his brother sir walter. he had not returned home; but it was yet early in the night, and he might have been led away to such a distance as to require the greater part of the night to bring him home. the hart was borne up to the hall in triumph, and exhibited before sir allan, with the arrow still sticking in his neck. the old man's countenance was filled with joy and exultation when he beheld it. the lady stradawn could not contain her triumph. "so, murdoch," said she, "thou art the lucky man who hath killed the much longed for venison! thou art the lucky man who hath brought thy father the food for which his soul so yearneth! there is something of good omen for thee in this, my boy!" "a noble head!--a great hart of sixteen, indeed," said sir allan. "aye, aye, that is a head, that is a head indeed! yet have i slain many as fine in my time. aye, aye,--but those days are gone; och, hey! gone indeed. see what a cuach his horn hath. yet that which i slew up at loch aven had a bigger cuach than this one by a great deal. as i live, you might have slaked your thirst from the hollow of it the drowthiest day you ever saw. yet this is a good hart--a noble hart of sixteen,--aye, aye! hoch-hey! but, hey! what's this? a goose-winged shaft? did i not tell ye that my dream spake of an eagle's wing? his heart will be naught after all--naught, naught--och, hey! och, hey!" "nay, we shall soon convince thee to the contrary, father," said murdoch, motioning to the attendants to lay the deer down upon the hearth. "i will forthwith break him under thine own eye, and thou shalt see, and judge for thyself." murdoch then drawing forth his knife, began to open up the animal according to the strictest rules laid down for breaking a deer, as this operation was called, and on proceeding to slit up the slough, to the great wonder of every one, it was discovered that the old man was right. the heart was indeed so very small that it might very well have been said to have been naught. murdoch was dismayed for a moment at an omen so very inauspicious, which, in his own mind, he felt was more than enough to overthrow all the fair prognostics which his mother had so evidently drawn from his success. the lady herself was equally disconcerted. "naught, naught!" whimpered sir allan. "'tis an ill omen for thee, boy. thou shalt ne'er fly with an eagle's wing--nay, nay! aye, aye! thou art ever doomed to gobble i' the muddy stagnant waters like a midden-gander.--uch, aye! och, hey!" "the fiend take the old carl for his saying!" whispered murdoch angrily aside to his mother. "amen!" replied the lady stradawn bitterly, in the same under tone. "but fear ye not, boy, thou shalt wear his eagle wing, aye, and sit in his chair to boot, ere long." this dialogue apart was unobserved by any one, and both son and mother speedily recovered their self-possession. the lady very cunningly set herself, straightway, to turn the weak and dribbling stream of sir allan's thoughts from the subject which then occupied them, to some other, which was to her less disagreeable at the moment, and she easily succeeded. patrick stewart's attention was attracted from all this superstitious trifling, as well as from what followed it, by again observing the garnet brooch, which appeared in the bosom of the lady stradawn. his thoughts were entirely occupied with it, and his eyes were from time to time rivetted on it. at length it seemed as if murdoch had somehow remarked his fixed gaze, for a private sign appeared to pass from him to his mother, after which she pleaded a sudden faintness, and left the hall, to return no more that night, and her son soon afterwards followed her. patrick stewart's mind remained filled with strange speculations regarding the jewel, until the night wore late, and he began to think anxiously about his brother sir walter. having done the last offices of attention to his father for the evening, he secretly desired dugald roy to follow him. "dugald," said he, "i am, most unaccountably, unhappy about thy master. surely, if all had been well with him he should have been here ere this? i cannot rid my mind of the idea that there is something amiss with him. he rested not, as thou knowest, when i was missing, and it would ill become me to sleep when he is absent. let us go seek for him, then, without delay." dugald roy readily assented; and both of them having dighted themselves well up for turmoil, as well as for toil, they secretly left the tower of drummin. all that night they travelled, and by daylight they had got into the range of mountains, and of forests, where they had reason to hope for tidings of sir walter. they searched through every part of the wooded side of that hill where he had last disappeared, and they visited every human dwelling within a great range around it, but all without obtaining the slightest intelligence regarding him. disappointed, and disheartened, they had returned nearly as far as where the village of tomantoul now stands, on their way home in the evening, when they met with dugald roy's brother neil. "what brought thee here, man?" demanded dugald; "and what a fiend gives thee that anxious face?" "holy saint michael, but it is well that i have foregathered with you both!" replied neil. "you must take some other road than that which leads to drummin, sir patrick. believe me, it is no place for you at this present time." "what, in the name of all the saints, hath happened to make it otherwise?" demanded patrick stewart. "cannot ye speak out at once, ye amadan ye, and not hammer like a fool that gate?" cried dugald impatiently. "patience! patience!" said neil; "patience! and ye shall know all presently. in the first place, then, master murdoch says that sir walter is murdered." "murdered!" cried patrick, in an agony of anxiety; "my brother walter murdered!--where?--when?--how?--by whom?--oh, speak, that i may hasten to avenge him! but, no!--'tis impossible!--speak!--i have mistaken thee--surely it cannot be!" "master murdoch says that it is true," replied neil. "but the worst of all is, that he hath accused thee, sir patrick, of having done the deed, with an arrow, somewhere in the wood on the hill of dalestie." "merciful saints!" exclaimed patrick; "can he indeed be such a villain? but who will believe so foul and unnatural a calumny? oh, walter, my brother, my brother! heaven above knows that thy life was ten thousand times dearer to me than mine own!" "nay," replied neil, "he hath called all the clansmen who were there to witness and to support the strong suspicions which he hath industriously raised against thee." "what argument hath he against me?" cried patrick stewart impatiently. "he says that the men who were present can testify that you and your brother, sir walter, went into the wood together," replied neil; "and that sir walter hath not been seen since; and then, he contends, that the sudden flight which you made from drummin, under the cloud of night, is enough to show that you have taken guilt home to your conscience." "and is this all?" demanded patrick stewart. "nay," replied neil, "there was more stuff of the same kind, by the use of which he hath contrived so to persuade them with his wily tongue, that they are all clamorous against thee. nay, he hath even warped the feeble judgment of sir allan himself to the same belief." "serpent that he is!" cried patrick stewart. "but let me hasten home to confront this vile traducer. my brother!--my brother walter!" continued he, bursting into tears. "my brother walter gone!--and i accused of his murder!--oh, my brother!--my dear brother! heaven above knows how willingly i would have laid down my life to have saved thine! nay, how willingly would i now lay it down at this moment, were it only to secure to me the certainty that thou art yet alive! the very thought that it may be otherwise is agony and desolation to me. but let us hasten to confront this villainy. let us hasten to revenge! for the love of heaven, let us hasten home, dugald!" "nay, my good master," said dugald weeping, "for if this sad tale be true as to sir walter's death, other master than thee, i fear me, that i now have none. neil says well that drummin is no place for thee to-night, with so sudden and tumultuous a clamour excited against thee. thine innocence will avail thee nothing. even the innocence of an angel would naught avail against the diseased judgments of men, with minds so poisoned and so possessed. be persuaded to go elsewhere, until the false and weak foundations of this most traitorous accusation fail beneath it, and the mists drop from men's eyes. who can say for certain that my beloved master, sir walter, is dead? i cannot believe in so great a calamity. what proof is there that he is dead? there is no news that his body hath been found." "nay," replied neil, "he is only amissing as i said." "thou dost well advise me, dugald," said patrick stewart after a moment's thought. "there is, as thou say'st, no proof that my brother, sir walter, is dead. it is most reasonable to believe that this may, after all, be nothing but a foolish or malicious surmise. my best hope, nay, my belief is, that it is founded on naught else; and may heaven in its mercy grant that it may prove so. i will take thine advice. i will not go to drummin at present, but i shall straightway bend my steps towards the castle of curgarf." "then shall i and neil attend thee thither, sir knight," said dugald; "for next to sir walter stewart do i assuredly owe thee fealty and service." sir patrick and his two attendants now turned off in the direction of curgarf, and the day was so far spent that the sun was setting, as they were passing over the ridge of the country lying between the aven and the don. the trees of the forest there grew thinly scattered in little stunted patches. sir patrick was walking a few paces in front of the two brothers, musing as he went, when he was suddenly surprised by a shower of arrows falling thickly on and around him. one stuck in his bonnet, another buried itself harmlessly in the folds of his plaid, a third pierced his sandal and slightly wounded his foot; and, whilst a fourth struck fire out of a large stone close to him, two more fell short of him among the heather near him. in an instant his bow and those of his attendants were bent, and their eyes being turned towards the place whence the shafts had flown, they descried some men lurking beneath one of the straggling patches of dwarf pine trees. to have stood aloof with the hope of shooting at them successfully would have been fatal, for the archery of sir patrick and his attendants could have done nothing against men so ambushed, whilst the knight and his people would have been a sure mark for their traitorous foes. "on them, my brave dugald!" cried sir patrick stewart, drawing his sword, and rushing towards the enemy. dugald roy, and his brother, neil, were at his back in a moment. before they could reach the point against which their assault was directed, several arrows were discharged at them. but so resolute, and so spirited an attack had been so little looked for by those who shot them, that they were too much appalled to take any very steady aim, so that all of them fell innocuous. seeing sir patrick and his two attendants so rapidly nearing their place of concealment, the villains thought it better to turn out, that they might receive their onset on ground where they could all act at once. six men accordingly appeared claymore in hand, and as sir patrick continued to hurry forward, he now took the opportunity of speaking hastily to dugald and neil, who were advancing to right and left of him. "draw an arrow each," said he, "and when i give you the word, stop suddenly, and each of you pick off the man opposite to you, and leave me to take my choice of the rest.--now!" the unlooked for halt was made just as the assassins were preparing to receive the on-comers on the points of their swords. the aim was sure and fatal. three men fell--and on rushed sir patrick and his two people with a loud shout. the three, who yet stood against them, were panic-struck, and, ere they could well offer defence, they were also extended writhing among the heather, in the agonies of death; and the whole matter was over in less time than it has taken for me to tell of it. but, uncertain whether the partial covert of the pine-patch might not still shelter some more enemies, they rushed in among the trees, brandishing their reeking blades. up started a youth from among some low brushwood, and ran off like a hare. neil was after him in a moment, and up to him ere he had fled twenty paces. already he had him by the hair of the head, and his claymore was raised to smite him, when patrick stewart called to his follower to stay his hand. neil obeyed, and granted the youth his life; but when he brought him in as a prisoner, what was the stewart's surprise when he discovered that he was the same individual whose life he had spared in the catterane's den. "ha!" exclaimed sir patrick; "said i not well that i questioned the wisdom of sparing thy life when we last met, thou vermin? what hast thou to urge, that i should show mercy to thee now, sir caitiff?" "oh, mercy, mercy, sir knight!" exclaimed the youth, piteously. "trust me, i came not hither willingly. i had no hand in this treacherous ambush against thy life." "appearances are woefully against thee," said patrick stewart; "yet would i not willingly do thee hurt, if thou be'st innocent. but this is no convenient time nor place to tarry for thy trial. so bring him along with thee, dugald. we shall take our own leisure to examine him afterwards; meanwhile, take especial care that he escape not." sir patrick stewart's reception at curgarf may be easily guessed at. he told of the providential escape he had made from assassination by the way; but he thought it better, as yet, to say nothing of the mysterious disappearance of his brother, sir walter, or of the traitorous accusations against himself, to which it had given rise. his resolve to be silent as to this matter was formed, because he had by this time reasoned himself into the firm persuasion that his brother's reappearance would speedily make his own innocence as clear as noonday. he was next morning happily seated in the hall, now talking with the old lord of curgarf on one subject, and again taking his opportunity of whispering to the lady catherine on another, when he suddenly recollected the brooch he had given her. it was not in her bosom. "where are the two twined hearts?" said he to her, smiling. "fear not, dearest--i am not jealous." "thou hast no cause for jealousy, dear patrick," replied the lady; "and yet, i grieve to say, that i have not the jewel. when the catteranes hurried me off from here, and just as they stopped for a little time to make up a litter, that they might the more easily carry me, one who appeared to have a certain command over them, but whose face or person i could not see in the obscurity which then prevailed, snatched it from my bosom, whilst affecting to fasten my arryssade more firmly around me. nay, look not so serious, dearest patrick! surely thou dost not doubt me in this matter?" "doubt thee, my catherine!" said sir patrick, kissing her hand with fervour; "sooner would i doubt mine own existence;--thou art pure virgin truth itself! think no more of it. thou shalt have another and a richer one anon. but say, dearest! why should we longer delay to set our own very two hearts in that indissoluble golden knot, with which the sacrament of our holy church may bind them together, so as to form a jewel, of which neither robber nor catterane can rifle us, and which cannot be rent asunder save by the iron hand of death. i have thy father's permission to move thee to shorten that cruel interval which thou hast placed between me and happiness." in such a strain as this, did he continue to urge his suit, until it was at last successful; and, to his great joy, it was ultimately arranged, with the consent of all parties, that the marriage should take place on the second day from the time i am now speaking of. the bustle of preparation began in the castle the moment the circumstance was announced; and it immediately spread far and wide everywhere around it, and went on incessantly day and night. joy was everywhere as universal among the clansmen as their devotion to the lady catherine, the bride, and their admiration of the merits of the bridegroom, could make it. the day at length arrived. the castle was crowded with all the friends and retainers of the family, who came pouring in to witness a ceremonial so interesting to them all. the priest had arrived; the castle chapel had been set in order; the bridal-chamber had been dight up; and the feast prepared; and every soul was astir to contribute, so far as in them lay, to the general felicity, as well as to share in it. the old lord of curgarf seemed to have grown young again. arthur, the master of forbes, was all life and raillery. already had the whole company been assembled within the hall. all the men-at-arms within the castle had crowded in thither. even the old warden at the gate had lowered his portcullis, and made every thing secure with bolt, bar, and chain, so that he might safely leave his post to the charge of their stubborn defences. the blushing bride, arrayed in the richest attire, had been led in, attended by her blooming maidens; and the movement towards the chapel was about to be made, so that the ceremony might go on, when suddenly a shrill bugle blast from without the gate made the very castle walls resound again. "go some of ye, and see who that may be who summons us so rudely," said the lord of curgarf. "murdoch stewart, and a party of the clan-allan, are at the gate, craving admittance," said the messenger, on his return. "son arthur," said the lord of curgarf, "get thee down quickly, and give murdoch stewart of clan-allan, the brother of this our son-in-law to be, instant entry. let the gate be opened to him, aye, and to all his people, dost thou hear? it was kind in him thus to come, on the spur of the occasion," continued the old lord, addressing patrick, after his son had gone with his attendants to obey his will--"it was kind in thy brother to come thus unasked on the spur of the moment. would that sir allan, thy father himself, could have been here." the court-yard and the stair now rang with the clink of armed men, and arthur, the master of forbes, entered, ushering in murdoch stewart, proudly attired, and followed by a formidable band of the clan-allan, whose flaring red tartans were strongly contrasted against the more modest green of those of the clan-forbes. to the no small surprise of his brother patrick, he no longer wore that appearance of youthful carelessness and indifference, under the mask of which he had hitherto disguised his true character. his bearing was now manly and lofty, suited to the command of the clan-allan, which he now seemed to have assumed. his salutation to the lord of curgarf was grave, dignified, and courteous; and, as way was made for him, he advanced, with the utmost self-possession, into the middle of the hall. "i rejoice that i have arrived thus, as it seems, in the nick of time," said he, looking around him, and bowing as he did so, but without once allowing his eyes to rest on his brother, who stood fixed in silent astonishment at what he beheld. "so do we all rejoice," replied the lord of curgarf. "had we but known that our bridal might have been thus honoured by the house of clan-allan, on so short a warning, trust me thou shouldst not have lacked our warmest bidding, as thou hast now our warmest welcome." "welcome or not, my lord," replied murdoch stewart, with a respectful reverence, "thou wilt surely thank me for this most unceremonious visit, when thou shalt know the object of it. i come to save the honour of thy house from foul disgrace: would, that in so doing, i could likewise save the honour of that which gave me birth! but although, in saving thee and thy house from dishonour, the good name of that of clan-allan must assuredly be tarnished, it shall never be said of me, that i preserved it by falsehood or infamous concealment." "of what wouldst thou speak?" demanded the lord of curgarf. "i do beseech thee, keep me, and keep this good company, no longer in suspense." "then, my good lord," replied murdoch, solemnly, "much as it pains me to utter it, and much as it must pain thee, and all present, to hear it, i must tell thee, that strong suspicions are abroad, that mine eldest brother, sir walter stewart, hath been most foully murdered, and that he, on whom thou wert now on the very eve of bestowing thine only daughter, is the foul murderer, who took an elder brother's life, to make way for the gratification of his own ambitious and avaricious desires. the circumstances are so strong against my unfortunate brother patrick, that all agree that no one else could have been the murderer." "all!--all!--all!--all! was echoed from the stern clan-allans, at the lower end of the hall. "holy saints defend us!" exclaimed the lord of curgarf, sinking into a chair. "'tis false! oh 'tis all false, father!" cried the trembling catherine forbes, rushing forward to assist her father. "infamous traitor!" cried patrick stewart; "lying and infamous traitor! where are the proofs on which you found so foul and false an accusation?" "would, for the credit of our poor house, that it were false!" said murdoch, mildly. "but it is impossible to conceal, that thou wert the last person seen in our poor brother walter's company. thou wentest up the wood with him, with three arrows in thy belt. thou camest back shortly afterwards without him. one of thine arrows was gone. thou gavest reasons for the want of it which proved to be false; and our dear brother walter hath never been since seen." "he is guilty! he, and no one else, is the murderer!" cried the men of clan-allan hoarsely. "woe is me!" said the distracted lord of curgarf, springing from his chair with nervous agitation; "the circumstances are indeed too suspicious!" "father!--father!--father, he is innocent!" cried the frantic lady catherine forbes, holding the old lord's arm. "sister," cried the master of forbes, taking the lady catherine affectionately by the hand, and speaking to her with great feeling--"dearest sister, this is indeed an afflicting trial for thee; yet, be of good courage--i have no fears of the result. patrick stewart cannot be guilty of the foul and cruel deed of which he has been accused. we must have the matter sifted to the bottom; the truth must be brought out; and, as his innocence must be thereby established, all the evil that can happen will be but the short delay of your nuptials, till he be fairly and fully cleansed from these wicked charges." "i am sent by my father," said murdoch stewart--"i am sent by my father, and that most unwillingly, to demand his son patrick as a prisoner. forgive me, my good lord of curgarf, for thus daring to execute his paternal order under your roof.--men of clan-allan, seize and bind patrick stewart!" "hold!" cried dugald roy, in a voice like thunder--"hold, men of clan-allan! lay not a hand upon him, to whom, if my dear master sir walter be indeed gone, ye must all soon, in the course of nature, swear fealty as your chieftain. he is guiltless of my beloved master's murder, though murdered, i fear, he hath most foully been. but here is one who can tell more of this cruel and wicked deed. come hither boy, and tell us what thou may'st know of this mysterious matter." dugald roy then led forward the youth whom he had brought prisoner to curgarf, of whose very existence sir patrick stewart had lost all recollection, amidst the tumult of joy in which he had been so continually kept by his approaching nuptials. the lady catherine forbes started with surprise when she beheld him; but the countenance of murdoch stewart turned as pale as a linen sheet at the sight of him. "what hast thou to say, young man, to the clearing up of this dark and cruel mystery?" demanded the lord of curgarf. "my lord, i saw sir walter stewart of clan-allan murdered," said the youth in a tremulous voice. "i saw him shot to the death by the arrow of ewan cameron, one of the band of catteranes." "how camest thou to have been in any such evil company?" demanded the lord of curgarf. "trusting to have mercy at your hands, my lord, i will tell my whole story as shortly as i can, if thou wilt but listen to me," replied the youth. "i was prentice to a craftsman in the town of banff, a man who wrought in gold and silver. being one day severely chidden by my master for some unlucky fault, the devil entered into me, and i resolved to be revenged of him. having become known to the captain of a certain band of catteranes, i stole my master's keys, and gave them to him, so that he and his gang were enabled to rifle the goldsmith's stores of all his valuables. in dread of punishment i fled with them to their den in the hills, where they afterwards kept me in thrall to do their service. the lady, thy daughter, can tell thee that i was there when she was brought in by them, and had not sir patrick stewart left me bound when he spared my life, they would have certainly taken it on their return, in their rage and fury at her escape; but, fortunately, i was lying quite out of their way at the moment, and was not discovered till they had somewhat cooled. finding that their retreat had been found out, they hastily abandoned it, and dispersed themselves through the hills. on the day that followed after that, we were all collected together to meet our captain; and after two days more, a breathless messenger came early in the morning to tell him something which was kept secret from all else. there were but few of the band with him at the time; but these were ordered to arm on the sudden; and even i, who had never been called out on any expedition until that day, was commanded to arm like the rest. "our small party marched off in all haste, and about mid-day we were planted in ambush on the side of a hill above the aven. our captain seemed to be restless and anxious. he moved about from place to place, stretching on tiptoe from the top of every knoll, and sometimes climbing the tallest pine trees, in order to scan the valley below more narrowly. at length, as it grew late in the afternoon, he took a long look from one point, and then, as if he had at last made some discovery of importance, he suddenly moved us off into a thicket, which grew on the edge of a considerable opening in the wood on the hill-side; and i would know that opening again, for it had the green quaking bog of a well-head in the very midst of it. "we had not stood long there, till a man in very plain attire, with a bow in his hand, came up from the thick wood below, and began to pass aslant the open space. 'there goes a good mark for an arrow,' said the captain of the band. 'shoot at him, my men.'--'he is not worth a shaft,' replied some of his people. 'he is a poor fellow who hath nothing in his sporran to pay for the killing of him.'--'no matter,' said ewan cameron, 'he hath a good pair of sandals on him; and my brogues are worn to shreds--so, here goes at him.' and just as the man was passing along the bank close above the well-eye, the arrow fled, and pierced him to the heart. 'well shot, ewan!' cried the captain, in a strange ecstasy of joy; 'thou shalt have gold for that shot of thine.' so instant was his death, that he sprang high into the air, and his body fell headlong and without life into the very middle of the bog, with a force that buried it in its yielding mass, so high, that nothing was seen of him but his legs. ewan hastened to the place, quietly took off the sandals from the dead man, threw off his own brogues, and put on the sandals in place of them, and then the captain himself ran eagerly to help him to force the corpse downwards into the bog; and this they did till the green moss closed over the soles of its feet. i then knew not who the murdered man might be,--and the deed was no sooner done, than our captain ordered us to make our way back, as fast as we could travel, over the hills, whilst he left us to go directly down into the glen. "early next morning, a messenger again came to us; and five picked archers were sent out under the orders of ewan cameron. i was directed to accompany them; and i marvelled much why i, who was so inexperienced, should be required to go on an expedition where they seemed to be so very particular in choosing their men. but ewan cameron soon let me into the secret. 'thou knowest the person of patrick stewart of clan-allan, dost thou not?' said he to me.--'if that was he who took the lady from the cave, and left me bound, replied i, 'then have i reason to remember him right well.'--'then must i tell thee, that we are now sent forth expressly to hunt for him, and to take his life,' replied ewan; 'and if thou would'st fain preserve thine own, thou wilt need to look sharply about thee, that thou mayest tell me when thou seest him.'--'who covets to have his life?' demanded i.'--'he who made me take the life of his brother walter, for those sandals which i now wear,' said ewan.--'what! our captain?' exclaimed i; 'that must be in revenge, because sir patrick stewart took the lady from him.'--'partly so, perhaps,' replied ewan; 'but i am rather jealous that our captain's greatest fault to sir patrick stewart is, that he, like his brother, sir walter stewart, was born before him. knowest thou not, that our captain is no other than murdoch stewart, the third son of old sir allan of stradawn?' i was no sooner made aware of this, than--" the youth would have proceeded, but the loud murmur of astonishment and horror that arose every where throughout the hall, so drowned his voice, that he was compelled to stop. "holy saint michael, what a perfect villain thou art!" exclaimed the old lord of curgarf, darting a look of indignant detestation at murdoch stewart. "thou wouldst not condemn a stranger unheard," said murdoch, calmly. "nay," replied the lord of curgarf, "thou shalt have full justice. we shall hear thee anon. but let this youth finish his narrative, which would seem to be pregnant with strange and horrible things." "i have but little more to say," continued the youth. "gratitude to sir patrick stewart, for having spared my life, when his own security might have required the taking of it, at once resolved me against betraying him to slaughter. ewan cameron marched us straight away to the hill, which rises above the track that leads from the little place of tomantoul to the river don, and there he kept us sitting, for some time, watching, till we espied three men coming along the way. whilst they were yet afar off i knew one of them to be the very person whom the murderers were in search of. 'is that sir patrick stewart that comes first yonder?' demanded ewan.--'i cannot tell at this distance,' said i; 'but i think the man i saw in the cave was much taller than that man.'--'that is a tall man,' said ewan; 'take care what thou sayest, or thou mayest chance to have thy stature curtailed by the whole head.'--'i say what is true,' said i; 'no man could know his own father at that distance.'--'then will i assert that thou sayest that which is a lie,' said one of the party; 'for great as the distance may be, i know that to be sir patrick stewart. i mean that man who comes first of the three.'--'let us down upon him without loss of time then,' cried ewan; 'and do you come along, sirrah! thou shalt along with us; and, when our work is done, we shall see whether we cannot find the means of refreshing thy memory.' having uttered these words, ewan hurried us all down to the covert of a small patch of stunted pines, that grew on the flat ground below. there we lay in ambush till sir patrick stewart, and his two attendants, came within bowshot, and there, as is already known to most here, the six assassins were speedily punished for their wicked attempt, and i became sir patrick stewart's prisoner." "now," said the lord of curgarf, addressing himself to murdoch, "what hast thou to say in answer to all this?--what hast thou to answer for thyself?" "i say that the young caitiff is a foul liar!" cried murdoch violently. "he is a foul liar, who hath been taught a false tale, to bear me down." "he may be a liar," said the lord of curgarf; "but his story hangs marvellously well together." "who would dare to condemn me on his unsupported testimony?" demanded murdoch, boldly. "here is one who is ready to support his tale," said michael forbes, pressing forward, and pushing before him a strange looking little man, with a long red beard, and a head of hair so untamed, that it hung over his sharp sallow features in such a manner, as, for some moments, to render it difficult for sir patrick stewart to recognise in him, the man whom he had saved from his perilous position in the salmon creel, at the lynn of aven. "ha!--grigor beg!" cried murdoch stewart, betrayed by his surprise, at beholding him; "what a fiend hath brought thee hither?--but thou--thou can'st say nothing against me." "i fear i can say nothing for thee, murdoch stewart," said the little man, darting a pair of piercing eyes towards him, from amidst the tangled thickets of his hair. "nor is it needful for me now to say all i might against thee. but here, as i understand, thou hast basely and falsely accused thy brother sir patrick stewart of murdering his elder brother sir walter. now, i saw ewan cameron shoot down sir walter stewart with an arrow; and it was done at thy bidding too, for i was by, on the hill-side, when thou didst give to ewan cameron his secret order to slay thy brother, and when thou didst teach him to do the deed, as if it were an idle act, done against a stranger." "lies!--lies!--a very net-work of lies, in which to ensnare me!" cried murdoch. "but who can condemn me for another's death, who, for aught that we know truly, may yet appear alive and well?" "thou hadst no such scruple in condemning thine innocent brother, sir patrick," said the lord of curgarf; "yet shall no guilt be fixed upon thee, till thy brother's death be established beyond question. meanwhile thou must be a bounden prisoner, till the truth be clearly brought to light." "men of clan-allan! will ye allow him who must be your chieftain to be laid hands on in the house of a stranger?" cried murdoch stewart aloud. "you are armed; use your weapons then, and leave not a man alive!" a thrill of horror ran through every bosom. there were brave men enough of the clan-forbes there, to have made head against three times the number of clan-allans that now stood, armed to the teeth, and in a firm body, at the lower end of the hall; but there was not a man of the forbeses, who, if not altogether unarmed, had any weapon at all to defend himself with but his dirk. those who had such instruments were drawing them, whilst others were rushing to the walls, to arm themselves with whatsoever weapons they could most easily reach, and pluck down thence. the noise and bustle of the moment was great, when, all at once, there fell a hush over the turbulence of the scene. "stir not a man of clan-allan!" cried sir patrick to the stewarts, who stood in their array, like a heavy and portentous thundercloud. "stir not, men of clan-allan!--stir not a finger, i command you!" "sir patrick stewart is our young chieftain!" broke like a roll of heaven's artillery from the clan-allans. "sir patrick stewart is our young chieftain! murdoch is a foul traitor and murderer! bind him, bind him! let him be the prisoner, and let us have him forthwith justified!" "nay, nay," cried sir patrick; "bind him if you will, but lay not your hands upon his life. this day, my catherine," said he, turning to the lady, and addressing her tenderly and sorrowfully; "this day, that was to have been to me so full of joy, must now, alas! be the first of that doleful time, which, in the bereavement of my heart, i must devote to mourning for my beloved brother walter. my first duty is to go and seek for his remains; and in following out this most sad and anxious search, i must crave thy presence, my lord of curgarf, and thine, too, arthur, with that of such of our friends as may be disposed to go forth with us, to aid us in so painful a quest." the wishes of sir patrick stewart were readily agreed to. the nuptials were for the present postponed; and instead of the marriage-feast, some hasty refreshment was taken, preparatory to their immediate departure on their melancholy search. the treacherous murdoch stewart was now given in charge, as a manacled prisoner, to those very clan-allans, at the head of whom he had come, so triumphantly, to fix a false accusation on his brother sir patrick. with them too went the youth, and the little man, grigor beg, who had given their evidence against murdoch. the old lord of curgarf's quiet palfrey was led forth; and he set forward, attended by arthur the master of forbes, sir patrick stewart, and a considerable following of those who were led to accompany him by duty, or from curiosity. they first visited the scene of the attempted assassination of sir patrick stewart. the spot where the six catteranes were slain, was easily discovered, by the flock of birds of prey that sat perched upon the tops of the dwarf pines, or that wheeled over them in whistling circles; whilst every now and then, some individual, bolder than the rest, would swoop down on the heath, to partake of the banquet which had been spread upon it for them. that some considerable share of courage was required to enable these creatures to do this, was proved to the party, who, on their nearer approach, scared away a brace of hungry, gaunt-looking wolves, who had been employed in ravenously tearing at the bodies, and dragging them hither and thither with bloody jaws; as well as an eagle, who had dared to sit a little way apart, to feed upon one of the carcases, in defiance of his ferocious four-footed fellow-guests. the spectacle was shocking to all who beheld it. but one object of their search was gained; for, on examination, patrick recognised his brother walter's sandals, which were removed from the feet of the corpse of ewan cameron, and taken care of--thus so far corroborating the testimony of the youth. having completed their investigations in this place, they piled heaps of stones over the bodies on the spot where they lay, and the party then pursued their way, over the mountain, towards the alleged scene of sir walter stewart's murder. providence seemed to guide their steps;--for, as they passed over the brow of the wooded hill that dropped down towards the aven, they scared away two ravens from a hollow place in the heath; and, on approaching the spot, they discovered the well-picked bones of a deer. his head showed him to have been an unusually fine great hart of sixteen. an arrow was sticking so deeply fixed through the shoulder-blade, as to satisfy all present, that its point must have produced death, very soon after the animal had received it. "as i hope for mercy, there is the very arrow that was lacking of sir patrick's three!" cried dugald roy, triumphantly. "see--there is the very eagle's feather which i put on it, with mine own hand! and, look--there is the cross, which i always cut on the shaft, to give them good luck. no shaft of mine, so armed, ever misses, when righteously discharged. but for foul or treacherous murther, i'll warrant me, that the most practised eye could never bring it to a true aim. but" added he, as he very adroitly dislocated out the shoulder-bone, as highlanders are wont, and then possessed himself of the shoulder-blade, arrow and all--"i'll e'en take this arrow with me, with the bone just as it is, as a dumb but true witness in a righteous cause." led by the directions which they received from grigor beg, they now descended through the forest, till they came to that very well-eye you see yonder--for that was the very individual place, that both the old man and the youth had described as the scene of sir walter's murder. they had used the precaution to bring with them implements for digging; and, by means of these, a few sturdy fellows were soon enabled to make an opening into the lower end of the quaking bog, so as very quickly to discharge the pent-up water within it. the green surface then gradually subsided, and the legs of a human being, with hose on, but without sandals, began to appear, sticking out, with the feet upwards; and, by digging a little around it, they soon succeeded in bringing the body of sir walter stewart fully to light. it was in all respects unchanged. the fatal arrow was deeply buried in his left breast; his bow was firmly grasped in his hand; and his three eagle-winged shafts were in his belt. the small unplumed bonnet which he usually wore, when dressed for following the deer, was fast squeezed down on his head, by the pressure which had been exerted to sink him. how differently were the two brothers, patrick and murdoch stewart, affected by the harrowing spectacle which was now brought before their eyes! murdoch shed no tear--yet his features were strongly agitated. he looked at the corpse with averted eyes, and shuddered as he looked; whilst his face became black, and again deadly pale, twenty times alternately. sir patrick stewart, on the other hand, threw himself, in an agony of tears, on the cold and dripping body of his murdered brother, as it lay exposed on the bank; and, unable to give utterance to his grief, he clasped it to his bosom, and lavished fond, though unavailing caresses on it. in vain he essayed, with as much tenderness as if his brother could have still felt the pain he might thereby have given him, to pluck forth the arrow, deeply buried in the fatal wound. all present were overcome by this sad scene;--but poor dugald roy hung over them, and sobbed aloud, till the violence of his grief recalled sir patrick stewart to himself again. "aye!" said dugald roy; "that is a murderous shaft indeed! a good cloth-yard in length, i'll warrant me; and feathered, too, from the wing of some ill-omened grey goose, that was hatched in some western sea-loch. this is no arrow of the make of aven-side, else am i no judge of the tool. no cross upon this, i'll be sworn. no, no.--by st. peter, but it hath murther in the very look of it! aye, and there are the true arrows of the cross in his belt!--these are of my winging, every one of them. little did i think, when i stuck them into my poor master's girdle, that this was to be the way in which i was to find them! would that he had but gotten fair play! would that he had but got his eye on the villains ere they slew him! if he had but gotten one glimpse of them, by the rood, but every cross of these shafts would have been eager to have dyed itself red in the blood of their cowardly hearts!" the body of sir walter stewart was now wrapped up in a plaid, and fastened lengthwise upon two parallel boughs, and it was borne towards drummin. their movements were so slow, and so often interrupted, that it was dark night long ere they came to the place of their destination. sir patrick stewart felt the necessity of preparing his father, sir allan, for the coming scene, as well as for the reception of the lord of curgarf, and his son, the master of forbes. he therefore resolved to hurry on before the party, that he might have a private meeting with the old knight, before their arrival. but being fully aware that sir allan's mind had been already filled with those iniquitous falsehoods, which his wicked brother, murdoch stewart, had engendered against him, he thought it prudent to take with him dugald roy, and two other men of the clan-allans, that they might be prepared, if necessary, to support his justification of himself. as sir patrick stewart, and his small escort, approached the outer gate of the castle of drummin, they perceived that it was shut. dugald had no sooner observed this circumstance, than he made a signal to the knight to remain silent, and then he advanced quietly to the little wicket in the middle of the gate, and knocked gently. "who is there?" demanded the warder, from within. "open the wicket, man, without a moment's tarrying," replied dugald. "is that thee, dugald roy?" demanded the warder. "who else could it be?" replied dugald. "it may be that any other might have done as well," replied the warder gruffly. "thou wentst not forth with murdoch stewart;--art thou of his company at the present time?" "what matter though i went not forth with him, if i come home in his company?" replied dugald readily. "is he with thee, then?" demanded the warder. "to be sure he is," cried dugald impatiently. "come, man! he is close at hand, i tell thee. come! art thou to keep us standing here all night? by all that's good, he is coming upon us;--and, if he be detained but the veriest fraction of a prod-flight, thou shalt surely have a cudgelling for thy supper. come man!--open i tell thee." the huge iron bolts were now withdrawn from their fastenings, the key grated among the rough wards of the lock, and the wicket was thrown back, whilst the warder, peering through the opening, seemed as if he were inclined to know something more of those without, before he removed his own bulky person, that still blocked the passage. but dugald, stooping his head, sprang through the low aperture, and throwing his skull right into the poor fellow's stomach, with the force of a battering-ram, he laid him sprawling on his back. "hech!" cried the warder, as he fell. "hech me!" "old fool that thou art!" cried dugald, taking up the first word of quarrel with him; "who was to think that thou wert to be standing in the very midst of the way?--yet i hope i have not hurt thee, for all that. thou knowest, rory, that i had rather hurt myself than thee." "nay, nay," said the old man, with a surly sort of acquiescence, as he was slowly raising himself from the ground by means of dugald's assistance; during which operation patrick stewart, wrapped up in his plaid, and followed by the other two men, had made good his entrance into the court-yard. "nay, nay, i am not hurt. i'm no such eggshells, i'faith. yet what a fiend made thee so impatient? i behooved to be careful who i let in, seeing that i was strictly charged to open to none but murdoch stewart himself there," pointing to sir patrick, who was standing a few paces aloof. "more by token, i required to be all the warier, seeing that there was none living within the walls, besides myself, save the old knight sir allan, and the lady stradawn." "how comes that?" demanded dugald; "though so many went to curgarf, there were still some left behind, surely." "true enough, true enough," replied the warder. "but i know not what hath possessed the lady. they have all been sent hither and thither, on some errand or another;--even the very women folk have all gone forth." sir patrick stewart stood to hear no more, but making a signal to dugald and the others to follow him, he crossed the court-yard towards the door of the keep tower, where they stood aside, whilst he knocked gently, yet loud enough to be heard in the hall above. soon afterwards, a timid and unsteady footstep was heard descending the stair. "open, good mother," said sir patrick. "oh, how thankful i am that thou art come!" said the lady stradawn, mistaking him for her son murdoch, their voices being a good deal like to each other, and opening the door, pale and trembling, with a lamp in her hand, which the gust immediately extinguished. "a plague on the wind, my lamp is out! but oh, i am thankful that thou art come! 'tis fearful to be left alone in the house with a dead man, and one, too----oh 'twas fearful!" "dead!" cried sir patrick, with an accent of horror, which might have betrayed him, but for the agitation which then possessed her whom he addressed. "a dead man, saidst thou?" "aye!" replied the lady, in a hollow tone, "aye! i saw that thou hadst yearnings. yet, after all, it was but giving him ease, by ridding him of a lingering life of pain. it was kindness, in truth, to help him away from such misery. yet, 'tis no marvel that thou, who art his very blood, should have some compunction. but thou mayest be at rest now, for he is gone beyond thy help, or that of any one else." "gone!" exclaimed sir patrick again--"gone! how did he die?" "horribly! most horribly!" replied the lady, shuddering. "it was fearful to behold him in his agonies! knowing, as i did, the potency of the poison, i could hardly have believed that the old man would have taken so long to die." "horrible!" exclaimed sir patrick, involuntarily. "aye, it was horrible!" replied the lady; "horrible indeed, as thou wouldst have said if thou hadst seen it. for a moment, the poison seemed to have given him new strength, and he rose from his chair as if he would have done vengeance on me. 'twas fearful to behold him!" "art sure he is quite dead?" said sir patrick again. "aye," replied the lady, "as dead as his son walter; so dead, as to make thee surely the laird of stradawn, the moment that thou shalt have made as sicker of patrick, as we may now soon hope thou wilt be able to do. i did but help him, as i was saying, out of the pains and wretchedness of old age and dotage. yet it was an awful work for me. and oh, his last look was fearful! i wish i may ever be able to get rid of it! would that thou couldst have steeled thyself up to have done it thyself murdoch! but come in--come in quickly! hast thou secured the prisoner?" "i have," replied sir patrick, now exerting a certain degree of command over his feelings; "he will be here anon." "that is well," replied the lady stradawn; "then all is thine own. his trial must be short, and his execution speedy. but come, we have much to do to make things seemly ere they arrive. he must appear to have died of a broken heart, caused by the wickedness of his son. every thing suspicious must be removed from about him. i could not dare to touch him. why stand ye so long hesitating? but 'tis no wonder, for i could not look upon him myself without fancying that the devil was grinning over my shoulder. 'tis horrible to think on't! but come," continued she, as she at last seemed to summon up resolution to climb the stair; "lock the door, murdoch, and follow me up quickly, for we have no time to lose." sir patrick stewart made a signal to dugald and the others, and then ascended to the hall after the lady stradawn. a deathlike silence prevailed within it. a single lamp was glimmering feebly on a sconce at the upper end of it: and there stood the lady, pale and trembling, at that side of the chimney which was farthest from sir allan's chair. sir patrick, in his agitation, moved hurriedly forward; and the moment the light of the lamp fell upon his features, the lady uttered a loud scream, and swooned away upon the floor. the spectacle that now met his eyes harrowed up his very soul. his father lay dead in his chair, with his features and his limbs fixed in the last frightful convulsion, by which the racking poison had terminated his existence. his mouth was twisted, his tongue thrust out, and his eyeballs so fearfully staring, that even his tenderly affectionate son felt it a dreadful effort to look upon that, which used to be to him an object of the deepest veneration and love. beside his chair was the small table, on which he was usually served with his food. there stood a silver porringer containing the minced meat, which his extreme age required; and notwithstanding all that the lady stradawn had said to the contrary, the operation of the poison seemed to have been so quick, as to have mortally affected him, ere he had taken the fourth part of the mess that had been provided for him. sir patrick was overpowered by his feelings. he sank into a chair, and covering his face with his hands, he gave way to his grief, in which he remained so entirely absorbed, that neither the entrance of dugald, nor the thundering which some time afterwards took place at the outer gate, nor the noise of the many voices of those who came pouring in, were sufficient to arouse him. dugald roy had the presence of mind to hurry down to the court-yard, to prepare the lord of curgarf, and those who came with him, for the dreadful spectacle they were to witness. thunderstruck and shocked by his intelligence, they crowded up to the hall, where the general horror was for some time so great, as to render every one incapable of acting; but at length they gathered sufficient recollection to bestir themselves. the poisoned porringer was first carefully preserved; the lady stradawn was carried off in strong fits to her apartment; the body of sir walter stewart was borne up into the hall; and there, after undergoing the necessary preparations used on such occasions, the father and son were laid out in state together, and the couches on which the bodies rested were surrounded by so great a multitude of wax tapers, as to exchange the melancholy gloom of the place into a blaze of light, which, reflected as it was from the various pieces of armour that glittered in vain pomp upon the walls, shone but to produce a greater intensity of sadness. the good priest of dounan was sent for; and the appalling news having spread quickly around, the retainers began to swarm into the castle, from all quarters, in sorrowing groups, full of lamentation. meanwhile the lord of curgarf and his son, the master of forbes, occupied themselves in soothing the afflicted sir patrick stewart, and in aiding and encouraging him to go through with those trying and painful duties which this most afflicting occasion demanded of him. food and wine had been carried to the lady stradawn, where she sat alone in her bower, so deeply sunk in remorse, and dejection, and dread, as to be quite unconscious of the entrance or departure of those who brought her these comforts. those who were compelled to be the bearers of them, gazed on her with fear, and hastened from her with expedition, and no one else could be persuaded to go near her, even her woman refused to remain with her, as something accursed, so that she was left abandoned by all, as a prey to her evil thoughts. had any one ventured to look in upon her, as she sat motionless in her great chair, with a lamp flickering on a table beside her, and throwing an uncertain light by fits and snatches on her face, now pale and fixed as marble,--and on her glazed and tearless eyes, and her dry and withered lips, he might have fancied that she was already a corpse; yet deep, deep was the mental agony that she felt. the midnight watch had been set, and all had been for some time silent within the walls of drummin, save the distant hum of the subdued voices of those who, according to custom, sat waking the corpses in the hall, when the door of the lady stradawn's bower opened, and her son murdoch appeared. if the spirit of her murdered husband had arisen before her eyes, she could not have started with more astonishment, or recoiled with greater apparent horror. "murdoch!" cried she, in a loud and agitated voice, "is it thee, murdoch?"--and then, sinking back into the same fixed and motionless attitude, whence she had been thus momentarily aroused, she added, in a faint, low, and feeble tone, "murdoch!--would that thou hadst never been born!" "mother," said murdoch, calmly shutting the door behind him, and taking a seat beside her chair, "i have heard all from nicol, the playfellow of my boyhood, who chanced to be set to guard me, in the apartment below. i wished to see thee ere we die; and i purchased from the sordid wretch this midnight hour--this last hour of privacy with thee." "ha!" cried the lady stradawn, with a strange and sudden transition from the apathy and torpor of despair, to the most energetic anxiety of hope; "if nicol did that for thee, why may we not bribe him to open a way for us through those who guard the gate?--quick!--quick!--quick!--oh, let us quickly escape!--oh, let us not tarry one moment longer! there are my keys; we have treasure in that cabinet, which may well bribe him, and yet leave us rich!" "be composed, my most worthy mother," said murdoch stewart; "there is not the shadow of a chance for us in that way. the door of the keep is doubly barred, and doubly guarded, and no one leaves it unexamined beneath the light of a blazing torch. the whole men-at-arms and clansmen within the walls, infuriated against us, are of their own free will engaged in vigilant watching. the portcullis is down, the gate barricaded, the barbican manned, and the walls surrounded by patroles. mother, cast aside all such hopes as useless, for as the guilt of both of us must soon appear as clear as to-morrow's noonday, so that sun, which shall certainly arise to-morrow morning, shall as surely look upon our graves ere he sets." the lady stradawn sank again into the chair, from which the sudden impulse of hope had so energetically raised her, and, groaning deeply, she relapsed into her former state of deathlike stillness, broken only by the long drawn sob that at certain intervals convulsed her whole frame. "mother!" said murdoch stewart, after a pause; "where are all the fruits of that career of crime for which thou nursed me as an infant, tutored me as a boy, and prompted me as a man? have i not followed thy bidding through deceit, robbery, and murder, and where is now my reward?--thine is locked up there in that secret cabinet of glittering toys, which to-morrow thou must leave, to go out to be hanged by the neck on the gallows-tree, with the son, whom thou wouldst have had lord of the aven, grinning at thee like a caitiff cur from the farther end of its beam--" "oh!--oh--ho!" cried the agonized woman, shaken through every limb by the palsy of her fears; "is there no--no deliverance for us?" "yes," said murdoch stewart, calmly; "yes, there is a deliverance, and a speedy one too." "oh, name it!" cried the frantic woman; "oh, name it! and quickly let us avail ourselves of it!" "here it is," said murdoch stewart, quietly taking a small paper packet from his bosom; "here it is, mother. a few small pinches of this powder, mingled in a cup of that wine, will snatch us both from the torture of being made a disgraceful public spectacle to-morrow--of being gazed at by the vulgar eyes, and pointed at by the vile fingers of those wretched serfs, and their grovelling mates and spawn, whom, a little better luck and better fortune for us, had by that time made the abject slaves of our will. see! here it is mingled, already it is dissolved, and now the draught is potent. good mother, i pledge thee," said he, drinking down half of what the goblet contained; "and now here is thy share." "no,--no,--no!--i cannot!--no, i cannot!" cried the lady stradawn, with frantic horror in her averted eyes. "then do i tell thee, mother mine," said murdoch stewart sternly; "thou hast not trained me up to deal in deeds of blood and death for naught. i shall never suffer thy womanish fears to bring the disgrace of the gallows upon thee. i love thee too much for that. see here, good mother! 'tis but a choice of deaths. here is a concealed dagger, look you. say! wouldst thou bring one more murder--the murder of a mother on my already overburdened soul, to sink it deeper in that sea of torment, to which these priests would fain have us believe that those, who, like us, have used the wit and the strength with which they have been gifted, for bettering their own condition in this world, must hasten from hence. drink! or by every fiend that suffers there, thou diest in the instant!" the lady stradawn glared at her son with a vacant stare, as if all reason had fled from her. she took the cup mechanically from his hand, and drained it to the bottom. "what hast thou done?" cried the man-at-arms, who had been brought to the door by the violent tone of some of murdoch stewart's last words, and who rushed in just as the lady stradawn had swallowed the poison. "do what thou wilt now, nicol," said murdoch stewart, with perfect composure; "we are both beyond thy power, or that of any one else within the castle of drummin." nicol at once guessed at what had happened, and ran instantly for the priest. the good father of dounan was deeply skilled in medicine, as well as in divinity. he called for assistance, and antidotes were forcibly given to murdoch stewart, and passively received by his mother the lady stradawn. their wretched existence was thus prolonged, though death could not be altogether averted. they lingered on, in great pain, for many days, during which all judicial proceedings were suspended. the pious priest lost not one moment of this precious time. by exerting all his religious learning, and all his eloquence, he at length succeeded in bringing both of them to a full sense of the enormity of their guilt, as well as to an ample confession of all their crimes. it is not for us to interpret the decrees of the almighty in such a case as theirs; but if the apparent deep contrition that followed was real, and heartfelt, we may trust that the mercy, as well as the benefit of the merits of that blessed saviour, who died for us all upon the cross, even for the thief that was crucified with him, was extended to them, dreadful as their crimes had been. my legend now draws to a hasty conclusion. the days of mourning were fully numbered by sir patrick stewart, for his murdered father and brother. the kindness of the old lord of curgarf, and his son arthur master of forbes, towards him, was unwearied and most consolatory. nor were the delicate affections of the lady catherine forbes less tenderly or unremittingly displayed, so that, in due time, by becoming her husband, he bound himself to both his friends by the closest and dearest ties. in pious remembrance of his brother sir walter's murder, he erected the pillar of stone i spoke of, as that which stood so long by the side of the well-eye where he was slain; but he refrained from inscribing any thing upon it, lest his doing so might have revived the recollection of murdoch stewart's atrocity. he likewise ordered a stone to be set up, where the proud priest of dalestie was burned, rather as a sort of expiation of the stern act of justice, which his brother sir walter had inflicted upon him, than to perpetuate the detested memory of the depraved wretch who suffered there. fate of the ould auncient monuments. clifford.--(as we arose to pursue our journey.)--and what became of these two monuments, serjeant stewart? serjeant.--a certain gentleman, who was building a house somewhere in this neighbourhood, (for i had rather not designate him too particularly,) cast his eyes on the fine stone that stood by the well-eye, and perceiving that it would make an excellent lintel, he took immediate measures to get it carried off to his rising edifice. having accomplished his intention, with no little difficulty, it was speedily employed in the building, where it promised to conduct itself with the same quiet and decorum which were observed by all the other stones of the edifice, after being put to rest, each in his separate bed of mortar. but no sooner did the house come to be inhabited, than it began to be haunted by strange and mysterious noises. some of these were quite unintelligible, for they resembled no earthly sound that had ever been heard before. then long conversations began, and were continued, in small sharp clear voices; but although the words fell distinctly enough on the ears of those who heard them, the language was as a sealed book to them. and ever and anon the seeming dialogue would be interrupted by strange uncouth fits of laughter, as if of several persons together, or in different parts of the premises, that were so far from creating a corresponding disposition to mirth or merriment in the listeners, that they froze up the very blood in their veins. but this was not all. the most dismal croaking of frogs arose in every part of the house. you would have sworn that the creatures were in the cup-boards--the presses--the chimnies--in the beds--on the floors--nay, on the very tables, and among the dishes which the good folks of the family had set before them. it was as if the frogs, that formed the great plague in egypt, had filled the house with their hoarse voices. one would begin as if he were the leader of the band, and then others would start off, one after another, till the doleful chorus, resounding from all quarters, made the concert loud and sonorous. it was no uncommon thing, during the dark and dreary watches of the night, for the voice of the leader, which had something peculiarly striking in it, to arise of a sudden, as if he that uttered it was sitting astraddle on the nose of the goodman of the house. in vain was the hand applied to the organ, to drive off what, in reality, appeared to be the organist. there was nothing there; yet the sound continued as if it had come from the deepest pipe in the organ loft of some cathedral, yea, of that of the great organ of haerlem itself. the more he rubbed the more it grew, and the louder and more universal became the chorus. his very nose itself increased in size, from the frequent and severe rubbings to which it was thus subjected, whilst he began to grow thin and emaciated in proportion, till his whole person at length appeared rather as if it had been an appendage to his nose, than his nose an appendage to his person. at last, being worn out in spirit, as he was very nearly in body also, he was fain to take out the stone from the building, and to carry it back to the hill-side again, and then, to be sure, he enjoyed perfect quiet. clifford.--a sensible man, truly. but what had evil spirits or fairies to do with a monumental stone? serjeant.--nothing that i can see, sir, except that being guilty of so impious a deed as the removal of such a stone, he was for a time left unprotected by all good angels, and consequently he was altogether at the mercy of those evil ones. grant.--very well made out, mister serjeant. but where is the stone now? serjeant.--why, sir, i am sure you will hardly believe me when i tell you, that a few years ago it was wantonly destroyed by another gentleman, who shall be also nameless. grant.--what a goth he must have been! why should you conceal his name, serjeant?--it deserves to be held up to public reprobation serjeant.--i know my own interest too well to be the officious person who shall publish it though. yet i must own that it would have served him right that it should have been so marked. what do you think he did, gentlemen? happening to be in this part of strathdawn, he, without rhyme or reason, and out of sheer wickedness, ordered his people to break both that and the clach-na-tagart, or the priest's stone, which shocking pieces of barbarism he took care to see executed in his own presence, whilst he stood by, like a mischievous baboon, chuckling over their destruction. clifford.--the fellow deserved to have been plunged over head and ears into the wallee in the first place, and after being thus well soaked, he ought to have been leisurely consumed at the priest's stone, like a well watered sack of newcastle coals. serjeant.--why, sir, i must allow that he has been punished severely enough. the whole people of the country cried out upon him, and every one declared that it was quite impossible that the fellow could thrive, after having demolished two such ould auncient antiquities. and so in truth it turned out, for not long afterwards he lost the whole fushon [ ] of his side. as for the clach-na-tagart, the roman catholics, who form the chief population hereabouts, intended to have clasped it together with iron bands, but, (addressing author,) as you know very well, sir, from having recorded the fact in your book, the great flood of august saved them the trouble of doing so, for the aven then carried the broken stone clean away, aye, and it swept off the best part of the haugh it stood upon into the bargain. grant.--but stay, my good friend, archy. what do you mean by quitting the level path to climb this confounded steep hill, as the direction of your nose, at this moment, would seem to indicate your present intention to be? serjeant.--i would fain show you an extensive prospect, gentlemen. it is only a bit start of a pull up here. a mere breathing for you after the long rest you had by the water side yonder.--(then addressing the gilly.)--my man, hold you on the road to inchrory with the horse, and tell the gudewife there that we are coming. clifford.--'tis a very stiff pull, archy. but we shall be all the better for something of this sort to put us in wind. i calculate that we shall have some worse climbing than this before we are done with these mountains. serjeant.--troth, you may well say that, sir; and as for this hill, we may be very thankful that we have not to climb it with a strong demonstration of the enemies' riflemen lining the ridge of it. clifford.--you are out there, serjeant. depend upon it, if we saw an enemy lining the height, we should both of us climb it like roebucks, to be at them. serjeant.--i'm not saying but we might, sir; that is, if we saw that we were sufficiently well backed. but for all that, we might find our graves before we were half way up the hill; and then what the better should we be, of our comrades saying, as they passed by us, "poor fellows, you are settled!" would that be any consolation to us, as we lay writhing in the last agonies? grant.--very small consolation indeed, archy. serjeant.--i wot it would be little indeed, sir. yet ought a man to do his duty for all that, simply because it is his duty. many is the time i have heard my good friend captain ketley say that; and there were few words fell from his mouth that had not some good sense, or some good moral in them. and certain it is, that if we did not always keep this rule of our conduct in view, we should neither be good sodgers nor good christians. clifford.--right again, old boy. serjeant.--and yet, mr. clifford, as i reckon, there is some pleasure in coming out of the skrimmage in a whole skin, and with ears that can hear all the honest commendations that are bestowed upon your own brave and gallant conduct. grant--(after reaching the summit of the hill.)--that was indeed a breather; but now, serjeant, for the prospect you promised us, i see nothing as yet but the bare flat moist moory hill-top. serjeant--(leading us to the eastern verge of the top of the hill.)--come this way, then, gentlemen. see here what an extensive prospect you have down the course of the river don. it looks but a small stream there, especially from this height. author.--what old castle is that which we see below us there, near yonder clump of trees? serjeant.--that is curgarf castle. that is the very spot to which so much of my legend referred, though i shall not pretend to say that the building you see there is precisely the same. but now, gentlemen, turn your eyes westward again. is not that a fine mountain view? see how proudly the cairngorms rise yonder! but, observe me--you don't see the very highest summits as yet, because those big black lumps opposite to us there, hide the highest tops from our eyes. author.--it is a magnificent scene notwithstanding, especially as viewed at present, under that splendid display of evening light, that is now shooting over those loftier ridges from the descending sun. grant.--a very grand scene indeed! clifford.--aye, grant, we shall have some climbing there, i promise you. grant.--there can be little doubt of that. but tell me, serjeant, what solitary house is that we see in the valley below? author.--i can answer you that question. that is inchrory, the small place, half farm-house, half hostel, where we are to sojourn to-night. it is used as a place of rest and refreshment, by the few travellers who pass on foot, or on horseback, by the rugged path which we left in the valley, and which goes hence southwards, up through the valley of the builg--past the lake of that name,--so across what is there the rivulet of the don,--and then onwards over the hills to castleton of braemar. that deep hollow in the mountains, that turns sharp westwards beyond inchrory yonder, is what is more properly called glenaven. the river aven comes pouring down hitherwards through it, and our way lies up its course. clifford.--i should be sorry if it did so this evening. i am quite prepared to hail yonder house of inchrory below, as a welcome place of refuge for this night. author.--few places must be more welcome to a wayworn traveller than inchrory, especially when first descried by the weary wayfarer from castleton, in a winter's evening, as the sun is hasting downwards. serjeant.--you are not far wrong there, sir. a dreadful hill journey that is, indeed, from castleton to inchrory, amid the storms of winter. not a vestige of a house by the way. many a poor wretch has perished in the snow, amidst these trackless wastes. not to go very far back, there was a terrible snow storm about the martinmas time in the . it roared, and blew, and drifted so fast, that it was mid-day or ever mrs. shaw of inchrory ventured to put her head out beyond the threshold of her own door, to look at the thick and dreary shroud of white in which dead nature was wrapped, and which covered the whole lonely scene of hill and valley around her, and was in many places blown into wreathes of a great depth. there was not a speck of colour, nor any moving thing to vary the glazed unbroken surface, except on one distant hillock, where a single human figure was seen, wandering to and fro, as if in a maze, like some one bereft of reason. the male inhabitants of the house were all out looking after the stock belonging to the grazing farm; and, as mrs. shaw was in doubt whether the person she beheld might not in reality be some one who was deranged, as his movements rather seemed to indicate, she was afraid to venture to approach him. but curiosity as well as pity made her cast many a look towards him during that afternoon, as he still continued to move slowly round the hillock, and backwards and forwards, without any apparent sense or meaning, and stopping now and then, as if utterly bewildered. at length, as it was drawing towards night, mrs. shaw observed that the figure had either fallen, or lain down among the snow, and her charitable feelings then overcoming all her apprehensions, she proceeded to wade through the snow towards the hillock where he lay. having, with very considerable difficulty, made her way to the spot, she found him lying on his back, as composedly as if he had lain down in his bed. the intense cold had so benumbed his intellects, indeed, that he did not seem to be in the least aware of his own melancholy situation.--"wha are ye? and what are ye wantin?" said he, to mrs. shaw, with a faint smile on his emaciated face, as he beheld her stooping over him with an anxious gaze of inquiry. "i came to help you," replied mrs. shaw; "will you let me try to lift you up?"--"thank you, i can rise mysel'," replied he, making a vain effort to get up.--"you had better let me help you," said mrs. shaw.--"ou, na, thank ye," replied he again; "i can rise weel eneugh mysel."--"do so, then," said mrs. shaw, whilst at the same time she prepared herself for giving him her best assistance during his attempt. in this way, a strong effort on her part enabled her at last to succeed in getting the poor man on his legs; and then, after the expenditure of as much time as might have easily enabled her to have gone five or six miles, and with immense labour and fatigue, this heroic woman was finally successful in supporting him, or rather, i should say, in half carrying him to inchrory. when she had got him fairly out of the snow, and into the house, she had the horror to discover, that not only were his shoes and stockings gone, but that even the very flesh was worn off his feet. when help arrived, they got him into bed, and did all for him that charitable christians could do. food was brought to him, but it was some time before he could be made to swallow any portion of it, and that only by feeding him like a child. the poor fellow turned out to be a young man of the name of thomas macintosh, servant to the rev. mr. maceachan, the roman catholic priest at castleton, which place he had left on the wednesday morning, and he had wandered among the snow, without food or shelter, and becoming every moment more and more bewildered, until the friday evening, when mrs. shaw's praiseworthy exertions brought him to her house. on the saturday, the good people carried him down the valley to the next farm, on his way to the doctor. but, alas! no doctor was ever destined to do him any good, for he died that same evening. two one pound notes, and a few shillings, were found in his pocket, which sum went to pay the expense of his interment in the newly made church-yard at tomantoul, of which, as it so happened, he was the second tenant. grant.--what a melancholy fate! serjeant.--sad, indeed, sir. but there are many stories of the same kind connected with this wild path through these desolate mountains. author.--do you remember any more of them, archy? serjeant.--ou, yes, sir. it was upon that terrible night of drift, the th of november, , no farther gone, when so many poor people perished, that a man, three women, and two horses, were buried in the snow upon yon hill, which is called cairn elsach, as they were on their way back from the tomantoul market. so deep was the snow in many places, that one of the horses was found frozen stiff dead, and the beast was so supported in it, as to be sticking upright upon his legs, and a woman was discovered standing dead beside him. some little time afterwards, a shepherd, who happened to have occasion to cross the hill, had his attention attracted by some long hair which was seen above the icy surface, waving in the wintry blast. on scraping away the snow, he found that it was attached to a woman's head, who had unfortunately perished. he procured the assistance of some of his friends, who were afraid to dig out the body for fear it might have become offensive. i, who chanced to be there, had no such scruples, first, because i knew very well that the snow must have preserved it, and, secondly, because, if it had been otherwise, i knew that i had lost my sense of smelling in consequence of the desperate wound in my jaw, of which i told you. when the snow was removed, the poor young woman's body was found quite fresh and entire, but it was perfectly blue in colour. author.--these are melancholy details; yet, it must be confessed, they are quite in harmony with the wild and lonely scenery now before our eyes. grant.--they remind one of the horrors of the alps. clifford.--the gaunt wolves are wanting, though, to make up the picture completely. serjeant.--we had the wolves also ourselves once upon a time, sir; and now the corby, and the hill-fox, and the eagle, do their best to make up for the want of them. but such a wilderness as this, covered deep with snow, and the howling wind carrying the drift across it, has quite terrors enough in it for my taste. author.--i am quite of your opinion, archy. serjeant.--yet it is wonderful how providence will interfere to preserve people alive, amidst such complicated horrors. i remember a story of a man of the name of macintosh, who left braemar, with his wife, to come over this way. a dreadful snow storm came upon them, and, being blinded by the snow-drift, and encumbered in the deep and heavy wreathes, the poor people were separated from each other. the man made his way, with great difficulty, to a whisky bothy, where he arrived much exhausted, and quite inconsolable for the loss of his wife. being thus saved himself, he procured the assistance of people to help him to look for the corpse of his lost partner. for two whole days they sought in vain; when, just as they were about to abandon their search, till the surface of the ground should become less burdened with snow, they observed a figure coming slowly and wearily down the hill of gart. this, as it drew nearer, appeared to be a woman; and, on her approaching nearer still, the overjoyed husband discovered that she was his living wife, for whom he had been weeping as dead. she had been wandering for nearly three days, without either food or shelter, amid the mountain snows, but, although she was dreadfully exhausted, she eventually recovered. grant.--that was indeed the support of providence, archy! author.--most wonderful indeed! her preservation was little short of a miracle. serjeant.--aye, truly, you may well say that, sir. nothing but a miracle could have preserved the poor woman from so many perils as she must have encountered in her wanderings,--not to mention those of cold, hunger, and fatigue. it was the hand of providence, assuredly, that supported her. by what means he worked, we have no opportunity of knowing. but surely it was strange that he could have enabled any human being, and especially a woman, to have come through so much fatigue and suffering alive. clifford.--truly, most miraculous! serjeant.--and then, gentlemen, how very strangely--so far as we blind mortals can perceive--are others permitted to perish at the very door, as it were, of help. i think it is now about sixteen years ago--and, if i remember rightly, it was about the christmas time--that james stewart, son of the miller of delnabo, perished, on the very haugh there, just below the house of inchrory. the poor fellow passed by this place, on his way over to braemar, one morning that i happened to be here. he stopped a few minutes with me, and had some talk.--"i'm likely to get a fine day for crossing the hill, archy," said he.--"well," said i, "i hope you will, and i wish you may. yet i don't altogether like yon mountaneous heap of white tumbling-looking clouds, that are casting up afar off over the hill-top yonder."--"they dinna look awthegither weel, to be sure," said jemmy; "but i houp i may be in weel kent land lang or they break."--we parted. the snow came on in a dreadful storm, about mid-day; and i had two or three anxious thoughts about jemmy stewart, as the recollection of him was ever and anon brought back to me, during the night, by the fearful whistling of the wind, and the rattling of the hail. next morning, i, and some of the other men about the place, found a human track, running in a bewildered, irregular, and uncertain line, between the house of inchrory and the burn yonder, which must be a width of not much more than forty yards. we had not followed this far, when we came to the poor man, whose worn-out feet had made these prints. his walking-stick was standing erect among the snow beside him,--and there lay poor jemmy stewart, on his face; his hands were closed, and his head rested on them, just as if he had lain quietly down to sleep. the lads who were with me, stupid gomerills that they were, had a superstitious dread of touching him; but, deeply as i grieved for the poor fellow, i had seen too many dead men in my time to have any such scruples. i accordingly turned him, and found, alas! that he was quite gone. it appeared that he had been suddenly surprised and bewildered by the snow-drift among the hills, and that, having lost all knowledge of his way, he had unconsciously wandered in the very opposite direction to that in which he had intended to go. becoming more and more confused, as he wandered and wandered, he became at last so entirely stupified by the multiplied terrors of that awful night, that he ultimately yielded to the last drowsiness of death, and so laid himself down to court its fatal repose. alas! he was unhappily ignorant that he was within a few yards of the friendly house which he had passed on his way upwards on the previous morning, to the reviving shelter of which, the least possible additional exertion might have easily brought him, had he but known in what direction to have made it. clifford.--what a sad and fearful story! serjeant.--aye, sir, sad and fearful indeed! is it not dreadful to think how often the recollection of him crossed my mind during that fatal night, and how little trouble, on my part, would have saved him, had i only known that he was wandering in the snow so near me? aye, and to think that i should have lain ignorantly all the while in my warm bed, allowing him so cruelly to perish! willing would i have been to have travelled all night through the drift to have saved poor jemmy stewart! author.--no one can doubt that, archy. serjeant.--well, but sir, you see these matters are in the hand of god, and at his wise disposal; and although we, blind moles of the yearth as we are, cannot easily descry why a worthy well-doing young man like jemmy stewart should be permitted thus wretchedly to die, without aid, either human or divine, we cannot doubt the justice and wisdom of god's ways, which are inscrutable, and past man's finding out. well, i did all i could for the poor fellow, for i had his corpse carried down to his afflicted father at delnabo, and i saw him buried at dounan, near the bridge of livat. clifford.--that, indeed, was all you could do for the poor man, archy; and the manner in which you did that little, together with all the sentiments that you have uttered regarding him, are enough to convince any one that you would not have scrupled to peril your life, if you could have thereby saved that of a fellow-creature, still more that of a friend. serjeant.--thank you, sir, for your good opinion of me; but, as i said before, these matters are in the hand of god: and, whilst he allows the strong to perish, he can, if he so wills it, preserve the weakest. i remember an extraordinary circumstance that happened about eighteen or twenty years ago, which i may mention to you as an example of the truth of this observe of mine. four women, who had been in the south country at the harvest, were on their return home over these mountains, when they were caught in a storm. the snow came on so thickly upon them, and the wind raised so great a land-drift, that they became bewildered, lost their way, and, after much wandering, they at last got into the ruins of an old bothy, near the side of the river gairden, which runs, as i may tell ye, beyond those farther hills there to the south. by this time their shoes were worn off. they were without food--without all means of making a fire--and the cold came on so intense during the night, that the poor things were all frozen to death. there they were found in the morning by a party of smugglers, who had been early a-stir after their trade. the whole of the four women were cold and stiff. but the most wonderful, as well as the most touching circumstance of all was, that a female child, of about sixteen months old, was found alive, vainly attempting to draw nourishment from its mother's breast. the poor woman's maternal anxiety had enabled her to use precautions to keep her babe warm and in life, which she had failed to exercise for her own preservation. the child was taken charge of by donald shaw of lagganall, and brought up by him under the name of kirstock; and she afterwards went to service in glen livat, where----but mark me now, gentlemen! here we are at caochan-seirceag, of which you heard so much from me in my legend of the clan-allan stewarts. clifford.--i see there are no trees here now, as you say there were in the days of sir patrick stewart of clan-allan. grant.--the cliffs are fine though, and the ravine itself romantic. how comes it that some of these rocks are so brilliantly white? they absolutely shine like alabaster amid the dazzling radiance of that setting sun. author.--if i answer your question, it will draw me into a disquisition which may bring an attack upon us from clifford, for prosing about geology to one another. grant.--never mind him; he may shut his ears, if he likes. author.--those brilliant streaks of alabastrine white, are nothing more than incrustations of calcareous stalactites, formed on those rocks of gneiss, by the evaporation of these trickling rills, the water of which holds lime in solution, probably derived from the little aquatic marl snail in the moss above, from which they drain themselves. clifford.--i'd advise you to think less of your alabastrine incrustations of calcareous stalactites on gneiss, and more of your necks and limbs, during this steep and somewhat hazardous descent, else you may evaporate like some of those trickling rills you are speaking of. these fellows you told us of, mr. serjeant, must have had some little difficulty in carrying the lady catherine down and up here. but tell me, i pray you, what is the meaning of the name of caochan-seirceag? for i know that all your gaelic names of places are highly poetical and descriptive. serjeant.--the meaning of caochan-seirceag, sir, so far as i can make it out, is the rivulet of the beloved maiden. clifford.--poetical in the highest degree!--why, what scope does it not afford to the poet's mind to fancy the ardour of the passion of the lovers who must have made the romantic bed of this rivulet their trysting place, as well as the beauty of the maiden by whose beloved image the youth thus happily chose to distinguish it--to imagine all the obstacles which the pure stream of their love may have encountered in its course, and of which this vexed and tortured little brook may have formed but too lively a type, until at length it glided into a peaceful channel, as this does in its passage across the green meadow yonder below! what a glorious poetical romance might be suggested by these rocks and rills!--confound them!--i had nearly tumbled headlong over this slippery stone!--what a fall i should have had! grant.--you made a narrow escape there, indeed, clifford. i would have you to remember, that it would have been quite as bad to have died the victim of romantic enthusiasm, as of dry geological speculation. clifford.--i beg your pardon, my good fellow, you are quite wrong there. i at least would have infinitely preferred to have died from thinking of the beloved maiden, than from a confusion of brain occasioned by a mixture of alabastrine incrustations of calcareous stalactites and gneiss and marl snails! but to return to my speculations as to the rivulet of the beloved maiden,--why may it not have had its name from the lady catherine forbes herself? serjeant.--as i shall answer, you have hit the very thing, sir. there cannot be a doubt that it was from her that the rill was so called. clifford.--see now how lucky it was for you, mister archy, that i was not killed by a fall, as i had so nearly been, else had you been deprived of my ingenious elucidation of this most difficult point. but now, thank heaven, we are all safe in the meadow, and i shall have one touch at the trouts yet ere the light goes away entirely. author.--i wish you great success, clifford. pray do your best, my good fellow, for i know not what commons we may have in this our hostel of inchrory here. clifford.--aha! you see that my rod and my piscatorial skill are not without their use. depend upon it, you shan't go without a supper, if i can help it. as i suspected, we found that our accommodations at inchrory were rather of the simplest description. but the good people of the house showed every disposition to do the best, for our comfort, that lay in their power. a dozen and a half of large trouts, which clifford soon brought in, added to some of those provisions which we carried with us, made up the best part of our repast, and we very speedily prepared ourselves for the intellectual enjoyment of the evening. clifford.--one would think that the worthy people here, had been forewarned of our story-telling propensities, and that they had made especial provision accordingly for the serjeant's long yarns. did you ever see a more magnificent pair of wax candles on any table? why, these would see out all the narratives that ever were told by sindbad the sailor. grant.--who could have expected to have met with wax candles, such as these, in an humble place like this, in the midst of these lonely mountains, and so far from the haunts of men? nay, who could have expected to have met with any candles at all here? author.--how happens it, archy, that they can give us candles so superb as these, in a place like this, where they have so little else to produce, and nothing at all that can in the least degree correspond with them? they are of enormous size--nearly three inches in diameter, i should say. i have seen no such candles as these, except in a roman catholic church, or procession. serjeant.--troth, sir, i imagine you have solved the mystery. the truth is, as i told you before, that the great mass of the population of this highland country consists of roman catholics; and it is probable that these candles, which have been originally used for some religious rite, have, from necessity, been this night lighted for your use. clifford.--come, then, serjeant, do you proceed to use the candles as fast as may be. open your budget, my good man, and give us one of your many legends. grant.--you had better allow the serjeant to mix a tumbler of warm stuff in the first place, and whilst he is doing so, he can be considering as to what he had best give us. serjeant.--thank you, sir. i'll just be doing that same. would you have any objections to another legend of the clan-allan stewarts, gentlemen? author.--certainly not, archy, if it be only as good as the last you gave us. serjeant.--it is not for me to speak in its praise, sir, though i must e'en say that i think it no worse than the last. but it is a hantel longer. grant.--the longer the better, if it be good. we have a long night, and great candles before us, so that you may give your tongue its fullest licence. serjeant.--well, gentlemen, it's a good thing to be neither gagged in the mouth, nor stinted in the bicker. author.--depend upon it, archy, you shall be neither the one nor the other. clifford.--come away, then, serjeant, begin as soon as you please. archy then took a long snuff out of the box which i handed to him, during which he seemed to be collecting his ideas, and then he began his narrative. although i regret that i cannot always give the precise words used by him, i shall endeavour to preserve as faithful an outline of its particulars as i can, and that in language which i hope may be at least as intelligible. end of volume first. notes [ ] accidental, and rarely occurring. [ ] a swing. [ ] mòr, great, and beg or beag, little, are well known highland cognomina, employed like dubh, black, ruadh, red, and bàn, white, to distinguish different individuals of the same name. [ ] that is, having sixteen or more tynes upon his antlers. [ ] or ruadh, red. [ ] power. proofreading team. what's mine's mine by george macdonald in three volumes vol. iii. contents of vol. iii. chapter i. at a high school ii. a terrible discovery iii. how alister took it iv. love v. passion and patience vi. love glooming vii. a generous dowry viii. mistress conal ix. the marches x. midnight xi. something strange xii. the power of darkness xiii. the new stance xiv. the peat-moss xv. a daring visit xvi. the flitting xvii. the new village xviii. a friendly offer xix. another expulsion xx. alister's princess xxi. the farewell what's mine's mine chapter i at a high school. when mercy was able to go down to the drawing-room, she found the evenings pass as never evenings passed before; and during the day, although her mother and christina came often to see her, she had time and quiet for thinking. and think she must; for she found herself in a region of human life so different from any she had hitherto entered, that in no other circumstances would she have been able to recognize even its existence. everything said or done in it seemed to acknowledge something understood. life went on with a continuous lean toward something rarely mentioned, plainly uppermost; it embodied a tacit reference of everything to some code so thoroughly recognized that occasion for alluding to it was unfrequent. its inhabitants appeared to know things which her people did not even suspect. the air of the brothers especially was that of men at their ease yet ready to rise--of men whose loins were girded, alert for an expected call. under their influence a new idea of life, and the world, and the relations of men and things, began to grow in the mind of mercy. there was a dignity, almost grandeur, about the simple life of the cottage, and the relation of its inmates to all they came near. no one of them seemed to live for self, but each to be thinking and caring for the others and for the clan. she awoke to see that manners are of the soul; that such as she had hitherto heard admired were not to be compared with the simple, almost peasant-like dignity and courtesy of the chief; that the natural grace, accustomed ease, and cultivated refinement of ian's carriage, came out in attention and service to the lowly even more than in converse with his equals; while his words, his gestures, his looks, every expression born of contact, witnessed a directness and delicacy of recognition she could never have imagined. the moment he began to speak to another, he seemed to pass out of himself, and sit in the ears of the other to watch his own words, lest his thoughts should take such sound or shape as might render them unwelcome or weak. if they were not to be pleasant words, they should yet be no more unpleasant than was needful; they should not hurt save in the nature of that which they bore; the truth should receive no injury by admixture of his personality. he heard with his own soul, and was careful over the other soul as one of like kind. so delicately would he initiate what might be communion with another, that to a nature too dull or selfish to understand him, he gave offence by the very graciousness of his approach. it was through her growing love to alister that mercy became able to understand ian, and perceived at length that her dread, almost dislike of him at first, was owing solely to her mingled incapacity and unworthiness. before she left the cottage, it was spring time in her soul; it had begun to put forth the buds of eternal life. such buds are not unfrequently nipped; but even if they are, if a dull, false, commonplace frost close in, and numb the half wakened spirit back into its wintry sleep, that sleep will ever after be haunted with some fainting airs of the paradise those buds prophesied. in mercy's case they were to grow into spiritual eyes--to open and see, through all the fogs and tumults of this phantom world, the light and reality of the true, the spiritual world everywhere around her--as the opened eyes of the servant of the prophet saw the mountains of samaria full of horses of fire and chariots of fire around him. every throb of true love, however mingled with the foolish and the false, is a bourgeoning of the buds of the life eternal--ah, how far from leaves! how much farther from flowers. ian was high above her, so high that she shrank from him; there seemed a whole heaven of height between them. it would fill her with a kind of despair to see him at times sit lost in thought: he was where she could never follow him! he was in a world which, to her childish thought, seemed not the world of humanity; and she would turn, with a sense of both seeking and finding, to the chief. she imagined he felt as she did, saw between his brother and him a gulf he could not cross. she did not perceive this difference, that alister knew the gulf had to be crossed. at such a time, too, she had seen his mother regarding him with a similar expression of loss, but with a mingling of anxiety that was hers only. it was sweet to mercy to see in the eyes of alister, and in his whole bearing toward his younger brother, that he was a learner like herself, that they were scholars together in ian's school. a hunger after something beyond her, a something she could not have described, awoke in her. she needed a salvation of some kind, toward which she must grow! she needed a change which she could not understand until it came--a change the greatest in the universe, but which, man being created with the absolute necessity for it, can be no violent transformation, can be only a grand process in the divine idea of development. she began to feel a mystery in the world, and in all the looks of it--a mystery because a meaning. she saw a jubilance in every sunrise, a sober sadness in every sunset; heard a whispering of strange secrets in the wind of the twilight; perceived a consciousness of unknown bliss in the song of the lark;--and was aware of a something beyond it all, now and then filling her with wonder, and compelling her to ask, "what does it, what can it mean?" not once did she suspect that nature had indeed begun to deal with her; not once suspect, although from childhood accustomed to hear the name of love taken in vain, that love had anything to do with these inexplicable experiences. let no one, however, imagine he explains such experiences by suggesting that she was in love! that were but to mention another mystery as having introduced the former. for who in heaven or on earth has fathomed the marvel betwixt the man and the woman? least of all the man or the woman who has not learned to regard it with reverence. there is more in this love to uplift us, more to condemn the lie in us, than in any other inborn drift of our being, except the heavenly tide godward. from it flow all the other redeeming relations of life. it is the hold god has of us with his right hand, while death is the hold he has of us with his left. love and death are the two marvels, yea the two terrors--but the one goal of our history. it was love, in part, that now awoke in mercy a hunger and thirst after heavenly things. this is a direction of its power little heeded by its historians; its earthly side occupies almost all their care. because lovers are not worthy of even its earthly aspect, it palls upon them, and they grow weary, not of love, but of their lack of it. the want of the heavenly in it has caused it to perish: it had no salt. from those that have not is taken away that which they have. love without religion is the plucked rose. religion without love--there is no such thing. religion is the bush that bears all the roses; for religion is the natural condition of man in relation to the eternal facts, that is the truths, of his own being. to live is to love; there is no life but love. what shape the love puts on, depends on the persons between whom is the relation. the poorest love with religion, is better, because truer, therefore more lasting, more genuine, more endowed with the possibility of persistence--that is, of infinite development, than the most passionate devotion between man and woman without it. thus together in their relation to ian, it was natural that mercy and the chief should draw yet more to each other. mercy regarded alister as a big brother in the same class with herself, but able to help her. quickly they grew intimate. in the simplicity of his large nature, the chief talked with mercy as openly as a boy, laying a heart bare to her such that, if the world had many like it, the kingdom of heaven would be more than at hand. he talked as to an old friend in perfect understanding with him, from whom he had nothing to gain or to fear. there was never a compliment on the part of the man, and never a coquetry on the part of the girl--a dull idea to such as without compliment or coquetry could hold no intercourse, having no other available means. mercy had never like her sister cultivated the woman's part in the low game; and her truth required but the slightest stimulus to make her incapable of it. with such a man as alister she could use only a simplicity like his; not thus to meet him would have been to decline the honouring friendship. dark and plain, though with an interesting face and fine eyes, she had received no such compliments as had been showered upon her sister; it was an unspoiled girl, with a heart alive though not yet quite awake, that was brought under such good influences. what better influences for her, for any woman, than those of unselfish men? what influences so good for any man as those of unselfish women? every man that hears and learns of a worthy neighbour, comes to the father; every man that hath heard and learned of the father comes to the lord; every man that comes to the lord, he leads back to the father. to hear ian speak one word about jesus christ, was for a true man to be thenceforth truer. to him the lord was not a theological personage, but a man present in the world, who had to be understood and obeyed by the will and heart and soul, by the imagination and conscience of every other man. if what ian said was true, this life was a serious affair, and to be lived in downright earnest! if god would have his creatures mind him, she must look to it! she pondered what she heard. but she went always to alister to have ian explained; and to hear him talk of ian, revealed alister to her. when mercy left the cottage, she felt as if she were leaving home to pay a visit. the rich house was dull and uninteresting. she found that she had immediately to put in practice one of the lessons she had learned--that the service of god is the service of those among whom he has sent us. she tried therefore to be cheerful, and even to forestall her mother's wishes. but life was harder than hitherto--so much more was required of her. the chief was falling thoroughly in love with mercy, but it was some time before he knew it. with a heart full of tenderness toward everything human, he knew little of love special, and was gradually sliding into it without being aware of it. how little are we our own! existence is decreed us; love and suffering are appointed us. we may resist, we may modify; but we cannot help loving, and we cannot help dying. we need god to keep us from hating. great in goodness, yea absolutely good, god must be, to have a right to make us--to compel our existence, and decree its laws! without his choice the chief was falling in love. the woman was sent him; his heart opened and took her in. relation with her family was not desirable, but there she was! ian saw, but said nothing. his mother saw it too. "nothing good will come of it!" she said, with a strong feeling of unfitness in the thing. "everything will come of it, mother, that god would have come of it," answered ian. "she is an honest, good girl, and whatever comes of it must be good, whether pleasant or not." the mother was silent. she believed in god, but not so thoroughly as to abjure the exercise of a subsidiary providence of her own. the more people trust in god, the less will they trust their own judgments, or interfere with the ordering of events. the man or woman who opposes the heart's desire of another, except in aid of righteousness, is a servant of satan. nor will it avail anything to call that righteousness which is of self or of mammon. "there is no action in fretting," ian would say, "and not much in the pondering of consequences. true action is the doing of duty, come of it heartache, defeat, or success." "you are a fatalist, ian!" said his mother one day. "mother, i am; the will of god is my fate!" answered ian. "he shall do with me what he pleases; and i will help him!" she took him in her arms and kissed him. she hoped god would not be strict with him, for might not the very grandeur of his character be rooted in rebellion? might not some figs grow on some thistles? at length came the paternal summons for the palmers to go to london. for a month the families had been meeting all but every day. the chief had begun to look deep into the eyes of the girl, as if searching there for some secret joy; and the girl, though she drooped her long lashes, did not turn her head away. and now separation, like death, gave her courage, and when they parted, mercy not only sustained alister's look, but gave him such a look in return that he felt no need, no impulse to say anything. their souls were satisfied, for they knew they belonged to each other. chapter ii a terrible discovery. so entirely were the chief and his family out of the world, that they had not yet a notion of the worldly relations of mr. peregrine palmer. but the mother thought it high time to make inquiry as to his position and connections. she had an old friend in london, the wife of a certain vice-chancellor, with whom she held an occasional correspondence, and to her she wrote, asking if she knew anything of the family. mrs. macruadh was nowise free from the worldliness that has regard to the world's regard. she would not have been satisfied that a daughter in law of hers should come of people distinguished for goodness and greatness of soul, if they were, for instance, tradespeople. she would doubtless have preferred the daughter of an honest man, whatever his position, to the daughter of a scoundrel, even if he chanced to be a duke; but she would not have been content with the most distinguished goodness by itself. walking after jesus, she would have drawn to the side of joanna rather than martha or mary; and i fear she would have condescended--just a little--to mary magdalen: repentance, however perfect, is far from enough to satisfy the worldly squeamishness of not a few high-principled people who do not know what repentance means. mrs. macruadh was anxious to know that the girl was respectable, and so far worthy of her son. the idea of such an inquiry would have filled mercy's parents with scornful merriment, as a thing ludicrous indeed. people in their position, who could do this and that, whose name stood so high for this and that, who knew themselves well bred, who had one relation an admiral, another a general, and a marriage-connection with some of the oldest families in the country--that one little better than a yeoman, a man who held the plough with his own big hands, should enquire into their social standing! was not mr. peregrine palmer prepared to buy him up the moment he required to sell! was he not rich enough to purchase an earl's daughter for his son, and an earl himself for his beautiful christina! the thing would have seemed too preposterous. the answer of the vice-chancellor's lady burst, nevertheless, like a bombshell in the cottage. it was to this effect:--the palmers were known, if not just in the best, yet in very good society; the sons bore sign of a defective pedigree, but the one daughter out was, thanks to her mother, fit to go anywhere. for her own part, wrote the london correspondent, she could not help smelling the grains: in scotland a distiller, mr. peregrine palmer had taken to brewing in england--was one of the firm pulp and palmer, owning half the public-houses in london, therefore high in the regard of the english nobility, if not actually within their circle.--thus far the satirical lady of the vice-chancellor. horror fell upon the soul of the mother. the distiller was to her as the publican to the ancient jew. no dealing in rags and marine stores, no scraping of a fortune by pettifogging, chicane, and cheating, was to her half so abominable as the trade of a brewer. worse yet was a brewer owning public-houses, gathering riches in half-pence wet with beer and smelling of gin. the brewer was to her a moral pariah; only a distiller was worse. as she read, the letter dropped from her hands, and she threw them up in unconscious appeal to heaven. she saw a vision of bloated men and white-faced women, drawing with trembling hands from torn pockets the money that had bought the wide acres of the clanruadh. to think of the macruadh marrying the daughter of such a man! in society few questions indeed were asked; everywhere money was counted a blessed thing, almost however made; none the less the damnable fact remained, that certain moneys were made, not in furthering the well-being of men and women, but in furthering their sin and degradation. the mother of the chief saw that, let the world wink itself to blindness, let it hide the roots of the money-plant in layer upon layer of social ascent, the flower for which an earl will give his daughter, has for the soil it grows in, not the dead, but the diseased and dying, of loathsome bodies and souls of god's men and women and children, which the grower of it has helped to make such as they are. she was hot, she was cold; she started up and paced hurriedly about the room. her son the son in law of a distiller! the husband of his daughter! the idea was itself abhorrence and contempt! was he not one of the devil's fishers, fishing the sea of the world for the souls of men and women to fill his infernal ponds withal! his money was the fungous growth of the devil's cellars. how would the brewer or the distiller, she said, appear at the last judgment! how would her son hold up his head, if he cast in his lot with theirs! but that he would never do! why should she be so perturbed! in this matter at least there could be no difference between them! her noble alister would be as much shocked as herself at the news! could the woman be a lady, grown on such a hot-bed! yet, alas! love could tempt far--could subdue the impossible! she could not rest; she must find one of them! not a moment longer could she remain alone with the terrible disclosure. if alister was in love with the girl, he must get out of it at once! never again would she enter the palmers' gate, never again set foot on their land! the thought of it was unthinkable! she would meet them as if she did not see them! but they should know her reason--and know her inexorable! she went to the edge of the ridge, and saw ian sitting with his book on the other side of the burn. she called him to her, and handed him the letter. he took it, read it through, and gave it her back. "ian!" she exclaimed, "have you nothing to say to that?" "i beg your pardon, mother," he answered: "i must think about it. why should it trouble you so! it is painfully annoying, but we have come under no obligation to them!" "no; but alister!" "you cannot doubt alister will do what is right!" "he will do what he thinks right!" "is not that enough, mother?" "no," she answered angrily; "he must do the thing that is right." "whether he knows it or not? could he do the thing he thought wrong?" she was silent. "mother dear," resumed ian, "the only way to get at what is right is to do what seems right. even if we mistake there is no other way!" "you would do evil that good may come! oh, ian!" "no, mother; evil that is not seen to be evil by one willing and trying to do right, is not counted evil to him. it is evil only to the person who either knows it to be evil, or does not care whether it be or not." "that is dangerous doctrine!" "i will go farther, mother, and say, that for alister to do what you thought right, if he did not think it right himself--even if you were right and he wrong--would be for him to do wrong, and blind himself to the truth." "a man may be to blame that he is not able to see the truth," said the mother. "that is very true, but hardly such a man as alister, who would sooner die than do the thing he believed wrong. but why should you take it for granted that alister will think differently from you?" "we don't always think alike." "in matters of right and wrong, i never knew him or me think differently from you, mother!" "he is very fond of the girl!" "and justly. i never saw one more in earnest, or more anxious to learn." "she might well be teachable to such teachers!" "i don't see that she has ever sought to commend herself to either of us, mother. i believe her heart just opened to the realities she had never had shown her before. come what may, she will never forget the things we have talked about." "nothing would make me trust her!" "why?" "she comes of an' abominable breed." "is it your part, mother, to make her suffer for the sins of her fathers?" "i make her suffer!" "certainly, mother--by changing your mind toward her, and suspecting her, the moment you learn cause to condemn her father." "the sins of the fathers are visited on the children!--you will not dispute that?' "i will grant more--that the sins of the fathers are often reproduced in the children. but it is nowhere said, 'thou shalt visit the sins of the fathers on the children.' god puts no vengeance into our hands. i fear you are in danger of being unjust to the girl, mother!--but then you do not know her so well as we do!" "of course not! every boy understands a woman better than his mother!" "the thing is exceedingly annoying, mother! let us go and find alister at once!" "he will take it like a man of sense, i trust!" "he will. it will trouble him terribly, but he will do as he ought. give him time and i don't believe there is a man in the world to whom the right comes out clearer than to alister." the mother answered only with a sigh. "many a man," remarked ian, "has been saved through what men call an unfortunate love affair!" "many a man has been lost by having his own way in one!" rejoined the mother. "as to lost, i would not make up my mind about that for a few centuries or so!" returned ian. "a man may be allowed his own way for the discipline to result from it." "i trust, ian, you will not encourage him in any folly!" "i shall have nothing to do but encourage him in his first resolve, mother!" chapter iii how alister took it. they could not find alister, who had gone to the smithy. it was tea-time before he came home. as soon as he entered, his mother handed him the letter. he read it without a word, laid it on the table beside his plate, and began to drink his tea, his eyes gleaming with a strange light, lan kept silence also. mrs. macruadh cast a quick glance, now at the one, now at the other. she was in great anxiety, and could scarce restrain herself. she knew her boys full of inbred dignity and strong conscience, but was nevertheless doubtful how they would act. they could not feel as she felt, else would the hot blood of their race have at once boiled over! had she searched herself she might have discovered a latent dread that they might be nearer the right than she. painfully she watched them, half conscious of a traitor in her bosom, judging the world's judgment and not god's. her sons seemed on the point of concluding as she would not have them conclude: they would side with the young woman against their mother! the reward of parents who have tried to be good, may be to learn, with a joyous humility from their children. mrs. macruadh was capable of learning more, and was now going to have a lesson. when alister pushed back his chair and rose, she could refrain no longer. she could not let him go in silence. she must understand something of what was passing in his mind! "what do you think of that, alister?" she said. he turned to her with a faint smile, and answered, "i am glad to know it, mother." "that is good. i was afraid it would hurt you!" "seeing the thing is so, i am glad to be made aware of it. the information itself you cannot expect me to be pleased with!" "no, indeed, my son! i am very sorry for you. after being so taken with the young woman,--" alister looked straight in his mother's face. "you do not imagine, mother," he said, "it will make any difference as to mercy?" "not make any difference!" echoed mrs. macruadh. "what is it possible you can mean, alister?" the anger that glowed in her dark eyes made her look yet handsomer, proving itself not a mean, though it might be a misplaced anger. "is she different, mother, from what she was before you had the letter?" "you did not then know what she was!" "just as well as i do now. i have no reason to think she is not what i thought her." "you thought her the daughter of a gentleman!" "hardly. i thought her a lady, and such i think her still." "then you mean to go on with it?" "mother dear," said alister, taking her by the hand, "give me a little time. not that i am in any doubt--but the news has been such a blow to me that--" "it must have been!" said the mother. "--that i am afraid of answering you out of the soreness of my pride, and ian says the truth is never angry." "i am quite willing you should do nothing in a hurry," said the mother. she did not understand that he feared lest, in his indignation for mercy, he should answer his mother as her son ought not. "i will take time," he replied. "and here is ian to help me!" "ah! if only your father were here!" "he may be, mother! anyhow i trust i shall do nothing he would not like!" "he would sooner see son of his marry the daughter of a cobbler than of a brewer!" "so would i, mother!" said alister. "i too," said ian, "would much prefer that my sister-in-law's father were not a brewer." "i suppose you are splitting some hair, ian, but i don't see it," remarked his mother, who had begun to gather a little hope. "you will be back by supper-time, alister, i suppose?" "certainly, mother. we are only going to the village." the brothers went. "i knew everything you were thinking," said ian. "of course you did!" answered alister. "but i am very sorry!" "so am i! it is a terrible bore!" a pause followed. alister burst into a laugh that was not merry. "it makes me think of the look on my father's face," he said, "once at the market, as he was putting in his pocket a bunch of more than usually dirty bank-notes. the look seemed almost to be making apology that he was my father--the notes were so dirty! 'they're better than they look, lad!' he said." "what are you thinking of, alister?" "of nothing you are not thinking of, ian, i hope in god! mr. palmer's money is worse than it looks." "you frightened me for a moment, alister!" "how could i, ian?" "it was but a nervo-mechanical fright. i knew well enough you could mean nothing i should not like. but i see trouble ahead, alister!" "we shall be called a pack of fools, but what of that! we shall be told the money itself was clean, however dirty the hands that made it! the money-grubs!" "i would rather see you hanged, than pocketing a shilling of it!" "of course you would! but the man who could pocket it, will be relieved to find it is only his daughter i care about." "there will be difficulty, alister, i fear. how much have you said to mercy?" "i have said nothing definite." "but she understands?" "i think--i hope so.--don't you think christina is much improved, lan?" "she is more pleasant." "she is quite attentive to you!" "she is pleased with me for saving her life. she does not like me--and i have just arrived at not disliking her." "there is a great change on her!" "i doubt if there is any in her though!" "she may be only amusing herself with us in this outlandish place! mercy, i am sure, is quite different!" "i would trust her with anything, alister. that girl would die for the man she loved!" "i would rather have her love, though we should never meet in this world, than the lands of my fathers!" "what will you do then?" "i will go to mr. palmer, and say to him: 'give me your daughter. i am a poor man, but we shall have enough to live upon. i believe she will be happy.'" "i will answer for him: 'i have the greatest regard for you, macruadh. you are a gentleman, and that you are poor is not of the slightest consequence; mercy's dowry shall be worthy the lady of a chief!'--what then, alister?" "fathers that love money must be glad to get rid of their daughters without a. dowry!" "yes, perhaps, when they are misers, or money is scarce, or wanted for something else. but when a poor man of position wanted to marry his daughter, a parent like mr. palmer would doubtless regard her dowry as a good investment. you must not think to escape that way, alister! what would you answer him?" "i would say, 'my dear sir,'--i may say 'my dear sir,' may i not? there is something about the man i like!--'i do not want your money. i will not have your money. give me your daughter, and my soul will bless you.'" "suppose he should reply,' do you think i am going to send my daughter from my house like a beggar? no, no, my boy! she must carry something with her! if beggars married beggars, the world would be full of beggars!'--what would you say then?" "i would tell him i had conscientious scruples about taking his money." "he would tell you you were a fool, and not to be trusted with a wife. 'who ever heard such rubbish!' he would say. 'scruples, indeed! you must get over them! what are they?'--what would you say then?" "if it came to that, i should have no choice but tell him i had insuperable objections to the way his fortune was made, and could not consent to share it." "he would protest himself insulted, and swear, if his money was not good enough for you, neither was his daughter. what then?" "i would appeal to mercy." "she is too young. it would be sad to set one of her years at variance with her family. i almost think i would rather you ran away with her. it is a terrible thing to go into a house and destroy the peace of those relations which are at the root of all that is good in the world." "i know it! i know it! that is my trouble! i am not afraid of mercy's courage, and i am sure she would hold out. i am certain nothing would make her marry the man she did not love. but to turn the house into a hell about her--i shrink from that!--do you count it necessary to provide against every contingency before taking the first step?" "indeed i do not! the first step is enough. when that step has landed us, we start afresh. but of all things you must not lose your temper with the man. however despicable his money, you are his suitor for his daughter! and he may possibly not think you half good enough for her." "that would be a grand way out of the difficulty!" "how?" "it would leave me far freer to deal with her." "perhaps. and in any case, the more we can honestly avoid reference to his money, the better. we are not called on to rebuke." "small is my inclination to allude to it--so long as not a stiver of it seeks to cross to the macruadh!" "that is fast as fate. but there is another thing, alister: i fear lest you should ever forget that her birth and her connections are no more a part of the woman's self than her poverty or her wealth." "i know it, ian. i will not forget it." "there must never be a word concerning them!" "nor a thought, ian! in god's name i will be true to her." they found annie of the shop in a sad way. she had just had a letter from lachlan, stating that he had not been well for some time, and that there was little prospect of his being able to fetch her. he prayed her therefore to go out to him; and had sent money to pay her passage and her mother's. "when do you go?" asked the chief. "my mother fears the voyage, and is very unwilling to turn her back on her own country. but oh, if lachlan die, and me not with him!" she could say no more. "he shall not die for want of you!" said the laird. "i will talk to your mother." he went into the room behind. ian remained in the shop. "of course you must go, annie!" he said. "indeed, sir, i must! but how to persuade my mother i do not know! and i cannot leave her even for lachlan. no one would nurse him more tenderly than she; but she has a horror of the salt water, and what she most dreads is being buried in it. she imagines herself drowning to all eternity!" "my brother will persuade her." "i hope so, sir. i was just coming to him! i should never hold up my head again--in this world or the next--either if i did not go, or if i went without my mother! aunt conal told me, about a month since, that i was going a long journey, and would never come back. i asked her if i was to die on the way, but she would not answer me. anyhow i'm not fit to be his wife, if i'm not ready to die for him! some people think it wrong to marry anybody going to die, but at the longest, you know, sir, you must part sooner than you would! not many are allowed to die together!--you don't think, do you, sir, that marriages go for nothing in the other world?" she spoke with a white face and brave eyes, and ian was glad at heart. "i do not, annie," he answered. "'the gifts of god are without repentance.' he did not give you and lachlan to each other to part you again! though you are not married yet, it is all the same so long as you are true to each other." "thank you, sir; you always make me feel strong!" alister came from the back room. "i think your mother sees it not quite so difficult now," he said. the next time they went, they found them preparing to go. now ian had nearly finished the book he was writing about russia, and could not begin another all at once. he must not stay at home doing nothing, and he thought that, as things were going from bad to worse in the highlands, he might make a voyage to canada, visit those of his clan, and see what ought to be done for such as must soon follow them. he would presently have a little money in his possession, and believed he could not spend it better. he made up his mind therefore to accompany annie and her mother, which resolve overcame the last of the old woman's lingering reluctance. he did not like leaving alister at such a critical point in his history; but he said to himself that a man might be helped too much; arid it might come that he and mercy were in as much need of a refuge as the clan. i cannot say no worldly pride mingled in the chief's contempt for the distiller's money; his righteous soul was not yet clear of its inherited judgments as to what is dignified and what is not. he had in him still the prejudice of the landholder, for ages instinctive, against both manufacture and trade. various things had combined to foster in him also the belief that trade at least was never free from more or less of unfair dealing, and was therefore in itself a low pursuit. he had not argued that nothing the father of men has decreed can in its nature be contemptible, but must be capable of being nobly done. in the things that some one must do, the doer ranks in god's sight, and ought to rank among his fellow-men, according to how he does it. the higher the calling the more contemptible the man who therein pursues his own ends. the humblest calling, followed on the principles of the divine caller, is a true and divine calling, be it scavenging, handicraft, shop-keeping, or book-making. oh for the day when god and not the king shall be regarded as the fountain of honour. but the macruadh looked upon the calling of the brewer or distiller as from the devil: he was not called of god to brew or distil! from childhood his mother had taught him a horror of gain by corruption. she had taught, and he had learned, that the poorest of all justifications, the least fit to serve the turn of gentleman, logician, or christian, was--"if i do not touch this pitch, another will; there will be just as much harm done; and another instead of me will have the benefit; therefore it cannot defile me.--offences must come, therefore i will do them!" "imagine our lord in the brewing trade instead of the carpentering!" she would say. that better beer was provided by the good brewer would not go far for brewer or drinker, she said: it mattered little that, by drinking good beer, the drunkard lived to be drunk the oftener. a brewer might do much to reduce drinking; but that would be to reduce a princely income to a modest livelihood, and to content himself with the baker's daughter instead of the duke's! it followed that the macruadh would rather have robbed a church than touched mr. peregrine palmer's money. to rifle the tombs of the dead would have seemed to him pure righteousness beside sharing in that. he could give mercy up; he could not take such money with her! much as he loved her, separate as he saw her, clearly as she was to him a woman undefiled and straight from god, it was yet a trial to him that she should be the daughter of a person whose manufacture and trade were such. after much consideration, it was determined in the family conclave, that ian should accompany the two women to canada, note how things were going, and conclude what had best be done, should further exodus be found necessary. as, however, there had come better news of lachlan, and it was plain he was in no immediate danger, they would not, for several reasons, start before the month of september. a few of the poorest of the clan resolved to go with them. partly for their sakes, partly because his own provision would be small, ian would take his passage also in the steerage. chapter iv love. christina went back to london considerably changed. her beauty was greater far, for there was a new element in it--a certain atmosphere of distances and shadows gave mystery to her landscape. her weather, that is her mood, was now subject to changes which to many made her more attractive. fits of wild gaiety alternated with glooms, through which would break flashes of feline playfulness, where pat and scratch were a little mixed. she had more admirers than ever, for she had developed points capable of interesting men of somewhat higher development than those she had hitherto pleased. at the same time she was more wayward and imperious with her courtiers. gladly would she have thrown all the flattery once so coveted into the rag-bag of creation, to have one approving smile from the grave-looking, gracious man, whom she knew happier, wandering alone over the hills, than if she were walking by his side. for an hour she would persuade herself that he cared for her a little; the next she would comfort herself with the small likelihood of his meeting another lady in glenruadh. but then he had been such a traveller, had seen so much of the great world, that perhaps he was already lost to her! it seemed but too probable, when she recalled the sadness with which he seemed sometimes overshadowed: it could not be a religious gloom, for when he spoke of god his face shone, and his words were strong! i think she mistook a certain gravity, like that of the merchant of venice, for sorrowfulness; though doubtless the peculiarity of his loss, as well as the loss itself, did sometimes make him sad. she had tried on him her little arts of subjugation, but the moment she began to love him, she not only saw their uselessness, but hated them. her repellent behaviour to her admirers, and her occasional excitement and oddity, caused her mother some anxiety, but as the season came to a close, she grew gayer, and was at times absolutely bewitching. the mother wished to go northward by degrees, paying visits on the way; but her plan met with no approbation from the girls. christina longed for the presence and voice of ian in the cottage-parlour, mercy for a hill-side with the chief; both longed to hear them speak to each other in their own great way. and they talked so of the delights of their highland home, that the mother began to feel the mountains, the sea, and the islands, drawing her to a land of peace, where things went well, and the world knew how to live. but the stormiest months of her life were about to pass among those dumb mountains! after a long and eager journey, the girls were once more in their rooms at the new house. mercy went to her window, and stood gazing from it upon the mountain-world, faint-lighted by the northern twilight. she might have said with portia:-- "this night methinks is but the daylight sick; it looks a little paler: 'tis a day, such as the day is when the sun is hid." she could see the dark bulk of the hills, sharpened to a clear edge against the pellucid horizon, but with no colour, and no visible featuring of their great fronts. when the sun rose, it would reveal innumerable varieties of surface, by the mottling of endless shadows; now all was smooth as an unawakened conscience. by the shape of a small top that rose against the greenish sky betwixt the parting lines of two higher hills, where it seemed to peep out over the marge into the infinite, as a little man through the gap between the heads of taller neighbours, she knew the roof of the tomb; and she thought how, just below there, away as it seemed in the high-lifted solitudes of heaven, she had lain in the clutches of death, all the time watched and defended by the angel of a higher life who had been with her ever since first she came to glenruadh, waking her out of such a stupidity, such a non-existence, as now she could scarce see possible to human being. it was true her waking had been one with her love to that human east which first she saw as she opened her eyes, and whence first the light of her morning had flowed--the man who had been and was to her the window of god! but why should that make her doubt? god made man and woman to love each other: why should not the waking to love and the waking to truth come together, seeing both were of god? if the chief were never to speak to her again, she would never go back from what she had learned of him! if she ever became careless of truth and life and god, it would but show that she had never truly loved the chief! as she stood gazing on the hill-top, high landmark of her history, she felt as if the earth were holding her up toward heaven, an offering to the higher life. the hill grew an altar of prayer on which her soul was lying, dead until taken up into life by the arms of the father. a deep content pervaded her heart. she turned with her weight of peace, lay down, and went to sleep in the presence of her life. christina looked also from her window, but her thoughts were not like mercy's, for her heart was mainly filled, not with love of ian, but with desire that ian should love her. she longed to be his queen--the woman of all women he had seen. the sweet repose of the sleeping world wrought in her--not peace, but weakness. her soul kept leaning towards ian; she longed for his arms to start out the alien nature lying so self-satisfied all about her. to her the presence of god took shape as an emptiness--an absence. the resting world appeared to her cold, unsympathetic, heedless; its peace was but heartlessness. the soft pellucid chrysolite of passive heavenly thought, was a merest arrangement, a common fact, meaning nothing to her. she was hungry, not merely after bliss, but after distinction in bliss; not after growth, but after acknowledged superiority. she needed to learn that she was nobody--that if the world were peopled with creatures like her, it would be no more worth sustaining than were it a world of sand, of which no man could build even a hut. still, by her need of another, god was laying hold of her. as by the law is the knowledge of sin, so by love is selfishness rampantly roused--to be at last, like death, swallowed up in victory--the victory of the ideal self that dwells in god. all night she dreamed sad dreams of ian in the embrace of a lovely woman, without word or look for her. she woke weeping, and said to herself that it could not be. he could not be taken from her! it was against nature! soul, brain, and heart, claimed him hers! how could another possess what, in the testimony of her whole consciousness, was hers and hers alone! love asserts an innate and irreversible right of profoundest property in the person loved. it is an instinct--but how wrongly, undivinely, falsely interpreted! hence so many tears! hence a law of nature, deep written in the young heart, seems often set utterly at nought by circumstance! but the girl in her dejection and doubt, was worth far more than in her content and confidence. she was even now the richer by the knowledge of sorrow, and she was on the way to know that she needed help, on the way to hate herself, to become capable of loving. life could never be the same to her, and the farther from the same the better! the beauty came down in the morning pale and dim and white-lipped, like a flower that had had no water. mercy was fresh and rosy, with a luminous mist of loveliness over her plain unfinished features. already had they begun to change in the direction of beauty. christina's eyes burned; in mercy's shone something of the light by which a soul may walk and not stumble. in the eyes of both was expectation, in the eyes of the one confident, in the eyes of the other anxious. as soon as they found themselves alone together, eyes sought eyes, and met in understanding. they had not made confidantes of each other, each guessed well, and was well guessed at. they did not speculate; they understood. in like manner, mercy and alister understood each other, but not christina and ian. neither of these knew the feelings of the other. without a word they rose, put on their hats, left the house, and took the road toward the valley. about half-way to the root of the ridge, they came in sight of the ruined castle; mercy stopped with a little cry. "look! chrissy!" she said, pointing. on the corner next them, close by the pepper-pot turret, sat the two men, in what seemed to loving eyes a dangerous position, but to the mountaineers themselves a comfortable coin of vantage. the girls thought, "they are looking out for us!" but ian was there only because alister was there. the men waved their bonnets. christina responded with her handkerchief. the men disappeared from their perch, and were with the ladies before they reached the ridge. there was no embarrassment on either side, though a few cheeks were rosier than usual. to the chief, mercy was far beyond his memory of her. not her face only, but her every movement bore witness to a deeper pleasure, a greater freedom in life than before. "why were you in such a dangerous place?" asked christina. "we were looking out for you," answered alister. "from there we could see you the moment you came out." "why didn't you come and meet us then?" "because we wanted to watch you coming." "spies!--i hope, mercy, we were behaving ourselves properly! i had no idea we were watched!" "we thought you had quarrelled; neither said a word to the other." mercy looked up; christina looked down. "could you hear us at that height?" asked mercy. "how could we when there was not a word to hear!" "how did you know we were silent?" "we might have known by the way you walked," replied alister. "but if you had spoken we should have heard, for sound travels far among the mountains!" "then i think it was a shame!" said christina. "how could you tell that we might not object to your hearing us?" "we never thought of that!" said alister. "i am very sorry. we shall certainly not be guilty again!" "what men you are for taking everything in downright earnest!" cried christina; "--as if we could have anything to say we should wish you not to hear?" she pat a little emphasis on the you, hut not much. alister heard it as if mercy had said it, and smiled a pleased smile. "it will be a glad day for the world," he said, "when secrecy is over, and every man may speak out the thing that is in him, without danger of offence!" in her turn, christina heard the words as if spoken with reference to ian though not by him, and took them to hint at the difficulty of saying what was in his heart. she had such an idea of her superiority because of her father's wealth and fancied position, that she at once concluded ian dreaded rejection with scorn, for it was not even as if he were the chief. however poor, alister was at least the head of a family, and might set sir before, and baronet after his name--not that her father would think that much of a dignity!--but no younger son of whatever rank, would be good enough for her in her father's eyes! at the same time she had a choice as well as her father, and he should find she too had a will of her own! "but was it not a dangerous place to be in?" she said. "it is a little crumbly!" confessed ian. "--that reminds me, alister, we must have a bout at the old walls before long!--ever since alister was ten years old," he went on in explanation to christina, "he and i have been patching and pointing at the old hulk--the stranded ship of our poor fortunes. i showed you, did i not, the ship in our coat of arms--the galley at least, in which, they say, we arrived at the island?" "yes, i remember.--but you don't mean you do mason's work as well as everything else?" exclaimed christina. "come; we will show you," said the chief. "what do you do it for?" the brothers exchanged glances. "would you count it sufficient reason," returned ian, "that we desired to preserve its testimony to the former status of our family?" a pang of pleasure shot through the heart of christina. passion is potent to twist in its favour whatever can possibly be so twisted. here was an indubitable indication of his thoughts! he must make the most of himself, set what he could against the overwhelming advantages on her side! in the eyes of a man of the world like her father, an old name was nothing beside new money! still an old castle was always an old castle! and that he cared about it for her sake made it to her at least worth something! ere she could give an answer, ian went on. "but in truth," he said, "we have always had a vague hope of its resurrection. the dream of our boyhood was to rebuild the castle. every year it has grown more hopeless, and keeps receding. but we have come to see how little it matters, and content ourselves with keeping up, for old love's sake, what is left of the ruin." "how do you get up on the walls?" asked mercy. "ah, that is a secret!" said ian. "do tell us," pleaded christina. "if you want very much to know,--" answered ian, a little doubtfully. "i do, i do!" "then i suppose we must tell you!" yet more confirmation to the passion-prejudiced ears of christina! "there is a stair," ian went on, "of which no one but our two selves knows anything. such stairs are common in old houses--far commoner than people in towns have a notion of. but there would not have been much of it left by this time, if we hadn't taken care of it. we were little fellows when we began, and it needed much contrivance, for we were not able to unseat the remnants of the broken steps, and replace them with new ones." "do show it us," begged christina. "we will keep it," said alister, "for some warm twilight. morning is not for ruins. yon mountain-side is calling to us. will you come, mercy?" "oh yes!" cried christina; "that will be much better! come, mercy! you are up to a climb, i am sure!" "i ought to be, after such a long rest." "you may have forgotten how to climb!" said alister. "i dreamed too much of the hills for that! and always the noise of london was changed into the rush of waters." they had dropped a little behind the other pair. "did you always climb your dream-hills alone?" asked alister. she answered him with just a lift of her big dark eyes. they walked slowly down the road till they came to mrs. conal's path, passed her door unassailed, and went up the hill. chapter v passion and patience. it was a glorious morning, and as they climbed, the lightening air made their spirits rise with their steps. great masses of cloud hung beyond the edge of the world, and here and there towered foundationless in the sky--huge tumulous heaps of white vapour with gray shadows. the sun was strong, and poured down floods of light, but his heat was deliciously tempered by the mountain atmosphere. there was no wind--only an occasional movement as if the air itself were breathing--just enough to let them feel they moved in no vacuum, but in the heart of a gentle ocean. they came to the hut i have already described as the one chiefly inhabited by hector of the stags and bob of the angels. it commanded a rare vision. in every direction rose some cone-shaped hill. the world lay in coloured waves before them, wild, rugged, and grand, with sheltering spots of beauty between, and the shine of lowly waters. they tapped at the door of the hut, but there was no response; they lifted the latch--it had no lock--and found neither within. alister and mercy wandered a little higher, to the shadow of a great stone; christina went inside the hut and looked from its door upon the world; ian leaned against the side of it, and looked up to the sky. suddenly a few great drops fell--it was hard to say whence. the scattered clouds had been drawing a little nearer the sun, growing whiter as they approached him, and more had ascended from the horizon into the middle air, blue sky abounding between them. a swift rain, like a rain of the early summer, began to fall, and grew to a heavy shower. they were glorious drops that made that shower; for the sun shone, and every drop was a falling gem, shining, sparkling like a diamond, as it fell. it was a bounteous rain, coming from near the zenith, and falling in straight lines direct from heaven to earth. it wanted but sound to complete its charm, and that the bells of the heather gave, set ringing by the drops. the heaven was filled with blue windows, and the rain seemed to come from them rather than from the clouds. into the rain rose the heads of the mountains, each clothed in its surplice of thin mist; they seemed rising on tiptoe heavenward, eager to drink of the high-born comfort; for the rain comes down, not upon the mown grass only, but upon the solitary and desert places also, where grass will never be--"the playgrounds of the young angels," bob called them. "do come in," said christina; "you will get quite wet!" he turned towards her. she stepped back, and he entered. like one a little weary, he sat down on hector's old chair. "is anything the matter?" asked christina, with genuine concern. she saw that he was not quite like himself, that there was an unusual expression on his face. he gave a faint apologetic smile. "as i stood there," he answered, "a strange feeling came over me--a foreboding, i suppose you would call it!" he paused; christina grew pale, and said, "won't you tell me what it was?" "it was an odd kind of conviction that the next time i stood there, it would not be in the body.--i think i shall not come back." "come back!" echoed christina, fear beginning to sip at the cup of her heart. "where are you going?" "i start for canada next week." she turned deadly white, and put out her hands, feeling blindly after support. ian started to his feet. "we have tired you out!" he said in alarm, and took her by both hands to place her in the chair. she did not hear him. the world had grown dark about her, a hissing noise was in her ears, and she would have fallen had he not put his arm round her. the moment she felt supported, she began to come to herself. there was no pretence, however, no coquetry in her faintness. neither was it aught but misery and affection that made her lay her head on ian's shoulder, and burst into a violent fit of weeping. unused to real emotion, familiar only with the poverty-stricken, false emotion of conquest and gratified vanity, when the real emotion came she did not know how to deal with it, and it overpowered her. "oh! oh!" she cried at length between her sobs, "i am ashamed of myself! i can't help it! i can't help it! what will you think of me! i have disgraced myself!" ian had been far from any suspicion of the state of things, but he had had too much sorrowful experience to be able to keep his unwilling eyes closed to this new consternation. the cold shower seemed to flood his soul; the bright drops descending with such swiftness of beauty, instinct with sun-life, turned into points of icy steel that pierced his heart. but he must not heed himself! he must speak to her! he must say something through the terrible shroud that infolded them! "you are as safe with me," he faltered, "--as safe as with your mother!" "i believe it! i know it," she answered, still sobbing, but looking up with an expression of genuine integrity such as he had never seen on her face before. "but i am sorry!" she went on. "it is very weak, and very, very un--un--womanly of me! but it came upon me all at once! if i had only had some warning! oh, why did you not tell me before? why did you not prepare me for it? you might have known what it would be to hear it so suddenly!" more and more aghast grew ian! what was to be done? what was to be said? what was left for a man to do, when a woman laid her soul before him? was there nothing but a lie to save her from bitterest humiliation? to refuse any woman was to ian a hard task; once he had found it impossible to refuse even where he could not give, and had let a woman take his soul! thank god, she took it indeed! he yielded himself perfectly, and god gave him her in return! but that was once, and for ever! it could not be done again! "i am very sorry!" he murmured; and the words and their tone sent a shiver through the heart of christina. but now that she had betrayed her secret, the pent up tide of her phantasy rushed to the door. she was reckless. used to everything her own way, knowing nothing of disappointment, a new and ill understood passion dominating her, she let everything go and the torrent sweep her with it. passion, like a lovely wild beast, had mastered her, and she never thought of trying to tame it. it was herself! there was not enough of her outside the passion to stand up against it! she began to see the filmy eyed despair, and had neither experience to deal with herself, nor reticence enough to keep silence. "if you speak to me like that," she cried, "my heart will break!--must you go away?" "dear miss palmer,--" faltered ian. "oh!" she ejaculated, with a world of bitterness in the protest. "--do let us be calm!" continued ian. "we shall not come to anything if we lose ourselves this way!" the we and the us gave her a little hope. "how can i be calm!" she cried. "i am not cold-hearted like you!--you are going away, and i shall never see you again to all eternity!" she burst out weeping afresh. "do love me a little before you go," she sobbed. "you gave me my life once, but that does not make it right to take it from me again! it only gives you a right to its best!" "god knows," said ian, "if my life could serve you, i should count it a small thing to yield!--but this is idle talk! a man must not pretend anything! we must not be untrue!" she fancied he did not believe in her. "i know! i know! you may well distrust me!" she returned. "i have often behaved abominably to you! but indeed i am true now! i dare not tell you a lie. to you i must speak the truth, for i love you with my whole soul." ian stood dumb. his look of consternation and sadness brought her to herself a little. "what have i done!" she cried, and drawing back a pace, stood looking at him, and trembling. "i am disgraced for ever! i have told a man i love him, and he leaves me to the shame of it! he will not save me from it! he will not say one word to take it away! where is your generosity, ian?" "i must be true!" said ian, speaking as if to himself, and in a voice altogether unlike his own. "you will not love me! you hate me! you despise me! but i will not live rejected! he brushes me like a feather from his coat!" "hear me," said ian, trying to recover himself. "do not think me insensible--" "oh, yes! i know!" cried christina yet more bitterly; "--insensible to the honour _i_ do you, and all that world of nothing!--pray use your victory! lord it over me! i am the weed under your foot! i beg you will not spare me! speak out what you think of me!" ian took her hand. it trembled as if she would pull it away, and her eyes flashed an angry fire. she looked more nearly beautiful than ever he had seen her! his heart was like to break. he drew her to the chair, and taking a stool, sat down beside her. then, with a voice that gathered strength as he proceeded, he said:-- "let me speak to you, christina palmer, as in the presence of him who made us! to pretend i loved you would be easier than to bear the pain of giving you such pain. were i selfish enough, i could take much delight in your love; but i scorn the unmanliness of accepting gold and returning silver: my love is not mine to give." it was some relief to her proud heart to imagine he would have loved her had he been free. but she did not speak. "if i thought," pursued ian, "that i had, by any behaviour of mine, been to blame for this,--" there he stopped, lest he should seem to lay blame on her.--"i think," he resumed, "i could help you if you would listen to me. were i in like trouble with you, i would go into my room, and shut the door, and tell my father in heaven everything about it. ah, christina! if you knew him, you would not break your heart that a man did not love you just as you loved him." had not her misery been so great, had she not also done the thing that humbled her before herself, christina would have been indignant with the man who refused her love and dared speak to her of religion; but she was now too broken for resentment. the diamond rain was falling, the sun was shining in his vaporous strength, and the great dome of heaven stood fathomless above the pair; but to christina the world was black and blank as the gloomy hut in which they sat. when first her love blossomed, she saw the world open; she looked into its heart; she saw it alive--saw it burning with that which made the bush alive in the desert of horeb--the presence of the living god; now, the vision was over, the desert was dull and dry, the bush burned no more, the glowing lava had cooled to unsightly stone! there was no god, nor any man more! time had closed and swept the world into the limbo of vanity! for a time she sat without thought, as it were in a mental sleep. she opened her eyes, and the blank of creation stared into the very heart of her. the emptiness and loneliness overpowered her. hardly aware of what she was doing, she slid to her knees at ian's feet, crying, "save me, save me, ian! i shall go mad! pardon me! help me!" "all a man may be to his sister, i am ready to be to you. i will write to you from canada; you can answer me or not as you please. my heart cries out to me to take you in my arms and comfort you, but i must not; it would not comfort you." "you do not despise me, then?--oh, thank you!" "despise you!--no more than my dead sister! i would cherish you as i would her were she in like sorrow. i would die to save you this grief--except indeed that i hope much from it." "forget all about me," said christina, summoning pride to her aid. "i will not forget you. it is impossible, nor would i if i could." "you forgive me then, and will not think ill of me?" "how forgive trust? is that an offence?" "i have lost your good opinion! how could i degrade myself so!" "on the contrary, you are fast gaining my good opinion. you have begun to be a true woman!" "what if it should be only for--" "whatever it may have been for, now you have tasted truth you will not turn back!" "now i know you do not care for me, i fear i shall soon sink back into my old self!" "i do care for you, christina, and you will not sink back into your old self. god means you to be a strong, good woman--able, with the help he will give you, to bear grief in a great-hearted fashion. believe me, you and i may come nearer each other in the ages before us by being both true, than is possible in any other way whatever." "i am miserable at the thought of what you must think of me! everybody would say i had done a shameless thing in confessing my love!" "i am not in the way of thinking as everybody thinks. there is little justice, and less sympathy, to be had from everybody. i would think and judge and feel as the one, my master. be sure you are safe with me." "you will not tell anybody?" "you must trust me." "i beg your pardon! i have offended you!" "not in the least. but i will bind myself by no promises. i am bound already to be as careful over you as if you were the daughter of my father and mother. your confession, instead of putting you in my power, makes me your servant." by this time christina was calm. there was a great load on her heart, but somehow she was aware of the possibility of carrying it. she looked up gratefully in ian's face, already beginning to feel for him a reverence which made it easier to forego the right to put her arms round him. and therewith awoke in her the first movement of divine relationship--rose the first heave of the child-heart toward the source of its being. it appeared in the form of resistance. complaint against god is far nearer to god than indifference about him. "ian macruadh," said christina solemnly, and she looked him in the eyes as she said it, "how can you believe there is a god? if there were, would he allow such a dreadful thing to befall one of his creatures? how am i to blame? i could not help it!" "i see in it his truth and goodness toward his child. and he will let you see it. the thing is between him and you." "it will be hard to convince me it is either good or loving to make anyone suffer like this!" protested christina, her hand unconsciously pressed on her heart; "--and all the disgrace of it too!" she added bitterly. "i will not allow there is any disgrace," returned ian. "but i will not try to con vince you of anything about god. i cannot. you must know him. i only say i believe in him with all my heart. you must ask him to explain himself to you, and not take it for granted, because he has done what you do not like, that he has done you a wrong. whether you seek him or not, he will do you justice; but he cannot explain himself except you seek him." "i think i understand. believe me, i am willing to understand." a few long seconds of silence followed. christina came a little nearer. she was still on her knees. "will you kiss me once," she said, "as you would a little child!" "in the name of god!" answered ian, and stooping kissed her gently and tenderly. "thank you!" she said; "--and now the rain is over, let us join mercy and the chief. i hope they have not got very wet!" "alister will have taken care of that. there is plenty of shelter about here." they left the cottage, drew the door close, and through the heather, sparkling with a thousand rain-drops, the sun shining hotter than ever through the rain-mist, went up the hill. they found the other pair sheltered by the great stone, which was not only a shadow from the heat, but sloped sufficiently to be a covert from the rain. they did not know it had ceased; perhaps they did not know it had rained. on a fine morning of the following week, the emigrants began the first stage of their long journey; the women in two carts, with their small impedimenta, the men walking--ian with them, a stout stick in his hand. they were to sail from greenock. ian and christina met several times before he left, but never alone. no conference of any kind, not even of eyes, had been sought by christina, and ian had resolved to say nothing more until he reached canada. thence he would write things which pen and ink would say better and carry nearer home than could speech; and by that time too the first keenness of her pain would have dulled, and left her mind more capable of receiving them. he was greatly pleased with the gentle calm of her behaviour. no one else could have seen any difference toward himself. he read in her carriage that of a child who had made a mistake, and was humbled, not vexed. her mother noted that her cheek was pale, and that she seemed thoughtful; but farther she did not penetrate. to ian it was plain that she had set herself to be reasonable. chapter vi love glooming. ian, the light of his mother's eyes, was gone, and she felt forsaken. alister was too much occupied with mercy to feel his departure as on former occasions, yet he missed him every hour of the day. mercy and he met, but not for some time in open company, as christina refused to go near the cottage. things were ripening to a change. alister's occupation with mercy, however, was far from absorption; the moment ian was gone, he increased his attention to his mother, feeling she had but him. but his mother was not quite the same to him now. at times she was even more tender; at other times she seemed to hold him away from her, as one with whom she was not in sympathy. the fear awoke in him that she might so speak to some one of the palmers as to raise an insuperable barrier between the families; and this fear made him resolve to come at once to an understanding with mercy. the resulting difficulties might be great; he felt keenly the possible alternative of his loss of mercy, or mercy's loss of her family; but the fact that he loved her gave him a right to tell her so, and made it his duty to lay before her the probability of an obstacle. that his mother did not like the alliance had to be braved, for a man must leave father and mother and cleave to his wife--a saying commonly by male presumption inverted. mercy's love he believed such that she would, without a thought, leave the luxury of her father's house for the mere plenty of his. that it would not be to descend but to rise in the true social scale he would leave her to discover. had he known what mr. palmer was, and how his money had been made, he would neither have sought nor accepted his acquaintance, and it would no more have been possible to fall in love with one of his family than to covet one of his fine horses. but that which might, could, would, or should have been, affected in no way that which was. he had entered in ignorance, by the will of god, into certain relations with "the young woman," as his mother called her, and those relations had to be followed to their natural and righteous end. talking together over possibilities, mr. peregrine palmer had agreed with his wife that, mercy being so far from a beauty, it might not be such a bad match, would not at least be one to be ashamed of, if she did marry the impoverished chief of a highland clan with a baronetcy in his pocket. having bought the land cheap, he could afford to let a part, perhaps even the whole of it, go back with his daughter, thus restoring to its former position an ancient and honourable family. the husband of his younger daughter would then be head of one of the very few highland families yet in possession of their ancestral acres--a distinction he would owe to peregrine palmer! it was a pleasant thought to the kindly, consequential, common little man. mrs. palmer, therefore, when the chief called upon her, received him with more than her previous cordiality. his mother would have been glad to see him return from his call somewhat dejected; he entered so radiant and handsome, that her heart sank within her. was she actually on the point of being allied through the child of her bosom to a distiller and brewer--a man who had grown rich on the ruin of thousands of his fellow countrymen? to what depths might not the most ancient family sink! for any poverty, she said to herself, she was prepared--but how was she to endure disgrace! alas for the clan, whose history was about to cease--smothered in the defiling garment of ill-gotten wealth! miserable, humiliating close to ancient story! she had no doubt as to her son's intention, although he had said nothing; she knew that his refusal of dower would be his plea in justification; but would that deliver them from the degrading approval of the world? how many, if they ever heard of it, would believe that the poor, high-souled macruadh declined to receive a single hundred from his father-in-law's affluence! that he took his daughter poor as she was born--his one stipulation that she should be clean from her father's mud! for one to whom there would even be a chance of stating the truth of the matter, a hundred would say, "that's your plan! the only salvation for your shattered houses! point them up well with the bird-lime of the brewer, the quack, or the money-lender, and they'll last till doom'sday!" thus bitterly spoke the mother. she brooded and scorned, raged inwardly, and took to herself dishonour, until evidently she was wasting. the chief's heart was troubled; could it be that she doubted his strength to resist temptation? he must make haste and have the whole thing settled! and first of all speak definitely to mercy on the matter! he had appointed to meet her the same evening, and went long before the hour to watch for her appearing. he climbed the hill, and lay down in the heather whence he could see the door of the new house, and mercy the moment she should come out of it. he lay there till the sun was down, and the stars began to appear. at length--and even then it was many minutes to the time--he saw the door open, and mercy walk slowly to the gate. he rose and went down the hill. she saw him, watched him descending, and the moment he reached the road, went to meet him. they walked slowly down the road, without a word spoken, until they felt themselves alone. "you look so lovely!" said the chief. "in the twilight, i suppose!" said mercy. "perhaps; you are a creature of the twilight, or the night rather, with your great black eyes!" "i don't like you to speak to me so! you never did before! you know i am not lovely! i am very plain!" she was evidently not pleased. "what have i done to vex you, mercy?" he rejoined. "why should you mind my saying what is true?" she bit her lip, and could hardly speak to answer him. often in london she had been morally sickened by the false rubbish talked to her sister, and had boasted to herself that the chief had never paid her a compliment. now he had done it! she took her hand from his arm. "i think i will go home!" she said. alister stopped and turned to her. the last gleam of the west was reflected from her eyes, and all the sadness of the fading light seemed gathered into them. "my child!" he said, all that was fatherly in the chief rising at the sight, "who has been making you unhappy?" "you," she answered, looking him in the face. "how? i do not understand!" he returned, gazing at her bewildered. "you have just paid me a compliment--a thing you never did before--a thing i never heard before from any but a fool! how could you say i was beautiful! you know i am not beautiful! it breaks my heart to think you could say what you didn't believe!" "mercy!" answered the chief, "if i said you were beautiful, and to my eyes you were not, it would yet be true; for to my heart, which sees deeper than my eyes, you are more beautiful than any other ever was or ever will be. i know you are not beautiful in the world's meaning, but you are very lovely--and it was lovely i said you were!" "lovely because you love me? is that what you meant?" "yes, that and more. your eyes are beautiful, and your hair is beautiful, and your expression is lovely. but i am not flattering you--i am not even paying you compliments, for those things are not yours; god made them, and has given them to me!" she put her hand in his arm again, and there was no more love-making. "but mercy," said the chief, when they had walked some distance without speaking, "do you think you could live here always, and never see london again?" "i would not care if london were scratched out." "could you be content to be a farmer's wife?" "if he was a very good farmer," she answered, looking up archly. "am i a good enough farmer, then, to serve your turn?" "good enough if i were ten times better. do you really mean it, macruadh?" "with all my heart. only there is one thing i am very anxious about." "what is that?" "how your father will take my condition." "he will allow, i think, that it is good enough for me--and more than i deserve." "that is not what i mean; it is that i have a certain condition to make." "else you won't marry me? that seems strange! of course i will do anything you would wish me to do! a condition!" she repeated, ponderingly, with just a little dissatisfaction in the tone. alister wondered she was not angry. but she trusted him too well to take offence readily. "yes," he rejoined, "a real condition! terms belong naturally to the giver, not the petitioner; i hope with all my heart it will not offend him. it will not offend you, i think." "let me hear your condition," said mercy, looking at him curiously, her honest eyes shining in the faint light. "i want him to let me take you just as you are, without a shilling of his money to spoil the gift. i want you in and for yourself." "i dare not think you one who would rather not be obliged to his wife for anything!" said mercy. "that cannot be it!" she spoke with just a shadow of displeasure. he did not answer. he was in great dread of hurting her, and his plain reason could not fail to hurt her. "well," she resumed, as he did not reply, "there are fathers, i daresay, who would not count that a hard condition!" "of course your father will not like the idea of your marrying so poor a man!" "if he should insist on your having something with me, you will not refuse, will you? why should you mind it?" alister was silent. the thing had already begun to grow dreadful! how could he tell her his reasons! was it necessary to tell her? if he had to explain, it must be to her father, not to her! how, until absolutely compelled, reveal the horrible fact that her father was despised by her lover! she might believe it her part to refuse such love! he trembled lest she should urge him. but mercy, thinking she had been very bold already, also held her peace. they tried to talk about other things, but with little success, and when they parted, it was with a sense on both sides that something had got between them. the night through mercy hardly slept for trying to discover what his aversion to her dowry might mean. no princedom was worth contrasting with poverty and her farmer-chief, but why should not his love be able to carry her few thousands? it was impossible his great soul should grudge his wife's superiority in the one poor trifle of money! was not the whole family superior to money! had she, alas, been too confident in their greatness? must she be brought to confess that their grand ways had their little heart of pride? did they not regard themselves as the ancient aristocracy of the country! yes, it must be! the chief despised the origin of her father's riches! but, although so far in the direction of the fact, she had no suspicion of anything more than landed pride looking down upon manufacture and trade. she suspected no moral root of even a share in the chief's difficulty. naturally, she was offended. how differently christina would have met the least hint of a condition, she thought. she had been too ready to show and confess her love! had she stood off a little, she might have escaped this humiliation! but would that have been honest? must she not first of all be true? was the chief, whatever his pride, capable of being ungenerous? questions like these kept coming and going throughout the night. hither and thither went her thoughts, refusing to be controlled. the morning came, the sun rose, and she could not find rest. she had come to see how ideally delightful it was just to wait god's will of love, yet, in this her first trouble, she actually forgot to think of god, never asked him to look after the thing for her, never said, "thy will be done!" and when at length weariness overpowered her, fell asleep like a heathen, without a word from her heart to the heart. alister missed ian sorely. he prayed to god, but was too troubled to feel him near. trouble imagined may seem easy to meet; trouble actual is quite another thing! his mother, perhaps, was to have her desire; mercy, perhaps, would not marry a man who disapproved of her family! between them already was what could not be talked about! he could not set free his heart to her! when mercy woke, the old love was awake also; let alister's reason be what it might, it was not for her to resent it! the life he led was so much grander than a life spent in making money, that he must feel himself superior! throned in the hearts, and influencing the characters of men, was he not in a far nobler position than money could give him? from her night of doubt and bitterness mercy issued more loving and humble. what should she be now, she said to herself, if alister had not taught her? he had been good to her as never father or brother! she would trust him! she would believe him right! had he hurt her pride? it was well her pride should be hurt! her mind was at rest. but alister must continue in pain and dread until he had spoken to her father. knowing then the worst, he might use argument with mercy; the moment for that was not yet come! if he consented that his daughter should leave him undowered, an explanation with mercy might be postponed. when the honour of her husband was more to her than the false credit of her family, when she had had time to understand principles which, born and brought up as she had been, she might not yet be able to see into, then it would be time to explain! one with him, she would see things as he saw them! till her father came, he would avoid the subject! all the morning he was busy in the cornyard--with his hands in preparing new stances for ricks, with his heart in try ing to content himself beforehand with whatever fate the lord might intend for him. as yet he was more of a christian philosopher than a philosophical christian. the thing most disappointing to him he would treat as the will of god for him, and try to make up his mind to it, persuading himself it was the right and best thing--as if he knew it the will of god. he was thus working in the region of supposition, and not of revealed duty; in his own imagination, and not in the will of god. if this should not prove the will of god concerning him, then he was spending his strength for nought. there is something in the very presence and actuality of a thing to make one able to bear it; but a man may weaken himself for bearing what god intends him to bear, by trying to bear what god does not intend him to bear. the chief was forestalling the morrow like an unbeliever--not without some moral advantage, i dare say, but with spiritual loss. we have no right to school ourselves to an imaginary duty. when we do not know, then what he lays upon us is not to know, and to be content not to know. the philosopher is he who lives in the thought of things, the christian is he who lives in the things themselves. the philosopher occupies himself with god's decree, the christian with god's will; the philosopher with what god may intend, the christian with what god wants him to do. the laird looked up and there were the young ladies! it was the first time christina had come nigh the cottage since ian's departure. "can you tell me, macruadh," she said, "what makes mrs. conal so spiteful always? when we bade her good morning a few minutes ago, she overwhelmed us with a torrent of abuse!" "how did you know it was abuse?" "we understand enough of gaelic to know it was not exactly blessing us she was. it is not necessary to know cat-language to distinguish between purring and spitting! what harm have we done? her voice was fierce, and her eyes were like two live peats flaming at us! do speak to her." "it would be of no use!" "where's the good of being chief then? i don't ask you to make the old woman civil, but i think you might keep her from insulting your friends! i begin to think your chiefdom a sham!" "i doubt indeed if it reaches to the tongues of the clan! but let us go and tell my mother. she may be able to do something with her!" christina went into the cottage; the chief drew mercy back. "what do you think the first duty of married people, mercy--to each other, i mean," he said. "to be always what they look," answered mercy. "yes, but i mean actively. what is it their first duty to do towards each other?" "i can't answer that without thinking." "is it not each to help the other to do the will of god?" "i would say yes if i were sure i really meant it." "you will mean it one day." "are you sure god will teach me?" "i think he cares more to do that than anything else." "more than to save us?" "what is saving but taking us out of the dark into the light? there is no salvation but to know god and grow like him." chapter vii a generous dowry. the only hope of the chief's mother was in what the girl's father might say to her son's proposal. would not his pride revolt against giving his daughter to a man who would not receive his blessing in money? mr. peregrine palmer arrived, and the next day alister called upon him. not unprepared for the proposal of the chief, mercy's father had nothing to urge against it. her suitor's name was almost an historical one, for it stood high in the home-annals of scotland. and the new laird, who had always a vague sense of injury in the lack of an illustrious pedigree of his own to send forward, was not un willing that a man more justly treated than himself should supply the solatium to his daughter's children. he received the macruadh, therefore, if a little pompously, yet with kindness. and the moment they were seated alister laid his request before him. "mr. palmer," he said, "i come to ask the hand of your daughter mercy. i have not much beyond myself to offer her, but i can tell you precisely what there is." mr. peregrine palmer sat for a moment looking important. he seemed to see much to ponder in the proposal. "well, macruadh," he said at length, hesitating with hum and with haw, "the thing is--well, to speak the truth, you take me a good deal by surprise! i do not know how the thing may appear to mrs. palmer. and then the girl herself, you will allow, ought, in a free country, to have a word in the matter! we give our girls absolute liberty; their own hearts must guide them--that is, where there is no serious exception to be taken. honestly, it is not the kind of match we should have chosen! it is not as if things were with you now as once, when the land was all your own, and--and--you--pardon me, i am a father--did not have to work with your own hands!" had he been there on any other errand the chief would have stated his opinion that it was degrading to a man to draw income from anything he would count it degrading to put his own hand to; but there was so much he might be compelled to say to the displeasure of mr. palmer while asking of him the greatest gift he had to bestow, that he would say nothing unpalatable which he was not compelled to say. "my ancestors," he answered, willing to give the objection a pleasant turn, "would certainly have preferred helping themselves to the produce of lowland fields! my great-great-grandfather, scorning to ask any man for his daughter, carried her off without a word!" "i am glad the peculiarity has not shown itself hereditary," said mr. palmer laughing. "but if i have little to offer, i expect nothing with her," said the chief abruptly. "i want only herself!" "a very loverly mode of speaking! but it is needless to say no daughter of mine shall leave me without a certainty, one way or the other, of suitable maintenance. you know the old proverb, macruadh,--'when poverty comes in at the door,'--?" "there is hardly a question of poverty in the sense the proverb intends!" answered the chief smiling. "of course! of course! at the same time you cannot keep the wolf too far from the door. i would not, for my part, care to say i had given my daughter to a poor farmer in the north. two men, it is, i believe, you employ, macruadh?" the chief answered with a nod. "i have other daughters to settle--not to mention my sons," pursued the great little man, "--but--but i will find a time to talk the matter over with mrs. palmer, and see what i can do for you. meanwhile you may reckon you have a friend at court; all i have seen makes me judge well of you. where we do not think alike, i can yet say for you that your faults lean to virtue's side, and are such as my daughter at least will be no loser by. good morning, macruadh." mr. peregrine palmer rose; and the chief, perplexed and indignant, but anxious not to prejudice, his very doubtful cause, rose also. "you scarcely understand me, mr. palmer," he said. "on the possibility of being honoured with your daughter's hand, you must allow me to say distinctly beforehand, that i must decline receiving anything with her. when will you allow me to wait upon you again?" "i will write. good morning." the interview was certainly not much to the assuagement of the chief's anxiety. he went home with the feeling that he had submitted to be patronized, almost insulted by a paltry fellow whose consequence rested on his ill-made money--a man who owed everything to a false and degrading appetite in his neighbours! nothing could have made him put up with him but the love of mercy, his dove in a crow's nest! but it would be all in vain, for he could not lie! truth, indeed, if not less of a virtue, was less of a heroism in the chief than in most men, for he could not lie. had he been tempted to try, he would have reddened, stammered, broken down, with the full shame, and none of the success of a falsehood. for a week, he heard nothing; there seemed small anxiety to welcome him into the palmer family! then came a letter. it implied, almost said that some difficulty had been felt as to his reception by every member of the family--which the chief must himself see to have been only natural! but while money was of no con sequence to mr. palmer, it was of the greatest consequence that his daughter should seem to make a good match; therefore, as only in respect of position was the alliance objectionable, he had concluded to set that right, and in giving him his daughter, to restore the chief's family to its former dignity, by making over to him the clanruadh property now in his possession by purchase. while he thus did his duty by his daughter, he hoped the macruadh would accept the arrangement as a mark of esteem for himself. two conditions only he would make--the first, that, as long as he lived, the shooting should be mr. palmer's, to use or to let, and should extend over the whole estate; the second, that the chief should assume the baronetcy which belonged to him. my reader will regard the proposition as not ungenerous, however much the money value of the land lay in the shooting. as alister took leave of his mother for the night, he gave her the letter. she took it, read it slowly, laughed angrily, smiled scornfully, wept bitterly, crushed it in her hand, and walked up to her room with her head high. all the time she was preparing for her bed, she was talking in her spirit with her husband. when she lay down she became a mere prey to her own thoughts, and was pulled, and torn, and hurt by them for hours ere she set herself to rule them. for the first time in her life she distrusted her son. she did not know what he would do! the temptation would surely be too strong for him! two good things were set over against one evil thing--an evil thing, however, with which nobody would associate blame, an evil thing which would raise him high in the respect of everyone whose respect was not worth having!--the woman he loved and the land of his ancestors on the one side, and only the money that bought the land for him on the other!--would he hold out? he must take the three together, or have none of them! her fear for him grew and possessed her. she grew cold as death. why did he give her the letter, and go without saying a word? she knew well the arguments he would adduce! henceforward and for ever there would be a gulf between them! the poor religion he had would never serve to keep him straight! what was it but a compromise with pride and self-sufficiency! it could bear no such strain! he acknowledged god, but not god reconciled in christ, only god such as unregenerate man would have him! and when ian came home, he would be sure to side with alister! there was but one excuse for the poor boy--and that a miserable one: the blinding of love! yes there was more excuse than that: to be lord of the old lands, with the old clan growing and gathering again about its chief! it was a temptation fit to ruin an archangel! what could he not do then for his people! what could he not do for the land! and for her, she might have her ian always at home with her! god forbid she should buy even such bliss at such a cost! she was only thinking, she said to herself, how, if the thing had to be, she would make the best of it: she was bound as a mother to do that! but the edge of the wedge was in. she said to herself afterwards, that the enemy of her soul must have been lying in wait for her that night; she almost believed in some bodily presence of him in her room: how otherwise could she account for her fall! he must have been permitted to tempt her, because, in condemning evil, she had given way to contempt and worldly pride. her thoughts unchecked flowed forward. they lingered brooding for a time on the joys that might be hers--the joys of the mother of a chief over territory as well as hearts. then they stole round, and began to flow the other way. ere the thing had come she began to make the best of it for the sake of her son and the bond between them; then she began to excuse it for the sake of the clan; and now she began to justify it a little for the sake of the world! everything that could favour the acceptance of the offer came up clear before her. the land was the same as it always had been! it had never been in the distillery! it had never been in the brew-house! it was clean, whoever had transacted concerning it, through whatever hands it had passed! a good cow was a good cow, had she been twenty times reaved! for mr. palmer to give and alister to take the land back, would be some amends to the nation, grievously injured in the money of its purchase! the deed would restore to the redeeming and uplifting influence of her son many who were fast perishing from poverty and whisky; for, their houses and crofts once more in the power of their chief, he would again be their landlord as well! it would be a pure exercise of the law of compensation! hundreds who had gone abroad would return to replenish the old glens with the true national wealth--with men and women, and children growing to be men and women, for the hour of their country's need! these were the true, the golden crops! the glorious time she had herself seen would return, when strathruadh could alone send out a regiment of the soldiers that may be defeated, but will not live to know it. the dream of her boys would come true! they would rebuild the old castle, and make it a landmark in the history of the highlands! but while she stood elate upon this high-soaring peak of the dark mountains of ambition, sudden before her mind's eye rose the face of her husband, sudden his voice was in her ear; he seemed to stand above her in the pulpit, reading from the prophet isaiah the four woes that begin four contiguous chapters:--"woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine!"--"woe to ariel, to ariel, the city where david dwelt! add ye year to year; let them kill sacrifices; yet i will distress ariel."--"woe to the rebellious children, saith the lord, that take counsel, but not of me; and that cover with a covering, but not of my spirit, that they may add sin to sin!"--"woe to them that go down to egypt for help; and stay on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many; and in horsemen, because they are very strong; but they look not unto the holy one of israel, neither seek the lord!" then followed the words opening the next chapter:--"behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment. and a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest." all this, in solemn order, one woe after the other, she heard in the very voice of her husband; in awful spiritual procession, they passed before her listening mind! she grew cold as the dead, and shuddered and shivered. she looked over the edge into the heart of a black gulf, into which she had been on the point of casting herself--say rather, down whose side, searching for an easy descent, she had already slid a long way, when the voice from above recalled her! she covered her face with her hands and wept--ashamed before god, ashamed before her husband. it was a shame unutterable that the thing should even have looked tempting! she cried for forgiveness, rose, and sought alister's room. seldom since he was a man had she visited her elder son in his chamber. she cherished for him, as chief, something of the reverence of the clan. the same familiarity had never existed between them as between her and ian. now she was going to wake him, and hold a solemn talk with him. not a moment longer should he stand leaning over the gulf into which she had herself well nigh fallen! she found him awake, and troubled, though not with an eternal trouble such as hers. "i thought i should find you asleep, alister!" she said. "it was not very likely, mother!" he answered gently. "you too have been tried with terrible thoughts?" "i have been tried, but hardly with terrible thoughts: i know that mercy loves me!" "ah, my son, my dear son! love itself is the terrible thing! it has drawn many a man from the way of peace!" "did it draw you and my father from the way of peace?" asked alister. "not for a moment!" she answered. "it made our steps firmer in the way." "then why should you fear it will draw me from it? i hope i have never made you think i was not following my father and you!" "who knows what either of us might have done, with such a temptation as yours!" "either you say, mother, that my father was not so good as i think him, or that he did what he did in his own strength!" "' let him that thinketh '--you know the rest!" rejoined the mother. "i don't think i am tempted to anything just now." "there it is, you see!--the temptation so subtle that you do not suspect its character!" "i am confident my father would have done just as i mean to do!" "what do you mean to do?" "is it my own mother asks me? does she distrust her husband and her son together?" it began to dawn on the mother that she had fallen into her own temptation through distrust of her son. because she-distrusted him, she sought excuse for him, and excuse had turned to all but justification: she had given place to the devil! but she must be sure about alister! she had had enough of the wiles of satan: she must not trust her impressions! the enemy might even now be bent on deceiving her afresh! for a moment she kept silence, then said:-- "it would be a grand thing to have the whole country-side your own again--wouldn't it, alister?" "it would, mother!" he answered. "and have all your people quite under your own care?" "a grand thing, indeed, mother!" "how can you say then it is no temptation to you?" "because it is none." "how is that?" "i would not have my clan under a factor of satan's, mother!" "i do not understand you!" "what else should i be, if i accepted the oversight of them on terms of allegiance to him! that was how he tempted jesus. i will not be the devil's steward, to call any land or any people mine!" his mother kissed him on the forehead, walked erect from the room, and went to her own to humble herself afresh. in the morning, alister took his dinner of bread and cheese in his pocket, and set out for the tomb on the hill-top. there he remained until the evening, and wrote his answer, sorely missing ian. he begged mr. peregrine palmer to dismiss the idea of enriching him, thanked him for his great liberality, but declared himself entirely content, and determined not to change his position. he could not and would not avail himself of his generosity. mr. palmer, unable to suspect the reasons at work in the chief's mind, pleased with the genuineness of his acknowledgment, and regarding him as a silly fellow who would quixotically outdo him in magnanimity, answered in a more familiar, almost jocular strain. he must not be unreasonable, he said; pride was no doubt an estimable weakness, but it might be carried too far; men must act upon realities not fancies; he must learn to have an eye to the main chance, and eschew heroics: what was life without money! it was not as if he gave it grudgingly, for he made him heartily welcome. the property was in truth but a flea-bite to him! he hoped the macruadh would live long to enjoy it, and make his father-in-law the great grandfather of chiefs, perpetuating his memory to ages unborn. there was more to the same effect, void neither of eloquence nor of a certain good-heartedness, which the laird both recognized and felt. it was again his painful turn. he had now to make his refusal as positive as words could make it. he said he was sorry to appear headstrong, perhaps uncivil and ungrateful, but he could not and would not accept anything beyond the priceless gift of mercy's hand. not even then did peregrine palmer divine that his offered gift was despised; that idea was to him all but impossible of conception. he read merely opposition, and was determined to have his way. next time he too wrote positively, though far from unkindly:--the macruadh must take the land with his daughter, or leave both! the chief replied that he could not yield his claim to mercy, for he loved her, and believed she loved him; therefore begged mr. peregrine palmer, of his generosity, to leave the decision with his daughter. the next was a letter from mercy, entreating alister not to hurt her father by seeming to doubt the kindness of his intentions. she assured him her father was not the man to interfere with his management of the estate, the shooting was all he cared about; and if that was the difficulty, she imagined even that might be got over. she ended praying that he would, for her sake, cease making much of a trifle, for such the greatest property in the world must be betwixt them. no man, she said, could love a woman right, who would not be under the poorest obligation to her people! the chief answered her in the tenderest way, assuring her that if the property had been hers he would only have blessed her for it; that he was not making much ado about nothing; that pride, or unwillingness to be indebted, had nothing to do with his determination; that the thing was with him in very truth a matter of conscience. he implored her therefore from the bottom of his heart to do her best to persuade her father--if she would save him who loved her more than his own soul, from a misery god only could make him able to bear. mercy was bewildered. she neither understood nor suspected. she wrote again, saying her father was now thoroughly angry; that she found herself without argument, the thing being incomprehensible to her as to her father; that she could not see where the conscience of the thing lay. her terror was, that, if he persisted, she would be driven to think he did not care for her; his behaviour she had tried in vain to reconcile with what he had taught her; if he destroyed her faith in him, all her faith might go, and she be left without god as well as without him! then alister saw that necessity had culminated, and that it was no longer possible to hold anything back. whatever other suffering he might cause her, mercy must not be left to think him capable of sacrificing her to an absurdity! she must know the truth of the matter, and how it was to him of the deepest conscience! he must let her see that if he allowed her to persuade him, it would be to go about thenceforward consumed of self-contempt, a slave to the property, no more its owner than if he had stolen it, and in danger of committing suicide to escape hating his wife! for the man without a tender conscience, cannot imagine the state to which another may come, who carries one about with him, stinging and accusing him all day long. so, out of a heart aching with very fullness, alister wrote the truth to mercy. and mercy, though it filled her with grief and shame, had so much love for the truth, and for the man who had waked that love, that she understood him, and loved him through all the pain of his words; loved him the more for daring the risk of losing her; loved him yet the more for cleaving to her while loathing the mere thought of sharing her wealth; loved him most of all that he was immaculate in truth. she carried the letter to her father's room, laid it before him without a word, and went out again. the storm gathered swiftly, and burst at once. not two minutes seemed to have passed when she heard his door open, and a voice of wrathful displeasure call out her name. she returned--in fear, but in fortitude. then first she knew her father!--for although wrath and injustice were at home in him, they seldom showed themselves out of doors. he treated her as a willing party to an unspeakable insult from a highland boor to her own father. to hand him such a letter was the same as to have written it herself! she identified herself with the writer when she became the bearer of the mangy hound's insolence! he raged at mercy as in truth he had never raged before. if once she spoke to the fellow again, he would turn her out of the house! she would have left the room. he locked the door, set a chair before his writing table, and ordered her to sit there and write to his dictation. but no power on earth or under it would have prevailed to make mercy write as her own the words that were not hers. "you must excuse me, papa!" she said in a tone unheard from her before. this raising of the rampart of human dignity, crowned with refusal, between him and his own child, galled him afresh. "then you shall be compelled!" he said, with an oath through his clenched teeth. mercy stood silent and motionless. "go to your room. by heaven you shall stay there till you do as i tell you!" he was between her and the door. "you need not think to gain your point by obstinacy," he added. "i swear that not another word shall pass between you and that blockhead of a chief--not if i have to turn watch-dog myself!" he made way for her, but did not open the door. she left the room too angry to cry, and went to her own. her fear of her father had vanished. with alister on her side she could stand against the world! she went to her window. she could not see the cottage from it, but she could see the ruin, and the hill of the crescent fire, on which she had passed through the shadow of death. gazing on the hill she remembered what alister would have her do, and with her father in heaven sought shelter from her father on earth. chapter viii mistress conal. mr. peregrine palmer's generosity had in part rested on the idea of securing the estate against reverse of fortune, sufficiently possible though not expected; while with the improvements almost in hand, the shooting would make him a large return. he felt the more wronged by the ridiculous scruples of the chief--in which after all, though he could not have said why, he did not quite believe. it never occurred to him that, even had the land been so come by that the chief could accept a gift of it, he would, upon the discovery that it had been so secured from the donor's creditors, at once have insisted on placing it at their disposal. his wrath proceeded to vent itself in hastening the realization of his schemes of improvement, for he was well aware they would be worse than distasteful to the macruadh. their first requirement was the removal of every peasant within his power capable of violating the sanctity of the deer forest into which he and his next neighbour had agreed to turn the whole of their property. while the settlement of his daughter was pending, he had seen that the point might cause trouble unless previously understood between him and the chief; but he never doubted the recovery of the land would reconcile the latter to the loss of the men. now he chuckled with wrathful chuckle to think how entirely he had him in his power for justifiable annoyance; for he believed himself about to do nothing but good to the country in removing from it its miserable inhabitants, whom the sentimental indulgence of their so-called chief kept contented with their poverty, and with whom interference must now enrage him. how he hated the whole wretched pack! mr. palmer's doing of good to the country consisted in making the land yield more money into the pockets of mr. brander and himself by feeding wild animals instead of men. to tell such land-owners that they are simply running a tilt at the creative energy, can be of no use: they do not believe in god, however much they may protest and imagine they do. the next day but one, he sent mistress conal the message that she must be out of her hut, goods and gear, within a fortnight. he was not sure that the thing was legally correct, but he would risk it. she might go to law if she would, but he would make a beginning with her! the chief might take up her quarrel if he chose: nothing would please mr. palmer more than to involve him in a law-suit, clear him out, and send him adrift! his money might be contemptible, but the chief should find it at least dangerous! contempt would not stave off a land-slip! mistress conal, with a rage and scorn that made her feel every inch a witch, and accompanied by her black cat, which might or might not be the innocent animal the neighbours did not think him, hurried to the macruadh, and informed him that "the lowland thief" had given her notice to quit the house of her fathers within a fortnight. "i fear much we cannot help it! the house is on his land!" said the chief sorrowfully. "his land!" echoed the old woman. "is the nest of the old eagle his land? can he make his heather white or his ptarmigan black? will he dry up the lochs, and stay the rivers? will he remove the mountains from their places, or cause the generations of men to cease from the earth? defend me, chief! i come to you for the help that was never sought in vain from the macruadh!" "what help i have is yours without the asking," returned the chief. "i cannot do more than is in my power! one thing only i can promise you--that you shall lack neither food nor shelter." "my chief will abandon me to the wolf!" she cried. "never! but i can only protect you, not your house. he may have no right to turn you out at such short notice; but it could only be a matter of weeks. to go to law with him would but leave me without a roof to shelter you when your own was gone!" "the dead would have shown him into the dark, ere he turned me into the cold!" she muttered, and turning, left him. the chief was greatly troubled. he had heard nothing of such an intention on the part of his neighbour. could it be for revenge? he had heard nothing yet of his answer to mercy! all he could do was to represent to mr. palmer the trouble the poor woman was in, and let him know that the proceeding threatened would render him very unpopular in the strath. this he thought it best to do by letter. it could not enrage mr. palmer more, but it enraged him afresh. he vowed that the moment the time was up, out the old witch should go, neck and crop; and with the help of mr. brander, provided men for the enforcement of his purpose who did not belong to the neighbourhood. the chief kept hoping to hear from the new house, but neither his letter to mercy nor to her father received any answer. how he wished for ian to tell him what he ought to do! his mother could not help him. he saw nothing for it but wait events. day after day passed, and he heard nothing. he would have tried to find out the state of things at the new house, but until war was declared that would not be right! mr. palmer might be seeking how with dignity to move in the matter, for certainly the chief had placed him in a position yet more unpleasant than his own! he must wait on! the very day fortnight after the notice given, about three o'clock in the afternoon, came flying to the chief a ragged little urchin of the village, too breathless almost to make intelligible his news--that there were men at mistress conal's who would not go out of her house, and she and her old black cat were swearing at them. the chief ran: could the new laird be actually unhousing the aged, helpless woman? it was the part of a devil and not of a man! as he neared the place--there were her poor possessions already on the roadside!--her one chair and stool, her bedding, her three-footed pot, her girdle, her big chest, all that she could call hers in the world! and when he came in sight of the cottage, there she was being brought out of it, struggling, screaming, and cursing, in the grasp of two men! fierce in its glow was the torrent of gaelic that rushed from the crater of her lips, molten in the volcanic depths of her indignant soul. when one thinks of the appalling amount of rage exhausted by poor humans upon wrong, the energy of indignation, whether issued or suppressed, and how little it has done to right wrong, to draw acknowledgment or amends from self-satisfied insolence, he naturally asks what becomes of so much vital force. can it fare differently from other forces, and be lost? the energy of evil is turned into the mill-race of good; but the wrath of man, even his righteous wrath, worketh not the righteousness of god! what becomes of it? if it be not lost, and have but changed its form, in what shape shall we look for it? "set her down," cried the chief. "i will take care of her." when she heard the voice of her champion, the old woman let go a cat-like screech of triumph, and her gliding gaelic, smoothness itself in articulation, flowed yet firier in word, and fiercer in tone. but the who were thus ejecting her--hangers on of the sheriff-court in the county town, employed to give a colour of law to the doubtful proceeding--did not know the chief. "oh, we'll set her down," answered one of them insolently, "--and glad enough too! but we'll have her on the public road with her sticks first!" infuriated by the man's disregard of her chief, mistress conal struck her nails into his face, and with a curse he flung her from him. she turned instantly on the other with the same argument ad hominem, and found herself staggering on her own weak limbs to a severe fall, when the chief caught and saved her. she struggled hard to break from him and rush again into the hut, declaring she would not leave it if they burned her alive in it, but he held her fast. there was a pause, for one or two who had accompanied the men employed, knew the chief, and their reluctance to go on with the ruthless deed in his presence, influenced the rest. report of the ejection had spread, and the neighbours came running from the village. a crowd seemed to be gathering. again and again mistress conal tried to escape from alister and rush into the cottage. "you too, my chief!" she cried. "you turned against the poor of your people!" "no, mistress conal," he answered. "i am too much your friend to let you kill yourself!" "we have orders, macruadh, to set fire to the hovel," said one of the men, touching his hat respectfully. "they'll roast my black one!" shrieked the old woman. "small fear for him," said a man's voice from the little crowd, "if half be true--!" apparently the speaker dared no more. "fire won't singe a hair of him, mistress conal," said another voice. "you know it; he's used to it!" "come along, and let's get it over!" cried the leader of the ejection-party. "it--won't take many minutes once it's well a going, and there's fire enough on the hearth to set ben cruachan in a blaze!" "is everything out of it?" demanded the chief. "all but her cat. we've done our best, sir, and searched everywhere, but he's not to be found. there's nothing else left." "it's a lie!" screamed mistress conal. "is there not a great pile of peats, carried on my own back from the moss! ach, you robbers! would you burn the good peats?" "what good will the peats be to you, woman," said one of them not unkindly, "when you have no hearth?" she gave a loud wail, but checked it. "i will burn them on the road," she said. "they will keep me a few hours from the dark! when i die i will go straight up to god and implore his curse upon you, on your bed and board, your hands and tools, your body and soul. may your every prayer be lost in the wide murk, and never come at his ears! may--" "hush! hush!" interposed the chief with great gentleness. "you do not know what you are saying. but you do know who tells us to forgive our enemies!" "it's well for him to forgive," she screamed, "sitting on his grand throne, and leaving me to be turned out of my blessed house, on to the cold road!" "nannie!" said the chief, calling her by her name, "because a man is unjust to you, is that a reason for you to be unjust to him who died for you? you know as well as he, that you will not be left out on the cold road. he knows, and so do you, that while i have a house over my head, there is a warm corner in it for you! and as for his sitting on his throne, you know that all these years he has been trying to take you up beside him, and can't get you to set your foot on the first step of it! be ashamed of yourself, nannie!" she was silent. "bring out her peats," he said, turning to the bystanders; "we have small need, with winter on the road, to waste any of god's gifts!" they obeyed. but as they carried them out, and down to the road, the number of mistress conal's friends kept growing, and a laying together of heads began, and a gathering of human fire under glooming eyebrows. it looked threatening. suddenly mistress conal broke out in a wild yet awful speech, wherein truth indeed was the fuel, but earthly wrath supplied the prophetic fire. her friends suspended their talk, and her foes their work, to listen. english is by no means equally poetic with the gaelic, regarded as a language, and ill-serves to represent her utterance. much that seems natural in the one language, seems forced and unreal amidst the less imaginative forms of the other. i will nevertheless attempt in english what can prove little better than an imitation of her prophetic outpouring. it was like a sermon in this, that she began with a text:-- "woe unto them," she said--and her voice sounded like the wind among the great stones of a hillside--"that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth!" this woe she followed with woe upon woe, and curse upon curse, now from the bible, now from some old poem of the country, and now from the bitterness of her own heart. then she broke out in purely native eloquence:-- "who art thou, o man, born of a woman, to say to thy brother, 'depart from this earth: here is no footing for thee: all the room had been taken for me ere thou wast heard of! what right hast thou in a world where i want room for the red deer, and the big sheep, and the brown cattle? go up, thou infant bald-head! is there not room above, in the fields of the air? is there not room below with the dead? verily there is none here upon the earth!' who art thou, i say, to speak thus to thy fellow, as if he entered the world by another door than thyself! because thou art rich, is he not also a man?--a man made in the image of the same god? who but god sent him? and who but god, save thy father was indeed the devil, hath sent thee? thou hast to make room for thy brother! what brother of thy house, when a child is born into it, would presume to say, 'let him begone, and speedily! i do not want him! there is no room for him! i require it all for myself!' wilt thou say of any man, 'he is not my brother,' when god says he is! if thou say, 'am i therefore his keeper?' god for that saying will brand thee with the brand of cain. yea, the hour will come when those ye will not give room to breathe, will rise panting in the agony, yea fury of their need, and cry, 'if we may neither eat nor lie down by their leave, lo, we are strong! let us take what they will not give! if we die we but die!' then shall there be blood to the knees of the fighting men, yea, to the horses' bridles; and the earth shall be left desolate because of you, foul feeders on the flesh and blood, on the bodies and souls of men! in the pit of hell you will find room enough, but no drop of water; and it will comfort you little that ye lived merrily among pining men! which of us has coveted your silver or your gold? which of us has stretched out the hand to take of your wheat or your barley? all we ask is room to live! but because ye would see the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, ye have crushed and straitened us till we are ready to cry out, 'god, for thy mercy's sake, let us die, lest we be guilty of our own blood!'" a solitary man had come down the hill behind, and stood alone listening. it was the mover of the wickedness. in the old time the rights of the people in the land were fully recognized; but when the chiefs of clanruadh sold it, they could not indeed sell the rights that were not theirs, but they forgot to secure them for the helpless, and they were now in the grasp of the selfish and greedy, the devourers of the poor. he did not understand a word the woman was saying, but he was pleased to look on her rage, and see the man who had insulted him suffer with her. when he began to note the glances of lurid fire which every now and then turned upon him during mistress conal's speech, he scorned the indication: such poor creatures dared venture nothing, he thought, against the mere appearance of law. under what he counted the chiefs contempt, he had already grown worse; and the thought that perhaps the great world might one day look upon him with like contempt, wrought in him bitterly; he had not the assurance of rectitude which makes contempt hurtless. he was crueller now than before the chief's letter to his daughter. when mistress conal saw him, she addressed herself to him directly. what he would have felt had he understood, i cannot tell. never in this life did he know how the weak can despise the strong, how the poor can scorn the rich! "worm!" she said, "uncontent with holding the land, eating the earth that another may not share! the worms eat but what their bodies will hold, and thou canst devour but the fill of thy life! the hour is at hand when the earth will swallow thee, and thy fellow worms will eat thee, as thou hast eaten men. the possessions of thy brethren thou hast consumed, so that they are not! the holy and beautiful house of my fathers,--" she spoke of her poor little cottage, but in the words lay spiritual fact. "--mock not its poverty!" she went on, as if forestalling contempt; "for is it not to me a holy house where the woman lay in the agony whence first i opened my eyes to the sun? is it not a holy house where my father prayed morning and evening, and read the words of grace and comfort? is it not to me sacred as the cottage at nazareth to the poor man who lived there with his peasants? and is not that a beautiful house in which a woman's ear did first listen to the words of love? old and despised i am, but once i was younger than any of you, and ye will be old and decrepit as i, if the curse of god do not cut you off too soon. my alister would have taken any two of you and knocked your heads together. he died fighting for his country; and for his sake the voice of man's love has never again entered my heart! i knew a true man, and could be true also. would to god i were with him! you man-trapping, land-reaving, house-burning sasunnach, do your worst! i care not." she ceased, and the spell was broken. "come, come!" said one of the men impatiently. "tom, you get a peat, and set it on the top of the wall, under the roof. you, too, george!--and be quick. peats all around! there are plenty on the hearth!--how's the wind blowing?--you, henry, make a few holes in the wall here, outside, and we'll set live peats in them. it's time there was an end to this!" "you're right; but there's a better way to end it!" returned one of the clan, and gave him a shove that sent him to the ground. "men, do your duty!" cried mr. palmer from behind. "_i_ am here--to see you do it! never mind the old woman! of course she thinks it hard; but hard things have got to be done! it's the way of the world, and all for the best." "mr. palmer," said another of the clan, "the old woman has the right of you: she and hers have lived there, in that cottage, for nigh a hundred years." "she has no right. if she thinks she has, let her go to the law for it. in the meantime i choose to turn her off my land. what's mine's mine, as i mean every man jack of you to know--chief and beggar!" the macruadh walked up to him. "pardon me, sir," he said: "i doubt much if you have a legal right to disturb the poor woman. she has never paid rent for her hut, and it has always been looked upon as her property." "then the chief that sold it swindled both me and her!" stammered mr. palmer, white with rage. "but as for you who call yourself a chief, you are the most insolent, ill-bred fellow i ever had to do with, and i have not another word to say to you!" a silence like that before a thunderstorm succeeded: not a man of the clan could for the moment trust his hearing. but there is nothing the celtic nature resents like rudeness: half a dozen at once of the macruadhs rushed upon the insulter of their chief, intent on his punishment. "one of you touch him," cried alister, "and i will knock him down. i would if he were my foster-brother!" each eager assailant stood like a block. "finish your work, men!" shouted mr. palmer. to do him justice, he was no coward. "clansmen," said the chief, "let him have his way. i do not see how to resist the wrong without bringing more evil upon us than we can meet. we must leave it to him who says 'vengeance is mine.'" the macruadhs murmured their obedience, and stood sullenly looking on. the disseizors went into the hut, and carried out the last of the fuel. then they scooped holes in the turf walls, inside to leeward, outside to windward, and taking live peats from the hearth, put them in the holes. a few minutes, and poor nannie's "holy and beautiful house" was a great fire. when they began to apply the peats, alister would at once have taken the old woman away, but he dreaded an outbreak, and lingered. when the fire began to run up the roof, mistress conal broke from him, and darted to the door. every one rushed to seize her, mr. palmer with the rest. "blackie! blackie! blackie!" she shrieked like a madwoman. while the men encumbered each other in their endeavours to get her away, down shot the cat from the blazing roof, a fizz of fire in his black fur, his tail as thick as his neck, an infernal howling screech of hatred in his horrible throat, and, wild with rage and fear, flung himself straight upon mr. palmer. a roar of delighted laughter burst forth. he bawled out--and his bawl was mingled with a scream--to take the brute off him, and his own men hurried to his rescue; but the fury-frantic animal had dug his claws and teeth into his face, and clung to him so that they had to choke him off. the chief caught up mistress conal and carried her away: there was no danger of any one hurting mr. palmer now! he bore her on one arm like a child, and indeed she was not much heavier. but she kept her face turned and her eyes fixed on her burning home, and leaning over the shoulder of the chief, poured out, as he carried her farther and farther from the scene of the outrage, a flood of maledictory prophecy against the doers of the deed. the laird said never a word, never looked behind him, while she, almost tumbling down his back as she cursed with outstretched arms, deafened him with her raging. he walked steadily down the path to the road, where he stepped into the midst of her goods and chattels. the sight of them diverted a little the current of her wrath. "where are you going, macruadh?" she cried, as he walked on. "see you not my property lying to the hand of the thief? know you not that the greedy sasunnach will sweep everything away!" "i can't carry them and you too, mistress conal!" said the chief gayly. "set me down then. who ever asked you to carry me! and where would you be carrying me? my place is with my things!" "your place is with me, mistress conal! i belong to you, and you belong to me, and i am taking you home to my mother." at the word, silence fell, not on the lips, but on the soul of the raving prophetess: the chief she loved, his mother she feared. "set me down, macruadh!" she pleaded in gentle tone. "don't carry me to her empty-handed! set me down straight; i will load my back with my goods, and bear them to my lady, and throw them at her feet." "as soon as we get to the cottage," said the chief, striding on with his reluctant burden, "i will send up two men with wheelbarrows to bring them home." "home, said you?" cried the old woman, and burst into the tearless wailing of a child; "there is a home for me no more! my house was all that was left me of my people, and it is your own that make a house a home! in the long winter nights, when i sat by the fire and heard the wind howl, and the snow pat, pat like the small hands of my little brothers on the window, my heart grew glad within me, and the dead came back to my soul! when i took the book, i heard the spirit of my father reading through my own lips! and oh, my mother! my mother!" she ceased as if in despair. "surely, nannie, you will be at home with your chief!" said alister. "my house is your house now, and your dead will come to it and be welcome!" "it is their chief's house, and they will!" she returned hopefully. "they loved their chief.--shall we not make a fine clan when we're all gathered, we macmadhs! man nor woman can say i did anything to disgrace it!" "lest we should disgrace it," answered the chief, "we must bear with patience what is sent upon it." he carried her into the drawing-room and told her story, then stood, to the delighted amusement of his mother, with his little old sister in his arms, waiting her orders, like a big boy carrying the baby, who now and then moaned a little, but did not speak. mrs. macruadh called nancy, and told her to bring the tea-tray, and then, get ready for mistress conal the room next nancy's own, that she might be near to wait on her; and thither, when warmed and fed, the chief carried her. but the terrible excitement had so thinned the mainspring of her time-watch, that it soon broke. she did not live many weeks. from the first she sank into great dejection, and her mind wandered. she said her father never came to see her now; that he was displeased with her for leaving the house; and that she knew now she ought to have stayed and been burned in it. the chief reminded her that she had no choice, but had been carried bodily away. "yes, yes," she answered; "but they do not know that! i must make haste and tell them! who can bear her own people to think ill of her!--i'm coming! i'm coming! i'll tell you all about it! i'm an honest woman yet!" another thing troubled her sorely, for which she would hear no consolation; blackie had vanished!--whether he was killed at the time of his onslaught on mr. palmer, or was afterwards shot; whether, disgusted with the treatment of his old home, or the memory of what he had there suffered, he had fled the strath, and gone to the wild cats among the hills, or back to the place which some averred he came from, no one could tell. in her wanderings she talked more of her cat than of anything else, and would say things that with some would have gone far to justify the belief that the animal was by nature on familiar terms with the element which had yet driven him from his temporary home. nancy was more than uneasy at having the witch so near, but by no means neglected her duty to her. one night she woke, and had for some time lain listening whether she stirred or not, when suddenly quavered through the dark the most horrible cat-cry she had ever heard. in abject terror she covered her head, and lay shuddering. the cry came again, and kept coming at regular intervals, but drawing nearer and nearer. its expression was of intense and increasing pain. the creature whence it issued seemed to come close to the house, then with difficulty to scramble up on the roof, where it went on yowling, and screeching, and throwing itself about as if tying itself in knots, nancy said, until at last it gave a great choking, gobbling scream, and fell to the ground, after which all was quiet. persuading herself it was only a cat, she tried to sleep, and at length succeeded. when she woke in the morning, the first thing she did was to go out, fully expecting to find the cat lying at the foot of the wall. no cat was there. she went then as usual to attend to the old woman. mistress conal was dead and cold. the clan followed her body to the grave, and the black cat was never seen. chapter ix the marches. it was plainly of no use for the chief to attempt mollifying mr. palmer. so long as it was possible for him to be what he was, it must be impossible for him to understand the conscience that compelled the chief to refuse participation in the results of his life. where a man's own conscience is content, how shall he listen to the remonstrance of another man's! but even if he could have understood that the offence was unavoidable, that would rather have increased than diminished the pain of the hurt; as it was, the chief's determination must seem to mr. palmer an unprovoked insult! thus reflecting, alister tried all he could to be fair to the man whom he had driven to cut his acquaintance. it was now a lonely time for alister, lonelier than any ever before. ian was not within reach even by letter; mercy was shut up from him: he had not seen or heard from her since writing his explanation; and his mother did not sympathize with his dearest earthly desire: she would be greatly relieved, yea heartily glad, if mercy was denied him! she loved ian more than the chief, yet could have better borne to see him the husband of mercy; what was wanting to the equality of her love was in this regard more than balanced by her respect for the chief of the clan and head of the family. alister's light was thus left to burn in very darkness, that it might burn the better; for as strength is made perfect through weakness, so does the light, within grow by darkness. it was the people that sat in darkness that saw a great light. he was brought closer than ever to first principles; had to think and judge more than ever of the right thing to do--first of all, the right thing with regard to mercy. of giving her up, there was of course no thought; so long as she would be his, he was hers as entirely as the bonds of any marriage could make him! but she owed something to her father! and of all men the patriarchal chief was the last to dare interfere with the rights of a father. but they must be rights, not rights turned into, or founded upon wrongs. with the first in acknowledging true, he would not be with the last even, in yielding to false rights! the question was, what were the rights of a father? one thing was clear, that it was the duty, therefore the right of a father, to prevent his child from giving herself away before she could know what she did; and mercy was not yet of age. that one woman might be capable of knowing at fifteen, and another not at fifty, left untouched the necessity for fixing a limit. it was his own duty and right, on the other hand, to do what he could to prevent her from being in any way deceived concerning him. it was essential that nothing should be done, resolved, or yielded, by the girl, through any misunderstanding he could forestall, or because of any falsehood he could frustrate. he must therefore contrive to hold some communication with her! first of all, however, he must learn how she was treated! it was not only in fiction or the ancient clan-histories that tyrannical and cruel things were done! a tragedy is even more a tragedy that it has not much diversity of incident, that it is acted in commonplace surroundings, and that the agents of it are commonplace persons--fathers and mothers acting from the best of low or selfish motives. where either mammon or society is worshipped, in love, longing, or fear, there is room for any falsehood, any cruelty, any suffering. there were several of the clan employed about the new house of whom alister might have sought information; but he was of another construction from the man of fashion in the old plays, whose first love-strategy is always to bribe the lady's maid: the chief scorned to learn anything through those of a man's own household. he fired a gun, and ran up a flag on the old castle, which brought rob of the angels at full speed, and comforted the heart of mercy sitting disconsolate at her window: it was her chiefs doing, and might have to do with her! having told rob the state of matters between him and the new house-- "i need not desire you, rob," he concluded, "to be silent! you may of course let your father know, but never a soul besides. from this moment, every hour your father does not actually need you, be somewhere on the hills where you can see the new house. i want to learn first whether she goes out at all. with the dark you must draw nearer the house. but i will have no questioning of the servants or anyone employed about it; i will never use a man's pay to thwart his plans, nor yet make any man even unconsciously a traitor." rob understood and departed; but before he had news for his master an event occurred which superseded his service. the neighbours, mr. peregrine palmer and mr. brander, had begun to enclose their joint estates for a deer-forest, and had engaged men to act as curators. they were from the neighbourhood, but none of them belonged to strathruadh, and not one knew the boundaries of the district they had to patrol; nor indeed were the boundaries everywhere precisely determined: why should they be, where all was heather and rock? until game-sprinkled space grew valuable, who would care whether this or that lump of limestone, rooted in the solid earth, were the actual property of the one or the other! either would make the other welcome to blast and cart it away! there was just one person who knew all about the boundaries that was to be known; he could not in places draw their lines with absolute assurance, but he had better grounds for his conclusions than anyone else could have; this was hector of the stags. for who so likely to understand them as he who knew the surface within them as well as the clay-floor of his own hut? if he did not everywhere know where the marchline fell, at least he knew perfectly where it ought to fall. it happened just at this time that the mistress told hector she would be glad of a deer, intending to cure part for winter use; the next day, therefore,--the first of rob of the angels' secret service--he stalked one across the hill-farm, got a shot at it near the cave-house, brought it down, and was busy breaking it, when two men who had come creeping up behind, threw themselves upon him, and managed, well for themselves, to secure him before he had a chance of defending himself. finding he was deaf and dumb, one of them knew who he must be, and would have let him go; but the other, eager to ingratiate himself with the new laird, used such, argument to the contrary as prevailed with his companion, and they set out for the new house, hector between them with his hands tied. annoyed and angry at being thus treated like a malefactor, he yet found amusement in the notion of their mistake. but he found it awkward to be unable to use that readiest weapon of human defence, the tongue. if only his ears and mouth, as he called rob in their own speech, had been with him! when he saw, however, where they were taking him, he was comforted, for rob was almost certain to see him: wherever he was, he was watching the new house! he went composedly along with them therefore, fuming and snorting, not caring to escape. when rob caught sight of the three, he could not think how it was that his father walked so unlike himself. he could not be hurt, for his step was strong and steady as ever; not the less was there something of the rhythm gone out of his motion! there was "a broken music" in his gait! he took the telescope which the chief had lent him, and turned it upon him. discovering then that his father's hands were bound behind his back, fiercest indignation overwhelmed the soul of rob of the angels. his father bound like a criminal!--his father, the best of men! what could the devils mean? ah, they were taking him to the new house! he shut up his telescope, laid it down by a stone, and bounded to meet them, sharpening his knife on his hand as he went. the moment they were near enough, signs, unintelligible to the keepers, began to pass between the father and son: rob's meant that he must let him pass unnoticed; hector's that he understood. so, with but the usual salutation of a stranger, rob passed them. the same moment he turned, and with one swift sweep of his knife, severed the bonds of his father. the old man stepped back, and father and son stood fronting the enemy. "now," said rob, "if you are honest men, stand to it! how dared you bind hector of the stags?" "because he is not an honest man," replied one of them. rob answered him with a blow. the man made at him, but hector stepped between. "say that again of my father," cried rob, "who has no speech to defend himself, and i will drive my knife into you." "we are only doing our duty!" said the other. "we came upon him there cutting up the deer he had just killed on the new laird's land." "who are you to say which is the stranger's, and which the macruadh's? neither my father nor i have ever seen the faces of you in the country! will you pretend to know the marches better than my father, who was born and bred in the heather, and knows every stone on the face of the hills?" "we can't help where he was born or what he knows! he was on our land!" "he is the macruadh's keeper, and was on his own land. you will get yourselves into trouble!" "we'll take our chance!" "take your man then!" "if he try to escape, i swear by the bones of my grandfather," said the more inimical of the two, inheritor of a clan-feud with the macruadhs, "i will shoot him." bob of the angels burst into a scornful laugh. "you will! will you?" "i will not kill him; i don't want to be hanged for him! but i will empty my shot-barrel into the legs of him! so take your chance; you are warned!" they had hector's gun, and rob had no weapon but his knife. nor was he inclined to use either now he had cooled a little. he turned to his father. the old man understood perfectly what had passed between them, and signed to rob that he would go on to the new house, and rob might run and let the chief know what had happened. the same thing was in rob's mind, for he saw how it would favour the desires of his chief, bringing them all naturally about the place. but he must first go with his father on the chance of learning something. "we will go with you," he said. "we don't want you!" "but i mean to go!--my father is not able to speak for himself!" "you know nothing." "i know what he knows. the lie does not grow in our strath." "you crow high, my cock!" "no higher than i strike," answered rob. in the eyes of the men rob was small and weak; but there was something in him notwithstanding that looked dangerous, and, though far from cowards, they thought it as well to leave him alone. mercy at her window, where was her usual seat now, saw them coming, and instinctively connected their appearance with her father's new measures of protection; and when the men turned toward the kitchen, she ran down to learn what she could. rob greeted her with a smile as he entered. "i am going to fetch the macruadh," he whispered, and turning went out again. he told the chief that at the word her face lighted up as with the rise of the moon. one of the maids went and told her master that they had got a poacher in the kitchen. mr. palmer's eyes lightened under his black brows when he saw the captive, whom he knew by sight and by report. his men told him the story their own way, never hinting a doubt as to whose was the land on which the deer had been killed. "where is the nearest magistrate?" he inquired with grand severity. "the nearest is the macruadh, sir!" answered a highlander who had come from work in the garden to see what was going on. "i cannot apply to him; the fellow is one of his own men!" "the macruadh does what is just!" rejoined the man. his master vouchsafed him no reply. he would not show his wrath against the chief: it would be undignified! "take him to the tool-house, and lock him up till i think what to do with him. bring me the key." the butler led the way, and hector followed between his captors. they might have been showing him to his bed-room, so calm was he: bob gone to fetch the chief, his imprisonment could not last!--and for the indignity, was he not in the right! as mr. palmer left the kitchen, his eye fell on mercy. "go to your room," he said angrily, and turned from her. she obeyed in silence, consoling herself that from her window she could see the arrival of the chief. nor had she watched long when she saw him coming along the road with rob. at the gate she lost sight of them. presently she heard voices in the hall, and crept down the stair far enough to hear. "i could commit you for a breach of the peace, mr. palmer," she heard the chief say. "you ought to have brought the man to me. as a magistrate i order his release. but i give my word he shall be forthcoming when legally required." "your word is no bail. the man was taken poaching; i have him, and i will keep him." "let me see him then, that i may learn from himself where he shot the deer." "he shall go before mr. brander." "then i beg you will take him at once. i will go with him. but listen a moment, mr. palmer. when this same man, my keeper, took your guest poaching on my ground, i let mr. sercombe go. i could have committed him as you would commit hector. i ask you in return to let hector go. being deaf and dumb, and the hills the joy of his life, confinement will be terrible to him." "i will do nothing of the kind. you could never have committed a gentleman for a mistake. this is quite a different thing!" "it is a different thing, for hector cannot have made a mistake. he could not have followed a deer on to your ground without knowing it!" "i make no question of that!" "he says he was not on your property." "says!" "he is not a man to lie!" mr. palmer smiled. "once more i pray you, let us see him together." "you shall not see him." "then take him at once before mr. brander." "mr. brander is not at home." "take him before some magistrate--i care not who. there is mr. chisholm!" "i will take him when and where it suits me." "then as a magistrate i will set him at liberty. i am sorry to make myself unpleasant to you. of all things i would have avoided it. but i cannot let the man suffer unjustly. where have you put him?" "where you will not find him." "he is one of my people; i must have him!" "your people! a set of idle, poaching fellows! by heaven, the strath shall be rid of the pack of them before another year is out!" "while i have land in it with room for them to stand upon, the strath shall not be rid of them!--but this is idle! where have you put hector of the stags?" mr. palmer laughed. "in safe keeping. there is no occasion to be uneasy about him! he shall have plenty to eat and drink, be well punished, and show the rest of the rascals the way out of the country!" "then i must find him! you compel me!" so saying, the chief, with intent to begin his search at the top of the house in the hope of seeing mercy, darted up the stair. she heard him coming, went a few steps higher, and waited. on the landing he saw her, white, with flashing eyes. their hands clasped each other--for a moment only, but the moment was of eternity, not of time. "you will find hector in the tool-house," she said aloud. "you shameless hussey!" cried her father, following the chief in a fury. mercy ran up the stair. the chief turned and faced mr. palmer. "you have no business in my house!" "i have the right of a magistrate." "you have no right. leave it at once." "allow me to pass." "you ought to be ashamed of yourself--making a girl turn traitor to her own father!" "you ought to be proud of a daughter with the conscience and courage to turn against you!" the chief passed mr. palmer, and running down the stair, joined rob of the angels where he stood at the door in a group composed of the keepers and most of the servants. "do you know the tool-house?" he said to rob. "yes, macruadh." "lead the way then. your father is there." "on no account let them open the door," cried mr. palmer. "they may hold through it what communication they please." "you will not be saying much to a deaf man through inch boards!" remarked the clansman from the garden. mr. palmer hurried after them, and his men followed. alister found the door fast and solid, without handle. he turned a look on his companion, and was about to run his weight against the lock. "it is too strong," said rob. "hector of the stags must open it!" "but how? you cannot even let him know what you want!" rob gave a smile, and going up to the door, laid himself against it, as close as he could stand, with his face upon it, and so stood silent. mr. palmer coming up with his attendants, all stood for a few moments in silence, wondering at rob: he must be holding communication with his father--but how? sounds began inside--first a tumbling of tools about, then an attack on the lock. "come! come! this won't do!" said mr. palmer, approaching the door. "prevent it then," said the chief. "do what you will you cannot make him hear you, and while the door is between you, he cannot see you! if you do not open it, he will!" "run," said mr. palmer to the butler; "you will find the key on my table! i don't want the lock ruined!" but there was no stopping the thing! before the butler came back, the lock fell, the door opened, and out came hector, wiping his brow with his sleeve, and looking as if he enjoyed the fun. the keepers darted forward. "stand off!" said the chief stepping between. "i don't want to hurt you, but if you attempt to lay hands on him, i will." one of the men dodged round, and laid hold of hector from behind; the other made a move towards him in front. hector stood motionless for an instant, watching his chief, but when he saw him knock down the man before him, he had his own assailant by the throat in an instant, gave him a shake, and threw him beside his companion. "you shall suffer for this, macruadh!" cried mr. palmer, coming close up to him, and speaking in a low, determined tone, carrying a conviction of unchangeableness. "better leave what may not be the worst alone!" returned the chief. "it is of no use telling you how sorry i am to have to make myself disagreeable to you; but i give you fair warning that i will accept no refusal of the hand of your daughter from any but herself. as you have chosen to break with me, i accept your declaration of war, and tell you plainly i will do all i can to win your daughter, never asking your leave in respect of anything i may think it well to do. you will find there are stronger forces in the world than money. henceforward i hold myself clear of any personal obligation to you except as mercy's father and my enemy." from very rage mr. palmer was incapable of answering him. alister turned from him, and in his excitement mechanically followed rob, who was turning a corner of the house. it was not the way to the gate, but rob had seen mercy peeping round that same corner--anxious in truth about her father; she feared nothing for alister. he came at once upon mercy and rob talking together. rob withdrew and joined his father a little way off; they retired a few more paces, and stood waiting their chief's orders. "how am i to see you again, mercy?" said the chief hurriedly. "can't you think of some way? think quick." now mercy, as she sat alone at her window, had not unfrequently imagined the chief standing below on the walk, or just beyond in the belt of shrubbery; and now once more in her mind's eye suddenly seeing him there, she answered hurriedly, "come under my window to-night." "i do not know which it is." "you see it from the castle. i will put a candle in it." "what hour?" "any time after midnight. i will sit there till you come." "thank you," said the chief, and departed with his attendants. mercy hastened into the house by a back door, but had to cross the hall to reach the stair. as she ran up, her father came in at the front door, saw her, and called her. she went down again to meet the tempest of his rage, which now broke upon her in gathered fury. he called her a treacherous, unnatural child, with every name he thought bad enough to characterize her conduct. had she been to him as began or goneril, he could hardly have found worse names for her. she stood pale, but looked him in the face. her mother came trembling as near as she dared, withered by her terror to almost twice her age. mr. palmer in his fury took a step towards mercy as if he would strike her. mercy did not move a muscle, but stood ready for the blow. then love overcame her fear, and the wife and mother threw herself between, her arms round her husband, as if rather to protect him from the deed than her daughter from its hurt. "go to your room, mercy," she said. mercy turned and went. she could not understand herself. she used to be afraid of her father when she knew no reason; now that all the bad in his nature and breeding took form and utterance, she found herself calm! but the thing that quieted her was in reality her sorrow that he should carry himself so wildly. what she thought was, if the mere sense of not being in the wrong made one able to endure so much, what must not the truth's sake enable one to bear! she sat down at her window to gaze and brood. when her father cooled down, he was annoyed with himself, not that he had been unjust, but that he had behaved with so little dignity. with brows black as evil, he sat degraded in his own eyes, resenting the degradation on his daughter. every time he thought of her, new rage arose in his heart. he had been proud of his family autocracy. so seldom had it been necessary to enforce his authority, that he never doubted his wishes had but to be known to be obeyed. born tyrannical, the characterless submission of his wife had nourished the tyrannical in him. now, all at once, a daughter, the ugly one, from whom no credit was to be looked for, dared to defy him for a clown figuring in a worn-out rag of chieftainship--the musty fiction of a clan--half a dozen shepherds, crofters, weavers, and shoemakers, not the shadow of a gentleman among them!--a man who ate brose, went with bare knees, worked like any hind, and did not dare offend his wretched relations by calling his paltry farm his own!--for the sake of such a fellow, with a highland twang that disgusted his fastidious ear, his own daughter made a mock of his authority, treated him as a nobody! in his own house she had risen against him, and betrayed him to the insults of his enemy! his conscious importance, partly from doubt in itself, boiled and fumed, bubbled and steamed in the caldron of his angry brain. not one, but many suns would go down upon such a wrath! "i wish i might never set eyes on the girl again!" he said to his wife. "a small enough loss the sight of her would be, the ugly, common-looking thing! i beg you will save me from it in future as much as you can. she makes me feel as if i should go out of my mind!--so calm, forsooth! so meek! so self-sufficient!--oh, quite a saint!--and so strong-minded!--equal to throwing her father over for a fellow she never saw till a year ago!" "she shall have her dinner sent up to her as usual," answered his wife with a sigh. "but, really, peregrine, my dear, you must compose yourself! love has driven many a woman to extremes!" "love! why should she love such a fellow? i see nothing in him to love! why should she love him? tell me that! give me one good reason for her folly, and i will forgive her--do anything for her!--anything but let her have the rascal! that i will not! take for your son-in-law an ape that loathes your money, calls it filthy lucre--and means it! not if i can help it!--don't let me see her! i shall come to hate her! and that i would rather not; a man must love and cherish his own flesh! i shall go away, i must!--to get rid of the hateful face of the minx, with its selfrighteous, injured look staring at you!" "if you do, you can't expect me to prevent her from seeing him!" "lock her up in the coal-hole--bury her if you like! i shall never ask what you have done with her! never to see her again is all i care about!" "ah, if she were really dead, you would want to see her again--after a while!" "i wish then she was dead, that i might want to see her again! it won't be sooner! ten times rather than know her married to that beast, i would see her dead and buried!" the mother held her peace. he did not mean it, she said to herself. it was only his anger! but he did mean it; at that moment he would with joy have heard the earth fall on her coffin. notwithstanding her faculty for shutting out the painful, her persistent self-assuring that it would blow over, and her confidence that things would by and by resume their course, mrs. palmer was in those days very unhappy. the former quiet once restored, she would take mercy in hand, and reasoning with her, soon persuade her to what she pleased! it was her husband's severity that had brought it to this! the accomplice of her husband, she did not understand that influence works only between such as inhabit the same spiritual sphere: the daughter had been lifted into a region far above all the arguments of her mother--arguments poor in life, and base in reach. chapter x midnight. mercy sat alone but not lonely at her window. a joy in her heart made her independent for the time of human intercourse. life at the moment was livable without it, for there was no bar between her and her lover. the evening drew on. they sent her food. she forgot to eat it, and sat looking, till the lines of the horizon seemed grown into her mind like an etching. she watched the slow dusk swell and gather--with such delicate, soft-blending gradations in the birth of night as edwin waugh loves to seize and word-paint. through all its fine evanescent change of thought and feeling she watched unconsciously; and the growth, death, and burial of that twilight were ever after a substratum to all the sadness and all the hope that visited her. through palest eastern rose, through silvery gold and golden green and brown, the daylight passed into the shadow of the light, and the stars, like hope in despair, began to show themselves where they always were, and the night came on, and deeper and deeper sank the silence. household sound expired, and no step came near her door. her father had given orders, and was obeyed. christina has stolen indeed from her own room and listened at hers, but hearing nor sound nor motion, had concluded it better for mercy as well as safer for herself, to return. so she sat the sole wakeful thing in the house, for even her father slept. the earth had grown vague and dim, looking as it must look to the dead. its oppressive solidity, its obtrusive hereness, dissolved in the dark, it left the soul to live its own life. she could still trace the meeting of earth and sky, each the evidence of the other, but the earth was content to be and not assert, and the sky lived only in the points of light that dotted its vaulted quiet. sound itself seemed asleep, and filling the air with the repose of its slumber. absolute silence the soul cannot grasp; therefore deepest silence seems ever, in wordsworth's lovely phrase, wandering into sound, for silence is but the thin shadow of harmony--say rather creation's ear agape for sound, the waiting matrix of interwoven melodies, the sphere-bowl standing empty for the wine of the spirit. there may be yet another reason beyond its too great depth or height or strength, why we should be deaf to the spheral music; it may be that the absolute perfection of its harmony can take to our ears but the shape of silence. content and patient, mercy sat watching. it was just past midnight, but she had not yet lighted a candle, when something struck the window as with the soft blow of a moth's wing. her heart gave a great leap. she listened breathless. nothing followed. it must have been some flying night-thing, though surely too late in the year for a moth! it came again! she dared not speak. she softly opened the window. the darkness had thinned on the horizon, and the half-moon was lifting a corner above the edge of the world. something in the shrubbery answered her shine, and without rustle of branch, quiet as a ghost, the chief stepped into the open space. mercy leaned toward him and said, "hush! speak low." "there is no need to say much," he answered. "i come only to tell you that, as man may, i am with you always." "how quietly you came! i did not hear a sound!" "i have been two hours here in the shrubbery." "and i not once to suspect it! you might have given me some hint! a very small one would have been enough! why did you not let me know?" "it was not your hour; it is twelve but now; the moon comes to say so. i came for the luxury of expectation, and the delight of knowing you better attended than you thought: you knew me with you in spirit; i was with you in the body too!" "my chief!" she said softly. "i shall always find you nearer and better than i was able to think! i know i do not know how good you are." "i am good toward you, mercy! i love you!" a long silence, save of shining eyes, followed. "we are waiting for god!" said alister at length. "waiting is loving," answered mercy. she leaned out, looking down to her heaven. the moon had been climbing the sky, veiled in a little cloud. the cloud vanished, and her light fell on the chief. "have you been to a ball?" said mercy. "no, mercy. i doubt if there will be any dancing more in strathruadh!" "then why are you in court dress?" "when should a celt, who of all the world loves radiance and colour, put on his gay attire? for the multitude, or for the one?" "thank you. is it a compliment?--but after your love, everything fine seems only natural!" "in love there are no compliments; truth only walks the sacred path between the two doors. i will love you as my father loved my mother, and loves her still." "i do like to see you shining! it was kind of you to dress for the moon and me!" "whoever loves the truth must love shining things! god is the father of lights, even of the lights hid in the dark earth--sapphires and rubies, and all the families of splendour." "i shall always see you like that!" "there is one thing i want to say to you, mercy:--you will not think me indifferent however long i may be in proposing a definite plan for our future! we must wait upon god!" "i shall think nothing you would not have me think. a little while ago i might have dreamed anything, for i was fast asleep. i was dead till you waked me. if i were what girls call in love, i should be impatient to be with you; but i love you much more than that, and do not need to be always with you. you have made me able to think, and i can think about you! i was but a child, and you made a woman of me!" "god and ian did," said alister. "yes, but through you, and i want to be worthy of you. a woman to whom a man's love was so little comfort that she pined away and died because she could not be married to him, would not be a wife worthy of my chief!" "then you will always trust me?" "i will. when one really knows another, then all is safe!" "how many people do you know?" asked the chief. she thought a moment, and with a little laugh, replied, "you." "pardon me, mercy, but i do want to know how your father treats you!" "we will not talk about him, please. he is my father!--and so far yours that you are bound to make what excuse you can for him." "that i am bound to do, if he were no father to either of us. it is what god is always doing for us!--only he will never let us off." "he has had no one to teach him, alister! and has always been rich, and accustomed to have his own way! i begin to think one punishment of making money in a wrong manner is to be prosperous in it!" "i am sure you are right! but will you be able to bear poverty, mercy?" "yes," she answered, but so carelessly that she seemed to speak without having thought. "you do not know what poverty means!" rejoined alister. "we may have to endure much for our people!" "it means you any way, does it not? if you and poverty come together, welcome you and your friend!--i see i must confess a thing! do you remember telling me to read julius caesar?" "yes." "do you remember how portia gave herself a wound, that she might prove to her husband she was able to keep a secret?" "yes, surely!" "i have my meals in my room now, so i can do as i please, and i never eat the nice things dear mother always sends me, but potatoes, and porridge, and bread and milk." "what is that for, mercy?" "to show you i am worthy of being poor--able at least to be poor. i have not once tasted anything very nice since the letter that made my father so angry." "you darling!" of all men a highlander understands independence of the kind of food. "but," continued alister, "you need not go on with it; i am quite convinced; and we must take with thanksgiving what god gives us. besides, you have to grow yet!" "alister! and me like a may-pole!" "you are tall enough, but we are creatures of three dimensions, and need more than height. you must eat, or you will certainly be ill!" "oh, i eat! but just as you please! only it wouldn't do me the least harm so long as you didn't mind! it was as much to prove to myself i could, as to you! but don't you think it must be nearly time for people to wake from their first sleep?" the same instant there was a little noise--like a sob. mercy started, and when she looked again alister had vanished--as noiselessly as he came. for a moment she sat afraid to move. a wind came blowing upon her from the window: some one had opened her door! what if it were her father! she compelled herself to turn her head. it was something white!--it was christina! she came to her through the shadow of the moonlight, put her arms round her, and pressed to her face a wet cheek. for a moment or two neither spoke. "i heard a little, mercy!" sobbed christina. "forgive me; i meant no harm; i only wanted to know if you were awake; i was coming to see you." "thank you, chrissy! that was good of you!" "you are a dear!--and so is your chief! i am sorry i scared him! it made me so miserable to hear you so happy that i could not help it! would you mind forgiving me, dear?" "i don't mind your hearing a bit. i am glad you should know how the chief loves me!" "but you must be careful, dear! papa might pretend to take him for a robber, and shoot him!" "oh, no, chrissy! he wouldn't do that!" "i would not be too sure! i hadn't an idea before what papa was like! oh what men are, and what they can be! i shall never hold up my head again!" with this incoherent speech, to mercy's astonishment and consternation she burst into tears. mercy tried to comfort her, but did not know how. she had seen for some time that there was a difference in her, that something was the matter, and wondered whether she could be missing ian, but it was merest surmise. perhaps now she would tell her! she was weeping like a child on her shoulder. presently she began to tremble. mercy coaxed her into her bed, and undressing quickly, lay down beside her, and took her in her arms to make her warm. before the morning, with many breaks of sobbing and weeping, christina had told mercy her story. "i wish you would let me tell the chief!" she said. "he would know how to comfort you." "thank you!" said christina, with not a little indignation. "i forgot i was talking to a girl as good as married, who would not keep my secrets any more than her own!" she would have arisen at once to go to her own room, and the night that had brought such joy to mercy threatened to end very sadly. she threw her arms round christina's waist, locked her hands together, and held her fast. "hear me, chrissy, darling! i am a great big huge brute," she cried. "but i was only stupid. i would not tell a secret of yours even to alister--not for worlds! if i did, he would be nearer despising me than i should know how to bear. i will not tell him. did i ever break my word to you, chrissy?" "no, never, mercy!" responded christina, and turning she put her arms round her. "besides," she went on, "why should i go to anyone for counsel? could i have a better counsellor than ian? is he not my friend? oh, he is! he is! he said so! he said so!" the words prefaced another storm of tears. "he is going to write to me," she sobbed, as soon as she could again speak. "perhaps he will love you yet, chrissy!" "no, no; he will never love me that way! for goodness' sake don't hint at such a thing! i should not be able to write a word to him, if i thought that! i should feel a wolf in sheep's clothing! i have done with tricks and pretendings! ian shall never say to himself, 'i wish i had not trusted that girl! i thought she was going to be honest! but what's bred in the bone--!' i declare, mercy, i should blush myself out of being to learn he thought of me like that! i mean to be worthy of his friendship! his friendship is better than any other man's love! i will be worthy of it!" the poor girl burst yet again into tears--not so bitter as before, and ended them all at once with a kiss to mercy. "for his sake," she said, "i am going to take care of alister and you!" "thank you! thank you, chrissy! only you must not do anything to offend papa! it is hard enough on him as it is! i cannot give up the chief to please him, for he has been a father to my better self; but we must do nothing to trouble him that we can help!" chapter xi something strange. alister did not feel inclined to go home. the night was more like mercy, and he lingered with the night, inhabiting the dream that it was mercy's house, and she in the next room. he turned into the castle, climbed the broken steps, and sat on the corner of the wall, the blank hill before him, asleep standing, with the new house on its shoulder, and the moonlight reflected from mercy's window under which he had so lately stood. he sat for an hour, and when he came down, was as much disinclined to go home as before: he could not rest in his chamber, with no ian on the other side of its wall! he went straying down the road, into the valley, along the burnside, up the steep beyond it, and away to the hill-farm and the tomb. the moon was with him all the way, but she seemed thinking to herself rather than talking to him. why should the strange, burnt-out old cinder of a satellite be the star of lovers? the answer lies hid, i suspect, in the mysteries of light reflected. he wandered along, careless of time, of moonset, star-shine, or sunrise, brooding on many things in the rayless radiance of his love, and by the time he reached the tomb, was weary with excitement and lack of sleep. taking the key from where it was cunningly hidden, he unlocked the door and entered. he started back at sight of a gray-haired old man, seated on one of the stone chairs, and leaning sadly over the fireless hearth: it must be his uncle! the same moment he saw it was a ray from the sinking moon, entering by the small, deep window, and shining feebly on the chair. he struck a light, kindled the peats on the hearth, and went for water. returning from the well he found the house dark as before; and there was the old man again, cowering over the extinguished fire! the idea lasted but a moment; once more the level light of the moon lay cold and gray upon the stone chair! he tried to laugh at his fancifulness, but did not quite succeed. several times on the way up, he had thought of his old uncle: this must have given the shape to the moonlight and the stone! he made many attempts to recall the illusion, but in vain. he relighted the fire, and put on the kettle. going then for a book to read till the water boiled, he remembered a letter which, in the excitement of the afternoon, he had put in his pocket unread, and forgotten. it was from the family lawyer in glasgow, informing him that the bank in which his uncle had deposited the proceeds of his sale of the land, was in a state of absolute and irrecoverable collapse; there was not the slightest hope of retrieving any portion of the wreck. alister did not jump up and pace the room in the rage of disappointment; neither did he sit as one stunned and forlorn of sense. he felt some bitterness in the loss of the hope of making up to his people for his uncle's wrong; but it was clear that if god had cared for his having the money, he would have cared that he should have it. here was an opportunity for absolute faith and contentment in the will that looks after all our affairs, the small as well as the great. those who think their affairs too insignificant for god's regard, will justify themselves in lying crushed under their seeming ruin. either we live in the heart of an eternal thought, or we are the product and sport of that which is lower than we. "it was evil money!" said the chief to himself; "it was the sale of a birthright for a mess of pottage! i would have turned it back into the right channel, the good of my people! but after all, what can money do? it was discontent with poverty that began the ruin of the highlands! if the heads of the people had but lived pure, active, sober, unostentatious lives, satisfied to be poor, poverty would never have overwhelmed them! the highlands would have made scotland great with the greatness of men dignified by high-hearted contentment, and strong with the strength of men who could do without!" therewith it dawned upon alister how, when he longed to help his people, his thoughts had always turned, not to god first, but to the money his uncle had left him. he had trusted in a fancy--no less a fancy when in his uncle's possession than when cast into the quicksand of the bank; for trust in money that is, is no less vain, and is farther from redress, than trust in money that is not. in god alone can trust repose. his heart had been so faithless that he did not know it was! he thought he loved god as the first and last, the beginning, middle, and end of all things, and he had been trusting, not in god, but in uncertain riches, that is in vile mammon! it was a painful and humiliating discovery. "it was well," he said, "that my false deity should be taken from me! for my idolatry perhaps, a good gift has failed to reach my people! i must be more to them than ever, to make up to them for their loss with better than money!" he fell on his knees, and thanked god for the wind that had blown cold through his spirit, and slain at least one evil thing; and when he rose, all that was left of his trouble was a lump in his throat, which melted away as he walked home through the morning air on the hills. for he could not delay; he must let his mother know their trouble, and, as one who had already received help from on high, help her to bear it! if the messenger of satan had buffeted him, he had but broken a way for strength! but at first he could not enjoy as he was wont the glory of the morning. it troubled him. would a single note in the song of the sons of the morning fail because god did or would not do a thing? could god deserve less than thanks perfect from any one of his creatures? that man could not know god who thanked him but for what men call good things, nor took the evil as from the same love! he scorned himself, and lifted up his heart. as he reached the brow of his last descent, the sun rose, and with it his soul arose and shone, for its light was come, and the glory of the lord was risen upon it. "let god," he said, "take from us what he will: himself he can only give!" joyful he went down the hill. god was, and all was well! chapter xii the power of darkness. he found his mother at breakfast, wondering what had become of him. "are you equal to a bit of bad news, mother?" he asked with a smile. the mother's thoughts flew instantly to ian. "oh, it's nothing about ian!" said the chief, answering her look. its expression changed; she hoped now it was some fresh obstacle between him and mercy. "no, mother, it is not that either!" said alister, again answering her look--with a sad one of his own, for the lack of his mother's sympathy was the sorest trouble he had. "it is only that uncle's money is gone--all gone." she sat silent for a moment, gave a little sigh, and said, "well, it will all be over soon! in the meantime things are no worse than they were! his will be done!" "i should have liked to make a few friends with the mammon of unrighteousness before we were turned out naked!" "we shall have plenty," answered the mother, "--god himself, and a few beside! if you could make friends with the mammon, you can make friends without it!" "yes, that is happily true! ian says it was only a lesson for the wise and prudent with money in their pockets--a lesson suited to their limited reception!" as they spoke, nancy entered. "please, laird," she said, "donal shoemaker is wanting to see you." "tell him to come in," answered the chief. donal entered and stood up by the door, with his bonnet under his arm--a little man with puckered face, the puckers radiating from or centering in the mouth, which he seemed to untie like a money-hag, and pull open by means of a smile, before he began to speak. the chief shook hands with him, and asked how he could serve him. "it will not be to your pleasure to know, macruadh," said donal, humbly declining to sit, "that i have received this day notice to quit my house and garden!" the house was a turf-cottage, and the garden might grow two bushels and a half of potatoes. "are you far behind with your rent?" "not a quarter, macruadh." "then what does it mean?" "it means, sir, that strathruadh is to be given to the red deer, and the son of man have nowhere to lay his head. i am the first at your door with my sorrow, but before the day is over you will have--" here he named four or five who had received like notice to quit. "it is a sad business!" said the chief sorrowfully. "is it law, sir?" "it is not easy to say what is law, donal; certainly it is not gospel! as a matter of course you will not be without shelter, so long as i may call stone or turf mine, but things are looking bad! things as well as souls are in god's hands however!" "i learn from the new men on the hills," resumed donal, "that the new lairds have conspired to exterminate us. they have discovered, apparently, that the earth was not made for man, but for rich men and beasts!" here the little man paused, and his insignificant face grew in expression grand. "but the day of the lord will come," he went on, "as a thief in the night. vengeance is his, and he will know where to give many stripes, and where few.--what would you have us do, laird?" "i will go with you to the village." "no, if you please, sir! better men will be at your door presently to put the same question, for they will do nothing without the macruadh. we are no more on your land, great is our sorrow, chief, but we are of your blood, you are our lord, and your will is ours. you have been a nursing father to us, macruadh!" "i would fain be!" answered the chief. "they will want to know whether these strangers have the right to turn us out; and if they have not the right to disseize, whether we have not the right to resist. if you would have us fight, and will head us, we will fall to a man--for fall we must; we cannot think to stand before the redcoats." "no, no, donal! it is not a question of the truth; that we should be bound to die for, of course. it is only our rights that are concerned, and they are not worth dying for. that would be mere pride, and denial of god who is fighting for us. at least so it seems at the moment to me!" "some of us would fain fight and have done with it, sir!" the chief could not help smiling with pleasure at the little man's warlike readiness: he knew it was no empty boast; what there was of him was good stuff. "you have a wife and children, donal!" he said; "what would become of them if you fell?" "my sister was turned out in the cold spring," answered donal, "and died in glencalvu! it would be better to die together!" "but, donal, none of yours will die of cold, and i can't let you fight, because the wives and children would all come on my hands, and i should have too many for my meal! no, we must not fight. we may have a right to fight, i do not know; but i am sure we have at least the right to abstain from fighting. don't let us confound right and duty, donal--neither in thing nor in word!" "will the law not help us, macruadh?" "the law is such a slow coach! our enemies are so rich! and the lawyers have little love of righteousness! most of them would see the dust on our heads to have the picking of our bones! stick nor stone would be left us before anything came of it!" "but, sir," said donal, "is it the part of brave men to give up their rights?" "no man can take from us our rights," answered the chief, "but any man rich enough may keep us from getting the good of them. i say again we are not bound to insist on our rights. we may decline to do so, and that way leave them to god to look after for us." "god does not always give men their rights, sir! i don't believe he cares about our small matters!" "nothing that god does not care about can be worth our caring about. but, donal, how dare you say what you do? have you lived to all eternity? how do you know what you say? god does care for our rights. a day is coming, as you have just said, when he will judge the oppressors of their brethren." "we shall be all dead and buried long before then!" "as he pleases, donal! he is my chief. i will have what he wills, not what i should like! a thousand years i will wait for my rights if he chooses. i will trust him to do splendidly for me. no; i will have no other way than my chief's! he will set everything straight!" "you must be right, sir! only i can't help wishing for the old times, when a man could strike a blow for himself!" with all who came alister held similar talk; for though they were not all so warlike as the cobbler, they keenly felt the wrong that was done them, and would mostly, but for a doubt of its rectitude, have opposed force with force. it would at least bring their case before the country! "the case is before a higher tribunal," answered the laird; "and one's country is no incarnation of justice! how could she be, made up mostly of such as do not love fair play except in the abstract, or for themselves! the wise thing is to submit to wrong." it is in ordering our own thoughts and our own actions, that we have first to stand up for the right; our business is not to protect ourselves from our neighbour's wrong, but our neighbour from our wrong. this is to slay evil; the other is to make it multiply. a man who would pull out even a mote from his brother's eye, must first pull out the beam from his own eye, must be righteous against his own selfishness. that is the only way to wound the root of evil. he who teaches his neighbour to insist on his rights, is not a teacher of righteousness. he who, by fulfilling his own duties, teaches his neighbour to give every man the fair play he owes him, is a fellow-worker with god. but although not a few of the villagers spoke in wrath and counselled resistance, not one of them rejoiced in the anticipation of disorder. heartily did rob of the angels insist on peace, but his words had the less force that he was puny in person, and, although capable of great endurance, unnoted for deeds of strength. evil birds carried the words of natural and righteous anger to the ears of the new laird; no good birds bore the words of appeasement: he concluded after his kind that their chief countenanced a determined resistance. on all sides the horizon was dark about the remnant of clanruadh. poorly as they lived in strathruadh, they knew no place else where they could live at all. separated, and so disabled from making common cause against want, they must perish! but their horizon was not heaven, and god was beyond it. it was a great comfort to the chief that in the matter of his clan his mother agreed with him altogether: to the last penny of their having they must help their people! those who feel as if the land were their own, do fearful wrong to their own souls! what grandest opportunities of growing divine they lose! instead of being man-nobles, leading a sumptuous life until it no longer looks sumptuous, they might be god-nobles--saviours of men, yielding themselves to and for their brethren! what friends might they not make with the mammon of unrighteousness, instead of passing hence into a region where no doors, no arms will be open to them! things are ours that we may use them for all--sometimes that we may sacrifice them. god had but one precious thing, and he gave that! the chief, although he saw that the proceedings of mr. palmer and mr. brander must have been determined upon while his relation to mercy was yet undeclared, could not help imagining how differently it might have gone with his people, had he been married to mercy, and in a good understanding with her father. had he crippled his reach toward men by the narrowness of his conscience toward god? so long as he did what seemed right, he must regret no consequences, even for the sake of others! god would mind others as well as him! every sequence of right, even to the sword and fire, are god's care; he will justify himself in the eyes of the true, nor heed the judgment of the false. one thing was clear--that it would do but harm to beg of mr. palmer any pity for his people: it would but give zest to his rejoicing in iniquity! something nevertheless must be determined, and speedily, for winter was at hand. the macruadh had to consider not only the immediate accommodation of the ejected but how they were to be maintained. such was his difficulty that he began to long for such news from ian as would justify an exodus from their own country, not the less a land of bondage, to a home in the wilderness. but ah, what would then the land of his fathers without its people be to him! it would be no more worthy the name of land, no longer fit to be called a possession! he knew then that the true love of the land is one with the love of its people. to live on it after they were gone, would be like making a home of the family mausoleum. the rich "pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor," but what would any land become without the poor in it? the poor are blessed because by their poverty they are open to divine influences; they are the buckets set out to catch the rain of heaven; they are the salt of the earth! the poor are to be always with a nation for its best blessing, or for its condemnation and ruin. the chief saw the valleys desolate of the men readiest and ablest to fight the battles of his country. for the sake of greedy, low-minded fellows, the summons of her war-pipes would be heard in them no more, or would sound in vain among the manless rocks; from sheilin, cottage, or clachan, would spring no kilted warriors with battle response! the red deer and the big sheep had taken the place of men over countless miles of mountain and moor and strath! his heart bled for the sufferings and wrongs of those whose ancestors died to keep the country free that was now expelling their progeny. but the vengeance had begun to gather, though neither his generation nor ours has seen it break. it must be that offences come, but woe unto them by whom they come! chapter xiii. the new stance. the macruadh cast his mind's and his body's eye too upon the small strip of ground on the west side of the castle-ridge, between it and the tiny tributary of the strath burn which was here the boundary between the lands of the two lairds. the slope of the ridge on this side was not so steep, and before the rock sank into the alluvial soil of the valley, it became for a few yards nearly level--sufficiently so, with a little smoothing and raising, to serve for a foundation; while in front was a narrow but rich piece of ground, the bank of the little brook. before many days were over, men were at work there, in full sight of the upper windows of the new house. it was not at first clear what they were about; but soon began to rise, plain enough, the walls of cottages, some of stone, and some of turf; mr. palmer saw a new village already in process of construction, to take the place of that about to be destroyed! the despicable enemy had moved his camp, to pitch it under his very walls! it filled him with the rage of defeat. the poor man who scorned him was going to be too much for him! not yet was he any nearer to being placed alone in the midst of the earth. he thought to have rid himself of all those hateful faces, full of their chiefs contempt, he imagined, ever eyeing him as an intruder on his own land; but here instead was their filthy little hamlet of hovels growing like a fungus just under his nose, expressly to spite him! thinking to destroy it, he had merely sent for it! when the wind was in the east, the smoke of their miserable cabins would be blown right in at his dining-room windows! it was useless to expostulate! that he would not like it was of course the chief's first reason for choosing that one spot as the site of his new rookery! the fellow had stolen a march upon him! and what had he done beyond what was absolutely necessary for the improvement of his property! the people were in his way, and he only wanted to get rid of them! and here their chief had brought them almost into his garden! doubtless if his land had come near enough, he would have built his sty at the very gate of his shrubbery!--the fellow could not like having them so near himself! he let his whole household see how annoying the thing was to him. he never doubted it was done purely to irritate him. christina ventured the suggestion that mr. brander and not the chief was the author of the inconvenience. what did that matter! he returned. what right had the chief, as she called him, to interfere between a landlord and his tenants? christina hinted that, evicted by their landlord, they ceased to be his tenants, and even were he not their chief, he could not be said to interfere in giving help to the destitute. thereupon he burst at her in a way that terrified her, and she had never even been checked by him before, had often been impertinent to him without rebuke. the man seemed entirely changed, but in truth he was no whit changed: things had but occurred capable of bringing out the facts of his nature. her mother, who had not dared to speak at the time, expostulated with her afterward. "why should papa never be told the truth?" objected christina. her mother was on the point of replying, "because he will not hear it," but saw she owed it to her husband not to say so to his child. mercy said to herself, "it is not to annoy my father he does it, but to do what he can for his people! he does not even know how unpleasant it is to my father to have them so near! it must be one of the punishments of riches that they make the sight of poverty so disagreeable! to luxury, poverty is a living reproach." she longed to see alister: something might perhaps be done to mitigate the offence. but her father would never consent to use her influence! perhaps her mother might! she suggested therefore that alister would do nothing for the sake of annoying her father, and could have no idea how annoying this thing was to him: if her mother would contrive her seeing him, she would represent it to him! mrs. palmer was of mercy's opinion regarding the purity of alister's intent, and promised to think the matter over. the next night her husband was going to spend at mr. brander's: the project might be carried out in safety! the thing should be done! they would go together, in the hope of persuading the chief to change the site of his new village! when it was dark they walked to the cottage, and knocking at the door, asked nancy if the chief were at home. the girl invited them to enter, though not with her usual cordiality; but mrs. palmer declined, requesting her to let the chief know they were there, desirous of a word with him. alister was at the door in a moment, and wanted them to go in and see his mother, but an instant's reflection made him glad of their refusal. "i am so sorry for all that has happened!" said mrs. palmer. "you know i can have had nothing to do with it! there is not a man i should like for a son-in-law better than yourself, macruadh; but i am helpless." "i quite understand," replied the chief, "and thank you heartily for your kindness. is there anything i can do for you?" "mercy has something she wants to speak to you about." "it was so good of you to bring her!--what is it, mercy?" without the least hesitation, mercy told him her father's fancy that he was building the new village to spite him, seeing it could not be a pleasure to himself to have the smoke from its chimneys blowing in at door and windows as often as the wind was from the sea. "i am sorry but not surprised your father should think so, mercy. to trouble him is as much against my feelings as my interests. and certainly it is for no convenience or comfort to ourselves, that my mother and i have determined on having the village immediately below us." "i thought," said mercy, "that if you knew how it vexed papa, you would--but i am afraid it may be for some reason that cannot be helped!" "indeed it is; i too am afraid it cannot be helped! i must think of my people! you see, if i put them on the other side of the ridge, they would be exposed to the east wind--and the more that every door and window would have to be to the east. you know yourselves how bitterly it blows down the strath! besides, we should there have to build over good land much too damp to be healthy, every foot of which will be wanted to feed them! there they are on the rock. i might, of course, put them on the hillside, but i have no place so sheltered as here, and they would have no gardens. and then it gives me an opportunity, such as chief never had before, of teaching them some things i could not otherwise. would it be reasonable, mercy, to sacrifice the good of so many poor people to spare one rich man one single annoyance, which is yet no hurt? would it be right? ought i not rather to suffer the rise of yet greater obstacles between you and me?" "yes, alister, yes!" cried mercy. "you must not change anything. i am only sorry my father cannot be taught that you have no ill will to him in what you do." "i cannot think it would make much difference. he will never give you to me, mercy. but be true, and god will." "would you mind letting the flag fly, alister? i should have something to look at!" "i will; and when i want particularly to see you, i will haul it down. then, if you hang a handkerchief from your window, i will come to you." chapter xiv the peat-moss. for the first winter the clanruadh had not much to fear--hardly more than usual: they had their small provision of potatoes and meal, and some a poor trifle of money. but "lady macruadh" was anxious lest the new cottages should not be quite dry, and gave a general order that fires were to be burned in them for some time before they were occupied: for this they must use their present stock of dry peats, and more must be provided for the winter. the available strength of the clan would be required to get the fresh stock under cover before the weather broke. the peat-moss from which they cut their fuel, was at some distance from the castle, on the outskirts of the hill-farm. it was the nearest moss to the glen, and the old chief, when he parted with so much of the land, took care to except it, knowing well that his remaining people could not without it live through a winter. but as, of course, his brother, the minister, who succeeded him, and the present chieftain, had freely allowed all the tenants on the land sold to supply themselves from it as before, the notion had been generated that the moss was not part of the chief's remaining property. when the report was carried to mr. peregrine palmer, that the tenants mr. brander and he were about to eject, and who were in consequence affronting him with a new hamlet on the very verge of his land, were providing themselves with a stock of fuel greatly in excess of what they had usually laid in for the winter--that in fact they were cutting large quantities of peat, besides the turf for their new cottages; without making the smallest inquiry, or suspecting for a moment that the proceeding might be justifiable, he determined, after a brief consultation with men who knew nothing but said anything, to put a stop to the supposed presumption. a few of the peats cut in the summer had not yet been removed, not having dried so well as the rest, and the owners of some of these, two widows, went one day to fetch them home to the new village, when, as it happened, there were none of the clan besides in the moss. they filled their creels, helped each other to get them on their backs, and were setting out on their weary tramp home, when up rose two of mr. palmer's men, who had been watching them, cut their ropes and took their loads, emptied the peats into a moss-hag full of water, and threw the creels after them. the poor women poured out their wrath on the men, telling them they would go straight to the chief, but were answered only with mockery of their chief and themselves. they turned in despair, and with their outcry filled the hollows of the hills as they went, bemoaning the loss of their peats and their creels, and raging at the wrong they had received. one of them, a characterless creature in the eyes of her neighbours, harmless, and always in want, had faith in her chief, for she had done nothing to make her ashamed, and would go to him at once: he had always a word and a smile and a hand-shake for her, she said; the other, commonly called craftie, was unwilling: her character did not stand high, and she feared the face of the macruadh. "he does not like me!" said craftie. "when a woman is in trouble," said the other, "the macruadh makes no questions. you come with me! he will be glad of something to do for you." in her confidence she persuaded her companion, and together they went to the chief. having gathered courage to appear, craftie needed none to speak: where that was the call, she was never slow to respond. "craftie," said the chief, "is what you are telling me true?" "ask her," answered craftie, who knew that asseveration on her part was not all-convincing. "she speaks the truth, macruadh," said the other. "i will take my oath to it." "your word is enough," replied the chief, "--as craftie knew when she brought you with her." "please, laird, it was myself brought craftie; she was not willing to come!" "craftie," said the chief, "i wish i could make a friend of you! but you know i can't!" "i do know it, macruadh, and i am sorry for it, many is the good time! but my door never had any latch, and the word is out before i can think to keep it back!" "and so you send another and another to back the first! ah, craftie! if purgatory don't do something for you, then--!" "indeed and i hope i shall fall into it on my way farther, chief!" said craftie, who happened to be a catholic. "but now," resumed the chief, "when will you be going for the rest of your peats?" "they're sure to be on the watch for us; and there's no saying what they mightn't do another time!" was the indirect and hesitating answer. "i will go with you." "when you please, then, chief." so the next day the poor women went again, and the chief went with them, their guard and servant. if there were any on the watch, they did not appear. the macruadh fished out their creels, and put them to dry, then helped them to fill those they had borrowed for the occasion. returning, he carried now the one, now the other creel, so that one of the women was always free. the new laird met them on the road, and recognized with a scornful pleasure the chief bending under his burden. that was the fellow who would so fain be his son-in-law! about this time sercombe and valentine came again to the new house. sercombe, although he had of late had no encouragement from christina, was not therefore prepared to give her up, and came "to press the siege." he found the lady's reception of him so far from cordial, however, that he could not but suspect some new adverse influence. he saw too that mercy was in disgrace; and, as ian was gone, concluded there must have been something between them: had the chief been "trying it on with" christina? the brute was always getting in his way! but some chance of serving him out was certain to turn, up! for the first suitable day alister had arranged an expedition from the village, with all the carts that could be got together, to bring home as many peats as horses and men and women could together carry. the company was seen setting out, and report of it carried at once to mr. palmer; for he had set watch on the doings of the clan. within half an hour he too set out with the messenger, accompanied by sercombe, in grim delight at the prospect of a row. valentine went also, willing enough to see what would happen, though with no ill will toward the chief. they were all furnished as for a day's shooting, and expected to be joined by some of the keepers on their way. the chief, in view of possible assault, had taken care that not one of his men should have a gun. even hector of the stags he requested to leave his at home. they went in little groups, some about the creeping carts, in which were the older women and younger children, some a good way ahead, some scattered behind, but the main body attending the chief, who talked to them as they went. they looked a very poor company, but god saw past their poverty. the chief himself, save in size and strength, had not a flourishing appearance. he was very thoughtful: much lay on his shoulders, and ian was not there to help! his clothes, all their clothes were shabby, with a crumpled, blown-about look--like drifts, in their many faded colours, of autumnal leaves. they had about them all a forgotten air--looked thin and wan like a ghostly funeral to the second sight--as if they had walked so long they had forgotten how to sleep, and the grave would not have them. except in their chief, there was nothing left of the martial glance and gait and show, once so notable in every gathering of the clanruadh, when the men were all soldiers born, and the women were mothers, daughters, and wives of soldiers. their former stately grace had vanished from the women; they were weather-worn and bowed with labour too heavy for their strength, too long for their endurance; they were weak from lack of fit human food, from lack of hope, and the dreariness of the outlook, the ever gray spiritual horizon; they were numbed with the cold that has ceased to be felt, the deadening sense of life as a weight to be borne, not a strength to rejoice in. but they were not abject yet; there was one that loved them--their chief and their friend! below their level was a deeper depth, in which, alas, lie many of like heart and, passions with them, trodden into the mire by dives and his stewards! the carts were small, with puny horses, long-tailed and droop-necked, in harness of more rope than leather. they had a look of old men, an aspect weirdly venerable, as of life and labour prolonged after due time, as of creatures kept from the grave and their last sleep to work a little longer. scrambling up the steep places they were like that rare sea-bird which, unable to fly for shortness of wing, makes of its beak a third leg, to help it up the cliff: these horses seemed to make fifth legs of their necks and noses. the chief's horses alone, always at the service of the clan, looked well fed, well kept, and strong, and the clan was proud of them. "and what news is there from ian?" asked an old man of his chief. "not much news yet, but i hope for more soon. it will be so easy to let you hear all his letters, when we can meet any moment in the barn!" "i fear he will be wanting us all to go after the rest!" said one of the women. "there might be a worse thing!" answered her neighbour. "a worse thing than leave the hills where we were born?--no! there is no worse for me! i trust in god i shall be buried where i grew up!" "then you will leave the hills sure enough!" said the chief. "not so sure, macruadh! we shall rest in our graves till the resurrection!" said an old man. "only our bodies," returned alister. "well, and what will my body be but myself! much i would make of myself without my body! i will stay with my body, and let my soul step about, waiting for me, and craving a shot at the stags with the big branches! no, i won't be going from my own strath!" "you would not like to be left in it alone, with none but unfriendly sasunnachs about you--not one of your own people to close your eyes?" "indeed it would not be pleasant. but the winds would be the same; and the hills would be the same; and the smell of the earth would be the same; and they would be our own worms that came crawling over me to eat me! no; i won't leave the strath till i die--and i won't leave it then!" "that is very well, john!" said the woman; "but if you were all day with your little ones--all of them all day looking hunger in your face, you would think it a blessed country wherever it was that gave you bread to put in their mouths!" "and how to keep calling this home!" said another. "why, it will soon be everywhere a crime to set foot on a hill, for frightening of the deer! i was walking last month in a part of the county i did not know, when i came to a wall that went out of my sight, seeming to go all round a big hill. i said to myself, 'is no poor man to climb to heaven any more?' and with that i came to a bill stuck on a post, which answered me; for it said thus: 'any well-dressed person, who will give his word not to leave the path, may have permission to go to the top of the hill, by applying to--'--i forget the name of the doorkeeper, but sure he was not of god, seeing his door was not to let a poor man in, but to keep him out!" "they do well to starve us before they choke us: we might else fight when it comes to the air to breathe!" "have patience, my sons," said the chief. "god will not forget us." "what better are we for that? it would be all the same if he did forget us!" growled a young fellow shambling along without shoes. "shame! shame!" cried several voices. "has not god left us the macruadh? does he not share everything with us?" "the best coat in the clan is on his own back!" muttered the lad, careless whether he were heard or not. "you scoundrel!" cried another; "yours is a warmer one!" the chief heard all, and held his peace. it was true he had the best coat! "i tell you what," said donal shoemaker, "if the chief give you the stick, not one of us will say it was more than you deserved! if he will put it into my hands, not to defile his own, i will take and give it with all my heart. everybody knows you for the idlest vagabond in the village! why, the chief with his own hands works ten times as much!" "that's how he takes the bread out of my mouth--doing his work himself!" rejoined the youth, who had been to glasgow, and thought he had learned a thing or two. the chief recovered from his impulse to pull off his coat and give it him. "i will make you an offer, my lad," he said instead: "come to the farm and take my place. for every fair day's work you shall have a fair day's wages, and, for every bit of idleness, a fair thrashing. do you agree?" the youth pretended to laugh the thing off, but slunk away, and was seen no more till eating time arrived, and "lady macruadh's" well-filled baskets were opened. "and who wouldn't see a better coat on his chief!" cried the little tailor. "i would clip my own to make lappets for his!" they reached the moss. it lay in a fold of the hills, desert and dreary, full of great hollows and holes whence the peat had been taken, now filled with water, black and terrible,--a land hideous by day, and at night full of danger and lonely horror. everywhere stood piles of peats set up to dry, with many openings through and through, windy drains to gather and remove their moisture. here and there was a tuft of dry grass, a bush of heather, or a few slender-stalked, hoary heads of cannach or cotton-grass; it was a land of devoted desolation, doing nothing for itself, this bountiful store of life and warmth for the winter-sieged houses of the strath. they went heartily to work. they cut turf for their walls and peats for their fires; they loaded the carts from the driest piles, and made new piles of the fresh wet peats they dug. it was approaching noon, and some of the old women were getting the food out of "my lady's" baskets, when over the nearest ridge beyond rose men to the number of seven, carrying guns. rob of the angels was the first to spy them. he pointed them out to his father, and presently they two disappeared together. the rest went on with their work, but the chief could see that, stooping to their labour, they cast upward and sidelong glances at them, reading hostility in their approach. suddenly, as by common consent, they all ceased working, stood erect, and looked out like men on their guard. but the chief making them a sign, they resumed their labour as if they saw nothing. mr. peregrine palmer had laid it upon himself to act with becoming calmness and dignity. but it would amaze most people to be told how little their order is self-restraint, their regular conduct their own--how much of the savage and how little of the civilized man goes to form their being--how much their decent behaviour is owing to the moral pressure, like that of the atmosphere, of the laws and persons and habits and opinions that surround them. witness how many, who seemed respectable people at home, become vulgar, self-indulgent, ruffianly, cruel even, in the wilder parts of the colonies! no man who has not, through restraint, learned not to need restraint, but be as well behaved among savages as in society, has yet become a true man. no perfection of mere civilization kills the savage in a man: the savage is there all the time till the man pass through the birth from above. till then, he is no certain hiding-place from the wind, no sure covert from the tempest. mr. palmer was in the worst of positions as to protection against himself. possessed of large property, he owed his position to evil and not to good. not only had he done nothing to raise those through whom he made his money, but the very making of their money his, was plunging them deeper and deeper in poverty and vice: his success was the ruin of many. yet was he full of his own imagined importance--or had been full until now that he felt a worm at the root of his gourd--the contempt of one man for his wealth and position. well might such a man hate such another--and the more that his daughter loved him! all the chief's schemes and ways were founded on such opposite principles to his own that of necessity they annoyed him at every point, and, incapable of perceiving their true nature, he imagined his annoyance their object and end. and now here was his enemy insolently daring, as mr. palmer fully believed, to trespass in person on his land! add to all this, that here mr. peregrine palmer was in a place whose remoteness lightened the pressure of conventional restraints, while its wildness tended to rouse all the old savage in him--its very look suggesting to the city-man its fitness for an unlawful deed for a lawful end. persons more respectable than mr. palmer are capable of doing the most wicked and lawless things when their selfish sense of their own right is uppermost. witness the occasionally iniquitous judgments of country magistrates in their own interest--how they drive law even to cruelty! "are you not aware you are trespassing on my land, macruadh?" cried the new laird, across several holes full of black water which obstructed his nearer approach. "on the contrary, mr. palmer," replied the chief, "i am perfectly aware that i am not!" "you have no right to cut peats there without my permission!" "i beg your pardon: you have no right to stand where you speak the words without my permission. but you are quite welcome." "i am satisfied there is not a word of truth in what you say," rejoined mr. palmer. "i desire you to order your people away at once." "that i cannot do. it would be to require their consent to die of cold." "let them die! what are they to me--or to anybody! order them off, or it will be the worse for them--and for you too!" "excuse me; i cannot." "i give you one more warning. go yourself, and they will follow." "i will not." "go, or i will compel you." as he spoke, he half raised his gun. "you dare not!" said the chief, drawing himself up indignantly. together mr. palmer and mr. sercombe raised their guns to their shoulders, and one of them fired. to give mr. palmer the benefit of a doubt, he was not quite at home with his gun, and would use a hair-trigger. the same instant each found himself, breath and consciousness equally scant, floundering, gun and all, in the black bog water on whose edge he had stood. there now stood rob of the angels, gazing after them into the depth, with the look of an avenging seraph, his father beside him, grim as a gratified fate. such a roar of rage rose from the clansmen with the shot, and so many came bounding with sticks and spades over the rough ground, that the keepers, knowing, if each killed his two men, they would not after escape with their lives, judged it more prudent to wait orders. only valentine came running in terror to the help of his father. "don't be frightened," said rob; "we only wanted to wet their powder!" "but they'll be drowned!" cried the lad, almost weeping. "not a hair of them!" answered bob. "we'll have them out in a moment! but please tell your men, if they dare to lift a gun, we'll serve them the same. it wets the horn, and it cools the man!" a minute more, and the two men lay coughing and gasping on the crumbly bank, for in their utter surprizal they had let more of the nasty soft water inside than was good for them. with his first breath sercombe began to swear. "drop that, sir, if you please," said rob, "or in you go again!" he began to reply with a volley of oaths, but began only, for the same instant the black water was again choking him. might hector of the stags have had his way, he would have kept there the murderer of an cabrach mor till he had to be dived for. rob on his part was determined he should not come out until he gave his word that he would not swear. "come! come!" gasped sercombe at length, after many attempts to get out which, the bystanders easily foiled--"you don't mean to drown me, do you?" "we mean to drown your bad language. promise to use no more on this peat-moss," returned rob. "damn the promise you get from me!" he gasped. "men must have patience with a suffering brother!" remarked bob, and seated himself, with a few words in gaelic which drew a hearty laugh from the men about him, on a heap of turf to watch the unyielding flounder in the peat-hole, where there was no room to swim. he had begun to think the man would drown in his contumacy, when his ears welcomed the despairing words-- "take me out, and i will promise anything." he was scarcely able to move till one of the keepers gave him whisky, but in a few minutes he was crawling homeward after his host, who, parent of little streams, was doing his best to walk over rocks and through bogs with the help of valentine's arm, chattering rather than muttering something about "proper legal fashion." in the mean time the chief lay shot in the right arm and chest, but not dangerously wounded by the scattering lead. he had lost a good deal of blood, and was faint--a sensation new to him. the women had done what they could, but that was only binding his arm, laying him in a dry place, and giving him water. he would not let them recall the men till the enemy was gone. when they knew what had happened they were in sad trouble--rob of the angels especially that he had not been quick enough to prevent the firing of the gun. the chief would have him get the shot out of his arm with his knife; but rob, instead, started off at full speed, running as no man else in the county could run, to fetch the doctor to the castle. at the chief's desire, they made a hurried meal, and then resumed the loading of the carts, preparing one of them for his transport. when it was half full, they covered the peats with a layer of dry elastic turf, then made on that a bed of heather, tops uppermost; and more to please them than that he could not walk, alister consented to be laid on this luxurious invalid-carriage, and borne home over the rough roads like a disabled warrior. they arrived some time before the doctor. chapter xv a daring visit. mercy soon learned that some sort of encounter had taken place between her father's shooting party and some of the clan; also that the chief was hurt, but not in what manner--for by silent agreement that was not mentioned: it might seem to put them in the wrong! she had heard enough, however, to fill her with anxiety. her window commanding the ridge by the castle, she seated herself to watch that point with her opera-glass. when the hill-party came from behind the ruin, she missed his tall figure amongst his people, and presently discovered him lying very white on one of the carts. her heart became as water within her. but instant contriving how she could reach him, kept her up. by and by christina came to tell her she had just heard from one of the servants that the macruadh was shot. mercy, having seen him alive, heard the frightful news with tolerable calmness. christina said she would do her best to discover before the morning how much he was hurt; no one in the house seemed able to tell her! mercy, to avoid implicating her sister, held her peace as to her own intention. as soon as it was dark she prepared to steal from the house, dreading nothing but prevention. when her dinner was brought her, and she knew they were all safe in the dining-room, she drew her plaid over her head, and leaving her food untasted, stole half down the stair, whence watching her opportunity between the comings and goings of the waiting servants, she presently got away unseen, crept softly past the windows, and when out of the shrubbery, darted off at her full speed. her breath was all but gone when she knocked at the drawing-room door of the cottage. it opened, and there stood the mother of her chief! the moment mrs. macruadh saw her, leaving her no time to say a word, she bore down upon her like one vessel that would sink another, pushing her from the door, and pulling it to behind her, stern as righteous fate. mercy was not going to be put down, however: she was doing nothing wrong! "how is the macruadh, please?" she managed to say. "alive, but terribly hurt," answered his mother, and would have borne her out of the open door of the cottage, towards the latch of which she reached her hand while yet a yard from it. her action said, "why will nancy leave the door open!" "please, please, what is it?" panted mercy, standing her ground. "how is he hurt?" she turned upon her almost fiercely. "this is what you have done for him!" she said, with right ungenerous reproach. "your father fired at him, on my son's own land, and shot him in the chest." "is he in danger?" gasped mercy, leaning against the wall, and trembling so she could scarcely stand. "i fear he is in great danger. if only the doctor would come!" "you wouldn't mind my sitting in the kitchen till he does?" whispered mercy, her voice all but gone. "i could not allow it. i will not connive at your coming here without the knowledge of your parents! it is not at all a proper thing for a young lady to do!" "then i will wait outside!" said mercy, her quick temper waking in spite of her anxiety: she had anticipated coldness, but not treatment like this! "there is one, i think, mrs. macruadh," she added, "who will not find fault with me for it!" "at least he will not tell you so for some time!" the door had not been quite closed, and it opened noiselessly. "she does not mean me, mother," said alister; "she means jesus christ. he would say to you, let her alone. he does not care for society. its ways are not his ways, nor its laws his laws. come in, mercy. i am sorry my mother's trouble about me should have made her inhospitable to you!" "i cannot come in, alister, if she will not let me!" answered mercy. "pray walk in!" said mrs. macruadh. she would have passed mercy, going toward the kitchen, but the trance was narrow, and mercy did not move. "you see, alister, i cannot!" she insisted. "that would not please, would it?" she added reverently. "tell me how you are, and i will go, and come again to-morrow." alister told her what had befallen, making little of the affair, and saying he suspected it was an accident. "oh, thank you!" she said, with a sigh of relief. "i meant to sit by the castle wall till the doctor came; but now i shall get back before they discover i am gone." without a word more, she turned and ran from the house, and reached her room unmissed and unseen. the next was a dreary hour--the most painful that mother and son had ever passed together. the mother was all this time buttressing her pride with her grief, and the son was cut to the heart that he should have had to take part against his mother. but when the doctor came at length, and the mother saw him take out his instruments, the pride that parted her from her boy melted away. "forgive me, alister!" she whispered; and his happy kiss comforted her repentant soul. when the small operations were over, and alister was in bed, she would have gone to let mercy know all she could tell her. but she must not: it would work mischief in the house! she sat down by alister's bedside, and watched him all night. he slept well, being in such a healthful condition of body that his loss of blood, and the presence of the few shot that could not be found, did him little harm. he yielded to his mother's entreaties to spend the morning in bed, but was up long before the evening in the hope of mercy's coming, confident that his mother would now be like herself to her. she came; the mother took her in her arms, and begged her forgiveness; nor, having thus embraced her, could she any more treat her relation to her son with coldness. if the girl was ready, as her conduct showed, to leave all for alister, she had saved her soul alive, she was no more one of the enemy! thus was the mother repaid for her righteous education of her son: through him her pride received almost a mortal blow, her justice grew more discriminating, and her righteousness more generous. in a few days the chief was out, and looking quite himself. chapter xvi the flitting. the time was drawing nigh when the warning of ejection would doubtless begin to be put in force; and the chief hearing, through rob of the angels, that attempts were making to stir the people up, determined to render them futile: they must be a trick of the enemy to get them into trouble! taking counsel therefore with the best of the villagers, both women and men, he was confirmed in the idea that they had better all remove together, before the limit of the earliest notice was expired. but his councillors agreed with him that the people should not be told to get themselves in readiness except at a moment's notice to move. in the meantime he pushed on their labour at the new village. in the afternoon preceding the day on which certain of the clan were to be the first cast out of their homes, the chief went to the village, and going from house to house, told his people to have everything in order for flitting that very night, so that in the morning there should not be an old shoe left behind; and to let no rumour of their purpose get abroad. they would thus have a good laugh at the enemy, who was reported to have applied for military assistance as a precautionary measure. his horses should be ready, and as soon as it was dark they would begin to cart and carry, and be snug in their new houses before the morning! all agreed, and a tumult of preparation began. "lady macruadh" came with help and counsel, and took the children in charge while the mothers bustled. it was amazing how much had to be done to remove so small an amount of property. the chief's three carts were first laden; then the men and women loaded each other. the chief took on his hack the biggest load of all, except indeed it were hector's. to and fro went the carts, and to and fro went the men and women, i know not how many journeys, upheld by companionship, merriment, hope, and the clan-mother's plentiful provision of tea, coffee, milk, bread and butter, cold mutton and ham--luxurious fare to all. as the sun was rising they closed every door, and walked for the last time, laden with the last of their goods, out of the place of their oppression, leaving behind them not a cock to crow, a peat to burn, or a scrap that was worth stealing--all removed in such order and silence that not one, even at the new house, had a suspicion of what was going on. mercy, indeed, as she sat looking from her window like daniel praying toward jerusalem, her constant custom now, even when there was no moon to show what lay before her, did think she heard strange sounds come faintly through the night from the valley below--even thought she caught shadowy glimpses of a shapeless, gnome-like train moving along the road; but she only wondered if the highlands had suddenly gifted her with the second sight, and these were the brain-phantasms of coming events. she listened and gazed, but could not be sure that she heard or saw. when she looked out in the morning, however, she understood, for the castle-ridge was almost hidden in the smoke that poured from every chimney of the new village. her heart swelled with joy to think of her chief with all his people under his eyes, and within reach of his voice. from her window they seemed so many friends gathered to comfort her solitude, or the camp of an army come to set her free. hector and rob, with one or two more of the clan, hid themselves to watch those who came to evict the first of the villagers. there were no military. two sheriff's officers, a good many constables, and a few vagabonds, made up the party. rob's keen eye enabled him to distinguish the very moment when first they began to be aware of something unusual about the place; he saw them presently halt and look at each other as if the duty before them were not altogether canny. at no time would there be many signs of life in the poor hamlet, but there would always be some sounds of handicraft, some shuttle or hammer going, some cries of children weeping or at play, some noises of animals, some ascending smoke, some issuing or entering shape! they feared an ambush, a sudden onslaught. warily they stepped into the place, sharply and warily they looked about them in the street, slowly and with circumspection they opened door after door, afraid of what might be lurking behind to pounce upon them at unawares. only after searching every house, and discovering not the smallest sign of the presence of living creature, did they recognize their fool's-errand. and all the time there was the new village, smoking hard, under the very windows, as he chose himself to say, of its chief adversary! chapter xvii the new village. the winter came down upon them early, and the chief and his mother had a sore time of it. well as they had known it before, the poverty of their people was far better understood by them now. unable to endure the sight of it, and spending more and more to meet it, they saw it impossible for them to hold out. for a long time their succour had been draining if not exhausting the poor resources of the chief; he had borne up in the hope of the money he was so soon to receive; and now there was none, and the need greater than ever! he was not troubled, for his faith was simple and strong; but his faith made him the more desirous of doing his part for the coming deliverance: faith in god compels and enables a man to be fellow-worker with god. he was now waiting the judgment of ian concerning the prospects of the settlers in that part of canada to which he had gone, hoping it might help him to some resolve in view of the worse difficulties at hand. in the meantime the clan was more comfortable, and passed the winter more happily, than for many years. first of all, they had access to the chief at any moment. then he had prepared a room in his own house where were always fire and light for such as would read what books he was able to lend them, or play at quiet games. to them its humble arrangements were sumptuous. and best of all, he would, in the long dark fore-nights, as the lowland scotch call them, read aloud, at one time in gaelic, at another in english, things that gave them great delight. donal shoemaker was filled with joy unutterable by the rime of the ancient mariner. if only this state of things could be kept up--with ian back, and mercy married to the chief! thought the mother. but it was not to be; that grew plainer every day. mr. palmer would gladly have spent his winter elsewhere, leaving his family behind him; but as things were, he could not leave them, and as certain other things were, he did not care to take them to london. besides, for them all to leave now, would be to confess defeat; and who could tell what hurt to his forest might not follow in his absence from the cowardly hatred of the peasants! he was resolved to see the thing out. but above all, he must keep that worthless girl, mercy, under his own eye! "that's what comes of not drinking!" he would say to himself; "a man grows as proud as satan, and makes himself a curse to his neighbours!" then he would sigh like a man ill-used and disconsolate. both mercy and the chief thought it better not to venture much, but they did occasionally contrive to meet for a few minutes--by the help of christina generally. twice only was mercy's handkerchief hung from the window, when her longing for his voice had grown almost too strong for her to bear. the signal brought him both times through the wild wintry storm, joyous as a bird through the summer air. once or twice they met just outside the gate, mercy flying like a snow-bird to the tryst, and as swiftly back through the keen blue frost, when her breath as she ran seemed to linger in the air like smoke, and threaten to betray her. at length came the much desired letter from ian, full of matter for the enabling of the chief's decision. two things had long been clear to alister--that, even if the ground he had could keep his people alive, it certainly could not keep them all employed; and that, if they went elsewhere, especially to any town, it might induce for many, and ensure for their children, a lamentable descent in the moral scale. he was their shepherd, and must lose none of them! therefore, first of all, he must not lose sight of them! it was now clear also, that the best and most desirable thing was, that the poor remnant of the clan should leave their native country, and betake themselves where not a few of their own people, among them lachlan and annie, would welcome them to probable ease and comfort. there he would buy land, settle with them, and build a village. some would cultivate the soil under their chief; others would pursue their trades for the good of the community and themselves! and now came once more the love of land face to face with the love of men, and in the chief's heart paled before it. for there was but one way to get the needful money: the last of the macruadh property must go! not for one moment did it rouse a grudging thought in the chief: it was for the sake of the men and women and children whose lives would be required of him! the land itself must yield, them wings to forsake it withal, and fly beyond the sea! chapter xviii a friendly offer it was agreed between mother and son to submit the matter to ian, and if he should, be of the same mind, at once to negotiate the sale of the land, in order to carry the clan to canada. they wrote therefore to ian, and composed themselves to await his answer. it was a sorrowful thing to alister to seem for a moment to follow the example of the recreant chiefs whose defection to feudalism was the prelude to their treachery toward their people, and whose faithlessness had ruined the highlands. but unlike glengarry or "esau" reay, he desired to sell his land that he might keep his people, care for them, and share with them: his people safe, what mattered the acres! reflecting on the thing, he saw, in the case of ian's approval of the sale, no reason why he should not show friendliness where none was expected, and give mr. peregrine palmer the first chance of purchase. he thought also, with his usual hopefulness, that the time might come when the clan, laying its savings together, would be able to redeem its ancient homesteads, and then it might be an advantage that they were all in the possession of one man. such things had been, and might be again! the lord could bring again the captivity of clanruahd as well as that of zion! two months passed, and they had ian's answer--when it was well on into the spring, and weather good for a sea-voyage was upon its way. because of the loss of their uncle's money, and the good prospect of comfort in return for labour, hard but not killing, ian entirely approved of the proposal. from that moment the thing was no longer discussed, but how best to carry it out. the chief assembled the clan in the barn, read his brother's letter, and in a simple speech acquainted them with the situation. he told them of the loss of the money to which he had looked for the power to aid them; reminded them that there was neither employment nor subsistence enough on the land--not even if his mother and he were to live like the rest of them, which if necessary they were quite prepared to do; and stated his resolve to part with the remnant of it in order to provide the means of their migrating in a body to canada, where not a few old friends were eager to welcome them. there they would buy land, he said, of which every man that would cultivate it should have a portion enough to live upon, while those with trades should have every facility for following them. all, he believed, would fare well in return for hard work, and they would be in the power of no man. there was even a possibility, he hoped, that, if they lived and laboured well, they might one day buy back the home they had left; or if not they, their sons and daughters might return from their captivity, and restore the house of their fathers. if anyone would not go, he would do for him what seemed fair. donal shoemaker rose, unpuckered his face, slackened the purse-strings of his mouth, and said, "where my chief goes, i will go; where my chief lives, i will live; and where my chief is buried, god grant i may be buried also, with all my family!" he sat down, covered his face with his hands, and wept and sobbed. one voice rose from all present: "we'll go, macruadh! we'll go! our chief is our home!" the chief's heart swelled with mingled gladness and grief, but he answered quietly, "then you must at once begin your preparations; we ought not to be in a hurry at the last." an immediate stir, movement, bustle, followed. there was much talking, and many sunny faces, over which kept sweeping the clouds of sorrow. the next morning the chief went to the new house, and desired to see mr. palmer. he was shown into what the new laird called his study. mr. palmer's first thought was that he had come to call him to account for firing at him. he neither spoke nor advanced a step to meet him. the chief stood still some yards from him, and said as pleasantly as he could,-- "you are surprised to see me, mr. palmer!" "i am." "i come to ask if you would like to buy my land?" "already!" said mr. palmer, cast on his enemy a glare of victory, and so stood regarding him. the chief did not reply. "well!" said mr. palmer. "i wait your answer," returned the chief. "did it never strike you that insolence might be carried too far?" "i came for your sake more than my own," rejoined the chief, without even a shadow of anger. "i have no particular desire you should take the land, but thought it reasonable you should have the first offer." "what a dull ox the fellow must take me for!" remarked the new laird to himself. "it's all a dodge to get into the house! as if he would sell me his land! or could think i would hold any communication with him! buy his land! it's some trick, i'll lay my soul! the infernal scoundrel! such a mean-spirited wretch too! takes an ounce of shot in the stomach, and never says 'what the devil do you mean by it?' i don't believe the savage ever felt it!" something like this passed with thought's own swiftness through the mind of mr. palmer, as he stood looking the chief from head to foot, yet in his inmost person feeling small before him. "if you cannot at once make up your mind," said alister, "i will give you till to-morrow to think it over." "when you have learned to behave like a gentleman," answered the new laird, "let me know, and i will refer you to my factor." he turned and rang the hell. alister bowed, and did not wait for the servant. it must be said for mr. palmer, however, that that morning christina had positively refused to listen to a word more from mr. sercombe. in the afternoon, alister set out for london. chapter xix another expulsion. mr. peregrine palmer brooded more and more upon what he counted the contempt of the chief. it became in him almost a fixed idea. it had already sent out several suckers, and had, amongst others, developed the notion that he was despised by those from whom first of all he looked for the appreciation after which his soul thirsted--his own family. he grew therefore yet more moody, and his moodiness and distrust developed suspicion. it is scarce credible what a crushing influence the judgment he pretended to scorn, thus exercised upon him. it was not that he acknowledged in it the smallest justice; neither was it that he cared altogether for what such a fanatical fool as the chief might think; but he reflected that if one could so despise his money because of its source, there might be others, might be many who did so. at the same time, had he been sure of the approbation of all the world beside, it would have troubled him not a little, in his thirst after recognition, that any gentleman, one of family especially, however old-fashioned and absurd he might be, should look down upon him. his smouldering, causelessly excited anger, his evident struggle to throw off an oppression, and the fierce resentment of the chief's judgment which he would now and then betray, revealed how closely the offence clung to his consciousness. flattering himself from her calmness that mercy had got over her foolish liking for the "boor," as he would not unfrequently style the chief, he had listened to the prayers of her mother, and submitted to her company at the dinner-table; but he continued to treat her as one who had committed a shameful fault. that evening, the great little man could hardly eat for recurrent wrathful memories of the interview of the morning. perhaps his most painful reflection was that he had not been quick enough to embrace the opportunity of annihilating his enemy. thunder lowered portentous in his black brows, and not until he had drunk several glasses of wine did a word come from his lips. his presence was purgatory without the purifying element. "what do you think that fellow has been here about this morning?" he said at length. "what fellow?" asked his wife unnecessarily, for she knew what visitor had been shown into the study. "the highland fellow," he answered, "that claims to do what he pleases on my property!" mercy's face grew hot. "--came actually to offer me the refusal of his land!--the merest trick to get into the house--confound him! as much as told me, if i did not buy it off-hand, i should not have the chance again! the cheek of the brute! to dare show his face in my house after trifling with my daughter's affections on the pretence that he could not marry a girl whose father was in trade!" mercy felt she would be false to the man she loved, and whom she knew to be true, if she did not speak. she had no thought of defending him, but simply of witnessing to him. "i beg your pardon, papa," she said, "but the macruadh never trifled with me. he loves me, and has not given me up. if he told you he was going to part with his land, he is going to part with it, and came to you first because he must return good for evil. i saw him from my window ride off as if he were going to meet the afternoon coach." she would not have been allowed to say so much, had not her father been speechless with rage. this was more than he or any man could bear! he rose from the table, his eyes blazing. "return me good for evil!" he exclaimed; "--a beast who has done me more wrong than ever i did in all my life! a scoundrel bumpkin who loses not an opportunity of insulting me as never was man insulted before! you are an insolent, heartless, depraved girl!--ready to sacrifice yourself, body and soul, to a man who despises you and yours with the pride of a savage! you hussey, i can scarce keep my hands off you!" he came toward her with a threatful stride. she rose, pushed back her chair, and stood facing him. "strike me," she said with a choking voice, "if you will, papa; but mamma knows i am not what you call me! i should be false and cowardly if i did not speak the truth for the man to whom i owe"--she was going to say "more than to any other human being," but she checked herself. "if the beggar is your god," said her father, and struck her on the cheek with his open hand, "you can go to him!" he took her by the arm, and pushed her before him out of the room, and across the hall; then opening the door, shoved her from him into the garden, and flung the door to behind her. the rain was falling in torrents, the night was very dark, and when the door shut, she felt as if she had lost her eyesight. it was terrible!--but, thank god, she was free! without a moment's hesitation--while her mother wept and pleaded, christina stood burning with indignation, the two little ones sat white with open mouths, and the servants hurried about scared, but trying to look as if nothing had happened--mercy fled into the dark. she stumbled into the shrubbery several times, but at last reached the gate, and while they imagined her standing before the house waiting to be let in, was running from it as from the jaws of the pit, in terror of a voice calling her back. the pouring rain was sweet to her whole indignant person, and especially to the cheek where burned the brand of her father's blow. the way was deep in mud, and she slipped and fell more than once as she ran. mrs. macruadh was sitting in the little parlour, no one but nancy in the house, when the door opened, and in came the wild-looking girl, draggled and spent, and dropped kneeling at her feet. great masses of long black hair hung dripping with rain about her shoulders. her dress was torn and wet, and soiled with clay from the road and earth from the shrubbery. one cheek was white, and the other had a red patch on it. "my poor child!" cried the mother; "what has happened? alister is away!" "i know that," panted mercy. "i saw him go, but i thought you would take me in--though you do not like me much!" "not like you, my child!" echoed the mother tenderly. "i love you! are you not my alister's choice? there are things i could have wished otherwise, but--" "well could i wish them otherwise too!" interposed mercy. "i do not wish another father; and i am not quite able to wish he hadn't struck me and put me out into the dark and the rain, but--" "struck you and put you out! my child! what did he do it for?" "perhaps i deserved it: it is difficult to know how to behave to a father! a father is supposed to be one whom you not only love, as i do mine, but of whom you can be proud as well! i can't be proud of mine, and don't know quite how to behave to him. perhaps i ought to have held my peace, but when he said things that were not--not correct about alister, misinterpreting him altogether, i felt it cowardly and false to hold my tongue. so i said i did not believe that was what alister meant. it is but a quarter of an hour ago, and it looks a fortnight! i don't think i quite know what i am saying!" she ceased, laid her head on mrs. macruadh's knee, then sank to the floor, and lay motionless. all the compassion of the woman, all the protective pride of the chieftainess, woke in the mother. she raised the girl in her arms, and vowed that not one of her house should set eyes on her again without the consent of her son. he should see how his mother cared for what was his!--how wide her arms, how big her heart, to take in what he loved! dear to him, the daughter of the man she despised should be as the apple of her eye! they would of course repent and want her back, but they should not have her; neither should a sound of threat or demand reach the darling's ears. she should be in peace until alister came to determine her future. there was the mark of the wicked hand on the sweet sallow cheek! she was not beautiful, but she would love her the more to make up! thank god, they had turned her out, and that made her free of them! they should not have her again; alister should have her!--and from the hand of his mother! she got her to bed, and sent for rob of the angels. with injunctions to silence, she told him to fetch his father, and be ready as soon as possible to drive a cart to the chief's cave, there to make everything comfortable for herself and miss mercy palmer. mercy slept well, and as the day was breaking mrs. macruadh woke her and helped her to dress. then they walked together through the lovely spring morning to the turn of the valley-road, where a cart was waiting them, half-filled with oat-straw. they got in, and were borne up and up at a walking-pace to the spot mercy knew so well. never by swiftest coach had she enjoyed a journey so much as that slow crawl up the mountains in the rough springless cart of her ploughman lover! she felt so protected, so happy, so hopeful. alister's mother was indeed a hiding place from the wind, a covert from the tempest! having consented to be her mother, she could mother her no way but entirely. an outcast for the sake of her alister, she should have the warmest corner of her heart next to him and ian! into the tomb they went, and found everything strangely comfortable--the stone-floor covered with warm and woolly skins of black-faced sheep, a great fire glowing, plenty of provisions hung and stored, and the deaf, keen-eyed father with the swift keen-eared son for attendants. "you will not mind sharing your bed with me--will you, my child?" said mrs. macruadh: "our accommodation is scanty. but we shall be safe from intrusion. only those two faithful men know where we are." "mother will be terribly frightened!" said mercy. "i thought of that, and left a note with nancy, telling her you were safe and well, but giving no hint of where. i said that her dove had flown to my bosom for shelter, and there she should have it." mercy answered with a passionate embrace. chapter xx alister's princess. ten peaceful days they spent in the cave-house. it was cold outside, but the clear air of the hill-top was delicious, and inside it was warm and dry. there were plenty of books, and mercy never felt the time a moment too long. the mother talked freely of her sons, and of their father, of the history of the clan, of her own girlhood, and of the hopes and intentions of her sons. "will you go with him, mercy?" she asked, laying her hand on hers. "i would rather be his servant," answered mercy, "than remain at home: there is no life there!" "there is life wherever there is the will to live--that is, to do the thing that is given one to do," said the mother. in writing she told alister nothing of what had happened: he might hurry home without completing his business! undisturbed by fresh anxiety, he settled everything, parted with his property to an old friend of the family, and received what would suffice for his further intents. he also chartered a vessel to take them over the sea, and to save weariness and expense, arranged for it to go northward as far as a certain bay on the coast, and there take the clan on board. when at length he reached home, nancy informed him that his mother was at the hill-house, and begged he would go there to her. he was a good deal perplexed: she very seldom went there, and had never before gone for the night! and it was so early in the season! he set out immediately. it was twilight when he reached the top of the hill, and no light shone from the little windows of the tomb. that day mercy had been amusing her protectress with imitations, in which kind she had some gift, of certain of her london acquaintance: when the mother heard her son's approaching step, a thought came to her. "here! quick!" she said; "put on my cap and shawl, and sit in this chair. i will go into the bedroom. then do as you like." when the chief entered, he saw the form of his mother, as he thought, bending over the peat-fire, which had sunk rather low: in his imagination he saw again the form of his uncle as on that night in the low moonlight. she did not move, did not even look up. he stood still for a moment; a strange feeling possessed him of something not being as it ought to be. but he recovered himself with an effort, and kneeling beside her, put his arms round her--not a little frightened at her continued silence. "what is the matter, mother dear?" he said. "why have you come up to this lonely place?" when first mercy felt his arms, she could not have spoken if she would--her heart seemed to grow too large for her body. but in a moment or two she controlled herself, and was able to say--sufficiently in his mother's tone and manner to keep up the initiated misconception: "they put me out of the house, alister." "put you out of the house!" he returned, like one hearing and talking in a dream. "who dared interfere with you, mother? am i losing my senses? i seem not to understand my own words!" "mr. palmer." "mr. palmer! was it to him i sold the land in london? what could he have to do with you, mother? how did they allow him to come near the house in my absence? oh, i see! he came and worried you so about mercy that you were glad to take refuge from him up here!--i understand now!" he ended in a tone of great relief: he felt as if he had just recovered his senses. "no, that was not it. but we are going so soon, there would have been no good in fighting it out. we are going soon, are we not?" "indeed we are, please god!" replied the chief, who had relapsed into bewilderment. "that is well--for you more than anybody. would you believe it--the worthless girl vows she will never leave her mother's house!" "ah, mother, you never heard her say so! i know mercy better than that! she will leave it when i say come. but that won't be now. i must wait, and come and fetch her when she is of age." "she is not worthy of you." "she is worthy of me if i were twenty times worthier! mother, mother! what has turned you against us again? it is not like you to change about so! i cannot bear to find you changeable! i should have sworn you were just the one to understand her perfectly! i cannot bear you should let unworthy reasons prejudice you against anyone!--if you say a word more against her, i will go and sit outside with the moon. she is not up yet, but she will be presently--and though she is rather old and silly, i shall find her much better company than you, mother dear!" he spoke playfully, but was grievously puzzled. "to whom are you talking, alister?--yourself or a ghost?" alister started up, and saw his mother coming from the bedroom with a candle in her hand! he stood stupefied. he looked again at the seated figure, still bending over the fire. who was it if not his mother? with a wild burst of almost hysteric laughter, mercy sprang to her feet, and threw herself in his arms. it was not the less a new bewilderment that it was an unspeakably delightful change from the last. was he awake or dreaming? was the dream of his boyhood come true? or was he dreaming it on in manhood? it was come true! the princess was arrived! she was here in his cave to be his own! a great calm and a boundless hope filled the heart of alister. the night was far advanced when he left them to go home. nor did he find his way home, but wandered all night about the tomb, making long rounds and still returning like an angel sent to hover and watch until the morning. when he astonished them by entering as they sat at breakfast, and told them how he had passed the night, it thrilled mercy's heart to know that, while she slept and was dreaming about him, he was awake and thinking about her. "what is only dreaming in me, is thinking in you, alister!" she said. "i was thinking," returned alister, "that as you did not know i was watching you, so, when we feel as if god were nowhere, he is watching over us with an eternal consciousness, above and beyond our every hope and fear, untouched by the varying faith and fluctuating moods of his children." after breakfast he went to see the clergyman of the parish, who lived some miles away; the result of which visit was that in a few days they were married. first, however, he went once more to the new house, desiring to tell mr. palmer what had been and was about to be done. he refused to see him, and would not allow his wife or christina to go to him. the wedding was solemnized at noon within the ruined walls of the old castle. the withered remnant of the clan, with pipes playing, guns firing, and shouts of celebration, marched to the cave-house to fetch thence the bride. when the ceremony was over, a feast was ready for all in the barn, and much dancing followed. when evening came, with a half-moon hanging faint in the limpid blue, and the stars looking large through the mist of ungathered tears--those of nature, not the lovers; with a wind like the breath of a sleeping child, sweet and soft, and full of dreams of summer; the mountains and hills asleep around them like a flock of day-wearied things, and haunted by the angels of rob's visions--the lovers, taking leave only of the mother, stole away to walk through the heavenly sapphire of the still night, up the hills and over the rushing streams of the spring, to the cave of their rest--no ill omen but lovely symbol to such as could see in the tomb the porch of paradise. where should true lovers make their bed but on the threshold of eternity! chapter xxi the farewell. a month passed, and the flag of their exile was seen flying in the bay. the same hour the chief's horses were put to, the carts were loaded, their last things gathered. few farewells had to be made, for the whole clan, except two that had gone to the bad, turned out at the minute appointed. the chief arranged them in marching column. foremost went the pipes; the chief, his wife, and his mother, came next; hector of the stags, carrying the double-barrelled rifle the chief had given him, rob of the angels, and donal shoemaker, followed. then came the women and children; next, the carts, with a few, who could not walk, on the top of the baggage; the men brought up the rear. four or five favourite dogs were the skirmishers of the column. the road to the bay led them past the gate of the new house. the chief called a halt, and went with his wife to seek a last interview. mr. peregrine palmer kept his room, but mrs. palmer bade her daughter a loving farewell--more relieved than she cared to show, that the cause of so much discomfort was going so far away. the children wept. christina bade her sister good-bye with a hopeless, almost envious look: mercy, who did not love him, would see ian! she who would give her soul for him was never to look on him again in this world! kissing mercy once more, she choked down a sob, and whispered, "give my love--no, my heart, to ian, and tell him i am trying." they all walked together to the gate, and there the chief's mother took her leave of the ladies of the new house. the pipes struck up; the column moved on. when they came to the corner which would hide from them their native strath, the march changed to a lament, and with the opening wail, all stopped and turned for a farewell look. men and women, the chief alone excepted, burst into weeping, and the sound of their lamentation went wandering through the hills with an adieu to every loved spot. and this was what the pipes said: we shall never see you more, never more, never more! till the sea be dry, and the world be bare, and the dews have ceased to fall, and the rivers have ceased to run, we shall never see you more, never more, never more! they stood and gazed, and the pipes went on lamenting, and the women went on weeping. "this is heathenish!" said alister to himself, and stopped the piper. "my friends," he cried, in gaelic of course, "look at me: my eyes are dry! where jesus, the son of god, is--there is my home! he is here, and he is over the sea, and my home is everywhere! i have lost my land and my country, but i take with me my people, and make no moan over my exile! hearts are more than hills. farewell strathruadh of my childhood! place of my dreams, i shall visit you again in my sleep! and again i shall see you in happier times, please god, with my friends around me!" he took off his bonnet. all the men too uncovered for a moment, then turned to follow their chief. the pipes struck up macrimmon's lament, till an crodh a dhonnachaidh (turn the kine, duncan). not one looked behind him again till they reached the shore. there, out in the bay, the biggest ship any of the clan had ever seen was waiting to receive them. when mr. peregrine palmer saw that the land might in truth be for sale, he would gladly have bought it, but found to his chagrin that he was too late. it was just like the fellow, he said, to mock him with the chance of buying it! he took care to come himself, and not send a man he could have believed! the clan throve in the clearings of the pine forests. the hill-men stared at their harvests as if they saw them growing. their many children were strong and healthy, and called scotland their home. in an outlying and barren part of the chief's land, they came upon rock oil. it was so plentiful that as soon as carriage became possible, the chief and his people began to grow rich. news came to them that mr. peregrine palmer was in difficulties, and desirous of parting with his highland estate. the chief was now able to buy it ten times over. he gave his agent in london directions to secure it for him, with any other land conterminous that might come into the market. but he would not at once return to occupy it, for his mother dreaded the sea, and thought to start soon for another home. also he would rather have his boys grow where they were, and as men face the temptations beyond: where could they find such teaching as that of their uncle ian! both father and uncle would have them alive before encountering what the world calls life. but the macruadh yet dreams of the time when those of the clan then left in the world, accompanied, he hopes, by some of those that went out before them, shall go back to repeople the old waste places, and from a wilderness of white sheep and red deer, make the mountain land a nursery of honest, unambitious, brave men and strong-hearted women, loving god and their neighbour; where no man will think of himself at his brother's cost, no man grow rich by his neighbour's ruin, no man lay field to field, to treasure up for himself wrath against the day of wrath. the end. legendary tales of the highlands. a sequel to highland rambles. by sir thomas dick lauder, bart. author of "lochandhu," "the wolfe of badenoch," "the moray floods," etc. in three volumes. volume iii. london: henry colburn, publisher, great marlborough street. m.dccc.xli. contents of the third volume. page the legend of serjeant john smith's adventures, comforts of a london club-house, the legend, &c.--continued, cruelty of the duke of cumberland after the battle of culloden, alister shaw of inchrory, drum-head court-martial and sentence on inchrory, the legend of the vision of campbell of inverawe, illustrations. john smith exhibits military genius in defence of the killogie, john smith under the turf, highland rambles. the legend of serjeant john smith's adventures. to understand my story the better, gentlemen, you must yemaygine to yourselves a snug well-doing nairnshire farmer's onstead, [ ] situated in the parish of auldearn, with a comfortable dwelling-house, of two low stories, accurately put down, so as mathematically to face the twelve o'clock line,--with its crow-steppit gables, small windows, little out-shot low addition behind, tall chimneys, and grey-slated roof--just such a house, to wit, as a man of his condition required in the middle of the last century--with two lines of strange-looking thatched or sod-covered stables, byres, barns, and other out-houses, projecting from its sides at right angles to its front, with divers out-riders, and isolated straggling edifices, of similar architecture and materials, dropped down here and there, as the hand of chance might have sown them--the smoke coming furth from some of their lumm-heads, and partly also from their low door-ways, proving to you, almost against your conviction, that they actually are the dwelling-places of human beings.--fancy the whole grouped (as mr. grant, the long painter lad of grantown, would have said) with sundry goodly rows of peat and turf stacks, a number of corn ricks wonderfully formed, and bulging and hanging out of the centre of gravity, each in a different direction, like a parcel of drunken dutch dancers;--in the midst of all a large midden--(query whether the word midden may not be a mere corruption of the words middle-in,--the midden being always in the middle of all rural premises in scotland? so that unlucky visitors not unfrequently walk up to the middle into the middle of it.)--then picture to yourselves, behind the biggins, sundry kail-yards, with a few very ancient ash trees, sycamores, and rowan trees, rising from among their bourtree fences, or from the sides of their dilapidated dry-stone dikes. at a little distance below, a bog, with its attendant pools of dark moss-water, which shine amidst the black chaotic mass around them, and look blue by their reflection of the sky--with a half-ruined and roofless killogie, or kiln for drying corn and malt, standing on a sloping bank at no great distance from them. then people all this with the farmer himself, a stout, hale, healthy-looking man, going bustling about from door to door among his folk, his muck-carts, and his horses, with a hodden-grey coat upon his back, a broad blue bonnet on his head, a hazle staff in his hand, and a colley and one or two rough terriers and greyhounds at his heels, shouting every now and then in gaelic to his man, john smith, a tall, handsome, strong-built highlander, whilst the gudeman's wife, a very good-looking, round-formed, trigly-dressed englishwoman, is seen appearing and disappearing from under the wooden porch, over which some attempts have been made to trail a plant or two of rose and honeysuckle, but which attempts have been rendered abortive by the epicurean taste of the browsing animals of the farm--her south country tongue sounding quick and sharp in the ears of morag, or mary, a clever, well-made, bare-footed, and short-gowned highland lass, with pleasing countenance, largish cheek bones, black snooded hair, sparkling eyes, arched eyebrows, and rosy cheeks, busied in washing out her milk cogues, with her coats kilted up to her knees. to which add the herd of cows, oxen, queys, stirks, and calves of all sorts and sizes, with a due mixture of sheep and lambs, and pownys, sprinkled all about, feeding among the whinny pasture-hillocks and baulks, dividing the queer-shaped patches of the surrounding arable land.--above all, i would have you particularly to remark a vurra large sow-beast, with a numerous litter of pigs, grubbing up the ground about the old killogie, amid the ruins of which her progeny first saw the light. in addition thereto, fancy, in the words of our own scottish pastoral poet, allan ramsay, that "hens on the midden, ducks in dubbs are seen," and you will be in full possession of the first scene of my tale, as well as acquainted with some of its more important dramatis personæ. mr. macarthur, the farmer, though a highlander, was a stanch whig, which made him, as you may well suppose, gentlemen, rather a "rara avis in terris, nigroque simillima cygno" among his brother celts. he had acquired his principles during his residence in england, where he had fallen in with and married his wife, who was a woman of good condition for her rank of life, and of superior yeddication. she was attached to the hanoverian royal family, both by principle and interest. her brother was an officer in the royal regiment; and as everything connected with england was dear to her, because it was her country, so every thing connected with the english army was especially dear to her on her brother's account. during the year , when the recruiting for the army of the prince of the stuarts was going on, many of mr. macarthur's servants, and john smith in particular, manifested a strong disposition to enlist under his banners. but so powerful were the influence and eloquence of this english lady, that she succeeded in dissuading them, one by one, from following out the bent of their inclinations. this her zealous and active opposition to the prince's cause, soon began to attract public attention, in a district where it was so generally favoured. she became a marked object of dislike to the jacobites, and this all the more so, perhaps, that she was an englishwoman. oftener than once it happened, that, whilst they spared some of her neighbours, whose politics were dubious, and therefore obnoxious in their eyes, they plundered her goodman's farm on her especial account. but these depredations were comparatively trifling, and protected as she was by her husband's fortitude, she bore these little evils with the magnanimity of a martyr; nay, she even ventured to talk of them with contempt, and there were many people who believed that she actually gloried in them. as mr. macarthur was a highlander, and spoke the gaelic language fluently, he might perhaps have been able, by modest behaviour, kind treatment, and smooth words, in some degree to have mitigated the prejudice which his countrymen had against his wife as a pensassenach, or english wife, as she was uniformly called by way of reproach. but husbands cannot always restrain the political enthusiasm of their ladies--and so it was with mr. macarthur. with or without his approbation she scrupled not, at times, when a good opportunity offered, to set the jacobites at defiance, to give them all manner of opprobrious epithets, and, with all a woman's rashness, but with more than feminine intrepidity, she dared them to do their worst. it was after sunset on the evening of the th of april, , that the pensassenach was seated in her elbow chair, by the fire in her little parlour. she was alone, for her husband had been called away from home, for some days, on very urgent business, and as she felt herself slightly indisposed, she was prepared to take particular care of herself for that night. a small tall-shaped chased silver vessel of mulled elderberry wine, with a close top to it to keep its contents warm, together with a very tiny silver cup, were placed beside her on a little round walnut-tree table, supported on a single spiral pillar with three claws. she was about to pour out a little of this medicinal fluid, to be taken preparatory to retiring to bed for the night, when she was startled by a noise in the kitchen, and immediately afterwards she was alarmed by the abrupt entrance of her maid morag. "mem!--mem!" cried the girl, breathless with the importance of her intelligence, "tare's wully tallas, ta packman in ta kitchen!--he's come a' ta way frae speymouth sin yesterday. ta englishers are a' comin' upon us horse and futs!--horse and futs an' mockell cannons, an' we'll be a' mordered, an' waur!--fat wull we do?" "what say you, girl?" exclaimed the pensassenach, starting from her chair, and overturning all her meditated comforts in her hurry. "but get out of my way, you senseless fool, i'll speak to the man myself. dallas! will dallas!" cried she, throwing her voice shrilly along the passage, towards the kitchen. "come this way, will dallas, and let me hear your news from your own mouth!" "comin' mem!" cried the travelling merchant, as he appeared limping along the passage, by no means sorry to be thus called on to unbuckle his budget of news, which he was always ready to dispose of at a much cheaper rate than he generally sold his goods. "where have you come from, will dallas?" cried the pensassenach; "and what news have ye got?" "weel, ye see, mem, i hae come straught frae speymooth, as fast as my heavy pack and this happity lamiter leg o' mine wad let me," replied dallas. "and my pack's very heavy yee noo, for i've got a grand new stock o' gudes in't." "well, well! never mind your goods at present!" cried the impatient pensassenach; "quick! quick! what news have you?" "od, mem, it wad at no rate do for me no to mind my goods at a' times and at a' saisins," said dallas. "but touching the news, mem,--the duke, mem--that is, the duke o' cummerland, i mean, crossed the spey yesterday wi' a' his airmy." "is it possible?" cried the pensassenach, her eyes sparkling with delight. "it's quite true, mem, for i seed the whole tott o' them yefeck the passage wi' my ain een," said dallas. "ha! tell me, good dallas, how did they cross?" demanded the lady. "they just fuirded through the spey, mem, in three grand deveesions, at three different pairts, just for a' the warld as gin ye had been rollin' aff three different pieces o' red ribban, like, at yae time," replied dallas. "a glorious sight!" cried the pensassenach. "aye, truly, ye wad hae said sae had ye seen't, mem," said dallas; "gin ye had seen them wi' the sun glancin' on their airms, and on the flashin' faem o' the spey! every bone o' them got safe across, exceppin yae dragoon that had taen a wee thoughty ower muckle liquor, and fell fae his horse,--and four weemen fouk, wha were whamled out o' a bit cairty, and wha were a' carried down, and a' drooned outright." "poor wretches!" said the pensassenach. "but it was well they were not men: their lives were comparatively but little worth." "i daur swear that you're right there, mem," said dallas; "little worth followers of the camp they were, nae doot;--and yet the hizzies were weel pit on. i followed the bodies as they soomed down the water, and cleekit ane o' them ashore, and although her mutch was gane, she had a gude goon and a daycent rocklay on, and ither things forbye; but they ware a' sae spiled wi' the water, that i selt them till a woman in elgin for an auld sang. but i'll tell ye what it is, mem, weemen--that is, daycent weemen--have nae business----" "you have no business with the women, mr. dallas," interrupted the pensassenach impatiently--"it is of the men--of the troops, and of their noble and gallant leader that i would hear. all across, said you? and what became of the other duke?" continued she, in a contemptuous tone. "i mean the rebel duke--the duke of perth, i mean? where was he, and where were his heroes, that they did not arrest the progress of the royal army?" "troth, mem, the duke o' perth and his men just came on their ways wast the country, and left the english airmy to cross at their ain wull," replied willy. "bravo! bravo!" shouted the lady, waving her hand around her head. "the false knaves dared not to face them! well, any more news, dallas?" "i ken nae mair that i hae to tell ye," said dallas, "exceppin' that i was in the english camp yestreen mysel', and that i selled a wheen caumrick pocket-napkins, and three yairds o' black ribban, till yere brither, captain john, and i promised to ca' in by this way aince eerant to tell ye that he was weel, and to drink his health." "thank ye, thank ye, good bill dallas!" cried the lady, clapping her hands in an ecstasy of joy; "you shall not fail to do that; but why did you not tell me this joyful news before? stay, my good man--here is for your happy tidings!" and, running to a corner cupboard, she brought out a bottle of brandy, and filled him a tasse, that made his eyes dance in his head after he had tossed it off. "my certy, that's prime stuff indeed," said dallas, panting with the very strength of it. "and noo, mem, will ye look at my pack.--i hae some o' the grandest jewels, rings, chains, watches, and brooches--the gayest ribbans--and, aboon a', the bonniest lace,--ye never saw siccan lace. the captain said he was quite sure it wad tak your ee, for that you had siccan a fine taste. troth, says i till him, you're no far wrang there, captain; mistress macarthur has the best taste and joodgement in lace o' a' my customers, north or sooth--north or sooth, said i. it's quite beautifou lace, mem, as ye'll say when ye see't; and sae cheap, too! od, i'm sellin' it for half nothin'. shall i bring the pack ben here, mem?--ye'll hae mair light here." "no--no--no!--not at present, will," cried the pensassenach, her patience quite exhausted with his prolixity. "another time will--but i have other fish to fry at present. morag!--morag, girl! run! call out all the men! my stars, how unfortunate it is that macarthur is from home! how he would rejoice! call all the men, i say!" "fat vas she cryin' aboot?" said morag, hurrying to answer her call. "run and call all the men, i tell you, girl!" cried the pensassenach, bustling about, all life and activity, and her indisposition entirely forgotten. "call all the men i say; and john smith in particular. i want john smith here immediately. what glorious news! there wont be a rascally rebel knave of them left in the whole country. and my brother john coming too! who knows but we may have the honour of being presented to his royal highness the duke of cumberland in person! how provoking it is that macarthur is from home!" "fat wad ta leddy be wantin' wi' her?" said john smith, at that moment putting his head into the room, his kilmarnock cowl, and the disordered state of the covering of so much of the upper part of his person as was visible, sufficiently indicating that he had been roused from his bed. "fat wad ta leddy be wantin'? we wus a' beddit." "run, john!" cried the impatient lady, "run and make all the people get out of their beds directly! collect every one, man and woman, about the farm. make them yoke all the carts, and drive a whole peat-stack to the head of the knoll, and build up a large bonfire, and see that you mix your layers of peats with layers of moss-fir, and dry furze-bushes. i'll have a blaze that shall be seen from forres to inverness. have we any tar-barrels left?" "ou aye!" replied john; "a tar barrels tat was ower mockell fan we last tar ta sheeps." "then put the whole tar-barrel in the midst of all," cried the pensassenach. "come, john, why do you stand staring so? run, man, and do as i bid you, without a moment's delay." "ou aye, aye, she's runnin' fast," replied john, slowly moving away. "fod, but she's thinks tat ta pensassenach be gaen taft awtagedder." "morag! bring a basket here directly," cried the pensassenach, as she hurried down stairs with the large key of the cellar in her hand. "now," said she, putting a number of bottles into the basket, "take care of these; and make haste, and bring a cheese, and some loaves of bread, and follow me quickly out to the knoll with the basket." in a very little time, an enormous pile of fuel was built up on the summit of the knoll, with the tar-barrel in the centre of it, to which an opening was at first left from the external air, which was afterwards partially filled with dry furze-bushes dipped in tar, so as to afford the flame a ready communication inwards. when every thing was prepared, the pensassenach seized a lighted candle from a lantern, and, as dryden hath it, she "like another helen, fired another troy!" that is to say, she set fire, not to a city, indeed, but to the whin-bushes, and the flame running inwards, to the tar-barrel, the whole mighty fabric of fuel was instantaneously in such a blaze, that any one might have thought that it was troy itself that was burning. "now," said the pensassenach, "draw me one of those stone bottles of brandy, and fill me a tasse of it. i drink to those to whom i have dedicated this bonfire--i drink, in the first place, to the health of my brother john, captain in the royal regiment, whom i hope soon to see here!" and, putting the cuach to her lips, she sipped a modest lady's share of the contents. "come, bill dallas," continued she, addressing the travelling merchant, who, tired as he was with his long tramp, had yet sneaked out to secure his share of the liquor, as well as of the fun. "come, bill, you must drink next; you have the best right to do so, as the bearer of the good news." "weel, here's to captain john, and wussin' him health, and muckle happiness, and a gude wife till him, wi' plenty o' siller," said the packman, tossing off the full contents of the tasse. "i'm sure there's no a bonnier man, nor a better man, nor a gallanter sodger--eh, beg his honor's pardon, i meant offisher--in the hail land o' the british isles, be the ither wha he may." "well spoken, bill," cried the lady. "now, john smith, come it is your turn next." "here's helss, an' mokel o't, to her broder captain shon, and mokel gude wifes and gude sillers!" cried john smith, draining the cuach to the last drop.--"oich, but she's goot trinks!" added he. the cup and the toast went round a large and encreasing party; for the bonfire, sending up sharp pointed flames, as if it meditated piercing the very clouds, spread wonder and speculation all over the country far and wide, and brought all manner of idlers, like flies and moths, about it. a considerable space of time, as well as a tolerable quantity of brandy, was expended, before the health had been drank by every one. "now," said the pensassenach, filling the cuach again to the brim, "i drink health and success to his royal highness the duke of cumberland, and confusion to all his enemies!"--and, kissing the cup merely, she handed it to the packman. "weel, mem, here's wussin' that same wi' a' my heart!" cried mr. dallas, and off went every drop of his brimmer. "now, john," said the pensassenach, filling the cuach again to the lip, "now, john smith, it is your turn. come, man, drink the toast--health and success to the duke and his brave fellows." "na!" said john, turning away as if the cup had contained vinegar or verjuice--"na!--teel be on her an she do!" "what do you mean, john?" demanded the pensassenach in a mingled tone of surprise and displeasure. "will you refuse to drink my toast?" "hoot, man, dinna refuse to drink the leddy's toast," said the packman. "that gude brandy wad wash down ony toast ava, let alane siccan' a grand man, and a hero, like the duke o' cummerland.--od, man, an ye had seen him as i hae seen him, ridin' at the head o' his men, wi' as muckle gold lace and reyal genowa velvet aboot him as might serve to cover a papish pupit wi', ye wad say he was the grandest man that ever ye seed.--come, man, drink success till him, and confusion till a' his yennemies!" "surely you will not refuse to drink success to that brave army in which my brother john serves?" said the pensassenach,--"and to that noble and gallant prince who commands it?" "she'll no grudge to trink hail bottals till ta helts o' captain shon, because she's her broder," said smith in a positive manner.--"but fint ae drops wull she tak' to wuss ony helts to ta titter man an' his fouks!" "tuts, nonsense man," said the packman; "ye're just a reyal guse.--come awa! drink the duke's health--the brandy's just parteeklar gude." "why should you hesitate?" said his mistress.--"come, drink the duke's health." "tamm hersell an' she do ony siccan' a sing!" said john smith doggedly, and with powerful emphasis and action.--"she'll as soon eat ta cuach!" "what! are you a loyal subject, and refuse to drink the health of the duke of cumberland!--the king's own brother!" exclaimed the pensassenach energetically. "ou troth--ou aye,--she be loyals eneugh till her ain kings," said john, "an' she'll no grudge to trink gallons till her. but for ta titter mans, fod but she's wussin' her nasins ava but a goot clink on ta croon," and with that john walked off, with a countenance so expressive of dissatisfaction and determination, as rendered it evident that it would be quite hopeless to call him back. "he is an obstinate disloyal mule!" cried the pensassenach, giving full way to her anger. "a reyal dour ass as i ever cam' across," said the packman; "an' siccan' reyal fine speerits too. the cheild thought naething o' hammerin' awa' and keepin' a' huss loyal fouk frae our drap drink.--it's weel that he's awa. my certy, i rauken that there's nae ither body here that'll be sae dooms foolish as to refuse that gude brandy, let what toast there may be soomin' on the tap o' the brimmer." "i trust that that fellow is the only disloyal man about the place," said the pensassenach.--"if it be otherwise i'll have all such jacobite knaves turned off this farm. we shall have none other but good loyal subjects here, i promise you, now that the duke and his gallant army are coming among us." this hint was not lost on the rest of the company; for whatever their private political opinions might have been, they preferred swallowing the good brandy in peace, let the tasse be prefaced by whatsoever toast the pensassenach pleased, rather than be martyrs, like john smith, and risk the loss of the liquor and their places, by any heroic and straightforward declaration of their sentiments. we sometimes see such folk in common life, even at the present time, gentlemen. many, then, were the toasts of the same character that went round.--liberally did the pensassenach make her enlivening eau-de-vie to circulate. the huge bonfire was again and again supplied by the willing revellers. they were wise enough to see that the endurance of the joviality of the night must, in all probability, be measured by that of the fire, and so they laboured and sweated like horses to keep it going. loud were the shouts, and many were the antic tricks performed around its blazing circle, all of which were to be attributed to the mirth-inspiring spirit. the packman was particularly joyous and hilarious, and his loquacity increased as he became elevated with the liquor. at last the pensassenach, wishing gradually to wind up the festivities of the night, proposed another toast. "now, come," said she, filling the cuach, "let us drink confusion to the rebels!" "hurrah! a capital toast!" cried the packman, whilst his cheer was blindly echoed by the more than half-intoxicated crowd around him. "then here i drink it as my most cordial wish," said the pensassenach, sipping a little of the liquor in token of her earnestness and sincerity. "tamm! but she'll rue tat wuss!" cried a hoarse voice, which came from the shadow beyond the circle of the revellers. "who spoke?" demanded the pensassenach, in vain endeavouring to dart her eyes into the impenetrable darkness, by which the bright field of light was surrounded. "tamm her, but she'll ken tat soon enough!" replied the same voice; but the pensassenach could see nothing but a pair of eyes, that, for the fraction of an instant, caught a strong reflection of the red light from the bonfire, glared fearfully at her, and then were gone. "lord hae a care o' huss! i wuss that i had had naething ado wi' this matter," exclaimed mr. dallas, very much fear-stricken. "seize that man, whoever he may be!" cried the pensassenach. but he was nowhere to be found. all the feeble and unsteady attempts of the drunken people to catch him were thrown away. the pensassenach was vexed and mortified. the voice was sterner than john smith's. but she could by no means banish the idea that it was his. she inquired and found that he was no where about the place, and she retired home to her chamber, filled with doubt regarding him, or rather more than half convinced that she nourished a traitor in her house. appearances on the following morning were by no means such as to overcome these suspicions. "is that you, morag?" demanded the pensassenach, as awakened at a later hour than usual by her maid, she started up from that profound sleep, which the extraordinary fatigue and excitement of the previous evening had thrown her into, and began to huddle on such parts of her clothes as lay nearest at hand. "aye, memm, it's me," replied morag, "fat wull she be doin' for mulks? shon smiss has driven awa a' ta wholl kye lang or it was skreichs o' tay." "what said you?" demanded the pensassenach. "john smith has driven away all our cows! traitorous thief and robber that he is, i thought as much!" "toot na! shon's nae fiefs nor rubbers neither," replied morag, in anything but a pleased tone. "he is a thief and a traitor to boot," cried the enraged pensassenach. "he is no fiefs!" rejoined morag, with great energy, both of voice and of action. "not a bonn o' him but is as honest as yoursel'." "i tell you he is a thief, and a traitor; and, for aught i know, an assassin too!" replied the pensassenach; "and you are an impudent baggage for daring to contradict me." "she canna stand and hear shon smiss misca'ed," exclaimed morag, bursting into tears of mingled grief and rage, excited by the unextinguishable love for john, which had long secretly possessed her; "an' war she no the mistress," continued morag, with very violent action, "war she no the mistress, fod, but she wad pu' tat cockernony aff her head for saying as mockell! but och mercy be aboot huss a'!" cried the girl, darting a look out at the window, and then hurrying away as she spoke; "mercy be aboot huss a'! yonder comes shon himsel', rinnin' like ony rae-buck!" "god be merciful to me, can the traitor mean murder!" cried the pensassenach, hastily shutting, locking, and bolting the chamber door, and, with great exertion moving a chest of drawers against it, whilst her very heart almost ceased to beat, from the terror that fell upon her. "far is she, morag? is she oot o' her bed? cried john, in a loud and hurried voice, as he came flying up the stair, and began thundering like a madman at the lady's bed-chamber door. "come, come, let her in direckly!" "no one can come here," said the lady trembling; "i am not half dressed." "dress be tamm!" cried john, furiously; "come away fast--open ta toor or she be killed!" "you shall find no entrance here, you murdering blood-thirsty villain, whilst i have power to defend my life," cried the pensassenach, driven to desperation, and as, with immense labour, she was dragging a heavy trunk of napery across the floor, which she reared on end against the chest of drawers. "oh, why did macarthur leave me thus to be murdered?" "let her in, or she see her sure murdered," cried john, in a voice of thunder, and kicking terribly at the door. "god help me, i'm gone!" muttered the pensassenach, in an agony of fear. "oh, why did my husband leave me? the door never can stand such kicks as these. i see it yielding. murder! murder! murder!" "tamm her nane sel', but she has no more time for nonsense!" cried john, in a voice that seemed to betoken the climax of fury, and with that he drove the whole weight of his body, with the force of a battering-ram, against the door, forcing it out from its hinges, and tumbling it, and the chest of drawers, and the huge trunk, into the very middle of the room, with a violence that burst them open, and scattered their contents in all directions. "villain!" cried the pensassenach, now suddenly excited to an unnatural boldness by despair of life, and standing with her back to the farther wall, armed with her husband's broad-sword, which she had snatched from the bed-head, and drawn in her own defence, and which she now flourished with great activity and determined resolution, altogether regardless of the imperfect state of her attire. "villain that you are, come but one step nearer to me, and this sword shall drink your life's blood from your heart." "ou fye! ou fye!" cried john, standing considerably abashed at this spectacle; "far got she tat terrible swoord?" "villain, you tremble!" cried the pensassenach, roused still more, and, advancing towards john smith, step by step, as she spoke; "fly villain, or i will put you to instant death!" "fye, fye!" said john; "but fod she mauna mind it noo; tere's nae mair time for ceremonies. she maun e'en tak her as she is." "attack me as i am!" cried the pensassenach; "if you do, death, instant death, shall be your portion." "we sall see tat," said john, lifting his hazle rung; "we sall soon see tat," and springing suddenly over the obstructing obstacles, john, with one blow of his stick, sent the sword spinning from the feeble grasp of the delicate hand that held it. "oh, mercy, mercy!" cried the pensassenach, throwing herself on her knees before him, with the horrible dread of impending death upon her. "you would not murder your mistress, john, and all for asking you to drink an idle toast? oh, spare me! spare me! do not murder me in cold blood!" "shon smiss murder!" cried he, with horror and astonishment on his countenance. "foo! foo! fat could gars her sinks tat o' shon smiss?--shon wad fichts to ta last trop o' her blots for her, futher she be king charles's man, or futher she be ta titter bid body o' a sham king's man. foo! foo!--hoo could she sinks tat shon smiss wad do ony ill to ta pensassenach tat has aye been sae kind till her, aye, and to morag an a'," and the poor fellow began blubbering and crying. "god be praised that i am safe, then!" cried the lady, immeasurably relieved. "but what is the meaning of all this violence, john? are you mad?" "na," cried john, starting from the melting fit into which he had been thrown. "she no mad a bit. but ta hillantmens comin'!--swarrants ta hillantmens no liket ta bonfires!" "the highlanders!" cried the pensassenach. "heaven defend me, what shall i do without the protection of my husband? what!--what shall i do?" and she burst into a flood of tears, from the nervous excitement to which she had been subjected. "troth, she be sinkin' tat its as weel tat ta master's no at hame," said he. "but fat need she fear as lang as shon smiss be here?" "will you protect me?" cried the pensassenach, eagerly. "will you really be true to me?" "fat has shon smiss toon to mak ta pensassenach sink tat she'll no be true till her ain mistress?" cried smith, in a whimpering tone, betokening vexation, so sincere, as, in a great measure, to restore the lady's confidence in him. "why did you drive away the cattle this morning, and what have you done with them?" demanded she. "trots she was dootin', a' nicht, tat ta hillantmen wad come after a' yon mockel fires," replied john, "an' sae she just trave tem, coos, cattal, sheeps, an' staigs, an' awtegitter, a' awa' ower to ta glen, whaur she's sinking tat tey'll no be gettin' tem at 'tis turn." "faithful creature, after all, then!" cried the pensassenach. "how can i sufficiently thank you?" "did she no tell her tat shon smiss was nae feefs nor rubbers neither," said morag, entering triumphantly at that moment. "is she no a prave ponny man? but uve, uve, memm, fat way is tat to be stannin'? fye, shon smiss! hoo could ye stand glowerin' tere?--get oot, man, till she gets ta leddy dressed." "fod, she has nae time, noo!" cried john. "fod, but she hears ta pipes 'tis blesset moment. hoot, toot!--hurry, hurry!--fod, but ta hillantmens comin' noo!" and snatching a blanket from the bed, he threw it over his mistress, and whipping her up in his arms ere she wist, he strode down stairs with her in a moment. "where are you carrying me? where are you carrying me to, john smith?" cried the pensassenach, much alarmed. "dis she no hear ta pipes?" cried john. "she be carrying her to hide her in ta auld killogie to be sure. dinna be fear. she mak' her safe eneugh, she swarrants her o' tat." john accordingly ran with the pensassenach to the old kiln, as fast as his legs could carry him and his burden. he found it already occupied by the great sow and her numerous progeny, who, from their unwillingness to quit it, seemed to consider it, both by birthright, and by long possession, as their own particular castle, from which no one could lawfully remove them. john smith used no great ceremony with them, but serving them all with an instantaneous process of ejectment, delivered by divers rapid and severe blows of his hazle cudgel, he forthwith dislodged them from the pend, or fire-place of the kiln, where they were used to find a dry and snug lair, and from which both mother and children retreated with manifest dissatisfaction, and with all manner of sounds and signs of extreme ire. to these john smith gave but small heed, but, shoving the pensassenach, blanket and all, with as much tenderness and delicacy as he could, into this their vacant bed-chamber, he concealed her as much as possible by covering her up with straw, and he had hardly accomplished all this, and made his retreat good from the killogie, when a large body of armed highlanders, under the command of a certain captain m'taggart, appeared filing over the neighbouring brow, and with what intent might easily be guessed, from the numerous horses they brought with them, some harnessed in rude carts, and some fitted with panniers or crooked saddles, for carrying off plunder. the men themselves displayed infuriated countenances, and ceased not, as they drew nearer, to give vent to the most horrible denunciations of vengeance against the pensassenach. "ta pensassenach! ta pensassenach!" cried the same stern voice that had spoken from amid the darkness that surrounded the blazing bonfire of the preceding night. "she sall soon ken fat it is to trink confusion to ta reypells! far be ta pensassenach?--ta englis wife?" "ta pensassenach!--ta pensassenach!--ta heart's blott o' ta pensassenach!--hang her!--purn her!--troon her!--far is she?--her heart's blott!--her heart's blott!" vociferated some thirty or forty rough and raging voices, coming from men that thirsted revengefully for her blood. the poor woman's heart almost died within her through fear, as these murderous sounds reached her, where she lay half suffocated under the straw in the killogie. most active and particular was the search which the highlanders then commenced. first of all, the captain and some of them proceeded to examine the dwelling-house, and there they were met at the very door by mr. dallas the packman. this worthy having been altogether overpowered by his last night's debauch, had thrown himself down in his clothes on the bed hospitably provided for him by his hostess in the room, contained in the little out-shot behind, and there he had slept, with his pack as usual under his head, until awaked by the noise made by john smith and the pensassenach. he had then witnessed enough to make him aware of the place where the lady was secreted. seeing that the highlanders came so suddenly upon them as to make it quite hopeless for him to attempt a retreat, with his lame leg, he hurried away out to the kail-yard and hid his pack under a goosberry bush, an operation which john smith, as he was flying with his mistress on his back, chanced, with the tail of his eye, to observe him performing. after having done this, mr. dallas returned into the house, and, making a virtue of necessity, he stepped boldly forth to meet the leader, when the party came to the door. "muckle prosperity till you and your cause, noble captain," said he, making his reverence. "there's a bonny mornin'." "who the devil are you, sir?" said captain m'taggart, sharply. "troth, captain, i'm a poor travellin' chapman," replied dallas. "i chanced to come here last night, and the gudewife gied me ludgings for charity's sake." "where's your pack, sir?" demanded captain m'taggart. "troth, i left it yesterday at inverness to get some fresh gudes pit intil't," replied dallas. "you are rather a suspicious character, methinks," said the captain. "see that you search every corner of the main house for this woman," continued he, turning to his men, "and if you find this fellow's pack bring it forth to me." "there's nae pack o' mine there, captain, an' that's as fack as death," said dallas. "but ye need hae nae jealousy o' me, for i'm a reyal true and loyal subject o' the prince." "ta prince!" cried the same man who had watched the last night's proceedings at the bonfire. "ta prince!--ta teevil;--tat is ta vera chield tat wanted to mak' honest shon smiss trink ta helss o' tat teevil ta tuke o' cummerlant. he's a reyal and blotty whugg, and weel deserves till hae his craig raxit." "hang up the villain directly, then," cried m'taggart, carelessly. "oh! spare my life, good captain, and i'll tell ye whaur the p--p--p----." pensassenach is hid, were the words that the villain would have uttered, but they were arrested by the ready hand of john smith, who sprang upon him with the pounce of an eagle, and clutched him up as that noble bird might clutch up a rat, his left arm being half round his middle, and his right hand griping his throat, in such a manner as to stop all utterance, and nearly to choke him. "ta tamm scounrel would fain puy her life for tellin' her fare her pack is," said john, laughing heartily. "but she need na mak' nae siccan pargains wi' her, for her nane sell saw her hide it under a perry-puss in ta kail-yaird, and a rich pack it is, she kens tat weel eneugh. see, captain, tats ta way till ta yaird, an' shon smiss 'ill tak cair o' tis chiel, and pit her past tooin' ony mair harms, she'll swarrants tat." off went the captain and those about him, greedy upon the scent of the pack, and caring little what became of its owner. john called to morag to bring him a sack and some bits of rope, and he had no sooner got them under one arm than he ran off with the sprawling mr. dallas under the other, who, having his wind-pipe still tightened by the fearful grasp of him who bore him, was now kicking in the agonies of death. john dived through among some peat-stalks, and so managed to get clear off without observation, to the side of a deep pond or pool, in a retired spot, where the pensassenach was wont to steep her flax.--there laying his, by this time, semianimate burden at length upon the brink, he put some heavy stones into the bottom of the sack, and then began to draw it on, like an under-garment, over the limbs of the unfortunate mr. dallas, inserting his arms therein, and tying the mouth of it tight round his neck, just as if he had been preparing him for running in a sack race, though it must be premised, that for such a purpose the heavy stones might have been well eneugh left out of the bottom of the sack. "hae mercy on my sowl, maister smith,--ye're no gawin' till droon me!" groaned out mr. dallas, in a faint, hollow, and semi-suffocated voice. "oh, mercy! mercy! what a horrible death! i'm no fit till dee, maister smith. i've been a horrible sinner. god forgee me for cheating the puir fowk! oh, hae mercy, maister smith--mercy!--mercy!--for i'm no fit till dee." "she no be gawn till mak' her dee," said john, coolly, "though she wad pe weel wordy o't. but she only be gawn ta hide her in ta watter tat ta hillantmen mayna hangit her." "hide me in the water? and is na that droonin'?" cried the terrified wretch. "oh, mercy! mercy!" "foots, na, man!" said john. "hidin's no troonin' ava, ava. she'll come back an tak' her oot again fan a' is dune, an' she'll no be a hair ta waur o't. but she maun stop her gab frae speakin' about ta pensassenach; an' trots an' she had been hangit or droonit either, aye, or baith tagedder, she had been weel wordy o't a', for fat she was gaein' to hae tell't on ta puir pensassenach." by this time john had prepared an effectual gag for his patient's mouth, which he made him gape and receive between his jaws, and then he secured it firmly by tying it behind his neck. he then lifted him up bodily, and whilst the poor man "aw awed" and "yaw yawed," from the dreadful fear that still possessed him that john's intention, after all, was certainly to drown him, he gradually let down mr. dallas's feet into a part of the water, the exact depth of which he perfectly knew would just admit of his immersion up to the neck, he left him, with his head resting safely against the bank on the side of the pool, with some dry rushes and sedges and flax scattered carelessly both over the bank and the water where he was, so as perfectly to conceal him. great as was the time that all this occupied, john found, on his return to the farm-house, that it had not been more than sufficient to satisfy captain m'taggart and his friends, in their examination of mr. dallas's pack, and in the division of the rich booty it contained. meanwhile, the search for the pensassenach was going on keenly and most unremittingly, and john was relieved to find that it was so, since he was thereby satisfied that, as yet at least, her place of concealment had not been discovered. they opened every door, and looked into every corner, for the unfortunate lady, still swearing all the time the bloodiest oaths of vengeance against her. not a house upon the premises, not a hole nor crevice about the whole place did they pass unexamined, save and except only the eye of the ruined killogie itself, where the object of their search was in reality concealed. frequently, to the almost complete annihilation of the action of the pulses of her heart, did she hear the footsteps of some of them passing close beside the place where she lay, as well as their curses, as they went. but so completely were they deceived by the ruined appearance of the roofless killogie, that they never once thought of the possibility of any one being concealed there. wearied at length with their ineffectual search, and believing that the pensassenach had fled, they began to wreak their rage, and to glut their rapacity, by plundering her effects. meal, butter, cheese, beef, and bacon, were crammed indiscriminately into sacks, with articles of wearing apparel, and the blankets, and the webs of cloth and linen which the thrifty housewife had prepared for her household. articles of silver plate were not forgotten, as well as all other valuables upon which they could lay their rapacious hands. the cellar was broken open and ransacked, and its contents, as well as many other pieces of plunder of a bulky nature, were stowed away to be carried off in the carts belonging to the farm. a general assault then commenced upon the live-stock. john smith's zealous precaution had secured the greater part of the larger animals from their clutches, but the attack on the poultry was simultaneous and terrific. loud was the cackling, gobbling, and quacking of the fowls, turkeys, ducks, and geese, as they were caught, one after another; and fearful was it to hear their music suddenly silenced, by their necks being drawn, and melancholy to behold their exanimate bodies thrown into the hampers that hung on the crook-saddled horses. the good morag's heart was rent, as she beheld these ruthless murders committed upon the innocent creatures whom she had delighted to rear. but honest john smith comforted himself with the reflection, that he had saved all the weightier and more valuable stock, and therefore he witnessed all these ravages among the feathered folk with tolerable composure, until a circumstance occurred which renewed all his apprehensions for the safety of his mistress, and again excited him to the full exertion of all his energies. war had not been long commenced against the poultry, when the large sow, alarmed by the murders she beheld going on around her, and terrified by the loud hurrahs of the plunderers, as well as scared by the sudden striking up of the bagpipes, took to flight in good time, and made straight for the eye of the killogie, at the head of her troop. the quick-sighted john smith at once perceived the risk which his mistress, the pensassenach, ran, of being discovered, by the animals making this attempt to find shelter there. off he flew like the wind to intercept them; and cutting in before them with great adroitness, he turned them right away towards the fragment of meadow, which lay in the close vicinity of the black bog. john played his part so well, that this manoeuvre of his had all the appearance as if he had been merely making a dash at them for the purpose of catching some of them, and that the creatures had for the present foiled him. there they were accordingly left at peace for a time, during which john's mind also remained in some degree tranquil and at ease. but the sow and her inviting family were not long in being descried by the highlanders, after every other living thing had been sacked by them, and a most eventful, hazardous, and very ludicrous chase after them immediately took place. full of the most anxious apprehensions as to the result, john planted himself in front of the killogie, and between it and the scene of action; and as all the old sow's efforts were directed towards her stronghold in the kiln, it was with the greatest difficulty that he repeatedly succeeded in driving her from the dangerous post. at length, by one exertion, greater than the rest, he had the good fortune to force the sow once more fairly a-field again, with all her grunting young ones running scattering after her, whilst the highlanders, deceived by his shouting to them in gaelic, and encouraging them to the pursuit, believed that he had no other object in view than honestly to aid them in catching her. to blind them still more, he now started off full tilt at the head of them, and soon outran the swiftest of them. with amazing dexterity, he first clutched up one pig, and then another, until he had one in each hand, swinging by the tail, and squeaking so fearfully, as to excite the maternal anxiety and rage of the sow mother, to so great an extent, that she followed him, fast and furiously grunting, wheresoever he turned. john inwardly chuckled at the thought of having thus got so easily and so perfectly the command of her motions. but a sudden onset from the highlanders speedily dispersed the remainder of her progeny; and the pursuers naturally scattered themselves to follow after individual grunters, so that the race was seen to rage over all parts of the field. this distracted the attention of the old sow, and she went cantering about, hither and thither, like a frantic creature, until, by degrees, she found herself at the very farthest end of the bog. there, seized by a panic, she suddenly turned, and bolted desperately back again, with her snout pointed directly towards the kiln. winged by terror, she pushed wildly on at a bickering pace, and running her head right between john's legs, ere ever he wist, she carried him off for several yards, horsed upon her back, with his face to the tail; and in the blindness of her alarm, she ran headlong with him into a great peat-pot, where he was instantly launched all his length among the black chaotic fluid which it contained. john scrambled out of the hole with some difficulty, and, starting to his legs, and shaking his ears like a water-spaniel, and clearing the dirt from his eyes, he, to his great horror, beheld the sow scouring away as hard as she could gallop, in a direct course for that chamber in the killogie, which prescriptive right had so long made her believe to be her own. john saw her hurrying thither, pursued by one or two of the highlanders. it was evident that she must soon reach it; and he felt certain that she would instantly dart in among the straw where the pensassenach was lying, and that so the lady must be exposed to certain discovery, and consequently to instant death. what was to be done? not a moment was to be lost. taking advantage of a double which the sow was compelled to make, in consequence of some one having headed her course, and which forced her to swerve considerably from the straight line of the chase, john seized a gun from the hand of a highlander near him, and aiming at the animal as she thus presented her great broadside to him, he fired at her, and rolled her over and over, by a bullet that passed through her very heart. there she lay dead before her pursuers, within some thirty or forty yards of her perilous place of refuge. a shout of applause at so wonderful a shot arose from all who witnessed it. "tat's ta learn her, mockel fusome beast tat she is, for tummelin shon smiss inta ta peat-hole!" cried john, infinitely relieved from all his terrors. the pigs were now very speedily secured in detail, and the great sow was dragged up to the farm-house, and quietly deposited, with her slaughtered family, in one of the carts. "my brave fellow!" said captain m'taggart, the leader of the party, now advancing towards john, and shaking him heartily by the hand, "you must come along with us. a young man, so handsome, so active, so spirited, and so soldierly-looking,--and, above all, so capital a shot as you are,--was never intended by nature to hold the stilts of a plough, or to fill dung-carts. you were born to be an officer at the very least, and, for aught i know, to be a colonel or a general. we are already aware that you are stanch to the righteous cause of the true prince. now is the time for you to raise yourself in the world, by joining his royal standard. come, then, and lend us your powerful aid in placing our lawful king upon the throne of his ancestors!--come along with us, and i shall forthwith introduce you to prince charles, who may yet make a lord of you before you die." john smith was, in truth, all that m'taggart had called him, being a handsome, good looking man, as brave as a lion, and not altogether devoid of a certain natural ambition. but he was ignorant, thoughtless, and credulous, owing to his having been, up to that day, entirely without experience. he had never before seen anything like military array, and irregular and deficient, in many respects, as that was which he now beheld, still it was enough to captivate his unpractised eye. john had a strong attachment to his master and mistress, who had always been very kind to him. but his devotion to the prince, whom he had never seen, was of a higher and holier order. bestowing a few moments of reflection on the ceaseless and profitless plodding, and slavish drudgery of his present duties, all, in themselves, absolutely repugnant to the very nature of a highlander, and comparing them with the ideal picture he had drawn to himself, of the gallant, gentlemanlike service of the prince, whose soldiers, he believed, had not only daily opportunities of enriching themselves with honourable plunder,--a small specimen of which he had just witnessed--but who had the prospect opened to them of one day becoming great men, the contrast was by far too flattering in favour of the latter not to dazzle him. but if it had not had that effect, the promise which m'taggart made him of introducing him to prince charles, the son of the true and legitimate king of scotland, was enough of itself to have gained john's consent in a moment. "ou, troth, she'll no be lang o' gangin' wi' her," said john, "an she'll but stop till she clean hersel' a wee frae ta durt o' ta fulthy bog, tat ta soo beast pat her intill,--and syne bids fereweel to ta leddy." "whoo!" exclaimed m'taggart.--"the lady! what, then, the pensassenach is somewhere about the place after all, and you know where she is?--by holy st. mary, but i will burn every house here, and force the rancorous whig she-devil to unkennel out of her hiding place!" "teel purn her nane sell's fooliss tongue for namin' ta leddy ava ava!" said john bitterly. "but she may e'en purn ta hale toon gin she likes--fint a bit o' ta leddy can she purn." "ha, my good fellow," said m'taggart, "since you have the secret knowledge of her place of concealment locked up in your bosom, what is to hinder me to use a thumbikin as a key to unlock it.--i have a great mind to try." "she may e'en puts ta toomkin on her nanesell's neck, and she'll no tell after a'," said john resolutely. "and ponny pounties tat wad be surely for shon smiss to serve ta prince." "nay, my good fellow, i was only joking," said m'taggart, afraid to lose so good a volunteer; "trust me i meant you no harm." "gin she purns ta toon, or gin she do ony mair ill aboot ta place, fouk wull be sayin' tat shon smiss bid her do it," continued john--"an tat wad be doin' shon mockell harm. teevil ae stap wull shon be gangin' wi' her at a' at a', an she do ony mair bad sings here." "well well," said m'taggart, soothing him, "go in and dress yourself, and make your mind easy; and the sooner we are away from here the better." john thought so too. he ran to the stable for his breachcan; [ ] put on his best coat, kilt, and hose; tied up his only two shirts, and a spare pair of hose, in a napkin, and placed the bundle into the fold of his plaid; and then seizing a trusty old broad-sword, he put on his new sunday's bonnet, smartly cocked up,--and he strode so erectly forth to m'taggart, and with so martial an air, that, added to the wonderful change created in his personal appearance by his dress, made the captain hesitate for a moment in believing him to be the same man. "she be ready noo," said john; "put fare be ta rest o' ta men, captain!" "they are hunting the pensassenach," replied m'taggart with a careless laugh. "she pe verra idle loons tan," said john, "for gin she wad seek a' tay she wad na' find her." and then, by way of diverting the captain's attention from the search by a joke, he pointed to morag, who stood at the door, weeping bitterly at the prospect of his departure, and added,--"see, tat pe ta pensassenach." "that the pensassenach!" said m'taggart.--"that's a good joke truly. i know well enough that's not the pensassenach that we are after." "she pe a verra ponny pensassenach," said john, going up to morag, and hastily delivering to her, in a gaelic whisper, directions how and when she should relieve her mistress from her confinement, and also where she was to look for the packman, that she might get him taken out of the water. "that pensassenach seems to be a favourite of yours, john," said the captain. "she wunna say put she is," replied john, his heart filling a little with sympathy for morag's tears, and at the prospect of leaving her.--"petter tak tiss pensassenach wi' huss,"--and then, rather as a parting word of kindness than anything else, he added, "will she go, morag?" this was too much for poor morag. her heart was too full for her to command words to reply. she rushed forward, and threw her arms around john. she fixed her hands into the folds of that breachcan, in which, in their days of herding, when she was but a lassie, and he but a boy, she had been so often wrapped by her lover as a shelter from the stormy elements, and she gave way to a burst of grief that at length enabled her to find utterance for her feelings. she implored him, in all the anguish of despair, not to leave her. john's heart was softened by her words, and her tears, and he blubbered like a child. m'taggart, fearing that the martial influence in john's soul might be overpowered and extinguished by that of love, and setting a much greater value on him as a recruit, than on the capture of the pensassenach, he thought it advisable to put an end to this tender interview as speedily as might be. he ordered the piper to play up therefore, and the men, abandoning their fruitless search after the english wife, were speedily gathered around him. the train of carts and horses, with the plunder, were driven on--the order of march was formed. john, after a severe struggle with his heart, rent himself away from the arms of morag, and followed m'taggart, without daring to speak, or to look behind him; whilst the poor girl, bereft of her support, fell upon the green--where she lay beating her breast and tearing her hair in utter despair, till the sound of the distant pipe died away, and the presence of some of her fellow-servants brought her back to her reason. morag was no sooner sufficiently calm and collected, than she hastened to execute john smith's last injunctions. the poor pensassenach was taken from the killogie more dead than alive. morag would have had her to go to bed, but, having recovered herself a little, she became too much excited to rest; and, having arranged her dress, she began to bustle about her affairs, and to take a full note of her loss. it was, indeed, severe. but she felt that she endured it for a glorious cause, and that reflection made her bear it with wonderful philosophy. she was grieved, and even angry to learn that john smith had enlisted with the prince's men, but she felt deeply grateful to him for having saved her life; and especially so, when she heard from morag the story of the packman's treachery, and john's ingenuity in defeating it, as well as of the whole of his exertions for her preservation. "where has john bestowed the villain?" demanded the pensassenach. "toon in ta lint pot, memm," replied morag; "i maun gang toon an get him oot o' ta holl noo." "i'll go with you, morag," said the pensassenach; and so mistress and maid proceeded together towards the pond. "what noise is that?" cried the pensassenach, as they drew near to it. "aw--yaw!--yaw--aw!" cried the packman from the pool. "where are you, wretched man?" cried the pensassenach. "yaw--aw!--yaw--aw!" replied mr. dallas. "why don't you speak distinctly?" demanded the lady. "aw--aw!--yaw--aw!" replied dallas again. "the sound would seem to come from under that loose heap of rushes at the margin of the pool yonder," said the pensassenach. "oich aye, she's here memm," cried morag, removing the covering from the packman's head. "ya--aw!--aw--aw!" cried dallas, raising his eyes with an expression of intense agony. "ah, i see how it is," said the pensassenach; "john has gagged him, to prevent his vile tongue from betraying me. loosen that string, morag, and take out the gag." "oh, heeven be praised that i hae fand freends at last," cried the packman in a hoarse voice. "hech, my jaws are stiff, stiff, and sair, sair, wi' that plaguit bit o' a rung that john smith pat into my mooth. hech me! kind souls that ye are, pu' me oot, pu' me oot o' this, or i maun e'en drap awthegither owerhead into the pool, for i haena mair poor to stand on this ae leg o' mine, and i canna rest ony at a' on the short ane, mind ye, without sinkin' my mooth below the water. och, memm, pu' me out!" "how can you ask me to assist you, base wretch that you are?" cried the pensassenach; "you who would have sold my life to have saved your own. i shall push you as gently under the water as i can, but drowned you must be." "oh, for the love o' heeven hae mair charity!" cried the packman most piteously. "i'm a sad sinner, nae doot. but i'm a puir, wake, nervish craytur,--and fan that deevil incarnate, captain m'taggart, spak o' hangin' me, my brains whurled sae i' my head, that i didna ken what i was sayin'. but i'm sure i never thocht o' doin' harm till you or ony o' your hoose. pu' me oot, memm; pu' me oot for the love o' heeven, or the very life'll leave my legs wi' cauld." "pull you out," exclaimed the pensassenach; "pull you out,--you who would have helped the highlanders to my murder: pull you out, who wilfully spoke treason, to aid, abet, and comfort the rebel captain. my loyalty to my king and my country forbids me to assist you, and compels me to make a sacrifice of you immediately. so, prepare for instant death." "och, hae mercy on my puir sowl," cried the packman in despair; "surely, surely, ye're no gawin' till droon me?" "what can you say in exculpation of your treason?" demanded the pensassenach, laying hold of the upper part of the sack with both her hands, and giving mr. dallas a gentle shake. "och, naething--naething ava," cried mr. dallas. "oh, i'm a dead man--a dead man: hae mercy--hae mercy upon me. i'm a great sinner--a wicked, and hardened sinner." "perhaps it were well to allow you a few moments, wretch that you are, to confess your sins and repent, before you are sent into the other world," said the pensassenach. "so make haste--lose not the fleeting space of time which i thus mercifully grant to you, and lighten your soul of as much load as you can." "oh, hae mercy--hae mercy on me!" cried dallas. "i'll have no mercy on you, more than this," cried the pensassenach, in a terrible voice. "if you will not confess yourself, your last moment is at hand;" and so saying, she ducked mr. dallas's head under the water. "o! o! o! oh!--hech! ech!" cried mr. dallas, panting for breath; "i'm a dead man! i'm a dead man! oh, lord forgie me for sellin' pastes for precious stanes." "come! is that all?" cried the pensassenach, shaking him again. "hae mercy on me for sellin' rock crystal for diamunts," cried dallas. "come! out with it all!" said the pensassenach. "oh! och! forgie me for sellin' bits o' ayster shells for pearls," cried dallas again, "and pinchbeck for gold; and watches wi' worn out auld warks for new anes." "come! nothing else to confess?" said the pensassenach. "oh, yes. heaven help me, and hae mercy on me, for keepin' fause weights and a fause ell-wand," cried dallas. "are these all your sins, villain?" exclaimed the pensassenach. "oh, hey, aye, aye," said dallas piteously, "and ower muckle, gude kens." "well, then," said the pensassenach, taking a more determined grasp of the sack; "now, that you have duly confessed, here goes." "oh, stop, stop!" cried dallas, in great fear. "stop, stop! no yet! no yet! i hae mair to tell o' yet. i hae noo an' than picked up an odd silver spoon, or sae, or ony siccan wee article whan it cam in my way, just tempin' me like, in ony o' the hooses whaur i had quarters. but i never was a great fief--no, no." "'twas you belike who stole my silver punch-ladle," said the pensassenach. "i missed it immediately after you were last here." "i canna just charge my memory wi' the punch-ladle," said mr. dallas, unwilling to admit that he had in any way wronged the pensassenach. "nay, then, your thefts must have been too numerous for you to note such a trifling item as that," said the pensassenach; "but it is clear you did steal my punch-ladle, so now you shall die for not confessing. now!" "oh, stop, stop, for mercy's sake!" cried dallas, in livid apprehension. "i mind noo! i mind noo! i did tak' it--i did tak' the ladle! it shined sae tempin' through the glass door o' the bit corner cupboard, and the door was open, sae that i may amaist say that the deevil himsel' handed it oot till me, and pat it intil my very pack. but i'll never wrang you ony mair." "i'll take good care you shall not," said the lady; "you shall never wrong me, nor any one else more. so now, prepare, for this is your last moment." "oh, mercy, mercy," cried the packman again. "i hae mair yet to confess! oh, dinna droun me just yet!" "well, be quick," said the pensassenach; "what more have ye to tell?" "oh, mercy, mercy!" cried dallas. "that woman that i telled ye o' yestreen; that woman that i clippit out o' the spey, was na just awthegither dead--" "what!" exclaimed the pensassenach, in horror; "wretch that you are, did you murder the woman?" "eh, na, na!" cried dallas; "ill as i am, i didna do that. i just took her roklay and her gown, an some ither wee things aperteenin' till her, and syne i gade aff wi' mysel', leaving her to come roond to life at her nain leisure and convenience." "leaving her to die without help you mean, you murdering thief!" said the pensassenach, shrinking back with horror from the very touch of him. "wretch, you are unworthy of life! but i shall not be your executioner. you will grace a gallows yet, i'll warrant you. i shall now leave morag to pull you out of the water. but hark ye, mr. dallas, before i leave you, i may as well tell you, that though i have spared your life, as indeed i never had the least intention of taking it, i advise you never to darken my door again; for, if you do, i promise you that you shall have another and a deeper taste of this lint-pot." "oh, bless you, memm!" cried mr. dallas, with an earnestness which showed how much he was relieved by her words; "i'll never come within five miles o' your farm. noo, morag, my dawty," continued he, addressing the maid after the mistress was gone; "gudesake, woman, be quick an' pu' me oot; or, as sure as death, i'll dee o't awthegither." "fawse loons tat she is," said morag, looking terribly at him. "she will no pu' her oot; she wull pit her toon in ta holl, an' troon her! she is a wicked vullian--she wull pit her toon in ta holl an' troon her wissout nae mercy at a' at a'." "oh!" cried the terrified dallas, with his eye-balls again starting from his head with apprehension. "oh, dinna droon me, noo that your mistress has spared me! i wus ragin' fu' wi' brandy last nicht, and i didna ken what i wus doin'; and maybe i wus a wee unceevil till ye, or the like. but oh, hae mercy, hae mercy on me!" "she'll no be ta waur o' a gude tooky tan," said morag, seizing the sack, and plunging the gasping mr. dallas two or three times successively under the water; "tat'll cool ta hot speerits in her stamick, or she pe far mistane." "oh! o! o! och! hech! och! oh!--o!" cried dallas, gasping and panting. "o, mercy, mercy! an' i hadna drucken a' yon oceans o' brandy yester nicht, i had assuredly been a dead man this day, just frae very cauld itsel'. but the brandy o' yestreen has saved me frae a' the water that my body has imbibit frae this nasty lint-pot, by actuwully makin' a kind o' wake punch o' me. oh, gude lassie that ye are, pu' me oot, pu me oot!" "its mair nor she's weel deservan'," said morag, now putting forth all her strength to pull the sack and its contents up out of the water; "but morag canna let a man be trooned an she can help it, pad man so she pe." having hauled up the sack, she laid it upon the grass, undid the fastenings of its mouth, and, with some difficulty, extricated mr. dallas from its durance vile. the worthy packman arose to his feet, and, shaking himself heartily, and stretching out first his short, and then his long leg, two or three times alternately, to relieve that killing cold cramp which possessed them, he hobbled off without uttering a word of thanks, and shivering so, that his teeth were rattling in his head, as if his jaws had contained a corps of drummers, beating the rogue's march. morag looked after him with a hearty laugh, and then picking up the wet sack, she hastened to join her mistress. let us now follow the march of john smith. comforts of a london club-house. author.--pray, stop for one moment, mr. macpherson, if you please. let me throw a few more peats on the fire. with the rain still beating thus without, and the picture of the half-drowned shivering chapman brought so vividly before our mind's eyes by your description, we shall have our teeth rattling in our jaws from very sympathy, if we don't keep up the caloric we have already generated. grant.--it is right not to allow it to be too much reduced, certainly. but i declare i am as comfortable here in inchrory, as if i were in my club-house in london. clifford.--much more so, my good fellow, take my word for it. where is the london club-house in which we could have been so quiet as we are here, especially in such weather as this. think of the noise in the streets; think, i say, of the eternal thunder of the carriages of all kinds, the hackney-coaches, stage-coaches, omnibusses, and cabs, with the cherokee yelling, and whooping of the drivers, uttering strange and horrible oaths; and, to complete the instrumental part of this mechanical concert, to have it grounded with the grating double bass of the huge carts, drays, and waggons. the mellow roar of the aven is like the soft music of a flute, compared to so terrific a combination of ear-rending sounds. then think of the crowd of dull and damp fellows, dry to talk to, but wet enough to the touch, who are continually coming in and going out, restless and unhappy--miserable when condemned to the house, and yet more wretched when out in the rain--giving you hopes of enjoying a glimpse of the fire at one moment, and then shutting you out entirely from it at the next, with persons so steeped, as to make the very evaporation from their bodies, by the heat, fill the room with clouds of steam,--talking, and chattering, and recognizing each other--disputing about politics, or the merits of the last opera, or opera singer, or ballet, or dancer. in vain you try to have some rational talk with some sensible man, or to listen to something of the greatest possible interest, which he has to tell you--for you have hardly begun so to do, when up comes some fool of a fellow, who, at some unfortunate time or another, has sworn eternal friendship to you, and who now, to your great discomfiture, as well as to the imminent peril of your good temper and manners, breaks boisterously in upon your tête-a-tête, to prove to you how well he keeps his oath, by nearly shaking your hand off, or perhaps dislocating your shoulder, by loudly protesting how rejoiced he is to see you, and by most heroically sacrificing himself, and his own valuable time, in kindly bestowing his fullest tediousness upon you, that he may give you the whole history of his life since he last saw you. then, suppose you sit down to read some important speech, or leading article, in your favourite newspaper, or something which you wish to devour out of some much-talked-of pamphlet or review of the day, it is ten to one but you experience a similar interruption from some such kind and much attached friend. but the height of your misery is only attained, when you come to take refuge in the writing-room, in order to write a letter of more than ordinary importance, and requiring great care in the arrangement of its subject, as well as in the choice of its expressions. then it is, that among those employed at the different tables, you are certain to find some two or more idle scribblers, who go not there really to write, but who, notwithstanding, waste more of the writing materials belonging to the club, than all the rest of its members put together, in order to give themselves importance, by an affectation of much business, and high correspondence. amongst these there is probably one, who, after allowing you to get down to the bottom of your first page, and fairly into your subject, suddenly, and as if accidentally descries you, and rushing across to salute you, rivets himself on the floor close to your chair, and goes on ear-wigging you with his important secrets, whilst he is all the time curiously drinking in your's, from your half-written letter, which lies open before him. or, if you should have the good fortune to escape from such a jackal as this, then you will find the other men of his kidney, who may be sitting at the different tables with the affectation of writing, carrying on such a battery of loud talk across the room, as altogether to distract your attention. in vain do you try to control your thoughts within their proper current. they are continually jostled aside by some half-caught sentence, which sets your mind working in some wrong direction, merely to have it again driven off at a tangent into some other, which is equally foreign to that subject to which you would confine it. in vain do you rub your brow, cover your eyes, and gnaw your pen; every thought but the right thought is forced upon you, until at last, in utter despair, you start to your feet, snatch up your blotted and often corrected letter, tear it into shreds, commit it to the flames, and, seizing your hat, you abruptly hurry homewards, duly execrating, as you go, all club-houses, and those many men of annoyance with which clubs are so universally afflicted. grant.--your picture is a lively one, clifford, and in its general features most just. though our london clubs have many advantages, this lonely house of inchrory is certainly better for our present purpose. author.--gentlemen, unless you mean to enact here the part of some of those london club-annoyance-givers, which you, clifford, have so well described, i think you had better drop your conversation, and allow mr. macpherson to proceed with his story. clifford.--i stand corrected;--then allow me to light a fresh cigar; and now, mr. macpherson, pray go on with serjeant john smith. the legend of serjeant john smith's adventures continued. you will remember, gentlemen, that when i was interrupted, i was about to follow john smith on his march with captain m'taggart. well, you see, prince charles edward chanced to be at this time at kilravock castle, the ancient seat of the roses. thither the sagacious captain thought it good policy to present himself, with the motley company, the greater number of the individuals of which he had himself collected. there he received his due meed of praise for his zeal, with large promises of future preferment for his energetic exertions in the prince's cause. but although the captain thus took especial care to serve himself in the first place, he made a point of strictly keeping his own promise to john smith, for he did present him to the prince, along with some five or six other recruits, whom he had cajoled to follow him, somewhat in the way he had cajoled john. but this their presentation was more with a view of enhancing the value of his own zeal and services, for his own private ends, than for the purpose, or with the hope of benefiting them in any way. the prince came out to the lawn with m'taggart, and some of his own immediate attendants. the men were presented to him by name; and john smith was especially noticed by him. he spoke to each of them in succession; and then, clapping john familiarly on the shoulder,-- "my brave fellows," said he, "you have a glorious career before you. the enemy advances into our very hands. i trust we shall soon have an opportunity of fighting together, side by side. meanwhile, go, join the gallant army which i have so lately left at culloden, eagerly waiting the approach of our foes. i shall see you very soon, and i shall not forget you." so saying, he took off his highland bonnet; and, whilst a gentle zephyr sported and played with his fair curls, he bowed gracefully to the men, and then retired into the house. "she's fichts to ta last trap o' her bluids for ta ponny princey!" cried john, with an enthusiasm which was cordially responded to by shouts from all present. m'taggart then gave the word, and the party wheeled off on their march in the direction of inverness, in the vicinity of which town the prince's army was encamped. their way lay down through the parish of petty, and past castle-stuart. as they moved on, they were every where loudly cheered by the populace--men, women, and children, who turned out to meet them, and showered praises and blessings upon them; and this friendly welcome seemed to await them all along their route, till they joined the main body of their forces, which lay about and above the mansion house of culloden. john smith would have much preferred to have placed himself under the standard of the mackintosh, whom the smiths or gowe, the descendants of the celebrated gowin cromb, who fought on the inch of perth, held to be their chief, as head of the clan-chattan. but m'taggart was unwilling to lose the personal support of so promising a soldier. perhaps also he began to feel a certain interest in the young man; and he accordingly advised him to stick close to him at all times. "stick you by me, john," said he--"stick close by my side; i shall then be able to see what you do, as well as to give a fair and honest, and i trust not unfavourable report of the gallant deeds which your brave spirit may prompt you to perform. depend upon it, with my frequent opportunities of obtaining access to the prince, i can do as much good for you, at least, as any mackintosh." on the night of the th of april then, john smith lay with m'taggart and his company, among the whin and juniper bushes in the wood of culloden, where the greater part of the jacobite army that night disposed of themselves. whatever might have been the ill-provided state of the other portions of the prince's troops, that with which john was now consorted, had no reason to complain of any want of those refreshments which human nature requires, and which are so important to soldiers. large fires were speedily kindled; and the pensassenach's great sow, with all her little pigs, and the poor woman's poultry of all kinds, together with some few similar delicacies which had elsewhere been picked up here and there, were soon divided, and prepared to undergo such rude cookery as each individual could command; and these, with the bread and cheese, and other such provisions, which they had carried off from the pensassenach, as well as from some other houses, enabled them to spread for themselves what might be called a vurra liberal table in the wilderness. but the savoury odour which their culinary operations diffused around, brought hungry highlanders from every quarter of the wood, like wolves upon them, so that each man of their party was fain to gobble up as much as he could swallow in haste, lest he should fail to secure to himself enough to satisfy his hunger, ere the whole feast should disappear under the active jaws of those intruders. the liquor was more under their own control. the flask was allowed to circulate through the hands of those only to whom it most properly belonged by the right of capture. john, for his part, had a good tasse of the pensassenach's brandy; and the smack did not seem to savour the worse within his lips, because it was prefaced with the toast of--"success to the prince, and confusion to the duke of cumberland!" after this their refreshment, the men and officers disposed themselves to sleep around the fires of their bivouac, each in a natural bed of his own selection, john smith, being a pious young man, retired under the shelter of a large juniper bush, and having there offered up his evening prayer to god, he wrapped himself up in his plaid, and consigned himself to sleep. how long he had slept he knew not; when, as he turned in his lair to change his position, his eye caught a dim human figure, which floated, as it were, in the air, stiff and erect, immediately under the high projecting limb of a great fir tree, that grew at some twenty paces distant from the spot where he lay. the figure seemed to have a preternatural power of supporting itself; and as the breeze wailed and moaned through the boughs, it appeared alternately to advance and to recede again with a slow tremulous motion. john's heart, stout as it was against every thing of earthly mould, began to beat quick, and finally to thump against his very ribs, with all manner of superstitious fears. he gazed and trembled, without the power of rising, which he would have fain done, not for the purpose of investigating the mystery, but to take the wiser course of looking out for some other place of repose, where he might hope to escape from the appalling contemplation of this strange and most unaccountable apparition. he lay staring then at it in a cold sweat of fright, whilst the faint glimmering light from the nearest fire, as it rose or fell, now made it somewhat more visible, and now again somewhat more dim. at length, an accidental fall of some of the half burnt fuel, sent up a transient gleam that fully illuminated the ghastly countenance of the spectre, when, to john's horror, he recognised the pale and corpse-like features of mr. william dallas, the packman, whom he had left so ingeniously inserted into the sack, and deposited in the pensassenach's lint-pot. though the gag was gone, the mouth was wide open, and the large, protruded, and glazed eye-balls, glared fearfully upon him. though the light was not sufficient to display the figure correctly, john's fancy made him vividly behold the sack. he would have spoken if he could; but he felt that the apparition of a murdered man was floating before him. his throat grew dry of a sudden. he gasped--but could not utter a word. he doubted not that the packman had been forgotten by morag, and that, having fallen down into the water through cold and exhaustion, the wretch had at last miserably perished; and he came very naturally to the conclusion, that he who had put the unfortunate man there, was now doomed to be henceforth continually haunted by his ghost. fain would he have shut out this horrible sight, by closing his eyes, or by drawing his plaid over them; but this he was afraid to do, lest the object of his dread should swim towards him through the air, and congeal his very life's-blood by its freezing touch. much as he loved morag, he had some difficulty in refraining from inwardly cursing her, for her supposed neglect of his express injunctions to relieve the packman from the pool. as he stared on this dreadful apparition, the flickering gleam from the faggot sunk again, and the countenance again grew dim; but john seemed still to see it in all its intensity of illumination. no more rest had he that night. still, as he gazed on the figure, he again and again fancied that he saw it gradually and silently gliding nearer and nearer to him. the only relief he had was in fervent and earnest prayers, which he confusedly murmured, from time to time, in gaelic. he eagerly petitioned for daylight, hoping that the morning air might remove all such unrealities from the earth. at length, the eastern horizon began to give forth the partial glimmer of dawn; but john was somewhat surprised to find, that, instead of the apparition fading away before it, the outlines of its horrible figure became gradually more and more distinct as it advanced, until even the features were by degrees rendered visible. but although john, by this time, began to discover that his fancy had supplied the sack, he now perceived something which he had not been able to see before, and that was, a thin rope which hung down from the horizontal limb of the fir tree, and suspended, by its lower extremity, the body of the poor packman by the neck. john was much shocked by this discovery. but he could not help thanking god that he was thus acquitted of the wretched man's death; and after the misery that he had suffered from the supposed presence of the apparition of a man who had been drowned through his means, however innocently, the relief he now experienced was immense. he called up some of his comrades to explain the mystery; and from them he learned, that mr. dallas had been caught in the early part of the night, in the very act of attempting to carry off captain m'taggart's horse from its piquet, and that he had been instantly tucked up to the bough of the fir tree, without even the ceremony of a trial. the young prince charley was in the field by an early hour on the morning of the th, and being all alive to the critical nature of his circumstances, and by no means certain as yet how near the enemy might by this time be to him, he judged it important to collect, and to draw up his army on the most favourable ground he could find in the neighbourhood. he therefore marched them up the high, partly flattish, and partly sloping ridge, which, though commonly called culloden moor, from its being situated immediately above the house and grounds of that place, has in reality the name of drummossie. he led them to a part of this ground, a little to the south eastward of their previous position in the wood of culloden, and there he drew them up in order of battle. there they were most injudiciously kept lying on their arms the whole day, and if captain m'taggart's men had feasted tolerably well the previous night, their commons were any thing but plentiful during the time they occupied that position. it was not in the nature of things, that subordination could be so strictly preserved in the prince's army, as it was in that of the duke of cumberland. i, who am well practeesed in the discipline of boys, gentlemen, know very well that it would be impossible to bring a regiment of them under immediate command, if the individuals composing it were to be collected together all at once, raw and untaught, from different parts of the district. it is only by bringing one or two at a time, into the already great disciplined mass, that either a schoolmaster, or a field-marischal can promise to have his troops always well under control. by the time evening came, the officers, as well as the men of the prince's army, began to suffer under the resistless orders of a commander to whom no human being can say nay. hunger, i may say, was rugging at their vurra hearts, and as they all saw, or supposed that they saw, reason to believe that there was no chance of the enemy coming upon them that night, many of them went off to inverness and elsewhere, in search of food. m'taggart himself could not resist those internal admonitions, which his stomach was so urgently giving him from time to time, and accordingly, john smith conceived he was guilty of no great dereliction of duty, in strictly following the first order which his captain had given him, viz., to "stick by his side," which he at once resolved to do, as he saw him go off to look for something to support nature. but the captain and his man had hardly got a quarter of a mile on the road to inverness, when they, with other stragglers, were called back by a mounted officer, who was sent, with all speed, after them, to tell them that they must return, in order to march immediately. the object of their march was that ill-conceived, worse managed, and most unlucky expedition for a night attack on the duke of cumberland's camp at nairn, which had that evening been so hastily planned. hungry as they were they had no choice but to obey, and accordingly they hurried to their standards. the word was given, and after having been harassed by marching all night, without food or refreshment of any kind, they at last got only near enough to nairn just to enable them to discover that day must infallibly break before they could reach the enemy's camp, and that consequently no surprise could possibly take place. disheartened by this failure, they were led back to their ground, where they arrived in so very faint and jaded a condition, that even to go in search of food was beyond their strength, so that they sank down in irregular groups over the field, and fell asleep for a time. awakened by hunger after a very brief slumber, they arose to forage. m'taggart, and some of his party, and john smith amongst the rest, went prowling across the river nairn, which ran to the south of their position, and there they caught and killed a sheep. they soon managed to kindle a fire, and to subdivide the animal into fragments, but ere each man had time to broil his morsel, an alarm was given from their camp. like ravenous savages they tore up and devoured as much of the half raw flesh as haste would allow them to swallow, and hurrying back, they reached their post about eight o'clock in the morning, when they found that the duke of cumberland was approaching with his army in full march. the position chosen by the prince as that where he was to make his stand on that memorable day, the th of april, was by no means very wisely or very well selected. it was a little way to the westward of that which his army had occupied on the previous day. somewhat in advance, and to the right of his ground, there stood the walls of an enclosure, which the experienced eye of lord george murray soon enabled him to perceive, and he was at once so convinced that they presented too advantageous a cover to the assailing enemy, to be neglected by them, that he would fain have moved forward with a party to have broken them down, had time remained to have enabled him to have effected his purpose. but the duke of cumberland's army was already in sight, advancing in three columns, steadily over the heath, from dalcross castle, the tower of which was seen rising towards its eastern extremity. the highlanders were at this time dwindled to a mere handful, and some of the best friends of the cause of the stewarts who were present, and perhaps even the young prince himself, began to believe that he had been traitorously deserted. but the alarm had no sooner been fully spread by the clang of the pipes, and the shrill notes of the bugles, than small and irregular streams of armed men, in various coloured tartans, were seen rushing towards their common position, like mountain rills towards some highland lake, and filling up the vacant ranks with all manner of expedition. many a brave fellow, who had gone to look for something to satisfy the craving of an empty stomach, came hurrying back with as great a void as he had carried away with him, because he preferred fighting for him whom he conscientiously believed to be his king, to remaining ingloriously to subdue that hunger which was absolutely consuming him. no one was wilfully absent who could possibly contrive to be present, but yet the urgent demands of the demon of starvation, to which many of them had yielded, had very considerably thinned their numbers, and, in addition to this source of weakness, there was another obvious one, arising from the physical strength of those who were present being wofully diminished by the want they had endured, and the fatigue they had undergone. but with all these disadvantages the heroic souls of those who were on the field remained firm and resolute. john smith's military knowledge was then too small to allow him to form any judgment of the state of affairs, far less to enable him to carry off, or to describe, any thing like the general arrangement of the order of battle on both sides. he could not even tell very well what regiments his corps was posted with: he only knew this, that according to the order he had received he stuck close to captain m'taggart. he always remembered with enthusiasm, indeed, that the prince rode through the ranks with his attendants, doing all that he could to encourage his men, and that when he passed by where john himself stood, he smiled on him like an angel, and bid him do his duty like a man. "och, hoch!" cried john, with an exultation, which arose from the circumstance of his not being in the least aware that every individual near him had, like him, flattered himself that he was the person so distinguished.--"fa wad hae soughts tat ta ponny princey wad hae mindit on poor shon smiss? fod, but she wad fichts for her till she was cut to collops!" but john had little opportunity of fighting, though he appears to have borne plenty of the brunt of the battle. there were two cannons placed in each space between the battalions composing the first line of the duke of cumberland's army, and these were so well served as to create a fearful carnage among the highland ranks. to this dreadful discharge john smith stood exposed, with men falling by dozens around him, mutilated and mashed, and exhibiting death in all his most horrible forms, till, to use his own very expressive words,--"she was bitin' her ain lips for angher tat she could not get at tem." but before john could get at them, the english dragoons, who, under cover of the walls of the enclosure i have mentioned, had advanced by the right of the highland army, finally broke through the fence, and getting in behind their first line, came cutting and slashing on their backs, whilst the campbells were attacking them in front, and mowing them down like grass. then, indeed, did the melée become desperate, and then was it that john began to bestir himself in earnest. throwing away his plaid, and the little bundle that it contained, he dealt deadly blows with his broad-sword, everywhere around him. he fought with the bravery and the perseverance of a hero. at length his bonnet was knocked from his head, and although he was still possessed with the most anxious desire to obey captain m'taggart's order to stick to his side, he was surprised on looking about him to find that there was no m'taggart, no, nor any one else left near him to stick to but enemies. john smith's spirit was undaunted, so that, seeing he had no one else to stick to, he now resolved to stick to his foes, to the last drop of life's blood that was within him. furiously and fatally did he cut and thrust, and turn and cut and thrust again, at all who opposed him; but he was so overwhelmed by opponents, that in the midst of the blood, and wounds, and death which he was thus dealing in all directions, he received a desperate sabre cut, which, descending on him from above, entirely across the crown of his bared head, felled him instantaneously to the ground, and stretched him senseless among the heather, whilst a deluge of blood poured from the wound over both his eyes. when john began partially to recover, he rubbed the half-congealed blood from his eyelids with the back of his left hand, and looking up and seeing that the ground was somewhat clear around him, he griped his claymore firmly with his right hand, and raising himself to his feet, he began to run as fast as his weak state would allow him. he thought that he ran in the direction of strath nairn, and he ran whilst he had the least strength to run, or the least power remaining in him. but his ideas soon became confused, and the blood from the terrible gash athwart his head trickled so fast into his eyes, that it was continually obscuring his vision. at length he came to a large, deep irregular hollow hag, or ditch, in a piece of moss ground, which had been cut out for peats, and there, his brain beginning to spin round, he sank down into the moist bottom of it to die, and as the tide of life flowed fast from him, he was soon lost to all consciousness of the things or events of this world. whilst john was lying in this senseless state, he was recognised by one of the fugitives, who, in making his own escape, chanced to pass by the edge of the ditch in the moss where the poor man lay. this was a certain donald murdoch, who had long burned with a hopeless flame for black-eyed morag. with a satisfaction that seemed to make him forget his present jeopardy in the contemplation of the death of his rival, he looked down from the edge of the peat hag upon the pale and bloody corpse, and grinned with a fiendish joy. "ha! there you lie!" cried he in bitter gaelic soliloquy.--"the fiend a bit sorry am i to see you so. you'll fling or dance no more, else i'm mistaken.--stay!--is not that the bit of blue ribbon that morag tied round his neck, the last time that we had a dance in the barn? i'll secure that, it may be of some use to me;" and so saying he let himself down into the peat hag, hastily undid the piece of ribbon,--and then continued his flight with all manner of expedition. following the downward course of the river nairn, running at one time, and ducking and diving into bushes, and behind walls at another, to avoid the stragglers who were in pursuit, he by degrees gained some miles of distance from the fatal field, and coming to a little brook, he ventured to halt for a moment, to quench his raging thirst. as he lay gulping down the crystal fluid, he was startled by hearing his own name, and by being addressed in gaelic. "donald murdoch!--oh, donald murdoch, can you tell me is john smith safe? oh, those fearful cannons how they thundered!--oh, tell me, is john smith safe?--oh, tell me! tell me!" "morag!" cried donald, much surprised, but very much relieved to find that it was no one whom he had any cause to be afraid of,--"morag!--what brought you so far from home on such a day as this?" "oh donald!" replied morag, "i came to look after john smith;--oh, grant that he be safe!" "safe enough, morag," replied donald, galled by jealousy. "i'll warrant nothing in this world will harm him now." "what say you?" cried morag. "oh, tell me! tell me truly if he be safe?" "i saw john smith lying dead in a moss hole, his skull cleft by a dragoon's sword," replied donald with malicious coolness. "what?" cried morag, wringing her hands, "john smith dead! but no! it is impossible!--and you are a lying loon, that would try to deceive me, by telling me what i well enough know you would wish to be true. god forgive you, donald, for such cruel knavery!" "thanks to ye, morag, for your civility," replied donald murdoch calmly; "but if you wont believe me, believe that bit of ribbon--see, the very bit of blue ribbon you tied round john smith's neck, the night you last so slighted me at the dance in the barn. see, it is partly died red in his life's blood." "it is the ribbon!" cried morag, snatching it from his hand with excessive agitation, and kissing it over and over again, and then bursting into tears. "alas! alas! it must be too true! what will become of poor morag!--why did i not go with him! what is this world to poor desolate morag now?--and yet--he may be but wounded after all. it must be so--he cannot be killed. where did you leave him?--quick, tell me!--oh, tell me, donald. why do we tarry here? let us forward and seek him!--there may be life in him yet, and whilst there is life there is hope. let me pass, donald; i will fly to seek him!" "i love you too well to let you pass on so foolish and dangerous an errand," said donald, endeavouring to detain her. "i tell you that john smith is dead; but you know, morag, you will always find a friend and a lover in me. so think no more----" "i will pass, donald," cried morag, interrupting him, and making a determined attempt to rush past him. "that you shall not," replied donald, catching her in his arms. "help, help!" cried morag, struggling with all her might, and with great vigour too, against his exertions to hold her. at this moment the trampling of a horse was heard, and a mounted dragoon came cantering down into the hollow. his sabre gleamed in the air--and donald murdoch fell headlong down the bank into the little rill, his skull nearly cleft in two, and perfectly bereft of life. "a plague on the lousy scot!" said the trooper, scanning the corpse of his victim with a searching eye. "his life was not worth the taking, had it not been, that the more of the rascally race that are put out of this world, the better for the honest men that are to remain in it, and therefore it was in the way of my duty to cut him down. there is nought on his beggarly carcase to benefit any one but the crows.--and so the knave would have kissed thee against thy will, my bonny black-eyed wench. well, 'tis no wonder thou shouldst have scorned that carotty-pated fellow; you showed your taste in so doing, my dear: and now you shall be rewarded by having a somewhat better sweetheart.--come!" continued he, alighting from his charger, and approaching the agitated and panting girl--"come, a kiss from the lips of beauty is the best reward for brave deeds; and no one deserves this reward better than i do, for brave deeds have i this day performed. why do you not speak, my dear? have you no christian language to give me? can it be possible that these pretty pouting lips have no language but that of the savages of this country?--come, then, we must try the kissing language; i have always found that to be well understood in all parts of the world." "petter tak' tonald's pig puss o' money first," said morag, pointing down to the corpse in the hollow. "ha! money saidst thou, my gay girl?" cried the trooper. "who would have thought of a purse of money being in the pouch of such a miserable rascally savage as that? but the best apple may sometimes have the coarsest and most unpromising rhind; and so that fellow, unseemly and wretched as he appears, may perchance have a well-lined purse after all. if it be so, girl, i shall say that thy language is like the talk of an angel. then do you hold the rein of this bridle, do you see, till i make sure of the coin in the first place--best secure that, for no one can say what mischance may come; or whether some comrade may not appear with a claim to go snacks with me. so lay hold of the bridle, do you hear, and dont be afraid of old canterbury, for the brute is as quiet as a lamb." morag took the bridle. the trooper descended the bank, and he had scarcely stooped over the body to commence his search for the dead man's supposed purse, when the active girl, well accustomed to ride horses in all manner of ways, vaulted into the saddle, and kicking her heels into canterbury's side, she was out of the hollow in a moment. looking over her shoulder, after she had gone some distance, she beheld the raging dragoon puffing, storming, and swearing, and striding after her, with, what might be called, that dignified sort of agility, to which he was enforced by the weighty thraldom of his immense jack-boots. bewildered by the terror and the anxiety of her escape, she flew over the country, for some time, without knowing which way she fled. at length she began to recover her recollection, so far as to enable her to recur to the object which had prompted her to leave home. on the summit of a knoll she checked her steed--surveyed the country,--and the whole tide of her feelings returning upon her; she urged the animal furiously forward in the direction of the fatal field of culloden. she had not proceeded far, when, on coming suddenly to the edge of a rough little stoney ravine, she discovered five troopers refreshing themselves and their horses from the little brook that had its course through the bottom. she reined back her horse, with the intention of stealing round to some other point of passage; but as she did so, a shout arose from the hollow of the dell.--she had been perceived. in an instant the mounted riders rushed, one after another, out of the ravine, and she had no chance of escape left her, but to ride as hard as the beast that carried her could fly, in the very opposite direction to that which she had hitherto pursued, for there was no other course of flight left open to her. the five troopers were now in full chase after morag, shouting out as they rode, and urging on their horses to the top of their speed. the ground, though rough, stony, and furzy, was for the most part firm enough, and the poor girl, now driven from that purpose to which her strong attachment to john smith had so powerfully impelled her, and being distracted by her griefs and her fears, spared not the animal she rode, but forced him, by every means she could employ, either by hands, limbs, or voice, to the utmost exertion of every muscle. "lord, how she does ride!" said one trooper to the others; "i wish that she beant some of them witches, as, they say, be bred in this here uncanny country of scotland." "bless you no, man," said another; "them devils as you speak of ride on broomsticks. now, i'se much mistaken an' that be not tom dickenson's horse canterbury." "zounds, i believe you are right, hall," said another man; "but that beant no proof that she aint a witch, for nothing but a she-devil, wot can ride on a broom, could ride ould canterbury in that 'ere fashion, i say." "witch or devil, my boys, let us ketch her if we can," shouted another.--"hurrah! hurrah!" "hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!" re-echoed the others, burying their spurs in their horses' sides, and bending forward, and grinning with very eagerness. for several miles morag kept the full distance she had at first gained on her pursuers, but having got into a road, fenced by a rough stone wall upon one side, and a broad and very deep ditch on the other, the troopers, if possible, doubled their speed, in the full conviction that they must now very soon come up with her, and capture her. still morag flew,--but as she every moment cast her eyes over one or other of her shoulders, she was terrified to see that the troopers were visibly gaining upon her. the road before her turned suddenly at an angle,--and she had no sooner doubled it, than, there, to her unspeakable horror--in the very midst of the way--stood tom dickenson, the dismounted dragoon from whom she had taken the very charger, called canterbury, which she then rode. the time of the action of what followed was very brief. for an instant she reined up her horse till he was thrown back on his haunches.--tom dickenson's sword-blade glittered in the sun. "by the god of war, but i have you now!" cried he in a fury. the triumphant shouts of morag's pursuers increased, as they neared her, and beheld the position in which she was now placed. no weapon had she, but the large pair of scissors that hung dangling from her side, in company with her pincushion. in desperation she grasped the sharp-pointed implement dagger fashion, and directed old canterbury's head towards the ditch. dickenson saw her intention, and wishing to counteract it, he rushed to the edge of the ditch. the hand of morag which held the scissors descended on the flank of the horse, and in defiance of his master, who stood in his way, and the gleaming weapon with which he threatened him, old canterbury, goaded by the pain of the sharp wound inflicted on him, sprang towards the leap with a wild energy, and despite of the cut, which deprived him of an ear, and sheared a large slice of the skin off one side of his neck, he plunged the unlucky tom dickenson backwards, swash into the water, and carried his burden fairly over the ditch. morag tarried not to look behind her, until she had scoured across a piece of moorish pasture land, and then casting her eyes over one shoulder, she perceived that only two of the troopers had cleared the ditch, and that the others had either failed in doing so, or were engaged in hauling their half-drowned comrade out of it. the two men who had taken the leap, however, were again hard after her, shouting as before, and evidently gaining upon her. the moment she perceived this, she dashed into a wide piece of mossy, boggy ground, a description of soil with which she was well acquainted. there the chase became intricate and complicated. now her pursuers were so near to her, as to believe that they were on the very point of seizing her, and again some impassable obstacle would throw them quite out, and give her the advantage of them. various were the slips and plunges which the horses made; but ere she had threaded through three-fourths of the snares which she met with, she had the satisfaction of beholding one of the riders who followed her, fairly unhorsed, and hauling at the bridle of his beast, the head and neck of which alone appeared from the slough, in which the rest of the poor animal was engulfed. the man called loudly to his comrade, but he was too keenly intent on the pursuit, to give heed to him. the hard ground was near at hand, and he pushed on after morag, who was now making towards it. she reached it, and again she plied the points of her scissors on the heaving flanks of old canterbury. but she became sensible that his pace was fast flagging,--and that the trooper was rapidly gaining on her. in despair she made towards a small patch of natural wood.--she was already within a short distance of it. but the blowing and snorting of the horse behind her, and the blaspheming of his rider, came every instant more distinctly upon her ear. some fifty or an hundred yards only now lay between her and the wood. again, in desperation, she gave the point of the scissors to her steed--when, all at once he stopped--staggered--and, faint with fatigue and loss of blood, old canterbury fell forward headlong on the grass. "hurrah!" cried the trooper, who was close at his heels, "witch or no witch, i think i'll grapple with thee now." he threw himself from his heaving horse, and rushed towards morag. but she was already on her legs, and scouring away like a hare for the covert. jack-booted, and otherwise encumbered as he was, the bulky trooper strode after her like a second goliah of gath, devouring the way with as much expedition as he could possibly use. but morag's speed was like that of the wind, and he beheld her dive in among the underwood before he had covered half the distance. "a very witch in rayal arnest!" exclaimed the trooper, slackening his pace in dismay and disappointment. and then turning towards his comrade, who, having by this time succeeded in extricating his horse from the slough, was now coming cantering towards him, "hollo, bill!" shouted he, "i've run the blasted witch home here.--come away, man, do; for if so be that she dont arth like a badger, or furnish herself with a new horse to her own fancy out of one of 'em 'ere broom bushes, this covert aint so large but we must sartinly find her. so come along, man, and be active." but we must now return to poor john smith, whom we have too long left for dead in the bottom of a peat-hag. the cold and astringent moss-water flowing about his head, by degrees checked the effusion of his blood, and at length he began to revive. when his senses returned to him, he gathered himself up, and leaning his back against the perpendicular face of the peat bank above him, he drank a little water from the hollow of his hand, and then washed away the clotted blood from his eyes. the first object that broke upon his newly recovered vision was an english trooper riding furiously up to him, with his brandished sword. john was immediately persuaded that he was a doomed man, for he felt that, in his case, resistance was altogether out of the question. he threw himself on his back in the bottom of the broad deep cut in the peat-hag. the trooper came up, and having no time to dismount, he stooped from his saddle and made one or two ineffectual cuts at the poor man. the horse shyed at john's bloody head as it was raised in terror from the peat-hag, and then the animal reared back as he felt the soft mossy ground sinking under him. the trooper was determined,--got angry, and spurred the beast forward, but the horse became obstinate and restive. at length the trooper succeeded in bringing him up again to the edge of the peat-hag; but just as he was craning his neck over its brink, john, roused by desperation, pricked the creature's nose with the point of his claymore. it so happened that he accidentally did this, at the very instant that the irascible trooper was giving his horse a dig with his spurs, and the consequence of these double, though antagonist stimulis, was, that the brute made a desperate spring, and carried himself and his rider clean over the hag-ditch, john smith and all, and then he ran off with his master through the broken moss-ground, scattering the heaps of drying peats to right and left, until horse and man were rolled over and over into the plashy bog. uninjured, except as to his gay clothes and accoutrements, which were speedily dyed of a rich chocolate hue, the trooper arose in a rage, and could he have by any means safely left his horse so as to have secured his not running away, he would have charged the dying man on foot, and so he would have very speedily sacrificed him; but dreading to lose his charger if he should abandon him, he mounted him again, and was in the act of returning to the attack, with the determination of putting john to death, at all hazards, either by steel or by lead, when he was arrested by the voice of his officer, who was then passing along a road tract, at some little distance, with a few of his troop, and who called out to him in a loud authoritative tone, "come away you, jem barnard! why dont you follow the living? why waste time by cutting at the dying or dead?" on hearing this command, the trooper uttered a half-smothered curse, and unwillingly turned to ride after his comrades, throwing back bitter execrations on john smith as he went. john's tongue was otherwise employed. he used it for the better purpose of returning thanks to that almighty providence who had thus so wonderfully protected him. after this pious mental exercise, john thought that he felt himself somewhat better. he made a feeble effort to rise, but it was altogether abortive. the blood still continued to flow from his head--he began to feel very faint, and a raging thirst attacked him. turning himself round in the peat-hag, he contrived to lap up a considerable quantity of the moss water, which, however muddy and distasteful it might be, refreshed him so much as to give him strength sufficient to raise himself up a little, so as to enable him to extend the circuit of his view. he had now a moment's leisure to look about him, and to consider, as well as the confusion of his ideas would allow him, what he had best to do. but what was his surprise and dismay to see, that although many were yet flying in all directions, and many more pursuing after them, whole battalions of the enemy still remained unbroken in the vicinity of the field of battle, and that some were marching up, in close order, both to the right and left of him. there was but little time left him for farther consideration, as one of these battalions was so near to him, that he saw, from the course it was holding, that it must soon march directly over the spot where he was. the first thought that struck him was that his best plan would be to lie down and feign that he was dead. but it immediately afterwards occurred to him that a thrust from some curious or malicious person, who might be the bearer of one of those bayonets, which already glittered in his eyes, might do his business even more effectually than the sword of the trooper might have done. he became convinced that he had nothing left for it but to run. but although he was now somewhat revived, and that the dread of death gave new strength to exhausted nature, he felt persuaded of the truth, that if his wound should continue to bleed, as it had already again began to do, his race could not be a long one in any sense of the word, even if he should have the wonderful luck to escape the chance of its being shortened by the sword, bayonet, or bullet of an enemy. to give himself some small chance of life, john, though he was no surgeon, would have fain tried some means of stanching the blood, but he lacked all manner of materials for any such operation, and he could only try to cover the wound very ineffectually with both hands, whilst the red stream continued to run down through his fingers. at length, necessity, that great mother of invention, and wisest of all teachers, enabled him to hit off in a moment, a remedy, which, as it was the best he could have possibly adopted in his present difficult and distressing situation, might perhaps, even on an occasion where no such embarrassment exists, be found as valuable and effective as any other which the most favourable circumstances could afford, or the most consummate skill devise. stooping down, he picked up a large mass of peaty turf, of nearly a foot square, and two or three inches thick. this had been regularly cut by the peat-diggers, but having tumbled by chance into the bottom of the peat-hag, it had been there lying soaking till the soft unctuous matter of which it was composed was completely saturated with water like a sponge. john proceeded upon no certain ratio medicandi, except this, that as his life's blood was manifestly welling fast away from him, he thought that the wet peat would stop the flow of it, and as his head was in a burning fever, every fibre of his scalp seemed to call out for the immediate application of its cold and moist surface. john seized it then with avidity, and clapping it instantly on his head, with the black soft oleaginous side of it next to the wound, and the heathery top of it outwards, he pressed it down with great care all over his skull, and then quickly secured it fast, by tying a coarse red handkerchief over it, the ends of which he fastened very carefully under his chin. the outward appearance of this strange uncouth head-gear may be easily imagined, with the heather-bush rising everywhere around his head over the red tier that bound it on, and surmounting a countenance so rueful and bloody; but the effect within was so wonderfully refreshing and invigorating, that he felt himself almost immediately restored to comparative strength. he started to his feet; and, being yet uncertain as to which way he should run, he raised his head slowly over the peat-hag to reconnoitre. now, it happened, that, at this very moment, a couple of english foot soldiers came straggling along, thirsting for more slaughter, and prowling about for prey and plunder. ere john was aware of their proximity to him, they were within a few yards of the peat-hag. as he raised his head, he beheld them approaching with their muskets and their bayonets reeking with gore. believing himself to be now utterly lost, a deep groan of despair escaped from him. the soldiers had halted suddenly on beholding the bloody face and neck of what scarcely seemed to be a human being, with a huge overgrown forest of heather on the head instead of hair, appearing, as it were by magic, out of the very earth. they started back, and stood for an instant transfixed to the spot by superstitious fear. "waunds, gilbert, wot is that?" cried one, his eyes staring at john with horror. seeing, that as he was now discovered, his only chance lay in working upon that dread which he saw that he had already excited, john first gradually drew down his head below the bank, and then again raised it slowly and portentously, and uttered another groan more deep and ghostly and prolonged than the first. the effect was instantaneous. "oh lord! oh lord! one of them highland warlocks of the bog, wot dewours men, women, and children!" cried gilbert. "fly--fly, warner, for dear life!" off he ran, and his comrade staid not to question farther, but darted away after him, and john had the satisfaction to see the two heroes, from whom he had looked for nothing but sudden death, scouring away over the field, and hardly daring to look behind them. john smith was considerably emboldened by the discovery that his appearance was so formidable to his foes. he again applied himself to the consideration of the question as to which way it was best for him to fly. he cast his eyes all over the field of action around him; and, much to his satisfaction, he perceived that the officer at the head of the red regiment of englishmen, which had previously given him so much alarm, had been so very obliging as to determine this difficult question for him. some movement of the flying clans, who had retreated on strath nairn, had induced the officer to alter his line of march; and, in a very short time, john had the happiness of seeing himself very much in the rear of the red battalion, instead of being immediately in its front, as he had formerly been. looking to the north-eastward, he perceived that all was comparatively clear and quiet, so far as he could see. there were now no longer any regular masses of men on the field, neither were there any signs of flight or pursuit in that direction. a few stragglers were to be seen, it is true, moving about, like evil spirits among the killed, and perhaps performing the office of messengers of death to the wounded. strange, indeed, was the change that had taken place, upon that which had been so lately a scene of stormy and desperate conflict. a few large birds of prey were soaring high in air, in eager contemplation of that banquet which had been so liberally spread for them on the plain by ferocious man. but, in the immediate neighbourhood of the spot where john smith was, the terrified pewit had already settled down again with confidence on her nest, the robin had again begun to chirp, and to direct his sharp eye towards the earth in search of worms; and the lark was again heaving herself up into the sky, giving forth her innocent song as she rose,--all apparently utterly unconscious that any such terrible and bloody turmoil had taken place between different sections of the human race. john therefore made up his mind at once; and, scrambling out of the peat-hag, he darted away over the moor, and flying like a ghost across the very middle of the field of battle, through the heaps of dead and dying, to the utter terror and discomfiture of those wolves and hyenas in the shape of men--aye, and of women too--who were preying, as well upon those who had life, as upon those who were lifeless, he scattered them to right and left in terror at his appalling appearance, and dived amid the thick woods of culloden. having once found shelter among the trees, john stopped to breathe awhile, and then he again set forward to unravel his way. it so happened, that, as he proceeded, he chanced to come upon the very spot where he had feasted with mactaggart and his comrades on his mistress the pensassenach's sow, and the other good things which the highlanders had taken from her. the gnawing demon of hunger that possessed him, inserted his fell fangs more furiously into his stomach, from very association with the scene. what would he not have now given for the smallest morsel of that goodly beast, the long and ample side of which arose upon his mind's eyes, as he had beheld her carcase hanging from the bough of a tree, previous to the rapid subdivision which it underwent. alas! the very thought of it was now an unreal mockery. yet he could not help looking anxiously around, though in vain, among the extinguished remains of the fires of the bivouacs; and he figured to himself the joy and comfort and refreshment he would have experienced, if his eyes could have lighted even on a half-broiled fragment of one of the pettitoes, which he might have picked at as he fled. john's eyes were so intently turned to the ground, that he saw not the unfortunate mr. dallas, who still dangled from the bough of the fir tree above him. whilst john was poking about in this manner, earnestly turning over the ashes, and looking amongst them as if he had been in search of a pin, he suddenly heard the tramp of horses at some little distance. the sound was evidently coming towards him; and he could distinguish men's voices. he cast his eyes eagerly around him, to discover some ready place of concealment; and now, for the first time, he caught sight of the wasted figure of mr. dallas, swinging at some distance above him, with the dull glassy eyeballs apparently fixed upon him. his heart sank within him; for the corpse of the wretched man seemed to typify his own immediate fate. he was paralyzed for a moment. but the sound drew nearer; and, spying a holly-tree with a reasonably tall stem, and a very thick and bushy head, which happened to grow most fortunately near him, he ran towards it, reached up his hands, seized hold of its lower branches, and, weak though he was, the energy of self-preservation enabled him very quickly to coil himself up amongst its dense foliage, where he sat as still as death, and scarcely allowing himself to breathe. the holly-tree stood by the side of a horse-track that led through the wood, and which crossed the small open space where most of the fires of captain m'taggart's bivouac had been kindled. two troopers came riding leisurely up through the wood along it, their horses considerably jaded by the work of the day. "ha!" said one of them to the other, reining up his steed as he spoke, just on entering the open space,--"what have we here, jack?" "i should not wonder now if 'em 'ere should be the remains of the fires of some of them rebel rascals," said jack, with wonderful acuteness. "them is a proper set of waggabones, to be sure. how we did lick the rascals! didn't we, bob?" "to be sure we did, jack," replied bob. "but you and i aint made much on it, arter all. i wish the captain at the devil--so i do--for sendin' us a unting arter that officer he was a wanting to ketch." "aye," said jack; "so do i, from the bottom of my soul. but if we had ketcht him, i think we should 'a gained a prize, seeing that he wur walued at twenty golden pieces by his highness the duke. whoy, who the plague could he be? not the chap they calls prince charles stuart himself surelye? i should think that his carcase would fetch a deal more money." "a deal more money indeed!" said bob. "lord bless thee, i would not sell my share of him for an underd. but why may we not ketch him yet, jack? look sharp; do--and see if you can spy ere an oak in this wood, with a head so royal as to hide this prince charles stuart in it, as that 'ere one did king charley the second arter the great battle of worcester. zounds! what a fortin you and i should make, an' we could only ketch him!" "pooh!" replied jack, moving so close to the little holly, that his head and that of john smith were within two yards of each other--"pooh man! there beant no oaks bigger than this here holly, in all this blasted, cold, and wretched country." and, at the same time, he gave its bushy head a thwack with the flat of his sword that set every leaf of it in motion, and john's heart, body, muscles, and nerves, shaking in sympathy with them. "beg your pardon," said bob. "i was in a great big wood yesterday--that same, i mean, that spreads abroad all over the country, above that 'ere ould castle wot they calls cawdor castle. and sitch oak trees as i seed there! my heyes, some on 'em had heads as would cover half a troop! but, hark ye, jack! is there no tree, think ye, fit to have a man in't but an oak? dost not think that a good stout fir-tree now might support a man?" "oh," replied jack, "surelye, surelye. this here holly, for instance, might hide a man in its head;"--and, as he said so, he gave the holly another thwack, that, for a few moments, banished every drop of blood from the heart of john smith. "but your oak is your only tree for concealing your king or your prince; for, as the old rhyme has it, 'the royal oak is not a joke.' as for your firs, they may be well enough for affording a refuge to your men of smaller mark." "then you don't think that 'ere feller, wot hangs from yonder fir tree, can be a king or a prince, do you, jack?" demanded bob, laughing heartily at his own joke. "my heyes!" exclaimed jack, rubbing his optics, and looking earnestly for some time at the corpse of mr. dallas; "sure i cannot be mistaken? as i'm a soldier, that 'ere is the very face, figure, clothes, and, above all, short leg and queer shoe, of the identical feller wot sould me an ould watch, wot was of no use, because you know it never went, and therefore it stands to reason that it could only tell the hour twice in the twenty-four. i say surelye, surelye, that 'ere is the very feller as sould me this here ould useless watch, for a bran new great goer. well, if it be'ant some satisfaction to see the feller hanging there, my name aint jack blunt!" "them rascally rebels has robbed and murdered the poor wretch," said bob. "well," replied jack, "i am a right soft arted christine; and therefore most surelye do i forgive 'em for that same hact, if they'd never ha' done no worse. but come bob, my boy; an' we would be ketching kings or princes, i doubt we mun be stirrin'." "aye, aye, that's true--let's be joggin'," replied bob. you may believe, gentlemen, that it was with no small satisfaction that john smith beheld them apply their spurs to the sides of their weary animals. he listened to their departing footsteps until they were beyond the reach of his hearing; and then, conscious as he felt himself, that he was in much too weak a state to have maintained an unequal combat against two fresh and vigorous men, with the most distant chance of success, he put up a fervent ejaculation of thankfulness for their departure, and his own safety. he was in the act of preparing himself to drop from the tree, that he might continue his flight, and was just putting down his legs from amid the thick foliage, when he met with a new alarm, that compelled him to draw them up again with great expedition. some one on foot now came singing along up the path, and john had hardly more than time to conceal himself again, when he beheld the person enter upon the open space, near the holly tree where he was perched. and a very remarkable and striking personage he was. he wore an old, soiled, torn, and tarnished regimental coat, which, though now divested of every shred of the lace that had once adorned it, seemed to have once belonged to an english officer; and this was put on over a tattered highland kilt, from beneath which his raw-boned limbs and long horny feet appeared uncased by any covering. a dirty canvas shirt was all that showed itself where a waistcoat should have been, and that was all loose at the collar, fully exhibiting a thin, long, scraggy neck, that supported a head of extraordinary dimensions, and of the strangest malconformation, having a countenance, in which the appearance of the goggle eyes alone, would have been enough to have satisfied the most transient observer of the insanity of the individual to whom they belonged. an old worn-out drummer's cap completed his costume. he came dancing along, with a large piece of cheese held up before him with both hands, and he went on, singing, hoarsely and vehemently,-- "troll de roll loll--troll de loll lay; if i could catch a reybell, i would him flay-- troll de roll lay--troll de roll lum-- and out of his skin i wud make a big drum. ho! ho; ho; that wud be foine. but stay; i mun halt here, and sit doon, and munch up mye cheese that i took so cleverly from that ould woman.--ho! ho! ho! ho!--how nice it is to follow the sodgers! take what we like--take what we like!--ho! ho!--this is livin' like a man! they ca'ed me daft jock in the streets o' perth; but our sarjeant says as hoo that i'm to be made a captain noo.--ho! ho!--a captain! and to have a lang swurd by my side!--ho! ho! ho!--i'll be grand, very grand--and i'll fecht, and cut off the heads o' the reybel loons!--ho! ho! ho! troll de roll loll--troll de roll lay-- if i could catch a reybell i wud him----" "hoch!"--roared out john smith, his patience being now quite exhausted, by the thought that his chance of escaping with life was thus to be rendered doubly precarious, by the provoking delay of this idiot.--"hoch!" roared he again, in a yet more tremendous voice, whilst at the same time he thrust his head--and nothing but his turf-covered head--with his bloody countenance, partially streaked with the tiny streams of the inky liquid that had oozed from the peat, and run down here and there over his face;--this horrible head, i say, john thrust forth from the foliage, and glared fearfully at the appalled songster, who stopped dead in the midst of his stave. "ah--a-ach--ha--a-ah--ha!" cried the poor idiot, in a prolonged scream of terror that echoed through the wood, and off he flew, and was out of sight in a moment. john smith lost not another instant of time. dropping down from the tree, he hastily picked up a small fragment of the cheese which the idiot had let fall in his terror and confusion, and this he devoured with inconceivable rapacity. but although this refreshed him a little, it stirred up his hunger to a most agonizing degree, so that if he had had no other cause for running, he would have run from the very internal torment he was enduring. dashing down through the thickest of the brakes of the wood, so as to avoid observation as much as possible, he at last traversed the whole extent of it in a north-easterly direction, and gained the low open country beyond it, whence he urged on his way, until he fell into that very line of road, in the parish of petty, which he had so lately marched over in an opposite direction, and under circumstances so different, with captain m'taggart and his company, on the afternoon of the th, just two days before. remembering the whole particulars of that march, and the cheers and the benedictions with which they had been every where greeted, john smith flattered himself that he had now got into a country of friends, and that he had only to show himself at any of their doors, wounded, weary, an' hungered and athirst, as he was, to ensure the most charitable, compassionate, and hospitable reception. but, in so calculating, john was ignorant of the versatility and worthlessness of popular applause. he forgot that when he was passing to culloden, with the bold captain m'taggart and his company, they had been looked upon as heroes marching to conquest; whilst he was now to be viewed as a wretched runaway from a lost field. but he still more forgot, that the same bloody, haggard countenance, and horrible head-gear, which had been already so great a protection to him by terrifying his enemies, could not have much chance of favourably recommending him to his friends. john stumped on along the road, therefore, with comparative cheerfulness, arising from the prospect which he now had of speedy relief. at some little distance before him, he observed a nice, trig-looking country girl, trudging away barefoot, in the same direction he was travelling. he hurried on to overtake her, in order to learn from her where he was most likely to have his raging hunger relieved. the girl heard his footstep coming up behind her, whilst she was yet some twenty paces a-head of him;--she turned suddenly round to see who the person was that was about to join her, and beholding the terrible spectre-looking figure which john presented, she uttered a piercing shriek, and darted off along the highway, with a speed that nothing but intense dread could have produced. altogether forgetful of the probable cause of her alarm, john imagined that it must proceed from fear of the duke of cumberland's men, and, with this idea in his head, he ran after her as fast as his weak state of body would allow him, earnestly vociferating to her to stop. but the more he ran, and the more he shouted, just so much the more ran and screamed the terrified young woman. another girl was seated, with a boy, on the grassy slope of a broomy hillock, immediately over the road, tending three cows and a few sheep. seeing the first girl running in the way she was doing, they hurried to the road side to enquire the cause of her alarm, but ere they had time to ask, or she to answer, she shot past them, and the hideous figure of john smith appeared. horror-struck, and so bewildered that they hardly knew what they were doing, both girl and boy leaped into the road, and fled along it. a little farther on, two labourers were engaged digging a ditch, in a mossy hollow below the road. curiosity to know what was the cause of all this shrieking and running, induced these men to hasten up to the road-side. but ere they had half reached it, they beheld john coming, and turning with sudden dismay, they scampered off across the fields, never stopping to draw breath till they reached their own homes. john minded them not,--but fancying that he was gaining on the three fugitives before him, and perceiving a small hamlet of cottages a little way on, he redoubled his exertions. some dozen of persons, men, women, and children, were assembled about a well, at what we in scotland would call the town-end. they were talking earnestly over the many, and most contradictory rumours, that had reached them of the events of that day's battle, their rustic and unwarlike souls having been so sunk, with the trepidation occasioned by the distant sound of the heavy cannonade, that they as yet hardly dared to speak but in whispers. suddenly the shrieking of the three young persons came upon their ears. they pricked them up in alarm, and turned every eye along the road. the shrieking increased, and the two girls and the boy appeared, with the formidable figure of john smith in pursuit of them. "the duke's men! the duke's men! with the devil at their head!" cried the wise man of the hamlet in gaelic. "run! or we're all dead and murdered!" in an instant every human head of them had disappeared, each having burrowed under its own proper earthen hovel, with as much expedition as would be displayed by the rabbits of a warren, when scared by a highland terrier. so instantaneously, and so securely, was every little door fastened, that it was with some difficulty that the three fugitives found places of shelter, and that too, not until their shrieks had been multiplied ten-fold. when john smith came up, panting and blowing like a stranded porpus, all was snug, and the little hamlet so silent, that if he had not caught a glimpse of the people alive, he might have supposed that they were all dead. john knocked at the first door he came to.--not a sound was returned but the angry barking of a cur. he tried the next--and the next--and the next--all with like success;--at last he knocked at one, whence came a low, tremulous voice, more of ejaculation than intended for the ear of any one without, and speaking in gaelic. "lord be about us!--defend us from satan, and from all his evil spirits and works!" "give me a morsel of bread, and a cup of water, for mercy's sake!" said john, poking his head close against a small pane of dirty glass in the mud wall, that served for a window. "avoid thee, evil spirit!" said the same voice.--"avoid thee, satan!--o deliver us from satan!--deliver us from the prince of darkness and all his wicked angels!" "have mercy upon me, and give me but a bit of bread, and a drop of water, for the sake of christ your saviour!" cried john earnestly again. "avoid, i say, blasphemer!" replied the voice, with more energy than before. "name not vainly the name of my saviour, enemy as thou art to him and his. begone, and tempt us not!" john smith was preparing to answer and to explain, and to defend himself from these absurd and unjust imputations against him, when he heard the sound of a bolt drawn in the hovel immediately behind him. full of hope that some good and charitable christian within, melted by his pitiful petitions, had come to the resolution of opening his door to relieve him, he turned hastily round. but what was his mortification, when, instead of seeing the door opened, he beheld the small wooden shutter of an unglazed hole in the wall, slowly and silently pushed outwards on its hinges, until it fell aside, and then the muzzle of a rusty fowling-piece was gradually projected, levelled, and pointed at him. john waited not to allow him who held it to perfect his aim. he sprang instantly aside towards the wall, and fortunately, the tardy performance of the old and ill constructed lock enabled him to do so, just in time to clear the way for the shower of swan-shot which the gun discharged in a diagonal line across the way. luckily for john, he had thus no opportunity of judging of the weight of the charge in his own person, but he was made sufficiently aware that it was quite potent enough, by its effects on an unfortunate sheep-dog, that happened to be at that moment lying peaceably gnawing a bone on the top of a dunghill, some fifty yards down the road, on the opposite side of the way to that where the hovel stood from which the shot had been fired. the poor animal sprang up, and gave a loud and sharp yelp, when he received the shot, and then followed a long and dismal howl, after which he rolled over on his back and died. after such a hint as this, john staid not to make farther experiments on the hospitality of the little place, but, getting out at the farther end of its street with all manner of expedition, he slowly proceeded on his way, weary, faint, and heart-sunken. just as sunset was approaching, he came to the door of a small single cottage, hard by the way-side. there he knocked gently, without saying a word. "who is there?" asked a soft woman's voice in gaelic, from within. "a poor man like to die with hunger and thirst," replied john in the same language. "for the love of god give me a piece of bread, and a drink of water." "you shant want that," said the good samaritan woman within, who promptly came to undo the door. "heaven reward you!" said john fervently, as she was fumbling with the key in the key-hole, and with an astonishing rapidity of movement in his ideas, he felt, by anticipation, as if he was already devouring the food he had asked for. "preserve us, what's that?" cried the woman, the moment the half-opened door had enabled her to catch a glimpse of his fearful head and bloody features. the door was shut and locked in an instant; and whether it was that the poor young lonely widow, for such she was, had fainted or not, or whether she had felt so frightened for herself and her young child, that she dared not to speak, all john's farther attempts to procure an answer from her were fruitless. it was probably from the cruel and unexpected disappointment that he here had met with, just at the time when his hopes of relief had been highest, that his faintness came more overpoweringly upon him. he tottered away from the widow's door, with his head swimming strangely round, and he had not proceeded above two or three dozen of steps, when he sank down on a green bank by the side of the road, where he lay almost unconscious as to what had befallen him. he had not lain long there, when the tender hearted widow, who had reconnoitred him well through a single pane of glass in the gable end of her house, began to have her fears overcome by her compassion. seeing that he was now at some distance from her dwelling, she ventured again to open her door, and perceiving that he did not stir, she retired for a minute, and then reappeared with a bottle of milk and two barley cakes, with which she crept timorously, and therefore slowly and cautiously, along the road. her step became slower and slower, as, with fear and trembling, she drew near to john. at last, when within three or four yards of him, she halted, and, looking back, as if to measure the distance that divided her from her own door, she turned towards him, and ventured to address him. "here, poor man," said she, setting down the cakes and the bottle of milk on the bank. "here is some refreshment for you." john smith raised his eyes languidly as her words reached him, and spying the food she had brought him, he started up and proceeded to seize upon it with an energy which no one could have believed was yet left in him; and, as the benevolent widow was flying back with a beating heart to her cottage, she heard his thanks and benedictions coming thickly and loudly after her. john devoured the barley cakes, and drank the milk, and felt wonderfully refreshed, and then, placing the bottle on the bank in view of the cottage, he knelt down and offered up his thanks to god for his mercy, and prayed for blessings on the head of her who had relieved him. he then arose, and having waved his hand two or three times towards the cottage in token of his gratitude, he proceeded with some degree of spirit on his journey. i may here remark, gentlemen, that however those worthies who denied john admittance to their houses may have passed the night, i may venture to pronounce, and that with some probability of truth too, that the sleep of that virtuous young widow, with her innocent child in her arms, was as sweet and refreshing as the purity and balminess of her previous reflections could make it. john smith had not gone far on his way till the sun went down; but, as the moon was up, and he knew his road sufficiently well, he continued to trudge on without fear, until he approached the old walls of an ancient church, the burying yard of which had an ugly reputation for being haunted, and then he began to walk with somewhat more circumspection. as he drew nearer to it, he halted under the shadow of a bank, and stood for a time somewhat aghast, for, in the open part of the grave-yard, between the church and the high-road, he beheld three figures standing in the moonlight which then prevailed. at first john quaked with fear, lest they should prove to be some of the uncanny spirits which were said to frequent the place. but he soon became reassured, by observing enough of them and of their motions to convince him that they were men of flesh and blood, yea, and highlanders too, like himself. as john smith had no fear of mortal man, he would have at once advanced. but there was something so suspicious in the manner in which the three fellows hung over the wall, as if they were watching the public road, that he became at once convinced that they were lying in wait for a prey; and although he had nothing to lose, he did not feel quite assured as to the manner in which they might be disposed to accost him; and in his present weak state, he felt prudence to be the better part of valour. availing himself of the concealment of the bank, therefore, until he had entered a small opening in the churchyard wall, he crept quietly across a dark part of the churchyard itself, by which means he got into the deep shadow that fell with great breadth all along the church wall, between the moon and the three figures who were watching the road, and who consequently had their backs to the old building. having succeeded in accomplishing this, john was stealing slowly and silently along the wall, with the hope of passing by them, altogether unnoticed, when, as ill luck would have it, one of them chanced to turn round, so as dimly to descry his figure. "what the devil is that gliding along yonder?" cried the man, in gaelic, and in a voice that betrayed considerable fear. "halt you there!" cried another, who was somewhat bolder. "halt, i say, and give an account of yourself." john saw that there was now no mode of escaping the danger but by boldly bearding it. he halted therefore, but still keeping deep within the shade, he drew out his claymore, and placed his back to the church wall to prepare for defence. "ha! steel!" cried the third fellow; "i heard it clash on the stones of the wall, and i saw it bring a flash of fire out of them too. come, come, goodman, whoever you are--come out here, and give us your claymore." "he that will have it, must come and take it by the point," said john, in gaelic, and in a stern, hoarse, hollow voice; "and he had better have iron gloves on, or he will find it too hot for his palms." "what the devil does he mean?" said the first. "we'll detain you as a runaway rebel," said the third. "the boldest of men could not detain me," replied john, now recognising the last speaker, by the moonlight on his face, as well as by his voice. "but for a base traitor like you, neil maccallum, better were it for you to be lying dead, like your brave brother, among the slain on drummosie moor, than to encounter me here in this churchyard, at such an hour as this!" "in the name of wonder, how knows he my name?" exclaimed maccallum in a voice that quavered considerably. "oh, neil! neil!" cried the first speaker, in great dismay, "it is no man! it is something most uncanny: for the love of god, parley with it no farther!" "pshaw--nonsense!" exclaimed the second speaker. "its a man, and nothing else. let us all rush upon him at once. surely, if he were the devil himself, three of us ought to be a match for him." "i am the devil himself!" cried john smith in a terrible voice, and at the same time stalking slowly forth from the shadow, with the bloody blade of his claymore before him, he strode into the moonlight, which at once fully disclosed his hideous head-gear and ghastly features, to which at the same time it gave a tenfold effect of horror. "oh, the devil!--the devil!--the devil!" cried the fellows, the moment they thus beheld him; and, overpowered by their terror, they rushed forward towards the churchyard wall, and threw themselves over it pell-mell, tumbling higgledy-piggledy into the road, and scampering out of sight and out of hearing in a moment, leaving john smith sole master of the field. in the midst of all his miseries, john could not help laughing heartily at the suddenness of their retreat. but gravity of mood came quickly over him again, when he heard his laugh re-echoed--he knew not how, as it were in a tone of mockery, from the old church walls. he began to recollect where he was, and he half repented that he had so indiscreetly used the name of satan in the manner he had done. "the lord be about us!" ejaculated john most fervently, whilst his knees smote against each other violently, and his jaws were stretched to a fearful extent. he felt that the shorter time he tarried in that uncanny place the better it would be for his comfort; and, accordingly, he began to move forward as quickly as he could towards a wicket gate, which he well knew gave exit to the footpath at the other end of the churchyard. john, now proceeding at what might rather be called an anxious pace than a quick one, had very nearly reached the wicket, when his eye caught a tall white figure, standing within a few yards of it, and posted close by the path which he must necessarily pursue. the moonshine enabled him to see a terrible face, with a huge mouth; and, so far as his recollection of his own natural physiognomy went, derived as it was from his shavings on saturday nights ever since his chin had required a razor, he felt persuaded that the countenance before him was a fac-simile of his own. it was, moreover, very ghastly, and very bloody. his eyes fixed themselves upon it with unconquerable dismay, and he shook throughout every nerve, like the trembling poplar. but that which most astonished and terrified him, as he gazed on this apparition, was, the strange circumstance, that he could distinctly perceive, that it had already assumed a head-gear precisely similar to the very remarkable one which he had been so recently compelled from necessity to adopt. on the summit of its crown appeared a huge sod, with all its native plants upon it, and these waved to and fro before him with something like portentous omen. john felt as if he had only fled from the battle-field of culloden to meet both death and burial in this most unchancy churchyard, and if his knees smote each other before, they now increased their reciprocal antagonist action in a degree that was tenfold more striking. john felt persuaded beyond a doubt, that the devil had been permitted thus to assume his own appearance, and to come thus personally to reprove him for the indiscreet use which he had made of his name. sudden death seemed to be about to fall on him. the grave appeared to be about to open to receive his wounded and worn-out body. but these were evils which, at that dreadful moment, john hardly recognized, for the jaws of the evil spirit himself seemed to him to be slowly and terribly expanding themselves to swallow up his sinful soul. fain would john have fled, but he was rivetted to the spot. no way suggested itself to his distracted mind by which he could escape, and he well knew that he had no way that led homewards to that spot where he looked for concealment and safety, save that which went directly by the dreaded object before him. for some time he stood trembling and staring, in a cold sweat, until at length, overpowered by his feelings, he dropped upon his knees, and began putting up such snatches of prayer to heaven, for help against the powers of darkness, as his fears allowed him to utter. as john thus sat on his knees, praying and quaking, his animal courage so far returned to him as to permit him to observe that the object of his terror remained unchanged and immovable. at length his mind recovered itself to such an extent, as to enable him to revert to that night of misery which he had so recently experienced, in beholding that which he had believed to be the spirit of dallas the packman, and remembering how that matter had been cleared up by the appearance of daylight, he began to reason with himself as to the possibility of this being a somewhat similar case. having thus so far reduced his fears within the control of his reason, he summoned up resolution to raise himself from his knees, and to advance one step nearer to the phantom which had so long triumphed over the courage that was within him. and, seeing that, notwithstanding this movement of his, it still maintained its position, and uttered no sound, he ventured to take a second step--and then a third step, until the truth, and the whole truth, began gradually to dawn upon his eyes and his mind, and then, at last, he discovered, to his very great relief, that the horrible and much-dreaded demon whose appearance had so disturbed and discomposed his nervous system, was no other than a tall old tombstone, with a head so fearfully chisselled on the top of it, as might have left it a very doubtful matter, even in the day-time, for any one, however learned in such pieces of art, to have determined whether the rustic sculptor had intended it for a death's-head or a cherubim. some idle artist of the brush, in passing by that way with a pot full of red paint, prepared for giving a temporary glory to a new cart about to be turned out from a neighbouring wright's shop, had paused as he passed by, and exhausted the full extent of his small talents in communicating to the countenance that bloody appearance, the effect of which had so much appalled john smith, and some waggish schoolboy had finished the figure, by tearing up a sod covered with plants of various kinds, and clapping it on its top, so as thereby very much to augment its artificial terrors. john smith drew a long breath of inconceivable relief on making this discovery, and then darting through the wicket, he pursued his journey with as much expedition as his weakness and fatigue permitted him to use. john walked on for some hour or twain with very determined resolution, but at length the great loss of blood he had experienced, brought on so unconquerable a drowsiness, that he felt he must have a little rest, were it but for a few minutes, even if his taking it should be at the risk of his life. john was never wont to be very particular as to the place where he made his bed, but on the present occasion it happened, probably from the blood-vessels of his body having been so much drained, that he had a most unpleasant chill upon him. he felt as if ice itself was shooting and crystallizing through every vein and artery within him. then the night had become somewhat raw, and he had left his plaid, which is a highlander's second house, on the fatal field of battle. under all these circumstances, john was seized with a resistless desire to enjoy the luxury of sleep for a short time, under the shelter of a roof, and in the vicinity of a good peat fire. calling to mind that there was an humble turf-built cottage in a hollow a little way farther on, by the side of a small rushy, mossy stream, he made the best of his way towards it. the house consisted of three small apartments, one in the middle of it, opposite to the outer door, and one at either end, which had their entrances from that in the centre. when john came to the brow of the bank that looked down upon this humble dwelling, he was by no means sorry to perceive that the middle apartment had a good blazing fire in it, as he could easily see through the window and outer door, which last chanced to be invitingly open. john, altogether forgetful of his uncouth and terrific appearance, lost not a moment in availing himself of this lucky circumstance. but he had no sooner presented his awful spectral form and visage within the threshold, than he spread instantaneous terror over the group assembled within. "oh, a ghost! a ghost!" cried out in gaelic a pale-faced girl of some eight or nine years of age, as she dropped on her knees, shaken by terror in every limb and feature. "oh, the devil! the devil!" roared an old man and woman, who also sank down before john, bellowing out like frightened cattle. "och, och! we shall all be swallowed up quick by the evil one!" "fear nothing," said john smith, in a mild tone, and in the same tongue. "i am but a poor wounded and wearied man. i only want to lie down and rest me a little, if you will be so charitable as to grant me leave." "wounded!" said the old man, rising from his knees, somewhat reassured; "where were you wounded?" "in the head here," said john, with a stare that again somewhat disconcerted the old man; "and if it had not been for this peat that i clapped on my skull, i believe my very brains would have been all out of me." "mercy on us, where got ye such a mischance as that?" exclaimed the old woman. "at culloden, i'll be sworn," said the old man. "aye, aye, it was at culloden," replied john. "but, if ye be christians, give me a drink of warm milk and water, to put away this shivering thirst that is on me, and let me lie down in a warm bed for half an hour." "och aye, poor man, ye shall not want a drop of warm milk and water, and such a bed as we can give you," said the old woman, moving about to prepare the drink for him. "thank ye--thank ye!" said john, much refreshed and comforted by swallowing the thin but hot potation. and then following the old man into the inner apartment on the right hand, he sank down in a darksome nook of it, on a pallet among straw, and covering himself up, turf, nightcap and all, under a coarse blanket, he was sound asleep before the old man had withdrawn the light, and shut the door of his clay chamber. "oh that our boys were back again safe and sound!" cried the old woman, wringing her hands. "safe and sound i fear we cannot expect them to be, janet," replied the old man. "but oh that we had them back again, though it was to see them wounded as badly as that poor fellow! much do i fear that they are both corpses on drummossie moor." "what will become of us!" cried the old woman, weeping bitterly; "what will become of this poor motherless lassie now, if her father be gone?" but, leaving this aged couple to complain, and john smith to enjoy his repose, we must now return to poor morag, whom, as you may recollect, gentlemen, we left hunted into covert by the two dragoons who had so closely pursued her. the patch of natural wood into which she dived was not large. it chiefly consisted of oaks and birches, which, though they had grown to a considerable size in certain parts, so that their wide-spreading heads had kept the knolls on which their stems stood, altogether free from the incumbrance of any kind of brushwood,--had yet in most places risen up thinner and smaller, leaving ample room and air around them to support thickets of the tallest broom and juniper bushes. it chanced that morag was not altogether unacquainted with the nature of the place, having at one time, in earlier life, been hired to tend the cows of a farmer at no great distance from it. she was well aware that a rill, which had its origin in the higher grounds at some distance, came wimpling into the upper part of the wood, and thence, during its descent over the sloping surface of the ground, from its having met with certain obstructions, or from some other cause, it had worn itself a channel through the soft soil, to the depth of some six feet or so, but which was yet so narrow, that the ferns and bushes growing out of the undermined sods that fringed the edges of it, almost entirely covered it with one continued tangled and matted arch. towards this rill morag endeavoured to make her way through the tall broom, and, as she was doing so, she heard the dismounted trooper, who had by this time entered the wood after her, calling to his comrade, who sat mounted outside: "bill! do you padderowl round the wood, and keep a sharp look out that she don't bolt without your seeing her. i'll follow arter her here, and try if i can't lay my hands on her; and if i do but chance to light on her, be she witch or devil, i'll drag her out of her covert by the scruff of the neck." morag heard no more than this.--she pressed forward towards the bed of the rill, and having reached it, she stopped, like a chased doe, one moment to listen, and hearing that the curses, as well as the crashing of the jack-boots of her pursuer, as yet indicated that he was still at some distance behind her, and evidently much entangled in his progress, she carefully shed the pendulous plants of the ferns asunder, and then slid herself gently down into the hollow channel. there finding her feet safely planted on the bottom, she cautiously and silently groped her way along the downward course of the rill, through the dark and confined passage which it had worn out for its tiny stream. in this way she soon came to the lower edge of the wood, where the hollow channel became deeper, and where it assumed more of the character of a ravine, but where it was still skirted with occasional oaks, mingled with thickets of birches, hazels, and furze bushes. morag was about to emerge from the obscurity of this subterranean arch, into the more open light, when, as she looked out, she beheld the mounted trooper standing on his stirrups on the top of the bank, eagerly gazing around him in all directions. the furze there grew too thick and high for him to be able to force his way down to the bottom of the ravine, even if he had accidently observed her. but his eyes were directed to higher and more distant objects, and seeing that she had been as yet unperceived, she instantly drew so far back, as to be beyond all reach of his observation,--whilst she could perfectly well watch him, so long as he maintained his present position. she listened for the crashing strides of him who was engaged in searching the wood for her. for a time they came faint and distant to her ear, but, by degrees, they began to come nearer,--and then again the sound would alternately diminish and increase, as he turned away in some other direction, fighting through the opposing boughs, and then came beating his way back again, in the same manner, with many a round oath. at length she heard him raging forward in the direction of the rill, at some forty yards above the place where she was, blaspheming as he went. "ten thousand devils!" cried he; "such a place as this i never se'ed in all my life afore. if my heyes beant nearly whipt out of my head with them 'ere blasted broom shafts, my name aint tom wetherby! dang it, there again! that whip has peeled the very skin off my cheek, and made both my heyes run over with water like mill-sluices--i wonder at all where this she-devil can be hidden? curse her! do you think, bill, that she can raaly have ridden off through the hair, as they do say they do? but for a matter of that, she may be here somewhere after all, for my heyes be so dimmed, that, dang me an' i could see her if she were to rise up afore my very face. how they do smart with pain! oh! lord, where am i going?" cried he, as he went smack down through the ferns and brush into the concealed bed of the rill, and was laid prostrate on his back in the narrow clayey bottom of it, in such a position that it defied him to rise. "hollo bill!" cried he, from the bowels of the earth, in a voice which reached his comrade as if he had spoken with a pillow on his mouth, but which rang with terrible distinctness down the hollow natural tube to the spot where morag was concealed. "hollo!--help!--help!" "what a murrain is the matter with ye?" cried bill, very much astonished. "i've fallen plump into the witches' den!--into the very bottomless pit!--hollo!--hollo! help!--help!" cried the fallen trooper from the abyss. "how the plague am i to get to ye if so be the pit be bottomless?" cried bill, in a drawling tone, that did not argue much promise of any zealous exertion of effective aid on the part of the speaker. "curse ye, come along quickly, or i shall be smothered in this here infernal, dark, outlandish place," cried tom wetherby. "well,--well," replied bill, with the same long-drawn tone of philosophic indifference, "i'm a coming--i'm a coming. but you must keep chaunting out from the bottom of that bottomless pit of yours, do you hear, tom, else i shall never find you in that 'ere wilderness. and how the devil i am to get into it is more than i know." the dragoon turned his horse very leisurely away, to look for some place where he could best quit his saddle, in order to make good his entrance on foot into the thicket. the moment the quick eyes of morag perceived that he had disappeared from his station on the brow of the bank, she crept forth from her concealment, and keeping her way down through the shallow stream, that her footsteps might leave no prints behind them, she stole off, until she was beyond all hearing of the two dragoons. then it was that morag began to ply her utmost speed, and, after following the ravine until it expanded into a small and partially wooded glen, she hurried on through it, until at length she found herself emerging on the lower and more open country. afraid of being seen, she made a long circuitous sweep through some rough broomy waste ground of considerable extent, towards a distant hummock, with the shape of which she was familiar, and having thus gained a part of the country with which she was acquainted, though it was still very distant from her present home, she hailed the descent of the shades of night with great satisfaction. under their protection she proceeded on her way with great alacrity, and without apprehension, though with a torn heart, that made her every now and then stop to give full vent to her grief for john smith, of whose death she had so little reason to doubt, from all the circumstances she had heard. at length, fatigue came so powerfully upon her, that she was not sorry to perceive, as she was about to descend into a hollow, the light of a cheerful fire, that blazed through the window of a turf-built cottage, and was reflected on the surface of a rushy stream, that ran lazily through the bottom near to it. the door was shut, but morag descended the path that led towards it, and knocked without scruple. an old man and woman came immediately to open it, and looked out eagerly, as if for some one whose coming they had expected, and disappointment seemed to cloud their brows, when they found only her who was a stranger to them. morag, addressing them in gaelic, entreated for leave to rest herself for half an hour by their fireside. she was admitted, after some hesitation and whispering between them, after which she craved a morsel of oaten cake, and a draught of water. a little girl, of some eight or nine years old, waited not to know her granny's will, but ran to a cupboard for the cake; and brought it to her, and then hastened to fill a bowl with water from a pitcher that stood in a corner. the old couple would have fain pumped out of morag something of her history, and they put many questions to her for that purpose. but she was too shrewd for them, and all they could gather from her was, that she had been away seeing her friends a long way off, and that she had first rode, and then walked so far, that she was glad of a little rest, and a morsel to allay her hunger, after which she would be enabled to continue her journey, with many thanks to them for their hospitality. morag had not sat there for many minutes, when there came a rap to the door. the old man sprang up to open it, and immediately three highlanders appeared, full armed with claymores and dirks, but very much jaded and soiled with travel. morag retired into a corner. "och, ian! ian!"--"och, hamish! hamish!" cried the old couple, embracing two of them, who appeared to be their sons; and, "oh, father! father!" cried the little girl, springing into ian's arms. "tuts, don't be foolish, kirstock!" cried ian, in a surly tone, as he shook off the little girl; "what's the use of all this nonsense, father?--better for you to be getting something for us and our comrade maccallum here to drink. we are almost famished for want;" and with that he threw himself into the old man's wooden arm-chair. "aye, aye, father," said hamish, occupying the seat where his mother had sat, and motioning to maccallum to take that which morag had just left; "we have had a sad tramp away from the battle. would we had never gone near it! aye, and we got such a fright into the bargain." "fright!" cried the old man much excited; "surely, surely, my sons are not cowards!--much as i love you, boys, i would rather that you had both died than run away." "oh!" said maccallum, now joining in the conversation, "we all three fought like lions in the battle. but it requires nerves harder than steel to look upon the devil, and if ever he was seen on earth, we saw him this precious night." "preserve us all!" said the old woman; "what was he like?" "never mind what he was like, mother," said ian gruffly; "let us have some of your bread and cheese, and a drop of uisge-beatha to put some heart in us." "you shall have all that i have to give you, boys," said the old man; "but that is not much. i would have fain given a sup out of the bottle to the poor wounded man that came in here, a little time ago; but i bethought me that you might want it all, and so we sent him to his bed with a cup of warm milk and water." "bed, did you say?" cried ian. "what! one of prince charley's men?" "surely, surely!" said the old man. "troth, i should have been any thing but fond of letting in any one else but a man who had fought on the same side with yourselves." "don't speak of our having fought on charley's side, father," said ian; "that's not to be boasted of now. the fruits of fighting for him have been nothing but danger and starvation, so far as we have gathered them; and now we have no prospect before us but the risk of hanging. methinks you would have shewn more wisdom if you had sent this fellow away from your door. to have us three hunted men here, is enough to make the place too hot, without bringing in another to add to the fire." "never mind, ian," said maccallum; "why may we not make our own of him? you know very well that john macallister told us that he could make our peace, and save our lives, if we could only prove our loyalty to the king, by bringing in a rebel or two." "very true," said hamish; "and an excellent advice it was." "most excellent," said ian; "and if we act wisely, and as i advise, this fellow shall be our first peace-offering." "oh, boys, boys!" cried the old man; "would you buy your own lives by treachery of so black a die?" "oh, life is sweet!" cried the old woman--"and the lives of my bairns----" "hold your foolish tongue, woman!" interrupted the old man. "no, no, boys! i'll never consent to it." "oh life is sweet! life is sweet!" cried the old woman again; "and the lives of both my bonny boys--the life of ian, the father of this poor lassie!----" "oh, my father's life!" whimpered the little girl. "this is no place to talk of such things," said the old man, leading the way into the apartment at the opposite end of the house, to that where john smith was sleeping, and followed by all but morag, who, having slipped towards the door, to listen after he had closed it, heard him say, "what made you speak that way before the stranger lass?" "who and what is she at all?" demanded ian. "a poor tired lass, weary with the long way she has been to see her friends," said the old woman; "but she'll be gone very soon." "if she does not go of her own accord, we must take strong measures with her too," said ian. "god forgive you, boys, what would you do?" said the old man. "let not the devil tempt you thus. would you bring foul treason upon this humble, but hitherto spotless shed of mine, by violating the sacred rights of hospitality to a woman, and by giving up a man to an ignominious death, who, upon the faith of it, is now soundly sleeping under my roof, in the other end of the house? fye, fye, boys! i tell you plainly i will be a party to no such wickedness." "so you would rather be a party to assist in hanging hamish and me, your own flesh and blood?" said ian. "but you need be no party to either; for we shall take all the guilt of this fellow's death upon ourselves." "you shall never do this foul treason, if i can prevent it," said the old man, with determination. "poof!" said ian, "how could you prevent us?" "by rousing the man to defend himself," said the father rather unguardedly. "ha! say you so?" cried ian. "what! would you rouse up an armed man to fight against your own children? then must we take means to prevent your so doing." "oh, ian!" cried the old woman. "oh, hamish! oh, boys! boys!" "what! what! what boys!" cried the old man with great excitement, whilst there was a sound of feet as of a struggle. "would you lay your impious hands upon your own father?" "oh, don't hurt poor granny!" cried the little girl, in the bitterest tone of grief. "be quiet, i tell you, kirstock!" cried ian, in an angry tone. "hold out of my way, mother! we'll do him no harm! we are only going to bind him that he may not interfere." "boys, boys!" cried the old man; "you have been tempted by the devil! there is no wonder that you should have seen him once to-night; and i should not wonder if he was to appear to you again, for you seem resolved to be his children, and not mine." "sit down--sit down quietly in this chair," said ian; "sit down, i say quietly, and let maccallum put the rope about you. by the great oath you had better!" "oh, boys!" cried the old woman; "och, hamish! och, ian." morag hardly waited to hear so much of this dialogue as i have given, when she resolved to be the means, if possible, of saving the life of the poor wounded man, whom the wretches had thus determined so traitorously to give up to the tender mercies of the duke of cumberland. she had her hand upon the door of the chamber where he slept, in order to go in and rouse him, when she remembered that, in this way, her own safety was almost certain to be compromised. she therefore immediately adopted a plan, which she considered might be equally effectual for her purpose as regarded the stranger, whilst it would leave to herself some chance of escape. slipping on tiptoe to the outer door, she quietly opened it, and, letting herself out, she moved quickly round the house, towards a little window belonging to the room at that end of it, where she knew the wounded man was lying. it consisted of two small panes of glass, placed in a frame that moved inwards upon hinges. she put her ear to it, but no sound reached her save that of deep snoring. morag pushed gently against the frame, and it yielded to the pressure. having inserted her head, and looked eagerly about, in the hope of descrying the sleeper, by the partial stream of moonlight that was admitted into the place, she could discover nothing but the heap of straw in the bedstead in a dark corner, where, wrapped in a blanket, he lay so buried as to be altogether invisible. she called to him, at first in a low voice, and afterwards in a somewhat louder tone, till at length she awaked him. "who is there?" demanded he in gaelic. "rise! rise, and escape!" said she, in a low but distinct voice, and in the same language; "your liberty! your life is in danger! up, up, and fly from this house!" having said this, she retreated her head a little from the window, to watch the effect of her warning, so that the moon shone brightly upon her countenance, and completely illuminated every feature of it. there was a quick rustling noise among the straw, and then she heard the slow heavy step of the man within. suddenly a head was thrust out of the window, and the moonbeam falling fully upon it, disclosed to the terrified eyes of morag, the features of john smith--pale, bloody, and death-like, with all the fearful appendages which he bore, the whole combination being such as to leave not a doubt in her mind that she beheld his ghost. with one shrill scream, which she could not control, she vanished in a moment from before the window. john smith, filled in his turn with superstitious awe, as well as with the strangeness of the manner in which he had been roused from the deep sleep into which he had been plunged,--and struck by the well known though hollow voice in which he had been addressed--the solemn warning which he had received, and, above all, the distinct, though most unaccountable appearance of morag, with whose features he was so perfectly acquainted--together with the wild and sudden manner in which the vision had departed--all tended to convince him that the whole was a supernatural visitation. for some moments his powers of action were suspended; but steps and voices in the outer apartment speedily recalled his presence of mind. he drew his claymore, summoned up his resolution, and banging up the door with one kick of his foot, he took a single stride into the middle of the floor. the fire was still blazing, and it threw on his terrible figure the full benefit of its light. the three villains having tied the old man into his chair, and locked him and his wife and grandchild into the place where their conference was held, had been at that moment preparing to steal in upon the sleeping stranger. suddenly they beheld the same apparition which they had seen in the churchyard, burst from the very room which they were about to enter. the threatening words of the old man recurred to them all. "oh, the devil! the devil! the devil!" cried the terrified group, and bearing back upon one another, they tripped, and, in one moment, all their heels were dancing the strangest possible figures in the air, to the music of their own mingled screams and yells. you will easily believe, gentlemen, that john smith tarried not a moment to inquire after their bruises, but pushing up the outer door, and slapping it to after him, he again pursued his way towards the farm of the pensassenach. winged by her fears, and in dreadful apprehension that the ghost of john smith was still following her, morag flew with an unnatural swiftness and impetus. she was quite unconscious of noticing any of the familiar objects by the way; yet, by a species of instinct, she reached home, in so short a time, that she could hardly believe her own senses. but still in dreadful fear of the ghost, she thundered at the door, and roared out to her mistress for admittance. the kind-hearted pensassenach had been sitting up in a state of the cruellest anxiety regarding morag, of whose intended expedition she had received no inkling, nor had she been informed of her departure, until long after she was gone. she no sooner heard her voice, and her knock, than she hastened to admit her. "foolish girl that you are!" said she, "i am thankful to see you alive. my stars and garters, what a draggled figure you are!--but come away into this room here, and let me hear all you have to tell me about the battle. the rebels were defeated, were they not?--eh?--why, what is the matter with the girl? she pants as if she was dying. sit down, sit down, child, and compose yourself; you look for all the world as if you had seen a ghost." "och, och, memm!--och, hoch!" replied the girl very much appalled, that her mistress should thus, as she thought, so immediately see the truth written in her very face. "och, hoch! an' a ghaist morag has surely seen. has ta ghaist put her mark upon her face?--och, hoch! she'll ne'er won ower wi't!" "the poor girl's head has been turned by the horrible scenes of carnage she has witnessed," said the pensassenach. "och, hoch!" said morag, with her hands on her knees, and rocking to and fro with nervous agitation; "terrible sights! terrible sights, surely, surely!" "here, my poor morag," said the pensassenach, after she had dropped into a cup a small quantity of some liquid nostrum of her own, from a phial, hastily taken from a little medicine chest, and added some water to it, "drink this, my good girl!" "och, hoch!" said morag, after she had swallowed it; "she thinks she sees ta ghaist yet." "what ghost did you see?" demanded the pensassenach. "och, hoch! och, hoch, memm!" replied morag, trembling more than ever; "shon smiss ghaist; shon smiss, as sure as morag is in life, an' ta leddy stannin' in ta body tare afore her e'en." "john smith's ghost!" cried the pensassenach. "pooh, nonsense! but again i ask you, how went the battle? the rumour is, that the rebels have been signally defeated, and all cut to pieces." "och, hoch! is tat true?" said morag, weeping. "och, hoch, poor shon smiss!" "did you not see the rout?" demanded the pensassenach. "did you not witness the battle, and behold the glorious triumph of the royal army?" "och, hoch, no!" replied the girl. "morag saw nae pattals, nor naesin' but hearin' terrible shots o' guns, an' twa or sree red cotted sodgers tat pursued her for her life." "well, well!" replied the pensassenach; "come now! tell me your whole history." morag's nerves being now somewhat composed, she gave her mistress as clear an outline as she could, of all that had befallen her. the pensassenach dropped some tears, to mingle with those which morag shed, when she recounted the evidence of john smith's death, which she felt to be but too probably true. but when she came to talk of the ghost, she did all she could to laugh the girl out of her fears, insisting with her that she had been deceived by terror and weakness, and seeing how much the poor girl was worn out, she desired her to take some refreshment, and to go to bed directly; and she had no sooner retired, than the pensassenach prepared to follow her example. morag, overcome with the immense fatigue she had undergone, had not strength left to undo much more than half her dress, when she dropped down on her bed, and fell over into a slumber. she had been lying in this state for fully half an hour or more, during part of which she had been dreaming of john smith, mixed up with many a strange incident, with all of which his slaughter, and his pale countenance and bloody figure were invariably connected, when she was awaked by a tapping at the window of her apartment, which was upon the ground floor. she looked up and stared, but the moon was by this time gone down, and all without was dark as pitch. "morag! morag!" cried john smith, who knowing well where she slept, went naturally to her window to get her to come round and give him admission to the house, and yet at the same time half doubting, after the strange visitation which he had had, from what he believed to be her wraith, that he could hardly expect to find her alive. "morag! morag!" cried he again in his faint hollow voice. "och, lord have mercy upon me, there it is!" cried morag, in her native tongue, and shaking from head to foot with terror. "who is there?" "its me, your own ian," cried john, in a tender tone. "let me in, morag, for the love of god!" "och, ian, ian!" cried morag. "och, ian, my darling dear ian! are you sure that it is really yourself in real flesh and blood?--for i have got such a fright already this night. but if it really and truly be you, go round to the door and i'll be with you in a minute. och, och, the lord be praised, if it really be him after all!" trembling, and agitated with the numerous contrary emotions of hope, fear, and joy, by which she was assailed, morag sprang out of bed, lighted her lamp, hurried on just enough of her clothes as might make her decent in the eyes of her lover, and with her bosom heaving, and her heart beating, as if it would have burst through her side, she ran to unlock the outer door. her lamp flashed on the fearful figure without. she again beheld the horrible spectre which had so recently terrified her, and believing that it was john smith's ghost which she saw, and that it had followed her home to corroborate the fatal tidings she had heard regarding his death, which had been already so much strengthened by her dreams, she uttered a piercing shriek, and fainted away on the floor. the shriek alarmed the pensassenach, who was not yet in bed. hastily throwing a wrapper over her deshabille, she seized her candle, and proceeded down stairs with all speed, and was led by john's voice of lamentation to the kitchen, whither he had carried morag in his arms, and where the lady found him tearing his hair, or rather the heathery turf which then appeared to be doing duty for it, in the very extremity of mental agony. it is strange how the same things, seen under different aspects and circumstances, will produce the most opposite effects. there being nothing now about john smith, or his actions, that did not savour of humanity, but his extraordinary head-dress, the pensassenach had no doubt that it was the real bodily man that she saw before her, she perceived nothing but what was powerfully ludicrous in his strange costume, the absurdity of which was heightened by his agonizing motions and attitudes, and exclamations of intense anxiety about morag, whose fainting-fit gave no uneasiness to a woman of her experience. the pensassenach laughed heartily, and then hurried away for a bunch of feathers to burn under morag's nose, by which means she quickly brought her out of her swoon, and by a little explanation she speedily restored her to the full possession of her reason. this accomplished, the pensassenach entirely forgot john smith's wretched appearance, in the eagerness of her inquiries regarding the result of the engagement. "how went the battle, john?" demanded she. "we heard the guns, but the cannonade did not last long. the victory was soon gained, and it was with the right cause, was it not?" "woe, woe! oich, oich!" cried john, in a melancholy tone, and shaking his head in utter despair. "oich, oich, her head is sore, sore." "very true, very true!" cried the compassionate pensassenach. "i had forgotten you altogether, shame on me! ah! poor fellow, how bloody you are about the face! you must be grievously wounded." "troth she be tat," said john smith. "she has gotten a wicked slash on ta croon, tat maist spleeted her skull. an' she wad hae peen dead lang or noo an it had na peen for tiss ponny peat plaister tat she putten tilt. morag tak' her awa' noo, for she has toon her turn, and somesing lighter may serve." "och, hoch, hoch, tat is fearsome," said morag, after she had removed the clod from john's head. "she mak's morag sick ta vera sight o't." "oich, but tat be easy noo," said john. "hech, she was joost like an if she had been carryin' a' ta hill o' lethen bar on her head." "poor fellow, poor fellow!" cried the pensassenach, "that is a fearful cut indeed. but i don't think the skull is fractured. how and where did you get this fearful wound?" "fare mony a petter man's got more," replied john, yielding up his head into the affectionate hands of morag, who was now so far recovered as to be able to look more narrowly at it. "oich, oich, fat a head!" cried the affectionate and feeling girl, shuddering and growing pale, and then bursting into an agony of tears, as she looked upon his gaping wound. "oich, oich, she'll never do good more! she canna leeve ava, ava!" "tut, tut!" cried john, with a ghastly smile, that was meant to reassure morag. "fat nonsense, tat morag pe speak! an' she pe traivel a' ta way hame so far, fat for wad she pe deein' noo tat she is at hame?" "alas, poor fellow!" said the pensassenach, as she was directing morag to bind up his head, "i wish i may be able to make this your home. after all our losses and sufferings for our loyalty by those marauding rascals, three days ago, we shall next run the risk of being punished for harbouring a rebel. but no matter. happen what may, you have large claims upon me, john, and as long as morag can conceal you here you shall be safe. you have been so short a time away that few people can be aware of it, and still fewer can know the cause of your absence." what the pensassenach said was true, for as most of her people had run away when the highland party appeared, there were few who certainly knew the cause of john smith's absence, and those few who did know were not very likely to tell any thing about it. trusting to this, she gave out that she had sent him after the rebels, to keep an eye on her husband's horses, and to endeavour to recover them if he could, and that, in making this attempt, he had received his wound. to give the better colour to this story, she called her people together, and offered a handsome reward to such of them as would go immediately and try to find and bring back the horses, telling them that john smith could describe to them whereabouts they were most likely to fall in with them, he having, at one time, actually got possession of most of them, but that they had escaped from him, having been scared away by the thundering of the artillery. but not a man of them would venture upon such a search among the gibbets, where, as they were told, so many of their murdered countrymen were still hanging, and where, without much inquiry or ceremony, any one who might go on such an errand might be tucked up to swing in company with them. every hour increased this terror, by bringing accounts of fresh executions, and indeed the fears of the pensassenach's men turned out to be by no means groundless, for it is a truth but too well known, that many innocent servants who were sent to seek their master's horses never returned. the pensassenach did not suffer for her kindness in thus protecting john smith; and she and her husband were ultimately no losers from the havoc which the highlanders committed on their farm. their damage was reported to the duke of cumberland, and the lady's conduct having been highly extolled, as that of a very loyal englishwoman, who had been thus persecuted for the open expression of her sentiments, the most ample remuneration was assigned to her by the government. john smith, nursed as he was by morag, soon recovered. after he was quite restored to health, he only waited until he could scrape a little money together to enable him to furnish a cottage, ere he should make her his wife. the penetration of the pensassenach soon enabled her to discover how matters stood between them, and she found means to make all smooth for them in the manner which was most flattering to john, that is, by presenting him with a very handsome purse of money, as a reward for the eminent services he had rendered her. john was so proud of the purse that he did not know whether most to value it or the gold pieces it contained, and much as he loved morag, and eager as he was for their union, he had some doubt whether he could ever bring himself to part, even with one of those pretty pieces which he so respected for the pensassenach's sake. and, alas, as it so happened, he was never called upon to spend them as it was intended they should have been spent. fain would i have made my story end happily, gentlemen; but, as i am narrating a piece of actual history, i must be verawcious. john had made all preparation for their marriage, when, alas, morag was seized with some acute complaint about the region of the heart and lungs, which all the medical attendants that the pensassenach could command could not fathom or relieve. john watched her with the tenderest and most unremitting solicitude. but it pleased god that his unwearied care of her, should not be blessed with the same happy result, which hers had been with regard to him, for after a long and lingering illness, poor morag died on the very day she should have been his bride. the probability was, that the unheard of fatigue of body, and agitation of mind, which she underwent during her heroic expedition in search of her lover, had produced some fatal organic change within her. john smith was inconsolable for the loss of morag. for some time he was more like a walking clod than a man. even the kind attempts of his master and mistress to rouse him were unavailing. when at length he was able to go about his usual duties on the farm, to do which his honest regard for his employer's interest stimulated him, he suffered so much mental agony from the painful recollections which every object around him suggested to his mind, that he felt he could no longer go rationally about his master's affairs. being at last convinced that he was in danger of falling into utter and hopeless despair, he came to the resolution of enlisting in the army, and having once formed this determination, he went through a very touching scene of parting with the kind pensassenach and her husband, and shouldering his small kitt, he went and joined the gallant forty-second, then the black watch. he served with distinguished approbation in all the actions in which that brave corps was in his time engaged. he was made a serjeant at bunker's hill; and after time had in some degree assuaged his affliction, he married a very active, intelligent, and economical woman, with whose aid he undertook to keep the regimental mess. john could neither read nor write, and he always spoke english imperfectly. but his clever wife enabled him to carry on the business for so many years, with so much credit to himself, and so successfully, that he ultimately retired with her at an advanced period of life, with the enjoyment of his pension, and such an accumulation of fortune as made him perfectly comfortable. i knew john well. he was a warm-hearted man, and always remarkable for his uprightness and integrity, and especially for a strict determination to keep his word, whatever it might cost him so to do. as an instance of this, i may mention, that having on one occasion had a serious illness, in which he was given up by the doctor, he made a will, in which he left many small legacies to poor people. john recovered, but he thought it his duty to keep his word, and he paid the legacies. to me, and to my brother, who lived in one of his houses while we were at the school of nairn, he acted the part of a kind friend and guardian. he was perhaps too kind and indulgent to us, indeed. no one dared to him to impute a fault to us, even when we were guilty. i remember that he had a large garden, well stocked with fruit trees, and gooseberry bushes. often has the good old man sent me into it, to steal fruit for myself and brother, whilst he watched at the door, lest his wife might surprise and detect me. many is the time that i have listened to him, with boyish wonder, as, with lightning in his eye, he fought over again his battles of culloden, bunker's hill, and ticonderoga. as john had no children, his intended heir was a nephew. his greatest desire in life was to marry him to a grand-daughter of his old departed benefactress, the pensassenach. he offered to settle his whole fortune, which was not small, on the young lady, if she would only marry his nephew; and john's wife did all in her power to back up the proposal. but although the nephew was a good, well-doing lad, he was not the man to take the young woman's fancy; and so the match never took place. cruelty of the duke of cumberland after the battle of culloden. clifford.--is it possible that the duke of cumberland could have authorized such atrocities, as the hanging up innocent servants in the way you describe, mr. macpherson? dominie.--i am afraid that what i have asserted is but too true, sir. author.--i am sorry to say, that i am in possession of a document which but too satisfactorily proves, that he did give most cruel orders. it is an orderly book of the thirty-seventh regiment, which was called cholmondeley's regiment; and in that i find, in the general orders, dated "the camp at enwerness, aprill th, ," the following entry:--"a captain and fifty foot to march directly, and vizt all the cothidges in the naberhod of the field of batall, and to search for rebbels, the officers and men will take notiss, that the pubilick orders of the rabells yesterday was to give us no quarters." this, i think, was a pretty broad hint to the men and the officer commanding them, what it was that the duke expected of them. grant.--very distinct, indeed. author.--not to be mistaken, i think. clifford.--is there anything existing to establish that any such order was given by the prince, previous to the battle, as that to which the duke here alludes? author.--not a vestige of any thing that i am aware of. but if such orders had been given by the prince, that circumstance would have afforded no apology for him to have issued the order i have now repeated to you, after the battle was over, and the enemy so effectually cut to pieces in the field. nothing, i think, could more mark a sanguinary temper than his thus letting loose a body of men, to visit all the neighbouring cottages, and to put to death, in cold blood, all whom his ignorant and bloodthirsty myrmidons might choose to consider as rebels. the slaughter in this way, of the innocent as well as of the guilty, was said to have been immense. clifford.--the picture is horrible! grant.--it is horrible to think of it, even at this great distance of time, seated comfortably, as i am at this moment, in this great oaken arm-chair. serjeant.--and a comfortable arm-chair that is, sir; and many a good day and queer night has it seen. if i am not mistaken, that was old alister shaw of inchrory's very chair. author.--ay--who was alister shaw, archy? serjeant.--faith, sir, he was a queer tough little fellow, inchrory--for by that name he was always best known in the country--as proud as a bantam cock on his own midden-head. the body cared not for the king. i have two or three curious little anecdotes about him, which i can tell you and the gentlemen, if you have no objections. clifford.--objections, mr serjeant! i, the secretary, desire that you shall tell them, without another moment's delay. serjeant.--aweel, aweel, sir! i'll do that at your bidding. i'm not accustomed to disobey the adjutant. alister shaw of inchrory. it happened one day, gentlemen, that the earl of fife was travelling up this glen, on his way over to his house of mar lodge, in braemar, and having stopped at caochan-seirceag over by yonder, he sent one of his people across the meadow here, to tell inchrory that he meant to honour him with a visit. the gentleman knocked at the door, was admitted by the goodwife, and ushered into inchrory's presence. he found him seated in his arm-chair, in the position which he always occupied, that is, on the most comfortable side of the fire. "good day to you, inchrory," said the gentleman, bowing. "the same to you sir," said inchrory, bowing his head very grandly and ceremoniously, but without stirring. "my lord the earl of fife, who is halting at caochan-seirceag, on his road to braemar, has sent me over to tell you, that he means to step aside from his way to visit you," said the gentleman. "well, sir," said inchrory, proudly, "what of that? tell him he is welcome." the gentleman, astonished with his reception, bowed and retired, as an ambassador might have done from a royal presence. "well, sir," said lord fife to him, after he had rejoined him, "is inchrory at home?" "he is at home, my lord," replied the gentleman; "but he is the surliest churl i ever came across." "as how?" demanded the earl. "why, my lord, the little wretch never rose from his chair," replied the gentleman; and then he repeated the conversation he had had with inchrory. "if your lordship would take my council, you would e'en continue your journey, and leave the bear to suck his own paws in his own den." "why do you not flit [ ] that insolent fellow," said lord fife to james macgrigor of pitiveach, his factor, who happened to be with him; "you are tacksman of this farm, and so you have it in your power to turn him out." "why, my lord," replied macgrigor, "he and his forebears [ ] have been there for generations; and, though he certainly is a great original, he is no bad fellow for all that." "so, so," replied the earl, laughing, "the fellow is an original, is he? then i must see him. it is something to discover so great a potentate, holding his undisputed reign in wilds like these, so many miles from any other human dwelling. i must visit him directly." the fact was, that the earl had but recently become possessed of these highland estates, and inchrory looked upon him as a new man--a lowlander--whom it was his duty, as it was very much his inclination, to despise; whilst the earl, for his part, knowing that such was a feeling which naturally enough pervaded the minds of the highlanders, even on his own newly acquired lands, was determined to do it away, by using all manner of courtesy to every one with whom he might come into contact. above all things, he felt that the opportunity which he now had of overcoming the prejudice of such a man as inchrory, was by no means to be lost. to inchrory, therefore, he went without a moment's delay, was admitted into the house, and ushered into the presence. "good day to you, inchrory," said the earl, bowing. "good day to you, lord fife," replied inchrory, bowing with the same formality as formerly, but still keeping his seat. "sit down, my lord--sit down. here is a chair beside me; for i always keep the benmost [ ] seat in my own house." "very right, inchrory," said the earl, smiling, and seating himself accordingly beside his host; "and a very comfortable seat it seems to be." "very comfortable," said inchrory, setting himself more firmly into it; "and i hope that one is easy for your lordship." "very easy indeed," said lord fife; "a long ride, such as i have had, would make a hard stone feel easy, and much more this chair beneath your hospitable roof of inchrory, and before your good fire, in this bitter cold day." "well, well, my lord," replied inchrory, for the first time shaking the earl heartily by the hand, and very much pleased with the familiar manner in which his visitor had so unexpectedly comported himself,--"well, all i can say is, that you are heartily welcome to it.--here, gudewife! bring out the bottle. lord fife must taste inchrory's bottle; and bestir yourself, do you hear, and see what you can give his lordship to eat." the whisky bottle was brought, and inchrory drank the earl's health, who, without any ceremony, hobernobbed with him in turn. mutton, ham, cheese, broiled kipper salmon, bannocks and butter, were produced, and put down promiscuously. the earl ate like a hill farmer, and partook moderately of the whisky, which inchrory swallowed in large and repeated bumpers to his lordship's good health. he talked loud and joyously, and the earl familiarly humoured him to his full bent. they were the greatest friends in the world. the earl particularly delighted inchrory by praising, caressing, and feeding a great rough deer-hound, which, roused from his lair in front of the fire by the entrance of the eatables, put his long snout and cold nose into his lordship's hand, and craved his attention. but this dog had very nearly ruined all; for the earl was so much taken with the animal, that having left the house after a very warm parting with inchrory, he sent back his factor to him, to offer to purchase the animal at any price. "what!" cried inchrory, drawing himself up in his chair, and looking thunderbolts,--"what! does lord fife take me for a dog-dealer? i would not sell my dog to any lord in the land. i would not sell my dog to the king on the throne. tell his lordship, i would as soon sell him my wife!" "what a stupid fellow i am, inchrory!" said the factor. "did i say that it was the earl that sent me? if i did, i was quite wrong. no! no! his lordship did no such thing. he only admired the dog so much, that he could speak of nothing else as he crossed the meadow to join his people. it was my mistake altogether. hearing him admire your dog so much, i thought it would be a kind act from me to you, my old friend, just to ride back quietly, and give you a hint of it. 'i thought i had the best dogs in all scotland,' said the earl, 'but that dog of inchrory's beats them all clean. he is worth them all put together. he is a prince among dogs, as his master is a prince among men. where could you find a master worthy of such a dog but inchrory himself--the best fellow i have met with in all this country.'" "did the earl of fife say that?" cried inchrory. "here, bring me a leash. now," added he after having fastened it about the hound's neck, "take hold of that, and lead the dog with you to the earl, and tell him that inchrory begs he will accept of him as a present." the earl was delighted with the dog, as well as with the able conduct of his ambassador who brought him; and he was no sooner fairly established in his own house at mar lodge, than he sent an especial messenger over the hill to inchrory, with a letter from himself, thanking him for his noble present, and requesting him to come and pay him a visit. inchrory most graciously accepted the invitation; and the earl took care to be prepared to give him a proper reception. inchrory, dressed in his best highland costume, accoutred with sword, dirk, and pistols complete, mounted his long tailed garron, and rode over to mar lodge. when he arrived at the door, two grooms of the earl's were ready, one to hold his horse's head, and the other his stirrup whilst he dismounted, and he was ushered into the house by the house-steward, and through an alley of footmen, all richly attired in the earl's livery, till he was shewn into the room where his lordship was seated. inchrory had never seen anything the least like this before. but he was too proud to manifest the smallest surprise--and holding up his head, he strode in with a dignified air, and took all this pomp as if it had belonged to him of course. the earl was seated, amidst all his magnificence, in a great arm-chair next the fire, with an empty one placed at his left hand. "good day to you, inchrory," said the earl to him as he entered, and at the same time nodding his head familiarly as he spoke, but without rising from his seat. "good day to you, my lord," said inchrory, strutting forward like a turkey cock. "come away, and sit down beside me here, inchrory," said the earl, "for i always keep the benmost seat in my own house." "right!--right, my lord!" said inchrory, seating himself beside the earl, and taking his hand and shaking it heartily, without any sort of ceremony; "you are quite right, my lord; that is exactly my rule. every man should have the benmost seat in his own house." "you see that luath hath not forgotten you," said the earl, as the great dog was manifesting his joy at seeing his old master. "by my faith you have him in good quarters here!" said inchrory, observing that a quadruple fold of carpet had been spread for the animal close in front of the fire. "the best i can give him, inchrory," said the earl; "as, next to his late master, he deserves the best at my hands. here, bring the bottle! inchrory must taste the earl of fife's bottle! and, do you hear, bring something for inchrory to stay his hunger with after his long ride!" immediately, as if by magic, several footmen entered with a table covered with the richest viands and wines, which was placed close to inchrory's chair and that of the earl. by especial order a bottle of whisky appeared among the other liquors. "here's to ye, inchrory!" said the earl, after filling himself a glass of whisky, and drinking to his guest with a hearty shake of his hand. and,-- "here's to you, my lord," cried inchrory, following his example in a bumper of the same liquor. inchrory had no reason to complain of his entertainment during the time he was at mar lodge. the earl gave orders that every thing should be done to please him; and the little man was highly pleased, and as proud as a peacock. amongst other things, hunting parties were made in all directions through the neighbouring forests; and although these were by no means expressly got up for him, yet he was always brought so prominently forward on all such occasions, that, in his pride, he believed, like the fly on the pillar, that the very world was moving for him, and for him alone. it happened that a tenchil, or a driving of the woods for game of all kinds, was one day held at alnac. inchrory was posted in a pass with farquharson of allargue and grant of burnside in cromdale, who was one of lord fife's factors. this last mentioned gentleman, having only arrived at mar lodge that morning, knew nothing of inchrory personally, though inchrory knew something of him. so that, whilst farquharson, who was by this time well acquainted with inchrory and all his peculiarities, was treating him with all that respect, which was at all times paid him by a universal agreement among lord fife's friends then assembled as his guests, the little man was left quite unnoticed by burnside, and treated by him as nobody. inchrory was severely nettled at this apparently marked neglect on the part of burnside towards him. as usual on such occasions, the people who had surrounded a large portion of the forest, gradually contracted their circle, and their shouts increasing, and the dogs beginning to range through the coverts, and to give tongue, game of all kinds came popping singly out through the different passes where the hunters were stationed. a short-legged, long-bodied, rough, cabbage-worm-looking terrier, of the true highland breed, came yelping along towards the point where burnside, allargue, and inchrory were posted near to each other. all was anxiety and eager anticipation. a hart of the first head was the least thing that was looked for. when,--lo, and behold, out came an enormous wild-cat, the very tigger of our highland woods. burnside had a capital chance of him, but fired at him, and missed him. inchrory immediately levelled his piece, and shot him dead. "there's at you, clowns of cromdale!" cried inchrory, leering most triumphantly and provokingly over his shoulder at burnside. "what do you mean by that, you rascal?" cried burnside, firing up at this insult, and at the same time striding towards inchrory with every possible demonstration of active hostility. "what do you mean by that, you little shrimp?" "sir," said inchrory, standing his ground boldly and proudly, "what do you mean? i know nothing of you; and, it appears by your insolent manners, that you know nothing of me." "stop, stop, gentlemen!" cried allargue, running in between them; "the fault is mine for having neglected to introduce you to each other. burnside, this is inchrory, the particular friend of the earl of fife;--and, inchrory, this is burnside, also a particular friend of your friend, the earl. this, i hope, is enough to put a stop to any thing unpleasant between you." "oh!" said burnside, who had caught the intelligent wink of the eye which allargue had secretly conveyed to him, whilst going through this pompous introduction, and who had heard enough of inchrory to enable him to guess at the case and the character of the animal he had to deal with, as well as to pick up his cue as to the proper way in which he should treat him. "oh, that is altogether another affair! had i only known the person in whose company i had the good fortune to be, i should not have presumed to have fired a shot before him. but if i have said any thing amiss, i am sure inchrory will have the magnanimity to forgive me, seeing that i have been already sufficiently punished by the exhibition of bad gunning which i have unwittingly ventured to make in presence of him, who is by all acknowledged to be the best marksman in scotland." "sir," said inchrory, rising full a couple of inches higher in his brogues, and coming forward to burnside with extended palm, and with a manner full of dignified condescension. "you are a gentleman of the first water! i beg you will forget and forgive any expression which in my ignorance i may have let fall, that may by chance have given you offence." "sir, i am proud to shake hands with you," said burnside, advancing to give him a cordial squeeze. "sir," said inchrory with a proud air, but at the same time shaking him heartily by the hand, "any friend of my friend the earl of fife, is my friend. henceforth, sir, i am your sworn friend." i daresay, gentlemen, i have given you enough of inchrory to make you sufficiently well acquainted with his character. but i have yet one more anecdote of him, which i think brings it out more than all the others. his wife, ealsach, was one morning occupied in tending the cattle at the shieling of altanarroch. lonely as you already know this place of inchrory to be, its loneliness was nothing when compared to that of the shieling of altanarroch, where even the cattle themselves could only exist for a month or two during the finest part of the year. now, it happened that ealsach, being in the family way, became extremely anxious and unhappy as her time of confinement approached, and her anxiety went on increasing daily, till at last she began to think it very expedient to go home to inchrory. the distance was considerable, and the way rough enough in all conscience. but, having the spirit of a highland woman within her, she set out boldly on foot, and arrived at inchrory at an early hour in the morning. her husband met her at the door of the house, where she looked for a kind welcome from him, and modestly signified the cause of her coming. "ha!" exclaimed he proudly, and with anger in his eye. "how is this that you come on foot? how dared you to come home till i sent a horse for you, that you might travel as inchrory's wife ought to do?" "no one saw how i came," replied his wife meekly. "i met nothing but the moor-cocks and the pease-weeps on the hill." "no matter," said inchrory, "even the moor-cocks and the pease-weeps should not have it to say, that they saw the wife of inchrory tramping home a-foot through the heather. get thee back this moment every foot of the way to altanarroch, that i may send for thee as inchrory's wife ought to be sent for." the poor woman knew that argument with him was useless. without entering the house, therefore, she was compelled to turn her weary steps back to altanarroch; and she was no sooner there, than a servant appeared, leading by the bridle a horse, having a saddle on its back covered with a green cloth, on which she was compelled to mount forthwith, in order to ride home over the barren and desert moors and mosses, in such style, as might satisfy the moor-cocks and the pease-weeps, that she was the wife of inchrory. drum-head court-martial and sentence on inchrory. dominie.--what a vain windy-wallets of a body the creature must have been! my humble opinion is, that he would have been much benefited by a gentle tasting of my tawse. clifford.--or the drummer's cat-o-nine-tails, mr. macpherson. but come, gentlemen, who tells the next tale? i have nothing now on my book but old stachcan, and turfearabrad, both, as i understand, adjourned to time and place more fitting. come, i must beat up for a volunteer. author.--the circumstance of mr. macpherson having incidentally mentioned ticonderoga, towards the end of his account of the adventures of serjeant john smith, has brought to my mind a legend of the family of campbell of inverawe, which i had from a friend of mine, the story of which is intimately connected with that most disastrous affair. if you like i shall be happy to give it to you. clifford.--andiamo dunque, signore mio!--let's have it without more delay. the legend of the vision of campbell of inverawe. perhaps you are all acquainted with the history of the black watch, which, as mr. macpherson has already told you, was afterwards formed into that gallant corps now immortalized by its actions as the forty-second highlanders? general stewart of garth, in his interesting account of the highland regiments, tells us that it was originally composed of independent companies, which were raised about or . these were stationed in small bodies in different parts of the country, in order to preserve the peace of the highlands. it was, in some sort, a great national guard, and it was considered so great an honour to belong to it, that most of the privates were the sons of gentlemen or tenants. most of them generally rode on horseback, and had gillies to carry their arms at all times, except when they were on parade or on duty. they were called freiceadan dubh, or the black watch, from the dark colour of their well-known regimental tartan, in opposition to the seider-deargg, or red soldiers, who were so named from the colour of their coats. you may probably remember the circumstance of their having been most unfairly marched to london, under the pretence that they were to be reviewed by the king,--of their having been ordered abroad,--of their refusal to go,--of their having been moved, as if by one impulse pervading every indignant bosom among them, to make that most extraordinary and interesting march of retreat which they effected to northampton,--of their having been ultimately brought under subjection,--and, finally, of their brave conduct in flanders, from which country they returned in october . after their return to great britain, the black watch were ordered into kent, instead of being sent into scotland with the other troops under general hawley, to act against those who had risen for prince charles. this arrangement probably arose entirely from great consideration and delicacy on the part of the government, who, fully aware of the high honour of the individuals of the corps, never entertained the smallest doubt of their loyalty, but who felt the cruelty of exposing men to the dreadful alternative of fighting against their friends and relatives, many of whom were necessarily to be found in the ranks of the insurgents. there were, however, three additional companies raised in the highlands, a little time before the return of the regiment from abroad. these were kept in scotland, and however distressing to their feelings the duty was which they were called upon to perform, on the side for which they were enlisted, they did that duty most honourably. one of these was recruited and commanded by duncan campbell, laird of inverawe. after various services in their own country during the period that the rest of the corps was abroad for the second time, these three companies were ordered to embark, in march , to join the regiment in flanders. but the preliminaries of peace having been soon afterwards signed, the order was countermanded, and they were reduced. during the time that campbell of inverawe's company was occupied in the unpleasant duty to which i have alluded, he had been on one occasion compelled to march into the district of lorn, and to burn and destroy the houses and effects of a few small gentlemen, who were of that resolute description that they would have sacrificed all they had, and even life itself, rather than yield to what they held to be the government of an usurper. having been thus led to pursue his route, in a certain direction, for many a mile, he happened, on his return, to be detained behind his men by some accidental circumstance, and having lost his way after night-fall, he wandered about alone for several hours, until he became considerably oppressed with hunger and fatigue. with the expectation of gathering some better knowledge of his way, he left the lower grounds, where the darkness of night had settled more deeply and decidedly down, and he climbed the side of a hill with the hope of benefiting, in some degree, by the half twilight which lingers longer upon these elevations, continuing to rest upon them sometimes for hours after it has altogether deserted their lower regions. with the dogged perseverance of one who labours on because he has no other alternative, he blindly pursued his hap-hazard course in a diagonal line along the abrupt face, always rising as he proceeded, until his way became every moment more and more difficult. the side of the hill became steeper and steeper at every step, until he began to be satisfied that he had no chance of reaching its brow, except by retracing his steps, in order to discover some other means of ascending to it. to any such alternative as this he could by no means make up his mind. he cursed his own folly for allowing his company to march on without him. he uttered many a wish that he was with them. he felt sufficiently convinced that he had acted imprudently in having thus exposed himself alone, in the midst of a district which was yet reeking with the vengeance which his duty had compelled him so unwillingly to pour out upon it. but his courage was indomitable, and his way lay onwards, and onwards he without hesitation resolved to go. he had not proceeded far, until high cliffs began to rear themselves over his head, whilst, from his very feet, perpendicular precipices shot down into the deep night that prevailed below. the goat or deer track that he followed became every moment more and more blocked up with stony fragments, until at length it offered one continuous series of dangerous steps, requiring his utmost care and attention to preserve him from a slip or fall that might have been fatal. whilst he was thus proceeding, with his whole attention occupied in self-preservation, he was suddenly challenged in gaelic by a rough voice in his front. "who comes there?" "a friend," replied inverawe, in the same language in which he was addressed. "i am not sure of that," said the same voice hoarsely and bitterly. "is he alone?" "he is alone," said a voice a little way behind inverawe; "we are quite safe." "come on then, sir," said the voice in front, "you have nothing to fear." "fear!" cried inverawe, in a tone which implied that any such feeling had ever been a stranger to him; "i fear nothing." "i know you to be a brave man, inverawe!" said the man who now appeared in front of him. "come on then without apprehension. you need not put your hand into the guard of your claymore, for no one here will harm you. but what strange chance has brought you here?" "the loss of my way," replied inverawe. "but how do you come to know me so well?" "it is no matter how i know you," replied the other. "it is sufficient that i do know you, and know you to be a brave man, to whom, as such, i am prepared to do what kindness i can. what are your wants then, and what can i do for you?" "my wants are, simply to find my lost way, and then to procure some food, of which i stand much in need," replied inverawe. "be at ease then, for i shall help you to both," replied the person with whom he was conversing; "but methinks your last want requires to be first attended to, as the most urgent; so follow me, and look sharply to your footing." then, speaking in a louder tone to some individuals, who, though unseen, were posted somewhere in the obscurity to the rear of inverawe, he said, "look well to your post, lads, i shall be with you by and bye." and then again turning to inverawe, he added--"come on, sir, you must climb up this way; the ascent is steep, and you will require to use hands as well as feet. goats were wont to be the only travellers here, and even they must have been hardy ones. but troublous times will often people the desert cliffs themselves with human beings, and scare the very eagle from her aerie, that she may yield her lodging to weary man." inverawe now began to clamber after his guide up a steep, tortuous, and dangerous ascent, where in some places they were compelled to pull up their bodies by the strength of their hands and arms. it lasted for some time; and he of the black watch, albeit well accustomed to such work, was beginning to be very weary of it, when at length they landed on a tolerably wide natural ledge, where inverawe perceived that the cliffs that arose from the inner angle of it so overhung their base as to render it self-evident that all farther ascent in this direction was cut off by them. rounding a huge fallen mass of rock, which lay poised on the very edge of the precipice, they came suddenly on a ravine, or rift, in the face of the cliff above, on climbing a few paces up which, they discovered the low, arched mouth of a cave, whence issued a faint gleam of light, and an odour of smoke. his guide stooped under the projection of the cliff that hung over it, and let himself down through the narrow entrance. inverawe followed his example without fear, and found himself in a cavern of an irregular form, from ten to twenty feet in diameter. this he discovered partly by the light of a fire of peats that smouldered near the entrance, and partially filled the place with smoke, but more perfectly by a torch of bog-fir which his guide immediately lighted. but he felt no curiosity about this, in comparison with that which he experienced in regard to the figure and features of his guide, with which he was intensely anxious to make himself acquainted. he was a tall and remarkably fine looking man, considerably below middle age. he was dressed in a grey plaid and kilt, betokening disguise, but with the full complement of highland armour about him. his hair hung in long black curls around his head. his face was very handsome, his nose aquiline, his mouth small and well formed, having its upper lip graced by a dark and well-trimmed moustache. his eyes, and his whole general expression, were extremely benignant. after scanning his face with great attention, inverawe was satisfied that he never had seen him before, and he had ample opportunity of ascertaining the reverse, if it had been otherwise, for the man stood with the bog-fir torch blazing in his hand, as if he wished to give his guest the fullest advantage of it in his scrutiny of him, and then, as if guessing the conclusion to which that scrutiny had brought him, he at last began to speak. "aye," said he calmly, "you are right, inverawe. your eyes have never beheld me until this moment. but i have seen you to my cost. i was looking on all the while that you and your men were burning and destroying my house, goods, and gear, this blessed morning, and i can never forget you." "i know you not, that is certain," replied inverawe; "and the cruel duty we were on to-day was so extensive in its operation, that i cannot even guess whom you are." "you shall never know it from me, inverawe," replied the other. "and why not?" demanded inverawe. "from no fear for myself," replied the stranger; "but because i would not add to that remorse, which you must feel, from being compelled to execute deeds which are as unworthy of you, as i know they are contrary to your generous and kindly nature. i have suffered from you deeply--deeply indeed have i suffered. but i look upon you but as an involuntary minister of the vengeance of a cruel government, and perhaps as an agent in the hand of a just god, who would punish me for those sins and frailties which are inherent in my human nature. i blame not you, and i can have no feeling of anger against you, far less of revenge. give me, then, the right hand of fellowship." "willingly, most willingly!" said inverawe, cordially shaking hands with him. "you are a noble high-minded man; for certainly i can imagine what your feelings might have very naturally been against me, and i know that i am now in your power." "all i ask, inverawe, is this," continued the stranger; "that as i have been, and will continue to be honourable towards you, you will be the same to me; and in asking that, i know that i am asking what is sure to be granted. the confidence in your honour which i have shown by bringing you here, will not be betrayed." "never!" said inverawe, with energy. "never while i have life!" "i know i can rely upon you," said the stranger; "and now let me hasten to give you such refreshment as i possess. sit down, i pray you, as near to the ground as possible, you will find that the smoke will annoy you less." inverawe did as his host had recommended, and, seating himself on some heather which lay on the floor of the place, the stranger opened a wicker pannier that stood in a low recess, and speedily produced from it various articles of food, of no mean description, together with a bottle of french wine, and, spreading the viands before his guest, he seated himself by him, and they ate and drank together. they had little conversation; and the stranger no sooner saw that inverawe's hunger was satisfied, than he arose, and proposed that he should now guide him on his journey. creeping from the hole, therefore, they descended the crags together, with all that care which the steepness of the declivity rendered necessary, until they came to the spot where they had first encountered each other, and then the stranger began to guide inverawe onwards in the same direction he had been formerly pursuing. they had not proceeded far, until they were challenged by voices among the rocks, showing that his host's place of retreat was protected by sentinels in all quarters. his guide answered the challenge, and they then went on without molestation. after about an hour's walk over very rugged ground, during which they wound over the mountain, and threaded their way through various bogs and woods, that completely bewildered inverawe, his guide suddenly brought him out upon a road which he well knew, and then shaking hands with him, and bidding him farewell, he dived again into the wood, and disappeared. inverawe rejoined his company at their night's quarters. they had spent an anxious time, regarding him, during his absence, and they were clamorous in their enquiries as to what had become of him. he gave them an account of the circumstance of his losing his way; but he told them not a syllable of his adventure with the stranger, resolving that it should be for ever buried in his own bosom. there, however, it produced many a thought; and often did he earnestly hope, that chance might again bring him into contact with the man who had taken so noble a revenge of him--to whom he felt as an honest bankrupt might do towards his generous and forgiving creditor; and whose person and features he had engraven so deeply on his recollection, to be embalmed there amidst the warmest and kindliest affections of his heart. it was soon after the disbanding of his company, that campbell of inverawe returned to his own romantic territory, and to his ancient castle, standing in the midst of beautiful natural lawns, surrounded by wooded banks and knolls, lying at the north-western base of the mighty ben-cruachan. speaking in a general way, the country around was thickly covered with oak and birch woods, giving double value, both in point of beauty and utility, to the rich, glady pastures, which were seen to spread their verdant surface to the sun, along the course of the river awe. behind the grey towers of the building, broken rocks arose here and there, in bare masses, in the direction of the mountain,--whilst the blue expanse of loch etive stretched away from the eye towards the north-east, as well as to the west. to the south-west, the groves, and grassy slopes, were abruptly broken off by the perpendicular crags of the romantic ravine through which the river makes its way, to pour itself across the open haughs of bunawe, and into loch etive. to sketch out the remainder of the neighbourhood, so that you may be fully aware of the nature of the country, which was the scene, where one of the most important circumstances of my tale took place, i may add, that about a mile above the ravine, the river has its origin from a long narrow arm of loch awe, which presents one of the most romantic ranges of scenery in scotland. the lake in the bottom, is there every where about eighty or an hundred yards wide only; and whilst a bare, rocky mountain front, furrowed by many a misty cataract, rises sheer up out of the water on its western side, the steep, lofty, and rugged face of cruachan shuts it in on the eastern side, forming the grand and wild pass of brandera. here the mountain exhibits every variety of picturesque form,--of prominent crag, and half-concealed hollow, among which the grey mists are continually playing and producing magical effects; together with deep torrent beds, and innumerable waterfalls, thundering downwards unseen, save in glimpses, amid the thick copse which, generation after generation, has sprung from the stools of those giant oaks, which were once permitted to rear their spreading heads, and to throw their bold arms freely abroad, athwart the rocky steeps that rear themselves so high up above, as to be softened by distance and air, till they almost melt from human vision. having thus put you in possession of the scenery, i shall now proceed to tell you, that campbell of inverawe, after his long absence from home on military duty, felt all the luxury of enjoyment which these his own quiet scenes could bestow, and his mind expanding to all his old friendships, he largely exercised all the hospitalities of life. frequently did he fill the hall of his fathers with gay and merry feasters, and his own hilarious disposition, always made him the very soul of the mirth that prevailed among them. on one occasion, it happened that he had congregated a large party together. the wine circulated freely. the fire bickered on the hearth, and threw a cheerful blaze over the walls of the hall, reddening the very roof, and gleaming on the warlike weapons that hung around. the wine was good,--the jests were merry,--and the conversation sparkling, so that the guests were as loath to depart as their kind host was unwilling to let them go. his lady had retired to her chamber--but still they sat on, making the old building ring again with their jocund laughter. but all things must have an end. the parting cup, to their host's rooftree, was proposed by a certain young man called george campbell, and it was filled to the brim. but as all were on their legs to drain it, with heart and good will, to the bottom,--a rattling peal of thunder rolled directly over their heads. there was not a man of them that did not feel that the omen was appalling. some hardy ones tried to laugh it off, as a salvo from heaven in homologation of their good wishes to the house of inverawe. but the pleasantry went ill down with the rest. servants were called for,--horses were ordered, and out poured their owners to mount them,--when they were all surprised to see the heavens quite serene and tranquil. but not a word of remark was ventured by any one on this so very strange a circumstance. their hospitable entertainer saw every man of them take his stirrup cup; and they galloped away, one after the other. after they were all gone, inverawe paced about in the court-yard for some time, in sombre thought, which stole involuntarily upon him. he then sought his way up stairs, and lifting an oaken chair towards the great hearth, where the billets had by this time begun to burn red, and without flame, he sat down in it for a while, listlessly to ponder over the events of the evening. the weary servants had gladly stolen away to bed, and the whole castle was soon as silent as the grave. not a sound was to be heard within the walls, but the dull, drowsy buzzing of a large fly, which the flickering light of a solitary lamp, left on the table, had prevented from retiring to some cranny of repose. the master of the mansion smiled for a moment, as the whimsical idea crossed him, that this tiny insect was perhaps the only thing of life, which, at that time, kept watch with him within the castle. inverawe's thoughts reverted to the last toast which had been given by his young friend campbell, and the strange circumstances by which it had been accompanied. he had an only son, called donald, a promising young man, who was the prop of his house, and to whose future career in life he looked forward with all a father's anxiety. he had been long accustomed to weave a silken tissue of anticipated happiness, and honours, for the young man, and to view him, in his mind's eye, as the father of many generations to come. the youth was at that time from home; and this was the very first moment of his life that the notion of there being any chance of his being one day left childless, had ever occurred to him. he tried to shake off these gloomy presentiments, but still they returned, and clung to him, with a force and pertinacity that no reason could conquer. he would fain have risen to go to his chamber, but he felt as if some powerful, though unseen hand, had held him down to his chair,--and he continued to sit on, absorbed in contemplative musings on these gloomy and painful dreams, till the billets on the hearth had consumed themselves to their red embers. suddenly all such thoughts were put to flight from his mind. he distinctly heard the great outer door of the castle creak upon its hinges. he remembered, that although he had not locked it, he had shut it behind him when he came in. it now banged against its doorway, and sent a hollow sound echoing up the long turnpike stair. faint, quick, and stealthy footsteps, were then heard ascending. one or two other doors were moved in succession. the footsteps approached with cautious expedition. and as inverawe listened with breathless attention, the door of the hall was thrust open,--a human countenance appeared for an instant in the dusky aperture--and then a man, with a naked dirk in his hand,--his clothes dripping wet--his long hair hanging streaming over his shoulders, and half veiling his glaring eyes, and pale and haggard countenance, rushed in, and made straight up to him. inverawe started to his feet, drew his dirk, and prepared to defend himself from this unlooked for attempt at assassination. but ere he had well plucked it forth from its sheath, the intruder assumed the attitude of a suppliant. "for mercy's sake pardon my unceremonious entrance, inverawe!" said the stranger, in a hollow, husky, and exhausted voice. "and be not alarmed, for i come with no hostile intention against you or yours. i am an unfortunate wretch, who, in a sudden quarrel, have shed the blood of a fellow-creature. he was a man of lorn. i have been hotly pursued by his friends, and though i have thrown those who are after me considerably out, during the long chase they have kept up, yet they are still pressing like blood-hounds on my track. to baffle them, if possible, i threw myself into the river, and swam across it, and i now claim that protection, and that hospitality, which no one ever failed to find within the house of inverawe." "by cruachan!" cried inverawe, sheathing his dirk, and slapping it smartly with the open palm of his hand. "by cruachan, i swear that you shall have both!" now, i must tell you, that this was considered as the most solemn pledge that a campbell of inverawe could give. their war-cry was, "coar-a-cruachan," that is, "help from cruachan." and this expression had a double meaning, inasmuch as the word cruachan had reference both to the mountain of that name, and to the hip where the dirk hung. to swear by cruachan, therefore, and to strengthen the oath by slapping the dirk with the open palm, was to utter an oath, which must, under all circumstances, be for ever held inviolable. "but tell me," said inverawe, "how happened this unlucky affair?" "we were all met to make merry at a wedding," replied the stranger, "when, as i was dancing with---- but hold!--i hear voices! they approach the castle! i am lost if you do not hide me immediately." "this way," said inverawe, leading him to a certain obscure part of the hall. "aid me to lift this trap.--now, down with ye and crouch there.--they come." inverawe had barely time to drop the trap-door into its place, to resume his seat at the fire, and to affect to be in a deep sleep, when the voices and the sound of human footsteps were heard ascending the stairs. three men entered the hall in reeking haste--claymores in hand. they rushed towards the fire-place, where he was sitting. inverawe started up as if just awaked by the noise they made, and drew his dirk, as if to defend himself from their meditated attack. "ha!" cried he, with well-feigned surprise. "assassins: then must i sell my life as dearly as i can." "not assassins!" cried they. "we are not assassins, inverawe. we crave your pardon for this apparently rude intrusion, but we are in pursuit of an assassin. we come to look for a man who has murdered another. have we your permission to search for him?" "certainly," said inverawe, "wherever you please." "he cannot be here," said one of the men. "i told you that he could not be here. don't you see plainly that he could not have come in here without awaking inverawe. we lose time here. we had better on after our friends." "depend on't he has run up loch etive side," said another of them. "what are all these wet foot-steps on the floor?" said the first of them that spoke. "he might have been here without inverawe's knowledge." "don't you see that inverawe has had a feast, and that wine, and water, and whisky too, have been flowing in gallons in all directions?" said the second man. "see there is a large pool of lost liquor. i verily believe that some of these footsteps are my own, made this moment, by walking accidentally through it. i tell you he never could have come here." "it is true that i have had a feast," said inverawe, carelessly, "as you may see from the wrecks of it that still remain on the table." "i told you so," said the second man. "we only lose time here. if you had only been guided by my counsel we might have been hard at his heels by this time, as well as the rest." "haste, then, let us go!" said the first man. "away! away!" cried his companions, and, without waiting for farther parley, they rushed out of the hall, and inverawe heard with some satisfaction, their footsteps hurrying down stairs, and the shouts which they yelled forth after their companions, growing fainter and fainter, until they were altogether lost in the direction of loch etive. inverawe was no sooner certain that they were fairly gone, without all risk of returning, than he proceeded, in the first place, to secure the outer door of the castle, and then returning to the hall, he went to the trap-door, and calling softly to the man concealed below it, he desired him to aid him in raising it, by applying his strength to force it upwards, and thus their united strength enabled them speedily to open it, and to lift it up. "come forth now, unfortunate man," said inverawe; "your pursuers are gone." "i come," said the stranger, in his husky hoarse voice, and as he raised himself from the trap-door, his haggard countenance, and his blood-shot eyes, that glared with the horror of his situation, half seen as they were through his long moist locks, chilled inverawe's very heart as he looked upon him. "now, sir," said inverawe, "you are safe for the present, your pursuers have passed on." "thanks! thanks!" replied the man; "i know not how sufficiently to thank you." "aye--all is so far well for you," said inverawe; "but concealment for you here is impossible. you must remove into a place of more certain safety, and no time is to be lost. at present you may remove without observation or suspicion; but no one can say how soon the search for you hereabouts may be renewed. here," continued he, setting before him some of the remains of the feast, which the tired servants had not removed from the sideboard; "take what refreshment circumstances may allow, whilst i go for a basket, in which to carry food enough to last you during to-morrow. we must go to ben-cruachan, with as much secrecy and expedition as we can." the stranger, thus left for a few minutes by himself, hastily devoured some of the viands, of which he had so much need, and having swallowed a full cup of wine, he was rejoined by inverawe with a basket, into which he hastily packed some provisions, and, without a moment's delay, they quietly and stealthily quitted the hall, and the castle, and the moment they found themselves in the open air, inverawe led the way diagonally up the slope, on the western side of ben-cruachan. their way was long, and their path rough, and they moved on through woods, and over rocks, without uttering a word. many a half expressed exclamation, indeed, burst involuntarily from the stranger, betraying a mind ill at ease with itself, and many a start did he give, as if he apprehended surprise from some lurking pursuer; and inverawe shuddered to think, that the haggard appearance of the man, and these his guilty-like apprehensions, were more in accordance with the accusation of murder, or unfair slaughter, which seemed to have been made against him, by the expressions of some of those who had come into the hall in search of him, than with the chance-medley killing of a man in an affray, which was the complexion he had himself wished to put on the matter. be this as it might, however, his most solemn pledge had been given for his security, and accordingly he determined honourably to fulfil it, at all hazards to himself. his reflections, as he went with this man, were of any thing but a pleasing nature. after a long and painful walk, or rather race, for their pace had been more like that, than walking, inverawe began to climb up the abrupt face of cruachan, till he came to that part of it which hangs over the northern entrance of the pass of brandera, where the river awe breaks away from the end of the narrow branch of the lake, and there, after some scrambling, he led the stranger high up the face of the mountain, to a cave that yawned in the perpendicular cliff. the concealment here was perfect, for its mouth was masked in front by a cairn of large stones, which might have been accidentally accumulated by falling during successive ages from the rocks above, or perhaps artificially piled up there in memory of some person or event long since forgotten. it was moreover surrounded by trees of all sorts of growth; indeed, the universal wooding which prevailed over the surrounding features of nature, of itself rendered any object on the ground of the mountain side difficult to be discovered by any creature that did not, like an eagle, mount into the sky. in addition to this, the great elevation of the position, added to the security of the place, and the ravine-seamed front of the perpendicular mountain of rock that guarded the western side of the pass, immediately opposite to the face of cruachan, precluded all chance of observation from that quarter. "this is not exactly the place where campbell of inverawe would wish to exercise his hospitality, to any one who deigns to ask for his protection," said the laird, whilst he was engaged in striking a light; "but in your circumstances it is the best retreat in which i can extend it towards you. here is a lamp; and i will leave this tinder-box, and this flask of oil with you. the cave is dry enough, and there is abundance of heather to be had around you. use your lamp only when you may find it absolutely necessary so to do; for its light might betray you; and take care to show yourself as little as possible during the daylight of to-morrow. i have promised you protection by cruachan, and by cruachan you shall have it. you must be contented with this my assurance for the present, for your safety demands that i shall not see you again, until i can do so without observation, under the veil of to-morrow-night's darkness. till then, you must e'en do with such provisions as this basket contains, and you may reckon on my bringing a fresh supply with me when i return. farewell, for i must hurry back, so as to escape discovery." "thanks! thanks! kind inverawe!" said the man, in a state of extreme agitation and excitement,--"a thousand thanks! but, must you--must you leave me thus alone? alone, for a whole night, on this wild mountain side, with that yawning hole for my place of rest, and with nothing but the roar of these eternal cataracts, mingled with the wild howl of the wind through the pass to lull me to repose! that cairn, too!--may not that be a cairn which marks the spot where--where--where some murder has been done? can you assure me that no ghosts ever haunt this wild place?" "the soul that is free from all consciousness of guilt may hold patient, solitary, and fearless converse with ghost or goblin, even on such a wild mountain side as this," said inverawe, somewhat impatiently. "but surely you cannot expect that my hospitality to you should require my sharing this mountain concealment with you? if you do, i must tell you, what common prudence ought to teach you, that if i were disposed to do so, nothing could be more unwise, as nothing could more certainly lead to your detection. my absence from home would create so much surprise and anxiety, that the whole country would turn out to seek for me, and their search for me, could not fail to produce your discovery. even now, i may be risking it by thus delaying to return." "true, true, inverawe!" said the stranger, in a desponding tone, and apparently making a strong effort to command his feelings. "there is too much truth in what you say. i must steel myself up to this night. my safety, as you say, demands it. yet, 'tis a terrible trial! would that the dawn were come! is it far from day?" "i hope it is, indeed," replied inverawe, "else might my absence and all be discovered. it cannot, as yet, as i suppose, be much after midnight; but even that is late enough for me. i must borrow the swiftness of the roebuck to carry me back. so again i say farewell till to-morrow-night." inverawe tarried not for an answer, but, darting off through the wood, he rapidly descended among the rocks, and then bounded over all the obstacles in his way, with a swiftness almost rivaling that of the animal he had alluded to; and so he reached his own door, in a space of time so short, as to be almost incredible. the fire in the hall had now sunk into white ashes. the lamp, which he had left burning, was now flickering in its last expiring efforts. he swallowed a single draught of wine to restore his exhausted strength, and then he stole to his chamber, and crept into bed, happy in the conviction that his lady, who was in a deep sleep, had never discovered that he had been absent. the sleep that immediately fell upon inverawe himself was that of the most perfect unconsciousness of existence. he knew not, of course, how long it had lasted, nor was he, in the least degree, sensible of the cause or manner of its interruption. but he did awake, somehow or other; and then it was that he discovered, to his great wonder and astonishment, that the chamber which, on going to bed, he had left as dark as the most impenetrable night could make it, was now illuminated with a lambent light, of a bluish cast, which shone through the very curtains of his bed. a certain feeling of awe crept chillingly over him; for he was at once convinced that the light was something very different from the dawn of morning. it became gradually more and more intense, till, through the thick drapery that surrounded him, he distinctly beheld the shadow of a human figure approaching his bed. he was a brave man; but he felt that every nerve and muscle of his frame was paralysed, he knew not how. he watched the slow advance of the figure with motionless awe. the shadowy arm was extended, and the curtain was slowly and silently raised. the bluish light that so miraculously pervaded the chamber, then suddenly arose to a degree of splendour, that was dazzling to his sight, and clearly defined the appalling object that now presented itself to his eyes. the face and figure were those of the very man who had formerly entertained him in the hole in the cliff on the mountain side, in lorn. he was wrapped in the same grey plaid, too. but those handsome features, which had made so deep an impression on the recollection of inverawe, were now pale and fixed, as if all the pulses of life had ceased, and the raven locks, which hung curling around them, and the moustaches which once gave so much expression to his upper lip, now only served to increase the ghastliness of the hue of death that overspread his countenance, as well as that of the glaze of those immoveable eyes, which had then exhibited so much generous intelligence. inverawe lay petrified, his expanded orbs devouring the spectacle before them. with noiseless action, the figure dropped one corner of the shadowy plaid in which it was enveloped, and displayed a gaping wound in its bosom, which appeared to pour out rivers of blood. its lips moved not; yet it spoke--slowly, and in a hollow and sepulchral tone. "inverawe!--blood must flow for blood! shield not the murderer!" slowly did the spectre drop the curtain; and its shadow, seen through it, gradually faded away in the waning light, ere inverawe could well gather together his routed faculties to his aid. he rubbed his eyes, started up in bed, leaned on his pillow, and brushed the curtain hastily aside. all was again dark and silent. again he rubbed his eyes, and looked; but again he looked into impenetrable night. "it was a dream," thought, rather than said, inverawe; "a horrible dream--but nevertheless it was a dream--curious in its coincidences, but not unnatural. nay, it was most natural, that the strangest adventure of my past life, should be recalled by the yet stranger occurrences of this night, and that both should thus link themselves confusedly and irrationally together during sleep. pshaw! it is absurd for a rational man to think of this illusion more. i'll to sleep again." but sleep is one of those blessed conditions of human nature, which cannot be controlled or commanded by the mere will. on the contrary, the very resolution to command it, is almost certain to put it to flight. the vision, or whatever else it might have been, haunted his imagination, and kept his thoughts so busily occupied, that he could not sleep. when his lady awaked in the morning, she found him lying fevered, restless, and unrefreshed. her inquiries were anxious and affectionate; but, by carelessly attributing his indisposition to the prolonged revelry of the previous evening, he at last succeeded in ridding himself of farther question, and springing from his couch, he tried to banish all thought of the unpleasant dilemma into which he had been brought, by occupying himself actively in the business of the day. he was so far successful for a time; but, as night approached, his uncomfortable reflections and anticipations began again to crowd into his mind. he must fulfil his promise of visiting his guest of the cave, a guest whom he now could not help looking upon with horror as a foul murderer; and yet, if he disbelieved the reality of the previous night's visitation, there was no reason that he should so regard him more now, than he had done before. the difficulty of contriving the means of managing his visit, so that it should escape observation or suspicion on the part of his lady, or his domestics, was very considerable. his lady was that evening more than ordinarily solicitous about him, from the conviction that pressed upon her, that he had had little or no sleep the previous night, and remarking his jaded appearance, she eagerly urged him to retire to bed at an early hour. "my dearest," said he affectionately, "i shall; but before i can do so, i have some otter-traps to set. perhaps i had better go and finish that business now, while there is yet some twilight. go you to your chamber, and retire to rest. i shall sleep all the sounder by and bye, after breathing the fresh air of this balmy evening for an hour or so." the lady yielded to his persuasion, and she had no sooner left him, than he took an opportunity of filling his basket, with such provisions as he could appropriate for the stranger, with the least possible chance of detection; and putting a few of his otter-traps over all, by way of a blind, he sallied forth in the direction of the river. there he first most conscientiously made good his word, by planting his traps, and then, as it was by that time dark, he turned his steps up the side of ben-cruachan, and made the best of his way towards the cliffs where the cave was situated. as he drew near to its mouth, he was, in some degree, alarmed by observing a light proceeding from it. he approached it with caution, and, on entering it, he beheld the stranger sitting in the farthest corner of it, on the bed of heather, with his figure drawn up and compressed together, and his features painfully distorted, whilst his eyes were intently fixed on vacancy. for a moment inverawe doubted whether some fit had not seized upon him; but he started at the noise made by the entrance of his protector, and sprang up to meet him. "oh, inverawe," said he, "what a relief it is to behold you! oh what a wretched weary time i have passed since you left me!" "i have brought you something to comfort you," said inverawe, so shocked with his haggard appearance, and conscience-worn countenance, as almost to recoil from him. "you know that i could not come sooner. you seem to be exhausted with watching. you had better take some of this wine." "oh, yes, yes, give me wine--a large cup of wine!" cried the stranger, wildly seizing the vessel which inverawe had filled, and swallowing its contents with avidity. "oh, such a time as i have spent!" "this place is quite secure," said inverawe. "you have no cause for such anxiety, if you will only be prudent. but why do you keep this light burning? did i not tell you it was most dangerous to do so. some wandering or belated shepherd or huntsman might be guided hither by it, and if your retreat should be once discovered, your certain destruction must follow." "i could not remain in darkness," replied the stranger, with a cold shudder; "it was agonizing to do so! horrid shapes continually haunted me,--horrid, horrid shapes!--even the shutting of my eyes could not exclude them. oh, such a night as last! never have i before endured any thing so horrible." "you must take your own way then," said inverawe, as he spread out the contents of the basket before him; "i am sorry that i can do nothing better for you, but this is the best fare i could provide for you, without exciting suspicion in my own house. stay--here is a blanket to help to make your bed somewhat more comfortable. and now, i must hurry away.--yet, before i go, let me once more caution you about the light. perhaps i had better make all secure, by taking the lamp with me." "oh no! no! no! no!" cried the stranger, his eyes glaring like those of a maniac, whilst he rushed towards the lamp and seized it up, and clasped it within his arms. "no, nothing shall rend it from me! i will sacrifice my life to preserve it. what! would you leave me to another long, long, and dreadful night? would you leave me to utter darkness and despair?" "leave you i must," replied inverawe; "and if you will keep the lamp, you must do so at your own risk. but your thoughts must be dreadful thoughts indeed, so to disturb you. if conscious guilt be the cause of them, i can only advise you to confess yourself humbly to your creator, and to pray for his forgiveness." without waiting for a reply, inverawe left the cave, and made the best of his way home. on reaching his apartment, he found his lady awake. "you have been a long time absent, inverawe," said she anxiously. "i have, my love," replied he carelessly; "the delicious air of this night induced me to stay out longer than i had intended; but i hope i shall sleep all the better for it." exhausted as he was by fatigue of body and mind, as well as worn out by want of rest, inverawe did fall asleep immediately, and his sleep was sound and deep. for aught he knew, it might have lasted for some hours, when again, as on the previous night, he was awaked, he could not tell how. the curtains of his bed were drawn close, but the same uncouth blue light which pervaded the apartment on the former night, now again rendered them quite transparent. to convince himself that he was awake, inverawe looked round upon his wife. even at this early stage, the light was sufficiently bright to enable him distinctly to see his lady's features as her head lay in calm repose on the pillow beside him. he turned again towards the side of the bed, and his eyes were dazzled by the sudden increase of light, produced by the curtain being raised as before, by the extended hand of the spectre. the same well remembered features were there, pale, fixed, and corpse-like, but the expression of the brow, and bloodless lips, was more stern than it was on the previous night. again the spectre dropped the fold of the filmy plaid that covered the bosom, and displayed the yawning gash, which continued to pour out rivers of blood. the spectacle was horrible, and inverawe's very arteries were frozen up. again it spoke in a deep hollow tone, whilst its lips moved not. "inverawe! my first visit has been fruitless!--once more i come to warn you that blood must flow for blood. no longer shield the murderer! force me not to appear again, when all warning will be vain!" inverawe made an effort to question it. his parched mouth, and dried and stiffened tongue, refused to do their office. the curtain fell, and the light in the room, as well as the shadow of the figure, began to wane away. he struggled to spring out of bed, but his nerves and muscles refused to obey his will, until it was gone, and all was again darkness. the moment that his powers returned to him, he dashed back the curtain, threw himself from the bed, and searched through the room, with outstretched arms, yet, bold and desperate as he was, he almost feared that they might embrace the cold and bloody figure which he had beheld. his search, however, was vain, and, utterly confused and confounded, he returned to bed with his very heart as cold as ice. fortunately, his lady had lain perfectly undisturbed, and amidst his own horror, and amidst all his own agonizing agitation of thought, he felt thankful that she had escaped sharing in the terrors to which he had been subjected. as on the former night, he tried to persuade himself that all that had passed was nothing more than a dream,--but all the reasoning powers he possessed were ineffectual in removing from his mind the conviction that now laid hold of it, that it really was a spirit that had appeared to him. sleep was banished from his eyelids for the remainder of the night; and never before had he so anxiously longed for day-break. it came at last; and soon afterwards his lady awaked. "inverawe," said she, tenderly and anxiously addressing him, "you are ill--very ill. what, in the name of all goodness, is the matter with you? your worn out looks tell me that something terrible has occurred to you. your late excursion of last night has something mysterious about it. you were not wont thus to have concealment from me--from me your affectionate wife!--what is it that preys upon your mind?--i must know it." "promise me, upon the honour of inverawe's wife," said he, now seeing that concealment from her was no longer practicable; "promise me on that honour which is pure and unsullied as the snow, that you will not divulge what i have to tell you, and your curiosity shall be satisfied." with a look of intense and apprehensive interest, the lady promised what he desired, and then inverawe communicated to her every circumstance that had occurred to him. she was struck dumb and petrified by the narration; but she had no sooner gathered sufficient nerve to speak, than she earnestly entreated him to have nothing to do in concealing the guilty stranger. "let not this awful warning, now given you for the second time, be neglected," said she. "send for the officers of justice without delay, and give up the murderer to be tried by the offended laws of his country. you know not what curse may fall upon you, for thus trying to arrest heaven's judgment on the guilty man. oh, inverawe, it is dreadful to think of it!" "all this earnestness on your part, my love, is natural," said inverawe calmly. "but think of the solemn oath i have sworn;--you would not have inverawe--you would not have your husband--break a pledge so solemnly given? whatever may befal me here, i cannot so dishonour myself. besides," added he, "whilst, on the one hand, i know that he to whom i am so pledged is like myself, a man of flesh and blood, who, for anything i know to the contrary, may, after all, be really less guilty than unfortunate; i cannot even yet say with certainty, that i have not been the sport of dreams, naturally enough arising out of the strange circumstances to which i have been exposed. but were it otherwise, and that, contrary to all our accustomed rational belief, i have indeed been visited by a spirit, what proof have i that it is a spirit of health? what proof have i that it may not be a spirit wickedly commissioned by the father of lies to take this form, in order to seduce me into that breach of my pledge, which would for ever blacken the high name of campbell of inverawe, and doom myself to ceaseless remorse during the rest of my days?--no, no, lady!--i must keep my solemn vow, whatever may befal me." the lady was silenced by these words from her husband, but her anxiety was not thereby allayed. it increased as night approached; and especially when inverawe told her that he must again visit the man in the cave. during that day, various rumours had reached him, of people being afoot in search of a murderer, who was supposed to have found a place of concealment somewhere in that neighbourhood; and it was with some difficulty that he could suppress a hope that unconsciously arose within him, that he might be relieved from his pledge, and from his present most distressing and embarrassing position, by the accidental capture of him for whom they were searching. the duty of visiting the wretched man had now become oppressively painful to inverawe,--and the painfulness of it was not decreased by the additional risk which he now ran of being detected. but inverawe was not a man to abandon any duty for any such reasons. having again privately made up his basket of provisions therefore, and put his otter-traps over its contents, as formerly, he left the castle as twilight came on, and making his circuit by the river side with yet more care and caution than before, he climbed along the side of cruachan, and in due course of time reached the mouth of the cave. the light was burning as before, and on entering the place, its inmate was sitting with a countenance and expression if possible more haggard and terrific than he had exhibited on the previous night. "welcome!--welcome!" cried he, starting wildly up, and speaking in a frantic tone, as he rushed forward to seize inverawe's cold hand in both of his, that felt like heated iron,--"welcome, my guardian angel! all other good angels have fled from me now!--and the bad!--oh!--but you will not leave me to-night?--oh, say that you will not leave me to-night!" "i grieve to say, that, for your own sake, i cannot gratify you," replied inverawe, withdrawing his hand involuntarily from the contamination of his touch, and shrinking back with horror from the glare of his phrenzied and blood-shot eyes, though with a heart almost moved to pity for the wretch before him, whose very manhood seemed to have abandoned him. "it is vain to ask me to stay with you, as i have already frequently explained to you; but much more so now, that i have learned that there are men out searching for you in this neighbourhood, brought hither by the strong conviction that you are concealed somewhere hereabouts. this circumstance renders it imperatively necessary that you should no longer persevere in the perilous practice of burning your lamp, which exposes you to tenfold danger." "talk not to me of danger!" exclaimed the man, in a dreadful state of excitement, and in a tone and words that seemed more like those of a raving madman than anything else--"i must have light--i should go distracted if i had not light. darkness would drive me to self-destruction! i tell you it is filled with horrible shapes. even when i shut my eyes the horrible spectre appears. have pity!--have mercy on me, and stay with me but this one single night!--for even the light of the lamp itself cannot always banish the terrific spectre from before me!" "spectre!" cried inverawe, shuddering with horror,--"what spectre?" "aye, the horrible spectre," replied the man. and then suddenly starting back, with his hands stretched forth, as if to keep off some terrific shape that had instantaneously risen before him, and with his eye-balls glaring towards the dark opening of the cave, he shrieked out--"hell and torments! 'tis there again,--there--there--see there!" "i see nothing," said inverawe, with some difficulty retaining a proper command of himself. "but this is madness--absolute insanity. see, here is your food;--i must leave you immediately." "oh, do not go!" said the stranger, following inverawe for a few steps towards the mouth of the cave, and entreating him in a subdued and abject tone. and then, just as his protector was about to make his exit, he again started back, and stood as if he had been transfixed, whilst, with his hands stretched out before him, and his eyes fearfully staring on the vacancy of the darkness that was beyond the cavern's mouth, he again yelled out--"there! there!--see there!" it must be honestly confessed, that it was with no very imperturbed state of nerves, that inverawe committed himself to the obscurity of that night, to hurry homewards, and though no spectre appeared before his visual orbs, yet the harrowing spectacle which the guilty man had exhibited, and the allusion which he had made to the supposed spectre which he had seen in his imagination, kept that which he had himself beheld constantly floating before his mind's eye, during the whole of his way home; and he was not sorry, when he reached his own hall, to find his lady sitting by the fire waiting for his return. she was lonely, and cheerless, and full of anxious thoughts regarding him; but her eye brightened up at his entrance, and she filled him a goblet of wine. inverawe swallowed it greedily down,--gave her a brief and bare account of his evening's expedition,--and then they retired to their chamber. on this occasion inverawe silently took the precaution of bolting the door of the apartment; and, on going to bed, the lady, with great resolution of mind, determined within herself to keep off sleep, and to watch, so that she too might behold whatever apparition might appear; hoping that if the spectre which had so disturbed inverawe, should, after all, prove to be nothing but a dream, she might be able, from her own observation, to disabuse him of his phantasy. but it so happened, that, notwithstanding all her precautions, and all her mental exertions to prevent it, she fell immediately into a most unaccountably deep sleep; and inverawe himself, in spite of all his harassing and distressing thoughts, was speedily plunged into a similar state of utter unconsciousness. again, for this the third night, he was awaked by the same light streaming through the apartment, and rendering the curtain of his bed transparent by its wonderful illumination.--again he looked round on his wife, and beheld every feature of her face clearly displayed by its influence. she lay in the soundest and sweetest repose. his first impulse was to awake her,--but he instantly checked himself, and felt grateful that she was thus to be saved from the contemplation of the terrific spectral appearance, the shadow of which he now observed gliding slowly towards the bed. the curtain was again raised.--the same well-remembered figure and face appeared under the usual increased intensity of light. again the filmy plaid was partially dropped, and the fearful gash in the bosom was exposed, as before, pouring out blood. again the deep, hollow voice came from the motionless lips, but it was accompanied by a yet sterner expression of the eyes, and of the pale countenance. "inverawe!--my warnings have been vain.--the time is now past.--yet blood must flow for blood!--the blood of the murderer might have been offered up--now your blood must flow for his!--we meet once more at ticonderoga!" this last visitation of the apparition, accompanied as it was by a denunciation so terrible, had a yet more overwhelming effect upon inverawe than either of those that preceded it. bereft of all power over himself, he lay, conscious of existence it is true, but utterly incapable of commanding thought, much less of exercising action. ere he could rally his intellect, or his nervous energy, the spectre was gone; and the apartment was dark. when his thoughts began to arise within him, they were of a more agonizing character than any which he had formerly experienced--"your blood must flow for his."--these dreadful words still sounded in his ears, in the same deep, sepulchral tone in which they had been uttered. do not suppose that one thought of himself ever crossed his mind. he thought of his son--that son, for whose welfare every desire of his life was concentrated,--that was his blood, against which he conceived this dread prophecy to be directed--that was his blood which he dreaded might flow. he shivered at the very thought. he recalled the strange circumstances which had attended the drinking of the toast to his roof-tree. his anxiety about his son was raised to a pitch, that converted his bed, for that night at least, into a bed of thorns. he slept not,--yet all his tossings failed to awaken his lady, who slept as if she had been drenched with some soporiferous drug. the sun had no sooner darted his first rays through the casement, however, than she awaked as if from a most refreshing sleep. she looked round upon her husband--observed his haggard and tortured expression--and the whole recollection of what she previously knew having come upon her at once, she began vehemently to upbraid herself. "i have slept," said she, in a tone of vexed self-reprehension.--"after all my determination to the contrary, i have slept throughout the whole night; and you have been again disturbed.--say!--what has happened? have you seen him again?" "i have seen him," replied inverawe in a subdued tone and manner--"i have seen him, and his appearance was terrible." "say--tell me!--what passed?" exclaimed the lady earnestly. "inverawe, i must know all." inverawe would have fain eaten in his words. he would have especially wished to have left his wife in ignorance of the denunciation to which the apparition had given utterance. but he had not as yet recovered sufficient mastery over himself, to enable him to baffle the questioning of an acute woman. in a short time the whole truth was extracted from him; and now the lady, in a state of agitation that very much exceeded his, began to press upon him the necessity of giving up the criminal to justice. her argument was long and energetic; and during the time that it occupied, he gradually resumed the full possession of himself. "i have heard you, my love," replied he calmly; "yet you have urged, and you can urge nothing which can persuade me to break my solemn pledge. the hitherto spotless honour of inverawe shall never be tarnished in my person. dreadful as is the curse which has been denounced upon me, i am still resolved to act as an honourable man. yet i will do this much. i will again visit the man in the cave, and insist with him that he shall seek some other place of refuge. i have done enough for him. i have suffered enough on his account. he must go elsewhere. perhaps i should have come to this resolve yesterday--the time, alas! may now be past. but, come what come may, i am determined that the visit of this night shall be the last that i shall pay to him. he must go elsewhere. even his own safety requires that he shall do so--and mine! but no matter, he must seek some other asylum." even this resolve--late though it might be, was, for the time, some consolation to the afflicted mind of his wife. nay, it was in some degree matter of alleviation to his own sufferings. the broad sunlight of heaven, and the bustling action of the creatures of this world while all creation is awake, produces a wonderful effect upon the human mind, in relieving it from all those phantoms of anticipated evil which the silent shades of night are so apt to conjure up within it. inverawe and his lady were less oppressed with gloomy thoughts during that day than might have been supposed possible. it is true, that he often secretly repeated over the denunciation of the apparition, but even yet he would have fain persuaded himself, as he tried to persuade his wife, that he had been the sport of dreams, resulting from some morbid state of his system. "ticonderoga!" said he, "where is ticonderoga? i know of no such place; nay, i never heard of any such place; and, in truth, i do not believe that any such place really exists on the face of this earth. ticonderoga! a name so utterly unknown to me, and so strangely uncouth in itself, would lead me to believe that it is the coinage of my own distempered brain; and, if so, then the whole must have been an illusion. yet it is altogether unaccountable and inexplicable." thus it was that inverawe reasoned during that day; but as night again approached, it brought all its phantoms of the imagination along with it. inverawe, however, wound himself up to go through with that which he now considered as his last trial. having filled his basket as before, he set off on his wonted circuitous route to the cave. as he went thither, he endeavoured to steel up his mind to assume that resolute tone with the stranger which he now felt to be absolutely necessary to rid himself of so troublesome and distressing a charge. much as it did violence to his innate feelings of hospitality to come to any such determination, he resolved to insist on his departure from the cave that very night, and he had no difficulty in persuading himself that his doing this would be the best line of safety he could prescribe for the stranger, seeing that, by the active use of his limbs during the remaining portion of it, he might well enough reach some distant place of concealment before day-break. full of such ideas, he pressed on towards the cave, that he might get him off with as little delay as possible. the light which had shone from its mouth upon former occasions was now absent, and inverawe hailed the circumstance as a proof that the wretched man had at last become more rational. he approached the orifice in the cliff, and gently called him. his own voice alone was returned to him from the hollow bowels of the rock. all was so mysteriously silent, that an involuntary chill fell upon inverawe. he repeated his call in a louder voice, but still there was no reply--no stir from within. a cold shudder crept over him, and for a moment he half expected to see issue from the black void before him, that appalling apparition which had now three several times appeared by his bedside. a little thought enabled him to get rid of this temporary weakness. he recalled the last words of the spectre, and the strange uncouth name of ticonderoga. if such a place had existence at all, it was there, and there only, that he could expect to behold him again. he became reassured, and all his wonted manliness returned to him. he struck a light, and crept into the cave. a short survey of its interior satisfied him that the stranger was gone. the blanket, the extinguished lamp, and some other things lay there, but no other vestige of its recent inmate was to be seen. inverawe felt relieved; he was saved from even the semblance of inhospitality. but the recollection of the apparition's last words recurred to him, and then every thing around him seemed to whisper him that indeed the time might now be past. he began, most inconsistently, to wish that the stranger had still been there--nay, he almost hoped that he might yet be lingering about the neighbouring rocks or thickets. he sallied forth from the cave, and abandoning all his former caution, he shouted twice or thrice in succession, at the very top of his voice, but without obtaining any response, except that which came from the echoes of the cliffs, muffled as they were by the roar of the numerous cataracts of the mountain side, and the howling blast that swept downward through the pass far below. for a moment he felt that if the stranger had been still in his power, he could have given him up to justice, to be dealt with as a murderer; but reason made him blush, by bringing back to him his high and chivalric sense of honour in its fullest force, so that he turned to go homewards possessed with a very different train of thought. when his lady met him, she was eager in her enquiries, and deeply depressed when she learned that inverawe had now lost all chance of delivering up the murderer. "alas!" said she, in an agony of tears, "the time is now past." "do not allow this matter to distress you so, my love," said inverawe, endeavouring to sooth her into a calm, which he could by no means command for himself. "the more i think of it, the more i am persuaded that the whole has been a phantasm of the brain. let us have a cup of wine, and laugh all such foolish fancies away ere we go to bed. this perplexing and distressing adventure has now passed by, and this night i hope to shake off all such vapours of the imagination." inverawe had little sleep that night, but he was undisturbed by any re-appearance of the apparition. unknown to his wife, he made a circuitous excursion next day to ben-cruachan, where a more accurate examination of the cave and its environs satisfied him that the stranger was indeed gone. and he was gone for ever, for inverawe never afterwards saw him,--nor, indeed, did he ever again hear the slightest intelligence regarding him. days, weeks, and months rolled away, and by degrees the gloom which these extraordinary and portentous events had brought upon inverawe, as well as upon his lady, began to be in a great degree dissipated. his son had long since returned home in full health and vigour, and things fell gradually into their natural and usual course. inverawe was one night sitting in social converse with his wife and his son, and their friend, young george campbell--the same individual who, as you may remember, was the giver of the toast of the roof-tree of inverawe--when a packet of letters was brought in, and handed to the laird. "what is all this?" exclaimed he, quickly breaking the seal, and hastily examining the contents. "ha! the old black watch again! this is news indeed!" "what?--what is it?" cried his lady. "glorious news!" cried inverawe, rubbing his hands. "i am appointed to the majority of the highlanders; and here is an ensign's commission for you, young gentleman," said he, addressing george campbell. "and my friend grant, who writes to me, tells me that he has got the lieutenant-colonelcy. what can be more delightful than the prospect of serving in such a corps, under the command of so old a friend?" "glorious!--glorious!" cried young george campbell, jumping from his chair, and dancing through the room with joy. "a bumper to the gallant highlanders, and their brave commander!" cried inverawe, filling the cups. the toast was quaffed with enthusiasm. young inverawe alone seemed to feel that there was no joy in the cup for him. "would i had a commission too!" said he, in a tone of extreme vexation. "boy," said inverawe, gravely, "your time is coming. it will be well for you to stay at home to look after your mother. one of us two is enough in the field at once." "am i then to be doomed to sloth and idleness at home?" said donald, pettishly; "better put petticoats on me at once, and give me a distaff to wield." "speak not so, donald," said his mother, in a trembling voice. "you are hardly old enough for such warlike undertakings; and, indeed, your father says what is but too true--for what could i do, were both of you to be torn from me?" donald said no more. the cup circulated. george campbell was in high spirits, and full of happy anticipations. "i hope we may soon be sent on service," said he, exultingly. "you may have service sooner than you dream of," said inverawe, going on to gather the remainder of the contents of his packet. "grant writes me here, that in consequence of the turn which matters are taking in america, he hopes every day for the arrival of an order for the regiment to embark. george, you and i must lose no time in making up our kitts, for we must join the corps with all manner of expedition." the parting between inverawe and his lady was tender and touching. donald bid his father farewell with less appearance of regret than his known affection for him would have led any one to have anticipated. there was even a certain smile of triumph on his countenance as he saw them depart. but his mother was too much overwhelmed by her own feelings, to notice any thing regarding those of her son. the meeting between inverawe and his old brother officers was naturally a joyous one, and nothing could be more delightful than the warmth of the reception he met with from his long-tried friend colonel grant, now the commanding-officer of the corps. "my dear fellow, inverawe!" said he, cordially shaking him by the hand, "this happy circumstance of having got you amongst us again, is even more gratifying to me than my own promotion, and yet, let me tell you, the peculiar circumstances attending that were gratifying enough." "i need not assure you that the news of it were most gratifying to me," replied inverawe. "it doubled the happiness i felt, in getting the majority, to find that i was to serve under so old and so much valued a friend. but to what particular circumstances do you allude?" "when the step was opened to me, by the promotion of colonel campbell to the command of the fifty-fourth regiment," replied colonel grant, in a trembling voice, and with the tears beginning to swell in his eyes, "i was not a little surprised, and, as you will readily believe, pleased also, to be waited on by a deputation from the non-commissioned officers and privates of the corps, to make offer to me of a purse containing the sum necessary to purchase the lieutenant-colonelcy, which they had subscribed among themselves, and proposed to present to me, with the selfish view, as the noble fellows declared to me, of securing to themselves as commanding-officer a man whom they all so much loved and respected! campbell!--inverawe!" continued he, with his voice faultering still more from the swelling of his emotions, "i can never forget this, were i to live to the age of methuselah--i can never deserve it all--but--but--phsaw! my heart is too full to give utterance to my feelings--and i must e'en play the woman." "noble fellows indeed!" cried inverawe, fully sympathizing with him in all he felt; "but by my faith they looked at the matter in its true light, when moved by selfish considerations, they were led so to act--for they well knew that you would be as a father to them." "i shall ever be as a father to them whilst it pleases god to spare me," said the colonel warmly, "and if ever i desert them while life remains, may i be blown from the mouth of a cannon!" "what was the result of this matter then?" demanded inverawe. "why, as it happened," replied the colonel, "the promotion went in the regiment without purchase, so that i enjoyed all the pleasure of receiving this kind demonstration from my children, without taxing their pockets, or laying myself under an unpleasant pecuniary obligation to them, which might at times have had a tendency in some degree to paralyze me in the wholesome exercise of strict discipline. and we shall require to stick the more rigidly to that now, seeing that we are going on service." "we are going on service then?" said inverawe. "we have this very evening received our orders for america," replied colonel grant; "and never did commanding-officer go on service with more confidence in his men and officers than i do." "and i may safely say that never did officers or men go on service with greater confidence in their commander than we shall do," replied inverawe, again shaking the colonel heartily by the hand. george campbell was introduced by inverawe to the particular notice of colonel grant, and by him to the rest of the officers, among whom he soon found himself at his ease. the time for their embarkation approached, and all was bustle and preparation amongst them. george had much to do, and it was with some difficulty, but with great inward delight, that he at last found himself complete in all his arms, trappings, and necessaries. the night previous to their going on board of the ships appointed to convey them to their place of destination, was a busy one for him, and he was still occupied, at a late hour, in his quarters, when he was surprised by a knock at his door. "come in!" cried george campbell. the door opened, and a young man entered, whose fatigued and soiled appearance showed that he had come off a long journey. "donald campbell of inverawe!" cried george, in utter astonishment; and the young men were instantly in one another's arms. "my dear fellow, what strange chance has brought you hither?" "i come to throw myself on your honour," said donald. "i come to throw myself on the honour of him whom i have ever held to be my dearest friend;--on the honour of one who has never failed me hitherto, and who, if i mistake not, will not fail me now. give me your solemn promise that you will keep my counsel, and do your best to assist me in my present undertaking." "methinks you need hardly ask for my solemn promise," replied george campbell; "for you might safely count on my best exertions to oblige you at all times. but what can i do for you? it would need to be something that may be quickly and immediately gone about, else cannot i stay to effect it. we embark to-morrow morning." "you will not require to stay behind the rest, in order to do what i require of you," said donald of inverawe. "i could not if i would," replied george campbell. "do you go in the same ship with my father?" demanded young inverawe. "i wish i did," replied george campbell; "but i regret to say that i go in a different vessel." "so much the better for my purpose," replied young inverawe eagerly. "you will be the better able to take me with you without my being discovered." "take you with me!" cried george campbell, in great astonishment. "what in the name of wonder would you propose?" "that which is perfectly reasonable," replied young inverawe. "do you think that i could sit quietly at home, whilst my father, and you, and so many of my friends, are earning honour and glory abroad? ask yourself, george, what would you have done under my circumstances?" "i have never thought as to how i might have acted, had i been so placed," replied george campbell, much perplexed. "but i have no relish for having any hand in aiding you to oppose the will of your father." "no matter now, george, whether you have any relish for it or not," replied young inverawe, smiling. "you have given me your promise that you will aid me, and you must now make the best of it. so come away. let me see how you can best manage to get me aboard. i must not be seen by my father till we land in america, and then i shall enter as a volunteer." "what will your father say then?" demanded george campbell. "why, that the blood of inverawe was too strong in me to be restrained," replied donald. "why man, it is just what he would have done himself. he will be too proud of the spirit inherent in his house, which has impelled me to this act, ever to think of blaming me for it. come, come, you have given me your word." "i have given you my word," said george campbell; "and i must honestly tell you that i wish i had been less precipitate. but having given it, i must in truth abide by it. it may be as you say, that your father will have more pride than pain in this matter, when he comes to know it. and then, as for myself, i shall be too happy to have you as my companion in so long a voyage. but come, let us have some refreshment, and then we can talk over the matter, and consider how your scheme may be best carried into effect." the thing was easily enough arranged. many of the privates of the corps were gentlemen who had attendants of their own. there was nothing extraordinary, therefore, in an officer being so provided. a slight disguise was employed to alter donald's appearance, so that he might escape detection from any one who had seen him before. next morning he went on board in charge of some of ensign george campbell's baggage, and there he remained snugly, until the expedition sailed. the highland regiment embarked full of enthusiasm, and it was ultimately landed at new york in the highest health and spirits. colonel stewart of garth, in his interesting work, tells us, that they were caressed by all ranks and orders of men, but more particularly by the indians. those inhabitants of the wilds flocked from all quarters to see the strangers, as they were on their march to albany, and the resemblance which they discovered between the celtic dress and their own, inclining them to believe that they were of the same extraction as themselves, they hailed them as brothers. orders were issued to treat the indians kindly; but, although these were most generally and most cheerfully obeyed, instances did occur, where gross acts of impropriety and harshness were exhibited towards them, and one of these i shall now mention. a young indian, of tall and handsome proportions, with that conscious air of equality which they all possess, came up to a group of the highlanders who were resting themselves round a fire. an ignorant and mischievous fellow of the party, who much more merited the name of savage than him of the woods, having heated the end of the stalk of a tobacco-pipe, handed it, full of tobacco, with much mock solemnity, to the young indian,--who, in ignorance of the trick, was just about to take it into his hand, and to apply the heated end of it to his lips, when a young highlander who was present, dashed it to the ground. the indian started--looked tomahawks at the highland youth, and might have used one too, had not he, with his glove on, taken up a portion of the broken pipe-stalk, and signing to the indian to feel it, made him sensible of the kind and friendly service he had rendered him. the ferocious rage that lightened in the eye of the red man was at once extinguished. a mild and benignant sunshine succeeded it. he took the hand of the young highlander, and pressed it to his heart; and then, darting a look of dignified contempt upon the poor creature who had been the author of this base and childish piece of knavery against him, he slowly, solemnly, and silently withdrew. whilst major campbell of inverawe was on the march, his noble appearance seemed to make a strong impression on their indian followers. for his part, he was peculiarly struck with the fine figure and graceful mien of a heroic-looking young warrior of the woods, who seemed to keep near to him, as if earnestly intent on holding intercourse with him. he encouraged his approach; and, conversing with him, as well as the young man's imperfect knowledge of english permitted him to do, he invited him, when they halted for refreshment, to partake of his hasty meal. the young eagle eye--for such was the indian's name in his own tribe--carried a rifle; and major campbell having put some questions to him as to his skill in using it, his curiosity was so excited by all that the red man said of himself, that he resolved to put it to the proof. having loaded his own piece, therefore, he proposed to his new indian ally, to take a short circuit, to look for game, during the brief time that the men were allowed for rest, and one or two of the officers arose to accompany them. the eagle eye moved on before them with that silence, and with that dignified air, which marked the confidence which he had in his own powers. a walk of a few hundred yards from their line of march, brought them into a small open space of grassy ground, surrounded by thickets. inverawe stopped by chance to adjust the buckle of his bandoleer, when the eagle eye, who happened at that moment to be some paces to the right of him, sprang on him like a falcon, and threw him to the ground. as he was in the very act of doing so, an arrow from the thicket in front of them pierced the indian's shoulder, whilst he, almost at the same moment, levelled his rifle, fired it in the direction from whence the arrow came, and, rushing forward with a yell, plunged among the bushes. the whole of these circumstances passed so instantaneously, that major campbell's brother officers were confounded. but having assisted him to rise from the ground, they congratulated him on his escape from a danger which neither he nor they could as yet very well comprehend or explain. they were not long left in suspense however, for the eagle eye soon reappeared, dragging from the thicket the body of an indian belonging to a hostile tribe. in an instant, the eagle eye exercised his scalping-knife, and possessed himself of the bloody trophy of his enemy. on examination, the ball from his rifle was discovered to have perforated the brain through the forehead of his victim. the mystery was explained. the young eagle eye had suddenly descried the lurking foe, deeply nestled among the bushes, and in the act of taking a deliberate aim at inverawe. he had saved the major's life at the imminent risk of his own, and that quick sight from which he had his name, had enabled his ready hand to take prompt and deadly vengeance for the wound he had received in doing so. the grateful inverawe felt beggared in expressions of thanks to his indian preserver. he and his friends extracted the arrow from the shoulder of the hero, poured spirits into the wound, and bound it up; and then, as they hastened back to join the troops, he entreated the eagle eye to tell him how he could recompense him. "it is enough for me," replied the young indian warrior, with dignified gravity of manner, mingled with becoming modesty, and in his broken language, the imperfections of which i shall not attempt to give you, though i shall endeavour to preserve the finer peculiarities of its poetical conceptions,--"it is enough for my youth to be suffered to live within the shadow of a chief, broad as that which the great rock spreads over the grassy surface of the prairie. a chief among those who have come over the waters of the great salt lake, in number like that of the beavers of the mohawk, whose fathers were the brethren of our fathers, though their hunting grounds are now so far apart. the tribe of the eagle eye has been broken. the pride of the foes of the eagle eye is swelled by a thousand scalps of his kindred. he is like a solitary tree that has escaped from the whirlwind that has levelled the forest. the eagle eye has no father--he is alone--make him thy son." "you shall be as a son to me!" said inverawe, deeply affected by the many tender recollections of home which this appeal had awakened in his mind. "you shall never want such fatherly protection as i can give you. but i would fain have you ask some more instant and direct recompense from me, for having thus so nobly saved my life at the peril of your own. is there nothing immediate that i can do for you? gratify me by asking something." "the eagle eye will obey his father," replied the indian, calmly. "one of your pale-faced tribe has deeply insulted your red son." "ha!" exclaimed inverawe, "find him out for me, and you shall forthwith see him punished to your heart's content." "the cunning and cowardly kite is beneath the vengeance of the eagle," replied the indian. "but there was a youth among your pale faces, who stood the red man's friend. him would i hold as my brother. him would i bring with me beneath the shelter of my father, the great chief, that he may grow green and lofty under his protection." "you shall search me out that youth," replied inverawe, "and be assured he shall find a friend in me for your sake." the eagle eye, with great dignity, took the right hand of inverawe between both of his, and pressed it forcibly to his heart. when they reached the ground where the men were halting, the major despatched a non-commissioned officer with the indian, to find out the young man, and to bring him immediately before him. they soon reappeared with him; and what was inverawe's astonishment, when he lifted up his eyes, and beheld--his son! it was exactly as donald had himself prognosticated. inverawe's heart was so filled with joy, in thus so unexpectedly beholding and embracing his boy, at the very moment when he had been dreaming that he was so far from him; and with pride in thinking of that brave spirit which had impelled him to follow him to america; as well as with deep gratification at the kind-hearted act which had thus caused him to be so strangely brought before him, that no room was left within it for those gloomy thoughts which might have otherwise arisen there. he clasped him again and again to his bosom, whilst the indian stood by as a calm spectator of the scene, his countenance unmoved by the feelings of sympathy that were working within him. their first emotions were no sooner over, than inverawe hurried donald away to introduce him to the commanding-officer, and he was speedily admitted into the corps as a gentleman volunteer, with the promise of the first vacant ensigncy. it will easily be believed, that the strict ties which were thus formed between the campbells of inverawe and the noble eagle eye, were destined to increase every day. under the direction of his european friends, his wound was treated with the most tender care, and he was soon perfectly cured. the eagle eye deeply felt the kindness of his highland father and brother; but, whether in happiness or in pain, in joy or in grief, his lofty countenance never betrayed those feelings which are so readily yielded to in civilized life. it was in vain that they tried to induce him to adopt european habits, or to domesticate him so far as to make him regularly participate in those comforts, which are the fruits of civilization. he adhered with pertinacity to his own customs, and looked down with barbarian dignity upon those of his hosts, which so widely differed from them; and when at any time he was induced to partake of them, it was with a lofty native politeness, which seemed to indicate that he did so more in compliment to those with whom he was associated, than from any gratification he received in his own person. circumstances, with which they or their commanding-officer had nothing to do, had kept the highlanders altogether out of action during the campaign of , which had done so little for the glory of the british arms. but in the autumn of this year, lord loudon was recalled, and lieutenant-general abercromby succeeded to the command of the army. by this time, the highlanders had received an accession of strength, by the arrival of seven hundred recruits from their native mountains; and the corps now numbered no less than thirteen hundred men, of size, figure, strength, and courage, not easily to be matched. the british army in america now consisted altogether of above twenty-two thousand regulars, and thirty thousand provincial troops, which last could not be classed under that character. the hopes of all were high, therefore, and active operations were immediately contemplated. it was some little time before this, that inverawe was spending an evening, tête-a-tête, with his friend, colonel grant. the bottle was passing slowly but regularly between them, when, by some unaccountable change in their conversation, the subject of supernatural appearances came to be introduced. colonel grant protested against all belief in them. the recollection of the apparition which had three several times visited inverawe, came back upon his mind, in form and colours so strong and forcible, that his cheeks grew pale, and a deep gloom overspread his brow; so much so, indeed, that it did not escape the observation of his friend. colonel grant rallied him, and asked him, jocularly, if he had ever seen a ghost. "i declare i could almost fancy that you saw some spectre at this moment, inverawe," said he. "where?--how?--what?" cried inverawe, darting his eyes into every corner of the room, with a degree of perturbation which the colonel had never seen him display before. "nay," said the colonel, surprised into sudden gravity, "i cannot say either where or what; but i must confess that you seem to me as much disturbed at present as if you saw a spectre." "i cannot see him here," said inverawe, with an abstracted solemnity of tone and manner, that greatly increased his friend's astonishment--"i cannot see him here. this is not the place where i am fated to behold him." "him!" exclaimed colonel grant, with growing anxiety--"him!--whom, i pray you? for heaven's sake, tell me whom it is that you are fated to behold!" "pardon me," replied inverawe, at length in some degree collecting his ideas, but speaking in a solemn tone. "an intense remembrance which came suddenly upon me, regarding strange circumstances which happened to myself, has betrayed me to talk of that which i would have rather avoided, and--and which cannot interest you, incredulous as you have declared yourself to be regarding all such supernatural visitations." "nay, you will pardon me, if you please," said the colonel, eagerly; "for you have so wonderfully excited my curiosity, that i must e'en entreat you to satisfy me. what were these circumstances that happened to you?--tell me, i conjure you." "it is with great pain," said inverawe gravely, "that i enter upon them at all; for, although they still remain as fresh upon my mind as if they had happened yesterday, i would fain bury them, not only from all mankind, but from myself. and yet, perhaps, it may be as well that you should know them,--for strange as they are in themselves, they would yet be stranger in their fulfilment. listen then attentively, and i shall tell you every thing, even to the very minutest thought that possessed me." and so he proceeded to narrate all that i have already told. "strange!" said the colonel, after devouring the narrative with breathless attention--"wonderfully strange indeed! but these are airy phantoms of the brain, which we must not--nay, cannot allow to weigh with us, or to dwell upon our minds--else might we be bereft of reason itself, by permitting them to get mastery over us, and so might we unwittingly aid them in working out their own accomplishment. help yourself to another cup of wine, inverawe, and then let us change the subject for something of a more cheerful nature." but all cheerfulness had fled from inverawe for that night, and the friends soon afterwards separated, to seek a repose, which he at least in vain tried to court to his pillow for many hours; and when sleep did come at last, the figure of the murdered man floated to and fro in his dreams. but it did so, only the more to convince him of the wonderful difference between such faint visions of slumber, and that vivid spectral appearance, which had formerly so terribly and deeply impressed itself upon his waking senses, in his own bed-chamber at inverawe. the conversation i have just repeated, together with inverawe's narrative, remained strongly engraven upon the recollection of colonel grant. the whole circumstances adhered to him so powerfully, that he almost felt as if he too had seen the apparition, and heard him utter his fatal words. he could not divest himself of a most intense solicitude about his friend's future fate, which he could in no manner of way explain to his own rational satisfaction. but the active and bustling duties which now called for his attention, in consequence of the approaching campaign, very speedily banished all such thoughts from his mind. it was not long after this, that colonel grant was summoned by general abercromby to meet the other commanding-officers of corps in a council of war. the council lasted for many hours, and when the colonel came forth from it after it had broken up, he was observed to have a cloud upon his brow, and a certain air of serious anxiety about him, which was very much augmented by his meeting with his friend inverawe. "well," said inverawe cheerfully to him, as colonel grant joined him and his other officers at mess. "i hope you have good news for us, colonel, and that at last you can tell us that we are to march out of quarters on some piece of active service." "we are to march to-morrow," replied the colonel, with unusual gravity. "whither?" cried inverawe eagerly. "whither, if i may be permitted to ask?" "we march to lake george," replied the colonel, with a very manifest disposition to taciturnity. "pardon me," said inverawe; "perhaps i push my questions indiscreetly,--if so, forgive me." "no," replied the colonel, with assumed carelessness. "i have nothing which the good of the service requires me to conceal from you, inverawe, nor, indeed, from any one here present. we march for lake george, as i have already said; and there we are to be embarked in boats to proceed up the lake. our object," added he, in a deeper and somewhat melancholy tone,--"our object is to attack fort defiance." "what sort of a place is it?" demanded one of the officers. "a strong place, as i understand from the engineer who reconnoitred it," replied the colonel. "but these american fastnesses are so beset with forests, that no one can well judge of them till he is fairly within their entrenchments." "then let us pledge this cup to our speedy possession of them!" exclaimed inverawe joyously. "with all my heart," said the colonel, filling his to the brim,--but with a solemnity of countenance that sorted but ill with the cheerful shouts of mutual interchange of congratulation, that arose around the table. "with all my heart, i drink the toast, and may we all be there alive to drink a cup of thanks for our success." "father," cried young inverawe, in his keenness overlooking the colonel's ominous addition to the toast; "now father, these frenchmen shall see what stuff highlanders are made of!" "they shall, my boy," replied inverawe.--"come, then, as i am master of the revels to-night, i call on you all to fill a brimmer.--i give you highlanders shoulder to shoulder!" "hurrah!--hurrah!--hurrah!" vociferated the whole officers present. this was but the commencement of an evening of more than usual jollity. the spirits of all were up,--and of all, none were so high in glee as those of inverawe and his son. there was something, indeed, which might have been almost said to have been strangely wild in the unwonted revelry of the father. colonel grant was the only individual present, who did not seem to keep pace with the rest. the flask circulated with more than ordinary rapidity and frequency,--but as the mirth which it created rose higher and higher, and especially with inverawe and young donald, colonel grant's thoughts seemed to sink deeper and deeper into gloomy speculation. if any one chanced so far to forget his own hilarity for a moment, as to observe this strange anomaly in his commanding-officer, it is probable that he attributed it to those cares, which must necessarily arise in the mind of one, with whom so much of the responsibility of the approaching contest must rest. he retired from the festive board at an early hour, leaving the others, who kept up their night's enjoyment as long as they could do so with decency. inverawe and his son sat with them to the last; and all agreed, at parting, that they had been the life and soul of that evening's revel. the next morning, the officers of the highlanders were early astir, to get their men into order of march. major campbell of inverawe was the most active man among them. general abercromby's force upon this occasion consisted of about six thousand regulars, and nine thousand provincial troops, together with a small train of artillery. before they moved off, the general rode along the line of troops, giving his directions to the field officers of each battalion in succession. when he came up to the highlanders, he courteously accosted colonel grant and major campbell. "gentlemen," said he, "we shall have toughish work of it; for though the enemy have not had time to complete their defences, yet, i am told, that, even in its present state, there are few places which are naturally likely to be of more troublesome entrance than we shall find----" "than we shall find fort defiance," somewhat strangely interrupted colonel grant, with an emphasis which not a little surprised inverawe, as coming from a man usually so polite.--"aye, i have heard, indeed, that fort defiance is naturally a strong place, general. but what will not highlanders accomplish!--you may rely on it you shall have no cause to complain of the black watch!" "i have no fear that i shall," replied the general, betraying no symptom of having taken offence at the colonel's apparently unaccountable interruption. "i know that both you and your men will do your duty against fort defiance, or any other fort in america." "fort defiance is a bold name, general," said major campbell, laughing. "it is a bold name," said the colonel gravely. "it is a vaunting name enough," replied the general.--"yet i hope to meet you both alive and merry as conquerors within its works. meanwhile, gentlemen, pray get your highlanders under march for the boats with as little delay as possible." not another word but the necessary words of command were now uttered. the regiment moved off steadily, and the embarkation on lake george was speedily effected, with the most perfect regularity and order, on the th of july, . it must have been a beautiful sight indeed, to have beheld that immense flotilla of boats moving over the pellucid surface of that lovely sheet of water--not a sound proceeding from them save that of the oars,--the unruffled bosom of the lake every where reflecting the serene sky of a july evening, together with all the charms of its bold and varied shores, and its romantic islands;--its stillness affording a strange prelude to that tempest of mortal contest which was about to ensue. its breadth is about two miles--so that the boats nearly covered it from side to side. as they moved on, they were occasionally lost to the eyes of those who looked upon them from the shores, as they disappeared into the numerous channels formed by its islands, or were again discovered, as they emerged from these narrow straits. there were snatches of scenery, and many little circumstances in the features of nature around them, that called up the remembrance of their own loch awe to both the laird of inverawe and young donald, as the sun went down; and the pensiveness arising from these home recollections, at such a time, kept both of them silent. at length, after a safe, and easy, and, on the part of the enemy, an unobserved navigation, the boats reached the northern end of the lake early on the ensuing morning; and the landing having been effected without opposition, the troops were formed by general abercromby into two parallel columns. the order was given to advance; and the troops speedily came to an outpost of the enemy, which was abandoned without a shot. but as they proceeded, the nature of the ground, encumbered as it was with trees, rendered the march of both lines uncertain and wavering, so that the columns soon began to interfere with each other; and great confusion ensued. whilst endeavouring to extend themselves, the right column, composed of the highlanders, and the fifty-fifth regiment, under the command of lord howe, fell in with a detachment of the enemy, which had got bewildered in the wood, just as they themselves had done. the british attacked them briskly, and a sharp contest followed. the enemy behaved gallantly; and the highlanders especially distinguished themselves. young donald of inverawe, his bosom bounding with excitement, from the shouts of those engaged in the skirmish, rushed into the thickest part of the irregular melée, and performed such feats of prowess with his maiden claymore, that they might have done honour to an old and well-tried soldier. excited yet more by his success, he became rash and unguarded, and being too forward in the pursuit among the trees--which had already broken the troops on both sides into small handfulls--he found himself suddenly engaged with three enemies at once. as he was just about to be overpowered by their united pressure upon him, a ball from a rifle stretched one of them lifeless before him, and in an instant afterwards, the eagle eye, whose accurate aim had directed it to its deadly errand, was flourishing his tomahawk over the head of another of his foes. it fell upon him--the skull was split open--the man rolled down on the ground a ghastly corpse; and the third, that was left opposed to young inverawe, began to give way in terror before him. urging fiercely upon this last foe, however, the youth ran him through with one tremendous thrust, and he too dropped dead. flushed with success, donald campbell was now about to continue the pursuit, after some fugitives of the enemy, who came rushing past him, when, turning to call on his red brother and preserver, the eagle eye, to follow him, he beheld him stooping over one of his dead foes, in the act of scalping him. at that very moment, he saw a french soldier approaching his indian brother unperceived, with sword uplifted, and with the fell intent of hewing him down. springing before the eagle eye, the young inverawe prepared himself to receive the meditated stroke--warded it skilfully off,--and then following in on his foe with a thrust, he penetrated him right through the breast, with a wound that was instantaneously mortal. the eagle eye was now as sensible that he owed his life to young donald, as donald could have been that his had been preserved by the indian warrior. they stood for a moment gazing at each other,--and then they embraced, with an affection, which the stern eagle eye had difficulty in veiling, and which young inverawe could not conceal. by this time the enemy were all cut to pieces, or put to flight. the joy of this unexpected victory was turned into mourning, by the death of lord howe, who had been unfortunately killed in the early part of this random engagement. his loss, at such a time, was greater than anything they had gained by this partial overthrow of the enemy. and you will easily understand this, when i tell you, that it was said of this young nobleman, that he particularly distinguished himself by his courage, activity, and rigid observance of military discipline; and that he had so acquired the esteem and affection of the soldiers, by his generosity, sweetness of manners, and engaging address, that they assembled in groups around the hurried grave to which his venerated remains were consigned, and wept over it in deep and silent grief. the troops having been much harassed by this engagement, as well as by the troublesome nature of their march, general abercromby, in consideration of the lateness of the hour, deemed it prudent, to deliver them from the embarrassment of the woods, to march them back to the landing-place; which they reached early in the morning. they were then allowed the whole of the ensuing day and night for repose. but on the morning of the th of july, he rode up to the lines of the highlanders, and saluting colonel grant and major campbell of inverawe, "gentlemen," said he, "i have just obtained information from some of the prisoners, that general levi is advancing with three thousand men to reinforce, or succour,--a--a--a--to succour, i say,--the garrison i wish to attack." "what!" exclaimed colonel grant,--"to succour fort defiance, general? then i presume you will move on directly, to strike the blow before they can arrive." "that is exactly my intention," replied general abercromby. "and now i must tell you, confidentially, gentlemen, that the present garrison consists of fully five thousand men, of whom the greater part are said to be french troops of the line; who, as i am informed, are stationed behind the traverses, with large trees lying every where felled in front of them. but i have sent forward an engineer to reconnoitre more strictly, and i trust i shall have his report before we shall have advanced as far as--as--" "as fort defiance," interrupted colonel grant. "well, general, are we to be in the advance?" "no," replied the general. "as you and the fifty-fifth have had all the fighting that has as yet fallen to our lot, i mean that you shall be in the reserve upon this occasion. the picquets will commence the assault, and they will be followed by the grenadiers,--which will be in their turn supported by the battalions of the reserve.--nay, do not look mortified, colonel;--you and your men will have a bellyfull of it before all is done, i promise you." with these words the general left them, and the columns moved on through the wood, in the order he had signified to them. they had now possessed themselves of better guides, and they were thus enabled to make their march more direct, and as they had already cleared their front of enemies, the leading troops were soon up at the entrenchments. here they were surprised to find a regular breast work, nine or ten feet high, strongly defended with wall-pieces, and having a very impregnable chevaux de frise, whilst the whole ground in front was every where strewed thickly over with huge newly felled oak trees, for the distance of about a cannon-shot from the walls. from behind the chevaux de frise, the enemy, in strong force, commenced a most galling and destructive fire upon the assailants, so as to render the works almost unapproachable, without certain destruction, especially without the artillery, which, from some accident, had not as yet been brought up. but the very danger they had to encounter seemed to give the british troops a more than human courage. regardless of the hail-storm of bullets discharged on them, with deliberate aim, from behind the abattis, whilst they were fighting their laborious and painful way through the labyrinth of fallen trunks and branches that opposed their passage, they continued, column after column, to advance, dropping and thinning fearfully as they went. the highlanders beheld this slaughter that the enemy was making of their friends--their blood boiled within them. in vain colonel grant and major campbell galloped backwards and forwards, along the line, using every command and every argument that official authority or reason could employ to restrain and to sooth them, till their time for action should arrive. with one tremendous shout, they rushed forward from the reserve, and cutting their way through the trees with their claymores, they were soon shewing their plumed crests among the very foremost ranks of the assailants. but so murderous was the fire that fell upon them, that their black tufted bonnets were seen dropping in all directions, never to be again raised by the brave heads that bore them. their loss, before they gained the outward defences of the fort, was fearful; but the onset of those who survived was so overwhelming, that it drove the enemy from these outworks, and compelled them to retreat within the body of the fort itself. now came the most dreadful part of this work of death. the garrison, protected by the works of the fort, mowed down the ranks of the besiegers with a yet more certain and unerring aim. under the false report that these works were as yet incomplete, scaling ladders had been considered as unnecessary. the highlanders, gnashing their teeth like raging tigers caught in the toils, endeavoured to clamber up the front of them, by rearing themselves on each other's shoulders, and by digging holes with their swords and bayonets in the face of the intrenchments. some few succeeded, by such means, in gaining a footing on the top. but it was only to make themselves more conspicuous, and more certain marks for destruction; and they were no sooner seen, than their lifeless bodies, perforated by showers of bullets, were swept down upon their struggling comrades below. by repeated and multiplied exertions of this kind, captain john campbell succeeded in forcing his way entirely over the breastwork, at the head of a handful of men; but they also were instantly despatched by the multitude of bayonets by which they were assailed. four hours did these gallant men persevere in the repetition of such daring attempts as i have described--all, alas! with equal want of success, and with increasing slaughter, till general abercromby ordered the retreat to be sounded. to this call, however, the highlanders were deaf; and it was not until colonel grant, after receiving three successive orders from the general, which he had failed in enforcing, threw himself among them, and literally drove them back from the works with his sword, that he could collect and bring away the small moiety that yet remained alive, of that splendid regiment with which he had marched to the attack. more than one-half of the men, and two-thirds of the officers, were lying killed or wounded on that bloody field. colonel grant had hardly gathered this remnant of his men together, when he hastened back over the ground where the contest had raged, to search eagerly for some of those whom he most dearly loved, and for the cause of whose absence from this hasty muster he trembled to inquire or investigate. the enemy, though victorious, had been too roughly handled to be tempted to a sally, for the mere purpose of annoying those who were peacefully engaged in the sad duty of carrying off their wounded or dying comrades. the colonel was therefore enabled to make his way over the encumbered field without molestation, and with no other interruption than that which was presented to him by the prostrate trees, which, however, seemed to him to offer greater obstruction to his present impatience, than they had done during his advance with his corps to the attack. the scene was strangely terrible! it might have been imagined by any one who looked upon that field, that all nature, even the elements themselves, had been at strife. slaughtered, and mutilated, and dying men lay in confused heaps, or scattered singly among the overthrown giants of the forest, those enormous trees which had been so recently rooted in the primeval soil, where they had stood for ages. colonel grant looked everywhere anxiously around him. many were the familiar faces that he recognized, but their features were now so fixed by the last agonizing pang of a violent death, as cruelly, yet certainly, to assure him, that they could never again in this world recognize him. the last spirited words of high and courageous hope, so recently uttered by many of them to him in their anticipation of triumph, still rang in his recollection, and as he tore his eyes away from them, the tears would burst over his manly cheeks as the thought arose in his mind, that words of theirs would never again reach his ears. he moved hurriedly on, endeavouring to suppress his feelings, but every now and then compelled to give way to them, till his attention was absorbingly attracted by descrying the dark form of an indian, who was seated on his hams, beneath the arched trunk and boughs of a huge felled oak. it was the eagle eye. he sat motionless as a bronze statue, with the drapery of his blanket, hanging in deep folds from his shoulders. his features were grave and still, and apparently devoid of feeling; but his eyes were turned downward, and they were immovably fixed on the countenance of a young man, who lay stretched out a corpse before him. his head was supported between the knees of the red man, whilst the cold and stiffened fingers of him who was dead, were firmly clasped between both his hands. the body was that of young donald campbell of inverawe. "god help me!" cried the colonel, clasping his hands, and weeping bitterly. "god help me, what a spectacle!" "why should you weep, old man?" said the eagle eye, with imperturbable calmness. "my young brother has gone to the great spirit, like a great warrior as he was. who among his tribe shall be ashamed of him? who among warriors shall call him a woman? i could weep for him too, did i not know that the great spirit has taken him to happiness, from which it were wicked in me to wish to have detained him for my own miserable gratification. but he is happy! he has gone to those fair, boundless, and plentiful hunting-grounds that lie beyond the great lake, where he will never know want, and where we, if our deeds be like his, will surely follow him. but till then, the sunshine of the eagle eye has departed, and night must surround his footsteps, since the light of his pale-faced brother has departed!" "this is too much!" said the colonel, quite overwhelmed by his feelings. "help him to bear off the body. it must not be left here." the eagle eye arose in silence, and gravely and solemnly assisted the highlander, who attended the colonel, to lift and bear away the body, and they had not thus proceeded more than a few paces in their retreat from the works, when the weeping eyes of the highland commanding-officer, and the eagle gaze of the red warrior, were equally arrested, at the same moment, by one and the same object. this was the manly and heroic form of major campbell of inverawe. he sat on the ground, desperately wounded, with his back partially supported against the body of his horse, which had been killed under him. his eye-balls were stretched from their sockets, and fixed upon vacancy, with an expression of terror, greater than that with which death himself, riding triumphant as he was over that field of the slain, could have filled those of so brave a man. colonel grant was so overcome, that he could not utter a word. he was convulsed by his emotions. the eagle eye laid down the body of donald opposite to his father, and silently resumed his former position, with the youth's head between his knees. the father's eyes caught the motionless features of his son, and he started from his strange state of abstraction. "my son!" murmured the wounded inverawe. "so, it is as i supposed,--he is gone! but i shall soon be with you, boy. god in his mercy help and protect your poor mother!" "speak not thus, my dearest friend!" said colonel grant, making an effort to command himself, and hastening to support and comfort the wounded man; "trust me you will yet do well. you must live for your poor wife's sake." "no!" replied inverawe, with deep solemnity. "my hour is come. in vain was it that your kind friendship, and that of the brave abercromby, succeeded in deceiving me,--for i have seen him--i have seen him terribly,--and this is ticonderoga!" "pardon me, my dear inverawe, for a deception which was so well intended," said the colonel, much agitated. "it is indeed ticonderoga as you say, but--but--believe me,--that which now disturbs you was only some phantom of your brain, arising from loss of blood and weakness. cheer up!--come, man!--come!--inverawe!--merciful heaven, he is gone!" end of volume third. notes [ ] a scottish farmer's house and offices. [ ] plaid. [ ] remove. [ ] ancestors. [ ] innermost. proofreading team. what's mine's mine by george macdonald in three volumes vol. i. contents of vol. i. chapter i. how come they there? ii. a short glance over the shoulder iii. the girls' first walk iv. the shop in the village v. the chief vi. work and wage vii. mother and son viii. a morning call ix. mr. sercombe x. the plough-bulls xi. the fir-grove xii. among the hills xiii. the lake xiv. the wolves xv. the gulf that divided xvi. the clan christmas xvii. between dancing and supper what's mine's mine. chapter i. how come they there? the room was handsomely furnished, but such as i would quarrel with none for calling common, for it certainly was uninteresting. not a thing in it had to do with genuine individual choice, but merely with the fashion and custom of the class to which its occupiers belonged. it was a dining-room, of good size, appointed with all the things a dining-room "ought" to have, mostly new, and entirely expensive--mirrored sideboard in oak; heavy chairs, just the dozen, in fawn-coloured morocco seats and backs--the dining-room, in short, of a london-house inhabited by rich middle-class people. a big fire blazed in the low round-backed grate, whose flashes were reflected in the steel fender and the ugly fire-irons that were never used. a snowy cloth of linen, finer than ordinary, for there was pride in the housekeeping, covered the large dining-table, and a company, evidently a family, was eating its breakfast. but how come these people there? for, supposing my reader one of the company, let him rise from the well-appointed table--its silver, bright as the complex motions of butler's elbows can make it; its china, ornate though not elegant; its ham, huge, and neither too fat nor too lean; its game-pie, with nothing to be desired in composition, or in flavour natural or artificial;--let him rise from these and go to the left of the two windows, for there are two opposite each other, the room having been enlarged by being built out: if he be such a one as i would have for a reader, might i choose--a reader whose heart, not merely his eye, mirrors what he sees--one who not merely beholds the outward shows of things, but catches a glimpse of the soul that looks out of them, whose garment and revelation they are;--if he be such, i say, he will stand, for more than a moment, speechless with something akin to that which made the morning stars sing together. he finds himself gazing far over western seas, while yet the sun is in the east. they lie clear and cold, pale and cold, broken with islands scattering thinner to the horizon, which is jagged here and there with yet another. the ocean looks a wild, yet peaceful mingling of lake and land. some of the islands are green from shore to shore, of low yet broken surface; others are mere rocks, with a bold front to the sea, one or two of them strange both in form and character. over the pale blue sea hangs the pale blue sky, flecked with a few cold white clouds that look as if they disowned the earth they had got so high--though none the less her children, and doomed to descend again to her bosom. a keen little wind is out, crisping the surface of the sea in patches--a pretty large crisping to be seen from that height, for the window looks over hill above hill to the sea. life, quiet yet eager, is all about; the solitude itself is alive, content to be a solitude because it is alive. its life needs nothing from beyond--is independent even of the few sails of fishing boats that here and there with their red brown break the blue of the water. if my reader, gently obedient to my thaumaturgy, will now turn and cross to the other window, let him as he does so beware of casting a glance on his right towards the place he has left at the table, for the room will now look to him tenfold commonplace, so that he too will be inclined to ask, "how come these and their belongings here--just here?"--let him first look from the window. there he sees hills of heather rolling away eastward, at middle distance beginning to rise into mountains, and farther yet, on the horizon, showing snow on their crests--though that may disappear and return several times before settling down for the winter. it is a solemn and very still region--not a pretty country at all, but great--beautiful with the beauties of colour and variety of surface; while, far in the distance, where the mountains and the clouds have business together, its aspect rises to grandeur. to his first glance probably not a tree will be discoverable; the second will fall upon a solitary clump of firs, like a mole on the cheek of one of the hills not far off, a hill steeper than most of them, and green to the top. is my reader seized with that form of divine longing which wonders what lies over the nearest hill? does he fancy, ascending the other side to its crest, some sweet face of highland girl, singing songs of the old centuries while yet there was a people in these wastes? why should he imagine in the presence of the actual? why dream when the eyes can see? he has but to return to the table to reseat himself by the side of one of the prettiest of girls! she is fair, yet with a glowing tinge under her fairness which flames out only in her eyes, and seldom reddens her skin. she has brown hair with just a suspicion of red and no more, and a waviness that turns to curl at the ends. she has a good forehead, arched a little, not without a look of habitation, though whence that comes it might be hard to say. there are no great clouds on that sky of the face, but there is a soft dimness that might turn to rain. she has a straight nose, not too large for the imperfect yet decidedly greek contour; a doubtful, rather straight, thin-lipped mouth, which seems to dissolve into a bewitching smile, and reveals perfect teeth--and a good deal more to the eyes that can read it. when the mouth smiles, the eyes light up, which is a good sign. their shape is long oval--and their colour when unlighted, much that of an unpeeled almond; when she smiles, they grow red. she has an object in life which can hardly be called a mission. she is rather tall, and quite graceful, though not altogether natural in her movements. her dress gives a feathery impression to one who rather receives than notes the look of ladies. she has a good hand--not the doll hand so much admired of those who can judge only of quantity and know nothing of quality, but a fine sensible hand,--the best thing about her: a hand may be too small just as well as too large. poor mother earth! what a load of disappointing women, made fit for fine things, and running all to self and show, she carries on her weary old back! from all such, good lord deliver us!--except it be for our discipline or their awaking. near her at the breakfast table sits one of aspect so different, that you could ill believe they belonged to the same family. she is younger and taller--tall indeed, but not ungraceful, though by no means beautiful. she has all the features that belong to a face--among them not a good one. stay! i am wrong: there were in truth, dominant over the rest, two good features--her two eyes, dark as eyes well could be without being all pupil, large, and rather long like her sister's until she looked at you, and then they opened wide. they did not flash or glow, but were full of the light that tries to see--questioning eyes. they were simple eyes--i will not say without arriere pensee, for there was no end of thinking faculty, if not yet thought, behind them,--but honest eyes that looked at you from the root of eyes, with neither attack nor defence in them. if she was not so graceful as her sister, she was hardly more than a girl, and had a remnant of that curiously lovely mingling of grace and clumsiness which we see in long-legged growing girls. i will give her the advantage of not being further described, except so far as this--that her hair was long and black, that her complexion was dark, with something of a freckly unevenness, and that her hands were larger and yet better than her sister's. there is one truth about a plain face, that may not have occurred to many: its ugliness accompanies a condition of larger undevelopment, for all ugliness that is not evil, is undevelopment; and so implies the larger material and possibility of development. the idea of no countenance is yet carried out, and this kind will take more developing for the completion of its idea, and may result in a greater beauty. i would therefore advise any young man of aspiration in the matter of beauty, to choose a plain woman for wife--if through her plainness she is yet lovely in his eyes; for the loveliness is herself, victorious over the plainness, and her face, so far from complete and yet serving her loveliness, has in it room for completion on a grander scale than possibly most handsome faces. in a handsome face one sees the lines of its coming perfection, and has a glimpse of what it must be when finished: few are prophets enough for a plain face. a keen surprise of beauty waits many a man, if he be pure enough to come near the transfiguration of the homely face he loved. this plain face was a solemn one, and the solemnity suited the plainness. it was not specially expressive--did not look specially intelligent; there was more of latent than operative power in it--while her sister's had more expression than power. both were lady-like; whether they were ladies, my reader may determine. there are common ladies and there are rare ladies; the former may be countesses; the latter may be peasants. there were two younger girls at the table, of whom i will say nothing more than that one of them looked awkward, promised to be handsome, and was apparently a good soul; the other was pretty, and looked pert. the family possessed two young men, but they were not here; one was a partner in the business from which his father had practically retired; the other was that day expected from oxford. the mother, a woman with many autumnal reminders of spring about her, sat at the head of the table, and regarded her queendom with a smile a little set, perhaps, but bright. she had the look of a woman on good terms with her motherhood, with society, with the universe--yet had scarce a shadow of assumption on her countenance. for if she felt as one who had a claim upon things to go pleasantly with her, had she not put in her claim, and had it acknowledged? her smile was a sweet white-toothed smile, true if shallow, and a more than tolerably happy one--often irradiating the governor opposite--for so was the head styled by the whole family from mother to chit. he was the only one at the table on whose countenance a shadow--as of some end unattained--was visible. he had tried to get into parliament, and had not succeeded; but i will not presume to say that was the source of the shadow. he did not look discontented, or even peevish; there was indeed a certain radiance of success about him-only above the cloudy horizon of his thick, dark eyebrows, seemed to hang a thundery atmosphere. his forehead was large, but his features rather small; he had, however, grown a trifle fat, which tended to make up. in his youth he must have been very nice-looking, probably too pretty to be handsome. in good health and when things went well, as they had mostly done with him, he was sweet-tempered; what he might be in other conditions was seldom conjectured. but was that a sleeping thunder-cloud, or only the shadow of his eyebrows? he had a good opinion of himself-on what grounds i do not know; but he was rich, and i know no better ground; i doubt if there is any more certain soil for growing a good opinion of oneself. certainly, the more you try to raise one by doing what is right and worth doing, the less you succeed. mr. peregrine palmer had finished his breakfast, and sat for a while looking at nothing in particular, plunged in deep thought about nothing at all, while the girls went on with theirs. he was a little above the middle height, and looked not much older than his wife; his black hair had but begun to be touched with silver; he seemed a man without an atom of care more than humanity counts reasonable; his speech was not unlike that of an englishman, for, although born in glasgow, he had been to oxford. he spoke respectfully to his wife, and with a pleasant playfulness to his daughters; his manner was nowise made to order, but natural enough; his grammar was as good as conversation requires; everything was respectable about him-and yet-he was one remove at least from a gentleman. something hard to define was lacking to that idea of perfection. mr. peregrine palmer's grandfather had begun to make the family fortune by developing a little secret still in a remote highland glen, which had acquired a reputation for its whisky, into a great superterrene distillery. both he and his son made money by it, and it had "done well" for mr. peregrine also. with all three of them the making of money had been the great calling of life. they were diligent in business, fervent in spirit, serving mammon, and founding claim to consideration on the fact. neither jacob nor john palmer's worst enemy had ever called him a hypocrite: neither had been suspected of thinking to serve mammon and god. both had gone regularly to church, but neither had taught in a sunday school, or once gone to a week-day sermon. peregrine had built a church and a school. he did not now take any active part in the distillery, but worked mainly in money itself. jacob, the son of a ship-chandler in greenock, had never thought about gentleman or no gentleman; but his son john had entertained the difference, and done his best to make a gentleman of peregrine; and neither peregrine nor any of his family ever doubted his father's success; and if he had not quite succeeded, i would have the blame laid on peregrine and not on either father or grandfather. for a man to grow a gentleman, it is of great consequence that his grandfather should have been an honest man; but if a man be a gentleman, it matters little what his grandfather or grandmother either was. nay--if a man be a gentleman, it is of the smallest consequence, except for its own sake, whether the world counts him one or not. mr. peregrine palmer rose from the table with a merry remark on the prolongation of the meal by his girls, and went towards the door. "are you going to shoot?" asked his wife. "not to-day. but i am going to look after my guns. i daresay they've got them all right, but there's nothing like seeing to a thing yourself!" mr. palmer had this virtue, and this very gentlemanlike way--that he always gave his wife as full an answer as he would another lady. he was not given to marital brevity. he was there for the grouse-shooting--not exactly, only "as it were." he did not care very much about the sport, and had he cared nothing, would have been there all the same. other people, in what he counted his social position, shot grouse, and he liked to do what other people did, for then he felt all right: if ever he tried the gate of heaven, it would be because other people did. but the primary cause of his being so far in the north was the simple fact that he had had the chance of buying a property very cheap--a fine property of mist and cloud, heather and rock, mountain and moor, and with no such reputation for grouse as to enhance its price. "my estate" sounded well, and after a time of good preserving he would be able to let it well, he trusted. no sooner was it bought than his wife and daughters were eager to visit it; and the man of business, perceiving it would cost him much less if they passed their autumns there instead of on the continent, proceeded at once to enlarge the house and make it comfortable. if they should never go a second time, it would, with its perfect appointments, make the shooting there more attractive! they had arrived the day before. the journey had been fatiguing, for a great part of it was by road; but they were all in splendid health, and not too tired to get up at a reasonable hour the next day. chapter ii. a short glance over the shoulder. mr. peregrine was the first of the palmer family to learn that there was a palmer coat of arms. he learned it at college, and on this wise. one day a fellow-student, who pleased himself with what he called philology, remarked that his father must have been a hit of a humorist to name him peregrine:--"except indeed it be a family name!" he added. "i never thought about it," said peregrine. "i don't quite know what you mean." the fact was he had no glimmer of what he meant. "nothing profound," returned the other. "only don't you see peregrine means pilgrim? it is the same as the italian pellegrino, from the latin, peregrinus, which means one that goes about the fields,--what in scotland you call a landlouper." "well, but," returned peregrine, hesitatingly, "i don't find myself much wiser. peregrine means a pilgrim, you say, but what of that? all names mean something, i suppose! it don't matter much." "what is your coat of arms?" "i don't know." "why did your father call you peregrine?" "i don't know that either. i suppose because he liked the name." "why should he have liked it?" continued the other, who was given to the socratic method. "i know no more than the man in the moon." "what does your surname mean?" "something to do with palms, i suppose." "doubtless." "you see i don't go in for that kind of thing like you!" "any man who cares about the cut of his coat, might have a little curiosity about the cut of his name: it sits to him a good deal closer!" "that is true--so close that you can't do anything with it. i can't pull mine off however you criticize it!" "you can change it any day. would you like to change it?" "no, thank you, mr. stokes!" returned peregrine dryly. "i didn't mean with mine," growled the other. "my name is an historical one too--but that is not in question.--do you know your crest ought to be a hairy worm?" "why?" "don't you know the palmer-worm? it got its name where you got yours!" "well, we all come from adam!" "what! worms and all?" "surely. we're all worms, the parson says. come, put me through; it's time for lunch. or, if you prefer, let me burst in ignorance. i don't mind." "well, then, i will explain. the palmer was a pilgrim: when he came home, he carried a palm-branch to show he had been to the holy land." "did the hairy worm go to the holy land too?" "he is called a palmer-worm because he has feet enough to go any number of pilgrimages. but you are such a land-louper, you ought to blazon two hairy worms saltier-wise." "i don't understand." "why, your name, interpreted to half an ear, is just pilgrim pilgrim!" "i wonder if my father meant it!" "that i cannot even guess at, not having the pleasure of knowing your father. but it does look like a paternal joke!" his friend sought out for him the coat and crest of the palmers; but for the latter, strongly recommended a departure: the fresh family-branch would suit the worm so well!--his crest ought to be two worms crossed, tufted, the tufts ouched in gold. it was not heraldic language, but with peregrine passed well enough. still he did not take to the worms, but contented himself with the ordinary crest. he was henceforth, however, better pleased with his name, for he fancied in it something of the dignity of a doubled surname. his first glance at his wife was because she crossed the field of his vision; his second glance was because of her beauty; his third because her name was shelley. it is marvellous how whimsically sentimental commonplace people can be where their own interesting personality is concerned: her name he instantly associated with scallop-shell, and began to make inquiry about her. learning that her other name was miriam, one also of the holy land-- "a most remarkable coincidence!--a mere coincidence of course!" he said to himself. "evidently that is the woman destined to be the companion of my pilgrimage!" when their first child was born, the father was greatly exercised as to a fitting name for him. he turned up an old botany book, and sought out the scientific names of different palms. chamaerops would not do, for it was a dwarf-palm; borassus might do, seeing it was a boy--only it stood for a fan-palm; corypha would not be bad for a girl, only it was the name of a heathen goddess, and would not go well with the idea of a holy palmer. cocoa, phoenix, and areca, one after the other, went in at his eyes and through his head; none of them pleased him. his wife, however, who in her smiling way had fallen in with his whim, helped him out of his difficulty. she was the daughter of nonconformist parents in lancashire, and had been encouraged when a child to read a certain old-fashioned book called the pilgrim's progress, which her husband had never seen. he did not read it now, but accepting her suggestion, named the boy christian. when a daughter came, he would have had her christiana, but his wife persuaded him to be content with christina. they named their second son valentine, after mr. valiant-for-truth. their second daughter was mercy; and for the third and fourth, hope and grace seemed near enough. so the family had a cool glow of puritanism about it, while nothing was farther from the thoughts of any of them than what their names signified. all, except the mother, associated them with the crusades for the rescue of the sepulchre of the lord from the pagans; not a thought did one of them spend on the rescue of a live soul from the sepulchre of low desires, mean thoughts, and crawling selfishness. chapter iii. the girls' first walk. the governor, peregrine and palmer as he was, did not care about walking at any time, not even when he had to do it because other people did; the mother, of whom there would have been little left had the sweetness in her moral, and the house-keeping in her practical nature, been subtracted, had things to see to within doors: the young people must go out by themselves! they put on their hats, and issued. the temperature was keen, though it was now nearly the middle of august, by which time in those northern regions the earth has begun to get a little warm: the house stood high, and the atmosphere was thin. there was a certain sense of sadness in the pale sky and its cold brightness; but these young people felt no cold, and perceived no sadness. the air was exhilarating, and they breathed deep breaths of a pleasure more akin to the spiritual than they were capable of knowing. for as they gazed around them, they thought, like hamlet's mother in the presence of her invisible husband, that they saw all there was to be seen. they did not know nature: in the school to which they had gone they patronized instead of revering her. she wrought upon them nevertheless after her own fashion with her children, unheedful whether they knew what she was about or not. the mere space, the mere height from which they looked, the rarity of the air, the soft aspiration of earth towards heaven, made them all more of children. but not one of them being capable of enjoying anything by herself, together they were unable to enjoy much; and, like the miser who, when he cannot much enjoy his money, desires more, began to desire more company to share in the already withering satisfaction of their new possession--to help them, that is, to get pleasure out of it, as out of a new dress. it is a good thing to desire to share a good thing, but it is not well to be unable alone to enjoy a good thing. it is our enjoyment that should make us desirous to share. what is there to share if the thing be of no value in itself? to enjoy alone is to be able to share. no participation can make that of value which in itself is of none. it is not love alone but pride also, and often only pride, that leads to the desire for another to be present with us in possession. the girls grew weary of the show around them because it was so quiet, so regardless of their presence, so moveless, so monotonous. endless change was going on, but it was too slow for them to see; had it been rapid, its motions were not of a kind to interest them. ere half an hour they had begun to think with regret of piccadilly and regent street--for they had passed the season in london. there is a good deal counted social which is merely gregarious. doubtless humanity is better company than a bare hill-side; but not a little depends on how near we come to the humanity, and how near we come to the hill. i doubt if one who could not enjoy a bare hill-side alone, would enjoy that hill-side in any company; if he thought he did, i suspect it would be that the company enabled him, not to forget himself in what he saw, but to be more pleasantly aware of himself than the lone hill would permit him to be;--for the mere hill has its relation to that true self which the common self is so anxious to avoid and forget. the girls, however, went on and on, led mainly by the animal delight of motion, the two younger making many a diversion up the hill on the one side, and down the hill on the other, shrieking at everything fresh that pleased them. the house they had just left stood on the projecting shoulder of a hill, here and there planted with firs. of the hardy trees there was a thicket at the back of the house, while toward the south, less hardy ones grew in the shrubbery, though they would never, because of the sea-breezes, come to any height. the carriage-drive to the house joined two not very distant points on the same road, and there was no lodge at either gate. it was a rough, country road, a good deal rutted, and seldom repaired. opposite the gates rose the steep slope of a heathery hill, along the flank of which the girls were now walking. on their right lay a piece of rough moorland, covered with heather, patches of bracken, and coarse grass. a few yards to the right, it sank in a steep descent. such was the disposition of the ground for some distance along the road--on one side the hill, on the other a narrow level, and abrupt descent. as they advanced they caught sight of a ruin rising above the brow of the descent: the two younger darted across the heather toward it; the two elder continued their walk along the road, gradually descending towards a valley. "i wonder what we shall see round the corner there!" said mercy, the younger of the two. "the same over again, i suppose!" answered christina. "what a rough road it is! i've twice nearly sprained my ankle!" "i was thinking of what i saw the other day in somebody's travels--about his interest in every turn of the road, always looking for what was to come next." "time enough when it comes, in my opinion!" rejoined christina. for she was like any other mirror--quite ready to receive what was thrown upon her, but incapable of originating anything, almost incapable of using anything. as they descended, and the hill-side, here covered with bracken and boulders, grew higher and higher above them, the valley, in front and on the right, gradually opened, here and there showing a glimpse of a small stream that cantered steadily toward the sea, now tumbling over a rock, now sullen in a brown pool. arriving at length at a shoulder of the hill round which the road turned, a whole mile of the brook lay before them. it came down a narrow valley, with scraps of meadow in the bottom; but immediately below them the valley was of some width, and was good land from side to side, where green oats waved their feathery grace, and the yellow barley was nearly ready for the sickle. no more than the barren hill, however, had the fertile valley anything for them. their talk was of the last ball they were at. the sisters were about as good friends as such negative creatures could be; and they would be such friends all their lives, if on the one hand neither of them grew to anything better, and on the other no jealousy, or marked difference of social position through marriage, intervened. they loved each other, if not tenderly, yet with the genuineness of healthy family-habit--a thing not to be despised, for it keeps the door open for something better. in itself it is not at all to be reckoned upon, for habit is but the merest shadow of reality. still it is not a small thing, as families go, if sisters and brothers do not dislike each other. they were criticizing certain of the young men they had met at the said ball. being, in their development, if not in their nature, commonplace, what should they talk about but clothes or young men? and why, although an excellent type of its kind, should i take the trouble to record their conversation? to read, it might have amused me--or even interested, as may a carrot painted by a dutchman; but were i a painter, i should be sorry to paint carrots, and the girls' talk is not for my pen. at the same time i confess myself incapable of doing it justice. when one is annoyed at the sight of things meant to be and not beautiful, there is danger of not giving them even the poor fair-play they stand in so much the more need of that it can do so little for them. but now they changed the subject of their talk. they had come to a point of the road not far from the ruin to which the children had run across the heather. "look, chrissy! it is an old castle!" said mercy. "i wonder whether it is on our land!" "not much to be proud of!" replied the other. "it is nothing but the walls of a square house!" "not just a common square house! look at that pepper-pot on one of the corners!--i wonder how it is all the old castles get deserted!" "because they are old. it's well to desert them before they tumble down." "but they wouldn't tumble down if they weren't neglected. think of warwick castle! stone doesn't rot like wood! just see the thickness of those walls!" "yes, they are thick! but stone too has its way of rotting. westminster palace is wearing through, flake by flake. the weather will be at the lords before long." "that's what valentine would call a sign of the times. i say, what a radical he is, chrissy!--look! the old place is just like an empty egg-shell! i know, if it had been mine, i wouldn't have let it come to that!" "you say so because it never was yours: if it had been, you would know how uncomfortable it was!" "i should like to know," said mercy, after a little pause, during which they stood looking at the ruin, "whether the owners leave such places because they get fastidious and want better, or because they are too poor to keep them up! at all events a man must be poor to sell the house that belonged to his ancestors!--it must be miserable to grow poor after being used to plenty!--i wonder whose is the old place!" "oh, the governor's, i suppose! he has all hereabout for miles." "i hope it is ours! i should like to build it up again! i would live in it myself!" "i'm afraid the governor won't advance your share for that purpose!" "i love old things!" said mercy. "i believe you take your old doll to bed with you yet!" rejoined christina. "i am different to you!" she continued, with frenchified grammar; "i like things as new as ever i can have them!" "i like new things well enough, chrissy--you know i do! it is natural. the earth herself has new clothes once a year. it is but once a year, i grant!" "often enough for an old granny like her!" "look what a pretty cottage!--down there, half-way to the burn! it's like an english cottage! those we saw as we came along were either like a piece of the earth, or so white as to look ghastly! this one looks neat and comfortable, and has trees about it!" the ruin, once a fortified house and called a castle, stood on a sloping root or spur that ran from the hill down to the bank of the stream, where it stopped abruptly with a steep scaur, at whose foot lay a dark pool. on the same spur, half-way to the burn, stood a low, stone-built, thatched cottage, with a little grove about it, mostly of the hardy, contented, musical fir--a tree that would seem to have less regard to earthly prosperity than most, and looks like a pilgrim and a stranger: not caring much, it thrives where other trees cannot. there might have been a hundred of them, mingled, in strangest contrast, with a few delicate silver birches, about the cottage. it stood toward the east side of the sinking ridge, which had a steep descent, both east and west, to the fields below. the slopes were green with sweet grass, and apparently smooth as a lawn. not far from where the cottage seemed to rest rather than rise or stand, the burn rushed right against the side of the spur, as if to go straight through it, but turned abruptly, and flowed along the side to the end of it, where its way to the sea was open. on the point of the ridge were a few more firs: except these, those about the cottage, the mole on the hill-cheek, and the plantation about the new house, up or down was not a tree to be seen. the girls stood for a moment looking. "it's really quite pretty!" said christina with condescension. "it has actually something of what one misses here so much--a certain cosy look! tidy it is too! as you say, mercy, it might be in england--only for the poverty of its trees.--and oh those wretched bare hills!" she added, as she turned away and moved on. "wait till the heather is quite out: then you will have colour to make up for the bareness." "tell true now, mercy: that you are scotch need not keep you from speaking the truth:--don't you think heather just--well--just a leetle magentaish?--not a colour to be altogether admired?--just a little vulgar, don't you know? the fashion has changed so much within the last few years!" "no, i don't think so; and if i did i should be ashamed of it. i suppose poor old mother earth ought to go to the pre-raphaelites to be taught how to dress herself!" mercy spoke with some warmth, but christina was not sufficiently interested to be cross. she made no answer. they were now at the part of the road which crossed the descending spur as it left the hill-side. here they stopped again, and looked down the rocky slope. there was hardly anything green betwixt them and the old ruin--little but stones on a mass of rock; but immediately beyond the ruin the green began: there it seemed as if a wave of the meadow had risen and overflowed the spur, leaving its turf behind it. catching sight of hope and grace as they ran about the ruin, they went to join them, the one drawn by a vague interest in the exuviae of vanished life, the other by mere curiosity to see inside the care-worn, protesting walls. through a gap that might once have been a door, they entered the heart of the sad unhoping thing dropt by the past on its way to oblivion: nothing looks so unlike life as a dead body, nothing so unfit for human dwelling as a long-forsaken house. finding in one corner a broken stair, they clambered up to a gap in the east wall; and as they reached it, heard the sound of a horse's feet. looking down the road, they saw a gig approaching with two men. it had reached a part not so steep, and was coming at a trot. "why!" exclaimed christina, "there's val!--and some one with him!" "i heard the governor say to mamma," returned mercy, "that val was going to bring a college friend with him,--'for a pop at the grouse,' he said. i wonder what he will be like!" "he's a good-big-looking fellow," said christina. they drew nearer. "you might have said a big, good-looking fellow!" rejoined mercy. "he really is handsome!--now mind, mercy, i was the first to discover it!" said christina. "indeed you were not!--at least i was the first to say it!" returned mercy. "but you will take him all to yourself anyhow, and i am sure i don't care!" yet the girls were not vulgar--they were only common. they did and said vulgar things because they had not the sensitive vitality to shrink from them. they had not been well taught--that is roused to live: in the family was not a breath of aspiration. there was plenty of ambition, that is, aspiration turned hell-ward. they thought themselves as far from vulgar as any lady in any land, being in this vulgar--that they despised the people they called vulgar, yet thought much of themselves for not being vulgar. there was little in them the world would call vulgar; but the world and its ways are vulgar; its breeding will not pass with the ushers of the high countries. the worst in that of these girls was a fast, disagreeable way of talking, which they owed to a certain governess they had had for a while. they hastened to the road. the gig came up. valentine threw the reins to his companion, jumped out, embraced his sisters, and seemed glad to see them. had he met them after a like interval at home, he would have given them a cooler greeting; but he had travelled so many miles that they seemed not to have met for quite a long time. "my friend, mr. sercombe," he said, jerking his head toward the gig. mr. sercombe raised his pot-lid--the last fashion in head-gear--and acquaintance was made. "we'll drive on, sercombe," said valentine, jumping up. "you see, chris, we're half dead with hunger! do you think we shall find anything to eat?" "judging by what we left at breakfast," replied christina, "i should say you will find enough for--one of you; but you had better go and see." chapter iv. the shop in the village. two or three days have passed. the sun had been set for an hour, and the night is already rather dark notwithstanding the long twilight of these northern regions, for a blanket of vapour has gathered over the heaven, and a few stray drops have begun to fall from it. a thin wind now and then wakes, and gives a feeble puff, but seems immediately to change its mind and resolve not to blow, but let the rain come down. a drearier-looking spot for human abode it would be difficult to imagine, except it were as much of the sandy sahara, or of the ashy, sage-covered waste of western america. a muddy road wound through huts of turf--among them one or two of clay, and one or two of stone, which were more like cottages. hardly one had a window two feet square, and many of their windows had no glass. in almost all of them the only chimney was little more than a hole in the middle of the thatch. this rendered the absence of glass in the windows not so objectionable; for, left without ordered path to its outlet, the smoke preferred a circuitous route, and lingered by the way, filling the air. peat-smoke, however, is both wholesome and pleasant, nor was there mingled with it any disagreeable smell of cooking. outside were no lamps; the road was unlighted save by the few rays that here and there crept from a window, casting a doubtful glimmer on the mire. one of the better cottages sent out a little better light, though only from a tallow candle, through the open upper half of a door horizontally divided in two. except by that same half-door, indeed, little light could enter the place, for its one window was filled with all sorts of little things for sale. small and inconvenient for the humblest commerce, this was not merely the best, it was the only shop in the hamlet. there were two persons in it, one before and one behind the counter. the latter was a young woman, the former a man. he was leaning over the counter--whether from weariness, listlessness, or interest in his talk with the girl behind, it would not have been easy, in the dim light and deep shadow, to say. he seemed quite at home, yet the young woman treated him with a marked, though unembarrassed respect. the candle stood to one side of them upon the counter, making a ghastly halo in the damp air; and in the light puff that occasionally came in at the door, casting the shadow of one of a pair of scales, now on this now on that of the two faces. the young woman was tall and dark, with a large forehead:--so much could be seen; but the sweetness of her mouth, the blueness of her eyes, the extreme darkness of her hair, were not to be distinguished. the man also was dark. his coat was of some rough brown material, probably dyed and woven in the village, and his kilt of tartan. they were more than well worn--looked even in that poor light a little shabby. on his head was the highland bonnet called a glengarry. his profile was remarkable--hardly less than grand, with a certain aquiline expression, although the nose was not roman. his eyes appeared very dark, but in the daylight were greenish hazel. usually he talked with the girl in gaelic, but was now speaking english, a far purer english than that of most english people, though with something of the character of book-english as distinguished from conversation-english, and a very perceptible accent. "and when was it you heard from lachlan, annie?" he asked. after a moment's pause, during which she had been putting away things in a drawer of the counter--not so big as many a kitchen dresser-- "last thursday it was, sir," answered the girl. "you know we hear every month, sometimes oftener." "yes; i know that.--i hope the dear fellow is well?" "he is quite well and of good hope. he says he will soon come and see us now." "and take you away, annie?" "well, sir," returned annie, after a moment's hesitation, "he does not say so!" "if he did not mean it, he would be a rascal, and i should have to kill him. but my life on lachlan's honesty!" "thank you, sir. he would lay down his for you." "not if you said to him, don't!-eh, annie?" "but he would, macruadh!" returned the young woman, almost angrily. "are not you his chief?" "ah, that is all over now, my girl! there are no chiefs, and no clans any more! the chiefs that need not, yet sell their land like esau for a mess of pottage--and their brothers with it! and the sasunnach who buys it, claims rights over them that never grew on the land or were hid in its caves! thank god, the poor man is not their slave, but he is the worse off, for they will not let him eat, and he has nowhere to go. my heart is like to break for my people. sometimes i feel as if i would gladly die." "oh, sir! don't say that!" expostulated the young woman, and her voice trembled. "every heart in glenruadh is glad when it goes well with the macruadh." "yes, yes; i know you all love my father's son and my uncle's nephew; but how can it go well with the macruadh when it goes ill with his clan? there is no way now for a chief to be the father of his people; we are all poor together! my uncle--god rest his soul!--they managed it so, i suppose, as to persuade him there was no help for it! well, a man must be an honest man, even if there be no way but ruin! god knows, as we've all heard my father say a hundred times from the pulpit, there's no ruin but dishonesty! for poverty and hard work, he's a poor creature would crouch for those!" "he who well goes down hill, holds his head up!" said annie, and a pause followed. "there are strangers at the new house, we hear," she said. "from a distance i saw some young ladies, and one or two men. i don't desire to see more of them. god forbid i should wish them any manner of harm! but--i hardly understand myself--i don't like to see them there. i am afraid it is pride. they are rich, i hear, so we shall not be troubled with attention from them; they will look down upon us." "look down on the macruadh!" exclaimed annie, as if she could not believe her ears. "not that i should heed that!" he went on. "a cock on the barn-ridge looks down on you, and you don't feel offended! what i do dread is looking down on them. there is something in me that can hate, annie, and i fear it. there is something about the land--i don't care about money, but i feel like a miser about the land!--i don't mean any land; i shouldn't care to buy land unless it had once been ours; but what came down to me from my own people--with my own people upon it--i would rather turn the spigot of the molten gold and let it run down the abyss, than a rood of that slip from me! i feel it even a disgrace to have lost what of it i never had!" "indeed, macruadh," said annie, "it's a hard time! there is no money in the country! and fast the people are going after lachlan!" "i shall miss you, annie!" "you are very kind to us all, sir." "are you not all my own! and you have to take care of for lachlan's sake besides. he left you solemnly to my charge--as if that had been necessary, the foolish fellow, when we are foster-brothers!" again came a pause. "not a gentleman-farmer left from one end of the strath to the other!" said the chief at length. "when ian is at home, we feel just like two old turkey-cocks left alone in the yard!" "say two golden eagles, sir, on the cliff of the rock." "don't compare us to the eagle, annie. i do not love the bird. he is very proud and greedy and cruel, and never will know the hand that tames him. he is the bird of the monarch or the earl, not the bird of the father of his people. but he is beautiful, and i do not kill him." "they shot another, the female bird, last week! all the birds are going! soon there will be nothing but the great sheep and the little grouse. the capercailzie's gone, and the ptarmigan's gone!--well, there's a world beyond!" "where the birds go, annie?--well, it may be! but the ptarmigan's not gone yet, though there are not many; and for the capercailzie--only who that loves them will be here to see!--but do you really think there is a heaven for all god's creatures, annie? ian does." "i don't know what i said to make you think so, sir! when the heart aches the tongue mistakes. but how is my lady, your mother?" "pretty well, thank you--wonderfully cheerful. it is time i went home to her. lachlan would think i was playing him false, and making love to you on my own account!" "no fear! he would know better than that! he would know too, if she was not belonging to lachlan, her father's daughter would not let her chief humble himself." "you're one of the old sort, annie! good night. mind you tell lachlan i never miss a chance of looking in to see how you are getting on." "i will. good night, macruadh." they shook hands over the counter, and the young chief took his departure. as he stood up, he showed a fine-made, powerful frame, over six feet in height, and perfectly poised. with a great easy stride he swept silently out of the shop; nor from gait any more than look would one have thought he had been all day at work on the remnant of property he could call his own. to a cit it would have seemed strange that one sprung from innumerable patriarchal ancestors holding the land of the country, should talk so familiarly with a girl in a miserable little shop in a most miserable hamlet; it would have seemed stranger yet that such a one should toil at the labour the soul of a cit despises; but stranger than both it would seem to him, if he saw how such a man is tempted to look down upon him. if less cleverness is required for country affairs, they leave the more room for thinking. there are great and small in every class; here and there is a ploughman that understands burns, here and there a large-minded shopkeeper, here and there perhaps an unselfish duke. doubtless most of the youth's ancestors would likewise have held such labour unworthy of a gentleman, and would have preferred driving to their hills a herd of lowland cattle; but this, the last macruadh, had now and then a peep into the kingdom of heaven. chapter v. the chief. the macruadh strode into the dark, and down the village, wasting no time in picking his way--thence into the yet deeper dark of the moorland hills. the rain was beginning to come down in earnest, but he did not heed it; he was thoroughbred, and feared no element. an umbrella was to him a ludicrous thing: how could a little rain--as he would have called it had it come down in torrents--hurt any one! the macruadh, as the few who yet held by the sore-frayed, fast-vanishing skirt of clanship, called him, was the son of the last minister of the parish-a godly man, who lived that which he could ill explain, and was immeasurably better than those parts of his creed which, from a sense of duty, he pushed to the front. for he held devoutly by the root of which he spoke too little, and it supplied much sap to his life and teaching--out of the pulpit. he was a genial, friendly, and by nature even merry man, always ready to share what he had, and making no show of having what he had not, either in wisdom, knowledge, or earthly goods. his father and brother had been owners of the property and chiefs of the clan, much beloved by the poor of it, and not a little misunderstood by most of the more nourishing. for a great hunger after larger means, the ambition of the mammon-ruled world, had arisen in the land, and with it a rage for emigration. the uncle of the present macruadh did all he could to keep his people at home, lived on a couple of hundreds a year himself, and let many of his farms to his gentlemen-tacksmen, as they were called, at lower rents; but it was unavailing; one after another departed, until his land lay in a measure waste, and he grew very poor, mourning far more over his clan and his country than his poverty. in more prosperous times he had scraped together a little money, meaning it, if he could but avoid spending it in his old age, for his brother, who must soon succeed him; for he was himself a bachelor--the result of a romantic attachment and sorrow in his youth; but he lent it to a company which failed, and so lost it. at length he believed himself compelled, for the good of his people, to part with all but a mere remnant of the property. from the man to whom he sold it, mr. peregrine palmer bought it for twice the money, and had still a good bargain. but the hopes of the laird were disappointed: in the sheep it fed, and the grouse it might be brought to breed, lay all its value in the market; there was no increase in the demand for labour; and more and more of the peasantry emigrated, or were driven to other parts of the country. such was the present treatment of the land, causing human life to ebb from it, and working directly counter to the creative god. the laird retired to the humble cottage of his brother the pastor, just married rather late in life--where every comfort love could give waited for him; but the thought that he could have done better for his people by retaining the land soon wore him out; and having made a certain disposition of the purchase-money, he died. what remained of the property came to the minister. as for the chieftainship, that had almost died before the chief; but, reviving by union with the reverence felt for the minister, it took thereafter a higher form. when the minister died, the idea of it transmitted to his son was of a peculiarly sacred character; while in the eyes of the people, the authority of the chief and the influence of the minister seemed to meet reborn in alister notwithstanding his youth. in himself he was much beloved, and in love the blessed rule, blessed where understood, holds, that to him that hath shall be given, he only who has being fit to receive. the love the people bore to his father, both pastor and chief, crowned head and heart of alister. scarce man or woman of the poor remnant of the clan did not love the young macruadh. on his side was true response. with a renewed and renovating conscience, and a vivid sense that all things had to be made new, he possessed an old strong heart, clinging first to his father and mother, and then to the shadow even of any good thing that had come floating down the ages. call it a dream, a wild ideal, a foolish fancy--call it what you please, he was filled with the notion of doing something in his own person and family, having the remnant of the clan for the nucleus of his endeavour, to restore to a vital reality, let it be of smallest extent, that most ancient of governments, the patriarchal, which, all around, had rotted into the feudal, in its turn rapidly disintegrating into the mere dust and ashes of the kingdom of the dead, over which mammon reigns supreme. there may have been youthful presumption and some folly in the notion, but it sprang neither from presumption nor folly, but from simple humanity, and his sense of the responsibility he neither could nor would avoid, as the person upon whom had devolved the headship, however shadowy, of a house, ruinous indeed, but not yet razed. the castle on the ridge stood the symbol of the family condition. it had, however, been a ruin much longer than any one alive could remember. alister's uncle had lived in a house on the spot where mr. peregrine palmer's now stood; the man who bought it had pulled it down to build that which mr. palmer had since enlarged. it was but a humble affair--a great cottage in stone, much in the style of that in which the young chief now lived--only six times the size, with the one feature indispensable to the notion of a chief's residence, a large hall. some would say it was but a huge kitchen; but it was the sacred place of the house, in which served the angel of hospitality. there was always plenty to eat and drink for any comer, whether he had "claim" or not: the question of claim where was need, was not thought of. when the old house had to make room for the new, the staves of the last of its half-pipes of claret, one of which used always to stand on tap amidst the peat-smoke, yielded its final ministration to humanity by serving to cook a few meals for mason and carpenter. the property of clanruadh, for it was regarded as clan-property because belonging to the chief, stretched in old time away out of sight in all directions--nobody, in several, could tell exactly how far, for the undrawn boundary lines lay in regions of mist and cloud, in regions stony, rocky, desert, to which a red deer, not to say a stray sheep, rarely ascended. at one time it took in a portion at least of every hill to be seen from the spot where stood the ruin. the chief had now but a small farm, consisting of some fair soil on the slope of a hill, and some very good in the valley on both sides of the burn; with a hill-pasture that was not worth measuring in acres, for it abounded in rocks, and was prolific in heather and ling, with patches of coarse grass here and there, and some extent of good high-valley grass, to which the small black cattle and black-faced sheep were driven in summer. beyond periodical burnings of the heather, this uplifted portion received no attention save from the mist, the snow, the rain, the sun, and the sweet air. a few grouse and black game bred on it, and many mountain-hares, with martens, wild cats, and other vermin. but so tender of life was the macruadh that, though he did not spare these last, he did not like killing even a fox or a hooded crow, and never shot a bird for sport, or would let another shoot one, though the poorest would now and then beg a bird or two from him, sure of having their request. it seemed to him as if the creatures were almost a part of his clan, of which also he had to take care against a greedy world. but as the deer and the birds ranged where they would, it was not much he could do for them--as little almost as for the men and women that had gone over the sea, and were lost to their country in canada. regret, and not any murmur, stirred the mind of alister macruadh when he thought of the change that had passed on all things around him. he had been too well taught for grumbling--least of all at what was plainly the will of the supreme--inasmuch as, however man might be to blame, the thing was there. personal regrets he had none beyond those of family feeling and transmitted sentiment. he was able to understand something of the signs of the times, and saw that nothing could bring back the old way--saw that nothing comes back--at least in the same form; saw that there had been much that ought not to come back, and that, if patriarchal ways were ever to return, they must rise out of, and be administered upon loftier principles--must begin afresh, and be wrought out afresh from the bosom of a new abraham, capable of so bringing up his children that a new development of the one natural system, of government should be possible with and through them. perhaps even now, in the new country to which so many of his people were gone, some shadowy reappearance of the old fashion might have begun to take shape on a higher level, with loftier aims, and in circumstances holding out fewer temptations to the evils of the past! alister could not, at his years, have generated such thoughts but for the wisdom that had gone before him--first the large-minded speculation of his father, who was capable even of discarding his prejudices where he saw they might mislead him; and next, the response of his mother to the same: she was the only one who entirely understood her husband. isobel macruadh was a woman of real thinking-power. her sons being but boys when their father died, she at once took the part of mediator between the mind of the father and that of his sons; and besides guiding them on the same principles, often told them things their father had said, and talked with them of things they had heard him say. one of the chief lessons he left them wrought well for the casting out of all with which the feudal system had debased the patriarchal; and the poverty shared with the clan had powerfully helped: it was spoken against the growing talionic regard of human relations--that, namely, the conditions of a bargain fulfilled on both sides, all is fulfilled between the bargaining parties. "in the possibility of any bargain," he had said, "are involved eternal conditions: there is relationship--there is brotherhood. even to give with a denial of claim, to be kind under protest, is an injury, is charity without the love, is salt without the saltness. if we spent our lives in charity we should never overtake neglected claims--claims neglected from the very beginning of the relations of men. if a man say, 'i have not been unjust; i owed the man nothing;' he sides with death--says with the typical murderer, 'am i my brother's keeper?' builds the tombs of those his fathers slew." in the bosom of young alister macruadh, the fatherly relation of the strong to the weak survived the disappearance of most of the outward signs of clan-kindred: the chieftainship was sublimed in him. the more the body of outer fact died, the stronger grew in him the spirit of the relation. as some savage element of a race will reappear in an individual of it after ages of civilization, so may good old ways of thinking and feeling, modes long gone out of fashion and practice, survive and revive modified by circumstance, in an individual of a new age. such a one will see the customs of his ancestors glorified in the mists of the past; what is noble in them will appeal to all that is best in his nature, spurring the most generous of his impulses, and stirring up the conscience that would be void of offence. when the operative force of such regards has been fostered by the teaching of a revered parent; when the influences he has left behind are nourished and tended, with thorough belief and devoted care, by her who shared his authority in life, and now bears alone the family sceptre, there can be no bound set to their possible potency in a mind of high spiritual order. the primary impulse became with alister a large portion of his religion: he was the shepherd of the much ravaged and dwindled macruadh-fold; it was his church, in which the love of the neighbour was intensified in the love of the relation and dependent. to aid and guard this his flock, was alister's divine service. it was associated with a great dislike of dogma, originating in the recoil of the truth within him from much that was commonly held and taught for true. call the thing enthusiasm or what you will, so you believe it there, and genuine. it was only towards the poor of a decayed clan he had opportunity of exercising the cherished relation; almost all who were not poor had emigrated before the lands were sold; and indeed it was only the poor who set store by their unity with the old head. not a few of the clan, removed elsewhither, would have smiled degenerate, and with scorn in their amusement, at the idea of alister's clinging to any supposed reality in the position he could claim. among such nevertheless were several who, having made money by trade, would each have been glad enough to keep up old traditions, and been ready even to revive older, had the headship fallen to him. but in the hands of a man whom, from the top of their wealth, they regarded as but a poor farmer, they forgot all about it--along with a few other more important and older-world matters; for where mammon gets in his foot, he will soon be lord of the house, and turn not merely rank, his rival demon, out of doors, but god himself. alister indeed lived in a dream; he did not know how far the sea of hearts had ebbed, leaving him alone on the mount of his vision; but he dreamed a dream that was worth dreaming; comfort and help flowed from it to those about him, nor did it fail to yield his own soul refreshment also. all dreams are not false; some dreams are truer than the plainest facts. fact at best is but a garment of truth, which has ten thousand changes of raiment woven in the same loom. let the dreamer only do the truth of his dream, and one day he will realize all that was worth realizing in it--and a great deal more and better than it contained. alister had no far-reaching visions of anything to come out of his; he had, like the true man he was, only the desire to live up to his idea of what the people looked up to in him. the one thing that troubled him was, that his uncle, whom he loved so dearly, should have sold the land. doubtless there was pride mingled with his devotion, and pride is an evil thing. still it was a human and not a devilish pride. i would not be misunderstood as defending pride, or even excusing it in any shape; it is a thing that must be got rid of at all costs; but even for evil we must speak the truth; and the pride of a good man, evil as it is, and in him more evil than in an evil man, yet cannot be in itself such a bad thing as the pride of a bad man. the good man would at once recognize and reject the pride of a bad man. a pride that loves cannot be so bad as a pride that hates. yet if the good man do not cast out his pride, it will sink him lower than the bad man's, for it will degenerate into a worse pride than that of any bad man. each must bring its own divinely-ordained consequence. there is one other point in the character of the macruadh which i must mention ere i pass on; in this region, and at this time, it was a great peculiarity, one that yielded satisfaction to few of the clan, and made him even despised in the strath: he hated whisky, and all the drinking customs associated with it. in this he was not original; he had not come to hate it from noting the degradation and crime that attended it, or that as poverty grew, drunkenness grew, men who had used it in moderation taking more and more as circumstances became more adverse, turning sadness into slavery: he had been brought up to hate it. his father, who, as a clergyman doing his endeavour for the welfare of his flock, found himself greatly thwarted by its deadening influences, rendering men callous not only to the special vice itself, but to worse vices as well, had banished it from his table and his house; while the mother had from their very childhood instilled a loathing of the national weakness and its physical means into the minds of her sons. in her childhood she had seen its evils in her own father: by no means a drunkard, he was the less of a father because he did as others did. never an evening passed without his drinking his stated portion of whisky-toddy, growing more and more subject to attacks of had temper, with consequent injustice and unkindness. the recollection may have made her too sweeping in her condemnation of the habit, but i doubt it; and anyhow a habit is not a man, and we need not much condemn that kind of injustice. we need not be tender over a habit which, though not all bad, yet leads to endless results that are all bad. i would follow such to its grave without many tears! isobel macruadh was one of those rare women who preserve in years the influence gained in youth; and the thing that lay at the root of the fact was her justice. for though her highland temper would occasionally burst out in hot flame, everyone knew that if she were in the wrong, she would see it and say it before any one else would tell her of it. this justice it was, ready against herself as for another, that fixed the influence which her goodness and her teaching of righteousness gained. her eldest child, a girl, died in infancy. alister and ian were her whole earthly family, and they worshipped her. chapter vi. work and wage. alister strode through the night, revolving no questions hard to solve, though such were not strangers to him. he had not been to a university like his brother, but he had had a good educational beginning--who ever had more than a beginning?--chiefly from his father, who for his time and opportunity was even a learned man--and better, a man who knew what things were worth a man's human while, and what were not: he could and did think about things that a man must think about or perish; and his son alister had made himself able to think about what he did not know, by doing the thing he did know. but now, as he walked, fighting with the wind, his bonnet of little shelter pulled down on his forehead, he was thinking mostly of lachlan his foster-brother, whose devotion had done much to nourish in him the sense that he was head of the clan. he had not far to go to reach his home--about a couple of miles. he had left the village a quarter of the way behind him, when through the darkness he spied something darker yet by the roadside. going up to it, he found an old woman, half sitting, half standing, with a load of peats in a creel upon her back, unable, apparently, for the moment at least, to proceed. alister knew at once by her shape and posture who she was. "ah, mistress conal!" he said, "i am sorry to see you resting on such a night so near your own door. it means you have filled your creel too full, and tired yourself too much." "i am not too much tired, macruadh!" returned the old woman, who was proud and cross-tempered, and had a reputation for witchcraft, which did her neither much good nor much harm. "well, whether you are tired or not, i believe i am the stronger of the two!" "small doubt of that, alister!" said mistress conal with a sigh. "then i will take your creel, and you will soon be home. come along! it is going to be a wild night!" so saying he took the rope from the neck of the old woman right gently, and threw the creel with a strong swing over his shoulder. this dislodged a few of the topmost of the peats which the poor old thing had been a long way to fetch. she heard them fall, and one of them struck her foot. she started up, almost in a rage. "sir! sir! my peats!" she cried. "what would you be throwing away the good peats into the dark for, letting that swallow them they should swallow!" these words, as all that passed between them, were spoken neither in scotch nor english, but in gaelic--which, were i able to write it down, most of my readers would no more understand than they would phoenician: we must therefore content ourselves with what their conversation comes to in english, which, if deficient compared with gaelic in vowel-sounds, yet serves to say most things capable of being said. "i am sorry, mistress conal; but we'll not be losing them," returned the laird gently, and began to feel about the road for the fallen peats. "how many were there, do you think, of them that fell?" he asked, rising after a vain search. "how should i be knowing! but i am sure there would be nigh six of them!" answered the woman, in a tone of deep annoyance--nor was it much wonder; they were precious to the cold, feeble age that had gone so far to fetch so few. the laird again stooped his long back, and searched and searched, feeling on all sides around him. he picked up three. not another, after searching for several minutes, could he find. "i'm thinking that must be all of them, but i find only three!" he said. "come, let us go home! you must not make your cough worse for one or two peats, perhaps none!" "three, macruadh, three!" insisted the old woman in wavering voice, broken by coughing; for, having once guessed six, she was not inclined to lower her idea of her having. "well, well! we'll count them when we get home!" said alister, and gave his hand to her to help her up. she yielded grumbling, and, bowed still though relieved from her burden, tottered by his side along the dark, muddy, wind-and-rain-haunted road. "did you see my niece to-night at the shop?" she asked; for she was proud of being so nearly related to those who kept the shop of the hamlet. "that i did," answered the chief; and a little talk followed about lachlan in canada. no one could have perceived from the way in which the old woman accepted his service, and the tone in which she spoke to him while he bent under her burden, that she no less than loved her chief; but everybody only smiled at mistress conal's rough speech. that night, ere she went to bed, she prayed for the macruadh as she never prayed for one of her immediate family. and if there was a good deal of superstition mingled with her prayer, the main thing in it was genuine, that is, the love that prompted it; and if god heard only perfect prayers, how could he be the prayer-hearing god? her dwelling stood but a stone's-throw from the road, and presently they turned up to it by a short steep ascent. it was a poor hut, mostly built of turf; but turf makes warm walls, impervious to the wind, and it was a place of her own!--that is, she had it to herself, a luxury many cannot even imagine, while to others to be able to be alone at will seems one of the original necessities of life. even the lord, who probably had not always a room to himself in the poor houses he staid at, could not do without solitude; therefore not unfrequently spent the night in the open air, on the quiet, star-served hill: there even for him it would seem to have been easier to find an entrance into that deeper solitude which, it is true, he did not need in order to find his father and his god, but which apparently he did need in order to come into closest contact with him who was the one joy of his life, whether his hard life on earth, or his blessed life in heaven. the macruadh set down the creel, and taking out peat after peat, piled them up against the wall, where already a good many waited their turn to be laid on the fire; for, as the old woman said, she must carry a few when she could, and get ahead with her store ere the winter came, or she would soon be devoured: there was a death that always prowled about old people, she said, watching for the fire to go out. many of the celts are by nature poets, and mistress conal often spoke in a manner seldom heard from the lips of a lowland woman. the common forms of gaelic are more poetic than those of most languages, and could have originated only with a poetic people, while mistress conal was by no means an ordinary type of her people; maugre her ill temper and gruffness, she thought as well as spoke like a poetess. this, conjoined with the gift of the second sight, had helped to her reputation as a witch. as the chief piled the peats, he counted them. she sat watching him and them from a stone that made part of a rude rampart to the hearth. "i told you so, macruadh!" she said, the moment she saw his hand return empty from the bottom of the creel. "i was positive there should be three more!--but what's on the road is not with the devil." "i am very sorry!" said the chief, who thought it wiser not to contradict her. he would have searched his sporan for a coin to make up to her for the supposed loss of her peats; but he knew well enough there was not a coin in it. he shook hands with her, bade her good night, and went, closing the door carefully behind him against a great gust of wind that struggled to enter, threatening to sweep the fire she was now blowing at with her wrinkled, leather-like lips, off the hearth altogether--a thing that had happened before, to the danger of the whole building, itself of the substance burning in the middle of its floor. the macruadh ran down the last few steep steps of the path, and jumped into the road. through the darkness came the sound of one springing aside with a great start, and the click of a gun-lock. "who goes there?" cried a rather tremulous voice. "the macruadh," answered the chief. the utterance apparently conveyed nothing. "do you belong to these parts?" said the voice. a former macruadh might have answered, "no; these parts belong to me;" alister curtly replied, "i do." "here then, my good fellow! take my game-bag, and carry it as far as the new house--if you know where i mean. i will give you a shilling." one moment the chief spent in repressing a foolish indignation; the next he spent in reflection. had he seen how pale and tired was the youth with the gun, he would have offered to carry his bag for him; to offer and to be asked, however, most people find different; and here the offer of payment added to the difficulty. but the word shilling had raised the vision of the old woman in her lonely cottage, brooding over the loss, real or imaginary mattered nothing, of her three far-borne peats. what a happy night, through all the wind and the rain, would a silver shilling under her chaff pillow give her! the thought froze the chief's pride, and warmed his heart. what right had he to deny her such a pleasure! it would cost him nothing! it would even bring him a little amusement! the chief of clanruadh carrying his game-bag for a sasunnach fellow to earn a shilling! the idea had a touch of humorous consolation in it. i will not assert the consolation strong enough to cast quite out a certain feeling of shame that mingled with his amusement--a shame which--is it not odd!--he would not have felt had his sporan been full of sovereigns. but the shame was not altogether a shameful one; a fanciful fear of degrading the chieftainship, and a vague sense of the thing being an imposition, had each a part in it. there could be nothing dishonest, however, in thus earning a shilling for poor mistress conal! "i will carry your bag," he said, "but i must have the shilling first, if you please." "oh!" rejoined valentine palmer. "you do not trust me! how then am i to trust you?" "sir!" exclaimed alister--and, again finding himself on the point of being foolish, laughed. "i will pay you when the job is done," said valentine. "that is quite fair, but it does not suit my purpose," returned alister. they were walking along the road side by side, but each could scarcely see anything of the other. the sportsman was searching his pockets to find a shilling. he succeeded, and, groping, put it in alister's hand, with the words-- "all right! it is only a shilling! there it is! but it is not yours yet: here is the bag!" alister took the bag, turned, and ran back. "hillo!" cried valentine. but alister had disappeared, and as soon as he turned up the soft path to the cottage, his steps became inaudible through the wind. he opened the door, went in, laid the shilling on the back of the old woman's hand, and without a word hurried out again, and down to the road. the stranger was some distance ahead, tramping wearily on through the darkness, and grumbling at his folly in bribing a fellow with a shilling to carry off his game-bag. alister overtook him. "oh, here you are after all!" exclaimed valentine. "i thought you had made off with work and wages both! what did you do it for?" "i wanted to give the shilling to an old woman close by." "your mother--eh?" "no." "your grandmother?" "no." "some relation then!" insisted the stranger. "doubtless," answered the laird, and valentine thought him a surly fellow. they walked on in silence. the youth could hardly keep up with alister, who thought him ill bred, and did not care for his company. "why do you walk so fast?" said valentine. "because i want to get home," replied alister. "but i paid you to keep me company!" "you paid me to carry your bag. i will leave it at the new house." his coolness roused the weary youth. "you rascal!" he said; "you keep alongside of me, or i'll pepper you." as he spoke, he shifted his gun. but alister had already, with a few long strides, put a space of utter darkness between them. he had taken the shilling, and must carry the bag, but did not feel bound to personal attendance. at the same time he could not deny there was reason in the man's unwillingness to trust him. what had he about him to give him in pledge? nothing but his watch, his father's, a gift of the prince to the head of the family!--he could not profane that by depositing it for a game-bag! he must yield to his employer, moderate his pace, and move side by side with the sasunnach! again they walked some distance in silence. alister began to discover that his companion was weary, and his good heart spoke. "let me carry your gun," he said. "see you damned!" returned valentine, with an angry laugh. "you fancy your gun protects your bag?" "i do." the same instant the gun was drawn, with swift quiet force, through the loop of his arm from behind. feeling himself defenceless, he sprang at the highlander, but he eluded him, and in a moment was out of his reach, lost in the darkness. he heard the lock of one barrel snap: it was not loaded; the second barrel went off, and he gave a great jump, imagining himself struck. the next instant the gun was below his arm again. "it will be lighter to carry now!" said the macruadh; "but if you like i will take it." "take it, then. but no!--by jove, i wish there was light enough to see what sort of a rascal you look!" "you are not very polite!" "mind your own politeness. i was never so roughly served in my life!--by a fellow too that had taken my money! if i knew where to find a magistrate in this beastly place,--" "you would tell him i emptied your gun because you threatened me with it!" "you were going off with my bag!" "because i undertook to carry your bag, was i bound to endure your company?" "alister!" said a quiet voice out of the darkness. the highlander started, and in a tone strangely tremulous, yet with a kind of triumph in it, answered-- "ian!" the one word said, he stood still, but as in the act to run, staring into the darkness. the next moment he flung down the game-bag, and two men were in each other's arms. "where are you from, ian?" said the chief at length, in a voice broken with gladness. all valentine understood of the question, for it was in gaelic, was its emotion, and he scorned a fellow to show the least sign of breaking down. "straight from moscow," answered the new-comer. "how is our mother?" "well, ian, thank god!" "then, thank god, all is well!" "what brought you home in such haste?" "i had a bad dream about my mother, and was a little anxious. there was more reason too, which i will tell you afterwards." "what were you doing in moscow? have you a furlough?" "no; i am a sort of deserter. i would have thrown up my commission, but had not a chance. in moscow i was teaching in a school to keep out of the way of the police. but i will tell you all by and by." the voice was low, veiled, and sad; the joy of the meeting rippled through it like a brook. the brothers had forgotten the stranger, and stood talking till the patience of valentine was as much exhausted as his strength. "are you going to stand there all night?" he said at last. "this is no doubt very interesting to you, but it is rather a bore to one who can neither see you, nor understand a word you say." "is the gentleman a friend of yours, alister?" asked ian. "not exactly.--but he is a sasunnach," he concluded in english, "and we ought not to be speaking gaelic." "i beg his pardon," said ian. "will you introduce me?" "it is impossible; i do not know his name. i never saw him, and don't see him now. but he insists on my company." "that is a great compliment. how far?" "to the new house." "i paid him a shilling to carry my bag," said valentine. "he took the shilling, and was going to walk off with my bag!" "well?" "well indeed! not at all well! how was i to know--" "but he didn't--did he?" said ian, whose voice seemed now to tingle with amusement. "--alister, you were wrong." it was an illogical face-about, but alister responded at once. "i know it," he said. "the moment i heard your voice, i knew it.--how is it, ian,"--here he fell back into gaelic--"that when you are by me, i know what is right so much quicker? i don't understand it. i meant to do right, but--" "but your pride got up. alister, you always set out well--nobly--and then comes the devil's turn! then you begin to do as if you repented! you don't carry the thing right straight out. i hate to see the devil make a fool of a man like you! do you not know that in your own country you owe a stranger hospitality?" "my own country!" echoed alister with a groan. "yes, your own country--and perhaps more yours than it was your grandfather's! you know who said, 'the meek shall inherit the earth'! if it be not ours in god's way, i for one would not care to call it mine another way."--here he changed again to english.--"but we must not keep the gentleman standing while we talk!" "thank you!" said valentine. "the fact is, i'm dead beat." "have you anything i could carry for you?" asked ian. "no, i thank you.--yes; there! if you don't mind taking my gun?--you speak like a gentleman!" "i will take it with pleasure." he took the gun, and they started. "if you choose, alister," said his brother, once more in gaelic, "to break through conventionalities, you must not expect people to allow you to creep inside them again the moment you please." but the young fellow's fatigue had touched alister. "are you a big man?" he said, taking valentine gently by the arm. "not so big as you, i'll lay you a sovereign," answered valentine, wondering why he should ask. "then look here!" said alister; "you get astride my shoulders, and i'll carry you home. i believe you're hungry, and that takes the pith out of you!--come," he went on, perceiving some sign of reluctance in the youth, "you'll break down if you walk much farther!--here, ian! you take the bag; you can manage that and the gun too!" valentine murmured some objection; but the brothers took the thing so much as a matter of course, and he felt so terribly exhausted--for he had lost his way, and been out since the morning--that he yielded. alister doubled himself up on his heels; valentine got his weary legs over his stalwart shoulders; the chief rose with him as if he had been no heavier than mistress conal's creel, and bore him along much relieved in his aching limbs. so little was the chief oppressed by his burden, that he and his brother kept up a stream of conversation, every now and then forgetting their manners and gliding off into gaelic, but as often recollecting themselves, apologizing, and starting afresh upon the path of english. long before they reached the end of their journey, valentine, able from his perch to listen in some measure of ease, came to understand that he had to do, not with rustics, but, whatever their peculiarities, with gentlemen of a noteworthy sort. the brothers, in the joy of their reunion, talked much of things at home and abroad, avoiding things personal and domestic as often as they spoke english; but when they saw the lights of the new house, a silence fell upon them. at the door, alister set his burden carefully down. "there!" he said with a laugh, "i hope i have earned my shilling!" "ten times over," answered valentine; "but i know better now than offer to pay you. i thank you with all my heart." the door opened, ian gave the gun and the bag to the butler, and the brothers bade valentine good night. valentine had a strange tale to tell. sercombe refused to accept his conclusions: if he had offered the men half a crown apiece, he said, they would have pocketed the money. chapter vii. mother and son. the sun was shining bright, and the laird was out in his fields. his oats were nearly ready for the scythe, and he was judging where he had best begin to cut them. his fields lay chiefly along the banks of the stream, occupying the whole breadth of the valley on the east side of the ridge where the cottage stood. on the west side of the ridge, nearly parallel to, and not many yards from it, a small brook ran to join the stream: this was a march betwixt the chief's land and mr. peregrine palmer's. their respective limit was not everywhere so well defined. the air was clear and clean, and full of life. the wind was asleep. a consciousness of work approaching completion filled earth and air--a mood of calm expectation, as of a man who sees his end drawing nigh, and awaits the saving judgment of the father of spirits. there was no song of birds--only a crow from the yard, or the cry of a blackcock from the hill; the two streams were left to do all the singing, and they did their best, though their water was low. the day was of the evening of the year; in the full sunshine was present the twilight and the coming night, but there was a sense of readiness on all sides. the fruits of the earth must be housed; that alone remained to be done. when the laird had made up his mind, he turned towards the house--a lowly cottage, more extensive than many farmhouses, but looking no better. it was well built, with an outside wall of rough stone and lime, and another wall of turf within, lined in parts with wood, making it as warm a nest as any house of the size could be. the door, picturesque with abundant repair, opened by a latch into the kitchen. for long years the floor of the kitchen had been an earthen one, with the fire on a hearth in the middle of it, as in all the cottages; and the smoke rose into the roof, keeping it very dry and warm, if also very sooty, and thence into the air through a hole in the middle. but some ten years before this time, alister and ian, mere lads, had built a chimney outside, and opening the wall, removed the hearth to it--with the smoke also, which now had its own private way to liberty. they then paved the floor with such stones as they could find, in the fields and on the hill, sufficiently flat and smooth on one side, and by sinking them according to their thickness, managed to get a tolerably even surface. many other improvements followed; and although it was a poor place still, it would at the time of dr. johnson's visit to the highlands have been counted a good house, not to be despised by unambitious knight or poor baronet. nor was the time yet over, when ladies and gentlemen, of all courtesy and good breeding, might be found in such houses. in the kitchen a deal-dresser, scoured white, stood under one of the tiny windows, giving light enough for a clean-souled cook--and what window-light would ever be enough for one of a different sort? there were only four panes in it, but it opened and closed with a button, and so was superior to many windows. there was a larger on the opposite side, which at times in the winter nights when the cold was great, they filled bodily with a barricade of turf. here, in the kitchen, the chief takes his meals with his lady-mother. she and ian have just finished their breakfast, and gone to the other end of the house. the laird broke his fast long ago. a fire is burning on the hearth--small, for the mid-day-meal is not yet on its way. everything is tidy; the hearth is swept up, and the dishes are washed: the barefooted girl is reaching the last of them to its place on the rack behind the dresser. she is a red-haired, blue-eyed celt, with a pretty face, and a refinement of motion and speech rarer in some other peasantries. the chief enters, and takes from the wall an old-fashioned gun. he wants a bird or two, for ian's home-coming is a great event. "i saw a big stag last night down by the burn, sir," said the girl, "feeding as if he had been the red cow." "i don't want him to-day, nancy," returned her master. "had he big horns?" "great horns, sir; but it was too dark to count the tines." "when was it? why did you not tell me?" "i thought it was morning, sir, and when i got up it was the middle of the night. the moon was so shiny that i went to the door and looked out. just at the narrow leap, i saw him plain." "if you should see him again, nancy, scare him. i don't want the sasunnachs at the new house to see him." "hadn't you better take him yourself, macruadh? he would make fine hams for the winter!" "mind your own business, nancy, and hold your tongue," said the chief, with a smile that took all the harshness from the words. "don't you tell any one you saw him. for what you know he may be the big stag!" "sure no one would kill him, sir!" answered the girl aghast. "i hope not. but get the stoving-pot ready, nancy; i'm going to find a bird or two. lest i should not succeed, have a couple of chickens at hand." "sir, the mistress has commanded them already." "that is well; but do not kill them except i am not back in time." "i understand, sir." macruadh knew the stag as well as the horse he rode, and that his habit had for some time been to come down at night and feed on the small border of rich grass on the south side of the burn, between it and the abrupt heathery rise of the hill. for there the burn ran so near the hill, and the ground was so covered with huge masses of grey rock, that there was hardly room for cultivation, and the bank was left in grass. the stalking of the stag was the passion of the highlander in that part of the country. he cared little for shooting the grouse, black or red, and almost despised those whose ambition was a full bag of such game; he dreamed day and night of killing deer. the chief, however, was in this matter more of a man without being less of a highlander. he loved the deer so much, saw them so much a part of the glory of mountain and sky, sunshine and storm, that he liked to see them living, not dead, and only now and then shot one, when the family had need of it. he felt himself indeed almost the father of the deer as well as of his clan, and mourned greatly that he could do so little now, from the limited range of his property, to protect them. his love for live creatures was not quite equal to that of st. francis, for he had not conceived the thought of turning wolf or fox from the error of his ways; but even the creatures that preyed upon others he killed only from a sense of duty, and with no pleasure in their death. the heartlessness of the common type of sportsman was loathsome to him. when there was not much doing on the farm, he would sometimes be out all night with his gun, it is true, but he would seldom fire it, and then only at some beast of prey; on the hill-side or in the valley he would lie watching the ways and doings of the many creatures that roam the night--each with its object, each with its reasons, each with its fitting of means to ends. one of the grounds of his dislike to the new possessors of the old land was the raid he feared upon the wild animals. the laird gone, i will take my reader into the parlour, as they called in english their one sitting-room. shall i first tell him what the room was like, or first describe the two persons in it? led up to a picture, i certainly should not look first at the frame; but a description is a process of painting rather than a picture; and when you cannot see the thing in one, but must take each part by itself, and in your mind get it into relation with the rest, there is an advantage, i think, in having a notion of the frame first. for one thing, you cannot see the persons without imagining their surroundings, and if those should be unfittingly imagined, they interfere with the truth of the persons, and you may not be able to get them right after. the room, then, was about fifteen feet by twelve, and the ceiling was low. on the white walls hung a few frames, of which two or three contained water-colours--not very good, but not displeasing; several held miniature portraits--mostly in red coats, and one or two a silhouette. opposite the door hung a target of hide, round, and bossed with brass. alister had come upon it in the house, covering a meal-barrel, to which service it had probably been put in aid of its eluding a search for arms after the battle of culloden. never more to cover man's food from mice, or his person from an enemy, it was raised to the walhalla of the parlour. under it rested, horizontally upon two nails, the sword of the chief--a long and broad andrew ferrara, with a plated basket-hilt; beside it hung a dirk--longer than usual, and fine in form, with a carved hilt in the shape of an eagle's head and neck, and its sheath, whose leather was dry and flaky with age, heavily mounted in silver. below these was a card-table of marquetry with spindle-legs, and on it a work-box of ivory, inlaid with silver and ebony. in the corner stood a harp, an erard, golden and gracious, not a string of it broken. in the middle of the room was a small square table, covered with a green cloth. an old-fashioned easy chair stood by the chimney; and one sat in it whom to see was to forget her surroundings. in middle age she is still beautiful, with the rare beauty that shines from the root of the being. her hair is of the darkest brown, almost black; her eyes are very dark, and her skin is very fair, though the soft bloom, as of reflected sunset, is gone from her cheek, and her hair shows lines of keen silver. her features are fine, clear, and regular--the chin a little strong perhaps, not for the size, but the fineness of the rest; her form is that of a younger woman; her hand and foot are long and delicate. a more refined and courteous presence could not have been found in the island. the dignity of her carriage nowise marred its grace, or betrayed the least consciousness; she looked dignified because she was dignified. that form of falsehood which consists in assuming the look of what one fain would be, was, as much as any other, impossible to isobel macruadh. she wore no cap; her hair was gathered in a large knot near the top of her head. her gown was of a dark print; she had no ornament except a ring with a single ruby. she was working a bit of net into lace. she could speak gaelic as well as any in the glen--perhaps better; but to her sons she always spoke english. to them indeed english was their mother-tongue, in the sense that english only came addressed to themselves from her lips. there were, she said, plenty to teach them gaelic; she must see to their english. the one window of the parlour, though not large, was of tolerable size; but little light entered, so shaded was it with a rose-tree in a pot on the sill. by the wall opposite was a couch, and on the couch lay ian with a book in his hand--a book in a strange language. his mother and he would sometimes be a whole morning together and exchange no more than a word or two, though many a look and smile. it seemed enough for each to be in the other's company. there was a quite peculiar hond between the two. like so many of the young men of that country, ian had been intended for the army; but there was in him this much of the spirit of the eagle he resembled, that he passionately loved freedom, and had almost a gypsy's delight in wandering. when he left college, he became tutor in a russian family of distinction, and after that accepted a commission in the household troops of the czar. but wherever he went, he seemed, as he said once to his mother, almost physically aware of a line stretching between him and her, which seemed to vibrate when he grew anxious about her. the bond between him and his brother was equally strong, but in feeling different. between him and alister it was a cable; between him and his mother a harpstring; in the one case it was a muscle, in the other a nerve. the one retained, the other drew him. given to roaming as he was, again and again he returned, from pure love-longing, to what he always felt as the protection of his mother. it was protection indeed he often had sought--protection from his own glooms, which nothing but her love seemed able to tenuate. he was tall--if an inch above six feet be tall, but not of his brother's fine proportion. he was thin, with long slender fingers and feet like his mother's. his small, strong bones were covered with little more than hard muscle, but every motion of limb or body was grace. at times, when lost in thought and unconscious of movement, an observer might have imagined him in conversation with some one unseen, towards whom he was carrying himself with courtesy: plain it was that courtesy with him was not a graft upon the finest stock, but an essential element. his forehead was rather low, freckled, and crowned with hair of a foxy red; his eyes were of the glass-gray or green loved of our elder poets; his nose was a very eagle in itself--large and fine. he more resembled the mask of the dead shakspere than any other i have met, only in him the proportions were a little exaggerated; his nose was a little too large, and his mouth a little too small for the mask; but the mingled sweetness and strength in the curves of the latter prevented the impression of weakness generally given by the association of such a nose and such a mouth. on his short upper lip was a small light moustache, and on his face not a hair more. in rest his countenance wore a great calmness, but a calmness that might seem rooted in sadness. while the mother might, more than once in a day, differ to fault-finding from her elder-born--whom she admired, notwithstanding, as well as loved, from the bottom of her heart--she was never known to say a word in opposition to the younger. it was even whispered that she was afraid of him. it was not so; but her reverence for ian was such that, even when she felt bound not to agree with him, she seldom had the confidence that, differing from him, she was in the right. sometimes in the middle of the night she would slip like a ghost into the room where he lay, and sit by his bed till the black cock, the gray cock, the red cock crew. the son might be awake all the time, and the mother suspect him awake, yet no word pass between them. she would rise and go as she came. her feeling for her younger son was like that of hannah for her eldest--intensest love mixed with strangest reverence. but there were vast alternations and inexplicable minglings in her thoughts of him. at one moment she would regard him as gifted beyond his fellows for some great work, at another be filled with a horrible fear that he was in rebellion against the god of his life. doubtless mothers are far too ready to think their sons above the ordinary breed of sons: self, unpossessed of god, will worship itself in its offspring; yet the sons whom holy mothers have regarded as born to great things and who have passed away without sign, may have gone on toward their great things. whether this mother thought too much of her son or not, there were questions moving in his mind which she could not have understood--even then when he would creep to her bed in the morning to forget in her arms the terrible dreams of the night, or when at evening he would draw his little stool to her knee, unable or unwilling to enjoy his book anywhere but by her side. what gave him his unconscious power over his mother, was, first, the things he said, and next, the things he did not say; for he seemed to her to dwell always in a rich silence. yet throughout was she aware of a something between them, across which they could not meet; and it was in part her distress at the seeming impossibility of effecting a spiritual union with her son, that made her so desirous of personal proximity to him. such union is by most thinking people presumed impossible without consent of opinion, and this mistake rendered her unable to feel near him, to be at home with him. if she had believed that they understood each other, that they were of like opinion, she would not have been half so unhappy when he went away, would not have longed half so grievously for his return. ian on his part understood his mother, but knew she did not understand him, and was therefore troubled. hence it resulted that always after a time came the hour--which never came to her--when he could endure proximity without oneness no longer, and would suddenly announce his departure. and after a day or two of his absence, the mother would be doubly wretched to find a sort of relief in it, and would spend wakeful nights trying to oust it as the merest fancy, persuading herself that she was miserable, and nothing but miserable, in the loss of her darling. naturally then she would turn more to alister, and his love was a strengthening tonic to her sick motherhood. he was never jealous of either. their love for each other was to him a love. he too would mourn deeply over his brother's departure, but it became at once his business to comfort his mother. and while she had no suspicion of the degree to which he suffered, it drew her with fresh love to her elder born, and gave her renewal of the quiet satisfaction in him that was never absent, when she saw how he too missed ian. their mutual affection was indeed as true and strong as a mother could desire it. "if such love," she said to herself, "had appeared in the middle of its history instead of now at its close, the transmitted affection would have been enough to bind the clan together for centuries more!" it was with a prelusive smile that shone on the mother's heart like the opening of heaven, that ian lowered his book to answer her question. she had said-- "did you not feel the cold very much at st. petersburg last winter, ian?" "yes, mother, at times," he answered. "but everybody wears fur; the peasant his sheep-skin, the noble his silver fox. they have to fight the cold! nose and toes are in constant danger. did i never tell you what happened to me once in that way? i don't think i ever did!" "you never tell me anything, ian!" said his mother, looking at him with a loving sadness. "i was suddenly stopped in the street by what i took for an unheard-of insult: i actually thought my great proboscis was being pulled! if i had been as fiery as alister, the man would have found his back, and i should have lost my nose. without the least warning a handful of snow was thrust in my face, and my nose had not even a chance of snorting with indignation, it found itself so twisted in every direction at once! but i have a way, in any sudden occurrence, of feeling perplexed enough to want to be sure before doing anything, and if it has sometimes hindered me from what was expedient, it has oftener saved me from what would have been wrong: in another instant i was able to do justice to the promptitude of a fellow christian for the preservation of my nose, already whitening in frosty death: he was rubbing it hard with snow, the orthodox remedy! my whole face presently sharpened into one burning spot, and taking off my hat, i thanked the man for his most kind attention. he pointed out to me that time spent in explaining the condition of my nose, would have been pure loss: the danger was pressing, and he attacked it at once! i was indeed entirely unconscious of the state of my beak--the worst symptom of any!" "i trust, ian, you will not go back to russia!" said his mother, after a little more talk about frost-biting. "surely there is work for you at home!" "what can i do at home, mother? you have no money to buy me a commission, and i am not much good at farm-work. alister says i am not worth a horseman's wages!" "you could find teaching at home; or you could go into the church. we might manage that, for you would only have to attend the divinity classes." "mother! would you put me into one of the priests' offices that i may eat a piece of bread? as for teaching, there are too many hungry students for that: i could not take the bread out of their mouths! and in truth, mother, i could not endure it--except it were required of me. i can live on as little as any, but it must be with some liberty. i have surely inherited the spirit of some old sea-rover, it is so difficult for me to rest! i am a very thistle-down for wandering! i must know how my fellow-creatures live! i should like to be one man after another--each for an hour or two!" "your father used to say there was much norse blood in the family." "there it is, mother! i cannot help it!" "i don't like your holding the czar's commission, ian--somehow i don't like it! he is a tyrant!" "i am going to throw it up, mother." "i am glad of that! how did you ever get it?" "oddly enough, through the man that pulled my nose. i had a chance afterwards of doing him a good turn, which he was most generous in acknowledging; and as he belonged to the court, i had the offer of a lieutenant's commission. the scotch are in favour." a deep cloud had settled on the face of the young man. the lady looked at him for a moment with keenest mother-eyes, suppressed a deep sigh, and betook herself again to her work. ere she thought how he might take it, another question broke from her lips. "what sort of church had you to go to in st. petersburg, ian?" she said. ian was silent a moment, thinking how to be true, and not hurt her more than could not be helped. "there are a thousand places of worship there, mother," he returned, with a curious smile. "any presbyterian place?" she asked. "i believe so," he replied. "ian, you haven't given up praying?" "if ever i prayed, mother, i certainly have not given it up." "ever prayed, ian! when a mere child you prayed like an aged christian!" "ah, mother, that was a sad pity! i asked for things of which i felt no need! i was a hypocrite! i ought to have prayed like a little child!" the mother was silent: she it was who had taught him to pray thus--making him pray aloud in her hearing! and this was the result! the premature blossom had withered! she said to herself. but it was no blossom, only a muslin flower! "then you didn't go to church!" she said at length. "not often, mother dear," he answered. "when i do go, i like to go to the church of the country i happen to be in. going to church and praying to god are not the same thing." "then you do say your prayers? oh, do not tell me you never bow down before your maker!" "shall i tell you where i think i did once pray to god, mother?" he said, after a little pause, anxious to soothe her suffering. "at least i did think then that i prayed!" he added. "it was not this morning, then, before you left your chamber?" "no, mother," answered ian; "i did not pray this morning, and i never say prayers." the mother gave a gasp, but answered nothing. ian went on again. "i should like to tell you, mother, about that time when i am almost sure i prayed!" "i should like to hear about it," she answered, with strangest minglings of emotion. at one and the same instant she felt parted from her son by a gulf into which she must cast herself to find him, and that he stood on a height of sacred experience which she never could hope to climb. "oh for his father to talk to him!" she said to herself. he was a power on her soul which she almost feared. if he were to put forth his power, might he not drag her down into unbelief? it was the first time they had come so close in their talk. the moment his mother spoke out, ian had responded. he was anxious to be open with her so far as he could, and forced his natural taciturnity, the prime cause of which was his thoughtfulness: it was hard to talk where was so much thinking to be done, so little time to do it in, and so little progress made by it! but wherever he could keep his mother company, there he would not leave her! just as he opened his mouth, however, to begin his narration, the door of the room also opened, flung wide by the small red hand of nancy, and two young ladies entered. chapter viii. a morning call. had valentine known who the brothers were, or where they lived, he would before now have called to thank them again for their kindness to him; but he imagined they had some distance to go after depositing him, and had not yet discovered his mistake. the visit now paid had nothing to do with him. the two elder girls, curious about the pretty cottage, had come wandering down the spur, or hill-toe, as far as its precincts--if precincts they may be called where was no fence, only a little grove and a less garden. beside the door stood a milk-pail and a churn, set out to be sweetened by the sun and wind. it was very rural, they thought, and very homely, but not so attractive as some cottages in the south:--it indicated a rusticity honoured by the most unceremonious visit from its superiors. thus without hesitation concluding, christina, followed by mercy, walked in at the open door, found a barefooted girl in the kitchen, and spoke pleasantly to her. she, in simple hospitality forgetting herself, made answer in gaelic; and, never doubting the ladies had come to call upon her mistress, led the way, and the girls, without thinking, followed her to the parlour. as they came, they had been talking. had they been in any degree truly educated, they would have been quite capable of an opinion of their own, for they had good enough faculties; but they had never been really taught to read; therefore, with the utmost confidence, they had been passing judgment upon a book from which they had not gathered the slightest notion as to the idea or intention of the writer. christina was of that numerous class of readers, who, if you show one thing better or worse than another, will without hesitation report that you love the one and hate the other. if you say, for instance, that it is a worse and yet more shameful thing for a man to break his wife's heart by systematic neglect, than to strike her and be sorry for it, such readers give out that you approve of wife-beating, and perhaps write to expostulate with you on your brutality. if you express pleasure that a poor maniac should have succeeded in escaping through the door of death from his haunting demon, they accuse you of advocating suicide. but mercy was not yet afloat on the sea of essential lie whereon christina swung to every wave. one question they had been discussing was, whether the hero of the story was worthy the name of lover, seeing he deferred offering his hand to the girl because she told her mother a fib to account for her being with him in the garden after dark. "it was cowardly and unfair," said christina: "was it not for his sake she did it?" mercy did not think to say "was it?" as she well might. "don't you see, chrissy," she said, "he reasoned this way: 'if she tell her mother a lie, she may tell me a lie some day too!'?" so indeed the youth did reason; but it occurred to neither of his critics to note the fact that he would not have minded the girl's telling her mother the lie, if he could have been certain she would never tell him one! in regard to her hiding from him certain passages with another gentleman, occurring between this event and his proposal, christina judged he had no right to know them, and if he had, their concealment was what he deserved. when the girl, who would have thought it rude to ask their names--if i mistake not, it was a point in highland hospitality to entertain without such inquiry--led the way to the parlour, they followed expecting they did not know what: they had heard of the cowhouse, the stable, and even the pigsty, being under the same roof in these parts! when the opening door disclosed "lady" macruadh, every inch a chieftain's widow, their conventional breeding failed them a little; though incapable of recognizing a refinement beyond their own, they were not incapable of feeling its influence; and they had not yet learned how to be rude with propriety in unproved circumstances--still less how to be gracious without a moment's notice. but when a young man sprang from a couch, and the stately lady rose and advanced to receive them, it was too late to retreat, and for a moment they stood abashed, feeling, i am glad to say, like intruders. the behaviour of the lady and gentleman, however, speedily set them partially at ease. the latter, with movements more than graceful, for they were gracious, and altogether free of scroll-pattern or polonius-flourish, placed chairs, and invited them to be seated, and the former began to talk as if their entrance were the least unexpected thing in the world. leaving them to explain their visit or not as they saw fit, she spoke of the weather, the harvest, the shooting; feared the gentlemen would be disappointed: the birds were quite healthy, but not numerous--they had too many enemies to multiply! asked if they had seen the view from such and such a point;--in short, carried herself as one to whom cordiality to strangers was an easy duty. but she was not taken with them. her order of civilization was higher than theirs; and the simplicity as well as old-fashioned finish of her consciousness recoiled a little--though she had not experience enough of a certain kind to be able at once to say what it was in the manner and expression of the young ladies that did not please her. mammon, gaining more and more of the upper hand in all social relations, has done much to lower the petite as well as the grande morale of the country--the good breeding as well as the honesty. unmannerliness with the completest self-possession, is a poor substitute for stiffness, a poorer for courtesy. respect and graciousness from each to each is of the very essence of christianity, independently of rank, or possession, or relation. a certain roughness and rudeness have usurped upon the intercourse of the century. it comes of the spread of imagined greatness; true greatness, unconscious of itself, cannot find expression other than gracious. in the presence of another, a man of true breeding is but faintly aware of his own self, and keenly aware of the other's self. before the human--that bush which, however trodden and peeled, yet burns with the divine presence--the man who thinks of the homage due to him, and not of the homage owing by him, is essentially rude. mammon is slowly stifling and desiccating rank; both are miserable deities, but the one is yet meaner than the other. unrefined families with money are received with open arms and honours paid, in circles where a better breeding than theirs has hitherto prevailed: this, working along with the natural law of corruption where is no aspiration, has gradually caused the deterioration of which i speak. courtesy will never regain her former position, but she will be raised to a much higher; like duty she will be known as a daughter of the living god, "the first stocke father of gentilnes;" for in his neighbour every man will see a revelation of the most high. without being able to recognize the superiority of a woman who lived in a cottage, the young ladies felt and disliked it; and the matron felt the commonness of the girls, without knowing what exactly it was. the girls, on the other hand, were interested in the young man: he looked like a gentleman! ian was interested in the young women: he thought they were shy, when they were only "put out," and wished to make them comfortable--in which he quickly succeeded. his unconsciously commanding air in the midst of his great courtesy, roused their admiration, and they had not been many minutes in his company ere they were satisfied that, however it was to be accounted for, the young man was in truth very much of a gentleman. it was an unexpected discovery of northern produce, and "the estate" gathered interest in their eyes. christina did the greater part of the talking, but both did their best to be agreeable. ian saw quite as well as his mother what ordinary girls they were, but, accustomed to the newer modes in manner and speech, he was not shocked by movements and phrases that annoyed her. the mother apprehended fascination, and was uneasy, though far from showing it. when they rose, ian attended them to the door, leaving his mother anxious, for she feared he would accompany them home. till he returned, she did not resume her seat. the girls took their way along the ridge in silence, till the ruin was between them and the cottage, when they burst into laughter. they were ladies enough not to laugh till out of sight, but not ladies enough to see there was nothing to laugh at. "a harp, too!" said christina. "mercy, i believe we are on the top of mount ararat, and have this very moment left the real noah's ark, patched into a cottage! who can they be?" "gentlefolk evidently," said mercy, "--perhaps old-fashioned people from inverness." "the young man must have been to college!--in the north, you know," continued christina, thinking with pride that her brother was at oxford, "nothing is easier than to get an education, such as it is! it costs in fact next to nothing. ploughmen send their sons to st. andrew's and aberdeen to make gentlemen of them! fancy!" "you must allow this case a successful one!" "i didn't mean his father was a ploughman! that is impossible! besides, i heard him call that very respectable person mother! she is not a ploughman's wife, but evidently a lady of the middle class." christina did not count herself or her people to belong to the middle class. how it was it is not quite easy to say--perhaps the tone of implied contempt with which the father spoke of the lower classes, and the quiet negation with which the mother would allude to shopkeepers, may have had to do with it--but the young people all imagined themselves to belong to the upper classes! it was a pity there was no title in the family--but any of the girls might well marry a coronet! there were indeed persons higher than they; a duke was higher; the queen was higher--but that was pleasant! it was nice to have a few to look up to! on anyone living in a humble house, not to say a poor cottage, they looked down, as the case might be, with indifference or patronage; they little dreamed how, had she known all about them, the respectable person in the cottage would have looked down upon them! at the same time the laugh in which they now indulged was not altogether one of amusement; it was in part an effort to avenge themselves of a certain uncomfortable feeling of rebuke. "i will tell you my theory, mercy!" christina went on. "the lady is the widow of an indian officer--perhaps a colonel. some of their widows are left very poor, though, their husbands having been in the service of their country, they think no small beer of themselves! the young man has a military air which he may have got from his father; or he may be an officer himself: young officers are always poor; that's what makes them so nice to flirt with. i wonder whether he really is an officer! we've actually called upon the people, and come away too, without knowing their names!" "i suppose they're from the new house!" said ian, returning after he had bowed the ladies from the threshold, with the reward of a bewitching smile from the elder, and a shy glance from the younger. "where else could they be from?" returned his mother; "--come to make our poor country yet poorer!" "they're not english!" "not they!--vulgar people from glasgow!" "i think you are too hard on them, mother! they are not exactly vulgar. i thought, indeed, there was a sort of gentleness about them you do not often meet in scotch girls!" "in the lowlands, i grant, ian; but the daughter of the poorest tacksman of the macruadhs has a manner and a modesty i have seen in no sasunnach girl yet. those girls are bold!" "self-possessed, perhaps!" said ian. upon the awkwardness he took for shyness, had followed a reaction. it was with the young ladies a part of good breeding, whatever mistake they made, not to look otherwise than contented with themselves: having for a moment failed in this principle, they were eager to make up for it. "girls are different from what they used to be, i fancy, mother!" added ian thoughtfully. "the world changes very fast!" said the mother sadly. she was thinking, like rebecca, if her sons took a fancy to these who were not daughters of the land, what good would her life do her. "ah, mother dear," said ian, "i have never"--and as he spoke the cloud deepened on his forehead--"seen more than one woman whose ways and manners reminded me of you!" "and what was she?" the mother asked, in pleased alarm. but she almost repented the question when she saw how low the cloud descended on his countenance. "a princess, mother. she is dead," he answered, and turning walked so gently from the room that it was impossible for his mother to detain him. chapter ix. me. sercombe. the next morning, soon after sunrise, the laird began to cut his barley. ian would gladly have helped, but alister had a notion that such labour was not fit for him. "i had a comical interview this morning," said the chief, entering the kitchen at dinner-time. "i was out before my people, and was standing by the burn-side near the foot-bridge, when i heard somebody shouting, and looked up. there was a big english fellow in gray on the top of the ridge, with his gun on his shoulder, hollo-ing. i knew he was english by his hollo-ing. it was plain it was to me, but not choosing to be at his beck and call, i took no heed. 'hullo, you there! wake up!' he cried. 'what should i wake up for?' i returned. 'to carry my bag. you don't seem to have anything to do! i'll give you five shillings.'" "you see to what you expose yourself by your unconventionalities, alister!" said his brother, with mock gravity. "it was not the fellow we carried home the other night, ian; it was one twice his size. it would take all i have to carry him as far!" "the other must have pointed you out to him!" "it was much too dark for him to know me again!" "you forget the hall-lamp!" said ian. "ah, yes, to be sure! i had forgotten!" answered alister. "to tell the truth, i thought, when i took his shilling, he would never know me from nebuchadnezzar: that is the one thing i am ashamed of in the affair--i did in the dark what perhaps i should not have done in the daylight!--i don't mean i would not have carried him and his bag too! i refer only to the shilling! now, of course, i will hold my face to it; but i thought it better to be short with a fellow like that." "well?" "'you'll want prepayment, no doubt!' he went on, putting his hand in his pocket. those sasunnach fellows think every highlandman keen as a hawk after their dirty money!" "they have but too good reason in some parts!" said the mother. "it is not so bad here yet, but there is a great difference in that respect. the old breed is fast disappearing. what with the difficulty of living by the hardest work, and the occasional chance of earning a shilling easily, many have turned both idle and greedy." "that's for you and your shilling, alister!" said ian. "i confess," returned alister, "if i had foreseen what an idea of the gentlemen of the country i might give, i should have hesitated. but i haven't begun to be ashamed yet!" "ashamed, alister!" cried ian. "what does it matter what a fellow like that thinks of you?" "and mistress conal has her shilling!" said the mother. "if the thing was right," pursued ian, "no harm can come of it; if it was not right, no end of harm may come. are you sure it was good for mistress conal to have that shilling, alister? what if it be drawing away her heart from him who is watching his old child in her turf-hut? what if the devil be grinning at her from, that shilling?" "ian! if god had not meant her to have the shilling, he would not have let alister earn it." "certainly god can take care of her from a shilling!" said ian, with one of his strangely sweet smiles. "i was only trying alister, mother." "i confess i did not like the thought of it at first," resumed mrs. macruadh; "but it was mere pride; for when i thought of your father, i knew he would have been pleased with alister." "then, mother, i am glad; and i don't care what ian, or any sasunnach under the sun, may think of me." "but you haven't told us," said ian, "how the thing ended." "i said to the fellow," resumed alister, "that i had my shearing to do, and hadn't the time to go with him. 'is this your season for sheep-shearing?' said he.'we call cutting the corn shearing,' i answered, 'because in these parts we use the reaping hook.' 'that is a great waste of labour!' he returned. i did not tell him that some of our land would smash his machines like toys. 'how?' i asked. 'it costs so much more,' he said. 'but it feeds so many more!' i replied. 'oh yes, of course, if you don't want the farmer to make a living!' 'i manage to make a living,' i said. 'then you are the farmer?' 'so it would appear.' 'i beg your pardon; i thought--' 'you thought i was an idle fellow, glad of an easy job to keep the life in me!' 'you were deuced glad of a job the other night, they tell me!' 'so i was. i wanted a shilling for a poor woman, and hadn't one to give her without going home a mile and a half for it!' by this time he had come down, and i had gone a few steps to meet him; i did not want to seem unfriendly. 'upon my word, it was very good of you! the old lady ought to be grateful!' he said. 'so ought we all,' i answered, '--i to your friend for the shilling, and he to me for taking his bag. he did me one good turn for my poor woman, and i did him another for his poor leg!' 'so you're quits!' said he. 'not at all,' i answered; 'on the contrary, we are under mutual obligation.' 'i don't see the difference!--hillo, there's a hare!' and up went his gun to his shoulder. 'none of that!' i cried, and knocked up the barrel. 'what do you mean?' he roared, looking furious. 'get out of the way, or i'll shoot you.' 'murder as well as poaching!' i said. 'poaching!' he shouted. 'that rabbit is mine,' i answered; 'i will not have it killed.' 'cool!--on mr. palmer's land!' said he. 'the land is mine, and i am my own gamekeeper!' i rejoined. 'you look like it!' he said. 'you go after your birds!--not in this direction though,' i answered, and turned and left him." "you were rough with him!" said ian. "i did lose my temper rather." "it was a mistake on his part." "i expected to hear him fire," alister continued, "for there was the rabbit he took for a hare lurching slowly away! i'm glad he didn't: i always feel bad after a row!--can a conscience ever get too fastidious, ian?" "the only way to find that out is always to obey it." "so long as it agrees with the bible, ian!" interposed the mother. "the bible is a big book, mother, and the things in it are of many sorts," returned ian. "the lord did not go with every thing in it." "ian! ian! i am shocked to hear you!" "it is the truth, mother." "what would your father say!" "'he that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.'" ian rose from the table, knelt by his mother, and laid his head on her shoulder. she was silent, pained by his words, and put her arm round him as if to shelter him from the evil one. homage to will and word of the master, apart from the acceptance of certain doctrines concerning him, was in her eyes not merely defective but dangerous. to love the lord with the love of truest obedience; to believe him the son of god and the saver of men with absolute acceptance of the heart, was far from enough! it was but sentimental affection! a certain young preacher in scotland some years ago, accused by an old lady of preaching works, took refuge in the lord's sermon on the mount: "ow ay!" answered the partisan, "but he was a varra yoong mon whan he preacht that sermon!" alister rose and went: there was to him something specially sacred in the communion of his mother and brother. heartily he held with ian, but shrank from any difference with his mother. for her sake he received sunday after sunday in silence what was to him a bushel of dust with here and there a bit of mouldy bread in it; but the mother did not imagine any great coincidence of opinion between her and alister any more than between her and ian. she had not the faintest notion how much genuine faith both of them had, or how it surpassed her own in vitality. but while ian seemed to his brother, who knew him best, hardly touched with earthly stain, alister, notwithstanding his large and dominant humanity, was still in the troublous condition of one trying to do right against a powerful fermentation of pride. he held noblest principles; but the sediment of generations was too easily stirred up to cloud them. he was not quite honest in his attitude towards some of his ancestors, judging them far more leniently than he would have judged others. he loved his neighbour, but his neighbour was mostly of his own family or his own clan. he might have been unjust for the sake of his own--a small fault in the eyes of the world, but a great fault indeed in a nature like his, capable of being so much beyond it. for, while the faults of a good man cannot be such evil things as the faults of a bad man, they are more blameworthy, and greater faults than the same would be in a bad man: we must not confuse the guilt of the person with the abstract evil of the thing. ian was one of those blessed few who doubt in virtue of a larger faith. while its roots were seeking a deeper soil, it could not show so fast a growth above ground, he doubted most about the things he loved best, while he devoted the energies of a mind whose keenness almost masked its power, to discover possible ways of believing them. to the wise his doubts would have been his best credentials; they were worth tenfold the faith of most. it was truth, and higher truth, he was always seeking. the sadness which coloured his deepest individuality, only one thing could ever remove--the conscious presence of the eternal. this is true of all sadness, but ian knew it. he overtook alister on his way to the barley-field. "i have been trying to find out wherein lay the falseness of the position in which you found yourself this morning," he said. "there could be nothing wrong in doing a small thing for its reward any more than a great one; where i think you went wrong was in assuming your social position afterwards: you should have waited for its being accorded you. there was no occasion to be offended with the man. you ought to have seen how you must look to him, and given him time. i don't perceive why you should be so gracious to old mistress conal, and so hard upon him. certainly you would not speak as he did to any man, but he has been brought up differently; he is not such a gentleman as you cannot help being. in a word, you ought to have treated him as an inferior, and been more polite to him." chapter x. the plough-bulls. partly, it may be, from such incidents at the outset of their acquaintance, there was for some time no further meeting betwixt any of the chief's family and that of the new laird. there was indeed little to draw them together except common isolation. valentine would have been pleased to show gratitude to his helpers on that stormy night, but after his sisters' account of their call, he felt not only ashamed, which was right, but ashamed to show his shame, which was a fresh shame. the girls on their part made so much of what they counted the ridiculous elements of their "adventure," that, natural vengeance on their untruthfulness, they came themselves to see in it almost only what was ridiculous. in the same spirit mr. sercombe recounted his adventure with alister, which annoyed his host, who had but little acquaintance with the boundaries of his land. from the additional servants they had hired in the vicinity, the people of the new house gathered correct information concerning the people at the cottage, but the honour in which they were held only added to the ridicule they associated with them. on the other side also there was little inclination towards a pursuit of intercourse. mrs. macruadh, from nancy's account and the behaviour of the girls, divined the explanation of their visit; and, as their mother did not follow it up, took no notice of it. in the mind of mercy, however, lurked a little thorn, with the bluntest possible sting of suspicion, every time she joined in a laugh at the people of the cottage, that she was not quite just to them. the shooting, such as it was, went on, the sleeping and the eating, the walking and the talking. long letters were written from the new house to female friends--letters with the flourishes if not the matter of wit, and funny tales concerning the natives, whom, because of their poor houses and unintelligibility, they represented as semi-savages. the young men went back to oxford; and the time for the return of the family to civilization seemed drawing nigh. it happened about this time, however, that a certain speculation in which mr. peregrine palmer was very materially interested, failed utterly, depriving him of the consciousness of a good many thousands, and producing in him the feeling of a lady of moderate means when she loses her purse: he must save it off something! for though he spent freely, he placed a great value on money--as well he might, seeing it gave him all the distinction which before everything else he prized. he did not know what a poor thing it is to be distinguished among men, therefore did not like losing his thousands. having by failure sinned against mammon, he must do something to ease the money-conscience that ruled his conduct; and the first thing that occurred to him was, to leave his wife and daughters where they were for the winter. none of them were in the least delicate; his wife professed herself fond of a country life; it would give the girls a good opportunity for practice, drawing, and study generally, and he would find them a suitable governess! he talked the matter over with mrs. palmer. she did not mind much, and would not object. he would spend christmas with them, he said, and bring down christian, and perhaps mr. sercombe. the girls did not like the idea. it was so cold in the country in winter, and the snow would be so deep! they would be starved to death! but, of course--if the governor had made up his mind to be cruel! the thing was settled. it was only for one winter! it would be a new experience for them, and they would enjoy their next season all the more! the governor had promised to send them down new furs, and a great boxful of novels! he did not apprise them that he meant to sell their horses. their horses were his! he was an indulgent father and did not stint them, but he was not going to ask their leave! at the same time he had not the courage to tell them. he took his wife with him as far as inverness for a day or two, that she might lay in a good stock of everything antagonistic to cold. when father and mother were gone from the house, the girls felt larky. they had no wish to do anything they would not do if their parents were at home, but they had some sense of relief in the thought that they could do whatever they liked. a more sympathetic historian might say, and i am nowise inclined to contradict him, that it was only the reaction from the pain of parting, and the instinct to make the best of their loneliness. however it was, the elder girls resolved on a walk to the village, to see what might be seen, and in particular the young woman at the shop, of whom they had heard their brother and mr. sercombe speak with admiration, qualified with the remark that she was so proper they could hardly get a civil word out of her. she was in fact too scrupulously polite for their taste. it was a bright, pleasant, frosty morning, perfectly still, with an air like wine. the harvest had vanished from the fields. the sun shone on millions of tiny dew-suns, threaded on forsaken spider-webs. a few small, white, frozen clouds flecked the sky. the purple heather was not yet gone, and not any snow had yet fallen in the valley. the burn was large, for there had been a good deal of rain, but it was not much darker than its usual brown of smoke-crystal. they tripped gaily along. if they had little spiritual, they had much innocent animal life, which no great disappointments or keen twinges of conscience had yet damped. they were hut human kittens--and not of the finest breed. as they crossed the root of the spur, and looked down on the autumn fields to the east of it, they spied something going on which they did not understand. stopping, and gazing more intently, they beheld what seemed a contest between man and beast, but its nature they could not yet distinguish. gradually it grew plain that two of the cattle of the country, wild and shaggy, were rebelling against control. they were in fact two young bulls, of the small black highland breed, accustomed to gallop over the rough hills, jumping like goats, which alister had set himself the task of breaking to the plough--by no means an easy one, or to be accomplished single-handed by any but a man of some strength, and both persistence and patience. in the summer he had lost a horse, which he could ill afford to replace: if he could make these bulls work, they would save him the price of the horse, would cost less to keep, and require less attention! he bridled them by the nose, not with rings through the gristle, but with nose-bands of iron, bluntly spiked inside, against which they could not pull hard without pain, and had made some progress, though he could by no means trust them yet: every now and then a fit of mingled wildness and stubbornness would seize them, and the contest would appear about to begin again from the beginning; but they seldom now held out very long. the nose-band of one of them had come off, alister had him by a horn in each hand, and a fierce struggle was going on between them, while the other was pulling away from his companion as if determined to take to the hills. it was a good thing for them that share and coulter were pretty deep in the ground, to the help of their master; for had they got away, they would have killed, or at least disabled themselves. presently, however, he had the nose-band on, and by force and persuasion together got the better of them; the staggy little furies gave in; and quickly gathering up his reins, he went back to the plough-stilts, where each hand held at once a handle and a rein. with energetic obedience the little animals began to pull--so vigorously that it took nearly all the chief's strength to hold at once his plough and his team. it was something of a sight to the girls after a long dearth of events. many things indeed upon which they scarce cast an eye when they came, they were now capable of regarding with a little feeble interest. nor, although ignorant of everything agricultural, were they quite unused to animals; having horses they called their own, they would not unfrequently go to the stables to give their orders, or see that they were carried out. they waited for some time hoping the fight would begin again, and drew a little nearer; then, as by common consent, left the road, passed the ruin, ran down the steep side of the ridge, and began to toil through the stubble towards the ploughman. a sharp straw would every now and then go through a delicate stocking, and the damp soil gathered in great lumps on their shoes, but they plodded on, laughing merrily as they went. the macruadh was meditating the power of the frost to break up the clods of the field, when he saw the girls close to him. he pulled in his cattle, and taking off his bonnet with one hand while the other held both reins-- "excuse me, ladies," he said; "my animals are young, and not quite broken." they were not a little surprised at such a reception, and were driven to conclude that the man must be the laird himself. they had heard that he cultivated his own land, but had not therefore imagined him labouring in his own person. in spite of the blindness produced by their conventional training, vulgarly called education, they could not fail to perceive something in the man worthy of their regard. before them, on the alert toward his cattle, but full of courtesy, stood a dark, handsome, weather-browned man, with an eagle air, not so pronounced as his brother's. his hair was long, and almost black,--in thick, soft curls over a small, well-set head. his glance had the flash that comes of victorious effort, and his free carriage was that of one whom labour has nowise subdued, whose every muscle is instinct with ready life. true even in trifles, he wore the dark beard that nature had given him; disordered by the struggle with his bulls, it imparted a certain wild look that contrasted with his speech. christina forgot that the man was a labourer like any other, but noted that he did not manifest the least embarrassment in their presence, or any consciousness of a superfluity of favour in their approach: she did not know that neither would his hired servant, or the poorest member of his clan. it was said of a certain sutherland clan that they were all gentlemen, and of a certain argyll clan that they were all poets; of the macruadhs it was said they were both. as to mercy, the first glance of the chiefs hazel eyes, looking straight into hers with genial respect, went deeper than any look had yet penetrated. ladies in alister's fields were not an everyday sight. hardly before had his work been enlivened by such a presence; and the joy of it was in his eyes, though his behaviour was calm. christina thought how pleasant it would be to have him for a worshipping slave--so interpenetrated with her charms that, like una's lion, he would crouch at her feet, come and go at her pleasure, live on her smiles, and be sad when she gave him none. she would make a gentleman of him, then leave him to dream of her! it would be a pleasant and interesting task in the dullness of their winter's banishment, with the days so short and the nights so unendurably long! the man was handsome!--she would do it!--and would proceed at once to initiate the conquest of him! the temptation to patronize not unfrequently presents an object for the patronage superior to the would-be patron; for the temptation is one to which slight persons chiefly are exposed; it affords an outlet for the vague activity of self-importance. few have learned that one is of no value except to god and other men. miss palmer worshipped herself, and therefore would fain be worshipped--so dreamed of a friendship de haut en bas with the country fellow. she put on a smile--no difficult thing, for she was a good-natured girl. it looked to alister quite natural. it was nevertheless, like hamlet's false friends, "sent for." "do you like ploughing?" she asked. had she known the manners of the country, she would have added "laird," or "macruadh." "yes i do," alister answered; "but i should plough all the same if i did not. it has to be done." "but why should you do it?" "because i must," laughed the laird. what ought she to answer? should she condole with the man because he had to work? it did not seem prudent! she would try another tack! "you had some trouble with your oxen! we saw it from the road, and were quite frightened. i hope you are not hurt." "there was no danger of that," answered alister with a smile. "what wild creatures they are! ain't it rather hard work for them? they are so small!" "they are as strong as horses," answered the laird. "i have had my work to break them! indeed, i can hardly say i have done it yet! they would very much like to run their horns into me!" "then it must be dangerous! it shows that they were not meant to work!" "they were meant to work if i can make them work." "then you approve of slavery!" said mercy she hardly knew what made her oppose him. as yet she had no opinions of her own, though she did catch a thought sometimes, when it happened to come within her reach. alister smiled a curious smile. "i should," he said, "if the right people were made slaves of. i would take shares in a company of algerine pirates to rid the social world of certain types of the human!" the girls looked at each other. "sharp!" said christina to herself. "what sorts would you have them take?" she asked. "idle men in particular," answered alister. "would you not have them take idle ladies as well?" "i would see first how they behaved when the men were gone." "you believe, then," said mercy, "we have a right to make the lower animals work?" "i think it is our duty," answered alister. "at all events, if we do not, we must either kill them off by degrees, or cede them this world, and emigrate. but even that would be a bad thing for my little bulls there! it is not so many years since the last wolf was killed--here, close by! and if the dogs turned to wolves again, where would they be? the domestic animals would then have wild beasts instead of men for their masters! to have the world a habitable one, man must rule." "men are nothing but tyrants to them!" said christina. "most are, i admit." ere he could prevent her, she had walked up to the near bull, and begun to pat him. he poked a sharp wicked horn sideways at her, catching her cloak on it, and grazing her arm. she started back very white. alister gave him a terrible tug. the beast shook his head, and began to paw the earth. "it wont do to go near him," he said. "--but you needn't be afraid; he can't touch you. that iron band round his nose has spikes in it." "poor fellow!" said christina; "it is no wonder he should be out of temper! it must hurt him dreadfully!" "it does hurt him when he pulls against it, but not when he is quiet." "i call it cruel!" "i do not. the fellow knows what is wanted of him--just as well as any naughty child." "how can he when he has no reason!" "oh, hasn't he!" "animals have no reason; they have only instinct!" "they have plenty of reason--more than many men and women. they are not so far off us as pride makes most people think! it is only those that don't know them that talk about the instinct of animals!" "do you know them?" "pretty well for a man; but they're often too much for me." "anyhow that poor thing does not know better." "he knows enough; and if he did not, would you allow him to do as he pleased because he didn't know better? he wanted to put his horn into you a moment ago!" "still it must be hard to want very much to do a thing, and not be able to do it!" said mercy. "i used to feel as if i could tear my old nurse to pieces when she wouldn't let me do as i wanted!" said christina. "i suppose you do whatever you please now, ladies?" "no, indeed. we wanted to go to london, and here we are for the winter!" "and you think it hard?" "yes, we do." "and so, from sympathy, you side with my cattle?" "well--yes!" "you think i have no right to keep them captive, and make them work?" "none at all," said christina. "then it is time i let them go!" alister made for the animals' heads. "no, no! please don't!" cried both the girls, turning, the one white, the other red. "certainly not if you do not wish it!" answered alister, staying his step. "if i did, however, you would be quite safe, for they would not come near me. they would be off up that hill as hard as they could tear, jumping everything that came in their way." "is it not very dull here in the winter?" asked christina, panting a little, but trying to look as if she had known quite well he was only joking. "i do not find it dull." "ah, but you are a man, and can do as you please!" "i never could do as i pleased, and so i please as i do," answered alister. "i do not quite understand you." "when you cannot do as you like, the best thing is to like what you have to do. one's own way is not to be had in this world. there's a better, though, which is to be had!" "i have heard a parson talk like that," said mercy, "but never a layman!" "my father was a parson as good as any layman. he would have laid me on my back in a moment--here as i stand!" said alister, drawing himself to his height. he broke suddenly into gaelic, addressing the more troublesome of the bulls. no better pleased to stand still than to go on, he had fallen to digging at his neighbour, who retorted with the horn convenient, and presently there was a great mixing of bull and harness and cloddy earth. turning quickly towards them, alister dropped a rein. in a moment the plough was out of the furrow, and the bulls were straining every muscle, each to send the other into the wilds of the unseen creation. alister sprang to their heads, and taking them by their noses forced them back into the line of the furrow. christina, thinking they had broken loose, fled; but there was mercy with the reins, hauling with all her might! "thank you, thank you!" said the laird, laughing with pleasure. "you are a friend indeed!" "mercy! mercy! come away directly," cried christina. but mercy did not heed her. the laird took the reins, and administering a blow each to the animals, made them stand still. there are tender-hearted people who virtually object to the whole scheme of creation; they would neither have force used nor pain suffered; they talk as if kindness could do everything, even where it is not felt. millions of human beings but for suffering would never develop an atom of affection. the man who would spare due suffering is not wise. it is folly to conclude a thing ought not to be done because it hurts. there are powers to be born, creations to be perfected, sinners to be redeemed, through the ministry of pain, that could be born, perfected, redeemed, in no other way. but christina was neither wise nor unwise after such fashion. she was annoyed at finding the laird not easily to be brought to her feet, and mercy already advanced to his good graces. she was not jealous of mercy, for was she not beautiful and mercy plain? but mercy had by her pluck secured an advantage, and the handsome ploughman looked at her admiringly! partly therefore because she was not pleased with him, partly that she thought a little outcry would be telling,-- "oh, you wicked man!" she cried, "you are hurting the poor brutes!" "no more than is necessary," he answered. "you are cruel!" "good morning, ladies." he just managed to take off his bonnet, for the four-legged explosions at the end of his plough were pulling madly. he slackened his reins, and away it went, like a sharp knife through a dutch cheese. "you've made him quite cross!" said mercy. "what a brute of a man!" said christina. she never restrained herself from teasing cat or puppy for her amusement--did not even mind hurting it a little. those capable of distinguishing between the qualities of resembling actions are few. there are some who will regard alister as capable of vivisection. on one occasion when the brothers were boys, alister having lost his temper in the pursuit of a runaway pony, fell upon it with his fists the moment he caught it. ian put himself between, and received, without word or motion, more than one blow meant for the pony. "donal was only in fun!" he said, as soon as alister's anger had spent itself. "father would never have punished him like that!" alister was ashamed, and never again was guilty of such an outbreak. from that moment he began the serious endeavour to subjugate the pig, tiger, mule, or whatever animal he found in himself. there remained, however, this difference between them--that alister punished without compunction, while ian was sorely troubled at having to cause any suffering. chapter xi. the fir-grove. as the ladies went up the ridge, regarded in the neighbourhood as the chief's pleasure-ground where nobody went except to call upon the chief, they must, having mounted it lower down than where they descended, pass the cottage. the grove of birch, mountain-ash, and fir which surrounded it, was planted quite irregularly, and a narrow foot-path went winding through it to the door. against one of the firs was a rough bench turned to the west, and seated upon it they saw ian, smoking a formless mass of much defiled sea-foam, otherwise meer-schaum. he rose, uncovered, and sat down again. but christina, who regarded it as a praiseworthy kindness to address any one beneath her, not only returned his salutation, but stopped, and said, "good morning! we have been learning how they plough in scotland, but i fear we annoyed the ploughman." "fergus does sometimes look surly," said ian, rising again, and going to her; "he has bad rheumatism, poor fellow! and then he can't speak a word of english, and is ashamed of it!" "the man we saw spoke english very well. is fergus your brother's name?" "no; my brother's name is alister--that is gaelic for alexander." "he was ploughing with two wild little oxen, and could hardly manage them." "then it must have been alister--only, excuse me, he could manage them perfectly. alister could break a pair of buffaloes." "he seemed rather vexed, and i thought it might be that we made the creatures troublesome.--i do not mean he was rude--only a little rough to us." ian smiled, and waited for more. "he did not like to be told he was hard on the animals. i only said the poor things did not know better!" "ah--i see!--he understands animals so well, he doesn't like to be meddled with in his management of them. i daresay he told you that, if they didn't know better, he had to teach them better! they are troublesome little wretches.--yes, i confess he is a little touchy about animals!" somehow christina felt herself rebuked, and did not like it. he had almost told her that, if she had quarrelled with his ploughman-brother, the fault must be hers! "but indeed, captain macruadh," she said--for the people called him captain, "i am not ignorant about animals! we have horses of our own, and know all about them.--don't we, mercy?" "yes," said mercy; "they take apples and sugar from our hands." "and you would have the chief's bulls tamed with apples and sugar!" returned ian, laughing. "but the horses were tamed before ever you saw them! if you had taken them wild, or even when they were foals, and taught them everything, then you would know a little about them. an acquaintance is not a friendship! my brother loves animals and understands them almost like human beings; he understands them better than some human beings, for the most cunning of the animals are yet simple. he knows what they are thinking when i cannot read a word of their faces. i remember one terrible night, winters ago--there had been a blinding drift on and off during the day, and my father and mother were getting anxious about him--how he came staggering in, and fell on the floor, and a great lump in his plaid on his back began to wallow about, and forth crept his big colley! they had been to the hills to look after a few sheep, and the poor dog was exhausted, and alister carried him home at the risk of his life." "a valuable animal, i don't doubt," said christina. "he had been, but was no more what the world calls valuable. he was an old dog almost past work--but the wisest creature! poor fellow, he never recovered that day on the hills! a week or so after, we buried him--in the hope of a blessed resurrection," added ian, with a smile. the girls looked at each other as much as to say, "good heavens!" he caught the look, but said nothing, for he saw they had "no understanding." the brothers believed most devoutly that the god who is present at the death-bed of the sparrow does not forget the sparrow when he is dead; for they had been taught that he is an unchanging god; "and," argued ian, "what god remembers, he thinks of, and what he thinks of, is." but ian knew that what misses the heart falls under the feet! a man is bound to share his best, not to tumble his seed-pearls into the feeding-trough, to break the teeth of them that are there at meat. he had but lifted a corner to give them a glimpse of the life eternal, and the girls thought him ridiculous! the human caterpillar that has not yet even begun to sicken with the growth of her psyche-wings, is among the poorest of the human animals! but christina was not going to give in! her one idea of the glory of life was the subjugation of men. as if moved by a sudden impulse, she went close up to him. "do not be angry with me," she said, almost coaxingly, but with a visible mingling of boldness and shyness, neither of them quite assumed; for, though conscious of her boldness, she was not frightened; and there was something in the eagle-face that made it easy to look shy. "i did not mean to be rude. i am sorry." "you mistake me," he said gently. "i only wanted you to know you misjudged my brother." "then, if you have forgiven me, you will let me sit for a few minutes! i am so tired with walking in the sticky earth!" "do, pray, sit down," responded ian heartily, and led the way. but she sank gracefully at the foot of the next fir, while mercy sat down on the bench. "do go on with your pipe," she said, looking up as she arranged her dress; "i am quite used to smoke. papa would smoke in church if he dared!" "chrissy! you know he never smokes in the drawing-room!" cried mercy, scandalized. "i have seen him--when mamma was away." ian began to be a little more interested in the plain one. but what must his mother think to see them sitting there together! he could not help it! if ladies chose to sit down, it was not for him to forbid them! and there was a glimmer of conscience in the younger! most men believe only what they find or imagine possible to themselves. they may be sure of this, that there are men so different from them that no judgment they pass upon them is worth a straw, simply because it does not apply to them. i assert of ian that neither beauty nor intellect attracted him. imagination would entice him, but the least lack of principle would arrest its influence. the simplest manifestation of a live conscience would draw him more than anything else. i do not mean the conscience that proposes questions, but the conscience that loves right and turns from wrong. notwithstanding the damsel's invitation, he did not resume his pipe. he was simple, but not free and easy--too sensitive to the relations of life to be familiar upon invitation with any girl. if she was not one with whom to hold real converse, it was impossible to blow dandelions with her, and talk must confine itself to the commonplace. after gentlest assays to know what was possible, the result might be that he grew courteously playful, or drew back, and confined himself to the formal. in the conversation that followed, he soon found the younger capable of being interested, and, having seen much in many parts of the world, had plenty to tell her. christina smiled sweetly, taking everything with over-gentle politeness, but looking as if all that interested her was, that there they were, talking about it. provoked at last by her persistent lack of genuine reception, ian was tempted to try her with something different: perhaps she might be moved to horror! any feeling would be a find! he thought he would tell them an adventure he had read in a book of travels. in persia, alone in a fine moonlit night, the traveller had fallen asleep on his horse, but woke suddenly, roused by something frightful, he did not know what. the evil odour all about him explained, however, his bewilderment and terror. presently he was bumped on this side, then bumped on that; first one knee, then the other, would be struck; now the calf of one leg was caught, now the calf of the other; then both would be caught at once, and he shoved nearly over his pommel. his horse was very uneasy, but could ill help himself in the midst of a moving mass of uncertain objects. the traveller for a moment imagined himself in a boat on the sea, with a huge quantity of wrecked cargo floating around him, whence came the frequent collisions he was undergoing; but he soon perceived that the vague shapes were boxes, pannierwise on the backs of mules, moving in caravan along the desert. of not a few the lids were broken, of some gone altogether, revealing their contents--the bodies of good mussulmans, on their way to the consecrated soil of mecca for burial. carelessly shambled the mules along, stumbling as they jogged over the uneven ground, their boxes tilting from side to side, sorely shaken, some of them, in frustration of dying hopes, scattering their contents over the track--for here and there a mule carried but a wreck of coffins. on and on over the rough gravelly waste, under the dead cold moon, weltered the slow stream of death! "you may be sure," concluded ian, "he made haste out of the ruck! but it was with difficulty he got clear, happily to windward--then for an hour sat motionless on his horse, watching through the moonlight the long dark shadow flitting toward its far-off goal. when at length he could no longer descry it, he put his horse to his speed--but not to overtake it." as he spoke, mercy's eyes grew larger and larger, never leaving his face. she had at least imagination enough for that! christina curled her pretty lip, and looked disgusted. the one at a horrible tale was horrified, the other merely disgusted! the one showed herself capable of some reception; the other did not. "something might be done with that girl!" thought ian. "did he see their faces?" drawled christina. mercy was silent, but her eyes remained fixed on him. it was ian's telling, more than the story, that impressed her. "i don't think he mentions them," answered ian. "but shall i tell you," he went on, "what seems to me the most unpleasant thing about the business?" "do," said christina. "it is that the poor ghosts should see such a disagreeable fuss made with their old clothes." christina smiled. "do you think ghosts see what goes on after they are dead?" asked mercy. "the ghosts are not dead," said ian, "and i can't tell. but i am inclined to think some ghosts have to stay a while and look on." "what would be the good of that?" returned mercy. "perhaps to teach them the little good they were in, or got out of the world," he answered. "to have to stick to a thing after it is dead, is terrible, but may teach much." "i don't understand you," said mercy. "the world is not dead!" "better and better!" thought ian with himself. "the girl can understand!--a thing is always dead to you when you have done with it," he answered her. "suppose you had a ball-dress crumpled and unsightly--the roses on it withered, and the tinsel shining hideously through them--would it not be a dead dress?" "yes, indeed." "then suppose, for something you had done, or for something you would not stop being, you had to wear that ball-dress till something came about--you would be like the ghosts that cannot get away.--suppose, when you were old and wrinkled,--" "you are very amusing, captain macruadh!" said christina, with a bell-like laugh. but ian went on. "some stories tell us of ghosts with the same old wrinkled faces in which they died. the world and its uses over, they are compelled to haunt it still, seeing how things go but taking no share in them beholding the relief their death is to all, feeling they have lost their chance of beauty, and are fixed in ugliness, having wasted being itself! they are like a man in a miserable dream, in which he can do nothing, but in which he must stay, and go dreaming, dreaming on without hope of release. to be in a world and have nothing to do with it, must be awful! a little more imagination would do some people good!" "no, please!--no more for me!" said christina, laughing as she rose. mercy was silent. though she had never really thought about anything herself, she did not doubt that certain people were in earnest about something. she knew that she ought to be good, and she knew she was not good; how to be good she did not know, for she had never set herself, to be good. she sometimes wished she were good; but there are thousands of wandering ghosts who would be good if they might without taking trouble: the kind of goodness they desire would not be worth a life to hold it. fear is a wholesome element in the human economy; they are merely silly who would banish it from all association with religion. true, there is no religion in fear; religion is love, and love casts out fear; but until a man has love, it is well he should have fear. so long as there are wild beasts about, it is better to be afraid than secure. the vague awe ready to assail every soul that has not found rest in its source, readier the more honest the soul, had for the first time laid hold of mercy. the earnest face of the speaker had most to do with it. she had never heard anybody talk like that! the lady of the house appeared, asking, with kind dignity, if they would not take some refreshment: to a highlander hospitality is a law where not a passion. christina declined the offer. "thanks! we were only a little tired, and are quite rested now," she said. "how beautifully sheltered your house is!" "on the side of the sea, yes," answered mrs. macruadh; "but not much on the east where we want it most. the trees are growing, however!" when the sisters were out of sight of the cottage-- "well!" remarked christina, "he's a nice young man too, is he not? exceedingly well bred! and what taste he has! he knows how to amuse ladies!" mercy did not answer. "i never heard anything so disgusting!" pursued christina. "but," suggested mercy, "you like to read horrid stories, chrissy! you said so only yesterday! and there was nothing in what he told us that oughtn't to be spoken about." "what!--not those hideous coffins--and the bodies dropping out of them--all crawling, no doubt?" "that is your own, chrissy! you know he did not go so far as that! if colonel webberly had told you the story, you would have called it charming--in fun, of course, i mean!" but christina never liked the argumentum ad feminam. "i would not! you know i would not!" she exclaimed. "i do believe the girl has fallen in love with the horrid man! of the two, i declare, i like the ploughman better. i am sorry i happened to vex him; he is a good stupid sort of fellow! i can't bear this man! how horribly he fixed his eyes on you when he was talking that rubbish about the ball-dress!" "he was anxious to make himself understood. i know he made me think i must mind what i was about!" "oh, nonsense! we didn't come into this wilderness to be preached to by a lay john the baptist! he is an ill-bred fellow!" she would not have said so much against him, had not mercy taken his part. mercy rarely contradicted her sister, but even this brief passage with a real man had roused the justice in her. "i don't agree with you, chrissy," she said. "he seems to me very much of a gentleman!" she did not venture to say all she felt, not choosing to be at absolute variance, and the threatened quarrel blew over like a shower in spring. but some sort of impression remained from the words of ian on the mind of mercy, for the next morning she read a chapter in the book of genesis, and said a prayer her mother had taught her. chapter xii. among the hills. when mr. and mrs. palmer reached inverness, they found they could spend a few days there, one way and another, to good purpose, for they had friends to visit as well as shopping to do. mr. palmer's affairs calling him to the south were not immediately pressing, and their sojourn extended itself to a full week of eight days, during which the girls were under no rule but their own. their parents regarded them as perfectly to be trusted, nor were the girls themselves aware of any reason why they should not be so regarded. the window of christina's bedroom overlooked a part of the road between the new house and the old castle; and she could see from it all the ridge as far as the grove that concealed the cottage: if now they saw more of the young men their neighbours, and were led farther into the wilds, thickets, or pasturage of their acquaintance, i cannot say she had no hand in it. she was depressed by a sense of failure; the boor, as she called him, was much too thick-skinned for any society but that of his bulls! and she had made no progress with the valentine any more than with the orson; he was better pleased with her ugly sister than with her beautiful self! she would have given neither of tie men another thought, but that there was no one else with whom to do any of that huckster business called flirting, which to her had just harm enough in it to make it interesting to her. she was one of those who can imagine beauty nor enjoyment in a thing altogether right. she took it for granted that bad and beautiful were often one; that the pleasures of the world owed their delight to a touch, a wash, a tincture of the wicked in them. such have so many crooked lines in themselves that they fancy nature laid down on lines of crookedness. they think the obliquity the beauty of the campanile, the blurring the charm of the sketch. i tread on delicate ground--ground which, alas! many girls tread boldly, scattering much feather-bloom from the wings of poor psyche, gathering for her hoards of unlovely memories, and sowing the seed of many a wish that they had done differently. they cannot pass over such ground and escape having their nature more or less vulgarized. i do not speak of anything counted wicked; it is only gambling with the precious and lovely things of the deepest human relation! if a girl with such an experience marry a man she loves--with what power of loving may be left such a one--will she not now and then remember something it would be joy to discover she had but dreamed? will she be able always to forget certain cabinets in her brain which "it would not do" to throw open to the husband who thinks her simple as well as innocent? honesty and truth, god's essentials, are perhaps more lacking in ordinary intercourse between young men and women than anywhere else. greed and selfishness are as busy there as in money-making and ambition. thousands on both sides are constantly seeking more than their share--more also than they even intend to return value for. thousands of girls have been made sad for life by the speeches of a man careful all the time to say nothing that amounted to a pledge! i do not forget that many a woman who would otherwise have been worth little, has for her sorrow found such consolation that she has become rich before god; these words hold nevertheless: "it must needs be that offences come, but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh!" on a morning two days later, christina called mercy, rather imperiously, to get ready at once for their usual walk. she obeyed, and they set out. christina declared she was perishing with cold, and they walked fast. by and by they saw on the road before them the two brothers walking slow; one was reading, the other listening. when they came nearer they descried in alister's hand a manuscript volume; ian carried an old-fashioned fowling-piece. it was a hard frost, which was perhaps the cause of alister's leisure so early in the day. hearing the light steps of the girls behind them, the men turned. the laird was the first to speak. the plough and the fierce bulls not there to bewilder their judgment, the young women immediately discovered their perception in the matter of breeding to be less infallible than they had imagined it: no well bred woman could for a moment doubt the man before them a gentleman--though his carriage was more courteous and more natural than is often seen in a mayfair drawing-room, and his english, a little old-fashioned. ian was at once more like and more unlike other people. his manner was equally courteous, but notably stiffer: he was as much at his ease, but more reserved. to use a figure, he did not step out so far to meet them. they walked on together. "you are a little earlier than usual this morning, ladies!" remarked the chief. "how do you know that, mr. macruadh?" rejoined christina. "i often see you pass--and till now always at the same hour." "and yet we have never met before!" "the busy and the"--he hesitated a moment--"unbusy seldom meet," said the chief. "why don't you say the idle?" suggested christina. "because that would be rude." "why would it be rude? most people, suppose, are more idle than busy!" "idle is a word of blame; i had no right to use it." "i should have taken you for one of those who always speak their minds!" "i hope i do when it is required, and i have any to speak." "you prefer judging with closed doors!" the chief was silent: he did not understand her. did she want him to say he did not think them idle? or, if they were, that they were quite right? "i think it hard," resumed christina, with a tone of injury, almost of suffering, in her voice, "that we should be friendly and open with people, and they all the time thinking of us in a way it would be rude to tell us! it is enough to make one vow never to speak to--to anybody again!" alister turned and looked at her. what could she mean? "you can't think it hard," he said, "that people should not tell you what they think of you the moment they first see you!" "they might at least tell us what they mean by calling us idle!" "i said not busy." "is everybody to blame that is idle?" persisted christina. "perhaps my brother will answer you that question," said alister. "if my brother and i tell you honestly what we thought of you when first we saw you," said ian, "will you tell us honestly what you thought of us?" the girls cast an involuntary glance at each other, and when their eyes met, could not keep them from looking conscious. a twitching also at the corners of mercy's mouth showed they had been saying more than they would care to be cross-questioned upon. "ah, you betray yourselves, ladies!" ian said. "it is all very well to challenge us, but you are not prepared to lead the way!" "girls are never allowed to lead!" said christina. "the men are down on them the moment they dare!" "i am not that way inclined," answered ian. "if man or woman lead to anything, success will justify the leader. i will propose another thing!" "what is it?" asked christina. "to agree that, when we are about to part, with no probability of meeting again in this world, we shall speak out plainly what we think of each other!" "but that will be such a time!" said christina. "in a world that turns quite round every twenty-four hours, it may be a very short time!" "we shall be coming every summer, though i hope not to stay through another winter!" "changes come when they are least expected!" "we cannot know," said alister, "that we shall never meet again!" "there the probability will be enough." "but how can we come to a better--i mean a fairer opinion of each other, when we meet so seldom?" asked mercy innocently. "this is only the second time we have met, and already we are not quite strangers!" said christina. "on the other hand," said alister, "we have been within call for more than two months, and this is our second meeting!" "well, who has not called?" said christina. the young men were silent. they did not care to discuss the question as to which mother was to blame in the matter. they were now in the bottom of the valley, had left the road, and were going up the side of the burn, often in single file, alister leading, and ian bringing up the rear, for the valley was thickly strewn with lumps of gray rock, of all shapes and sizes. they seemed to have rolled down the hill on the other side of the burn, but there was no sign of their origin: the hill was covered with grass below, and with heather above. such was the winding of the way among the stones--for path there was none--that again and again no one of them could see another. the girls felt the strangeness of it, and began to experience, without knowing it, a little of the power of solitary places. after walking thus for some distance, they found their leader halted. "here we have to cross the burn," he said, "and go a long way up the other side." "you want to be rid of us!" said christina. "by no means," replied alister. "we are delighted to have you with us. but we must not let you get tired before turning to go back." "if you really do not mind, we should like to go a good deal farther. i want to see round the turn there, where another hill comes from behind and closes up the view. we haven't anybody to go with us, and have seen nothing of the country. the men won't take us shooting; and mamma is always so afraid we lose ourselves, or fall down a few precipices, or get into a bog, or be eaten by wild beasts!" "if this frost last, we shall have time to show you something of the country. i see you can walk!" "we can walk well enough, and should so like to get to the top of a mountain!" "for the crossing then!" said alister, and turning to the burn, jumped and re-jumped it, as if to let them see how to do it. the bed of the stream was at the spot narrowed by two rocks, so that, though there was little of it, the water went through with a roar, and a force to take a man off his legs. it was too wide for the ladies, and they stood eyeing it with dismay, fearing an end to their walk and the pleasant companionship. "do not be frightened, ladies," said alister: "it is not too wide for you." "you have the advantage of us in your dress!" said christina. "i will get you over quite safe," returned the chief. christina looked as if she could not trust herself to him. "i will try," said mercy. "jump high," answered alister, as he sprang again to the other side, and held out his hand across the chasm. "i can neither jump high nor far!" said mercy. "don't be in a hurry. i will take you--no, not by the hand; that might slip--but by the wrist. do not think how far you can jump; all you have to do is to jump. only jump as high as you can." mercy could not help feeling frightened--the water rushed so fast and loud below. "are you sure you can get me over?" she asked. "yes." "then i will jump." she sprang, and alister, with a strong pull on her arm, landed her easily. "it is your turn now," he said, addressing christina. she was rather white, but tried to laugh. "i--i--i don't think i can!" she said. "it is really nothing," persuaded the chief. "i am sorry to be a coward, but i fear i was born one." "some feelings nobody can help," said ian, "but nobody need give way to them. one of the bravest men i ever knew would always start aside if the meanest little cur in the street came barking at him; and yet on one occasion, when the people were running in all directions, he took a mad dog by the throat, and held him. come, alister! you take her by one arm and i will take her by the other." the chief sprang to her side, and the moment she felt the grasp of the two men, she had the needful courage. the three jumped together, and all were presently walking merrily along the other bank, over the same kind of ground, in single file--ian bringing up the rear. the ladies were startled by a gun going off close behind them. "i beg your pardon," said ian, "but i could not let the rascal go." "what have you killed?" his brother asked. "only one of my own family--a red-haired fellow!" answered ian, who had left the path, and was going up the hill. the girls looked, but saw nothing, and following him a few yards, came to him behind a stone. "goodness gracious!" exclaimed christina, with horror in her tone, "it's a fox!--is it possible you have shot a fox?" the men laughed. "and why not?" asked alister, as if he had no idea what she could mean. "is the fox a sacred animal in the south?" "it's worse than poaching!" she cried. "hardly!" returned alister. "no doubt you may get a good deal of fun out of reynard, but you can't make game of him! why--you look as if you had lost a friend! i admire his intellect, but we can't afford to feed it on chickens and lambs." "but to shoot him!" "why not? we do not respect him here. he is a rascal, to be sure, but then he has no money, and consequently no friends!" "he has many friends! what would christian or mr. sercombe say to shooting, actually shooting a fox!" "you treat him as if he were red gold!" said the chief. "we build temples neither to reynard nor mammon here. we leave the men of the south to worship them!" "they don't worship them!" said mercy. "do they not respect the rich man because he is rich, and look down on the poor man because he is poor?" said ian. "though the rich be a wretch, they think him grand; though the poor man be like jesus christ, they pity him!" "and shouldn't the poor be pitied?" said christina. "not except they need pity." "is it not pitiable to be poor?" "by no means. it is pitiable to be wretched--and that, i venture to suspect, the rich are oftener than the poor.--but as to master reynard there--instead of shooting him, what would you have had us do with him?" "hunt him, to be sure." "would he like that better?" "what he would like is not the question. the sport is the thing." "that will show you why he is not sacred here: we do not hunt him. it would be impossible to hunt this country; you could not ride the ground. besides, there are such multitudes of holes, the hounds would scarcely have a chance. no; the only dog to send after the fellow is a leaden one." "there's another!" exclaimed the chief; "--there, sneaking away!--and your gun not loaded, ian!" "i am so glad!" said christina. "he at least will escape you!" "and some poor lamb in the spring won't escape him!" returned alister. "lambs are meant to be eaten!" said christina. "yes; but a lamb might think it hard to feed such a creature!" "if the fox is of no good in the world," said mercy, "why was he made?" "he can't be of no good," answered the chief. "what if some things are, just that we may get rid of them?" "could they be made just to be got rid of?" "i said--that we might get rid of them: there is all the difference in that. the very first thing men had to do in the world was to fight beasts." "i think i see what you mean," said mercy: "if there had been no wild beasts to fight with, men would never have grown able for much!" "that is it," said alister. "they were awful beasts! and they had poor weapons to fight them with--neither guns nor knives!" "and who knows," suggested ian, "what good it may be to the fox himself to make the best of a greedy life?" "but what is the good to us of talking about such things?" said christina. "they're not interesting!" the remark silenced the brothers: where indeed could be use without interest? but mercy, though she could hardly have said she found the conversation very interesting, felt there was something in the men that cared to talk about such things, that must be interesting if she could only get at it. they were not like any other men she had met! christina's whole interest in men was the admiration she looked for and was sure of receiving from them; mercy had hitherto found their company stupid. chapter xiii. the lake. silence lasted until they reached the shoulder of the hill that closed the view up the valley. as they rounded it, the sun went behind a cloud, and a chill wind, as if from a land where dwelt no life, met them. the hills stood back, and they were on the shore of a small lake, out of which ran the burn. they were very desolate-looking hills, with little heather, and that bloomless, to hide their hard gray bones. their heads were mostly white with frost and snow; their shapes had little beauty; they looked worn and hopeless, ugly and sad--and so cold! the water below was slaty gray, in response to the gray sky above: there seemed no life in either. the hearts of the girls sank within them, and all at once they felt tired. in the air was just one sign of life: high above the lake wheeled a large fish-hawk. "look!" said alister pointing; "there is the osprey that lives here with his wife! he is just going to catch a fish!" he had hardly spoken when the bird, with headlong descent, shot into the water, making it foam up all about. he reappeared with a fish in his claws, and flew off to find his mate. "do you know the very bird?" asked mercy. "i know him well. he and his wife have built on that conical rock you see there in the middle of the water many years." "why have you never shot him? he would look well stuffed!" said christina. she little knew the effect of her words; the chief hated causeless killing; and to hear a lady talk of shooting a high-soaring creature of the air as coolly as of putting on her gloves, was nauseous to him. ian gave him praise afterwards for his unusual self-restraint. but it was a moment or two ere he had himself in hand. "do you not think he looks much better going about god's business?" he said. "perhaps; but he is not yours; you have not got him!" "why should i have him? he seems, indeed, the more mine the higher he goes. a dead stuffed thing--how could that be mine at all? alive, he seems to soar in the very heaven of my soul!" "you showed the fox no such pity!" remarked mercy. "i never killed a fox to have him!" answered alister. "the osprey does no harm. he eats only fish, and they are very plentiful; he never kills birds or hares, or any creature on the land. i do not see how any one could wish to kill the bird, except from mere love of destruction! why should i make a life less in the world?" "there would be more lives of fish--would there not?" said mercy. "i don't want you to shoot the poor bird; i only want to hear your argument!" the chief could not immediately reply, ian came to his rescue. "there are qualities in life," he said. "one cannot think the fish-life so fine, so full of delight as the bird-life!" "no. but," said mercy, "have the fishes not as good a right to their life as the birds?" "both have the right given them by the maker of them. the osprey was made to eat the fish, and the fish, i hope, get some good of being eaten by the osprey." "excuse me, captain macruadh, but that seems to me simple nonsense!" said christina. "i hope it is true." "i don't know about being true, but it must be nonsense." "it must seem so to most people." "then why do you say it?" "because i hope it is true." "why should you wish nonsense to be true?" "what is true cannot be nonsense. it looks nonsense only to those that take no interest in the matter. would it be nonsense to the fishes?" "it does seem hard," said mercy, "that the poor harmless things should be gobbled up by a creature pouncing down upon them from another element!" "as the poor are gobbled up everywhere by the rich!" "i don't believe that. the rich are very kind to the poor." "i beg your pardon," said ian, "but if you know no more about the rich than you do about the fish, i can hardly take your testimony. the fish are the most carnivorous creatures in the world." "do they eat each other?" "hardly that. only the cats of kilkenny can do that." "i used a common phrase!" "you did, and i am rude: the phrase must bear the blame for both of us. but the fish are even cannibals--eating the young of their own species! they are the most destructive of creatures to other lives." "i suppose," said mercy, "to make one kind of creature live on another kind, is the way to get the greatest good for the greatest number!" "that doctrine, which seems to content most people, appears to me a poverty-stricken and selfish one. i can admit nothing but the greatest good to every individual creature." "don't you think we had better be going, mercy? it has got quite cold; i am afraid it will rain," said christina, drawing her cloak round her with a little shiver. "i am ready," answered mercy. the brothers looked at each other. they had come out to spend the day together, but they could not leave the ladies to go home alone; having brought them across the burn, they were bound to see them over it again! an imperceptible sign passed between them, and alister turned to the girls. "come then," he said, "we will go back!" "but you were not going home yet!" said mercy. "would you have us leave you in this wild place?" "we shall find our way well enough. the burn will guide us." "yes; but it will not jump over you; it will leave you to jump over it!" "i forgot the burn!" said christina. "which way were you going?" asked mercy, looking all around for road or pathway over the encircling upheaved wildernesses. "this way," answered ian. "good-bye." "then you are not coming?" "no. my brother will take care of you." he went straight as an arrow up the hill. they stood and watched him go. at what seemed the top, he turned and waved his cap, then vanished. christina felt disappointed. she did not much care for either of the very peculiar young men, but any company was better than none; a man was better than a woman; and two men were better than one! if these were not equal to admiring her as she deserved, what more remunerative labour than teaching them to do so? the thing that chiefly disappointed her in them was, that they had so little small talk. it was so stupid to be always speaking sense! always polite! always courteous!--"two sir charles grandisons," she said, "are two too many!" and indeed the history of sir charles grandison had its place in the small library free to them from childhood; but christina knew nothing of him except by hearsay. the young men had been brought up in a solemn school--had learned to take life as a serious and lovely and imperative thing. not the less, upon occasions of merry-making, would they frolic like young colts even yet, and that without the least reaction or sense of folly afterwards. at the same time, although ian had in the village from childhood the character, especially in the workshops of the carpenter, weaver, and shoemaker, of being 'full of humour, he was in himself always rather sad, being perplexed with many things: his humour was but the foam of his troubled sea. christina was annoyed besides that mercy seemed not indifferent to the opinion of the men. it was from pure inexperience of the man-world, she said to herself, that the silly child could see anything interesting in them! gentlemen she must allow them--but of such an old-fashioned type as to be gentlemen but by courtesy--not gentlemen in the world's count! she was of the world; they of the north of scotland! all day mercy had been on their side and against her! it might be from sheer perversity, but she had never been like that before! she must take care she did not make a fool of herself! it might end in some unhappiness to the young goose! assuredly neither her father nor mother would countenance the thing! she must throw herself into the breach! but which of them was she taking a fancy to? she was not so anxious about her sister, however, as piqued that she had not herself gathered one expression of homage, surprised one look of admiration, seen one sign of incipient worship in either. of the two she liked better the ploughman! the other was more a man of the world--but he was not of her world! with him she was a stranger in a very strange land! christina's world was a very small one, and in its temple stood her own image. ian belonged to the universe. he was a gentleman of the high court. wherever he might go throughout god's worlds, he would be at home. how could there be much attraction between christina and him? alister was more talkative on the way back than he had been all day. christina thought the change caused by having them, or rather her, to himself alone; but in reality it sprang from the prospect of soon rejoining his brother without them. some of the things he said, mercy found well worth hearing; and an old scotch ballad which he repeated, having learned it of a lowland nurse, appeared to her as beautiful as it was wild and strange. for christina, she despised the scotch language: it was vulgar! had alister informed her that beowulf, "the most important of all the relics of the pagan anglo-saxon, is written in undeniable scotch, the english of the period," it would have made no difference to christina! why should it? she had never yet cared for any book beyond the novels of a certain lady which, to speak with due restraint, do not tend to profitable thought. at the same time, it was not for the worst in them that she liked them; she did not understand them well enough to see it. but there was ground to fear that, when she came to understand, shocked at first, she would speedily get accustomed to it, and at length like them all the better for it. in mercy's unawakened soul, echoed now and then a faint thrill of response to some of the things alister said, and, oftener, to some of the verses he repeated; and she would look up at him when he was silent, with an unconscious seeking glance, as if dimly aware of a beneficent presence. alister was drawn by the honest gaze of her yet undeveloped and homely countenance, with its child-look in process of sublimation, whence the woman would glance out and vanish again, leaving the child to give disappointing answers. there was something in it of the look a dog casts up out of his beautiful brown eyes into the mystery of his master's countenance. she was on the edge of coming awake; all was darkness about her, but something was pulling at her! she had never known before that a lady might be lovely in a ballad as well as in a beautiful gown! finding himself so listened to, though the listener was little more than a child, the heart of the chief began to swell in his great bosom. like a child he was pleased. the gray day about him grew sweet; its very grayness was sweet, and of a silvery sheen. when they arrived at the burn, and, easily enough from that side, he had handed them across, he was not quite so glad to turn from them as he had expected to be. "are you going?" said christina with genuine surprise, for she had not understood his intention. "the way is easy now," he answered. "i am sorry to leave you, but i have to join ian, and the twilight will be flickering down before i reach the place." "and there will be no moon!" said mercy: "how will you get home through the darkness?" "we do not mean to come home to-night." "oh, then, you are going to friends!" "no; we shall be with each other--not a soul besides." "there can't surely be a hotel up there?" alister laughed as he answered, "there are more ways than one of spending a night on the hills. if you look from a window--in that direction," he said, pointing, "the last thing before you go to bed, you will see that at least we shall not perish with cold." he sprang again over the burn, and with a wave of his bonnet, went, like ian, straight up the hill. the girls stood for some time watching him climb as if he had been going up a flight of stairs, until he stood clear against the sky, when, with another wave of his bonnet, he too disappeared. mercy did not forget to look from her window in the direction alister had indicated. there was no room to mistake what he meant, for through the dark ran a great opening to the side of a hill, somewhere in the night, where glowed and flamed, reddening the air, a huge crescent of fire, slowly climbing, like a column of attack, up toward the invisible crest. "what does it mean?" she said to herself. "why do they make such a bonfire--with nobody but themselves to enjoy it? what strange men--out by themselves in the dark night, on the cold hill! what can they be doing it for? i hope they have something to eat! i should like to hear them talk! i wonder what they are saying about us! i am certain we bored them!" the brothers did speak of them, and readily agreed in some notion of their characters; but they soon turned to other things, and there passed a good deal that mercy could not have followed. what would she, for instance, have made of alister's challenge to his brother to explain the metaphysical necessity for the sine, tangent, and secant of an angle belonging to its supplement as well? when the ladies overtook them in the morning, alister was reading, from an old manuscript volume of his brother's which he had found in a chest, a certain very early attempt at humour, and now they disputed concerning it as they watched the fire. it had abundance of faults, and in especial lacked suture, but will serve to show something of lan's youthful ingenium. to a vagrant. gentle vagrant, stumping over several verdant fields of clover! subject of unnumbered knockings! tattered' coat and ragged stockings, slouching hat and roving eye, tell of settled vagrancy! wretched wanderer, can it be the poor laws have leaguered thee? hear'st thou, in thy thorny den, tramp of rural policemen, inly fancying, in thy rear coats of blue and buttons clear, while to meet thee, in the van stalks some vengeful alderman?-- each separate sense bringing a notion of forms that teach thee locomotion! beat and battered altogether, by fellow-men, by wind and weather; hounded on through fens and bogs, chased by men and bit by dogs: and, in thy weakly way of judging, so kindly taught the art of trudging; or, with a moment's happier lot, pitied, pensioned, and forgot-- cutty-pipe thy regium donum; poverty thy summum bonum; thy frigid couch a sandstone stratum; a colder grave thy ultimatum; circumventing, circumvented; in short, excessively tormented, everything combines to scare charity's dear pensioner! --say, vagrant, can'st thou grant to me a slice of thy philosophy? haply, in thy many trudgings, having found unchallenged lodgings, thy thoughts, unused to saddle-crupper, ambling no farther than thy supper-- thou, by the light of heaven-lit taper, mendest thy prospective paper! then, jolly pauper, stitch till day; let not thy roses drop away, lest, begrimed with muddy matter, thy body peep from every tatter, and men--a charitable dose-- should physic thee with food and clothes! nursling of adversity! 'tis thy glory thus to be sinking fund of raggery! thus to scrape a nation's dishes, and fatten on a few good wishes! or, on some venial treason bent, frame thyself a government, for thy crest a brirnless hat, poverty's aristocrat! nonne habeam te tristem, planet of the human system? comet lank and melancholic --orbit shocking parabolic-- seen for a little in the sky of the world of sympathy-- seldom failing when predicted, coming most when most restricted, dragging a nebulous tail with thee of hypothetic vagrancy-- of vagrants large, and vagrants small, vagrants scarce visible at all! matchless oracle of woe! anarchy in embryo! strange antipodes of bliss! parody on happiness! baghouse of the great creation! subject meet for strangulation, by practice tutored to condense the cautious inquiry for pence, and skilful, with averted eye, to hide thy latent roguery-- lo, on thy hopes i clap a stopper! vagrant, thou shalt have no copper! gather thy stumps, and get thee hence, unwise solicitor of pence! alister, who all but worshipped ian, and cherished every scrap from his pen, had not until quite lately seen this foolish production, as ian counted it, and was delighted with it, as he would have been had it been much worse. ian was vexed that he should like it, and now spent the greater part of an hour trying to show him how very bad in parts, even senseless it was. profusion of epithets without applicability, want of continuity, purposelessness, silliness, heartlessness--were but a few of his denunciations. alister argued it was but a bit of fun, and that anybody that knew ian, knew perfectly he would never amuse himself with a fellow without giving him something, but it was in vain; ian was bent on showing it altogether unworthy. so, not to waste the night, they dropped the dispute, and by the light of the blazing heather, turned to a chapter of boethius. chapter xiv. the wolves. my readers may remember that ian was on the point of acquainting his mother with an important event in his spiritual history, when they were interrupted by the involuntary call of the girls from the new house. the mother, as will readily be believed, remained desirous of listening to her son's story, though dreading it would not be of a kind to give her much satisfaction; but partly from preventions--favoured, it must be confessed by ian, and yet more from direct avoidance on his part, the days passed without her hearing anything more of it. ian had in truth almost repented his offer of the narrative: a certain vague assurance that it would not be satisfactory to her, had grown upon him until he felt it unkind to lay before her an experience whose narration would seem to ask a sympathy she could not give. but the mother was unable to let the thing rest. more than by interest she was urged by anxiety. in spite of her ungodlike theories of god, it was impossible she could be in despair about her noble ian; still, her hope was at best founded on the uncovenanted mercies of god, not on the security of his bond! she did not believe that god was doing and would do his best for every man; therefore she had no assurance that he would bring down the pride of ian, and compel his acceptance of terms worthy of an old roman father, half law-circumventing lawyer, half heartless tyrant. but her longing to hear what her son had proposed telling her, was chiefly inspired by the hope of getting nearer to him, of closer sympathy becoming possible between them through her learning more clearly what his views were. she constantly felt as if walking along the side of a thick hedge, with occasional thinnesses through which now and then she gained a ghostly glimpse of her heart's treasure gliding along the other side--close to her, yet so far that, when they spoke, they seemed calling across a gulf of dividing darkness. therefore, the night after that spent by her sons on the hill, all having retired some two hours before, the mother, finding herself unable to sleep, rose as she had often done ere now, and stole to the door of the little room under the thatch where ian lay. listening, and judging him awake, she went softly in, and sat down by his bedside. there had been such occasions on which, though son as well as mother was wide awake, neither spoke a word; but this time the mother could not be silent. "you never told me, ian, the story you began about something that made you pray!" ian saw he could not now draw back without causing, her more trouble than would the narration. "are you sure you will not take cold mother dear?" he said. "i am warmly clad, my son; and my heart, more than i can tell you, is longing to hear all about it." "i am afraid you will not find my story so interesting as you expect, mother!" "what concerns you is more interesting to me than anything else in the whole world, ian." "not more than god, mother?" said ian. the mother was silent. she was as honest as her sons. the question, dim-lucent, showed her, if but in shadow, something of the truth concerning herself--not so that she could grasp it, for she saw it as in a glimmer, a fluctuating, vanishing flash--namely, that she cared more about salvation than about god--that, if she could but keep her boy out of hell, she would be content to live on without any nearer approach to him in whom she had her being! god was to her an awe, not a ceaseless, growing delight! there are centuries of paganism yet in many lovely christian souls--paganism so deep, therefore so little recognized, that their earnest endeavour is to plant that paganism ineradicably in the hearts of those dearest to them. as she did not answer, ian was afraid she was hurt, and thought it better to begin his story at once. "it was one night in the middle of winter--last winter, near moscow," he began, "and the frost was very bitter--the worst night for cold i have ever known. i had gone with a companion into the depth of a great pine forest. on our way, the cold grew so intense, that we took refuge at a little public-house, frequented by peasants and persons of the lowest ranks. on entering i saw a scene which surpassed all for interest i had ever before witnessed. the little lonely house was crammed with russian soldiers, fierce-looking fellows, and i daresay their number formed our protection from violence. many of them were among the finest looking fellows i have ever seen. they were half drunk, and were dancing and singing with the wildest gesticulations and grimaces; but such singing for strange wildness and harmony combined i had never before listened to. one would keep up a solo for some minutes, when the whole company would join in a sort of chorus, dancing frantically about, but with the most perfect regularity of movement. one of them came up to me and with a low bow begged me in the name of the rest to give them some money. i accordingly gave them a silver ruble, upon which the whole party set up a shout, surrounded me, and in a moment a score of brawny fellows had lifted me in the air, where i was borne along in triumph. i took off my cap and gave three hip-hip-hurrahs as loud as my lungs could bawl, whereupon, with the profoundest expressions of gratitude, i was lowered from my elevation. one of them then who seemed to be the spokesman of the rest, seized me in his arms and gave me a hearty kiss on the cheek, on which i took my departure amid universal acclamation.--but all that's not worth telling you about; it was not for that i began--only the scene came up so clear before me that it drew me aside." "i don't need to tell you, ian," said his mother, with shining eyes, "that if it were only what you had to eat on the most ordinary day of your life, it would be interesting to me!" "thank you, mother dear; i seem to know that without being told; but i could never talk to you about anything that was not interesting to myself." here he paused. he would rather have stopped. "go on, go on, ian. i am longing to hear." "well--where was i?--we left at the inn our carriage and horses, and went with our guns far into the forest--all of straight, tall pines, up and up; and the little island-like tops of them, which, if there be a breath of wind, are sure to be swaying about like the motion of a dream, were as still as the big frosty stars in the deep blue overhead." "what did you want in such a lonely place at that time of the night?" asked the mother. she sat with firm-closed lips, and wide, night-filled eyes looking at her son, the fear of love in her beautiful face--a face more beautiful than any other that son had yet seen, fit window for a heart so full of refuge to look out of; and he knew how she looked though the darkness was between them. "wolves, mother," he answered. she shuddered. she was a great reader in the long winter nights, and had read terrible stories of wolves--the last of which in scotland had been killed not far from where they sat. "what did you want with the wolves, ian?" she faltered. "to kill them, mother. i never liked killing animals any more than alister; but even he destroys the hooded crow; and wolves are yet fairer game. they are the out-of-door devils of that country, and i fancy devils do go into them sometimes, as they did once into the poor swine: they are the terror of all who live near the forests. "there was no moon--only star-light; but whenever we came to any opener space, there was light enough from the snow to see all about; there was light indeed from the snow all through the forest, but the trees were thick and dark. far away, somewhere in the mystery of the black wood, we could now and then hear a faint howling: it came from the red throats of the wolves." "you are frightening me, ian!" said the mother, as if they had been two children telling each other tales. "indeed, mother, they are very horrible when they hunt in droves, ravenous with hunger. to kill one of them, if it be but one, is to do something for your kind. and just at that time i was oppressed with the feeling that i had done and was doing nothing for my people--my own humans; and not knowing anything else i could at the moment attempt, i resolved to go and kill a wolf or two: they had killed a poor woman only two nights before. "as soon as we could after hearing the noise of them, we got up into two trees. it took us some time to discover two that were fit for our purpose, and we did not get them so near each other as we should have liked. it was rather anxious work too until we found them, for if we encountered on foot a pack of those demons, we could be but a moment or two alive: killing one, ten would be upon us, and a hundred more on the backs of those. but we hoped they would smell us up in the trees, and search for us, when we should be able to give account of a few of them at least: we had double-barrelled guns, and plenty of powder and ball." "but how could you endure the cold--at night--and without food?" "no, mother; we did not try that! we had plenty to eat in our pockets. my companion had a bottle of vodki, and--" "what is that?" asked the mother with suspicion. "a sort of raw spirit--horrible stuff--more like spirits of wine. they say it does not hurt in such cold." "but, ian!" cried the mother, and seemed unable to say more. "don't be frightened, mother!" said ian, with a merry laugh. "surely you do not imagine _i_ would drink such stuff! true, i had my bottle, but it was full of tea. the russians drink enormous quantities of tea--though not so strong as you make it." "go on, then, ian; go on." "we sat a long time, and there was no sign of the wolves coming near us. it was very cold, but our furs kept in our warmth. by and by i fell asleep--which was not dangerous so long as i kept warm, and i thought the cold must wake me before it began to numb me. and as 'i slept i dreamed; but my dream did not change the place; the forest, the tree i was in, all my surroundings were the same. i even dreamed that i came awake, and saw everything about me just as it was. i seemed to open my eyes, and look about me on the dazzling snow from my perch: i was in a small tree on the border of a little clearing. "suddenly, out of the wood to my left, issued something, running fast, but with soundless feet, over the snow. i doubted in my dream whether the object were a live thing or only a shadow. it came nearer, and i saw it was a child, a little girl, running as if for her life. she came straight to the tree i sat in, and when close to it, but without a moment's halt, looked up, and i saw a sweet little face, white with terror--which somehow seemed, however, not for herself, but for me. i called out after her to stop, and i would take her into the tree beside me, where the wolves could not reach her; but she only shook her head, and ran on over the clearing into the forest. among the holes i watched the fleeting shape appear and disappear and appear again, until i saw it no more. then first i heard another kind of howl from the wolves--that of pursuit. it strengthened and swelled, growing nearer and nearer, till at last, through the stillness of the night and the moveless forest and the dead snow, came to my ear a kind of soft rushing sound. i don't know how to describe it. the rustle of dry leaves is too sharp; it was like a very soft heavy rain on a window--a small dull padding padding: it was the feet of the wolves. they came nearer and grew louder and louder, but the noise was still muffled and soft. their howling, however, was now loud and horrid. i suppose they cannot help howling; if they could, they would have too much power over poor creatures, coming upon them altogether at unawares; but as it is, they tell, whether they will or no, that they are upon the way. at length, dark as a torrent of pitch, out of the forest flowed a multitude of obscure things, and streamed away, black over the snow, in the direction the child had taken. they passed close to the foot of my tree, but did not even look up, flitting by like a shadow whose substance was unseen. where the child had vanished they also disappeared: plainly they were after her! "it was only a dream, mother! don't be so frightened," interrupted lan, for here his mother gave a little cry, almost forgetting what the narration was. "then first," he went on, "i seemed to recover my self-possession. i saw that, though i must certainly be devoured by the wolves, and the child could not escape, i had no choice but go down and follow, do what i could, and die with her. down i was the same instant, running as i had never run before even in a dream, along the track of the wolves. as i ran, i heard their howling, but it seemed so far off that i could not hope to be in time to kill one of them ere they were upon her. still, by their howling, it did not appear they had reached her, and i ran on. their noise grew louder and louder, but i seemed to run miles and miles, wondering what spell was upon me that i could not come up with them. all at once the clamour grew hideous, and i saw them. they were gathered round a tree, in a clearing just like that i had left, and were madly leaping against it, but ever falling back baffled. i looked up: in the top of the tree sat the little girl, her white face looking down upon them with a smile. all the terror had vanished from it. it was still white as the snow, but like the snow was radiating a white light through the dark foliage of the fir. i see it often, mother, so clear that i could paint it. i was enchanted at the sight. but she was not in safety yet, and i rushed into the heap of wolves, striking and stabbing with my hunting-knife. i got to the tree, and was by her in a moment. but as i took the child in my arms i woke, and knew that it was a dream. i sat in my own tree, and up against the stem of it broke a howling, surging black wave of wolves. they leaped at the tree-bole as a rock-checked billow would leap. my gun was to my shoulder in a moment, and blazed among them. howls of death arose. their companions fell upon the wounded, and ate them up. the tearing and yelling at the foot of the tree was like the tumult of devils full of hate and malice and greed. then for the first time i thought whether such creatures might not be the open haunts of demons. i do not imagine that, when those our lord drove out of the man asked permission to go into the swine, they desired anything unheard of before in the demon-world. i think they were not in the way of going into tame animals; but, as they must go out of the man, as they greatly dreaded the abyss of the disembodied, and as no ferocious animals fit to harbour them were near, they begged leave to go into such as were accessible, though unsuitable; whereupon the natural consequence followed: their presence made the poor swine miserable even to madness, and with the instinct of so many maniacs that in death alone lies their deliverance, they rushed straight into the loch." "it may be so, ian! but i want to hear how you got away from the wolves." "i fired and fired; and still they kept rushing on the tree-hole, heaping themselves against it, those behind struggling up on the backs of those next it, in a storm of rage and hunger and jealousy. not a few who had just helped to eat some of their fellows, were themselves eaten in turn, and not a scrap of them left; but it was a large pack, and it would have taken a long time to kill enough to satisfy those that remained. i killed and killed until my ammunition was gone, and then there was nothing for it but await the light. when the morning began to dawn, they answered its light with silence, and turning away swept like a shadow back into the wood. strange to tell, i heard afterwards that a child had been killed by them in the earlier part of that same night. but even now sometimes, as i lie awake, i grow almost doubtful whether the whole was not a hideous dream. "not the less for that was what i went through between the time my powder came to an end and the dawn of the morning, a real spiritual fact. "in the midst of the howling i grew so sleepy that the horrible noise itself seemed to lull me while it kept me awake, and i fell into a kind of reverie with which my dream came back and mingled. i seemed to be sitting in the tree with the little shining girl, and she was my own soul; and all the wrong things i had in me, and all the wrong things i had done, with all the weaknesses and evil tendencies of my nature, whether mine by fault or by inheritance, had taken shape, and, in the persons of the howling wolves below, were besieging me, to get at me, and devour me. suddenly my soul was gone. above were the still, bright stars, shining unmoved; beneath was the white, betraying snow, and the howling wolves; away through the forest was fleeting, ever fleeting, my poor soul, in the likeness of a white-faced child! all at once came a great stillness, as of a desert place, where breathed nor life of man nor life of beast. i was alone, frightfully alone--alone as i had never been before. the creatures at the foot of the tree were still howling, but their cry sounded far away and small; they were in some story i had been reading, not anywhere in my life! i was left and lost--left by whom?--lost by whom?--in the waste of my own being, without stay or comfort. i looked up to the sky; it was infinite--yet only a part of myself, and much too near to afford me any refuge from the desert of my lost self. it came down nearer; the limitless space came down, and clasped me, and held me. it came close to me--as if i had been a shape off which all nature was taking a mould. i was at once everything and nothing. i cannot tell you how frightful it was! in agony i cried to god, with a cry of utter despair. i cannot say whether i may believe that he answered me; i know this, that a great quiet fell upon me--but a quiet as of utter defeat and helplessness. then again, i cannot tell how, the quiet and the helplessness melted away into a sense of god--a feeling as if great space all about me was god and not emptiness. wolf nor sin could touch me! i was a wide peace--my very being peace! and in my mind--whether an echo from the bible, i do not know--were the words:--'i, even i, am he that comforteth thee. i am god, thy saviour!' whereas i had seemed all alone, i was with god, the only withness man can really share! i lifted my eyes; morning was in the east, and the wolves were slinking away over the snow." how to receive the strange experience the mother did not know. she ought to say something, for she sorely questioned it! not a word had he spoken belonging to the religion in which she had brought him up, except two--sin and god! there was nothing in it about the atonement! she did not see that it was a dream, say rather a vision, of the atonement itself. to ian her interpretation of the atonement seemed an everlasting and hopeless severance. the patience of god must surely be far more tried by those who would interpret him, than by those who deny him: the latter speak lies against him, the former speak lies for him! yet all the time the mother felt as in the presence of some creature of a higher world--one above the ordinary race of men--whom the powers of evil had indeed misled, but perhaps not finally snared. she little thought how near she was to imagining that good may come out of evil--that there is good which is not of god! she did not yet understand that salvation lies in being one with christ, even as the branch is one with the vine;--that any salvation short of knowing god is no salvation at all. what moment a man feels that he belongs to god utterly, the atonement is there, the son of god is reaping his harvest. the good mother was not, however, one of those conceited, stiff-necked, power-loving souls who have been the curse and ruin of the church in all ages; she was but one of those in whom reverence for its passing form dulls the perception of unchangeable truth. they shut up god's precious light in the horn lantern of human theory, and the lantern casts such shadows on the path to the kingdom as seem to dim eyes insurmountable obstructions. for the sake of what they count revealed, they refuse all further revelation, and what satisfies them is merest famine to the next generation of the children of the kingdom. instead of god's truth they offer man's theory, and accuse of rebellion against god such as cannot live on the husks they call food. but ah, home-hungry soul! thy god is not the elder brother of the parable, but the father with the best robe and the ring--a god high above all thy longing, even as the heavens are high above the earth. chapter xv. the gulf that divided. when ian ceased, a silence deep as the darkness around, fell upon them. to ian, the silence seemed the very voice of god, clear in the darkness; to the mother it was a darkness interpenetrating the darkness; it was a great gulf between her and her boy. she must cry to him aloud, but what should she cry? if she did not, an opportunity, perhaps the last, on which hung eternal issues, would be gone for ever! each moment's delay was a disobedience to her conscience, a yielding to love's sinful reluctance! with "sick assay" she heaved at the weight on her heart, but not a word would come. if ian would but speak again, and break the spell of the terrible stillness! she must die in eternal wrong if she did not speak! but no word would come. something in her would not move. it was not in her brain or her lips or her tongue, for she knew all the time she could speak if she would. the caitiff will was not all on the side of duty! she was not for the truth!--could she then be of the truth? she did not suspect a divine reluctance to urge that which was not good. not always when the will works may we lay hold of it in the act: somehow, she knew not how, she heard herself speaking. "are you sure it was god, ian?" she said. the voice she heard was weak and broken, reedy and strained, like the voice of one all but dead. "no, mother," answered ian, "but i hope it was." "hopes, my dear hoy, are not to be trusted." "that is true, mother; and yet we are saved by hope." "we are saved by faith." "i do not doubt it." "you rejoice my heart. but faith in what?" "faith in god, mother." "that will not save you." "no, but god will." "the devils believe in god, and tremble." "i believe in the father of jesus christ, and do not tremble." "you ought to tremble before an unreconciled god." "like the devils, mother?" "like a sinful child of adam. whatever your fancies, ian, god will not hear you, except you pray to him in the name of his son." "mother, would you take my god from me? would you blot him out of the deeps of the universe?" "ian! are you mad? what frightful things you would lay to my charge!" "mother, i would gladly--oh how gladly! perish for ever, to save god from being the kind of god you would have me believe him. i love god, and will not think him other than good. rather than believe he does not hear every creature that cries to him, whether he knows jesus christ or not, i would believe there was no god, and go mourning to my grave." "that is not the doctrine of the gospel." "it is, mother: jesus himself says, 'every one that hath heard and learned of the father, cometh unto me.'" "why then do you not come to him, ian?" "i do come to him; i come to him every day. i believe in nobody but him. he only makes the universe worth being, or any life worth living!" "ian, i can not understand you! if you believe like that about him,--" "i don't believe about him, mother! i believe in him. he is my life." "we will not dispute about words! the question is, do you place your faith for salvation in the sufferings of christ for you?" "i do not, mother. my faith is in jesus himself, not in his sufferings." "then the anger of god is not turned away from you." "mother, i say again--i love god, and will not believe such things of him as you say. i love him so that i would rather lose him than believe so of him." "then you do not accept the bible as your guide?" "i do, mother, for it tells me of jesus christ. there is no such teaching as you say in the bible." "how little you know your new testament!" "i don't know my new testament! it is the only book i do know! i read it constantly! it is the only thing i could not live without!--no, i do not mean that! i could do without my testament! christ would be all the same!" "oh, ian! ian! and yet you will not give christ the glory of satisfying divine justice by his suffering for your sins!" "mother, to say that the justice of god is satisfied with suffering, is a piece of the darkness of hell. god is willing to suffer, and ready to inflict suffering to save from sin, but no suffering is satisfaction to him or his justice." "what do you mean by his justice then?" "that he gives you and me and everybody fair play." the homeliness of the phrase offended the moral ear of the mother. "how dare you speak lightly of him in my hearing!" she cried. "because i will speak for god even to the face of my mother!" answered ian. "he is more to me than you, mother--ten times more." "you speak against god, ian," she rejoined, calmed by the feeling she had roused. "no, mother. he speaks against god who says he does things that are not good. it does not make a thing good to call it good. i speak for him when i say lie cannot but give fair play. he knows he put rue where i was sure to sin; he will not condemn me because i have sinned; he leaves me to do that myself. he will condemn me only if i do not turn away from sin, for he has made me able to turn from it, and i do." "he will forgive sin only for christ's sake." "he forgives it for his own name's sake, his own love's sake. there is no such word as for christ's sake in the new testament--except where paul prays us for christ's sake to be reconciled to god. it is in the english new testament, but not in the greek." "then you do not believe that the justice of god demands the satisfaction of the sinner's endless punishment?" "i do not. nothing can satisfy the justice of god but justice in his creature. the justice of god is the love of what is right, and the doing of what is right. eternal misery in the name of justice could satisfy none but a demon whose bad laws had been broken." "i grant you that no amount of suffering on the part of the wicked could satisfy justice; but it is the holy one who suffers for our sins!" "oh, mother! justice do wrong for its own satisfaction! did jesus deserve punishment? if not, then to punish him was to wrong him!" "but he was willing; he consented;" "he yielded to injustice--but the injustice was man's, not god's. if justice, insisted on punishment, it would at least insist on the guilty, not the innocent, being punished! it would revolt from the idea of the innocent being punished for the guilty! mind, i say being punished, not suffering: that is another thing altogether. it is an eternal satisfaction to love to suffer for the guilty, but not to justice that innocence should be punished for the guilty. the whole idea of such atonement is the merest subterfuge, a figment of the paltry human intellect to reconcile difficulties of its own invention. once, when alister had done something wrong, my father said, 'he must be punished--except some one will be punished for him!' i offered to take his place, partly that it seemed expected of me, partly that i was moved by vanity, and partly that i foresaw what would follow." "and what did follow?" asked the mother, to whom the least word out of the past concerning her husband, was like news from the world beyond. at the same time it seemed almost an offence that one of his sons should know anything about him she did not know. "he scarcely touched me, mother," answered ian. "the thing taught me something very different from what he had meant to teach by it. that he failed to carry out his idea of justice helped me afterwards to see that god could not have done it either, for that it was not justice. some perception of this must have lain at the root of the heresy that jesus did not suffer, but a cloud-phantom took his place on the cross. wherever people speculate instead of obeying, they fall into endless error." "you graceless boy! do you dare to say your father speculated instead of obeying?" cried the mother, hot with indignation. "no, mother. it was not my father who invented that way of accounting for the death of our lord." "he believed it!" "he accepted it, saturated with the tradition of the elders before he could think for himself. he does not believe it now." "but why then should christ have suffered?" "it is the one fact that explains to me everything," said ian. "--but i am not going to talk about it. so long as your theory satisfies you, mother, why should i show you mine? when it no longer satisfies you, when it troubles you as it has troubled me, and as i pray god it may trouble you, when you feel it stand between you and the best love you could give god, then i will share my very soul with you--tell you thoughts which seem to sublimate my very being in adoration." "i do not see what other meaning you can put upon the statement that he was a sacrifice for our sins." "had we not sinned he would never have died; and he died to deliver us from our sins. he against whom was the sin, became the sacrifice for it; the father suffered in the son, for they are one. but if i could see no other explanation than yours, i would not, could not accept it--for god's sake i would not." "how can you say you believe in christ, when you do not believe in the atonement!" "it is not so, mother. i do not believe what you mean by the atonement; what god means by it, i desire to accept. but we are never told to believe in the atonement; we are told to believe in christ--and, mother, in the name of the great father who hears me speak, i do believe in him." "how can you, when you do not believe what god says about him?" "i do. god does not say those things about him you think he says. they are mere traditions, not the teaching of those who understood him. but i might believe all about him quite correctly, and yet not believe in him." "what do you call believing in him, then?" "obeying him, mother--to say it as shortly as i can. i try to obey him in the smallest things he says--only there are no small things he says--and so does alister. i strive to be what he would have me, nor do i hold anything else worth my care. let a man trust in his atonement to absolute assurance, if he does not do the things he tells him--the very things he said--he does not believe in him. he may be a good man, but he has not yet heard enough and learned enough of the father to be sent to jesus to learn more." "then i do not believe in him," said the mother, with a strange, sad gentleness--for his words awoke an old anxiety never quite at rest. ian was silent. the darkness seemed to deepen around them, and the silence grew keen. the mother began to tremble. "god knows," said ian at length, and again the broken silence closed around them. it was between god and his mother now! unwise counsellors will persuade the half crazy doubter in his own faith, to believe that he does believe!--how much better to convince him that his faith is a poor thing, that he must rise and go and do the thing that jesus tells him, and so believe indeed! when will men understand that it is neither thought nor talk, neither sorrow for sin nor love of holiness that is required of them, but obedience! to be and to obey are one. a cold hand grasping her heart, the mother rose, and went from the room. the gulf seemed now at last utterly, hopelessly impassable! she had only feared it before; she knew it now! she did not see that, while she believed evil things of god, and none the less that she called them good, oneness was impossible between her and any being in god's creation. the poor mother thought herself broken-hearted, and lay down too sick to know that she was trembling from head to foot. such was the hold, such the authority of traditional human dogma on her soul--a soul that scorned the notion of priestly interposition between god and his creature--that, instead of glorifying god that she had given birth to such a man, she wept bitterly because he was on the broad road to eternal condemnation. but as she lay, now weeping, now still and cold with despair, she found that for some time she had not been thinking. but she had not been asleep! whence then was this quiet that was upon her? something had happened, though she knew of nothing! there was in her as it were a moonlight of peace! "can it be god?" she said to herself. no more than ian could she tell whether it was god or not; but from that night she had an idea in her soul by which to reach after "the peace of god." she lifted up her heart in such prayer as she had never prayed before; and slowly, imperceptibly awoke in her the feeling that, if she was not believing aright, god would not therefore cast her off, but would help her to believe as she ought to believe: was she not willing? therewith she began to feel as if the gulf betwixt her and ian were not so wide as she had supposed; and that if it were, she would yet hope in the son of man. doubtless he was in rebellion against god, seeing he would question his ways, and refuse to believe the word he had spoken, but surely something might be done for him! the possibility had not yet dawned upon her that there could be anything in the new testament but those doctrines against which the best in him revolted. she little suspected the glory of sky and earth and sea eternal that would one day burst upon her! that she would one day see god not only good but infinitely good--infinitely better than she had dared to think him, fearing to image him better than he was! mortal, she dreaded being more just than god, more pure than her maker! "i will go away to-morrow!" said ian to himself. "i am only a pain to her. she will come to see things better without me! i cannot live in her sight any longer now! i will go, and come again." his heart broke forth in prayer. "o god, let my mother see that thou art indeed true-hearted; that thou dost not give us life by parings and subterfuges, but abundantly; that thou dost not make men in order to assert thy dominion over them, but that they may partake of thy life. o god, have pity when i cannot understand, and teach me as thou wouldst the little one whom, if thou wert an earthly father amongst us as thy son was an earthly son, thou wouldst carry about in thy arms. when pride rises in me, and i feel as if i ought to be free and walk without thy hand; when it looks as if a man should be great in himself, nor need help from god; then think thou of me, and i shall know that i cannot live or think without the self-willing life; that thou art because thou art, i am because thou art; that i am deeper in thee than my life, thou more to my being than that being to itself. was not that satan's temptation, father? did he not take self for the root of self in him, when god only is the root of all self? and he has not repented yet! is it his thought coming up in me, flung from the hollow darkness of his soul into mine? thou knowest, when it comes i am wretched. i love it not. i would have thee lord and love over all. but i cannot understand: how comes it to look sometimes as if independence must be the greater? a lie cannot be greater than the truth! i do not understand, but thou dost. i cannot see my foundations; i cannot dig up the roots of my being: that would be to understand creation! will the adversary ever come to see that thou only art grand and beautiful? how came he to think to be greater by setting up for himself? how was it that it looked so to him? how is it that, not being true, it should ever look so? there must be an independence that thou lovest, of which this temptation is the shadow! that must be how 'satan fell!--for the sake of not being a slave!--that he might be a free being! ah, lord, i see how it all comes! it is because we are not near enough to thee to partake of thy liberty that we want a liberty of our own different from thine! we do not see that we are one with thee, that thy glory is our glory, that we can have none but in thee! that we are of thy family, thy home, thy heart, and what is great for thee is great for us! that man's meanness is to want to be great out of his father! without thy eternity in us we are so small that we think ourselves great, and are thus miserably abject and contemptible. thou only art true! thou only art noble! thou wantest no glory for selfishness! thou doest, thou art, what thou requirest of thy children! i know it, for i see it in jesus, who casts the contempt of obedience upon the baseness of pride, who cares only for thee and for us, never thinking of himself save as a gift to give us! o lovely, perfect christ! with my very life i worship thee! oh, pray, christ! make me and my brother strong to be the very thing thou wouldst have us, as thy brothers, the children of thy father. thou art our perfect brother--perfect in love, in courage, in tenderness! amen, lord! good-night! i am thine." he was silent for a few moments, then resumed: "lord, thou knowest whither my thoughts turn the moment i cease praying to thee. i dared not think of her, but that i know thee. but for thee, my heart would be as water within me! oh, take care of her, come near to her! thou didst send her where she could not learn fast--but she did learn. and now, god, i do not know where she is! thou only of all in this world knowest, for to thee she lives though gone from my sight and knowledge--in the dark to me. pray, father, let her know that thou art near her, and that i love her. thou hast made me love her by taking her from me: thou wilt give her to me again! in this hope i will live all my days, until thou takest me also; for to hope mightily is to believe well in thee. i will hope in thee infinitely. amen, father!" chapter xvi. the clan christmas. by slow degrees, with infinite subdivisions and apparent reversals of change, the autumn had passed into winter indeed. cloud above, mire below, mist and rain all between, made up many days; only, like the dreariest life, they were broken through and parted, lest they should seem the universe itself, by such heavenly manifestations, such gleams and glimpses of better, as come into all lives, all winters, all evil weathers. what is loosed on earth is loosed first in heaven: we have often shared of heaven, when we thought it but a softening of earth's hardness. every relief is a promise, a pledge as well as a passing meal. the frost at length had brought with it brightness and persuasion and rousing. in the fields it was swelling and breaking the clods; and for the heart of man, it did something to break up that clod too. a sense of friendly pleasure filled all the human creatures. the children ran about like wild things; the air seemed to intoxicate them. the mother went out walking with the girls, and they talked of their father and christian and mr. sercombe, who were all coming together. for some time they saw nothing of their next neighbours. they had made some attempts at acquaintance with the people of the glen, but unhappily were nowise courteous enough for their ideas of good breeding, and offended both their pride and their sense of propriety. the manners and address of these northern peasants were blameless--nearly perfect indeed, like those of the irish, and in their own houses beyond criticism; those of the ladies conventional where not rudely condescending. if mistress conal was an exception to the rest of the clan, even she would be more civil to a stranger than to her chief whom she loved--until the stranger gave her offence. and if then she passed to imprecation, she would not curse like an ordinary woman, but like a poetess, gaining rather than losing dignity. she would rise to the evil occasion, no hag, but a largely-offended sibyl, whom nothing thereafter should ever appease. to forgive was a virtue unknown to mistress conal. its more than ordinary difficulty in forgiving is indeed a special fault of the celtic character.--this must not however be confounded with a desire for revenge. the latter is by no means a specially celtic characteristic. resentment and vengeance are far from inseparable. the heart that surpasses in courtesy, except indeed that courtesy, be rooted in love divine, must, when treated with discourtesy, experience the worse revulsion, feel the bitterer indignation. but many a celt would forgive, and forgive thoroughly and heartily, with his enemy in his power, who, so long as he remained beyond his reach, could not even imagine circumstances in which they might be reconciled. to a celt the summit of wrong is a slight, but apology is correspondingly potent with him. mistress conal, however, had not the excuse of a specially courteous nature. christina and mercy, calling upon her one morning, were not ungraciously received, but had the misfortune to remark, trusting to her supposed ignorance of english, upon the dirtiness of her floor, they themselves having imported not a little of the moisture that had turned its surface into a muddy paste. she said nothing, but, to the general grudge she bore the possessors of property once belonging to her clan, she now added a personal one; the offence lay cherished and smouldering. had the chief offended her, she would have found a score of ways to prove to herself that he meant nothing; but she desired no mitigation of the trespass of strangers. the people at the new house did not get on very well with any of the clan. in the first place, they were regarded not merely as interlopers, but almost as thieves of the property--though in truth it had passed to them through other hands. in the second place, a rumour had got about that they did not behave with sufficient respect to the chief's family, in the point of whose honour the clan was the more exacting because of their common poverty. hence the inhabitants of the glen, though they were of course polite, showed but little friendliness. but the main obstacle to their reception was in themselves: the human was not much developed in them; they understood nothing of their own beings; they had never had any difficulty with themselves:--how could they understand others, especially in circumstances and with histories so different from their own! they had not a notion how poor people feel, still less poor people poorer than before--or how they regard the rich who have what they have lost. they did not understand any huftian feeling--not even the silliness they called love--a godless, mindless affair, fit only for the doll-histories invented by children: they had a feeling, or a feeling had them, till another feeling came and took its place. when a feeling was there, they felt as if it would never go; when it was gone, they felt as if it had never been; when it returned, they felt as if it had never gone. they seldom came so near anything as to think about it, never put a question to themselves as to how a thing affected them, or concerning the phenomena of its passage through their consciousness! there is a child-eternity of soul that needs to ask nothing, because it understands everything: the ways of the spirit are open to it; but where a soul does not understand, and has to learn, how is it to do so without thinking? they knew nothing of labour, nothing of danger, nothing of hunger, nothing of cold, nothing of sickness, nothing of loneliness. the realities of life, in their lowest forms as in their highest, were far from them. if they had nearly gone through life instead of having but entered upon it, they would have had some ground for thinking themselves unfairly dealt with; for to be made, and then left to be worthless, unfit even for damnation, might be suspected for hard lines; but there is one who takes a perfect interest in his lowliest creature, and will not so spare it. they were girls notwithstanding who could make themselves agreeable, and passed for clever--christina because she could give a sharp answer, and sing a drawingroom-song, mercy because as yet she mostly held her tongue. that there was at the same time in each of them the possibility of being developed into something of inestimable value, is merely to say that they were human. the days passed, and christmas drew near. the gentlemen arrived. there was family delight and a bustling reception. it is amazing--it shows indeed how deep and divine, how much beyond the individual self are the family affections--that such gladness breaks forth in the meeting of persons who, within an hour or so of the joyous welcome, self getting the better of the divine, will begin to feel bored, and will each lay the blame of the disappointment on the other. coats were pulled off; mufflers were unwound; pretty hands were helping; strong hands were lifting and carrying; every room was bright with a great fire; tea was refused, and dinner welcomed. after dinner came the unpacking of great boxes; and in the midst of the resultant pleasure, the proposal came to be made--none but christina knew how--that the inhabitants of the cottage should be invited to dinner on christmas-eve. it was carried at once, and the next afternoon a formal invitation was sent. at the cottage it caused conference, no discussion. the lady of the new house had not called with her girls, it was true; but then neither had the lady of the castle--for that was the clanspeople's name for the whole ridge on which the cottage stood--called on the new-comers! if there was offence, it was mutual! the unceremonious invitation might indicate that it was not thought necessary to treat them as persons who knew the ways of society; on the other hand, if it meant that they were ready to throw aside formalities and behave heartily, it would be wrong not to meet them half-way! they resolved therefore to make a counter-proposal; and if the invitation came of neighbourliness, and not of imagined patronage, they would certainly meet it in a friendly spirit! answer was returned, sealed with no mere crest but with a coat of arms, to the effect that it had been the custom since time forgotten for the chief to welcome his people and friends without distinction on christmas-eve, and the custom could not be broken; but if the ladies and gentlemen of the new house would favour them with their company on the occasion, to dine and dance, the chief and his family would gratefully accept any later offer of hospitality mr. and mrs. peregrine palmer might do them, the honour to send. this reply gave occasion to a good deal of talk at the new house, not entirely of a sort which the friends of the chief would have enjoyed hearing. frequent were the bursts of laughter from the men at the assumption of the title of chief by a man with no more land than he could just manage to live upon. the village they said, and said truly, in which the greater number of his people lived, was not his at all--not a foot of the ground on which it stood, not a stone or sod of which it was built--but belonged to a certain canadian, who was about to turn all his territory around and adjacent into a deer forest! they could not see that, if there had ever been anything genuine in the patriarchal relation, the mere loss of the clan-property could no more cause the chieftainship to cease, than could the loss of the silver-hilted andrew ferrara, handed down from father to son for so many generations. there are dull people, and just as many clever people, who look upon customs of society as on laws of nature, and judge the worth of others by their knowledge or ignorance of the same. so doing they disable themselves from understanding the essential, which is, like love, the fulfilling of the law. a certain englishman gave great offence in an arab tent by striding across the food placed for the company on the ground: would any celt, irish or welsh, have been guilty of such a blunder? but there was not any overt offence on the present occasion. they called it indeed a cool proposal that they should put off their christmas party for that of a ploughman in shabby kilt and hob-nailed shoes; but on their amused indignation supervened the thought that they were in a wild part of the country, where it would be absurd to expect the savoir vivre of the south, and it would be amusing to see the customs of the land. by suggestion and seeming response, the clever christina, unsuspected even of mercy, was the motive power to bring about the acceptance of the chief's invitation. a friendly answer was returned: they would not go to dinner, they said, as it was their custom also to dine at home on christmas-eve; but they would dine early, and spend the evening with them. to the laird the presence of the lowland girls promised a great addition to the merry-making. during the last thirty years, all the gentlemen-farmers of the clan, and most of the humbler tacksmen as well, had vanished, and there was a wide intellectual space between all those left and the family of the chief. often when ian was away, would alister, notwithstanding his love to his people and their entire response, have felt lonely but for labour. there being in the cottage no room equal to the reception of a large company, and the laird receiving all the members of the clan--"poor," i was going to say, "and rich," but there were no rich--as well as any neighbour or traveller who chose to appear, the father of the present chief had had good regard to the necessities of entertainment in the construction of a new barn: companionship, large feasting, and dancing, had been even more considered than the storing and threshing of his corn. there are in these days many who will mock; but for my part i am proud of a race whose social relations are the last upon which they will retrench, whose latest yielded pleasure is their hospitality. it is a common feeling that only the well-to-do have a right to be hospitable: the ideal flower of hospitality is almost unknown to the rich; it can hardly be grown save in the gardens of the poor; it is one of their beatitudes. means in glenruadh had been shrinking for many years, but the heart of the chief never shrank. his dwelling dwindled from a castle to a house, from a house to a cottage; but the hospitality did not dwindle. as the money vanished, the show diminished; the place of entertainment from a hall became a kitchen, from a kitchen changed to a barn; but the heart of the chief was the same; the entertainment was but little altered, the hospitality not in the least. when things grow hard, the first saving is generally off others; the macruadh's was off himself. the land was not his, save as steward of the grace of god! let it not be supposed he ran in debt: with his mother at the head, or rather the heart of affairs, that could not be. she was not one to regard as hospitality a readiness to share what you have not! little did good doctor johnson suspect the shifts to which some of the highland families he visited were driven--not to feed, but to house him: and housing in certain conditions of society is the large half of hospitality. where he did not find his quarters comfortable, he did not know what crowding had to be devised, what inconveniences endured by the family, that he might have what ease and freedom were possible. be it in stone hall or thatched cottage, the chief must entertain the stranger as well as befriend his own! this was the fulfilling of his office--none the less that it had descended upon him in evil times. that seldom if ever had a chief been christian enough or strong enough to fill to the full the relation of father of his people, was nothing against the ideal fact in the existent relation; it was rather for it: now that the chieftainship had come to a man with a large notion of what it required of him, he was the more, not the less ready to aim at the mark of the idea; he was not the more easily to be turned aside from a true attempt to live up to his calling, that many had yielded and were swept along bound slaves in the triumph of mammon! he looked on his calling as entirely enough to fill full the life that would fulfil the calling. it was ambition enough for him to be the head of his family, with the highest of earthly relations to realize toward its members. as to the vulgar notion of a man's obligation to himself, he had learned to despise it. "rubbish!" ian would say. "i owe my self nothing. what has my self ever done for me, but lead me wrong? what but it has come between me and my duty--between me and my very father in heaven--between me and my fellow man! the fools of greed would persuade that a man has no right to waste himself in the low content of making and sharing a humble living; he ought to make money! make a figure in the world, forsooth! be somebody! 'dwell among the people!' such would say: 'bah! let them look after themselves! if they cannot pay their rents, others will; what is it to you if the rents are paid? send them about their business; turn the land into a deer-forest or a sheep-farm, and clear them out! they have no rights! a man is bound to the children of his body begotten; the people are nothing to him! a man is not his brother's keeper--except when he has got him in prison! and so on, in the name of the great devil!" whether there was enough in alister to have met and overcome the spirit of the world, had he been brought up at oxford or cambridge, i have not to determine; there was that in him at least which would have come to, repent bitterly had he yielded; but brought up as he was, he was not only able to entertain the exalted idea presented to him, but to receive and make it his. with joy he recognized the higher dignity of the shepherd of a few poor, lean, wool-torn human sheep, than of the man who stands for himself, however "spacious in the possession of dirt." he who holds dead land a possession, and living souls none of his, needs wake no curse, for he is in the very pit of creation, a live outrage on the human family. if alister macruadh was not in the highest grade of christianity, he was on his way thither, for he was doing the work that was given him to do, which is the first condition of all advancement. he had much to learn yet, but he was one who, from every point his feet touched, was on the start to go further. the day of the holy eve rose clear and bright. snow was on the hills, and frost in the valley. there had been a time when at this season great games were played between neighbour districts or clans, but here there were no games now, because there were so few men; the more active part fell to the women. mistress macruadh was busy all day with her helpers, preparing a dinner of mutton, and beef, and fowls, and red-deer ham; and the men soon gave the barn something of the aspect of the old patriarchal hall for which it was no very poor substitute. a long table, covered with the finest linen, was laid for all comers; and when the guests took their places, they needed no arranging; all knew their standing, and seated themselves according to knowledge. two or three small farmers took modestly the upper places once occupied by immediate relatives of the chief, for of the old gentry of the clan there were none. but all were happy, for their chief was with them still. their reverence was none the less that they were at home with him. they knew his worth, and the roughest among them would mind what the macruadh said. they knew that he feared nothing; that he was strong as the red stag after which the clan was named; that, with genuine respect for every man, he would at the least insolence knock the fellow down; that he was the best shot, the best sailor, the best ploughman in the clan: i would have said the best swordsman, but that, except ian, there was not another left to it. not many of them, however, understood how much he believed that he had to give an account of his people. he was far from considering such responsibility the clergyman's only. again and again had he expostulated with some, to save them from the slow gaping hell of drink, and in one case, he had reason to hope, with success. as they sat at dinner, it seemed to the young fellow who, with his help, had so far been victorious, that the chief scarcely took his eyes off him. one might think there was small danger where the hostess allowed nothing beyond water and milk but small ale; the chief, however, was in dread lest he should taste even that, and caught one moment the longing look he threw at the jug as it passed. he rose and went down the table, speaking to this one and that, but stopped behind the lad, and putting his arm round his shoulders, whispered in his ear. the youth looked up in his face with a solemn smile: had not the chief embraced him before them all! he was only a shepherd-lad, but his chief cared for him! in the afternoon the extemporized tables were cleared away, candles were fixed in rough sconces along the walls, not without precaution against fire, and the floor was rubbed clean--for the barn was floored throughout with pine, in parts polished with use. the walls were already covered with the plaids of the men and women, each kept in place by a stone or two on the top of the wall where the rafters rested. in one end was a great heap of yellow oat-straw, which, partly levelled, made a most delightful divan. what with the straw, the plaids, the dresses, the shining of silver ornaments, and the flash of here and there a cairngorm or an amethyst, there was not a little colour in the barn. some of the guests were poorly but all were decently attired, and the shabbiest behaved as ladies and gentlemen. the party from the new house walked through the still, star-watched air, with the motionless mountains looking down on them, and a silence around, which they never suspected as a presence. the little girls were of the company, and there was much merriment. foolish compliments were not wanting, offered chiefly on the part of mr. sercombe, and accepted on that of christina. the ladies, under their furs and hoods, were in their best, with all the jewels they could wear at once, for they had heard that highlanders have a passion for colour, and that poor people are always best pleased when you go to them in your finery. the souls of these sasunnachs were full of things. they made a fine show as they emerged from the darkness of their wraps into the light of the numerous candles; nor did the approach of the widowed chieftainess to receive them, on the arm of alister, with ian on her other side, fail in dignity. the mother was dressed in a rich, matronly black silk; the chief was in the full dress of his clan--the old-fashioned coat of the french court, with its silver buttons and ruffles of fine lace, the kilt of macruadh tartan in which red predominated, the silver-mounted sporan--of the skin and adorned with the head of an otter caught with, the bare hands of one of his people, and a silver-mounted dirk of length unusual, famed for the beauty of both hilt and blade; ian was similarly though less showily clad. when she saw the stately dame advancing between her sons, one at least of her visitors felt a doubt whether their condescension would be fully appreciated. as soon as their reception was over, the piper--to the discomfort of mr. sercombe's english ears--began his invitation to the dance, and in a few moments the floor was, in a tumult of reels. the girls, unacquainted with their own country's dances, preferred looking on, and after watching reel and strathspey for some time, altogether declined attempting either. but by and by it was the turn of the clanspeople to look on while the lady of the house and her sons danced a quadrille or two with their visitors; after which the chief and his brother pairing with the two elder girls, the ladies were astonished to find them the best they had ever waltzed with, although they did not dance quite in the london way. ian's dancing, christina said, was french; mercy said all she knew was that the chief took the work and left her only the motion: she felt as in a dream of flying. before the evening was over, the young men had so far gained on christina that mr. sercombe looked a little commonplace. chapter xvii. between dancing and supper. the dancing began about six o'clock, and at ten it was time for supper. it was ready, but there was no room for it except the barn; the dancing therefore had to cease for a while, that the table might again be covered. the ladies put on their furs and furry boots and gloves, and went out into the night with the rest. the laird and christina started together, but, far from keeping at her side, alister went and came, now talking to this couple, now to that, and adding to the general pleasure with every word he spoke. ian and mercy walked together, and as often as the chief left her side, christina joined them. mrs. palmer stayed with their hostess; her husband took the younger children by the hand; mr. sercombe and christian sauntered along in the company, talking now to one, now to another of the village girls. all through the evening christina and mercy noted how instantly the word of the chief was followed in the smallest matter, and the fact made its impression on them; for undeveloped natures in the presence of a force, revere it as power--understanding by power, not the strength to create, to harmonize, to redeem, to discover the true, to suffer with patience; but the faculty of having things one's own vulgar, self-adoring way. ian had not proposed to mercy that they should walk together; but when the issuing crowd had broken into twos and threes, they found themselves side by side. the company took its way along the ridge, and the road eastward. the night was clear, and like a great sapphire frosted with topazes--reminding ian that, solid as is the world under our feet, it hangs in the will of god. mercy and he walked for some time in silence. it was a sudden change from the low barn, the dull candles, and the excitement of the dance, to the awful space, the clear pure far-off lights, and the great stillness. both felt it, though differently. there was in both of them the quest after peace. it is not the banished demon only that wanders seeking rest, but souls upon souls, and in ever growing numbers. the world and hades swarm with them. they long after a repose that is not mere cessation of labour: there is a positive, an active rest. mercy was only beginning to seek it, and that without knowing what it was she needed. ian sought it in silence with god; she in crepitant intercourse with her kind. naturally ready to fall into gloom, but healthy enough to avoid it, she would rush at anything to do--not to keep herself from thinking, for she had hardly begun to think, but to escape that heavy sense of non-existence, that weary and restless want which is the only form life can take to the yet unliving, those who have not yet awakened and arisen from the dead. she was a human chicken that had begun to be aware of herself, but had not yet attacked the shell that enclosed her: because it was transparent, and she could see life about her, she did not know that she was in a shell, or that, if she did not put forth the might of her own life, she was sealing herself up, a life in death, in her antenatal coffin. many who think themselves free have never yet even seen the shell that imprisons them--know nothing of the liberty wherewith the lord of our life would set them free. men fight many a phantom when they ought to be chipping at their shells. "thou art the dreamer!" they cry to him who would wake them. "see how diligent we are to get on in the world! we labour as if we should never go out of it!" what they call the world is but their shell, which is all the time killing the infant christ that houses with them. ian looked up to the sky, and breathed a deep breath. mercy looked up in his face, and saw his strangely beautiful smile. "what are you thinking of, captain macruadh?" she said. "i was thinking," he answered, "that perhaps up there"--he waved his arm wide over his head--"might be something like room; but i doubt it, i doubt it!" naturally, mercy was puzzled. the speech sounded quite mad, and yet he could not be mad, he had danced so well! she took comfort that her father was close behind. "did you never feel," he resumed, "as if you could not anyhow get room enough?" "no," answered mercy, "never." ian fell a thinking how to wake in her a feeling of what he meant. he had perceived that one of the first elements in human education is the sense of space--of which sense, probably, the star-dwelt heaven is the first awakener. he believed that without the heavens we could not have learned the largeness in things below them, could not, for instance, have felt the mystery of the high-ascending gothic roof--for without the greater we cannot interpret the less; and he thought that to have the sense of largeness developed might be to come a little nearer to the truth of things, to the recognition of spiritual relations. "did you ever see anything very big?" he asked. "i suppose london is as big as most things!" she answered, after a moment. "did you ever see london?" he asked. "we generally live there half the year." "pardon me; i did not ask if you had ever been to london," said ian; "i asked if you had ever seen london." "i know the west end pretty well." "did it ever strike you as very large?" "perhaps not; but the west end is only a part of london." "did you ever see london from the top of st. paul's?" "no." "did you ever see it from the top of hampstead heath?" "i have been there several times, but i don't remember seeing london from it. we don't go to london for the sights." "then you have not seen london!" mercy was annoyed. ian did not notice that she was, else perhaps he would not have gone on--which would have been a pity, for a little annoyance would do her no harm. at the same time the mood was not favourable to receiving any impression from the region of the things that are not seen. a pause followed. "it is so delightful," said ian at length, "to come out of the motion and the heat and the narrowness into the still, cold greatness!" "you seemed to be enjoying yourself pretty well notwithstanding, captain macruadh!" "what made you think so?" he asked, turning to her with a smile. "you were so merry--not with me--you think me only a stupid lowland girl; but the other young persons you danced with, laughed very much at things you said to them." "you are right; i did enjoy myself. as often as one comes near a simple human heart, one's own heart finds a little room." ere she knew, mercy had said-- "and you didn't find any room with me?" with the sound of her words her face grew hot, as with a furnace-blast, even in the frosty night-air. she would have covered what she had said, but only stammered. ian turned, and looking at her, said with a gentle gravity-- "you must not be offended with me! i must answer you truly.--you do not give me room: have you not just told me you never longed for any yourself?" "one ought to be independent!" said mercy, a little nettled. "are you sure of that? what is called independence may really be want of sympathy. that would indicate a kind of loneliness anything but good." "i wish you would find a less disagreeable companion then!--one that would at least be as good as nobody! i am sorry i don't know how to give you room. i would if i could. tell me how." again ian turned to her: was it possible there were tears in her voice? but her black eyes were flashing in the starlight! "did you ever read zanoni?" he asked. "i never heard of it. what is it?" "a romance of bulwer's." "my father won't let us read anything of bulwer's. does he write very wicked books?" "the one i speak of," said ian, "is not wicked, though it is full of rubbish, and its religion is very false." whether mercy meant to take her revenge on him with consciously bad logic, i am in doubt. "captain macruadh! you astonish me! a scotchman speak so of religion!" "i spoke of the religion in that book. i said it was false--which is the same as saying it was not religion." "then religion is not all true!" "all true religion is true," said ian, inclined to laugh like one that thought to catch an angel, and had clutched a bat! "i was going on to say that, though the religion and philosophy of the book were rubbish, the story was fundamentally a grand conception. it puzzles me to think how a man could start with such an idea, and work it out so well, and yet be so lacking both in insight and logic. it is wonderful how much of one portion of our nature may be developed along with so little of another!" "what is the story about?" asked mercy. "what i may call the canvas of it, speaking as if it were a picture, is the idea that the whole of space is full of life; that, as the smallest drop of water is crowded with monsters of hideous forms and dispositions, so is what we call space full of living creatures,--" "how horrible!" "--not all monsters, however. there are among them creatures not altogether differing from us, but differing much from each other,--" "as much as you and i?" "--some of them lovely and friendly, others frightful in their beauty and malignity,--" "what nonsense!" "why do you call it nonsense?" "how could anything beautiful be frightful?" "i ought not to have said beautiful. but the frightfullest face i ever saw ought to have been the finest. when the lady that owned it spoke to me, i shivered." "but anyhow the whole thing is nonsense!" "how is it nonsense?" "because there are no such creatures." "how do you know that? another may have seen them though you and i never did!" "you are making game of me! you think to make me believe anything you choose!" "will you tell me something you do believe?" "that you may prove immediately that i do not believe it!" she retorted, with more insight than he had expected. "--you are not very entertaining!" "would you like me to tell you a story then?" "will it be nonsense?" "no." "i should like a little nonsense." "you are an angel of goodness, and as wise as you are lovely!" said ian. she turned upon him, and opened wide at him her great black eyes, in which were mingled defiance and question. "your reasoning is worthy of your intellect. when you dance," he went on, looking very solemn, "your foot would not bend the neck of a daisy asleep in its rosy crown. the west wind of may haunts you with its twilight-odours; and when you waltz, so have i seen the waterspout gyrate on the blue floor of the mediterranean. your voice is as the harp of selma; and when you look out of your welkin eyes--no! there i am wrong! allow me!--ah, i thought so!--dark as erebus!--but what!" for mercy, perceiving at last that he was treating her like the silliest of small girls, lost her patience, and burst into tears. "you are dreadfully rude!" she sobbed. ian was vexed with himself. "you asked me to talk nonsense to you, miss mercy! i attempted to obey you, and have done it stupidly. but at least it was absolute nonsense! shall i make up for it by telling you a pretty story?" "anything to put away that!" answered mercy, trying to smile. he began at once, and told her a wonderful tale--told first after this fashion by rob of the angels, at a winter-night gathering of the women, as they carded and spun their wool, and reeled their yarn together. it was one well-known in the country, but rob had filled it after his fancy with imaginative turns and spiritual hints, unappreciable by the tall child of seventeen walking by ian's side. there was not among the maidens of the poor village one who would not have understood it better than she. it took her fancy notwithstanding, partly, perhaps, from its unlikeness to any story she had ever heard before. her childhood had been starved on the husks of new fairy-tales, all invention and no imagination, than which more unnourishing food was never offered to god's children. the story ian told her under that skyful of stars, was as rob of the angels had dressed it for the clan matrons and maidens, only altered a very little for the ears of the lowland girl. end of vol. i. vol. ii. contents of vol. ii. chapter i. the story told by ian ii. rob of the angels iii. at the new house iv. the brothers v. the princess vi. the two pairs vii. an cabrach mor viii. the stag's head ix. annie of the shop x. the encounter xi. a lesson xii. nature xiii. granny angry xiv. change xv. love allodial xvi. mercy calls on grannie xvii. in the tomb whats's mine's mine. chapter i. the story told by ian. "there was once a woman whose husband was well to do, but he died and left her, and then she sank into poverty. she did her best; but she had a large family, and work was hard to find, and hard to do when it was found, and hardly paid when it was done. only hearts of grace can understand the struggles of the poor--with everything but god against them! but she trusted in god, and said whatever he pleased must be right, whether he sent it with his own hand or not. "now, whether it was that she could not find them enough to eat, or that she could not keep them warm enough, i do not know; i do not think it was that they had not gladness enough, which is as necessary for young things as food and air and sun, for it is wonderful on how little a child can be happy; but whatever was the cause, they began to die. one after the other sickened and lay down, and did not rise again; and for a time her life was just a waiting upon death. she would have wanted to die herself, but that there was always another to die first; she had to see them all safe home before she dared wish to go herself. but at length the last of them was gone, and then when she had no more to provide for, the heart of work went out of her: where was the good of working for herself! there was no interest in it! but she knew it was the will of god she should work and eat until he chose to take her back to himself; so she worked on for her living while she would much rather have worked for her dying; and comforted herself that every day brought death a day nearer. then she fell ill herself, and could work no more, and thought god was going to let her die; for, able to win her bread no longer, surely she was free to lie down and wait for death! but just as she was going to her bed for the last time, she bethought herself that she was bound to give her neighbour the chance of doing a good deed: and felt that any creature dying at her door without letting her know he was in want, would do her a great wrong. she saw it was the will of god that she should beg, so put on her clothes again, and went out to beg. it was sore work, and she said so to the priest. but the priest told her she need not mind, for our lord himself lived by the kindness of the women who went about with him. they knew he could not make a living for his own body and a living for the souls of so many as well, and the least they could do was to keep him alive who was making them alive. she said that was very true; but he was all the time doing everything for everybody, and she was doing nothing for anybody. the priest was a wise man, and did not tell her how she had, since ever he knew her, been doing the work of god in his heart, helping him to believe and trust in god; so that in fact, when he was preaching, she was preaching. he did not tell her that, i say, for he was jealous over her beauty, and would have christ's beloved sheep enter his holy kingdom with her wool white, however torn it might be. so he left her to think she was nobody at all; and told her that, whether she was worth keeping alive or not, whether she was worth begging for or not, whether it was a disgrace or an honour to beg, all was one, for it was the will of god that she should beg, and there was no word more to be said, and no thought more to be thought about it. to this she heartily agreed, and did beg--enough to keep her alive, and no more. "but at last she saw she must leave that part of the country, and go back to the place her husband took her from. for the people about her were very poor, and she thought it hard on them to have to help a stranger like her; also her own people would want her to bury. for you must know that in the clans, marriage was thought to be dissolved by death, so far at least as the body was concerned; therefore the body of a dead wife was generally carried back to the burial place of her own people, there to be gathered to her fathers. so the woman set out for her own country, begging her way thither. nor had she any difficulty, for there were not a few poor people on her way, and the poor are the readiest to help the poor, also to know whether a person is one that ought to be helped or not. "one night she came to a farm house where a rich miserly farmer dwelt. she knew about him, and had not meant to stop there, but she was weary, and the sun went down as she reached his gate, and she felt as if she could go no farther. so she went up to the door and knocked, and asked if she could have a nights lodging. the woman who opened to her went and asked the farmer. now the old man did not like hospitality, and in particular to such as stood most in need of it; he did not enjoy throwing away money! at the same time, however, he was very fond of hearing all the country rumours; and he thought with himself he would buy her news with a scrap of what was going, and a shake-down at the foot of the wall. so he told his servant to bring her in. "he received her not unkindly, for he wanted her to talk; and he let her have a share of the supper, such as it was. but not until he had asked every question about everybody he could think of, and drawn her own history from her as well, would he allow her to have the rest she so much needed. "now it was a poor house, like most in the country, and nearly without partitions. the old man had his warm box-bed, and slept on feathers where no draught could reach him, and the poor woman had her bed of short rumpled straw on the earthen floor at the foot of the wall in the coldest corner. yet the heart of the man had been moved by her story, for, without dwelling on her sufferings, she had been honest in telling it. he had indeed, ere he went to sleep, thanked god that he was so much better off than she. for if he did not think it the duty of the rich man to share with his neighbours, he at least thought it his duty to thank god for his being richer than they. "now it may well seem strange that such a man should be privileged to see a vision; but we do read in the bible of a prophet who did not even know his duty to an ass, so that the ass had to teach it him. and the man alone saw the vision; the woman saw nothing of it. but she did not require to see any vision, for she had truth in the inward parts, which is better than all visions. the vision was on this wise:--in the middle of the night the man came wide awake, and looking out of his bed, saw the door open, and a light come in, burning like a star, of a faint rosy colour, unlike any light he had ever before seen. another and another came in, and more yet, until he counted six of them. they moved near the floor, but he could not see clearly what sort of little creatures they were that were carrying them. they went up to the woman's bed, and walked slowly round it in a hovering kind of a way, stopping, and moving up and down, and going on again; and when they had done this three times, they went slowly out of the door again, stopping for a moment several times as they went. "he fell asleep, and waking not very early, was surprised to see his guest still on her hard couch--as quiet as any rich woman, he said to himself, on her feather bed. he woke her, told her he wondered she should sleep so far into the morning, and narrated the curious vision he had had. 'does not that explain to you,' she said, 'how it is that i have slept so long? those were my dead children you saw come to me. they died young, without any sin, and god lets them come and comfort their poor sinful mother. i often see them in my dreams. if, when i am gone, you will look at my bed, you will find every straw laid straight and smooth. that is what they were doing last night.' then she gave him thanks for good fare and good rest, and took her way to her own, leaving the farmer better pleased with himself than he had been for a long time, partly because there had been granted him a vision from heaven. "at last the woman died, and was carried by angels into abraham's bosom. she was now with her own people indeed, that is, with god and all the good. the old farmer did not know of her death till a long time after; but it was upon the night she died, as near as he could then make out, that he dreamed a wonderful dream. he never told it to any but the priest from whom he sought comfort when he lay dying; and the priest did not tell it till after everybody belonging to the old man was gone. this was the dream:-- "he was lying awake in his own bed, as he thought, in the dark night, when the poor woman came in at the door, having in her hand a wax candle, but not alight. he said to her, 'you extravagant woman! where did you get that candle?' she answered, 'it was put into my hand when i died, with the word that i was to wander till i found a fire at which to light it.' 'there!' said he, 'there's the rested fire! blow and get a light, poor thing! it shall never be said i refused a body a light!' she went to the hearth, and began to blow at the smouldering peat; but, for all she kept trying, she could not light her candle. the old man thought it was because she was dead, not because he was dead in sin, and losing his patience, cried, 'you foolish woman! haven't you wit enough left to light a candle? it's small wonder you came to beggary!' still she went on trying, but the more she tried, the blacker grew the peat she was blowing at. it would indeed blaze up at her breath, but the moment she brought the candle near it to catch the flame, it grew black, and each time blacker than before. 'tut! give me the candle,' cried the farmer, springing out of bed; 'i will light it for you!' but as he stretched out his hand to take it, the woman disappeared, and he saw that the fire was dead out. 'here's a fine business!' he said. 'how am i to get a light?' for he was miles from the next house. and with that he turned to go back to his bed. when he came near it, he saw somebody lying in it. 'what! has the carline got into my very bed?' he cried, and went to drive her out of the bed and out of the house. but when he came close, he saw it was himself lying there, and knew that at least he was out of the body, if not downright dead. the next moment he found himself on the moor, following the woman, some distance before him, with her unlighted candle still in her hand. he walked as fast as he could to get up with her, but could not; he called after her, but she did not seem to hear. "when first he set out, he knew every step of the ground, but by and by he ceased to know it. the moor stretched out endlessly, and the woman walked on and on. without a thought of turning back, he followed. at length he saw a gate, seemingly in the side of a hill. the woman knocked, and by the time it opened, he was near enough to hear what passed. it was a grave and stately, but very happy-looking man that opened it, and he knew at once it was st. peter. when he saw the woman, he stooped and kissed her. the same moment a light shone from her, and the old man thought her candle was lighted at last; but presently he saw it was her head that gave out the shining. and he heard her say, 'i pray you, st. peter, remember the rich tenant of balmacoy; he gave me shelter one whole night, and would have let me light my candle but i could not.' st. peter answered, 'his fire was not fire enough to light your candle, and the bed he gave you was of short straw!' 'true, st. peter,' said the woman, 'but he gave me some supper, and it is hard for a rich man to be generous! you may say the supper was not very good, but at least it was more than a cup of cold water!' 'yes, verily!' answered the saint, 'but he did not give it you because you loved god, or because you were in need of it, but because he wanted to hear your news.' then the woman was sad, for she could not think of anything more to say for the poor old rich man. and st. peter saw that she was sad, and said, 'but if he die to-night, he shall have a place inside the gate, because you pray for him. he shall lie there!' and he pointed to just such a bed of short crumpled straw as she had lain upon in his house. but she said, 'st. peter, you ought to be ashamed of yourself! is that the kind of welcome to give a poor new-dead man? where then would he have lain if i had not prayed for him?' 'in the dog-kennel outside there,' answered st. peter. 'oh, then, please, let me go back and warn him what comes of loving money!' she pleaded. 'that is not necessary,' he replied; 'the man is hearing every word you and i are this moment saying to each other.' 'i am so glad!' rejoined the woman; 'it will make him repent.' 'he will not be a straw the better for it!' answered the saint. 'he thinks now that he will do differently, and perhaps when he wakes will think so still; but in a day or two he will mock at it as a foolish dream. to gather money will seem to him common sense, and to lay up treasure in heaven nonsense. a bird in the hand will be to him worth ten in the heavenly bush. and the end will be that he will not get the straw inside the gate, and there will be many worse places than the dog-kennel too good for him!' with that he woke. "'what an odd dream!' he said to himself. 'i had better mind what i am about!' so he was better that day, eating and drinking more freely, and giving more to his people. but the rest of the week he was worse than ever, trying to save what he had that day spent, and so he went on growing worse. when he found himself dying, the terror of his dream came upon him, and he told all to the priest. but the priest could not comfort him." by the time the story was over, to which mercy had listened without a word, they were alone in the great starry night, on the side of a hill, with the snow high above them, and the heavens above the snow, and the stars above the heavens, and god above and below everything. only ian felt his presence. mercy had not missed him yet. she did not see much in the tale: how could she? it was very odd, she thought, but not very interesting. she had expected a tale of clan-feud, or a love-story! yet the seriousness of her companion in its narration had made some impression upon her. "they told me you were an officer," she said, "but i see you are a clergyman! do you tell stories like that from the pulpit?" "i am a soldier," answered ian, "not a clergyman. but i have heard my father tell such a story from the pulpit." ian imagined himself foiled in his attempt to interest the maiden. if he was, it would not be surprising. he had not the least desire to commend himself to the girl; and he would not talk rubbish even to a child. there is sensible and senseless nonsense, good absurdity and bad. as mercy recounted to her sister the story ian had told her, it certainly was silly enough. she had retained but the withered stalk and leaves; the strange flower was gone. christina judged it hardly a story for a gentleman to tell a lady. they returned almost in silence to find the table laid, a plentiful supper spread, and the company seated. after supper came singing of songs, saying of ballads, and telling of tales. i know with what incredulity many highlanders will read of a merry-making in their own country at which no horn went round, no punch-bowl was filled and emptied without stint! but the clearer the brain, the better justice is done to the more etherial wine of the soul. of several of the old songs christina begged the tunes, but was disappointed to find that, as she could not take them down, so the singers of them could not set them down. in the tales she found no interest. the hostess sang to her harp, and made to revering listeners eloquent music, for her high clear tones had not yet lost their sweetness, and she had some art to come in aid of her much feeling: loud murmurs of delight, in the soft strange tongue of the songs themselves, followed the profound silence with which they were heard, but christina wondered what there was to applaud. she could not herself sing without accompaniment, and when she left, it was with a regretful feeling that she had not distinguished herself. naturally, as they went home, the guests from the new house had much fun over the queer fashions and poverty--stricken company, the harp and the bagpipes, the horrible haggis, the wild minor songs, and the unintelligible stories and jokes; but the ladies agreed that the macruadh was a splendid fellow. chapter ii rob of the angels. among the peasantry assembled at the feast, were two that had neither danced, nor seated themselves at the long table where all were welcome. mercy wondered what might be the reason of their separation. her first thought was that they must be somehow, she could not well imagine how, in lower position than any of the rest--had perhaps offended against the law, perhaps been in prison, and so the rest would not keep company with them; or perhaps they were beggars who did not belong to the clan, and therefore, although fed, were not allowed to eat with it! but she soon saw she must be wrong in each conjecture; for if there was any avoiding, it was on the part of the two: every one, it was clear, was almost on the alert to wait upon them. they seemed indeed rather persons of distinction than outcasts; for it was with something like homage, except for a certain coaxing tone in the speech of the ministrants, that they were attended. they had to help themselves to nothing; everything was carried to them. now one, now another, where all were guests and all were servants, would rise from the table to offer them something, or see what they would choose or might be in want of, while they partook with the same dignity and self-restraint that was to be noted in all. the elder was a man about five-and-fifty, tall and lean, with a wiry frame, dark grizzled hair, and a shaven face. his dress, which was in the style of the country, was very poor, but decent; only his plaid was large and thick, and bright compared with the rest of his apparel: it was a present he had had from his clan-some giving the wool, and others the labour in carding, dyeing, and weaving it. he carried himself like a soldier-which he had never been, though his father had. his eyes were remarkably clear and keen, and the way he used them could hardly fail to attract attention. every now and then they would suddenly fix themselves with a gaze of earnest inquiry, which would either grow to perception, or presently melt away and let his glance go gently roving, ready to receive, but looking for nothing. his face was very brown and healthy, with marked and handsome features. its expression seemed at first a little severe, but soon, to reading eyes, disclosed patience and tenderness. at the same time there was in it a something indescribably unlike the other faces present-and indeed his whole person and carriage were similarly peculiar. had mercy, however, spent on him a little more attention, the peculiarity would have explained itself. she would have seen that, although everybody spoke to him, he never spoke in reply--only made signs, sometimes with his lips, oftener with hand or head: the man was deaf and dumb. but such was the keenness of his observation that he understood everything said to him by one he knew, and much from the lips of a stranger. his companion was a youth whose age it would have been difficult to guess. he looked a lad, and was not far from thirty. his clothing was much like his father's--poor enough, yet with the air of being a better suit than that worn every day. he was very pale and curiously freckled, with great gray eyes like his father's, which had however an altogether different expression. they looked dreamy, and seemed almost careless of what passed before them, though now and then a certain quick, sharp turn of the head showed him not devoid of attention. the relation between the two was strangely interesting. day and night they were inseparable. because the father was deaf, the son gave all his attention to the sounds of the world; his soul sat in his ears, ever awake, ever listening; while such was his confidence in his father's sight, that he scarcely troubled himself to look where he set his feet. his expression also was peculiar, partly from this cause, mainly from a deeper. it was a far-away look, which a common glance would have taken to indicate that he was "not all there." in a lowland parish he would have been regarded as little better than a gifted idiot; in the mountains he was looked upon as a seer, one in communion with higher powers. whether his people were of this opinion from being all fools together, and therefore unable to know a fool, or the lowland authorities would have been right in taking charge of him, let him who pleases judge or misjudge for himself. what his own thought of him came out in the name they gave him: "rob of the angels," they called him. he was nearly a foot shorter than his father, and very thin. some said he looked always cold; but i think that came of the wonderful peace on his face, like the quiet of a lake over which lies a thin mist. never was stronger or fuller devotion manifested by son to father than by rob of the angels to hector of the stags. his filial love and faith were perfect. while they were together, he was in his own calm elysium; when they were apart, which was seldom for more than a few minutes, his spirit seemed always waiting. i believe his notions of god his father, and hector his father, were strangely mingled--the more perhaps that the two fathers were equally silent. it would have been a valuable revelation to some theologians to see in those two what _love_ might mean. so gentle was rob of the angels, that all the women, down to the youngest maid-child, gave him a compassionate, mother-like love. he had lost his mother when he was an infant; the father had brought him up with his own hand, and from the moment of his mother's departure had scarce let him out of his sight; but the whole woman-remnant of the clan was as a mother to the boy. and from the first they had so talked to him of his mother, greatly no doubt through the feeling that from his father he could learn nothing of her, that now his mother seemed to him everywhere: he could not see god; why should not his mother be there though he could not see her! no wonder the man was peaceful! many would be inclined to call the two but poachers and vagabonds--vagabonds because they lived in houses not quite made with hands, for they had several dwellings that were mostly caves--which yet they contrived to make warm and comfortable; and poachers because they lived by the creatures which god scatters on his hills for his humans. let those who inherit or purchase, avenge the breach of law; but let them not wonder when those who are disinherited and sold, cry out against the breach of higher law! the land here had never, partly from the troubles besetting its owners, but more from their regard for the poor, of the clan, been with any care preserved; little notice was ever taken of what game was killed, or who killed it. at the same time any wish of the chief with regard to the deer, of which rob's father for one knew every antlered head, was rigidly respected. as to the parts which became the property of others-the boundaries between were not very definite, and sale could ill change habits, especially where owners were but beginning to bestir themselves about the deer, or any of the wild animals called game. hector and rob led their life with untroubled conscience and easy mind. in a world of the devil, where the justification of existence lay in money on the one side, and work for money on the other, there could be no justification of the existence of these men; but this world does not belong to the devil, though it may often seem as if it did, and father and son lived and enjoyed life, as in a manner so to a decree unintelligible to him who, without his money and its consolations, would know himself in the hell he has not yet recognized. neither of them could read or write; neither of them had a penny laid by for wet weather; neither of them would leave any memory beyond their generation; the will of neither would be laid up in doctors' commons; neither of the two would leave on record a single fact concerning one of the animals whose ways and habits they knew better than any other man in the highlands; that they were nothing, and worth nothing to anybody--even to themselves, would have been the judgment of most strangers concerning them; but god knew what a life of unspeakable pleasures it was that he had given them-a life the change from which to the life beyond, would scarce be distracting: neither would find himself much out of doors when he died. to rob of the angels tow could abraham's bosom feel strange, accustomed to lie night after night, star-melted and soft-breathing, or snow-ghastly and howling, with his head on--the bosom of hector of the stags-an abraham who could as ill do without his isaac, as his isaac without him! the father trusted his son's hearing as implicitly as his own sight. when he saw a certain look come on his face, he would drop on the instant, and crouch as still as if he had ears and knew what noise was, watching rob's face for news of some sound wandering through the vast of the night. it seemed at times, however, as if either he was not quite deaf, or he had some gift that went toward compensation. to all motion about him he was sensitive as no other man. i am afraid to say from how far off the solid earth would convey to him the vibration of a stag's footstep. rob sometimes thought his cheek must feel the wind of a sound to which his ear was irresponsive. beyond a doubt he was occasionally aware of the proximity of an animal, and knew what animal it was, of which rob had no intimation. his being, corporeal and spiritual, seemed, to the ceaseless vibrations of the great globe, a very seismograph. often would he make his sign to rob to lay his ear on the ground and listen, when no indication had reached the latter. i suspect the exceptional development in him of some sense rudimentary in us all. he had the keenest eyes in glenruadh, and was a dead shot. even the chief was not his equal. yet he never stalked a deer, never killed anything, for mere sport. i am not certain he never had, but for rob of the angels, he had the deep-rooted feeling of his chief in regard to the animals. what they wanted for food, they would kill; but it was not much they needed, for seldom can two men have lived on less, and they had positively not a greed of any kind between them. if their necessity was meal or potatoes, they would carry grouse or hares down the glen, or arrange with some farmer's wife, perhaps mrs. macruadh herself, for the haunches of a doe; but they never killed from pleasure in killing. of creatures destructive to game they killed enough to do far more than make up for all the game they took; and for the skins of ermine and stoat and fox and otter they could always get money's worth; money itself they never sought or had. if the little birds be regarded as earning the fruit and seed they devour by the grubs and slugs they destroy, then hector of the stags and rob of the angels also thoroughly earned their food. when a trustworthy messenger was wanted, and rob was within reach, he was sure to be employed. but not even then were his father and he quite parted. hector would shoulder his gun, and follow in the track of his fleet-footed son till he met him returning. for what was life to hector but to be with rob! was his mary's son to go about the world unattended! he had a yet stronger feeling than any of the clan that his son was not of the common race of mortals. to hector also, after their own fashion, would rob of the angels tell the tales that suggested the name his clanspeople gave him--wonderful tales of the high mountain-nights, the actors in them for the most part angels. whether rob believed he had intercourse with such beings, heard them speak, and saw them, do the things he reported, i cannot tell: it may be that, like any other poet of good things, he but saw and believed the things his tales meant, the things with which he represented the angels as dealing, and concerning which he told their sayings. to the eyes of those who knew him, rob seemed just the sort of person with whom the angels might be well pleased to hold converse: was he not simplicity itself, truth, generosity, helpfulness? did he not, when a child, all but lose his life in the rescue of an idiot from the swollen burn? did he not, when a boy, fight a great golden eagle on its nest, thinking to deliver the lamb it had carried away? knowing his father in want of a new bonnet, did not rob with his bare hands seize an otter at the mouth of its hole, and carry it home, laughing merrily over the wounds it had given him? his voice had in it a strangely peculiar tone, making it seem not of this world. especially after he had been talking for some time, it would appear to come from far away, not from the lips of the man looking you in the face. it was wonderful with what solemnity of speech, and purity of form he would tell his tales. so much in solitude with his dumb father, his speech might well be unlike the speech of other men; but whence the impression of cultivation it produced? when the christmas party broke up, most of the guests took the road toward the village, the chief and his brother accompanying them part of the way. of these were rob and his father, walking hand in hand, hector looking straight before him, rob gazing up into the heavens, as if holding counsel with the stars. "are you seeing any angels, rob?" asked a gentle girl of ten. "well, and i'm not sure," answered rob of the angels. "sure you can tell whether you see anything!" "oh, yes, i see! but it is not easy to tell what will be an angel and what will not. there's so much all blue up there, it might be full of angels and none of us see one of them!" "do tell us what you see, rob, dear rob," said the girl. "well, and i will tell you. i think i see many heads close together, talking." "and can you hear what they will be saying?" "some of it." "tell me, do tell me-some-just a little." "well then, they are saying, one to the other--not very plain, but i can hear--they are saying, 'i wonder when people will be good! it would be so easy, if only they would mean it, and begin when they are little!' that's what they are saying as they look down on us walking along." "that will be good advice, rob!" said one of the women. "and," he resumed, "they are saying now--at least that is what it sounds to me--'i wish women were as good as they were when they were little girls!'" "now i know they are not saying that!" remarked the woman. "how should the angels trouble themselves about us! rob, dear, confess you are making it up, because the child would be asking you." rob made no answer, but some saw him smile a curious smile. rob would never defend anything he had said, or dispute anything another said. after a moment or two, he spoke again. "shall i be telling you what i heard them saying to each other this last night of all?" he asked. "yes, do, do!" "it was upon dorrachbeg; and there were two of them. they were sitting together in the moon--in the correi on the side of the hill over the village. i was lying in a bush near them, for i could not sleep, and came out, and the night was not cold. now i would never be so bad-mannered as to listen where persons did not want me to hear." "what were they like, rob, dear?" interrupted the girl. "that does not matter much," answered rob; "but they were white, and their eyes not so white, but brighter; for so many sad things go in at their eyes when they come down to the earth, that it makes them dark." "how could they be brighter and darker both at once?" asked the girl, very pertinently. "i will tell you," answered rob. "the dark things that go in at their eyes, they have to burn them in the fire of faith; and it is the fire of that burning that makes their eyes bright; it is the fire of their faith burning up the sad things they see." "oh, yes! i understand now!" said the girl. "and what were their clothes like, rob?" "when you see the angels, you don't think much about their clothes." "and what were they saying?" "i spoke first--the moment i saw them, for i was not sure they knew that i was there. i said, 'i am here, gentlemen.' 'yes, we know that,' they answered. 'are you far from home, gentlemen?' i asked. 'it is all one for that,' they answered. 'well,' said i, 'it is true, gentlemen, for you seem as much at home here on the side of dorrachbeg, as if it was a hill in paradise!' 'and how do you know it is not?' said they. 'because i see people do upon it as they would not in paradise,' i answered. 'ah!' said one of them, 'the hill may be in paradise, and the people not! but you cannot understand these things.' 'i think i do,' i said; 'but surely, if you did let them know they were on a hill in paradise, they would not do as they do!' 'it would be no use telling them,' said he; 'but, oh, how they spoil the house!' 'are the red deer, and the hares, and the birds in paradise?' i asked. 'certain sure!' he answered. 'do they know it?' said i. 'no, it is not necessary for them; but they will know it one day.' 'you do not mind your little brother asking you questions?' i said. 'ask a hundred, if you will, little brother,' he replied. 'then tell me why you are down here to-night.' 'my friend and i came out for a walk, and we thought we would look to see when the village down there will have to be reaped.' 'what do you mean?' i said. 'you cannot see what we see,' they answered; 'but a human place is like a flower, or a field of corn, and grows ripe, or won't grow ripe, and then some of us up there have to sharpen our sickles.' 'what!' said i, for a great fear came upon me, 'they are not wicked people down there!' 'no, not very wicked, but slow and dull.' then i could say nothing more for a while, and they did not speak either, but sat looking before them. 'can you go and come as you please?' i asked at length. 'yes, just as we are sent,' they answered. 'would you not like better to go and come of yourselves, as my father and i do?' i said. 'no,' answered both of them, and something in their one voice almost frightened me; 'it is better than everything to go where we are sent. if we had to go and come at our own will, we should be miserable, for we do not love our own will.' 'not love your own will?' 'no, not at all!' 'why?' 'because there is one--oh, ever so much better! when you and your father are quite good, you will not be left to go and come at your own will any more than we are.' and i cried out, and said, 'oh, dear angel! you frighten me!' and he said, 'that is because you are only a man, and not a--' now i am not sure of the word he said next; bat i think it was christian; and i do not quite know what the word meant." "oh, rob, dear! everybody knows that!" exclaimed the girl. but rob said no more. while he was talking, alister had come up behind him, with annie of the shop, and he said-- "rob, my friend, i know what you mean, and i want to hear the rest of it: what did the angels say next?" "they said," answered rob, "--'was it your will set you on this beautiful hill, with all these things to love, with such air to breathe, such a father as you've got, and such grand deer about you?' 'no,' i answered. 'then,' said the angel, 'there must be a better will than yours, for you would never have even thought of such things!' 'how could i, when i wasn't made?' said i. 'there it is!' he returned, and said no more. i looked up, and the moon was shining, and there were no angels on the stone. but a little way off was my father, come out to see what had become of me." "now did you really see and hear all that, rob?" said alister. rob smiled a beautiful smile--with something in it common people would call idiotic--stopped and turned, took the chief's hand, and carried it to his lips; but not a word more would he speak, and soon they came where the path of the two turned away over the hill. "will you not come and sleep at our house?" said one of the company. but they made kindly excuse. "the hill-side would miss us; we are expected home!" said rob--and away they climbed to their hut, a hollow in a limestone rock, with a front wall of turf, there to sleep side by side till the morning came, or, as rob would have said, "till the wind of the sun woke them." rob of the angels made songs, and would sing one sometimes; but they were in gaelic, and the more poetic a thing, the more inadequate at least, if not stupid is its translation. he had all the old legends of the country in his head, and many stories of ghosts and of the second sight. these stories he would tell exactly as he had heard them, showing he believed every word of them; but with such of the legends as were plainly no other than poetic inventions, he would take what liberties he pleased--and they lost nothing by it; for he not only gave them touches of fresh interest, but sent glimmering through them hints of something higher, of which ordinary natures perceived nothing, while others were dimly aware of a loftier intent: according to his listeners was their hearing. in rob's stories, as in all the finer work of genius, a man would find as much as, and no more than, he was capable of. ian's opinion of rob was even higher than alister's. "what do you think, ian, of the stories rob of the angels tells?" asked alister, as they walked home. "that the lord has chosen the weak things of the world to confound the mighty," answered ian. "tut! rob confounds nobody." "he confounds me," returned ian. "does he believe what he tells?" "he believes all of it that is to be believed," replied ian. "you are as bad as he!" rejoined alister. "there is no telling, sometimes, what you mean!" "tell me this, alister: can a thing be believed that is not true?" "yes, certainly!" "i say, no. can you eat that which is not bread?" "i have seen a poor fellow gnawing a stick for hunger!" answered alister. "yes, gnawing! but gnawing is not eating. did the poor fellow eat the stick? that is just it! many a man will gnaw at a lie all his life, and perish of want. i mean lie, of course, the real lie--a thing which is in its nature false. he may gnaw at it, he may even swallow it, but i deny that he can believe it. there is not that in it which can be believed; at most it can but be supposed to be true. belief is another thing. truth is alone the correlate of belief, just as air is for the lungs, just as form and colour are for the sight. a lie can no more be believed than carbonic acid can be breathed. it goes into the lungs, true, and a lie goes into the mind, but both kill; the one is not breathed, the other is not believed. the thing that is not true cannot find its way to the home of faith; if it could, it would be at once rejected with a loathing beyond utterance; to a pure soul, which alone can believe, nothing is so loathsome as a pretence of truth. a lie is a pretended truth. if there were no truth there could be no lie. as the devil upon god, the very being of a lie depends on that whose opposite and enemy it is. but tell me, alister, do you believe the parables of our lord?" "with all my heart." "was there any real person in our lord's mind when he told that one about the unjust judge?" "i do not suppose there was; but there were doubtless many such." "many who would listen to a poor woman because she plagued them?" "well, it does not matter; what the story teaches is true, and that was what he wanted believed." "just so. the truth in the parables is what they mean, not what they say; and so it is, i think, with rob of the angels' stories. he believes all that can be believed of them. at the same time, to a mind so simple, the spirit of god must have freer entrance than to ours--perhaps even teaches the man by what we call the man's own words. his words may go before his ideas--his higher ideas at least--his ideas follow after his words. as the half-thoughts pass through his mind--who can say how much generated by himself, how much directly suggested by the eternal thought in which his spirit lives and breathes!--he drinks and is refreshed. i am convinced that nowhere so much as in the highest knowledge of all--what the people above count knowledge--will the fulfilment of the saying of our lord, "many first shall be last, and the last first," cause astonishment; that a man who has been leader of the age's opinion, may be immeasurably behind another whom he would have shut up in a mad-house. depend upon it, things go on in the soul of that rob of the angels which the angels, whether they come to talk with him or not, would gladly look into. of such as he the angels may one day be the pupils." a silence followed. "do you think the young ladies of the new house could understand rob of the angels, ian?" at length asked alister. "not a bit. i tried the younger, and she is the best.--they could if they would wake up." "you might say that of anybody!" "yes; but there is this among other differences--that some people do not wake up, because they want a new brain first, such as they will get when they die, perhaps; while others do not wake up, because their whole education has been a rocking of them to sleep. and there is this difference between the girls, that the one is full of herself, and the other is not. the one has a close, the other an open mind." "and yet," said alister, "if they heard you say so, the open mind would imagine itself the close, and the close never doubt it was the open!" chapter iii at the new house. the ladies of the new house were not a little surprised the next day when, as they sat waiting their guests, the door of the drawing-room opened, and they saw the young highlanders enter in ordinary evening dress. the plough-driving laird himself looked to christina very much like her patterns of grosvenor-square. it was long since he had worn his dress-coat, and it was certainly a little small for his more fully developed frame, but he carried himself as straight as a rush, and was nowise embarrassed with hands or feet. his hands were brown and large, but they were well shaped, and not ashamed of themselves, being as clean as his heart. out of his hazel eyes, looking in the candle-light nearly as dark as mercy's, went an occasional glance which an emergency might at once develop into a look of command. for ian, he would have attracted attention anywhere, if only from his look of quiet unselfness, and the invariable grace of the movement that broke his marked repose; but his entertainers would doubtless have honoured him more had they understood that his manner was just the same and himself as much at home in the grandest court of europe. the elder ladies got on together pretty well. the widow of the chief tried to explain to her hostess the condition of the country and its people; the latter, though knowing little and caring less about relations beyond those of the family and social circle, nor feeling any purely human responsibility, was yet interested enough to be able to seem more interested than she was; while her sweet smile and sweet manners were very pleasing to one who seldom now had the opportunity of meeting a woman so much on her own level. the gentlemen, too, were tolerably comfortable together. both alister and ian had plenty of talk and anecdote. the latter pleased the ladies with descriptions of northern ways and dresses and manners--perhaps yet more with what pleased the men also, tales of wolf-and bear-shooting. but it seemed odd that, when the talk turned upon the home-shooting called sport, both alister and ian should sit in unsmiling silence. there was in ian a certain playfulness, a subdued merriment, which made mercy doubt her ears after his seriousness of the night before. life seemed to flash from him on all sides, occasionally in a keen stroke of wit, oftener in a humorous presentation of things. his brother alone could see how he would check the witticism on his very lips lest it should hurt. it was in virtue of his tenderness toward everything that had life that he was able to give such narratives of what he had seen, such descriptions of persons he had met. when he told a story, it was with such quiet participation, manifest in the gleam of his gray eyes, in the smile that hovered like the very soul of psyche about his lips, that his hearers enjoyed the telling more than the tale. even the chief listened with eagerness to every word that fell from his brother. the ladies took note that, while the manners of the laird and his mother were in a measure old-fashioned, those of ian were of the latest: with social custom, in its flow of change, he seemed at home. but his ease never for a moment degenerated into the free-and-easy, the dry rot of manners; there was a stateliness in him that dominated the ease, and a courtesy that would not permit frendliness to fall into premature familiarity. he was at ease with his fellows because he respected them, and courteous because he loved them. the ladies withdrew, and with their departure came the time that tests the man whether he be in truth a gentleman. in the presence of women the polish that is not revelation but concealment preserves itself only to vanish with them. how would not some women stand aghast to hear but a specimen of the talk of their heroes at such a time! it had been remarked throughout the dinner that the highlanders took no wine; but it was supposed they were reserving their powers. when they now passed decanter and bottle and jug without filling their glasses, it gave offence to the very soul of mr. peregrine palmer. the bettered custom of the present day had not then made progress enough to affect his table; he was not only fond of a glass of good wine, but had the ambition of the cellar largely developed; he would fain be held a connaisseur in wines, and kept up a good stock of distinguished vintages, from which he had brought of such to glenruadh as would best bear the carriage. having no aspiration, there was room in him for any number of petty ambitions; and it vexed him not to reap the harvest of recognition. "but of course," he said to himself, "no highlander understands anything but whisky!" "you don't mean you're a teetotaler, macruadh!" he said. "no," answered the chief; "i do not call myself one; but i never drink anything strong." "not on christmas-day? of course you make an exception at times; and if at any time, why not on the merriest day of the year? you are under no pledge!" "if that were a reason," returned alister, laughing, "it would rather be one for becoming pledged immediately." "well, you surprise me! and highlanders too! i thought better of all highlanders; they have the reputation of good men at the bottle! you make me sorry to have brought my wine where it meets with no consideration.--mr. ian, you are a man of the world: you will not refuse to pledge me?" "i must, mr. palmer! the fact is, my brother and i have seen so much evil come of the drinking habits of the country, which always get worse in a time of depression, that we dare not give in to them. my father, who was clergyman of the parish before he became head of the clan, was of the same mind before us, and brought us up not to drink. throughout a whole siberian winter i kept the rule." "and got frost-bitten for your pains?" "and found myself nothing the worse." "it's mighty good of you, no doubt!" said the host, with a curl of his shaven lip. "you can hardly call that good which does not involve any self-denial!" remarked alister. "well," said mr. peregrine palmer, "what is the world coming to? all the pith is leaking out of our young men. in another generation we shall have neither soldiers nor sailors nor statesmen!" "on what do you found such a sad conclusion?" inquired ian. "on the growth of asceticism in the young men. believe me, it is necessary to manhood that men when they are young should drink a little, gamble a little, and sow a few wild oats--as necessary as that a nation should found itself by the law of the strongest. how else can we look for the moderation to follow with responsibilities? the vices that are more than excusable in the young, are very properly denied to the married man; the law for him is not the same as for the young man. i do not plead for license, you see; but it will never do for young men to turn ascetics! let the clergy do as they please; they are hardly to be counted men; at least their calling is not a manly one! depend upon it, young men who do not follow the dictates of nature--while they are young, i mean--will never make any mark in the world! they dry up like a nut, brain and all, and have neither spirit, nor wit, nor force of any kind. nature knows best! when i was a young man,--" "pray spare us confession, mr. palmer," said ian. "in our case your doctrine does not enter willing ears, and i should be sorry anything we might feel compelled to say, should have the appearance of personality." "do you suppose i should heed anything you said?" cried the host, betraying the bad blood in his breeding. "is it manners here to prevent a man from speaking his mind at his own table? i say a saint is not a man! a fellow that will neither look at a woman nor drink his glass, is not cut out for man's work in the world!" like a sledge-hammer came the fist of the laird on the table, that the crystal danced and rang. "my god!" he exclaimed, and rose in hugest indignation. ian laid his hand on his arm, and he sat down again. "there may be some misunderstanding, alister," said ian, "between us and our host!--pray, mr. palmer, let us understand each other: do you believe god made woman to be the slave of man? can you believe he ever made a woman that she might be dishonoured?--that a man might caress and despise her?" "i know nothing about god's intentions; all i say is, we must obey the laws of our nature." "is conscience then not a law of our nature? or is it below the level of our instincts? must not the lower laws be subject to the higher? it is a law--for ever broken, yet eternal--that a man is his brother's keeper: still more must he be his sister's keeper. therein is involved all civilization, all national as well as individual growth." mr. peregrine palmer smiled a contemptuous smile. the other young men exchanged glances that seemed to say, "the governor knows what's what!" "such may be the popular feeling in this out-of-the-way spot," said mr. peregrine palmer, "and no doubt it is very praiseworthy, but the world is not of your opinion, gentlemen." "the world has got to come to our opinion," said the laird--at which the young men of the house broke into a laugh. "may we join the ladies?" said ian, rising. "by all means," answered the host, with a laugh meant to be good-humoured; "they are the fittest company for you." as the brothers went up the stair, they heard their host again holding forth; but they would not have been much edified by the slight change of front he had made--to impress on the young men the necessity of moderation in their pleasures. there are two opposite classes related by a like unbelief--those who will not believe in the existence of the good of which they have apprehended no approximate instance, and those who will not believe in the existence of similar evil. i tell the one class, there are men who would cast their very being from them rather than be such as they; and the other, that their shutting of their eyes is no potent reason for the shutting of my mouth. there are multitudes delicate as they, who are compelled to meet evil face to face, and fight with it the sternest of battles: on their side may i be found! what the lord knew and recognized, i will know and recognize too, be shocked who may. i spare them, however, any more of the talk at that dinner-table. only let them take heed lest their refinement involve a very bad selfishness. cursed be the evil thing, not ignored! mrs. palmer, sweet-smiled and clear-eyed, never showed the least indignation at her husband's doctrines. i fear she was devoid of indignation on behalf of others. very far are such from understanding the ways of the all-pardoning, all-punishing father! the three from the cottage were half-way home ere the gentlemen of the new house rose from their wine. then first the mother sought an explanation of the early departure they had suggested. "something went wrong, sons: what was it she said?" "i don't like the men, mother; nor does ian," answered alister gloomily. "take care you are not unjust!" she replied. "you would not have liked mr. palmer's doctrine any better than we did, mother." "what was it?" "we would rather not tell you." "it was not fit for a woman to hear." "then do not tell me. i trust you to defend women." "in god's name we will!" said alister. "there is no occasion for an oath, alister!" said his mother. "alister meant it very solemnly!" said ian. "yes; but it was not necessary--least of all to me. the name of our lord god should lie a precious jewel in the cabinet of our hearts, to be taken out only at great times, and with loving awe." "i shall be careful, mother," answered alister; "but when things make me sorry, or glad, or angry, i always think of god first!" "i understand you; but i fear taking the name of god in vain." "it shall not be in vain, mother!" said the laird. "must it be a breach with our new neighbours?" asked the mother. "it will depend on them. the thing began because we would not drink with them." "you did not make any remark?" "not until our host's remarks called for our reasons. by the way, i should like to know how the man made his money." chapter iv. the brothers. events, then, because of the deeper things whence they came, seemed sorely against any cordial approach of the old and the new houses of glenruadh. but there was a sacred enemy within the stronghold of mr. peregrine palmer, and that enemy forbade him to break with the young highlanders notwithstanding the downright mode in which they had expressed their difference with him: he felt, without knowing it, ashamed of the things he had uttered; they were not such as he would wish proclaimed from the house-tops out of the midst of which rose heavenward the spire of the church he had built; neither did the fact that he would have no man be wicked on sundays, make him feel quite right in urging young men to their swing on other days. christian and sercombe could not but admire the straightforwardness of the brothers; their conventionality could not prevent them from feeling the dignity with which they acted on their convictions. the quixotic young fellows ought not to be cut for their behaviour! they could not court their society, but would treat them with consideration! things could not well happen to bring them into much proximity! what had taken place could not definitely influence the ideas, feelings, or opinions of the young ladies. their father would sooner have had his hand cut off than any word said over that fuliginous dessert reach the ears of his daughters. is it not an absolute damnation of certain evil principles, that many men would be flayed alive rather than let those they love know that they hold them? but see the selfishness of such men: each looks with scorn on the woman he has done his part to degrade, but not an impure breath must reach the ears of his children! another man's he will send to the devil! mr. palmer did, however, communicate something of the conversation to his wife; and although she had neither the spirit, nor the insight, nor the active purity, to tell him he was in the wrong, she did not like the young highlanders the worse. she even thought it a pity the world should have been so made that they could not be in the right. it is wonderful how a bird of the air will carry a matter, and some vaguest impression of what had occurred alighted on the minds of the elder girls--possibly from hints supposed unintelligible, passing between mr. sercombe and christian: something in the social opinions of the two highlanders made those opinions differ much from the opinions prevailing in society! now even mercy had not escaped some notion of things of which the air about her was full; and she felt the glow of a conscious attraction towards men--somehow, she did not know how--like old-fashioned knights errant in their relations to women. the attachment between the brothers was unusual both in kind and degree. alister regarded ian as his better self, through whom to rise above himself; ian looked up to his brother as the head of the family, uniting in himself all ancestral claims, the representative of an ordered and harmonious commonwealth. he saw in alister virtues and powers he did not recognize in himself. his love blossomed into the deeper devotion that he only had been sent to college: he was bound to share with his elder brother what he had learned. so alister got more through ian than he would have got at the best college in the world. for ian was a born teacher, and found intensest delight, not in imparting knowledge--that is a comparatively poor thing--but in leading a mind up to see what it was before incapable of seeing. it was part of the same gift that he always knew when he had not succeeded. in alister he found a wonderful docility--crossed indeed with a great pride, against which he fought sturdily. it is not a good sign of any age that it should find it hard to believe in such simplicity and purity as that of these young men; it is perhaps even a worse sign of our own that we should find it difficult to believe in such love between men. i am sure of this, that a man incapable of loving another man with hearty devotion, can not be capable of loving a woman as a woman ought to be loved. from each other these two kept positively nothing secret. alister had a great love of music, which however had had little development except from the study of the violin, with the assistance of a certain poor enough performer in the village, and what criticism his brother could afford him, who, not himself a player, had heard much good music. but alister was sorely hampered by the fact that his mother could not bear the sound of it. the late chief was one of the few clergymen who played the violin; and at the first wail of the old instrument in the hands of his son, his widow was seized with such a passion of weeping, that alister took the utmost care she should never hear it again, always carrying it to some place too remote for the farthest-travelling tones to reach her. but this was not easy, for sound will travel very far among the hills. at times he would take it to the room behind annie's shop, at times to the hut occupied by hector of the stags: there he would not excruciate his host at least, and rob of the angels would endure anything for his chief. the place which he most preferred was too distant to be often visited; but there, soon after christmas, the brothers now resolved to have a day together, a long talk, and a conference with the violin. on a clear frosty morning in january they set out, provided for a night and two days. the place was upon an upland pasture-ground, yet in their possession: no farm was complete without a range in some high valley for the sheep and cattle in summer. on the north of this valley stood a bare hilltop, whose crest was a limestone rock, rising from the heather about twenty feet. every summer they had spent weeks of their boyhood with the shepherds, in the society of this hill, and one day discovered in its crest a shallow cave, to which thereafter they often took their food, and the book they were reading together. there they read the english ossian, troubled by no ignorant unbelief; and there they made gaelic songs, in which alister excelled, while ian did better in english. when ian was at home in the university-vacations, they were fonder than ever of going to the hill. there ian would pour out to alister of the fullness of his gathered knowledge, and there and then they made their first acquaintance with shakspere. ian had bought some dozen of his plays, in smallest compass and cleanest type, at a penny a piece, and how they revelled in them the long summer evenings! ian had bought also, in a small thick volume, the poems of shelley: these gave them not only large delight, but much to talk about, for they were quite capable of encountering his vague philosophy. then they had their euclid and virgil--and even tried their mental teeth upon dante, but found the commedia without notes too hard a nut for them. every fresh spring, ian brought with him fresh books, and these they read in their cave. but i must not forget the cave itself, which also shared in the progress of its troglodytes. the same week in which they first ate and read in it, they conceived and began to embody the idea of developing the hollow into a house. foraging long ago in their father's library for mental pabulum, they had come upon belzoni's quarto, and had read, with the avidity of imaginative boys, the tale of his discoveries, taking especial delight in his explorations of the tombs of the kings in the rocks of beban el malook: these it was that now suggested excavation. they found serviceable tools about the place at home, and the rock was not quite of the hardest. not a summer, for the last seventeen years, had passed without a good deal being done, alister working alone when ian was away, and the cave had now assumed notable dimensions. it was called by the people uamh an ceann, the cave of the chief, and regarded as his country house. all around it was covered with snow throughout the winter and spring, and supplied little to the need of man beyond the blessed air, and a glorious vision of sea and land, mountain and valley, falling water, gleaming lake, and shadowy cliff. crossing the wide space where so lately they had burned the heather that the sheep might have its young shoots in the spring, the brothers stood, and gazed around with delight. "there is nothing like this anywhere!" said ian. "do you mean nothing so beautiful?" asked alister. "no; i mean just what i say: there is nothing like it. i do not care a straw whether one scene be more or less beautiful than another; what i do care for is--its individual speech to my soul. i feel towards visions of nature as towards writers. if a book or a prospect produces in my mind a mood that no other produces, then i feel it individual, original, real, therefore precious. if a scene or a song play upon the organ of my heart as no other scene or song could, why should i ask at all whether it be beautiful? a bare hill may be more to me than a garden of damascus, but i love them both. the first question as to any work of art is whether it puts the willing soul into any mood at all peculiar; the second, what that mood is. it matters to me little by whom our ossian was composed, and it matters nothing whoever may in his ignorance declare that there never was an ossian any more than a homer: here is a something that has power over my heart and soul, works upon them as not anything else does. i do not ask whether its power be great or small; it is enough that it is a peculiar power, one by itself; that it puts my spiritual consciousness in a certain individual condition, such in character as nothing else can occasion. either a man or a nation must have felt to make me so feel." they were now climbing the last slope of the hill on whose top stood their playhouse, dearer now than in their boyhood. alister occasionally went there for a few hours' solitude, and ian would write there for days at a time, but in general when they visited the place it was together. alister unlocked the door and they entered. unwilling to spend labour on the introductory, they had made the first chamber hardly larger than the room required for opening the door. immediately within, another door opened into a room of about eight feet by twelve, with two small windows. its hearth was a projection from the floor of the live stone; and there, all ready for lighting, was a large pile of peats. the chimney went up through the rock, and had been the most difficult part of their undertaking. they had to work it much wider than was necessary for the smoke, and then to reduce its capacity with stone and lime. now and then it smoked, but peat-smoke is sweet. the first thing after lighting the fire, was to fill their kettle, for which they had to take off the snow-lid of a small spring near at hand. then they made a good meal of tea, mutton-ham, oatcakes and butter. the only seats in the room were a bench in each of two of the walls, and a chair on each side of the hearth, all of the live rock. from this opened two rooms more--one a bedroom, with a bed in the rock-wall, big enough for two. dry heather stood thick between the mattress and the stone. the third room, of which they intended making a parlour, was not yet more than half excavated; and there, when they had rested a while, they began to bore and chip at the stone. their progress was slow, for the grain was close: never, even when the snow above was melting, had the least moisture come through. for a time they worked and talked: both talked better when using their hands. then alister stopped, and played while ian went on; ian stopped next, and read aloud from a manuscript he had brought, while his brother again worked. but first he gave alister the history of what he was going to read. it was suggested, he said, by that strange poem of william mayne's, called "the dead man's moan," founded on the silly notion that the man himself is buried, and not merely his body. "i wish i were up to straught my banes, and drive frae my face the cauld, dead air; i wish i were up, that the friendly rains micht wash the dark mould frae my tangled hair!" quoted ian, and added, "i thought i should like to follow out the idea, and see what ought to come of it. i therefore supposed a person seized by something of the cataleptic kind, from which he comes to himself still in the body, but unable to hold communication with the outer world. he thinks therefore that he is dead and buried. recovering from his first horror, he reflects that, as he did not make himself think and feel, nor can cease to think and feel if he would, there must be somewhere--and where but within himself?--the power by which he thinks and feels, a power whose care it must be, for it can belong to no other, to look after the creature he has made. then comes to him the prayer of job, 'oh that thou wouldst hide me in the grave till thy anger with me was past! then wouldst thou desire to see again the work of thy hands, the creature thou hadst made! then wouldst thou call, and i would answer.' so grandly is the man comforted thereby, that he breaks out in a dumb song of triumph over death and the grave. as its last tone dies in him, a kiss falls upon his lips. it is the farewell of the earth; the same moment he bursts the bonds and rises above the clouds of the body, and enters into the joy of his lord." having thus prepared alister to hear without having to think as well as attend, which is not good for poetry, ian read his verses. i will not trouble my reader with them; i am sure he would not think so well of them as did alister. what ian desired was sympathy, not admiration, but from alister he had both. few men would care to hear the talk of those two, for they had no interest in anything that did not belong to the reality of things. to them the things most men count real, were the merest phantasms. they sought what would not merely last, but must go on growing. at strife with all their known selfishness, they were growing into strife with all the selfishness in them as yet unknown. there was for them no question of choice; they must choose what was true; they must choose life; they must not walk in the way of death. they were very near to agreeing about everything they should ask. few men are capable of understanding such love as theirs, of understanding the love of david and jonathan, of shakspere to w. h., of tennyson and hallam. every such love, nevertheless, is a possession of the race; what has once been is, in possibility to come, as well as in fact that has come. a solitary instance of anything great is enough to prove it human, yea necessary to humanity. i have wondered whether the man in whom such love is possible, may not spring of an altogether happy conjunction of male and female--a father and mother who not only loved each other, but were of the same mind in high things, of the same lofty aims in life, so that their progeny came of their true man-and-woman-hood. if any unaccountable disruption or discord of soul appear in a man, it is worth while to ask whether his father and mother were of one aspiration. might not the fact that their marriage did not go deep enough, that father and mother were not of one mind, only of one body, serve to account for the rude results of some marriages of personable people? at the same time we must not forget the endless and unfathomable perpetuations of ancestry. but however these things may be, those two men, brothers born, were also brothers willed. they ceased quarrying, and returned to the outer room. ian betook himself to drawing figures on one of the walls, with the intention of carving them in dipped relief. alister proceeded to take their bedding from before the fire, and prepare for the night. chapter v. the princess. while they were thus busied, ian, with his face to the wall, in the dim light of the candle by which he was making his first rough sketches, began the story of his flight from russia. long ere he ended, alister came close behind him, and there stood, his bosom heaving with emotion, his eyes burning with a dry fire. ian was perfectly composed, his voice quiet and low. i will not give his tale in the first person; and will tell of it only as much as i think it necessary my reader should know. having accepted a commission of the czar, he was placed in a post of trust in the palace. in one apartment of it, lived an imperial princess, the burden of whose rank had not even the alleviation of society. her disclosure of a sympathy with oppressed humanity had wakened a doubt as to her politics, and she was virtually a prisoner, restricted to a corner of the huge dwelling, and allowed to see hardly any but her women. her father had fallen into disgrace before her, and her mother was dead of grief. all around her were spies, and love was nowhere. gladly would she have yielded every rag of her rank, to breathe the air of freedom. to be a peasant girl on her father's land, would be a life of rapture! she knew little of the solace books might have given her. with a mind capable of rapid development, she had been ill taught except in music; and that, alone, cannot do much for spiritual development; it cannot enable the longing, the aspiration it rouses, to understand itself; it cannot lead back to its own eternal source. she knew no one in whom to trust, or from whom to draw comfort; her confessor was a man of the world, incapable of leading her to any fountain of living water; she had no one to tell her of god and his fatherhood, the only and perfect refuge from the divine miseries of loneliness. a great corridor went from end to end of one of the wings of the palace, and from this corridor another passage led toward the apartment of the princess, consisting of some five or six rooms. at certain times of the day, ian had to be at the beginning of the corridor, at the head of a huge stair with a spacious hall-like landing. along the corridor few passed, for the attendants used a back stair and passages. as he sat in the recess of a large window, where stood a table and chair for his use, ian one morning heard a cry--whence, he never knew--and darted along the corridor, thinking assistance might be wanted. when about halfway down, he saw a lady enter, near the end of it, and come slowly along. he stood aside, respectfully waiting till she should pass. her eyes were on the ground, but as she came near she raised them. the sadness of them went to his heart, and his soul rushed into his. the princess, i imagine, had never before met such an expression, and misunderstood it. lonely, rejected, too helpless even to hope, it seemed full of something she had all her life been longing for--a soul to be her refuge from the wind, her covert from the tempest, her shadow as of a great rock in the weary land where no one cared for her. she stood and gazed at him. ian at once perceived who she must be, and stood waiting for some expression of her pleasure. but she appeared fascinated; her eyes remained on his, for they seemed to her to be promising help. her fascination fascinated him, and for some moments they stood thus, regarding each other. ian felt he must break the spell. it was her part to speak, his to obey, but he knew the danger of the smallest suspicion. if she was a princess and he but a soldier on guard, she was a woman and he was a man: he was there to protect her! "how may i serve your imperial highness?" he asked. she was silent yet a moment, then said, "your name?" he gave it. "your nation?" he stated it. "when are you here?" he told her his hours. "i will see you again," she said, and turned and went back. from that moment she loved him, and thought he loved her. but, though he would willingly have died for her, he did not love her as she thought. alister wondered to hear him say so. at such a moment, and heart-free, alister could no more have helped falling in love with her than he could help opening his eyes when the light shone on their lids. ian, with a greater love for his kind than even alister, and with a tenderness for womankind altogether infinite, was not ready to fall in love. accessible indeed he was to the finest of nature's witcheries; ready for the response as of summer lightnings from opposing horizons; all aware of loveliest difference, of refuge and mysterious complement; but he was not prone to fall in love. the princess, knowing the ways of the house, contrived to see him pretty often. he talked to her of the hest he knew; he did what he could to lighten her loneliness by finding her books and music; best of all, he persuaded her--without difficulty--to read the new testament. in their few minutes of conference, he tried to show her the master of men as he showed himself to his friends; but their time together was always so short, and their anxiety for each other so great, seeing that discovery would be ruin to both, that they could not go far with anything. at length came an occasion when at parting they embraced. how it was ian could not tell. he blamed himself much, but alister thought it might not have been his fault. the same moment he was aware that he did not love her and that he could not turn back. he was ready to do anything, everything in honour; yet felt false inasmuch as he had given her ground for believing that he felt towards her as he could not help seeing she felt towards him. had it been in his power to order his own heart, he would have willed to love, and so would have loved her. but the princess doubted nothing, and the change that passed upon her was wonderful. the power of human love is next to the power of god's love. like a flower long repressed by cold, she blossomed so suddenly in the sunshine of her bliss, that ian greatly dreaded the suspicion which the too evident alteration might arouse: the plain, ordinary-looking young woman with fine eyes, began to put on the robes of beauty. a softest vapour of rose, the colour of the east when sundown sets it dreaming of sunrise, tinged her cheek; it grew round like that of a girl; and ere two months were gone, she looked years younger than her age. but ian could never be absolutely open with her; while she, poor princess, happy in her ignorance of the shows of love, and absorbed in the joy of its great deliverance, jealoused nothing of restraint, nothing of lack, either in his words or in the caresses of which he was religiously sparing. he was haunted by the dread of making her grieve who had already grieved so much, and was but just risen from the dead. one evening they met as usual in the twilight; in five minutes the steps of the man would be heard coming to light the lamps of the corridor, his guard would be over, and he must retire. few words passed, but they parted with more of lingering tenderness than usual, and the princess put a little packet in his hand. the same night his only friend in the service entered his room hurriedly, and urged immediate flight: something had been, or was imagined to be discovered, through which his liberty, perhaps his life, was compromised; he must leave at once by a certain coach which would start in an hour: there was but just time to disguise him; he must make for a certain port on the baltic, and there lie concealed until a chance of getting away turned up! ian refused. he feared nothing, had done nothing to be ashamed of! what was it to him if they did take his life! he could die as well as another! anxious about the princess, he persisted in his refusal, and the coach went without him. every passenger in that coach was murdered. he saw afterward the signs of their fate in the snow. in the middle of the night, a company of men in masks entered his room, muffled his head, and hurried him into a carriage, which drove rapidly away. when it stopped, he thought he had arrived at some prison, but soon found himself in another carriage, with two of the police. he could have escaped had he been so minded, but he could do nothing for the princess, and did not care what became of him. at a certain town his attendants left him, with the assurance that if he did not make haste out of the country, he would find they had not lost sight of him. but instead of obeying, he disguised himself, and took his way to moscow, where he had friends. thence he wrote to his friend at st. petersburg. not many letters passed ere he learned that the princess was dead. she had been placed in closer confinement, her health gave way, and by a rapid decline she had gained her freedom. all the night through, not closing their eyes till the morning, the brothers, with many intervals of thoughtful silence, lay talking. "i am glad to think," said alister, after one of these silences, "you do not suffer so much, ian, as if you had been downright in love with her." "i suffer far more," answered ian with a sigh; "and i ought to suffer more. it breaks my heart to think she had not so much from me as she thought she had." they were once more silent. alister was full of trouble for his brother. ian at length spoke again. "alister," he said, "i must tell you everything! i know the truth now. if i wronged her, she is having her revenge!" by his tone alister seemed through the darkness to see his sad smile. he was silent, and alister waited. "she did not know much," ian resumed. "i thought at first she had nothing but good manners and a good heart; but the moment the sun of another heart began to shine on her, the air of another's thought to breathe upon her, the room of another soul to surround her, she began to grow; and what more could god intend or man desire? as i told you, she grew beautiful, and what sign of life is equal to that!" "but i want to know what you mean by her having her revenge on you?" said alister. "whether i loved her then or not, and i believe i did, beyond a doubt i love her now. it needed only to be out of sight of her, and see other women beside the memory of her, to know that i loved her.--alister, i love her!" repeated ian with a strange exaltation. "oh, ian!" groaned alister; "how terrible for you!" "alister, you dear fellow!" returned ian, "can you understand no better than that? do you not see i am happy now? my trouble was that i did not love her--not that she loved me, but that i did not love her! now we shall love each other for ever!" "how do you know that, ian?" "by knowing that i love her. if i had not come to know that, i could not have said to myself i would love her for ever." "but you can't marry her, ian! the lord said there would be no marrying there!" "did he say there would be no loving there, alister? most people seem to fancy he did, for how else could they forget the dead as they do, and look so little for their resurrection? few can be said really to believe in any hereafter worth believing in. how many go against the liking of the dead the moment they are gone-behave as if they were nowhere, and could never call them to account! their plans do not recognize their existence; the life beyond is no factor in their life here. if god has given me a hope altogether beyond anything i could have generated for myself, beyond all the likelihoods and fulfilments around me, what can i do but give him room to verify it--what but look onward! some people's bodies get so tired that they long for the rest of the grave; it is my soul that gets tired, and i know the grave can give that no rest; i look for the rest of more life, more strength, more love. but god is not shut up in heaven, neither is there one law of life there and another here; i desire more life here, and shall have it, for what is needful for this world is to be had in this world. in proportion as i become one with god, i shall have it. this world never did seem my home; i have never felt quite comfortable in it; i have yet to find, and shall find the perfect home i have not felt this world, even my mother's bosom to be. nature herself is not lovely enough to satisfy me. nor can it be that i am beside myself, seeing i care only for the will of god, not for my own. for what is madness but two or more wills in one body? does not the 'bible itself tell us that we are pilgrims and strangers in the world, that here we have no abiding city? it is but a place to which we come to be made ready for another. yet i am sure those who regard it as their home, are not half so well pleased with it as i. they are always grumbling at it. 'what wretched weather!' they say. 'what a cursed misfortune!' they cry. 'what abominable luck!' they protest. health is the first thing, they say, and cannot find it. they complain that their plans are thwarted, and when they succeed, that they do not yield the satisfaction they expected. yet they mock at him who says he seeks a better country!--but i am keeping you awake, alister! i will talk no more. you must go to sleep!" "it is better than any sleep to hear you talk, ian," returned alister. "what a way you are ahead of me! i do love this world! when i come to die, it will tear my heart to think that this cave which you and i have dug out together, must pass into other hands! i love every foot of the earth that remains to us--every foot that has been taken from us. when i stand on the top of this rock, and breathe the air of this mountain, i bless god we have still a spot to call our own. it is quite a different thing from the love of mere land; i could not feel the same toward any, however beautiful, that i had but bought. this, our own old land, i feel as if i loved in something the same way as i love my mother. often in the hot summer-days, lying on my face in the grass, i have kissed the earth as if it were a live creature that could return my caresses! the long grass is a passion to me, and next to the grass i love the heather, not the growing corn. i am a fair farmer, i think, but i would rather see the land grow what it pleased, than pass into the hands of another. place is to me sacred almost as body. there is at least something akin between the love we bear to the bodies of our friends, and that we bear to the place in which we were born and brought up." "that is all very true, alister. i understand your feeling perfectly; i have it myself. but we must be weaned, i say only weaned, from that kind of thing; we must not love the outside as if it were the inside! everything comes that' we may know the sender-of whom it is a symbol, that is, a far-off likeness of something in him; and to him it must lead us-the self-existent, true, original love, the making love. but i have felt all you say. i used to lie in bed and imagine the earth alive and carrying me on her back, till i fell asleep longing to see the face of my nurse. once, the fancy turned into a dream. i will try to recall a sonnet i made the same night, before the dream came: it will help you to understand it. i was then about nineteen, i believe. i did not care for it enough to repeat it to you, and i fear we shall find it very bad." stopping often to recall and rearrange words and lines, ian completed at last the following sonnet:-- "she set me on my feet with steady hand, among the crowding marvels on her face, bidding me rise, and run a strong man's race; swathed mo in circumstance's swaddling band; fed me with her own self; then bade me stand myself entire,--while she was but a place hewn for my dwelling from the midst of space, a something better than her sea or land. nay, earth! thou bearest me upon thy back, like a rough nurse, and i can almost feel a touch of kindness in thy bands of steel, although i cannot see thy face, and track an onward purpose shining through its black, instinct with prophecy of future weal. "there! it is not much, is it?" "it is beautiful!" protested alister. "it is worth nothing," said ian, "except between you and me-and that it will make you understand my dream. that i shall never forget. when a dream does us good we don't forget it. "i thought i was home on the back of something great and strong-i could not tell what; it might be an elephant or a great eagle or a lion. it went sweeping swiftly along, the wind of its flight roaring past me in a tempest. i began to grow frightened. where could this creature of such awful speed be carrying me? i prayed to god to take care of me. the head of the creature turned to me, and i saw the face of a woman, grand and beautiful. never with my open eyes have i seen such a face! and i knew it was the face of this earth, and that i had never seen it before because she carries us upon her back. when i woke, i knew that all the strangest things in life and history must one day come together in a beautiful face of loving purpose, one of the faces of the living god. the very mother of the lord did not for a long time understand him, and only through sorrow came to see true glory. alister, if we were right with god, we could see the earth vanish and never heave a sigh; god, of whom it was but a shimmering revelation, would still be ours!" in the morning they fell asleep, and it was daylight, late in the winter, when alister rose. he roused the fire, asleep all through the night, and prepared their breakfast of porridge and butter, tea, oat-cake, and mutton-ham. when it was nearly ready, he woke ian, and when they had eaten, they read together a portion of the bible, that they might not forget, and start the life of the day without trust in the life-causing god. "all that is not rooted in him," ian would say, "all hope or joy that does not turn its face upward, is an idolatry. our prayers must rise that our thoughts may follow them." the portion they read contained the saying of the lord that we must forsake all and follow him if we would be his disciples. "i am sometimes almost terrified," said ian, "at the scope of the demands made upon me, at the perfection of the self-abandonment required of me; yet outside of such absoluteness can be no salvation. in god we live every commonplace as well as most exalted moment of our being. to trust in him when no need is pressing, when things seem going right of themselves, may be harder than when things seem going wrong. at no time is there any danger except in ourselves, and the only danger is of trusting in something else than the living god, and so getting, as it were, outside of god. oh alister, take care you do not love the land more than the will of god! take care you do not love even your people more than the will of god." they spent the day on the hill-top, and as there was no sign of storm, remained till the dark night, when the moon came to light them home. "perhaps when we are dead," said alister as they went, "we may be allowed to come here again sometimes! only we shall not be able to quarry any further, and there is pain in looking on what cannot go on." "it may be a special pleasure," returned ian, "in those new conditions, to look into such a changeless cabinet of the past. when we are one with our life, so that no prayer can be denied, there will be no end to the lovely possibilities." "so i have the people i love, i think i could part with all things else, even the land!" said alister. "be sure we shall not have to part with them. we shall yet walk, i think, with our father as of old, where the setting sun sent the shadows of the big horse-gowans that glowed in his red level rays, trooping eastward, as if they would go round the world to meet the sun that had banished them, and die in his glory; the wind of the twilight will again breathe about us like a thought of the living god haunting our goings, and watching to help us; the stars will yet call to us out of the great night, 'love and be fearless.' 'be independent!' cries the world from its' great bible of the belly;-says the lord of men, 'seek ye first the kingdom of god and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.' our dependence is our eternity. we cannot live on bread alone; we need every word of god. we cannot live on air alone; we need an atmosphere of living souls. should we be freer, alister, if we were independent of each other? when i am out in the world, my heart is always with mother and you. we must be constantly giving ourselves away, we must dwell in houses of infinite dependence, or sit alone in the waste of a godless universe." it was a rough walk in the moonlight over the hills, but full of a rare delight. and while they walked the mother was waiting them, with the joy of st. john, of the saviour, of god himself in her heart, the joy of beholding how the men she loved loved each other. chapter vi. the two pairs. the next morning, on the way to the village, the brothers overtook christina and mercy, and they walked along together. the young men felt inclined to be the more friendly with the girls, that the men of their own family were so unworthy of them. a man who does not respect a woman because she is a woman, cannot have thorough respect for his own mother, protest as he pleases: he is incapable of it, and cannot know his own incapacity. alas for girls in a family where the atmosphere of vile thinking, winnowed by the carrion wings of degraded and degrading judgments, infolds them! one of the marvels of the world is, that, with such fathers and brothers, there are so few wicked women. type of the greater number stands ophelia, poor, weak, and not very refined, yet honest, and, in all her poverty, immeasurably superior to father and brother. christina's condescension had by this time dwindled almost to the vanishing-point, and her talk was in consequence more natural: the company, conversation, and whole atmosphere of the young men, tended to wake in the girls what was best and sweetest. reality appeals at once to the real, opens the way for a soul to emerge from the fog of the commonplace, the marsh of platitude, the sahara of lies, into the colour and air of life. the better things of humanity often need the sun of friendship to wile them out. a girl, well-bred, tolerably clever, and with some genius of accommodation, will appear to a man possessed of a hundred faculties of which she knows nothing; but his belief will help to rouse them in her. a young man will see an angel where those who love her best see only a nice girl; but he sees not merely what she might be, but what one day she must be. christina had been at first rather taken with the ploughman, but she turned her masked batteries now mainly on the soldier. during the dinner she had noted how entirely ian was what she chose to call a man of the world; and it rendered him in her eyes more worthy of conquest. besides, as elder sister, must she not protect the inexperienced mercy? what is this passion for subjugation? this hunger for homage? is it of hell direct, or what is there in it of good to begin with? apparently it takes possession of such women as have set up each herself for the object of her worship: she cannot then rest from the effort to bring as many as possible to worship at the same shrine; and to this end will use means as deserving of the fire as any witchcraft. christina stopped short with a little cry, and caught ian's arm. "i beg your pardon," she said, "but i cannot bear it a moment longer! something in my boot hurts me so!" she limped to the road-side, sat down, accepted the service of ian to unlace her boot, and gave a sigh of relief when he pulled it off. he inverted and shook it, then searched and found a nail which must have hurt her severely. but how to get rid of the cruel projection! ian's slender hand could but just reach with its finger-tips the haunted spot. in vain he tried to knock it down against a stone put inside. alister could suggest nothing. but mistress conal's cottage was near: they might there find something to help! only christina could not be left behind, and how was she to walk in a silk stocking over a road frozen hard as glass? the chief would have carried her, but she would not let him. ian therefore shod her with his glengarry bonnet, tying it on with his handkerchief. there was much merriment over the extemporized shoe, mingled with apologetic gratitude from christina, who, laughing at her poulticed foot, was yet not displeased at its contrast with the other. when the chief opened the door of the cottage, there was no one to be seen within. the fire was burning hot and flameless; a three-footed pot stood half in it; other sign of presence they saw none. as alister stooped searching for some implement to serve their need, in shot a black cat, jumped over his back, and disappeared. the same instant they heard a groan, and then first discovered the old woman in bed, seemingly very ill. ian went up to her. "what is the matter with you, mistress conal?" he asked, addressing her in english because of the ladies. but in reply she poured out a torrent of gaelic, which seemed to the girls only grumbling, but was something stronger. thereupon the chief went and spoke to her, but she was short and sullen with him. he left her to resume his search. "let alone," she cried. "when that nail leaves her brog, it will be for your heart." ian sought to soothe her. "she will bring misery on you all!" she insisted. "you have a hammer somewhere, i know!" said alister, as if he had not heard her. "she shall be finding no help in my house!" answered the old woman in english. "very well, mistress conal!" returned the chief; "the lady cannot walk home; i shall have to carry her!" "god forbid!" she cried. "go and fetch a wheelbarrow." "mistress conal, there is nothing for it but carry her home in my arms!" "give me the cursed brog then. i will draw the nail." but the chief would not yield the boot; he went out and searched the hill-side until he found a smooth stone of suitable size, with which and a pair of tongs, he beat down the nail. christina put on the boot, and they left the place. the chief stayed behind the rest for a moment, but the old woman would not even acknowledge his presence. "what a rude old thing she is! this is how she always treats us!" said christina. "have you done anything to offend her?" asked alister. "not that we know of. we can't help being lowlanders!" "she no doubt bears you a grudge," said ian, "for having what once belonged to us. i am sorry she is so unfriendly. it is not a common fault with our people." "poor old thing! what does it matter!" said christina. a woman's hate was to her no more than the barking of a dog. they had not gone far, before the nail again asserted itself; it had been but partially subjugated. a consultation was held. it resulted in this, that mercy and the chief went to fetch another pair of boots, while ian remained with christina. they seated themselves on a stone by the roadside. the sun clouded over, a keen wind blew, and christina shivered. there was nothing for it but go back to the cottage. the key was in the door, ian turned it, and they went in. certainly this time no one was there. the old woman so lately groaning on her bed had vanished. ian made up the fire, and did what he could for his companion's comfort. she was not pleased with the tone of his attentions, but the way she accepted them made her appear more pleased than ian cared for, and he became colder and more polite. piqued by his indifference, she took it nevertheless with a sweetness which belonged to her nature as god made it, not as she had spoiled it; and even such a butterfly as she, felt the influence of a man like ian, and could not help being more natural in his presence. his truth elicited what there was of hers; the true being drew to the surface what there was of true in the being that was not true. the longer she was in his company, the more she was pleased with him, and the more annoyed with her failure in pleasing him. it is generally more or less awkward when a young man and maiden between whom is no convergent rush of spiritual currents, find themselves alone together. ian was one of the last to feel such awkwardness, but he thought his companion felt it; he did his best, therefore, to make her forget herself and him, telling her story after story which she could not but find the more interesting that for the time she was quieted from self, and placed in the humbler and healthier position of receiving the influence of another. for one moment, as he was narrating a hair's-breadth escape he had had from a company of tartar soldiers by the friendliness of a young girl, the daughter of a siberian convict, she found herself under the charm of a certain potency of which he was himself altogether unconscious, but which had carried away hearts more indifferent than hers. in the meantime, alister and mercy were walking toward the new house, and, walking, were more comfortable than those that sat waiting. mercy indeed had not much to say, but she was capable of asking a question worth answering, and of understanding not a little. thinking of her walk with ian on christmas day,-- "would you mind telling me something about your brother?" she said. "what would you like to know about him?" asked alister. "anything you care to tell me," she answered. now there was nothing pleased alister better than talking about ian; and he talked so that mercy could not help feeling what a brother he must be himself; while on his part alister was delighted with the girl who took such an interest in ian: for ian's sake he began to love mercy. he had never yet been what is called in love--had little opportunity indeed of falling in love. his breeding had been that of a gentleman, and notwithstanding the sweetness and gentleness of the maidens of his clan, there were differences which had as yet proved sufficient to prevent the first approaches of love, though, once entertained, they might have added to the depth of it. at the same time it was by no means impossible for alister to fall in love with even an uneducated girl--so-called; neither would he, in that case, have felt any difficulty about marrying her; but the fatherly relation in which he stood toward his clan, had tended rather to prevent the thing. many a youth falls to premature love-making, from the lack in his daily history of the womanly element. matrons in towns should be exhorted to make of their houses a refuge. too many mothers are anxious for what they count the welfare of their own children, and care nothing for the children of other women! but can we wonder, when they will wallow in meannesses to save their own from poverty and health, and damn them into comfort and decay. alister told mercy how ian and he used to spend their boyhood. he recounted some of their adventures in hunting and herding and fishing, and even in going to and from school, a distance of five miles, in all weathers. then he got upon the poetry of the people, their legends, their ballads and their songs; and at last came to the poetry of the country itself--the delights of following the plough, the whispers and gleams of nature, her endless appeal through every sense. the mere smell of the earth in a spring morning, he said, always made him praise god. "everything we have," he went on, "must be shared with god. that is the notion of the jewish thank-offering. ian says the greatest word in the universe is one; the next greatest, all. they are but the two ends of a word to us unknowable--god's name for himself." mercy had read mrs. barbauld's hymns, and they had been something to her; but most of the little poetry she had read was only platitude sweetened with sound; she had never read, certainly never understood a real poem. who can tell what a nature may prove, after feeding on good food for a while? the queen bee is only a better fed working bee. who can tell what it may prove when it has been ploughed with the plough of suffering, when the rains of sorrow, the frosts of pain, and the winds of poverty have moistened and swelled and dried its fallow clods? mercy had not such a sweet temper as her sister, but she was not so selfish. she was readier to take offence, perhaps just because she was less self-satisfied. before long they might change places. a little dew from the eternal fountain was falling upon them. christina was beginning to be aware that a certain man, neither rich nor distinguished nor ambitious, had yet a real charm for her. not that for a moment she would think seriously of such a man! that would be simply idiotic! but it would be very nice to have a little innocent flirtation with him, or perhaps a "platonic friendship! "--her phrase, not mine. what could she have to do with plato, who, when she said i, was aware only of a neat bundle of foolish desires, not the god at her heart! mercy, on the other hand, was being drawn to the big, strong, childlike heart of the chief. there is always, notwithstanding the gulf of unlikeness between them, an appeal from the childish to the childlike. the childish is but the shadow of the childlike, and shadows are little like the things from which they fall. but to what save the heavenly shall the earthly appeal in its sore need, its widowhood, its orphanage? with what shall the childish take refuge but the childlike? to what shall ignorance cry but wisdom? mercy felt no restraint with the chief as with ian. his great, deep, yet refined and musical laugh, set her at ease. ian's smile, with its shimmering eternity, was no more than the moon on a rain-pool to mercy. the moral health of the chief made an atmosphere of conscious safety around her. by the side of no other man had she ever felt so. with him she was at home, therefore happy. she was already growing under his genial influence. every being has such influence who is not selfish. when christina was re-shod, and they were leaving the cottage, ian, happening to look behind him, spied the black cat perched on the edge of the chimney in the smoke. "look at her," he said, "pretending innocence, when she has been watching you all the time!" alister took up a stone. "don't hurt her," said ian, and he dropped it. chapter vii. an cabrach mor. i have already said that the young men had not done well as hunters. they had neither experience nor trustworthy attendance: none of the chief's men would hunt with them. they looked on them as intruders, and those who did not share in their chiefs dislike to useless killing, yet respected it. neither christian nor sercombe had yet shot a single stag, and the time was drawing nigh when they must return, the one to glasgow, the other to london. to have no proof of prowess to display was humbling to sercombe; he must show a stag's head, or hide his own! he resolved, therefore, one of the next moonlit nights, to stalk by himself a certain great, wide-horned stag, of whose habits he had received information. at oxford, where valentine made his acquaintance, sercombe belonged to a fast set, but had distinguished himself notwithstanding as an athlete. he was a great favourite with a few, not the best of the set, and admired by many for his confidence, his stature, and his regular features. these latter wore, however, a self-assertion which of others made him much disliked: a mean thing in itself, it had the meanest origin--the ability, namely, to spend money, for he was the favourite son of a rich banker in london. he knew nothing of the first business of life--self-restraint, had never denied himself anything, and but for social influences would, in manhood as infancy, have obeyed every impulse. he was one of the merest slaves in the universe, a slave in his very essence, for he counted wrong to others freedom for himself, and the rejection of the laws of his own being, liberty. the most righteous interference was insolence; his likings were his rights, and any devil that could whisper him a desire, might do with him as he pleased. from such a man every true nature shrinks with involuntary recoil, and a sick sense of the inhuman. but i have said more of him already than my history requires, and more than many a reader, partaking himself of his character to an unsuspected degree, will believe; for such men cannot know themselves. he had not yet in the eyes of the world disgraced himself: it takes a good many disgraceful things to bring a rich man to outward disgrace. his sole attendant when shooting was a clever vagabond lad belonging to nowhere in particular, and living by any crook except the shepherd's. from him he heard of the great stag, and the spots which in the valleys he frequented, often scraping away the snow with his feet to get at the grass. he did not inform him that the animal was a special favourite with the chief of clanruadh, or that the clan looked upon him as their live symbol, the very stag represented as crest to the chief's coat of arms. it was the same nancy had reported to her master as eating grass on the burn-side in the moonlight. christian and sercombe had stalked him day after day, but without success. and now, with one poor remaining hope, the latter had determined to stalk him at night. to despoil him of his life, his glorious rush over the mountain side, his plunge into the valley, and fierce strain up the opposing hill; to see that ideal of strength, suppleness, and joyous flight, lie nerveless and flaccid at his feet; to be able to call the thicket-like antlers of the splendid animal his own, was for the time the one ambition of hilary sercombe; for he was of the brood of mephistopheles, the child of darkness, whose delight lies in undoing what god has done--the nearest that any evil power can come to creating. there was, however, a reason for the failure of the young hunters beyond lack of skill and what they called their ill-luck. hector of the stags was awake; his keen, everywhere-roving eyes were upon them, seconded by the keen, all-hearkening ears of rob of the angels. they had discovered that the two men had set their hearts on the big stag, an cabrach mor by right of excellence, and every time they were out after him, hector too was out with his spy-glass, the gift of an old sea-faring friend, searching the billowy hills. while, the southrons would be toiling along to get the wind of him unseen, for the old stag's eyes were as keen as his velvety nose, the father and son would be lying, perhaps close at hand, perhaps far away on some hill-side of another valley, watching now the hunters, now the stag. for love of the macruadh, and for love of the stag, they had constituted themselves his guardians. again and again when one of them thought he was going to have a splendid chance--perhaps just as, having reached a rock to which he had been making his weary way over stones and bogs like satan through chaos, and raised himself with weary slowness, he peeped at last over the top, and lo, there he was, well within range, quietly feeding, nought between the great pumping of his big joyous heart and the hot bullet but the brown skin behind his left shoulder!--a distant shot would forestall the nigh one, a shot for life, not death, and the stag, knowing instantly by wondrous combination of sense and judgment in what quarter lay the danger, would, without once looking round, measure straight a hundred yards of hillocks and rocks between the sight-taking and the pulling of the trigger. another time it would be no shot, but the bark of a dog, the cry of a moorfowl, or a signal from watching hind that started him; for the creatures understand each the other's cries, and when an animal sees one of any sort on the watch to warn covey or herd or flock of its own kind, it will itself keep no watch, but feed in security. to christian and sercombe it seemed as if all the life in the glen were in conspiracy to frustrate their hearts' desire; and the latter at least grew ever the more determined to kill the great stag: he had begun to hate him. the sounds that warned the stag were by no means always what they seemed, those of other wild animals; they were often hut imitations by rob of the angels. i fear the animal grew somewhat bolder and less careful from the assurance thus given him that he was watched over, and cultivated a little nonchalance. not a moment, however, did he neglect any warning from quarter soever, but from peaceful feeder was instantaneously wind-like fleer, his great horns thrown back over his shoulders, and his four legs just touching the ground with elastic hoof, or tucking themselves almost out of sight as he skipped rather than leaped over rock and gully, stone and bush--whatever lay betwixt him and larger room. great joy it was to his two guardians to see him, and great game to watch the motions of his discomfited enemies. for the sake of an cabrach hector and rob would go hungry for hours. but they never imagined the luxurious sasunnach, incapable, as they thought, of hardship or sustained fatigue, would turn from his warm bed to stalk the lordly animal betwixt snow and moon. one night, hector of the stags found he could not sleep. it was not for cold, for the night was for the season a mild one. the snow indeed lay deep around their dwelling, but they owed not a little of its warmth to the snow. it drifted up all about it, and kept off the terrible winds that swept along the side of the hill, like sharp swift scythes of death. they were in the largest and most comfortable of their huts--a deepish hollow in the limestone rock, lined with turf, and with wattles filled in with heather, the tops outward; its front a thick wall of turf, with a tolerable door of deal. it was indeed so snug as to be far from airy. here they kept what little store of anything they had--some dried fish and venison; a barrel of oat-meal, seldom filled full; a few skins of wild creatures, and powder, ball, and shot. after many fruitless attempts to catch the still fleeting vapour sleep, raising himself at last on his elbow, hector found that rob was not by his side. he too had been unable to sleep, and at last discovered that he was uneasy about something-what, he could not tell. he rose and went out. the moon was shining very clear, and as there was much snow, the night, if not so bright as day, was yet brighter than many a day. the moon, the snow, the mountains, all dreaming awake, seemed to rob the same as usual; but presently he fancied the hillside opposite had come nearer than usual: there must be a reason for that! he searched every yard of it with keenest gaze, but saw nothing. they were high above glenruadh, and commanded parts of it: late though it was, rob thought he saw some light from the new house, which itself he could not see, reflected from some shadowed evergreen in the shrubbery. he was thinking some one might be ill, and he ought to run down and see whether a messenger was wanted, when his father joined him. he had brought his telescope, and immediately began to sweep the moonlight on the opposite hill. in a moment he touched rob on the shoulder, and handed him the telescope, pointing with it. rob looked and saw a dark speck on the snow, moving along the hill-side. it was the big stag. now and then he would stop to snuff and search for a mouthful, but was evidently making for one of his feeding-places--most likely that by the burn on the chief's land. the light! could it imply danger? he had heard the young men were going to leave: were they about to attempt a last assault on the glory of the glen? he pointed out to his father the dim light in the shadow of the house. hector turned his telescope thitherward, immediately gave the glass to rob, went into the hut, and came out again with his gun. they had not gone far when they lost sight of the stag, but they held on towards the castle. at every point whence a peep could be had in the direction of the house, they halted to reconnoitre: if enemies were abroad, they must, if possible, get and keep sight of them. they did not stop for more than a glance, however, but made for the valley as fast as they could walk: the noise of running feet would, on such a still night, be heard too far. the whole way, without sound uttered, father and son kept interchanging ideas on the matter. from thorough acquaintance with the habits of the animal, they were pretty certain he was on his way to the haunt aforementioned: if he got there, he would be safe; it was the chiefs ground, and no one would dare touch him. but he was not yet upon it, and was in danger; while, if he should leave the spot in any westward direction, he would almost at once be out of sanctuary! if they found him therefore at his usual feed, and danger threatening, they must scare him eastward; if no peril seemed at hand, they would watch him a while, that he might feed in safety. swift and all but soundless on their quiet brogs they paced along: to startle the deer while the hunter was far off, might be to drive him within range of his shot. they reached the root of the spur, and approached the castle; immediately beyond that, they would be in sight of the feeding ground. but they were yet behind it when rob of the angels bounded forward in terror at the sound of a gun. his father, however, who was in front, was off before him. neither hearing anything, nor seeing rob, he knew that a shot had been fired, and, caution being now useless, was in a moment at full speed. the smoke of the shot hung white in the moonlight over the end of the ridge. no red bulk shadowed the green pasture, no thicket of horns went shaking about over the sod. no lord of creation, but an enemy of life, stood regarding his work, a tumbled heap of death, yet saying to himself, like god when he made the world, "it is good." the noble creature lay disformed on the grass; shot through the heart he had leaped high in the air, fallen with his head under him, and broken his neck. rage filled the heart of hector of the stags. he could not curse, but he gave a roar like a wild beast, and raised his gun. but rob of the angels caught it ere it reached his shoulder. he yielded it, and, with another roar like a lion, bounded bare-handed upon the enemy. he took the descent in three leaps, and the burn in one. it was not merely that the enemy had killed an cabrach mor, the great stag of their love; he had killed him on the chief's own land! under the very eyes of the man whose business it was to watch over him! it was an offence unpardonable! an insult as well as a wrong to his chief! in the fierce majesty of righteous wrath he threw himself on the poacher. sercombe met him with a blow straight from the shoulder, and he dropped. rob of the angels, close behind him, threw down the gun. the devil all but got into rob of the angels. his knife flashed pale in the moonlight, and he darted on the sasunnach. it would then have gone ill with the bigger man, for rob was lithe as a snake, swift not only to parry and dodge but to strike; he could not have reached the body of his antagonist, but sercombe's arm would have had at least one terrible gash from his skean-dhu, sharp as a razor, had not, at the moment, from the top of the ridge come the stern voice of the chief. rob's knife, like excalibur from the hand of sir bedivere, "made lightnings in the splendour of the moon," as he threw it from him, and himself down by his father. then hector came to himself and rose. rob rose also; and his father, trembling with excitement, stood grasping his arm, for he saw the stalwart form of his chief on the ridge above them. alister had been waked by the gun, and at the roar of his friend hector, sprang from his bed. when he saw his beloved stag dead on his pasture, he came down the ridge like an avalanche. sercombe stood on his defence, wondering what devil was to pay, but beginning to think he might be in some wrong box. he had taken no trouble to understand the boundaries between mr. peregrine palmer's land and that of the chief, and had imagined himself safe on the south side of the big burn. alister gazed speechless for a moment on the slaughtered stag, and heaved a great sigh. "mr. sercombe," he said, "i would rather you had shot my best horse! are you aware, sir, that you are a poacher?" "i had supposed the appellation inapplicable to a gentleman!" answered sercombe, with entire coolness. "but by all means take me before a magistrate." "you are before a magistrate." "all i have to answer then is, that i should not have shot the animal had i not believed myself within my rights." "on that point, and on this very ground, i instructed you myself!" said the chief. "i misunderstood you." "say rather you had not the courtesy to heed what i told you-had not faith enough to take the word of a gentleman! and for this my poor stag has suffered!" he stood for some moments in conflict with himself, then quietly resumed. "of course, mr. sercombe, i have no intention of pushing the matter!" he said. "i should hope not!" returned sercombe scornfully. "i will pay whatever you choose to set on the brute." it would be hard to say which was less agreeable to the chief-to have his stag called a brute, or be offered blood-money for him. "stag ruadh priced like a bullock!" he said, with a slow smile, full of sadness; "--the pride of every child in the strath! not a gentleman in the county would have shot clanruadh's deer!" sercombe was by this time feeling uncomfortable, and it made him angry. he muttered something about superstition. "he was taken when a calf," the chief went on, "and given to a great-aunt of mine. but when he grew up, he took to the hills again, and was known by his silver collar till he managed to rid himself of it. he shall be buried where he lies, and his monument shall tell how the stranger sasunnach served the stag of clanruadh!" "why the deuce didn't you keep the precious monster in a paddock, and let people know him for a tame animal?" sneered sercombe. "my poor euadh!" said the chief; "he was no tame animal! he as well as i would have preferred the death you have given him to such a fate. he lived while he lived! i thank you for his immediate transit. shot right through the heart! had you maimed him i should have been angrier." sercombe felt flattered, and, attributing the chief's gentleness to a desire to please him, began to condescend. "well, come now, macruadh!" he began; but the chief turned from him. hector stood with his arm on rob's shoulder, and the tears rolling down his cheeks. he would not have wept but that the sobs of his son shook him. "rob of the angels," alister said in their mother-tongue, "you must make an apology to the sasunnach gentleman for drawing the knife on him. that was wrong, if he had killed all the deer in benruadh." "it was not for that, macruadh," answered rob of the angels. "it was because he struck my father, and laid a better man than himself on the grass." the chief turned to the englishman. "did the old man strike you, mr. sercombe?" "no, by jove! i took a little care of that! if he had, i would have broke every bone in his body!" "why did you strike him then?" "because he rushed at me." "it was his duty to capture a poacher!--but you did not know he was deaf and dumb!" alister added, as some excuse. "the deaf makes no difference!" protested rob. "hector of the stags does not fight with his hands like a woman!" "well, what's done is done!" laughed sercombe. "it wasn't a bad shot anyhow!" "you have little to plume yourself upon, mr. sercombe!" said the chief. "you are a good shot, but you need not have been so frightened at an old man as to knock him down!" "come, come, macruadh! enough's enough! it's time to drop this!" returned sercombe. "i can't stand much more of it!--take ten pounds for the head!--come!" the chief made one great stride towards him, but turned away, and said, "come along, rob! tell your father you must not go up the hill again to-night." "no, sir," answered rob; "there's nothing now to go up the hill for! poor old buadh! god rest his soul!" "amen!" responded the chief; "but say rather, 'god give him room to run!'" "amen! it is better.--but," added rob, "we must watch by the body. the foxes and hooded crows are gathering already--i hear them on the hills; and i saw a sea-eagle as white as silver yesterday! we cannot leave ruadh till he is under god's plaid!" "then one of you come and fetch food and fire," said the chief. "i will be with you early." father and son communicated in silence, and rob went with the chief. "they worship the stag, these peasants, as the old egyptians the bull!" said sercombe to himself, walking home full of contempt. chapter viii. the stag's head. alister went straight to his brother's room, his heart bursting with indignation. it was some time before ian could get the story from him in plain consecution; every other moment he would diverge into fierce denunciations. "hadn't you better tell your master what has happened?" at length said ian. "he ought to know why you curse one of your fellows so bitterly." alister was dumb. for a moment he looked aghast. "ian!" he said: "you think he wants to be told anything? i always thought you believed in his divinity!" "ah!" returned ian, "but do you? how am i to imagine it, when you go on like that in his hearing? is it so you acknowledge his presence?" "oh, ian! you don't know how it tortures me to think of that interloper, the low brute, killing the big stag, the macruadh stag-and on my land too! i feel as if i could tear him in pieces. but for him i would have killed him on the spot! it is hard if i may not let off my rage even to you!" "let it off to him, alister; he will give you fairer play than your small brother; he understands you better than i." "but i could not let it off to him that way!" "then that is not a good way. the justice that, even in imagination, would tear and destroy and avenge, may be justice, but it is devil's justice. come, begin now, and tell me all quietly-as if you had read it in a book." "word for word, then, with all the imprecations!" returned alister, a little cooler; and ian was soon in possession of the story. "now what do you think, ian?" said the chief, ending a recital true to the very letter, and in a measure calm, but at various points revealing, by the merest dip of the surface, the boiling of the floods beneath. "you must send him the head, alister," answered ian. "send-what-who-i don't understand you, ian!" returned the chief, bewildered. "oh, well, never mind!" said ian. "you will think of it presently!" and therewith he turned his face to the wall, as if he would go to sleep. it had been a thing understood betwixt the brothers, and that from so far back in the golden haze of childhood that the beginning of it was out of sight, that, the moment one of them turned his back, not a word more was to be said, until he who thus dropped the subject, chose to resume it: to break this unspoken compact would have been to break one of the strands in the ancient bond of their most fast brotherhood. alister therefore went at once to his room, leaving ian loving him hard, and praying for him with his face to the wall. he went as one knowing well the storm he was about to encounter, but never before had he had such a storm to meet. he closed the door, and sat down on the side of his bed like one stunned. he did not doubt, yet could hardly allow he believed, that ian, his oracle, had in verity told him to send the antlers of his cabrach mor, the late live type of his ancient crest, the pride of clanruadh, to the vile fellow of a sasunnach who had sent out into the deep the joyous soul of the fierce, bare mountains. there were rushings to and fro in the spirit of alister, wild and terrible, even as those in the valley of the shadow of death. he never closed his eyes, but fought with himself all the night, until the morning broke. could this thing be indeed his duty? and if not his duty, was he called to do it from mere bravado of goodness? how frightfully would not such an action be misunderstood by such a man! what could he take it for but a mean currying of favour with him! why should he move to please such a fellow! ian was too hard upon him! the more he yielded, the more ian demanded! every time it was something harder than the last! and why did he turn his face to the wall? was he not fit to be argued with! was he one that would not listen to reason! he had never known ian ungenerous till now! but all the time there lay at his door a thing calling out to be done! the thing he did not like was always the thing he had to do! he grumbled; but this thing he hated doing! it was abominable! what! send the grand head, with its horns spread wide like a half-moon, and leaning--like oaks from a precipice--send it to the man that made it a dead thing! never! it must not be left behind! it must go to the grave with the fleet limbs! and over it should rise a monument, at sight of which every friendly highlandman would say, feiich an cabracli mor de clanruadli! what a mockery of fate to be exposed for ever to the vulgar cockney gaze, the trophy of a fool, whose boast was to kill! such a noble beast! such a mean man! to mutilate his remains for the pride of the wretch who killed him! it was too horrible! he thought and thought--until at last he lay powerless to think any more. but it is not always the devil that enters in when a man ceases to think. god forbid! the cessation of thought gives opportunity for setting the true soul thinking from another quarter. suddenly alister remembered a conversation he had had with ian a day or two before. he had been saying to ian that he could not understand what jesus meant when he said, "whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also;" and was dissatisfied with the way ian had answered him. "you must explain it to yourself," ian said. he replied, "if i could do that, i should not have to ask you." "there are many things," ian rejoined, "--arithmetic is one--that can be understood only in the doing of them." "but how can i do a thing without understanding it?" objected alister. "when you have an opportunity of doing this very thing," said ian, "do it, and see what will follow!" at the time he thought ian was refusing to come to the point, and was annoyingly indefinite and illogical; but now it struck him that here was the opportunity of which he had spoken. "i see!" he said to himself. "it is not want of understanding that is in the way now! a thing cannot look hateful and reasonable at the same moment! this may be just the sort of thing jesus meant! even if i be in the right, i have a right to yield my right--and to him i will yield it. that was why ian turned his face to the wall: he wanted me to discover that here was my opportunity! how but in the name of jesus christ could he have dared tell me to forgive ruadh's death by sending his head to his murderer! it has to be done! i've got to do it! here is my chance of turning the other cheek and being hurt again! what can come of it is no business of mine! to return evil is just to do a fresh evil! it may make the man ashamed of himself! it cannot hurt the stag; it only hurts my pride, and i owe my pride nothing! why should not the fellow have what satisfaction he may--something to show for his shot! he shall have the head." thereupon rushed into his heart the joy of giving up, of deliverance from self; and pity, to leaven his contempt, awoke for sercombe. no sooner had he yielded his pride, than he felt it possible to love the man--not for anything he was, but for what he might and must be. "god let the man kill the stag," he said; "i will let him have the head." again and yet again swelled afresh the tide of wrath and unwillingness, making him feel as if he could not carry out his resolve; but all the time he knew the thing was as good as done--absolutely determined, so that nothing could turn it aside. "to yield where one may, is the prerogative of liberty!" he said to himself. "god only can give; who would be his child must yield! abroad in the fields of air, as paul and the love of god make me hope, what will the wind-battling ruadh care for his old head! would he not say, 'let the man have it; my hour was come, or the some one would not have let him kill me!'?" thus argued the chief while the darkness endured--and as soon as the morning began to break, rose, took spade and pick and great knife, and went where hector and rob were watching the slain. it was bitterly cold. the burn crept silent under a continuous bridge of ice. the grass-blades were crisp with frost. the ground was so hard it met iron like iron. he sent the men to get their breakfast from nancy: none but himself should do the last offices for ruadh! with skilful hand he separated and laid aside the head--in sacrifice to the living god. then the hard earth rang with mighty blows of the pickaxe. the labour was severe, and long ere the grave was deep enough, hector and rob had returned; but the chief would not get out of it to give them any share in the work. when he laid hold of the body, they did not offer to help him; they understood the heart of their chief. not without a last pang that he could not lay the head beside it, he began to shovel in the frozen clods, and then at length allowed them to take a part. when the grave was full, they rolled great stones upon it, that it might not be desecrated. then the chief went back to his room, and proceeded to prepare the head, that, as the sacrifice, so should be the gift. "i suppose he would like glass eyes, the ruffian!" he muttered to himself, "but i will not have the mockery. i will fill the sockets and sew up the eyelids, and the face shall be as of one that sleeps." haying done all, and written certain directions for temporary treatment, which he tied to an ear, he laid the head aside till the evening. all the day long, not a word concerning it passed between the brothers; but when evening came, alister, with a blue cotton handkerchief in his hand, hiding the head as far as the roots of the huge horns, asked ian to go for a walk. they went straight to the new house. alister left the head at the door, with his compliments to mr. sercombe. as soon as they were out of sight of the house, ian put his arm through his brother's, but did not speak. "i know now about turning the other cheek!" said alister. "--poor euadh!" "leave him to the god that made the great head and nimble feet of him," said ian. "a god that did not care for what he had made, how should we believe in! but he who cares for the dying sparrow, may be trusted with the dead stag." "truly, yes," returned alister. "let us sit down," said ian, "and i will sing you a song i made last night; i could not sleep after you left me." without reply, alister took a stone by the wayside, and ian one a couple of yards from him. this was his song. love's history. love, the baby, toddled out to pluck a flower; one said, "no, sir;" one said, "maybe, at the evening hour!" love, the boy, joined the boys and girls at play; but he left them half his joy ere the close of day. love, the youth, roamed the country, lightning-laden; but he hurt himself, and, sooth, many a man and maiden! love, the man, sought a service all about; but he would not take their plan, so they cast him out. love, the aged, walking, bowed, the shadeless miles, bead a volume many-paged, full of tears and smiles. love, the weary, tottered down the shelving road: at its foot, lo, night the starry meeting him from god! "love, the holy!" sang a music in her dome, sang it softly, sang it slowly, "--love is coming home!" ere the week was out, there stood above the dead stag a growing cairn, to this day called carn a' cabrach mor. it took ten men with levers to roll one of the boulders at its base. men still cast stones upon it as they pass. the next morning came a note to the cottage, in which sercombe thanked the macruadh for changing his mind, and said that, although he was indeed glad to have secured such a splendid head, he would certainly have stalked another deer, had he known the chief set such store by the one in question. it was handed to alister as he sat at his second breakfast with his mother and ian: even in winter he was out of the house by six o'clock, to set his men to work, and take his own share. he read to the end of the first page with curling lip; the moment he turned the leaf, he sprang from his seat with an exclamation that startled his mother. "the hound!--i beg my good dogs' pardon, one and all!" he cried. "--look at this, ian! see what comes of taking your advice!" "my dear fellow, i gave you no advice that had the least regard to the consequence of following it! that was the one thing you had nothing to do with." "reada," insisted alister, as he pranced about the room. "no, don't read the letter; it's not worth, reading. look at the paper in it." ian looked, and saw a cheque for ten pounds. he burst into loud laughter. "poor ruadh's horns! they're hardly so long as their owner's ears!" he said. "i told you so!" cried the chief. "no, alister! you never suspected such a donkey!" "what is it all about?" asked the mother. "the wretch who shot ruadh," replied alister, "--to whom i gave his head, all to please ian,--" "alister!" said ian. the chief understood, and retracted. "--no, not to please ian, but to do what ian showed me was right:--i believe it was my duty!--i hope it was!--here's the murdering fellow sends me a cheque for ten pounds!--i told you, ian, he offered me ten pounds over the dead body!" "i daresay the poor fellow was sorely puzzled what to do, and appealed to everybody in the house for advice!" "you take the cheque to represent the combined wisdom of the new house?" "you must have puzzled them all!" persisted ian. "how could people with no principle beyond that of keeping to a bargain, understand you otherwise! first, you perform an action such persons think degrading: you carry a fellow's bag for a shilling, and then himself for nothing! next, in the very fury of indignation with a man for killing the finest stag in the country on your meadow, you carry him home the head with your own hands! it all comes of that unlucky divine motion of yours to do good that good may come! that shilling of mistress conal's is at the root of it all!" ian laughed again, and right heartily. the chief was too angry to enter into the humour of the thing. "upon my word, ian, it is too bad of you! what are you laughing at? it would become you better to tell me what i am to do! am i free to break the rascal's bones?" "assuredly not, after that affair with the bag!" "oh, damn the bag!--i beg your pardon, mother." "am i to believe my ears, alister?" "what does it matter, mother? what harm can it do the bag? i wished no evil to any creature!" "it was the more foolish." "i grant it, mother. but you don't know what a relief it is sometimes to swear a little!--you are quite wrong, ian; it all comes of giving him the head!" "you wish you had not given it him?" "no!" growled alister, as from a pent volcano. "you will break my ears, alister!" cried the mother, unable to keep from laughing at the wrath in which he went straining through the room. "think of it," insisted ian: "a man like could not think otherwise without a revolution of his whole being to which the change of the leopard's spots would be nothing.--what you meant, after all, was not cordiality; it was only generosity; to which his response, his countercheck friendly, was an order for ten pounds!--all is right between you!" "now, really, ian, you must not go on teasing your elder brother so!" said the mother. alister laughed, and ceased fuming. "but i must answer the brute!" he said. "what am i to say to him?" "that you are much obliged," replied ian, "and will have the cheque framed and hung in the hall." "come, come! no more of that!" "well, then, let me answer the letter." "that is just what i wanted!" ian sat down at his mother's table, and this is what he wrote. "dear sir,--my brother desires me to return the cheque which you unhappily thought it right to send him. humanity is subject to mistake, but i am sorry for the individual who could so misunderstand his courtesy. i have the honour to remain, sir, your obedient servant, ian macruadh." as ian guessed, the matter had been openly discussed at the new house; and the money was sent with the approval of all except the two young ladies. they had seen the young men in circumstances more favourable to the understanding of them by ordinary people. "why didn't the chief write himself?" said christian. "oh," replied sercombe, "his little brother had been to school, and could write better!" christina and mercy exchanged glances. "i will tell you," mercy said, "why mr. lau answered the note: the chief had done with you!" "or," suggested christina, "the chief was in such a rage that he would write nothing but a challenge." "i wish to goodness he had! it would have given me the chance of giving the clodhopper a lesson." "for sending you the finest stag's head and horns in the country!" remarked mercy. "i shot the stag! perhaps you don't believe i shot him!" "indeed i do! no one else would have done it. the chief would have died sooner!" "i'm sick of your chief!" said christian. "a pretty chief without a penny to bless himself! a chief, and glad of the job of carrying a carpet-bag! you'll be calling him my lord, next!" "he may at least write baronet after his name when he pleases," returned mercy. "why don't he then? a likely story!" "because," answered christina, "both his father and himself were ashamed of how the first baronet got his title. it had to do with the sale of a part of the property, and they counted the land the clan's as well as the chief's. they regarded it as an act of treachery to put the clan in the power of a stranger, and the chief looks on the title as a brand of shame." "i don't question the treachery," said christian. "a highlander is treacherous." christina had asked a friend in glasgow to find out for her anything known among the lawyers concerning the macruadhs, and what she had just recounted was a part of the information she had thereby received. thenceforward silence covered the whole transaction. sercombe neither returned the head, sent an apology, nor recognized the gift. that he had shot the stag was enough! but these things wrought shaping the idea of the brothers in the minds of the sisters, and they were beginning to feel a strange confidence in them, such as they had never had in men before. a curious little halo began to shimmer about the heads of the young men in the picture-gallery of the girls' fancy. not the less, however, did they regard them as enthusiasts, unfitted to this world, incapable of self-protection, too good to live--in a word, unpractical! because a man would live according to the laws of his being as well as of his body, obeying simple, imperative, essential human necessity, his fellows forsooth call him unpractical! of the idiotic delusions of the children of this world, that of being practical is one of the most ludicrous. here is a translation, made by ian, of one of alister's gaelic songs. the sun's daughter. a bright drop of water in the gold tire of a sun's daughter was laughing to her sire; and from all the flowers about, that never toiled or spun, the soul of each looked out, clear laughing to the sun. i saw them unfolding their hearts every one! every soul holding within it the sun! but all the sun-mirrors vanished anon; and their flowers, mere starers, grew dry in the sun. "my soul is but water, shining and gone! she is but the daughter," i said, "of the sun!" my soul sat her down in a deep-shaded gloom; her glory was flown, her earth was a tomb, till night came and caught her, and then out she shone; and i knew her no daughter of that shining sun-- till night came down and taught her of a glory yet unknown; and i knew my soul the daughter of a sun behind the sun. back, back to him that wrought her my soul shall haste and run; straight back to him, his daughter, to the sun behind the sun. chapter ix. annie of the shop. at the dance in the chief's barn, sercombe had paired with annie of the shop oftener than with any other of the girls. that she should please him at all, was something in his favour, for she was a simple, modest girl, with the nicest feeling of the laws of intercourse, the keenest perception both of what is in itself right, and what is becoming in the commonest relation. she understood by a fine moral instinct what respect was due to her, and what respect she ought to show, and was therefore in the truest sense well-bred. there are women whom no change of circumstances would cause to alter even their manners a hair's-breadth: such are god's ladies; there are others in whom any outward change will reveal the vulgarity of a nature more conscious of claim than of obligation. i need not say that sercomhe, though a man of what is called education, was but conventionally a gentleman. if in doubt whether a man be a gentleman or not, hear him speak to a woman he regards as his inferior: his very tone will probably betray him. a true gentleman, that is a true man, will be the more carefully respectful. sercombe was one of those who regard themselves as respectable because they are prudent; whether they are human, and their brother and sister's keeper, they have never asked themselves. to some minds neither innocent nor simple, there is yet something attractive in innocence and simplicity. perhaps it gives them a pleasing sense of their superiority--a background against which to rejoice in their liberty, while their pleasure in it helps to obscure the gulf between what the man would fain hold himself to be, and what in reality he is. there is no spectre so terrible as the unsuspected spectre of a man's own self; it is noisome enough to the man who is ever trying to better it: what must it appear to the man who sees it for the first time! sercombe's self was ugly, and he did not know it; he thought himself an exceptionally fine fellow. no one knows what a poor creature he is but the man who makes it his business to be true. the only mistake worse than thinking well of himself, is for a man to think god takes no interest in him. one evening, sorely in lack of amusement, sercombe wandered out into a star-lit night, and along the road to the village. there he went into the general shop, where sat annie behind the counter. now the first attention he almost always paid a woman, that is when he cared and dared, was a compliment--the fungus of an empty head or a false heart; but with annie he took no such initiative liberty, and she, accustomed to respectful familiarity from the chief and his brother, showed no repugnance to his friendly approach. "upon my word, miss annie," said sercombe, venturing at length a little, "you were the best dancer on the floor that night!" "oh, mr. sercombe! how can you say so--with such dancers as the young ladies of your party!" returned annie. "they dance well," he returned, "but not so well as you." "it all depends on the dance--whether you are used to it or not." "no, by jove! if you had a lesson or two such as they have been having all their lives, you would dance out of their sight in the twinkling of an eye. if i had you for a partner every night for a month, you would dance better than any woman i have ever seen--off the stage--any lady, that is." the grosser the flattery, the surer with a country girl, he thought. but there was that in his tone, besides the freedom of sounding her praises in her own ears, which was unpleasing to annie's ladyhood, and she held her peace. "come out and have a turn," he said thereupon. "it is lovely star-light. have you had a walk to-day?" "no, i have not," answered annie, casting how to get rid of him. "you wrong your beauty by keeping to the house." "my beauty," said annie, flushing, "may look after itself; i have nothing to do with it--neither, excuse me, sir, have you." "why, who has a right to be offended with the truth! a man can't help seeing your face is as sweet as your voice, and your figure, as revealed by your dancing, a match for the two!" "i will call my mother," said annie, and left the shop. sercombe did not believe she would, and waited. he took her departure for a mere coquetry. but when a rather grim, handsome old woman appeared, asking him--it took the most of her english--"what would you be wanting, sir?" as if he had just come into the shop, he found himself awkwardly situated. he answered, with more than his usual politeness, that, having had the pleasure of dancing with her daughter at the chief's hall, he had taken the liberty of looking in to inquire after her health; whereupon, perplexed, the old woman in her turn called annie, who came at once, but kept close to her mother. sercombe began to tell them about a tour he had made in canada, for he had heard they had friends there; but the mother did not understand him, and annie more and more disliked him. he soon saw that at least he had better say nothing more about a walk, and took himself off, not a little piqued at repulse from a peasant-girl in the most miserable shop he had ever entered. two days after, he went again--this time to buy tobacco. annie was short with him, but he went yet again and yet sooner: these primitive people objected to strangers, he said; accustomed to him she would be friendly! he would not rest until he had gained some footing of favour with her! annie grew heartily offended with the man. she also feared what might be said if he kept coming to the shop--where mistress conal had seen him more than once, and looked poison at him. for her own sake, for the sake of lachlan, and for the sake of the chief, she resolved to make the young father of the ancient clan acquainted with her trouble. it was on the day after his rejection of the ten-pound note that she found her opportunity, for the chief came to see her. "was he rude to you, annie?" he asked. "no, sir--too polite, i think: he must have seen i did not want his company.--i shall feel happier now you know." "i will see to it," said the chief. "i hope it will not put you to any trouble, sir!" "what am i here for, annie! are you not my clanswoman! is not lachlan my foster-brother!--he will trouble you no more, i think." as alister walked home, he met sercombe, and after a greeting not very cordial on either side, said thus: "i should be obliged to you, mr. sercombe, if you would send for anything you want, instead of going to the shop yourself. annie macruadh is not the sort of girl you may have found in such a position, and you would not wish to make her uncomfortable!" sercombe was, ashamed, i think; for the refuge of the fool when dissatisfied with himself, is offence with his neighbour, and sercombe was angry. "are you her father--or her lover?" he said. "she has a right to my protection--and claims it," rejoined alister quietly. "protection! oh!--what the devil would you protect her from?" "from you, mr. sercombe." "protect her, then." "i will. force yourself on that young woman's notice again, and you will have to do with me." they parted. alister went home. sercombe went straight to the shop. he was doing what he could to recommend himself to christina; but whether from something antagonistic between them, or from unwillingness on her part to yield her position of advantage and so her liberty, she had not given him the encouragement he thought he deserved. he believed himself in love with her, and had told her so; but the truest love such a man can feel, is a poor thing. he admired, and desired, and thought he loved her beauty, and that he called being in love with her! he did not think much about her money, but had she then been brought to poverty, he would at least have hesitated about marrying her. in the family he was regarded as her affianced, although she did not treat him as such, but merely went on bewitching him, pleased that at least he was a man of the world. while one is yet only in love, the real person, the love-capable, lies covered with the rose-leaves of a thousand sleepy-eyed dreams, and through them come to the dreamer but the barest hints of the real person of whom is the dream. a thousand fancies fly out, approach, and cross, but never meet; the man and the woman are pleased, not with each other, but each with the fancied other. the merest common likings are taken for signs of a wonderful sympathy, of a radical unity--of essential capacity, therefore, of loving and being loved; at a hundred points their souls seem to touch, but their contacts are the merest brushings as of insect-antennae; the real man, the real woman, is all the time asleep under the rose-leaves. happy is the rare fate of the true--to wake and come forth and meet in the majesty of the truth, in the image of god, in their very being, in the power of that love which alone is being. they love, not this and that about each other, but each the very other--a love as essential to reality, to truth, to religion, as the love of the very god. where such love is, let the differences of taste, the unfitnesses of temperament be what they may, the two must by and by be thoroughly one. sercombe saw no reason why a gentleman should not amuse himself with any young woman he pleased. what was the chief to him! he was not his chief! if he was a big man in the eyes of his little clan, he was nothing much in the eyes of hilary sercombe. chapter x the encounter. annie came again to her chief, with the complaint that mr. sercombe persisted in his attentions. alister went to see her home. they had not gone far when sercombe overtook them, and passed. the chief told annie to go on, and called after him, "i must have a word or two with you, mr. sercombe!" he turned and came up with long steps, his hands in his coat-pockets. "i warned you to leave that girl alone!" said the chief. "and i warn you now," rejoined sercombe, "to leave me alone!" "i am bound to take care of her." "and i of myself." "not at her expense!" "at yours then!" answered sercombe, provoking an encounter, to which he was the more inclined that he saw ian coming slowly up the ridge. "it was your deliberate intention then to forget the caution i gave you?" said the chief, restraining his anger. "i make a point of forgetting what i do not think worth remembering." "i forget nothing!" "i congratulate you." "and i mean to assist your memory, mr. sercombe." "mr. macruadh!" returned sercombe, "if you expect me not to open my lips to any hussy in the glen without your leave,--" his speech was cut short by a box on the ear from the open hand of the chief. he would not use his fist without warning, but such a word applied to any honest woman of his clan demanded instant recognition. sercomhe fell back a step, white with rage, then darting forward, struck straight at the front of his adversary. alister avoided the blow, but soon found himself a mere child at such play with the englishman. he had not again touched sercombe, and was himself bleeding fast, when ian came up running. "damn you! come on!" cried sercombe when he saw him; "i can do the precious pair of you!" "stop!" cried ian, laying hold of his brother from behind, pinning his arms to his sides, wheeling him round, and taking his place. "give over, alister," he went on. "you can't do it, and i won't see you punished when it is he that deserves it. go and sit there, and look on." "you can't do it, ian!" returned alister. "it is my business. one blow in will serve. he jumps about like a goat that i can't hit him!" "you are blind with blood!" said ian, in a tone that gave sercombe expectation of too easy a victory. "sit down there, i tell you!" "mind, i don't give in!" said alister, but turning went to the bank at the roadside. "if he speak once again to annie, i swear i will make him repent it!" sercombe laughed insultingly. "mr. sercombe," said ian, "had we not better put off our bout till to-morrow? you have fought already!" "damn you for a coward, come on!" "would you not like to take your breath for a moment?" "i have all i am likely to need." "it is only fair," persisted ian, "to warn you that you will not find my knowledge on the level of my brother's!" "shut up," said sercombe savagely, "and come on." for a few rounds ian seemed to alister to be giving sercombe time to recover his wind; to sercombe he seemed to be saving his own. he stood to defend, and did not attempt to put in a blow. "mr. sercombe," he said at length, "you cannot serve me as you did my brother." "i see that well enough. come on!" "will you give your word to leave annie of the shop alone?" sercombe answered with a scornful imprecation. "i warn you again, i am no novice in this business!" said ian. sercombe struck out, but did not reach his antagonist. the fight lasted but a moment longer. as his adversary drew back from a failed blow, alister saw ian's eyes flash, and his left arm shoot out, as it seemed, to twice its length. sercombe neither reeled nor staggered but fell supine, and lay motionless. the brothers were by his side in a moment. "i struck too hard!" said ian. "who can think about that in a fight!" returned alister. "i could have helped it well enough, and a better man would. something shot through me--i hope it wasn't hatred; i am sure it was anger--and the man went down! what if the devil struck the blow!" "nonsense, ian!" said alister, as they raised sercombe to carry him to the cottage. "it was pure indignation, and nothing to blame in it!" "i wish i could be sure of that!" they had not gone far before he began to come to himself. "what are you about?" he said feebly but angrily. "set me down." they did so. he staggered to the road-side, and leaned against the bank. "what's been the row?" he asked. "oh, i remember!--well, you've had the best of it!" he held out his hand in a vague sort of way, and the gesture invaded their soft hearts. each took the hand. "i was all right about the girl though," said sercombe. "i didn't mean her any harm." "i don't think you did," answered alister; "and i am sure you could have done her none; but the girl did not like it." "there is not a girl of the clan, or in the neighbourhood, for whom my brother would not have done the same." said ian. "you're a brace of woodcocks!" cried sercombe. "it's well you're not out in the world. you would be in hot water from morning to night! i can't think how the devil you get on at all!" "get on! where?" asked ian with a smile. "come now! you ain't such fools as you want to look! a man must make a place for himself somehow in the world!" he rose, and they walked in the direction of the cottage. "there is a better thing than that," said ian! "what?" "to get clean out of it." "what! cut your throats?" "i meant that to get out of the world clean was better than to get on in it." "i don't understand you. i don't choose to think the man that thrashed me a downright idiot!" growled sercombe. "what you call getting on," rejoined ian, "we count not worth a thought. look at our clan! it is a type of the world itself. everything is passing away. we believe in the kingdom of heaven." "come, come! fellows like you must know well enough that's all bosh! nobody nowadays--nobody with any brains--believes such rot!" "we believe in jesus christ," said ian, "and are determined to do what he will have us do, and take our orders from nobody else." "i don't understand you!" "i know you don't. you cannot until you set about changing your whole way of life." "oh, be damned! what an idea! a sneaking, impossible idea!" "as to its being an impossible idea, we hold it, and live by it. how absurd it must seem to you, i know perfectly. but we don't live in your world, and you do not even see the lights of ours." "'there is a world beyond the stars'!--well, there may be; i know nothing about it; i only know there is one on this side of them,--a very decent sort of world too! i mean to make the best of it." "and have not begun yet!" "indeed i have! i deny myself nothing. i live as i was made to live." "if you were not made to obey your conscience or despise yourself, you are differently made from us, and no communication is possible between us. we must wait until what differences a man from a beast make its appearance in you." "you are polite!" "you have spoken of us as you think; now we speak of you as we think. taking your representation of yourself, you are in the condition of the lower animals, for you claim inclination as the law of your life." "my beast is better than your man!" "you mean you get more of the good of life!" "right! i do." the brothers exchanged a look and smile. "but suppose," resumed ian, "the man we have found in us should one day wake up in you! suppose he should say, 'why did you make a beast of me?'! it will not be easy for you to answer him!" "that's all moonshine! things are as you take them." "so said lady macbeth till she took to walking in her sleep, and couldn't get rid of the smell of the blood!" sercombe said no more. he was silent with disgust at the nonsense of it all. they reached the door of the cottage. alister invited him to walk in. he drew back, and would have excused himself. "you had better lie down a while," said alister. "you shall come to my room," said ian. "we shall meet nobody." sercombe yielded, for he felt queer. he threw himself on ian's bed, and in a few minutes was fast asleep. when he woke, he had a cup of tea, and went away little the worse. the laird could not show himself for several days. after this annie had no further molestation. but indeed the young men's time was almost up--which was quite as well, for annie of the shop, after turning a corner of the road, had climbed the hill-side, and seen all that passed. the young ladies, hearing contradictory statements, called upon annie to learn the truth, and the intercourse with her that followed was not without influence on them. through annie they saw further into the character of the brothers, who, if they advocated things too fine for the world the girls had hitherto known, did things also of which it would by no means have approved. they valued that world and its judgment not a straw! chapter xi. a lesson. all the gentlemen at the new house left it together, and its ladies were once more abandoned to the society of nature, who said little to any of them. for, though she recognized her grandchildren, and did what she could for them, it was now time they should make some move towards acquaintance with her. a point comes when she must stand upon her dignity, for it is great. if you would hear her wonderful tales, or see her marvellous treasures, you must not trifle with her; you must not talk as if you could rummage her drawers and cabinets as you pleased. you must believe in her; you must reverence her; else, although she is everywhere about the house, you may not meet her from the beginning of one year to the end of another. to allude to any aspect of nature in the presence of the girls was to threaten to bore them; and i heartily confess to being bored myself with common talk about scenery; but these ladies appeared unaware of the least expression on the face of their grand-mother. doubtless they received some good from the aspect of things--that they could not help; there grannie's hidden, and therefore irresistible power was in operation; but the moment they had their thoughts directed to the world around them, they began to gape inwardly. even the trumpet and shawm of her winds, the stately march of her clouds, and the torrent-rush of her waters, were to them poor facts, no vaguest embodiment of truths eternal. it was small wonder then that verse of any worth should be to them but sounding brass and clanging cymbals. what they called society, its ways and judgments, its decrees and condemnations, its fashions and pomps and shows, false, unjust, ugly, was nearly all they cared for. the truth of things, without care for which man or woman is the merest puppet, had hitherto been nothing to them. to talk of nature was sentimental. to talk of god was both irreverent and ill-bred. wordsworth was an old woman; st. paul an evangelical churchman. they saw no feature of any truth, but, like all unthinkers, wrapped the words of it in their own foolishness, and then sneered at them. they were too much of ladies, however, to do it disagreeably; they only smiled at the foolish neighbour who believed things they were too sensible to believe. it must, however, be said for them, that they had not yet refused anything worth believing--as presented to them. they had not yet actually looked upon any truth and refused it. they were indeed not yet true enough in themselves to suspect the presence of either a truth or a falsehood. a thaw came, and the ways were bad, and they found the time hang yet heavier on their unaided hands. an intercourse by degrees established itself between mrs. macruadh and the well-meaning, handsome, smiling mrs. palmer, and rendered it natural for the girls to go rather frequently to the cottage. they made themselves agreeable to the mother, and subject to the law of her presence showed to better advantage. with their love of literature, it was natural also that the young men should at such times not only talk about books, but occasionally read for their entertainment from some favourite one; so that now, for the first time in their lives, the young ladies were brought under direct teaching of a worthy sort--they had had but a mockery of it at school and church--and a little light began to soak through their unseeking eyes. among many others, however, less manifest, one obstruction to their progress lay in the fact that christina, whose perceptions in some directions was quick enough, would always make a dart at the comical side of anything that could be comically turned, so disturbing upon occasion the whole spiritual atmosphere about some delicate epiphany: this to both alister and ian was unbearable. she offended chiefly in respect of wordsworth--who had not humour enough always to perceive what seriously meant expression might suggest a ludicrous idea. one time, reading from the excursion, ian came to the verse--not to be found, i think, in later editions-- "perhaps it is not he but some one else":-- "awful idea!" exclaimed christina, with sepulchral tone; "--'some one else!' think of it! it makes me shudder! who might it not have been!" ian closed the book, and persistently refused to read more that day. another time he was reading, in illustration of something, wordsworth's poem, "to a skylark," the earlier of the two with that title: when he came to the unfortunate line,-- "happy, happy liver!"-- "oh, i am glad to know that!" cried christina. "i always thought the poor lark must have a bad digestion--he was up so early!" ian refused to finish the poem, although mercy begged hard. the next time they came, he proposed to "read something in miss palmer's style," and taking up a volume of hood, and avoiding both his serious and the best of his comic poems, turned to two or three of the worst he could find. after these he read a vulgar rime about an execution, pretending to be largely amused, making flat jokes of his own, and sometimes explaining elaborately where was no occasion. "ian!" said his mother at length; "have you bid farewell to your senses?" "no, mother," he answered; "what i am doing is the merest consequence of the way you brought us up." "i don't understand that!" she returned. "you always taught us to do the best we could for our visitors. so when i fail to interest them, i try to amuse them." "but you need not make a fool of yourself!" "it is better to make a fool of myself, than let miss palmer make a fool of--a great man!" "mr. ian," said christina, "it is not of yourself but of me you have been making a fool.--i deserved it!" she added, and burst into tears. "miss palmer," said ian, "i will drop my foolishness, if you will drop your fun." "i will," answered christina. and ian read them the poem beginning-- "three years she grew in sun and shower." scoffing at what is beautiful, is not necessarily a sign of evil; it may only indicate stupidity or undevelopment: the beauty is not perceived. but blame is often present in prolonged undevelopment. surely no one habitually obeying his conscience would long be left without a visit from some shape of the beautiful! chapter xii. nature. the girls had every liberty; their mother seldom interfered. herself true to her own dim horn-lantern, she had confidence in the discretion of her daughters, and looked for no more than discretion. hence an amount of intercourse was possible between them and the young men, which must have speedily grown to a genuine intimacy had they inhabited even a neighbouring sphere of conscious life. almost unknown to herself, however, a change for the better had begun in mercy. she had not yet laid hold of, had not yet perceived any truth; but she had some sense of the blank where truth ought to be. it was not a sense that truth was lacking; it was only a sense that something was not in her which was in those men. a nature such as hers, one that had not yet sinned against the truth, was not one long to frequent such a warm atmosphere of live truth, without approach to the hour when it must chip its shell, open its eyes, and acknowledge a world of duty around it. one lovely star-lit night of keen frost, the two mothers were sitting by a red peat-fire in the little drawing-room of the cottage, and ian was talking to the girls over some sketches he had made in the north, when the chief came in, bringing with him an air of sharp exhilaration, and proposed a walk. "come and have a taste of star-light!" he said. the girls rose at once, and were ready in a minute. the chief was walking between the two ladies, and ian was a few steps in front, his head bent as in thought. suddenly, mercy saw him spread out his arms toward the starry vault, with his face to its serrated edge of mountain-tops. the feeling, almost the sense of another presence awoke in her, and as quickly vanished. the thought, is he a pantheist? took its place. had she not surprised him in an act of worship? in that wide outspreading of the lifted arms, was he not worshipping the whole, the pan? sky and stars and mountains and sea were his god! she walked aghast, forgetful of a hundred things she had heard him say that might have settled the point. she had, during the last day or two, been reading an article in which pantheism was once and again referred to with more horror than definiteness. recovering herself a little, she ventured approach to the subject. "macruadh," she said, "mr. ian and you often say things about nature that i cannot understand: i wish you would tell me what you mean by it." "by what?" asked alister. "by nature" answered mercy. "i heard mr. ian say, for instance, the other night, that he did not like nature to take liberties with him; you said she might take what liberties with you she pleased; and then you went on talking so that i could not understand a word either of you said!" while she spoke, ian had turned and rejoined them, and they were now walking in a line, mercy between the two men, and christina on ian's right. the brothers looked at each other: it would be hard to make her understand just that example! something more rudimentary must prepare the way! silence fell for a moment, and then ian said-- "we mean by nature every visitation of the outside world through our senses." "more plainly, please mr. ian! you cannot imagine how stupid i feel when you are talking your thinks, as once i heard a child call them." "i mean by nature, then, all that you see and hear and smell and taste and feel of the things round about you." "if that be all you mean, why should you make it seem so difficult?" "but that is not all. we mean the things themselves only for the sake of what they say to us. as our sense of smell brings us news of fields far off, so those fields, or even the smell only that comes from them, tell us of things, meanings, thoughts, intentions beyond them, and embodied in them." "and that is why you speak of nature as a person?" asked mercy. "whatever influences us must be a person. but god is the only real person, being in himself, and without help from anybody; and so we talk even of the world which is but his living garment, as if that were a person; and we call it she as if it were a woman, because so many of god's loveliest influences come to us through her. she always seems to me a beautiful old grandmother." "but there now! when you talk of her influences, and the liberties she takes, i do not know what you mean. she seems to do and be something to you which certainly she does not and is not to me. i cannot tell what to make of it. i feel just as when our music-master was talking away about thorough bass: i could not get hold, head or tail, of what the man was after, and we all agreed there was no sense in it. now i begin to suspect there must have been too much!" "there is no fear of her!" said ian to himself. "my heart told me the truth about her!" thought alister jubilant. "now we shall have talk!" "i think i can let you see into it, miss mercy," said ian. "imagine for a moment how it would be if, instead of having a roof like 'this most excellent canopy the air, this brave o'erhanging, this majestical roof, fretted with golden fire,'--" "are you making the words, or saying them out of a book?" interrupted mercy. "ah! you don't know hamlet? how rich i should feel myself if i had the first reading of it before me like you!--but imagine how different it would have been if, instead of such a roof, we had only clouds, hanging always down, like the flies in a theatre, within a yard or two of our heads!" mercy was silent for a moment, then said, "it would be horribly wearisome." "it would indeed be wearisome! but how do you think it would affect your nature, your being?" mercy held the peace which is the ignorant man's wisdom. "we should have known nothing of astronomy," said christina. "true; and the worst would have been, that the soul would have had no astronomy--no notion of heavenly things." "there you leave me out again!" said mercy. "i mean," said ian, "that it would have had no sense of outstretching, endless space, no feeling of heights above, and depths beneath. the idea of space would not have come awake in it." "i understand!" said christina. "but i do not see that we should have been much the worse off. why should we have the idea of more than we want? so long as we have room, i do not see what space matters to us!" "ah, but when the soul wakes up, it needs all space for room! a limit of thousands of worlds will not content it. mere elbow-room will not do when the soul wakes up!" "then my soul is not waked up yet!" rejoined christina with a laugh. ian did not reply, and christina felt that he accepted the proposition, absurd as it seemed to herself. "but there is far more than that," he resumed. "what notion could you have had of majesty, if the heavens seemed scarce higher than the earth? what feeling of the grandeur of him we call god, of his illimitation in goodness? for space is the body to the idea of liberty. liberty is--god and the souls that love; these are the limitless room, the space, in which thoughts, the souls of things, have their being. if there were no holy mind, then no freedom, no spiritual space, therefore no thoughts; just as, if there were no space, there could be no things." ian saw that not even alister was following him, and changed his key. "look up," he said, "and tell me what you see.--what is the shape over us?" "it is a vault," replied christina. "a dome--is it not?" said mercy. "yes; a vault or a dome, recognizable at the moment mainly by its shining points. this dome we understand to be the complement or completing part of a correspondent dome on the other side of the world. it follows that we are in the heart of a hollow sphere of loveliest blue, spangled with light. now the sphere is the one perfect geometrical form. over and round us then we have the one perfect shape. i do not say it is put there for the purpose of representing god; i say it is there of necessity, because of its nature, and its nature is its relation to god. it is of god's thinking; and that half-sphere above men's heads, with influence endlessly beyond the reach of their consciousness, is the beginning of all revelation of him to men. they must begin with that. it is the simplest as well as most external likeness of him, while its relation to him goes so deep that it represents things in his very nature that nothing else could." "you bewilder me," said mercy. "i cannot follow you. i am not fit for such high things!" "i will go on; you will soon begin to see what i mean: i know what you are fit for better than you do yourself, miss mercy.--think then how it would be if this blue sky were plainly a solid. men of old believed it a succession of hollow spheres, one outside the other; it is hardly a wonder they should have had little gods. no matter how high the vault of the inclosing sphere; limited at all it could not declare the glory of god, it could only show his handiwork. in our day it is a sphere only to the eyes; it is a foreshortening of infinitude that it may enter our sight; there is no imagining of a limit to it; it is a sphere only in this, that in no one direction can we come nearer to its circumference than in another. this infinitive sphere, i say then, or, if you like it better, this spheric infinitude, is the only figure, image, emblem, symbol, fit to begin us to know god; it is an idea incomprehensible; we can only believe in it. in like manner god cannot by searching be found out, cannot be grasped by any mind, yet is ever before us, the one we can best know, the one we must know, the one we cannot help knowing; for his end in giving us being is that his humblest creature should at length possess himself, and be possessed by him." "i think i begin," said mercy--and said no more. "if it were not for the outside world," resumed ian, "we should have no inside world to understand things by. least of all could we understand god without these millions of sights and sounds and scents and motions, weaving their endless harmonies. they come out from his heart to let us know a little of what is in it!" alister had been listening hard. he could not originate such things, but he could understand them; and his delight in them proved them his own, although his brother had sunk the shaft that laid open their lode. "i never heard you put a thing better, ian!" he said. "you gentlemen," said mercy, "seem to have a place to think in that i don't know how to get into! could you not open your church-door a little wider to let me in? there must be room for more than two!" she was looking up at alister, not so much afraid of him; ian was to her hardly of this world. in her eyes alister saw something that seemed to reflect the starlight; but it might have been a luminous haze about the waking stars of her soul! "my brother has always been janitor to me," replied alister; "i do not know how to open any door. but here no door needs to be opened; you have just to step straight into the temple of nature, among all the good people worshipping." "there! that is what i was afraid of!" cried mercy: "you are pantheists!" "bless my soul, mercy!" exclaimed christina; "what do you mean?" "yes," answered ian. "if to believe that not a lily can grow, not a sparrow fall to the ground without our father, be pantheism, alister and i are pantheists. if by pantheism you mean anything that would not fit with that, we are not pantheists." "why should we trouble about religion more than is required of us!" interposed christina. "why indeed?" returned ian. "but then how much is required?" "you require far more than my father, and he is good enough for me!" "the master says we are to love god with all our hearts and souls and strength and mind." "that was in the old law, ian," said alister. "you are right. jesus only justified it--and did it." "how then can you worship in the temple of nature?" said mercy. "just as he did. it is nature's temple, mind, for the worship of god, not of herself!" "but how am i to get into it? that is what i want to know." "the innermost places of the temple are open only to such as already worship in a greater temple; but it has courts into which any honest soul may enter." "you wouldn't set me to study wordsworth?" "by no means." "i am glad of that--though there must be more in him than i see, or you couldn't care for him so much!" "some of nature's lessons you must learn before you can understand them." "can you call it learning a lesson if you do not understand it?" "yes--to a certain extent. did you learn at school to work the rule of three?" "yes; and i was rather fond of it." "did you understand it?" "i could work sums in it." "did you see how it was that setting the terms down so, and working out the rule, must give you a true answer. did you perceive that it was safe to buy or sell, to build a house, or lay out a garden, by the rule of three?" "i did not. i do not yet." "then one may so far learn a lesson without understanding it! all do, more or less, in dame nature's school. not a few lessons must be so learned in order to be better learned. without being so learned first, it is not possible to understand them; the scholar has not facts enough about the things to understand them. keats's youthful delight in nature was more intense even than wordsworth's, but he was only beginning to understand her when he died. shelley was much nearer understanding her than keats, but he was drowned before he did understand her. wordsworth was far before either of them. at the same time, presumptuous as it may appear, i believe there are regions to be traversed, beyond any point to which wordsworth leads us." "but how am i to begin? do tell me. nothing you say helps me in the least." "i have all the time been leading you toward the door at which you want to go in. it is not likely, however, that it will open to you at once. i doubt if it will open to you at all except through sorrow." "you are a most encouraging master!" said christina, with a light laugh. "it was wordsworth's bitter disappointment in the outcome of the french revolution," continued ian, "that opened the door to him. yet he had gone through the outer courts of the temple with more understanding than any who immediately preceded him.--will you let me ask you a question?" "you frighten me!" said mercy. "i am sorry for that. we will talk of something else." "i am not afraid of what you may ask me; i am frightened at what you tell me. i fear to go on if i must meet sorrow on the way!" "you make one think of some terrible secret society!" said christina. "tell me then, miss mercy, is there anything you love very much? i don't say any person, but any thing." "i love some animals." "an animal is not a thing. it is possible to love animals and not the nature of which we are speaking. you might love a dog dearly, and never care to see the sun rise!--tell me, did any flower ever make you cry? "no," answered mercy, with a puzzled laugh; "how could it?" "did any flower ever make you a moment later in going to bed, or a moment earlier in getting out of it?" "no, certainly!" "in that direction, then, i am foiled!" "you would not really have me cry over a flower, mr. ian? did ever a flower make you cry yourself? of course not! it is only silly women that cry for nothing!" "i would rather not bring myself in at present," answered ian smiling. "do you know how chaucer felt about flowers?" "i never read a word of chaucer." "shall i give you an instance?" "please." "chaucer was a man of the world, a courtier, more or less a man of affairs, employed by edward iii. in foreign business of state: you cannot mistake him for an effeminate or sentimental man! he does not anywhere, so far as i remember, say that ever he cried over a flower, but he shows a delight in some flowers so delicate and deep that it must have a source profounder than that of most people's tears. when we go back i will read you what he says about the daisy; but one more general passage i think i could repeat. there are animals in it too!" "pray let us hear it," said christina. he spoke the following stanzas--not quite correctly, but supplying for the moment's need where he could not recall:-- a gardein saw i, full of blosomed bowis, upon a river, in a grene mede, there as sweetnesse evermore inough is, with floures white, blewe, yelowe, and rede, and cold welle streames, nothing dede, that swommen full of smale fishes light, with finnes rede, and scales silver bright. on every bough the birdes heard i sing, with voice of angell, in hir armonie, that busied hem, hir birdes forth to bring, the little pretty conies to hir play gan hie, and further all about i gan espie, the dredeful roe, the buck, the hart, and hind, squirrels, and beastes small, of gentle kind. of instruments of stringes in accorde, heard i so play, a ravishing swetnesse, that god, that maker is of all and lorde, ne heard never better, as i gesse, therewith a wind, unneth it might be lesse, made in the leaves grene a noise soft, accordant to the foules song on loft. the aire of the place so attempre was, that never was ther grevance of hot ne cold, there was eke every noisome spice and gras, ne no man may there waxe sicke ne old, yet was there more joy o thousand fold, than i can tell or ever could or might, there is ever clere day, and never night. he modernized them also a little in repeating them, so that his hearers missed nothing through failing to understand the words: how much they gained, it were hard to say. "it reminds one," commented ian, "of dante's paradise on the top of the hill of purgatory." "i don't know anything about dante either," said mercy regretfully. "there is plenty of time!" said ian. "but there is so much to learn!" returned mercy in a hopeless tone. "that is the joy of existence!" ian replied. "we are not bound to know; we are only bound to learn.--but to return to my task: a man may really love a flower. in another poem chaucer tells us that such is his delight in his books that no other pleasure can take him from them-- save certainly, when that the month of may is comen, and that i heare the foules sing, and that the floures ginnen for to spring, farwell my booke, and my devotion! poor people love flowers; rich people admire them." "but," said mercy, "how can one love a thing that has no life?" ian could have told her that whatever grows must live; he could further have told her his belief that life cannot be without its measure of consciousness; but it would have led to more difficulty, and away from the end he had in view. he felt also that no imaginable degree of consciousness in it was commensurate with the love he had himself for almost any flower. his answer to mercy's question was this:-- "the flowers come from the same heart as man himself, and are sent to be his companions and ministers. there is something divinely magical, because profoundly human in them. in some at least the human is plain; we see a face of childlike peace and confidence that appeals to our best. our feeling for many of them doubtless owes something to childish associations; but how did they get their hold of our childhood? why did they enter our souls at all? they are joyous, inarticulate children, come with vague messages from the father of all. if i confess that what they say to me sometimes makes me weep, how can i call my feeling for them anything but love? the eternal thing may have a thousand forms of which we know nothing yet!" mercy felt ian must mean something she ought to like, if only she knew what it was; but he had not yet told her anything to help her! he had, however, neither reached his end nor lost his way; he was leading her on--gently and naturally. "i did not mean," he resumed, "that you must of necessity begin with the flowers. i was only inquiring whether at that point you were nearer to nature.--tell me--were you ever alone?" "alone!" repeated mercy, thinking. "--surely everybody has been many times alone!" "could you tell when last you were alone?" she thought, but could not tell. "what i want to ask you," said ian, "is--did you ever feel alone? did you ever for a moment inhabit loneliness? did it ever press itself upon you that there was nobody near--that if you called nobody would hear? you are not alone while you know that you can have a fellow creature with you the instant you choose." "i hardly think i was ever alone in that way." "then what i would have you do," continued ian, "is--to make yourself alone in one of nature's withdrawing-rooms, and seat yourself in one of grannie's own chairs.--i am coming to the point at last!--upon a day when the weather is fine, go out by yourself. tell no one where you are going, or that you are going anywhere. climb a hill. if you cannot get to the top of it, go high on the side of it. no book, mind! nothing to fill your thinking-place from another's! people are always saying 'i think,' when they are not thinking at all, when they are at best only passing the thoughts of others whom they do not even know. "when you have got quite alone, when you do not even know the nearest point to anybody, sit down and be lonely. look out on the loneliness, the wide world round you, and the great vault over you, with the lonely sun in the middle of it; fold your hands in your lap, and be still. do not try to think anything. do not try to call up any feeling or sentiment or sensation; just be still. by and by, it may be, you will begin to know something of nature. i do not know you well enough to be sure about it; but if you tell me afterwards how you fared, i shall then know you a little better, and perhaps be able to tell you whether nature will soon speak to you, or not until, as henry vaughan says, some veil be broken in you." they were approaching the cottage, and little more was said. they found mrs. palmer prepared to go, and mercy was not sorry: she had had enough for a while. she was troubled at the thought that perhaps she was helplessly shut out from the life inhabited by the brothers. when she lay down, her own life seemed dull and poor. these men, with all their kindness, respect, attention, and even attendance upon them, did not show them the homage which the men of their own circle paid them! "they will never miss us!" she said to herself. "they will go on with their pantheism, or whatever it is, all the same!" but they should not say she was one of those who talk but will not do! that scorn she could not bear! all the time, however, the thing seemed to savour more of spell or cast of magic than philosophy: the means enjoined were suggestive of a silent incantation! chapter xiii. granny angry. it must not be supposed that all the visiting was on the part of those of the new house. the visits thence were returned by both matron and men. but somehow there was never the same freedom in the house as in the cottage. the difference did not lie in the presence of the younger girls: they were well behaved, friendly, and nowise disagreeable children. doubtless there was something in the absence of books: it was of no use to jump up when a passage occurred; help was not at hand. but it was more the air of the place, the presence of so many common-place things, that clogged the wheels of thought. neither, with all her knowledge of the world and all her sweetness, did mrs. palmer understand the essentials of hospitality half so well as the widow of the late minister-chief. all of them liked, and confessed that they liked the cottage best. even christina felt something lacking in their reception. she regretted that the house was not grand enough to show what they were accustomed to. mrs. palmer seldom understood the talk, and although she sat looking persistently content, was always haunted with a dim feeling that her husband would not be hest pleased at so much intercourse between his rich daughters and those penniless country-fellows. but what could she do! the place where he had abandoned them was so dull, so solitary! the girls must not mope! christina would wither up without amusement, and then good-bye to her beauty and all that depended upon it! in the purity of her motherhood, she more than liked the young men: happy mother she would think herself, were her daughters to marry such men as these! the relations between them and their mother delighted her: they were one! their hearts were together! they understood each other! she could never have such bliss with her sons! never since she gave them birth had she had one such look from either of hers as she saw pass every now and then from these to their mother! it would be like being born again to feel herself loved in that way! for any danger to the girls, she thought with a sigh how soon in london they would forget the young highlanders. was there no possibility of securing one of them? what chance was there of mercy's marrying well! she was so decidedly plain! was the idea of marrying her into an old and once powerful family like that of the macruadh, to her husband inconceivable? could he not restore its property as the dowry of his unprized daughter! it would be to him but a trifle!--and he could stipulate that the chief should acknowledge the baronetcy and use his title! mercy would then be a woman of consequence, and peregrine would have the bible-honour of being the repairer of the breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in!--such were some of the thoughts that would come and go in the brain of the mother as she sat; nor were they without a share in her readiness to allow her daughters to go out with the young men: she had an unquestioning conviction of their safety with them. the days went by, and what to christina had seemed imprisonment, began to look like some sort of liberty. she had scarce come nearer to sympathy with those whose society consoled her, but their talk had ceased to sound repulsive. she was infinitely more than a well-modelled waxflower, and yet hardly a growing plant. more was needed to wake her than friends awake. it is wonderful how long the sleeping may go with the waking, and not discover any difference between them. but grannie nature was about to interfere. the spring drew gently on. it would be long ere summer was summer enough to show. there seemed more of the destructive in the spring itself than of the genial--cold winds, great showers, days of steady rain, sudden assaults of hail and sleet. still it was spring, and at length, one fine day with a bright sun, snow on the hills, and clouds in the east, but no sign of any sudden change, the girls went out for a walk, and took the younger girls with them. a little way up the valley, out of sight of the cottage, a small burn came down its own dell to join that which flowed through the chiefs farm. its channel was wide, but except in time of rain had little water in it. about half a mile up its course it divided, or rather the channel did, for in one of its branches there was seldom any water. at the fork was a low rocky mound, with an ancient ruin of no great size-three or four fragments of thick walls, within whose plan grew a slender birch-tree. thither went the little party, wandering up the stream: the valley was sheltered; no wind but the south could reach it; and the sun, though it could not make it very warm, as it looked only aslant on its slopes, yet lighted both sides of it. great white clouds passed slowly across the sky, with now and then a nearer black one threatening rain, but a wind overhead was carrying them quickly athwart. ian had seen the ladies pass, but made no effort to overtake them, although he was bound in the same direction: he preferred sauntering along with a book of ballads. suddenly his attention was roused by a peculiar whistle, which he knew for that of hector of the stags: it was one of the few sounds he could make. three times it was hurriedly repeated, and ere the third was over, ian had discovered hector high on a hill on the opposite side of the burn, waving his arms, and making eager signs to him. he stopped and set himself to understand. hector was pointing with energy, but it was impossible to determine the exact direction: all that ian could gather was, that his presence was wanted somewhere farther on. he resumed his walk therefore at a rapid pace, whereupon hector pointed higher. there on the eastern horizon, towards the north, almost down upon the hills, ian saw a congeries of clouds in strangest commotion, such as he had never before seen in any home latitude--a mass of darkly variegated vapours manifesting a peculiar and appalling unrest. it seemed tormented by a gyrating storm, twisting and contorting it with unceasing change. now the gray came writhing out, now the black came bulging through, now a dirty brown smeared the ashy white, and now the blue shone calmly out from eternal distances. at the season he could hardly think it a thunderstorm, and stood absorbed in the unusual phenomenon. but again, louder and more hurried, came the whistling, and again he saw hector gesticulating, more wildly than before. then he knew that someone must be in want of help or succour, and set off running as hard as he could: he saw hector keeping him in sight, and watching to give him further direction: perhaps the ladies had got into some difficulty! when he arrived at the opening of the valley just mentioned, hector's gesticulations made it quite plain it was up there he must go; and as soon as he entered it, he saw that the cloudy turmoil was among the hills at its head. with that he began to suspect the danger the hunter feared, and almost the same instant heard the merry voices of the children. running yet faster, he came in sight of them on the other side of the stream,--not a moment too soon. the valley was full of a dull roaring sound. he called to them as he ran, and the children saw and came running down toward him, followed by mercy. she was not looking much concerned, for she thought it only the grumbling of distant thunder. but ian saw, far up the valley, what looked like a low brown wall across it, and knew what it was. "mercy!" he cried, "run up the side of the hill directly; you will be drowned--swept away if you do not." she looked incredulous, and glanced up the hill-side, but carne on as if to cross the burn and join him. "do as i tell you," he cried, in a tone which few would have ventured to disregard, and turning darted across the channel toward her. mercy did not wait his coming, but took the children, each by a hand, and went a little way up the hill that immediately bordered the stream. "farther! farther!" cried ian as he ran. "where is christina?" "at the ruin," she answered. "good heavens!" exclaimed ian, and darted off, crying, "up the hill with you! up the hill!" christina was standing by the birch-tree in the ruin, looking down the burn. she had heard ian calling, and saw him running, but suspected no danger. "come; come directly; for god's sake, come!" he cried. "look up the burn!" he added, seeing her hesitate bewildered. she turned, looked, and came running to him, down the channel, white with terror. it was too late. the charging water, whose front rank was turf, and hushes, and stones, was almost upon her. the solid matter had retarded its rush, but it was now on the point of dividing against the rocky mound, to sweep along both sides, and turn it into an island. ian bounded to her in the middle of the channel, caught her by the arm, and hurried her back to the mound as fast as they could run: it was the highest ground immediately accessible. as they reached it, the water broke with a roar against its rocky base, rose, swelled--and in a moment the island was covered with a brown, seething, swirling flood. "where's mercy and the children?" gasped christina, as the water rose upon her. "safe, safe!" answered ian. "we must get to the ruin!" the water was halfway up his leg, and rising fast. their danger was but beginning. would the old walls, in greater part built without mortar, stand the rush? if a tree should strike them, they hardly would! if the flood came from a waterspout, it would soon be over--only how high it might first rise, who could tell! such were his thoughts as they struggled to the ruin, and stood up at the end of a wall parallel with the current. the water was up to christina's waist, and very cold. here out of the rush, however, she recovered her breath in a measure, and showed not a little courage. ian stood between her and the wall, and held her fast. the torrent came round the end of the wall from both sides, but the encounter and eddy of the two currents rather pushed them up against it. without it they could not have stood. the chief danger to christina, however, was from the cold. with the water so high on her body, and flowing so fast, she could not long resist it! ian, therefore, took her round the knees, and lifted her almost out of the water. "put your arms up," he said, "and lay hold of the wall. don't mind blinding me; my eyes are of little use at present. there--put your feet in my hands. don't be frightened; i can hold you." "i can't help being frightened!" she panted. "we are in god's arms," returned ian. "he is holding us." "are you sure we shall not be drowned?" she asked. "no; but i am sure the water cannot take us out of god's arms." this was not much comfort to christina. she did not know anything about god--did not believe in him any more than most people. she knew god's arms only as the arms of ian--and they comforted her, for she felt them! how many of us actually believe in any support we do not immediately feel? in any arms we do not see? but every help i from god; ian's help was god's help; and though to believe in ian was not to believe in god, it was a step on the road toward believing in god. he that believeth not in the good man whom he hath seen, how shall he believe in the god whom he hath not seen? she began to feel a little better; the ghastly choking at her heart was almost gone. "i shall break your arms!" she said. "you are not very heavy," he answered; "and though i am not so strong as alister, i am stronger than most men. with the help of the wall i can hold you a long time." how was it that, now first in danger, self came less to the front with her than usual? it was that now first she was face to face with reality. until this moment her life had been an affair of unrealities. her selfishness had thinned, as it were vaporized, every reality that approached her. solidity is not enough to teach some natures reality; they must hurt themselves against the solid ere they realize its solidity. small reality, small positivity of existence has water to a dreaming soul, half consciously gazing through half shut eyes at the soft river floating away in the moonlight: christina was shivering in its grasp on her person, its omnipresence to her skin; its cold made her gasp and choke; the push and tug of it threatened to sweep her away like a whelmed log! it is when we are most aware of the factitude of things, that we are most aware of our need of god, and most able to trust in him; when most aware of their presence, the soul finds it easiest to withdraw from them, and seek its safety with the maker of it and them. the recognition of inexorable reality in any shape, or kind, or way, tends to rouse the soul to the yet more real, to its relations with higher and deeper existence. it is not the hysterical alone for whom the great dash of cold water is good. all who dream life instead of living it, require some similar shock. of the kind is every disappointment, every reverse, every tragedy of life. the true in even the lowest kind, is of the truth, and to be compelled to feel even that, is to be driven a trifle nearer to the truth of being, of creation, of god. hence this sharp contact with nature tended to make christina less selfish: it made her forget herself so far as to care for her helper as well as herself. it must be remembered, however, that her selfishness was not the cultivated and ingrained selfishness of a long life, but that of an uneducated, that is undeveloped nature. her being had not degenerated by sinning against light known as light; it had not been consciously enlightened at all; it had scarcely as yet begun to grow. it was not lying dead, only unawaked. i would not be understood to imply that she was nowise to blame--but that she was by no means so much to blame as one who has but suspected the presence of a truth, and from selfishness or self-admiration has turned from it. she was to blame wherever she had not done as her conscience had feebly told her; and she had not made progress just because she had neglected the little things concerning which she had promptings. there are many who do not enter the kingdom of heaven just because they will not believe the tiny key that is handed them, fit to open its hospitable gate. "oh, mr. ian, if you should be drowned for my sake!" she faltered with white lips. "you should not have come to me!" "i would not wish a better death," said ian. "how can you talk so coolly about it!" she cried. "well," he returned, "what better way of going out of the world is there than by the door of help? no man cares much about what the idiots of the world call life! what is it whether we live in this room or another? the same who sent us here, sends for us out of here!" "most men care very much! you are wrong there!" "i don't call those who do, men! they are only children! i know many men who would no more cleave to this life than a butterfly would fold his wings and creep into his deserted chrysalis-case. i do care to live--tremendously, but i don't mind where. he who made this room so well worth living in, may surely be trusted with the next!" "i can't quite follow you," stammered christina. "i am sorry. perhaps it is the cold. i can't feel my hands, i am so cold." "leave the wall, and put your arms round my neck. the change will rest me, and the water is already falling! it will go as rapidly as it came!" "how do you know that?" "it has sunk nearly a foot in the last fifteen minutes: i have been carefully watching it, you may be sure! it must have been a waterspout, and however much that may bring, it pours it out all at once." "oh!" said christina, with a tremulous joyfulness; "i thought it would go on ever so long!" "we shall get out of it alive!--god's will be done!" "why do you say that? don't you really mean we are going to be saved?" "would you want to live, if he wanted you to die?" "oh, but you forget, mr. ian, i am not ready to die, like you!" sobbed christina. "do you think anything could make it better for you to stop here, after god thought it better for you to go?" "i dare not think about it." "be sure god will not take you away, if it be better for you to live here a little longer. but you will have to go sometime; and if you contrived to live after god wanted you to go, you would find yourself much less ready when the time came that you must. but, my dear miss palmer, no one can be living a true life, to whom dying is a terror." christina was silent. he spoke the truth! she was not worth anything! how grand it was to look death in the face with a smile! if she had been no more than the creature she had hitherto shown herself, not all the floods of the deluge could have made her think or feel thus: her real self, her divine nature had begun to wake. true, that nature was as yet no more like the divine, than the drowsy, arm-stretching, yawning child is like the merry elf about to spring from his couch, full of life, of play, of love. she had no faith in god yet, but it was much that she felt she was not worth anything. you are right: it was odd to hold such a conversation at such a time! but ian was an odd man. he actually believed that god was nearer to him than his own consciousness, yet desired communion with him! and that jesus christ knew what he said when he told his disciples that the father cared for his sparrows. only one human being witnessed their danger, and he could give no help. hector of the stags had crossed the main valley above where the torrent entered it, and coming over the hill, saw with consternation the flood-encompassed pair. if there had been help in man, he could have brought none; the raging torrent blocked the way both to the village and to the chief's house. he could only stand and gaze with his heart in his eyes. beyond the stream lay mercy on the hillside, with her face in the heather. frozen with dread, she dared not look up. had she moved but ten yards, she would have seen her sister in ian's arms. the children sat by her, white as death, with great lumps in their throats, and the silent tears rolling down their cheeks. it was the first time death had come near them. a sound of sweeping steps came through the heather. they looked up: there was the chief striding toward them. the flood had come upon him at work in his fields, whelming his growing crops. he had but time to unyoke his bulls, and run for his life. the bulls, not quite equal to the occasion, were caught and swept away. they were found a week after on the hills, nothing the worse, and nearly as wild as when first the chief took them in hand. the cottage was in no danger; and nancy got a horse and the last of the cows from the farm-yard on to the crest of the ridge, against which the burn rushed roaring, just as the water began to invade the cowhouse and stable. the moment he reached the ridge, the chief set out to look for his brother, whom he knew to be somewhere up the valley; and having climbed to get an outlook, saw mercy and the girls, from whose postures he dreaded that something had befallen them. the girls uttered a cry of welcome, and the chief answered, but mercy did not lift her head. "mercy," said alister softly, and kneeling laid his hand on her. she turned to him such a face of blank misery as filled him with consternation. "what has happened?" he asked. she tried to speak, but could not. "where is christina?" he went on. she succeeded in bringing out the one word "ruin." "is anybody with her?" "ian." "oh!" he returned cheerily, as if then all would be right. but a pang shot through his heart, and it was as much for himself as for mercy that he went on: "but god is with them, mercy. if he were not, it would be bad indeed! where he is, all is well!" she sat up, and putting out her hand, laid it in his great palm. "i wish i could believe that!" she said; "but you know people are drowned sometimes!" "yes, surely! but if god be with them what does it matter! it is no worse than when a mother puts her baby into a big bath." "it is cruel to talk like that to me when my sister is drowning!" she gave a stifled shriek, and threw herself again on her face. "mercy," said the chief--and his voice trembled a little, "you do not love your sister more than i love my brother, and if he be drowned i shall weep; but i shall not be miserable as if a mocking devil were at the root of it, and not one who loves them better than we ever shall. but come; i think we shall find them somehow alive yet! ian knows what to do in an emergency; and though you might not think it, he is a very strong man." she rose immediately, and taking like a child the hand he offered her, went up the hill with him. the girls ran before them, and presently gave a scream of joy. "i see chrissy! i see chrissy!" cried one. "yes! there she is! i see her too!" cried the other. alister hurried up with mercy. there was christina! she seemed standing on the water! mercy burst into tears. "but where's ian?" she said, when she had recovered herself a little; "i don't see him!" "he is there though, all right!" answered alister. "don't you see his hands holding her out of the water?" and with that he gave a great shout:-- "ian! ian! hold on, old boy! i'm coming!" ian heard him, and was filled with terror, but had neither breath nor strength to answer. along the hillside went alister bounding like a deer, then turning sharp, shot headlong down, dashed into the torrent--and was swept away like a cork. mercy gave a scream, and ran down the hill. he was not carried very far, however. in a moment or two he had recovered himself, and crept out gasping and laughing, just below mercy. ian did not move. he was so benumbed that to change his position an inch would, he well knew, be to fall. and now hector began to behave oddly. he threw a stone, which went in front of ian and christina. then he threw another, which went behind them. then he threw a third, and christina felt her hat caught by a bit of string. she drew it toward her as fast as numbness would permit, and found at the end a small bottle. she managed to get it uncorked, and put it to ian's lips. he swallowed a mouthful, and made her take some. hector stood on one side, the chief on the other, and watched the proceeding. "what would mother say, alister!" cried ian across the narrowing water. in the joy of hearing his voice, alister rushed again into the torrent; and, after a fierce struggle, reached the mound, where he scrambled up, and putting his arms round ian's legs with a shout, lifted the two at once like a couple of babies. "come! come, alister! don't be silly!" said ian. "set me down!" "give me the girl then." "take her!" christina turned on him a sorrowful gaze as alister took her. "i have killed you!" she said. "you have done me the greatest favour," he replied. "what?" she asked. "accepted help." she burst out crying. she had not shed a tear before. "get on the top of the wall, ian, out of the wet," said alister. "you can't tell what the water may have done to the foundations, alister! i would rather not break my leg! it is so frozen it would never mend again!" as they talked, the torrent had fallen so much, that hector of the stags came wading from the other side. a few minutes more, and alister carried christina to mercy. "now," he said, setting her down, "you must walk." ian could not cross without hector's help; he seemed to have no legs. they set out at once for the cottage. "how will your crops fare, alister?" asked ian. "part will be spoiled," replied the chief; "part not much the worse." the torrent had rushed half-way up the ridge, then swept along the flank of it, and round the end in huge bulk, to the level on the other side. the water lay soaking into the fields. the valley was desolated. what green things had not been uprooted or carried away with the soil, were laid flat. everywhere was mud, and scattered all over were lumps of turf, with heather, brushwood, and small trees. but it was early in the year, and there was hope! i will spare the description of the haste and hurrying to and fro in the little house--the blowing of fires, the steaming pails and blankets, the hot milk and tea! mrs. macruadh rolled up her sleeves, and worked like a good housemaid. nancy shot hither and thither on her bare feet like a fawn--you could not say she ran, and certainly she did not walk. alister got ian to bed, and rubbed him with rough towels--himself more wet than he, for he had been rolled over and over in the torrent. christina fell asleep, and slept many hours. when she woke, she said she was quite well; but it was weeks before she was like herself. i doubt if ever she was quite as strong again. for some days ian confessed to an aching in his legs and arms. it was the cold of the water, he said; but alister insisted it was from holding christina so long. "water could not hurt a highlander!" said alister. chapter xiv change. christina walked home without difficulty, but the next day did not leave her bed, and it was a fortnight before she was able to be out of doors. when ian and she met, her manner was not quite the same as before. she seemed a little timid. as she shook hands with him her eyes fell; and when they looked up again, as if ashamed of their involuntary retreat, her face was rosy; but the slight embarrassment disappeared as soon as they began to talk. no affectation or formality, however, took its place: in respect of ian her falseness was gone. the danger she had been in, and her deliverance through the voluntary sharing of it by ian, had awaked the simpler, the real nature of the girl, hitherto buried in impressions and their responses. she had lived but as a mirror meant only to reflect the outer world: something of an operative existence was at length beginning to appear in her. she was growing a woman. and the first stage in that growth is to become as a little child. the child, however, did not for some time show her face to any but ian. in his presence christina had no longer self-assertion or wile. without seeking his notice she would yet manifest an almost childish willingness to please him. it was no sudden change. she had, ever since their adventure, been haunted, both awake and asleep, by his presence, and it had helped her to some discoveries regarding herself. and the more she grew real, the nearer, that is, that she came to being a person, the more she came under the influence of his truth, his reality. it is only through live relation to others that any individuality crystallizes. "you saved my life, ian!" she said one evening for the tenth time. "it pleased god you should live," answered ian. "then you really think," she returned, "that god interfered to save us?" "no, i do not; i don't think he ever interferes." "mr. sercombe says everything goes by law, and god never interferes; my father says he does interfere sometimes." "would you say a woman interfered in the management of her own house? can one be said to interfere where he is always at work? he is the necessity of the universe, ever and always doing the best that can be done, and especially for the individual, for whose sake alone the cosmos exists. if we had been drowned, we should have given god thanks for saving us." "i do not understand you!" "should we not have given thanks to find ourselves lifted out of the cold rushing waters, in which we felt our strength slowly sinking?" "but you said drowned! how could we have thanked god for deliverance if we were drowned?" "what!--not when we found ourselves above the water, safe and well, and more alive than ever? would it not be a dreadful thing to lie tossed for centuries under the sea-waves to which the torrent had borne us? ah, how few believe in a life beyond, a larger life, more awake, more earnest, more joyous than this!" "oh, _i_ do! but that is not what one means by life; that is quite a different kind of thing!" "how do you make out that it is so different? if i am i, and you are you, how can it be very different? the root of things is individuality, unity of idea, and persistence depends on it. god is the one perfect individual; and while this world is his and that world is his, there can be no inconsistency, no violent difference, between there and here." "then you must thank god for everything--thank him if you are drowned, or burnt, or anything!" "now you understand me! that is precisely what i mean." "then i can never be good, for i could never bring myself to that!" "you cannot bring yourself to it; no one could. but we must come to it. i believe we shall all be brought to it." "never me! i should not wish it!" "you do not wish it; but you may be brought to wish it; and without it the end of your being cannot be reached. no one, of course, could ever give thanks for what he did not know or feel as good. but what is good must come to be felt good. can you suppose that jesus at any time could not thank his father for sending him into the world?" "you speak as if we and he were of the same kind!" "he and we are so entirely of the same kind, that there is no bliss for him or for you or for me but in being the loving obedient child of the one father." "you frighten me! if i cannot get to heaven any other way than that, i shall never get there." "you will get there, and you will get there that way and no other. if you could get there any other way, it would be to be miserable." "something tells me you speak the truth; but it is terrible! i do not like it." "naturally." she was on the point of crying. they were alone in the drawing-room of the cottage, but his mother might enter any moment, and ian said no more. it was not a drawing toward the things of peace that was at work in christina: it was an urging painful sense of separation from ian. she had been conscious of some antipathy even toward him, so unlike were her feelings, thoughts, judgments, to his: this feeling had changed to its opposite. a meeting with ian was now to christina the great event of day or week; but ian, in love with the dead, never thought of danger to either. one morning she woke from a sound and dreamless sleep, and getting out of bed, drew aside the curtains, looked out, and then opened her window. it was a lovely spring-morning. the birds were singing loud in the fast greening shrubbery. a soft wind was blowing. it came to her, and whispered something of which she understood only that it was both lovely and sad. the sun, but a little way up, was shining over hills and cone-shaped peaks, whose shadows, stretching eagerly westward, were yet ever shortening eastward. his light was gentle, warm, and humid, as if a little sorrowful, she thought, over his many dead children, that he must call forth so many more to the new life of the reviving year. suddenly as she gazed, the little clump of trees against the hillside stood as she had never seen it stand before--as if the sap in them were no longer colourless, but red with human life; nature was alive with a presence she had never seen before; it was instinct with a meaning, an intent, a soul; the mountains stood against the sky as if reaching upward, knowing something, waiting for something; over all was a glory. the change was far more wondrous than from winter to summer; it was not as if a dead body, but a dead soul had come alive. what could it mean? had the new aspect come forth to answer this glow in her heart, or was the glow in her heart the reflection of this new aspect of the world? she was ready to cry aloud, not with joy, not from her feeling of the beauty, but with a sensation almost, hitherto unknown, therefore nameless. it was a new and marvellous interest in the world, a new sense of life in herself, of life in everything, a recognition of brother-existence, a life-contact with the universe, a conscious flash of the divine in her soul, a throb of the pure joy of being. she was nearer god than she had ever been before. but she did not know this--might never in this world know it; she understood nothing of what was going on in her, only felt it go on; it was not love of god that was moving in her. yet she stood in her white dress like one risen from the grave, looking in sweet bliss on a new heaven and a new earth, made new by the new opening of her eyes. to save man or woman, the next thing to the love of god is the love of man or woman; only let no man or woman mistake the love of love for love! she started, grew white, stood straight up, grew red as a sunset:--was it--could it be?--"is this love?" she said to herself, and for minutes she hardly moved. it was love. whether love was in her or not, she was in love--and it might get inside her. she hid her face in her hands, and wept. with what opportunities i have had of studying, i do not say understanding, the human heart, i should not have expected such feeling from christina--and she wondered at it herself. till a child is awake, how tell his mood?--until a woman is awaked, how tell her nature? who knows himself?--and how then shall he know his neighbour? for who can know anything except on the supposition of its remaining the same? and the greatest change of all, next to being born again, is beginning to love. the very faculty of loving had been hitherto repressed in the soul of christina--by poor education, by low family and social influences, by familiarity with the worship of riches, by vanity, and consequent hunger after the attentions of men; but now at length she was in love. at breakfast, though she was silent, she looked so well that her mother complimented her on her loveliness. had she been more of a mother, she might have seen cause for anxiety in this fresh bourgeoning of her beauty. chapter xv. love allodial. while the chief went on in his humble way, enjoying life and his lowly position; seeming, in the society of his brother, to walk the outer courts of heaven; and, unsuspicious of the fact, growing more and more in love with the ill educated, but simple, open, and wise mercy, a trouble was gathering for him of which he had no presentiment. we have to be delivered from the evils of which we are unaware as well as from those we hate; and the chief had to be set free from his unconscious worship of mammon. he did not worship mammon by yielding homage to riches; he did not make a man's money his pedestal; had he been himself a millionaire, he would not have connived at being therefore held in honour; but, ever consciously aware of the deteriorating condition of the country, and pitifully regarding the hundred and fifty souls who yet looked to him as their head, often turning it over in his mind how to shepherd them should things come to a crisis, his abiding, ever-recurring comfort was the money from the last sale of the property, accumulating ever since, and now to be his in a very few years: he always thought, i say, first of this money and not first of god. he imagined it an inexhaustible force, a power with which for his clan he could work wonders. it is the common human mistake to think of money as a force and not as a mere tool. but he never thought of it otherwise than as belonging to the clan; never imagined the least liberty to use it save in the direct service of his people. and all the time, the very shadow of this money was disappearing from the face of the earth! it had scarcely been deposited where the old laird judged it as safe as in the bank of england, when schemes and speculations were initiated by the intrusted company which brought into jeopardy everything it held, and things had been going from bad to worse ever since. nothing of this was yet known, for the directors had from the first carefully muffled up the truth, avoiding the least economy lest it should be interpreted as hinting at any need of prudence; living in false show with the very money they were thus lying away, warming and banqueting their innocent neighbours with fuel and wine stolen from their own cellars; and working worse wrong and more misery under the robe of imputed righteousness, that is, respectability, than could a little army of burglars. unawares to a trusting multitude, the vacant eyes of loss were drawing near to stare them out of hope and comfort; and annihilation had long closed in upon the fund which the chief regarded as the sheet-anchor of his clan: he trusted in mammon, and mammon had played him one of his rogue's-tricks. the most degrading wrong to ourselves, and the worst eventual wrong to others, is to trust in any thing or person but the living god: it was an evil thing from which the chief had sore need to be delivered. even those who help us we must regard as the loving hands of the great heart of the universe, else we do god wrong, and will come to do them wrong also. and there was more yet of what we call mischief brewing in another quarter to like hurt. mr. peregrine palmer was not now so rich a man as when he bought his highland property; also he was involved in affairs of doubtful result. it was natural, therefore, that he should begin to think of the said property not merely as an ornament of life, but as something to fall back upon. he feared nothing, however, more unpleasant than a temporary embarrassment. had not his family been in the front for three generations! had he not a vested right in success! had he not a claim for the desire of his heart on whatever power it was that he pictured to himself as throned in the heavens! it never came into his head that, seeing there were now daughters in the family, it might be worth the while of that power to make a poor man of him for their sakes; or that neither he, his predecessors, nor his sons, had ever come near enough to anything human to be fit for having their pleasures taken from them. but what i have to do with is the new aspect his scotch acres now put on: he must see to making the best of them! and that best would be a deer-forest! he and his next neighbour might together effect something worth doing! therefore all crofters or villagers likely to trespass must be got rid of--and first and foremost the shepherds, for they had endless opportunities of helping themselves to a deer. where there were sheep there must be shepherds: they would make a clearance of both! the neighbour referred to, a certain mr. brander, who had made his money by sharp dealing in connection with a great russian railway, and whom mr. peregrine palmer knew before in london, had enlightened him on many things, and amongst others on the shepherds' passion for deer-stalking. being in the company of the deer, he said, the whole day, and the whole year through, they were thoroughly acquainted with their habits, and were altogether too much both for the deer and for their owners. a shepherd would take the barrel of his gun from the stock, and thrust it down his back, or put it in a hollow crook, and so convey it to the vicinity of some spot frequented by a particular animal, to lie hidden there for his opportunity. in the hills it was impossible to tell with certainty whence came the sound of a shot; and no rascal of them would give information concerning another! in short, there was no protecting the deer without uprooting and expelling the peasantry! the village of the clanruadh was on mr. brander's land, and was dependent in part on the produce of small pieces of ground, the cultivators of which were mostly men with other employment as well. some made shoes of the hides, others cloth and clothes of the wool of the country. some were hinds on neighbouring farms, but most were shepherds, for there was now very little tillage. almost all the land formerly cultivated had been given up to grass and sheep, and not a little of it was steadily returning to that state of nature from which it had been reclaimed, producing heather, ling, blueberries, cnowperts, and cranberries. the hamlet was too far from the sea for much fishing, but some of its inhabitants would join relatives on the coast and go fishing with them, when there was nothing else to be done. but many of those who looked to the sea for help had lately come through a hard time, in which they would have died but for the sea-weed and shellfish the shore afforded them; yet such was their spirit of independence that a commission appointed to inquire into their necessity, found scarcely one willing to acknowledge any want: such was the class of men and women now doomed, at the will of two common-minded, greedy men, to expulsion from the houses and land they had held for generations, and loved with a love unintelligible to their mean-souled oppressors. ian, having himself learned the lesson that, so long as a man is dependent on anything earthly, he is not a free man, was very desirous to have his brother free also. he could not be satisfied to leave the matter where, on their way home that night from the tomb, as they called their cave-house, their talk had left it. alister's love of the material world, of the soil of his ancestral acres, was, ian plainly saw, not yet one with the meaning and will of god: he was not yet content that the home of his fathers should fare as the father of fathers pleased. he was therefore on the outlook for the right opportunity of having another talk with him on the subject. that those who are trying to be good are more continuously troubled than the indifferent, has for ages been a puzzle. "i saw the wicked spreading like a green bay tree," says king david; and he was far from having fathomed the mystery when he got his mind at rest about it. is it not simply that the righteous are worth troubling? that they are capable of receiving good from being troubled? as a man advances, more and more is required of him. a wrong thing in the good man becomes more and more wrong as he draws nearer to freedom from it. his friends may say how seldom he offends; but every time he offends, he is the more to blame. some are allowed to go on because it would be of no use to stop them yet; nothing would yet make them listen to wisdom. there must be many who, like dives, need the bitter contrast between the good things of this life and the evil things of the next, to wake them up. in this life they are not only fools, and insist on being treated as fools, but would have god consent to treat them as if he too had no wisdom! the laird was one in whom was no guile, but he was far from perfect: any man is far from perfect whose sense of well-being could be altered by any change of circumstance. a man unable to do without this thing or that, is not yet in sight of his perfection, therefore not out of sight of suffering. they who do not know suffering, may well doubt if they have yet started on the way to be. if clouds were gathering to burst in fierce hail on the head of the chief, it was that he might be set free from yet another of the cords that bound him. he was like a soaring eagle from whose foot hung, trailing on the earth, the line by which his tyrant could at his will pull him back to his inglorious perch. to worship truly is to treat according to indwelling worth. the highest worship of nature is to worship toward it, as david and daniel worshipped toward the holy place. but even the worship of nature herself might be an ennobling idolatry, so much is the divine present in her. there is an intense, almost sensuous love of nature, such as the chief confessed to his brother, which is not only one with love to the soul of nature, but tends to lift the soul of man up to the lord of nature. to love the soul of nature, however, does not secure a man from loving the body of nature in the low mammon-way of possession. a man who loves the earth even as the meek love it, may also love it in a way hostile to such possession of it as is theirs. the love of possessing as property, must, unchecked, come in time to annihilate in a man the inheritance of the meek. a few acres of good valley-land, with a small upland pasturage, and a space of barren hill-country, had developed in the chief a greater love of the land as a possession than would have come of entrance upon an undiminished inheritance. he clave to the ground remaining to him, as to the last remnant of a vanishing good. one day the brothers were lying on the westward slope of the ridge, in front of the cottage. a few sheep, small, active, black-faced, were feeding around them: it was no use running away, for the chief's colley was lying beside him! the laird every now and then buried his face in the short sweet mountain-grass-like that of the clowns in england, not like the rich sown grass on the cultivated bank of the burn. "i believe i love the grass," he said, "as much, ian, as your chaucer loved the daisy!" "hardly so much, i should think!" returned ian. "why do you think so?" "i doubt if grass can be loved so much as a flower." "why not?" "because the one is a mass, the other an individual." "i understand." "i have a fear, alister, that you are in danger of avarice," said ian, after a pause. "avarice, ian! what can you mean?" "you are as free, alister, from the love of money, as any man i ever knew, but that is not enough. did you ever think of the origin of the word avarice?" "no." "it comes--at least it seems to me to come--from the same root as the verb have. it is the desire to call things ours--the desire of company which is not of our kind--company such as, if small enough, you would put in your pocket and carry about with you. we call the holding in the hand, or the house, or the pocket, or the power, having; but things so held cannot really be had; having is but an illusion in regard to things. it is only what we can be with that we can really possess--that is, what is of our kind, from god to the lowest animal partaking of humanity. a love can never be lost; it is a possession; but who can take his diamond ring into the somewhere beyond?--it is not a possession. god only can be ours perfectly; nothing called property can be ours at all." "i know it--with my head at least," said alister; "but i am not sure how you apply it to me." "you love your country--don't you, alister?" "i do." "what do you mean by loving your country?" "it is hard to say all at once. the first thing that comes to me is, that i would rather live in it than in any other." "would you care to vaunt your country at the expense of any other?" "not if it did not plainly excel--and even then it might be neither modest nor polite!" "would you feel bound to love a man more because he was a fellow-countryman?" "other things being equal, i could not help it." "other things not being equal,--?" "i should love the best man best--scotsman or negro." "that is as i thought of you. for my part, my love for my own people has taught me to love every man, be his colour or country what it may. the man whose patriotism is not leading him in that direction has not yet begun to be a true patriot. let him go to st. paul and learn, or stay in his own cellar and be an idiot.--but now, from loving our country, let us go down the other way:--do you love the highlands or the lowlands best? you love the highlands, of course, you say. and what district do you like best? our own. what parish? your father's. what part of the parish? why this, where at this moment we are lying. now let me ask, have you, by your love for this piece of the world, which you will allow me to call ours, learned to love the whole world in like fashion?" "i cannot say so. i do not think we can love the whole world in the same way as our own part of it--the part where we were born and bred! it is a portion of our very being." "if your love to what we call our own land is a love that cannot spread, it seems to me of a questionable kind--of a kind involving the false notion of having? the love that is eternal is alone true, and that is the love of the essential, which is the universal. we love indeed individuals, even to their peculiarities, but only because of what lies under and is the life of them--what they share with every other, the eternal god-born humanity which is the person. without this humanity where were your friend? mind, i mean no abstraction, but the live individual humanity. do you see what i am driving at? i would extend my love of the world to all the worlds; my love of humanity to all that inhabit them. i want, from being a scotsman, to be a briton, then a european, then a cosmopolitan, then a dweller of the universe, a lover of all the worlds i see, and shall one day know. in the face of such a hope, i find my love for this ground of my father's--not indeed less than before, but very small. it has served its purpose in having begun in me love of the revelation of god. wherever i see the beauty of the lord, that shall be to me his holy temple. our lord was sent first to the lost sheep of the house of israel:-how would you bear to be told that he loved them more than africans or scotsmen?" "i could not bear it." "then, alister, do you not see that the love of our mother earth is meant to be but a beginning; and that such love as yours for the land belongs to that love of things which must perish? you seem to me not to allow it to blossom, but to keep it a hard bud; and a bud that will not blossom is a coffin. a flower is a completed idea, a thought of god, a creature whose body is most perishable, bat whose soul, its idea, cannot die. with the idea of it in you, the withering of the flower you can bear. the god in it is yours always. every spring you welcome the daisy anew; every time the primrose departs, it grows more dear by its death. i say there must be a better way of loving the ground on which we were born, than that whence the loss of it would cause us torture." alister listened as to a prophecy of evil. "rather than that cottage and those fields should pass into the hands of others," he said, almost fiercely, "i would see them sunk in a roaring tide!" ian rose, and walked slowly away. alister lay clutching the ground with his hands. for a passing moment ian felt as if he had lost him. "lord, save him from this demon-love," he said, and sat down among the pines. in a few minutes, alister came to him. "you cannot mean, ian," he said-and his face was white through all its brown, "that i am to think no more of the fields of my fathers than of any other ground on the face of the earth!" "think of them as the ground god gave to our fathers, which god may see fit to take from us again, and i shall be content--for the present," answered ian. "do not be vexed with me," cried alister. "i want to think as well as do what is right; but you cannot know how i feel or you would spare me. i love the very stones and clods of the land! the place is to me as jerusalem to the jews:--you know what the psalm says:-- thy saints take pleasure in her stones, her very dust to them is dear!" "they loved their land as theirs," said ian, "and have lost it!" "i know i must be cast out of it! i know i must die and go from it; but i shall come back and wander about the fields and the hills with you and our father and mother!" "and how about horse and dog?" asked ian, willing to divert his thoughts for a moment. "well! daoimean and luath are so good that i don't see why i should not have them!" "no more do i!" responded ian. "we may be sure god will either let you have them, or show you reason to content you for not having them. no love of any thing is to be put in the same thought-pocket with love for the poorest creature that has life. but i am sometimes not a little afraid lest your love for the soil get right in to your soul. we are here but pilgrims and strangers. god did not make the world to be dwelt in, but to be journeyed through. we must not love it as he did not mean we should. if we do, he may have great trouble and we much hurt ere we are set free from that love. alister, would you willingly walk out of the house to follow him up and down for ever?" "i don't know about willingly," replied alister, "but if i were sure it was he calling me, i am sure i would walk out and follow him." "what if your love of house and lands prevented you from being sure, when he called you, that it was he?" "that would be terrible! but he would not leave me so. he would not forsake me in my ignorance!" "no. having to take you from everything, he would take everything from you!" alister went into the house. he did not know how much of the worldly mingled with the true in him. he loved his people, and was unselfishly intent on helping them to the utmost; but the thought that he was their chief was no small satisfaction to him; and if the relation between them was a grand one, self had there the more soil wherein to spread its creeping choke-grass roots. in like manner, his love of nature nourished the parasite possession. he had but those bare hill-sides, and those few rich acres, yet when, from his eyry on the hill-top, he looked down among the valleys, his heart would murmur within him, "from my feet the brook flows gurgling to water my fields! the wild moors around me feed my sheep! yon glen is full of my people!" even with the pure smell of the earth, mingled the sense of its possession. when, stepping from his cave-house, he saw the sun rise on the outstretched grandeur of the mountain-world, and felt the earth a new creation as truly as when adam first opened his eyes on its glory, his heart would give one little heave more at the thought that a portion of it was his own. but all is man's only because it is god's. the true possession of anything is to see and feel in it what god made it for; and the uplifting of the soul by that knowledge, is the joy of true having. the lord had no land of his own. he did not care to have it, any more than the twelve legions of angels he would not pray for: his pupils must not care for things he did not care for. he had no place to lay his head in-had not even a grave of his own. for want of a boat he had once to walk the rough galilean sea. true, he might have gone with the rest, but he had to stop behind to pray: he could not do without that. once he sent a fish to fetch him money, but only to pay a tax. he had even to borrow the few loaves and little fishes from a boy, to feed his five thousand with. the half-hour which alister spent in the silence of his chamber, served him well: a ray as of light polarized entered his soul in its gloom. he returned to ian, who had been all the time walking up and down the ridge. "you are right, ian!" he said. "i do love the world! if i were deprived of what i hold, i should doubt god! i fear, oh, i fear, ian, he is going to take the land from me!" "we must never fear the will of god, alister! we are not right until we can pray heartily, not say submissively, 'thy will be done!' we have not one interest, and god another. when we wish what he does not wish, we are not more against him than against our real selves. we are traitors to the human when we think anything but the will of god desirable, when we fear our very life." it was getting toward summer, and the days were growing longer. "let us spend a night in the tomb!" said ian; and they fixed a day in the following week. chapter xvi. mercy calls on grannie. although the subject did not again come up, mercy had not forgotten what ian had said about listening for the word of nature, and had resolved to get away the first time she could, and see whether grannie, as ian had called her, would have anything to do with her. it were hard to say what she expected--something half magical rather than anything quite natural. the notions people have of spiritual influence are so unlike the facts, that, when it begins they never recognize it, but imagine something common at work. when the lord came, those who were looking for him did not know him:--was he not a man like themselves! did they not know his father and mother! it was a fine spring morning when mercy left the house to seek an interview with nature somewhere among the hills. she took a path she knew well, and then struck into a sheep-track she had never tried. up and up she climbed, nor spent a thought on the sudden changes to which at that season, and amongst those hills, the weather is subject. with no anxiety as to how she might fare, she was yet already not without some awe: she was at length on her pilgrimage to the temple of isis! not until she was beyond sight of any house, did she begin to feel alone. it was a new sensation, and of a mingled sort. but the slight sense of anxiety and fear that made part of it, was soon overpowered by something not unlike the exhilaration of a child escaped from school. this grew and grew until she felt like a wild thing that had been caught, and had broken loose. now first, almost, she seemed to have begun to live, for now first was she free! she might lie in the heather, walk in the stream, do as she pleased! no one would interfere with her, no one say don't! she felt stronger and fresher than ever in her life; and the farther she went, the greater grew the pleasure. the little burn up whose banks, now the one and now the other, she was walking, kept on welcoming her unaccustomed feet to the realms of solitude and liberty. for ever it seemed coming to meet her, hasting, running steep, as if straight out of the heaven to which she was drawing nearer and nearer. the wind woke now and then, and blew on her for a moment, as if tasting her, to see what this young psyche was that had floated up into the wild thin air of the hills. the incessant meeting of the brook made it a companion to her although it could not go her way, and was always leaving her. but it kept her from the utter loneliness she sought; for loneliness is imperfect while sound is by, especially a sing-sound, and the brook was one of nature's self--playing song--instruments. but she came at length to a point where the ground was too rough to let her follow its path any more, and turning from it, she began to climb a steep ridge. the growing and deepening silence as she went farther and farther from the brook, promised the very place for her purpose on the top of the heathery ridge. but when she reached it and looked behind her, lo, the valley she had left lay at her very feet! the world had rushed after and caught her! she had not got away from it! it was like being enchanted! she thought she was leaving it far behind, but the nature she sought to escape that she might find nature, would not let her go! it kept following her as if to see that she fell into no snare, neither was too sternly received by the loftier spaces. she could distinguish one of the laird's men, ploughing in the valley below: she knew him by his red waistcoat! almost fiercely she turned and made for the next ridge: it would screen her from the world she had left; it should not spy upon her! the danger of losing her way back never suggested itself. she had not learned that the look of things as you go, is not their look when you turn to go back; that with your attitude their mood will have altered. nature is like a lobster-pot: she lets you easily go on, but not easily return. when she gained the summit of the second ridge, she looked abroad on a country of which she knew nothing. it was like the face of an utter stranger. not far beyond rose yet another ridge: she must see how the world looked from that! on and on she went, crossing ridge after ridge, but no place invited her to stay and be still. she found she was weary, and spying in the midst of some short heather a great stone, sat down, and gave herself up to the rest that stole upon her. though the sun was warm, the air was keen, and, hot with climbing, she turned her face to it, and drank in its refreshing with delight. she looked around; not a trace of humanity was visible-nothing but brown and gray and green hills, with the clear sky over her head, and in the north a black cloud creeping up from the horizon. another sense than that of rest awoke in her; now first in her life the sense of loneliness absolute began to possess her. and therewith suddenly descended upon her a farther something she had never known; it was as if the loneliness, or what is the same thing, the presence of her own being without another to qualify and make it reasonable and endurable, seized and held her. the silence gathered substance, grew as it were solid, and closing upon her, imprisoned her. was it not rather that the soul of nature, unprevented, unthwarted by distracting influences, found a freer entrance to hers, but she, not yet in harmony with it, felt its contact as alien-as bondage therefore and not liberty? she was nearer than ever she had been to knowing the presence of the god who is always nearer to us than aught else. yea, something seemed, through the very persistence of its silence, to say to her at last, and keep saying, "here i am!" she looked behind her in sudden terror: form was there. she sent out her gaze to the horizon: the huge waves of the solid earth stood up against the sky, sinking so slowly she could not see them sink: they stood mouldering away, biding their time. they were of those "who only stand and wait," fulfilling the will of him who set them to crumble till the hour of the new heavens and the new earth arrive. there was no visible life between her and the great silent mouldering hills. on her right hand lay a blue segment of the ever restless sea, but so far that its commotion seemed a yet deeper rest than that of the immovable hills. she sat and sat, but nothing came, nothing seemed coming to her. the hope ian had given her was not to be fulfilled! for here there was no revelation! she was not of the kind nature could speak to! she began to grow uncomfortable--to feel as if she had done something wrong--as if she was a child put into the corner--a corner of the great universe, to learn to be sorry for something. certainly something was wrong with her-but what? why did she feel so uncomfortable? was she so silly as mind being alone? there was nothing in these mountains that would hurt her! the red deer were sometimes dangerous, but none were even within sight! yet something like fear was growing in her! why should she be afraid? everything about her certainly did look strange, as if she had nothing to do with it, and it had nothing to do with her; but that was all! ian macruadh must be wrong! how could there be any such bond as he said between nature and the human heart, when the first thing she felt when alone with her, was fear! the world was staring at her! she was the centre of a fixed, stony regard from all sides! the earth, and the sea, and the sky, were watching her! she did not like it! she would rise and shake off the fancy! but she did not rise; something held her to her thinking. just so she would, when a child in the dark, stand afraid to move lest the fear itself, lying in wait like a tigress, should at her first motion pounce upon her. the terrible, persistent silence!--would nothing break it! and there was in herself a response to it--something that was in league with it, and kept telling her that things were not all right with her; that she ought not to be afraid, yet had good reason for being afraid; that she knew of no essential safety. there must be some refuge, some impregnable hiding-place, for the thing was a necessity, and she ought to know of it! there must be a human condition of never being afraid, of knowing nothing to be afraid of! she wondered whether, if she were quite good, went to church twice every sunday, and read her bible every morning, she would come not to be afraid of-she did not know what. it would be grand to have no fear of person or thing! she was sometimes afraid of her own father, even when she knew no reason! how that mountain with the horn kept staring at her! it was all nonsense! she was silly! she would get up and go home: it must be time! but things were not as they should be! something was required of her! was it god wanting her to do something? she had never thought whether he required anything of her! she must be a better girl! then she would have god with her, and not be afraid! and all the time it was god near her that was making her unhappy. for, as the son of man came not to send peace on the earth but a sword, so the first visit of god to the human soul is generally in a cloud of fear and doubt, rising from the soul itself at his approach. the sun is the cloud-dispeller, yet often he must look through a fog if he would visit the earth at all. the child, not being a son, does not know his father. he may know he is what is called a father; what the word means he does not know. how then should he understand when the father comes to deliver him from his paltry self, and give him life indeed! she tried to pray. she said, "oh g--od! forgive me, and make me good. i want to be good!" then she rose. she went some little way without thinking where she was going, and then found she did not even know from what direction she had come. a sharp new fear, quite different from the former, now shot through her heart: she was lost! she had told no one she was going anywhere! no one would have a notion where to look for her! she had been beginning to feel hungry, but fear drove hunger away. all she knew was that she must not stay there. here was nowhere; walking on she might come somewhere--that is, among human beings! so out she set on her weary travel from no-where to somewhere, giving nature little thanks. she did not suspect that her grandmother had been doing anything for her by the space around her, or that now, by the tracklessness, the lostness, she was doing yet more. on and on she walked, climbing the one hillside and descending the other, going she knew not whither, hardly hoping she drew one step nearer home. all at once her strength went from her. she sat down and cried. but with her tears came the thought how the chief and his brother talked of god. she remembered she had heard in church that men ought to cry to god in their troubles. broken verses of a certain psalm came to her, saying god delivered those who cried to him even from things they had brought on themselves, and she had been doing nothing wrong! she tried to trust in him, but could not: he was as far from her as the blue heavens! true, it bent over all, but its one great eye was much too large to see the trouble she was in! what did it matter to the blue sky if she fell down and withered up to bones and dust! she well might-for here no foot of man might pass till she was a thing terrible to look at! if there was nobody where seemed to be nothing, how fearfully empty was the universe! ah, if she had god for her friend! what if he was her friend, and she had not known it because she never spoke to him, never asked him to do anything for her? it was horrible to think it could be a mere chance whether she got home, or died there! she would pray to god! she would ask him to take her home! a wintery blast came from the north. the black cloud had risen, and was now spreading over the zenith. again the wind came with an angry burst and snarl. snow carne swept upon it in hard sharp little pellets. she started up, and forgot to pray. some sound in the wind or some hidden motion of memory all at once let loose upon her another fear, which straight was agony. a rumour had reached the new house the night before, that a leopard had broken from a caravan, and got away to the hills. it was but a rumour; some did not believe it, and the owners contradicted it, but a party had set out with guns and dogs. it was true! it was true! there was the terrible creature crouching behind that stone! he was in every clump of heather she passed, swinging his tail, and ready to spring upon her! he must be hungry by this time, and there was nothing there for him to eat but her! by and by, however, she was too cold to be afraid, too cold to think, and presently, half-frozen and faint for lack of food, was scarce able to go a step farther. she saw a great rock, sank down in the shelter of it, and in a minute was asleep. she slept for some time, and woke a little refreshed. the wonder is that she woke at all. it was dark, and her first consciousness was ghastly fear. the wind had ceased, and the storm was over. little snow had fallen. the stars were all out overhead, and the great night was round her, enclosing, watching her. she tried to rise, and could just move her limbs. had she fallen asleep again, she would not have lived through the night. but it is idle to talk of what would have been; nothing could have been but what was. mercy wondered afterwards that she did not lose her reason. she must, she thought, have been trusting somehow in god. it was terribly dreary. sure never one sorer needed god's help! and what better reason could there be for helping her than that she so sorely needed it! perhaps god had let her walk into this trouble that she might learn she could not do without him! she--would try to be good! how terrible was the world, with such wide spaces and nobody in them! and all the time, though she did not know it, she was sobbing and weeping. the black silence was torn asunder by the report of a gun. she started up with a strange mingling of hope and terror, gave a loud cry, and sank senseless. the leopard would be upon her! her cry was her deliverance. chapter xvii. in the tomb. the brothers had that same morning paid their visit to the tomb, and there spent the day after their usual fashion, intending to go home the same night, and as the old moon was very late in rising, to take the earlier and rougher part of the way in the twilight. just as they were setting out, however, what they rightly judged a passing storm came on, and they delayed their departure. by the time the storm was over, it was dark, and there was no use in hurrying; they might as well stop a while, and have the moon the latter part of the way. when at length they were again on the point of starting, they thought they heard something like sounds of distress, but the darkness making search difficult and unsatisfactory, the chief thought of firing his gun, when mercy's cry guided them to where she lay. alister's heart, at sight of her, and at the thought of what she must have gone through, nearly stood still. they carried her in, laid her on the bed, and did what they could to restore her, till she began to come to herself. then they left her, that she might not see them without preparation, and sat down by the fire in the outer room, leaving the door open between the two. "i see how it is!" said alister. "you remember, ian, what you said to her about giving nature an opportunity of exerting her influence? mercy has been following your advice, and has lost her way among the hills!" "that was so long ago!" returned ian thoughtfully. "yes-when the weather was not fit for it. it is not fit now, but she has ventured!" "i believe you are right! i thought there was some reality in her!-but she must not hear us talking about her!" when mercy came to herself, she thought at first that she lay where she had fallen, but presently perceived that she was covered, and had something hot at her feet: was she in her own bed? was it all a terrible dream, that she might know what it was to be lost, and think of god? .she put out her arm: her hand went against cold stone. the dread thought rushed in-that she was buried-was lying in her grave-to lie there till the trumpet should sound, and the dead be raised. she was not horrified; her first feeling was gladness that she had prayed before she died. she had been taught at church that an hour might come when it would be of no use to pray-the hour of an unbelieving death: it was of no use to pray now, but her prayer before she died might be of some avail! she wondered that she was not more frightened, for in sooth it was a dreary prospect before her: long and countless years must pass ere again she heard the sound of voices, again saw the light of the sun! she was half awake and half dreaming; the faintness of her swoon yet upon her, the repose following her great weariness, and the lightness of her brain from want of food, made her indifferent-almost happy. she could lie so a long time, she thought. at length she began to hear sounds, and they were of human voices. she had companions then in the grave! she was not doomed to a solitary waiting for judgment! she must be in some family-vault, among strangers. she hoped they were nice people: it was very desirable to be buried with nice people! then she saw a reddish light. it was a fire--far off! was she in the bad place? were those shapes two demons, waiting till she had got over her dying? she listened:--"that will divide her between us," said one. "yes," answered the other; "there will be no occasion to cut it!" what dreadful thing could they mean? but surely she had heard their voices before! she tried to speak, but could not. "we must come again soon!" said one. "at this rate it will take a life-time to carve the tomb." "if we were but at the roof of it!" said the other. "i long to tackle the great serpent of eternity, and lay him twining and coiling and undulating all over it! i dream about those tombs before ever they were broken into-royally furnished in the dark, waiting for the souls to come back to their old, brown, dried up bodies!" here one of them rose and came toward her, growing bigger and blacker as he came, until he stood by the bedside. he laid his hand on her wrist, and felt her pulse. it was ian! she could not see his face for there was no light on it, but she knew his shape, his movements! she was saved! he saw her wide eyes, two great spiritual nights, gazing up at him. "all, you are better, miss mercy!" lie said cheerily. "now you shall have some tea!" something inside her was weeping for joy, but her outer self was quite still. she tried again to speak, and uttered a few inarticulate sounds. then came alister on tip-toe, and they stood both by the bedside, looking down on her. "i shall be all right presently!"' she managed at length to say. "i am so glad i'm not dead! i thought i was dead!" "you would soon have been if we had not found you!" replied alister. "was it you that fired the gun?" "yes." "i was so frightened!" "it saved your life, thank god! for then you cried out." "fright was your door out of fear!" said ian. "i thought it was the leopard!" "i did bring my gun because of the leopard," said alister. "it was true about him then?" "he is out." "and now it is quite dark!" "it doesn't signify; we'll take a lantern; i've got my gun, and ian has his dirk!" "where are you going then?" asked mercy, still confused. "home, of course." "oh, yes, of course! i will get up in a minute." "there is plenty of time," said ian. "you must eat something before you get up. we, have nothing but oat-cakes, i am sorry to say!" "i think you promised me some tea!" said mercy. "i don't feel hungry." "you shall have the tea. when did you eat last?" "not since breakfast." "it is a marvel you are able to speak! you must try to eat some oat-cake." "i wish i hadn't taken that last slice of deer-ham!" said alister, ruefully. "i will eat if i can," said mercy. they brought her a cup of tea and some pieces of oat-cake; then, having lighted her a candle, they left her, and closed the door. she sipped her tea, managed to eat a little of the dry but wholesome food, and found herself capable of getting up. it was the strangest bedroom! she thought. everything was cut out of the live rock. the dressing-table might have been a sarcophagus! she kneeled by the bedside, and tried to thank god. then she opened the door. the chief rose at the sound of it. "i'm sorry," he said, "that we have no woman to wait on you." "i want nothing, thank you!" answered mercy, feeling very weak and ready to cry, but restraining her tears. "what a curious house this is!" "it is a sort of doll's house my brother and i have been at work upon for nearly fifteen years. we meant, when summer was come, to ask you all to spend a day with us up here." "when first we went to work on it," said ian, "we used to tell each other tales in which it bore a large share, and alister's were generally about a lost princess taking refuge in it!" "and now it is come true!" said alister. "what an escape i have had!" "i do not like to hear you say that!" returned ian. "you have been taken care of all the time. if you had died in the cold, it would not have been because god had forgotten you; you would not have been lost." "i wanted to know," said mercy, "whether nature would speak to me. it was of no use! she never came near me!" "i think she must have come without your knowing her," answered ian. "but we shall have a talk about that afterwards, when you are quite rested; we must prepare for home now." mercy's heart sank within her--she felt so weak and sleepy! how was she to go back over all that rough mountain-way! but she dared not ask to be left-with the leopard about! he might come down the wide chimney! she soon found that the brothers had never thought of her walking. they wrapt her in ian's plaid. then they took the chiefs, which was very strong, and having folded it twice lengthwise, drew each an end of it over his shoulders, letting it hang in a loop between them: in this loop they made her seat herself, and putting each as arm behind her, tried how they could all get on. after a few shiftings and accommodations, they found the plan likely to answer. so they locked the door, and left the fire glowing on the solitary hearth. to mercy it was the strangest journey--an experience never to be forgotten. the tea had warmed her, and the air revived her. it was not very cold, for only now and then blew a little puff of wind. the stars were brilliant overhead, and the wide void of the air between her and the earth below seemed full of wonder and mystery. now and then she fancied some distant sound the cry of the leopard: he might be coming nearer and nearer as they went! but it rather added to the eerie witchery of the night, making it like a terrible story read in the deserted nursery, with the distant noise outside of her brothers and sisters at play. the motion of her progress by and by became pleasant to her. sometimes her feet would brush the tops of the heather; but when they came to rocky ground, they always shortened the loop of the plaid. to mercy's inner ear came the sound of words she had heard at church: "he shall give his angels charge over thee, and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone." were not these two men god's own angels! they scarcely spoke, except when they stopped to take breath, but went on and on with a steady, rhythmic, silent trudge. up and down the rough hill, and upon the hardly less rough hill-road, they had enough ado to heed their steps. now and then they would let her walk a little way, but not far. she was neither so strong nor so heavy as a fat deer, they said. they were yet high among the hills, when the pale, withered, waste shred of the old moon rose above the upheaved boat-like back of one of the battlements of the horizon-rampart. with disconsolate face, now lost, now found again, always reappearing where mercy had not been looking for her, she accompanied them the rest of their journey, and the witch-like creature brought out the whole character of the night. booked in her wonderful swing, mercy was not always quite sure that she was not dreaming the strangest, pleasantest dream. were they not fittest for a dream, this star and moon beset night-this wind that now and then blew so eerie and wild, yet did not wake her-this gulf around, above, and beneath her, through which she was borne as if she had indeed died, and angels were carrying her through wastes of air to some unknown region afar? except when she brushed the heather, she forgot that the earth was near her. the arms around her were the arms of men and not angels, but how far above this lower world dwelt the souls that moved those strong limbs! what a small creature she was beside them! how unworthy of the labour of their deliverance! her awe of the one kept growing; the other she could trust with heart as well as brain; she could never be afraid of him! to the chief she turned to shadow her from ian. when they came to the foot of the path leading up to mistress conal's cottage, there, although it was dark night, sat the old woman on a stone. "it's a sorrow you are carrying home with you, chief!" she said in gaelic. "as well have saved a drowning man!" she did not rise or move, but spoke like one talking by the fireside. "the drowning man has to be saved, mother!" answered the chief, also in gaelic; "and the sorrow in your way has to be taken with you. it won't let you pass!" "true, my son!" said the woman; "but it makes the heart sore that sees it!" "thank you for the warning then, but welcome the sorrow!" he returned. "good night." "good night, chiefs sons both!" she replied. "you're your father's anyway! did he not one night bring home a frozen fox in his arms, to warm him by his fire! but when he had warmed him--he turned him out!" it was quite clear when last they looked at the sky, but the moment they left her, it began to rain heavily. so fast did it rain, that the men, fearing for mercy, turned off the road, and went down a steep descent, to make straight across their own fields for the cottage; and just as they reached the bottom of the descent, although they had come all the rough way hitherto without slipping or stumbling--once, the chief fell. he rose in consternation; but finding that mercy, upheld by ian, had simply dropped on her feet, and taken no hurt, relieved himself by unsparing abuse of his clumsiness. mercy laughed merrily, resumed her place in the plaid, and closed her eyes. she never saw where they were going, for she opened them again only when they stopped a little as they turned into the fir-clump before the door. "where are we?" she asked; but for answer they carried her straight into the house. "we have brought you to our mother instead of yours," said alister. "to get wet would have been the last straw on the back of such a day. we will let them know at once that you are safe." lady macruadh, as the highlanders generally called her, made haste to receive the poor girl with that sympathetic pity which, of all good plants, flourishes most in the celtic heart. mercy's mother had come to her in consternation at her absence, and the only comfort she could give her was the suggestion that she had fallen in with her sons. she gave her a warm bath,-put her to bed, and then made her eat, so preparing her for a healthful sleep. and she did sleep, but dreamed of darkness and snow and leopards. as men were out searching in all directions, alister, while ian went to the new house, lighted a beacon on the top of the old castle to bring them back. by the time ian had persuaded mrs. palmer to leave mercy in his mother's care for the night, it was blazing beautifully. in the morning it was found that mercy had a bad cold, and could not be moved. but the cottage, small as it was, had more than one guest-chamber, and mrs. macruadh was delighted to have her to nurse. end of vol. ii. vol. iii. contents of vol. iii. chapter i. at a high school ii. a terrible discovery iii. how alister took it iv. love v. passion and patience vi. love glooming vii. a generous dowry viii. mistress conal ix. the marches x. midnight xi. something strange xii. the power of darkness xiii. the new stance xiv. the peat-moss xv. a daring visit xvi. the flitting xvii. the new village xviii. a friendly offer xix. another expulsion xx. alister's princess xxi. the farewell what's mine's mine chapter i at a high school. when mercy was able to go down to the drawing-room, she found the evenings pass as never evenings passed before; and during the day, although her mother and christina came often to see her, she had time and quiet for thinking. and think she must; for she found herself in a region of human life so different from any she had hitherto entered, that in no other circumstances would she have been able to recognize even its existence. everything said or done in it seemed to acknowledge something understood. life went on with a continuous lean toward something rarely mentioned, plainly uppermost; it embodied a tacit reference of everything to some code so thoroughly recognized that occasion for alluding to it was unfrequent. its inhabitants appeared to know things which her people did not even suspect. the air of the brothers especially was that of men at their ease yet ready to rise--of men whose loins were girded, alert for an expected call. under their influence a new idea of life, and the world, and the relations of men and things, began to grow in the mind of mercy. there was a dignity, almost grandeur, about the simple life of the cottage, and the relation of its inmates to all they came near. no one of them seemed to live for self, but each to be thinking and caring for the others and for the clan. she awoke to see that manners are of the soul; that such as she had hitherto heard admired were not to be compared with the simple, almost peasant-like dignity and courtesy of the chief; that the natural grace, accustomed ease, and cultivated refinement of ian's carriage, came out in attention and service to the lowly even more than in converse with his equals; while his words, his gestures, his looks, every expression born of contact, witnessed a directness and delicacy of recognition she could never have imagined. the moment he began to speak to another, he seemed to pass out of himself, and sit in the ears of the other to watch his own words, lest his thoughts should take such sound or shape as might render them unwelcome or weak. if they were not to be pleasant words, they should yet be no more unpleasant than was needful; they should not hurt save in the nature of that which they bore; the truth should receive no injury by admixture of his personality. he heard with his own soul, and was careful over the other soul as one of like kind. so delicately would he initiate what might be communion with another, that to a nature too dull or selfish to understand him, he gave offence by the very graciousness of his approach. it was through her growing love to alister that mercy became able to understand ian, and perceived at length that her dread, almost dislike of him at first, was owing solely to her mingled incapacity and unworthiness. before she left the cottage, it was spring time in her soul; it had begun to put forth the buds of eternal life. such buds are not unfrequently nipped; but even if they are, if a dull, false, commonplace frost close in, and numb the half wakened spirit back into its wintry sleep, that sleep will ever after be haunted with some fainting airs of the paradise those buds prophesied. in mercy's case they were to grow into spiritual eyes--to open and see, through all the fogs and tumults of this phantom world, the light and reality of the true, the spiritual world everywhere around her--as the opened eyes of the servant of the prophet saw the mountains of samaria full of horses of fire and chariots of fire around him. every throb of true love, however mingled with the foolish and the false, is a bourgeoning of the buds of the life eternal--ah, how far from leaves! how much farther from flowers. ian was high above her, so high that she shrank from him; there seemed a whole heaven of height between them. it would fill her with a kind of despair to see him at times sit lost in thought: he was where she could never follow him! he was in a world which, to her childish thought, seemed not the world of humanity; and she would turn, with a sense of both seeking and finding, to the chief. she imagined he felt as she did, saw between his brother and him a gulf he could not cross. she did not perceive this difference, that alister knew the gulf had to be crossed. at such a time, too, she had seen his mother regarding him with a similar expression of loss, but with a mingling of anxiety that was hers only. it was sweet to mercy to see in the eyes of alister, and in his whole bearing toward his younger brother, that he was a learner like herself, that they were scholars together in ian's school. a hunger after something beyond her, a something she could not have described, awoke in her. she needed a salvation of some kind, toward which she must grow! she needed a change which she could not understand until it came--a change the greatest in the universe, but which, man being created with the absolute necessity for it, can be no violent transformation, can be only a grand process in the divine idea of development. she began to feel a mystery in the world, and in all the looks of it--a mystery because a meaning. she saw a jubilance in every sunrise, a sober sadness in every sunset; heard a whispering of strange secrets in the wind of the twilight; perceived a consciousness of unknown bliss in the song of the lark;--and was aware of a something beyond it all, now and then filling her with wonder, and compelling her to ask, "what does it, what can it mean?" not once did she suspect that nature had indeed begun to deal with her; not once suspect, although from childhood accustomed to hear the name of love taken in vain, that love had anything to do with these inexplicable experiences. let no one, however, imagine he explains such experiences by suggesting that she was in love! that were but to mention another mystery as having introduced the former. for who in heaven or on earth has fathomed the marvel betwixt the man and the woman? least of all the man or the woman who has not learned to regard it with reverence. there is more in this love to uplift us, more to condemn the lie in us, than in any other inborn drift of our being, except the heavenly tide godward. from it flow all the other redeeming relations of life. it is the hold god has of us with his right hand, while death is the hold he has of us with his left. love and death are the two marvels, yea the two terrors--but the one goal of our history. it was love, in part, that now awoke in mercy a hunger and thirst after heavenly things. this is a direction of its power little heeded by its historians; its earthly side occupies almost all their care. because lovers are not worthy of even its earthly aspect, it palls upon them, and they grow weary, not of love, but of their lack of it. the want of the heavenly in it has caused it to perish: it had no salt. from those that have not is taken away that which they have. love without religion is the plucked rose. religion without love--there is no such thing. religion is the bush that bears all the roses; for religion is the natural condition of man in relation to the eternal facts, that is the truths, of his own being. to live is to love; there is no life but love. what shape the love puts on, depends on the persons between whom is the relation. the poorest love with religion, is better, because truer, therefore more lasting, more genuine, more endowed with the possibility of persistence--that is, of infinite development, than the most passionate devotion between man and woman without it. thus together in their relation to ian, it was natural that mercy and the chief should draw yet more to each other. mercy regarded alister as a big brother in the same class with herself, but able to help her. quickly they grew intimate. in the simplicity of his large nature, the chief talked with mercy as openly as a boy, laying a heart bare to her such that, if the world had many like it, the kingdom of heaven would be more than at hand. he talked as to an old friend in perfect understanding with him, from whom he had nothing to gain or to fear. there was never a compliment on the part of the man, and never a coquetry on the part of the girl--a dull idea to such as without compliment or coquetry could hold no intercourse, having no other available means. mercy had never like her sister cultivated the woman's part in the low game; and her truth required but the slightest stimulus to make her incapable of it. with such a man as alister she could use only a simplicity like his; not thus to meet him would have been to decline the honouring friendship. dark and plain, though with an interesting face and fine eyes, she had received no such compliments as had been showered upon her sister; it was an unspoiled girl, with a heart alive though not yet quite awake, that was brought under such good influences. what better influences for her, for any woman, than those of unselfish men? what influences so good for any man as those of unselfish women? every man that hears and learns of a worthy neighbour, comes to the father; every man that hath heard and learned of the father comes to the lord; every man that comes to the lord, he leads back to the father. to hear ian speak one word about jesus christ, was for a true man to be thenceforth truer. to him the lord was not a theological personage, but a man present in the world, who had to be understood and obeyed by the will and heart and soul, by the imagination and conscience of every other man. if what ian said was true, this life was a serious affair, and to be lived in downright earnest! if god would have his creatures mind him, she must look to it! she pondered what she heard. but she went always to alister to have ian explained; and to hear him talk of ian, revealed alister to her. when mercy left the cottage, she felt as if she were leaving home to pay a visit. the rich house was dull and uninteresting. she found that she had immediately to put in practice one of the lessons she had learned--that the service of god is the service of those among whom he has sent us. she tried therefore to be cheerful, and even to forestall her mother's wishes. but life was harder than hitherto--so much more was required of her. the chief was falling thoroughly in love with mercy, but it was some time before he knew it. with a heart full of tenderness toward everything human, he knew little of love special, and was gradually sliding into it without being aware of it. how little are we our own! existence is decreed us; love and suffering are appointed us. we may resist, we may modify; but we cannot help loving, and we cannot help dying. we need god to keep us from hating. great in goodness, yea absolutely good, god must be, to have a right to make us--to compel our existence, and decree its laws! without his choice the chief was falling in love. the woman was sent him; his heart opened and took her in. relation with her family was not desirable, but there she was! ian saw, but said nothing. his mother saw it too. "nothing good will come of it!" she said, with a strong feeling of unfitness in the thing. "everything will come of it, mother, that god would have come of it," answered ian. "she is an honest, good girl, and whatever comes of it must be good, whether pleasant or not." the mother was silent. she believed in god, but not so thoroughly as to abjure the exercise of a subsidiary providence of her own. the more people trust in god, the less will they trust their own judgments, or interfere with the ordering of events. the man or woman who opposes the heart's desire of another, except in aid of righteousness, is a servant of satan. nor will it avail anything to call that righteousness which is of self or of mammon. "there is no action in fretting," ian would say, "and not much in the pondering of consequences. true action is the doing of duty, come of it heartache, defeat, or success." "you are a fatalist, ian!" said his mother one day. "mother, i am; the will of god is my fate!" answered ian. "he shall do with me what he pleases; and i will help him!" she took him in her arms and kissed him. she hoped god would not be strict with him, for might not the very grandeur of his character be rooted in rebellion? might not some figs grow on some thistles? at length came the paternal summons for the palmers to go to london. for a month the families had been meeting all but every day. the chief had begun to look deep into the eyes of the girl, as if searching there for some secret joy; and the girl, though she drooped her long lashes, did not turn her head away. and now separation, like death, gave her courage, and when they parted, mercy not only sustained alister's look, but gave him such a look in return that he felt no need, no impulse to say anything. their souls were satisfied, for they knew they belonged to each other. chapter ii a terrible discovery. so entirely were the chief and his family out of the world, that they had not yet a notion of the worldly relations of mr. peregrine palmer. but the mother thought it high time to make inquiry as to his position and connections. she had an old friend in london, the wife of a certain vice-chancellor, with whom she held an occasional correspondence, and to her she wrote, asking if she knew anything of the family. mrs. macruadh was nowise free from the worldliness that has regard to the world's regard. she would not have been satisfied that a daughter in law of hers should come of people distinguished for goodness and greatness of soul, if they were, for instance, tradespeople. she would doubtless have preferred the daughter of an honest man, whatever his position, to the daughter of a scoundrel, even if he chanced to be a duke; but she would not have been content with the most distinguished goodness by itself. walking after jesus, she would have drawn to the side of joanna rather than martha or mary; and i fear she would have condescended--just a little--to mary magdalen: repentance, however perfect, is far from enough to satisfy the worldly squeamishness of not a few high-principled people who do not know what repentance means. mrs. macruadh was anxious to know that the girl was respectable, and so far worthy of her son. the idea of such an inquiry would have filled mercy's parents with scornful merriment, as a thing ludicrous indeed. people in their position, who could do this and that, whose name stood so high for this and that, who knew themselves well bred, who had one relation an admiral, another a general, and a marriage-connection with some of the oldest families in the country--that one little better than a yeoman, a man who held the plough with his own big hands, should enquire into their social standing! was not mr. peregrine palmer prepared to buy him up the moment he required to sell! was he not rich enough to purchase an earl's daughter for his son, and an earl himself for his beautiful christina! the thing would have seemed too preposterous. the answer of the vice-chancellor's lady burst, nevertheless, like a bombshell in the cottage. it was to this effect:--the palmers were known, if not just in the best, yet in very good society; the sons bore sign of a defective pedigree, but the one daughter out was, thanks to her mother, fit to go anywhere. for her own part, wrote the london correspondent, she could not help smelling the grains: in scotland a distiller, mr. peregrine palmer had taken to brewing in england--was one of the firm pulp and palmer, owning half the public-houses in london, therefore high in the regard of the english nobility, if not actually within their circle.--thus far the satirical lady of the vice-chancellor. horror fell upon the soul of the mother. the distiller was to her as the publican to the ancient jew. no dealing in rags and marine stores, no scraping of a fortune by pettifogging, chicane, and cheating, was to her half so abominable as the trade of a brewer. worse yet was a brewer owning public-houses, gathering riches in half-pence wet with beer and smelling of gin. the brewer was to her a moral pariah; only a distiller was worse. as she read, the letter dropped from her hands, and she threw them up in unconscious appeal to heaven. she saw a vision of bloated men and white-faced women, drawing with trembling hands from torn pockets the money that had bought the wide acres of the clanruadh. to think of the macruadh marrying the daughter of such a man! in society few questions indeed were asked; everywhere money was counted a blessed thing, almost however made; none the less the damnable fact remained, that certain moneys were made, not in furthering the well-being of men and women, but in furthering their sin and degradation. the mother of the chief saw that, let the world wink itself to blindness, let it hide the roots of the money-plant in layer upon layer of social ascent, the flower for which an earl will give his daughter, has for the soil it grows in, not the dead, but the diseased and dying, of loathsome bodies and souls of god's men and women and children, which the grower of it has helped to make such as they are. she was hot, she was cold; she started up and paced hurriedly about the room. her son the son in law of a distiller! the husband of his daughter! the idea was itself abhorrence and contempt! was he not one of the devil's fishers, fishing the sea of the world for the souls of men and women to fill his infernal ponds withal! his money was the fungous growth of the devil's cellars. how would the brewer or the distiller, she said, appear at the last judgment! how would her son hold up his head, if he cast in his lot with theirs! but that he would never do! why should she be so perturbed! in this matter at least there could be no difference between them! her noble alister would be as much shocked as herself at the news! could the woman be a lady, grown on such a hot-bed! yet, alas! love could tempt far--could subdue the impossible! she could not rest; she must find one of them! not a moment longer could she remain alone with the terrible disclosure. if alister was in love with the girl, he must get out of it at once! never again would she enter the palmers' gate, never again set foot on their land! the thought of it was unthinkable! she would meet them as if she did not see them! but they should know her reason--and know her inexorable! she went to the edge of the ridge, and saw ian sitting with his book on the other side of the burn. she called him to her, and handed him the letter. he took it, read it through, and gave it her back. "ian!" she exclaimed, "have you nothing to say to that?" "i beg your pardon, mother," he answered: "i must think about it. why should it trouble you so! it is painfully annoying, but we have come under no obligation to them!" "no; but alister!" "you cannot doubt alister will do what is right!" "he will do what he thinks right!" "is not that enough, mother?" "no," she answered angrily; "he must do the thing that is right." "whether he knows it or not? could he do the thing he thought wrong?" she was silent. "mother dear," resumed ian, "the only way to get at what is right is to do what seems right. even if we mistake there is no other way!" "you would do evil that good may come! oh, ian!" "no, mother; evil that is not seen to be evil by one willing and trying to do right, is not counted evil to him. it is evil only to the person who either knows it to be evil, or does not care whether it be or not." "that is dangerous doctrine!" "i will go farther, mother, and say, that for alister to do what you thought right, if he did not think it right himself--even if you were right and he wrong--would be for him to do wrong, and blind himself to the truth." "a man may be to blame that he is not able to see the truth," said the mother. "that is very true, but hardly such a man as alister, who would sooner die than do the thing he believed wrong. but why should you take it for granted that alister will think differently from you?" "we don't always think alike." "in matters of right and wrong, i never knew him or me think differently from you, mother!" "he is very fond of the girl!" "and justly. i never saw one more in earnest, or more anxious to learn." "she might well be teachable to such teachers!" "i don't see that she has ever sought to commend herself to either of us, mother. i believe her heart just opened to the realities she had never had shown her before. come what may, she will never forget the things we have talked about." "nothing would make me trust her!" "why?" "she comes of an' abominable breed." "is it your part, mother, to make her suffer for the sins of her fathers?" "i make her suffer!" "certainly, mother--by changing your mind toward her, and suspecting her, the moment you learn cause to condemn her father." "the sins of the fathers are visited on the children!--you will not dispute that?' "i will grant more--that the sins of the fathers are often reproduced in the children. but it is nowhere said, 'thou shalt visit the sins of the fathers on the children.' god puts no vengeance into our hands. i fear you are in danger of being unjust to the girl, mother!--but then you do not know her so well as we do!" "of course not! every boy understands a woman better than his mother!" "the thing is exceedingly annoying, mother! let us go and find alister at once!" "he will take it like a man of sense, i trust!" "he will. it will trouble him terribly, but he will do as he ought. give him time and i don't believe there is a man in the world to whom the right comes out clearer than to alister." the mother answered only with a sigh. "many a man," remarked ian, "has been saved through what men call an unfortunate love affair!" "many a man has been lost by having his own way in one!" rejoined the mother. "as to lost, i would not make up my mind about that for a few centuries or so!" returned ian. "a man may be allowed his own way for the discipline to result from it." "i trust, ian, you will not encourage him in any folly!" "i shall have nothing to do but encourage him in his first resolve, mother!" chapter iii how alister took it. they could not find alister, who had gone to the smithy. it was tea-time before he came home. as soon as he entered, his mother handed him the letter. he read it without a word, laid it on the table beside his plate, and began to drink his tea, his eyes gleaming with a strange light, lan kept silence also. mrs. macruadh cast a quick glance, now at the one, now at the other. she was in great anxiety, and could scarce restrain herself. she knew her boys full of inbred dignity and strong conscience, but was nevertheless doubtful how they would act. they could not feel as she felt, else would the hot blood of their race have at once boiled over! had she searched herself she might have discovered a latent dread that they might be nearer the right than she. painfully she watched them, half conscious of a traitor in her bosom, judging the world's judgment and not god's. her sons seemed on the point of concluding as she would not have them conclude: they would side with the young woman against their mother! the reward of parents who have tried to be good, may be to learn, with a joyous humility from their children. mrs. macruadh was capable of learning more, and was now going to have a lesson. when alister pushed back his chair and rose, she could refrain no longer. she could not let him go in silence. she must understand something of what was passing in his mind! "what do you think of that, alister?" she said. he turned to her with a faint smile, and answered, "i am glad to know it, mother." "that is good. i was afraid it would hurt you!" "seeing the thing is so, i am glad to be made aware of it. the information itself you cannot expect me to be pleased with!" "no, indeed, my son! i am very sorry for you. after being so taken with the young woman,--" alister looked straight in his mother's face. "you do not imagine, mother," he said, "it will make any difference as to mercy?" "not make any difference!" echoed mrs. macruadh. "what is it possible you can mean, alister?" the anger that glowed in her dark eyes made her look yet handsomer, proving itself not a mean, though it might be a misplaced anger. "is she different, mother, from what she was before you had the letter?" "you did not then know what she was!" "just as well as i do now. i have no reason to think she is not what i thought her." "you thought her the daughter of a gentleman!" "hardly. i thought her a lady, and such i think her still." "then you mean to go on with it?" "mother dear," said alister, taking her by the hand, "give me a little time. not that i am in any doubt--but the news has been such a blow to me that--" "it must have been!" said the mother. "--that i am afraid of answering you out of the soreness of my pride, and ian says the truth is never angry." "i am quite willing you should do nothing in a hurry," said the mother. she did not understand that he feared lest, in his indignation for mercy, he should answer his mother as her son ought not. "i will take time," he replied. "and here is ian to help me!" "ah! if only your father were here!" "he may be, mother! anyhow i trust i shall do nothing he would not like!" "he would sooner see son of his marry the daughter of a cobbler than of a brewer!" "so would i, mother!" said alister. "i too," said ian, "would much prefer that my sister-in-law's father were not a brewer." "i suppose you are splitting some hair, ian, but i don't see it," remarked his mother, who had begun to gather a little hope. "you will be back by supper-time, alister, i suppose?" "certainly, mother. we are only going to the village." the brothers went. "i knew everything you were thinking," said ian. "of course you did!" answered alister. "but i am very sorry!" "so am i! it is a terrible bore!" a pause followed. alister burst into a laugh that was not merry. "it makes me think of the look on my father's face," he said, "once at the market, as he was putting in his pocket a bunch of more than usually dirty bank-notes. the look seemed almost to be making apology that he was my father--the notes were so dirty! 'they're better than they look, lad!' he said." "what are you thinking of, alister?" "of nothing you are not thinking of, ian, i hope in god! mr. palmer's money is worse than it looks." "you frightened me for a moment, alister!" "how could i, ian?" "it was but a nervo-mechanical fright. i knew well enough you could mean nothing i should not like. but i see trouble ahead, alister!" "we shall be called a pack of fools, but what of that! we shall be told the money itself was clean, however dirty the hands that made it! the money-grubs!" "i would rather see you hanged, than pocketing a shilling of it!" "of course you would! but the man who could pocket it, will be relieved to find it is only his daughter i care about." "there will be difficulty, alister, i fear. how much have you said to mercy?" "i have said nothing definite." "but she understands?" "i think--i hope so.--don't you think christina is much improved, lan?" "she is more pleasant." "she is quite attentive to you!" "she is pleased with me for saving her life. she does not like me--and i have just arrived at not disliking her." "there is a great change on her!" "i doubt if there is any in her though!" "she may be only amusing herself with us in this outlandish place! mercy, i am sure, is quite different!" "i would trust her with anything, alister. that girl would die for the man she loved!" "i would rather have her love, though we should never meet in this world, than the lands of my fathers!" "what will you do then?" "i will go to mr. palmer, and say to him: 'give me your daughter. i am a poor man, but we shall have enough to live upon. i believe she will be happy.'" "i will answer for him: 'i have the greatest regard for you, macruadh. you are a gentleman, and that you are poor is not of the slightest consequence; mercy's dowry shall be worthy the lady of a chief!'--what then, alister?" "fathers that love money must be glad to get rid of their daughters without a. dowry!" "yes, perhaps, when they are misers, or money is scarce, or wanted for something else. but when a poor man of position wanted to marry his daughter, a parent like mr. palmer would doubtless regard her dowry as a good investment. you must not think to escape that way, alister! what would you answer him?" "i would say, 'my dear sir,'--i may say 'my dear sir,' may i not? there is something about the man i like!--'i do not want your money. i will not have your money. give me your daughter, and my soul will bless you.'" "suppose he should reply,' do you think i am going to send my daughter from my house like a beggar? no, no, my boy! she must carry something with her! if beggars married beggars, the world would be full of beggars!'--what would you say then?" "i would tell him i had conscientious scruples about taking his money." "he would tell you you were a fool, and not to be trusted with a wife. 'who ever heard such rubbish!' he would say. 'scruples, indeed! you must get over them! what are they?'--what would you say then?" "if it came to that, i should have no choice but tell him i had insuperable objections to the way his fortune was made, and could not consent to share it." "he would protest himself insulted, and swear, if his money was not good enough for you, neither was his daughter. what then?" "i would appeal to mercy." "she is too young. it would be sad to set one of her years at variance with her family. i almost think i would rather you ran away with her. it is a terrible thing to go into a house and destroy the peace of those relations which are at the root of all that is good in the world." "i know it! i know it! that is my trouble! i am not afraid of mercy's courage, and i am sure she would hold out. i am certain nothing would make her marry the man she did not love. but to turn the house into a hell about her--i shrink from that!--do you count it necessary to provide against every contingency before taking the first step?" "indeed i do not! the first step is enough. when that step has landed us, we start afresh. but of all things you must not lose your temper with the man. however despicable his money, you are his suitor for his daughter! and he may possibly not think you half good enough for her." "that would be a grand way out of the difficulty!" "how?" "it would leave me far freer to deal with her." "perhaps. and in any case, the more we can honestly avoid reference to his money, the better. we are not called on to rebuke." "small is my inclination to allude to it--so long as not a stiver of it seeks to cross to the macruadh!" "that is fast as fate. but there is another thing, alister: i fear lest you should ever forget that her birth and her connections are no more a part of the woman's self than her poverty or her wealth." "i know it, ian. i will not forget it." "there must never be a word concerning them!" "nor a thought, ian! in god's name i will be true to her." they found annie of the shop in a sad way. she had just had a letter from lachlan, stating that he had not been well for some time, and that there was little prospect of his being able to fetch her. he prayed her therefore to go out to him; and had sent money to pay her passage and her mother's. "when do you go?" asked the chief. "my mother fears the voyage, and is very unwilling to turn her back on her own country. but oh, if lachlan die, and me not with him!" she could say no more. "he shall not die for want of you!" said the laird. "i will talk to your mother." he went into the room behind. ian remained in the shop. "of course you must go, annie!" he said. "indeed, sir, i must! but how to persuade my mother i do not know! and i cannot leave her even for lachlan. no one would nurse him more tenderly than she; but she has a horror of the salt water, and what she most dreads is being buried in it. she imagines herself drowning to all eternity!" "my brother will persuade her." "i hope so, sir. i was just coming to him! i should never hold up my head again--in this world or the next--either if i did not go, or if i went without my mother! aunt conal told me, about a month since, that i was going a long journey, and would never come back. i asked her if i was to die on the way, but she would not answer me. anyhow i'm not fit to be his wife, if i'm not ready to die for him! some people think it wrong to marry anybody going to die, but at the longest, you know, sir, you must part sooner than you would! not many are allowed to die together!--you don't think, do you, sir, that marriages go for nothing in the other world?" she spoke with a white face and brave eyes, and ian was glad at heart. "i do not, annie," he answered. "'the gifts of god are without repentance.' he did not give you and lachlan to each other to part you again! though you are not married yet, it is all the same so long as you are true to each other." "thank you, sir; you always make me feel strong!" alister came from the back room. "i think your mother sees it not quite so difficult now," he said. the next time they went, they found them preparing to go. now ian had nearly finished the book he was writing about russia, and could not begin another all at once. he must not stay at home doing nothing, and he thought that, as things were going from bad to worse in the highlands, he might make a voyage to canada, visit those of his clan, and see what ought to be done for such as must soon follow them. he would presently have a little money in his possession, and believed he could not spend it better. he made up his mind therefore to accompany annie and her mother, which resolve overcame the last of the old woman's lingering reluctance. he did not like leaving alister at such a critical point in his history; but he said to himself that a man might be helped too much; arid it might come that he and mercy were in as much need of a refuge as the clan. i cannot say no worldly pride mingled in the chief's contempt for the distiller's money; his righteous soul was not yet clear of its inherited judgments as to what is dignified and what is not. he had in him still the prejudice of the landholder, for ages instinctive, against both manufacture and trade. various things had combined to foster in him also the belief that trade at least was never free from more or less of unfair dealing, and was therefore in itself a low pursuit. he had not argued that nothing the father of men has decreed can in its nature be contemptible, but must be capable of being nobly done. in the things that some one must do, the doer ranks in god's sight, and ought to rank among his fellow-men, according to how he does it. the higher the calling the more contemptible the man who therein pursues his own ends. the humblest calling, followed on the principles of the divine caller, is a true and divine calling, be it scavenging, handicraft, shop-keeping, or book-making. oh for the day when god and not the king shall be regarded as the fountain of honour. but the macruadh looked upon the calling of the brewer or distiller as from the devil: he was not called of god to brew or distil! from childhood his mother had taught him a horror of gain by corruption. she had taught, and he had learned, that the poorest of all justifications, the least fit to serve the turn of gentleman, logician, or christian, was--"if i do not touch this pitch, another will; there will be just as much harm done; and another instead of me will have the benefit; therefore it cannot defile me.--offences must come, therefore i will do them!" "imagine our lord in the brewing trade instead of the carpentering!" she would say. that better beer was provided by the good brewer would not go far for brewer or drinker, she said: it mattered little that, by drinking good beer, the drunkard lived to be drunk the oftener. a brewer might do much to reduce drinking; but that would be to reduce a princely income to a modest livelihood, and to content himself with the baker's daughter instead of the duke's! it followed that the macruadh would rather have robbed a church than touched mr. peregrine palmer's money. to rifle the tombs of the dead would have seemed to him pure righteousness beside sharing in that. he could give mercy up; he could not take such money with her! much as he loved her, separate as he saw her, clearly as she was to him a woman undefiled and straight from god, it was yet a trial to him that she should be the daughter of a person whose manufacture and trade were such. after much consideration, it was determined in the family conclave, that ian should accompany the two women to canada, note how things were going, and conclude what had best be done, should further exodus be found necessary. as, however, there had come better news of lachlan, and it was plain he was in no immediate danger, they would not, for several reasons, start before the month of september. a few of the poorest of the clan resolved to go with them. partly for their sakes, partly because his own provision would be small, ian would take his passage also in the steerage. chapter iv love. christina went back to london considerably changed. her beauty was greater far, for there was a new element in it--a certain atmosphere of distances and shadows gave mystery to her landscape. her weather, that is her mood, was now subject to changes which to many made her more attractive. fits of wild gaiety alternated with glooms, through which would break flashes of feline playfulness, where pat and scratch were a little mixed. she had more admirers than ever, for she had developed points capable of interesting men of somewhat higher development than those she had hitherto pleased. at the same time she was more wayward and imperious with her courtiers. gladly would she have thrown all the flattery once so coveted into the rag-bag of creation, to have one approving smile from the grave-looking, gracious man, whom she knew happier, wandering alone over the hills, than if she were walking by his side. for an hour she would persuade herself that he cared for her a little; the next she would comfort herself with the small likelihood of his meeting another lady in glenruadh. but then he had been such a traveller, had seen so much of the great world, that perhaps he was already lost to her! it seemed but too probable, when she recalled the sadness with which he seemed sometimes overshadowed: it could not be a religious gloom, for when he spoke of god his face shone, and his words were strong! i think she mistook a certain gravity, like that of the merchant of venice, for sorrowfulness; though doubtless the peculiarity of his loss, as well as the loss itself, did sometimes make him sad. she had tried on him her little arts of subjugation, but the moment she began to love him, she not only saw their uselessness, but hated them. her repellent behaviour to her admirers, and her occasional excitement and oddity, caused her mother some anxiety, but as the season came to a close, she grew gayer, and was at times absolutely bewitching. the mother wished to go northward by degrees, paying visits on the way; but her plan met with no approbation from the girls. christina longed for the presence and voice of ian in the cottage-parlour, mercy for a hill-side with the chief; both longed to hear them speak to each other in their own great way. and they talked so of the delights of their highland home, that the mother began to feel the mountains, the sea, and the islands, drawing her to a land of peace, where things went well, and the world knew how to live. but the stormiest months of her life were about to pass among those dumb mountains! after a long and eager journey, the girls were once more in their rooms at the new house. mercy went to her window, and stood gazing from it upon the mountain-world, faint-lighted by the northern twilight. she might have said with portia:-- "this night methinks is but the daylight sick; it looks a little paler: 'tis a day, such as the day is when the sun is hid." she could see the dark bulk of the hills, sharpened to a clear edge against the pellucid horizon, but with no colour, and no visible featuring of their great fronts. when the sun rose, it would reveal innumerable varieties of surface, by the mottling of endless shadows; now all was smooth as an unawakened conscience. by the shape of a small top that rose against the greenish sky betwixt the parting lines of two higher hills, where it seemed to peep out over the marge into the infinite, as a little man through the gap between the heads of taller neighbours, she knew the roof of the tomb; and she thought how, just below there, away as it seemed in the high-lifted solitudes of heaven, she had lain in the clutches of death, all the time watched and defended by the angel of a higher life who had been with her ever since first she came to glenruadh, waking her out of such a stupidity, such a non-existence, as now she could scarce see possible to human being. it was true her waking had been one with her love to that human east which first she saw as she opened her eyes, and whence first the light of her morning had flowed--the man who had been and was to her the window of god! but why should that make her doubt? god made man and woman to love each other: why should not the waking to love and the waking to truth come together, seeing both were of god? if the chief were never to speak to her again, she would never go back from what she had learned of him! if she ever became careless of truth and life and god, it would but show that she had never truly loved the chief! as she stood gazing on the hill-top, high landmark of her history, she felt as if the earth were holding her up toward heaven, an offering to the higher life. the hill grew an altar of prayer on which her soul was lying, dead until taken up into life by the arms of the father. a deep content pervaded her heart. she turned with her weight of peace, lay down, and went to sleep in the presence of her life. christina looked also from her window, but her thoughts were not like mercy's, for her heart was mainly filled, not with love of ian, but with desire that ian should love her. she longed to be his queen--the woman of all women he had seen. the sweet repose of the sleeping world wrought in her--not peace, but weakness. her soul kept leaning towards ian; she longed for his arms to start out the alien nature lying so self-satisfied all about her. to her the presence of god took shape as an emptiness--an absence. the resting world appeared to her cold, unsympathetic, heedless; its peace was but heartlessness. the soft pellucid chrysolite of passive heavenly thought, was a merest arrangement, a common fact, meaning nothing to her. she was hungry, not merely after bliss, but after distinction in bliss; not after growth, but after acknowledged superiority. she needed to learn that she was nobody--that if the world were peopled with creatures like her, it would be no more worth sustaining than were it a world of sand, of which no man could build even a hut. still, by her need of another, god was laying hold of her. as by the law is the knowledge of sin, so by love is selfishness rampantly roused--to be at last, like death, swallowed up in victory--the victory of the ideal self that dwells in god. all night she dreamed sad dreams of ian in the embrace of a lovely woman, without word or look for her. she woke weeping, and said to herself that it could not be. he could not be taken from her! it was against nature! soul, brain, and heart, claimed him hers! how could another possess what, in the testimony of her whole consciousness, was hers and hers alone! love asserts an innate and irreversible right of profoundest property in the person loved. it is an instinct--but how wrongly, undivinely, falsely interpreted! hence so many tears! hence a law of nature, deep written in the young heart, seems often set utterly at nought by circumstance! but the girl in her dejection and doubt, was worth far more than in her content and confidence. she was even now the richer by the knowledge of sorrow, and she was on the way to know that she needed help, on the way to hate herself, to become capable of loving. life could never be the same to her, and the farther from the same the better! the beauty came down in the morning pale and dim and white-lipped, like a flower that had had no water. mercy was fresh and rosy, with a luminous mist of loveliness over her plain unfinished features. already had they begun to change in the direction of beauty. christina's eyes burned; in mercy's shone something of the light by which a soul may walk and not stumble. in the eyes of both was expectation, in the eyes of the one confident, in the eyes of the other anxious. as soon as they found themselves alone together, eyes sought eyes, and met in understanding. they had not made confidantes of each other, each guessed well, and was well guessed at. they did not speculate; they understood. in like manner, mercy and alister understood each other, but not christina and ian. neither of these knew the feelings of the other. without a word they rose, put on their hats, left the house, and took the road toward the valley. about half-way to the root of the ridge, they came in sight of the ruined castle; mercy stopped with a little cry. "look! chrissy!" she said, pointing. on the corner next them, close by the pepper-pot turret, sat the two men, in what seemed to loving eyes a dangerous position, but to the mountaineers themselves a comfortable coin of vantage. the girls thought, "they are looking out for us!" but ian was there only because alister was there. the men waved their bonnets. christina responded with her handkerchief. the men disappeared from their perch, and were with the ladies before they reached the ridge. there was no embarrassment on either side, though a few cheeks were rosier than usual. to the chief, mercy was far beyond his memory of her. not her face only, but her every movement bore witness to a deeper pleasure, a greater freedom in life than before. "why were you in such a dangerous place?" asked christina. "we were looking out for you," answered alister. "from there we could see you the moment you came out." "why didn't you come and meet us then?" "because we wanted to watch you coming." "spies!--i hope, mercy, we were behaving ourselves properly! i had no idea we were watched!" "we thought you had quarrelled; neither said a word to the other." mercy looked up; christina looked down. "could you hear us at that height?" asked mercy. "how could we when there was not a word to hear!" "how did you know we were silent?" "we might have known by the way you walked," replied alister. "but if you had spoken we should have heard, for sound travels far among the mountains!" "then i think it was a shame!" said christina. "how could you tell that we might not object to your hearing us?" "we never thought of that!" said alister. "i am very sorry. we shall certainly not be guilty again!" "what men you are for taking everything in downright earnest!" cried christina; "--as if we could have anything to say we should wish you not to hear?" she pat a little emphasis on the you, hut not much. alister heard it as if mercy had said it, and smiled a pleased smile. "it will be a glad day for the world," he said, "when secrecy is over, and every man may speak out the thing that is in him, without danger of offence!" in her turn, christina heard the words as if spoken with reference to ian though not by him, and took them to hint at the difficulty of saying what was in his heart. she had such an idea of her superiority because of her father's wealth and fancied position, that she at once concluded ian dreaded rejection with scorn, for it was not even as if he were the chief. however poor, alister was at least the head of a family, and might set sir before, and baronet after his name--not that her father would think that much of a dignity!--but no younger son of whatever rank, would be good enough for her in her father's eyes! at the same time she had a choice as well as her father, and he should find she too had a will of her own! "but was it not a dangerous place to be in?" she said. "it is a little crumbly!" confessed ian. "--that reminds me, alister, we must have a bout at the old walls before long!--ever since alister was ten years old," he went on in explanation to christina, "he and i have been patching and pointing at the old hulk--the stranded ship of our poor fortunes. i showed you, did i not, the ship in our coat of arms--the galley at least, in which, they say, we arrived at the island?" "yes, i remember.--but you don't mean you do mason's work as well as everything else?" exclaimed christina. "come; we will show you," said the chief. "what do you do it for?" the brothers exchanged glances. "would you count it sufficient reason," returned ian, "that we desired to preserve its testimony to the former status of our family?" a pang of pleasure shot through the heart of christina. passion is potent to twist in its favour whatever can possibly be so twisted. here was an indubitable indication of his thoughts! he must make the most of himself, set what he could against the overwhelming advantages on her side! in the eyes of a man of the world like her father, an old name was nothing beside new money! still an old castle was always an old castle! and that he cared about it for her sake made it to her at least worth something! ere she could give an answer, ian went on. "but in truth," he said, "we have always had a vague hope of its resurrection. the dream of our boyhood was to rebuild the castle. every year it has grown more hopeless, and keeps receding. but we have come to see how little it matters, and content ourselves with keeping up, for old love's sake, what is left of the ruin." "how do you get up on the walls?" asked mercy. "ah, that is a secret!" said ian. "do tell us," pleaded christina. "if you want very much to know,--" answered ian, a little doubtfully. "i do, i do!" "then i suppose we must tell you!" yet more confirmation to the passion-prejudiced ears of christina! "there is a stair," ian went on, "of which no one but our two selves knows anything. such stairs are common in old houses--far commoner than people in towns have a notion of. but there would not have been much of it left by this time, if we hadn't taken care of it. we were little fellows when we began, and it needed much contrivance, for we were not able to unseat the remnants of the broken steps, and replace them with new ones." "do show it us," begged christina. "we will keep it," said alister, "for some warm twilight. morning is not for ruins. yon mountain-side is calling to us. will you come, mercy?" "oh yes!" cried christina; "that will be much better! come, mercy! you are up to a climb, i am sure!" "i ought to be, after such a long rest." "you may have forgotten how to climb!" said alister. "i dreamed too much of the hills for that! and always the noise of london was changed into the rush of waters." they had dropped a little behind the other pair. "did you always climb your dream-hills alone?" asked alister. she answered him with just a lift of her big dark eyes. they walked slowly down the road till they came to mrs. conal's path, passed her door unassailed, and went up the hill. chapter v passion and patience. it was a glorious morning, and as they climbed, the lightening air made their spirits rise with their steps. great masses of cloud hung beyond the edge of the world, and here and there towered foundationless in the sky--huge tumulous heaps of white vapour with gray shadows. the sun was strong, and poured down floods of light, but his heat was deliciously tempered by the mountain atmosphere. there was no wind--only an occasional movement as if the air itself were breathing--just enough to let them feel they moved in no vacuum, but in the heart of a gentle ocean. they came to the hut i have already described as the one chiefly inhabited by hector of the stags and rob of the angels. it commanded a rare vision. in every direction rose some cone-shaped hill. the world lay in coloured waves before them, wild, rugged, and grand, with sheltering spots of beauty between, and the shine of lowly waters. they tapped at the door of the hut, but there was no response; they lifted the latch--it had no lock--and found neither within. alister and mercy wandered a little higher, to the shadow of a great stone; christina went inside the hut and looked from its door upon the world; ian leaned against the side of it, and looked up to the sky. suddenly a few great drops fell--it was hard to say whence. the scattered clouds had been drawing a little nearer the sun, growing whiter as they approached him, and more had ascended from the horizon into the middle air, blue sky abounding between them. a swift rain, like a rain of the early summer, began to fall, and grew to a heavy shower. they were glorious drops that made that shower; for the sun shone, and every drop was a falling gem, shining, sparkling like a diamond, as it fell. it was a bounteous rain, coming from near the zenith, and falling in straight lines direct from heaven to earth. it wanted but sound to complete its charm, and that the bells of the heather gave, set ringing by the drops. the heaven was filled with blue windows, and the rain seemed to come from them rather than from the clouds. into the rain rose the heads of the mountains, each clothed in its surplice of thin mist; they seemed rising on tiptoe heavenward, eager to drink of the high-born comfort; for the rain comes down, not upon the mown grass only, but upon the solitary and desert places also, where grass will never be--"the playgrounds of the young angels," rob called them. "do come in," said christina; "you will get quite wet!" he turned towards her. she stepped back, and he entered. like one a little weary, he sat down on hector's old chair. "is anything the matter?" asked christina, with genuine concern. she saw that he was not quite like himself, that there was an unusual expression on his face. he gave a faint apologetic smile. "as i stood there," he answered, "a strange feeling came over me--a foreboding, i suppose you would call it!" he paused; christina grew pale, and said, "won't you tell me what it was?" "it was an odd kind of conviction that the next time i stood there, it would not be in the body.--i think i shall not come back." "come back!" echoed christina, fear beginning to sip at the cup of her heart. "where are you going?" "i start for canada next week." she turned deadly white, and put out her hands, feeling blindly after support. ian started to his feet. "we have tired you out!" he said in alarm, and took her by both hands to place her in the chair. she did not hear him. the world had grown dark about her, a hissing noise was in her ears, and she would have fallen had he not put his arm round her. the moment she felt supported, she began to come to herself. there was no pretence, however, no coquetry in her faintness. neither was it aught but misery and affection that made her lay her head on ian's shoulder, and burst into a violent fit of weeping. unused to real emotion, familiar only with the poverty-stricken, false emotion of conquest and gratified vanity, when the real emotion came she did not know how to deal with it, and it overpowered her. "oh! oh!" she cried at length between her sobs, "i am ashamed of myself! i can't help it! i can't help it! what will you think of me! i have disgraced myself!" ian had been far from any suspicion of the state of things, but he had had too much sorrowful experience to be able to keep his unwilling eyes closed to this new consternation. the cold shower seemed to flood his soul; the bright drops descending with such swiftness of beauty, instinct with sun-life, turned into points of icy steel that pierced his heart. but he must not heed himself! he must speak to her! he must say something through the terrible shroud that infolded them! "you are as safe with me," he faltered, "--as safe as with your mother!" "i believe it! i know it," she answered, still sobbing, but looking up with an expression of genuine integrity such as he had never seen on her face before. "but i am sorry!" she went on. "it is very weak, and very, very un--un--womanly of me! but it came upon me all at once! if i had only had some warning! oh, why did you not tell me before? why did you not prepare me for it? you might have known what it would be to hear it so suddenly!" more and more aghast grew ian! what was to be done? what was to be said? what was left for a man to do, when a woman laid her soul before him? was there nothing but a lie to save her from bitterest humiliation? to refuse any woman was to ian a hard task; once he had found it impossible to refuse even where he could not give, and had let a woman take his soul! thank god, she took it indeed! he yielded himself perfectly, and god gave him her in return! but that was once, and for ever! it could not be done again! "i am very sorry!" he murmured; and the words and their tone sent a shiver through the heart of christina. but now that she had betrayed her secret, the pent up tide of her phantasy rushed to the door. she was reckless. used to everything her own way, knowing nothing of disappointment, a new and ill understood passion dominating her, she let everything go and the torrent sweep her with it. passion, like a lovely wild beast, had mastered her, and she never thought of trying to tame it. it was herself! there was not enough of her outside the passion to stand up against it! she began to see the filmy eyed despair, and had neither experience to deal with herself, nor reticence enough to keep silence. "if you speak to me like that," she cried, "my heart will break!--must you go away?" "dear miss palmer,--" faltered ian. "oh!" she ejaculated, with a world of bitterness in the protest. "--do let us be calm!" continued ian. "we shall not come to anything if we lose ourselves this way!" the we and the us gave her a little hope. "how can i be calm!" she cried. "i am not cold-hearted like you!--you are going away, and i shall never see you again to all eternity!" she burst out weeping afresh. "do love me a little before you go," she sobbed. "you gave me my life once, but that does not make it right to take it from me again! it only gives you a right to its best!" "god knows," said ian, "if my life could serve you, i should count it a small thing to yield!--but this is idle talk! a man must not pretend anything! we must not be untrue!" she fancied he did not believe in her. "i know! i know! you may well distrust me!" she returned. "i have often behaved abominably to you! but indeed i am true now! i dare not tell you a lie. to you i must speak the truth, for i love you with my whole soul." ian stood dumb. his look of consternation and sadness brought her to herself a little. "what have i done!" she cried, and drawing back a pace, stood looking at him, and trembling. "i am disgraced for ever! i have told a man i love him, and he leaves me to the shame of it! he will not save me from it! he will not say one word to take it away! where is your generosity, ian?" "i must be true!" said ian, speaking as if to himself, and in a voice altogether unlike his own. "you will not love me! you hate me! you despise me! but i will not live rejected! he brushes me like a feather from his coat!" "hear me," said ian, trying to recover himself. "do not think me insensible--" "oh, yes! i know!" cried christina yet more bitterly; "--insensible to the honour _i_ do you, and all that world of nothing!--pray use your victory! lord it over me! i am the weed under your foot! i beg you will not spare me! speak out what you think of me!" ian took her hand. it trembled as if she would pull it away, and her eyes flashed an angry fire. she looked more nearly beautiful than ever he had seen her! his heart was like to break. he drew her to the chair, and taking a stool, sat down beside her. then, with a voice that gathered strength as he proceeded, he said:-- "let me speak to you, christina palmer, as in the presence of him who made us! to pretend i loved you would be easier than to bear the pain of giving you such pain. were i selfish enough, i could take much delight in your love; but i scorn the unmanliness of accepting gold and returning silver: my love is not mine to give." it was some relief to her proud heart to imagine he would have loved her had he been free. but she did not speak. "if i thought," pursued ian, "that i had, by any behaviour of mine, been to blame for this,--" there he stopped, lest he should seem to lay blame on her.--"i think," he resumed, "i could help you if you would listen to me. were i in like trouble with you, i would go into my room, and shut the door, and tell my father in heaven everything about it. ah, christina! if you knew him, you would not break your heart that a man did not love you just as you loved him." had not her misery been so great, had she not also done the thing that humbled her before herself, christina would have been indignant with the man who refused her love and dared speak to her of religion; but she was now too broken for resentment. the diamond rain was falling, the sun was shining in his vaporous strength, and the great dome of heaven stood fathomless above the pair; but to christina the world was black and blank as the gloomy hut in which they sat. when first her love blossomed, she saw the world open; she looked into its heart; she saw it alive--saw it burning with that which made the bush alive in the desert of horeb--the presence of the living god; now, the vision was over, the desert was dull and dry, the bush burned no more, the glowing lava had cooled to unsightly stone! there was no god, nor any man more! time had closed and swept the world into the limbo of vanity! for a time she sat without thought, as it were in a mental sleep. she opened her eyes, and the blank of creation stared into the very heart of her. the emptiness and loneliness overpowered her. hardly aware of what she was doing, she slid to her knees at ian's feet, crying, "save me, save me, ian! i shall go mad! pardon me! help me!" "all a man may be to his sister, i am ready to be to you. i will write to you from canada; you can answer me or not as you please. my heart cries out to me to take you in my arms and comfort you, but i must not; it would not comfort you." "you do not despise me, then?--oh, thank you!" "despise you!--no more than my dead sister! i would cherish you as i would her were she in like sorrow. i would die to save you this grief--except indeed that i hope much from it." "forget all about me," said christina, summoning pride to her aid. "i will not forget you. it is impossible, nor would i if i could." "you forgive me then, and will not think ill of me?" "how forgive trust? is that an offence?" "i have lost your good opinion! how could i degrade myself so!" "on the contrary, you are fast gaining my good opinion. you have begun to be a true woman!" "what if it should be only for--" "whatever it may have been for, now you have tasted truth you will not turn back!" "now i know you do not care for me, i fear i shall soon sink back into my old self!" "i do care for you, christina, and you will not sink back into your old self. god means you to be a strong, good woman--able, with the help he will give you, to bear grief in a great-hearted fashion. believe me, you and i may come nearer each other in the ages before us by being both true, than is possible in any other way whatever." "i am miserable at the thought of what you must think of me! everybody would say i had done a shameless thing in confessing my love!" "i am not in the way of thinking as everybody thinks. there is little justice, and less sympathy, to be had from everybody. i would think and judge and feel as the one, my master. be sure you are safe with me." "you will not tell anybody?" "you must trust me." "i beg your pardon! i have offended you!" "not in the least. but i will bind myself by no promises. i am bound already to be as careful over you as if you were the daughter of my father and mother. your confession, instead of putting you in my power, makes me your servant." by this time christina was calm. there was a great load on her heart, but somehow she was aware of the possibility of carrying it. she looked up gratefully in ian's face, already beginning to feel for him a reverence which made it easier to forego the right to put her arms round him. and therewith awoke in her the first movement of divine relationship--rose the first heave of the child-heart toward the source of its being. it appeared in the form of resistance. complaint against god is far nearer to god than indifference about him. "ian macruadh," said christina solemnly, and she looked him in the eyes as she said it, "how can you believe there is a god? if there were, would he allow such a dreadful thing to befall one of his creatures? how am i to blame? i could not help it!" "i see in it his truth and goodness toward his child. and he will let you see it. the thing is between him and you." "it will be hard to convince me it is either good or loving to make anyone suffer like this!" protested christina, her hand unconsciously pressed on her heart; "--and all the disgrace of it too!" she added bitterly. "i will not allow there is any disgrace," returned ian. "but i will not try to con vince you of anything about god. i cannot. you must know him. i only say i believe in him with all my heart. you must ask him to explain himself to you, and not take it for granted, because he has done what you do not like, that he has done you a wrong. whether you seek him or not, he will do you justice; but he cannot explain himself except you seek him." "i think i understand. believe me, i am willing to understand." a few long seconds of silence followed. christina came a little nearer. she was still on her knees. "will you kiss me once," she said, "as you would a little child!" "in the name of god!" answered ian, and stooping kissed her gently and tenderly. "thank you!" she said; "--and now the rain is over, let us join mercy and the chief. i hope they have not got very wet!" "alister will have taken care of that. there is plenty of shelter about here." they left the cottage, drew the door close, and through the heather, sparkling with a thousand rain-drops, the sun shining hotter than ever through the rain-mist, went up the hill. they found the other pair sheltered by the great stone, which was not only a shadow from the heat, but sloped sufficiently to be a covert from the rain. they did not know it had ceased; perhaps they did not know it had rained. on a fine morning of the following week, the emigrants began the first stage of their long journey; the women in two carts, with their small impedimenta, the men walking--ian with them, a stout stick in his hand. they were to sail from greenock. ian and christina met several times before he left, but never alone. no conference of any kind, not even of eyes, had been sought by christina, and ian had resolved to say nothing more until he reached canada. thence he would write things which pen and ink would say better and carry nearer home than could speech; and by that time too the first keenness of her pain would have dulled, and left her mind more capable of receiving them. he was greatly pleased with the gentle calm of her behaviour. no one else could have seen any difference toward himself. he read in her carriage that of a child who had made a mistake, and was humbled, not vexed. her mother noted that her cheek was pale, and that she seemed thoughtful; but farther she did not penetrate. to ian it was plain that she had set herself to be reasonable. chapter vi love glooming. ian, the light of his mother's eyes, was gone, and she felt forsaken. alister was too much occupied with mercy to feel his departure as on former occasions, yet he missed him every hour of the day. mercy and he met, but not for some time in open company, as christina refused to go near the cottage. things were ripening to a change. alister's occupation with mercy, however, was far from absorption; the moment ian was gone, he increased his attention to his mother, feeling she had but him. but his mother was not quite the same to him now. at times she was even more tender; at other times she seemed to hold him away from her, as one with whom she was not in sympathy. the fear awoke in him that she might so speak to some one of the palmers as to raise an insuperable barrier between the families; and this fear made him resolve to come at once to an understanding with mercy. the resulting difficulties might be great; he felt keenly the possible alternative of his loss of mercy, or mercy's loss of her family; but the fact that he loved her gave him a right to tell her so, and made it his duty to lay before her the probability of an obstacle. that his mother did not like the alliance had to be braved, for a man must leave father and mother and cleave to his wife--a saying commonly by male presumption inverted. mercy's love he believed such that she would, without a thought, leave the luxury of her father's house for the mere plenty of his. that it would not be to descend but to rise in the true social scale he would leave her to discover. had he known what mr. palmer was, and how his money had been made, he would neither have sought nor accepted his acquaintance, and it would no more have been possible to fall in love with one of his family than to covet one of his fine horses. but that which might, could, would, or should have been, affected in no way that which was. he had entered in ignorance, by the will of god, into certain relations with "the young woman," as his mother called her, and those relations had to be followed to their natural and righteous end. talking together over possibilities, mr. peregrine palmer had agreed with his wife that, mercy being so far from a beauty, it might not be such a bad match, would not at least be one to be ashamed of, if she did marry the impoverished chief of a highland clan with a baronetcy in his pocket. having bought the land cheap, he could afford to let a part, perhaps even the whole of it, go back with his daughter, thus restoring to its former position an ancient and honourable family. the husband of his younger daughter would then be head of one of the very few highland families yet in possession of their ancestral acres--a distinction he would owe to peregrine palmer! it was a pleasant thought to the kindly, consequential, common little man. mrs. palmer, therefore, when the chief called upon her, received him with more than her previous cordiality. his mother would have been glad to see him return from his call somewhat dejected; he entered so radiant and handsome, that her heart sank within her. was she actually on the point of being allied through the child of her bosom to a distiller and brewer--a man who had grown rich on the ruin of thousands of his fellow countrymen? to what depths might not the most ancient family sink! for any poverty, she said to herself, she was prepared--but how was she to endure disgrace! alas for the clan, whose history was about to cease--smothered in the defiling garment of ill-gotten wealth! miserable, humiliating close to ancient story! she had no doubt as to her son's intention, although he had said nothing; she knew that his refusal of dower would be his plea in justification; but would that deliver them from the degrading approval of the world? how many, if they ever heard of it, would believe that the poor, high-souled macruadh declined to receive a single hundred from his father-in-law's affluence! that he took his daughter poor as she was born--his one stipulation that she should be clean from her father's mud! for one to whom there would even be a chance of stating the truth of the matter, a hundred would say, "that's your plan! the only salvation for your shattered houses! point them up well with the bird-lime of the brewer, the quack, or the money-lender, and they'll last till doom'sday!" thus bitterly spoke the mother. she brooded and scorned, raged inwardly, and took to herself dishonour, until evidently she was wasting. the chief's heart was troubled; could it be that she doubted his strength to resist temptation? he must make haste and have the whole thing settled! and first of all speak definitely to mercy on the matter! he had appointed to meet her the same evening, and went long before the hour to watch for her appearing. he climbed the hill, and lay down in the heather whence he could see the door of the new house, and mercy the moment she should come out of it. he lay there till the sun was down, and the stars began to appear. at length--and even then it was many minutes to the time--he saw the door open, and mercy walk slowly to the gate. he rose and went down the hill. she saw him, watched him descending, and the moment he reached the road, went to meet him. they walked slowly down the road, without a word spoken, until they felt themselves alone. "you look so lovely!" said the chief. "in the twilight, i suppose!" said mercy. "perhaps; you are a creature of the twilight, or the night rather, with your great black eyes!" "i don't like you to speak to me so! you never did before! you know i am not lovely! i am very plain!" she was evidently not pleased. "what have i done to vex you, mercy?" he rejoined. "why should you mind my saying what is true?" she bit her lip, and could hardly speak to answer him. often in london she had been morally sickened by the false rubbish talked to her sister, and had boasted to herself that the chief had never paid her a compliment. now he had done it! she took her hand from his arm. "i think i will go home!" she said. alister stopped and turned to her. the last gleam of the west was reflected from her eyes, and all the sadness of the fading light seemed gathered into them. "my child!" he said, all that was fatherly in the chief rising at the sight, "who has been making you unhappy?" "you," she answered, looking him in the face. "how? i do not understand!" he returned, gazing at her bewildered. "you have just paid me a compliment--a thing you never did before--a thing i never heard before from any but a fool! how could you say i was beautiful! you know i am not beautiful! it breaks my heart to think you could say what you didn't believe!" "mercy!" answered the chief, "if i said you were beautiful, and to my eyes you were not, it would yet be true; for to my heart, which sees deeper than my eyes, you are more beautiful than any other ever was or ever will be. i know you are not beautiful in the world's meaning, but you are very lovely--and it was lovely i said you were!" "lovely because you love me? is that what you meant?" "yes, that and more. your eyes are beautiful, and your hair is beautiful, and your expression is lovely. but i am not flattering you--i am not even paying you compliments, for those things are not yours; god made them, and has given them to me!" she put her hand in his arm again, and there was no more love-making. "but mercy," said the chief, when they had walked some distance without speaking, "do you think you could live here always, and never see london again?" "i would not care if london were scratched out." "could you be content to be a farmer's wife?" "if he was a very good farmer," she answered, looking up archly. "am i a good enough farmer, then, to serve your turn?" "good enough if i were ten times better. do you really mean it, macruadh?" "with all my heart. only there is one thing i am very anxious about." "what is that?" "how your father will take my condition." "he will allow, i think, that it is good enough for me--and more than i deserve." "that is not what i mean; it is that i have a certain condition to make." "else you won't marry me? that seems strange! of course i will do anything you would wish me to do! a condition!" she repeated, ponderingly, with just a little dissatisfaction in the tone. alister wondered she was not angry. but she trusted him too well to take offence readily. "yes," he rejoined, "a real condition! terms belong naturally to the giver, not the petitioner; i hope with all my heart it will not offend him. it will not offend you, i think." "let me hear your condition," said mercy, looking at him curiously, her honest eyes shining in the faint light. "i want him to let me take you just as you are, without a shilling of his money to spoil the gift. i want you in and for yourself." "i dare not think you one who would rather not be obliged to his wife for anything!" said mercy. "that cannot be it!" she spoke with just a shadow of displeasure. he did not answer. he was in great dread of hurting her, and his plain reason could not fail to hurt her. "well," she resumed, as he did not reply, "there are fathers, i daresay, who would not count that a hard condition!" "of course your father will not like the idea of your marrying so poor a man!" "if he should insist on your having something with me, you will not refuse, will you? why should you mind it?" alister was silent. the thing had already begun to grow dreadful! how could he tell her his reasons! was it necessary to tell her? if he had to explain, it must be to her father, not to her! how, until absolutely compelled, reveal the horrible fact that her father was despised by her lover! she might believe it her part to refuse such love! he trembled lest she should urge him. but mercy, thinking she had been very bold already, also held her peace. they tried to talk about other things, but with little success, and when they parted, it was with a sense on both sides that something had got between them. the night through mercy hardly slept for trying to discover what his aversion to her dowry might mean. no princedom was worth contrasting with poverty and her farmer-chief, but why should not his love be able to carry her few thousands? it was impossible his great soul should grudge his wife's superiority in the one poor trifle of money! was not the whole family superior to money! had she, alas, been too confident in their greatness? must she be brought to confess that their grand ways had their little heart of pride? did they not regard themselves as the ancient aristocracy of the country! yes, it must be! the chief despised the origin of her father's riches! but, although so far in the direction of the fact, she had no suspicion of anything more than landed pride looking down upon manufacture and trade. she suspected no moral root of even a share in the chief's difficulty. naturally, she was offended. how differently christina would have met the least hint of a condition, she thought. she had been too ready to show and confess her love! had she stood off a little, she might have escaped this humiliation! but would that have been honest? must she not first of all be true? was the chief, whatever his pride, capable of being ungenerous? questions like these kept coming and going throughout the night. hither and thither went her thoughts, refusing to be controlled. the morning came, the sun rose, and she could not find rest. she had come to see how ideally delightful it was just to wait god's will of love, yet, in this her first trouble, she actually forgot to think of god, never asked him to look after the thing for her, never said, "thy will be done!" and when at length weariness overpowered her, fell asleep like a heathen, without a word from her heart to the heart. alister missed ian sorely. he prayed to god, but was too troubled to feel him near. trouble imagined may seem easy to meet; trouble actual is quite another thing! his mother, perhaps, was to have her desire; mercy, perhaps, would not marry a man who disapproved of her family! between them already was what could not be talked about! he could not set free his heart to her! when mercy woke, the old love was awake also; let alister's reason be what it might, it was not for her to resent it! the life he led was so much grander than a life spent in making money, that he must feel himself superior! throned in the hearts, and influencing the characters of men, was he not in a far nobler position than money could give him? from her night of doubt and bitterness mercy issued more loving and humble. what should she be now, she said to herself, if alister had not taught her? he had been good to her as never father or brother! she would trust him! she would believe him right! had he hurt her pride? it was well her pride should be hurt! her mind was at rest. but alister must continue in pain and dread until he had spoken to her father. knowing then the worst, he might use argument with mercy; the moment for that was not yet come! if he consented that his daughter should leave him undowered, an explanation with mercy might be postponed. when the honour of her husband was more to her than the false credit of her family, when she had had time to understand principles which, born and brought up as she had been, she might not yet be able to see into, then it would be time to explain! one with him, she would see things as he saw them! till her father came, he would avoid the subject! all the morning he was busy in the cornyard--with his hands in preparing new stances for ricks, with his heart in try ing to content himself beforehand with whatever fate the lord might intend for him. as yet he was more of a christian philosopher than a philosophical christian. the thing most disappointing to him he would treat as the will of god for him, and try to make up his mind to it, persuading himself it was the right and best thing--as if he knew it the will of god. he was thus working in the region of supposition, and not of revealed duty; in his own imagination, and not in the will of god. if this should not prove the will of god concerning him, then he was spending his strength for nought. there is something in the very presence and actuality of a thing to make one able to bear it; but a man may weaken himself for bearing what god intends him to bear, by trying to bear what god does not intend him to bear. the chief was forestalling the morrow like an unbeliever--not without some moral advantage, i dare say, but with spiritual loss. we have no right to school ourselves to an imaginary duty. when we do not know, then what he lays upon us is not to know, and to be content not to know. the philosopher is he who lives in the thought of things, the christian is he who lives in the things themselves. the philosopher occupies himself with god's decree, the christian with god's will; the philosopher with what god may intend, the christian with what god wants him to do. the laird looked up and there were the young ladies! it was the first time christina had come nigh the cottage since ian's departure. "can you tell me, macruadh," she said, "what makes mrs. conal so spiteful always? when we bade her good morning a few minutes ago, she overwhelmed us with a torrent of abuse!" "how did you know it was abuse?" "we understand enough of gaelic to know it was not exactly blessing us she was. it is not necessary to know cat-language to distinguish between purring and spitting! what harm have we done? her voice was fierce, and her eyes were like two live peats flaming at us! do speak to her." "it would be of no use!" "where's the good of being chief then? i don't ask you to make the old woman civil, but i think you might keep her from insulting your friends! i begin to think your chiefdom a sham!" "i doubt indeed if it reaches to the tongues of the clan! but let us go and tell my mother. she may be able to do something with her!" christina went into the cottage; the chief drew mercy back. "what do you think the first duty of married people, mercy--to each other, i mean," he said. "to be always what they look," answered mercy. "yes, but i mean actively. what is it their first duty to do towards each other?" "i can't answer that without thinking." "is it not each to help the other to do the will of god?" "i would say yes if i were sure i really meant it." "you will mean it one day." "are you sure god will teach me?" "i think he cares more to do that than anything else." "more than to save us?" "what is saving but taking us out of the dark into the light? there is no salvation but to know god and grow like him." chapter vii a generous dowry. the only hope of the chief's mother was in what the girl's father might say to her son's proposal. would not his pride revolt against giving his daughter to a man who would not receive his blessing in money? mr. peregrine palmer arrived, and the next day alister called upon him. not unprepared for the proposal of the chief, mercy's father had nothing to urge against it. her suitor's name was almost an historical one, for it stood high in the home-annals of scotland. and the new laird, who had always a vague sense of injury in the lack of an illustrious pedigree of his own to send forward, was not un willing that a man more justly treated than himself should supply the solatium to his daughter's children. he received the macruadh, therefore, if a little pompously, yet with kindness. and the moment they were seated alister laid his request before him. "mr. palmer," he said, "i come to ask the hand of your daughter mercy. i have not much beyond myself to offer her, but i can tell you precisely what there is." mr. peregrine palmer sat for a moment looking important. he seemed to see much to ponder in the proposal. "well, macruadh," he said at length, hesitating with hum and with haw, "the thing is--well, to speak the truth, you take me a good deal by surprise! i do not know how the thing may appear to mrs. palmer. and then the girl herself, you will allow, ought, in a free country, to have a word in the matter! we give our girls absolute liberty; their own hearts must guide them--that is, where there is no serious exception to be taken. honestly, it is not the kind of match we should have chosen! it is not as if things were with you now as once, when the land was all your own, and--and--you--pardon me, i am a father--did not have to work with your own hands!" had he been there on any other errand the chief would have stated his opinion that it was degrading to a man to draw income from anything he would count it degrading to put his own hand to; but there was so much he might be compelled to say to the displeasure of mr. palmer while asking of him the greatest gift he had to bestow, that he would say nothing unpalatable which he was not compelled to say. "my ancestors," he answered, willing to give the objection a pleasant turn, "would certainly have preferred helping themselves to the produce of lowland fields! my great-great-grandfather, scorning to ask any man for his daughter, carried her off without a word!" "i am glad the peculiarity has not shown itself hereditary," said mr. palmer laughing. "but if i have little to offer, i expect nothing with her," said the chief abruptly. "i want only herself!" "a very loverly mode of speaking! but it is needless to say no daughter of mine shall leave me without a certainty, one way or the other, of suitable maintenance. you know the old proverb, macruadh,--'when poverty comes in at the door,'--?" "there is hardly a question of poverty in the sense the proverb intends!" answered the chief smiling. "of course! of course! at the same time you cannot keep the wolf too far from the door. i would not, for my part, care to say i had given my daughter to a poor farmer in the north. two men, it is, i believe, you employ, macruadh?" the chief answered with a nod. "i have other daughters to settle--not to mention my sons," pursued the great little man, "--but--but i will find a time to talk the matter over with mrs. palmer, and see what i can do for you. meanwhile you may reckon you have a friend at court; all i have seen makes me judge well of you. where we do not think alike, i can yet say for you that your faults lean to virtue's side, and are such as my daughter at least will be no loser by. good morning, macruadh." mr. peregrine palmer rose; and the chief, perplexed and indignant, but anxious not to prejudice, his very doubtful cause, rose also. "you scarcely understand me, mr. palmer," he said. "on the possibility of being honoured with your daughter's hand, you must allow me to say distinctly beforehand, that i must decline receiving anything with her. when will you allow me to wait upon you again?" "i will write. good morning." the interview was certainly not much to the assuagement of the chief's anxiety. he went home with the feeling that he had submitted to be patronized, almost insulted by a paltry fellow whose consequence rested on his ill-made money--a man who owed everything to a false and degrading appetite in his neighbours! nothing could have made him put up with him but the love of mercy, his dove in a crow's nest! but it would be all in vain, for he could not lie! truth, indeed, if not less of a virtue, was less of a heroism in the chief than in most men, for he could not lie. had he been tempted to try, he would have reddened, stammered, broken down, with the full shame, and none of the success of a falsehood. for a week, he heard nothing; there seemed small anxiety to welcome him into the palmer family! then came a letter. it implied, almost said that some difficulty had been felt as to his reception by every member of the family--which the chief must himself see to have been only natural! but while money was of no con sequence to mr. palmer, it was of the greatest consequence that his daughter should seem to make a good match; therefore, as only in respect of position was the alliance objectionable, he had concluded to set that right, and in giving him his daughter, to restore the chief's family to its former dignity, by making over to him the clanruadh property now in his possession by purchase. while he thus did his duty by his daughter, he hoped the macruadh would accept the arrangement as a mark of esteem for himself. two conditions only he would make--the first, that, as long as he lived, the shooting should be mr. palmer's, to use or to let, and should extend over the whole estate; the second, that the chief should assume the baronetcy which belonged to him. my reader will regard the proposition as not ungenerous, however much the money value of the land lay in the shooting. as alister took leave of his mother for the night, he gave her the letter. she took it, read it slowly, laughed angrily, smiled scornfully, wept bitterly, crushed it in her hand, and walked up to her room with her head high. all the time she was preparing for her bed, she was talking in her spirit with her husband. when she lay down she became a mere prey to her own thoughts, and was pulled, and torn, and hurt by them for hours ere she set herself to rule them. for the first time in her life she distrusted her son. she did not know what he would do! the temptation would surely be too strong for him! two good things were set over against one evil thing--an evil thing, however, with which nobody would associate blame, an evil thing which would raise him high in the respect of everyone whose respect was not worth having!--the woman he loved and the land of his ancestors on the one side, and only the money that bought the land for him on the other!--would he hold out? he must take the three together, or have none of them! her fear for him grew and possessed her. she grew cold as death. why did he give her the letter, and go without saying a word? she knew well the arguments he would adduce! henceforward and for ever there would be a gulf between them! the poor religion he had would never serve to keep him straight! what was it but a compromise with pride and self-sufficiency! it could bear no such strain! he acknowledged god, but not god reconciled in christ, only god such as unregenerate man would have him! and when ian came home, he would be sure to side with alister! there was but one excuse for the poor boy--and that a miserable one: the blinding of love! yes there was more excuse than that: to be lord of the old lands, with the old clan growing and gathering again about its chief! it was a temptation fit to ruin an archangel! what could he not do then for his people! what could he not do for the land! and for her, she might have her ian always at home with her! god forbid she should buy even such bliss at such a cost! she was only thinking, she said to herself, how, if the thing had to be, she would make the best of it: she was bound as a mother to do that! but the edge of the wedge was in. she said to herself afterwards, that the enemy of her soul must have been lying in wait for her that night; she almost believed in some bodily presence of him in her room: how otherwise could she account for her fall! he must have been permitted to tempt her, because, in condemning evil, she had given way to contempt and worldly pride. her thoughts unchecked flowed forward. they lingered brooding for a time on the joys that might be hers--the joys of the mother of a chief over territory as well as hearts. then they stole round, and began to flow the other way. ere the thing had come she began to make the best of it for the sake of her son and the bond between them; then she began to excuse it for the sake of the clan; and now she began to justify it a little for the sake of the world! everything that could favour the acceptance of the offer came up clear before her. the land was the same as it always had been! it had never been in the distillery! it had never been in the brew-house! it was clean, whoever had transacted concerning it, through whatever hands it had passed! a good cow was a good cow, had she been twenty times reaved! for mr. palmer to give and alister to take the land back, would be some amends to the nation, grievously injured in the money of its purchase! the deed would restore to the redeeming and uplifting influence of her son many who were fast perishing from poverty and whisky; for, their houses and crofts once more in the power of their chief, he would again be their landlord as well! it would be a pure exercise of the law of compensation! hundreds who had gone abroad would return to replenish the old glens with the true national wealth--with men and women, and children growing to be men and women, for the hour of their country's need! these were the true, the golden crops! the glorious time she had herself seen would return, when strathruadh could alone send out a regiment of the soldiers that may be defeated, but will not live to know it. the dream of her boys would come true! they would rebuild the old castle, and make it a landmark in the history of the highlands! but while she stood elate upon this high-soaring peak of the dark mountains of ambition, sudden before her mind's eye rose the face of her husband, sudden his voice was in her ear; he seemed to stand above her in the pulpit, reading from the prophet isaiah the four woes that begin four contiguous chapters:--"woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine!"--"woe to ariel, to ariel, the city where david dwelt! add ye year to year; let them kill sacrifices; yet i will distress ariel."--"woe to the rebellious children, saith the lord, that take counsel, but not of me; and that cover with a covering, but not of my spirit, that they may add sin to sin!"--"woe to them that go down to egypt for help; and stay on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many; and in horsemen, because they are very strong; but they look not unto the holy one of israel, neither seek the lord!" then followed the words opening the next chapter:--"behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment. and a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest." all this, in solemn order, one woe after the other, she heard in the very voice of her husband; in awful spiritual procession, they passed before her listening mind! she grew cold as the dead, and shuddered and shivered. she looked over the edge into the heart of a black gulf, into which she had been on the point of casting herself--say rather, down whose side, searching for an easy descent, she had already slid a long way, when the voice from above recalled her! she covered her face with her hands and wept--ashamed before god, ashamed before her husband. it was a shame unutterable that the thing should even have looked tempting! she cried for forgiveness, rose, and sought alister's room. seldom since he was a man had she visited her elder son in his chamber. she cherished for him, as chief, something of the reverence of the clan. the same familiarity had never existed between them as between her and ian. now she was going to wake him, and hold a solemn talk with him. not a moment longer should he stand leaning over the gulf into which she had herself well nigh fallen! she found him awake, and troubled, though not with an eternal trouble such as hers. "i thought i should find you asleep, alister!" she said. "it was not very likely, mother!" he answered gently. "you too have been tried with terrible thoughts?" "i have been tried, but hardly with terrible thoughts: i know that mercy loves me!" "ah, my son, my dear son! love itself is the terrible thing! it has drawn many a man from the way of peace!" "did it draw you and my father from the way of peace?" asked alister. "not for a moment!" she answered. "it made our steps firmer in the way." "then why should you fear it will draw me from it? i hope i have never made you think i was not following my father and you!" "who knows what either of us might have done, with such a temptation as yours!" "either you say, mother, that my father was not so good as i think him, or that he did what he did in his own strength!" "' let him that thinketh '--you know the rest!" rejoined the mother. "i don't think i am tempted to anything just now." "there it is, you see!--the temptation so subtle that you do not suspect its character!" "i am confident my father would have done just as i mean to do!" "what do you mean to do?" "is it my own mother asks me? does she distrust her husband and her son together?" it began to dawn on the mother that she had fallen into her own temptation through distrust of her son. because she-distrusted him, she sought excuse for him, and excuse had turned to all but justification: she had given place to the devil! but she must be sure about alister! she had had enough of the wiles of satan: she must not trust her impressions! the enemy might even now be bent on deceiving her afresh! for a moment she kept silence, then said:-- "it would be a grand thing to have the whole country-side your own again--wouldn't it, alister?" "it would, mother!" he answered. "and have all your people quite under your own care?" "a grand thing, indeed, mother!" "how can you say then it is no temptation to you?" "because it is none." "how is that?" "i would not have my clan under a factor of satan's, mother!" "i do not understand you!" "what else should i be, if i accepted the oversight of them on terms of allegiance to him! that was how he tempted jesus. i will not be the devil's steward, to call any land or any people mine!" his mother kissed him on the forehead, walked erect from the room, and went to her own to humble herself afresh. in the morning, alister took his dinner of bread and cheese in his pocket, and set out for the tomb on the hill-top. there he remained until the evening, and wrote his answer, sorely missing ian. he begged mr. peregrine palmer to dismiss the idea of enriching him, thanked him for his great liberality, but declared himself entirely content, and determined not to change his position. he could not and would not avail himself of his generosity. mr. palmer, unable to suspect the reasons at work in the chief's mind, pleased with the genuineness of his acknowledgment, and regarding him as a silly fellow who would quixotically outdo him in magnanimity, answered in a more familiar, almost jocular strain. he must not be unreasonable, he said; pride was no doubt an estimable weakness, but it might be carried too far; men must act upon realities not fancies; he must learn to have an eye to the main chance, and eschew heroics: what was life without money! it was not as if he gave it grudgingly, for he made him heartily welcome. the property was in truth but a flea-bite to him! he hoped the macruadh would live long to enjoy it, and make his father-in-law the great grandfather of chiefs, perpetuating his memory to ages unborn. there was more to the same effect, void neither of eloquence nor of a certain good-heartedness, which the laird both recognized and felt. it was again his painful turn. he had now to make his refusal as positive as words could make it. he said he was sorry to appear headstrong, perhaps uncivil and ungrateful, but he could not and would not accept anything beyond the priceless gift of mercy's hand. not even then did peregrine palmer divine that his offered gift was despised; that idea was to him all but impossible of conception. he read merely opposition, and was determined to have his way. next time he too wrote positively, though far from unkindly:--the macruadh must take the land with his daughter, or leave both! the chief replied that he could not yield his claim to mercy, for he loved her, and believed she loved him; therefore begged mr. peregrine palmer, of his generosity, to leave the decision with his daughter. the next was a letter from mercy, entreating alister not to hurt her father by seeming to doubt the kindness of his intentions. she assured him her father was not the man to interfere with his management of the estate, the shooting was all he cared about; and if that was the difficulty, she imagined even that might be got over. she ended praying that he would, for her sake, cease making much of a trifle, for such the greatest property in the world must be betwixt them. no man, she said, could love a woman right, who would not be under the poorest obligation to her people! the chief answered her in the tenderest way, assuring her that if the property had been hers he would only have blessed her for it; that he was not making much ado about nothing; that pride, or unwillingness to be indebted, had nothing to do with his determination; that the thing was with him in very truth a matter of conscience. he implored her therefore from the bottom of his heart to do her best to persuade her father--if she would save him who loved her more than his own soul, from a misery god only could make him able to bear. mercy was bewildered. she neither understood nor suspected. she wrote again, saying her father was now thoroughly angry; that she found herself without argument, the thing being incomprehensible to her as to her father; that she could not see where the conscience of the thing lay. her terror was, that, if he persisted, she would be driven to think he did not care for her; his behaviour she had tried in vain to reconcile with what he had taught her; if he destroyed her faith in him, all her faith might go, and she be left without god as well as without him! then alister saw that necessity had culminated, and that it was no longer possible to hold anything back. whatever other suffering he might cause her, mercy must not be left to think him capable of sacrificing her to an absurdity! she must know the truth of the matter, and how it was to him of the deepest conscience! he must let her see that if he allowed her to persuade him, it would be to go about thenceforward consumed of self-contempt, a slave to the property, no more its owner than if he had stolen it, and in danger of committing suicide to escape hating his wife! for the man without a tender conscience, cannot imagine the state to which another may come, who carries one about with him, stinging and accusing him all day long. so, out of a heart aching with very fullness, alister wrote the truth to mercy. and mercy, though it filled her with grief and shame, had so much love for the truth, and for the man who had waked that love, that she understood him, and loved him through all the pain of his words; loved him the more for daring the risk of losing her; loved him yet the more for cleaving to her while loathing the mere thought of sharing her wealth; loved him most of all that he was immaculate in truth. she carried the letter to her father's room, laid it before him without a word, and went out again. the storm gathered swiftly, and burst at once. not two minutes seemed to have passed when she heard his door open, and a voice of wrathful displeasure call out her name. she returned--in fear, but in fortitude. then first she knew her father!--for although wrath and injustice were at home in him, they seldom showed themselves out of doors. he treated her as a willing party to an unspeakable insult from a highland boor to her own father. to hand him such a letter was the same as to have written it herself! she identified herself with the writer when she became the bearer of the mangy hound's insolence! he raged at mercy as in truth he had never raged before. if once she spoke to the fellow again, he would turn her out of the house! she would have left the room. he locked the door, set a chair before his writing table, and ordered her to sit there and write to his dictation. but no power on earth or under it would have prevailed to make mercy write as her own the words that were not hers. "you must excuse me, papa!" she said in a tone unheard from her before. this raising of the rampart of human dignity, crowned with refusal, between him and his own child, galled him afresh. "then you shall be compelled!" he said, with an oath through his clenched teeth. mercy stood silent and motionless. "go to your room. by heaven you shall stay there till you do as i tell you!" he was between her and the door. "you need not think to gain your point by obstinacy," he added. "i swear that not another word shall pass between you and that blockhead of a chief--not if i have to turn watch-dog myself!" he made way for her, but did not open the door. she left the room too angry to cry, and went to her own. her fear of her father had vanished. with alister on her side she could stand against the world! she went to her window. she could not see the cottage from it, but she could see the ruin, and the hill of the crescent fire, on which she had passed through the shadow of death. gazing on the hill she remembered what alister would have her do, and with her father in heaven sought shelter from her father on earth. chapter viii mistress conal. mr. peregrine palmer's generosity had in part rested on the idea of securing the estate against reverse of fortune, sufficiently possible though not expected; while with the improvements almost in hand, the shooting would make him a large return. he felt the more wronged by the ridiculous scruples of the chief--in which after all, though he could not have said why, he did not quite believe. it never occurred to him that, even had the land been so come by that the chief could accept a gift of it, he would, upon the discovery that it had been so secured from the donor's creditors, at once have insisted on placing it at their disposal. his wrath proceeded to vent itself in hastening the realization of his schemes of improvement, for he was well aware they would be worse than distasteful to the macruadh. their first requirement was the removal of every peasant within his power capable of violating the sanctity of the deer forest into which he and his next neighbour had agreed to turn the whole of their property. while the settlement of his daughter was pending, he had seen that the point might cause trouble unless previously understood between him and the chief; but he never doubted the recovery of the land would reconcile the latter to the loss of the men. now he chuckled with wrathful chuckle to think how entirely he had him in his power for justifiable annoyance; for he believed himself about to do nothing but good to the country in removing from it its miserable inhabitants, whom the sentimental indulgence of their so-called chief kept contented with their poverty, and with whom interference must now enrage him. how he hated the whole wretched pack! mr. palmer's doing of good to the country consisted in making the land yield more money into the pockets of mr. brander and himself by feeding wild animals instead of men. to tell such land-owners that they are simply running a tilt at the creative energy, can be of no use: they do not believe in god, however much they may protest and imagine they do. the next day but one, he sent mistress conal the message that she must be out of her hut, goods and gear, within a fortnight. he was not sure that the thing was legally correct, but he would risk it. she might go to law if she would, but he would make a beginning with her! the chief might take up her quarrel if he chose: nothing would please mr. palmer more than to involve him in a law-suit, clear him out, and send him adrift! his money might be contemptible, but the chief should find it at least dangerous! contempt would not stave off a land-slip! mistress conal, with a rage and scorn that made her feel every inch a witch, and accompanied by her black cat, which might or might not be the innocent animal the neighbours did not think him, hurried to the macruadh, and informed him that "the lowland thief" had given her notice to quit the house of her fathers within a fortnight. "i fear much we cannot help it! the house is on his land!" said the chief sorrowfully. "his land!" echoed the old woman. "is the nest of the old eagle his land? can he make his heather white or his ptarmigan black? will he dry up the lochs, and stay the rivers? will he remove the mountains from their places, or cause the generations of men to cease from the earth? defend me, chief! i come to you for the help that was never sought in vain from the macruadh!" "what help i have is yours without the asking," returned the chief. "i cannot do more than is in my power! one thing only i can promise you--that you shall lack neither food nor shelter." "my chief will abandon me to the wolf!" she cried. "never! but i can only protect you, not your house. he may have no right to turn you out at such short notice; but it could only be a matter of weeks. to go to law with him would but leave me without a roof to shelter you when your own was gone!" "the dead would have shown him into the dark, ere he turned me into the cold!" she muttered, and turning, left him. the chief was greatly troubled. he had heard nothing of such an intention on the part of his neighbour. could it be for revenge? he had heard nothing yet of his answer to mercy! all he could do was to represent to mr. palmer the trouble the poor woman was in, and let him know that the proceeding threatened would render him very unpopular in the strath. this he thought it best to do by letter. it could not enrage mr. palmer more, but it enraged him afresh. he vowed that the moment the time was up, out the old witch should go, neck and crop; and with the help of mr. brander, provided men for the enforcement of his purpose who did not belong to the neighbourhood. the chief kept hoping to hear from the new house, but neither his letter to mercy nor to her father received any answer. how he wished for ian to tell him what he ought to do! his mother could not help him. he saw nothing for it but wait events. day after day passed, and he heard nothing. he would have tried to find out the state of things at the new house, but until war was declared that would not be right! mr. palmer might be seeking how with dignity to move in the matter, for certainly the chief had placed him in a position yet more unpleasant than his own! he must wait on! the very day fortnight after the notice given, about three o'clock in the afternoon, came flying to the chief a ragged little urchin of the village, too breathless almost to make intelligible his news--that there were men at mistress conal's who would not go out of her house, and she and her old black cat were swearing at them. the chief ran: could the new laird be actually unhousing the aged, helpless woman? it was the part of a devil and not of a man! as he neared the place--there were her poor possessions already on the roadside!--her one chair and stool, her bedding, her three-footed pot, her girdle, her big chest, all that she could call hers in the world! and when he came in sight of the cottage, there she was being brought out of it, struggling, screaming, and cursing, in the grasp of two men! fierce in its glow was the torrent of gaelic that rushed from the crater of her lips, molten in the volcanic depths of her indignant soul. when one thinks of the appalling amount of rage exhausted by poor humans upon wrong, the energy of indignation, whether issued or suppressed, and how little it has done to right wrong, to draw acknowledgment or amends from self-satisfied insolence, he naturally asks what becomes of so much vital force. can it fare differently from other forces, and be lost? the energy of evil is turned into the mill-race of good; but the wrath of man, even his righteous wrath, worketh not the righteousness of god! what becomes of it? if it be not lost, and have but changed its form, in what shape shall we look for it? "set her down," cried the chief. "i will take care of her." when she heard the voice of her champion, the old woman let go a cat-like screech of triumph, and her gliding gaelic, smoothness itself in articulation, flowed yet firier in word, and fiercer in tone. but the who were thus ejecting her--hangers on of the sheriff-court in the county town, employed to give a colour of law to the doubtful proceeding--did not know the chief. "oh, we'll set her down," answered one of them insolently, "--and glad enough too! but we'll have her on the public road with her sticks first!" infuriated by the man's disregard of her chief, mistress conal struck her nails into his face, and with a curse he flung her from him. she turned instantly on the other with the same argument ad hominem, and found herself staggering on her own weak limbs to a severe fall, when the chief caught and saved her. she struggled hard to break from him and rush again into the hut, declaring she would not leave it if they burned her alive in it, but he held her fast. there was a pause, for one or two who had accompanied the men employed, knew the chief, and their reluctance to go on with the ruthless deed in his presence, influenced the rest. report of the ejection had spread, and the neighbours came running from the village. a crowd seemed to be gathering. again and again mistress conal tried to escape from alister and rush into the cottage. "you too, my chief!" she cried. "you turned against the poor of your people!" "no, mistress conal," he answered. "i am too much your friend to let you kill yourself!" "we have orders, macruadh, to set fire to the hovel," said one of the men, touching his hat respectfully. "they'll roast my black one!" shrieked the old woman. "small fear for him," said a man's voice from the little crowd, "if half be true--!" apparently the speaker dared no more. "fire won't singe a hair of him, mistress conal," said another voice. "you know it; he's used to it!" "come along, and let's get it over!" cried the leader of the ejection-party. "it--won't take many minutes once it's well a going, and there's fire enough on the hearth to set ben cruachan in a blaze!" "is everything out of it?" demanded the chief. "all but her cat. we've done our best, sir, and searched everywhere, but he's not to be found. there's nothing else left." "it's a lie!" screamed mistress conal. "is there not a great pile of peats, carried on my own back from the moss! ach, you robbers! would you burn the good peats?" "what good will the peats be to you, woman," said one of them not unkindly, "when you have no hearth?" she gave a loud wail, but checked it. "i will burn them on the road," she said. "they will keep me a few hours from the dark! when i die i will go straight up to god and implore his curse upon you, on your bed and board, your hands and tools, your body and soul. may your every prayer be lost in the wide murk, and never come at his ears! may--" "hush! hush!" interposed the chief with great gentleness. "you do not know what you are saying. but you do know who tells us to forgive our enemies!" "it's well for him to forgive," she screamed, "sitting on his grand throne, and leaving me to be turned out of my blessed house, on to the cold road!" "nannie!" said the chief, calling her by her name, "because a man is unjust to you, is that a reason for you to be unjust to him who died for you? you know as well as he, that you will not be left out on the cold road. he knows, and so do you, that while i have a house over my head, there is a warm corner in it for you! and as for his sitting on his throne, you know that all these years he has been trying to take you up beside him, and can't get you to set your foot on the first step of it! be ashamed of yourself, nannie!" she was silent. "bring out her peats," he said, turning to the bystanders; "we have small need, with winter on the road, to waste any of god's gifts!" they obeyed. but as they carried them out, and down to the road, the number of mistress conal's friends kept growing, and a laying together of heads began, and a gathering of human fire under glooming eyebrows. it looked threatening. suddenly mistress conal broke out in a wild yet awful speech, wherein truth indeed was the fuel, but earthly wrath supplied the prophetic fire. her friends suspended their talk, and her foes their work, to listen. english is by no means equally poetic with the gaelic, regarded as a language, and ill-serves to represent her utterance. much that seems natural in the one language, seems forced and unreal amidst the less imaginative forms of the other. i will nevertheless attempt in english what can prove little better than an imitation of her prophetic outpouring. it was like a sermon in this, that she began with a text:-- "woe unto them," she said--and her voice sounded like the wind among the great stones of a hillside--"that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth!" this woe she followed with woe upon woe, and curse upon curse, now from the bible, now from some old poem of the country, and now from the bitterness of her own heart. then she broke out in purely native eloquence:-- "who art thou, o man, born of a woman, to say to thy brother, 'depart from this earth: here is no footing for thee: all the room had been taken for me ere thou wast heard of! what right hast thou in a world where i want room for the red deer, and the big sheep, and the brown cattle? go up, thou infant bald-head! is there not room above, in the fields of the air? is there not room below with the dead? verily there is none here upon the earth!' who art thou, i say, to speak thus to thy fellow, as if he entered the world by another door than thyself! because thou art rich, is he not also a man?--a man made in the image of the same god? who but god sent him? and who but god, save thy father was indeed the devil, hath sent thee? thou hast to make room for thy brother! what brother of thy house, when a child is born into it, would presume to say, 'let him begone, and speedily! i do not want him! there is no room for him! i require it all for myself!' wilt thou say of any man, 'he is not my brother,' when god says he is! if thou say, 'am i therefore his keeper?' god for that saying will brand thee with the brand of cain. yea, the hour will come when those ye will not give room to breathe, will rise panting in the agony, yea fury of their need, and cry, 'if we may neither eat nor lie down by their leave, lo, we are strong! let us take what they will not give! if we die we but die!' then shall there be blood to the knees of the fighting men, yea, to the horses' bridles; and the earth shall be left desolate because of you, foul feeders on the flesh and blood, on the bodies and souls of men! in the pit of hell you will find room enough, but no drop of water; and it will comfort you little that ye lived merrily among pining men! which of us has coveted your silver or your gold? which of us has stretched out the hand to take of your wheat or your barley? all we ask is room to live! but because ye would see the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, ye have crushed and straitened us till we are ready to cry out, 'god, for thy mercy's sake, let us die, lest we be guilty of our own blood!'" a solitary man had come down the hill behind, and stood alone listening. it was the mover of the wickedness. in the old time the rights of the people in the land were fully recognized; but when the chiefs of clanruadh sold it, they could not indeed sell the rights that were not theirs, but they forgot to secure them for the helpless, and they were now in the grasp of the selfish and greedy, the devourers of the poor. he did not understand a word the woman was saying, but he was pleased to look on her rage, and see the man who had insulted him suffer with her. when he began to note the glances of lurid fire which every now and then turned upon him during mistress conal's speech, he scorned the indication: such poor creatures dared venture nothing, he thought, against the mere appearance of law. under what he counted the chiefs contempt, he had already grown worse; and the thought that perhaps the great world might one day look upon him with like contempt, wrought in him bitterly; he had not the assurance of rectitude which makes contempt hurtless. he was crueller now than before the chief's letter to his daughter. when mistress conal saw him, she addressed herself to him directly. what he would have felt had he understood, i cannot tell. never in this life did he know how the weak can despise the strong, how the poor can scorn the rich! "worm!" she said, "uncontent with holding the land, eating the earth that another may not share! the worms eat but what their bodies will hold, and thou canst devour but the fill of thy life! the hour is at hand when the earth will swallow thee, and thy fellow worms will eat thee, as thou hast eaten men. the possessions of thy brethren thou hast consumed, so that they are not! the holy and beautiful house of my fathers,--" she spoke of her poor little cottage, but in the words lay spiritual fact. "--mock not its poverty!" she went on, as if forestalling contempt; "for is it not to me a holy house where the woman lay in the agony whence first i opened my eyes to the sun? is it not a holy house where my father prayed morning and evening, and read the words of grace and comfort? is it not to me sacred as the cottage at nazareth to the poor man who lived there with his peasants? and is not that a beautiful house in which a woman's ear did first listen to the words of love? old and despised i am, but once i was younger than any of you, and ye will be old and decrepit as i, if the curse of god do not cut you off too soon. my alister would have taken any two of you and knocked your heads together. he died fighting for his country; and for his sake the voice of man's love has never again entered my heart! i knew a true man, and could be true also. would to god i were with him! you man-trapping, land-reaving, house-burning sasunnach, do your worst! i care not." she ceased, and the spell was broken. "come, come!" said one of the men impatiently. "tom, you get a peat, and set it on the top of the wall, under the roof. you, too, george!--and be quick. peats all around! there are plenty on the hearth!--how's the wind blowing?--you, henry, make a few holes in the wall here, outside, and we'll set live peats in them. it's time there was an end to this!" "you're right; but there's a better way to end it!" returned one of the clan, and gave him a shove that sent him to the ground. "men, do your duty!" cried mr. palmer from behind. "_i_ am here--to see you do it! never mind the old woman! of course she thinks it hard; but hard things have got to be done! it's the way of the world, and all for the best." "mr. palmer," said another of the clan, "the old woman has the right of you: she and hers have lived there, in that cottage, for nigh a hundred years." "she has no right. if she thinks she has, let her go to the law for it. in the meantime i choose to turn her off my land. what's mine's mine, as i mean every man jack of you to know--chief and beggar!" the macruadh walked up to him. "pardon me, sir," he said: "i doubt much if you have a legal right to disturb the poor woman. she has never paid rent for her hut, and it has always been looked upon as her property." "then the chief that sold it swindled both me and her!" stammered mr. palmer, white with rage. "but as for you who call yourself a chief, you are the most insolent, ill-bred fellow i ever had to do with, and i have not another word to say to you!" a silence like that before a thunderstorm succeeded: not a man of the clan could for the moment trust his hearing. but there is nothing the celtic nature resents like rudeness: half a dozen at once of the macruadhs rushed upon the insulter of their chief, intent on his punishment. "one of you touch him," cried alister, "and i will knock him down. i would if he were my foster-brother!" each eager assailant stood like a block. "finish your work, men!" shouted mr. palmer. to do him justice, he was no coward. "clansmen," said the chief, "let him have his way. i do not see how to resist the wrong without bringing more evil upon us than we can meet. we must leave it to him who says 'vengeance is mine.'" the macruadhs murmured their obedience, and stood sullenly looking on. the disseizors went into the hut, and carried out the last of the fuel. then they scooped holes in the turf walls, inside to leeward, outside to windward, and taking live peats from the hearth, put them in the holes. a few minutes, and poor nannie's "holy and beautiful house" was a great fire. when they began to apply the peats, alister would at once have taken the old woman away, but he dreaded an outbreak, and lingered. when the fire began to run up the roof, mistress conal broke from him, and darted to the door. every one rushed to seize her, mr. palmer with the rest. "blackie! blackie! blackie!" she shrieked like a madwoman. while the men encumbered each other in their endeavours to get her away, down shot the cat from the blazing roof, a fizz of fire in his black fur, his tail as thick as his neck, an infernal howling screech of hatred in his horrible throat, and, wild with rage and fear, flung himself straight upon mr. palmer. a roar of delighted laughter burst forth. he bawled out--and his bawl was mingled with a scream--to take the brute off him, and his own men hurried to his rescue; but the fury-frantic animal had dug his claws and teeth into his face, and clung to him so that they had to choke him off. the chief caught up mistress conal and carried her away: there was no danger of any one hurting mr. palmer now! he bore her on one arm like a child, and indeed she was not much heavier. but she kept her face turned and her eyes fixed on her burning home, and leaning over the shoulder of the chief, poured out, as he carried her farther and farther from the scene of the outrage, a flood of maledictory prophecy against the doers of the deed. the laird said never a word, never looked behind him, while she, almost tumbling down his back as she cursed with outstretched arms, deafened him with her raging. he walked steadily down the path to the road, where he stepped into the midst of her goods and chattels. the sight of them diverted a little the current of her wrath. "where are you going, macruadh?" she cried, as he walked on. "see you not my property lying to the hand of the thief? know you not that the greedy sasunnach will sweep everything away!" "i can't carry them and you too, mistress conal!" said the chief gayly. "set me down then. who ever asked you to carry me! and where would you be carrying me? my place is with my things!" "your place is with me, mistress conal! i belong to you, and you belong to me, and i am taking you home to my mother." at the word, silence fell, not on the lips, but on the soul of the raving prophetess: the chief she loved, his mother she feared. "set me down, macruadh!" she pleaded in gentle tone. "don't carry me to her empty-handed! set me down straight; i will load my back with my goods, and bear them to my lady, and throw them at her feet." "as soon as we get to the cottage," said the chief, striding on with his reluctant burden, "i will send up two men with wheelbarrows to bring them home." "home, said you?" cried the old woman, and burst into the tearless wailing of a child; "there is a home for me no more! my house was all that was left me of my people, and it is your own that make a house a home! in the long winter nights, when i sat by the fire and heard the wind howl, and the snow pat, pat like the small hands of my little brothers on the window, my heart grew glad within me, and the dead came back to my soul! when i took the book, i heard the spirit of my father reading through my own lips! and oh, my mother! my mother!" she ceased as if in despair. "surely, nannie, you will be at home with your chief!" said alister. "my house is your house now, and your dead will come to it and be welcome!" "it is their chief's house, and they will!" she returned hopefully. "they loved their chief.--shall we not make a fine clan when we're all gathered, we macmadhs! man nor woman can say i did anything to disgrace it!" "lest we should disgrace it," answered the chief, "we must bear with patience what is sent upon it." he carried her into the drawing-room and told her story, then stood, to the delighted amusement of his mother, with his little old sister in his arms, waiting her orders, like a big boy carrying the baby, who now and then moaned a little, but did not speak. mrs. macruadh called nancy, and told her to bring the tea-tray, and then, get ready for mistress conal the room next nancy's own, that she might be near to wait on her; and thither, when warmed and fed, the chief carried her. but the terrible excitement had so thinned the mainspring of her time-watch, that it soon broke. she did not live many weeks. from the first she sank into great dejection, and her mind wandered. she said her father never came to see her now; that he was displeased with her for leaving the house; and that she knew now she ought to have stayed and been burned in it. the chief reminded her that she had no choice, but had been carried bodily away. "yes, yes," she answered; "but they do not know that! i must make haste and tell them! who can bear her own people to think ill of her!--i'm coming! i'm coming! i'll tell you all about it! i'm an honest woman yet!" another thing troubled her sorely, for which she would hear no consolation; blackie had vanished!--whether he was killed at the time of his onslaught on mr. palmer, or was afterwards shot; whether, disgusted with the treatment of his old home, or the memory of what he had there suffered, he had fled the strath, and gone to the wild cats among the hills, or back to the place which some averred he came from, no one could tell. in her wanderings she talked more of her cat than of anything else, and would say things that with some would have gone far to justify the belief that the animal was by nature on familiar terms with the element which had yet driven him from his temporary home. nancy was more than uneasy at having the witch so near, but by no means neglected her duty to her. one night she woke, and had for some time lain listening whether she stirred or not, when suddenly quavered through the dark the most horrible cat-cry she had ever heard. in abject terror she covered her head, and lay shuddering. the cry came again, and kept coming at regular intervals, but drawing nearer and nearer. its expression was of intense and increasing pain. the creature whence it issued seemed to come close to the house, then with difficulty to scramble up on the roof, where it went on yowling, and screeching, and throwing itself about as if tying itself in knots, nancy said, until at last it gave a great choking, gobbling scream, and fell to the ground, after which all was quiet. persuading herself it was only a cat, she tried to sleep, and at length succeeded. when she woke in the morning, the first thing she did was to go out, fully expecting to find the cat lying at the foot of the wall. no cat was there. she went then as usual to attend to the old woman. mistress conal was dead and cold. the clan followed her body to the grave, and the black cat was never seen. chapter ix the marches. it was plainly of no use for the chief to attempt mollifying mr. palmer. so long as it was possible for him to be what he was, it must be impossible for him to understand the conscience that compelled the chief to refuse participation in the results of his life. where a man's own conscience is content, how shall he listen to the remonstrance of another man's! but even if he could have understood that the offence was unavoidable, that would rather have increased than diminished the pain of the hurt; as it was, the chief's determination must seem to mr. palmer an unprovoked insult! thus reflecting, alister tried all he could to be fair to the man whom he had driven to cut his acquaintance. it was now a lonely time for alister, lonelier than any ever before. ian was not within reach even by letter; mercy was shut up from him: he had not seen or heard from her since writing his explanation; and his mother did not sympathize with his dearest earthly desire: she would be greatly relieved, yea heartily glad, if mercy was denied him! she loved ian more than the chief, yet could have better borne to see him the husband of mercy; what was wanting to the equality of her love was in this regard more than balanced by her respect for the chief of the clan and head of the family. alister's light was thus left to burn in very darkness, that it might burn the better; for as strength is made perfect through weakness, so does the light, within grow by darkness. it was the people that sat in darkness that saw a great light. he was brought closer than ever to first principles; had to think and judge more than ever of the right thing to do--first of all, the right thing with regard to mercy. of giving her up, there was of course no thought; so long as she would be his, he was hers as entirely as the bonds of any marriage could make him! but she owed something to her father! and of all men the patriarchal chief was the last to dare interfere with the rights of a father. but they must be rights, not rights turned into, or founded upon wrongs. with the first in acknowledging true, he would not be with the last even, in yielding to false rights! the question was, what were the rights of a father? one thing was clear, that it was the duty, therefore the right of a father, to prevent his child from giving herself away before she could know what she did; and mercy was not yet of age. that one woman might be capable of knowing at fifteen, and another not at fifty, left untouched the necessity for fixing a limit. it was his own duty and right, on the other hand, to do what he could to prevent her from being in any way deceived concerning him. it was essential that nothing should be done, resolved, or yielded, by the girl, through any misunderstanding he could forestall, or because of any falsehood he could frustrate. he must therefore contrive to hold some communication with her! first of all, however, he must learn how she was treated! it was not only in fiction or the ancient clan-histories that tyrannical and cruel things were done! a tragedy is even more a tragedy that it has not much diversity of incident, that it is acted in commonplace surroundings, and that the agents of it are commonplace persons--fathers and mothers acting from the best of low or selfish motives. where either mammon or society is worshipped, in love, longing, or fear, there is room for any falsehood, any cruelty, any suffering. there were several of the clan employed about the new house of whom alister might have sought information; but he was of another construction from the man of fashion in the old plays, whose first love-strategy is always to bribe the lady's maid: the chief scorned to learn anything through those of a man's own household. he fired a gun, and ran up a flag on the old castle, which brought rob of the angels at full speed, and comforted the heart of mercy sitting disconsolate at her window: it was her chiefs doing, and might have to do with her! having told rob the state of matters between him and the new house-- "i need not desire you, rob," he concluded, "to be silent! you may of course let your father know, but never a soul besides. from this moment, every hour your father does not actually need you, be somewhere on the hills where you can see the new house. i want to learn first whether she goes out at all. with the dark you must draw nearer the house. but i will have no questioning of the servants or anyone employed about it; i will never use a man's pay to thwart his plans, nor yet make any man even unconsciously a traitor." rob understood and departed; but before he had news for his master an event occurred which superseded his service. the neighbours, mr. peregrine palmer and mr. brander, had begun to enclose their joint estates for a deer-forest, and had engaged men to act as curators. they were from the neighbourhood, but none of them belonged to strathruadh, and not one knew the boundaries of the district they had to patrol; nor indeed were the boundaries everywhere precisely determined: why should they be, where all was heather and rock? until game-sprinkled space grew valuable, who would care whether this or that lump of limestone, rooted in the solid earth, were the actual property of the one or the other! either would make the other welcome to blast and cart it away! there was just one person who knew all about the boundaries that was to be known; he could not in places draw their lines with absolute assurance, but he had better grounds for his conclusions than anyone else could have; this was hector of the stags. for who so likely to understand them as he who knew the surface within them as well as the clay-floor of his own hut? if he did not everywhere know where the marchline fell, at least he knew perfectly where it ought to fall. it happened just at this time that the mistress told hector she would be glad of a deer, intending to cure part for winter use; the next day, therefore,--the first of rob of the angels' secret service--he stalked one across the hill-farm, got a shot at it near the cave-house, brought it down, and was busy breaking it, when two men who had come creeping up behind, threw themselves upon him, and managed, well for themselves, to secure him before he had a chance of defending himself. finding he was deaf and dumb, one of them knew who he must be, and would have let him go; but the other, eager to ingratiate himself with the new laird, used such, argument to the contrary as prevailed with his companion, and they set out for the new house, hector between them with his hands tied. annoyed and angry at being thus treated like a malefactor, he yet found amusement in the notion of their mistake. but he found it awkward to be unable to use that readiest weapon of human defence, the tongue. if only his ears and mouth, as he called rob in their own speech, had been with him! when he saw, however, where they were taking him, he was comforted, for rob was almost certain to see him: wherever he was, he was watching the new house! he went composedly along with them therefore, fuming and snorting, not caring to escape. when rob caught sight of the three, he could not think how it was that his father walked so unlike himself. he could not be hurt, for his step was strong and steady as ever; not the less was there something of the rhythm gone out of his motion! there was "a broken music" in his gait! he took the telescope which the chief had lent him, and turned it upon him. discovering then that his father's hands were bound behind his back, fiercest indignation overwhelmed the soul of rob of the angels. his father bound like a criminal!--his father, the best of men! what could the devils mean? ah, they were taking him to the new house! he shut up his telescope, laid it down by a stone, and bounded to meet them, sharpening his knife on his hand as he went. the moment they were near enough, signs, unintelligible to the keepers, began to pass between the father and son: rob's meant that he must let him pass unnoticed; hector's that he understood. so, with but the usual salutation of a stranger, rob passed them. the same moment he turned, and with one swift sweep of his knife, severed the bonds of his father. the old man stepped back, and father and son stood fronting the enemy. "now," said rob, "if you are honest men, stand to it! how dared you bind hector of the stags?" "because he is not an honest man," replied one of them. rob answered him with a blow. the man made at him, but hector stepped between. "say that again of my father," cried rob, "who has no speech to defend himself, and i will drive my knife into you." "we are only doing our duty!" said the other. "we came upon him there cutting up the deer he had just killed on the new laird's land." "who are you to say which is the stranger's, and which the macruadh's? neither my father nor i have ever seen the faces of you in the country! will you pretend to know the marches better than my father, who was born and bred in the heather, and knows every stone on the face of the hills?" "we can't help where he was born or what he knows! he was on our land!" "he is the macruadh's keeper, and was on his own land. you will get yourselves into trouble!" "we'll take our chance!" "take your man then!" "if he try to escape, i swear by the bones of my grandfather," said the more inimical of the two, inheritor of a clan-feud with the macruadhs, "i will shoot him." rob of the angels burst into a scornful laugh. "you will! will you?" "i will not kill him; i don't want to be hanged for him! but i will empty my shot-barrel into the legs of him! so take your chance; you are warned!" they had hector's gun, and rob had no weapon but his knife. nor was he inclined to use either now he had cooled a little. he turned to his father. the old man understood perfectly what had passed between them, and signed to rob that he would go on to the new house, and rob might run and let the chief know what had happened. the same thing was in rob's mind, for he saw how it would favour the desires of his chief, bringing them all naturally about the place. but he must first go with his father on the chance of learning something. "we will go with you," he said. "we don't want you!" "but i mean to go!--my father is not able to speak for himself!" "you know nothing." "i know what he knows. the lie does not grow in our strath." "you crow high, my cock!" "no higher than i strike," answered rob. in the eyes of the men rob was small and weak; but there was something in him notwithstanding that looked dangerous, and, though far from cowards, they thought it as well to leave him alone. mercy at her window, where was her usual seat now, saw them coming, and instinctively connected their appearance with her father's new measures of protection; and when the men turned toward the kitchen, she ran down to learn what she could. rob greeted her with a smile as he entered. "i am going to fetch the macruadh," he whispered, and turning went out again. he told the chief that at the word her face lighted up as with the rise of the moon. one of the maids went and told her master that they had got a poacher in the kitchen. mr. palmer's eyes lightened under his black brows when he saw the captive, whom he knew by sight and by report. his men told him the story their own way, never hinting a doubt as to whose was the land on which the deer had been killed. "where is the nearest magistrate?" he inquired with grand severity. "the nearest is the macruadh, sir!" answered a highlander who had come from work in the garden to see what was going on. "i cannot apply to him; the fellow is one of his own men!" "the macruadh does what is just!" rejoined the man. his master vouchsafed him no reply. he would not show his wrath against the chief: it would be undignified! "take him to the tool-house, and lock him up till i think what to do with him. bring me the key." the butler led the way, and hector followed between his captors. they might have been showing him to his bed-room, so calm was he: rob gone to fetch the chief, his imprisonment could not last!--and for the indignity, was he not in the right! as mr. palmer left the kitchen, his eye fell on mercy. "go to your room," he said angrily, and turned from her. she obeyed in silence, consoling herself that from her window she could see the arrival of the chief. nor had she watched long when she saw him coming along the road with rob. at the gate she lost sight of them. presently she heard voices in the hall, and crept down the stair far enough to hear. "i could commit you for a breach of the peace, mr. palmer," she heard the chief say. "you ought to have brought the man to me. as a magistrate i order his release. but i give my word he shall be forthcoming when legally required." "your word is no bail. the man was taken poaching; i have him, and i will keep him." "let me see him then, that i may learn from himself where he shot the deer." "he shall go before mr. brander." "then i beg you will take him at once. i will go with him. but listen a moment, mr. palmer. when this same man, my keeper, took your guest poaching on my ground, i let mr. sercombe go. i could have committed him as you would commit hector. i ask you in return to let hector go. being deaf and dumb, and the hills the joy of his life, confinement will be terrible to him." "i will do nothing of the kind. you could never have committed a gentleman for a mistake. this is quite a different thing!" "it is a different thing, for hector cannot have made a mistake. he could not have followed a deer on to your ground without knowing it!" "i make no question of that!" "he says he was not on your property." "says!" "he is not a man to lie!" mr. palmer smiled. "once more i pray you, let us see him together." "you shall not see him." "then take him at once before mr. brander." "mr. brander is not at home." "take him before some magistrate--i care not who. there is mr. chisholm!" "i will take him when and where it suits me." "then as a magistrate i will set him at liberty. i am sorry to make myself unpleasant to you. of all things i would have avoided it. but i cannot let the man suffer unjustly. where have you put him?" "where you will not find him." "he is one of my people; i must have him!" "your people! a set of idle, poaching fellows! by heaven, the strath shall be rid of the pack of them before another year is out!" "while i have land in it with room for them to stand upon, the strath shall not be rid of them!--but this is idle! where have you put hector of the stags?" mr. palmer laughed. "in safe keeping. there is no occasion to be uneasy about him! he shall have plenty to eat and drink, be well punished, and show the rest of the rascals the way out of the country!" "then i must find him! you compel me!" so saying, the chief, with intent to begin his search at the top of the house in the hope of seeing mercy, darted up the stair. she heard him coming, went a few steps higher, and waited. on the landing he saw her, white, with flashing eyes. their hands clasped each other--for a moment only, but the moment was of eternity, not of time. "you will find hector in the tool-house," she said aloud. "you shameless hussey!" cried her father, following the chief in a fury. mercy ran up the stair. the chief turned and faced mr. palmer. "you have no business in my house!" "i have the right of a magistrate." "you have no right. leave it at once." "allow me to pass." "you ought to be ashamed of yourself--making a girl turn traitor to her own father!" "you ought to be proud of a daughter with the conscience and courage to turn against you!" the chief passed mr. palmer, and running down the stair, joined rob of the angels where he stood at the door in a group composed of the keepers and most of the servants. "do you know the tool-house?" he said to rob. "yes, macruadh." "lead the way then. your father is there." "on no account let them open the door," cried mr. palmer. "they may hold through it what communication they please." "you will not be saying much to a deaf man through inch boards!" remarked the clansman from the garden. mr. palmer hurried after them, and his men followed. alister found the door fast and solid, without handle. he turned a look on his companion, and was about to run his weight against the lock. "it is too strong," said rob. "hector of the stags must open it!" "but how? you cannot even let him know what you want!" rob gave a smile, and going up to the door, laid himself against it, as close as he could stand, with his face upon it, and so stood silent. mr. palmer coming up with his attendants, all stood for a few moments in silence, wondering at rob: he must be holding communication with his father--but how? sounds began inside--first a tumbling of tools about, then an attack on the lock. "come! come! this won't do!" said mr. palmer, approaching the door. "prevent it then," said the chief. "do what you will you cannot make him hear you, and while the door is between you, he cannot see you! if you do not open it, he will!" "run," said mr. palmer to the butler; "you will find the key on my table! i don't want the lock ruined!" but there was no stopping the thing! before the butler came back, the lock fell, the door opened, and out came hector, wiping his brow with his sleeve, and looking as if he enjoyed the fun. the keepers darted forward. "stand off!" said the chief stepping between. "i don't want to hurt you, but if you attempt to lay hands on him, i will." one of the men dodged round, and laid hold of hector from behind; the other made a move towards him in front. hector stood motionless for an instant, watching his chief, but when he saw him knock down the man before him, he had his own assailant by the throat in an instant, gave him a shake, and threw him beside his companion. "you shall suffer for this, macruadh!" cried mr. palmer, coming close up to him, and speaking in a low, determined tone, carrying a conviction of unchangeableness. "better leave what may not be the worst alone!" returned the chief. "it is of no use telling you how sorry i am to have to make myself disagreeable to you; but i give you fair warning that i will accept no refusal of the hand of your daughter from any but herself. as you have chosen to break with me, i accept your declaration of war, and tell you plainly i will do all i can to win your daughter, never asking your leave in respect of anything i may think it well to do. you will find there are stronger forces in the world than money. henceforward i hold myself clear of any personal obligation to you except as mercy's father and my enemy." from very rage mr. palmer was incapable of answering him. alister turned from him, and in his excitement mechanically followed rob, who was turning a corner of the house. it was not the way to the gate, but rob had seen mercy peeping round that same corner--anxious in truth about her father; she feared nothing for alister. he came at once upon mercy and rob talking together. rob withdrew and joined his father a little way off; they retired a few more paces, and stood waiting their chief's orders. "how am i to see you again, mercy?" said the chief hurriedly. "can't you think of some way? think quick." now mercy, as she sat alone at her window, had not unfrequently imagined the chief standing below on the walk, or just beyond in the belt of shrubbery; and now once more in her mind's eye suddenly seeing him there, she answered hurriedly, "come under my window to-night." "i do not know which it is." "you see it from the castle. i will put a candle in it." "what hour?" "any time after midnight. i will sit there till you come." "thank you," said the chief, and departed with his attendants. mercy hastened into the house by a back door, but had to cross the hall to reach the stair. as she ran up, her father came in at the front door, saw her, and called her. she went down again to meet the tempest of his rage, which now broke upon her in gathered fury. he called her a treacherous, unnatural child, with every name he thought bad enough to characterize her conduct. had she been to him as began or goneril, he could hardly have found worse names for her. she stood pale, but looked him in the face. her mother came trembling as near as she dared, withered by her terror to almost twice her age. mr. palmer in his fury took a step towards mercy as if he would strike her. mercy did not move a muscle, but stood ready for the blow. then love overcame her fear, and the wife and mother threw herself between, her arms round her husband, as if rather to protect him from the deed than her daughter from its hurt. "go to your room, mercy," she said. mercy turned and went. she could not understand herself. she used to be afraid of her father when she knew no reason; now that all the bad in his nature and breeding took form and utterance, she found herself calm! but the thing that quieted her was in reality her sorrow that he should carry himself so wildly. what she thought was, if the mere sense of not being in the wrong made one able to endure so much, what must not the truth's sake enable one to bear! she sat down at her window to gaze and brood. when her father cooled down, he was annoyed with himself, not that he had been unjust, but that he had behaved with so little dignity. with brows black as evil, he sat degraded in his own eyes, resenting the degradation on his daughter. every time he thought of her, new rage arose in his heart. he had been proud of his family autocracy. so seldom had it been necessary to enforce his authority, that he never doubted his wishes had but to be known to be obeyed. born tyrannical, the characterless submission of his wife had nourished the tyrannical in him. now, all at once, a daughter, the ugly one, from whom no credit was to be looked for, dared to defy him for a clown figuring in a worn-out rag of chieftainship--the musty fiction of a clan--half a dozen shepherds, crofters, weavers, and shoemakers, not the shadow of a gentleman among them!--a man who ate brose, went with bare knees, worked like any hind, and did not dare offend his wretched relations by calling his paltry farm his own!--for the sake of such a fellow, with a highland twang that disgusted his fastidious ear, his own daughter made a mock of his authority, treated him as a nobody! in his own house she had risen against him, and betrayed him to the insults of his enemy! his conscious importance, partly from doubt in itself, boiled and fumed, bubbled and steamed in the caldron of his angry brain. not one, but many suns would go down upon such a wrath! "i wish i might never set eyes on the girl again!" he said to his wife. "a small enough loss the sight of her would be, the ugly, common-looking thing! i beg you will save me from it in future as much as you can. she makes me feel as if i should go out of my mind!--so calm, forsooth! so meek! so self-sufficient!--oh, quite a saint!--and so strong-minded!--equal to throwing her father over for a fellow she never saw till a year ago!" "she shall have her dinner sent up to her as usual," answered his wife with a sigh. "but, really, peregrine, my dear, you must compose yourself! love has driven many a woman to extremes!" "love! why should she love such a fellow? i see nothing in him to love! why should she love him? tell me that! give me one good reason for her folly, and i will forgive her--do anything for her!--anything but let her have the rascal! that i will not! take for your son-in-law an ape that loathes your money, calls it filthy lucre--and means it! not if i can help it!--don't let me see her! i shall come to hate her! and that i would rather not; a man must love and cherish his own flesh! i shall go away, i must!--to get rid of the hateful face of the minx, with its selfrighteous, injured look staring at you!" "if you do, you can't expect me to prevent her from seeing him!" "lock her up in the coal-hole--bury her if you like! i shall never ask what you have done with her! never to see her again is all i care about!" "ah, if she were really dead, you would want to see her again--after a while!" "i wish then she was dead, that i might want to see her again! it won't be sooner! ten times rather than know her married to that beast, i would see her dead and buried!" the mother held her peace. he did not mean it, she said to herself. it was only his anger! but he did mean it; at that moment he would with joy have heard the earth fall on her coffin. notwithstanding her faculty for shutting out the painful, her persistent self-assuring that it would blow over, and her confidence that things would by and by resume their course, mrs. palmer was in those days very unhappy. the former quiet once restored, she would take mercy in hand, and reasoning with her, soon persuade her to what she pleased! it was her husband's severity that had brought it to this! the accomplice of her husband, she did not understand that influence works only between such as inhabit the same spiritual sphere: the daughter had been lifted into a region far above all the arguments of her mother--arguments poor in life, and base in reach. chapter x midnight. mercy sat alone but not lonely at her window. a joy in her heart made her independent for the time of human intercourse. life at the moment was livable without it, for there was no bar between her and her lover. the evening drew on. they sent her food. she forgot to eat it, and sat looking, till the lines of the horizon seemed grown into her mind like an etching. she watched the slow dusk swell and gather--with such delicate, soft-blending gradations in the birth of night as edwin waugh loves to seize and word-paint. through all its fine evanescent change of thought and feeling she watched unconsciously; and the growth, death, and burial of that twilight were ever after a substratum to all the sadness and all the hope that visited her. through palest eastern rose, through silvery gold and golden green and brown, the daylight passed into the shadow of the light, and the stars, like hope in despair, began to show themselves where they always were, and the night came on, and deeper and deeper sank the silence. household sound expired, and no step came near her door. her father had given orders, and was obeyed. christina has stolen indeed from her own room and listened at hers, but hearing nor sound nor motion, had concluded it better for mercy as well as safer for herself, to return. so she sat the sole wakeful thing in the house, for even her father slept. the earth had grown vague and dim, looking as it must look to the dead. its oppressive solidity, its obtrusive hereness, dissolved in the dark, it left the soul to live its own life. she could still trace the meeting of earth and sky, each the evidence of the other, but the earth was content to be and not assert, and the sky lived only in the points of light that dotted its vaulted quiet. sound itself seemed asleep, and filling the air with the repose of its slumber. absolute silence the soul cannot grasp; therefore deepest silence seems ever, in wordsworth's lovely phrase, wandering into sound, for silence is but the thin shadow of harmony--say rather creation's ear agape for sound, the waiting matrix of interwoven melodies, the sphere-bowl standing empty for the wine of the spirit. there may be yet another reason beyond its too great depth or height or strength, why we should be deaf to the spheral music; it may be that the absolute perfection of its harmony can take to our ears but the shape of silence. content and patient, mercy sat watching. it was just past midnight, but she had not yet lighted a candle, when something struck the window as with the soft blow of a moth's wing. her heart gave a great leap. she listened breathless. nothing followed. it must have been some flying night-thing, though surely too late in the year for a moth! it came again! she dared not speak. she softly opened the window. the darkness had thinned on the horizon, and the half-moon was lifting a corner above the edge of the world. something in the shrubbery answered her shine, and without rustle of branch, quiet as a ghost, the chief stepped into the open space. mercy leaned toward him and said, "hush! speak low." "there is no need to say much," he answered. "i come only to tell you that, as man may, i am with you always." "how quietly you came! i did not hear a sound!" "i have been two hours here in the shrubbery." "and i not once to suspect it! you might have given me some hint! a very small one would have been enough! why did you not let me know?" "it was not your hour; it is twelve but now; the moon comes to say so. i came for the luxury of expectation, and the delight of knowing you better attended than you thought: you knew me with you in spirit; i was with you in the body too!" "my chief!" she said softly. "i shall always find you nearer and better than i was able to think! i know i do not know how good you are." "i am good toward you, mercy! i love you!" a long silence, save of shining eyes, followed. "we are waiting for god!" said alister at length. "waiting is loving," answered mercy. she leaned out, looking down to her heaven. the moon had been climbing the sky, veiled in a little cloud. the cloud vanished, and her light fell on the chief. "have you been to a ball?" said mercy. "no, mercy. i doubt if there will be any dancing more in strathruadh!" "then why are you in court dress?" "when should a celt, who of all the world loves radiance and colour, put on his gay attire? for the multitude, or for the one?" "thank you. is it a compliment?--but after your love, everything fine seems only natural!" "in love there are no compliments; truth only walks the sacred path between the two doors. i will love you as my father loved my mother, and loves her still." "i do like to see you shining! it was kind of you to dress for the moon and me!" "whoever loves the truth must love shining things! god is the father of lights, even of the lights hid in the dark earth--sapphires and rubies, and all the families of splendour." "i shall always see you like that!" "there is one thing i want to say to you, mercy:--you will not think me indifferent however long i may be in proposing a definite plan for our future! we must wait upon god!" "i shall think nothing you would not have me think. a little while ago i might have dreamed anything, for i was fast asleep. i was dead till you waked me. if i were what girls call in love, i should be impatient to be with you; but i love you much more than that, and do not need to be always with you. you have made me able to think, and i can think about you! i was but a child, and you made a woman of me!" "god and ian did," said alister. "yes, but through you, and i want to be worthy of you. a woman to whom a man's love was so little comfort that she pined away and died because she could not be married to him, would not be a wife worthy of my chief!" "then you will always trust me?" "i will. when one really knows another, then all is safe!" "how many people do you know?" asked the chief. she thought a moment, and with a little laugh, replied, "you." "pardon me, mercy, but i do want to know how your father treats you!" "we will not talk about him, please. he is my father!--and so far yours that you are bound to make what excuse you can for him." "that i am bound to do, if he were no father to either of us. it is what god is always doing for us!--only he will never let us off." "he has had no one to teach him, alister! and has always been rich, and accustomed to have his own way! i begin to think one punishment of making money in a wrong manner is to be prosperous in it!" "i am sure you are right! but will you be able to bear poverty, mercy?" "yes," she answered, but so carelessly that she seemed to speak without having thought. "you do not know what poverty means!" rejoined alister. "we may have to endure much for our people!" "it means you any way, does it not? if you and poverty come together, welcome you and your friend!--i see i must confess a thing! do you remember telling me to read julius caesar?" "yes." "do you remember how portia gave herself a wound, that she might prove to her husband she was able to keep a secret?" "yes, surely!" "i have my meals in my room now, so i can do as i please, and i never eat the nice things dear mother always sends me, but potatoes, and porridge, and bread and milk." "what is that for, mercy?" "to show you i am worthy of being poor--able at least to be poor. i have not once tasted anything very nice since the letter that made my father so angry." "you darling!" of all men a highlander understands independence of the kind of food. "but," continued alister, "you need not go on with it; i am quite convinced; and we must take with thanksgiving what god gives us. besides, you have to grow yet!" "alister! and me like a may-pole!" "you are tall enough, but we are creatures of three dimensions, and need more than height. you must eat, or you will certainly be ill!" "oh, i eat! but just as you please! only it wouldn't do me the least harm so long as you didn't mind! it was as much to prove to myself i could, as to you! but don't you think it must be nearly time for people to wake from their first sleep?" the same instant there was a little noise--like a sob. mercy started, and when she looked again alister had vanished--as noiselessly as he came. for a moment she sat afraid to move. a wind came blowing upon her from the window: some one had opened her door! what if it were her father! she compelled herself to turn her head. it was something white!--it was christina! she came to her through the shadow of the moonlight, put her arms round her, and pressed to her face a wet cheek. for a moment or two neither spoke. "i heard a little, mercy!" sobbed christina. "forgive me; i meant no harm; i only wanted to know if you were awake; i was coming to see you." "thank you, chrissy! that was good of you!" "you are a dear!--and so is your chief! i am sorry i scared him! it made me so miserable to hear you so happy that i could not help it! would you mind forgiving me, dear?" "i don't mind your hearing a bit. i am glad you should know how the chief loves me!" "but you must be careful, dear! papa might pretend to take him for a robber, and shoot him!" "oh, no, chrissy! he wouldn't do that!" "i would not be too sure! i hadn't an idea before what papa was like! oh what men are, and what they can be! i shall never hold up my head again!" with this incoherent speech, to mercy's astonishment and consternation she burst into tears. mercy tried to comfort her, but did not know how. she had seen for some time that there was a difference in her, that something was the matter, and wondered whether she could be missing ian, but it was merest surmise. perhaps now she would tell her! she was weeping like a child on her shoulder. presently she began to tremble. mercy coaxed her into her bed, and undressing quickly, lay down beside her, and took her in her arms to make her warm. before the morning, with many breaks of sobbing and weeping, christina had told mercy her story. "i wish you would let me tell the chief!" she said. "he would know how to comfort you." "thank you!" said christina, with not a little indignation. "i forgot i was talking to a girl as good as married, who would not keep my secrets any more than her own!" she would have arisen at once to go to her own room, and the night that had brought such joy to mercy threatened to end very sadly. she threw her arms round christina's waist, locked her hands together, and held her fast. "hear me, chrissy, darling! i am a great big huge brute," she cried. "but i was only stupid. i would not tell a secret of yours even to alister--not for worlds! if i did, he would be nearer despising me than i should know how to bear. i will not tell him. did i ever break my word to you, chrissy?" "no, never, mercy!" responded christina, and turning she put her arms round her. "besides," she went on, "why should i go to anyone for counsel? could i have a better counsellor than ian? is he not my friend? oh, he is! he is! he said so! he said so!" the words prefaced another storm of tears. "he is going to write to me," she sobbed, as soon as she could again speak. "perhaps he will love you yet, chrissy!" "no, no; he will never love me that way! for goodness' sake don't hint at such a thing! i should not be able to write a word to him, if i thought that! i should feel a wolf in sheep's clothing! i have done with tricks and pretendings! ian shall never say to himself, 'i wish i had not trusted that girl! i thought she was going to be honest! but what's bred in the bone--!' i declare, mercy, i should blush myself out of being to learn he thought of me like that! i mean to be worthy of his friendship! his friendship is better than any other man's love! i will be worthy of it!" the poor girl burst yet again into tears--not so bitter as before, and ended them all at once with a kiss to mercy. "for his sake," she said, "i am going to take care of alister and you!" "thank you! thank you, chrissy! only you must not do anything to offend papa! it is hard enough on him as it is! i cannot give up the chief to please him, for he has been a father to my better self; but we must do nothing to trouble him that we can help!" chapter xi something strange. alister did not feel inclined to go home. the night was more like mercy, and he lingered with the night, inhabiting the dream that it was mercy's house, and she in the next room. he turned into the castle, climbed the broken steps, and sat on the corner of the wall, the blank hill before him, asleep standing, with the new house on its shoulder, and the moonlight reflected from mercy's window under which he had so lately stood. he sat for an hour, and when he came down, was as much disinclined to go home as before: he could not rest in his chamber, with no ian on the other side of its wall! he went straying down the road, into the valley, along the burnside, up the steep beyond it, and away to the hill-farm and the tomb. the moon was with him all the way, but she seemed thinking to herself rather than talking to him. why should the strange, burnt-out old cinder of a satellite be the star of lovers? the answer lies hid, i suspect, in the mysteries of light reflected. he wandered along, careless of time, of moonset, star-shine, or sunrise, brooding on many things in the rayless radiance of his love, and by the time he reached the tomb, was weary with excitement and lack of sleep. taking the key from where it was cunningly hidden, he unlocked the door and entered. he started back at sight of a gray-haired old man, seated on one of the stone chairs, and leaning sadly over the fireless hearth: it must be his uncle! the same moment he saw it was a ray from the sinking moon, entering by the small, deep window, and shining feebly on the chair. he struck a light, kindled the peats on the hearth, and went for water. returning from the well he found the house dark as before; and there was the old man again, cowering over the extinguished fire! the idea lasted but a moment; once more the level light of the moon lay cold and gray upon the stone chair! he tried to laugh at his fancifulness, but did not quite succeed. several times on the way up, he had thought of his old uncle: this must have given the shape to the moonlight and the stone! he made many attempts to recall the illusion, but in vain. he relighted the fire, and put on the kettle. going then for a book to read till the water boiled, he remembered a letter which, in the excitement of the afternoon, he had put in his pocket unread, and forgotten. it was from the family lawyer in glasgow, informing him that the bank in which his uncle had deposited the proceeds of his sale of the land, was in a state of absolute and irrecoverable collapse; there was not the slightest hope of retrieving any portion of the wreck. alister did not jump up and pace the room in the rage of disappointment; neither did he sit as one stunned and forlorn of sense. he felt some bitterness in the loss of the hope of making up to his people for his uncle's wrong; but it was clear that if god had cared for his having the money, he would have cared that he should have it. here was an opportunity for absolute faith and contentment in the will that looks after all our affairs, the small as well as the great. those who think their affairs too insignificant for god's regard, will justify themselves in lying crushed under their seeming ruin. either we live in the heart of an eternal thought, or we are the product and sport of that which is lower than we. "it was evil money!" said the chief to himself; "it was the sale of a birthright for a mess of pottage! i would have turned it back into the right channel, the good of my people! but after all, what can money do? it was discontent with poverty that began the ruin of the highlands! if the heads of the people had but lived pure, active, sober, unostentatious lives, satisfied to be poor, poverty would never have overwhelmed them! the highlands would have made scotland great with the greatness of men dignified by high-hearted contentment, and strong with the strength of men who could do without!" therewith it dawned upon alister how, when he longed to help his people, his thoughts had always turned, not to god first, but to the money his uncle had left him. he had trusted in a fancy--no less a fancy when in his uncle's possession than when cast into the quicksand of the bank; for trust in money that is, is no less vain, and is farther from redress, than trust in money that is not. in god alone can trust repose. his heart had been so faithless that he did not know it was! he thought he loved god as the first and last, the beginning, middle, and end of all things, and he had been trusting, not in god, but in uncertain riches, that is in vile mammon! it was a painful and humiliating discovery. "it was well," he said, "that my false deity should be taken from me! for my idolatry perhaps, a good gift has failed to reach my people! i must be more to them than ever, to make up to them for their loss with better than money!" he fell on his knees, and thanked god for the wind that had blown cold through his spirit, and slain at least one evil thing; and when he rose, all that was left of his trouble was a lump in his throat, which melted away as he walked home through the morning air on the hills. for he could not delay; he must let his mother know their trouble, and, as one who had already received help from on high, help her to bear it! if the messenger of satan had buffeted him, he had but broken a way for strength! but at first he could not enjoy as he was wont the glory of the morning. it troubled him. would a single note in the song of the sons of the morning fail because god did or would not do a thing? could god deserve less than thanks perfect from any one of his creatures? that man could not know god who thanked him but for what men call good things, nor took the evil as from the same love! he scorned himself, and lifted up his heart. as he reached the brow of his last descent, the sun rose, and with it his soul arose and shone, for its light was come, and the glory of the lord was risen upon it. "let god," he said, "take from us what he will: himself he can only give!" joyful he went down the hill. god was, and all was well! chapter xii the power of darkness. he found his mother at breakfast, wondering what had become of him. "are you equal to a bit of bad news, mother?" he asked with a smile. the mother's thoughts flew instantly to ian. "oh, it's nothing about ian!" said the chief, answering her look. its expression changed; she hoped now it was some fresh obstacle between him and mercy. "no, mother, it is not that either!" said alister, again answering her look--with a sad one of his own, for the lack of his mother's sympathy was the sorest trouble he had. "it is only that uncle's money is gone--all gone." she sat silent for a moment, gave a little sigh, and said, "well, it will all be over soon! in the meantime things are no worse than they were! his will be done!" "i should have liked to make a few friends with the mammon of unrighteousness before we were turned out naked!" "we shall have plenty," answered the mother, "--god himself, and a few beside! if you could make friends with the mammon, you can make friends without it!" "yes, that is happily true! ian says it was only a lesson for the wise and prudent with money in their pockets--a lesson suited to their limited reception!" as they spoke, nancy entered. "please, laird," she said, "donal shoemaker is wanting to see you." "tell him to come in," answered the chief. donal entered and stood up by the door, with his bonnet under his arm--a little man with puckered face, the puckers radiating from or centering in the mouth, which he seemed to untie like a money-hag, and pull open by means of a smile, before he began to speak. the chief shook hands with him, and asked how he could serve him. "it will not be to your pleasure to know, macruadh," said donal, humbly declining to sit, "that i have received this day notice to quit my house and garden!" the house was a turf-cottage, and the garden might grow two bushels and a half of potatoes. "are you far behind with your rent?" "not a quarter, macruadh." "then what does it mean?" "it means, sir, that strathruadh is to be given to the red deer, and the son of man have nowhere to lay his head. i am the first at your door with my sorrow, but before the day is over you will have--" here he named four or five who had received like notice to quit. "it is a sad business!" said the chief sorrowfully. "is it law, sir?" "it is not easy to say what is law, donal; certainly it is not gospel! as a matter of course you will not be without shelter, so long as i may call stone or turf mine, but things are looking bad! things as well as souls are in god's hands however!" "i learn from the new men on the hills," resumed donal, "that the new lairds have conspired to exterminate us. they have discovered, apparently, that the earth was not made for man, but for rich men and beasts!" here the little man paused, and his insignificant face grew in expression grand. "but the day of the lord will come," he went on, "as a thief in the night. vengeance is his, and he will know where to give many stripes, and where few.--what would you have us do, laird?" "i will go with you to the village." "no, if you please, sir! better men will be at your door presently to put the same question, for they will do nothing without the macruadh. we are no more on your land, great is our sorrow, chief, but we are of your blood, you are our lord, and your will is ours. you have been a nursing father to us, macruadh!" "i would fain be!" answered the chief. "they will want to know whether these strangers have the right to turn us out; and if they have not the right to disseize, whether we have not the right to resist. if you would have us fight, and will head us, we will fall to a man--for fall we must; we cannot think to stand before the redcoats." "no, no, donal! it is not a question of the truth; that we should be bound to die for, of course. it is only our rights that are concerned, and they are not worth dying for. that would be mere pride, and denial of god who is fighting for us. at least so it seems at the moment to me!" "some of us would fain fight and have done with it, sir!" the chief could not help smiling with pleasure at the little man's warlike readiness: he knew it was no empty boast; what there was of him was good stuff. "you have a wife and children, donal!" he said; "what would become of them if you fell?" "my sister was turned out in the cold spring," answered donal, "and died in glencalvu! it would be better to die together!" "but, donal, none of yours will die of cold, and i can't let you fight, because the wives and children would all come on my hands, and i should have too many for my meal! no, we must not fight. we may have a right to fight, i do not know; but i am sure we have at least the right to abstain from fighting. don't let us confound right and duty, donal--neither in thing nor in word!" "will the law not help us, macruadh?" "the law is such a slow coach! our enemies are so rich! and the lawyers have little love of righteousness! most of them would see the dust on our heads to have the picking of our bones! stick nor stone would be left us before anything came of it!" "but, sir," said donal, "is it the part of brave men to give up their rights?" "no man can take from us our rights," answered the chief, "but any man rich enough may keep us from getting the good of them. i say again we are not bound to insist on our rights. we may decline to do so, and that way leave them to god to look after for us." "god does not always give men their rights, sir! i don't believe he cares about our small matters!" "nothing that god does not care about can be worth our caring about. but, donal, how dare you say what you do? have you lived to all eternity? how do you know what you say? god does care for our rights. a day is coming, as you have just said, when he will judge the oppressors of their brethren." "we shall be all dead and buried long before then!" "as he pleases, donal! he is my chief. i will have what he wills, not what i should like! a thousand years i will wait for my rights if he chooses. i will trust him to do splendidly for me. no; i will have no other way than my chief's! he will set everything straight!" "you must be right, sir! only i can't help wishing for the old times, when a man could strike a blow for himself!" with all who came alister held similar talk; for though they were not all so warlike as the cobbler, they keenly felt the wrong that was done them, and would mostly, but for a doubt of its rectitude, have opposed force with force. it would at least bring their case before the country! "the case is before a higher tribunal," answered the laird; "and one's country is no incarnation of justice! how could she be, made up mostly of such as do not love fair play except in the abstract, or for themselves! the wise thing is to submit to wrong." it is in ordering our own thoughts and our own actions, that we have first to stand up for the right; our business is not to protect ourselves from our neighbour's wrong, but our neighbour from our wrong. this is to slay evil; the other is to make it multiply. a man who would pull out even a mote from his brother's eye, must first pull out the beam from his own eye, must be righteous against his own selfishness. that is the only way to wound the root of evil. he who teaches his neighbour to insist on his rights, is not a teacher of righteousness. he who, by fulfilling his own duties, teaches his neighbour to give every man the fair play he owes him, is a fellow-worker with god. but although not a few of the villagers spoke in wrath and counselled resistance, not one of them rejoiced in the anticipation of disorder. heartily did rob of the angels insist on peace, but his words had the less force that he was puny in person, and, although capable of great endurance, unnoted for deeds of strength. evil birds carried the words of natural and righteous anger to the ears of the new laird; no good birds bore the words of appeasement: he concluded after his kind that their chief countenanced a determined resistance. on all sides the horizon was dark about the remnant of clanruadh. poorly as they lived in strathruadh, they knew no place else where they could live at all. separated, and so disabled from making common cause against want, they must perish! but their horizon was not heaven, and god was beyond it. it was a great comfort to the chief that in the matter of his clan his mother agreed with him altogether: to the last penny of their having they must help their people! those who feel as if the land were their own, do fearful wrong to their own souls! what grandest opportunities of growing divine they lose! instead of being man-nobles, leading a sumptuous life until it no longer looks sumptuous, they might be god-nobles--saviours of men, yielding themselves to and for their brethren! what friends might they not make with the mammon of unrighteousness, instead of passing hence into a region where no doors, no arms will be open to them! things are ours that we may use them for all--sometimes that we may sacrifice them. god had but one precious thing, and he gave that! the chief, although he saw that the proceedings of mr. palmer and mr. brander must have been determined upon while his relation to mercy was yet undeclared, could not help imagining how differently it might have gone with his people, had he been married to mercy, and in a good understanding with her father. had he crippled his reach toward men by the narrowness of his conscience toward god? so long as he did what seemed right, he must regret no consequences, even for the sake of others! god would mind others as well as him! every sequence of right, even to the sword and fire, are god's care; he will justify himself in the eyes of the true, nor heed the judgment of the false. one thing was clear--that it would do but harm to beg of mr. palmer any pity for his people: it would but give zest to his rejoicing in iniquity! something nevertheless must be determined, and speedily, for winter was at hand. the macruadh had to consider not only the immediate accommodation of the ejected but how they were to be maintained. such was his difficulty that he began to long for such news from ian as would justify an exodus from their own country, not the less a land of bondage, to a home in the wilderness. but ah, what would then the land of his fathers without its people be to him! it would be no more worthy the name of land, no longer fit to be called a possession! he knew then that the true love of the land is one with the love of its people. to live on it after they were gone, would be like making a home of the family mausoleum. the rich "pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor," but what would any land become without the poor in it? the poor are blessed because by their poverty they are open to divine influences; they are the buckets set out to catch the rain of heaven; they are the salt of the earth! the poor are to be always with a nation for its best blessing, or for its condemnation and ruin. the chief saw the valleys desolate of the men readiest and ablest to fight the battles of his country. for the sake of greedy, low-minded fellows, the summons of her war-pipes would be heard in them no more, or would sound in vain among the manless rocks; from sheilin, cottage, or clachan, would spring no kilted warriors with battle response! the red deer and the big sheep had taken the place of men over countless miles of mountain and moor and strath! his heart bled for the sufferings and wrongs of those whose ancestors died to keep the country free that was now expelling their progeny. but the vengeance had begun to gather, though neither his generation nor ours has seen it break. it must be that offences come, but woe unto them by whom they come! chapter xiii. the new stance. the macruadh cast his mind's and his body's eye too upon the small strip of ground on the west side of the castle-ridge, between it and the tiny tributary of the strath burn which was here the boundary between the lands of the two lairds. the slope of the ridge on this side was not so steep, and before the rock sank into the alluvial soil of the valley, it became for a few yards nearly level--sufficiently so, with a little smoothing and raising, to serve for a foundation; while in front was a narrow but rich piece of ground, the bank of the little brook. before many days were over, men were at work there, in full sight of the upper windows of the new house. it was not at first clear what they were about; but soon began to rise, plain enough, the walls of cottages, some of stone, and some of turf; mr. palmer saw a new village already in process of construction, to take the place of that about to be destroyed! the despicable enemy had moved his camp, to pitch it under his very walls! it filled him with the rage of defeat. the poor man who scorned him was going to be too much for him! not yet was he any nearer to being placed alone in the midst of the earth. he thought to have rid himself of all those hateful faces, full of their chiefs contempt, he imagined, ever eyeing him as an intruder on his own land; but here instead was their filthy little hamlet of hovels growing like a fungus just under his nose, expressly to spite him! thinking to destroy it, he had merely sent for it! when the wind was in the east, the smoke of their miserable cabins would be blown right in at his dining-room windows! it was useless to expostulate! that he would not like it was of course the chief's first reason for choosing that one spot as the site of his new rookery! the fellow had stolen a march upon him! and what had he done beyond what was absolutely necessary for the improvement of his property! the people were in his way, and he only wanted to get rid of them! and here their chief had brought them almost into his garden! doubtless if his land had come near enough, he would have built his sty at the very gate of his shrubbery!--the fellow could not like having them so near himself! he let his whole household see how annoying the thing was to him. he never doubted it was done purely to irritate him. christina ventured the suggestion that mr. brander and not the chief was the author of the inconvenience. what did that matter! he returned. what right had the chief, as she called him, to interfere between a landlord and his tenants? christina hinted that, evicted by their landlord, they ceased to be his tenants, and even were he not their chief, he could not be said to interfere in giving help to the destitute. thereupon he burst at her in a way that terrified her, and she had never even been checked by him before, had often been impertinent to him without rebuke. the man seemed entirely changed, but in truth he was no whit changed: things had but occurred capable of bringing out the facts of his nature. her mother, who had not dared to speak at the time, expostulated with her afterward. "why should papa never be told the truth?" objected christina. her mother was on the point of replying, "because he will not hear it," but saw she owed it to her husband not to say so to his child. mercy said to herself, "it is not to annoy my father he does it, but to do what he can for his people! he does not even know how unpleasant it is to my father to have them so near! it must be one of the punishments of riches that they make the sight of poverty so disagreeable! to luxury, poverty is a living reproach." she longed to see alister: something might perhaps be done to mitigate the offence. but her father would never consent to use her influence! perhaps her mother might! she suggested therefore that alister would do nothing for the sake of annoying her father, and could have no idea how annoying this thing was to him: if her mother would contrive her seeing him, she would represent it to him! mrs. palmer was of mercy's opinion regarding the purity of alister's intent, and promised to think the matter over. the next night her husband was going to spend at mr. brander's: the project might be carried out in safety! the thing should be done! they would go together, in the hope of persuading the chief to change the site of his new village! when it was dark they walked to the cottage, and knocking at the door, asked nancy if the chief were at home. the girl invited them to enter, though not with her usual cordiality; but mrs. palmer declined, requesting her to let the chief know they were there, desirous of a word with him. alister was at the door in a moment, and wanted them to go in and see his mother, but an instant's reflection made him glad of their refusal. "i am so sorry for all that has happened!" said mrs. palmer. "you know i can have had nothing to do with it! there is not a man i should like for a son-in-law better than yourself, macruadh; but i am helpless." "i quite understand," replied the chief, "and thank you heartily for your kindness. is there anything i can do for you?" "mercy has something she wants to speak to you about." "it was so good of you to bring her!--what is it, mercy?" without the least hesitation, mercy told him her father's fancy that he was building the new village to spite him, seeing it could not be a pleasure to himself to have the smoke from its chimneys blowing in at door and windows as often as the wind was from the sea. "i am sorry but not surprised your father should think so, mercy. to trouble him is as much against my feelings as my interests. and certainly it is for no convenience or comfort to ourselves, that my mother and i have determined on having the village immediately below us." "i thought," said mercy, "that if you knew how it vexed papa, you would--but i am afraid it may be for some reason that cannot be helped!" "indeed it is; i too am afraid it cannot be helped! i must think of my people! you see, if i put them on the other side of the ridge, they would be exposed to the east wind--and the more that every door and window would have to be to the east. you know yourselves how bitterly it blows down the strath! besides, we should there have to build over good land much too damp to be healthy, every foot of which will be wanted to feed them! there they are on the rock. i might, of course, put them on the hillside, but i have no place so sheltered as here, and they would have no gardens. and then it gives me an opportunity, such as chief never had before, of teaching them some things i could not otherwise. would it be reasonable, mercy, to sacrifice the good of so many poor people to spare one rich man one single annoyance, which is yet no hurt? would it be right? ought i not rather to suffer the rise of yet greater obstacles between you and me?" "yes, alister, yes!" cried mercy. "you must not change anything. i am only sorry my father cannot be taught that you have no ill will to him in what you do." "i cannot think it would make much difference. he will never give you to me, mercy. but be true, and god will." "would you mind letting the flag fly, alister? i should have something to look at!" "i will; and when i want particularly to see you, i will haul it down. then, if you hang a handkerchief from your window, i will come to you." chapter xiv the peat-moss. for the first winter the clanruadh had not much to fear--hardly more than usual: they had their small provision of potatoes and meal, and some a poor trifle of money. but "lady macruadh" was anxious lest the new cottages should not be quite dry, and gave a general order that fires were to be burned in them for some time before they were occupied: for this they must use their present stock of dry peats, and more must be provided for the winter. the available strength of the clan would be required to get the fresh stock under cover before the weather broke. the peat-moss from which they cut their fuel, was at some distance from the castle, on the outskirts of the hill-farm. it was the nearest moss to the glen, and the old chief, when he parted with so much of the land, took care to except it, knowing well that his remaining people could not without it live through a winter. but as, of course, his brother, the minister, who succeeded him, and the present chieftain, had freely allowed all the tenants on the land sold to supply themselves from it as before, the notion had been generated that the moss was not part of the chief's remaining property. when the report was carried to mr. peregrine palmer, that the tenants mr. brander and he were about to eject, and who were in consequence affronting him with a new hamlet on the very verge of his land, were providing themselves with a stock of fuel greatly in excess of what they had usually laid in for the winter--that in fact they were cutting large quantities of peat, besides the turf for their new cottages; without making the smallest inquiry, or suspecting for a moment that the proceeding might be justifiable, he determined, after a brief consultation with men who knew nothing but said anything, to put a stop to the supposed presumption. a few of the peats cut in the summer had not yet been removed, not having dried so well as the rest, and the owners of some of these, two widows, went one day to fetch them home to the new village, when, as it happened, there were none of the clan besides in the moss. they filled their creels, helped each other to get them on their backs, and were setting out on their weary tramp home, when up rose two of mr. palmer's men, who had been watching them, cut their ropes and took their loads, emptied the peats into a moss-hag full of water, and threw the creels after them. the poor women poured out their wrath on the men, telling them they would go straight to the chief, but were answered only with mockery of their chief and themselves. they turned in despair, and with their outcry filled the hollows of the hills as they went, bemoaning the loss of their peats and their creels, and raging at the wrong they had received. one of them, a characterless creature in the eyes of her neighbours, harmless, and always in want, had faith in her chief, for she had done nothing to make her ashamed, and would go to him at once: he had always a word and a smile and a hand-shake for her, she said; the other, commonly called craftie, was unwilling: her character did not stand high, and she feared the face of the macruadh. "he does not like me!" said craftie. "when a woman is in trouble," said the other, "the macruadh makes no questions. you come with me! he will be glad of something to do for you." in her confidence she persuaded her companion, and together they went to the chief. having gathered courage to appear, craftie needed none to speak: where that was the call, she was never slow to respond. "craftie," said the chief, "is what you are telling me true?" "ask her," answered craftie, who knew that asseveration on her part was not all-convincing. "she speaks the truth, macruadh," said the other. "i will take my oath to it." "your word is enough," replied the chief, "--as craftie knew when she brought you with her." "please, laird, it was myself brought craftie; she was not willing to come!" "craftie," said the chief, "i wish i could make a friend of you! but you know i can't!" "i do know it, macruadh, and i am sorry for it, many is the good time! but my door never had any latch, and the word is out before i can think to keep it back!" "and so you send another and another to back the first! ah, craftie! if purgatory don't do something for you, then--!" "indeed and i hope i shall fall into it on my way farther, chief!" said craftie, who happened to be a catholic. "but now," resumed the chief, "when will you be going for the rest of your peats?" "they're sure to be on the watch for us; and there's no saying what they mightn't do another time!" was the indirect and hesitating answer. "i will go with you." "when you please, then, chief." so the next day the poor women went again, and the chief went with them, their guard and servant. if there were any on the watch, they did not appear. the macruadh fished out their creels, and put them to dry, then helped them to fill those they had borrowed for the occasion. returning, he carried now the one, now the other creel, so that one of the women was always free. the new laird met them on the road, and recognized with a scornful pleasure the chief bending under his burden. that was the fellow who would so fain be his son-in-law! about this time sercombe and valentine came again to the new house. sercombe, although he had of late had no encouragement from christina, was not therefore prepared to give her up, and came "to press the siege." he found the lady's reception of him so far from cordial, however, that he could not but suspect some new adverse influence. he saw too that mercy was in disgrace; and, as ian was gone, concluded there must have been something between them: had the chief been "trying it on with" christina? the brute was always getting in his way! but some chance of serving him out was certain to turn, up! for the first suitable day alister had arranged an expedition from the village, with all the carts that could be got together, to bring home as many peats as horses and men and women could together carry. the company was seen setting out, and report of it carried at once to mr. palmer; for he had set watch on the doings of the clan. within half an hour he too set out with the messenger, accompanied by sercombe, in grim delight at the prospect of a row. valentine went also, willing enough to see what would happen, though with no ill will toward the chief. they were all furnished as for a day's shooting, and expected to be joined by some of the keepers on their way. the chief, in view of possible assault, had taken care that not one of his men should have a gun. even hector of the stags he requested to leave his at home. they went in little groups, some about the creeping carts, in which were the older women and younger children, some a good way ahead, some scattered behind, but the main body attending the chief, who talked to them as they went. they looked a very poor company, but god saw past their poverty. the chief himself, save in size and strength, had not a flourishing appearance. he was very thoughtful: much lay on his shoulders, and ian was not there to help! his clothes, all their clothes were shabby, with a crumpled, blown-about look--like drifts, in their many faded colours, of autumnal leaves. they had about them all a forgotten air--looked thin and wan like a ghostly funeral to the second sight--as if they had walked so long they had forgotten how to sleep, and the grave would not have them. except in their chief, there was nothing left of the martial glance and gait and show, once so notable in every gathering of the clanruadh, when the men were all soldiers born, and the women were mothers, daughters, and wives of soldiers. their former stately grace had vanished from the women; they were weather-worn and bowed with labour too heavy for their strength, too long for their endurance; they were weak from lack of fit human food, from lack of hope, and the dreariness of the outlook, the ever gray spiritual horizon; they were numbed with the cold that has ceased to be felt, the deadening sense of life as a weight to be borne, not a strength to rejoice in. but they were not abject yet; there was one that loved them--their chief and their friend! below their level was a deeper depth, in which, alas, lie many of like heart and, passions with them, trodden into the mire by dives and his stewards! the carts were small, with puny horses, long-tailed and droop-necked, in harness of more rope than leather. they had a look of old men, an aspect weirdly venerable, as of life and labour prolonged after due time, as of creatures kept from the grave and their last sleep to work a little longer. scrambling up the steep places they were like that rare sea-bird which, unable to fly for shortness of wing, makes of its beak a third leg, to help it up the cliff: these horses seemed to make fifth legs of their necks and noses. the chief's horses alone, always at the service of the clan, looked well fed, well kept, and strong, and the clan was proud of them. "and what news is there from ian?" asked an old man of his chief. "not much news yet, but i hope for more soon. it will be so easy to let you hear all his letters, when we can meet any moment in the barn!" "i fear he will be wanting us all to go after the rest!" said one of the women. "there might be a worse thing!" answered her neighbour. "a worse thing than leave the hills where we were born?--no! there is no worse for me! i trust in god i shall be buried where i grew up!" "then you will leave the hills sure enough!" said the chief. "not so sure, macruadh! we shall rest in our graves till the resurrection!" said an old man. "only our bodies," returned alister. "well, and what will my body be but myself! much i would make of myself without my body! i will stay with my body, and let my soul step about, waiting for me, and craving a shot at the stags with the big branches! no, i won't be going from my own strath!" "you would not like to be left in it alone, with none but unfriendly sasunnachs about you--not one of your own people to close your eyes?" "indeed it would not be pleasant. but the winds would be the same; and the hills would be the same; and the smell of the earth would be the same; and they would be our own worms that came crawling over me to eat me! no; i won't leave the strath till i die--and i won't leave it then!" "that is very well, john!" said the woman; "but if you were all day with your little ones--all of them all day looking hunger in your face, you would think it a blessed country wherever it was that gave you bread to put in their mouths!" "and how to keep calling this home!" said another. "why, it will soon be everywhere a crime to set foot on a hill, for frightening of the deer! i was walking last month in a part of the county i did not know, when i came to a wall that went out of my sight, seeming to go all round a big hill. i said to myself, 'is no poor man to climb to heaven any more?' and with that i came to a bill stuck on a post, which answered me; for it said thus: 'any well-dressed person, who will give his word not to leave the path, may have permission to go to the top of the hill, by applying to--'--i forget the name of the doorkeeper, but sure he was not of god, seeing his door was not to let a poor man in, but to keep him out!" "they do well to starve us before they choke us: we might else fight when it comes to the air to breathe!" "have patience, my sons," said the chief. "god will not forget us." "what better are we for that? it would be all the same if he did forget us!" growled a young fellow shambling along without shoes. "shame! shame!" cried several voices. "has not god left us the macruadh? does he not share everything with us?" "the best coat in the clan is on his own back!" muttered the lad, careless whether he were heard or not. "you scoundrel!" cried another; "yours is a warmer one!" the chief heard all, and held his peace. it was true he had the best coat! "i tell you what," said donal shoemaker, "if the chief give you the stick, not one of us will say it was more than you deserved! if he will put it into my hands, not to defile his own, i will take and give it with all my heart. everybody knows you for the idlest vagabond in the village! why, the chief with his own hands works ten times as much!" "that's how he takes the bread out of my mouth--doing his work himself!" rejoined the youth, who had been to glasgow, and thought he had learned a thing or two. the chief recovered from his impulse to pull off his coat and give it him. "i will make you an offer, my lad," he said instead: "come to the farm and take my place. for every fair day's work you shall have a fair day's wages, and, for every bit of idleness, a fair thrashing. do you agree?" the youth pretended to laugh the thing off, but slunk away, and was seen no more till eating time arrived, and "lady macruadh's" well-filled baskets were opened. "and who wouldn't see a better coat on his chief!" cried the little tailor. "i would clip my own to make lappets for his!" they reached the moss. it lay in a fold of the hills, desert and dreary, full of great hollows and holes whence the peat had been taken, now filled with water, black and terrible,--a land hideous by day, and at night full of danger and lonely horror. everywhere stood piles of peats set up to dry, with many openings through and through, windy drains to gather and remove their moisture. here and there was a tuft of dry grass, a bush of heather, or a few slender-stalked, hoary heads of cannach or cotton-grass; it was a land of devoted desolation, doing nothing for itself, this bountiful store of life and warmth for the winter-sieged houses of the strath. they went heartily to work. they cut turf for their walls and peats for their fires; they loaded the carts from the driest piles, and made new piles of the fresh wet peats they dug. it was approaching noon, and some of the old women were getting the food out of "my lady's" baskets, when over the nearest ridge beyond rose men to the number of seven, carrying guns. rob of the angels was the first to spy them. he pointed them out to his father, and presently they two disappeared together. the rest went on with their work, but the chief could see that, stooping to their labour, they cast upward and sidelong glances at them, reading hostility in their approach. suddenly, as by common consent, they all ceased working, stood erect, and looked out like men on their guard. but the chief making them a sign, they resumed their labour as if they saw nothing. mr. peregrine palmer had laid it upon himself to act with becoming calmness and dignity. but it would amaze most people to be told how little their order is self-restraint, their regular conduct their own--how much of the savage and how little of the civilized man goes to form their being--how much their decent behaviour is owing to the moral pressure, like that of the atmosphere, of the laws and persons and habits and opinions that surround them. witness how many, who seemed respectable people at home, become vulgar, self-indulgent, ruffianly, cruel even, in the wilder parts of the colonies! no man who has not, through restraint, learned not to need restraint, but be as well behaved among savages as in society, has yet become a true man. no perfection of mere civilization kills the savage in a man: the savage is there all the time till the man pass through the birth from above. till then, he is no certain hiding-place from the wind, no sure covert from the tempest. mr. palmer was in the worst of positions as to protection against himself. possessed of large property, he owed his position to evil and not to good. not only had he done nothing to raise those through whom he made his money, but the very making of their money his, was plunging them deeper and deeper in poverty and vice: his success was the ruin of many. yet was he full of his own imagined importance--or had been full until now that he felt a worm at the root of his gourd--the contempt of one man for his wealth and position. well might such a man hate such another--and the more that his daughter loved him! all the chief's schemes and ways were founded on such opposite principles to his own that of necessity they annoyed him at every point, and, incapable of perceiving their true nature, he imagined his annoyance their object and end. and now here was his enemy insolently daring, as mr. palmer fully believed, to trespass in person on his land! add to all this, that here mr. peregrine palmer was in a place whose remoteness lightened the pressure of conventional restraints, while its wildness tended to rouse all the old savage in him--its very look suggesting to the city-man its fitness for an unlawful deed for a lawful end. persons more respectable than mr. palmer are capable of doing the most wicked and lawless things when their selfish sense of their own right is uppermost. witness the occasionally iniquitous judgments of country magistrates in their own interest--how they drive law even to cruelty! "are you not aware you are trespassing on my land, macruadh?" cried the new laird, across several holes full of black water which obstructed his nearer approach. "on the contrary, mr. palmer," replied the chief, "i am perfectly aware that i am not!" "you have no right to cut peats there without my permission!" "i beg your pardon: you have no right to stand where you speak the words without my permission. but you are quite welcome." "i am satisfied there is not a word of truth in what you say," rejoined mr. palmer. "i desire you to order your people away at once." "that i cannot do. it would be to require their consent to die of cold." "let them die! what are they to me--or to anybody! order them off, or it will be the worse for them--and for you too!" "excuse me; i cannot." "i give you one more warning. go yourself, and they will follow." "i will not." "go, or i will compel you." as he spoke, he half raised his gun. "you dare not!" said the chief, drawing himself up indignantly. together mr. palmer and mr. sercombe raised their guns to their shoulders, and one of them fired. to give mr. palmer the benefit of a doubt, he was not quite at home with his gun, and would use a hair-trigger. the same instant each found himself, breath and consciousness equally scant, floundering, gun and all, in the black bog water on whose edge he had stood. there now stood rob of the angels, gazing after them into the depth, with the look of an avenging seraph, his father beside him, grim as a gratified fate. such a roar of rage rose from the clansmen with the shot, and so many came bounding with sticks and spades over the rough ground, that the keepers, knowing, if each killed his two men, they would not after escape with their lives, judged it more prudent to wait orders. only valentine came running in terror to the help of his father. "don't be frightened," said rob; "we only wanted to wet their powder!" "but they'll be drowned!" cried the lad, almost weeping. "not a hair of them!" answered rob. "we'll have them out in a moment! but please tell your men, if they dare to lift a gun, we'll serve them the same. it wets the horn, and it cools the man!" a minute more, and the two men lay coughing and gasping on the crumbly bank, for in their utter surprizal they had let more of the nasty soft water inside than was good for them. with his first breath sercombe began to swear. "drop that, sir, if you please," said rob, "or in you go again!" he began to reply with a volley of oaths, but began only, for the same instant the black water was again choking him. might hector of the stags have had his way, he would have kept there the murderer of an cabrach mor till he had to be dived for. rob on his part was determined he should not come out until he gave his word that he would not swear. "come! come!" gasped sercombe at length, after many attempts to get out which, the bystanders easily foiled--"you don't mean to drown me, do you?" "we mean to drown your bad language. promise to use no more on this peat-moss," returned rob. "damn the promise you get from me!" he gasped. "men must have patience with a suffering brother!" remarked rob, and seated himself, with a few words in gaelic which drew a hearty laugh from the men about him, on a heap of turf to watch the unyielding flounder in the peat-hole, where there was no room to swim. he had begun to think the man would drown in his contumacy, when his ears welcomed the despairing words-- "take me out, and i will promise anything." he was scarcely able to move till one of the keepers gave him whisky, but in a few minutes he was crawling homeward after his host, who, parent of little streams, was doing his best to walk over rocks and through bogs with the help of valentine's arm, chattering rather than muttering something about "proper legal fashion." in the mean time the chief lay shot in the right arm and chest, but not dangerously wounded by the scattering lead. he had lost a good deal of blood, and was faint--a sensation new to him. the women had done what they could, but that was only binding his arm, laying him in a dry place, and giving him water. he would not let them recall the men till the enemy was gone. when they knew what had happened they were in sad trouble--rob of the angels especially that he had not been quick enough to prevent the firing of the gun. the chief would have him get the shot out of his arm with his knife; but rob, instead, started off at full speed, running as no man else in the county could run, to fetch the doctor to the castle. at the chief's desire, they made a hurried meal, and then resumed the loading of the carts, preparing one of them for his transport. when it was half full, they covered the peats with a layer of dry elastic turf, then made on that a bed of heather, tops uppermost; and more to please them than that he could not walk, alister consented to be laid on this luxurious invalid-carriage, and borne home over the rough roads like a disabled warrior. they arrived some time before the doctor. chapter xv a daring visit. mercy soon learned that some sort of encounter had taken place between her father's shooting party and some of the clan; also that the chief was hurt, but not in what manner--for by silent agreement that was not mentioned: it might seem to put them in the wrong! she had heard enough, however, to fill her with anxiety. her window commanding the ridge by the castle, she seated herself to watch that point with her opera-glass. when the hill-party came from behind the ruin, she missed his tall figure amongst his people, and presently discovered him lying very white on one of the carts. her heart became as water within her. but instant contriving how she could reach him, kept her up. by and by christina came to tell her she had just heard from one of the servants that the macruadh was shot. mercy, having seen him alive, heard the frightful news with tolerable calmness. christina said she would do her best to discover before the morning how much he was hurt; no one in the house seemed able to tell her! mercy, to avoid implicating her sister, held her peace as to her own intention. as soon as it was dark she prepared to steal from the house, dreading nothing but prevention. when her dinner was brought her, and she knew they were all safe in the dining-room, she drew her plaid over her head, and leaving her food untasted, stole half down the stair, whence watching her opportunity between the comings and goings of the waiting servants, she presently got away unseen, crept softly past the windows, and when out of the shrubbery, darted off at her full speed. her breath was all but gone when she knocked at the drawing-room door of the cottage. it opened, and there stood the mother of her chief! the moment mrs. macruadh saw her, leaving her no time to say a word, she bore down upon her like one vessel that would sink another, pushing her from the door, and pulling it to behind her, stern as righteous fate. mercy was not going to be put down, however: she was doing nothing wrong! "how is the macruadh, please?" she managed to say. "alive, but terribly hurt," answered his mother, and would have borne her out of the open door of the cottage, towards the latch of which she reached her hand while yet a yard from it. her action said, "why will nancy leave the door open!" "please, please, what is it?" panted mercy, standing her ground. "how is he hurt?" she turned upon her almost fiercely. "this is what you have done for him!" she said, with right ungenerous reproach. "your father fired at him, on my son's own land, and shot him in the chest." "is he in danger?" gasped mercy, leaning against the wall, and trembling so she could scarcely stand. "i fear he is in great danger. if only the doctor would come!" "you wouldn't mind my sitting in the kitchen till he does?" whispered mercy, her voice all but gone. "i could not allow it. i will not connive at your coming here without the knowledge of your parents! it is not at all a proper thing for a young lady to do!" "then i will wait outside!" said mercy, her quick temper waking in spite of her anxiety: she had anticipated coldness, but not treatment like this! "there is one, i think, mrs. macruadh," she added, "who will not find fault with me for it!" "at least he will not tell you so for some time!" the door had not been quite closed, and it opened noiselessly. "she does not mean me, mother," said alister; "she means jesus christ. he would say to you, let her alone. he does not care for society. its ways are not his ways, nor its laws his laws. come in, mercy. i am sorry my mother's trouble about me should have made her inhospitable to you!" "i cannot come in, alister, if she will not let me!" answered mercy. "pray walk in!" said mrs. macruadh. she would have passed mercy, going toward the kitchen, but the trance was narrow, and mercy did not move. "you see, alister, i cannot!" she insisted. "that would not please, would it?" she added reverently. "tell me how you are, and i will go, and come again to-morrow." alister told her what had befallen, making little of the affair, and saying he suspected it was an accident. "oh, thank you!" she said, with a sigh of relief. "i meant to sit by the castle wall till the doctor came; but now i shall get back before they discover i am gone." without a word more, she turned and ran from the house, and reached her room unmissed and unseen. the next was a dreary hour--the most painful that mother and son had ever passed together. the mother was all this time buttressing her pride with her grief, and the son was cut to the heart that he should have had to take part against his mother. but when the doctor came at length, and the mother saw him take out his instruments, the pride that parted her from her boy melted away. "forgive me, alister!" she whispered; and his happy kiss comforted her repentant soul. when the small operations were over, and alister was in bed, she would have gone to let mercy know all she could tell her. but she must not: it would work mischief in the house! she sat down by alister's bedside, and watched him all night. he slept well, being in such a healthful condition of body that his loss of blood, and the presence of the few shot that could not be found, did him little harm. he yielded to his mother's entreaties to spend the morning in bed, but was up long before the evening in the hope of mercy's coming, confident that his mother would now be like herself to her. she came; the mother took her in her arms, and begged her forgiveness; nor, having thus embraced her, could she any more treat her relation to her son with coldness. if the girl was ready, as her conduct showed, to leave all for alister, she had saved her soul alive, she was no more one of the enemy! thus was the mother repaid for her righteous education of her son: through him her pride received almost a mortal blow, her justice grew more discriminating, and her righteousness more generous. in a few days the chief was out, and looking quite himself. chapter xvi the flitting. the time was drawing nigh when the warning of ejection would doubtless begin to be put in force; and the chief hearing, through rob of the angels, that attempts were making to stir the people up, determined to render them futile: they must be a trick of the enemy to get them into trouble! taking counsel therefore with the best of the villagers, both women and men, he was confirmed in the idea that they had better all remove together, before the limit of the earliest notice was expired. but his councillors agreed with him that the people should not be told to get themselves in readiness except at a moment's notice to move. in the meantime he pushed on their labour at the new village. in the afternoon preceding the day on which certain of the clan were to be the first cast out of their homes, the chief went to the village, and going from house to house, told his people to have everything in order for flitting that very night, so that in the morning there should not be an old shoe left behind; and to let no rumour of their purpose get abroad. they would thus have a good laugh at the enemy, who was reported to have applied for military assistance as a precautionary measure. his horses should be ready, and as soon as it was dark they would begin to cart and carry, and be snug in their new houses before the morning! all agreed, and a tumult of preparation began. "lady macruadh" came with help and counsel, and took the children in charge while the mothers bustled. it was amazing how much had to be done to remove so small an amount of property. the chief's three carts were first laden; then the men and women loaded each other. the chief took on his hack the biggest load of all, except indeed it were hector's. to and fro went the carts, and to and fro went the men and women, i know not how many journeys, upheld by companionship, merriment, hope, and the clan-mother's plentiful provision of tea, coffee, milk, bread and butter, cold mutton and ham--luxurious fare to all. as the sun was rising they closed every door, and walked for the last time, laden with the last of their goods, out of the place of their oppression, leaving behind them not a cock to crow, a peat to burn, or a scrap that was worth stealing--all removed in such order and silence that not one, even at the new house, had a suspicion of what was going on. mercy, indeed, as she sat looking from her window like daniel praying toward jerusalem, her constant custom now, even when there was no moon to show what lay before her, did think she heard strange sounds come faintly through the night from the valley below--even thought she caught shadowy glimpses of a shapeless, gnome-like train moving along the road; but she only wondered if the highlands had suddenly gifted her with the second sight, and these were the brain-phantasms of coming events. she listened and gazed, but could not be sure that she heard or saw. when she looked out in the morning, however, she understood, for the castle-ridge was almost hidden in the smoke that poured from every chimney of the new village. her heart swelled with joy to think of her chief with all his people under his eyes, and within reach of his voice. from her window they seemed so many friends gathered to comfort her solitude, or the camp of an army come to set her free. hector and rob, with one or two more of the clan, hid themselves to watch those who came to evict the first of the villagers. there were no military. two sheriff's officers, a good many constables, and a few vagabonds, made up the party. rob's keen eye enabled him to distinguish the very moment when first they began to be aware of something unusual about the place; he saw them presently halt and look at each other as if the duty before them were not altogether canny. at no time would there be many signs of life in the poor hamlet, but there would always be some sounds of handicraft, some shuttle or hammer going, some cries of children weeping or at play, some noises of animals, some ascending smoke, some issuing or entering shape! they feared an ambush, a sudden onslaught. warily they stepped into the place, sharply and warily they looked about them in the street, slowly and with circumspection they opened door after door, afraid of what might be lurking behind to pounce upon them at unawares. only after searching every house, and discovering not the smallest sign of the presence of living creature, did they recognize their fool's-errand. and all the time there was the new village, smoking hard, under the very windows, as he chose himself to say, of its chief adversary! chapter xvii the new village. the winter came down upon them early, and the chief and his mother had a sore time of it. well as they had known it before, the poverty of their people was far better understood by them now. unable to endure the sight of it, and spending more and more to meet it, they saw it impossible for them to hold out. for a long time their succour had been draining if not exhausting the poor resources of the chief; he had borne up in the hope of the money he was so soon to receive; and now there was none, and the need greater than ever! he was not troubled, for his faith was simple and strong; but his faith made him the more desirous of doing his part for the coming deliverance: faith in god compels and enables a man to be fellow-worker with god. he was now waiting the judgment of ian concerning the prospects of the settlers in that part of canada to which he had gone, hoping it might help him to some resolve in view of the worse difficulties at hand. in the meantime the clan was more comfortable, and passed the winter more happily, than for many years. first of all, they had access to the chief at any moment. then he had prepared a room in his own house where were always fire and light for such as would read what books he was able to lend them, or play at quiet games. to them its humble arrangements were sumptuous. and best of all, he would, in the long dark fore-nights, as the lowland scotch call them, read aloud, at one time in gaelic, at another in english, things that gave them great delight. donal shoemaker was filled with joy unutterable by the rime of the ancient mariner. if only this state of things could be kept up--with ian back, and mercy married to the chief! thought the mother. but it was not to be; that grew plainer every day. mr. palmer would gladly have spent his winter elsewhere, leaving his family behind him; but as things were, he could not leave them, and as certain other things were, he did not care to take them to london. besides, for them all to leave now, would be to confess defeat; and who could tell what hurt to his forest might not follow in his absence from the cowardly hatred of the peasants! he was resolved to see the thing out. but above all, he must keep that worthless girl, mercy, under his own eye! "that's what comes of not drinking!" he would say to himself; "a man grows as proud as satan, and makes himself a curse to his neighbours!" then he would sigh like a man ill-used and disconsolate. both mercy and the chief thought it better not to venture much, but they did occasionally contrive to meet for a few minutes--by the help of christina generally. twice only was mercy's handkerchief hung from the window, when her longing for his voice had grown almost too strong for her to bear. the signal brought him both times through the wild wintry storm, joyous as a bird through the summer air. once or twice they met just outside the gate, mercy flying like a snow-bird to the tryst, and as swiftly back through the keen blue frost, when her breath as she ran seemed to linger in the air like smoke, and threaten to betray her. at length came the much desired letter from ian, full of matter for the enabling of the chief's decision. two things had long been clear to alister--that, even if the ground he had could keep his people alive, it certainly could not keep them all employed; and that, if they went elsewhere, especially to any town, it might induce for many, and ensure for their children, a lamentable descent in the moral scale. he was their shepherd, and must lose none of them! therefore, first of all, he must not lose sight of them! it was now clear also, that the best and most desirable thing was, that the poor remnant of the clan should leave their native country, and betake themselves where not a few of their own people, among them lachlan and annie, would welcome them to probable ease and comfort. there he would buy land, settle with them, and build a village. some would cultivate the soil under their chief; others would pursue their trades for the good of the community and themselves! and now came once more the love of land face to face with the love of men, and in the chief's heart paled before it. for there was but one way to get the needful money: the last of the macruadh property must go! not for one moment did it rouse a grudging thought in the chief: it was for the sake of the men and women and children whose lives would be required of him! the land itself must yield, them wings to forsake it withal, and fly beyond the sea! chapter xviii a friendly offer it was agreed between mother and son to submit the matter to ian, and if he should, be of the same mind, at once to negotiate the sale of the land, in order to carry the clan to canada. they wrote therefore to ian, and composed themselves to await his answer. it was a sorrowful thing to alister to seem for a moment to follow the example of the recreant chiefs whose defection to feudalism was the prelude to their treachery toward their people, and whose faithlessness had ruined the highlands. but unlike glengarry or "esau" reay, he desired to sell his land that he might keep his people, care for them, and share with them: his people safe, what mattered the acres! reflecting on the thing, he saw, in the case of ian's approval of the sale, no reason why he should not show friendliness where none was expected, and give mr. peregrine palmer the first chance of purchase. he thought also, with his usual hopefulness, that the time might come when the clan, laying its savings together, would be able to redeem its ancient homesteads, and then it might be an advantage that they were all in the possession of one man. such things had been, and might be again! the lord could bring again the captivity of clanruahd as well as that of zion! two months passed, and they had ian's answer--when it was well on into the spring, and weather good for a sea-voyage was upon its way. because of the loss of their uncle's money, and the good prospect of comfort in return for labour, hard but not killing, ian entirely approved of the proposal. from that moment the thing was no longer discussed, but how best to carry it out. the chief assembled the clan in the barn, read his brother's letter, and in a simple speech acquainted them with the situation. he told them of the loss of the money to which he had looked for the power to aid them; reminded them that there was neither employment nor subsistence enough on the land--not even if his mother and he were to live like the rest of them, which if necessary they were quite prepared to do; and stated his resolve to part with the remnant of it in order to provide the means of their migrating in a body to canada, where not a few old friends were eager to welcome them. there they would buy land, he said, of which every man that would cultivate it should have a portion enough to live upon, while those with trades should have every facility for following them. all, he believed, would fare well in return for hard work, and they would be in the power of no man. there was even a possibility, he hoped, that, if they lived and laboured well, they might one day buy back the home they had left; or if not they, their sons and daughters might return from their captivity, and restore the house of their fathers. if anyone would not go, he would do for him what seemed fair. donal shoemaker rose, unpuckered his face, slackened the purse-strings of his mouth, and said, "where my chief goes, i will go; where my chief lives, i will live; and where my chief is buried, god grant i may be buried also, with all my family!" he sat down, covered his face with his hands, and wept and sobbed. one voice rose from all present: "we'll go, macruadh! we'll go! our chief is our home!" the chief's heart swelled with mingled gladness and grief, but he answered quietly, "then you must at once begin your preparations; we ought not to be in a hurry at the last." an immediate stir, movement, bustle, followed. there was much talking, and many sunny faces, over which kept sweeping the clouds of sorrow. the next morning the chief went to the new house, and desired to see mr. palmer. he was shown into what the new laird called his study. mr. palmer's first thought was that he had come to call him to account for firing at him. he neither spoke nor advanced a step to meet him. the chief stood still some yards from him, and said as pleasantly as he could,-- "you are surprised to see me, mr. palmer!" "i am." "i come to ask if you would like to buy my land?" "already!" said mr. palmer, cast on his enemy a glare of victory, and so stood regarding him. the chief did not reply. "well!" said mr. palmer. "i wait your answer," returned the chief. "did it never strike you that insolence might be carried too far?" "i came for your sake more than my own," rejoined the chief, without even a shadow of anger. "i have no particular desire you should take the land, but thought it reasonable you should have the first offer." "what a dull ox the fellow must take me for!" remarked the new laird to himself. "it's all a dodge to get into the house! as if he would sell me his land! or could think i would hold any communication with him! buy his land! it's some trick, i'll lay my soul! the infernal scoundrel! such a mean-spirited wretch too! takes an ounce of shot in the stomach, and never says 'what the devil do you mean by it?' i don't believe the savage ever felt it!" something like this passed with thought's own swiftness through the mind of mr. palmer, as he stood looking the chief from head to foot, yet in his inmost person feeling small before him. "if you cannot at once make up your mind," said alister, "i will give you till to-morrow to think it over." "when you have learned to behave like a gentleman," answered the new laird, "let me know, and i will refer you to my factor." he turned and rang the hell. alister bowed, and did not wait for the servant. it must be said for mr. palmer, however, that that morning christina had positively refused to listen to a word more from mr. sercombe. in the afternoon, alister set out for london. chapter xix another expulsion. mr. peregrine palmer brooded more and more upon what he counted the contempt of the chief. it became in him almost a fixed idea. it had already sent out several suckers, and had, amongst others, developed the notion that he was despised by those from whom first of all he looked for the appreciation after which his soul thirsted--his own family. he grew therefore yet more moody, and his moodiness and distrust developed suspicion. it is scarce credible what a crushing influence the judgment he pretended to scorn, thus exercised upon him. it was not that he acknowledged in it the smallest justice; neither was it that he cared altogether for what such a fanatical fool as the chief might think; but he reflected that if one could so despise his money because of its source, there might be others, might be many who did so. at the same time, had he been sure of the approbation of all the world beside, it would have troubled him not a little, in his thirst after recognition, that any gentleman, one of family especially, however old-fashioned and absurd he might be, should look down upon him. his smouldering, causelessly excited anger, his evident struggle to throw off an oppression, and the fierce resentment of the chief's judgment which he would now and then betray, revealed how closely the offence clung to his consciousness. flattering himself from her calmness that mercy had got over her foolish liking for the "boor," as he would not unfrequently style the chief, he had listened to the prayers of her mother, and submitted to her company at the dinner-table; but he continued to treat her as one who had committed a shameful fault. that evening, the great little man could hardly eat for recurrent wrathful memories of the interview of the morning. perhaps his most painful reflection was that he had not been quick enough to embrace the opportunity of annihilating his enemy. thunder lowered portentous in his black brows, and not until he had drunk several glasses of wine did a word come from his lips. his presence was purgatory without the purifying element. "what do you think that fellow has been here about this morning?" he said at length. "what fellow?" asked his wife unnecessarily, for she knew what visitor had been shown into the study. "the highland fellow," he answered, "that claims to do what he pleases on my property!" mercy's face grew hot. "--came actually to offer me the refusal of his land!--the merest trick to get into the house--confound him! as much as told me, if i did not buy it off-hand, i should not have the chance again! the cheek of the brute! to dare show his face in my house after trifling with my daughter's affections on the pretence that he could not marry a girl whose father was in trade!" mercy felt she would be false to the man she loved, and whom she knew to be true, if she did not speak. she had no thought of defending him, but simply of witnessing to him. "i beg your pardon, papa," she said, "but the macruadh never trifled with me. he loves me, and has not given me up. if he told you he was going to part with his land, he is going to part with it, and came to you first because he must return good for evil. i saw him from my window ride off as if he were going to meet the afternoon coach." she would not have been allowed to say so much, had not her father been speechless with rage. this was more than he or any man could bear! he rose from the table, his eyes blazing. "return me good for evil!" he exclaimed; "--a beast who has done me more wrong than ever i did in all my life! a scoundrel bumpkin who loses not an opportunity of insulting me as never was man insulted before! you are an insolent, heartless, depraved girl!--ready to sacrifice yourself, body and soul, to a man who despises you and yours with the pride of a savage! you hussey, i can scarce keep my hands off you!" he came toward her with a threatful stride. she rose, pushed back her chair, and stood facing him. "strike me," she said with a choking voice, "if you will, papa; but mamma knows i am not what you call me! i should be false and cowardly if i did not speak the truth for the man to whom i owe"--she was going to say "more than to any other human being," but she checked herself. "if the beggar is your god," said her father, and struck her on the cheek with his open hand, "you can go to him!" he took her by the arm, and pushed her before him out of the room, and across the hall; then opening the door, shoved her from him into the garden, and flung the door to behind her. the rain was falling in torrents, the night was very dark, and when the door shut, she felt as if she had lost her eyesight. it was terrible!--but, thank god, she was free! without a moment's hesitation--while her mother wept and pleaded, christina stood burning with indignation, the two little ones sat white with open mouths, and the servants hurried about scared, but trying to look as if nothing had happened--mercy fled into the dark. she stumbled into the shrubbery several times, but at last reached the gate, and while they imagined her standing before the house waiting to be let in, was running from it as from the jaws of the pit, in terror of a voice calling her back. the pouring rain was sweet to her whole indignant person, and especially to the cheek where burned the brand of her father's blow. the way was deep in mud, and she slipped and fell more than once as she ran. mrs. macruadh was sitting in the little parlour, no one but nancy in the house, when the door opened, and in came the wild-looking girl, draggled and spent, and dropped kneeling at her feet. great masses of long black hair hung dripping with rain about her shoulders. her dress was torn and wet, and soiled with clay from the road and earth from the shrubbery. one cheek was white, and the other had a red patch on it. "my poor child!" cried the mother; "what has happened? alister is away!" "i know that," panted mercy. "i saw him go, but i thought you would take me in--though you do not like me much!" "not like you, my child!" echoed the mother tenderly. "i love you! are you not my alister's choice? there are things i could have wished otherwise, but--" "well could i wish them otherwise too!" interposed mercy. "i do not wish another father; and i am not quite able to wish he hadn't struck me and put me out into the dark and the rain, but--" "struck you and put you out! my child! what did he do it for?" "perhaps i deserved it: it is difficult to know how to behave to a father! a father is supposed to be one whom you not only love, as i do mine, but of whom you can be proud as well! i can't be proud of mine, and don't know quite how to behave to him. perhaps i ought to have held my peace, but when he said things that were not--not correct about alister, misinterpreting him altogether, i felt it cowardly and false to hold my tongue. so i said i did not believe that was what alister meant. it is but a quarter of an hour ago, and it looks a fortnight! i don't think i quite know what i am saying!" she ceased, laid her head on mrs. macruadh's knee, then sank to the floor, and lay motionless. all the compassion of the woman, all the protective pride of the chieftainess, woke in the mother. she raised the girl in her arms, and vowed that not one of her house should set eyes on her again without the consent of her son. he should see how his mother cared for what was his!--how wide her arms, how big her heart, to take in what he loved! dear to him, the daughter of the man she despised should be as the apple of her eye! they would of course repent and want her back, but they should not have her; neither should a sound of threat or demand reach the darling's ears. she should be in peace until alister came to determine her future. there was the mark of the wicked hand on the sweet sallow cheek! she was not beautiful, but she would love her the more to make up! thank god, they had turned her out, and that made her free of them! they should not have her again; alister should have her!--and from the hand of his mother! she got her to bed, and sent for rob of the angels. with injunctions to silence, she told him to fetch his father, and be ready as soon as possible to drive a cart to the chief's cave, there to make everything comfortable for herself and miss mercy palmer. mercy slept well, and as the day was breaking mrs. macruadh woke her and helped her to dress. then they walked together through the lovely spring morning to the turn of the valley-road, where a cart was waiting them, half-filled with oat-straw. they got in, and were borne up and up at a walking-pace to the spot mercy knew so well. never by swiftest coach had she enjoyed a journey so much as that slow crawl up the mountains in the rough springless cart of her ploughman lover! she felt so protected, so happy, so hopeful. alister's mother was indeed a hiding place from the wind, a covert from the tempest! having consented to be her mother, she could mother her no way but entirely. an outcast for the sake of her alister, she should have the warmest corner of her heart next to him and ian! into the tomb they went, and found everything strangely comfortable--the stone-floor covered with warm and woolly skins of black-faced sheep, a great fire glowing, plenty of provisions hung and stored, and the deaf, keen-eyed father with the swift keen-eared son for attendants. "you will not mind sharing your bed with me--will you, my child?" said mrs. macruadh: "our accommodation is scanty. but we shall be safe from intrusion. only those two faithful men know where we are." "mother will be terribly frightened!" said mercy. "i thought of that, and left a note with nancy, telling her you were safe and well, but giving no hint of where. i said that her dove had flown to my bosom for shelter, and there she should have it." mercy answered with a passionate embrace. chapter xx alister's princess. ten peaceful days they spent in the cave-house. it was cold outside, but the clear air of the hill-top was delicious, and inside it was warm and dry. there were plenty of books, and mercy never felt the time a moment too long. the mother talked freely of her sons, and of their father, of the history of the clan, of her own girlhood, and of the hopes and intentions of her sons. "will you go with him, mercy?" she asked, laying her hand on hers. "i would rather be his servant," answered mercy, "than remain at home: there is no life there!" "there is life wherever there is the will to live--that is, to do the thing that is given one to do," said the mother. in writing she told alister nothing of what had happened: he might hurry home without completing his business! undisturbed by fresh anxiety, he settled everything, parted with his property to an old friend of the family, and received what would suffice for his further intents. he also chartered a vessel to take them over the sea, and to save weariness and expense, arranged for it to go northward as far as a certain bay on the coast, and there take the clan on board. when at length he reached home, nancy informed him that his mother was at the hill-house, and begged he would go there to her. he was a good deal perplexed: she very seldom went there, and had never before gone for the night! and it was so early in the season! he set out immediately. it was twilight when he reached the top of the hill, and no light shone from the little windows of the tomb. that day mercy had been amusing her protectress with imitations, in which kind she had some gift, of certain of her london acquaintance: when the mother heard her son's approaching step, a thought came to her. "here! quick!" she said; "put on my cap and shawl, and sit in this chair. i will go into the bedroom. then do as you like." when the chief entered, he saw the form of his mother, as he thought, bending over the peat-fire, which had sunk rather low: in his imagination he saw again the form of his uncle as on that night in the low moonlight. she did not move, did not even look up. he stood still for a moment; a strange feeling possessed him of something not being as it ought to be. but he recovered himself with an effort, and kneeling beside her, put his arms round her--not a little frightened at her continued silence. "what is the matter, mother dear?" he said. "why have you come up to this lonely place?" when first mercy felt his arms, she could not have spoken if she would--her heart seemed to grow too large for her body. but in a moment or two she controlled herself, and was able to say--sufficiently in his mother's tone and manner to keep up the initiated misconception: "they put me out of the house, alister." "put you out of the house!" he returned, like one hearing and talking in a dream. "who dared interfere with you, mother? am i losing my senses? i seem not to understand my own words!" "mr. palmer." "mr. palmer! was it to him i sold the land in london? what could he have to do with you, mother? how did they allow him to come near the house in my absence? oh, i see! he came and worried you so about mercy that you were glad to take refuge from him up here!--i understand now!" he ended in a tone of great relief: he felt as if he had just recovered his senses. "no, that was not it. but we are going so soon, there would have been no good in fighting it out. we are going soon, are we not?" "indeed we are, please god!" replied the chief, who had relapsed into bewilderment. "that is well--for you more than anybody. would you believe it--the worthless girl vows she will never leave her mother's house!" "ah, mother, you never heard her say so! i know mercy better than that! she will leave it when i say come. but that won't be now. i must wait, and come and fetch her when she is of age." "she is not worthy of you." "she is worthy of me if i were twenty times worthier! mother, mother! what has turned you against us again? it is not like you to change about so! i cannot bear to find you changeable! i should have sworn you were just the one to understand her perfectly! i cannot bear you should let unworthy reasons prejudice you against anyone!--if you say a word more against her, i will go and sit outside with the moon. she is not up yet, but she will be presently--and though she is rather old and silly, i shall find her much better company than you, mother dear!" he spoke playfully, but was grievously puzzled. "to whom are you talking, alister?--yourself or a ghost?" alister started up, and saw his mother coming from the bedroom with a candle in her hand! he stood stupefied. he looked again at the seated figure, still bending over the fire. who was it if not his mother? with a wild burst of almost hysteric laughter, mercy sprang to her feet, and threw herself in his arms. it was not the less a new bewilderment that it was an unspeakably delightful change from the last. was he awake or dreaming? was the dream of his boyhood come true? or was he dreaming it on in manhood? it was come true! the princess was arrived! she was here in his cave to be his own! a great calm and a boundless hope filled the heart of alister. the night was far advanced when he left them to go home. nor did he find his way home, but wandered all night about the tomb, making long rounds and still returning like an angel sent to hover and watch until the morning. when he astonished them by entering as they sat at breakfast, and told them how he had passed the night, it thrilled mercy's heart to know that, while she slept and was dreaming about him, he was awake and thinking about her. "what is only dreaming in me, is thinking in you, alister!" she said. "i was thinking," returned alister, "that as you did not know i was watching you, so, when we feel as if god were nowhere, he is watching over us with an eternal consciousness, above and beyond our every hope and fear, untouched by the varying faith and fluctuating moods of his children." after breakfast he went to see the clergyman of the parish, who lived some miles away; the result of which visit was that in a few days they were married. first, however, he went once more to the new house, desiring to tell mr. palmer what had been and was about to be done. he refused to see him, and would not allow his wife or christina to go to him. the wedding was solemnized at noon within the ruined walls of the old castle. the withered remnant of the clan, with pipes playing, guns firing, and shouts of celebration, marched to the cave-house to fetch thence the bride. when the ceremony was over, a feast was ready for all in the barn, and much dancing followed. when evening came, with a half-moon hanging faint in the limpid blue, and the stars looking large through the mist of ungathered tears--those of nature, not the lovers; with a wind like the breath of a sleeping child, sweet and soft, and full of dreams of summer; the mountains and hills asleep around them like a flock of day-wearied things, and haunted by the angels of rob's visions--the lovers, taking leave only of the mother, stole away to walk through the heavenly sapphire of the still night, up the hills and over the rushing streams of the spring, to the cave of their rest--no ill omen but lovely symbol to such as could see in the tomb the porch of paradise. where should true lovers make their bed but on the threshold of eternity! chapter xxi the farewell. a month passed, and the flag of their exile was seen flying in the bay. the same hour the chief's horses were put to, the carts were loaded, their last things gathered. few farewells had to be made, for the whole clan, except two that had gone to the bad, turned out at the minute appointed. the chief arranged them in marching column. foremost went the pipes; the chief, his wife, and his mother, came next; hector of the stags, carrying the double-barrelled rifle the chief had given him, rob of the angels, and donal shoemaker, followed. then came the women and children; next, the carts, with a few, who could not walk, on the top of the baggage; the men brought up the rear. four or five favourite dogs were the skirmishers of the column. the road to the bay led them past the gate of the new house. the chief called a halt, and went with his wife to seek a last interview. mr. peregrine palmer kept his room, but mrs. palmer bade her daughter a loving farewell--more relieved than she cared to show, that the cause of so much discomfort was going so far away. the children wept. christina bade her sister good-bye with a hopeless, almost envious look: mercy, who did not love him, would see ian! she who would give her soul for him was never to look on him again in this world! kissing mercy once more, she choked down a sob, and whispered, "give my love--no, my heart, to ian, and tell him i am trying." they all walked together to the gate, and there the chief's mother took her leave of the ladies of the new house. the pipes struck up; the column moved on. when they came to the corner which would hide from them their native strath, the march changed to a lament, and with the opening wail, all stopped and turned for a farewell look. men and women, the chief alone excepted, burst into weeping, and the sound of their lamentation went wandering through the hills with an adieu to every loved spot. and this was what the pipes said: we shall never see you more, never more, never more! till the sea be dry, and the world be bare, and the dews have ceased to fall, and the rivers have ceased to run, we shall never see you more, never more, never more! they stood and gazed, and the pipes went on lamenting, and the women went on weeping. "this is heathenish!" said alister to himself, and stopped the piper. "my friends," he cried, in gaelic of course, "look at me: my eyes are dry! where jesus, the son of god, is--there is my home! he is here, and he is over the sea, and my home is everywhere! i have lost my land and my country, but i take with me my people, and make no moan over my exile! hearts are more than hills. farewell strathruadh of my childhood! place of my dreams, i shall visit you again in my sleep! and again i shall see you in happier times, please god, with my friends around me!" he took off his bonnet. all the men too uncovered for a moment, then turned to follow their chief. the pipes struck up macrimmon's lament, till an crodh a dhonnachaidh (turn the kine, duncan). not one looked behind him again till they reached the shore. there, out in the bay, the biggest ship any of the clan had ever seen was waiting to receive them. when mr. peregrine palmer saw that the land might in truth be for sale, he would gladly have bought it, but found to his chagrin that he was too late. it was just like the fellow, he said, to mock him with the chance of buying it! he took care to come himself, and not send a man he could have believed! the clan throve in the clearings of the pine forests. the hill-men stared at their harvests as if they saw them growing. their many children were strong and healthy, and called scotland their home. in an outlying and barren part of the chief's land, they came upon rock oil. it was so plentiful that as soon as carriage became possible, the chief and his people began to grow rich. news came to them that mr. peregrine palmer was in difficulties, and desirous of parting with his highland estate. the chief was now able to buy it ten times over. he gave his agent in london directions to secure it for him, with any other land conterminous that might come into the market. but he would not at once return to occupy it, for his mother dreaded the sea, and thought to start soon for another home. also he would rather have his boys grow where they were, and as men face the temptations beyond: where could they find such teaching as that of their uncle ian! both father and uncle would have them alive before encountering what the world calls life. but the macruadh yet dreams of the time when those of the clan then left in the world, accompanied, he hopes, by some of those that went out before them, shall go back to repeople the old waste places, and from a wilderness of white sheep and red deer, make the mountain land a nursery of honest, unambitious, brave men and strong-hearted women, loving god and their neighbour; where no man will think of himself at his brother's cost, no man grow rich by his neighbour's ruin, no man lay field to field, to treasure up for himself wrath against the day of wrath. the end.