PIRATE. 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR OF " WAVERLEY, 
 KENILWORTH," &c. 
 
 Nothing in him ^-^ 
 But doth suffer a sea-change. 
 
 Tempest. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 EDINBURGH : 
 
 PRINTED FOR ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE AND CO. 
 
 A\ T 1) IIUIIST, ROBINSON, AND CO., 
 
 LONDON. 
 
 1822.
 
 
 Printed by James Ballantyne and Co. Bdnbttrgh.
 
 ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 THE purpose of the following Narrative 
 is to give a detailed and accurate account 
 of certain remarkable incidents which took 
 place in the Orkney Islands, concerning 
 which, the more imperfect traditions and 
 mutilated records of the country only tell 
 us the following erroneous particulars : 
 
 In the month of January 1724-5, a ves- 
 sel, called the Revenge, bearing twenty large 
 guns, and six smaller, commanded by JOHN 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 11 ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 Gow, or GOFFE, or SMITH, came to the 
 Orkney Islands, and was discovered to be a 
 pirate, by various acts of insolence and vil- 
 lainy committed by the crew. These were 
 for some time submitted to, the inhabitants 
 of these remote islands not possessing arms 
 nor means of resistance ; and so bold was the 
 Captain of these banditti, that he not only 
 came ashore, and gave dancing parties in the 
 village of Stromness,but, before his real cha- 
 racter was discovered, engaged the affections 
 and received the troth-plight of a young la- 
 dy, possessed of some property. A patriotic 
 individual, JAMES FEA, younger of Cles- 
 tron, formed the plan of securing the buc- 
 caneer, which he effected by a mixture of 
 courage and address, in consequence chiefly 
 of Gow's vessel having gone on shore near 
 the harbour of Calfsound, on the Island of
 
 ADVERTISEMENT. Ill 
 
 Eda, not far distant from a house then in- 
 habited by Mr FEA. In the various strata- 
 gems by which Mr FEA contrived finally, at 
 the peril of his life, they being well armed 
 and desperate, to make the whole pirates his 
 prisoners, he was much aided by Mr JAMES 
 LAING, the grandfather of the late MAL- 
 COLM LAING, Esq. the acute and ingeni- 
 ous historian of Scotland during the 17th 
 century. 
 
 Gow, and others of his crew, suffered by 
 sentence of the High Court of Admiralty, 
 the punishment their crimes had long de- 
 served. He conducted himself with great 
 audacity when before the Court ; and, 
 from an account of the matter, by an eye- 
 witness, seems to have been subjected to some 
 unusual severities, in order to compel him to 
 plead. The words are these : " JOHN Gow
 
 IV ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 
 
 would not plead, for which he was brought 
 to the bar, and the Judge ordered that his 
 thumbs should be squeezed by two men, 
 with a whip-cord, till it did break ; and then 
 it should be doubled, till it did again break, 
 and then laid threefold, and that the execu- 
 tioners should pull with their whole strength ; 
 which sentence Gow endured with a great 
 deal of boldness." The next morning, (27th 
 May, 1725,) when he had seen the prepa- 
 rations for pressing him to death, his cou- 
 rage gave way, and he told the Marshal of 
 Court, that he would not have given so much 
 trouble, had he been assured of not being 
 hanged in chains. He was then tried, con- 
 demned, and executed, with others of his 
 crew. 
 
 It is said, that the lady whose affections 
 Gow had engaged, went up to London to
 
 ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 see him before his death, and that, arriving 
 too late, she had the courage to request a 
 sight of his dead body ; and then touching 
 the hand of the corpse, she formally resu- 
 med the troth-plight which she had bestow- 
 ed. Without going through this ceremony, 
 she could not, according to the superstition 
 of the country, have escaped a visit from the 
 ghost of her departed lover, in the event of 
 her bestowing upon any living suitor, the 
 faith which she had plighted to the dead. 
 This part of the legend may serve as a cu- 
 rious commentary on the beautiful tale of 
 the fine Scottish ballad, which begins, 
 
 " There came a ghost to Margaret's door," &c. 
 
 The common account of this incident far- 
 ther bears, that Mr FEA, the spirited indi-
 
 VI ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 vidual, by whose exertions Gow's career of 
 iniquity was cut short, was so far from re- 
 ceiving any reward from Government,, that 
 he could not obtain even countenance enough 
 to protect him against a variety of sham suits, 
 raised against him by Newgate solicitors, 
 who acted in the name of Gow, and others 
 of the pirate crew; and the various expences, 
 vexatious prosecutions, and other legal con- 
 sequences, in which his gallantry involved 
 him, utterly ruined his fortune and his fa- 
 mily ; making his memory a notable exam- 
 ple to all who shall in future take pirates 
 on their own authority. 
 
 It is to be supposed, for the honour of 
 GEORGE the First's government, that the 
 last circumstance, as well as the dates, and 
 other particulars of the commonly received
 
 ADVERTISEMENT. Vll 
 
 story, are inaccurate, since they will be found 
 totally irreconcileable with the following ve- 
 racious narrative, compiled from materials 
 to which he himself alone has had access, 
 by 
 
 THE AUTHOR OF WAVERLEY. 
 
 1st November, 1821.
 
 THE PIRATE 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 THE PIKATE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 The storm had ceased its wintry roar, 
 
 Hoarse dash the billows of the sea ; 
 But who on Thule's desert shore, 
 
 Cries, Have I burn'd my harp for thee ? 
 
 MACKIEL. 
 
 THAT long, narrow, and irregular island, usu- 
 ally called the Main-Land of Zetland, because it 
 is by far the largest of that Archipelago, termi- 
 nates, as is well known to the mariners who 
 navigate the stormy seas which surround the 
 Thule of the ancients, in a cliff* of tremendous 
 height, entitled Samburgh-Head, which presents 
 its bare scalp and naked sides to the weight of a 
 tremendous surge, and forms the extreme point 
 of the isle to the south-east. This lofty promon-
 
 4 THE PI 11 ATE. 
 
 tory is constantly exposed to the current of a 
 strong and furious tide, which setting in betwixt 
 the Orkney and Zetland Islands, and running 
 with force only inferior to that of the Pentland 
 Frith, takes its name from the headland we have 
 mentioned, and is called the Roost of Sumburgh ; 
 roost being the phrase assigned in these isles to 
 currents of this description. 
 
 On the land side, the promontory is covered 
 with short grass, and slopes steeply down to a 
 little isthmus, upon which the sea has encroached 
 in creeks, which, advancing from either side of the 
 island, gradually work their way forward, and 
 seem as if in a short time they would form a 
 junction, and altogether insulate Sumburgh- 
 Head, when what is now a cape, will become a 
 lonely mountain islet, severed from the main- 
 land, of which it is at present the terminating ex- 
 tremity. 
 
 Man, however, had in former days considered 
 this as a remote or unlikely event ; for a Nor- 
 wegian chief of other times, or, as other accounts 
 said, and as the name of Jarlsh of seemed to imply, 
 an ancient Earl of the Orkneys had selected this
 
 THE PIRATE. 5 
 
 neck of land as the place for establishing a man- 
 sion-house. It has been long entirely deserted, 
 and the vestiges can only be discerned with diffi- 
 culty; for the loose sand, borne on the tempestuous 
 gales of these stormy regions, has overblown, and 
 almost buried the ruins of the buildings ; but in 
 the end of the seventeenth century, a part of the 
 Earl's mansion was still entire and inhabitable. It 
 was a rude building of rough stone, with nothing 
 about it to gratify the eye, or to excite the imagi- 
 nation ; a large old-fashioned house, with a very 
 steep roof, covered with flags composed of grey 
 sandstone, would perhaps convey the best idea of 
 the place to a modern reader. The windows were 
 few, were very small in size, and were distributed 
 up and down the building with utter contempt of 
 regularity. Against the main building had rest- 
 ed, in former times, certain smaller copartments 
 of the mansion-house, containing offices, or sub- 
 ordinate apartments, necessary for the accommo- 
 dation of the Earl's retainers and menials. But 
 these had become ruinous ; and the rafters had 
 been taken down for fire- wood, or for other pur- 
 poses ; the walls had given way in many places ; 
 and, to complete the devastation, the sand had
 
 6 THE PIRATE. 
 
 already drifted amongst the ruins, and filled up 
 what had been once the chambers they contain- 
 ed, to the depth of two or three feet. 
 
 Amid this desolation, the inhabitants of Jarls- 
 hof had contrived, by constant labour and at- 
 tention, to keep in order a few roods of land, 
 which had been inclosed as a garden, and which, 
 sheltered by the walls of the house itself, from 
 the relentless sea-blast, produced such vegetables 
 as the climate could bring forth, or rather as the 
 sea-gale would permit to grow ; for these islands 
 experience even less of the rigour of cold than is 
 encountered on the mainland of Scotland ; but, 
 unsheltered by a wall of some sort or other, it is 
 scarce possible to raise even the most ordinary 
 culinary vegetables ; and as for shrubs or trees, 
 they are entirely out of the question, such is the 
 force of the sweeping sea-blast. 
 
 At a short distance from the mansion, and 
 near to the sea-beach, just where the creek forms 
 a sort of imperfect harbour, in which lay three or 
 four fishing-boats, there were a few most wretch- 
 ed cottages for the inhabitants and tenants of the 
 township of Jarlshof, who held the whole district, 
 of the landlord upon such terms as were in those
 
 THI-: PIUATE. i 
 
 days usually granted to persons of this descrip- 
 tion, and which, of course, were hard enough. 
 The landlord himself resided upon an estate 
 which he possessed in a more eligible situation, 
 in a different part of the island, and seldom visit- 
 ed his possessions at Sumburgh-Head. He was 
 an honest, plain Zetland gentleman, somewhat 
 passionate, the necessary result of being surround- 
 ed by dependents; and somewhat over-convivial 
 in his habits, the consequence, perhaps, of having 
 too much time at his disposal ; but frank-tem- 
 pered, and generous to his people, and kind and 
 hospitable to strangers. He was descended also 
 of an old and noble Norwegian family ; a circum- 
 stance which rendered him dearer to the lower 
 orders, most of whom are of the same race ; while 
 the lairds, or proprietors, are generally of Scot- 
 tish extraction, who, at this early period, were 
 even still considered as strangers and intruders. 
 Magnus Troil, who deduced his descent from the 
 very Earl who was supposed to have founded 
 Jarlshof, was peculiarly of this opinion. 
 
 The present inhabitants of Jarlshof had expe- 
 rienced, on several occasions, the kindness and 
 good will of the proprietor of the territory. When
 
 8 THE PIBATE. 
 
 Mr Mertoun, such was the name of the present 
 inhabitant of the old mansion, first arrived in Zet- 
 land, some years before the story commences, he 
 had received at the house of Mr Troil that warm 
 and cordial hospitality for which the islands are 
 distinguished. No one asked him whence he came, 
 where he was going, what was his purpose in vi- 
 siting so remote a corner of the empire, or what 
 was likely to be the term of his stay. He arrived 
 a perfect stranger, yet was instantly overpowered 
 by a succession of invitations ; and in each house 
 which he visited, he found a home as long as he 
 chose to accept it, and lived as one of the family, 
 unnoticed and unnoticing, until he thought pro- 
 per to remove to some other dwelling. This ap- 
 parent indifference to the rank, character, and 
 qualities of their guest, did not arise from apathy 
 on the part of his kind hosts, for the islanders had 
 their full share of natural curiosity ; but their de- 
 licacy deemed it would be an infringement upon 
 the laws of hospitality, to ask questions which .heir 
 guest might have found it difficult or unpleasing 
 to answer ; and instead of endeavouring, as is 
 usual in other countries, to wring out of Mr Mer- 
 toun such communications as he might find it
 
 THE PIRATE. 9 
 
 i 
 
 agreeable to withhold, the considerate Zetlanders 
 contented themselves with eagerly gathering up 
 such scraps of information as could be collected 
 in the course of conversation. 
 
 But the rock in an Arabian desart is not more 
 reluctant to afford water, than Mr Basil Mertoun 
 was niggard in imparting his confidence, even in- 
 cidentally ; and certainly the politeness of the 
 gentry of Thule was never put to a more severe 
 task than when they felt that good-breeding en- 
 joined them to abstain from inquiring into the si- 
 tuation of so mysterious a personage. 
 
 All that was actually known of him was easily 
 summed up. Mr Mertoun had come to Lerwick, 
 then rising into some importance, but not yet ac- 
 knowledged as the principal town of the island, 
 in a Dutch vessel, accompanied only by his son, 
 a handsome boy of about fourteen years old. His 
 own age might exceed forty. The Dutch skip- 
 per introduced him to some of the very good 
 friends with whom he used to barter gin and gin- 
 gerbread for little Zetland bullocks, smoked 
 geese, and stockings of lambs' wool ; and al- 
 though Meinheer could only say, that " Mein-
 
 JO THE PIRATE. 
 
 heer Mertoun hab bay his bassage like one gen- 
 tlemans, and hab given a Kreitz-dollar beside to 
 the crew," this introduction served to establish 
 the Dutchman's passenger in a respectable circle 
 of acquaintances, which gradually enlarged, as it 
 appeared that the stranger was a man of consi- 
 derable acquirements. 
 
 This discovery was made as it were per farce ; 
 for Mertoun was as unwilling to speak upon ge- 
 neral subjects, as upon his own affairs. But he 
 was sometimes led into discussions, which shew- 
 ed, as it were in spite of himself, the scholar and 
 the man of the world ; and, at other times, as if 
 in requital of the hospitality which he experien- 
 ced, he seemed to compel himself, against his fix- 
 ed nature, to enter into the society of those around 
 him, especially when it assumed the grave, me- 
 lancholy, or satirical cast, which best suited the 
 temper of his own mind. Upon such occasions, 
 the Zetlanders were universally of opinion that 
 he must have had an excellent education, neglect- 
 ed only in one striking particular, namely, that Mr 
 Mertoun scarce knew the stem of a ship from the 
 stern ; and in the management of a boat, a cow 
 l
 
 THE PIRATE. 11 
 
 could not be more ignorant. It seemed astonish- 
 ing such gross ignorance of the most necessary 
 art of life, (in the Zetland Isles at least,) should 
 subsist along with his accomplishments in other 
 respects ; but so it was. 
 
 Unless called forth in the manner we have 
 mentioned, the habits of Basil Mertoun were re- 
 tired and gloomy. From loud mirth he instant- 
 ly fled ; and even the moderated cheerfulness of 
 a friendly party, had the invariable effect of 
 throwing him into deeper dejection than even his 
 usual demeanour indicated. 
 
 Women are always particularly desirous of in- 
 vestigating mystery, and of alleviating melan- 
 choly, especially when these circumstances are 
 united in a handsome man about the prime of 
 life. It is possible, therefore, that amongst the 
 fair-haired and blue-eyed daughters of Thule 
 this mysterious and pensive stranger might have 
 found some one to take upon herself the task of 
 consolation, had he shewn any willingness to ac- 
 cept such kindly offices ; but, far from doing so, 
 he seemed even to shun the presence of the sex, 
 to which in our distresses, whether of mind or 
 body, we generally apply for pity and comfort.
 
 2 THE PIRATE. 
 
 To these peculiarities Mr Mertoun added an- 
 other, which was particularly disagreeable to his 
 host and principal patron, Magnus Troil. This 
 magnate of Zetland, descended by the father's 
 side, as we have already said, from an ancient 
 Norwegian family by the marriage of its repre- 
 sentative with a Danish lady, held the devout 
 opinion that a cup of Geneva or Nantz was spe- 
 cific against all cares and afflictions whatsoever. 
 These were remedies to which Mr Mertoun never 
 applied ; his drink was water, and water alone, 
 and no persuasion or entreaties could induce him 
 to taste any stronger beverage than was afforded 
 by the pure spring. Now this Magnus Troil 
 could not tolerate ; it was a defiance to the an- 
 cient northern laws of conviviality, which, for his 
 own part, he had so rigidly observed, that al- 
 though he was wont to assert that he had never 
 in his life gone to bed drunk, (that is, in his 
 own sense of the word,) it would have been im- 
 possible to prove that he had ever resigned him- 
 self to slumber in a state of actual and absolute 
 sobriety. It may be therefore asked, what did 
 this stranger bring into society to compensate
 
 THE PIEATE. 13 
 
 the displeasure given by his austere and abstemi- 
 ous habits ? He had, in the first place, that man- 
 ner and self-importance which mark a person of 
 some consequence ; and although it was conjec- 
 tured that he could not be rich, yet it was cer- 
 tainly known by his expenditure that neither was 
 he absolutely poor. He had, besides, some pow- 
 ers of conversation, when, as we have already 
 hinted, he chose to exert them, and his misan- 
 thropy or aversion to the business and intercourse 
 of ordinary life, was often expressed in an anti- 
 thetical manner, which passed for wit, when bet- 
 ter was not to be had. Above all, Mr Mer- 
 toun's secret seemed impenetrable, and his pre- 
 sence had all the interest of a riddle, which men 
 love to read over and over, because they cannot 
 find out the meaning of it. 
 
 Notwithstanding these recommendations, Mer- 
 toun differed in so many material points from his 
 host, that after he had been for some time a guest 
 at his principal residence, Magnus Troil was 
 agreeably surprised when, one evening after they 
 had sate two hours in absolute silence, drinking 
 brandy and water, that is, Magnus drinking the 
 alcohol, and Mertoun the element, the guest ask-
 
 14 THE PlllATE. 
 
 ed his host's permission to occupy, as his tenant, 
 this deserted mansion of Jarslhof, at the extre- 
 mity of the territory called Dunrossness, and si- 
 tuated just beneath Sumburgh-Head. " I shall 
 be handsomely rid of him," quoth Magnus to 
 himself, " and his kill-joy visage will never again 
 stop the bottle in its round. His departure will 
 ruin me in lemons, however, for his mere look 
 was quite sufficient to sour a whole ocean of 
 punch. 1 " 
 
 Yet the kind-hearted Zetlander generously 
 and disinterestedly remonstrated with Mr Mer- 
 toun on the solitude and inconveniences to which 
 he was about to subject himself. " There were 
 scarce," he said, " even the most necessary articles 
 of furniture in the old house there was no so- 
 ciety within many miles for provisions, the prin- 
 cipal article of food would be sour sillocks, and 
 his only company gulls and gannets." 
 
 " My good friend," replied Mertoun, " if you 
 could have named a circumstance which would 
 render the residence more eligible to me than any 
 other, it is that there would be neither human 
 luxury nor human society near the place of my re- 
 treat; a shelter from the weather for my own head,
 
 THE PIBATE. 15 
 
 and for the boy's, is all I seek for ; so name your 
 rent, Mr Troil, and let me be your tenant at 
 Jarlshof." 
 
 " Rent ?" answered the Zetlander ; " why, no 
 great rent for an old house which no one has lived 
 in since my mother's time, God rest her ; and as 
 for shelter, the old walls are thick enough, and 
 will bear many a bang yet. But, Heaven love 
 you, Mr Mertoun, think what you are purposing. 
 For one of us to live at Jarlshof, were a wild 
 scheme enough ; but you, who are from another 
 country, whether English, Scotch, or Irish, no 
 one can tell" 
 
 " Nor does it greatly matter," said Mertoun, 
 somewhat abruptly. 
 
 " Not a herring's scale," answered the Laird ; 
 " only that I like you the better for being no 
 Scot, as I trust you are not one. Hither they 
 have come like the clack-geese every chamber- 
 lain has brought over a flock of his own name, 
 and his own hatching, for what I know, and 
 here they roost for ever catch them returning 
 to their own barren Highlands or Lowlands, 
 when they have tasted our Zetland beef, and seen 
 our bonny voes and lochs. No, sir," (here Mag-
 
 16 THE PIEATE. 
 
 nus proceeded with great animation, sipping from 
 time to time the half-diluted spirit, which at the 
 same time animated his resentment against the 
 intruders, and enabled him to endure the morti- 
 fying reflections which it suggested,) " No, sir, 
 the ancient days and the genuine manners of 
 these Islands are no more ; for our ancient pos- 
 sessors, our Patersons, our Feas, our Schlag- 
 brenners, our Yhiorbiorns, have given place to 
 Giffords, Scotts, Mouats, men whose names be- 
 speak them or their ancestors strangers to the soil 
 which we the Troils have inhabited long before 
 the days of Turf-Einar, who first taught these 
 Isles the mystery of burning peat for fuel, and 
 who has been handed down to a grateful poste- 
 rity by a name which records the discovery." 
 
 This was a subject upon which the potentate 
 of Jarlshof was usually very diffuse, and Mer- 
 toun saw him enter upon it with pleasure, because 
 he knew he would not be called upon to contri- 
 bute any aid to the conversation, and might there- 
 fore indulge his own saturnine humour while the 
 Norwegian Zetlander declaimed on the change of 
 times and inhabitants. But just as Magnus had 
 arrived at the melancholy conclusion, " how pro-
 
 THE PIRATE. 17 
 
 bable it was, that in another century scarce a tnerk 
 scarce even an ure of land, would be in posses- 
 sion of the Norse inhabitants, the true Udallers* 
 of Zetland," he recollected the circumstances of 
 his guest, and stopped suddenly short. " I do 
 not say all this," he added, interrupting himself, 
 " as if I were unwilling that you should settle on 
 my estate, Mr Mertoun but for Jarlshof the 
 place is a wild one Come from where you will, 
 I warrant you will say, like other travellers, you 
 came from a better climate than ours, for so say 
 you all. And yet you think of a retreat which 
 the very natives run away from. Will you not 
 take your glass?" 11 (This was to be considered as 
 interjectional,) " Then here's to you." 
 
 " My good sir," answered Mertoun, " I am 
 indifferent to climate ; if there is but air enough 
 to fill my lungs, I care not if it be the breath of 
 Arabia or of Lapland." 
 
 * The Udallers are the allodial possessors of Zetland, 
 who hold their possessions under the old Norwegian law, 
 instead of the feudal tenures introduced among them from 
 Scotland. 
 
 VOL. I.- B
 
 18 THE PIKATE. 
 
 " Air enough you may have, 11 answered Mag- 
 nus," no lack of that somewhat damp, strangers 
 allege it to be, but we know a corrective for that 
 Here^ to you, Mr Mertoun you must learn to 
 do so, and to smoke a pipe ; and then, as you 
 say, you will find the air of Zetland equal to that 
 of Arabia. But have you seen Jarlshof?" 
 
 The stranger intimated he had not. 
 
 " Then,"" replied Magnus, " you have no idea 
 of your undertaking. If you think it a comfort- 
 able roadstead like this, with the house situated 
 on the side of an inland voe, * that brings the 
 herrings up to your door, you are mistaken, my 
 heart. At Jarlshof you will see nought but the 
 wild waves tumbling on the bare rocks, and the 
 Roost of Sumburgh running at the rate of fifteen 
 knots an hour. 1 ' 
 
 " I shall see nothing at least of the current of 
 human passions, 1 ' replied Mertoun. 
 
 " You will hear nothing but the clanging and 
 screaming of scarfs, sheer-waters, and sea-gulls, 
 from day-break till sun-set. 11 
 
 * Salt-water lake.
 
 THE PIKATE. 
 
 " I will compound, my friend," replied the 
 stranger, " so that I do not hear the chattering 
 of women's tongues." 
 
 " Ah," said the Norman, " that is because you 
 hear just now my little Minna and Brenda sing- 
 ing in the garden with your Mordaunt. Now, I 
 would rather listen to their little voices, than the 
 sky-lark which I once heard in Caithness, or the 
 nightingale that I have read of. What will the 
 girls do for want of their playmate Mordaunt ?" 
 
 " They will shift for themselves," answered 
 Mertoun ; " younger or elder they will find play- 
 mates or dupes ; but the question is, Mr Troil, 
 will you let to me, as your tenant, this old man- 
 sion of Jarlshof ?" 
 
 " Gladly, since you make it your option to 
 live in a spot so desolate." 
 
 " And for the rent ?" continued Mertoun. 
 
 " The rent ?" replied Magnus ; " hum why, 
 you must have the bit of plantie cruive, which 
 they once called a garden, and a right in the scat- 
 hold, and a sixpenny merk of land, that the te- 
 nants may fish for you ; eight lispunds of but-
 
 20 THE PIHATE. 
 
 ter, and eight shillings sterling yearly, is not too 
 much ?" 
 
 Mr Mertoun agreed to terms so moderate, 
 and from thenceforward resided chiefly at the so- 
 litary mansion which we have described in the 
 beginning of this chapter, conforming not only 
 without complaint, but, as it seemed, with a sul- 
 len pleasure, to all the privations which so wild 
 and desolate a situation necessarily imposed on 
 its inhabitant.
 
 TFfK PIRATE. 21 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 "Tis not alone the scene the man, Anselmo, 
 The man finds sympathies in these wild wastes, 
 And roughly tumbling seas, which fairer views 
 And smoother waves deny him. 
 
 Ancient Dratna. 
 
 THE few inhabitants of the township of Jarls- 
 hof had at first heard with alarm that a person 
 of rank superior to their own, was come to reside 
 in the ruinous tenement which they still called 
 the castle. In those days, (for the present times 
 are greatly altered for the better,) the presence of 
 a superior, in such a situation, was almost certain 
 to be attended with additional burthens and ex- 
 actions, for which, under one pretext or another, 
 feudal customs furnished a thousand apologies. 
 By each of these, a part of the tenants' hard 
 won and precarious profits was diverted for the 
 use of their powerful neighbour and superior,
 
 22 THE PIRATE. 
 
 the tacksman as he was called. But the sub-te- 
 nants speedily found that no oppression of this 4 
 kind was to be apprehended at the hands of Ba- 
 sil Mertoun. His own means, whether large 
 or small, were at least fully adequate to his ex- 
 pences, which, so far as regarded his habits of 
 life, were of the most frugal description. The 
 luxuries of a few books, and some philosophical 
 instruments, with which he was supplied from 
 London as occasion offered, seemed to indicate a 
 degree of wealth unusual in these islands ; but, 
 on the other hand, the table and the accommo- 
 dations at Jarlshof, did not exceed what was 
 maintained by a Zetland proprietor of the most 
 inferior description. 
 
 The tenants of the hamlet troubled themselves 
 very little about the quality of their superior, as 
 soon as they found that their situation was ra- 
 ther to be mended than rendered worse by his 
 presence ; and once relieved from the apprehen- 
 sion of his tyrannizing over them, they laid their 
 heads together to make the most of him by various 
 petty tricks of overcharge and extortion, which for 
 a while the stranger submitted to with the most
 
 THE PIttATE. 93 
 
 philosophic indifference. An incident, however, 
 occurred, which put his character in a new light, 
 and effectually checked all future efforts at ex- 
 travagant imposition. 
 
 A dispute arose in the kitchen of the Castle 
 betwixt an old governante, who acted as house- 
 keeper to Mr Mertoun, and Sweyn Erickson, as 
 good a Zetlander as ever rowed a boat to the 
 haqf fishing ; * which dispute, as is usual in such 
 cases, was maintained with such increasing heat 
 and vociferation as to reach the ears of the mas- 
 ter, (as he was called,) who, secluded in a solita- 
 ry turret, was deeply employed in examining the 
 contents of a new package of books from London, 
 which, after long expectation, had found its way 
 to Hull, from thence by a whaling vessel to Ler- 
 wick, and so to Jarlshof. With more than the 
 usual thrill of indignation which indolent people 
 always feel when roused into action on some un- 
 pleasant occasion, Mertoun descended to the scene 
 of contest, and so suddenly, peremptorily, and 
 strictly inquired into the cause of dispute, that 
 
 * t. e. The deep-sea fishing, in distinction to that which 
 is practised along shore.
 
 24 THE 1-IRATE. 
 
 the parties, notwithstanding every evasion which 
 they attempted, became unable to disguise from 
 him that their difference respected the several in- 
 terests to which the honest governante, and no 
 less honest fisherman, were respectively entitled, 
 in an overcharge of about one hundred per cent. 
 on a bargain of rock-cod, purchased by the for- 
 mer from the latter, for the use of the family at 
 Jarlshof. 
 
 When this was fairly ascertained and confessed, 
 Mr Mertoun stood looking upon the culprits 
 with eyes in which the utmost scorn seemed to 
 contend with awakening passion. " Hark you, 
 ye old hag," said he at length to the housekeeper, 
 " avoid my house this instant ; and know that I 
 dismiss you, not for being a liar, a thief, and an 
 ungrateful quean, for these are qualities as pro- 
 per to you as your name of woman, but for daring, 
 in my house, to scold above your breath. And 
 for you, you rascal, who suppose you may cheat 
 a stranger as you would Jlinch* a whale, know 
 that I am well acquainted with the rights which, 
 
 * The operation of slicing the blubber from the bones 
 of the whale, is called, technically, flinching.
 
 THK PIRATE. 25 
 
 by delegation from your master, Magnus Troil, 
 I can exercise over you, if I will. Provoke me 
 to a certain pitch, and you shall learn, to your 
 cost, I can break your rest as easily as you can 
 interrupt my leisure. I know the meaning of 
 scat, and wattle, and hawkhen, and liagalef^ and 
 every other exaction by which your lords, in an- 
 cient and modern days, have wrung yourwithers ; 
 nor is there one of you that shall not rue the day 
 that you could not be content with robbing me of 
 my money, but must also break in on my leisure 
 with your atrocious northern clamour, that rivals 
 in discord the screaming of a flight of Arctic gulls. 1 ' 
 
 Nothing better occurred to Sweyn, in answer 
 to this objurgation, than the preferring a humble 
 request that his honour would be pleased to keep 
 the cod-fish without payment, and say no more 
 about the matter ; but by this time Mr Mertoun 
 had worked up his passions into an ungovernable 
 rage, and with one hand he threw the money at the 
 fisherman's head, while with the other he pelted 
 him out of the apartment with his own fish. 
 
 There was so much of appalling and tyrannic 
 fury in the stranger's manner on this occasion,
 
 26 THE PIRATE. 
 
 that Svveyn neither stopped to collect the money 
 nor take back his commodity, but fled at a pre- 
 cipitate rate to the small hamlet, to tell his com- 
 rades that if they provoked Master Mertoun any 
 further, he would turn an absolute Pate Stuart* 
 on their hand, and head and hang without either 
 judgment or mercy. 
 
 Hither also came the discarded housekeeper, to 
 consult with her neighbours and kindred, (for 
 she also was a native of the village,) what she 
 should do to regain the desirable situation from 
 which she had been so suddenly expelled. The 
 old Rauzellaar of the village, who had the voice 
 most potential in the deliberations of the town- 
 ship, after hearing what had happened, pronoun- 
 ced that Sweyn Erickson had gone too far in 
 raising the market upon Mr Mertoun ; and that 
 whatever pretext the tacksman might assume 
 for thus giving way to his anger, the real grie- 
 vance must have been the charging the rock cod- 
 
 * Meaning, probably, Patrick Stuart, Earl of Orkney, 
 executed for tyranny and oppression practised on the in- 
 habitants of these remote islands in the beginning of the 
 seventeenth century.
 
 TJIK PIRATE. 27 
 
 fish at a penny instead of a halfpenny a-piece ; 
 he therefore exhorted all the community never to 
 raise their exactions in future beyond the pro- 
 portion of threepence upon the shilling, at which 
 rate their master at the Castle could not reason- 
 ably be expected to grumble, since, as he was 
 disposed to do them no harm, it was reasonable 
 to think that, in a moderate way, he had no ob- 
 jection to do them good. " And three upon 
 twelve," said the experienced Rauzellaar, " is a 
 decent and moderate profit, and will bring with 
 it God's blessing and Saint Ronald's. 11 
 
 Proceeding upon the tariff' thus judiciously re- 
 commended to them, the inhabitants of Jarlshof 
 cheated Mertoun in future only to the moderate 
 extent of twenty-five per cent. ; a rate to which 
 all nabobs, army-contractors, speculators in the 
 funds, and others, whom recent and rapid success 
 has enabled to settle in the country upon a great 
 scale, ought to submit, as very reasonable treat- 
 ment at the hand of their rustic neighbours. 
 Mertoun at least seemed of that opinion, for he 
 gave himself no further trouble on the subject of 
 his household expences. 
 
 11
 
 28 THE PIRATE. 
 
 The conscript fathers of Jarlshof, having set- 
 tled their own matters, took next under their 
 consideration the case of Swertha, the banished 
 matron who had been expelled from the Castle, 
 whom as an experienced and useful ally, they 
 were highly desirous to restore to her office of 
 housekeeper, should that be found possible. But 
 as their wisdom here failed them, Swertha, in de- 
 spair, had recourse to the good offices of Mor- 
 daunt Mertoun, with whom she had acquired 
 some favour by her knowledge in old Norwegian 
 ballads, and dismal tales concerning the Trows 
 or Drows, (the dwarfs of the Scalds) with whom 
 superstitious eld had peopled many a lonely ca- 
 vern and brown dale in Dunrossness, as in every 
 other district of Zetland. " Swertha," said the 
 youth, " I can do but little for you, but you may 
 do something for yourself. My fathers passion 
 resembles the fury of those ancient champions 
 you sing songs about." 
 
 " Ay, ay, fish of my heart," replied the old 
 woman, with a pathetic whine ; " the Berserkars 
 were champions who lived before the blessed days 
 of Saint Olave, and who used to run like mad-
 
 THE PIKATK. 29 
 
 men on swords, and spears, and harpoons, and 
 muskets, and snap them all into pieces as a fin- 
 ner would go through a herring-net, and then, 
 when the fury went off, were as weak and un- 
 stable as water." 
 
 " That's the very thing, Swertha," said Mor- 
 daunt. " Now, my father never likes to think of 
 his passion after it is over, and is so much of a 
 Berserkar, that, let him be desperate as he will 
 to-day, he will not care about it to-morrow. There- 
 fore, he has not filled up your place in the house- 
 hold at the Castle, and not a mouthful of warm 
 food has been dressed there since you went away, 
 and not a morsel of bread baked, but we have li- 
 ved just upon whatever cold thing came to hand. 
 Now, Swertha, I will be your warrant, that if 
 you go boldly up to the Castle, and enter upon 
 the discharge of your duties as usual, you will 
 never hear a single word from him." 
 
 Swertha hesitated at first to obey this bold 
 counsel. She said, " to her thinking, Mr Mer- 
 toun, when he was angry, looked more like a 
 fiend than any Berserkar of them all ; that the 
 fire flashed from his eyes, and the foam flew from
 
 3U THE PIRATE. 
 
 his lips ; and that it would be a plain tempting 
 of Providence to put herself again in such a ven- 
 ture." 
 
 But, on the encouragement which she received 
 from the son, she determined at length once more 
 to face the parent ; and, dressing herself in her 
 ordinary household attire, for so Mordaunt par- 
 ticularly recommended, she slipped into the Castle, 
 and presently resuming the various and numerous 
 occupations which devolved on her, seemed as 
 deeply engaged in household cares as if she had 
 never been out of office. 
 
 The first day of her return to her duty, Swer- 
 tha made no appearance in presence of her mas- 
 ter, but trusted that, after his three days' diet on 
 cold meat, a hot dish, dressed with the best of 
 her simple skill, might introduce her favourably 
 to his recollection. When Mordaunt had report- 
 ed that his father had taken no notice of this 
 change of diet, and when she herself observed 
 that, in passing and repassing him occasionally, 
 her appearance produced no effect upon her sin- 
 gular master, she began to imagine that the whole 
 affair had escaped Mr Mertoun's memory. Nei-
 
 THK F1KATK. til 
 
 ther was she convinced of the contrary until one 
 day, when happening somewhat to elevate her 
 tone in a dispute with the other maid-servant, 
 her master, who at that time passed the place of 
 contest, eyed her with a strong glance, and pro- 
 nounced the single word, remember, in a tone 
 which taught Swertha the government of her 
 tongue for many weeks after. 
 
 If Mertoun was whimsical in his mode of go- 
 verning his household, he seemed no less so in 
 his plan of educating his son. He shewed the 
 youth but few symptoms of parental affection ; 
 yet, in his ordinary state of mind, the improve- 
 ment of Mordaunfs education seemed to be the 
 utmost object of his life. He had both books and 
 information sufficient to discharge the task of tu- 
 tor in the ordinary branches of knowledge ; and 
 in this capacity was regular, calm, and strict, not 
 to say severe, in exacting from his pupil the at- 
 tention necessary for his profiting. But in the 
 perusal of history, to which their attention was 
 frequently turned, as well as in the study of 
 classic authors, there often occurred facts or sen- 
 timents which produced an instant effect upon
 
 3* THE PIRATE. 
 
 Mertoun's mind, and brought on him suddenly 
 what Swertha, Sweyn, and even Mordaunt, came 
 to distinguish by the name of his dark hour. He 
 was aware, in the usual case, of its approach, and 
 retreated to an inner apartment, into which he 
 never permitted even Mordaunt to enter. Here 
 he would abide in seclusion for days, and even 
 weeks, only coming out at uncertain times, to 
 take such food as they had taken care to leave 
 within his reach, which he used in wonderfully 
 small quantities. At other times, and especially 
 during the winter solstice, when almost every 
 person spends the time within doors in feasting 
 and merriment, this unhappy man would wrap 
 himself in a dark-coloured sea-cloak, and wander 
 out along the stormy beach, or upon the desolate 
 heath, indulging his own gloomy and wayward re- 
 veries, under the inclement sky, the rather that 
 he was then most sure to wander unencountered 
 and unobserved. 
 
 As Mordaunt grew older, he learned to note 
 the particular signs which preceded these fits of 
 gloomy despondency, and to direct such precau- 
 tions as might insure his unfortunate parent from
 
 THE PIRATE. <>6 
 
 ill-timed interruption, (which had always the ef- 
 fect of driving him to fury,) while, on the con- 
 trary, full provision was made for his subsist- 
 ence. Mordaunt perceived, that at such periods 
 the melancholy fit of his father was greatly pro- 
 longed, if he chanced to present himself to his 
 eyes while the dark hour was upon him. Out of 
 respect, therefore, to his parent, as well as to in- 
 dulge the love of active exercise and of amuse- 
 ment natural to his period of life, Mordaunt 
 used often altogether to absent himself from the 
 mansion of Jarlshof, and even from the district, 
 secure that his father, if the dark hour passed 
 away in his absence, would be little disposed to 
 enquire how his son had disposed of his leisure, 
 so he was sure he had not watched his own weak 
 moments ; that being the subject on which he en- 
 tertained the utmost jealousy. 
 
 At such times, therefore, all the sources of 
 amusement which the country afforded, were open 
 to the younger Mertoun, who, in these intervals 
 of his education, had an opportunity to give full 
 scope to the energies of a bold, active, and da- 
 
 VOL. i. c
 
 34 THE PIKATE. 
 
 ring character. He was often engaged with the 
 youth of the hamlet in those desperate sports, 
 to which the " dreadful trade of the samphire 
 gatherer 1 ' is like a walk upon level ground often 
 joined those midnight excursions upon the face of 
 the giddy cliffs, to secure the eggs or the young 
 of the sea-fowl ; and in these daring adventures 
 displayed an address, and presence of mind, and 
 activity, which, in one so young, and not a native 
 of the country, astonished the oldest fowlers. 
 
 At other times, Mordaunt accompanied Sweyn 
 and other fishermen in their long and perilous 
 expeditions to the distant and deep sea, learning 
 under their direction the management of the 
 boat, in which they equal or exceed, perhaps, 
 any natives of the British empire. This exercise 
 had charms for Mordaunt, independently of the 
 fishing alone. 
 
 At this time, the old Norwegian sagas were 
 much remembered, and often rehearsed by the 
 fishermen, who still preserved amongst them- 
 selves the ancient Norse tongue, which was the 
 speech of their forefathers. In the dark romance 
 of those Scandinavian tales, lay much that was 
 1
 
 THE PIRATE. O 
 
 Captivating to a youthful ear ; and the classic 
 tales of antiquity were rivalled at least, if not 
 excelled, in Mordaunt's opinion, by the strange 
 legends of Berserkar, of Sea-kings, of dwarfs, 
 giants, and sorcerers, which he heard from the 
 native Zetlanders. Often the scenes around him 
 were assigned as the localities of the wild poems, 
 which, half recited, half chaunted, by voices as 
 hoarse, if not so loud, as the waves over which 
 they floated, pointed out the very bay on which 
 they sailed as the scene of a bloody sea-fight ; 
 the scarce-seen heap of stones that bristled over 
 the projecting cape, as the dun or castle of some 
 potent Earl or noted pirate ; the distant and so- 
 litary grey stone on the lonely moor, as marking 
 the grave of an hero ; the wild cavern, up which 
 the sea rolled in heavy, broad, and unbroken 
 billows, as the dwelling of some noted sorceress. 
 The ocean also had its mysteries, the effect of 
 which was aided by the dim twilight, through 
 which it was imperfectly seen for more than half 
 the year. Its bottomless depths and secret caves 
 contained, according to the account of Sweyn and
 
 9C THE PIRATE. 
 
 others, skilled in legendary lore, such wonders 
 as modern navigators reject with disdain. In the 
 quiet moonlight bay, where the waves came rip- 
 pling to the shore, upon a bed of smooth sand in- 
 termingled with shells, the mermaid was still seen 
 to glide along the waters by moonlight, and, ming- 
 ling her voice with the sighing breeze, was often 
 heard to singof subterranean wonders, or tochaunt 
 prophesies of future events. The kraken, that 
 hugest of living things, was still supposed to 
 cumber the recesses of the Northern Ocean ; and 
 often, when some fog-bank covered the sea at a 
 distance, the eye of the experienced boatmen saw 
 the horns of the monstrous leviathan welking and 
 waving amidst the wreaths of mist, and bore away 
 with all press of oar and sail, lest the sudden suc- 
 tion, occasioned by the sinking of the monstrous 
 mass to the bottom, should drag within the grasp 
 of its multifarious feelers his own frail skiff. The 
 sea-snake was also known, which, arising out of 
 the depths of ocean, stretches to the skies his enor- 
 mous neck, covered with a mane like that of a 
 war-horse, and with its broad glittering eyes,
 
 THE 1'IRATE. 37 
 
 raised mast-head high, looks out, as it seems, for 
 plunder or for victims. 
 
 Many prodigious stories of these marine mon- 
 sters, and of many others less known, were then 
 universally received among the Zetlanders, whose 
 descendants have not as yet by any means aban- 
 doned faith in them. 
 
 Such legends are, indeed, every where current 
 amongst the vulgar ; but the imagination is far 
 more powerfully affected by them on the deep 
 and dangerous seas of the north, amidst precipi- 
 ces and headlands, many hundred feet in height, 
 amid perilous straits, and currents, and eddies, 
 long sunken reefs of rock, over which the vivid 
 ocean foams and boils, dark caverns, to whose 
 extremities neither man nor skiff has ever ven- 
 tured, lonely, and often uninhabited isles, and 
 occasionally the ruins of ancient northern fast- 
 nesses, dimly seen by the feeble light of the Arc- 
 tic winter. To Mordaunt, who had much of ro- 
 mance in his disposition, these superstitions form- 
 ed a pleasing and interesting exercise of the ima- 
 gination, while, half doubting, half inclined to be-
 
 38 THE PIIIATE. 
 
 lieve, he listened to the tales chaunted concern- 
 ing these wonders of nature, and creatures of cre- 
 dulous belief, told in the rude but energetic lan- 
 guage of the ancient Scalds. 
 
 But there wanted not softer and lighter amuse- 
 ments, that might seem better suited toMordaunt's 
 age, than the wild tales and rude exercises which 
 we have already mentioned. The season of win- 
 ter, when, from the shortness of the day-light, 
 labour becomes impossible, is in Zetland the time 
 of revel, feasting, and merriment. Whatever the 
 fisherman has been able to acquire during sum- 
 mer, was expended, and often wasted, in maintain- 
 ing the mirth and hospitality of his hearth du- 
 ring this period ; while the landholders and gen- 
 tlemen of the island gave double loose to their 
 convivial and hospitable dispositions, thronged 
 their houses with guests, and drove away the ri- 
 gour of the season with jest, glee, and song, the 
 dance, and the wine-cup. 
 
 Amid the revels of this merry, though rigo- 
 rous season, no youth added more spirit to the 
 dance, or glee to the revel, than the young stran-
 
 THE PIRATE. 39 
 
 ger, Mordaunt Mertoun. When his father's state 
 of mind permitted, or indeed required his absence, 
 he wandered from house to house a welcome guest 
 wherever he came, and lent his willing voice to 
 the song, and his foot to the revel. A boat, or, 
 if the weather, as was often the case, permitted 
 not that convenience, one of the numerous ponies, 
 which, straying in hordes about the extensive 
 moors, may be said to be at any man's command- 
 ment, conveyed him from the mansion of one 
 hospitable Zetlander to that of another. None 
 excelled him in performing the warlike sword- 
 dance, a species of amusement which had been 
 derived from the habits of the ancient Norse- 
 men. He could play upon ihegue, and upon the 
 common violin, the melancholy and pathetic tunes 
 peculiar to the country; and with great spirit 
 and execution could relieve their monotony with 
 the livelier airs of the North of Scotland. When 
 a party set forth as maskers, or, as they are call- 
 ed in Scotland, guizards, to visit some neigh- 
 bouring laird, or rich udaller, it augured well of 
 the expedition if Mordaunt Mertoun could be
 
 40 THE PIRATE. 
 
 prevailed upon to undertake the office of skudler, 
 or leader of the band. Upon these occasions, 
 full of fun and frolic, he led his retinue from 
 house to house, bringing mirth where he went, 
 and leaving regret when he departed. Mordaunt 
 became thus generally known, and beloved as ge- 
 nerally, through most of the houses composing 
 the patriarchal community of the Main Isle ; but 
 his visits were most frequently and most willing- 
 ly paid at the mansion of his father's landlord and 
 protector, Magnus Troil. 
 
 It was not entirely the hearty and sincere wel- 
 come of the worthy old Magnate, nor the sense 
 that he was in effect his father's patron, which 
 occasioned these frequent visits. The hand of 
 welcome was indeed received as eagerly as it was 
 sincerely given, while the ancient udaller, raising 
 himself in his huge chair, whereof the inside was 
 lined with well-dressed seal-skins, and the outside 
 composed of massive oak, carved by the rude 
 graving-tool of some Hamburgh carpenter, shout- 
 ed forth his welcome in a tone which might have, 
 in ancient times, hailed the return of loul, the
 
 THE PIRATE. 41 
 
 highest festival of the Goths. There was metal 
 yet more attractive, and younger hearts, whose 
 welcome, if less loud, was as sincere as that of the 
 jolly udaller. But it is matter which ought not 
 to be discussed at the conclusion of a chapter.
 
 THE PIRATE- 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 " O, Bessy Bell and Mary Gray, 
 
 They were twa bonnie lasses ; 
 They bigged a house on yon burn-brae, 
 
 And theekit it ower wi' rashes. 
 
 Fair Bessie Bell I loo'ed yestreen, 
 
 And thought 1 ne'er could alter, 
 But Mary Gray's twa pawky een 
 
 Have garr'd my courage faulter." 
 
 Scott Song. 
 
 WE have already mentioned Minna and Bren- 
 da, the daughters of Magnus Troil. The mother 
 had been dead for many years, and they were 
 now two beautiful girls, the eldest only eighteen, 
 which might be a year or two younger than Mor- 
 daunt Mertoun, the second about seventeen. 
 They were the joy of their father's heart, and 
 the light of his old eyes ; and although indulged 
 to a degree which might have endangered his 
 comfort and their own, they repaid his affection 
 with a love, into which even blind indulgence had 
 not introduced slight regard, or feminine caprice.
 
 TH12 PIRATE. 4i3 
 
 The difference of their tempers and of their com- 
 plexions was singularly striking, although com- 
 bined, as is usual, with a certaia degree of fami- 
 ly resemblance. 
 
 The mother of these maidens had been a Scot- 
 tish lady from the Highlands of Sutherland, the 
 orphan of a noble chief, who, driven from his own 
 country during the feuds of the seventeenth cen- 
 tury, had found shelter in those peaceful islands, 
 which, amidst poverty and seclusion, were thus 
 far happy, that they remained unvexed by dis- 
 cord, and unstained by civil broil. The father 
 (his name was Saint Clair,) pined for his native 
 glen, his feudal tower, his clansmen, and his fall- 
 en authority, and died not long after his arrival 
 in Zetland. The beauty of his orphan daughter, 
 despite her Scottish lineage, melted the stout 
 heart of Magnus Troil. He sued and was list- 
 ened to, and she became his bride ; but dying in 
 the fifth year of their union, left him to mourn 
 his brief period of domestic happiness. 
 
 From her mother, Minna inherited the stately 
 form and dark eyes, the raven locks and finely- 
 pencilled brows, which shewed she was, on one
 
 44 THE PIKATE. 
 
 side at least, a stranger to the blood of Thule. 
 Her cheek, 
 
 O call it fair, not pale, 
 
 was so slightly and delicately tinged with the rose, 
 thatmany thoughtthelily hadan undue proportion 
 in her complexion. Butin that predominance of the 
 paler flower, there Avas nothing sickly or languid ; 
 it was the true natural complexion of health, and 
 corresponded in a peculiar degree with features 
 which seemed calculated to express a contempla- 
 tive and high-minded character. When Minna 
 Troil heard a tale of woe or of inj ustice, it was 
 then her blood rushed to her cheeks, and shewed 
 plainly how warm it beat, notwithstanding the 
 generally serious, composed, and retiring disposi- 
 tion, which her countenance and demeanour seem- 
 ed to exhibit. If strangers sometimes conceived 
 that these fine features were clouded by melan- 
 choly, for which her age and situation could scarce 
 have given occasion, they were soon satisfied, upon 
 further acquaintance, that the placid, mild quie- 
 tude of her disposition, and the mental energy of 
 a character which was but little interested in or- 
 
 13
 
 THE PIRATE. 45 
 
 dinary and trivial occurrences, was the real cause 
 of her gravity, and most men, when they knew 
 that her melancholy had no ground in real sorrow, 
 and was only the aspiration of a soul bent on 
 more important objects, than those by which she 
 was surrounded, might have wished her what- 
 ever could add to her happiness, but could scarce 
 have desired that, graceful as she was in her 
 natural and unaffected seriousness, she should 
 change that deportment for one more gay. In 
 short, notwithstanding our wish to have avoided 
 that hackneyed simile of an angel, we cannot 
 avoid saying there was something in the serious 
 beauty of her aspect, in the measured, yet grace- 
 ful ease of her motions, in the music of her voice, 
 and the serene purity of her eye, that seemed as 
 if Minna Troil belonged naturally to some higher 
 and better sphere, and was only the chance vi- 
 sitant of a world that was scarce worthy of her. 
 The scarce less beautiful, equally lovely, and 
 equally innocent Brenda, was of a complexion as 
 differing from her sister, as they differed in cha- 
 racter, taste, and expression. Her profuse locks 
 were of that paly brown which receives from the 
 passing sun-beam a tinge of gold, but darkens
 
 46 THE PIRATE. 
 
 again when the ray has passed from it. Her eye, 
 her mouth, the beautiful row of teeth, which, in 
 her innocent vivacity, were frequently disclosed ; 
 the fresh, yet not too bright glow of a healthy 
 complexion, tinging a skin like the drifted snow, 
 spoke her genuine Scandinavian descent. A fairy 
 form, less tall than that of Minna, but even more 
 finely moulded into symmetry a careless, and 
 almost childish lightness of step an eye that 
 seemed to look on every object with pleasure, 
 from a natural and serene cheerfulness of dispo- 
 sition, attracted even more general admiration 
 than the charms of her sister, though perhaps 
 that which Minna did excite, might be of a more 
 intense as well as a more reverential character. 
 
 The dispositions of these lovely sisters were 
 not less different than their complexions. In the 
 kindly affections, neither could be said to excel 
 the other, so much were they attached to their 
 father and to each other. But the cheerfulness 
 of Brenda mixed itself with the every-day busi- 
 ness of life, and seemed inexhaustible in its pro- 
 fusion. The less buoyant spirit of her sister, ap- 
 peared to bring to society a contented wish to be 
 interested and pleased with what was going for-
 
 THE PIRATE. 47 
 
 ward, but was rather placidly carried along with 
 the stream of mirth and pleasure, than disposed 
 to aid its progress by any efforts of her own. 
 She endured mirth, rather than enjoyed it ; and 
 the pleasures in which she most delighted, were 
 those of a graver and more solitary cast. The 
 knowledge which is derived from books was be- 
 yond her reach. Zetland afforded few opportu- 
 nities, in those days, of studying the lessons be- 
 queathed 
 
 By dead men to thek kind ; 
 
 and Magnus Troil, such as we have described 
 him, was not a person within whose mansion the 
 means of such knowledge was to be acquired. 
 But the book of nature was before Minna, that 
 noblest of volumes, where we are ever called to 
 wonder and to admire, even when we cannot un- 
 derstand. The plants of those wild regions, the 
 shells on the shores, and the long list of feathered 
 clans which haunt their cliffs and eyries, were as 
 well known to Minna Troil, as to the most expe- 
 rienced of the fowlers. Her pow ers of observation 
 were wonderful, and little interrupted by other 
 tones of feeling. The information which she ac-
 
 48 THE PIRATE. 
 
 quired by habits of patient attention, were inde- 
 libly rivetted in a naturally powei'ful memory. 
 She had also a high feeling for the solitary and 
 melancholy grandeur of the scenes in which she 
 was placed. The ocean, in all its varied forms of 
 sublimity and terror the tremendous cliffs that 
 resound to the ceaseless roar of the billows, and 
 the clang of the sea-fowl, had for Minna a charm 
 in almost every state in which the changing sea- 
 sons exhibited them. With the enthusiastic feel- 
 ings proper to the romantic race from which her 
 mother descended, the love of natural objects 
 was to her a passion capable of not only occupy- 
 ing, but at times of agitating her mind. Scenes 
 upon which her sister looked with a sense of tran- 
 sient awe or emotion, which vanished on her re- 
 turn from witnessing them, continued long to fill 
 Minna's imagination, not only in solitude, and in 
 the silence of the night, but in the hours of so- 
 ciety. So that sometimes when she sat like a beau- 
 tiful statue, a present member of the domestic 
 circle, her thoughts were far absent, wandering 
 on the wild sea-shore, and amongst the yet wild- 
 er mountains of her native isles. And yet, when 
 recalled to conversation, and mingling in it with
 
 THE PIRATE. 49 
 
 interest, there were few to whom her friends were 
 more indebted for enhancing its enjoyments ; and, 
 although something in her manners claimed de- 
 ference (notwithstanding her early youth) as well 
 as affection, even her gay, lovely, and amiable 
 sister was not more generally beloved than the 
 more retired and pensive Minna. 
 
 Indeed the two lovely sisters were not only 
 the delight of their friends, but the pride of those 
 islands, where the inhabitants of a certain rank 
 were formed, by the remoteness of their situation 
 and the general hospitality of their habits, into 
 one friendly community. A wandering poet and 
 parcel-musician, who, after going through various 
 fortunes, had returned to end his days as he could 
 in his native islands, had celebrated the daughters 
 of Magnus in a poem, which he entitled Night 
 and Day ; and, in his description of Minna, might 
 almost be thought to have anticipated, though 
 only in a rude outline, the exquisite lines of Lord 
 Byron, 
 
 " She walks in beauty, like the night 
 Of cloudless climes and starry skies ; 
 
 VOL. I. n
 
 50 THE PIRATE. 
 
 And all that's best of dark and bright 
 
 Meet in her aspect and her eyes : 
 Thus mellow'd to that tender light 
 
 Which heaven to gaudy day denies." 
 
 Their father loved the maidens both so well, 
 that it might be difficult to say which he liked 
 best, saving that, perchance, he loved his graver 
 damsel better in the walk without doors, and his 
 merry maiden better by the fireside ; that he 
 more desired the society of Minna when he was 
 sad, and that of Brenda when he was mirthful ; 
 and, what was nearly the same thing, preferred 
 Minna before noon, and Brenda after the glass 
 had circulated in the evening. 
 
 But it was still more extraordinary, that the 
 affections of Mordaunt Mertoun seemed to ho- 
 ver with the same impartiality as those of their 
 father betwixt the two lovely sisters. From his 
 boyhood, as we have noticed, he had been a fre- 
 quent inmate of the residence of Magnus at 
 Burgh- Westra, although it lay nearly twenty 
 miles distant from Jarlshof. The impassable cha- 
 racter of the country betwixt these places, ex- 
 tending over hills covered with loose and qua- 
 12
 
 THE PIRATK. 
 
 king bog, and frequently intersected by the creeks 
 or arms of the sea, which indent the island on 
 either side, as well as by fresh-water streams and 
 lakes, rendered the journey difficult, and even 
 dangerous, in the dark season ; yet, as soon as 
 the state of his father's mind warned him to ab- 
 sent himself, Mordaunt, at every risk, and under 
 every difficulty, was pretty sure to be found upon 
 the next day at Burgh- Westra, having achieved 
 his journey in less time than would have been 
 employed perhaps by the most active native. 
 
 He was of course set down as a wooer of one 
 of the daughters of Magnus, by the public of 
 Zetland ; and when the old udaller's great par- 
 tiality to the youth was considered, nobody doubt- 
 ed that he might aspire to the hand of either of 
 those distinguished beauties, with as large a share 
 of islets, rocky moorland, and shore-fishings, as 
 might be the fitting portion of a favoured child, 
 and with the prospect of possessing half the do- 
 mains of the ancient house of Troil, when their 
 present owner was no more. This seemed all a 
 reasonable speculation, and, in theory at least, 
 better constructed than many that are current
 
 52 THE PIRATE. 
 
 through the world as unquestionable facts. But 
 alas! all that sharpness of observation which could 
 be applied to the conduct of the parties, failed to 
 determine the main point, to which of the young 
 persons, namely, the attentions of Mordaunt 
 were peculiarly devoted. He seemed, in general, 
 to treat them as an affectionate and attached bro- 
 ther might have treated two sisters, so equally 
 dear to him that a breath would have turned the 
 scale of affection. Or if at any time, which oft- 
 en happened, the one maiden appeared the more 
 especial object of his attention, it seemed only to 
 be because circumstances called her peculiar ta- 
 lents and disposition into more particular and 
 immediate exercise. 
 
 They were both accomplished in the simple 
 music of the north, and Mordaunt, who was their 
 assistant, and sometimes their preceptor, when 
 they were practising this delightful art, might be 
 now seen assisting Minna in the acquisition of 
 those wild, solemn, and simple airs, to which 
 Scalds and harpers sung of old the deeds of he- 
 roes, and presently found equally active in teach- 
 ing Brenda the more lively and complicated mu-
 
 THE PIltATK. 53 
 
 sic, which their father's affection caused to be 
 brought from the English or Scottish capital for 
 the use of his daughters. And while conversing 
 with them, Mordaunt, who mingled a strain of 
 deep and ardent enthusiasm with the gay and un- 
 governable gaiety of youth, was equally ready to 
 enter into the wild and poetical visions of Minna, 
 or into the lively, and often humorous chat of 
 her gayer sister. In short, so little did he seem 
 to attach himself to either damsel exclusively, 
 that he was sometimes heard to say, that Minna 
 never looked so lovely as when her light-hearted 
 sister had induced her, for the time, to forget her 
 habitual gravity; or Brenda so interesting as 
 when she sate listening, a subdued and affected 
 partaker of the deep pathos of her sister Minna. 
 The public were, therefore, to use the hunter's 
 phrase, at fault in their farther conclusions, and 
 could but determine, after long vacillating be- 
 twixt the maidens, that Mordaunt was positively 
 to marry one of them, but which could only be 
 determined when his approaching manhood, or 
 the interference of stout old Magnus, the father, 
 should teach Master Mordaunt Mertoun to know
 
 54 THK PIRATE. 
 
 his own mind. " It was a pretty thing, indeed," 
 they usually concluded, " that he, no native born, 
 and possessed of no visible means of subsistence 
 that was known to any one, should presume to 
 hesitate, or affect to have the power of selection 
 and choice, betwixt the two most distinguished 
 beauties of Zetland. If they were Magnus Troil, 
 they would soon be at the bottom of the matter" 
 and so forth. All which remarks were only whis- 
 pered, for the hasty disposition of the udaller had 
 too much of the old Norse fire about it to render 
 it safe for any one to become an unauthorized in- 
 termeddler with his family affairs ; and thus stood 
 the relation of Mordaunt Mertoun to the family 
 of Mr Troil of Burgh- Westra, when the follow- 
 ing incidents took place.
 
 THE P1KATE. 55 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ' This is no pilgrim's morning yon grey mist 
 Lies upon hill, and dale, and field, and forest, 
 Like the dun wimple of a new-made widow ; 
 And, by my faith, although my heart be soft, 
 I'd rather hear that widow weep and sigh, 
 And tell the virtues of the dear-departed, 
 Than, when the tempest sends his voice abroad, 
 Be subject to its fury." 
 
 The Double Nuptials. 
 
 THE spring was far advanced, when, after a 
 week spent in sport and festivity at Burgh-West- 
 ra, Mordaunt Mertoun bade adieu to the family, 
 pleading the necessity of his return to Jarlshof. 
 The proposal was combatted by the maidens, and 
 more decidedly by Magnus himself: He saw 
 no occasion whatever for Mordaunt returning to 
 Jarlshof. If his father desired to see him, which, 
 by the way, Magnus did not believe, Mr Mer- 
 toun had only to throw himself into the stern of 
 Sweyn's boat, or betake himself to a poney, if he 
 liked a land journey better, and he would see not
 
 56* THE PI KATE. 
 
 only his son, but twenty folks besides, who would 
 be most happy to find that he had not lost the use 
 of his tongue entirely during his long solitude ; 
 " although I must own," added Magnus, " that 
 when he lived amongst us, nobody ever made less 
 use of it." 
 
 Mordaunt acquiesced both in what respected 
 his father's taciturnity and his dislike to general 
 society ; but suggested, at the same time, that the 
 first circumstance rendered his own immediate re- 
 turn more necessary, as he was the usual channel 
 of communication betwixt his father and others ; 
 and that the second corroborated the same neces- 
 sity, since Mr Mertoun's having no other society 
 whatever, seemed a weighty reason why his son's 
 should be restored to him without loss of time. 
 As to his father's coming toBurgh-Westra, " they 
 might as well, 1 ' he said, " expect to see Sumburgh 
 Cape come thither." 
 
 " And that would be a cumbrous guest," said 
 Magnus ; " but you will stop for our dinner to- 
 day ? There are the families of Muness, Quen- 
 dale, Therelivoe, and I know not whom else arc 
 expected ; and, besides the thirty that were in 
 the house this blessed night, AVC shall have as
 
 THK riKATE. 57 
 
 many more as chamber and bower, and barn and 
 boat-house, can furnish with beds, or with barley - 
 straw, and you will leave all this behind you !" 
 
 " And the blithe dance at night,' 1 added Bren- 
 da, in a tone betwixt reproach and vexation ; 
 " and the young men from the Isle of Paba that, 
 are to dance the sword-dance, whom shall we find 
 to match them, for the honour of the Main ?" 
 
 " There is many a merry dancer on the main- 
 land, Brenda," replied Mordaunt, " even if I 
 should never rise on tiptoe again. And where 
 good dancers are found, Brenda Troil will always 
 find the best partner. I must trip it to-night 
 through the Wastes of Dunrossness." 
 
 " Do not say so, Mordaunt," said Minna, who, 
 during this conversation, had been looking from 
 the window something anxiously ; " go not to-day 
 at least, through the Wastes of Dunrossness." 
 
 " And why not to-day, Minna," said Mor- 
 daunt, laughing, " any more than to-morrow ?" 
 
 " O, the morning mist lies heavy upon yonder 
 chain of isles, nor has it permitted us since day- 
 break even a single glimpse of Fitful-Head, the 
 lofty cape that concludes yon splendid range of
 
 58 THK PIRATE. 
 
 mountains. The fowl are winging their way to 
 the shore, and the shell-drake seems, through the 
 mist, as large as the scarf. See, the very shear- 
 waters and bonxies are making to the cliff for 
 shelter." 
 
 " And they will ride out a gale against a king's 
 frigate," said her father ; " there is foul weather 
 when they cut and run. 11 
 
 " Stay, then, with us," said Minna ; " the storm 
 will be dreadful, yet it will be grand to see it 
 from Burgh- Westra, if we have no friend expo- 
 sed to its fury. See, the air is close and sultry, 
 though the season is yet so early, and the day so 
 calm, that not a windel-straw moves on the heath. 
 Stay with us, Mordaunt ; the storm which these 
 signs announce will be a dreadful one." 
 
 " I must be gone the sooner," was the conclu- 
 sion of Mordaunt, who could not deny the signs, 
 which had not escaped his own quick observation. 
 " If the storm be too fierce, I will abide for the 
 night at Stourburgh." 
 
 " What !" said Magnus ; " will you leave us 
 for the new chamberlain's new Scots tacksman, 
 who is to teach all us Zetland savages new ways ?
 
 THE FIRATE. 59 
 
 Take your own gait, my lad, if that is the song 
 you sing."" 
 
 " Nay," said Mordaunt ; ** I had only some cu- 
 riosity to see the new implements he has brought." 
 
 " Ay, ay, ferlies make fools fain. I would like 
 to know if his new plough will bear against a 
 Zetland rock ?" answered Magnus. 
 
 " I will pass Stourburgh on the journey,"" said 
 the youth, deferring to his patron's prejudice 
 against innovation, k ' if this boding weather 
 bring on tempest ; but if it only break in rain, as 
 is most probable, I am not likely to be melted in 
 the wetting." 
 
 " It will not soften into rain alone," said Min- 
 na ; " see how much heavier the clouds fall every 
 moment, and see these weather-gaws that streak 
 the lead-coloured mass with partial gleams of 
 faded red and purple. 1 * 
 
 " I see them all," said Mordaunt ; " but they 
 only tell me I have no time to tarry here. Adieu, 
 Minna ; I will send you the eagle's feathers, if 
 an eagle can be found on Fair-isle or Foulah. 
 And fare thee well, my pretty Brenda, and keep 
 a thought for me, should the Paba men dance 
 ever so well."
 
 60 THE PIH ATE. 
 
 " Take care of yourself, since go you will," 
 said both sisters, together. 
 
 Old Magnus scolded them formally for suppo- 
 sing there was any danger to an active young fel- 
 low from a spring gale, whether by sea or land ; 
 yet ended by giving his own caution also to Mor- 
 daunt, advising him seriously to delay his jour- 
 ney, or at least to stop at Stourburgh. " For," 
 said he, " second thoughts are best ; and as this 
 Scotsman's howf lies right under your lee, why, 
 take any port in a storm. But do not be assured 
 to find the door on latch, let the storm blow ever 
 so hard ; there are such matters as bolts and bars 
 in Scotland, though, thanks to Saint Ronald, they 
 are unknown here, save that great lock on the old 
 Castle of Scalloway, that all men run to see 
 may be they make part of this man's improve- 
 ments. But go, Mordaunt, since go you will. 
 You should drink a stirrup-cup now, were 
 you three years older, but boys should never 
 drink, excepting after dinner ; I will drink it for 
 you, that good customs may not be broken, or 
 bad luck come of it. Here is your bonally, my 
 lad." And" so saying, he quaffed a rummer glass 
 of brandy with as much impunity as if it had
 
 THE PIRATE. 61 
 
 been spring-water. Thus regretted and caution- 
 ed on all hands, Mordaunt took leave of the hos- 
 pitable household, and looking back at the com- 
 forts with which it was surrounded, and the dense 
 smoke that rolled upwards from its chimnies, he 
 first recollected the guestless and solitary desola- 
 tion of Jarlshof, then compared with the sullen 
 and moody melancholy of his father's temper the 
 warm kindness of those whom he was leaving, and 
 could not refrain from a sigh at the thoughts which 
 forced themselves on his imagination. 
 
 The signs of the tempest did not dishonour the 
 predictions of Minna. Mordaunt had not advan- 
 ced three hours upon his journey, before the 
 wind, which had been so deadly still in the morn- 
 ing, began at first to wail and sigh, as if bemoan- 
 ing beforehand the evils which it might perpe- 
 trate in its fury, like a madman in the gloomy 
 state of dejection which precedes his fit of vio- 
 lence ; then gradually increasing, the gale howl- 
 ed, raged, and roared, with the full fury of a north- 
 ern storm. It was accompanied by showers of 
 rain mixed with hail, which were dashed with the 
 most unrelenting rage against the hills and rocks 
 with which the traveller was surrounded, distract-
 
 62 THE PIRATE. 
 
 ing his attention, in spite of his uttermost exer- 
 tions, and rendering it very difficult for him to 
 keep the direction of his journey in a country 
 where is neither road, nor even the slightest track 
 to direct the steps of the wanderer, and where he 
 is often interrupted by large pools of water, lakes, 
 and lagoons. All these inland waters were now 
 lashed into sheets of tumbling foam, much of 
 which, carried off by the fury of the whirlwind, 
 was mingled with the gale, and transported far 
 from the waves of which they had lately made a 
 part ; while the salt relish of the drift which was 
 pelted against his face, shewed Mordaunt that 
 the spray of the more distant ocean, disturbed 
 to frenzy by the storm, was mingled with that of 
 the inland lakes and streams. 
 
 Amidst this hideous combustion of the ele- 
 ments, Mordaunt Mertoun struggled forward as 
 one to whom such elemental war was familiar, 
 and who regarded the exertions which it required 
 to withstand its fury, but as a mark of resolution 
 and manhood. He felt even, as happens usually 
 to those who endure great hardships, that the ex- 
 ertion necessary to subdue them, is in itself a 
 kind of elevating triumph. To see and distin-
 
 THE mi ATI-:. 63 
 
 guish his path when the cattle were driven from 
 the hill, and the very fowls from the firmament, 
 was but the stronger proof of his own superiority. 
 " They shall not hear of me at Burgh- Westra," 
 said he to himself, " as they heard of old doited 
 Ringan Ewenson's boat, that foundered betwixt 
 
 O ' 
 
 road-stead and key. I am more of a crags-man 
 than to mind fire or water, wave by sea, or quag- 
 mire by land." Thus he struggled on, buffet- 
 ing with the storm, supplying the want of the 
 usual signs by which travellers directed their 
 course, (for rock, mountain, and headland, were 
 shrouded in mist and darkness,) by the instinc- 
 tive sagacity with which long acquaintance with 
 these wilds had taught him to mark every minute 
 object which could serve in such circumstances to 
 regulate his course. Thus, we repeat, he strug- 
 gled onward, occasionally standing still, or even 
 lying down, when the gust was most impetuous ; 
 making way against it when it was somewhat lull- 
 ed, by a rapid and bold advance even in its very 
 current ; or, when this was impossible, by a move- 
 ment resembling that of a vessel working to wind- 
 ward by short tacks, but never yielding one inch 
 of the way which he had fought so hard to gain.
 
 64 THE PIRATK. 
 
 Yet, notwithstanding Mordaunt's experience 
 and resolution, his situation was sufficiently un- 
 comfortable, and even precarious ; not because his 
 sailor's jacket and trowsers, the common dress of 
 young men through these isles when on a jour- 
 ney, were thoroughly wet, for that might have 
 taken place within the same brief time, in any 
 ordinary day, in this watery climate ; but the real 
 danger was, that, notwithstanding his utmost ex- 
 ertions, he made very slow way through brooks 
 that were sending their waters all abroad, through 
 morasses drowned in double deluges of moisture, 
 which rendered all the ordinary passes more than 
 usually dangerous, and repeatedly obliged the 
 traveller to perform a considerable circuit, which 
 in the usual case was unnecessary. Thus re- 
 peatedly baffled, notwithstanding his youth and 
 strength, Mordaunt, after maintaining a dogged 
 conflict with wind, rain, and the fatigue of a pro- 
 longed journey, was truly happy, when, not with- 
 out having been more than once mistaken in his 
 road, he at length found himself within sight of 
 the house of Stourburgh, or Harfra, for the names 
 were indifferently given to the residence of Mr 
 Triptolemus Yellowley, who was the chosen mis-
 
 THE PIRATE. 65 
 
 sionary of the Chamberlain of Orkney and Zet- 
 land, a speculative person, who designed, through 
 the medium of Triptolemus, to introduce into the 
 ultima ThuU of the Romans a spirit of improve- 
 ment, which at that early period was scarce known 
 to exist in Scotland itself. 
 
 At length, and with much difficulty, Mor- 
 daunt reached the house of this worthy agricul- 
 turist, the only refuge from the relentless storm 
 which he could hope for several miles ; and going 
 straight to the door, with the most undoubting 
 confidence of instant admission, he was not a lit- 
 tle surprised to find it not merely latched, which 
 the weather might excuse, but even bolted, a 
 thing which, as Magnus Troil has already inti- 
 mated, was almost unknown in the Archipelago. 
 To knock, to call, and finally to batter the door 
 with staff and stones, were the natural resources 
 of the youth, who was rendered alike impatient 
 by the pelting of the storm, and by the most un- 
 expected and unusual obstacles to instant admis- 
 sion. As he was suffered, however, for many 
 minutes to exhaust his impatience in noise and 
 
 VOL. i. E
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 clamour, without receiving any reply, we will em- 
 ploy them in informing the reader who Tripto- 
 lemus Yellowley was, and how he came by a name 
 so singular. 
 
 Old Jasper Yellowley, the father of Triptole- 
 mus, (though born at the foot of Roseberry- 
 Topping,) had been come over by a certain noble 
 Scottish Earl, who, proving too far north for can- 
 nv Yorkshire, had persuaded him to accept of a 
 farm in the Mearns, where, it is unnecessary to 
 add, that he found matters very different from 
 what he expected. It was in vain that the stout 
 farmer set manfully to work, to counterbalance, 
 by superior skill, the inconveniences arising from 
 a cold soil and a weeping climate. These might 
 have been probably overcome, but his neigh- 
 bourhood to the Grampians exposed him eter- 
 nally to that species of visitation from the plaid- 
 ed gentry who dwelled within their skirts, which 
 made young Norval a warrior and a hero, but 
 only converted Jasper Yellowley into a poor man. 
 This was, indeed, balanced in some sort by the 
 impression which his ruddy cheek and robust 
 form had the fortune to make upon Miss Bar-
 
 THK PI11ATE. 
 
 67 
 
 bara Clinkscale, daughter to the umquhile, and 
 sister to the then existing Clinkscale of that ilk. 
 This was thought a horrid and unnatural union 
 in the neighbourhood, considering that the house 
 of Clinkscale had at least as great a share of Scot- 
 tish pride as of Scottish parsimony, and were 
 amply endowed with both. But Miss Babie had 
 her handsome fortune of two thousand merks at 
 her own disposal, was a woman of spirit who 
 had been major and sui juris, (as the writer who 
 drew the contract assured her,) for full twenty 
 years ; so she set consequences and commenta- 
 ries alike at defiance, and wedded the hearty 
 Yorkshire yeoman. Her brother and her more 
 wealthy kinsmen drew off in disgust, and almost 
 disowned their degraded relative. But the house 
 of Clinkscale was allied (like every other family 
 in Scotland at the time) to a set of relations 
 who were not so nice tenth and sixteenth cou- 
 sins, who not only acknowledged their kinswo- 
 man Babie after her marriage with Yellowley, but 
 even condescended to eat beans and bacon (though 
 the latter was then the abomination of the Scots 
 as much as of the Jews) with her husband, and
 
 DO THK PIRATE. 
 
 would willingly have cemented the friendship by 
 borrowing a little cash from him, had not his 
 good lady (who understood trap as well as any 
 woman in the Mearns) put a negative on this 
 advance to intimacy. Indeed she knew how to 
 make young Deelbelicket, old Dougald Bare- 
 sword, the Laird of Bandy brawl, and others, pay 
 for the hospitality which she did not think pro- 
 per to deny them, by rendering them useful 
 in her negociations with the light-handed lads 
 beyond the Cairn, who, finding their late object 
 of plunder was now allied to " kend folks, and 
 owned by them at kirk and market, 1 ' became sa- 
 tisfied, on a moderate yearly composition, to de- 
 sist from their depredations. 
 
 This eminent success reconciled Jasper to the 
 dominion which his wife began to assume over 
 him ; and which was much confirmed by her pro- 
 ving to be let me see what is the prettiest mode 
 of expressing it ? in the family way. On this oc- 
 casion, Mrs Yellowley had a remarkable dream, 
 as is the usual practice of teeming mothers pre- 
 vious to the birth of an illustrious offspring. She 
 " was a-dreamed," as her husband expressed it,
 
 THE PIKATE. 69 
 
 that she was safely delivered of a plough, drawn 
 by three yoke of Angus-shire oxen ; and being 
 a mighty investigator into such portents, she sate 
 herself down with her gossips, to consider what 
 the thing might mean. Honest Jasper ventured, 
 with much hesitation, to intimate his own opinion, 
 that the vision had reference rather to things 
 past than things present, and might have been oc- 
 casioned by his wife's nerves having been a little 
 startled by meeting in the loan above the house 
 his own great plough with the six oxen, which 
 were the pride of his heart. But the good cum- 
 mers raised such a hue and cry against this ex- 
 position, that Jasper was fain to put his fingers 
 in his ears, and to run out of the apartment. 
 
 " Hear to him," said an old whigamore car- 
 line " hear to him, wi' his owsen, that are as 
 an idol to him, even as the calf of Bethel ! Na, 
 na its nae plough of the flesh that the bonnie 
 lad bairn for a lad it sail be shall e'er striddle 
 between the stilts o' its the pleugh of the spirit 
 and I trust mysell to see him wag the head 
 o' him in a pu'pit ; or, at the warst, on a hill- 
 side.' 1
 
 70 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " Now the deiTs in your whiggery," said the old 
 lady Glenprosing ; " wad ye hae our cummer's 
 bonnie lad-bairn wag the head aff his shouthers 
 like your godly Mess James Guthrie, that ye hald 
 such a clavering about ? Na, na, he sail walk a 
 rnair siccar path, and be a dainty curate and 
 say he should live to be a bishop, what the waur 
 wad he be ?" 
 
 'Yhe gauntlet thus fairly flung down by one 
 sybil, was caught up by another, and the contro- 
 versy raged, roared, or rather screamed, a round 
 of cinnamon-water serving only like oil to the 
 flame,, till Jasper entered with the plough-staff ; 
 and by the awe of his presence, and the shame 
 of misbehaving " before the stranger man,"" im- 
 posed some conditions of silence upon the dispu- 
 tants. 
 
 I do not know whether it was impatience to 
 give to the light a being destined to such high 
 and doubtful fates, or whether poor Dame Yel- 
 lowley was rather frightened at the hurly-burly 
 which had taken place in her presence, but she 
 was taken suddenly ill ; and, contrary to the for- 
 mula in such cases used and provided, was soon
 
 THE PIRATE. 71 
 
 reported to be " a good deal worse than was to be 
 expected." She took the opportunity (having still 
 all her wits about her) to extract from her sym- 
 pathetic husband two promises ; first, that he 
 would christen the child, whose birth was like to 
 cost her so dear, by a name indicative of the vi- 
 sion, with which she had been favoured ; and 
 next, that he would educate him for the ministry. 
 The canny Yorkshireman, thinking she had a 
 good title at present to dictate in such matters, 
 subscribed to all she required. A maa-child was 
 accordingly bom under these conditions, but the 
 state of the mother did not permit her for many 
 days to inquire how far they had been complied 
 with. When she was in some degree convales- 
 cent, she was informed, that as it was thought fit 
 the child should be immediately christened, it 
 had received the name of Triptolemus; the Cu- 
 rate, who was a man of some classical skill, con- 
 ceiving that this epithet contained a handsome 
 and classical allusion to the visionary plough, with 
 its triple yoke of oxen. Mrs Yellowley was not 
 much delighted with the manner in which her re- 
 quest had been complied with ; but grumbling
 
 7S THE PIRATE. 
 
 being to as little purpose as in the celebrated case 
 of Tristram Shandy, she e'en sat down content- 
 ed with the heathenish name, and endeavoured to 
 counteract the effects it might produce upon the 
 taste and feelings of the nominee, by such an edu- 
 cation asmight put him above the slightest thought 
 of sacks, coulters, stilts, mould-boards, or any thing 
 connected with the servile drudgery of the plough. 
 Jasper, sage Yorkshireman, smiled slily in his 
 sleeve, conceiving that young Trippie was likely 
 to prove a chip of the old block, and would ra- 
 ther take after the jolly Yorkshire yeoman, than 
 the gentle but somewhat aigre blood of the house 
 of Clinkscale. He remarked, with suppressed 
 glee, that the tune which best answered the pur- 
 pose of a lullaby was the " ploughman's whistle," 
 and the first words the infant learned to stammer 
 were the names of the oxen ; moreover, that the 
 "bern" preferred home-brewed ale to Scotch two- 
 penny, and never quitted hold of the tankard with 
 so much reluctance as when there had been, by 
 some manoeuvre of Jasper's own device, a double 
 straik of malt allowed to the brewing, above that 
 which was sanctioned by the most liberal recipe,
 
 THE PIUATE. 73 
 
 of which his dame's household thrift admitted. 
 Besides this, when no other means could be fallen 
 upon to divert an occasional fit of squalling, his 
 father observed that Trip could be always silen- 
 ced by jingling a bridle at his ear. From all 
 which symptoms, he used to swear in private, 
 that the boy would prove true Yorkshire, and 
 mother, and mother's kin, would have small share 
 of him. 
 
 Meanwhile, and within a year after the birth 
 of Triptolemus, Mrs Yellowley bore a daughter, 
 named after herself Barbara, who, even in ear- 
 liest infancy, exhibited the pinched nose and thin 
 lips by which the Clinkscale family were distin- 
 guished amongst the inhabitants of the Mearns ; 
 and as her childhood advanced, the readiness 
 with which she seized, and the tenacity where- 
 with she detained, the playthings of Triptolemus, 
 besides a desire to bite, pinch, and scratch, on 
 slight, or no provocation, were all considered by 
 attentive observers as proofs that Miss Baby 
 would prove " her mother over again." Malici- 
 ous people did not stick to say, that the acrimo- 
 ny of the Clinkscale blood had not on this occa-
 
 74 THE PIRATE. 
 
 sion been cooled and sweetened by that of old 
 England ; that youngDeilbelicketwasmuchabout 
 the house, and they could not but think it odd 
 that Mrs Yellowley , who, as the whole world knew, 
 gave nothing for nothing, should be so uncom- 
 monly attentive to heap the trencher, and to fill 
 the caup, of an idle blackguard ne'er-do-weel. 
 But when folks had once looked upon the austere 
 and awfully virtuous countenance of Mrs Yel- 
 lowley, they did full justice to her propriety of 
 conduct, and Deilbelicket's delicacy of taste. 
 
 Meantime young Triptolemus having received 
 such instructions as the curate could give him, 
 (for though Dame Yellowley adhered to the per- 
 secuted remnant, her jolly husband, edified by 
 the black gown and prayer-book, still conformed 
 to the church as by law established,) was, in due 
 process of time, sent to Saint Andrews to prose- 
 cute his studies. He went, it is true, but with 
 an eye turned back with sad remembrances on 
 his father's plough, his father's pancakes, and his 
 father's ale, for which the small beer of the col- 
 lege, commonly there termed " through go nim- 
 ble," furnished a poor substitute. Yet he advan-
 
 THE PIRATE. 75 
 
 ced in his learning, being found, however, to 
 shew a particular favour to such authors of an- 
 tiquity as had made the improvement of the soil 
 the object of their researches. He endured the 
 Bucolics of Virgil the Georgics he had by heart 
 but thevEneid he could not away with ; and he 
 was particularly severe upon the celebrated line 
 expressing a charge of cavalry, because, as he un- 
 derstood the word putrem,* he opined that the 
 combatants, in their inconsiderate ardour, gallop- 
 ed over a new-manured ploughed field. Cato, the 
 Iloman Censor, was his favourite among classical 
 heroes and philosophers, not on account of the 
 strictness of his morals, but because of his trea- 
 tise, de Re Rustica. He had ever in his month 
 the phrase of Cicero, Jam ne minem antepenes 
 Catoni. He thought well of Palladius, ajid of 
 Terentius Varro, but Columella was his pocket 
 companion. To these ancient worthies, he added 
 the more modern Tusser, Hartlib, and other wri- 
 ters on rural economics, not forgetting the lucu- 
 brations of the Shepherd of Salisbury Plain, and 
 
 * Quadrupedumque putrem sonitu quatit ungula campuin.
 
 76 
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 such of the better-informed Philomaths, who, in- 
 stead of loading their almanacks with vain pre- 
 dictions of political events, directed the attention 
 of their readers to that course of cultivation from 
 which theproduction of good cropsmight be safely 
 predicted, and who, careless of the rise and down- 
 fall of empires, contented themselves with point- 
 ing out the fit seasons to reap and sow, with a fair 
 guess at the weather which each month will be 
 likely to present ; as, for example, that if Heaven 
 pleases, we shall have snow in January, and the 
 author will stake his reputation that July proves, 
 on the whole, a month of sunshine. Now, although 
 the Rector of Saint Leonard's was greatly pleased 
 in general, with the quiet, laborious, and studious 
 bent of Triptolemus Yellowley, and deemed him, 
 in so far, worthy of a name of four syllables, ha- 
 ving a Latin termination, yet he relished not, by 
 any means, his exclusive attention to his favourite 
 authors. It savoured of the earth, he said, if not of 
 something worse, to have a man's mind always 
 grovelling in mould, stercorated or unstercorated; 
 and he pointed out, but in vain, history, and poe- 
 try, and divinity, as more elevating subjects of
 
 THE PIRATE. 77 
 
 occupation. Triptolemus Yellowley was obstinate 
 in his own course : Of the battle of Pharsalia, 
 he thought not as it affected the freedom of the 
 world, but dwelt on the rich crop which the Emu- 
 thian fields were likely to produce the next sea- 
 son. In vernacular poetry, Triptolemus could 
 scarce be prevailed upon to read a single couplet, 
 excepting old Tusser, as aforesaid, whose Hund- 
 red Points of Good Husbandry he had got by 
 heart; and excepting also Piers Ploughman's 
 Vision, which, charmed with the title, he bought 
 with avidity from a packman, but after reading 
 the two first pages, flung it into the fire as an im- 
 pudent and misnamed political libel. As to di- 
 vinity, he summed that matter up by reminding 
 his instructors, that to labour the earth and win 
 his bread with the toil of his body and sweat of 
 his brow, was the lot imposed upon fallen man ; 
 and, for his part, he was resolved to discharge, 
 to the best of his abilities, a task so obviously ne- 
 cessary to existence, leaving others to speculate 
 as much as they would, upon the more recondite 
 mysteries of theology.
 
 78 THE PIRATE. 
 
 With a spirit so much narrowed and limited 
 to the concerns of rural life, it may be doubted 
 whether the proficiency of Triptolemus in learn- 
 ing, or the use he was like to make of his acqui- 
 sitions, would have much gratified the ambitious 
 hope of his affectionate mother. It is true, he 
 expressed no reluctance to embrace the profes- 
 sion of a clergyman, which suited well enough 
 with the habitual personal indolence which some- 
 times attaches to speculative dispositions. He 
 had views, to speak plainly j (I wish they were 
 peculiar to himself,) of cultivating the glebe six 
 days in the week, preaching on the seventh with 
 due regularity, and dining with some fat frank- 
 lin or country laird, with whom he could smoke 
 a pipe and drink a tankard after dinner, and mix 
 in secret conference on the exhaustless subject, 
 
 Quid faciunt laetas segetes. 
 
 Now, this plan, besides that it indicated nothing 
 of what was then called the root of the matter, 
 implied necessarily the possession of a manse ; and 
 the possession of a manse inferred compliance 
 with the doctrines of prelacy, and other enormi-
 
 THE PIRATF,. 79 
 
 tics of the time. There was some question how 
 far manse and glebe, stipend, victual, and mo- 
 ney, might have out-balanced the good lady's 
 predisposition towards Presbytery ; but her zeal 
 was not put to so severe a trial. She died before 
 her son had completed his studies, leaving her af- 
 flicted spouse just as disconsolate as was to be ex- 
 pected. The first act of old Jasper's undivided ad- 
 ministration was to recal his son from Saint An- 
 drews, in order to obtain his assistance in his do- 
 mestic labours. And here it might have been sup- 
 posed that our Triptolemus, summoned to carry 
 into practice what he had so fondly studied in 
 theory, must have been, to use a simile which 
 he would have thought lively, like a cow entering 
 upon a clover park. Alas, mistaken thoughts, 
 and deceitful hopes of mankind ! 
 
 A laughing philosopher, the Democritusofour 
 day, once compared human life to a table pierced 
 with a number of holes, each of which has a pin 
 made exactly to fit it, but which pins being stuck 
 in hastily, and without selection, chance leads in- 
 evitably to the most awkward mistakes. " For, 
 how often do we see,"" the orator pathetically con-
 
 80 THE PIRATE. 
 
 eluded, " how often, I say, do we see the round 
 man stuck into the three-cornered hole ?" This 
 new illustration of the vagaries of fortune set every 
 one present into convulsions of laughter, except- 
 ing one fat alderman, who seemed to make the 
 case his own, arid insisted that it was no jesting 
 matter. To take up the simile, however, which 
 is an excellent one, it is plain that Triptolemus 
 Yellowley had been shaken out of the bag at least 
 a hundred years too soon. If he had come on the 
 stage in our own time, that is, if he had flourish- 
 ed at any time within these thirty or forty years, 
 he could not have missed to have held the office 
 of vice-president of some eminent agricultural so- 
 ciety, and to have transacted all the business 
 thereof under the auspices of some noble duke or 
 lord, who, as the matter might happen, either 
 knew, or did not know, the difference betwixt a 
 horse and a cart, and a cart-horse. He could not 
 have missed such preferment, for he was exceed- 
 dingly learned in all those particulars, which, r being 
 of no-consequence in actual practice, go of course 
 a great way to constitute the character of a con- 
 noisseur in any art, but especially in agriculture.
 
 THE PIRATE. 81 
 
 But, alas ! Triptolemus Yellowley had, as we al- 
 ready have hinted, come into the world at least a 
 century too soon ; for, instead of sitting in an arm- 
 chair, with a hammer in his hand, and a bumper 
 of port before him, giving forth the toast, " To 
 breeding, in all its branches," his father planted 
 him betwixt the stilts of a plough, and invited him 
 to guide the oxen, on whose beauties he would, in 
 our day, have descanted, and whose rumps he 
 would not have goaded, but have carved. Old 
 Jasper complained, that although no one talked 
 so well of common and several, wheat and rape, 
 fallow and lea, as his learned son, (whom he al- 
 ways called Tolimus,) yet, " dang it," added the 
 Seneca, " nought thrives wi' un nought thrives 
 wi 1 un." It was still worse, when Jasper, beco- 
 ming frail and ancient, was obliged, as happened 
 in the course of a few years, gradually to yield up 
 the reins of government to the academical neo- 
 phyte. 
 
 As if Nature had meant him a spite, he had 
 got one of the dourest and most untractable farms 
 on the Mearns, to try conclusions withal, a place 
 
 which seemed to yield every thing but what the 
 VOL. i. F
 
 82 THfc PIRATE. 
 
 agriculturist wanted; for there were plenty of 
 thistles, which indicates dry land ; and store of 
 fern, which is said to intimate deep land; and 
 nettles, which shew where lime hath been applied; 
 and deep furrows in the most unlikely spots, which 
 intimated that it had been cultivated in former 
 days by the Peghts, as popular tradition bore. 
 There was also plenty of stones to keep the ground 
 warm, according to the creed of some farmers, and 
 great abundance of springs to render it cool and 
 sappy, according to the theory of others. It was 
 in vain that, acting alternately on these opinions, 
 poor Triptolemus endeavoured to avail himself of 
 the supposed capabilities of the soil. No kind of 
 butter that might be churned could be made to 
 stick upon his own bread, any more than on that 
 of poor Tusser, whose Hundred Points of Good 
 Husbandry, so useful to others of his day, were 
 never to himself worth as many pennies. 
 
 In fact, excepting an hundred acres of infield, 
 to which old Jasper had early seen the necessity 
 of limiting his labours, there was not a corner of 
 the farm fit for any thing but to break plough- 
 graith, and kill cattle. And then, as for the part
 
 THE PIRATE. 83 
 
 which was really tilled with some profit, the ex- 
 pence of the farming establishment of Triptole- 
 mus, and his disposition to experiment, soon got 
 rid of any good arising from the cultivation of it. 
 " The carles and the cart-avers," he confessed, 
 with a sigh, speaking of his farm-servants and 
 horses, " make it all, and the carles and cart-avers 
 eat it all ;" a conclusion which might sum up the 
 year-book of many a gentleman-farmer. 
 
 Matters would have soon been brought to a 
 close with Triptolemus in the present day. He 
 would have got a bank-credit, manoeuvred with 
 wind-bills, dashed out upon a large scale, and 
 soon have seen his crop and stock sequestrated 
 by the Sheriff; but in those days a man could 
 not ruin himself so easily. The whole Scottish 
 tenantry stood upon the same level flat of pover- 
 ty, so that it was extremely difficult to find any 
 vantage ground, by climbing up to which a man 
 might have an opportunity of actually breaking 
 his neck with some eclat. They were pretty much 
 in the situation of people, who, being totally with- 
 out credit, may indeed suffer from indigence, but
 
 84 THE PIRATE. 
 
 cannot possibly become bankrupt. Besides, not- 
 withstanding the failure of Triptolemus's pro- 
 jects, there was to be balanced against the expen- 
 diture which they occasioned, all the savings 
 which the extreme economy of his sister Barbara 
 could eflect ; and in truth her exertions were won- 
 derful. She might have realized, if any one could, 
 the idea of the learned philosopher, who pro- 
 nounced that sleeping was a fancy, and eating 
 but a habit, and who appeared to the world to 
 have renounced both, until it was unhappily dis- 
 covered that he had an intrigue with the cook- 
 maid of the family, who indemnified him for his 
 privations by giving him private entree to the 
 larder, and to a share of her own couch. But no 
 such deceptions were practised by Barbara Yel- 
 lowley. She was up early, and down late, and 
 seemed, toherover-watchedand over-tasked maid- 
 ens, to be as wakerife as the cat herself. Then, for 
 eating, it appeared that the air was a banquet to 
 her, and she would fain have made it so to her re- 
 tinue. Her brother, who besides being lazy in his 
 person, was somewhat luxurious in his appetite,
 
 THE PIRATE. 85 
 
 would willingly now and then have tasted a mouth- 
 ful of animal food, were it but to know how his 
 sheep were fed off' ; but a proposal to eat a child 
 could not have startled Mistress Barbara more ; 
 and, being of a compliant and easy disposition, 
 Triptolemus reconciled himself to the necessity 
 of a perpetual Lent, too happy when he could 
 get a scrap of butter to his oaten cake, or (as 
 they lived on the banks of the Eske) escape the 
 daily necessity of eating salmon, whether in or 
 out of season, six days out of the seven. 
 
 But although Mrs Barbara brought faithfully 
 to the joint stock all savings which her awful 
 powers of economy accomplished to scrape to- 
 gether, and although the dower of their mother 
 was by degrees expended, or nearly so, in aid- 
 ing them upon extreme occasions, the term at 
 length approached when it seemed impossible 
 that they could sustain the conflict any longer 
 against the evil star of Triptolemus, as he called 
 it himself, or the natural result of his absurd spe- 
 culations, as it was termed by others. Luckily 
 at this sad crisis, a god jumped down to their re-
 
 OO THE PIRATE. 
 
 lief out of a machine. In plain English, the noble 
 lord, who owned their farm, arrived at his man- 
 sion-house in their neighbourhood, with his coach 
 and six and his running footmen, in the full 
 splendour of the seventeenth century. 
 
 This person of quality was the son of the no- 
 bleman who had brought the ancient Jasper in- 
 to the country from Yorkshire, and he was, like 
 his father, a fanciful and scheming man. He 
 had schemed well for himself, however, amid the 
 mutations of the time, having obtained for a cer- 
 tain period of years, the administration of the re- 
 mote islands of Orkney and Zetland, for pay- 
 ment of a certain rent, with the right of making 
 the most of whatever was the property or revenue 
 of the crown in these districts, under the title of 
 Lord Chamberlain. Now, his lordship had be- 
 come possessed with a notion, in itself a very true 
 one, that much might be done to render this grant 
 available, by improving the culture of the crown 
 lands, both in Orkney and Zetland ; and then, 
 having some acquaintance with our friend Trip- 
 tolemus, he thought (rather less happily) that he
 
 THE Pill ATE. 87 
 
 might prove a person capable of furthering his 
 schemes. He sent for him to the great Hall- 
 house, and was so much edified by the way in 
 which our friend laid down the law upon every 
 given subject, that he lost no time in securing 
 the co-operation of so valuable an assistant. 
 
 The terms were arranged much to the mind 
 of Triptolemus, who had already been taught, 
 by many years experience, a dark sort of notion, 
 that without undervaluing or doubting for a mo- 
 ment his own skill, it would be quite as well that 
 almost all the trouble and risk should be at the 
 expence of his employer. Indeed the hopes of 
 advantage which he held out to his patron were 
 so considerable, that the Lord Chamberlain drop- 
 ped every idea of admitting his dependent into 
 any share of the expected profits ; for, rude as 
 the arts of agriculture were in Scotland, they 
 were far superior to those known and practised 
 in the regions of Thule, and Triptolemus Yel- 
 lowley conceited himself to be possessed of a 
 degree of insight into these mysteries, far supe- 
 rior to what was possessed or practised in the
 
 88 THE PIRATE. 
 
 Mearns. The improvement, therefore, which was 
 to be expected, would bear a double proportion, 
 and the Lord Chamberlain was to reap all the 
 profit, deducting a handsome salary for his stew- 
 ard, Yellowley, together with the accommodation 
 of a house and domestic farm, for the support of 
 his family. Joy seized the heart of Mistress Bar- 
 bara, at hearing this happy termination of what 
 threatened to be so very bad an affair as their 
 lease of Cauldshouthers. 
 
 " If we cannot," she said, " provide for our 
 own house, when all is coming in, and nothing 
 going out, surely we must be worse than infi- 
 dels. 11 
 
 Triptolemus was a busy man for some time, 
 huffing and puffing, and eating and drinking in 
 every change-house, while he ordered and collect- 
 ed together proper implements of agriculture, to 
 be used by the natives of these devoted islands, 
 whose destinies were menaced with this formi- 
 dable change. Strange tools these would be, if 
 presented before a modern agricultural society ; 
 but every thing is relative, nor could the heavy
 
 THE PIRATE. i) 
 
 cart-load of timber, called the old Scotch plough, 
 seem more strange to a Scottish farmer of this 
 present day, than the corslets and casques of the 
 soldiers of Cortes might seem to a regiment of our 
 soldiers. Yet the latter conquered Mexico, and 
 undoubtedly the former would have been a splen- 
 did improvement on the state of agriculture in 
 Thule. 
 
 We have never been able to learn why Trip- 
 tolemus preferred fixing his residence in Zetland, 
 to becoming an inhabitant of the Orkneys. Per- 
 haps he thought the inhabitants of the latter Ar- 
 chipelago the more simple and docile of the two 
 kindred tribes ; or perhaps he preferred the si- 
 tuation of the house and farm, which he himself 
 was to occupy, (which was indeed a tolerable 
 one,) as preferable to that which he had it in 
 his power to have had upon Pomona, so the 
 main island of the Orkneys is entitled. At Har- 
 fra, or, as it was sometimes called, Stour-Brugh, 
 from the remains of a Pictish fort, which was al- 
 most close to the mansion-house, the factor set. 
 tied himself, in the plenitude of his authority,
 
 90 THE PIRATE. 
 
 determined to honour the name he bore by his 
 exertions, in precept and example, to civilize the 
 Zetlanders,and improve their very confined know- 
 ledge in the primary arts of human life.
 
 THE PIEATK. 91 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 The wind blew keen frae north and east ; 
 
 It blew upon the floor. 
 Quo' our goodman to our goodwife, 
 
 " Get up and bar the door." 
 
 " My hand is in my housewife skep, 
 
 Goodman, as ye may see; 
 If it shouldna be barr'd this hundred years, 
 
 It's no be barr'd for me." 
 
 Old Song. 
 
 WE can only hope that the gentle reader has 
 not found the latter part of the last chapter ex- 
 tremely tedious ; but, at any rate, his impatience 
 will scarce equal that of young Mordaunt Mer- 
 toun, who, while the lightning came flash after 
 flash, while the wind, veering and shifting from 
 point to point, blew with all the fury of a hur- 
 ricane, and while the rain was dashed against him 
 in deluges, stood hammering, calling, and roar- 
 ing at the door of the old Place of Harfra, impa-
 
 ySS THE PIRATE. 
 
 tient for admittance, and at a loss to conceive any 
 position of existing circumstances, which could oc- 
 casion the exclusion of a stranger, especially du- 
 ring such horrible weather. At length, finding 
 his noise and vociferation were equally in vain, he 
 fell back so far from the front of the house as was 
 necessary to enable him to reconnoitre the chim- 
 neys ; and amidst " storm and shade," 1 ' could dis- 
 cover, to the increase of his dismay, that though 
 noon, then the dinner hour of these islands, was 
 now nearly arrived, there was no smoke proceed- 
 ing from the tunnels of the vents to give any note 
 of preparation within. 
 
 Mordaunt"s wrathful impatience was now chan- 
 ged into sympathy and alarm ; for so long accus- 
 tomed to the exuberant hospitality of the Zet- 
 land islands, he was immediately induced to sup- 
 pose some strange and unaccountable disaster had 
 befallen the family, and forthwith set himself to 
 discover some place at which he could make for- 
 cible entry, in order to ascertain the situation of 
 the inmates, as much as to obtain shelter from the 
 still increasing storm. His present anxiety was, 
 however, as much thrown away as his late clamor-
 
 THK PIRATE. 9S 
 
 ous importunities for admittance had been. Trip- 
 tolemus and his sister had heard the whole alarm 
 without, and had already had a sharp dispute on 
 the propriety of opening the door. 
 
 Mrs Baby, as we have described her, was no 
 willing Tenderer of the rites of hospitality. In 
 their farm of Cauldshouthers, in the Mearns, she 
 had been the dread and abhorrence of all gaber- 
 lunzie men, and travelling packmen, gypsies, long 
 remembered beggars, and so forth ; nor was there 
 one of them so wily, as she used to boast, as could 
 ever say they had heard the clink of her sneck. 
 In Zetland, where the new settlers were yet stran- 
 gers to the extreme honesty and simplicity of all 
 classes, suspicion and fear joined with frugality in 
 her desire to exclude all wandering guests of un- 
 certain character; and the second of these mo- 
 tives had its effect on Triptolemus himself, who, 
 though neither suspicious nor penurious, knew 
 good people were scarce, good farmers scarcer, 
 and had a reasonable share of that wisdom which 
 looks towards self-preservation as the first law of 
 nature. These hints may serve as a commentary 
 on the following dialogue which took place be- 
 twixt the brother and sister.
 
 94 THE PIRATE, 
 
 " Now good be gracious to us," said Triptole- 
 mtis, as he sate thumbing his old school-copy of 
 Virgil, " here is a pure day for the bear seed ! 
 Well spoke the wise Mantuan ventis surgenti- 
 bus and then the groans of the mountains, and 
 thelongresouudingshores but where's the woods, 
 Baby ? tell me, I say, where we shall find the ne- 
 morum murmur, sister Baby, in these new seats 
 of ours ?" 
 
 " What's your foolish will ?" said Baby, pop- 
 ping her head from out of a dark recess in the 
 kitchen, where she was busy about some name- 
 less deed of housewifery. 
 
 Her brother, who had addressed himself to her 
 more from habit than intention, no sooner saw her 
 sharp red nose, keen grey eyes, with the sharp 
 features thereunto conforming, shaded by the 
 flaps of the loose toy which depended on each side 
 of her eager face, than he bethought himself that 
 his query was like to find little acceptation from 
 her, and therefore stood another volley before he 
 would resume the topic. 
 
 " I say, Mr Yellowley," said sister Baby, co- 
 ming into the middle of the room, " what for are
 
 THE PIRATE. 95 
 
 ye crying on me, and me in the midst of my 
 housewife skep ?" 
 
 " Nay, for nothing at all, Baby," answered 
 Triptolemus, " saving that I was saying to my- 
 self, that here we had the sea, and the wind, and 
 the rain sufficient enough, but where's the wood ? 
 where's the wood, Baby, answer me that ?" 
 
 " The wood ?" answered Baby " Were I no 
 to take better care of the wood than you, brother, 
 there would soon be no more wood about the town 
 than the barber's block thafs on your own should- 
 ers, Triptolemus. If ye be thinking of the wreck- 
 wood that the callants brought in yesterday, there 
 was six unces of it gaed to boil your parritch this 
 morning ; though, I trow, a carefu' man wad have 
 ta'en drammock, if breakfast he behoved to have, 
 rather than waste baith meltith and fuel in the 
 same morning.'" 
 
 " That is to say, Baby," replied Triptolemus, 
 who was somewhat of a dry joker in his way, 
 " that when we have fire we are not to have 
 food, and when we have food we are not to have 
 fire, these being too great blessings to enjoy both 
 in the same day. Good luck, you do not propose 
 
 8
 
 96 THE PIRATE. 
 
 we should starve with cold and starve with hun- 
 ger unico contextu. But to tell you the truth, 
 I could never away with raw oatmeal, sleekened 
 with water, in all my life. Call it drammock, or 
 crowdie, or just what ye list, my vivers must 
 thole fire and water." 
 
 " The mair gowk you," said Baby ; " can ye 
 not make your brose of the Sunday, and sup 
 them cauld on the Monday, since ye're sae dainty? 
 Mony is the fairer face than yours that has lick- 
 ed the lip after such a cogfuV 
 
 " Mercy on us, sister !" said Triptolemus ; 
 " at this rate, it's a finished field with me I 
 must unyoke the pleugh, and lie down to wait 
 for the dead-thraw. Here is that in this house 
 wad hold all Zetland in meal for a twelvemonth, 
 and ye grudge a cogfu' of warm parritch to me, 
 that has sic a charge." 
 
 " Whisht hold your silly clavering tongue," 
 said Baby, looking round with apprehension 
 " ye are a wise man to speak of what is in the 
 house, and a fitting man to have the charge of 
 it. Hark, as I live by bread, I hear a tapping 
 at. the outer yett." 
 
 10
 
 THE PIRATE. 97 
 
 " Go and open it then, Baby," said her bro- 
 ther, glad at any thing that promised to interrupt 
 the dispute. 
 
 " Go and open it, said he ?" echoed Baby, half 
 angry, half frightened, and half triumphant, at 
 the superiority of her understanding over that of 
 her brother " Go and open it, said you, indeed? 
 is it to lend robbers a chance to take all that is 
 in the house ?* 
 
 " Robbers !" echoed Triptolemus in his turn ; 
 " there are no more robbers in this country than 
 there are lambs at Youle. I tell you, as I have 
 told you an hundred times, there are no High- 
 landmen to harry us here. This is a land of 
 quiet and honesty. Ofortunati nimium /" 
 
 " And what good is Saint Rinian to do ye, 
 Tolemus ?" said his sister, mistaking the quota- 
 tion for a Catholic invocation. " Besides, if there 
 be no Highlandmen, there may be as bad. I saw 
 sax or seven as ill-looking chields gang past the 
 place yesterday, as ever came frae beyont Cloch- 
 na-ben ; illfa'red tools they had in their hands, 
 whaaling knives they ca'ed them, but they looked 
 as like whingers as ae bit airn can look like an- 
 
 VOL. i. c
 
 98 THE PIRATE. 
 
 ither. There is nae honest men carry siccan 
 tools." 
 
 Here the knocking and shouts of Mordaunt 
 were very audible betwixt every swell of the hor- 
 rible blast which was careering without. The 
 brother and sister looked at each other in real 
 perplexity and fear. " If they have heard of the 
 siller," said Baby, her very nose changing with 
 terror from red to blue, " we are but gane folks." 
 
 " Who speaks now, when they should hold 
 their peace ?" said Triptolemus. " Go to the 
 shot-window instantly, and see how many there 
 are of them, while I load the old Spanish-barrelled 
 duck-gun go as if you were stepping on new- 
 laid eggs." 
 
 Baby crept to the window, and reported that 
 she saw only " one young chield, clattering and 
 roaring as gin he were daft. How many there 
 might be out of sight, she could not say." 
 
 " Out of sight ! nonsense," said Triptolemus, 
 laying aside the ramrod with which he was load- 
 ing the piece, with a trembling hand. " I will 
 warrant them out of sight and hearing both this 
 is some poor fellow catched in the tempest, wants 
 9
 
 THE 1'IUATK. 99 
 
 the shelter of our roof, and a little refreshment. 
 Open the door, Baby, it's a Christian deed." 
 
 " But is it a Christian deed of him to come in 
 at the window then ?" said Baby, setting up a 
 most doleful shriek, as Mordaunt Mertoun, who 
 had forced open one of the windows, leaped down 
 into the apartment, dripping with water like a 
 river god. Triptolemus, in great tribulation, 
 presented the gun which he had not yet loaded, 
 while the intruder exclaimed, " Hold, hold * 
 what the devil mean you by keeping your doors 
 bolted in weather like this, and levelling your gun 
 at folk^s heads as you would at a sealglTs ?" 
 
 " And who are you, friend, and what want 
 you ?" said Triptolemus, lowering the butt of his 
 gun to the floor as he spoke, and so recovering 
 his arms, 
 
 What do I want !" said Mordaunt ; " I 
 want every thing I want meat, drink, and fire, 
 a bed for the night, and a sheltie for to-morrow 
 morning to carry me to Jarlshof." 
 
 *< And you said there were nae caterans or 
 sorners here ?" said Baby to the agriculturist, re- 
 proachfully. ({ Heard ye ever a breekless loon
 
 100 THE PIRATE. 
 
 frae Lochaber tell his mind and his errand mair 
 deftly ? Come, come, friend," she added, ad- 
 dressing herself to Mordaunt, " put up your 
 pipes and gang your gait ; this is the house of his 
 Lordship's factor, and no place of resett for thig- 
 gers or somers." 
 
 Mordaunt laughed in her face at the simpli- 
 city of the request. " Leave built walls," he said, 
 " and in such a tempest as this ? What take you 
 me for ? a gannet or a scarf do you think I 
 am, that your clapping your hands and skirling at 
 me like a mad woman, should drive me from the 
 shelter into the storm ?" 
 
 " And so you propose, young man," said Trip- 
 tolemus, gravely, " to stay in my house, volens 
 nolens that is, whether we will or no ?" 
 
 " Will !" said Mordaunt ; " what right have 
 you to will any thing about it ? Do you not hear 
 the thunder ? Do you not hear the rain ? Do 
 you not see the lightning ? And do you not 
 know this is the only house within I wot not how 
 many miles ? Come, my good master and dame, 
 this may be Scottish jesting, but it sounds strange 
 in Zetland ears. You have let out the fire too,
 
 THE PIRATE. 101 
 
 and my teeth are dancing a jig in my head with 
 cold ; but Til soon put that to rights." 
 
 He seized the fire-tongs, raked together the 
 embers upon the hearth, broke up into life the 
 gathering-peat which the hostess had calculated 
 should have preserved the seeds of fire, without 
 giving them forth, for many hours ; then casting 
 his eye round, saw in a corner the stock of drift- 
 wood, which Mistress Baby had served forth by 
 ounces, and transferred two or three logs of it at 
 once to the hearth, which, conscious of such un- 
 wonted supply, began to transmit to the chimney 
 such a smoke as had not issued from the Place of 
 Harfra for many a day. 
 
 While their uninvited guest was thus making 
 himself at home, Baby kept edging and jogging 
 the factor to turn out the intruder. But for this 
 undertaking, Triptolemus Yellowley felt neither 
 courage nor zeal, nor did circumstances seem at 
 all to warrant the favourable conclusion of any 
 fray in which he might enter with the young 
 stranger. The sinewy limbs and graceful form 
 of Mordaunt Mertoun were seen to great advan-
 
 102 THE PIRATE. 
 
 tage in his simple sea-dress ; and with his dark 
 sparkling eye, finely formed head, animated fea- 
 tures, close curled dark hair, and bold free looks, 
 the stranger formed a very strong contrast with 
 the host on whom he had intruded himself. Trip- 
 tolemus was a short, clumsy, duck-legged dis- 
 ciple of Ceres^ whose bottle-nose, turned up and 
 handsomely coppered at the extremity, seemed 
 to intimate something of an occasional treaty with 
 Bacchus. It was like to be no equal mellay be- 
 twixt persons of such unequal form and strength ; 
 and the difference betwixt twenty and fifty years 
 was nothing in favour of the weaker party. Be- 
 sides, the factor was an honest good-natured fel- 
 low at bottom, and being soon satisfied that his 
 guest had no other views than those of obtaining 
 refuge from the storm, it would, despite his sis- 
 ter's instigations, have been his last act to deny 
 a boon so reasonable and necessary to a youth 
 whose exterior was so prepossessing. He stood, 
 therefore, considering how he could most grace- 
 fully glide into the character of the hospitable 
 landlord, out of that of the churlish defender of
 
 THK PIRATE. 103 
 
 his domestic castle, against an unauthorized in- 
 trusion, when Baby, who had stood appalled at 
 the extreme familiarity of the stranger's address 
 and demeanour, now spoke up for herself. " My 
 troth, lad," said she to Mordaunt, " ye are no 
 blate, to light on at that rate, and the best of 
 wood too nane of your sharney peats, but good 
 aik timber, nae less maun serve ye 1" 
 
 " You come lightly by it, dame," said Mor- 
 daunt, carelessly ; " and you should not grudge 
 the fire what the sea gives you for nothing. 
 These good ribs of oak did their last duty upon 
 earth and ocean when they could hold no longer 
 together under the brave hearts that manned the 
 bark." 
 
 " And that's true, too," said the old woman, 
 softening " this maun be awsome weather by 
 sea. Sit down and warm ye, since the sticks are 
 a-low." 
 
 " Ay, ay," said Triptolemus, " it is a plea- 
 sure to see siccan a bonny bleeze. I have na seen 
 the like o't since I left Cauldacres." 
 
 " And shall na see the like o't again in ahutv
 
 104 
 
 THE PlilATK. 
 
 ry," said Baby, " unless the house take fire, or 
 there suld be a coal-heugh found out." 
 
 " And wherefore should not there be a coal- 
 heugh found out ?" said the factor, triumphantly 
 " I say, wherefore should not a coal-heugh be 
 found out in Zetland as well as in Fife, now that 
 the Chamberlain has a far-sighted and discreet 
 man upon the spot to make the necessary per- 
 quisitions ? They are baith fishing-stations, I 
 trow." 
 
 " I tell you what it is, Tolemus Yellowley," 
 answered his sister, who had practical reasons to 
 fear of her brother's opening upon any false 
 scent, " if you promise my Lord sae mony of 
 these bonnie wallies, we'll no be weel hafted here 
 before we are found out and set a trotting again. 
 If ane was to speak to ye about a gold mine, I 
 ken weel wha would promise he suld have Por- 
 tugal pieces clinking in his pouch before the year 
 gaed by." 
 
 " And why suld I not ?" said Triptolemus 
 " may be your head does not know there is a 
 land in Orkney called Ophir, or something very
 
 THE PIRATE. 105 
 
 like it ; and wherefore might not Solomon, the 
 wise king of the Jews, have sent thither his ships 
 and his servants for four hundred and fifty ta- 
 lents ? I hope he knew best where to go or send, 
 and I hope you believe in your Bible, Baby ?" 
 
 Baby was silenced by an appeal to Scripture, 
 however mal-a-propos^ and only answered by an 
 inarticulate humph of incredulity or scorn, while 
 her brother went on addressing Mordaunt. 
 " Yes, you shall all of you see what a change 
 shall coin introduce, even into such an unpropi- 
 tious country as yours. Ye have not heard of cop- 
 per, I warrant, or of iron-stone, in these islands 
 neither ?" Mordaunt said he had heard there was 
 copper near the Cliffs of Konigsburgh. " Ay, 
 and a copper scum is found on the Loch of Swa- 
 na too, young man. But the youngest of you, 
 doubtless, thinks himself a match for such as I 
 am." 
 
 Baby, who during all this while had been close- 
 ly and accurately reconnoitering the youth's per- 
 son, now interposed in a manner by her brother 
 totally unexpected. '* Ye had mair need, Mi 
 Yellowley, to give the young man some dry
 
 106 THE P1BATE. 
 
 clothes, and to see about getting something for 
 him to eat, than to sit there bleezing away with 
 your lang tales, as if the weather were not windy 
 enow without your help; and maybe the lad would 
 drink some bland, or sicklike, if ye had the grace 
 to ask him." 
 
 While Triptolemus stood astonished at such a 
 proposal, considering the quarter it came from, 
 Mordaunt answered, he " would be very glad to 
 have dry clothes, but begged to be excused from 
 drinking until he had eaten somewhat." 
 
 Triptolemus accordingly conducted him into 
 another apartment, and accommodating him with 
 a change of dress, left him to his arrangements, 
 while he himself returned to the kitchen, much 
 puzzled to account for his sister's unusual fit of 
 hospitality. " She must be fey"* he said, " and 
 in that case has not long to live, and though I fall 
 heir to her tocher-good, I am sorry for it ; for she 
 
 * When a person changes his condition suddenly, as 
 when a miser becomes liberal, or a churl good-humoured, 
 he is said, in Scots, to \tefey; that is, predestined to 
 speedy death, of which such mutations of humour are re- 
 ceived as a sure indication.
 
 THE PIRATE. 107 
 
 has held the house-gear well together drawn the 
 girth over tight it may be now and then, but the 
 saddle sits the better."" 
 
 When Triptolemus returned to the kitchen, 
 he found his suspicions confirmed, for his sister 
 was in the desperate action of consigning to the 
 pot a smoked goose, which, with others of the 
 same tribe, had long hung in the large chimney, 
 muttering to herself at the sa'me time, " It 
 maun be eaten sune or syne, and what for no by 
 the puir callant." 
 
 " What is this of it, sister ?" said Triptole- 
 mus. " You have on the girdle and the pot at 
 ance. What day is this wi 1 you ?" 
 
 " E'en such a day as the Israelites had beside 
 the flesh-pots of Egypt, billie Triptolemus ; but 
 ye little ken wha ye have in your house this bless- 
 ed day." 
 
 " Troth, and little I do ken," said Triptole- 
 mus, " as little as I would ken the naig I never 
 saw before. I would take the lad for a yagger, 
 but he has rather ower good havings, and he 
 has no pack."
 
 108 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " Ye ken as little as ane of your ain bits of 
 nout, man, 1 ' retorted sister Baby ; " if ye ken na 
 him, do ye ken Tronda Dronsdaughter ?" 
 
 " Tronda Dronsdaughter ?" echoed Triptole- 
 mus " how should I but ken her, when I pay 
 her twal pennies Scots by the day, for working in 
 the house here ? I trow she works as if the things 
 burned her fingers. I had better give a Scots lass 
 a groat of English siller." 
 
 " And that's the maist sensible word ye have 
 said this blessed morning. Weel, but Tronda 
 kens this lad weel, and she has often spoke to me 
 about him. They call his father the Silent Man 
 of Sumburgh, and they say he's uncanny." 
 
 " Hout, hout nonsense, nonsense they are 
 aye at sic trash as that," said the brother, " when 
 you want a day's wark out of them they have 
 stepped ower the tangs, or they have met an un- 
 canny body, or they have turned about the boat 
 against the sun, and then there's nought to be 
 done that day." 
 
 " Weel, weel, brother, ye are so wise," said 
 Baby, " because ye knapped Latin at Saint An-
 
 THE PIRATE. 109 
 
 drews ; and can your lair tell me then what the 
 lad has round his halse ?" 
 
 " A Barcelona napkin, as wet as a dishclout, 
 and I have just lent him one of my own over- 
 lays, 1 ' said Triptolemus. 
 
 " A Barcelona napkin !" said Baby, elevating 
 her voice, and then suddenly lowering it, as from 
 apprehension of being overheard " I say a gold 
 chain." 
 
 " A gold chain !" said Triptolemus. 
 
 " In troth is it, hinny ; and how like you that ? 
 The folk say here, as Tronda tells me, that the 
 King of the Drows gave it to his father, the Si- 
 lent Man of Sumburgh." 
 
 " I wish you would speak sense, or be the si- 
 lent woman," said Triptolemus. " The upshot 
 of it all is, then, that this lad is the rich stran- 
 ger's son, and that you are giving him the goose 
 you were to keep till Michaelmas," 
 
 " Troth, brother, we maun do something for 
 God's sake, and to make friends ; and the lad," 
 added Baby, (for even she was not altogether 
 above the prejudices of her sex in favour of out- 
 ward form,) " has a fair face of his ain."
 
 110 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " Ye would have let many a fair face," said 
 Triptolemus, " pass the door pining, if it had not 
 been for the gold chain." 
 
 " Nae doubt, nae doubt," replied Barbara ; 
 " ye wad not have me waste our substance on 
 every thiggeror sorner that has the luck to come 
 by the door in a wet day ? but this lad has a fair 
 and a wide name in the country, and Tronda says 
 he is to be married to a daughter of the rich udal- 
 ler, Magnus Troil, and the marriage-day is to be 
 fixed whenever he makes choice (set him up) be- 
 tween the twa lasses; and so it wad be as much as 
 our good name, and our quiet is worth forbye, to 
 let him sit unserved, although he does come un- 
 sent for." 
 
 " The best reason in life," said Triptolemus, 
 " for letting a man into a house is, that you dare 
 not bid him go by. However, since there is a 
 man of quality amongst them, I will let him 
 know whom he has to do with, in my person." 
 Then advancing to the door, he exclaimed, 
 Heus tibi, Dave .'" 
 
 " Adsum? answered the youth, entering the 
 apartment.
 
 THE PIRATE. Ill 
 
 " Hem r said the erudite Triptolemus, " not 
 altogether deficient in his humanities, I see. I 
 will try him further. Canst thou aught of hus- 
 bandry, young gentleman ?" 
 
 " Troth, sir, not I," answered Mordaunt : " I 
 have been trained to plough upon the sea, and to 
 reap upon the crag." 
 
 " Plough the sea !" said Triptolemus ; " that's 
 a furrow requires small harrowing ; and for your 
 harvest on the crag, I suppose you mean these 
 scozvries, or whatever you call them. It is a sort 
 of ingathering which the ranzelman should stop 
 by the law ; nothing more likely to break an ho- 
 nest man's bones. I profess I cannot see the 
 pleasure men propose by dangling in a rope's- 
 end betwixt earth and heaven. In my case, I 
 had as lief the other end of the rope were fasten- 
 ed to the gibbet ; I should be sure of not falling, 
 at least." 
 
 " Now, I would only advise you to try it," re- 
 plied Mordaunt. " Trust me, the world has 
 few grander sensations than when one is perched 
 in mid-air between a high-browed cliff and a roar- 
 ing ocean, the rope by which you are sustained
 
 112 THE PIRATE. 
 
 seeming scarce stronger than a silken thread, and 
 the stone on which you have one foot steadied, 
 affording such a breadth as the kittywake might 
 rest upon to feel and know all this with the full 
 confidence that your own agility of limb, and 
 strength of head, can bring you as safe off as if 
 you had the wing of the gosshawk this is in- 
 deed being almost independent of the earth you 
 tread on." 
 
 Triptolemus stared at this enthusiastic descrip- 
 tion of an amusement which had so few charms 
 for him ; and his sister, looking at the glancing eye 
 and elevated bearing of the young adventurer, 
 answered, by ejaculating, " My certie, lad, but 
 you are a brave chield." 
 
 " A brave chield !" returned Yellowley, " I 
 say a brave goose, to be flichtering and fleeing in 
 the wind when he might abide upon terra firma ; 
 but come, here's a goose that is more to the pur- 
 pose, when once it is well boiled. Get us tren- 
 chers and salt, Baby but in truth it will prove 
 salt enough a tasty morsel it is ; but I think the 
 Zetlanders be the only folks in the world that 
 think of running such risks to catch geese, and 
 then boiling them when they have done." 
 
 7
 
 THE PIRATE. 113 
 
 " To be sure," replied his sister, (it was the 
 only word they had agreed on that day,) " it 
 would be an unco thing to bid ony gudewife in 
 Angus or a' the Mearns boil a goose, while there 
 was sic things as spits in the warld. But wha's 
 this neist ?" she added, looking towards the en- 
 trance with great indignation. " My certie, open 
 doors and dogs come in and wha opened the 
 door to him ?" 
 
 " I did, to be sure,"" replied Mordaunt ; " you 
 would not have a poor devil stand beating your 
 deaf door-cheeks in weather like this? Here goes 
 something, though, to help the fire," he added, 
 drawing out the sliding bar of oak with which 
 the door had been secured, and throwing it on the 
 hearth, whence it was snatched by Dame Baby 
 in great wrath, she exclaiming at the same time, 
 
 " It's sea-borne timber, as there's little else 
 here, and he dings it about as if it were a fir- 
 clog ! And who be you, an it please you ?" she 
 added, turning to the stranger a very hallan- 
 shaker loon, as ever crossed my twa e'en." 
 
 " I am a jagger, if it like your ladyship," re- 
 plied the uninvited guest, a stout, vulgar, little 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 114 THE PIRATE. 
 
 man, who had indeed the humble appearance of 
 a pedlar, called jagger in these islands " never 
 travelled in a waur day, or was more willing to 
 get to harbourage. Heaven be praised for fire 
 and house-room !"" 
 
 So saying, he drew a stool to the fire, and sate 
 down without further ceremony. Dame Baby 
 stared " wild as grey goss-hawk," and was me- 
 ditating how to express her indignation in some- 
 thing warmer than words, for which the boiling 
 pot seemed to offer a convenient hint, when an 
 old half-starved serving woman, the sharer of her 
 domestic cares, who had been as yet in some re- 
 mote corner of the mansion, now hobbled into 
 the room, and broke out into exclamations which 
 indicated some new cause of alarm. 
 
 " O master !" and " O mistress !" were the on- 
 ly sounds she could for some time articulate, and 
 then followed them up with, " The best in the 
 house the best in the house set a' on the 
 board, and sC will be little aneugh there is auld 
 Norna of Fitful-head, the most fearful woman in 
 all the isles !" 
 
 " Where can she have been wandering ?" said
 
 THE PIRATE. 115 
 
 Mordaunt, not without some apparent sympathy 
 with the surprise, if not with the alarm, of the 
 old domestic ; " but it is needless to ask the 
 worse the weather, the more likely is she to be a 
 traveller." 
 
 " What new tramper is this ?*" echoed the dis- 
 tracted Baby, whom the quick succession of guests 
 had driven well nigh crazy with vexation. " I'll 
 soon settle her wandering, I sail warrant, if my 
 brother has but the soul of a man in him, or if 
 there be a pair of jougs at Scalloway." 
 
 " The iron was never forged on stithy that 
 would hauld her," said the old maid-servant. 
 " She comes she comes God's sake speak her 
 fair and canny, or we will have a ravelled hasp 
 on the yarn-windles." 
 
 As she spoke, a woman tall enough almost to 
 touch the top of the door with her cap, stepped in- 
 to the room, signing the cross as she entered, and 
 pronouncing, with a solemn voice, " The blessing 
 of God and Saint Ronald on the open door, and 
 their braid malison and mine upon close-handed 
 churls !" 
 
 " And wha are ye, that are sae bauld wi' your
 
 116 THE PIRATE. 
 
 blessing and banning in other folks' houses ? 
 What kind of country is this, that folks cannot 
 sit quiet for an hour, and serve heaven, and keep 
 their bit gear thegither, without gangrel men 
 and women coming thigging and sorning ane af- 
 ter another, like a string of wild-geese ?" 
 
 This speech, the understanding reader will 
 easily saddle on Mistress Baby, and what effects 
 it might have produced on the last stranger, can 
 only be matter of conjecture ; for the old servant 
 and Mordaunt applied themselves at once to the 
 party addressed, in order to deprecate her resent- 
 ment ; the former speaking to her some words of 
 Norse, in a tone of intercession, and Mordaunt 
 saying in English, " They are strangers, Norna, 
 and know not your name or qualities ; they are 
 unacquainted, too, with the ways of this country, 
 and therefore we must hold them excused for 
 their lack of hospitality." 
 
 " I lack no hospitality, young man,' 1 said Trip- 
 tolemus, " mueris succurrere disco the goose 
 that was destined to roost in the chimney till 
 Michaelmas, is boiling in the pot for you ; but 
 if we had twenty geese, I see we are like to find
 
 THE PIRATIC. 117 
 
 mouths to eat them every feather this must be 
 amended." 
 
 u What must be amended, sordid slave ?" said 
 the stranger Norna, turning at once upon him 
 with an emphasis that made him start " What 
 must be amended ? Bring hither, if thou wilt, thy 
 new-fangled coulters, spades, and harrows, alter 
 the implements of our fathers from the plough- 
 share to the mouse-trap ; but know thou art in 
 the land that was won of old by the flaxen-haired 
 Kempions of the North, and leave us their hospi- 
 tality at least, to shew we come of what was once 
 noble and generous. I say to you beware while 
 Norna looks forth at the measureless waters, from 
 the crest of Fitful-head, something is yet left that 
 resembles power of defence. If the men of Thule 
 have ceased to be champions, and to spread the 
 banquet for the raven, the women have not for- 
 gotten the arts that lifted them of yore into queens 
 and prophetesses." 
 
 The woman who pronounced this singular ti- 
 rade, was as striking in appearance as extrava- 
 gantly lofty in her pretensions and in her lan- 
 guage. She might well have represented on the
 
 118 THE P1IIATK. 
 
 stage, so far as features, voice, and stature were 
 concerned, the Bonduca or Boadicea of the Bri- 
 tons, or the sage Velleda, Aurinia, or any other 
 fated Pythoness, who ever led to battle a tribe of 
 the ancient Goths. Her features were high and 
 well formed, and would have been handsome but 
 for the ravages of time, and the effects of expo- 
 sure to the severe weather of her country. Age, 
 and perhaps sorrow, had quenched, in some de- 
 gree, the fire of a dark blue eye, whose hue al- 
 most approached to black, and had sprinkled 
 snow on such part of her tresses as had escaped 
 from under her cap, and were dishevelled by the 
 rigour of the storm. Her upper garment, which 
 dropped with water, was of a coarse dark-colour- 
 ed stuff, called Wadmaral, then much used in 
 the Zetland islands, as also in Iceland and Nor- 
 way. But as she threw this cloak back from her 
 shoulders, a short jacket, of dark-blue velvet, 
 stamped with figures, became visible, and the 
 vest, which corresponded to it, was of crimson 
 colour, and embroidered with tarnished silver. 
 Her girdle was plaited with silver ornaments, 
 cut into the shape of planetary signs her blue
 
 THK 1'IHATK.. 119 
 
 apron was embroidered with similar devices, and 
 covered a petticoat of crimson cloth. Strong thick 
 enduring shoes, of the half-dressed leather of the 
 country, were tied with straps like those of the 
 Roman buskins, over her scarlet stockings. She 
 wore in her belt, an ambiguous looking weapon, 
 which might pass for a sacrificing knife or dag- 
 ger, as the imagination of the spectator chose to 
 assign to the wearer the character of a priestess 
 or of a sorceress. In her hand she held a staff, 
 squared on all sides, and engraved with Runic 
 characters and figures, forming one of those port- 
 able and perpetual calendars which were used 
 among the ancient natives of Scandinavia, and 
 which, to a superstitious eye, might have passed 
 for a divining rod. 
 
 Such were the appearance, features, and attire 
 of Norna of the Fitful-head, upon whom many of 
 the inhabitants of the island looked with obser- 
 vance, many with fear, and almost all with a sort 
 of veneration. Less pregnant circumstances of sus- 
 picion would, in any other part of Scotland, have 
 exposed her to the investigation of those cruel in- 
 quisitors, who were then often invested with the
 
 120 
 
 THE rillATK. 
 
 delegated authority of the privy -council, for the 
 purpose of persecuting, torturing, and finally 
 consigning to the flames, those who were accused 
 of witchcraft or sorcery. But superstitions of 
 this nature pass through two stages ere they be- 
 come entirely obsolete. Those supposed to be 
 possessed of supernatural powers, are venerated 
 in the earlier stages of society. As religion and 
 knowledge increase, they are first held in hatred 
 and horror, and are finally regarded as impos- 
 tors. Scotland was in the second state the fear 
 of witchcraft was great, and the hatred against 
 those suspected of it intense. Zetland was as yet 
 a little world by itself, where, among the lower 
 and ruder classes, so much of the ancient north- 
 ern superstition remained, as cherished the origi- 
 nal veneration for those affecting supernatural 
 knowledge and power over the elements, which 
 made a constituent part of the ancient Scandi- 
 navian creed. At least if the natives of Thule 
 admitted that one class of magicians performed 
 their feats by their alliance with Satan, they 
 devoutly believed that others dealt with spirits of 
 a different and less odious class the ancient
 
 THE 1'IllATK. 121 
 
 dwarfs, called, in Zetland, Trows or Drows, the 
 modern fairies, and so forth. 
 
 Among those who were supposed to be in 
 league with disembodied spirits, this Norna, de- 
 scended from, and representative of a family 
 which had long pretended to such gifts, was so 
 eminent, that the name assigned to her, which 
 signifies one of those fatal sisters who weave the 
 web of human fate, had been conferred in honour 
 of her supernatural powers. The name by which 
 she had been actually christened was carefully 
 concealed by herself and her parents ; for to the 
 discovery they superstitiously annexed some fa- 
 tal consequences. In these times, the doubt on- 
 ly occurred whether her supposed powers were 
 acquired by lawful means. In our days, it would 
 have been questioned whether she was an impos- 
 tor, or whether her imagination was so deeply im- 
 pressed with the mysteries of her supposed art, 
 that she might be in some degree a believer in her 
 own pretensions to supernatural knowledge. Cer- 
 tain it is, that she performed her part with such 
 undoubting confidence, and such striking dignity 
 of look and action, and evinced, at the same time,
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 such strength of language, and such energy of 
 purpose, that it would have been difficult for the 
 greatest sceptic to have doubted the reality of 
 her enthusiasm, though he might smile at the 
 pretensions to which it gave rise.
 
 THE PIRATE. 123 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 " If, by your art, you have 
 
 Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them." 
 
 Tempest. 
 
 THE storm had somewhat, relaxed its rigour 
 just before the entrance of Norna, otherwise she 
 must have found it impossible to travel during 
 the extremity of its fury. But she had hardly 
 added herself so unexpectedly to the party whom 
 chance had assembled at the dwelling of Tripto- 
 lemus Yellowley, when the tempest suddenly re- 
 sumed its former vehemence, and raged around 
 the building with a fu-ry which made the inmates 
 insensible to any thing except the risk that the old 
 mansion was about to fall above their heads. 
 
 Mistress Baby gave vent to her fears in loud 
 exclamations of " the Lord guide us this is 
 surely the last day what kind of a country of 
 guisards and gyre-carlines is this ! and you, ye
 
 124 'I'Hli I'IKATE. 
 
 fool carle," she added, turning on her brother, 
 for all her passions had a touch of acidity in 
 them, " to quit the bonny Mearns land to come 
 here, where there is naething but sturdy beggars 
 and gaberlunzies within ane's house, and heaven's 
 anger on the outside on't !" 
 
 " I tell you, sister Baby," answered the insult- 
 ed agriculturist, " that all shall be reformed and 
 amended, excepting," he added betwixt his teeth, 
 " the scaulding humours of an ill-natured jaud, 
 that can add bitterness to the very storm." 
 
 The old domestic and the pedlar meanwhile 
 exhausted themselves in entreaties to Norna, of 
 which, as they were couched in the Norse lan- 
 guage, the master of the house understood no- 
 thing. 
 
 She listened to them with a haughty and un- 
 moved air, and replied at length aloud, and in 
 English " I will not. What if this house be 
 strewed in ruins before morning where would 
 be the world^s want in the crazed projector, and 
 the niggardly pinch-commons, by which it is in- 
 habited ? They will needs come to reform Zetland 
 customs, let them try how they like a Zetland
 
 TJJK PIRATE. 125 
 
 storm. You that would not perish, quit this 
 house." 
 
 The pedlar or jagger seized on his little knap- 
 sack, and began hastily to brace it on his back ; 
 the old maid-servant cast her cloak about her 
 shoulders, and both seemed to be in the act of 
 l<?aving the house. 
 
 Triptolemus Yellowley, somewhat commoved 
 by these appearances, asked Mordaunt, with a 
 voice which faultered with apprehension, whether 
 he thought there was any, that is, so very much 
 danger ? 
 
 " I cannot tell," answered the youth, " I have 
 scarce ever seen such a storm. Norna can tell us 
 better than any one when it will abate ; for no 
 one in these islands can judge of the weather like 
 her." 
 
 " And is that all thou thinkest Norna can do ?" 
 said the sybil ; " thou shall know her powers 
 are not bounded within such a narrow space. 
 Hear me, Mordaunt, youth of a foreign land, 
 but of a friendly heart Doest thou quit this 
 doomed mansion with those who now prepare to 
 leave it ?"
 
 126 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " I do not I will not, Norna," replied Mor- 
 daunt ; " I know not your motive for desiring 
 me to remove, and I will not leave, upon these 
 dark threats, the house in which I have been 
 kindly received in such a tempest as this. If the 
 owners are unaccustomed to our unlimited cus- 
 toms of hospitality, I am the more obliged to 
 them that they have relaxed their usages, and 
 opened their doors in my behalf." 
 
 " He is a brave lad,"" said Mistress Baby, whose 
 superstitious feelings had been daunted by the 
 threats of the supposed sorceress, and who, amidst 
 her eager, narrow, and repining disposition, had 
 some sparks of higher feeling, which made her 
 sympathize with generous sentiments, though she 
 thought it too expensive to entertain them at her 
 own cost. " He is a brave lad," she again re- 
 peated, " and worthy of ten geese, if I had them 
 to boil for him, or roast either. I'll warrant him 
 a gentleman's son, and no churl's blood." 
 
 " Hear me, young Mordaunt," said Norna, 
 " and depart from this house. Fate has high 
 views on you you shall not remain in this hovel 
 to be crushed amid its worthless ruins, with the
 
 THE PIRATE. 127 
 
 reliques of its more worthless inhabitants, whose 
 life is as little to the world as the vegetation of 
 the house-leek, which now grows on their thatch, 
 and which shall soon be crushed amongst their 
 mangled limbs." 
 
 " I I I will go forth," said Yellowley, who, 
 despite of his bearing himself scholarly and wise- 
 ly, was beginning to be terrified for the issue of 
 the adventure; for the house was old, and the 
 walls rocked formidably to the blast. 
 
 " To what purpose ?" said his sister. " I trust 
 the Prince of the power of the air has not yet 
 such like power over those that are made in God's 
 image, that a good house should fall about our 
 heads, because a randy quean (here she darted 
 a fierce glance at the Pythoness) should boast us 
 with her glamour, as if we were sae mony dogs 
 to crouch at her bidding ?" 
 
 " I was only wanting," said Triptolemus, 
 ashamed of his motion, " to look at the bear- 
 braid, which must be sair laid wi' this tempest ; 
 but if this honest woman like to bide wi* us, I 
 think it were best to let us a 1 sit doun canny the- 
 gither, till it's working weather again." 
 3
 
 128 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " Honest woman !" echoed Baby " Foul war- 
 lock thief aroint ye, ye linimer !" she added, 
 addressing Norna directly ; " out of an honest 
 house, or, shame fa 1 me, but I'll take the brttle 
 to you !" 
 
 Norna cast on her a look of supreme contempt, 
 then stepping to the window, seemed engaged in 
 deep contemplation of the heavens, while the old 
 maid-servant, Tronda, drawing close to her mis- 
 tress, implored, for the sake of all that was dear 
 to man or woman, " do not provoke Noma of 
 Fitful-head. You have no sic woman on the 
 mainland of Scotland she can ride on one of these 
 clouds as easilv as man ever rode on a sheltie." 
 
 " I shall live to see her ride on the reek of a 
 fat tar-barrel, 1 ' said Mistress Baby ; " and that 
 will be a fit pacing palfrey for her." 
 
 Again Norna regarded the enraged Mrs Baby 
 Yellowley with a look of that unutterable scorn 
 which her haughty features could so well express, 
 and moving to the window which looked to the 
 north-west, from which quarter the gale seemed 
 at present to blow, she stood for some time with 
 13
 
 TH1 P1HATE. 129 
 
 her arms crossed, looking out upon the leaden- 
 coloured sky, obscured as it was by the thick 
 drift, which, coming on in successive gusts of 
 tempest, left ever and anon sad and dreary inter- 
 vals of expectation betwixt the dying and the re- 
 viving blast. 
 
 Norna regarded this war of the elements as one 
 to whom their strife was familiar ; yet the stern 
 serenity of her features had in it a cast of awe, 
 and at the same time of authority, as the cabalist 
 may be supposed to look upon the spirit he has 
 evoked, and which, though he knows how to sub- 
 ject him to his spell, bears still an aspect appall- 
 ing to flesh and blood. The attendants stood by 
 in different attitudes, expressive of their various 
 feelings. Mordaunt, though not indifferent to 
 the risk in which they stood, was more curious 
 than alarmed. He had heard of Norna's alleged 
 power over the elements, and now expected an op- 
 portunity of judging for himself of its reality. 
 Triptolemus Yellowley was confounded at what 
 seemed to be far beyond the bounds of his philo- 
 sophy ; and, if the truth must be spoken, the 
 worthy agriculturist was far more frightened than 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 THK 1'IHATK. 
 
 curious. His sister was not in the least curious 
 on the subject ; but it was difficult to say whether 
 anger or fear predominated in her sharp eyes and 
 thin compressed lips. The pedlar and old Tron- 
 da, confident that the house would never fall 
 while the redoubted Norna was beneath its roof, 
 held themselves ready for a start the instant she 
 should take her departure. 
 
 Having looked on the sky for some time in a 
 fixed attitude, and with the most profound si- 
 lence, Norna at once, yet with a slow and majes- 
 tic gesture, extended her staff of black oak to- 
 wards that part of the heavens from which the 
 blast came hardest, and in the midst of its fury 
 chaunted a Norwegian invocation, still preserved 
 in the Island of Unst, under the name of the 
 Song of the Reim-kennar, though some call it the 
 Song of the Tempest. The following is a free 
 translation, it being impossible to render literally 
 many of the eliptical and metaphorical terms of 
 expression peculiar to the ancient Northern poe- 
 
 try :- 
 
 1. 
 
 " Stern eagle of the far north-west, 
 
 f hou that bcarest in thy grasp the thunderbolt,
 
 THE PIRATE. 131 
 
 Thou whose rushing pinions stir ocean to madness, 
 
 Thou the destroyer of herds, thou the scatterer of navies, 
 
 Amidst the scream of thy rage, 
 
 Amidst the rushing of thy onward wings, 
 
 Though thy scream be loud as the cry of a perishing na- 
 tion, 
 
 Though the rushing of thy wings be like the roar of ten 
 thousand waves, 
 
 Yet hear, in thine ire and thy haste, 
 
 Hear thou the voice of the Reim-kennar. 
 
 2. 
 
 " Thou hast met the pine-trees of Drontheim, 
 
 Their dark-green heads lie prostrate beside their uproot- 
 ed stems ; 
 
 Thou hast met the rider of the ocean, 
 
 The tall, the strong bark of the fearless rover, 
 
 And she has struck to thee the topsail 
 
 That she had not veil'd to a royal armada ; 
 
 Thou hast met the tower that bears its crest among the 
 clouds, 
 
 The battled massive tower of the Jarl of former days, 
 
 And the cope-stone of the turret 
 
 Is lying upon its hospitable hearth ; 
 
 But thou too shalt stoop, proud compeller of clouds, 
 
 When thou hearest the voice of the Reim-kennar. 
 
 3. 
 
 " There are verses that can stop the stag in the forest, 
 Ay, and when the dark-coloured dog is opening on his 
 
 track ; 
 There are verses can make the wild hawk pause on the 
 
 wing,
 
 132 THE 1>I MATE. 
 
 Like the falcon that wears the hood and the jesses, 
 And who knows the shrill whistle of the fowler ; 
 Thou who canst mock at the scream of the drowning ma- 
 riner, 
 
 And the crash of the ravaged forest, 
 And the groan of the overwhelmed crowds, 
 When the church hath fallen in the moment of prayer, 
 There are sounds which thou also must list, 
 When they are chaunted hy the voice of the Reim-kennar. 
 
 4. 
 
 " Enough of woe hast thou wrought on the ocean, 
 The widows wring their hands on the beach ; 
 Enough of woe hast thou wrought on the land, 
 The husbandman folds his arms in despair ; 
 Cease thou the waving of thy pinions, 
 Let the ocean repose in her dark strength ; 
 Cease thou the flashing of thine eye, 
 Let the thunderbolt sleep in the armoury of Odin ; 
 Be thou still at my bidding, viewless racer of the north- 
 western heaven, 
 Sleep thou at the voice of Norna the Reim-kennar." 
 
 We have said that Mordaunt was naturally 
 fond of romantic poetry and romantic situation ; 
 it is not therefore surprising that he listened with 
 interest to the wild address thus uttered to the 
 wildest wind of the compass, in a tone of such 
 dauntless enthusiasm. But though he had heard 
 so much of the Runic rhyme and of the northern
 
 THE PIRATE. 133 
 
 spell, in the country where he had so long dwelt, 
 he was not on this occasion so credulous as to be- 
 lieve that the tempest, which had raged so lately, 
 and which was now declining, was sinking sub- 
 dued before the charmed verse of Norna. Cer- 
 tain it was, that the blast seemed passing away, 
 and the apprehended danger was already over ; 
 but it was not improbable that this issue had been 
 for some time foreseen by the Pythoness, through 
 signs of the weather, imperceptible to those who 
 had not dwelt long in the country, or had not be- 
 stowed on the meteorological phenomena the at- 
 tention of a strict and close observer. Of Nor- 
 na's experience he had no doubt, and that went 
 a far way to explain what seemed supernatural in 
 her demeanour. Yet still the noble countenance, 
 half-shaded by dishevelled tresses, the air of ma- 
 jesty with which, in a tone of menace as well as 
 of command, she addressed the viewless spirit of 
 the tempest, gave him a strong inclination to be- 
 lieve in the ascendancy of the occult art over the 
 powers of nature ; for, if a woman ever moved on 
 earth to whom such authority over the ordinary 
 laws of the universe could belong, Norna of Fit-
 
 134- THE PIRATE. 
 
 ful-head, judging from bearing, figure, and face, 
 was born to that high destiny. 
 
 The rest of the company were less slow in re- 
 ceiving conviction. To Tronda and the j agger 
 none was necessary ; they had long believed in 
 the full extent of Norna's authority over the ele- 
 ments. But Triptolemus and his sister gazed at 
 each other with wondering and alarmed looks, 
 especially when the wind began perceptibly to 
 decline, as was especially visible during the 
 pauses which Norna made betwixt the strophes of 
 her incantation. A long silence followed the last 
 verse, until Norna resumed her chaunt, but with 
 a changed and more soothing modulation of voice 
 and tune. 
 
 " Eagle of the far north-western waters, 
 Thou hast heard the voice of the Reim-kennar, 
 Thou hast closed thy wide sails at her bidding, 
 And folded them in peace by thy side. 
 My blessing be on thy retiring path ; 
 When thou stoopest from thy place on high, 
 Soft be thy slumbers in the caverns of the unknown ocean, 
 Rest till destiny shall again awaken thee ; 
 Eagle of the north-west, thou hast heard the voice of the 
 Reim-kennar."
 
 THE 1' I HATE. 135 
 
 " A pretty song that would be to keep the com 
 from shaking in ha'rst," whispered the agricultu- 
 rist to his sister ; " we must spea 1 - her fair, Baby 
 she will maybe part with the secret for a hun- 
 dred pund Scots." 
 
 " An hundred fules' heads," replied Baby 
 " bid her five merks of ready siller. I never 
 knew a witch in my life but she was as poor as 
 Job." 
 
 Norna turned towards them as if she had guess- 
 ed their thoughts ; it may be that she did so. She 
 passed them with a look of the most sovereign 
 contempt, and walking to the table on which the 
 preparations for Mrs Barbara's frugal meal were 
 already disposed, she filled a small wooden quaigh 
 from an earthen pitcher which contained bland, 
 a subacid liquor made out of the serous part of 
 the milk. She broke a single morsel from a bar- 
 ley-cake, and having eaten and drunk, returned 
 towards the churlish hosts. " I give you no 
 thanks," she said, " for my refreshment, for you 
 bid me not welcome to it ; and thanks bestowed 
 on a churl are like the dew of heaven on the cliffs 
 of Foulah, where it finds nought that can be re-
 
 136 THE PIRATE. 
 
 freshed by its influences. I give you no thanks," 
 she said again, but drawing from her pocket a 
 leathern purse that seemed Jarge and heavy, she 
 added, " I pay you with what you will value 
 more than the gratitude of the whole inhabitants 
 of Hialtland. Say not that Norna of Fitful-head 
 hath eaten of your bread and drank of your cup, 
 and left you sorrowing for the charge to which 
 she hath put your house." So saying, she laid on 
 the table a small piece of antique coin, bearing 
 the rude and half-defaced effigies of some ancient 
 northern king. 
 
 Triptolemus and his sister exclaimed against 
 this liberality with vehemence ; the first protest- 
 ing that he kept no public, and the other exclaim- 
 ing, " Is the carline mad ? Heard ye ever of ony 
 of the gentle house of Clinkscale that gave meat 
 for siller ?" 
 
 *' Or for love either, 1 ' muttered her brother ; 
 " haud to that, tittie." 
 
 " What are ye whittle whattieing about, ye 
 gowk," said his gentle sister, who suspected the 
 tenor of his murmurs ; " gie the ladie back her 
 bonie die there, and be blithe to be sae rid on t
 
 THE PIRATE. 137 
 
 it will be a sclate-stane the morn, if not something 
 worse." 
 
 The honest factor lifted the money to return 
 it, yet could not help being struck when he saw 
 the impression, and his hand trembled as he 
 handed it to his sister. 
 
 " Yes," said the Pythoness again, as if she 
 read the thoughts of the astonished pair, " you 
 have seen that coin before beware how you use 
 it ! It thrives not with the sordid or the mean- 
 souled it was won with honourable danger, and 
 must be expended with honourable liberality. 
 The treasure which lies under a cold hearth will 
 one day, like the hidden talent, bear witness 
 against its avaricious possessors." 
 
 This last obscure intimation seemed to raise 
 the alarm and the wonder of Mrs Baby and her 
 brother to the uttermost. The latter tried to stam- 
 mer out something like an invitation to Norna to 
 tarry with them all night, or at least to take share 
 of the " dinner,' 1 so he at first called it ; but look- 
 ing at the company, and remembering the limit- 
 ed contents of the pot, he corrected the phrase, 
 and hoped shewould take some part of the "snack, 
 1
 
 138 THE PIRATK. 
 
 which would be on the table ere a man could loose 
 a pleugh." 
 
 " I eat not here I sleep not here," replied Nor- 
 na " nay, I relieve you not only of my own pre- 
 sence, but I will dismiss your unwelcome guests. 
 Mordaunt," she added, addressing young Mer- 
 toun, " the dark fit is past, and your father looks 
 for you this evening." 
 
 " Do you return in that direction ?" said Mor- 
 daunt. " I will but eat a morsel and give you 
 my aid, good mother, on the road. The brooks 
 must be out, and the journey perilous." 
 
 " Our ways lie different," answered the Sy- 
 bil, " and Norna needs not mortal arm to aid her 
 on the way. I am summoned far to the east, by 
 those who know well how to smooth my passage. 
 For thee,Bryce Snailsfoot," she continued, speak- 
 ing to the pedlar, " speed thee on to Sumburgh 
 the roost will afford thee a gallant harvest, and 
 worthy the gathering in. Much goodly ware will 
 ere now be seeking a new owner, and the careful 
 skipper will sleep still enough in the deep haaf, 
 andcares not that bale and kist are dashing against 
 the shores."
 
 THK PIRATE. 
 
 " Na, na, goodmother," answered Snailsfoot, 
 " I desire no man's life for my private advantage, 
 and am just grateful for the blessing of Provi- 
 dence on my sma' trade. But doubtless one man's 
 loss is another's gain ; and as these storms destroy 
 a' thing on land, it is but fair they suld send us 
 something by sea. Sae, taking the freedom, like 
 yoursell, mother, to borrow a lump of barley 
 bread, and a draught of bland, I will bid good 
 day, and thank you, to this good gentleman and 
 lady, and e'en go on my way to Jarlshof, as you 
 advise." 
 
 " Ay," replied the Pythoness, " where the 
 slaughter is, the eagles will be gathered; and 
 where the wreck is on the shore, the jagger is as 
 busy to purchase spoil as the shark to gorge up- 
 on the dead." 
 
 This rebuke, if it was intended for such, seem- 
 ed above the comprehension of the travelling mer- 
 chant, who, bent upon gain, assumed the knap- 
 sack and ellwand, and asked Mordaunt, with the 
 familiarity permitted in a wild country, whether 
 he would not take company along with him.
 
 140 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " I wait to eat some dinner with Mr Yellow- 
 ley and Mrs Baby," answered the youth, " and 
 will set forward in half an hour." 
 
 " Then I'll just take my piece in my hand," 
 said the pedlar. Accordingly he muttered a be- 
 nediction, and without more ceremony, helped 
 himself to what, in Mrs Baby's covetous eyes, ap- 
 peared to be two-thirds of the bread, took a long 
 pull at the jug of bland, seized on a handful of 
 the small fish called sillochs, which the domestic 
 was just placing on the board, and left the room 
 without farther ceremony. 
 
 t( My certie," said the despoiled Mrs Baby, 
 " there is the chapman's drouth and his hunger 
 baith, as folks say. If the laws against vagrants 
 be executed this gate It's no that I wad shut 
 the door against decent folks," she said, looking 
 to Mordaunt, " more especially in such judge- 
 ment-weather. But I see the goose is dished, 
 poor thing." 
 
 This she spoke in a tone of affection for the 
 smoked goose, which, though it had long been an 
 inanimate inhabitant of her chimney, was far more 
 interesting to Mrs Baby in that state, than when
 
 THE flUATU. 141 
 
 it screamed amongst the clouds. Mordaunt laugh- 
 ed and took his seat, then turned to look for Nor- 
 na, but she had glided from the apartment du- 
 ring the discussion with the pedlar. 
 
 " I am glad she is gane, the dour carline," 
 said Mrs Baby, " though she has left that piece 
 of gowd to be an everlasting shame to us." 
 
 " Whisht, mistress, for the love of heaven," 
 said Tronda Dronsdaughter ; " wha kens where 
 she may be this moment we are no sure but she 
 may hear us, though we cannot see her." 
 
 Mistress Baby cast a startled eye around, and 
 instantly recovering herself, for she was natural- 
 ly courageous as well as violent, she said, " I 
 bid aroint her before, and I bid her aroint again, 
 whether she sees me or hears me, or whether she's 
 ower the cairn and awa. And you, ye silly 
 sumph," she said to poor Yellowley, " what do 
 ye stand glowering there for ? You a Saunt An- 
 drew student ! you studied lair and Latin huma- 
 nities, as ye call them, and daunted wi' the cla- 
 vers of an auld randie wife ! Say your best col- 
 lege grace, man, and witch, or nae witch, we'll eat 
 our dinner and defy her. And for the value of
 
 142 THE PI KATE. 
 
 the gowden piece, it shall never be said I pouch- 
 ed her siller. I will gie it to some poor body 
 that is, I will test upon it at my death, and 
 keep it for a purse-penny till that day comes, and 
 thafs no using it in the way of spen ding-siller. 
 Say your best college grace, man, and let us eat 
 and drink in the meantime." 
 
 " Ye had muckle better say an oraamus to 
 Saint Ronald, and fling a sixpence ower your left 
 shouther, master, " said Tronda. 
 
 " That ye may pick it up, ye jaud," said the 
 implacable Mistress Baby ; " it will be lang or 
 ye win the worth of it ony other gate. Sit down, 
 Triptolemus, and mind na the words of a daft 
 wife." 
 
 " Daft or wise," replied Yellowley, very much 
 disconcerted, " she kens more than I would wish 
 she kend. It was awfif to see sic a wind fa 1 at 
 the voice of flesh and blood like oursells and 
 then yon about the hearth-stane I cannot but 
 think" 
 
 " If ye cannot but think," said Mistress Ba- 
 by, very sharply, " at least ye can haud your 
 tongue."
 
 Til IS PI II AT K. 143 
 
 The agriculturist made no reply, but sate 
 down to their scanty meal, and did the honours 
 of it with unusual heartiness to his new guest, 
 the first of the intruders who had arrived, and 
 the last who left them. The sillochs speedily dis- 
 appeared, and the smoked goose, with its append- 
 ages, took wing so effectually, that Tronda, to 
 whom the polishing of the bones had been des- 
 tined, found the task accomplished, or nearly so, 
 to her hand. After dinner, the host produced his 
 bottle of brandy, but Mordaunt, whose general 
 habits were as sober almost as those of his father, 
 laid a very light tax upon this unusual exertion 
 of hospitality. 
 
 During the meal, they learned so much of 
 young Mordaunt, and x>f his father, that even 
 Baby resisted his wish to re-assume his wet gar- 
 ments, and pressed him (at the risk of an expen- 
 sive supper being added to the charges of the day) 
 to tarry with them till the next morning. But 
 what Norna had said excited the youth's wish to 
 reach home, nor, however far the hospitality of 
 Stourburgh was extended in his behalf, did the 
 house present any particular temptations to in-
 
 144 THE IUKATK. 
 
 duce him to remain there longer. He therefore 
 accepted the loan of the factor's clothes, promised 
 to return them, and send for his own ; and took 
 a civil leaving of his host and Mistress Baby, 
 the latter of whom, however affected by the loss 
 of her goose, could not but think the cost well 
 bestowed (since it was to be expended at all) up- 
 on so handsome and cheerful a youth.
 
 THE MBATE. 145 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 She does no work by halves, yon raving ocean ; 
 Engulphing those she strangles, her wild womb 
 Affords the mariners whom she hath dealt on, 
 Their death at once, and sepulchre. 
 
 Old Play. 
 
 THERE were ten " larig Scots miles 11 betwixt 
 Stourburgh and Jarlshof ; and though the pedes- 
 trian did not number all the impediments which 
 crossed Tarn o 1 Shanter's path, for, in a coun- 
 try where there are neither hedges nor stone in- 
 closures, there can be neither " slaps nor stiles, 11 
 yet the number and nature of the u waters and 
 mosses 11 which he had to cross in his peregrina- 
 tion, was fully sufficient to balance the account, 
 and to render his journey as toilsome and dan- 
 gerous as that of the celebrated retreat from 
 Ayr. Neither witch nor warlock crossed Mor- 
 daunt's path, however. The length of the day 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 146 THK hlltATK. 
 
 was already considerable, and he arrived safe at 
 Jarlshof by eleven o'clock at night. All was still 
 and dark around the mansion, and it was not till 
 he had whistled twice or thrice beneath Swertha's 
 window, that she replied to the signal. 
 
 At the first sound, Swertha fell into an agree- 
 able dream of a young whale-fisher, who some 
 forty years since used to make such a signal be- 
 neath the window of her hut ; at the second, she 
 waked to remember that Johnnie Fea slept sound 
 amongst the frozen waves of Greenland for this 
 many a year, and that she was Mr Mertoun's 
 gouvernante at Jarlshof; at the third, she arose 
 and opened the window. 
 
 " Whae is that," she demanded, " at sic an 
 hour of the night r" 
 
 " It is I," said the youth. 
 
 " And what for come na ye in ? The door's ou 
 the latch, and there is a gathering peat on the 
 kitchen fire, and a spunk beside it ye can light 
 your ain candle." 
 
 " All well," replied Mordaunt ; " but I want 
 to know how my father is."
 
 THE PIRATE. 147 
 
 " Just in his ordinary, gude gentleman ask- 
 ing for you, Master Mordaunt; ye are owre far 
 and ower late in your walks, young gentleman." 
 
 " Then the dark hour has passed, Swertha ?" 
 
 " In troth has it, Master Mordaunt," answered 
 the gouvernante ; " and your father is very rea- 
 sonably good-natured for him, poor gentleman. 
 I spake to him twice yesterday without his speak- 
 ing first ; and the first time he answered me as 
 civil as you could do, and the neist time he bade 
 me no plague him ; and then, thought I, three 
 times were aye canny, so I spake to him again for 
 luckVsake, and he called me a chattering old 
 devil, but it was quite and clean in a civil sort of 
 way." 
 
 " Enough, enough, Swertha," answered Mor- 
 daunt ; " and now get up and find me something 
 to eat, for I have dined but poorly." 
 
 " Then you have been at the new folks at 
 Stourburgh ? for there is no another house in a' 
 the Isles but they wad hae gi'en ye the best share 
 of the best they had. Saw ye ought of Norna of 
 the Fitful-head ? She went to Stourburgh this 
 morning, and returned to the town at night."
 
 148 THE PIRATK. 
 
 " Returned ! then she is here. How could 
 she travel three leagues and better in so short a 
 time ?" 
 
 " Wha kens how she travels," replied Swer- 
 tha ; " but I heard her tell the Ranzelman wi' 
 my ain lugs, that she intended that day to have 
 gone on to Burgh- Westra, to speak with Minna 
 Troil, but she had seen that at Stourburgh (in- 
 deed she said at Harfra, for she never calls it by 
 the other name of Stourburgh,) that sent her back 
 to our town. But gang your ways round, and 
 ye shall have plenty of supper ours is nae toom 
 pantry, and still less a locked ane, though my 
 master be a stranger, and no just that tight in 
 the upper rigging, as the Ranzelman says." 
 
 Mordaunt walked round to the kitchen accord- 
 ingly, where Swertha's care speedily accommo- 
 dated him with a plentiful, though coarse meal, 
 which indemnified him for the scanty hospitality 
 he had experienced at Stourburgh. 
 
 In the morning, some feelings of fatigue made 
 young Mertoun later than usual in leaving his 
 bed ; so that, contrary to what was the ordinary 
 case, he found his father in the apartment where
 
 THE PIRATE. 149 
 
 they eat, and which served them indeed for every 
 common purpose, save that of a bed-chamber or 
 of a kitchen. The son greeted the father in mute 
 reverence, and waited until he should addresshim. 
 
 " You were absent yesterday, Mordaunt," 
 said his father. Mordaunt's absence had lasted 
 a week and more; but he had often observed that 
 his father never seemed to notice how time passed 
 during the time he was affected with his sullen 
 vapours. He assented to what the elder Mr Mer^ 
 toun had said. 
 
 " And you were at Burgh- Westraj as I think,** 
 continued his father. 
 
 " Yes, sir, 1 ' replied Mordaunt. 
 
 The elder Mertoun was then silent for some 
 time, and paced the floor in deep silence, with an 
 air of sombre reflection,which seemed as if he was 
 about to relapse into his moody fit. Suddenly 
 turning to his son, however, he observed, in the 
 tone of a query, " Magnus Troil has two daugh- 
 ters they must be now young women ; they are 
 thought handsome, of course ?" 
 
 " Very generally, sir," answered Mordaunt, 
 rather surprised to hear his father making any
 
 J50 THE PIRATE. 
 
 inquiries about the individuals of a sex which 
 he usually thought so light of, a surprise which 
 was much increased by the next question, put as 
 abruptly as the former. 
 
 " Which think you the handsomest ?" 
 " I sir ?" replied his son with some wonder, 
 but without embarrassment " I really am no 
 judge I never considered which was absolutely 
 the handsomest. They are both very pretty 
 young women," 
 
 " You evade my question, Mordaunt ; perhaps 
 I have some very particular reason for my wish 
 to be acquainted with your taste in this matter. 
 I am not used to waste words for no purpose. I 
 ask you again, which of Magnus Troil's daugh- 
 ters you think most handsome ?" 
 
 " Really, sir," replied Mordaunt " but you 
 only jest in asking me such a question." 
 
 " Young man," replied Mertoun, with eyes 
 which began to roll and sparkle with impatience, 
 " I never jest. I desire an answer to my ques- 
 tion. 1 " 
 
 " Then, upon my word, sir," said Mordaunt, 
 " it is not in my power to form a judgment be-
 
 THIi PIUATK. 151 
 
 twixt the young ladies they are both very pretty, 
 but by no means like each other. Minna is dark- 
 haired, and more grave than her sister more se- 
 rious, but by no means either dull or sullen. 11 
 
 " Um," replied his father ; " you have been 
 gravely brought up, and this Minna, I suppose, 
 pleases you most ?" 
 
 " No, sir, really I can give her no preference 
 over her sister Brenda, who is as gay as a lamb 
 in a spring morning less tall than her sister, but 
 so well formed, and so excellent a dancer" 
 
 " That she is best qualified to amuse the young 
 man who has a dull home and a moody father, 11 
 said Mr Mertoun. 
 
 Nothing in his father's conduct had ever sur- 
 prised Mordaunt so much as the obstinacy with 
 which he seemed to pursue a theme so foreign to 
 his general train of thought, and habits of con- 
 versation ; but he contented himself with answer- 
 ing once more, " that both the young ladies were 
 highly admirable, but he had never thought of 
 them with the wish to do either injustice by 
 ranking her lower than her sister that others
 
 152 THE P1EATE. 
 
 would probably decide between them as they hap- 
 pened to be partial to a grave or a gay disposi- 
 tion, or to a dark or fair complexion ; but that 
 he could see no excellent quality in the one that 
 was not balanced by something equally captiva- 
 ting in the other." 
 
 It is possible that even the coolness with which 
 Mordaunt made this explanation might not have 
 satisfied his father concerning the subject of inves- 
 tigation ; but Swertha at this moment entered 
 with breakfast, and the youth, notwithstanding 
 his late supper, engaged in that meal with an air 
 which satisfied Mertoun that he held it matter 
 of more grave importance than the conversation 
 which they had just held, and that he had nothing 
 more to say upon the subject explanatory of the 
 answers he had already given. Heshadedhis brow 
 with his hand, and looked long fixedly upon the 
 young man as he was busied with his morning 
 meal. There was neither abstraction nor a sense 
 of being observed in any of his motions ; all was 
 frank, natural, and open. 
 
 " He is fancy-free, 11 muttered Mertoun to him-
 
 THE PIRATE. 153 
 
 self " so young, so lively, and so imaginative, 
 so handsome and so attractive in face and person, 
 strange, that at his age, and in his circumstances, 
 he should have avoided the meshes which catch 
 all the world beside." 
 
 When the breakfast was over, the elder Mer- 
 toun, instead of proposing, as usual, that his son, 
 who awaited his commands, should betake him- 
 self to one branch or other of his studies, assumed 
 his hat and staff, and desired that Mordaunt 
 should accompany him to the top of the cliff, 
 called Sumburgh-head, and from thence look out 
 upon the state of the ocean, agitated as it must 
 still be by the tempest of the preceding day. 
 Mordaunt was at the age when young men will- 
 ingly exchange sedentary pursuits for active ex- 
 ercise, and started up with alacrity to comply 
 with his father's request ; and in the course of a 
 few minutes they were mounting together the hill, 
 which, ascending from the land side in a long, 
 steep, and grassy slope, sinks at once from the 
 summit to the sea in an abrupt and tremendous 
 precipice. 
 
 The day was delightful; there was just so
 
 THK f IK ATE. 
 
 much motion in the air as to disturb the little 
 fleecy clouds which were scattered on the hori- 
 zon, and by floating them occasionally over the 
 sun, to chequer the landscape with that variety 
 of light and shade which often gives to a bare 
 and unenclosed scene, for the time at least, a 
 species of charm approaching to the varieties of 
 a cultivated and planted country. A thousand 
 flitting hues of light and shade played over the 
 expanse of wild moor, rocks s and inlets, which, 
 as they climbed higher and higher, spread in wide 
 and wider circuit around them. 
 
 The elder Mertoun often paused and looked 
 around upon the scene, and for some time his son 
 supposed that he halted to enjoy its beauties ; 
 but as they ascended still higher up the hill, he 
 remarked his shortened breath and his uncertain 
 and toilsome step, and became assured, with some 
 feelings of alarm, that his father's strength was, 
 for the moment, exhausted, and that he found 
 the ascent more toilsome and fatiguing than usual. 
 To draw close to his side, and offer him in silence 
 the assistance of his arm, was an act of youthful 
 deference to advanced age, as well as of filial re-
 
 THE PIHATJi. 155 
 
 verence, and Mertoun seemed at first so to receive 
 it, for he took in silence the advantage of the aid 
 thus afforded him. 
 
 It was but for two or three minutes, however, 
 that the father availed himself of his son's sup- 
 port. They had not ascended fifty yards farther 
 ere he pushed Mordaunt suddenly, if not rude- 
 ly, from him ; and as if stung into exertion by 
 some sudden recollection, began to mount the ac- 
 clivity with such long and quick paces, that Mor- 
 daunt, in his turn, was obliged to exert himself 
 to keep pace with him. He knew his father's pe- 
 culiarity of disposition ; he was aware, from many 
 slight circumstances, that he loved him not even 
 while he took much pains of his education, and 
 while he seemed to be the sole object of his care 
 upon earth. But the conviction had never been 
 more strongly or more powerfully forced upon 
 him than by the hasty churlishness with which 
 Mertoun rejected from a son that assistance which 
 most elderly men are willing to receivefrom youths 
 with whom they are but slightly connected, as a 
 tribute which it is alike graceful to yield and to
 
 156 THE P1KATK. 
 
 receive. Mertoun, however, did not seem to per- 
 ceive the effect which his unkindness had produ- 
 ced upon his son's feelings. He paused upon a 
 sort of level terrace which they had now attain- 
 ed, and addressed his son with an indifferent 
 tone, which seemed in some degree affected. 
 
 " Since you have so few inducements, Mor- 
 daunt, to remain in these wild islands, I suppose 
 you sometimes wish to look a little more abroad 
 into the world ?" 
 
 " By my word, sir," replied Mordaunt, " I can- 
 not say I ever have thought on such a subject." 
 
 " And why not, young man ?" demanded his 
 father ; " it were but natural, I think, at your 
 age. At your age, the fair and varied breadth of 
 Britain could not gratify me, much less the com- 
 pass of a sea-girdled peat-moss." 
 
 " I have never thought of leaving Zetland, 
 sir," replied the son. " I am happy here, and 
 have friends. You yourself, sir, would miss me, 
 
 unless indeed" 
 
 -. 
 
 ' Why, thou wouldst not persuade me," said 
 
 his father, somewhat hastily, " that you stay here, 
 or desire to stay here, for the love of me ?"
 
 THE PIRATE. 157 
 
 " Why should I not, sir? 1 ' answered Mor- 
 daunt, mildly ; " it is my duty, and I hope I 
 have hitherto performed it." 
 
 " O ay," repeated Mertoun, in the same tone 
 " your duty your duty. So it is the duty of 
 the dog to follow the groom that feeds him." 
 
 " And does he not do so, sir ?" said Mordaunt. 
 
 " Ay," said his father, turning his head aside ; 
 " but he fawns only on those who caress him." 
 
 " I hope, sir," replied Mordaunt, " I have not 
 been found deficient ?" 
 
 " Say no more on^t say no more on" 1 !," said 
 Mertoun abruptly, " we have both done enough 
 by each other we must soon part Let that be 
 our comfort if our separation should require 
 comfort." 
 
 " I shall be ready to obey your wishes," said 
 Mordaunt, not altogether displeased at what pro- 
 mised him an opportunity of looking further 
 abroad into the world. " I presume it will be 
 your pleasure that I commence my travels with 
 a season at the whale-fishing." 
 
 " Whale-fishing !" replied Mertoun ; " that 
 were a mode indeed of seeing the world ; but
 
 -S THE PIRATK. 
 
 thou speakest but as thoa hast learned. Enough 
 of this for the present. Tell me where you had 
 shelter from the storm yesterday ?" 
 
 " At Stourburgh, the house of the new factor 
 from Scotland." 
 
 " A pedantic, fantastic, visionary schemer," 
 said Mertoun " and whom saw you there ?" 
 
 " His sister, sir," replied Mordaunt, " and old 
 Norna of the Fitful-head." 
 
 *' What ! the mistress of the potent spell," an- 
 swered Mertoun, with a sneer " she who can 
 change the wind by pulling her curch on one side, 
 as King Erick used to do by turning his cap ? 
 The dame journeys far from home how fares 
 she ? Does she get rich by selling favourable 
 winds to those who are port-bound ?" 
 
 " I really do not know, sir," said Mordaunt, 
 whom certain recollections prevented from freely 
 entering into his father's humour. 
 
 " You think the matter too serious to be jested 
 with, or perhaps esteem her merchandize too light 
 to be cared after," continued Mertoun, in the 
 same sarcastic tone, which was the nearest ap- 
 proach he ever made to cheerfulness ; " but con-
 
 THK PIRATE. 159 
 
 sider it more deeply. Every thing in the uni- 
 verse is bought and sold, and why not wind, if 
 the merchant can find purchasers ? The earth is 
 rented from its surface down to its most central 
 mines ; the fire, and the means of feeding it, are 
 currently bought and sold ; the wretches that 
 sweep the boisterous ocean with their nets, pay 
 ransom for the privilege of being drowned in it. 
 What title has the air to be exempted from the 
 universal course of traffic ? All above the earth, 
 under the earth, and around the earth, has its 
 price, its sellers, and its purchasers. In many 
 countries the priests will sell you a portion of 
 heaven in all countries men are willing to buy 
 in exchange for health, wealth, and peace of con- 
 science, a full portion of hell. Why should not 
 Norna pursue her traffic ?" 
 
 " Nay, I know no reason against it," replied 
 Mertoun ; " only I wish she would part with the 
 commodity in smaller quantities. Yesterday she 
 was a wholesale dealer whoever treated with her 
 had too good a pennyworth." 
 
 " It is even so," said the father, pausing on 
 the verge of the wild promontory which they
 
 160 THE PIRATE. 
 
 had attained, where the huge precipice sinks ab- 
 ruptly down on the wide and tempestuous ocean, 
 " and the effects are still visible." 
 
 The face of that lofty cape is composed of the 
 soft and crumbling stone called sand-flag, which 
 gradually yields to the action of the atmosphere, 
 and becomes split into large masses, that hang 
 loose upon the verge of the precipice, and, de- 
 tached from it by the fury of the tempests, of- 
 ten descend with great fury to the vexed abyss 
 which lashes the foot of the rock. Numbers of 
 these huge fragments lie strewed beneath the rocks 
 from which they have descended, and amongst 
 these the tide foams and rages with a fury pecu- 
 liar to these latitudes. 
 
 At the period when Mertoun and his son look- 
 ed from the verge of the precipice, the wide sea 
 still heaved and swelled with the agitation of the 
 yesterday's storm, which had been far too violent 
 to subside speedily. The tide therefore poured 
 on the headland with a fury deafening to the ear, 
 and dizzying to the eye, threatening instant de- 
 struction to whatever might be at the time invol- 
 ved in its current. The sight of nature in her 
 14
 
 THE PIRATE. 161 
 
 magnificence, or in her beauty, or in her terrors, 
 has at all times an overpowering interest, which 
 even habit cannot greatly weaken ; and both fa- 
 ther and son sate themselves down on the cliff to 
 look out upon that unbounded war of waters, 
 which rolled in their wrath to the foot of the 
 precipice. 
 
 At once Mordaunt, whose eyes were sharper, 
 and probably his attention more alert than that 
 of his father, started up and exclaimed, " God in 
 Heaven ! there is a vessel in the Roost."" 
 
 Mertoun looked to the north-westward, and an 
 object was visible amid the rolling tide. " She 
 shews no sail," he observed ; and immediately 
 added, after looking at the object through his 
 spy-glass, " She is dismasted, and lies a sheer- 
 hulk upon the water." 
 
 " And is drifting on the Sumburgh-head," 
 said Mordaunt, struck with horror, " without the 
 slightest means of weathering the cape." 
 
 " She makes no effort," replied his father ; " she 
 is probably deserted by her crew." 
 
 " And in such a day as yesterday," replied 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 THE PIRATE, 
 
 Mordaunt, " when no open boat could live were 
 she manned with the best men ever handled an 
 oar all must have perished." 
 
 " It is most probable, 1 ' said his father, with stern 
 composure; "and one day, sooner or later, all must 
 have perished. What signifies whether the fowl- 
 er, whom nothing escapes, caught them up at one 
 swoop from yonder shattered deck, or whether he 
 clutched them individually, as chance gave them 
 to his grasp ? What signifies it ? the deck, the 
 battle-field, are scarce more fatal to us than our 
 table and our bed ; and we are saved from the 
 one, merely to drag out a heartless and weari- 
 some existence, till we perish at the other. Would 
 the hour were come that hour which reason 
 would teach us to wish for, were it not that na- 
 ture has implanted the fear of it so strongly with- 
 in us. You wonder at such a reflection, because 
 life is yet new to you. Ere you have attained my 
 age, it will be the familiar companion of your 
 thoughts." 
 
 " Surely, sir," replied Mordaunt, " such dis- 
 taste to life is not the necessary consequence of 
 advanced age ?"
 
 THE PIRATE. 163 
 
 " To all who have sense to estimate that which 
 it is really worth,"" said Mertoun. " Those who, 
 like Magnus Troil, possess so much of the ani- 
 mal impulses about them, as to derive pleasure 
 from sensual gratification, may perhaps, like the 
 animals, feel pleasure in mere existence." 
 
 Mordaunt liked neither the doctrine nor the 
 example. He thought a man who discharged his 
 duties towards others as well as the good old 
 udaller, had a better right to have the sun shine 
 fair on his setting, than that which he might de- 
 rive from mere insensibility. But he let the sub- 
 ject drop ; for to dispute with his father, had 
 always the effect of irritating him ; and again he 
 adverted to the condition of the wreck. 
 
 The hulk, for it was little better, was now in 
 the very midst of the current, and drifting at a 
 great rate towards the foot of the precipice, upon 
 whose verge they were placed. Yet it was a long 
 while ere they had a distinct view of the object 
 which they had at first seen as a black speck 
 amongst the waters, and then at a nearer distance, 
 like a whale, which now scarce shews its back-fin 
 above the waves, now throws to view its huge
 
 164 THE PIRATE. 
 
 black side. Now, however, they could more dis- 
 tinctly observe the appearance of the ship, for 
 the huge swelling waves which bore it forward 
 to the shore, heaved it alternately high upon 
 the surface, and then plunged it into the trough 
 or furrow of the sea. She seemed a vessel of two 
 or three hundred tons, fitted up for defence, for 
 they could see her port-holes. She had been dis- 
 masted probably in the gale of the preceding day, 
 and lay water-logged on the waves, a prey to 
 their violence. It appeared certain, that the crew, 
 finding themselves unable either to direct the 
 vessel's course, or to relieve her by pumping, 
 had taken to their boats, and left her to her fate. 
 All apprehensions were therefore unnecessary, so 
 far as the immediate loss of human lives was con- 
 cerned ; and yet it was not without a feeling of 
 breathless awe that Mordaunt and his father be- 
 held the vessel that rare masterpiece by which 
 human genius aspires to surmount the waves, 
 and contend with the winds, upon the point of 
 falling a prey to them. 
 
 Onward it came, the large black hulk seeming 
 larger at every fathom's length. She came nearer,
 
 THE PIRATE. 165 
 
 until she bestrode the summit of pne tremendous 
 billow, which rolled on with her unbroken, till the 
 wave and its burthen were precipitated against the 
 rock, and then the triumph of the elements over 
 the work of human hands was at once completed. 
 One wave, we have said, made the wrecked ves- 
 sel completely manifest in her whole bulk, as it 
 raised her, and bore her onward against the face 
 of the precipice. But when that wave receded 
 from the foot of the rock, the ship had ceased to 
 exist ; and the retiring billow only bore back a 
 quantity of beams, planks, casks, and similar ob- 
 jects, which swept out to the offing, to be brought 
 in again by the next wave, and again precipitated 
 upon the face of the rock. 
 
 It was at this moment that Mordaunt concei- 
 ved he saw a man floating on a plank or water- 
 cask, which, drifting away from the main current, 
 seemed about to go a-shore upon a small spot of 
 sand, where the water was shallow, and the waves 
 broke more smoothly. To see the danger, and 
 to exclaim, " He lives, and may yet be saved !" 
 was the first impulse of the fearless Mordaunt. 
 The next was, after one rapid glance at the front
 
 166 THE PIRATE. 
 
 of the cliff, to precipitate himself such seemed 
 the rapidity of his movement from the verge, and 
 to commence, by means of slight fissures, projec- 
 tions, and crevices in the rock, a descent, which, 
 to a spectator, appeared little else than an act of 
 absolute insanity. 
 
 " Stop, I command you, rash boy," said his 
 father ; " the attempt is death. Stop, and take 
 the safer path to the left. 11 But Mordaunt was 
 already completely engaged in his perilous enter- 
 prize. 
 
 " Why should I prevent him f w said his fa- 
 ther, checking his anxiety with the stern and un- 
 feeling philosophy whose principles he had adopt- 
 ed. " Should he die now, full of generous and 
 high feeling, eager in the cause of humanity, hap- 
 py in the exertion of his own conscious activity 
 and youthful strength should he die now, will 
 he not escape misanthropy, and remorse, and age, 
 and the consciousness of decaying powers, both 
 of body and mind ? I will not look upon it, how- 
 ever I will not I cannot behold his young 
 light so suddenly quenched. 11
 
 THE 1'IRATK. 167 
 
 He turned from the precipice accordingly, and 
 hastening to the left for more than a quarter of 
 a mile, he proceeded towards a riva, or cleft in 
 the rock, containing a path, called Brick's steps, 
 neither safe, indeed, nor easy, but the only one 
 by which the inhabitants of Jarlshof were wont, 
 for any purpose, to seek access to the foot of the 
 precipice. 
 
 But long ere Mertoun had reached even the 
 upper end of the pass, his adventurous and ac- 
 tive son had accomplished his more desperate en- 
 terprize. He had been in vain turned aside from 
 the direct line of descent, by the intervention of 
 difficulties which he had not seen from above his 
 route became only more circuitous, but could not 
 be interrupted. More than once, large fragments 
 to which he was about to entrust his weight, gave 
 way before him, and thundered down into the tor- 
 mented ocean ; and in one or two instances, such 
 detached pieces of rock rushed after him, as if to 
 bear him headlong in their course. A courageous 
 heart, a steady eye, a tenacious hand, and a firm 
 foot, carried him through his desperate attempt ; 
 and in the space of seven minutes, he stood at the
 
 THE TIIIATE. 
 
 bottom of the cliff, from the verge of which he 
 had achieved his perilous descent. 
 
 The place which he now occupied was the small 
 projecting spot of stones, sand, and gravel, that 
 extended a little way into the sea, which on the 
 right hand lashed the very bottom of the preci- 
 pice, and on the left, was scarce divided from it 
 by a small wave-worn portion of beach which 
 extended as far as the foot of the rent in the 
 rocks called Erick's steps, by which Mordaunt's 
 father proposed to descend. 
 
 When the vessel split and went to pieces, all 
 was swallowed up in the ocean, which had, after 
 the first shock, been seen to float upon the waves, 
 excepting only a few pieces of wreck, casks, 
 chests, and the like, which a strong eddy, formed 
 by the reflux of the waves, had landed, or at 
 least grounded, upon the shallow where Mor- 
 daunt now stood. Amongst these, his eager eye 
 discovered the object which had at first engaged 
 his attention, and which now, seen at nigh er dis- 
 tance, proved to be in truth a man, and in a 
 most precarious state. His arms were still wrapt 
 with a close and convulsive grasp round the
 
 THE 1'IRATE. 169 
 
 plank to which he had clung, in the moment of 
 the shock, but sense and the power of motion 
 were fled ; and, from the situation in which the 
 plank lay, partly grounded upon the beach, part- 
 ly floating in the sea, there was every chance 
 that it might be again washed off shore, in which 
 case the man's death was inevitable. Just as he 
 had made himself aware of these circumstances, 
 Mordaunt beheld a huge wave advancing, and 
 hastened to interpose his aid ere it burst, aware 
 that the reflux might probably sweep away the 
 sufferer. 
 
 He rushed into the surf and fastened on the 
 body with the same tenacity, though under a dif- 
 ferent impulse, with that wherewith the hound 
 seizes his prey. The strength of the retiring wave 
 proved even stronger than he had expected, and 
 it was not without a struggle for his own life, as 
 well as for that of the stranger, that Mordaunt 
 resisted being swept out to sea with the rece- 
 ding billow, when, though an adroit swimmer, 
 the strength of the tide must either have dashed 
 him against the rocks, or hurried him out to sea. 
 He stood his ground, however, and ere another
 
 170 THE PIRATE. 
 
 such billow had returned to the attack, he drew 
 up, upon the small slip of dry sand, both the bo- 
 dy of the man, and the plank to which he conti- 
 nued firmly attached. But how to save and to 
 recall the means of ebbing life and strength, and 
 how to remove into a place of greater safety the 
 sufferer, who was incapable of giving any assist- 
 ance towards his own preservation, were ques- 
 tions which Mordaunt asked himself eagerly, but 
 in vain. 
 
 He looked to the summit of the cliff on which 
 he had left his father, and shouted to him for his 
 assistance ; but his eye could not distinguish his 
 form, and his voice was only answered by the 
 scream of the sea-birds. He gazed again on the 
 sufferer A dress richly laced, according to the 
 fashion of the times, fine linens, and rings upon 
 his fingers, evinced he was a man of superior 
 rank ; and his features shewed youth and come- 
 liness, notwithstanding they were pallid and dis- 
 figured. He still breathed, but so feebly, that 
 his respiration seemed almost imperceptible, and 
 life seemed to keep such slight hold of his frame,
 
 THE 1'IEATE. 171 
 
 that there was every reason to fear it would be- 
 come altogether extinguished, unlessit werespeed- 
 ily reinforced. To loosen the handkerchief from 
 his neck, to raise him with his face towards the 
 breeze, to support him with his arms, was all that 
 Mordaunt could do for his assistance, whilst he 
 anxiously looked round for some one who might 
 lend his aid in dragging the unfortunate to a more 
 safe situation. 
 
 At this moment he beheld a man advancing 
 slowly and cautiously along the beach. He was in 
 hopes, at first, it was his father, but instantly re- 
 collected that he had not had time to come round 
 by the circuitous descent, to which he must ne- 
 cessarily have recourse, and besides he saw that 
 the man who approached him was shorter in sta- 
 ture. 
 
 As he came nearer, Mordaunt was at no loss to 
 recognize the pedlar whom the day before he had 
 met with at Harfra, and who was known to him 
 before upon many occasions. He shouted as loud 
 as he could, " Bryce, hollo ! Bryce, come hither !" 
 But the merchant, intent upon picking up some 
 of the spoils of the wreck, and upon dragging
 
 172 THE P1KATE. 
 
 them out of reach of the tide, paid for some time 
 little attention to his shouts. 
 
 When he did at length approach Mordaunt, it 
 was not to lend him his aid, but to remonstrate 
 with him on his rashness in undertaking the cha- 
 ritable office. " Are you mad ?" said he ; " you 
 that have lived sae lang in Zetland, to risk the 
 saving of a drowning man ? Wot ye not, if you 
 bring him to life again, he will be sure to do you 
 some capital injury ? Come, Master Mordaunt, 
 bear a hand to what's mair to the purpose. Help 
 me to get ane or twa of these kists ashore before 
 any body else comes, and we shall share, like good 
 Christians, what God sends us, and be thankful." 
 
 Mordaunt was indeed no stranger to this in- 
 human superstition, current at a former period 
 among the lower orders of the Zetlanders, and 
 the more generally adopted, perhaps, that it ser- 
 ved as an apology for refusing assistance to the 
 unfortunate victims of ship wreck, while they made 
 plunder of their goods. At any rate, the opi- 
 nion, that to save a drowning man was to run 
 the risk of future injury from him, formed a 
 strange contradiction in the character of these
 
 THE PIRATE. 173 
 
 islanders ; who, hospitable, generous, and dis- 
 interested on all other occasions, were sometimes, 
 nevertheless, induced by this superstition, to re- 
 fuse their aid in these mortal emergencies, which 
 were so common upon their rocky and stormy 
 coasts. We are happy to add, that the exhort- 
 ation and example of the proprietors have era- 
 dicated even the traces of this inhuman belief, 
 of which there might be some observed within 
 the memory of those now alive. It is strange 
 that the minds of men should have ever been 
 hardened towards those involved in a distress to 
 which they themselves were so constantly ex- 
 posed ; but perhaps the constant sight and con- 
 sciousness of such danger tends to blunt the feel- 
 ings to its consequences, whether affecting our- 
 selves or others. 
 
 Bryce was remarkably tenacious of this ancient 
 belief; the more so, perhaps, that the mounting 
 of his pack depended less upon the ware-houses 
 of Lerwick or Kirkwall, than on the consequences 
 of such a north-western gale as that of the day 
 preceding ; for which (being a man who, in his 
 own way, professed great devotion) he seldom
 
 174 THE PIRATiS. 
 
 failed to express his grateful thanks to heaven. It 
 was indeed said of him, that if he had spent the 
 same time in assisting the wrecked seamen, that 
 he had done in rifling their bales and boxes, he 
 would have saved many lives, and lost much linen. 
 He paid no sort of attention to the repeated en- 
 treaties of Mordaunt, although he was now upon 
 the same slip of sand with him well known to 
 Bryce as a place on which the eddy was likely to 
 land such spoils as the ocean disgorged but occu- 
 pied himself busily in securing and appropriating 
 whatever seemed most portable and of greatest va- 
 lue. At length Mordaunt saw the honest pedlar fix 
 his views upon a strong sea-chest, framed of some 
 Indian wood, well secured by brass plates, and 
 seeming to be of a foreign construction. The stout 
 lock resisted all Bryce's efforts to open it, until, 
 with great composure, he plucked from his pocket 
 a very neat hammer and chisel, and began for- 
 cing the hinges. 
 
 Incensed at his assurance beyond patience, 
 Mordaunt caught up a wooden stretcher which 
 lay near him, and laying his charge softly on the 
 sand, approached Bryce with a menacing gesture,
 
 THE PI RAT K. 175 
 
 ami exclaimed, " You cold-blooded inhuman ras- 
 cal ! either get up instantly and lend me your as- 
 sistance to recover this man, and bear him out of 
 danger from the surf, or I will not only beat you 
 to a mummy on the spot, but inform Magnus 
 Troil of your thievery, that he may have you flog- 
 ged till your bones are bare, and then banish you 
 from the main island." 
 
 The lid of the chest had just sprung open as 
 this rough address saluted Bryce^ ears, and the 
 inside presented a tempting view of wearing ap- 
 parel for sea and land ; shirts, plain and with lace 
 ruffles, a silver compass, a silver-hilted sword, and 
 other valuable articles, which the pedlar well knew 
 to be such as stir in the trade. He was half-dispo- 
 sed to start up, draw the sword, which was a cut- 
 and-thrust, and " darraign battaile," as Spencer 
 says, rather than quit his prize, or brook inter- 
 ruption. Being, though short, a stout square-made 
 personage, and not much past the prime of life, 
 having besides the better weapon, he might have 
 given Mordaunt more trouble than his benevo- 
 lent knight-errantry deserved.
 
 176 THE PIRATE. 
 
 Already, as with vehemence he repeated his 
 injunctions that Bryce should forbear his plunder, 
 and come to the assistance of the dying man, the 
 pedlar retorted with a voice of defiance, " Dinna 
 swear, sir ; dinna swear, sir I will endure no 
 swearing in my presence ; and if you lay a finger 
 on me, that am taking the lawful spoil of the 
 Egyptians, I will give ye a lesson ye shall remem- 
 ber from this day to Yule." 
 
 Mordaunt would speedily have put the pedlar's 
 courage to the test, but a voice behind him sud- 
 denly said, " Forbear !" It was the voice of Nor- 
 na of the Fitful-head, who, during the heat of 
 their altercation, had approached them unobser- 
 ved. " Forbear, 1 ' she repeated ; " and, Bryce, do 
 thou render Mordaunt the assistance he requires ; 
 it shall avail thee more, and it is I who say the 
 word, than all that you could earn to-day besides."" 
 
 " It is seenteen hundred linen," said the pedlar, 
 giving a tweak to one of the shirts, in that know- 
 ing manner with which matrons and judges ascer- 
 tain the texture of the loom ; " it's seenteen hun- 
 dred linen, and as strong as an it were dowlas. 
 
 6
 
 THE PIHATE. 
 
 177 
 
 Nevertheless, mother, your bidding is to be done ; 
 and I would have done Mr Mordaunt's bidding 
 too," he added, relaxing from his note of defiance, 
 into the deferential whining tone with which he 
 cajoled his customers, " if he hadna made use of 
 profane oaths, which made my very flesh grue, 
 and caused me, in some sort, to forget myself. 1 ' 
 He then took a flask from his pocket, and ap- 
 proached the shipwrecked man. " It's" the best 
 of brandy," he said ; " and if that does na cure 
 him, I ken nought that will." So saying, he 
 took a preliminary gulp himself, as if to shew the 
 quality of the liquor, and was about to put it to 
 the man's mouth, when suddenly withholding his 
 hand, he looked at Norna " You insure trig 
 against all risk of evil from him, if I am to ren- 
 der him my help ? Ye ken yoursel what folks 
 say, mother." 
 
 For all other answer, Norna took the bottle 
 from the pedlar's hand, and began to chafe the 
 temples and throat of the shipwrecked man ; di- 
 recting Mordaunt botf to hold his head, so as to 
 afford him the means of disgorging the sea-water 
 which he had shallowed during his immersion. 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 178 THE PI11ATE. 
 
 The pedlar looked on inactive for a moment, 
 and then said, " To be sure there is not the same 
 risk in helping him now he is out of the water, 
 and lying high and dry on the beach ; and, to be 
 sure, the principal danger is, to those that first 
 touch him ; and, to be sure, it is a world's pity to 
 see how these rings are pinching the puir crea- 
 ture's swald fingers they make his hand as blue 
 as apartan's back before boiling." So saying, he 
 seized one of the man's cold hands, which had j ust, 
 by a tremulous motion, indicated the return of 
 Ufe, and began his charitable work of removing 
 the rings, which seemed to be of some value. 
 
 " As you love your life, forbear," said Norna 
 sternly, " or I will lay that on you which shall 
 spoil your travels through the isles." 
 
 " Now, for mercy s sake, mother, say nae mair 
 about it," said the pedlar, " and I'll e'en do your 
 pleasure in your ain way. I did feel a rheuma- 
 tize in my back-spauld yestreen ; and it wad be a 
 sair thing for the like of me to be debarred my 
 quiet walk round the country, in the way of trade 
 making the honest penny, and helping myself 
 with what Providence sends on our coasts."
 
 THK PIKATE. 
 
 " Peace, then," said the woman u Peace, as 
 thou wouldst not rue it ; and take this man on thy 
 broad shoulders. His life is of value, and you 
 will be rewarded. 11 
 
 " I had muckle need,' 1 said the pedlar, pensive- 
 ly looking at the lidless chest, and the other mat- 
 ters which strewed the sand ; " for he has corned 
 between me and as mickle spreacherie as wad hae 
 made a man of me for the rest of my life ; and 
 now it maun lie here till the next tide sweep it a 1 
 doun the Roost, after them that aught it yester- 
 day morning. 11 
 
 " Fear not, 11 said Norna, " it will come to man^ 
 use. See, there come carrion-crows, of scent as 
 keen as thine own. 11 
 
 She spoke truly, for several of the people from 
 the hamlet of Jarlshof were now hastening along 
 the beach, to have their share in the spoil. The 
 pedlar beheld them approach with a deep groan. 
 " Ay, ay, 11 he said, the folk of Jarlshof, they 
 will make clean wark ; they are ken'd for that far 
 and wide ; they winna leave the value of a rotten 
 ratlin ; and wha^s waur, there isna ane o 1 them 
 has mense or sense eneugh to give thanks for the
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 mercies when they have gotten them. There is 
 the auld Ranzelman, Neil Ronaldson, that canna 
 walk a mile to hear the minister, but he will hir- 
 ple ten if he hears of a ship embayed." 
 
 Norna, however, seemed to possess over him so 
 complete an ascendancy, that he no longer hesi- 
 tated to take the man, who now gave strong symp- 
 toms of reviving existence, upon his shoulders ; 
 and, assisted by Mordaunt, trudged along the 
 sea-beach with his burden, without farther remon- 
 strance. Ere he was borne off, the stranger point- 
 ed to the chest, and attempted to mutter some- 
 thing, to which Norna replied, " Enough. It 
 shall be secured." 
 
 Advancing towards the passage called Erick's 
 steps, by which they were to ascend the cliffs, 
 they met the people from Jarlshof, hastening in 
 the opposite direction. Man and woman, as they 
 passed, reverently made room for Norna, and sa- 
 luted her not without an expression of fear upon 
 some of their faces. She passed them a few paces, 
 and then turning back called aloud to the Ran- 
 zelman, who (though the practice was more com- 
 mon than legal) was attending the rest of the ham-
 
 THK FIJI ATE. 181 
 
 let upon this plundering expedition. "Neil Ko- 
 naldson," she said, " mark my words. There 
 stands yonder a chest, from which the lid has been 
 just prized off. Look it be brought down to your 
 own house at Jarlshof, just as it now is. Beware 
 of moving or touching the slightest article. He 
 were better in his grave, that so much as looks at 
 the contents. I speak not for nought, nor in 
 aught will I be disobeyed." 
 
 " Your pleasure shall be done, mother," said 
 Ronaldson. " I warrant we will not break bulk, 
 since sic is your bidding." 
 
 Far behind the rest of the villagers, followed 
 an old woman, talking to herself, and cursing 
 her own decrepitude, which kept her the last of 
 the party, yet pressing forward with all her might 
 to get her share of the spoil. 
 
 When they met her, Mordaunt was astonish- 
 ed to recognize his father's old houskeeper. 
 " How now," he said, " Swertha, what make 
 you so far from home ?" 
 
 " Just e'en daikering out to look after my 
 auld master and your honour," replied Swertha, 
 who felt like a criminal caught in the manner;
 
 183 
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 for on more occasions than one, Mr Mertoun had 
 intimated his high disapprobation of such excur- 
 sions as she was at present engaged in. 
 
 But Mordaunt was too much engaged with his 
 own thoughts to take much notice of her delin- 
 quency. " Have you seen my father ?" he said. 
 
 " And that I have," replied Swertha " The 
 gude gentleman was ganging to hirsel himsell 
 doun Erick's steps, whilk would have been the 
 ending of him, that is in no way a cragVman. 
 Sae I e'en gat him wiled away hame and I was 
 : ust seeking you that you may gang after him to 
 the hall-house, for, to my thought, he is far frae 
 weel." 
 
 " My father unwell ?" said Mordaunt, remem- 
 bering the faintness he had exhibited at the com- 
 mencement of that morning 1 s walk. 
 
 " Far frae weel far frae weel," groaned out 
 Swertha, with a piteous shake of the head 
 " white o 1 the gills white o' the gills and him 
 to think of coming down the riva !" 
 
 " Return home, Mordaunt," said Norna, who 
 was listening to what had passed. " I will see all 
 that is necessary done for this man's relief, and
 
 THE P1RATK. 
 
 183 
 
 you will find him at the Ranzelman's, when you 
 list to inquire. You cannot help him more than 
 you already have done." 
 
 Mordaunt felt this was true, and, commanding 
 Swertha to follow him home instantly, betook 
 himself to the path homeward. 
 
 Swertha hobbled reluctantly after her young 
 master in the same direction, until she lost sight 
 of him on his entering the cleft of the rock, then 
 instantly turned about, muttering to herself, 
 " Haste home, in good sooth ? haste home, and 
 lose the best chance of getting a new rokelay and 
 owrelay that I have had these ten years ? by my 
 certie, na Its seldom sic rich Godsends come on 
 our coast no since the Jenny and James came 
 ashore in King Charlie's time." 
 
 So saying, she mended her pace as well as she 
 could, and a willing mind making amends for 
 frail limbs, posted on with wonderful dispatch to 
 put in for her share of the spoil. She soon reach- 
 ed the beach, where the Ranzelman, stuffing his 
 own pouches all the while, was exhorting the 
 rest to part things fair, and be neighbourly, and
 
 184 THE PIRATE. 
 
 to give to the auld and helpless a share of what 
 was going, which he charitably remarked, would 
 bring a blessing on the shore, and send them 
 " niair wrecks ere winter."
 
 THE I'lKATE. 185 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 " He was a lovely youth, I guess ; 
 The panther in the wilderness 
 
 Was not so fair as he. 
 And when he chose to sport and play, 
 No dolphin ever was so gay, 
 
 Upon the tropic sea." 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 THE light foot of Mordaunt Mertoun was not 
 long of bearing him to Jarlshof. He entered the 
 house hastily, for what he himself had observed 
 that morning, corresponded in some degree with 
 the ideas which Swertha's tale was calculated to 
 excite. He found his father, however, in the in- 
 ner apartment, reposing himself after his fatigue ; 
 and his first question satisfied him that the good 
 dame bad practised a little imposition to get rid 
 of them both. 
 
 " Where is this dying man whom you have 
 so wisely ventured your own neck to relieve ?" 
 said the elder Mertoun to the younger.
 
 186 THE PIRATE. 
 
 rt Norna, sir," replied Mordaunt, " has taken 
 him under her charge; she understands such 
 matters." 
 
 " And is quack as well as witch ?" said the el- 
 der Mertoun. " With all my heart it is a trou- 
 ble saved. But I hasted home on Swertha's hint, 
 to look out for lint and bandages, for her speech 
 was of broken bones." 
 
 Mordaunt kept silence, well knowing his fa- 
 ther would not persevere in his enquiries upon 
 such a matter, and not willing either to prejudice 
 the old gouvernante, or to excite his father to 
 one of those excesses of passion into which he was 
 apt to burst, when, contrary to his wont, he thought 
 proper to correct the conduct of his domestic. 
 
 It was late in the day ere old Swertha return- 
 ed from her expedition, heartily fatigued, and 
 bearing with her a bundle of some bulk, contain- 
 ing, it would seem, her share of the spoil. Mor- 
 daunt instantly sought her out, to charge her with 
 the deceits she had practised on both his father 
 and himself ; but the accused matron lacked not 
 her reply.
 
 THE PIRATE. 187 
 
 " By her troth," she said, " she thought it was 
 time to bid Mr Mertoun gang hame and get 
 bandages, when she had seen, with her ain twa 
 een, Mordaunt ganging down the cliff like a wild 
 cat it was to be thought broken bones would be 
 the end, and lucky if bandages wad do any good 
 and, by her troth, she might weel tell Mor- 
 daunt his father was puirly, and him looking sae 
 white in the gills, (whilk, she wad die upon it, was 
 the very word she used,) and it was a thing that 
 couldna be denied by man at this very moment." 
 
 " But, Swertha," said Mordaunt, as soon as 
 her clamorous defence gave him time to speak in 
 reply, "how came you, that should have been 
 busy with your housewifery and your spinning, 
 to be out this morning at Erick's steps, in order 
 to take all this unnecessary care of my father and 
 me ? And what is in that bundle, Swertha ? for 
 I fear, Swertha, you have been transgressing the 
 law, and have been out upon the wrecking sys- 
 tem." 
 
 " Fair fa' your sonsy face, and the blessing of 
 Saint Ronald upon you," said Swertha, in a tone 
 betwixt coaxing and jesting ; " would you keep
 
 188 THE riKATK. 
 
 a puir body frae mending hersell, and sae muc- 
 kle gear lying on the loose sand for the lifting ? 
 Hout, Master Mordaunt, a ship ashore is a sight 
 to wile the minister out of his very pu'pit in the 
 middle of his preaching, muckle mair a puir auld 
 ignorant wife frae her rock and her tow. And lit- 
 tle did I get for my day's wark just some rags o 1 
 cambric things, and a bit or twa of coarse claith, 
 and sic like the strong and the hearty get a 1 
 thing in this warld. 1 ' 
 
 " Yes, Swertha," replied Mertoun, " and that 
 is rather hard, as you must have your share of 
 punishment in this world and the next, for rob- 
 bing the poor mariners.'" 
 
 " Hout, callant, wha wad punish an auld wife 
 like me for a wheen duds ? Folk speak muckle 
 black ill of Earl Patrick, but he was a friend to 
 the shore, and made wise laws against any body 
 helping vessels that were like to gang on the 
 breakers. * And the mariners, I have heard 
 Bryce Jagger say, lose their right frae the time 
 keel touches sand ; and, moreover, they arc dead 
 
 * This was literally true.
 
 THE PIHATE. 189 
 
 and gane, poor souls dead and gane, and care 
 little about war-Id's wealth now Nay, nae mair 
 than the great Jarls and Sea-kings, in the Norse 
 days, did about the treasures that they buried in 
 the tombs and sepulchres auld langsyne. Did I 
 ever tell you the sang, Master Mordaunt, how 
 Olaf Tryguarson gard hide five gold crmms in 
 the same grave with him ?" 
 
 " No, Swertha," said Mordaunt, who took 
 pleasure in tormenting the cunning old plunderer 
 " You never told me that ; but I tell you, that 
 the stranger, whom Norna has taken down to the 
 town, will be well enough to-morrow, to ask where 
 you have hidden the goods that you have stolen 
 from the wreck." 
 
 " But wha will tell him a word about it, hin- 
 nie ?" said Swertha, looking slily up in her young 
 master's face " The mair by token, since I maun 
 tell ye, that I have a bonnie remnant of silk amang 
 the lave, that will make a dainty waistcoat to your- 
 sell, the first merry-making ye gang to."" 
 
 Mordaunt could no longer forbear laughing at 
 the cunning with which the old dame proposed to 
 bribe off his evidence by imparting a portion of
 
 190 THE PIRATE. 
 
 her plunder ; and, desiring her to get ready what 
 provisions she had made for dinner, he returned 
 to his father, whom he still found sitting in the 
 same place, and nearly in the same posture, in 
 which he had left him. 
 
 When their hasty and frugal meal was finish- 
 ed, Mordaunt announced to his father his pur- 
 pose of going down to the town, or hamlet, to 
 look after the shipwrecked sailor. 
 
 The elder Mertoun assented with a nod. 
 
 " He must be ill accommodated there, sir," 
 added his son, a hint which only produced an- 
 other nod of assent. " He seemed, from his ap- 
 pearance," pursued Mordaunt, " to be of very 
 good rank and, admitting these poor people do 
 their best to receive him, in his present weak 
 state, yet" 11 
 
 " I know what you would say," said his father, 
 interrupting him ; " we, you think, ought to do 
 something towards assisting him. Go to him, 
 then if he lacks money, let him name the sum, 
 and he shall have it ; but, for lodging the stran- 
 ger here, and holding intercourse with him, I nei- 
 ther can, nor will do so. I have retired to this 
 10
 
 THE PIRATE. 191 
 
 farthest extremity of the British isles, to avoid 
 new friends and new faces, and none such shall 
 intrude on me either their happiness or their mi- 
 sery. When you have known the world half a 
 score of years longer, your early friends will have 
 given you reason to remember them, and to avoid 
 new ones for the rest of your life. Go then 
 why do you stop? rid the country of the man let 
 me see no one about me but those vulgar coun- 
 tenances, the extent and character of whose petty 
 knavery I know, and can submit to, as to an evil 
 too trifling to cause irritation." He then threw 
 his purse to his son, and signed to him to depart 
 with all speed. 
 
 Mordaunt was not long before he reached the 
 village. In the dark abode of Neil Ronaldson, 
 the Ranzelman, he found the stranger, seated by 
 the peat-fire, upon the very chest which had ex- 
 cited the cupidity of the devout Bryce Snailsfoot, 
 the pedlar. The Ranzelman himself was absent, 
 dividing, with all due impartiality, the spoils of 
 the wrecked vessel amongst the natives of the 
 community; listening to, and redressing their
 
 192 THK PIKATE. 
 
 complaints of inequality ; and (if the matter in 
 hand had not been, from the beginning to end, 
 utterly unjust and indefensible) discharging the 
 part of a wise and prudent magistrate, in all the 
 details relating to it. For at this time, and pro- 
 bably until a much later period, the lower orders 
 of the islanders entertained an opinion, common 
 to barbarians also when in the same situation, that 
 whatever was cast on their shores, became their 
 indisputable property. 
 
 Margery Bimbister, the worthy spouse of 
 the Ranzelman, was in the charge of the house, 
 and introduced Mordaunt to her guest, saying, 
 with no great ceremony, " This is the young 
 tacksman You will maybe tell him your name, 
 though you will not tell it to us. If it had not 
 been for his four quarters, it's but little you would 
 have said to any body, sae lang as life lasted." 
 
 The stranger arose, and shook Mordaunt by 
 the hand ; observing, he understood that he had 
 been the means of saving his life and his chest. 
 " The rest of the property," he said, " is, I see, 
 walking the plank ; for they are as busy as the 
 devil in a gale of wind." 
 11
 
 THE PIRATE. 193 
 
 " And what was the use of your seamanship, 
 then," said Margery, " that you couldna keep off 
 the Sumburgh-head ? It would have been long 
 ere Sumburgh-head had come to you." 
 
 " Leave us for a moment, good Margery Bim- 
 bister," said Mordaunt ; " I wish some private 
 conversation with this gentleman."" 
 
 " Gentleman !" said Margery, with an empha- 
 sis ; " not but the man is well eneugh to look at," 
 she added, again surveying him, " but I doubt 
 if there is muckle of the gentleman." 
 
 Mordaunt looked at the stranger, and was of 
 a different opinion. He was rather above the mid- 
 dle size, and formed handsomely as well as strong- 
 ly. Mordaunt's acquaintance with society was 
 not extensive ; but he thought his new acquaint- 
 ance, to a bold sun-burnt handsome countenance, 
 which seemed to have faced various climates, add- 
 ed the frank and open manners of a sailor. He 
 answered cheerfully the inquiries which Mor- 
 daunt made after his health ; and maintained that 
 one night's rest would relieve him from all the ef- 
 fects of the disaster he had sustained. But he 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 194 THE PIRATE. 
 
 spoke with bitterness of the avarice and curiosity 
 of the Ranzelman and his spouse. 
 
 " That chattering old woman," said the stran- 
 ger, " has persecuted me the whole day for the 
 name of the ship. I think she might be content- 
 ed with the share she has had of it. I was the 
 principal owner of the vessel that was lost yon- 
 der, and they have left me nothing but my wear- 
 ing apparel. Is there no magistrate, or justice of 
 the peace, in this wild country, that would lend a 
 hand to help one when he is among the break- 
 ers P" 
 
 Mordaunt mentioned Magnus Troil, the prin- 
 cipal proprietor, as well as the Fowd, or provin- 
 cial judge of the district, as the person from whom 
 lie was most likely to obtain redress ; and regret- 
 ted that his own youth, and his father's situation 
 as a retired stranger, should put it out of their 
 power to afford him the protection he required. 
 
 " Nay, for your part, you have done enough," 
 said the sailor ; " but if I had five out of the for- 
 ty brave fellows that are fishes' food by this time, 
 the devil a man would I ask to do me the right 
 that I could do for myself."
 
 THE PIRATK. 195 
 
 " Forty hands !" said Mordaunt ; " you were 
 well manned for the size of the ship." 
 
 " Not so well as we needed to be. We mount- 
 ed ten guns, besides chasers ; but our cruize on 
 the main had thinned us of men, and lumbered 
 us up with goods. Six of our guns were in bal- 
 last. Hands ! if I had had enough of hands, we 
 would never have miscarried so infernally. The 
 people were knocked up with working the pumps, 
 and so took to their boats, and left me with the 
 vessel, to sink or swim. But the dogs had their 
 pay, and I can afford to pardon them-? -The boats 
 swamped in the current all were lost and here 
 am I." 
 
 " You had came north about then, from the 
 West Indies ?" said Mordaunt. 
 
 " Ay, ay ; the vessel was the Good Hope of 
 Bristol, a letter of marque. She had fine luck 
 down on the Spanish main, both with commerce 
 and privateering, but the luck's ended with her 
 now. My name is Clement Cleveland, captain, 
 and part owner, as I said before I am a Bristol 
 man born my father was well known on the Toll- 
 sell old Clem Cleveland of the College-green^
 
 196 THK PIRATE. 
 
 Mordaunt had no right to inquire farther, and 
 yet it seemed to him as if his own mind was but 
 half satisfied. There was an affectation of blunt- 
 ness, a sort of defiance in the manner of the stran- 
 ger, for which circumstances afforded no occasion . 
 Captain Cleveland had suffered injustice from the 
 islanders, but from Mordaunt he had only recei- 
 ved kindness and protection ; yet he seemed as if 
 he involved all the neighbourhood in the wrongs 
 he complained of. Mordaunt looked down and 
 was silent, doubting whether it would be better 
 to take his leave, or to proceed farther in his offers 
 of assistance. Cleveland seemed to guess at his 
 thoughts, for he immediately added, in a concili- 
 ating manner," I am a plain man, Master Mer- 
 toun, for that I understand is your name ; and I 
 am a ruined man to boot, and that does not mend 
 one's good manners. But you have done a kind 
 and friendly part by me, and it may be I think 
 as much of it as if I thanked you more. And so 
 before I leave this place, 1*11 give you my fowling- 
 piece ; she will put a hundred swan-shot through 
 a Dutchman's cap at eighty paces she will carry 
 ball too I have hit a wild-bull within a hundred-
 
 THE PIRATK. 197 
 
 and-fifty yards but I have two that are as good, 
 or better, so you may keep this for my sake.' 
 
 " That would be to take my share of the 
 wreck," answered Mordaunt, laughing. 
 
 " No such matter," said Cleveland, undoing a 
 case which contained several guns and pistols, 
 " you see I have saved my private arm-chest, as 
 well as my clothes that the tall old woman in the 
 dark rigging managed for me. And, Between 
 ourselves, it is worth all I have lost ;" for, he add- 
 ed, lowering his voice and looking round, *' when 
 I speak of being ruined in the hearing of these 
 land-sharks, I do not mean ruined stock and 
 block. No, here is something will do more than 
 shoot sea-fowl.' 1 So saying, he pulled out a great 
 ammunition-pouch marked swan-shot, and shew- 
 ed Mordaunt hastily that it was full of Spanish 
 pistoles and Portagues (as the broad Portugal 
 pieces were then called.) " No, no," he added, 
 with a smile, " I have ballast enough to trim the 
 vessel again ; and now, will you take the piece ?" 
 " Since you are willing to give it me," said 
 Mordaunt, laughing, " with all my heart. I 
 I was just going to ask you, in my fathers name,"
 
 198 THE PIttATE. 
 
 he added, shewing his purse, " whether you 
 wanted any of that same ballast." 
 
 " Thanks, but you see I am provided take 
 my old acquaintance, and may she serve you as 
 well as she has served jne ; but you will never 
 make so good a voyage with her. You can shoot, 
 I suppose ?" 
 
 " Tolerably well," said Mordaunt, admiring 
 the piece, which was a beautiful Spanish barrel 
 gun, inlaid with gold, small in the bore, and of 
 unusual length, such as is chiefly used for shoot- 
 ing sea-fowl, and for ball-practice. 
 
 " With slugs," continued the donor, " never 
 gun shot closer ; and with single ball, you may 
 kill a seal two hundred yards at sea from the top 
 of the highest peak of this iron-bound coast of 
 yours. But I tell you again, that the old rattler 
 will never do you the service she has done me." 
 
 " I shall not use her so dexterously, perhaps," 
 said Mordaunt. 
 
 " Umph ! perhaps not," replied Cleveland ; 
 ** but that is not the question. What say you to 
 shooting the man at the wheel, just as we run 
 aboard of a Spaniard ? So the Don was taken
 
 THE PIRATE. 199 
 
 aback, and we laid him athwart the hawse, and 
 carried her cutlass in hand ; and worth the while 
 she was stout brigantine El Santo Francisco 
 bound for Porto Bello, with gold and negroes. 
 That little bit of lead was worth twenty thousand 
 pistoles." 
 
 " I have shot at no such game as yet," said 
 Mordaunt. 
 
 " Well, all in good time ; we cannot weigh till 
 the tide makes. But you are a tight, handsome, 
 active young man. What is to ail you to take a 
 trip after some of this stuff? 1 ' laying his hand on 
 the bag of gold. 
 
 " My father talks of my travelling soon," re- 
 plied Mordaunt, who, born to hold men-of-wars 
 men in great respect, felt flattered by this invi- 
 tation from one who appeared a thorough-bred 
 seaman. 
 
 " I respect him for the thought, 1 ' said the 
 Captain ; " and I will visit him before I weigh 
 anchor. I have a consort off these islands, and 
 be cursed to her. Shell find me out somewhere, 
 though she parted company in the bit of a squall, 
 unless she is gone to JDayy Jones too Well, she
 
 200 THE PIJIATE. 
 
 was better found than us, and not so deep load- 
 ed she must have weathered it. We'll have a 
 hammock slung for you aboard, and make a sail- 
 or and a man of you in the same trip. 1 ' 
 
 " I should like it well enough," said Mor- 
 daunt, who eagerly longed to see more of the 
 world than his lonely situation had hitherto per- 
 mitted ; " but then my father must decide." 
 
 " Your father ? pooh !" said Captain Cleve- 
 land ; " but you are very right," he added, check- 
 ing himself. " Gad, I have lived so long at sea, 
 that I cannot think any body has a right to think 
 except the captain and the master. But you are 
 very right. I will go up to the old gentleman 
 this instant, and speak him myself. He lives in 
 that handsome, modern-looking building, I sup- 
 pose, that I see a quarter of a mile off?" 
 
 "In that old half-ruined house," said Mor- 
 daunt, " he does indeed live ; but he will see no 
 visitors." 
 
 *' Then you must drive the point yourself, for 
 I can't stay in this latitude. Since your father 
 is no magistrate, I must go to see this same Mag- 
 nushow call you him ? who is not justice of
 
 THE 1'IRATK. 201 
 
 peace, but something else that will do the turn 
 as well. These fellows have got two or three 
 things that I must and will have back let them 
 keep the rest, and be d -d to them. Will you 
 give me a letter to him, just by way of commis- 
 sion ?" 
 
 " It is scarce needful," said Mordaunt. " It 
 is enough that you are shipwrecked, and need his 
 help ; but yet I may as well furnish you with a 
 letter of introduction." 
 
 " There," said the sailor, producing a writing- 
 case from his chest, " are your writing-tools, 
 meantime, since bulk has been broken, I will nail 
 down the hatches, and make sure of the cargo." 
 
 While Mordaunt accordingly was engaged in 
 writing to Magnus Troil a letter, setting forth the 
 circumstances in which Captain Cleveland had 
 been thrown upon their coast, the Captain, ha- 
 ving first selected and laid aside some wearing- 
 apparel and necessaries enough to fill a knapsack, 
 took in hand hammer and nails, employed him- 
 self in securing the lid of his sea-chest, by fast- 
 ening it down in a workmanlike manner, and then
 
 202 THE PIRATE. 
 
 added the corroborating security of a cord, twist- 
 ed and knotted with nautical dexterity. " I leave 
 this in your charge, 11 he said, " all except this," 
 shewing the bag of gold, " and these,"" pointing 
 to a cutlass and pistols, " which may prevent all 
 further risk of my parting company with my Por- 
 tages." 
 
 " You will find no occasion for weapons in this 
 country, Captain Cleveland," replied Mordaunt ; 
 " a child might travel with a purse of gold from 
 Sumburgh-head to the Scaw of Unst, and no soul 
 would injure him. 1 " 
 
 " And that's pretty boldly said, young gentle- 
 man, considering what is going on without doors 
 at this moment." 
 
 " O, 11 replied Mordaunt, a little confused, 
 <* what comes on land with the tide, they reckon 
 their lawful property. One would think they had 
 studied under Sir Arthegal, who pronounces 
 
 For equal right in equal things doth stand, 
 And what the mighty sea hath once possess'd, 
 
 And plucked quite from all possessors' hands, 
 Or else by wrecks that wretches hath distress'd.,
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 He may dispose, by his resistless might, 
 As things at random left, to whom he list. 
 
 " I shall think the better of plays and ballads 
 as long as I live, for these very words," said Cap- 
 tain Cleveland ; " and yet I have loved them 
 well enough in my day. JBut this is good doc- 
 trine, and more men than one may trim their sails 
 to such a breeze. What the sea sends is ours, 
 that's sure enough. However, in case that your 
 good folks should think the land as well as the 
 sea may present them with waiffs and strays, I 
 will make bold to take my cutlass and pistols. 
 Will you cause my chest to be secured in your 
 own house till you hear from me, and use your 
 influence to procure me a guide to shew me the 
 way, and to carry my kitt ?" 
 
 " Will you go by sea or land ?" said Mor- 
 daunt, in reply. 
 
 " By sea !" exclaimed Cleveland. " What 
 in one of these cockle-shells, and a cracked cockle- 
 shell, to boot ? No, no land, land, unless I 
 knew my crew, my vessel, and my voyage." 
 
 They parted accordingly, Captain Cleveland
 
 204 THE PIRATE. 
 
 being supplied with a guide to conduct him to 
 Burgh- Westra, and his chest being carefully re- 
 moved to the mansion-house at Jarlshof.
 
 THE PIRATE. 205 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 This is a gentle trader, and a prudent. 
 
 He's no Autolycus, to blear your eye, 
 
 With quips of worldly gauds and gamesomeness ; 
 
 But seasons all his glittering merchandize 
 
 With wholesome doctrines suited to the use, 
 
 As men sauce goose with sage and rosemary. 
 
 Old Play. 
 
 ON the subsequent morning, Mordaunt, in an- 
 swer to his father's inquiries, began to give him 
 some account of the shipwrecked mariner, whom 
 he had rescued from the waves. But he had not 
 proceeded far in recapitulating the particulars 
 which Cleveland had communicated, when Mr 
 M ertoun's looks became disturbed he arose has- 
 tily, and, after pacing twice or thrice across the 
 room, he retired into the inner chamber, to which 
 he usually confined himself, while under the in- 
 fluence of his mental malady. In the evening he
 
 206 THE PIRATE. 
 
 re-appeared, without any traces of his disorder ; 
 but it may be easily supposed that his son avoid- 
 ed recurring to the subject which had affected 
 him. 
 
 Mordaunt Mertoun was thus left without as- 
 sistance, to form at his leisure his own opinion re- 
 specting the new acquaintance which the sea had 
 sent him ; and, upon the whole, he was himself 
 surprised to find the result less favourable to the 
 stranger than he could well account for. There 
 seemed to Mordaunt to be a sort of repelling in- 
 fluence about the man. True, he was a hand- 
 some man, of a frank and prepossessing manner, 
 but there was an assumption of superiority about 
 him, which Mordaunt did not quite so much like. 
 Although he was so keen a sportsman as to be 
 delighted with his acquisition of the Spanish bar- 
 relled gun, and accordingly mounted and dis- 
 mounted it with great interest, paying the utmost 
 attention to the most minute parts about the lock 
 and ornaments, yet he was, upon the whole, in- 
 clined to have some scruples about the mode in 
 which he had acquired it. 
 9
 
 THE PIRATE. 207 
 
 " I should not have accepted it," he thought ; 
 " perhaps Captain Cleveland might give it me 
 as a sort of payment for the trifling service I did 
 him ; and yet it would have been churlish to re- 
 fuse it in the way it was offered. I wish he had 
 looked more like a man whom one would have 
 chosen to be obliged to." 
 
 But a successful day's shooting reconciled him 
 with his gun, and he became assured, like most 
 young sportsmen in similar circumstances, that 
 all other pieces were but pop-guns in comparison. 
 But then, to be doomed to shoot gulls and seals, 
 when there were Frenchmen and Spaniards to be 
 come at when there were ships to be boarded, 
 and steersmen to be marked off, seemed but a 
 dull and contemptible destiny. His father had 
 mentioned his leaving these islands, and no other 
 mode of occupation occurred to his inexperience, 
 save that of the sea, with which he had been con- 
 versant from his infancy. His ambition had for- 
 merly aimed no higher than at sharing the fa- 
 tigues and dangers of a Greenland fishing expe- 
 dition ; for it was in that scene that the Zetland-
 
 208 THE PIRATE. 
 
 ers laid most of their perilous adventures. But 
 of late that war was again raging, the history of 
 Sir Francis Drake, Captain Morgan, and other 
 bold adventurers, whose exploits he had purcha- 
 sed from Bryce Snailsfoot, had made much im- 
 pression on his mind, and the offer of Captain 
 Cleveland to take him to sea, frequently recur- 
 red to him, although the pleasure of such a pro- 
 ject was somewhat damped by a doubt, whether, 
 in the long run, he should not find many objec- 
 tions to his proposed commander. Thus much he 
 already saw, that he was opinionative, and might 
 probably prove arbitrary ; and that, since even his 
 kindness was mingled with assumption of superi- 
 ority, his occasional displeasure might contain a 
 great deal more of that disagreeable ingredient 
 than could be palatable to those who sailed under 
 him. And yet, after counting all risks, could his 
 father's consent but be obtained, with what plea- 
 sure, he thought, would he embark inquest of new 
 scenes and strange adventures, in which he pro- 
 posed to himself to achieve such deeds as should 
 be the theme of many a tale to the lovely sisters of
 
 THE PIRATE. 209 
 
 Burgh Westra talesat which Minnashouldweep, 
 and Bertha should smile, and both should marvel. 
 And this was to be the reward of his labours and 
 his dangers ; for the hearth of Magnus Troil had 
 a magnetic influence over his thoughts, and how- 
 ever they might traverse amid his day-dreams, it 
 was the point where they finally settled. 
 
 There were times when Mordaunt thought of 
 mentioning to his father the conversation he had 
 with Captain Cleveland, and the seaman's pro- 
 posal to him ; but the very short and general ac- 
 count which he had given of that person's history, 
 upon the morning after his departure from the 
 hamlet, had produced a sinister effect upon Mr 
 Mertoun's mind, and discouraged him from speak- 
 ing farther on any subject connected with it. It 
 would be time enough, he thought, to mention 
 Captain Cleveland's proposal, when his consort 
 should arrive, and when he should repeat his of- 
 fer in a more formal manner ; and these he sup- 
 posed events likely very soon to happen. 
 
 But days grew to weeks, and weeks were num- 
 bered into months, and he heard nothing from 
 
 VOL. i. o
 
 210 THE PIRATE. 
 
 Cleveland ; and only learned by an occasional vi- 
 sit from Bryce Snailsfoot, that the Captain was 
 residing at Burgh Westra, as one of the family. 
 Mordaunt was somewhat surprised at this, al- 
 though the unlimited hospitality of the islands, 
 which Magnus Troil, both from fortune and dis- 
 position, carried to the utmost extent, made it al- 
 most a matter of course that he should remain in 
 the family until he disposed of himself otherwise. 
 Still it seemed strange he had not gone to some 
 of the northern isles to inquire after his consort ; 
 or that he did not rather chuse to make his resi- 
 dence at Lerwick, where fishing vessels often 
 brought news from the coasts and ports of Scot- 
 land and Holland. Again, why did he not send 
 for the chest he had deposited at Jarlshof ? and 
 still further, Mordaunt thought it would have 
 been but polite if the stranger had sent him some 
 sort of message in token of remembrance. 
 
 These subjects of reflection were connected 
 with another still more unpleasant, and more dif- 
 ficult to account for. Until the arrival of this 
 person, scarce a week had passed without bring- 
 ing him some kind greeting, or token of recollec-
 
 THE PIRATE. 211 
 
 tion, from Burgh- Westra ; and pretences were 
 scarce ever wanting for maintaining a constant 
 intercourse. Minna wanted the words of a Norse 
 ballad ; or desired to have, for her various collec- 
 tions, feathers, or eggs, or shells, or specimens 
 of the rarer sea-weeds ; or Bertha sent a riddle 
 to be resolved, or a song to be learned ; or the 
 honest old Udaller, in a rude manuscript, which 
 might have passed for an ancient Runic inscrip- 
 tion, sent his hearty greetings to his good young 
 friend, with a present of something to make good 
 cheer, and an earnest request he would come to 
 Burgh- Westra as soon, and stay there as long, as 
 possible. These kindly tokens of remembrance 
 were often sent by special message; besides which, 
 there was never passenger or traveller who cross- 
 ed from the one mansion to the other, that did 
 not bring to Mordaunt some friendly greeting 
 from the Udaller and his family. Of late, this 
 intercourse had become more and more infre- 
 quent ; and no messenger from Burgh- Westra 
 had visited Jarlshof for several weeks. Mordaunt 
 both observed and felt this alteration, and it dwelt
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 on his mind, while he questioned Bryce as close- 
 ly as pride and prudence would permit, to ascer- 
 tain, if possible, the cause of the changes. Yet 
 he endeavoured to assume an indifferent air while 
 he asked the jagger whether there was no news 
 in the country. 
 
 " Great news," the jagger replied ; " and a gay 
 mony of them. That crack-brained carle, the 
 new factor, is for making a change in the bismars 
 and the lispunds ;* and our worthy Fowd, Mag- 
 nus Troil, has sworn, that, sooner than change 
 them for the still-yard, or aught else, he'll fling 
 Factor Yellowleys from Brassa-craig." 
 
 " Is that all ?" said Mordaunt, very little in- 
 terested. 
 
 *' All ? and eneugh, I think," replied the ped- 
 lar. " How are folks to buy and sell, if the 
 weights are changed on them ?" 
 
 " Very true," replied Mordaunt ; " but have 
 you heard of no strange vessels on the coast ?" 
 
 * These are weights of Norwegian origin, still used in 
 Zetland.
 
 THE PIRATE. 213 
 
 " Six Dutch doggers off Brassa ; and, as I 
 hear, a high-quartered galliot thing, with a gaff 
 mainsail, lying in Scalloway Bay. She will be 
 from Norway."" 
 
 " No ships of war, or sloops ?" 
 
 " None,"" replied the pedlar, " since the Kite 
 Tender sailed with the impress men. If it was 
 His will, and our men were out of her, I wish the 
 deep sea had her." 
 
 " Were there no news at Burgh- Westra ?" 
 Were the family all well ?" 
 
 " A' weel, and weel to do out-taken, it may 
 be, something ower muckle daffing and laughing 
 -dancing ilk night, they say, wi' the stranger 
 captain that's living there he that was ashore 
 on Sumburgh-head the tother day, less daffing 
 served him then. 1 * 
 
 " Daffing ! dancing every night !" said Mor- 
 daunt, not particularly well satisfied. " Whom 
 does Captain Cleveland dance with ?" 
 
 " Ony body he likes, I fancy," said the jag- 
 ger ; " at ony rate, he gars a 1 body yonder dance 
 after his fiddle. But I ken little about it, for I
 
 214 THE PIRATE. 
 
 am no free in conscience to look upon thae fling- 
 ing fancies. Folk should mind that life is made 
 but of rotten yarn.*" 
 
 " I fancy that it is to keep them in mind of 
 that wholesome truth, that you deal in such ten- 
 der wares, Bryce," replied Mordaunt, dissatisfied 
 as well with the tenor of the reply, as with the 
 affected scruples of the respondent. 
 
 " That's as muckle as to say, that I suld hae 
 minded you was a flinger and a fiddler yoursell, 
 Master Mordaunt ; but I am an auld man, and 
 maun unburthen my conscience. But ye will 
 be for the dance, I sail warrant, that's to be at 
 Burgh- Westra, on John's Even, (Saunt John's, 
 as the blinded creatures ca' him ;) and nae doubt 
 ye will be for some warldly braws hose, waist- 
 coats, or sic like. I hae pieces frae Flanders" 
 With that he placed his moveable warehouse on 
 the table, and began to unlock it. 
 
 " Dance !" repeated Mordaunt " Dance on 
 St John's even ? Were you desired to bid me 
 to it, Bryce ?" 
 
 " Na but ye ken weel eneugh ye wad be wel-
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 come, bidden or no bidden. This captain, how- 
 ca'-ye-him, is to be skudler as they ca't the first 
 of the gang, like." 
 
 " The devil take him !" said Mordaunt, in im- 
 patient surprise. 
 
 " A' in gude time,"" replied the jagger ; " hur- 
 ry no man's cattle the devil will hae his due, I 
 warrant ye, or it winna be for lack of seeking. 
 But it's true I'm telling you, for a' ye stare like a 
 wild cat; and this same captain, I-wat-na-his- 
 name, bought ane of the very waistcoats that I 
 am ganging to shew ye purple, wi' a gowd bind- 
 ing, and bonnily broidered ; and I have a piece 
 for you, the neighbour of it, wi' a green grund ; 
 and if ye mean to streak yoursell up beside him, 
 ye maun e'en buy it, for it's gowd that glances 
 in the lasses' een now-a-days. See look till't," 
 he added, displaying the pattern in various points 
 of view ; " look till it through the light, and till 
 the light through it wi' the grain, and against 
 the grain it shews ony gate cam frae Antwerp 
 a' the gate four dollars is the price ; and yon 
 captain was sae weel pleased, that he flang down
 
 THE PIKATE. 
 
 a twenty shilling Jacobus, and bade me keep the 
 change and be damned ! poor silly profane crea- 
 ture, I pity him." 
 
 Without inquiring whether the pedlar bestow- 
 ed his compassion on the worldly imprudence, or 
 the religious deficiencies of Captain Cleveland, 
 Mordaunt turned from him, folded his arms, and 
 paced the apartment, muttering to himself, " Not 
 asked A stranger to be king of the feast !" 
 Words which he repeated so earnestly, that Bryce 
 caught a part of their import. 
 
 " As for asking, I am almaist bauld to say, 
 that ye will be asked, Master Mordaunt." 
 
 " Did they mention my name then ?" said 
 Mordaunt. 
 
 f * I canna preceesely say that," said Bryce Snails- 
 foot ; " but ye needna turn away your head sae 
 sourly, like a sealgh when he leaves the shore ; 
 for, do you see, I heard distinctly that a' the re- 
 vellers about are to be there; and \s\ to be thought 
 they would leave out you, an auld ken'd freend, 
 and the lightest foot at sic frolics, (Heaven send 
 you a. better praise in His ain gude time,) that
 
 THE PIKATK. 217 
 
 ever flang at a fiddle-squeak, between this and 
 Unst ? Sae I consider ye altogether the same as 
 invited and ye had best provide yourself wi* a 
 waistcoat, for brave and brisk will every man be 
 that's there the Lord pity them !" 
 
 He thus continued to follow with his green 
 glazen eyes, the motions of young Mordaunt 
 Mertoun, who continued to pace the room in a 
 very pensive manner, which the jagger pro- 
 bably misinterpreted, as he thought, like Clau- 
 dio, that if a man is sad, it must needs be be 
 cause he lacks money. Bryce therefore, after 
 another pause, thus accosted him. " Ye need- 
 na be sad about the matter, Master Mordaunt ; 
 for although I got the just price of the article 
 from the captain-man, yet I maun deal freend- 
 ly wi 1 you, as a ken'd freend and customer, and 
 bring the price, as they say, within your purse- 
 mouth or it's the same to me to let it lie ower 
 till Martinmas, or e'en to Candlemas. I am de- 
 cent in the warld, Master Mordaunt forbid that 
 I should hurry onybody, far mair a freend that 
 has paid me siller afore now. Or I wad be con-
 
 218 THE PIRATE. 
 
 tent to swap the garment for the value in fea- 
 thers or sea-otters skins, or any kind of peltrie 
 nane kens better than yoursell how to come 
 by sic ware and I am sure I hae furnished you 
 wi 1 the primest o' powder. I dinna ken if I tell'd 
 ye it was out o' the kist of Captain Plunket, 
 that perished on the Scaw of Unst, wi* the arm- 
 ed brig Mary, sax years syne. He was a prime 
 fowler himself, and luck it was that the kist 
 came ashore dry. I sell that to nane but gude 
 marksmen. And so, I was saying, if ye had 
 ony wares ye liked to coup for the waistcoat, I 
 wad be ready to trock wi 1 you, for assuredly ye 
 will be wanted at Burgh Westra, on Saint John's 
 even ; and ye wadna like to look waur than the 
 captain that wadna be setting. 1 " 
 
 " I will be there, at least, whether wanted or 
 not," said Mordaunt, stopping short in his walk, 
 and taking the waistcoat piece hastily out of the 
 pedlar's hand ; " and, as you say, will not dis- 
 grace them."" 
 
 " Haud a care haud a care, Master Mor- 
 daunt," exclaimed the pedlar ; " ye handle it as 
 it were a bale of coarse wadmaal ye'll fray't to 
 
 8
 
 THE PIRATE. 219 
 
 bits ye might weel say my ware is tender and 
 yell mind the price is four dollars Sail I put ye 
 in my book for it ?" 
 
 " No,"" said Mordaunt hastily; and, taking out 
 his purse, he flung down the money. 
 
 " Grace to ye to wear the garment,"" said the 
 joyous pedlar, " and to me to guide the siller; 
 and protect us from earthly vanities, and earthly 
 covetousness ; and send you the white linen rai- 
 ment, whilk is mair to be desired than the mus- 
 lins, and cambrics, and lawns, and silks of this 
 world ; and send me the talents which avail more 
 than much fine Spanish gold, or Dutch dollars 
 either and but God guide the callant, what 
 for are ye wrapping the silk up that gate, like a 
 wisp of hay ?" 
 
 At this moment, old Swertha, the housekeeper, 
 entered, to whom, as if eager to get rid of the sub- 
 ject, Mordaunt threw his purchase, with some- 
 thing like careless disdain ; and, telling her to put 
 it aside, snatched his gun, which stood in the 
 corner, threw his shooting accoutrements about 
 him, and without noticing Bryce's attempt to en-
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 ter into conversation upon the " braw seal-skin, 
 as saft as doe-leather," which made the sling and 
 cover of his fowling-piece, he left the apartment 
 abruptly. 
 
 The j agger, with those green goggling and 
 gain-descrying kind of optics, which we have al- 
 ready described, continued gazing for an instant 
 after the customer, who treated his wares with 
 such irreverence. 
 
 Swertha also looked after him with some sur- 
 prise. " The callant's in a creel," quoth she. 
 
 " In a creel !" echoed the pedlar, " he will be 
 as wowf as ever his father was. To guide in that 
 gate a bargain that cost him four dollars very, 
 very Fifish, as the east-country fisher-folks say." 
 " Four dollars for that green rag !" said Swer- 
 tha, catching at the words which the jagger had 
 unwarily suffered to escape " that was a bar- 
 gain indeed ! I wonder whether he is the greater 
 fule, or you the mair rogue, Bryce Snailsfoot." 
 
 " I didna say it cost him preceesely four dol- 
 lars," said Snailsfoot ; " but if it had, the lad's 
 siller's his ain, I hope ; and he is auld aneugli to
 
 THE PIUATE. 221 
 
 % 
 
 make his ain bargains. Mair by token, the gudes 
 are weel worth the money, and mair." 
 
 " Mair by token," said Swertha coolly, " I 
 will see what his father thinks about it." 
 
 " Ye'll no be sae ill natured, Mrs Swertha," 
 said the jagger ; " that will be but cauld thanks 
 for the bonny owerlay , hat I hae brought you a* 
 the way frae Lerwick." 
 
 " And a bonnie price yell be setting on't," 
 said Swertha ; " for that's the gate your good 
 deeds end." 
 
 " Ye sail hae the fixing of the price yoursell ; 
 or it may lie ower till you're buying something 
 for the house, or for your master, and it can make 
 a' ae count." 
 
 *' Troth and that's true, Bryce Snailsfoot, I 
 am thinking we'll want some napery sune for 
 it's no to be thought we can spin, and the like, as 
 if there was a mistress in the house ; and sae we 
 make nane at hame.' 1 
 
 " And that's what I ca' walking by the word," 
 said the jagger. " ' Go unto those that buy and 
 sell ;* there's muckle profit in that text."
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " There is a pleasure in dealing wi 1 a discreet 
 man, that can make profit of ony thing," said 
 Swertha ; " and now that I take another look at 
 that daft callant's waistcoat piece, I think it is 
 honestly worth four dollars. 1 "
 
 THK 1' HI ATE 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 " I have possessed the regulation of the weather and the distribu- 
 tion of the seasons. The sun has listened to my dictates, and pass- 
 ed from tropic to tropic by my direction ; the clouds, at my com- 
 mand, have poured forth their waters." 
 
 Rasselat, 
 
 ANY sudden cause for anxious and mortifying 
 reflection, which, in advanced age, occasions sul- 
 len and pensive inactivity, stimulates youth to 
 eager and active exertion, as if, like the hurt deer, 
 they endeavour to drown the pain of the shaft 
 by the rapidity of motion. When Mordaunt 
 caught up his gun, and rushed out of the house 
 of Jarlshof, he walked on with great activity over 
 waste and wild, without any determined purpose, 
 except that of escaping, if possible, from the smart 
 of his own irritation. His pride was effectually 
 mortified by the report of the jagger, which co- 
 incided exactly with some doubts he had been
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 led to entertain, by the long and unkind silence 
 of his friends at Burgh-Westra. 
 
 If the fortunes of Caesar had doomed him, as 
 the poet suggests, to have been 
 
 " But the best wrestler on the green," 
 
 it is nevertheless to be presumed, that a foil from 
 a rival, in that rustic exercise, would have mor- 
 tified him as much as a defeat from his rival, 
 when he was struggling for the empery of the 
 world. And even so Mordaunt Mertoun, de- 
 graded in his own eyes from the height which 
 he had occupied as the chief amongst the youth 
 of the island, felt vexed and irritated, as well as 
 humbled. The two beautiful sisters also, whose 
 smiles all were so desirous of acquiring, with 
 whom he had lived on terms of such familiar af- 
 fection, that, with the same ease and innocence, 
 there was unconsciously mixed a shade of deeper 
 though undefined tenderness than characterizes 
 fraternal love, they also seemed to have forgot- 
 ten him. He could not be ignorant that, in the 
 universal opinion of all Dunrossness, nay, of the 
 whole Main-land, he might have had every chance 
 12
 
 THK PIRATE. 
 
 of being the favoured lover of either ; and now at 
 once, and without any failure on his part, he was 
 become so little to them, that he had lost even 
 the consequence of an ordinary acquaintance. 
 The old Udaller, too, whose hearty and sincere 
 character should have been more constant in his 
 friendships, seemed to have been as fickle as his 
 daughters, and poor Mordaunt had at once lost 
 the smiles of the fair, and the favour of the power- 
 ful. These were uncomfortable reflections, and 
 he doubled his pace, that he might outstrip them 
 if possible. 
 
 Without exactly reflecting upon the route 
 which he pursued, Mordaunt walked briskly on 
 through a country where neither hedge, wall, nor 
 inclosure of any kind, interrupts the steps of the 
 wanderer, until he reached a very solitary spot 
 where, embosomed among steep heathy hills, 
 which sunk suddenly down on the verge of the 
 water, lay one of those small fresh-water lakes 
 which are common in the Zetland isles, whose 
 outlets form the sources of the small brooks and 
 rivulets by which the country is watered, and 
 
 VOL. i. p
 
 226 THE PIRATE. 
 
 serve to drive the little mills which manufacture 
 their grain. 
 
 It was a mild summer day ; the beams of the 
 sun, as is not uncommon in Zetland, were mode- 
 rated and shaded by a silvery haze, which filled 
 the atmosphere, and, destroying the strong con- 
 trast of light and shade, gave even to noon the 
 sober livery of the evening twilight. The little 
 lake, not three-quarters of a mile in circuit, lay 
 in profound quiet ; its surface undimpled, save 
 when one of the numerous water-fowl, which gli- 
 ded on its surface, dived for an instant under it. 
 The depth of the water gave the whole that ceru- 
 lean tintof bluish green, which occasioned its being 
 called the Green Loch ; and at. present, it form- 
 ed so perfect a mirror to the bleak hills by which 
 it was surrounded, and which lay reflected on its 
 bosom, that it was difficult to distinguish the wa- 
 ter from the land ; nay, in the shadowy uncer- 
 tainty occasioned by the thin haze, a stranger 
 could scarce have been sensible that a sheet of wa- 
 ter lay before him. A scene of more complete so- 
 litude, having all its peculiarities heightened by
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 the extreme serenity of the weather, the quiet 
 grey composed tone of the atmosphere, and the 
 perfect silence of the elements, could hardly be 
 imagined. The very aquatic birds, who frequented 
 the spot in great numbers, forbore their usual 
 flight and screams, and floated in profound tran- 
 quillity upon the silent water. 
 
 Without taking any determined aim without 
 having any determined purpose without almost 
 thinking what he was about, Mordaunt present- 
 ed his fowling-piece, and fired across the lake. 
 The large swan-shot dimpled its surface like a 
 partial shower of hail the hills took up the noise 
 of the report, and repeated it again, and again, 
 and again, to all their echoes ; the water-fowl 
 took to wing in eddying and confused wheel, 
 answering the echoes with a thousand varying 
 screams, from the deep note of the swabie or 
 swartback, to the querulous cry of the tirracke 
 and kittiewake. 
 
 Mordaunt looked for a moment on the clamor- 
 ous crowd with a feeling of resentment, which he 
 felt disposed at the moment to apply to all nature, 
 and all her objects, animate or inanimate, how- 
 9
 
 228 THE PIRATE. 
 
 ever little concerned with the cause of his inter- 
 nal mortification. 
 
 " Ay, ay/' he said, " wheel, dive, scream, and 
 clamour as you will, and all because you have 
 seen a strange sight, and heard an unusual sound. 
 There is many a one like you in this round world. 
 But you, at least, shall learn," he added, as he 
 re-loaded his gun, " that strange sights and 
 strange sounds, ay, and strange acquaintances 
 to boot, have sometimes a little shade of danger 
 connected with them. But why should I wreak 
 my own vexation on these harmless sea-gulls ?" 
 he subjoined, after a moment's pause ; " they 
 have nothing to do with the friends that have for- 
 gotten me. I loved them all so well, and to be 
 so soon given up for the first stranger whom 
 chance threw on the coast !" 
 
 As he stood resting upon his gun, and aban- 
 doning his mind to the course of these unpleasant 
 reflections, his meditations were unexpectedly in- 
 terrupted by some one touching his shoulder. 
 He looked around, and saw Norna of the Fitful- 
 head, wrapped in her dark and ample mantle. She 
 had seen him from the brow of the hill, and had
 
 THE 1'IKATE. 
 
 descended to the lake, through a small ravine 
 which concealed her, until she came with noise- 
 less step so close to him that he turned round at 
 her touch. 
 
 Mordaunt Mertoun was by nature neither 
 timorous nor credulous, and a course of reading 
 more extensive than usual had, in some degree, 
 fortified his mind against the attacks of supersti- 
 tion; but he would have been an actual prodigy, 
 if, living in Zetland in the end of the seventeenth 
 century, he had possessed the philosophy which 
 did not exist in Scotland generally, until at least 
 two generations later. He doubted in his own 
 mind the extent, nay, the very existence, of Nor- 
 na's supernatural attributes, which was a high 
 flight of incredulity in the country where they 
 were universally received ; but still his incre- 
 dulity went no farther than doubts. She was 
 unquestionably an extraordinary woman, gifted 
 with an energy above others, acting upon motives 
 peculiar to herself, and apparently independent 
 on mere earthly considerations. Impressed with 
 these ideas, which he had imbibed from his youth,
 
 230 THE PIRATE. 
 
 it was not without something like alarm, that he 
 beheld this mysterious female standing of a sud- 
 den so close beside him, and looking upon him 
 with such sad and severe eyes, as those with which 
 the Fatal Virgins, who, according to northern my- 
 thology, were called the Valkyriur, or " chusers 
 of the slain, 1 ' were supposed to regard the young 
 champions whom they selected to share the ban- 
 quet of Odin. 
 
 It was, indeed, reckoned unlucky, to say the 
 least, to meet with Norna suddenly alone, and in 
 a place remote from witnesses ; and she was sup- 
 posed, on such occasions, to have been usually a 
 prophetess of evil, as well as an omen of misfor- 
 tune, to those who had such a rencontre. There 
 were few or none of the islanders, however fami- 
 liarized with her occasional appearance in society, 
 that would not have trembled to meet her on the 
 solitary banks of the Green Loch. 
 
 " I bring you no evil, Mordaunt Mertoun," 
 she said, reading perhaps something of this su- 
 perstitious feeling in the looks of the young man. 
 " Evil from me you never felt, and never will.""
 
 THE PIIIATE. 231 
 
 " Nor do I fear any," said Mordaunt, exert- 
 ing himself to throw aside an apprehension which 
 he felt to be unmanly. " Why should I, mo- 
 ther, you have been ever my friend ?" 
 
 " Yet, Mordaunt, thou art not of our region ; 
 but to none of Zetland blood, no, not even to 
 those who sit around the hearth-stone of Magnus 
 Troil, the noble descendants of the ancient Jarls 
 of Orkney, am I more a well-wisher, than I am 
 to thee, thou kind and brave-hearted boy. When 
 I hung around thy neck that gifted chain, which 
 all in our isles know was wrought by no earthly 
 artist, but by the Drows, in the secret recesses of 
 their caverns, thou wert then but fifteen years 
 old ; yet thy foot had been on the Maiden-skerrie 
 of Northmaven, known before but to the webbed 
 sole of the swariback, and thy skiff had been 
 in the deepest cavern of Brinnastir, where the 
 Jiaafjish * had before slumbered in dark obscu- 
 rity. Therefore I gave thee that noble gift ; and 
 
 * The larger seal, or sea-calf, which seeks the most SO T 
 litary recesses for its abode. See Dr Edmonstone's Zct* 
 land, vol. II. p. 294.
 
 232 THE PI 11 ATE. 
 
 well thou knowest, that since that day, every eye 
 in these isles has looked on thee as a son, or as a 
 brother, endowed beyond other youths, and the 
 favoured of those whose hour of power is when 
 the night meets with the day." * 
 
 " Alas ! mother, 11 said Mordaunt, " your kind 
 gift may have given me favour, but it has not 
 been able to keep it for me, or I have not been 
 able to keep it for myself. What matters it ? I 
 shall learn to set as little by others as they do by 
 me. My father says that I shall soon leave these 
 
 * The Drows or Trows, the legitimate successors of the 
 northern duergar, and somewhat allied to the fairies, re- 
 side like them in the interior of green hills and caverns, 
 and are most powerful at midnight. They are curious ar- 
 tificers in iron, as well as in the precious metals, and are 
 sometimes propitious to mortals, but more frequently ca- 
 pricious and malevolent. Among the common people of 
 Zetland, their existence still forms an article of universal 
 belief. In the neighbouring isles of Feroe, they are called 
 Foddenskencand, or subterranean people ; and Lucas Ja- 
 cobson Debes, well acquainted with their nature, assures 
 us that they inhabit in those places which are polluted 
 with the effusion of blood, or the practice of any crying 
 sin. They have a government, which seems to be mo- 
 narchical.
 
 THE PittATK. 
 
 islands, and therefore, Mother Norna, I will re- 
 turn to you your fairy gift, that it may bring 
 more lasting luck to some other than it has done 
 to me." 
 
 " Despise not the gift of the nameless race," 
 said Norna, frowning ; then suddenly changing 
 her tone of displeasure to that of mournful so- 
 lemnity, she added, " Despise them not, but, O 
 Mordaunt, court them not ! Sit down on that 
 grey stone thou art the son of my adoption, 
 and I will doff, as far as I may, those attributes 
 that sever me from the common mass of huma- 
 nity, and speak with you as a parent with a child." 
 
 There was a tremulous tone of grief which 
 mingled with the loftiness of her language and 
 carriage, and was calculated to excite sympathy, 
 as well as to attract attention. Mordaunt sate 
 down on the rock which she pointed out, a frag- 
 ment which, with many others that lay scattered 
 around, had been torn by some winter storm from 
 the precipice at the foot of which it lay, upon the 
 very verge of the water. Norna took her own 
 seat on a stone at about three feet distance, ad- 
 justed her mantle so that little more than her fore-
 
 234 THE PIKATil. 
 
 head, her eyes, and a single lock of her grey hair 
 were seen from beneath the shade of her dark 
 wadmaal cloak, and then proceeded in a tone in 
 which the imaginary consequence and importance 
 so often assumed by lunacy, seemed to contend 
 against the deep workings of some extraordinary 
 and deeply-rooted mental affliction. 
 
 " I was not always," she said, " that which I 
 now am. I was not always the wise, the powerful, 
 the commanding, before whom the young stand 
 abashed, and the old uncover their grey heads. 
 There was a time when my appearance did not 
 silence mirth, when I sympathized with human 
 passion, and had my own share in human joy and 
 sorrow. It was a time of helplessness it was a 
 time of folly it was a time of idle and unfruit- 
 ful laughter it was a time of causeless and sense- 
 less tears ; and yet, with its follies and its sor- 
 rows and its weaknesses, what would Norna of 
 Fitful-head give to be again the unmarked and 
 happy maiden that she was in her early days ! 
 Hear me, Mordaunt, and bear with me ; for you 
 hear me utter complaints which have never sound- 
 ed into mortal ears, and which in mortal ears shall
 
 THE Till ATE. 235 
 
 never sound again. I will be what I ought, 11 she 
 continued, starting up and extending her lean 
 and withered arm, " the queen and protectress 
 of these wild and neglected isles, I will be her 
 whose foot the waves wet not, save by her per- 
 ' mission ; ay, even though its rage be at its wild- 
 est madness whose robe the whirlwind respects 
 when it rends the house-rigging from theroof-tree. 
 Bear me witness, Mordaunt Mertoun, you heard 
 my words at Harfra you saw the tempest sink 
 before them Speak, bear me witness !" 
 
 To have contradicted her in this strain of high- 
 toned enthusiasm, would have been cruel and un- 
 availing, even had Mordaunt been more decidedly 
 convinced than he was, that an insane woman, not 
 one of supernatural power, stood before him. 
 
 " I heard you sing, 11 he replied, " and I saw 
 the tempest abate." 
 
 " Abate ? in exclaimed Norna, striking the 
 ground impatiently with her staff of black oak ; 
 " thou speakest it but half it sunk at once 
 sunk in shorter space than the child that is 
 hushed to silence by the nurse. Enough, you
 
 THE PIKATK. 
 
 know my power but you know not mortal 
 man knows not, and never shall know, the 
 price which I paid to attain it. No, Mordaunt, 
 never for the widest sway that the ancient 
 Norsemen boasted, when their banners waved 
 victorious from Bergen to Palestine never, 
 for all that the round world contains, do thou 
 barter thy peace of mind for such greatness as 
 Norna's." She resumed her seat upon the 
 rock, drew the mantle over her face, rested her 
 head upon her hands, and by the convulsive mo- 
 tion which agitated her bosom, appeared to be 
 weeping bitterly. 
 
 " Good Norna," said Mordaunt, and paused, 
 scarce knowing what to say that might console 
 the unhappy woman u Good Norna," he again 
 resumed, " if there be aught on your mind that 
 troubles it, were you not best to go to the worthy 
 minister at Dunrossness ? Men say you have not 
 for many years been in a Christian congregation 
 that cannot be well, or right. You are yourself 
 well known as a healer of bodily disease ; but 
 when the mind is sick, we should draw to the 
 Physician of our souls.""
 
 THE PIRATE. 237 
 
 Norna had raised her person slowly from the 
 stooping posture in which she sate ; but at length 
 she started up on her feet, threw back her mantle, 
 extended her arm, and while her lip foamed, and 
 her eye sparkled, exclaimed in a tone resembling 
 a scream, " Me did you speak me did you 
 bid seek out a priest ! Would you kill the good 
 man with horror ? Me in a Christian congrega- 
 tion ! Would you have the roof to fall on the 
 sackless assembly, and mingle their blood with 
 their worship ? I I seek to the good Physi- 
 cian ! Would you have the fiend claim his prey 
 openly before God and man ?" 
 
 The extreme agitation of the unhappy speaker 
 naturally led Mordaunt to the conclusion, which 
 was generally adopted and accredited in that su- 
 perstitious country and period. " Wretched wo- 
 man," he said, " if indeed thou hast leagued thy- 
 self with the Powers of Evil, why should you not 
 seek even yet for repentance ? But do as thou 
 wilt, I cannot, dare not, as a Christian, abide 
 longer with you ; and take again your gift," he 
 said, offering back the chain. " Good can never 
 come of it, if indeed evil hath not come already."
 
 238 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " Be still and hear me, thou foolish boy," said 
 Norna calmly, as if she had been restored to rea- 
 son by the alarm and horror which she perceived 
 in Mordaunt's countenance ; " hear me, I say. 
 I am not of those who have leagued themselves 
 with the Enemy of mankind, or derive skill or 
 power from his ministry. And although the un- 
 earthly powers were propitiated by a sacrifice 
 which human tongue can never utter, yet, God 
 knows, my guilt in that offering was no more than 
 that of the blind man who falls from the precipice 
 which he could neither see nor shun. O, leave 
 me not shun me not in this hour of weakness ! 
 Remain with me till the temptation be passed, or 
 I will plunge myself into that lake, and rid my- 
 self at once of my power and my wretchedness." 
 
 Mordaunt, who had always looked up to this 
 singular woman with a sort of affection, occasion- 
 ed no doubt by the early kindness and distinc- 
 tion which she had shewn to him, was readily in- 
 duced to reassume his seat, and listen to what she 
 had further to say, in hopes that she would gra- 
 dually overcome the violence of her agitation. 
 It was not long ere she seemed to have gained the
 
 THE PIUATE. 239 
 
 victory her companion expected, for she address- 
 ed him in her usually steady and authoritative 
 manner. 
 
 " It was not of myself, Mordaunt, that I pur- 
 posed to speak, when I beheld you from the sum- 
 mit of yonder grey rock, and came down the path 
 to meet with you. My fortunes are fixed beyond 
 change, be it for weal or for woe. For myself 
 I have ceased to feel much ; but for those whom 
 she loves, Norna of the Fitful-head has still those 
 feelings which link her to her kind. Mark me 
 there is an eagle, the noblest that builds in these 
 airy precipices, and into that eagle's nest there 
 has crept an adder wilt thou lend thy aid to 
 crush the reptile, and to save the noble brood of 
 the lord of the north sky ?" 
 
 " You must speak more plainly, Norna," said 
 Mordaunt, " if you would have me understand 
 or answer you. I am no guesser of riddles."" 
 
 " In plain language, then, you know well the 
 family of Burgh- Westra the lovely daughters 
 of the generous old Udaller, Magnus Troil, 
 Minna and Brenda, I mean. You know them, 
 and you love them."
 
 240 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " I have known them, mother, 1 ' replied Mor- 
 daunt, " and I have loved them none knows it 
 better than you yourself." 
 
 " To know them once, 11 said Norna, emphati- 
 cally, " is to know them always. To love them 
 once, is to love them for ever." 
 
 " To have loved them once, is to wish them 
 well for ever," replied the youth ; " but it is no- 
 thing more. To be plain with you, Norna, the 
 family at Burgh- Westra have of late totally ne- 
 glected me. But shew me the means of serving 
 them ; I will convince you how much I have re- 
 membered old kindness, how little I resent late 
 coldness." 
 
 " It is well spoken, and I will put your pur- 
 pose to the proof, 1 ' replied Norna. " Magnus 
 Troil has taken a serpent into his bosom his 
 lovely daughters are delivered up to the machi- 
 nations of a villain." 
 
 " You mean the stranger, Cleveland ?" said 
 Mordaunt. 
 
 " The stranger who so calls himself," replied 
 Norna " the same whom we found flung ashore 
 like a waste heap of sea-weed at the foot of the 
 l
 
 THE PIEATE. 
 
 Sumburgh-cape. I felt that within me, that 
 would have prompted me to let him lie till the 
 tide floated him off, as it had floated him on shore. 
 I repent me I gave not way to it." 
 
 " But," said Mordaunt, " I cannot repent that 
 I did my duty as a Christian man. And what right 
 have I to wish otherwise ? If Minna, Brenda, 
 Magnus, and the rest, like that stranger better 
 than me, I have no title to be offended ; nay, I 
 might well be laughed at for bringing myself in- 
 to comparison." 
 
 " It is well, and I trust they merit thy unselfish 
 friendship. 11 
 
 " But I cannot perceive," said Mordaunt, " in 
 what you can propose that I should serve them. 
 I have but just learned by Bryce the jagger, that 
 this Captain Cleveland is all in all with the ladies 
 at Harfra, and with the Udaller himself. I 
 would like ill to intrude myself where I am not 
 welcome, or to place my home-bred merit in com- 
 parison with Captain Cleveland's. He can tell 
 them of battles, when I can only speak of birds- 
 nestscan speak of shooting Frenchmen, when 
 
 VOL. I. Q,
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 I can only tell of shooting seals he wears gay 
 clothes, and bears a brave countenance; I am 
 plainly dressed, and plainly nurtured. Such gay 
 gallants as he can noose the hearts of those he 
 lives with, as the fowler nooses the guillemot with 
 his rod and line." 
 
 " You do wrong to yourself," replied Norna, 
 " wrong to yourself, and greater wrong to Minna 
 and Brenda ; and trust not the reports of Bryce 
 he is like the greedy chaffer-whale, that will 
 change his course and dive for the most petty 
 coin which a fisher can cast at him. Certain it 
 is, that if you have been lessened in the opinion 
 of Magnus Troil, that sordid fellow hath had 
 some share in it. But let him count his vantage, 
 for my eye is upon him." 
 
 " And why, mother,"" said Mordaunt, " do 
 you not tell to Magnus what you have told to 
 me?" 
 
 " Because," replied Norna, " they who wax 
 wise in their own conceit must be taught a bitter 
 lesson by experience. It was but yesterday that 
 I spoke with Magnus, and what was his reply ? 
 * Good Norna, you grow old. 1 And this was
 
 THE PIRATE. 243 
 
 spoken by one bounden to me by so many and 
 such close ties by the descendant of the ancient 
 Norse earls this was from Magnus Troil to me ; 
 and it was said in behalf of one whom the sea 
 flung forth as wreck- weed ! Since he despises the 
 counsel of the aged, he shall be taught by that 
 of the young ; and well that he is not left to his 
 own folly. Go, therefore, to Burgh Westra as 
 usually upon the Baptist's festival." 
 
 " I have had no invitation," said Mordaunt ; 
 " I am not wanted, not wished for, not thought 
 of perhaps I shall not be acknowledged if I go 
 thither ; and yet, mother, to confess the truth, 
 thither I had thought to go." 
 
 " It was a good thought, and to be cherished," 
 replied Norna ; " we seek our friends when they 
 are sick in health, why not when they are sick in 
 mind, and surfeited with prosperity ? Do not fail 
 to go it may be, we shall meet there. Mean- 
 while our roads lie different. Farewell, and speak 
 not of this meeting." 
 
 They parted, and Mordaunt remained stand- 
 ing by the lake, with his eyes fixed on Norna, 
 until her tall dark form became invisible among
 
 244? THE PIRATE. 
 
 the windings of the valley down which she wan- 
 dered, and Mordaunt returned to his father's 
 mansion, determined to follow counsel which co- 
 incided so well with his own wishes.
 
 THE PIRATE. 245 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 " All your ancient customs, 
 And long descended usages, I'll change. 
 Ye shall not eat nor drink, nor speak nor move, 
 Think, look, or walk, as ye were wont to do ; 
 Even your marriage-beds shall know mutation ; 
 The bride shall have the stock, the groom the wall ; 
 For all old practice will I turn and change, 
 And call it reformation marry, will I !" 
 
 ' T is Even that we're at Odds. 
 
 THE festal day approached, and still no invi- 
 tation arrived for that guest, without whom, but 
 a little space since, no feast could have been held 
 in the island ; while, on the other hand, such re- 
 ports as reached them on every side spoke highly 
 of the favour which Captain Cleveland enjoyed 
 in the family of the old Udaller of Burgh Westra. 
 Swertha and the old Ranzelar shook their heads 
 at these mutations, and reminded Mordaunt, by 
 many a half-hint and inuendo, that he had incur- 
 red this eclipse by being so imprudently active 
 to secure the safety of the stranger when he lay 
 at the mercy of the next wave beneath the cliffs
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 of Sumburgh-head. " It is best to let saut water 
 take its gait," said Swertha'; " luck never came 
 of crossing it." 
 
 " In troth," said the Ranzelar, " they are wise 
 folks that let wave and withy haud their ain 
 luck never came of a half-drowned man, or a 
 half-hanged ane either. Who was't shot Will 
 Paterson off the Noss ? the Dutchman that he 
 saved from sinking, I trow. To fling a drown- 
 ing man a plank or a tow, may be the part of a 
 Christian ; but I say keep hands aff him, if ye 
 wad live and thrive free frae his danger." 
 
 " Ye are a wise man, Ranzelar, and a worthy," 
 echoed Swertha, with a groan, " and ken how 
 and whan to help a neighbour, as weel as ony 
 man that ever drew a net." 
 
 " In troth, I have seen length of days," an- 
 swered the Ranzelar, " and I have heard what 
 the auld folk said to each other anent sic mat- 
 ters; and nae man in Zetland shall go farther 
 than I will in any Christian service to a man on 
 firm land ; but if he cry help out of the saut 
 waves, that's another story." 
 
 " And yet, to think of this lad Cleveland
 
 THE PIRATE. 247 
 
 standing in our Master Mordaunt's light," said 
 Swertha, " and with Magnus Troil, that thought 
 him the flower of the island but on Whitsunday 
 last, and Magnus, too, that's both held (when 
 he's fresh, honest man) the wisest and wealthiest 
 of Zetland/' 
 
 " He canna win by it," said the Ranzelman, 
 with a look of the deepest sagacity. " There's 
 whiles, Swertha, that the wisest of us (as I am 
 sure I humbly confess mysel) may be little better 
 than gulls, and can no more win by doing deeds 
 of folly than I can step over Sumburgh-head. It 
 has been my own case once or twice in my life. 
 But we will see soon what ill is to come of all 
 this, for good there cannot come," 
 
 And Swertha answered, with the same tone of 
 prophetic wisdom, " Na, na, gude can never 
 come on it, and that is ower truly said." 
 
 These doleful predictions, repeated from time 
 to time, had some effect upon Mordaunt. He did 
 not indeed suppose, that the charitable action of 
 relieving a drowning man had subjected him, as 
 a necessary and fatal consequence, to the unplea-
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 sant circumstances in which he was placed ; yet 
 he. felt as if a sort of spell were drawn around 
 him, of which he neither understood the nature 
 or the extent ; that some power, in short, be- 
 yond his own controul, was acting upon his des- 
 tiny, and, as it seemed, with no friendly influence. 
 His curiosity, as well as his anxiety, was highly 
 excited, and he continued determined, at all events, 
 to make his personal appearance at the approach- 
 ing festival, when he was impressed with the be- 
 lief that something uncommon was necessarily to 
 take place-, which should determine his future 
 views and prospects in life. 
 
 As the elder Mertoun was at this time in his 
 ordinary state of health, it became necessary 
 that his son should intimate to him his intended 
 visit to Burgh Westra. He did so ; and his fa- 
 ther desired to know the especial reason of his 
 going thither at this particular time. 
 
 t( It is a time of merry-making, 11 replied the 
 youth ; " all the country are assembled. 11 
 
 " And you are doubtless impatient to add an- 
 other fool to the number.-~-Go but beware how
 
 THE PIRATE. 249 
 
 you walk in the path which you arc about to 
 tread a fall from the cliffs of Foula were not 
 more fatal." 
 
 " May I ask the reason of your caution, sir ?" 
 replied Mordaunt, breaking through the reserve 
 which ordinarily subsisted betwixt him and his 
 singular parent. 
 
 " Magnus Troil," said the elder Mertoun, 
 " has two daughters you are of the age when 
 men look upon such gawds with eyes of affection, 
 that they may afterwards learn to curse the day 
 that first opened their eyes upon heaven. I bid 
 you beware of them ; for, as sure as that death 
 and sin came into the world by woman, so sure 
 are their soft words, and softer looks, the utter 
 destruction and ruin of all who put faith in them." 
 
 Mordaunt had sometimes observed his father's 
 marked dislike to the female sex, but had never 
 before heard him give vent to it in terms so de- 
 termined and precise. He replied, that the daugh- 
 ters of Magnus Troil were no more to him than 
 any other females in the islands ; " they were 
 even of less importance," he said, " for they had
 
 250 THE PIRATE. 
 
 broken off their friendship with him, without as- 
 signing any cause.' 1 
 
 " And you go to seek the renewal of it," an- 
 swered his father. " Silly moth, that hast once 
 escaped the taper without singeing thy wings, 
 you are not contented with the safe obscurity of 
 these wilds, but must hasten back to the flame, 
 which is sure at length to consume thee. Why 
 should I waste arguments in deterring thee from 
 thy inevitable fate ? Go where thy destiny calls 
 thee." 
 
 On the succeeding day, which was the eve of 
 the great festival, Mordaunt set forth on his road 
 to Burgh Westra, pondering alternately on the 
 injunctions of Norna on the ominous words of 
 his father on the inauspicious auguries of Swer- 
 tha and the Ranzelar of Jarlshof and not with- 
 out experiencing that gloom with which so many 
 concurring circumstances of ill omen combined to 
 oppress his mind. 
 
 " It bodes me but a cold reception at Burgh 
 Westra," said he; " but my stay shall be the 
 shorter. I will but find out whether they have been
 
 THE PIUATE. 251 
 
 deceived by this sea-faring stranger, or whether 
 they have acted out of pure caprice of temper, 
 and love of change of company. If the first be 
 the case, I will vindicate my character, and let 
 Captain Cleveland look to himself; if the latter, 
 why then, goodnight to Burgh Westra and all 
 its inmates." 
 
 As he mentally meditated this last alternative, 
 hurt pride, and a return of fondness for those to 
 whom he supposed he was bidding farewell for 
 ever, brought a tear into his eye, which he dash- 
 ed off hastily and indignantly, as, mending his 
 pace, he continued on his journey. 
 
 The weather being now serene and undisturb- 
 ed, Mordaunt made his way with an ease that 
 formed a striking contrast to the difficulties which 
 he had encountered when he last travelled the 
 same route ; yet there was a less pleasing subject 
 for comparison, within his own mind. 
 
 " My breast," he said to himself, " was then 
 against the wind, but my heart within was serene 
 and happy. I would I had now the same care- 
 less feelings, were they to be bought by battling
 
 252 THE PIRATE. 
 
 with the severest storm that ever blew across 
 these lonely hills." 
 
 With such thoughts, he arrived about noon at 
 Harfra, the habitation, as the reader may remem- 
 ber, of the ingenious Mr Yellowley. Our traveller 
 had, upon the present occasion, taken care to be 
 quite independent of the niggardly hospitality of 
 this mansion, which was now become infamous on 
 that account through the whole island, by bring- 
 ing with him, in his small knapsack, such provi- 
 sions as might have sufficed for a longer journey. 
 In courtesy, however, or rather, perhaps, to get 
 rid of his own disquieting thoughts, Mdrdaunt did 
 not fail to call at the mansion, which he found in 
 singular commotion. iViptolemus himself, in- 
 vested with a pair of large jack-boots, went clat- 
 tering up and down stairs, screaming out ques- 
 tions to his sister and his serving- woman Trbnda, 
 who replied with shriller and more complicated 
 screeches. At length, Mrs Baby herself made 
 her appearance, with her venerable person invest- 
 ed in what was then called a Joseph, an ample 
 garment, which had once been green, but now,
 
 THE PIRATE. 253 
 
 betwixt stains and patches, had become like the 
 vesture of the patriarch whose name it bore a 
 garment of divers colours. A steeple-crowned 
 hat, the purchase of some long past moment, in 
 which vanity had got the better of avarice, with 
 a feather which had stood as much wind and rain 
 as if it had been part of a sea-mew's wing, made 
 up her equipment, save that in her hand she held 
 a silver-mounted whip of antique fashion. This 
 attire, as well as an air of determined bustle in 
 the gait and appearance of Mrs Barbara Yellow- 
 ley, seemed to bespeak that she was prepared to 
 take a journey, and cared not, as the saying goes, 
 who knew that such was her determination. 
 
 She was the first that observed Mordaunt on 
 his arrival, and she greeted him with a degree of 
 mingled emotion. " Be good to us !" she ex- 
 claimed, u if here is not the canty callant that 
 wears yon thing about his neck, and that snap- 
 ped up our goose as light as if it had been a 
 sandie-lavrock !" The admiration of the gold 
 chain, which had formerly made so deep an im- 
 pression on her mind, was marked in the first part 
 of her speech, the recollection of the untimely
 
 254 THE PIRATE. 
 
 fate of the smoked goose was commemorated in 
 the second clause. " I will lay the burthen of 
 my life," she instantly added, " that he is gang- 
 ing our gate. 1 ' 
 
 " I am bound for Burgh Westra, Mrs Yellow- 
 ley," said Mordaunt. 
 
 " And blithe will we be of your company," 
 she added " it's early day to eat ; but if you 
 liked a barley scone and a drink of bland na- 
 theless, it is ill travelling on a full stomach, be- 
 sides quelling your appetite for the feast that is 
 biding you this day ; for all sort of prodigality 
 there will doubtless be." 
 
 Mordaunt produced his own stores, and, ex- 
 plaining that he did not love to be burthensome 
 to them on this second occasion, invited them to 
 partake of the provisions he had to offer. Poor 
 Triptolemus, who seldom saw half so good a din- 
 ner as his guest's luncheon, threw himself upon the 
 good cheer, like Sancho on the scum of Camacho's 
 kettle, and even the lady herself could not resist 
 the temptation, though she gave way to it with 
 more moderation, and with something like a sense 
 of shame. " She had let the fire out," she said, 
 
 15
 
 THE PI HATE. 255 
 
 " for it was a pity wasting fuel in so cold a 
 country, and so she had not thought of getting 
 any thing ready, as they were to set out so soon ; 
 and so she could not but say, that the young 
 gentleman's nacJcet looked very good ; and besides, 
 she had some curiosity to see whether the folks 
 in this country cured their beef in the same way 
 they did in the north of Scotland. 1 ' Under which 
 combined considerations, Dame Baby made a 
 hearty experiment on the refreshments which 
 thus unexpectedly presented themselves. 
 
 When their extemporary repast was finished, 
 the factor became solicitous to take the road ; and 
 now Mordaunt discovered, that the alacrity with 
 which he had been received by Mistress Baby 
 was not altogether disinterested. Neither she nor 
 the learned Triptolemus felt much disposed to 
 commit themselves to the wilds of Zetland, with- 
 out the assistance of a guide ; and although they 
 could have commanded the assistance of one of 
 their own labouring folks, yet the cautious agri- 
 culturist observed, that it would be losing at 
 least one day's work ; and his sister multiplied 
 his apprehensions by echoing back, " One day's
 
 256 THE PIRATE. 
 
 work ? ye may weel say twenty for, set ane of 
 their noses within the smell of a kail-pot, and 
 their lugs within the sound of a fiddle, and whistle 
 them back if ye can."" 
 
 Now the fortunate arrival of Mordaunt, in the 
 very nick of time, not to mention the good cheer 
 which he brought with him, made him as wel- 
 come as any one could possibly be to a thresh- 
 hold, which, on all ordinary occasions, abhorred 
 the passage of a guest ; nor was Mr Yellowley 
 altogether insensible of the pleasure he promised 
 himself in detailing his plans of improvement to 
 his young companion, and enjoying what his fate 
 seldom assigned him the company of a patient 
 and admiring listener. 
 
 As the factor and his sister were to prosecute 
 their journey on horseback, it only remained to 
 mount their guide and companion a thing easi- 
 ly accomplished, where there are such numbers 
 of shaggy, long-backed, short-legged ponies run- 
 ning wild upon the extensive moors, which are 
 the common pasturage for the cattle of every 
 township, where shelties, geese, swine, goats, 
 sheep, and little Zetland cows, are turned out 
 14
 
 THE PIRATE. 257 
 
 promiscuously, and often in numbers which can 
 obtain but precarious subsistence from the nig- 
 gard vegetation. There is, indeed, a right of in- 
 dividual property in all these animals, which are 
 branded or tattooed by each owner with his own 
 peculiar mark ; but when any passenger has oc- 
 casional use for a poney, he never scruples to lay 
 hold of the first which he can catch, puts on a 
 halter, and, having rode him as far as he finds 
 convenient, turns the animal loose to find his way 
 back again as he best can a matter in which the 
 ponies are sufficiently sagacious; 
 
 Although this general exercise of property was 
 one of the enormities which in due time the fac- 
 tor intended to abolish, yet, like a wise man, he 
 scrupled not, in the meantime, to avail himself of 
 so general a practice, which, he condescended to 
 allow, was particularly convenient for those who, 
 (as chanced to be his own present case,) had no 
 ponies of their own on which their neighbours 
 could retaliate. Three shelties, therefore, were 
 procured from the hill little shagged animals, 
 more resembling wild bears than any thing of the 
 horse tribe, yet possessed of no small degree of 
 
 VOL. i. h
 
 258 THE PIKATE. 
 
 strength and spirit, and able to endure as much 
 fatigue and indifferent usage as any creatures in 
 the world. 
 
 Two of these horses were already provided 
 and fully accoutred for the journey. One of them, 
 destined to bear the fair person of Mistress Baby, 
 was decorated with a huge side-saddle of vene- 
 rable antiquity a mass, as it were, of cushion 
 and padding, from which depended, on all sides, 
 a housing of ancient tapestry, which, having been 
 originally intended for a horse of ordinary size, 
 covered up the diminutive palfrey over whom it 
 was spread, from the ears to the tail, and from 
 the shoulder to the fetlock, leaving nothing visi- 
 ble but its head, which looked fiercely out from 
 these enfoldments, like the heraldric representa- 
 tion of a lion looking out of a bush. Mordaunt 
 gallantly lifted up the fair Mistress Yellowley, 
 and, at the expence of very slight exertion, placed 
 her upon the summit of her mountainous saddle. 
 It is probable, that, on feeling herself thus squi- 
 red and attended upon, and experiencing the long 
 unwonted consciousness that she was attired in 
 her best array, some thoughts dawned upon Mis- 
 tress Baby's mind, which chequered, for an in-
 
 THE PIRATE. 259 
 
 slant, those habitual ideas about thrift, that form- 
 ed the daily and all-engrossing occupation of 
 her soul. She glanced her eye upon her faded 
 Joseph, and on the long housings of her saddle, 
 as she observed, with a smile, to Mordaunt, that 
 " travelling was a pleasant thing in fine weather 
 and agreeable company, if," she added, glancing 
 a look at a place where the embroidery was some- 
 what frayed and tattered, " it was not sae waste- 
 ful to ane's horse-furniture. 1 ' 
 
 Meanwhile, her brother stepped stoutly to his 
 steed ; and as he chose, notwithstanding the se- 
 renity of the weather, to throw a long red cloak 
 over his other garments, his poney was even more 
 completely enveloped in drapery than that of his 
 sister. It happened, moreover, to be an animal 
 of an high and contumacious spirit, bouncing and 
 curvetting occasionally under the weight of Trip- 
 tolemus, with a vivacity which, notwithstanding 
 his Yorkshire descent, rather deranged him in 
 the saddle ; gambols which, as the palfrey itself 
 was not visible, except upon the strictest inspec- 
 tion, had, at a little distance, an effect as if they 
 were the voluntary movements of the cloaked ca-
 
 260 THE PIRATE. 
 
 valier, without the assistance of any other legs 
 than those with which nature had provided him ; 
 and, to any who had viewed Triptolemus under 
 such a persuasion, the gravity, and even distress, 
 announced in his countenance, must have made a 
 ridiculous contrast to the vivacious caprioles with 
 which he piaffed along the moor. 
 
 Mordaunt kept up with this worthy couple, 
 mounted, according to the simplicity of the time 
 and country, on the first and readiest poney which 
 they had been able to press into the service, with 
 no other accoutrement of any kind than the hal- 
 ter which served to guide him ; while Mr Yel- 
 lowley, seeing with pleasure his guide thus rea- 
 dily provided with a steed, privately resolved, 
 that this rude custom of helping travellers to 
 horses, without leave of the proprietor, should 
 not be abated in Zetland, until he came to possess 
 a herd of ponies belonging in property to himself, 
 and exposed to suffer in the way of retaliation. 
 
 But to other uses or abuses of the country, 
 Triptolemus Yellowley shewed himself less to- 
 lerant. Long and wearisome were the discourses 
 he held with Mordaunt, or, (to speak much more
 
 THK PIRATE. 261 
 
 correctly,) the harangues which he inflicted upon 
 him, concerning the changes which his own ad- 
 vent in these isles was about to occasion. Un- 
 skilled as he was in the modern arts by which an 
 estate may be improved to such a high degree that 
 it shall altogether slip through the proprietor's fin- 
 gers, Triptolemus had at least the zeal, if not the 
 knowledge, of a whole agricultural society in his 
 own person ; nor was he surpassed by any who 
 has followed him, in that noble spirit which scorns 
 to balance profit against outlay, but holds the 
 glory of effecting a great change on the face of 
 the land, to be, like virtue, in a great degree its 
 own reward. 
 
 No part of the wild and mountainous region 
 over which Mordaunt guided him but what sug- 
 gested to his active imagination some scheme of 
 improvement and alteration. He would make a 
 road through yon scarce passable glen, where at 
 present nothing but the sure-footed creatures on 
 which they were mounted could tread with any 
 safety. He would substitute better houses for 
 the skeoes, or sheds built of dry stones, in which 
 the inhabitants cured or manufactured their fish 
 they should brew good ale instead of bland
 
 $62 THK 1'IUATE. 
 
 they should plant forests where tree never grew, 
 and find mines of treasure where aDanish skilling 
 was accounted a coin of a most respectable deno- 
 mination. All these mutations, with many others, 
 did the worthy factor resolve upon, speaking at 
 the same time with the utmost confidence of the 
 countenance and assistance which he was to re- 
 ceive from the higher classes, and especially from 
 Magnus Troil. 
 
 ft I will impart some of my 'deas to the poor 
 man," he said, " before we are both many hours 
 older ; and you will mark how grateful he will 
 be to the man who brings him knowledge, which 
 is better than wealth." 
 
 " I would not have you build too strongly on 
 that," said Mordaunt, by way of caution ; " Mag- 
 nus Troll's boat is kittle to trim he likes his 
 own ways, and his country-ways, and you will as 
 soon teach your sheltie to dive like a sealgh, as 
 bring Magnus to take a Scottish fashion in the 
 place of a Norse one ; and yet, if he is steady to 
 his old customs, he may perhaps be as change- 
 able as another in his old friendships." 
 
 " Heus tu, inepte .'" said the scholar of Saint 
 Andrews, " steady or unsteady, what can it mat-
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 ter ? am not I here in point of trust, and in point 
 of power ? and shall aFowde, by which barbarous 
 appellative this Magnus Troil still calls himself, 
 presume to measure judgment and weigh reasons 
 Avith me, who represent the full dignity of the 
 Chamberlain of the islands of Orkney and Zet- 
 land?" 
 
 " Still," said Mordaunt, " I would advise you 
 not to advance too rashly upon his prejudices. 
 Magnus Troil, from the hour of his birth to this 
 day, never saw a greater man than himself, and 
 it is difficult to bridle an old horse for the first 
 time. Besides, he has at no time in his life been 
 a patient listener to long explanations, so it is 
 possible that he may quarrel with your proposed 
 reformation, before you can convince him of its 
 advantages." 
 
 " How mean you, young man ?" said the fac- 
 tor. " Is there one who dwells in these islands, 
 who is so wretchedly blind as not to be sensible 
 of their deplorable defects ? Can a man," he add- 
 ed, rising into enthusiasm as he spoke, " or 
 even a beast, look at that thing there, Avhich they 
 have the impudence to call a corn-mill, without
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 trembling to think that corn should be entrusted 
 to such a miserable molendinary ? The wretches 
 are obliged to have at least fifty in each parish, 
 each trundling away upon its paltry mill-stone, 
 under the thatch of a roof no bigger than a bee- 
 skep, instead of a noble and seemly baron's mill, 
 that you would hear the clack of through the 
 hail I country ; and that casts the meal through 
 the mill-eye by forpits at a time/' 1 
 
 " Ay, ay, brother," said his sister, " that's 
 spoken like your wise sell. The mair cost the 
 mair honour -that's your word ever mair. Can 
 it no creep into your wise head, man, that ilka 
 body grinds their ain nievefu' of meal, in this 
 country, without plaguing themselves about ba- 
 ron's mills, and thirls, and sucken, and the like 
 trade ? How mony a time have I heard you bell- 
 the-cat with auld Edie Happer, the miller at 
 Grindleburn, and wi' his very knave too, about 
 in-town and out-town multures lock, gowpen, 
 and knaveship, and a' the lave o't ; and now nae- 
 thing less will serve you than to bring in the 
 very same fashery on a wheen puir bodies, that 
 big ilk ane a mill for themselves, sic as it is."
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " Dinna tell me of gowpen and knaveship P 
 exclaimed the indignant agriculturist ; " bet- 
 ter pay the half the grist to the miller, to have 
 the rest grund in a Christian manner, than put 
 good grain into a bairnfs whirligig. Look at it 
 for a moment, Baby Bide still, ye cursed imp !" 
 This interjection was applied to his poney, which 
 began to be extremely impatient, while its rider 
 interrupted his journey, to point out all the weak 
 points of the Zetland mill " look at it, I say 
 it's just one degree better than a hand-quern 
 it has neither wheel nor trindle neither cog nor 
 happer Bide still, there's a canny beast it can- 
 na grind a bickerftT of meal in a quarter of an 
 hour, and that will be mair like a mash for horse 
 than a meltith for man's use Wherefore Bide 
 still, I say wherefore wherefore The deil's in 
 the beast, and nae good, I think !" 
 
 As he uttered the last words, the sheltie, which 
 had pranced and curvetted for some time with 
 much impatience, at length got its head betwixt 
 its legs, and at once canted its rider into the little 
 rivulet, which served to drive the depreciated 
 engine he was surveying ; then emancipating it*
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 self from the folds of the cloak, fled back towards 
 its own wilderness, neighing in scorn, and fling- 
 ing out its heels at every five yards. 
 
 Laughing heartily at his disaster, Mordaunt 
 helped the old man to arise ; while his sister 
 sarcastically congratulated him on having fallen 
 rather into the shallows of a Zetland rivulet than 
 the depths of a Scottish mill-pond. Disdaining 
 to reply to this sarcasm, Triptolemus, so soon as 
 he had recovered his legs, shaken his ears, and 
 found that the folds of his cloak had saved him 
 from being much wet in the scanty streamlet, ex- 
 claimed aloud, " I will have cussers from Lan- 
 arkshire brood mares from Ayrshire I will not 
 have one of these cursed abortions left on the 
 islands, to break honest folks'* necks I say, Ba- 
 by, I will rid the land of them." 
 
 " Ye had better wring your ain cloak, Tripto- 
 lemus," answered Baby. 
 
 Mordaunt meanwhile was employed in catch- 
 ing another poney, from a herd which strayed at 
 some distance ; and, having made a halter out of 
 twisted rushes, he seated the dismayed agricul- 
 turist in safety upon a more quiet, though less
 
 THE PIKATE. 267 
 
 active poney, than that which he had at first be- 
 strode. 
 
 But Mr Yellowley's fall had operated as a con- 
 siderable sedative upon his spirits, and, for the 
 full space of five miles' travel, he said scarce a 
 word, leaving full course to the melancholy aspi- 
 rations and lamentations which his sister Baby 
 bestowed on the old bridle, which the poney had 
 carried off in its flight, and which, she observed, 
 after having lasted for eighteen years come Mar- 
 tinmas, might be now considered as a cast-a-way 
 thing. Finding she had thus the field to herself, 
 the old lady launched forth into a lecture upon 
 economy, according to her own idea of that vir- 
 tue, which seemed to include a system of priva- 
 tions, which, though observed with the sole pur- 
 pose of saving money, might, if undertaken upon 
 other principles, have ranked high in the history 
 of a religious ascetic. 
 
 She was but little interrupted by Mordaunt, 
 who, conscious he was now on the eve of ap- 
 proaching Burgh Westra, employed himself ra- 
 ther in the task of anticipating the nature of 
 the reception he was about to meet with there
 
 268 THE PIRATE. 
 
 from two beautiful young women, than with the 
 prosing of an old one, however wisely she might 
 prove that small-beer was more wholesome than 
 strong ale ; and that if her brother had bruised 
 his ankle-bone in his tumble, cumfrey and butter 
 was better to bring him round again, than all the 
 doctor's drugs in the world. 
 
 But now the dreary moorlands, over which 
 their path had hitherto lain, v/ere exchanged for 
 a more pleasant prospect, opening on a salt-wa- 
 ter lake, or arm of the sea, which ran up far 
 inland, and was surrounded by flat and fertile 
 ground, producing crops better than the expe- 
 rienced eye of Triptolemus Yellowley had as 
 yet witnessed in Zetland. In the midst of this 
 Goshen stood the mansion of Burgh- Westra, 
 screened from the north and east by a ridge of 
 heathy hills which lay behind it, and commanding 
 an interesting prospect of the lake and its parent 
 ocean, as well as the islands, and more distant 
 mountains. From the mansion itself, as well as 
 from almost every cottage in the adjacent ham- 
 let, arose such a rich cloud of vapoury smoke, as 
 shewed, that the preparations for the festival
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 were not confined to the principal residence of 
 Magnus himself, but extended through the whole 
 vicinage. 
 
 " My certie," said Mistress Baby Yellowley, 
 " ane wad think the haill town was on fire ! The 
 very hill-side smells of their wastefulness, and a 
 hungry heart wad scarce seek better kitchen to a 
 barley scone, than just to waft it in the reek that's 
 rising out of yon lums."
 
 270 THE I'llt AT K. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Thou hast described 
 
 A hot friend cooling. Ever note, Lucilius, 
 When love begins to sicken and decay, 
 It useth an enforced ceremony. 
 There are no tricks in plain and simple faith. 
 
 Julius CcEsar. 
 
 IF the smell which was wafted from the chim- 
 nies of Burgh-Westra up to the barren hills by 
 which the mansion was surrounded, could, as 
 Mistress Barbara opined, have refreshed the hun- 
 gry, the noise which proceeded from thence might 
 have given hearing to the deaf. It was a med- 
 ley of all sounds, and all connected with jollity 
 and kind welcome* Nor were the sights connect- 
 ed with them less animating. 
 
 Troops of friends were seen in the act of arri- 
 ving their dispersed ponies flying to the moors 
 in every direction, to recover their own pastures 
 in the best way they could ; such, as we have al-
 
 THE PIRATE. 271 
 
 ready said, being the usual mode of discharging 
 the cavalry which had been levied for a day's ser- 
 vice. At a small but commodious harbour, con- 
 nected with the house and hamlet, those visitors 
 were landing from their boats, who, living in 
 distant islands, and along the coast, had prefer- 
 red making their journey by sea. Pausing fre- 
 quently to greet each other, Mordaunt and his 
 companions might see each party strolling on suc- 
 cessively to the house, whose ever open gate re- 
 ceived them alternately in such numbers, that it 
 seemed the extent of the mansion, though suited 
 to the opulence and hospitality of the owner, was 
 scarce, on this occasion, sufficient for the guests. 
 Amongst the confused sounds of mirth and 
 welcome which arose at the entrance of each new 
 company, Mordaunt thought he could distin- 
 guish the loud laugh and hearty salutation of the 
 sire of the mansion, and began to feel more deep- 
 ly than before, the anxious doubt, whether that 
 cordial reception, which was distributed so free- 
 ly to all others, would be on this occasion ex- 
 tended to him. As they came on, they heard 
 the voluntary scrapings and bravura effusions 
 of the gallant fiddlers, who impatiently flung
 
 272 THE PIRATE. 
 
 already from their bows those sounds with which 
 they were to animate the evening. The clamour 
 of the cook's assistants, and the loud scolding 
 tones of the cook himself, were also to be heard 
 sounds of dissonance at any other time, but 
 which, subdued with others, and by certain hap- 
 py associations, form no disagreeable part of the 
 full chorus which always precedes a rural feast. 
 Meanwhile, the guests advanced, full each of 
 their own thoughts. Mordaunt's we have alrea- 
 dy noticed. Baby was wrapt up in the melan- 
 choly grief and surprise excited by the positive 
 conviction, that so much victuals had been cook- 
 ed at once as were necessary to feed all the mouths 
 which were clamouring around her an enormi- 
 ty of expence, which, though she was no way con- 
 cerned in bearing it, affected her nerves, as the 
 beholding a massacre would touch those of the 
 most indifferent spectator, however well assured 
 of his own personal safety. She sickened, in short, 
 at the sight of so much extravagance, like Abys- 
 sinian Bruce, when he saw the luckless minstrels 
 of Gondar hacked to pieces by the order of Ras 
 Michael. As for her brother, they being nowar- 
 13
 
 THE PIRATE. 273 
 
 rived where the rude and antique instruments of 
 Zetland agriculture lay scattered in the usual 
 confusion of a Scottish barn-yard, his thoughts 
 were at once engrossed in the deficiencies of the 
 one-stilted plough of the twiscar, with which 
 they dig peats of the sledges, on which they 
 transport commodities of all and every thing, in 
 short, in which the usages of the islands differed 
 from that of the main land of Scotland. The sight 
 of these imperfect instruments stirred the blood of 
 Triptolemus Yellowley, as that of the bold war- 
 rior rises at seeing the arms and insignia of the 
 enemy with whom he is about to combat ; and, 
 faithful to his high emprize, he thought less of 
 the hunger which his journey had occasioned, al- 
 though about to be satisfied by such a dinner as 
 rarely fell to his lot, than upon the task which 
 he had undertaken, of civilizing the manners, and 
 improving the cultivation, of Zetland. 
 
 " Jacta esi alea? he muttered to himself, 
 " this very day shall prove whether the Zetland- 
 ers are worthy of our labours, or whether their 
 minds are as incapable of cultivation as their 
 
 VOL. i. s
 
 274 THE PIRATE. 
 
 peat-mosses. Yet let us be cautious, and watch 
 the soft time of speech. I feel, by my own ex- 
 perience, that it were best to let the body, in its 
 present state, take the placs of the mind. A 
 mouthful of that same roast beef, which smells 
 so delicately, will form an apt introduction to my 
 grand plan for improving the breed of stock." 
 
 By this time the visitors had reached the low 
 but ample front of Magnus Troll's residence, 
 which seemed of various datas, with large and ill- 
 contrived additions, hastily adapted to the original 
 building, as the increasing estate, or enlarged fa- 
 mily, of successive proprietors, appeared to each 
 to demand. Beneath a low, broad, and large porch, 
 supported by two huge carved posts, once the head- 
 ornaments of vessels which had found shipwreck 
 upon the coast, stood Magnus himself, intent on 
 the hospitable toil of receiving and welcoming the 
 numerous guests who successively approached. 
 His strong portly figure was well adapted to the 
 dress which he wore a blue coat of an antique 
 cut, lined with scarlet, and laced and looped with 
 gold down the seams and button-holes, and along 
 the ample cuffs. Strong and masculine features,
 
 THE PIRATE. 275 
 
 rendered ruddy and brown by frequent exposure 
 to severe weather a quantity of most venerable 
 silver hair, which fell in unshorn profusion from 
 under his gold-laced hat, and was carelessly tied 
 with a ribband behind, expressed at once his ad- 
 vanced age, his hasty, yet well-conditioned tem- 
 per, and his robust constitution. As our travel- 
 lers approached him, a shade of displeasure seem- 
 ed to cross his brow, and to interrupt for an in- 
 stant the honest and hearty burst of hilarity with 
 which he had been in the act of greeting all prior 
 arrivals. When he approached Triptolemus Yel- 
 lowley, he drew himself up, so as to mix, as it 
 were, some share of the stately importance of the 
 opulent Udaller with the welcome afforded by 
 the frank and hospitable landlord. 
 
 " You are welcome, Mr Yellowley," was his 
 address to the factor ; " you are welcome to 
 Westra the wind has blown you on a rough 
 coast, and we that are the natives must be kind 
 to you as we can. This, I believe, is your sister 
 Mistress Barbara Yellowley, permit me the 
 honour of a neighbourly salute. 11 And so say- 
 ing, with a daring and self-devoted courtesy,
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 which would find no equal in our degenerate 
 days, he actually ventured to salute the withered 
 cheek of the spinstress, who relaxed so much of 
 her usual peevishness of expression, as to receive 
 the courtesy with something which approached 
 to a smile. He then looked full at Mordaunt 
 Mertoun, and, without offering his hand, said, 
 in a tone somewhat broken by suppressed agita- 
 tion, " You too are welcome, Master Mordaunt." 
 
 " Did I not think so," said Mordaunt, natu- 
 rally offended by the coldness of his host's man- 
 ner, " I had not been here and it is not yet too 
 late to turn back." 
 
 " Young man," replied Magnus, " you know 
 better than most, that from these doors no man 
 can turn, without an offence to their owner. I 
 pray you, disturb not my guests by your ill-timed 
 scruples. When Magnus Troil says welcome, all 
 are welcome who are within hearing of his voice, 
 and it is an indifferent loud one. Walk on, my 
 worthy guests, and let us see what cheer my lasses 
 can make you within doors." 
 
 So saying, and taking care to make his man- 
 ner so general to the whole party, that Mordaunt
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 should not be able to appropriate any particular 
 portion of the welcome to himself, nor yet to com- 
 plain of being excluded from all share in it, the 
 Udaller ushered the guests into his house, where 
 two large outer rooms, which, on the present oc- 
 casion, served the purpose of a modern saloon, 
 were already crowded with guests of every de- 
 scription. 
 
 The furniture was sufficiently simple, and had 
 a character peculiar to the situation of these stormy 
 islands. Magnus Troil was, indeed, like most of 
 the higher class of Zetland proprietors, a friend 
 to the distressed traveller, whether by sea or land, 
 and had repeatedly exerted his whole authority 
 in protecting the property and persons of ship- 
 wrecked mariners ; yet so frequent were wrecks 
 upon that tremendous coast, and so many unap- 
 propriated articles were constantly flung ashore, 
 that the interior of the house bore sufficient wit- 
 ness to the ravages of the ocean, and to the ex- 
 ercise of those rights which the lawyers term 
 Flotsome and Jetsome. The chairs, which were 
 arranged around the walls, were such as are used 
 in cabins, and many of them were of foreign con-
 
 278 THE PIRATE. 
 
 struction ; the mirrors and cabinets, which were 
 placed against the walls for ornament or conve- 
 nience, had, it was plain from their form, been 
 constructed for ship-board, and one or two of the 
 latter were of strange and unknown wood. Even 
 the partition which separated the two apartments, 
 seemed constructed out of the bulk-heads of some 
 large vessel, clumsily adapted to the service which 
 it at present performed, by the labour of some na- 
 tive joiner. To a stranger, these evident marks and 
 tokens of human misery might, at the first glance, 
 form a contrast with the scene of mirth with which 
 they were now associated ; but to the natives, the 
 association was so familiar, that it did not for a 
 moment interrupt the course of their glee. 
 
 To the younger part of these revellers the pre- 
 sence of Mordaunt was like a fresh charm of en- 
 joyment. All came around him to marvel at his 
 absence, and all, by their repeated inquiries, plain- 
 ly shewed that they conceived it had been entirely 
 voluntary on his side. The youth felt that this 
 general acceptation relieved his anxiety on one 
 painful point. Whatever prejudice the family of 
 Burgh Westra might have adopted respecting
 
 THE PlllATE. 279 
 
 him, it must be of a private nature ; and at least 
 he had not the additional pain of finding that he 
 was depreciated in the eyes of society at large ; 
 and his vindication, when he found opportunity 
 to make one, would not require to be extended 
 beyond the circle of a single family. This was 
 consoling ; though his heart still throbbed with 
 anxiety at the thought of meeting with his estran- 
 ged, but still beloved friends. Laying the excuse 
 of his absence on his father's state of health, 
 he made his way through the various groupes 
 of friends and guests, each of whom seemed will- 
 ing to detain him as long as possible, and having 
 got rid of his travelling companions, who at first 
 stuck fast as burs, by presenting them to one or 
 two families of consequence, he reached at length 
 the door of a small apartment, which, opening 
 from one of the large exterior rooms we have 
 mentioned, Minna and Brenda had been permit- 
 ted to fit up after their own taste, and to call their 
 peculiar property. 
 
 Mordaunt had contributed no small share of 
 the invention and mechanical execution employ- 
 ed in fitting up this favourite apartment, and in
 
 280 THE PIRATE. 
 
 disposing its ornaments. It was, indeed, during 
 his last residence at Burgh Westra, as free to his 
 entrance and occupation, as to its proper mis- 
 tresses. But now, so much were times altered, 
 that he remained with his finger on the latch, un- 
 certain whether he should take the freedom to 
 draw it, until Brenda's voice pronounced the 
 words " Come in then," in the tone of one who is 
 interrupted by an unwelcome disturber, .who is to 
 be heard and dispatched with all the speed pos- 
 sible. 
 
 At this signal, Mertoun entered the fanciful 
 cabinet of the sisters, which, by the addition 
 of many ornaments, including some articles of 
 considerable value, had been fitted up for the ap. 
 preaching festival. The daughters of Magnus, 
 at the moment of Mordaunt's entrance, were seat- 
 ed in deep consultation with the stranger Cleve- 
 land, and with a little slight-made old man, whose 
 eye retained all the vivacity of spirit, which had 
 supported him under the thousand vicissitudes of 
 a changeful and precarious life, and which, accom- 
 panying him in his old age, rendered his grey 
 hairs less awfully reverend perhaps, but not less
 
 THE PIRATE. 281 
 
 beloved, than would a more grave and less imagi- 
 native expression of countenance and character. 
 There was even a penetrating shrewdness mingled 
 in the look of curiosity, with which, as he stepped 
 for an instant aside, he seemed to watch the meet- 
 ing of Mordaunt with the two lovely sisters. 
 
 The reception the youth met with resembled, in 
 general character, that which he had experienced 
 from Magnushimself ; but the maidens could not 
 so well cover their sense of the change of circum- 
 stances under which they met. Both blushed, as 
 rising, and without extending the hand, far less of- 
 fering the cheek, as the fashion of the times per- 
 mitted, and almost exacted, they paid to Mordaunt 
 the salutation due to an ordinary acquaintance. 
 But the blush of the elder was one of those tran- 
 sient evidences of flitting emotion, that vanish as 
 fast as the passing thought which excites them. 
 In an instant she stood before Mordaunt calm 
 and cold, returning, with guarded and cautious 
 courtesy, the usual civilities, which, with a faul- 
 tering voice, Mordaunt endeavoured to present to 
 her. The emotion of Brenda bore, externally at 
 least, a deeper and more agitating character. Her
 
 282 THE PIRATE. 
 
 blush extended over every part of her beautiful 
 skin which her dress permitted to be visible, in- 
 cluding her slender neck, and the upper region of 
 a finely formed bosom. Neither did she even at- 
 tempt to reply to what share of his confused com- 
 pliment Mordaunt addressed to her in particular, 
 but regarded him with eyes, in which displeasure 
 was evidently mingled with feelings of regret, and 
 recollections of former times. Mordaunt felt, as 
 it were, assured upon the instant, that the regard 
 of Minna was extinguished, but that it might be 
 yet possible to recover that of the milder Brenda ; 
 and such is the waywardness of human fancy, 
 that though he had never hitherto made any dis- 
 tinct difference betwixt these two beautiful and 
 interesting girls, the favour of -her, which seemed 
 most absolutely withdrawn, became at the mo- 
 ment the most interesting in his eyes. 
 
 He was disturbed in these hasty reflections by 
 Cleveland, who advanced, with military frank- 
 ness, to pay his compliments to his preserver, 
 having only delayed long enough to permit the 
 exchange of the ordinary salutation betwixt the 
 visitor and the ladies of the family. He made
 
 THE PIRATE. 283 
 
 his approach with so good a grace, that it was 
 impossible for Mordaunt, although he dated the 
 loss of favour at Burgh Westra from this stran- 
 ger's appearance on the coast, and domestication 
 in the family, to do less than return his advances 
 as courtesy demanded, accept his thanks with an 
 appearance of satisfaction, and hope that his time 
 had past pleasantly since their last meeting. 
 
 Cleveland was about to answer, when he was 
 anticipated by the little old man, formerly noti- 
 ced, who now, thrusting himself forward, and 
 seizing Mordaunt's hand, kissed him on the fore- 
 head ; and then at the same time echoed and 
 answered his question " How passes time at 
 Burgh Westra ? Was it you that asked it, my 
 prince of the cliff and of the scaur ? How should 
 it pass, but with all the wings that beauty and 
 joy can add to help its flight !" 
 
 " And wit and song, too, my good old friend, 1 ' 
 said Mordaunt, half-serious, half-jesting, as he 
 shook the old man cordially by the hand. 
 " These cannot be wanting, where Claud Halcro 
 comes !"
 
 284 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " Jeer me not, Mordaunt, my good lad," re- 
 plied the old man ; " When your foot is as slow 
 as mine, your wit frozen, and your song out of 
 tune " 
 
 " How can you belie yourself, my good mas- 
 ter ?" answered Mordaunt, who was not unwilling 
 to avail himself of his old friend's peculiarities to 
 introduce something like conversation, break the 
 awkwardness of this singular meeting, and gain 
 time for observation, ere requiring an explanation 
 of the change of conduct which the family seem- 
 ed to have adopted towards him. " Say not so,"" 
 he continued. " Time, my old friend, lays his 
 hand lightly on the bard. Have I not heard 
 you say, the poet partakes the immortality of 
 the song ? and surely the great English poet, 
 you used to tell us of, was elder than yourself 
 when he pulled the bow-oar among all the wits 
 of London." 
 
 This alluded to a story which was, as the 
 French term it, Halcro's cheval de battaille, and 
 any allusion to which was certain at once to place 
 him in the saddle, and to push his hobby-horse 
 into full career.
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 His laughing eye kindled with a sort of en- 
 thusiasm, which the ordinary folks of this world 
 might have called crazed, while he dashed into 
 the subject which he best loved to talk upon. 
 " Alas, alas ! my dear Mordaunt Mertoun sil- 
 ver is silver, and waxes not dim by use and 
 pewter is pewter, and grows the longer the dull- 
 er. It is not for poor Claud Halcro to name 
 himself in the same twelvemonth with the im- 
 mortal John Dryden. True it is, as I may have 
 told you before, that I have seen that great man, 
 nay I have been in the Wits 1 Coffee-house, as it 
 was then called, and had once a pinch out of his 
 own very snuff-box. I must have told you all 
 how it happened, but here is Captain Cleveland 
 who never heard it. I lodged, you must know, 
 in Russel-street. I question not but you know 
 Russel-street, Covent-Garden, Captain Cleve- 
 land ?" 
 
 " I should know its latitude pretty well, Mr 
 Halcro," said the Captain, smiling ; " but I be- 
 lieve you mentioned the circumstance yesterday, 
 and besides we have the day's duty in hand you 
 must play us this song which we are to study. 1 '
 
 286 THE PIRATE. 
 
 " It will not serve the turn now, 1 " said Halcro, 
 " we must think of something that will take in 
 our dear Mordaunt, the first voice in the island, 
 whether for a part or solo. I will never be he 
 will touch a string to you, unless Mordaunt Mer- 
 toun is to help us out. What say you, my fair- 
 est Night ? what think you, my sweet Dawn of 
 Day? 11 he added, addressing the young women, 
 upon whom, as we have said elsewhere, he had 
 long before bestowed these allegorical names. 
 
 " Mr Mordaunt Mertoun, 11 said Minna, " has 
 come too late to be of our band on this occasion 
 it is our misfortune, but it cannot be helped. 11 
 
 " How ? what ?" said Halcro, hastily " too 
 late and you have practised together all your 
 lives take my word, my bonny lasses, that old 
 tunes are sweetest, and old friends surest. Mr 
 Cleveland has a fine bass, that must be allowed ; 
 but I would have you trust for the first effect to 
 one of the twenty fine airs you can sing where 
 Mordaunt's tenor joins so well with your own 
 witchery here is my lovely Day approves of the 
 change in her heart. 11 
 
 " You were never in your life more mistaken, 
 3
 
 THE PIRATE. 287 
 
 father Halcro," said Brenda, her cheeks again 
 reddening, more with displeasure, it seemed, than 
 with shame. 
 
 " Nay, but how is this ?" said the old man, 
 pausing, and looking at them alternately . tc What 
 have we got here ? a cloudy night and a red 
 morning ? that betokens rough weather What 
 means all this, young women ? where lies the 
 offence ? In me, I fear ; for the blame is always 
 laid upon the oldest when young folks like you 
 go by the ears." 
 
 " The blame is not with you, father Halcro," 
 said Minna, rising, and taking her sister by the 
 arm, " if indeed there be blame any where." 
 
 " I should fear then, Minna," said Mordaunt, 
 endeavouring to soften his tone into one of in- 
 different pleasantry, " that the new comer has 
 brought the offence along with him. 1 ' 
 
 " When no offence is taken,"" replied Minna, 
 with her usual gravity, " it matters not by whom 
 such may have been offered." 
 
 " Is it possible, Minna !" exclaimed Mordaunt, 
 " and is it you who speak thus to me ? And you 
 too, Brenda, can you too judge so hardly of me,
 
 288 THE PIRATE. 
 
 yet without permitting me one moment of honest 
 and frank explanation ?" 
 
 " Those who should know best, 1 ' answered 
 Brenda, in a low but decisive tone of voice, " have 
 told us their pleasure, and it must be done. Sis- 
 ter, I think we have staid too long here, and will 
 be wanted elsewhere Mr Mertoun will excuse 
 us on so busy a day." 
 
 The sisters linked their arms together. Halcro 
 in vain endeavoured to stop them, making, at the 
 same time, a theatrical gesture, and exclaiming, 
 
 " Now, Day and Night, but this is wondrous strange !" 
 
 Then turned to Mordaunt Mertoun, and added, 
 " The girls are possessed with the spirit of 
 mutability, shewing, as our master Spenser well 
 saith, that 
 
 ' Among all living creatures, more or lesse, 
 Change still doth reign, and keep the greater sway.' 
 
 Captain Cleveland," he continued, " know you 
 any thing that has happened to put these two ju- 
 venile graces out of tune ?" 
 
 11 He will lose his reckoning," answered Cleve- 
 land, " that spends time in inquiring why the 
 2
 
 THE PIRATK. 
 
 wind shifts a point, or why a woman changes her 
 mind. Were I Mr Mordaunt, I would not ask 
 the proud wenches another question on such a 
 subject." 
 
 " It is a friendly advice, Captain Cleveland," 
 replied Mordaunt, " and I will not hold it the 
 less so that it has been given unasked. Allow 
 me to inquire if you are yourself as indifferent to 
 the opinion of your female friends as it seems you 
 would have me to be ?" 
 
 " Who, I ?" said the Captain, with an air of 
 frank indifference. " I never thought twice upon 
 such a subject. I never saw a woman worth think- 
 ing twice about after the anchor was a-peak - 
 on shore it is another thing ; and I will laugh, 
 sing, dance, and love, if they like it, with twenty 
 girls, were they but half so pretty as those who 
 have left us, and make them heartily welcome to 
 change their course in the sound of a boatswain's 
 
 O 
 
 whistle. It will be odds but I wear as fast as 
 they can." 
 
 A patient is seldom pleased with that sort of 
 consolation which is founded on holding light the 
 
 VOL. I. T
 
 290 -THE PIRATE. 
 
 malady of which he complains ; and Mordaunt 
 felt disposed to be offended with Captain Cleve- 
 land, both for taking notice of his embarrass- 
 ment, and intruding upon him his own opinion ; 
 and he replied, therefore, somewhat sharply, 
 " that Captain Cleveland's sentiments were only 
 suited to such as had the art to become universal 
 favourites wherever chance happened to throw 
 them, and who could not lose in one place more 
 than their merit was sure to gain for them in 
 another." 
 
 This was spoken ironically ; but there was, to 
 confess the truth, a superior knowledge of the 
 world, and a consciousness of external merit at 
 least about the man, which rendered his inter- 
 ference doubly disagreeable. As Sir Lucius 
 ^'Trigger says, there was an air of success about 
 Captain Cleveland which was mighty provoking. 
 Young, handsome, and well assured, his air of 
 nautical bluntness sate naturally and easily upon 
 him, and was perhaps particularly well fitted to 
 the simple manners of the remote country in 
 which he found himself ; and where, even in the 
 best families, a greater degree of refinement
 
 THE PIRATE. 291 
 
 might have rendered his conversation rather less 
 acceptable. He was contented, in the present 
 instance, to smile good-humouredly at the ob- 
 vious discontent of Mordaunt Mertoun, and re- 
 plied, " You are angry with me, my good friend, 
 but you cannot make me angry with you. The 
 fair hands of all the pretty women I ever saw 
 in my life would never have fished me up out of 
 the roost of Sumburgh. So pray do not quar- 
 rel with me ; for here is Mr Halcro witness that 
 I have struck both jack and topsail, and should 
 you fire a broadside into me, cannot return a 
 single shot." 
 
 " Ay, ay,"" said Halcro, (( you must be friends 
 with Captain Cleveland, Mordaunt. Never quar- 
 rel with your friend, because a woman is whim- 
 sical. Why, man, if they kept one humour, how 
 the devil could we make so many songs on them 
 as we do ? Even old Dryden himself, glorious 
 old John, could have said little about a girl that 
 was always of one mind as well write verses 
 upon a mill-pond. It is your tides and your 
 roosts, and your currents and eddies, that come 
 and go, and ebb and flow, (by Heaven ! I run
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 into rhyme when I so much as think upon them,) 
 that smile one day, rage the next, flatter and de- 
 vour, delight and ruin us, and so forth it is 
 these that give the real soul of poetry. Did you 
 never hear my Adieu to the Lass of Northmaven 
 that was poor Bet Stimbister, whom I call 
 Mary for the sound's sake, as I call myself Hacon 
 after my great ancestor Hacon Goldemund, or 
 Haco with the golden mouth, who came to the 
 island with Harold Harfager, and was his chief 
 Scald ? Well, but where was I O ay poor Bet 
 Stimbister, she, and partly some debt, was the 
 cause of my leaving the isles of Hialtland, (bet- 
 ter so called than Shetland, or Zetland even,) 
 and taking to the broad world. I have had a 
 tramp of it since that time I have battled my 
 way through the world, Captain, as a man of 
 mold may, that has a light head, a light purse, 
 and a heart as light as them both fought my 
 way, and paid my way that is, either with mo- 
 ney or wit have seen kings changed and de- 
 posed, as you would turn a tenant out of a scat- 
 hold knew all the wits of the age, and especial- 
 ly the glorious John Dryden what man in the
 
 THE PIRATK. 
 
 islands can say as much, barring lying I had a 
 pinch out of his own snuff-box I will tell you 
 how I came by such promotion." 
 
 " But the song, Mr Halcro," said Captain 
 Cleveland. 
 
 " The song ?" answered Halcro, seizing the 
 Captain by the button, for he was too much 
 accustomed to have his audience escape from him 
 during recitation, not to put in practice all the 
 usual means of prevention " The song ? Why 
 I gave a copy of it, with fifteen others, to the 
 immortal John. You shall hear it you shall 
 hear them all, if you will but stand still a mo- 
 ment ; and you too, my dear boy, Mordaunt 
 Mertoun, I have scarce heard a word from your 
 mouth these six months, and now you are run- 
 ning away from me." So saying, he secured him 
 with his other hand. 
 
 " Nay, now he has got us both in tow,"" said 
 the seaman ; " there is nothing for it but hear- 
 ing him out, though he spins as tough a yarn as 
 ever an old man-of-war's-man twisted on the 
 watch at midnight/'' 
 
 " Nay, now be silent, be silent, and let one of
 
 294 THE PIRATE. 
 
 us speak at once," said the poet, imperatively ; 
 while Cleveland and Mordaunt, looking at each 
 other with a ludicrous expression of resignation 
 to their fate, waited in submission for the well- 
 known and inevitable tale. " I will tell you all 
 about it," continued Halcro. " I was knocked 
 about the world like other young fellows, doing 
 this, that, and toother for a livelihood ; for, thank 
 God, I could turn my hand to any thing but 
 loving still the Muses as much as if the un- 
 grateful jades had found me, like so many block- 
 heads, in my own coach and six. However, 
 I held out till my cousin, old Laurence Link- 
 lutter, died, and left me the bit of an island 
 yonder ; although, by the way, Cultmalindie 
 was as near to him as I was ; but Lawrence 
 loved wit, though he had little of his own. Well, 
 he left me the wee bit island it is as barren as 
 Parnassus itself. What then I have a penny 
 to spend, a penny to keep my purse, a penny to 
 give to the poor ay, and a bed and a bottle for 
 a friend, as you shall know, boys, if you will go 
 back with me when this merriment is over. But 
 where was I in my story ?"
 
 THE PIRATE. 295 
 
 " Near port, I hope," answered Cleveland ; 
 but Halcro was too determined a narrator to be 
 interrupted by the broadest hint. 
 
 11 O ay," he resumed, with the self-satisfied 
 air of one who has recovered the thread of a 
 story, " I was in my old lodgings in Russel- 
 street, with old Timothy Thimblethwaite, the 
 Master Fashioner, then the best known man 
 about town. He made for all the wits, and for 
 the dull boobies of fortune besides, and made 
 the one pay for the other. He never denied a 
 wit credit save in jest, or for the sake of getting 
 a repartee ; and he was in correspondence with 
 all that was worth knowing about town. He had 
 letters from Crowne, and Tate, and Prior, and 
 Tom Brown, and all the famous fellows of the 
 time, with such pellets of wit, that there was no 
 reading them without laughing ready to die, and 
 all ending with craving a further term for pay- 
 ment."" 
 
 " I should have thought the tailor would have 
 found that jest rather serious,'" said Mordaunt, 
 
 " Not a bit not a bit Tim Thimblethwaite 
 (he was a Cumberland-man by birth,)" replied
 
 296 THE PIRATE. 
 
 his eulogist, " had the soul of a prince ay, and 
 died with the fortune of one ; for woe betide the 
 custard-gorged alderman that came under Tim's 
 goose, after he had got one of these letters 
 egad, he was sure to pay the kain. Why, Thim- 
 blethwaite was thought to be the original of little 
 Tom Bibber, in glorious John's comedy of the 
 Wild Gallant ; and I know that he has trusted, 
 ay, and lent John money to boot out of his own 
 pocket, at a time when all his fine court friends 
 blew cold enough. He trusted me too, and I 
 have been two months on the score at a time for 
 my upper-room. To be sure, I was obliging in 
 his way not that I exactly could shape or sew, 
 nor would that have been decorous for a gentle- 
 man of good descent ; but I eh, eh I drew 
 bills summed up the books'" 
 
 " Carried home the clothes of the wits and 
 aldermen, and got lodging for your labour," in- 
 terrupted Cleveland. 
 
 " No, no damn it, no," replied Halcro ; " no 
 such thing you put me out in my story where 
 was I ?"
 
 THE PIHATE. 
 
 u Nay, the devil help you to the latitude," 
 said the Captain, extricating his button from the 
 gripe of the unmerciful bard's finger and thumb, 
 " for I have no time to make an observation." 
 So saying, he bolted from the room. 
 
 " A silly ill-bred conceited fool," said Hal- 
 cro, looking after him ; " with as little man- 
 ners as wit in his empty coxcomb. I wonder 
 what Magnus and these silly wenches can see in 
 him he tells such damnable long-winded stories, 
 too, about his adventures and sea-fights every 
 second word a lie, I doubt not. Mordaunt, my 
 dear boy, take example by that man that is, 
 take warning by him never tell long stories 
 about yourself. You are sometimes given to talk 
 too much about your own exploits on craigs and 
 skerries, and the like, which only breaks conver- 
 sation, and prevents other folks from being heard. 
 Now I see you are impatient to hear out what I 
 was saying Stop, where about was I ? w 
 
 " I fear we must put it off, Mr Halcro, until 
 after dinner," said Mordaunt, who also meditated 
 his escape, though desirous of effecting it with 
 more delicacy towards his old acquaintance than
 
 298 THE PIRATE. 
 
 Captain Cleveland had thought it necessary to 
 use. 
 
 " Nay, my dear boy, 1 ' said Halcro, seeing him- 
 self about to be utterly deserted ; "do not you 
 leave me too never take so bad an example as 
 to set light by old acquaintance, Mordaunt. I 
 have wandered many a weary step in my day ; but 
 they were always lightened when I could get 
 hold of the arm of an old friend like yourself." 
 
 So saying, he quitted the youth's coat, and, 
 sliding his hand gently under his arm, grappled 
 him more effectually, to which Mordaunt sub- 
 mitted, a little moved by the poet's observation 
 upon the unkindness of old acquaintances, under 
 which he himself was an immediate sufferer. But 
 when Halcro renewed his formidable question, 
 " Whereabouts was I ?" Mordaunt, preferring 
 his poetry to his prose, reminded him of the song 
 which he said he had written upon his first lea- 
 ving Zetland, a song to which, indeed, the in- 
 quirer was no stranger, but which, as it must be 
 new to the reader, we shall here insert as a fa- 
 vourable specimen of the poetical powers of this 
 tuneful descendant of Haco the Golden-mouthed; 
 5
 
 T1IK PIRATIC. 
 
 for, in the opinion of many tolerable judges, he 
 held a respectable rank among the inditers of ma- 
 drigals of the period, and was as well qualified 
 to give immortality to his Nancies of the hills or 
 dales, as many a gentle sonnetteer of wit and plea- 
 sure about town. He was something of a musi- 
 cian also, and on the present occasion seized upon 
 a sort of lute, and, quitting his victim, prepared 
 the instrument for an accompaniment, speaking 
 all the while that he might lose no time. 
 
 " I learned the lute," he said, " from the same 
 man who taught honest Shadwell plump Tom, 
 as they used to call him somewhat roughly 
 treated by the glorious John, you remember 
 Mordaunt, you remember 
 
 ' Methinks I see the new Arion sail, 
 
 The lute still trembling underneath thy nail ; 
 
 At thy well sharpen'd thumb, from shore to shore, 
 
 The trebles squeak for fear, the basses roar.' 
 
 Come, I am indifferently in tune now what was 
 it to be? ay, I remember nay, The Lass of 
 Northmaven is the ditty poor Bet Stimbister ! I 
 have called her Mary in the verses. Betsy does 
 well for an English song ; but Mary is more
 
 300 THE 1'IRATK. 
 
 natural here."' So saying, after a short prelude, 
 he sung, with a tolerable voice and some taste, 
 the following verses : 
 
 tc Farewell to Northmaven, 
 
 Grey Hillswicke, farewell ! 
 To the calms of thy haven, 
 
 The storms on thy fell 
 To each breeze that can vary 
 
 The mood of thy main, 
 And to thee, bonny Mary ! 
 
 We meet not again. 
 
 " Farewell the wild ferry, 
 
 Which Hacon could brave, 
 When the peaks of the Skerry 
 
 Were white in the wave. 
 There's a maid may look over 
 
 These wild waves in vain, 
 For the skiff of her lover 
 
 He comes not again. 
 
 " The vows thou hast broke, 
 On the wild currents fling them ; 
 
 On the quicksand and rock 
 Let the mermaiden sing them.
 
 THE PIRATE. 301 
 
 New sweetness they'll give her 
 
 Bewildering strain ; 
 But there's one who will never 
 
 Believe them again. 
 
 " O were there an island, 
 
 Though ever so wild, 
 Where woman could smile, and 
 
 No man be beguiled 
 Too tempting a snare 
 
 To poor mortals were given, 
 And the hope would fix there, 
 
 That should anchor on heaven." 
 
 " I see you are softened, my young friend," 
 said Halcro, when he had finished his song ; " so 
 are most who hear that same ditty. Words and 
 music both mine own ; and, without saying much 
 of the wit of it, there is a sort of eh eh sim- 
 plicity and truth about it, which gets its way to 
 most folks' heart. Even your father cannot re- 
 sist it and he has a heart as impenetrable to 
 poetry and song as Apollo himself could draw an 
 arrow against. But then he has had some ill luck 
 in his time with the woman folks, as is plain from 
 his owing them such a grudge Ay, ay, there
 
 302 THE PIRATK. 
 
 the charm lies none of us but has felt the same 
 sore in our day. But come, my dear boy, they 
 are mustering in the hall, men and women both 
 plagues as they are, we should get on ill without 
 them but before we go, only mark the last 
 turn 
 
 * And the hope would fix there;' 
 
 that is, in the supposed island a place which 
 neither was nor will be 
 
 f That should anchor on heaven.' 
 
 Now you see, my good young man, there are 
 here none of your heathenish rants, which Ro- 
 chester, Etheridge, and these wild fellows, used 
 to string together. A parson might sing the 
 song, and his clerk bear the burthen but there 
 is the confounded bell we must go now but 
 never mind we'll get into a quiet corner at night, 
 and I'll tell you all about it. 1 '
 
 THK PI11ATE. 303 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Full in the midst the polish'd table shines, 
 And the bright goblets, rich with generous wines ; 
 Now each partakes the feast, the wine prepares, 
 Portions the food, and each the portion shares ; 
 Nor till the rage of thirst and hunger ceased, 
 To the high host approached the sagacious guest. 
 
 Odyssey* 
 
 THE hospitable profusion of Magnus Troll's 
 board, the numberof guests who feasted inthehall, 
 the much greater number of retainers, attendants, 
 humble friends, and domestics of every possible 
 description, who revelled without, with the multi- 
 tude of the still poorer, and less honoured assist- 
 ants, who came from every hamlet or township 
 within twenty miles round, to share the bounty 
 of the munificent Udaller, were such as altoge- 
 ther astonished TriptolemusYellowley, and made 
 him internally doubt whether it would be pru- 
 dent in him at this time, and amid the full glow
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 of his hospitality, to propose to the host who 
 presided over such a splendid banquet, a radical 
 change in the whole customs and usages of his 
 country. 
 
 True, the sagacious Triptolemus felt conscious 
 that he possessed in his own person wisdom far 
 superior to that of all the assembled feasters, to 
 say nothing of the landlord, against whose pru- 
 dence the very extent of his hospitality formed, 
 in Yellowley 1 s opinion, sufficient evidence. But 
 yet the Amphitryon with whom one dines holds, 
 for the time at least, an influence over the minds 
 of his most distinguished guests ; and if the din- 
 ner be in good style, and the wines of the right 
 quality, it is humbling to see that neither art nor 
 wisdom, scarce external rank itself, can assume 
 their natural and wonted superiority over the dis- 
 tributor of these good things, until coffee has been 
 brought in. Triptolemus felt the full weightof this 
 temporary superiority, yet he was desirous to do 
 something that might vindicate the vaunts he had 
 made to his sister and his fellow-traveller, and he 
 stole a look at them from time to time, to mark 
 whether he was not sinking in their esteem from 
 4
 
 THE PIRATE. 305 
 
 postjjoning his promised lecture upon the enor- 
 mities of Zetland. 
 
 But Mrs Barbara was busily engaged in noting 
 and registering the waste incurred in such an en- 
 tertainment as she had probably never before 
 looked upon, and in admiring the host's indiffe- 
 rence to, and the guests* absolute negligence of 
 those rules of civility in which her youth had 
 been brought up. The feasters desired to be 
 helped from a dish which was unbroken, and 
 might have figured at supper, with as much free- 
 dom as if it had undergone the ravages of half- 
 a-dozen guests, and no one seemed to care the 
 landlord himself least of all whether those dishes 
 only were consumed, which, from their nature, 
 are incapable of re-appearance, or whether the 
 assault was extended to the substantial rounds 
 of beef, pasties, and so forth, which, by the rules 
 of good housewifery, were destined to stand two 
 attacks, and which therefore, according to Mrs 
 Barbara's ideas of politeness, ought not to have 
 been annihilated by the guests upon the first on- 
 set, but spared, like Outis in the cave of Poly- 
 VOL. i. u
 
 306 THE PIRATE. 
 
 phemus, to be devoured the last. Lost in the 
 meditations to which these breaches of convivial 
 discipline gave rise, and in the contemplation of 
 an ideal larder of cold meat which she could have 
 saved out of the wreck of roast, boiled, and baked, 
 sufficient to have supplied her cupboard for at 
 least a twelvemonth, Mrs Barbara cared very lit- 
 tle whether or not her brother supported in its 
 extent the character which he had calculated up- 
 on assuming. 
 
 Mordaunt Mertoun also was conversant with 
 far other thoughts than those which regarded the 
 proposed reformer of Zetland enormities. His 
 seat was betwixt two blithe maidens of Thule, 
 who, not taking scorn that he had upon other oc- 
 casions given preference to the daughters of the 
 Udaller, were glad of the chance which assigned 
 to them the attentions of so distinguished a gal- 
 lant, who, as being their squire at the feast, might 
 in all probability become their partner in the 
 subsequent dance. But, whilst rendering to his 
 fair neighbours all the usual attentions which so- 
 ciety required, Mordaunt kept up a covert, but 
 accurate and close observation, upon his estran-
 
 THE I'IKATE. 307 
 
 ged friends, Minna and Brenda. The Udaller 
 himself had a share of his attention ; but in him 
 he could remark nothing, except the usual tone 
 of hearty and somewhat boisterous hospitality 
 with which he was accustomed to animate the 
 banquet upon all such occasions of general fes- 
 tivity. But in the differing mien of the two 
 maidens there was much more room for painful 
 remark. 
 
 Captain Cleveland sate betwixt the sisters, was 
 sedulous in his attentions to both, and Mordaunt 
 was so placed, that he could observe all, and hear 
 a great deal, of what passed between them. But 
 Cleveland's peculiar regard seemed devoted to 
 the elder sister. Of this the younger was perhaps 
 conscious, for more than once her eye glanced 
 towards Mordaunt, and, as he thought, with 
 something in it which resembled regret for the 
 interruption of their intercourse, and a sad re- 
 membrance of former and more friendly times ; 
 while Minna was exclusively engrossed by the 
 attentions of her neighbour ; and that it should 
 be so, filled Mordaunt with surprise and resent- 
 ment.
 
 308 THE PIRATE. 
 
 Minna, the serious, the prudent, the reserved, 
 whose countenance and manners indicated so 
 much elevation of character Minna, the lover 
 of solitude, and of those paths of knowledge in 
 which men walk best without company the ener 
 my of light mirth, the friend of musing melan- 
 choly, and the frequenter of fountain-heads and 
 pathless glens she whose character seemed, in 
 short, the very reverse of that which might 
 bfe captivated by the bold, coarse, and daring 
 gallattt.ry of such a man as this Captain Cleve- 
 land, gave^ nevertheless, her eye and ear to him, 
 as he sate beside her at table, Avith an interest 
 and a graciousness of attention, which, to Mor- 
 daunt, who well knew how to judge of her feel- 
 ings by her manner, intimated a degree of the 
 highest favour. He observed this, and his heart 
 roae against the favourite by whom he had been 
 thus superseded, as well as against Minna's in r 
 discreet departure from her own character. 
 
 *' What is there about the man,"" he said with- 
 in himself, " more than the bold and daring as- 
 sumption of importance which is derived from 
 success in petty enterprizes, and the exercise of
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 petty despotism over a ship's crew ? his very lan- 
 guage is more professional than is used by the 
 superior officers of the British navy ; and the wit 
 which has excited so many smiles, seems to me 
 such as Minna would not formerly have endured 
 for an instant. Even Brenda seems less taken 
 with his gallantry than Minna* whom it should 
 have suited so little." 
 
 Mordaunt was doubly mistaken in these his 
 angry speculations. In the first place, with an 
 eye which was, in some respects, that of a rival, he 
 criticised far too severely the manners and beha- 
 viour of Captain Cleveland. They were unpolish- 
 ed, certainly ; which was of the less consequence 
 in a country inhabited by so plain and simple a 
 race as the ancient Zetlanders. On the other 
 hand, there was an open, naval frankness in Cleve- 
 land's manners much natural shrewdness some 
 appropriate humour an undoubting confidence 
 in himself and that enterprizing hardihood of 
 disposition, which, without any other recommend- 
 able quality, very often leads to success with the 
 fair sex. But Mordaunt was farther mistaken, 
 in supposing that Cleveland was likely to be dis-
 
 310 THE PIRATE. 
 
 agreeable to Minna Troil, on account of the op- 
 position of their characters in so many material 
 particulars. Had his knowledge of the world 
 been a little more extensive, he might have ob- 
 served, that as unions are often formed betwixt 
 couples differing in complexion and stature, they 
 take place still more frequently betwixt persons, 
 totally differing in feelings, in taste, in pursuits, 
 and in understanding ; and it would not be say- 
 ing, perhaps, too much, to aver, that two-thirds 
 of the marriages around us have been contracted 
 betwixt persons, who, judging a priori, we should 
 have thought had scarce any charms for each 
 other. 
 
 A moral and primary cause might be easily 
 assigned for these anomalies, in the wise dispen- 
 sations of Providence, that the general balance 
 of wit, wisdom, and amiable qualities of all kinds, 
 should be kept up through society at large. For, 
 what a world were it, if the wise were to intermar- 
 ry only with the wise, the learned with the learn- 
 ed, the amiable with the amiable, nay, even the 
 handsome with the handsome ? and, is it not evi- 
 dent, that the degraded castes of the foolish, the
 
 THE PIRATE. 311 
 
 ignorant, the brutal, and the deformed, (com- 
 prehending, by the way, far the greater portion 
 of mankind,) must, when condemned to exclusive 
 intercourse with each other, become gradually as 
 much brutalized in person and disposition as so 
 many ouran-outangs ? When, therefore, we see 
 the " gentle joined to the rude," we may lament 
 the fate of the suffering individual, but we must 
 not the less admire the mysterious disposition of 
 that wise Providence which thus balances the 
 moral good and evil of life ; which secures for a 
 family, unhappy in the dispositions of one parent, 
 a share of better and sweeter blood, transmitted 
 from the other, and preserves to the offspring the 
 affectionate care and protection of at least one of 
 those from whom it is naturally due. Without the 
 frequent occurrence of such alliances and unions 
 missorted as they seem at first sight the world 
 could not be that for which Eternal Wisdom has 
 designed it a place of mixed good and evil a 
 place of trial at once, and of suffering, where 
 even the worst ills are chequered with something 
 that renders them tolerable to humble and patient 
 minds, and where the best blessings carry with
 
 312 TIIK PIRATK. 
 
 tlicm a necessary alloy of embittering deprecia- 
 tion. 
 
 When, indeed, we look a little closer on the 
 causes of those unexpected and ill-suited attach- 
 ments, we have occasion to acknowledge, that the 
 means by which they are produced do not infer 
 that complete departure from, or inconsistency 
 with, the character of the parties, which we might 
 expect when the result alone is contemplated. 
 The wise purposes which Providence appears to 
 have had in view, by permitting such intermix- 
 ture of dispositions, tempers, and understandings, 
 in the married state, are not accomplished by any 
 mysterious impulse by which, in contradiction to 
 the ordinary laws of nature, men or women arc 
 urged to an union with those whom the world 
 see to be unsuitable to them. The freedom of 
 will is permitted to us in the occurrences of or- 
 dinary life, as in our moral conduct ; and in the 
 former as well as the latter case, is often the 
 means of misguiding those who possess it. Thus 
 it usually happens, more especially to the enthu- 
 siastic and imaginative, that, having formed a 
 picture of admiration in their own mind, they too
 
 TIIK PIRATF. 313 
 
 often deceive themselves by some faint resem- 
 blance in some existing being, whom their fancy 
 as speedily as gratuitously invests with all the at- 
 tributes necessary to complete the bean ideal of 
 mental perfection. No one, perhaps, even in the 
 happiest marriage, with an object really beloved, 
 ever found all the qualities he expected to possess ; 
 but in far too many cases, he finds he has prac- 
 tised a much higher degree of mental deception, 
 and has erected his airy castle of felicity upon 
 some rainbow, which owed its very existence on- 
 ly to the peculiar state of the atmosphere. 
 
 Thus Mordaunt, if better acquainted with life, 
 and with the course of human things, would have 
 been little surprised that such a man as Cleve- 
 land, handsome, bold, and animated, a man who 
 had obviously lived in danger, and who spoke of 
 it as sport, should have been invested, by a girl 
 of Minna's fanciful character, with an extensive 
 share of those qualities, which, in her active ima- 
 gination, were held to fill up the accomplishments 
 of a heroic character. The plain bluntness of 
 his manner, if remote from courtesy, appeared, at 
 least, as widely different from deceit ; and, un-
 
 314 THE PIRATE. 
 
 fashioned as he seemed by forms, he had enough 
 both of natural sense, and natural good-breeding, 
 to support the delusion he had created, at least 
 so far as externals were concerned. It is scarce 
 necessary to add, that these observations apply 
 exclusively to what are called love-matches ; for 
 when either party fix their attachment upon the 
 substantial comforts of a rental, or a jointure, 
 they cannot be disappointed in the acquisition, 
 although they may be cruelly so in their over- 
 estimation of the happiness it was to afford, or in 
 having too slightly anticipated the disadvantages 
 with which it was to be attended. 
 
 Having a certain partiality for the dark Beauty 
 whom we have described, we have willingly de- 
 dicated this digression, in order to account for a 
 line of conduct which we allow to seem absolute- 
 ly unnatural in such a narrative as the present, 
 though the most common event in ordinary life ; 
 namely, in Minna's appearing to have over-esti- 
 mated the taste, talent, and ability of a hand- 
 some young man, who was dedicating to her his 
 whole time and attention, and whose homage 
 rendered her the envy of almost all the other
 
 THK PTKATE. 315 
 
 young women of that numerous party. Perhaps, 
 if our fair readers will take the trouble to consult 
 their own bosoms, they will be disposed to allow, 
 that the distinguished good taste exhibited by 
 any individual, who, when his attentions would 
 be agreeable to a whole circle of rivals, selects 
 one as their individual object, entitles him, on 
 the footing of reciprocity, if on no other, to a 
 large share of that one's favourable, and even par- 
 tial esteem. At any rate, if the character shall, 
 after all, be deemed inconsistent and unnatural, 
 it concerns not us, who record the facts as we find 
 them, and pretend no privilege for bringing closer 
 to nature those incidents which may seem to di- 
 verge from it ; or for reducing to consistence that 
 most inconsistent of all created things the heart 
 of a beautiful and admired female. 
 
 Necessity, which teaches all the liberal arts, 
 can render us also adepts in dissimulation ; and 
 Mordaunt, though a novice, failed not to profit 
 in her school. It was manifest, that, in order to 
 observe the demeanour of those on whom his at- 
 tention was fixed, he must needs put constraint 
 on his own, and appear, at least, so much engaged
 
 THE PIRATE. 
 
 with the damsels betwixt whom he sate, that 
 Minna and Brenda should suppose him indiffe- 
 rent to what was passing around him. The ready 
 cheerfulness of Maddie and Clara Groatsettars* 
 who were esteemed considerable fortunes in the 
 island, and were at this moment too happy in 
 feeling themselves seated somewhat beyond the 
 sphere of vigilance influenced by their aunt, the 
 good old Lady Glourourum, met and requited the 
 attempts which Mordaunt made to be lively and 
 entertaining ; and they were soon engaged in a gay 
 conversation, to which, as usual on such occa- 
 sions, the gentleman contributed wit, or what 
 passes for such, and the ladies their prompt 
 laughter and liberal applause. But, amidst this 
 seeming mirth, Mordaunt failed not, from time 
 to time, as covertly as he might, to observe the 
 conduct of the two daughters of Magnus ; and 
 still it appeared as if the elder, wrapt up in the 
 conversation of Cleveland, did not cast away a 
 thought on the rest of the company ; and as if 
 Brenda, more openly as she conceived his atten- 
 tion withdrawn from her, looked with an expression 
 both anxious and melancholy towards the groupe
 
 T1IK rillATE. 317 
 
 of which he himself formed a part. He was much 
 moved by the diffidence, as well as the trouble, 
 which her looks seemed to convey, and tacitly 
 formed the resolution of seeking a more full ex- 
 planation with her in the course of the evening. 
 Norna, he remembered, had stated that these two 
 amiable young women were in danger, the na- 
 ture of which she left unexplained, but which he 
 suspected to arise out of their mistaking the cha- 
 racter of this daring and all-engrossing stranger ; 
 and he secretly resolved, that, if possible, he 
 would be the means of detecting Cleveland, and 
 of saving his early friends, 
 
 As he revolved these thoughts, his attention to 
 the Miss Groatsettars gradually diminished, and 
 perhaps he might altogether have forgotten the ne- 
 cessity of his appearing an uninterested spectator 
 of what was passing, had not the signal been given 
 for the ladies retiring from table. Minna, with a 
 native grace, and somewhat of stateliness in her 
 manner, bent her head to the company in general, 
 with a kinder and more particular expression as 
 her eye reached Cleveland. Brenda, with the blush
 
 318 THE PI 11 ATE. 
 
 which attended her slightest personal exertion 
 when exposed to the eyes of others, hurried 
 through the same departing salutation with an 
 embarrassment which almost amounted to awk- 
 wardness, but which her youth and timidity ren- 
 dered at once natural and interesting. Again 
 Mordaunt thought that her eye distinguished 
 him amidst the numerous company. For the 
 first time he ventured to encounter and to return 
 the glance; and the consciousness that he had 
 done so, doubled the glow of Brenda's counte- 
 nance, while something resembling displeasure 
 was blended with her emotion. 
 
 When the ladies had retired, the men betook 
 themselves to the deep and serious drinking, 
 which, according to the fashion of the times, 
 preceded the evening exercise of the dance. Old 
 Magnus himself, by precept and example, ex- 
 horted them " to make the best use of their time, 
 since the ladies would soon summon them to 
 shake their feet. 11 At the same time giving the 
 signal to a grey-headed domestic, who stood be- 
 hind him in the dress of a Dantzic skipper, and
 
 THE PIRATE. 319 
 
 who added to many other occupations that of but- 
 ler, " Eric Scambester," he said, " has the good 
 ship the Jolly Mariner of Canton, got her cargo 
 on board ?" 
 
 " Choke-full loaded,"" answered the Ganymede 
 of Burgh Westra, " with good Nantz, Jamaica 
 sugar, Portugal lemons, not to mention nutmeg 
 and toast and water, taken in from the Shellicoat 
 spring." 
 
 Loud and long laughed the guests at this sta- 
 ted and regular jest betwixt the Udaller and his 
 butler, which always served as a preface to the 
 introduction of a punch-bowl of uncommon size, 
 the gift of the captain of one of the Honourable 
 East India Company's vessels, which, bound from 
 China homeward, had been driven north about by 
 stress of weather into Lerwick-bay, and had there 
 contrived to get rid of part of the cargo, without 
 very scrupulously reckoning for the King's du- 
 ties. 
 
 Magnus Troil, having been a large custom- 
 er, besides otherwise obliging Captain Coolie, 
 had been remunerated, on the departure of the 
 10
 
 320 THE PIRATE. 
 
 ship, with this splendid vehicle of conviviality, 
 at the very sight of which, as old Eric Scambes- 
 ter bent under its weight, a murmur of applause 
 ran through the company. 
 
 Those nearest this capacious Mediterranean of 
 punch, were accommodated by the Udaller with 
 their portions, dispensed in huge rummer glasses 
 by his own hospitable hand, whilst they who sat 
 at a greater distance replenished their cups by 
 means of a rich silver flagon, facetiously called 
 the Pinnace ; which, filled occasionally at the 
 bowl, served to dispense its liquid treasures to 
 the more remote parts of the table, and occasion- 
 ed many facetious jests on its frequent voyages. 
 The commerce of the Zetlanders with foreign 
 vessels, and homeward bound West Indiamen, 
 had early served to introduce among them the 
 general use of the generous beverage, with which 
 the Jolly Mariner of Canton was loaded ; nor was 
 there a man in the Archipelago of Thule more 
 skilled in combining its rich ingredients, than old 
 Eric Scambester, who indeed was known far and 
 wide through the isles by the name of the Punch-
 
 THE PIRATE. 321 
 
 maker, after the fashion of the ancient Norwe- 
 gians, who conferred on Hollo the Walker, and 
 other heroes of their strain, epithets expressive 
 of the feats of strength or dexterity in which 
 they excelled all other men. 
 
 The good liquor was not slow in performing 
 its office of exhilaration, and, as the revel ad- 
 vanced, some ancient Norse drinking songs were 
 sung with great effect by the guests, tending to 
 shew, that if from want of exercise the martial 
 virtues of their ancestors had decayed among 
 the Zetlanders, they could still actively and in- 
 tensely enjoy so much of the pleasures of Val- 
 halla as consisted in quaffing the oceans of mead 
 and brown ale, which were promised by Odin to 
 those who should share his Scandinavian para- 
 dise. At length, excited by the cup and song, 
 the diffident grew bold, and the modest loquaci- 
 ous all became desirous of talking, and none 
 were willing to listen each man mounted his 
 own special hobby-horse, and began eagerly to 
 call on his neighbours to witness his agility. 
 Amongst others, the little bard, who had now- 
 got next to our friend Mordaunt Mertoun, evin- 
 
 VOL. i. x
 
 THE 1'IHATK. 
 
 ced a positive determination to commence and 
 conclude, in all its longitude and latitude, the 
 story of his introduction to glorious John Dry- 
 den ; and Triptolemus Yellowley, as his spirits 
 arose, shaking off a feeling of involuntary awe, 
 with which he was impressed by the opulence indi- 
 cated in all he saw around him, as well as by the 
 respect paid to Magnus Troil by the assembled 
 guests, began to broach, to the astonished and 
 somewhat offended Udaller, some of those pro- 
 jects for ameliorating the islands, which he had 
 boasted of to his fellow-travellers upon their 
 journey of the morning. 
 
 But the innovations which he suggested, and 
 the reception which they met with at the hand of 
 Magnus Troil, must be told in the next Chapter. 
 
 EN'T) OF VOLUME FIRST. 
 
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