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 tf
 
 THE 
 
 BLACK WATCH. 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR OF 
 
 THE DOMINIE'S LEGACY 
 
 IMy heart's in the Highlands wherever I go. 
 
 Scots Song. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON, 
 
 RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. 
 
 (successor to henry colburn.) 
 
 1834.
 
 LONDON: 
 
 IE0T8OM ANT) PALMER, PRINTIRS, SAVOy STV.FF.T, !^ I nANIL
 
 ?^3 
 •f. 
 
 Pss-^ 
 
 
 <k 
 
 ^ 
 
 TO 
 
 SIR CHARLES FORBES, BART. 
 
 &c. &c. &c. 
 
 Sir; 
 It was the intention of my late father to 
 
 dedicate to you the following Tale, illustrative 
 
 of the martial character of the Highlands of 
 
 Scotland. But death has withheld him from 
 
 indulging in this wish. 
 
 May, I therefore, his son, presume to fulfil 
 
 the design which my father entertained, and 
 
 inscribe with your name this, his last, Work ? 
 
 I have the honour to be, 
 
 Sir, 
 With great respect, 
 
 Your most obedient Servant, 
 
 JOHN COXON PICKEN.
 
 THE 
 
 BLACK WATCH, 
 
 CHAPTEH I. 
 
 To Nature and to Holy Writ 
 Alone did God the boy commit : 
 Where flash'd and roar'd the torrent^ oft 
 His soul found wings^ and soar'd aloft ! 
 
 Coleridge. 
 
 The first peep of daylight was just beginning 
 to streak the sky on the seaward side of the old 
 town of Inverness, in the north of Scotland, 
 when a t^l Highland youth, dressed in bonnet 
 and trews, stole cautiously forth from the 
 straggling outskirts, and with his face turned 
 southerly, set hastily forward on some boyish 
 
 VOL. I. B
 
 2 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 adventure. The season of the year was early 
 summer; the time, that discontented and law- 
 less period in Scotland, which occurred between 
 the fifteen and the forty-five ; and the lad that 
 now bared his youthful bosom to the breezes of 
 the south, was not quite sixteen years of age. 
 
 No sooner had the youth got fairly clear of 
 Inverness, than he ran for several miles, as if 
 he had been chased; never stopping to take 
 breath until he found himself on the border of 
 the long dreary flat called Culloden ]\Ioor, 
 which was afterwards to become so famous 
 in the history of his country. As he proceeded 
 forward, clear day having now spread around, 
 the open level that he could see, to a distance 
 behind, showed him that so far there was none 
 in pursuit. When, however, he had reached 
 the farthest edge of the moor, and the hills 
 began to rise to his right in grand* and pic- 
 turesque irregularity, determining to avoid 
 any possible danger, as well as to gratify his 
 longing to enjoy one glorious week among the
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 3 
 
 glensj he plunged into the outer commencement 
 of the great wilds of Lochaber. 
 
 " Liberty ! blessed liberty ! is this indeed 
 thyself that I have found at last ?"*'* he cried, 
 holding out his arms towards the great blue 
 hills, that now stretched away, mountain be- 
 yond mountain, and peak beyond peak, to his 
 astonished admiration. " Have I no master 
 now to slave and harass me? no mercenary 
 mistress to stint me of my food ? Have I now 
 no morning'*s anxiety, no evening's terror ? 
 Am I really a free being, to run where I 
 please, and seek what I can, in this wide 
 world ? Is my feet now fairly on ' the bonny 
 blooming heather ?"" and can I run, like the 
 red deer, without any one to stop me ? Li- 
 berty ! glorious liberty !" he cried, bounding 
 along the ridge to which he had climbed ; " I 
 vow I am almost giddy with the joy of finding 
 thee at last !'' 
 
 He now mounted to the top of the hill, and 
 sitting himself down on a soft knoll, set himself 
 
 B 2
 
 4 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 * 
 
 to consider of his means and prospects. Thrust- 
 ing his fingers into an opening in the band of 
 his trews, he took out a little leathern purse, 
 and began to reckon his worldly wealth. He 
 had two beautiful silver pennies, the coinage of 
 his former majesty, King George the First — 
 three new farthings, excellently convenient for 
 small change, and not less than six Edinburgh 
 half-pennies, which it became him to husband 
 according to their value. Besides this, he had 
 an Inverness bodle, extremely useful on occa- 
 sions of economy ; and in addition to all, an 
 old-fashioned Scots plack, which being twice 
 the value of the former — namely, the third of a 
 penny — made the whole of this money put to- 
 gether amount to within a fraction above a 
 white sixpence ! — a sum which, if properly 
 managed, would go a great way indeed with an 
 abstemious Scotsman. 
 
 But considering the splendour of the boy's 
 plans, all this might have been deemed insuffi- 
 cient, but for a piece of good fortune, which,
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 5 
 
 above and beyond the former, had put into his 
 hand an actual shilling ! with a beautiful king's 
 crown on one side of it ; and when he now re- 
 flected on the way it had dropped from the 
 clouds upon him, he saw clearly that Provi- 
 dence favoured his present adventure. The 
 very day previous to that on which he now sat 
 at perfect liberty on the sunny side of a High- 
 land hill, a tall, swaggering Englishman, wear- 
 ing a great drab coat, and carrying a travelling 
 whip in his hand, had asked him to do him 
 some trifling service ; and after staring him in 
 the face, and saying something about its being 
 a pity that he did not go to the south, had 
 thrust into his hand this noble shilling ; and 
 then stumped off* as unconcerned as if be had 
 done nothing extraordinary. 
 
 There was only one other piece of wealth the 
 lad had, the value of which could not be so 
 correctly ascertained. That was a small old- 
 fashioned gold clasp, which by much persuasion 
 he had been enabled to obtain from the woman
 
 6 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 with whom he had lived from the time he was 
 an infant until he became apprentice to Daniel 
 M'Vicar. This little personal idol he had al- 
 ways held in the most sacred veneration ; for, 
 whenever he took a desponding thought about 
 his orphan condition, it did him good to con 
 over and contemplate its mysterious initials, 
 from some vague notion of hidden philosophy, 
 that it might one day become of service in help- 
 ing him to a friend. 
 
 Having now collected his thoughts, and ma- 
 tured his resolves, he descended the hill with 
 joy ; and stretching forward again down a 
 winding glen, he soon overtook, beside some 
 long patches of green corn, several straggling 
 cottages, that seemed sunning themselves plea- 
 santly in the morning's beams, and there he 
 found a needful, and to him, delicious refresh- 
 ment. Darting forward again, wherever his 
 fancy led him, he wandered for days among 
 scenes and places, whose very wildness to him 
 was enchanting, and even whose occasional bald
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 7 
 
 and gruesome sterility seemed to fill his soul 
 with the deep spirit of- nature. All the latent 
 romance of his disposition now came out in 
 glowing enthusiasm, as he lingered among the 
 recesses of those glorious wilds, and saw with 
 his own eyes hoAv nature had shaped out a re- 
 treat for herself, to which she invites none to 
 enter but her chosen children ; and thus, with 
 his young and buoyant spirit, he first drank in 
 her profound impressions. 
 
 During all this. Hector Monro was at little 
 loss for his simple maintenance ; for, whenever 
 he came to a laird's castle on a hill-side, or a 
 lonely shelling in a glen, the comely appear- 
 ance and bold spirit of the boy, procured him a 
 hearty and a delighted Highland welcome. 
 There he partook of the barley-bread and milk, 
 or the bit of braxey mutton, of the kindly cot- 
 tager, and rested at night on the bed of heath 
 made up for him in the corner; and if, on 
 leaving his kind hosts, he offered to open the 
 strings of his little leathern purse, to give a
 
 O THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 silver penny for his entertainment, the proffer 
 was refused as almost an insult. 
 
 Had we to tell the same story now, applying 
 to our own days, a different representation 
 would require to be given of a people, among 
 whom, at that time, simplicity of life brought a 
 happiness more than they themselves understood; 
 and poverty itself had the sacredness of virtue, 
 accompanied, as it was, by a doric nobleness 
 that made it almost enviable. Before southern 
 luxury and Lowland greed had found their 
 way among the mountains, to the fatal corrupt- 
 ing of landlord and clansmen — making all men 
 mercenary, and none contented — the more than 
 eastern hospitality of the primitive Highlander 
 was such, as well may excite the astonishment 
 of those, whose social sympathies have been im- 
 proved away, almost into a matter of memory 
 or of history. So common and so genuine was 
 this virtue in those days, among this secluded 
 people, that at length advantage was taken of 
 it by idle persons from the south, who, under
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. i) 
 
 the name of Sorners, lived from house to house, 
 upon the kind feelings of those who impo- 
 verished themselves to give to the travelling- 
 wayfarer, until the imposition became so com- 
 mon as to require the check of legal enact- 
 ment. 
 
 Though the people among whom our wan- 
 derer lighted seemed often poor " to a degree," 
 yet experiencing nothing on his way but kind- 
 ness and respect, when he retired at night to 
 his fragrant bed, often after partaking of every 
 thing that the cottagers had hoarded, and 
 haply having his fancy delighted with those 
 tales and songs of love and heroism which make 
 so powerful an impression upon the youthful 
 fancy — when, as he lay, he contrasted all this 
 with what he had suffered in the house of his 
 master, in Inverness, the tears would rush into 
 the eyes of the grateful youth, and he rejoiced 
 in spirit, in a more noble view of human 
 nature. 
 
 But here, among these romantic mountains, 
 
 B 5
 
 10 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Hector found that he had, after all, no call to 
 abide; the feeling of independence still ob- 
 truding in his thoughts: so, with great re- 
 luctance, he descended towards the towns, to 
 see what fortune would throw in his way. As 
 he approached the haunts of population and 
 trade, he soon found that the people began to 
 look with longing when he took out his little 
 purse ; and that his silver pennies were now 
 but faintly refused. The generosity of his 
 own disposition made him press them whenever 
 they appeared acceptable; and thus his last 
 plack was ultimately paid away, and his white 
 shilling he had a strong reluctance to discount. 
 With the common self-denial of a moimtaineer, 
 he had passed a whole day without food, and 
 towards evening came to a river, which it was 
 necessary to cross. Observing a boat fastened 
 to a stake, he was just about to help himself to 
 its assistance, when he saw a man, carrying a 
 bundle, come leisurely down from a small cot- 
 tage near the bank.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 11 
 
 The man, depositing the bundle in the boat, 
 proceeded to unloose it, and then stepped in 
 himself, taking no notice of Hector, who stood 
 watching by. He was taking up the oars, 
 meaning to cross the river, when seeing the boy 
 making no motion to go on board, he thought 
 fit to address him. 
 
 " Will she no be for crossing ta ferry ?'' 
 
 ". Then you keep a ferry here ?" 
 
 " Aye, to pe surely — an it's a penny price. 
 Will she go.?" 
 
 '' AVill you not let a poor lad get a crossing 
 in your boat, without changing his white shil- 
 ling r 
 
 " Shell see her nainsel's nose made a cheese 
 for ta mice first," said the man, preparing to 
 pull off. 
 
 " Then I'll try whether the stream is half as 
 churlish as yourself," said Hector ; and without 
 another word, he dashed in, clothed as he was, 
 his little bundle held firm in his teeth. Breast- 
 ing the current like a water-dog, he soon swam
 
 12 THE BLACK WA'ICH. 
 
 past the boat ; while it was as much as the 
 astonished ferryman could do to get to the 
 other side of the river at the same moment as 
 the adventurous boy. 
 
 " Here's a ruination to her trade," said the 
 man, stepping out of his boat. " Deevil ! if 
 she comes her that trick again, by the piper o, 
 Penny cuick, she'll just stick the oar in the back 
 o' her neck afore she's half across, and drown 
 her like a blind puppy.""* 
 
 * The alarm of the ferryman was quite natural^ 
 from the known reluctance or inability of his country- 
 men of that period, to pay any species of toll or 
 turnpike-money. A Highlander could never be made 
 to understand why a man should be obliged to pay 
 for " ganging on the ground," or for getting dryshod 
 across a river ; which was the great objection to the 
 military roads just then cut through the Highlands, 
 under Marshal Wade's direction. Rather than pay 
 so unreasonable a charge, the poorer Scotchwomen 
 made no scruple of exposing their persons in a manner 
 much less excusable than the washing-tub tramping.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 13 
 
 Hector never condescended any other answer 
 to this spurt, than to swing round the long end 
 of his wet plaid, until dashing, as if by acci- 
 dent, a showei; of water in the face of the en- 
 raged ferryman, he ran off laughing down the 
 haugh, with his shilling safe in the bottom of 
 his pocket. 
 
 so well known even in the Lowlands ; for a traveller 
 from England^ a little before this time, who had pene- 
 trated as far north as Inverness, shortly after the 
 bridge over the Murray Frith was built, relates, that 
 he has seen numbers of women, many of them carrying 
 loads on their heads, rush into the river ; and, tucking 
 up their petticoats to a very unseemly height, wade 
 over the flat stones at the bottom, " which are made 
 slippery by the sulphur," to the danger even of their 
 lives — the water above the bridge reaching nearly to 
 their middle ; and all to save a single hodle, the sixth 
 part of a penny, being the amount of the toll levied 
 for crossing the bridge.
 
 14 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 The torrent's rush. 
 The cataract's din, the ocean's distant roar, 
 The echo's answer to his foot or voice — 
 All spoke a language which he understood,, 
 And warn'd him of his way. 
 
 Grahame. 
 
 Although thus gay in spirits, as he again 
 approached towards the coast, free from all 
 danger of pursuit from his master, yet one or 
 two days of stormy weather had sadly cut up 
 Hector's slight vestments, and reduced him 
 eventually to much distress. This arose chiefly 
 from his losing his way among the mountains, 
 during the drifting of a storm of summer hail ; 
 so that when he had at length arrived in the 
 town of Perth, his brogues, and even his stock-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 15 
 
 ings, were completely worn out ; his feet were 
 bleeding with the effects of his march, and the 
 flat bonnet which he had worn, having been 
 blown away as he passed the angle of a rock 
 during the storm, his appearance now, in this 
 seat of comfort and comparative wealth, bare- 
 headed and shoeless, was but a humiliating 
 termination of his long journey. 
 
 Wandering along the antiquated streets, his 
 heart sank to find himself totally unheeded, 
 unless as an object to be avoided by the re- 
 spectable; and still more was he disposed to 
 despond at the prospect of being obliged again 
 to seek a trading employment, for the sake of 
 subsistence. But where to go, or to whom to 
 apply, even for that, was now the question. 
 Fainting witli exhaustion, his changed shilling 
 nearly all spent, he looked about in vain in the 
 faces of his species, for interest or compassion. 
 Reflecting on what little he knew of civilized 
 man, his sagacity led him to avoid those quar- 
 ters of the town where there was abundance or 
 grandeur, and to seek for a friend among the
 
 16 THE I'.LACK WATCH. 
 
 pinched and lowly like himself. Wandering 
 towards the meaner part of the town, he ob- 
 served several passers-by looking on him with 
 sympathy ; for, dilapidated as his apparel was, 
 he was yet a brave and a well-favoured youth. 
 At length he saw a middle-aged Highland 
 woman, sitting spinning at a door, who eyeing 
 him, as he passed, with strong looks of interest, 
 at length asked him into her cottage. The lad 
 obeyed, and when she had set him on a seat, 
 and surveyed for an instant his ruddy counte- 
 nance, long curling locks, and proud mountaineer 
 eye ; and saw by his apparel that, though now 
 weary and dejected, he looked, as she said, 
 " like an honest man's bairn," her heart melted 
 with compassion ; for she was strongly re- 
 minded by him of her own favourite son, whose 
 fair head she had but lately laid in the kirkyard 
 of Perth. 
 
 " And whare are ye frae, my bonnie young 
 man,"''' she said, " and what has happened you ? 
 Alack ! but ifs surely an ill world this, when 
 the like o' you is let to wander friendless on the
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 17 
 
 streets o' Perth, the shoon worn off your feet, 
 and no one to bid you a meal o' meat."' 
 
 Hector, putting a bridle on his proud feel- 
 ings, told the poor woman, in a few words, that 
 he had neither father nor mother known to him ; 
 that he had been put apprentice to a wheel- 
 wright, but his master having used him ill, and 
 tried all he could to break his spirit, he had 
 just taken the road and run for it, seeking for 
 better luck towards the Lowlands ; and being 
 now arrived in a strange town, no one would 
 know him, or ask him what he was willing 
 to do. 
 
 " Oh, oh, but it's sad and sair," said tlie 
 woman, " when the fatherless is left to be 
 helped by the widow, wha has no helper to 
 herself but Providence aboon, and nothing to 
 depend on but what she draws out o' the thread 
 o' the tow. But dinna be disheartened or take 
 pride at me, my man ; if I canna do aught else 
 for the friendless orphan, I can greet for him 
 as I've done for my ain bairn; and if, in the
 
 18 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 day of his necessity, he eats a bite o' the 
 widow's bread, it'll ne'er be a mote on his mar- 
 riage day. Now, my bonnie lad, just let me 
 see your hand." 
 
 The boy, turning away his head, to conceal 
 his feelings at the garrulous kindness of the 
 Highland woman, gave her his hand. 
 
 Looking at it on both sides, and pushing up 
 the lad's sleeve, for a species of examination to 
 which travellers in Scotland in those days 
 thought it no disgrace to be subjected, when 
 she saw the clear white skin of the boy, 
 through which shone the blue veins at his 
 wrist, all her good opinion of him was fully 
 verified. " A skin like an egg !" she exclaimed, 
 " and an ee like an eagle — a guest weel worthy 
 o' my clean sheets. Wha kens," she added, 
 surveying him all over, " wha's son the orphan 
 may be after a', and wha the puir widow may 
 be honoured to ha'e in her house !" 
 
 Agreeable to this primitive and sympathetic 
 philosophy, the poor woman comforted the de-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 19 
 
 jected youth, washed his feet according to the 
 Highland fashion, and put him to rest with a 
 mother's care, and even with much of a mo- 
 ther's pleasure. As she contemplated the lad 
 as he soon got into a sound sleep, the painful 
 pleasure of being thus reminded of her son 
 that was gone renewed her sorrow, and yet 
 she thought that the indulgence of her grief 
 over the sleeping stranger brought her a lonely 
 widow's melancholy comfort. 
 
 A few days' stay with this woman completely 
 restored the youth to his former vigour. But 
 with his strength returned anxiety for inde- 
 pendence, and the means of repaying his kind 
 entertainer. Possessing some acquaintances 
 above her own condition, Mrs. M'Lean did 
 not fail to add her own efforts to the inquiries 
 of the lad, and but a few days had elapsed, 
 when, finding that a substantial burgess and 
 deacon of Perth, by name Hugh M'Vey, was 
 willing to listen to her recommendations of 
 Hector, (clever youths being not so common
 
 20 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 as in our day,) he did her the honour to ])ay 
 her a visit at her cottage, liked exceedingly 
 the lad's looks, attended to his story with much 
 interest, and in ten minutes' time the prelimi- 
 naries were settled, and Hector was regularly 
 installed in a new line of life. 
 
 Master Hugh M'Vey, dealer and chapman 
 in the good city of Perth, and now the worthy 
 patron of our ambitious youth, deserves a few 
 sentences of brief description, as the represen- 
 tative of a class of traders now long extinct. 
 He was an easy-tempered bachelor of forty, 
 who, agreeably to the manners of the place and 
 period, knowing that few could outshine him 
 in goods and gear, and that which he dealt in 
 must be had, if there was money to buy it, 
 always acted towards those who bought from 
 him, with that high demeanour and urbane 
 condescension, which made them feel that it 
 was they were the party obliged, and he the 
 dignitary who conferred the obligation. Taking 
 liis cue, therefore, from the aristocratic shop-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 21 
 
 keepers of the Lowlands of his time, it was his 
 practice to take every thing exceedingly easy, 
 to shut the door of his shop every day at one 
 o'clock, when he went to eat his dinner. If, of 
 an afterrioon, when he chose to go a fishing, or 
 at any other time a customer came, whom it 
 was not convenient for him to attend, he would 
 inform the intending purchaser that he was 
 busy now, and bid him call to-morrow when 
 he would be at leisure. 
 
 It may easily be seen how great a man our 
 youth was soon constituted, as the juvenile 
 doer for such a person as this, and known, as 
 he grew up tall and manly j to be an exceed- 
 ing favourite with his new master. As the 
 burgess's days of fishing began to multiply, as 
 fast as Hector got acquainted with the details 
 of his craft, and his long summer evenings of 
 bowling-green playing in the outskirts next 
 became invested with sundry social invitations, 
 the lad was left much to himself, and thus the free 
 exercise of his own thoughts soon again worked
 
 22 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 themselves into restlessness, if not discontent, 
 agreeeably to the unerring philosophy of the 
 human character. But this intruding discon- 
 tent, if it deserve the name, was of a very dif- 
 ferent species and intensity, from the slavish 
 depression endured in his original situation, 
 and arose more out of the wantonness of ease 
 and plenty, and the not less powerful bias of 
 disposition, than from any privation or real 
 cause of complaint. Little of the trading spirit 
 as there comparatively was in the simple trans- 
 actions of his employer, with his long known 
 customers, or as there appeared in the good- 
 natured and benevolent disposition of the bur- 
 gess, yet this was by no means the case with 
 many others with whom Hector occasionally 
 came in contact ; and the fast developing con- 
 stitution of his own mind was so repugnant to 
 every thing having a mean or mercenary ap- 
 pearance, that, promising as were his prospects 
 as the favourite of the bachelor, and easy as 
 was his life in a quiet country town, he
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 23 
 
 began to look upon his good prospects with a 
 vague and discontented dread. Along with all 
 this, a pervading pride of nature, or of blood, 
 in the temperament of the youth, and some in- 
 trusive notion that he was designed for higher 
 things, made him look upon his employments 
 with true Highland contempt, which he at the 
 same time suspected to be tolerably unrea- 
 sonable. 
 
 But now was the time of life when he be- 
 gan to feel of what stuff nature had made him, 
 and, reason or none, all he could tell was, 
 that at times he felt himself peculiarly un- 
 happy. Even the taste he had received during 
 his runaway excursion, of the grand and poetic 
 impression of the mountains, increased the in- 
 definite restlessness of his mind. The roving 
 life, and the hardy fatigues of the free High- 
 lander, appeared to him invested with charms 
 irresistible — the echoing forest and the bound- 
 ing roe, the craggy peak and wild glen, inces- 
 
 ^
 
 2^4) THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 santly haunted his romantic imagination. Tale 
 also, and song, and heroic romance, now brought 
 frequently to his maturing mind, or rising upon 
 his memory with the music of nature, invested 
 all this, and the wild castles of the Highlands, 
 with an interest which was enhanced by igno- 
 rance itself, and charms which fancy made 
 almost inexpressible. 
 
 Still time went on, and still this disposition 
 increased, until it turned into the same dissa- 
 tisfied ennui which torments the great, and 
 thus those " nameless longings," which the 
 best hearts have beat with in all genera- 
 tions, became the constant companion of the 
 tradesman -boy. Too young as yet to under- 
 stand the political news of his time, which came 
 in brief and garbled snatches from the south, 
 or the relative situation of his own country, 
 then far from happy in general, under the go- 
 vernment of the House of Hanover, and agitated 
 from the one end to the other, by the fierce dis-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 25 
 
 putes of Whig and Jacobite, he only saw the 
 town of Perth occasionally disturbed by the 
 inarching and counter-marching of southern 
 soldiers, and heard exaggerated rumours of 
 tumults and robberies in the neighbouring 
 Highlands, which the unfortunate red-coats 
 were vainly attempting to suppress. But the 
 reports brought from the hills on a market- 
 day, by some of the grave Highland proprietors 
 who dealt with the burgess, the sentiments 
 uttered, and the predictions given out of what 
 was soon to take place, were of a nature which 
 might well puzzle the understanding, as they 
 excited the curiosity and impatience, of our 
 ardent youth. 
 
 Under all these circumstances, seldom has 
 kindness been felt more burthensome than be- 
 came the very goodness of Hector's good-natured 
 master ; nor could gratitude well be put to a 
 severer trial, than that which compelled his 
 honourable mind to make any sacrifice of him- 
 self, and his restless inclinations, to the feelings 
 
 VOL. I. c
 
 26 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 of him to whom he owed so much. He knew 
 not, however, while reflecting in this manner, 
 that occurrences were going on, surely and se- 
 cretly, which, without compromising his own 
 feelings, were preparatory to another change in 
 his condition.
 
 72 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 The trumpets blew, and the colours flew, 
 And every man to his armour drew ; 
 The Whigs were never so much aghast. 
 
 Scotch Ballad. 
 
 One morning, before Hector's usual hour of 
 rising, as he lay in his little dormitory dream- 
 ing of his favourite subject the mountains, and 
 was roaming in fancy among those wild glens 
 into which he as yet had only had in reality a 
 hurried peep, the fantasies of his sleep seemed 
 to become so real as to strike vividly even 
 upon his external senses. From following, in 
 his dream, dark legions of the warlike Gael, as 
 they plunged into the forests or threaded the 
 thickets of the mountains, he thought he him- 
 self bore broadsword and target among them, 
 
 c2
 
 28 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 and led his men to the coming war, while the 
 vallies echoed to the tread of their feet, and the 
 warlike music of the bagpipe seemed to be re- 
 verberated from the rocks with a sound that 
 stirred his spirit like enchantment. The pipers 
 seemed to blow louder and louder, and the 
 tread of his men to become more distinct as 
 they tramped the sod, in some dreary glen, 
 until the former became almost deafening in 
 its pealing note, and he began to wonder withal 
 wither he was proceeding, or who was this 
 armed clan of whom he made one. A loud 
 shout now rose from a shifting something, of 
 either hills or houses, and amidst the din and 
 confusion he heard the cry of " The black 
 watch ! the black watch !" rising upon the 
 wind, as if to solve the mystery which momen- 
 tarily puzzled him. In another instant the 
 skirl of the bagpipe seemed almost at his ear, 
 and starting from sleep he found it proceeded 
 from the street without. 
 
 Jumping from his bed, he soon divined
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 29 
 
 what had caused his dream, and that a partv of 
 the Black Watch, of which he had often heard, 
 and about which he was vehemently interested, 
 were at that moment tramping past under hib 
 window. He would scarcely take time to dress 
 himself, so anxious was he to get a sight of that 
 far-famed band ; but so hard had he been to 
 awake, that by the time he got to the foot of 
 his stair, and had the door opened, the last re- 
 mains of the company, which had just passed 
 through the town on an early march, were turn- 
 ing the angle of the street to issue from the 
 north gate, and the dark bonnets and gleaming 
 arms of a few of them were all that his eye 
 caught, while the loud bagpipe music was still 
 sounding strongly in the still silence of the 
 morning. 
 
 About to dart after them, to gratify as well 
 his fancy as his curiosity, a heavy hand at the 
 moment caught him by the shoulder, with — 
 
 " Whar awa ? — whar awa, young man ? Nae 
 time for sodgering at this time o' the morning.
 
 30 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Dinna ye see there's a' the shops round us be- 
 ginning to open, baith their een an' their mouths? 
 and deacon M'Vey should aye be the fore- 
 most. Na, never mind farlies, Hector, my man, 
 but draw the fastenings, and drap the shutters 
 frae the windows, for it doesna do for young 
 men, nor yet young maidens, to let their heads 
 run after the sodgers." 
 
 Hector saw that it would not do to gratify 
 himself against the pleasure of his indulgent 
 master, and proceeded in silence to the duties 
 of his employment. But he found, by experi- 
 ence, that it is not so easy a matter for either 
 young men or young maidens, to keep their 
 heads from running upon that which commends 
 itself to their inclination ; and all day the Black 
 Watch, the flower of Athol and Lochaber, and 
 the choice men of the clans, and brave Sir Dun- 
 can Campbell of Lochnell, and Master Camp- 
 bell of Finab, and the proud Grant of Ballin- 
 dallock, who watched the merry vallies of 
 Strathspey, or ranged the braes of Badenoch,
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 31 
 
 and Simon Frazer of Lovat himself, whose 
 black Highlanders ranged the great glen of 
 Scotland, from Fort Augustus to the old castle 
 of Inverness — were the talk, and nothing else 
 that day, of all who had a morsel of enthusiasm 
 in them who inhabited the old city of Perth. 
 
 It was no wonder that Hector's enthusiasm 
 was increased by the descriptions he heard on 
 every side of these gallant men, especially by 
 the women, who were quite enthusiastic in their 
 admiration of them, from Lovat himself and 
 his Frazers, and Ballindallock and his Grants, 
 gentlemen every man of them, as well as the 
 Camerons of Argyleshire, and the Stewarts of 
 Appin, from the colonel who rode in front of 
 all, to the piper who played at their head — the 
 latter not only a gentleman too, but a bard and 
 a man of Highland erudition, and who per- 
 formed his duties with more pride than an Eng- 
 lish general. 
 
 " O but they were braw chields !" exclaimed 
 the maids of Perth, " and clean of leg, and light
 
 32 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 of heel, and warm of heart on a cauld day, 
 every one of them, as ever sat on a hill side wi' 
 a fortunate lass on tlie lee of his plaidie." 
 
 l^ut as to particular information regarding 
 this interesting corps, Hector could get little or 
 nothnig out of the sober burgess, his master, 
 who, justly aware of the danger of this species 
 of fascination to a youth with Hector's pros- 
 pects, discouraged his inquiries, and repre- 
 sented the Watch as a dangerous armament of 
 self-elected Highlanders, who had associated 
 theniselves into a corps under colour of military 
 efficiency, merely as an excuse for being allowed 
 openly to wear those arms so dear to their fathers, 
 and which, on the passing of the disarming act, 
 their proud spirits would not suffer them to part 
 with. Not content, however, with this bald 
 information, which was tolerably correct as far 
 as it went, Hector resolved to go down the same 
 evening to visit the widow M'Lean, his early 
 patroness, to whom he usually applied for all 
 internal information regarding the people of the 
 hills.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 33 
 
 On his way thither, he observed the streets to 
 be more than usually crowded with Highland 
 strangers, among which, various groups of red 
 soldiers, as the southern infantry were called 
 by way of reproach, lounged about quite apart 
 from the more bold mountaineers. Taking 
 little heed, however, the youth proceeded on^ 
 and was soon seated by the peat fire of the 
 poor widow, whose former kindness it was not 
 his nature to forget. 
 
 " Things are mickle altered since I hae mind,"'"' 
 said widow M'Lean, in answer to Hector'^s in- 
 quiries. " I kend the time when a Highland 
 gentleman didna need to take an oath to Ger- 
 man George, no more than to Glenco Willie, 
 for the sake of liberty to wear a biodag on his 
 thigh, or a clymore on his haunch, as his fa- 
 thers had done before him, and when there 
 was nae watch across the hills, but the gude 
 auld neighbourly watch o' the like of Duncan 
 M'Naughton, or the sensible protection of 
 
 c 5
 
 34 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Evan M'Evan. And though they sometimes 
 milked a body dry enough, wi' their black meal 
 or maut, or whatever they took frae us, odd, we 
 sometimes got a fat sheep, or may be a gude 
 stot, or a yeanling, if the chields had a lucky 
 creagh in the Lowlands. Oh ! but the Earl of 
 Mar has had mickle to answer for, for his ill- 
 brew'd browst o' the fifteen, for it was that, and 
 the weary scrimage of Glenshields, that has 
 given the new German folk that's come to rule 
 over Scotland, an excuse to bring into the happy 
 glens ayont the Grampians sae many troubles." 
 
 "But the Black Watch," said Hector, at- 
 tempting to bring back the wandering ideas of 
 the talkative widow. 
 
 " Ou, I've naething to say against the Black 
 Watch ; theyVe pretty men, but I wish they 
 could hae keeped their swords and dirks, with- 
 out swearing to serve this Hanover laird, for 
 they're leal lads, and dinna know southron 
 deceit."
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 35 
 
 "But, what do you think is bringing the 
 Watch on the march just now, piping and 
 drumming through the town of Perth ?"*' 
 
 " Ou, what should I ken ? It's a southron 
 fashion, nae doubt. But I hear that there's to 
 be a great rising o' the Watch, and a many 
 more made o' them, and the Earl o' Crawford, a 
 rank Lowlander, is to be their commander ; and 
 ye may be sure the Hanover Elector has his 
 ain views to do wi' our Highlands lads; for 
 Simon of Lovat, and other auld lairds, are 
 going out, and there's the Whig lairds are 
 coming in, and the Watch is to be made a 
 thousand strong, wi' the brawest men that can 
 be gathered off the hills frae Dornoch to Dum- 
 barton ; and they're sC to meet in the valley of 
 Glenlyon, aboon Aberfeldy; and proud< men 
 they'll be, nae doubt, but we'll just see what'll 
 come o't." 
 
 The heart of Hector swelled at this intel- 
 ligence, but, obliged to suppress his rising 
 wishes, he quietly proceeded.
 
 36 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 "But you don't seem to approve of the 
 duties of this gallant legion, "" said Hector, 
 anxious to hear the opinions, as well as the in- 
 formation, of the sagacious old woman, " who 
 are stationed in bands across the hills, as I hear 
 tell, to be naething but the guardians of Scot- 
 land." 
 
 " It's all very weel for them to guard their 
 ain firesides, and to march and flourish their 
 broadswords; but the Black Watch shouldna 
 demean themselves, for the sake of pleasing 
 this new king, to undertake, like the red soldiers, 
 and other thief-takers o' the law, to hunt out 
 and berry our poor ruined lairds, and other 
 Cearnachs, who maybe drive twa or three score 
 o' beasts frae the Lowlands, now and then, and 
 gar us pay a neivefu' o' black meal, whilk is 
 never missed. It's easy to talk about robberies 
 and spulzie, but there's braw men hae lost their 
 all since the fifteen, and must live, and a wee 
 bit creagh, and a cattle lifting, is whyles a great 
 help to pay the laird his rent. Even an honest
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 37 
 
 quarrel and brulzie among the glens is naething 
 but what Highlandmen have been used to, since 
 ever I hae mind, and just helps to while away 
 the weariness o" the lang nights, and to keep 
 their cly mores in order." 
 
 This mode of reasoning was just letting in a 
 new light into Hector's mind, when a sudden 
 noise was heard in the street ; the door of the 
 house was hurriedly opened, and a young wo- 
 man entered, with terror in her looks, saying 
 .that a great brulzie had taken place at the cross 
 of Perth, between some strangers from the hills 
 and the red soldiers ; and the folk, she added, 
 were all running, and some said that Duncan 
 M'Naughton, or Shaw, the great Cearnach from 
 Strathtay, had been seen in the crowd, and had 
 drawn a short clymore that he had hid under 
 his plaid, and swore he would clear the cause- 
 way o' the seider diarg ; and so he was now 
 laying about him, and the people were shutting 
 their shops for fear o' the fray. 
 
 "Duncan M'Nanghton sayst thou, lassie ?""
 
 38 THE BLACK WATCH, 
 
 cried the woman in amaze. " It's not possible 
 that Duncan would venture on the streets of 
 Perth after what he's done. It'*s as mickle as 
 his neck's worth. Hector, my man, if ye will 
 run to the fray, take care of your ain crown. 
 Hoigh ! such times !"" 
 
 Before the woman had the half of the last sen- 
 tence uttered. Hector was off, and up the street ; 
 but by the time he arrived at the cross, the 
 crowd met him as flying from the danger; 
 and the red soldiers were running from all quar- 
 ters, in obedience to the drum, whose loud and 
 hasty beat to arms gave an alarming idea of 
 what was going forward. 
 
 The scene of strife, when Hector drew near 
 it, though comparatively limited in extent, pre- 
 sented that silently warlike appearance, which 
 was in earlier times much more common on the 
 streets of the Scottish capital, than, notwith- 
 standing all that is said of the quarrelsomeness 
 of the Highlanders, ever was the case in the 
 orderly town of Perth. The first object that
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 39 
 
 was conspicuous was a stout middle-sized High- 
 lander, who, clad in a dress better than com- 
 mon, and now bare-headed from the press of the 
 skirmish, layed about him against above a dozen 
 bayonets, with a bravery which, though evi- 
 dently on the defensive, showed him to be sen- 
 sible that he was fighting for his life. A few 
 other Highlanders, some with short knives or 
 skenookles, and more with nought but sloe-thorn 
 sticks, aided the riot, and increased the confu- 
 sion. But, although several of the townsmen, 
 who also hated the red soldiers, occasionally as- 
 sisted in embarrassing them in their attacks 
 upon the principal combatant, this was all that 
 either they or the Highlanders were able to 
 effect; for the unpopular disarming act having 
 deprived them of all efficient weapons, they 
 were able to make little head against so many 
 bayonets along with a single sword, which now 
 and then ventured to strike in from a thin lath 
 of an officer, who warily, yet zealously, made 
 himself busy in the fray. ♦
 
 40 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Though occasionally cheered by loud shouts 
 from the townsmen of " Well done ! cut again, 
 and give it them, brave Duncan M'Naughton," 
 the bare-headed Highlander's case was evi- 
 dently fast becoming desperate, notwithstand- 
 ing a degree of bravery, which might well 
 excite the astonishment of the multitude, who, 
 from outer stairs and numerous windows, gazed 
 breathlessly upon the riot beneath them. For 
 a youth such as Hector to take any part in an 
 affray so dangerous, was evidently madness, yet 
 the spirit that was in him stirred him up almost 
 to frenzy, as he clenched his empty hand, 
 finding no weapon within his reach with which 
 he might strike a blow for the hard-pressed 
 mountaineers, who fought so bravely with such 
 odds against them. 
 
 As the drum continued to beat to arms with- 
 out, and the soldiers to pour in, the shouts of 
 the townspeople, who also flocked to the spot, 
 increased the confusion, while lights now glanc- 
 ed from doors and windows, the excitement be-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 41 
 
 came general, and the fray assumed an appear- 
 ance absolutely terrific. With the fearlessness 
 of youth and a kindred spirit, Hector had got 
 within a few yards of the spot where Duncan 
 M'Naughton still swung round his short broad- 
 sword, and kept at bay half a score of bayonets, 
 when, observing the manoeuvres of the lathy 
 officer to get behind the veteran, taking advan- 
 tage of the fall of a soldier, who was cut down 
 by a back-stroke of the Highlander's active 
 clymore, he plucked the bayonet out of the 
 fallen man's hand, and. flew like a young tiger 
 upon the insidious subaltern. The gentleman 
 of the spontoon fell back among the others, and 
 immediately our youth found himself in the 
 very thick of the fray, while the shouts of the 
 multitude near, and the strong Gaelic expres- 
 sion which he heard from the mountaineer him- 
 self, indicated the value they set upon his 
 timely service. 
 
 The soldiers now began to retreat among the 
 crowd, and the Cearnach to regain some confi-
 
 42 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 dence, when a rush of the people on one side, 
 along with the sudden entrance of a fresh party 
 of soldiers, backed by several of the magis- 
 trates, changed the fate of the day ; and while 
 Hector opposed his bayonet to the sword of 
 the retreating officer, Duncan M'Naughton was 
 surrounded from behind, and a total rout of his 
 party became inevitable. Fortunately for our 
 youth, his own dexterous activity became his 
 salvation from a fate much worse, to his appre- 
 hension, than a deep wound in the fray ; 
 namely, to be carried to gaol as a rioter and 
 abetter of a Cearnach, of whom the officers of 
 the law had long attempted the capture in vain. 
 First driving back among the confused crowd, 
 and then hastily mounting one of the outer 
 stairs, from which its occupants had fled in con- 
 fusion but a moment before, he was enabled to 
 witness at his leisure the upshot of the affair. 
 Several of the soldiers and townspeople he saw 
 carried off desperately wounded, and afterwards 
 led past in shouting triumph by the soldiery,
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 43 
 
 town-officers, and magistrates, the athletic 
 figure of M'Naughton himself, the blood 
 streaming from him in several parts of his head 
 and body, while, with sullen dignity, he ap- 
 peared to submit to his fate. Soon after, as 
 Hector followed the crowd, he saw the heavy 
 doors of the old gaol open to receive, and 
 slowly close upon, the manly form of the reluc- 
 tant prisoner; and every one engaged being 
 now glad to make a safe retreat to his own 
 home, the military, by this time in better order, 
 found little difficulty in clearing the streets, 
 and Hector, with no hurt but a slight prick of a 
 sword on the shoulder, got safely up into his 
 own little dormitory.
 
 44 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 What fellow's this ? 
 
 A strange one as ever I looked on : I cannot get him 
 out of the house. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 One evening, after nightfall, not long after the 
 foregoing event, the streets of Perth presented 
 with peculiar truth, that gloomy and deserted 
 appearance which is often the characteristic of a 
 small country town. This night Hector stood 
 meditatively at the low door of his shop, or 
 rather store, looking listlessly up and down at 
 the casual straggler; and as his eye rested oc- 
 casionally upon the dim lamps along the narrow 
 venal, and the other obscure lights, which peep- 
 ed from windows of shops like his own, he felt 
 a strong twinge of that depressing ennui, to
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 45 
 
 which no bosom, liigh or low, is entirely a 
 stranger. His master was out, having left him 
 to prepare for the market-day to be held on the 
 morrow, and which, every thing being now 
 ready, he longed for exceedingly, as expected 
 to bring with it the usual excitement of trad- 
 ing bustle. Shutting the little half-door of the 
 store, he returned within, and trimming the 
 single oil lamp which hung from the low ceil- 
 ing, he sat down to think of his favourite sub- 
 ject, the Highland hills. Here his thoughts 
 mixed themselves with the various rumours 
 with which the town was filled, and imperfect 
 accounts both from the Lowlands and the moun- 
 tains, which only excited and perplexed his ill- 
 informed judgment. To relieve his thoughts, 
 he had taken up the ell-wand, or measuring 
 stick, which so ill befitted his hand ; and his 
 brooding pride, as well as vague predilections, 
 having induced him of late to take lessons, with 
 which he assiduously engaged himself, in the 
 broad-sword exercise, from a yoimg Highlander
 
 46 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 only known to him by the name of Farquhar, 
 he was practising his guards and his cuts 
 against a high roll of plaiding cloth which 
 stood in the inner shop, when he heard the half- 
 door scraping open behind him, and looking 
 round, saw the stalwart figure of a Highland 
 stranger drawn up to its height within, after 
 having stooped as he entered the low door of 
 the shop. Without a word's speaking, the 
 stranger paced straight into the back part of the 
 store. 
 
 The stranger and our youth looked for a 
 moment at each other. To the straight back 
 and haughty step of a better-class Highlander, 
 Hector was no stranger, from the high bearing 
 of the gentleman drover or gentleman piper, 
 to that of the lord of the isles himself; but the 
 air with which this personage strode into the 
 store, and the smile of contempt with which he 
 cast his eyes round on the bales and barrels 
 choking up the place, was such as Hector had 
 seldom had occasion to witness ; and certainly
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 47 
 
 conveyed no flattery to him who had the honour 
 to be the keeper of all this goods and gear. A 
 tall huirdly figure was the least thing remark- 
 able in the appearance of this impressive 
 stranger. To see the aristocratic cock's feather 
 stuck gracefully in the front of the high bonnet 
 of a mountain gentleman, was nothing uncom- 
 mon in the town of Perth ; but gold lace, edg- 
 ing the scarlet waistcoat so seldom worn in the 
 hills, a small portion of which revealed itself to 
 Hector's glance beneath the plaid which crossed 
 the gentleman's breast, as well as the round 
 bowl of a long Spanish pistol, the bright silver 
 of which just peeped from beneath the dark 
 tartan of his short coat, gave token that this 
 was no common man. No sword, however, ap- 
 peared on his haunch, for the obnoxious act, 
 then sometime passed, made such a weapon 
 rather too conspicuous to be worn in approach- 
 ing a town ; but the belted plaid, whose long 
 folds hung by this gentleman's side, did not 
 seem as ever meant to conceal the ample biodag
 
 48 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 or dirk, the threatening hilt of which, mounted 
 also with silver and garnished with the usual 
 convenient apparatus, sat close to the brawns- 
 thigh of the stranger. 
 
 " Be the chapman not at home then ?" said 
 the personage, casting another haughty glance 
 round the shop. 
 
 The blood mounted into Hector's face as he 
 found this contempt strike home upon himself, 
 and under the impulse of the moment, making 
 the ell-wand that he held sound upon the floor, 
 while his eyes flashed upon the stranger, ho 
 boldly replied, " My master, sir, is Deacon of 
 the drapers, and town councillor of Perth" 
 
 The gentleman opened his eyes with astonish- 
 ment, and as he gazed upon the youth, his 
 haughty features gradually relaxed into a smile, 
 when putting up his hand Avith great ceremony 
 to his bonnet, he lifted it gracefully from his 
 black bushy head, and made our hero a pro- 
 found bow. 
 
 The irony of this action, instead of humbling
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 49 
 
 him for whom it was intended, deepened the 
 affront ; and the youth, throwing down the ell- 
 wand with high contempt, merely turned his 
 back on the stranger and walked in silence to- 
 wards the window. 
 
 " By the soul of my father," exclaimed the 
 unknown, coming forward and offering his hand 
 to our youth, " there "s some mistake here ; for 
 it's evident that old mother Nature, who takes no 
 charge of her own, after she strikes them off her 
 anvil, never made thee for selling and swapping 
 goods and gear like a Lowlander. It 's no fault 
 of mine, not to expect such as thee in a chap- 
 man's shop. Nay, refuse not my hand, boy ! 
 there would be danger in that. I '11 give thee 
 to boast what few other can, that EvanM'Evan 
 has begged thy pardon, There, upon my 
 word, a handsome fellow, to be flourishing an 
 ellwand like a Kirkaldy tailor." 
 
 " It is your pleasure, sir," said Hector, 
 almost affected, " to reproach me with my mis- 
 fortune." 
 
 VOL. I. n
 
 50 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 " God forbid, young man," said the stranger, 
 resuming his dignity, and appearing still more 
 interested ; " although I am sorry to see so 
 likely a fellow cooped up in such a hole as this, 
 over a gathergae of merchandizing trumpery, I 
 know that on the hills from which I come, the 
 trees of the wood have not the choice of their 
 own situation, and that the winds of heaven, 
 which scatter about alike the seeds of the 
 strong oak and the feeble willow, sometimes let 
 the one fall in the place where the other should 
 be. I see you understand me, young man. By 
 heavens, youth, you have the very eye of the 
 eagle. Its a pity you could not build your 
 nest among the mountains." 
 
 The majestic stranger seemed to Hector to 
 rise a foot taller as he finished his speech, but 
 so affected was the youth with this picturesque 
 illustration of his fate and circumstances, that 
 the rising reply stuck in his throat. 
 
 " To be sure," resumed the chieftain, " the 
 eagles'* haunts in the hills are barren and bare,
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 51 
 
 often dreary and stormy ; and there grows not 
 on the cliffs or the moors, the comforts which 
 you merchants import from the southland. 
 But the free arm, and the free spirit, and the 
 mountain air, and the forest venison — pah ! 
 what a musty smell is here !— I am talking to 
 you, young man, in the spirit of a Highlander, 
 but perhaps you prefer this murky den where 
 you are." 
 
 " Only tell me, sir stranger, how I can get 
 there, and live by the use of arm or limb," 
 cried Hector, with animation, " and the eagle 
 you speak of shall not fly much quicker than I 
 shall bound away to the mountains." 
 
 " Hum — very well ; I thought you would 
 say so," said the chief, suddenly ; but I 
 must not, for all that, advise you to be rash in 
 turning your back upon the comfortable quar- 
 ters and sheep''s-head broth of a burgess of 
 Perth. It is now time, however, that I should 
 have some talk with my worthy acquaintance ; 
 and, harkee, youth ! in the meantime, be dis- 
 
 d2 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
 
 52 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 creet, and do not repeat the name that I have 
 just named in thy private ear, and see that thou 
 get me speedy speech of the good deacon, thy 
 master." 
 
 Hector seemed a little at a loss how to act at 
 the moment, which the stranger chief observing, 
 made a sign to his servant, who, without being 
 observed, had stood all this while in faithful 
 watch by the dark cheek of the door. Immedi- 
 ately a head was thrust cautiously in ; after 
 which came the short body of a sturdy High- 
 lander, who, drawing up to more than his full 
 height, took off the plain bonnet from his head, 
 and asked what was his honour's pleasure. 
 
 " Can you keep a chapman'*s shop, Dougald ? 
 and be ready to sell the merchant's gallimafery, 
 while this junior here goes to seek for his mas- 
 ter ? " 
 
 " Her nainsel doesna understand ta chop," 
 said the shock-headed Gael, looking round upon 
 the goods with a bewildered look, " but if her 
 honour"'s pleasure be to trust her lang in tis
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 53 
 
 chocked bourock, I wadna wonder but some of 
 the merchant's jigs-and-jugs wad find their way 
 into her nainsel's ain pouches." 
 
 " I would not wonder in the least," said the 
 chief, good-naturedly answering the taciturn 
 grin which developed the white teeth of the 
 Highlander, " but the men of Breadalbane do 
 not stoop to lifting of so low a kind — so, Dou- 
 gald, yell just take your stance here beside the 
 bing of plaiding; like the snuff-man's decoy 
 sign, in the Cowgate of Edinburgh ; for you 
 see, if any customer come in, it may not be con- 
 venient for me to be patent just now, and so I'll 
 step beyond the reach of the light of the 
 chruaskin ." 
 
 " Deevil nor her chop were at ta bottom 
 o' Lochow," mumbled the Highlander, taking 
 his stand beside the bale, with an angry mutter, 
 as his master retreated within ; " I wad rather 
 mount ta sentry post on the windy side o' Fort 
 William, than be stanced beside a plaiding, like a 
 Lowland weaver. Hunch ! Ta chief be o'er
 
 54 THE BLACK WvVTCII. 
 
 fool-hardy, I'm thought; an"* she'll may be find 
 she's put her finger in ta craw's nest, afore she 
 win out o' the north port o' Perth." 
 
 It was not without some misgivings about his 
 untradesman-like guests, that Hector consented 
 to go up the street to look for the burgess. He 
 had not been gone five minutes, when, to the 
 great uneasiness of the unwilling warder of the 
 shop, a strange man of respectable appearance 
 entered, and stepped familiarly wdthin. From 
 the manner in which he gazed round him, the 
 intruder seemed in some haste or alarm ; but 
 seeing the store deserted — no uncommon occur- 
 rence in a country-town — he quietly took a 
 position by seating himself on the counter, 
 determined to watch until the owner should 
 come in. 
 
 " She^ll just baud her whisht for a wee," 
 thought the Highlandnian within himself, as 
 he stood ensconced behind the plaiding ; " may 
 be the deevil will put it into the man's head to 
 gae out again without a spoke or a speer."
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 55 
 
 However useful the devil is upon most occa- 
 sions, it did not, however, please him to answer 
 Dougald's invocation in the present emergency ; 
 and the intruder seemed determined to divide 
 with him the high and responsible office of shop- 
 keeper. At length, looking unconsciously to- 
 wards its inner recesses, as his eyes became accus- 
 tomed to thedarkness, this new person thought he 
 saw something within, of an exceedingly strange 
 and dubious character. Next, he heard some- 
 thing breathe almost at his ear, which caused 
 such a tremor all over him, that he scarcely had 
 courage to turn his head to look beyond the 
 plaiding. On the first movement, however, of 
 his head in that direction, his terrified eyes be- 
 came fixed upon the broad brown countenance 
 of a bearded Highlander, in a place where 
 Highlandmen ought not to be. The worthy 
 citizen never having been a man of renowned 
 courage, sudden surprise, at seeing such an ap- 
 parition hidden among his friend's goods, with 
 the inexplicable terrors that seemed to surround
 
 56 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 him, alarmed as he was on entering the shop, 
 completely deprived him of his natural speech. 
 Continuing, however, to gaze in the Highlander''s 
 face until his own jaw fell, and his hair began to 
 rise, the countenance of the Gael seeming to keep 
 time to all these movements, by the various 
 grins to which it was subjected, the latter, at 
 length Ibsing all patience, broke the fearful 
 silence by a wild swear of, 
 
 '' Cot tamn her ! what will she be glouring 
 at .?" 
 
 '' Friend ! honest man ! what brings you 
 there.?" 
 
 "What brings her here.? Toot !— what'll 
 she be doing but just keeping ta shentleman*'s 
 chop. Is tat ony wonderment .?" 
 
 " Lord, but there's surely somebody else 
 among the barrels ! What can this mean .?" 
 
 " Teevil a ane but the ta rattons an^ ta mice 
 whilkter be plenty in ta toon o' Perth. Hoogh ! 
 stand back ! I tell her I'm ta chopkeeper." 
 
 " How do you do, deacon ^ I'm well pleased
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 57 
 
 to meet with you," — said a voice out of the 
 dark, and instantly came forward the imposing 
 figure of the stranger chieftain. 
 
 " Heaven be neest us ! " exclaimed the citi- 
 zen in increased terror, as he gazed on the armed 
 chief. " It's all true what I heard, and the 
 auld town o"* Perth is in the utmost jeopardy. 
 O Evan M'Evan, Laird of Glenmore, have 
 mercy this night on me and mine !" 
 
 A long chuckling laugh at the poor man's 
 terror was the only answer given to this earnest 
 appeal, but as the intruding baillie turned his 
 head the other way, the white teeth and gleam- 
 ing eyes of the grinning Highland gilly seemed, 
 even in their ludicrous or ferocious expression, 
 to promise to him no matter for merriment. 
 
 " Maister M'Evan, what brings you here?""' 
 he gaspingly exclaimed ; " and how have you 
 taken up unlawful possession of the goods and 
 premises of a respectable citizen o' this burgh ? 
 If ye've brought a legion o' your men frae the 
 hills to beleaguer our town, and burn the auld 
 
 d5
 
 58 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 jail o' Perth, as I liear tell, I hope ye'll at 
 least spare honest men like me and my unfor- 
 tunate friend, the worthy proprietor of this 
 shop." 
 
 " Teevil a fears o' ta chop ! if I may be so 
 bold," said the Highlander, striking in. " Am 
 I not a chopkeeper mysel .^ an' what's ta body 
 feard for ? Oigh ! she's no worth his glory's 
 speaking to, wi' her burning an' her belaguring." 
 
 At this moment the plot was thickened by 
 the hasty entrance of the burly burgess him- 
 self, followed by Hector ; and on looking around 
 him, M'Vey was more startled at the unexpected 
 presence of deacon M'Farlane on the scene, 
 than at the other strangers, for whose sudden 
 visit at his premises Hector had of course fully 
 prepared him. 
 
 " This is an unexpected honour, Glenmore," 
 said the burgess, pulling off his hat, " but it's 
 something oddly timed, methinks, considering 
 the fizz the town is in the night. Lord, Mr. 
 M'Evan, but ye're feard for naething. But
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 59 
 
 shut up the shop-door, Hector, my lad, and 
 make all haste ; for faith, if the townsmen get 
 sight of my honourable visitors this night, the 
 baillie there and I will have a fair chance to get 
 a snug lodging in our ain jail." 
 
 '• The Lord forbid !" exclaimed the baillie ; 
 *' but hadn't I better leave you, gentlemen ? — 
 ye'll be far better without me ;" and the terri- 
 fied functionary, stepping down off the counter, 
 prepared to go. 
 
 " No !" cried the chief, in a voice of thunder. 
 " You shall not go — to put your caitiff towns- 
 men in a panic about nothing. Besides, 
 baillie," he added, cajolingly, " I want your 
 services myself. Are you not a puissant man 
 and a magistrate ?^' 
 
 " Why, / am a man in some authority, cer- 
 tainly," said the baillie, the forces of his mind, 
 such as they were, greatly rallied by this sea- 
 sonable flattery ; " and being constituted by 
 Providence as of the powers that be ordeened 
 by God, we are prayed for constantly in the
 
 60 XHE BLACK WATCFI. 
 
 haly kirk, that our hands may he strengthened 
 to be a terror — '' 
 
 " Yes, but your Whiggish prayers are some- 
 times answered the contrary way," interrupted 
 the chieftain, with a dry smile, " so that if 
 you are not a terror to evil doers, evil doers are 
 a sore terror to you, and that answers its own 
 end." 
 
 " Ye are pleased to be pleasant, Glenmore, 
 in the midst o' danger," said the baillie, " but 
 in times like thae, great power and authority 
 are beset wi' many cares, that gar the hands 
 shake wi"" anxiety as mine hae done this night ; 
 and we that sit in high places, and dispense 
 judgment, hae mickle need o' the prayers o' 
 the saunts ; for, as the poet-man says, uneasy is 
 the head that wears a crown." 
 
 The idea of a crown, in connexion with a 
 burgh baillie, and the serious air with which 
 this was delivered, was too much for the gravity 
 of the listeners, and a loud burst of laughter 
 was the only response which the poor magis-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 61 
 
 trate received to his pathetic speech ; which 
 made him suspect that he had said something 
 not quite orthodox to his present purpose ; 
 although what that might be, was beyond his 
 penetration to divine. 
 
 *' Come, gentlemen," said the burgess, " this 
 is no place for such high personages as you to 
 hold your communications, so with your leave 
 we will adjourn up stairs, where, by the help o' 
 a seasonable excitement of the bottle, without 
 which no business ever yet was brought to a 
 lucky conclusion, we will maybe come to a 
 proper understanding — for it cannot be a sma' 
 affair that has brought Glenmore frae the 
 hills, to trust himself this night in the angry 
 town of Perth." 
 
 The adjournment was carried accordingly, 
 Dougald Downie being placed as sentinel with- 
 out, to see that no one intruded, and Hector 
 being, by the request of the chieftain, . per- 
 mitted to be present during the deliberation. 
 As the subject of their conversation, however,
 
 62 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 cannot be well understood without some brief 
 reference to the internal circumstances of the 
 times, by no means as yet understood in the 
 south, we shall venture upon a few particulars 
 in a new chapter.
 
 63 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 But wha's the man^ amang ye a'. 
 
 Will gae to the Tolbooth door wi' me ? 
 
 O up then spak him mettled John Hall, 
 (Frae the Laigh Tiviotdale was he,) 
 
 If it should cost my life this very night, 
 I'll gae to the Tolbooth door wi' thee. 
 
 Scotch Ballad. 
 
 " Methinks we could have dispensed, on the 
 present occasion, with all this officious hospi- 
 tality, deacon/' said the haughty mountaineer, 
 with some sternness, as he looked impatiently 
 on what appeared to him to be the never-to-end 
 setting down of the various flasks filled with 
 white and red liquor, and the horn drinking- 
 cups which it was the burgess's pleasure to 
 place before his guests, before he would allow
 
 64 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 a word to be spoken. " I am neither come 
 here to sell a nolt nor to buy English frippery, 
 nor yet to drink Whig toasts to the praise of 
 the loyal citizens of Perth — so pray have a 
 truce to this unseasonable jingling of stoups.*' 
 
 " God sake, laird, will ye no let a body 
 strengthen one"'s heart with a common dram, 
 just to prepare them for what yeVe about to 
 prepound," said the baillie, filling himself a 
 tass of excellent French eau de vie, which the 
 burgess had just set down — with a hand, how- 
 ever, that showed by its shaking how much his 
 nerves had need of the application. " Fill 
 yourser a toothfu"*, laird,"" he added to the 
 chieftain, " since ye are come amongst us. We 
 hae nae bread an' saut here, to eat ourseFs into 
 friendly confidentiality ; but if ye'll no pledge 
 me in a wholesome dram o' the jjudeman's 
 lickor afore we begin, I'll hae little brew o"* your 
 intercommunings.'' 
 
 " It's a wise propose, baillie," said the good- 
 natured host, filling up his caup, ''just to 
 drink the dry meal aff the tap of the con-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 65 
 
 ference, that we may see clearer to the bottom 
 o't, as the drouthy minister said to the Pres- 
 bytery. But, Lord, baillie ! what's the matter 
 wi** you, that yeVe ta'en the hiccup already 
 wi' that single mouthfu' o' lickor ? Fright 
 makes men sober, but disna gar them yisk at 
 that rate, or make faces, as you did when I 
 entered the shop this night." 
 
 " I just want to know one thing, deacon, 
 just one thing, frae his honour Glenmore there, 
 afore we say a single word — hie !" gasped the 
 baillie ; " whether it be true what I've this 
 minute learned in the court ha' among the 
 baillies convened in council, that there''s a 
 leoion of red-footed fallows frae the hills ambus- 
 caded amang the firs ayont the Tay, for to 
 come in by the Skinner''s gate when we"* re a' 
 sound asleep, to mob and maltreat the auld 
 jail of Perth, and maybe to set fire to the toun, 
 and murder us a' and our wives and bairns, 
 in our beds, just for the sake of rescuing out o"* 
 the hands o' law and justiciary, that notorious 
 loon and limmer, Duncan M'Naughton, the
 
 66 THE Bi-ACK WATCH. 
 
 robber. Na, ye needna laugh, Deacon M'Vey, 
 I'm a magistrate and a man in power ! and I 
 ]iae a right to put such questions — and the 
 powers that be hae always the most orthodox in- 
 formation on sC matters that concern the state, 
 and the peace and preservation o' this realm — 
 hie !" 
 
 The little baiilie set himself back on his long- 
 backed chair, with his mouth pursed up in ter- 
 rible officiality, after uttering this triumphant 
 speech ; and even the bluff face of the burgess 
 lengthened considerably, as both, now waiting 
 anxiously for a reply, gazed for a moment in 
 the dark flashing eyes of the chieftain. 
 
 The momentary sternness of the laird's face, 
 however, fell instantly into a nose-curling con- 
 tempt. '* By the mass of our fathers,"*^ he at 
 length said, " but there is more sense, and as 
 much respectability, in the single forefinger of 
 a Stonehaven fishwife, clad as it is wi' brass 
 rings, and barkened with herring scales, than in 
 the brainless sculls of those Lowland baillies. 
 AVhy should I reply to such babble as that ?
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 67 
 
 Have we not oppression enough already in the 
 Highlands, since Scotland lost her king, and 
 Mar lost his head, but we must provoke an- 
 other scouring and scattering, to set good men 
 by the ears? Law and justice, say you? 
 Have we not already red soldiers from the 
 south to hound us out among the hills, and 
 teach us the law by bayonet and lead — and 
 black-coated ravens from the low country, to 
 teach our very chieftains roguery and greed, 
 and to harry the homes of our poor clansmen, 
 until they take to the roads for a bit and a sip ? 
 And have not you townsmen white-wigged 
 men, wi' parchment faces, and red gowns, to 
 take your part against the simple mountaineer, 
 whilk are coming into Perth to-morrow, wi' 
 sound o' trumpet, like a triumph, and all to 
 hang a poor fellow or two whom their own in- 
 judicious oppression has made thieves and rob- 
 bers. But that is not what I am come to speak 
 of, nor will it serve any good purpose to dilate 
 to you upon Highland troubles. But the fact
 
 68 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 is, gentlemen burgesses of Perth, and men of 
 power, (as it happens,) I have a particular 
 reason for wishing that no scaith may at this 
 time come o'er a certain man that you have 
 just named, who is to be tried to-morrow before 
 the lords, for what you call robbery and hame- 
 sucken." 
 
 *' I told you sae ! I told you what would be 
 the upshot o' a^ this lang speciality,"' cried the 
 baillie, with vehement courage ; " that's a* to 
 prepare us for a treasonable threatenment 
 against the powers that be. There '11 be a 
 Highland rescue and jail breaking this night, 
 as sure as the deeviPs a gentleman !'' 
 
 " You're quite mistaken, worthy baillie," 
 said Glenmore, quietly ; " if there was any 
 such plot, I would not have demeaned myself 
 to have come up into your ill-flavoured truckery 
 shops, in the heart of Perth, to ask favour or 
 speak civility with the best baillie in your town. 
 But come, gentlemen, if we are to be friends, 
 let us talk not like merchants only, but simply
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 69 
 
 like men. In brief, here is the deacon, an old 
 friend of mine, and you, baillie, I've seen you 
 before, and that in a place where you did not 
 talk so loudly about the powers that be, whe- 
 ther ordained of God or not, as is your manner 
 of speaking-^they were then rather of a dif- 
 ferent sort to yourself. But you must manage, 
 by crink or by crank, to get Duncan M'Naugh- 
 ton slipped from the inside to the outside of the 
 old jail of Perth, and just let him make a lang 
 leg back to the hills for this once, to see his 
 wife and children, poor fellow, and I'll take 
 care that he behaves better in future." 
 
 " Did ony mortal flesh ever hear such a pro- 
 pose ?'''' exclaimed the baillie ; " to let afF ane o' 
 the greatest limmers between this and Caith- 
 ness ! after a' the pains weVe had to catch him ? 
 Didna he drive the whole cattle frae the hills 
 o' Cairncourlie, and left the bow-legged laird 
 hardly a stot ? Didna he rub Lady GlengrowPs 
 meal-girnal last winter in the snaw ? and car- 
 ried off the vera side o' beef that hung up in
 
 70 THE BLACK VVATCir. 
 
 the kitchen, so that if it hadna been for your- 
 ser and others, Glenmore, she might hae 
 starved, puir lady ? And did not he and his 
 men carry afF Saunders M'Dought's siller kist, 
 out o' the spence, body and banes, and left 
 the honest drover hardly a bodl^ to pay the 
 toll back to Angusshire ? And yet yell come 
 here to try to cheat the woodie o' its ain, 
 after the fallow has been ta'en and caged, an' 
 shall be tried, and condemn 'd to be execute in 
 the most orderly and civilized manner. NeVr 
 speak o't, Glenmore ! ne'er speak o't !" 
 
 " What say you, burgess ?" said the chief, 
 addressing M'Vey with a look of quiet deter- 
 mination. 
 
 " It's little that 1 can say on such a busi- 
 ness," said the burgess. " The baillie there is 
 better acquainted with the jailor that keeps 
 the cage of Perth, and the liangman that does 
 the work, forbye the writer and lawyer bodies, 
 that can quirk a man either into the woodie or 
 out the woodie, just as they finger the siller.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 71 
 
 But really, Gleiimore, why ye should seek to 
 cheat the gallows o' its ain, in respect to auld 
 M'Naughton, now when he is taen, I can 
 hardly jalouse ; for though Duncan is a braw 
 sonsy fallow, and whyles buys and pays like 
 a gentleman, it's weel known he is as great 
 a Cearnach as ever drove a stot frae the Low- 
 lands." 
 
 " Why, as to that, burgess," said M'Evan, 
 if every gentleman that drives a horned beast 
 o'er the hills were to be licked up by the long 
 tongue of the law, the old tolbooth of Perth 
 would require a new wing to the shoulder o't ; 
 and as to the reasons that have induced me to 
 come hither, to your purse-proud town, to try 
 my influence for the saving of the life of an ill- 
 used man, suffice it to say that tliey are good 
 and substantial, never speaking of the prayers 
 of his wife and the tears of his youngsters ; so 
 now, if you are men, you will put your wits 
 together and see if you cannot devise a way to 
 bring the poor culprit off, for I am well assured
 
 72 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 that Duncan, if he gets once clear of this scrape, 
 will be henceforward a changed man." 
 
 " It's not possible, Glenmore," said the 
 baillie zealously. " The pyefs a thief in its 
 very nature, and when it gets to a hardened 
 age, and its tongue grows black, it's o'er auld 
 to learn new manners. So, saving your pardon, 
 sir, ye'll just be best to let the lawyers take 
 their will o' Duncan, for an ensample to the 
 oongodly ; for ye ken, if it's fore-ordeen'd that 
 the man is to swing at the end o' the woodie, it 
 would be a tempting o' Providence to try to 
 gainsay its will." 
 
 " By heaven, he shall not swing, if you come 
 to that," thundered Glenmore, starting up out 
 of all patience at the long arguments of the 
 baillie, " or if, as you say, it's ordained that he 
 shall, by the saul of M'Evan, I'll show that it's 
 also ordained, that a dear revenge shall be taken 
 on the liead and hallan of every man that has a 
 hand in the ploy. So take your choice, baillie 
 and deacon both."
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 73 
 
 The two citizens sat looking a moment at 
 each other, but the silence was first broken by 
 the burgess. 
 
 " If I may speak for myself, I should not be 
 ill-pleased to see M'Naughton get scaut free 
 this time, particularly as you seem to be set 
 on the thing, Glenmore; and as there's some 
 sma' hopes that the chield may at least keep 
 out o' the hands o' the seider roy^ as you call 
 the red-back lads, in future ; but, really, how- 
 it is to be managed, wi' any safety to ourselves, 
 -I know not. There's the judges come in frae 
 Edinburgh this very day to try him, and there's 
 as mony big wigs and writers waiting to make 
 a guinea by his indicting, as would hang ony 
 three honest men ; and, waur than that, there's 
 auld Duncan Forbes o' Culloden, the Lord 
 President as he's ca'd, that kens every man o' 
 us here in Perth, and you too, Glenmore, and 
 isna the body as zealous o' the law as a Pha- 
 risee, and would clap us all up in the Tol- 
 booth ourselves, if he had the least suspicion 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 74 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 o' any joukcry paukery, for what he ca's de- 
 feating o' the ends o"* justice. I really wish ye 
 would giv't up, sir." 
 
 " I shall never give it up : if Duncan Forbes 
 were sitting there,*" said the chief, calmly, but 
 with a glance of determination that was almost 
 wild, " see you that !"" he added, drawing the long 
 dirk from his side, and laying its naked blade on 
 the table; " Forbes of Culloden knows well 
 that when Evan M'Evan breathes upon his 
 biodag, he never takes back hi^ word, or fails 
 of his oath. Whom do you stare at ? What 
 should hinder Duncan M'Naughton to twist off 
 the irons that the smith has ri vetted on his legs, 
 that is, if he get a seasonable hint or help, and 
 the turnkey should forget to lock the door, as 
 was done at Aberdeen, or that he should break 
 a hole in the wall, as Dougal Macdougal brake 
 the auld gaol of Inverness, even though your 
 Tolbooth is a strong place. Are you still afraid.^ 
 By heavens, if I would not rather trust tlie 
 whole affair to the management of this youth,"
 
 THE BLACK AVATCH. 75 
 
 and he pointed to Hector, " whose eye tells me 
 that he has a spirit in his body, than to any 
 one of you. Burgess, make me no answer, but 
 let the thing be done; you are this junior's 
 master, and if Duncan M'Naughton once gets 
 his feet on the heather, he, through whose 
 means it is chiefly affected, shall soon know that 
 a Highlander can both avenge his own cause, 
 and show his own gratitude." 
 
 " Stay a wee, laird, stay a wee," said the 
 baillie anxiously, as the chieftain stood up, " if 
 it maun be sae, I'll get auld Willie Caption, 
 the writer, to take the thing in hand, as loopy 
 a body as ever drew an auffidauvit ; and if ye 
 just get me twa bare legged chields frae the 
 hills, to say as Willie tells them, we'll grease 
 his loof weel wi' siller, and if law and leeing 
 ever got a man frae (he gallows, Willie will 
 do't this time for Duncan M'Naughton." 
 
 " Me get two clansmen to hold up their 
 right-hands in a court of justice, and call God 
 to witness to a falsehood !" said Glenmore, with 
 
 E 2
 
 76 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 indignation ; " curse your Lowland craft that 
 would moot such a proposal ;" and the moun- 
 taineer took two or three strides across the 
 room, apparently unable to utter fully his feel- 
 ings. " No, no, baillie ! to shoot a man fairly 
 on the hills is a decency to that ; but I'll get 
 two Highlanders, who, if I but touch this 
 shining blade, and mention your 7iame, will 
 think it good sport to make carrion's meat of 
 them who will be airt and part in the hanging 
 of M'Naughton " 
 
 " The Lord safe us !" whispered the alarmed 
 magistrate ; " I'm a dead man." 
 
 " Ye shouldna hae said that, baillie," said 
 the burgess, returning the whisper to his ter- 
 rified neighbour ; "1 know the way of the 
 mountain folk. If it was only but blawing on 
 a book, as they do in England, or kissing o' 
 your thumb instead of the calf's-skin, the lads o' 
 the hills would neer say you nay. But this is 
 a very different affair; and now, as ye have 
 fairly set up the birses of the chief, ye maun
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 77 
 
 try something to get out o' bis ire. I'll tell 
 you what, Glenniore," he added, addressing the 
 chief, " I see no other way but letting the trial 
 go on ; but if you will leave this matter be- 
 twixt me and the baillie, dangerous though it 
 is, it will be hard if we cannot find a way of 
 saving the auld reiver frae the last loup." 
 
 The chief put out his hand to the burgess, 
 and shook it cordially in silence. " I am in 
 rather strange circumstances myself you see, 
 deacon," he said, " and things are not with me as 
 they were before the fifteen ; but M'Naughton 
 and I fought side by side ; he's an old friend and 
 fellow sufferer, and thougli he sometimes does, 
 by open daring, what hundreds are doing by 
 more crooked means, I must not allow him, if I 
 can, to make a widow of his well far\l wife, 
 and orphans of his braw sons and daughters, 
 for there's poverty and ill-blood enough on tlie 
 hills since auld king Jamie left his chair. 
 Farewell, M'Vey, and hark ye, if ever you have 
 occasion to send to the mountains, make this
 
 78 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 good youth your ambassador. I'm mistaken if 
 he does not yet turn out to do you credit." 
 
 Shaking the honest burgess heartily by the 
 hand, the chief next gave his hand kindly to 
 Hector, into whose eyes the tears started at 
 the effects of his own feelings, as Glenmore 
 spoke to him some encouraging words, and, 
 taking a parting cup of the burgess's best claret, 
 the chieftain took his departure, leaving the 
 others to debate together on succeeding mea- 
 sures.
 
 79 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Treasons capital^ confess'd, and prov'd. 
 Have overthrown him ! 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 Next morning, by an early hour, that impor- 
 tant event, in a Scots country town, the coming 
 in of the Lords, as it is called, or rather the 
 opening of the criminal court by the judges on 
 circuit, walking in procession, began, along 
 with the circumstance of its being also market 
 day, to give unusual bustle to the streets of the 
 ancient city of Perth. Before eight o'clock a 
 waiting crowd had assembled in front of a 
 large old-fashioned mansion, picturesquely or- 
 namented with battlement and arched gateway. 
 This building, used as an hotel, and inhabited
 
 so THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 by their lordships, was one of the last of 
 those fabrics then remaining to ornament the 
 streets of Perth, which, when that city was 
 considered the capital of Scotland, had been 
 the town residence of one of the higher Scots 
 nobility. 
 
 Here, in imposing state, sat at breakfast two 
 of the venerable senators of the college of jus- 
 tice, from Edinburgh, having for their guests, on 
 this occasion, the provost and magistrates of the 
 town, including, of course, our puissant friend, 
 baillie M'Farlane, a pair of Edinburgh lawyers 
 who accompanied them in circuit, and, lastly, 
 sundry of the burgesses, and other principle 
 men of the city, among whom, on this high day, 
 deacon M'Vey himself had been honoured with 
 an invitation. Before the arched gateway of 
 the hotel paced a double guard of English 
 soldiers, and without stood a whole company 
 of the same, who, with a posse of quaint- 
 looking towns-officers, clad also in scarlet coats, 
 and valiantly holding up long battle-axe hal-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 81 
 
 berts, besides various other inferior functiona- 
 ries, all waited to take part in the forthcoming 
 procession. 
 
 The conversation of the puissant personages 
 above, over their substantial Scots breakfast, 
 related, of course, chiefly to the present un- 
 settled state of the Highlands, the prevailing 
 discontented and Jacobite feeling, notwith- 
 standing what was in one sense true, the mild 
 government of the House of Hanover; the 
 occasional lawless practices of the clansmen, 
 notwithstanding the active measures of Mar- 
 shal Wade on the one hand, and President 
 Forbes on the other, with the many difficulties 
 which stood in the way, both of the introduc- 
 tion of southern civilization, and the efficient 
 administration of justice among these extensive 
 districts. 
 
 . But lawyers are seldom philosophers, still 
 seldomer are they practical men, out of their 
 own mere profession ; and the mass of absurdity 
 that was talked tliis morning, regarding tlie 
 
 1:5
 
 032 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 peculiarities of the Highlanders, and that in 
 sounding periods of forensic construction ; and 
 the perfect ignorance that was shown of the 
 real state and feelings of the people of the 
 mountains, among whom there was, after all, 
 much of both innocence of heart and happiness 
 of life, and that by men arrayed in all the ex- 
 ternal paraphernalia @f wisdom, justly astonish- 
 ed the shrewd sense of the good burgess, and 
 made him question his own long experience, 
 little accustomed as he was to the observation 
 of ignorance in high places. Not that the 
 worthy Ulpins and statesmen of the period 
 were materially different from the same species 
 of men of our day; but it seldom has suited 
 the higher orders of society, wliose business it 
 is to legislate for the lower, or the more dis- 
 tinctly situated to take much pains either to 
 make themselves well acquainted with the cir- 
 cumstances, or to enter into the feelings of the 
 latter; and government and coercion being fre- 
 quently considered synonymous, the latter has
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 83 
 
 at all periods been the favourite system of the 
 indolent, as well as being more consonant to 
 the naturally tyrannous disposition of human 
 nature. Hence the irritation that at this period 
 prevailed in many parts of the Highlands, and 
 hence at all periods have many of the noblest 
 characters been lost to the world — some of them 
 even perishing by the hands of the executioner. 
 Hence, also, on this morning did the judges re- 
 joice over the fortunate capture of the Breadal- 
 bane Cearnach, and the ample materials there 
 appeared for his conviction, at least for a 
 felonious riot on the streets of Perth — so that 
 all parties present at the judges'* table this 
 morning, felt their individual importance great- 
 ly enhanced in their own eyes, by being acces- 
 sary to the hanging of so notorious an offender. 
 From these we may except, however, the bur- 
 gess. Hector's master, and also the baillie, with 
 whom the reader is already acquainted. But 
 whatever the fear of M'Evan might have in- 
 duced the latter magistrate to resolve in secret,
 
 84 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 that did not hinder him from being the loudest 
 in talking of the vengeance of the law, so far as 
 the well-ordered speech of his betters left him 
 the opportunity. 
 
 At length, breakfast being over, which, ac- 
 cording to the fashion of the times, was finished 
 by a small dram of whiskey, swallowed neat, as 
 a settler to the various substantialities of spiced 
 ham, braxey mutton, smoked haddocks, Tay 
 ti'out, kipper and honey, their lordsliips retired 
 to robe ; and an additional party having arrived 
 at the door to join the procession, the whole was 
 soon marshalled in that picturesque array ap- 
 pertaining to this simple but impressive pageant. 
 The first blast of the trumpets which was sent 
 forth by the high functionaries who carried these 
 warlike instruments, and who accompany to 
 this day tlie lords on circuit, to blow before 
 them, was the signal for march, and away pro- 
 ceeded the solemn procession towards the court- 
 house, situated near where the Scots parliament 
 once sat in Perth.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 85 
 
 Meantime, our youthful hero. Hector, whose 
 mind had been both stirred and affected by the 
 scene of the previous night, as well as by what 
 he had heard respecting the accused and his 
 family, looked forward to the one event of the 
 day with no slight interest. This interest was 
 deepened by several circumstances, and parti- 
 cularly by his recent knowledge of some small 
 details regarding the subject of it, of which, if 
 they do not materially serve to exculpate a 
 criminal, constitute, by exposing the peculiari- 
 ties and tendencies of human character, the very 
 essence of useful biography. Besides, in this 
 case, the youth had a vague idea, from what 
 the strange chieftain had expressed, that the 
 result of the trial was to have some sort of 
 effect upon his own after-fate. 
 
 At the first roll of the drums, therefore, which 
 announced the movement of the lords, Hector 
 shut the door of his store, and ran to obtain a 
 favourable station to witness the procession. 
 At no time have the Scots been much treated
 
 Ob THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 with showy pageants ; but had they even been 
 so, they could not easily have invented one so 
 simple as this, which, at the same time, should 
 be so well calculated to impress the youthful 
 mind. The day was delightful, and the hand- 
 some and then venerable streets of Perth, 
 crowded as they were with citizens and strangers, 
 and filled as were the windows, with well- 
 dressed women, had an appearance like the 
 gaiety and festivity of a triumph. First came 
 a sample of the English infantry, so lauded at 
 that day for their exploits at Ramillies and 
 Malplaquit, but so hated in the Highlands for 
 their inefficient and often cruel attempts to se- 
 cond the law. Next came the advocates in wig 
 and gown, and, after the trumpeters and burly 
 mace-bearers, came in their robes of scarlet and 
 silk, with small triangular hats above their 
 ample wigs, the venerable figures of the judges 
 themselves, the dispensers of life and liberty to 
 many a trembling wight. Next came the magis- 
 trates of Perth, dressed in their best, headed by
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 87 
 
 the provost, and guarded by a file of the hal- 
 berdier towns officers aforesaid, the whole closed 
 by a party of the principal citizens, mustered to 
 grace as well as lengthen this grand procession. 
 
 The streets had scarcely been cleared after 
 the pageant, when the burgess returned to the 
 duties of his shop, to which Hector also at- 
 tended for some time, but with evident uneasi- 
 ness. At length his master said, " Hector, 
 my lad, it does not answer me to be seen idling 
 in the court-house of a market-day. I see you 
 are anxious, as well as I am myself, about 
 what is going on. Put on your bonnet there- 
 fore, and go to the court. If you mention my 
 name to Thomas M'Dowal, the door-keeper, he 
 will get you a convenient seat; and be sure 
 you take good notice, and bring me a true ac- 
 count of Mr. M'Naugh ton's behaviour on the 
 trial." 
 
 Hector gladly accepted the considerate order 
 of his master, and in a few minutes found him- 
 self placed for the first time in a good station, to
 
 88 THE J3LACK WATCH. 
 
 witness the solemnities of a northern court of 
 justice. 
 
 The interest that by this time was excited for 
 the criminal, as well in the town as throughout 
 the whole neighbouring hills, had filled the 
 court to suffocation, and crowded the market- 
 place with droves of strangers. The jealousy 
 and aversion with which " the sheepskin law'"* 
 was at that time regarded in the Highlands, 
 particularly that branch of it that took cog- 
 nizance, of matters, which were thought by a 
 simple and warlike people to be the proper 
 province of individuals themselves, to revenge 
 or retaliate as they could, is hardly credible 
 in times like our own, when we suffer sorely 
 under the opposite evils; and hence, in the 
 mountains, almost every man who got into its 
 gripe, or was likely to be its victim, became the 
 object of general interest, and of the pity even 
 of those who had suffered most from his depre- 
 dations. Nor was this feeling imnatural, from 
 many circumstances, both on the side of the
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 89 
 
 enforcers of the law and its breakers, which are 
 already known to general readers. The chief 
 of these, on the part of the mountaineers, was 
 the jealousy, if not aversion, with which they 
 regarded all things coming to them from the 
 south ; where they, on the other hand, were 
 looked upon as half barbarians, who were to be 
 treated with that rigour and disregard of their 
 prejudices, with which men conceited of their 
 knowledge and refinement, think themselves at 
 liberty to use those who cannot speak their 
 own shibboleth ; and who, in this case, trusted 
 more to their swords, or a sort of natural 
 justice, than to paper courts, which they con- 
 sidered as the very hot-beds of Lowland op- 
 pression, trick, and effeminacy. We are the 
 more particular in intruding with these observa- 
 tions now, as however well known, they apply 
 strongly to a portion of our story yet to come, 
 of much more importance, botli as a matter of 
 history and an illustration of human nature, 
 than this present trial, however that may be
 
 90 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 considered as serving to characterize the manners 
 of the times. 
 
 The appearance of the prisoner, upon whom 
 all eyes were now set, as he stood at the bar, 
 was well calculated to increase the interest which 
 many had felt for him from mere report. He 
 seemed to be rather beyond fifty, stout and 
 well formed, but of middle stature ; he had the 
 bold open look and roving eye of the free Gael ; 
 but the confinement which he had suffered, 
 short as it had been, had already taken off a 
 portion of that hardy hue, which his face usu- 
 ally bore from the air of the mountains. 
 
 While the indictment was reading, setting 
 forth his several offences. Hector, who sat 
 quite near him, observed him nod assent to the 
 various charges, and say to himself, "It's a right 
 tale;" but when any thing was read which ap- 
 peared to him to misrepresent the truth, liis 
 brow knit into an expression, as if he could 
 hardly restrain himself from pouncing upon the 
 lawyer. But a bitter '* Tam her for a leeing
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 91 
 
 law," was all that this wrath was allowed to 
 end in. 
 
 When the time drew near for asking him, 
 according to the usual forms, his own verdict 
 as to his guilt or innocence — the courts in those 
 northern parts not being conducted with the 
 dignity of ours in the south, several lawyers, 
 and particularly that " loopy body," Willie 
 Caption, before-mentioned, got round him with 
 various advices ; and in particular urged him 
 at least to let nothing come from his own mouth 
 that might serve as an acknowledgment of the 
 truth of the indictment. 
 
 " What for'll she no tell the truth, and ban 
 the lee," he said, " when her ain neck is in jeo- 
 pardy, and when the auld men wi' the wigs hae 
 come all the way frae Edinburgh to speer their 
 speer.? Joost let Duncan M'Naughton alane, 
 an' no trouble her wi' ony bamboozlement, and 
 she'll answer for hersel'."" 
 
 " Prisoner, you have heard the indictment 
 read," said the judge; " are you guilty or not 
 of the charges therein laid ?"
 
 92 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 " Does her lordship mean to speer if she's 
 done the deeds that the man read from that lang 
 paper ?" 
 
 His lordship signified his assent. 
 
 " ItV o'er true, my lord, saving the twa or 
 three lees that's here and there." 
 
 " Prisoner, I have to caution you as to what 
 answer you give to my question.'" 
 
 '^ Is she no to speak the truth ?'"' 
 
 *^' The law does not call upon any man to 
 criminate himself." 
 
 " What will the law have her to do.^ if it's 
 her lordship's yjleasure?" 
 
 " Be silent, and hear the issue of the trial." 
 
 " Oigh, her lordship doesna mean to hang 
 her after all ? God bless her auld wig !" and 
 the simple Highlander leant himself carelessly 
 back against the boards w^hich enclosed tlie 
 bar. 
 
 " Prisoner, it will be necessary for you to 
 say guilty, or not guilty, to these allegations." 
 
 " Say, not guilty," whispered Caption the 
 lawyer, speaking from behind.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 93 
 
 " And what for wad she say that ?" 
 
 " Because we'll maj^be get you off by the 
 law." 
 
 " Tam her law ! If shell no get aff without 
 the law, shell ne'er try it, an' she should swing 
 on the ugly woodie yet. Haud her whisht 
 about the law, an' she'll joost say a word to the 
 auld man wi' the tippet round her neck." 
 
 " Prisoner ! your answer to the court."*' 
 
 *' Weel, her nainsel joost did the misdeeds 
 that the man read out o' that paper, and mony 
 ^others forbye." 
 
 " Then you plead guilty.'^" 
 
 " She'll no plead nothing; but her nainsel 
 will ne'er gie her tongue to tell an auld man a 
 lee afore the peoples ; for all that this vile 
 body," and he turned round and thrust his 
 finger almost into the eye of the lawyer, '*' tries 
 to blaw in her lug."' 
 
 " Silence in the court," cried the officer, to 
 suppress the titter. 
 
 " You are aware," said the condescending
 
 94 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 judge, " that you are accused of hamesucken 
 arid theft." 
 
 " I ken naething about the sooken ; but did 
 her lordship say a thief? she better mind 
 her talk, afore she tell that to Duncan 
 M'Naughton." 
 
 " Prisoner, I excuse your disrespect for the 
 present ; but I wish to make you understand 
 that you are accused of theft and cattle-lifting." 
 
 " Will her lordship speak that again ? Does 
 the law say that driving a score o' nolt frae 
 the Lowlands, or berrying the hallan o* a fat 
 Whig, wi' fire and sword, like a gentleman, is 
 the wark o' a thief! Na — na — if her nainsel 
 were a thief or a liar, she would deserve twa 
 hangings instead o' ane. But Duncan M'Naugh- 
 ton may lift a hundre cattle frae a hill-side, or 
 carry off a gude kist o' gear at night, for fear 
 the moths might eat it, and maybe gie a handfu' 
 o' the siller to a puir wife to help her wi' her 
 rent, as she passes, but ne'er would ' steal a 
 tawtey sheep, like a Lowlander."
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 95 
 
 A buz of approbation ran through the moun- 
 taineer spectators, who crowded the court, at 
 this speech, so agreeable to their common pre- 
 judices; and the judges looked at each other, 
 and smiled, to find the true philosophy of rob- 
 bery so well understood by a Highland cateran, 
 and that with a humanity with which it is not 
 always accompanied in higher places. 
 
 " You acknowledge, prisoner, to the princi- 
 pal charge — to wit, of entering the house of 
 James Halliburton, with several of your men, 
 and that with force of arms, carried contrary to 
 law, and after putting the said Halliburton 
 into great bodily fear, you . . . ." 
 
 " Yes — tam her ! and well she deserved it !^' 
 exclaimed M'Naughton, interrupting the judge 
 from delight at the thought ; " and the body 
 was in a deevil o' a fright, to be surely." 
 
 " Silence, prisoner ! — and that, besides as- 
 saulting the said Halliburton with sundry beat- 
 ings and bruises, you did carry off one clasped
 
 06 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 box, containing Spanish dollars, as set fortli 
 in the indictment." 
 
 *' The 'dytment, say you? but does your 
 dytment no tell what James Halliburton did to 
 me and minej lang before ever I crossed the 
 water o' Earn .P'' 
 
 '' No, that is not to the purpose." 
 
 " Then it's an ill law, and 'twill be the ruin 
 o' the Highlands, whether I'm hang't or no." 
 
 " Prisoner, you are detaining the court. 
 Have you any thing to say why judgment 
 should not be passed upon you for these various 
 crimes to which you have acknowledged, as well 
 as your open riot in the streets of this city ? I 
 wish you had not spoken so freely ; but I have 
 not allowed this conversation to be recorded, 
 and the law will allow you still to withdraw 
 your confession." 
 
 " Will her vile law bid her again to speak 
 the lee, after all the ill she's done afore ? Na, 
 na ! she'll tell the truth and shame the deevil,
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 97 
 
 and the law baith, although she should hang 
 for it this minute, and her puir wife sitting at 
 hame greeting for her, nae doubt." 
 
 The stout Cearnach then made an ample and 
 almost noble confession of all his principal reiving 
 adventures, to most of which he had been either 
 stimulated by the usages of his countrymen, or 
 impelled by some strong provocation ; and 
 whenever he came to a place wherein he or his 
 men had acted with aught like oppression or 
 wantonness, he uttered, in the best English he 
 could command, a strong invective against him- 
 self for giving way to passions which he averred 
 he could not always control. " But," said he, 
 finding himself at a loss, " if hersel had good 
 English, she would just speak another spoke 
 yet." 
 
 " Go on, prisoner. The court will excuse 
 the peculiarities of your language, from the 
 seriousness of the circumstances in which you 
 now stand." 
 
 "It's no' for hersel she would speak," said 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 98 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 the criminal, struck, if not affected, by the last 
 allusion ; "but she has as braw a family at hame 
 as ever sat round a fire, and a daughter that, 
 suppose her father say it, there's few to match 
 frae Lorn to Lochaber ; and a son that can 
 wield his father's sword without his father's 
 wayward passions. Maybe he's here this very 
 day — och, och ! there he is !" and the delin- 
 quent clapped his two hands on his eyes, from 
 emotion, at the sight : " come forward, Far- 
 quhar, my man, and countenance your father 
 at this time of trouble. Dinna be blate afore 
 their lordships, for yeVe weel worth to look ony 
 man in the face ; and if ye're no ashamed o' me 
 this day, may be ye'll help to save me from the 
 gruesome gallows." 
 
 The eyes of all were now turned to the quar- 
 ter to which he pointed ; and room being made 
 by the crowd, what was Hector's surprise, to 
 see the same youth who had been his teacher of 
 the broad-sword exercise, come forward, and 
 make a modest bow to the judges.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 99 
 
 " Now, if you will allow me another word," 
 said the prisoner. " This young man's mother, 
 who has been the cause, although she was the 
 opposer, of my lifting practices; and who, 
 when I took her at first afore the priest, was as 
 like this youth as a pretty woman may be like 
 a man : aye she told me, even when I brought 
 hame the beasts or the gear, that I would come 
 to an ill end, and begged me, wi' tears, to stay 
 at hame, and be content wi"* our poor bit land 
 in Breadalbane, and saying, that she and hers 
 would be weel content wi' nothing but a short 
 gown and a sheiling, rather than that I should 
 put my neck in the power of the law. But I 
 kend that for all that she was a proud woman, 
 and couldna bear to want a bit and a sip to 
 give to the stranger as they passed our door; 
 and my father bei»g ruined after Mar lost the 
 fifteen, I just thought I would take revenge o"* 
 the worr, that had 'poverished me and mine. 
 But now, my lords, as it's come to a stand wi' 
 me, and IVe been cooped up between four wa's 
 
 F 2
 
 100 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 sae long, and the ministers hae talked to me 
 about faith and gude works, I'm determined, 
 if I can get over this mishanter, to lead a new 
 life, and stick to my hungry farm amang the 
 hills. So, wi' your permission, my propose is 
 this, that if you gie me a pardonment, and let 
 me ance mair put my feet on the heather, I'll 
 do mair to keep down the limmers o* Perthshire, 
 than a"* the red soldiers that ever set themselves 
 up for a mark to be shot at by the lads ahint 
 the bushes ; and for token, here's my son Far- 
 quhar, that's ready to take the oath to King 
 George, and to guard the hills frae the like o' 
 what I hae been mysel, as a tested soldier o' 
 the Black Watch now gathering upon the bonnie 
 holms of Breadalbane. Now I've said my say, 
 and God gie your lordships a gude opinion o' 
 the repentant Cearnach." • 
 
 Notwithstanding the imperfection of tlie dia- 
 lect, there was a dignity in the bearing, and a 
 pathos in the tone, of the criminal, standing, as 
 he now did, between life and death, that, along
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 101 
 
 with the expressive looks of the youth, who 
 stood facing the judges, melted into tears the 
 great bulk of the crowded auditory. Both 
 fatlier and son stood straining their eyes upon 
 those who held their fate in their hands; but 
 no answer was returned to this appeal : and 
 after some forms, a verdict of guilty having 
 been instantly returned by the jury, agreeably 
 to direction, the judge consulted a moment with 
 the magistrates of Perth ; but the shakings of 
 the head and serious looks by which this was 
 met, gave pretty certain indication of what was 
 to follow. 
 
 "Prisoner," said the judge, "to the latter 
 part of your speech, I can make no answer. 
 What you have stated can be of no avail here, 
 nor, I fear, any where else, from what I learn 
 from the magistrates present. My duty, then, 
 and your doom, is already laid down by the 
 lawr 
 
 " Unfortunate auld carle,'*'' said the prisoner, 
 almost forgetting his own distress for a moment,
 
 102 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 as he looked at the judge ; " so ye canna hae 
 mercy on a puir sinner, for that vile pinch-craig, 
 the law. I wish ye had been bred to a better 
 trade ; but if I had you on the hills for a year, 
 I would just put a clymore in your hand, and 
 teach you an inkling o' common sense.*" 
 
 The gravity of the court was again somewhat 
 disturbed by this outbreaking, when a single 
 look on the ghastly face of his disappointed son, 
 restored the mountaineer, bold as he was, to 3 
 full sense of his unhappy situation. He said 
 nothing, however, while the judge calmly, yet 
 with evident feeling, put on his hat, and in a 
 voice that thrilled through the court, pro- 
 nounced the fatal words of condemnation to the 
 cord — at which the young man fainted, and fell 
 back into the arms of the people below the bars. 
 
 " Weel," said the criminal, after the confu- 
 sion caused by this affair had somewhat sub- 
 sided, " since it maun be sae, ye needna hae 
 said mickle about it, to gar my poor bairn 
 swarf at my feet. I've seen as gude a fallow as
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 103 
 
 stands here, shot to the death on a hill-side, and 
 ne'er a ane to put on a bonnet about it, or to 
 say, a Lord hae mercy to him'*s sowl. But I'll 
 die for the law, as mony a good chield has done 
 afore me, when a piobrach lament played for 
 him at the foot of the gallows tree. Huish ! 
 Almighty me ! — what's that ? I thought I was 
 to get back to my black hole in peace, to pre- 
 pare me for death.'' 
 
 What caused the last hasty exclamation, was 
 a noise which equally startled the solemn feel- 
 ings of the auditory, and those of him who was 
 the subject of it; for in the loud scream of a 
 woman's tongue, near the door, Duncan easily 
 recognized the voice of his own favourite daugh- 
 ter. Another shriek followed the former, when, 
 pressing through the crowd, with dishevelled 
 hair and a ghastly countenance, the maiden ob- 
 tained the first siglit of her unfortunate father, 
 as with hands stretched over the railing of the 
 bar, he watched the frightful agony of his child. 
 
 While the unhappy girl threw herself into
 
 104 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 the arms of her brother, and unable to get near 
 her parent, cast herself on her knees at the foot 
 of the judges' bench, and, tearing her hair as 
 she tried to speak, at length screamed forth 
 prayers that her father's life might be spared, — 
 the utmost efforts of the officers of the court 
 were scarce sufficient to keep the compassionate 
 excitement of the by-standers within such 
 bounds as were consistent with the safety of 
 their lordships, and the security of the new vic- 
 tim of the law. 
 
 This state of things could not be suffered. 
 The whole court was in a tumult. "Remove 
 the prisoner !" cried the judge in a voice of 
 thunder ; " and close the doors of the court- 
 house !" 
 
 In the midst of the confusion the prisoner 
 was hurried away, and the screams of the young 
 woman, praying in vain for mercy for her father, 
 were the last sounds he heard, as, much un- 
 manned, he was carried through the murky pas- 
 sages, towards the condemned cell of the prison.
 
 105 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 My merry'emen's lives, my widowe's teirs — 
 There lies the pang that pinches me ; 
 
 When I am straight in bludie eard, 
 Yon castell will be right dreirie. 
 
 Saxg of the Outlaw, Murray. 
 
 " It's gaun to be a bad job this, deacon,"" 
 said baillie M'Farlane to the burgess, one even- 
 ing some days after the trial, as they sat dis- 
 coursing alone on the aflPair of the escape. " I 
 wish I had my hands weel washed o't, for auld 
 Watty He wit, the jailor, is as dour as the 
 whinstane, and the turnkeys maunna be spoken 
 to by me on ony sic a business. Ye ken that 
 it's as mickle as my character's worth, forbye 
 the prospect o' the provostship." 
 
 f5
 
 106 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 " It's weel enough for you to speak that 
 way, baillie," said M'Vey stiffly, " so as to 
 throw the heavy end o' the concern on my 
 shoulders, but Evan M'Evan knows my dispo- 
 sition and your power, and he'll never speer 
 whether you are likely to get to the provost 
 or no, if Duncan M^Naughton swings in the 
 woodie." 
 
 " What do you think we'll do, burgess ? 
 This is a deevil o' a scrape for a 'sponsible man 
 like me to be into." 
 
 *' And Evan of Breadalbane is a man of his 
 word." 
 
 '* Faith, so he is, and the clansmen are sae 
 used to hae their ain way in thae cases, in spite 
 o' the powers of law and justice, whilk it'^s my 
 duty to maintain, that I fear the very worst, if 
 we shouldna be able to get this Cearnach out 
 o' the rape. There was auld baillie Frazer, of 
 Inverness, wha was set upon by the clansmen 
 frae the hills, just as Glen more set upon me, 
 and he behov'd to let lang Dawney Frazer slip
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 107 
 
 the rape, though as great a limmer as ever 
 drew a dirk, just because he was a Frazer too, 
 and maun be saved to be sure, for the honour o' 
 the clan."" 
 
 " But you have more virtue than the Inver- 
 ness bailHe, that's evident," said the burgess 
 slyly. 
 
 " Ye need na sneer at me, deacon. Ye ken 
 brawly how I am situate; and if the jail o' 
 Perth were as rotten a ruckle o' stanes, as the 
 auld tolbooth o' Inverness, whilk is eaten up 
 by the rattons, through and through, Duncan 
 M*Naughton would make a hole for himsel, as 
 well as the sensible brutes ; and if he wanted a 
 wee bit claw of cauld iron to pick his way, 
 some hand may be found to slip into a loaf of 
 his bread, a rusty nail or a bit whorl augor, or 
 may be the spring o' a watch, to cut the stan- 
 cheons, and naebody would ever be a hair the 
 wiser." 
 
 " And why don^t you try it as it is, since the 
 powers that be, as you say, resist every applica- 
 tion for mercy to this doubtful criminal."
 
 108 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 "First," answered the baillie, "because it's 
 a very unlikely affair for M'Naughton to get 
 out of sae kittle and sae strong a place, consi- 
 dering the many doors and locks ; and second, 
 because, being a magistrate o' the town myself, 
 I canna be seen to lend a finger to sic a busi- 
 ness, having no one that I could trust to do the 
 job, unless I run to some o"* the breekless lads 
 frae the hills, the whilk we know would be a 
 ruination. But now, deacon, ye are not won 
 the height o' the magistracy, yet, as I have. 
 What should hinder you to try your hand wi' 
 something o' the sort, as ye are in the link o' 
 the fear of Glenmore, as weel as I am, and 
 would be less likely to be suspected than me, a 
 public functionary ?" 
 
 " I wisli you would not throw your eternal 
 functionaryship so much in my teeth, baillie, " 
 said M'Vey, beginning to lose patience. " But 
 as to this business, although I am no friend to 
 countervening the laws in any ordinary case, I 
 feel so much interested for the fate of this 
 man, especially since I have become aware of
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 109 
 
 th^ injudicious resolutions in a high quarter in 
 favour of severe measures ; being, moreover, of 
 opinion that it is not reasonable to take a man's 
 life for merely lifting a penny of worldly gear, 
 or for driving a few stots or steers off the braes, 
 belonging to them that hae something left be- 
 hind — I tell you, that independent of the wishes 
 of Glenmore, I am determined to try what I 
 can do for this unfortunate gentleman, in the 
 old-fashioned manner of a bodily escape by 
 door or window ; and in this plan I have hit 
 upon an agent who is little likely to bring 
 suspicion upon either you or I." 
 
 " Have ye sae ? ■" said the baillie, rubbing 
 his hands in ecstasy. " Odd Deacon, I aye 
 thought you a clever man, an ye hae quite re- 
 moved a weight from my conscience. What 
 is't ? just let me into your plan ; and if we can 
 only keep it snug frae my brethren, the town 
 baillies, I'll lend a secret and a sure hand to 
 further the business. But whisht! — softly — 
 here's a knocking at the door.**"
 
 110 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 "It's only Hector, my doucy young friend, 
 and the trusty agent I've just spoken of," said 
 the deacon. " Come away, my man, and tell us 
 how you've sped in the auld tolbooth. I 
 dare say ye were more sure to find the poor 
 Cearnach at hame, than if ye had gan to seek 
 him on a highland hill."" 
 
 " He was not far to seek, indeed," said Hec- 
 tor, coming forward, his countenance bearing 
 evident marks of the impression which the 
 scene he had just witnessed had made on his 
 feelings. " The trial of the hardy reiver was 
 affecting enough," continued the youth; " but 
 to see a brave auld man chained by the leg 
 like a dog, to a great iron bar rooved into the 
 floor of his dungeon, and appointed to die e'er 
 six days come and go ; was to me a sight which 
 I shall not easily forget.*" 
 
 " This was not a job for one so young as you, 
 when I come to think o't," said the deacon, 
 half to himself; " but tell me, Hector, how 
 did the poor man look, and what did he say
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. HI 
 
 to you ? Be particular, and withhold no- 
 thing/' 
 
 " As for his look, sir, it was as firm and bold 
 as when he struck down the red-coats at the 
 town's cross. But it's well to be seen that the 
 air of a cell in the Perth jail is not so pure as the 
 breeze that blows from the top of Benvorlich ; 
 and neither a mountain man nor a mountain 
 hind could be expected to live long chained by 
 the leg in a stone cage. Yet the old man seems 
 to bend more under the weight of his solitary 
 thoughts, than the fetters that so bitterly resist 
 the activity of his manly limbs, although the 
 usual effects of his awful situation are too evi- 
 dent on his countenance to be altogether con- 
 cealed." 
 
 *' God keep us ! 'tis a sad situation, no doubt," 
 said the benevolent deacon, " but you gave him 
 some comfort. Hasten and inform us." 
 
 Hector went on with particulars, but he did 
 not fully tell with what feelings of reluctance, 
 if not humiliation, he drew from his sleeve, and
 
 112 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 exhibited to the condemned man, some small 
 articles with which he contrived to elude the 
 vigilance of the jailor in aid of his intended 
 escape. 
 
 " What's tat .?" said the Ceamach, as Hector 
 offered the instruments, he surveying them at 
 the same time with a bewildered and suspicious 
 look. 
 
 With a half-guilty hesitation. Hector tried 
 an explanation. No sooner, however, had 
 M'Naughton understood his meaning, than he 
 pushed the articles from him with a contempt 
 that made our youth blush with shame for his 
 commission. 
 
 " Does the Perth bodies send their weavers' 
 wimbles and their tailors'* bodkins to me ?''* said 
 he, drawing back the whole stretch of his chain. 
 "Deevil! they little ken Duncan M'Naughton. 
 Na, na, youngster ! gang back and tell your 
 chapman baillies, that if the auld reiver o' the 
 hills canna win her way out at the door as she 
 came in, wi"* a stroke o"* fair manliness, and the
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 113 
 
 strength o"* her arm, she'll ne'er try to pick her 
 way out o' a Lowland jail wi' a bodkin, or grub 
 anoth the ground like a mowdiwart ; but she'll 
 eether knock her way out like a shentleman, or 
 she'll die for the law, as her betters did afore 
 her/' 
 
 •' But life is sweet, Mr. M'Naughton," said 
 Hector, more and more anxious for the mag- 
 nanimous condemned ; and it's a sad thing for 
 a Highland gentleman to die by the tow, like 
 a Lowland fellow. Listen to me, sir," added 
 -the youth, seeing his advantage in appealing to 
 the deep-rooted pride of a Highlander — " could 
 you only get your foot once more on the heath 
 of Breadalbane, where your friends and kin 
 would receive you with shouts that would make 
 the glens ring again — one day, but one glorious 
 day ! spent as you were wont on your own 
 braes, tracking the deer in the forests of Athol,^ 
 or shooting the caipercailzie on the cliffs of 
 Cairntoul, would be worth any effort or any 
 fancied degradation in freeing yourself from
 
 114 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 a dog's death, and the weary solitude of this 
 dungeon. And then, sir— nay, I will speak 
 it — think of sweet life, and the look of the 
 blessed sun on your own braes — and of a wife's 
 embrace, could you return to her once more 
 from death and doom ! — and of a daughter s 
 sob of joy on your bosom — and of a son's hope, 
 and the flush of his eye, as he prepares to follow 
 you again to the mountains ! — think — think of 
 aUthis!" 
 
 No sooner had our youth given vent to his 
 warm feelings in this enthusiastic manner, than 
 he found his neck grasped, as he described it, 
 with the grip of a tiger, in the strong fingers of 
 the Cearnach, into whose cheeks the pallid blood 
 had gradually mounted with the climax of Hec- 
 tor's speech, until his eyes seemed ready to start 
 out of his head with a terrific excitement. 
 
 " What have I done to you or your friends, 
 boy,*" he said, in a tone that was harrowingly 
 pathetic, " that you should thus come into the 
 black hole of the law, to trouble the resignation
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 115 
 
 of a doomed man ? Is not my day almost at 
 hand ? Are not my thoughts in the grave, and 
 among the spectres and shadows of the gos- 
 peller's world, where my fathers dwell from 
 the days of the Fingallians ? And you would 
 disturb her weary thoughts wi"* talk o' the hills 
 that she'll ne'er see again ; and the wife, and 
 the bairns that she daurnee think of! and that 
 shall hae to tell, when she's dead and gane, 
 that their auld father was hangit like a dog, at 
 the town-cross o' Perth. Ochon ! ochon ! 
 -laddie, that thou should see her greet !" and 
 the unhappy condemned turned his angry grasp 
 into an embrace, and sobbed aloud on the 
 youth's shoulder. 
 
 An exchange of forgiveness passed between 
 them as soon as the condemned had a little re- 
 covered his tranquillity ; but to any further 
 urging upon the point that Hector had come 
 about, he replied, after a long and bitter strug- 
 gle against the weakness of nature, with the 
 same stern contempt which he had formerly
 
 116 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 done to the quirky suggestions of Caption the 
 lawyer ; adding, however, that if he only had 
 a loose leg, even where he was, and a clyniore 
 in his belt to give him confidence, he " would 
 not die the death yet, at least without a bit 
 brulzie, wi' the jailor men, and other o' the 
 scabbed collies o"* the law." 
 
 Thus it appeared that every plan suggested 
 by the worthy citizens was defeated by the 
 peculiar prejudices and disposition of the cri- 
 minal ; and yet did they dread the ultimate 
 event, for more reasons than we have space to 
 enumerate, although now they separated with- 
 out coming to any conclusion. 
 
 Time passed on, and the day of doom drew 
 nigh, when one night Hector, returning from 
 going on a message, begged with much anxiety 
 of manner to be allowed to absent himself for 
 that evening. The readiness with which he 
 obtained the consent of the kind-hearted bur- 
 gess, and the expressions of confidence in his 
 prudence with which it was accompanied, af-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH.' 117 
 
 fected the youth ahnost to tears; and taking 
 his master's hand, and thanking him fervently 
 for all his kindness, his manner seemed so pecu- 
 liar as to induce inquiry as to the cause of his 
 evident emotion. 
 
 " There's something on your mind, Hector," 
 said the burgess, " for I see your eye kindle 
 with some present purpose. Unfold it to me, 
 that it may be well with you ; youth is the 
 better for the counsel of an auld head." 
 
 The youth, however, seemed too much af- 
 fected to be pressed for a reply, further than to 
 beg to be excused from the formality of counsel, 
 which he foresaw would have no effect if con- 
 trary to his purpose ; and wringing his master's 
 hands, he took his leave. Before he had got 
 three steps from the door, however, returning 
 hastily back, he said that a foreboding was on 
 his mind that something might happen to him 
 in his intended adventure, or at least that he 
 might be prevented from returning to his duty 
 in the morning. Should that be the case, or
 
 118 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 should he be obliged in any way to leave his 
 generous friend for a time, he begged to know 
 how far he might count, if not upon his consent, 
 at least on his forgiveness; as he would not 
 willingly run the hazard of being counted an 
 ingrate by so true a benefactor. 
 
 The good burgess, suppressing his present 
 feelings of alarm or reluctance, expressed his 
 full trust in the youth's own prudence, gave his 
 consent to any change which might arise from 
 the best exercise of that quality, and, aware of 
 Hector's secret propensity for the free life of 
 the mountains, assured him of his future friend- 
 ship. He even insisted upon his putting in his 
 pocket the wages that were due to liim, as a ne- 
 cessary preparative to whatever event might be 
 the issue of what he was about to attempt. 
 This done, Hector and his master parted a 
 second time, and with feelings of uncertainty, 
 yet of dogged resolution, he set off towards 
 another part of the town.
 
 119 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 O Jockie Hall stepp'd to the door. 
 And he bended low back his knee ; 
 
 And he made the bolts, the door hang- on, 
 Loup frae the wa' right wantonlie. 
 
 Yestreen I was your prisoner. 
 But now this morning am I free. 
 
 Scotch Ballad. 
 
 If any portion of life may be considered as a 
 series of chances, to use one mode of expres- 
 sion, that portion is youth, with its prepared 
 circumstances, in which the individual can take 
 no part, and its thick- coming impressions to af- 
 fect his after life, over which he has indeed 
 little controul. As Hector moved down the 
 narrow street, he wondered internally why he 
 should have engaged himself so deeply in the
 
 120 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 fate of mere strangers, or have been so impressed 
 in favour of one, who in no respect had 
 commended himself to the estimation of the 
 world. He did not then know how much sym- 
 pathy is a component part of the noblest natures, 
 or how much juxta-position, in all circumstances, 
 may happen to bring out that sympathy. Un- 
 aware also of the precise tendencies of his own 
 character, his mind only sought the exercise and 
 activity of the most urgent of his faculties, with 
 little regard to the world's opinion, of those to 
 whom the great disposer, juxta-position, hap- 
 pened to introduce him. A neglected orphan, 
 and the victim of necessity, where could fortune 
 throw him but among the obscure sons of lower 
 life, perhaps in the poor townships of Scotland, 
 whose simple joys few delight in contemplating, 
 and to whose many sorrows the high born or the 
 luxurious can afford but little sympathy 
 
 Feeling discontent growing upon him even in 
 the comfortable keeping of a burgess of Perth, 
 what did it signify to him — a floating windfall
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 121 
 
 of the world's chances — through whose means 
 he got into more congenial circumstances, pro- 
 vided his sympathies were in the meantime inte- 
 rested ; and, while he found agreeable employ- 
 ment for his own activity, was able to do what 
 he considered a good for some other human 
 being, which would give an inward satisfaction 
 to his mind ? 
 
 Entering a house as he went along, and pro- 
 ceeding up a narrow stair, as he pondered in this 
 manner, upon opening a door a scene presented 
 itself within, which well might interest the most 
 callous feelings. It was the wife and family of 
 the man who, in two days hence, was appointed 
 for execution. The whole were assembled, and 
 waiting for Hector's coming with the most 
 intense impatience. There was the Cearnach''s 
 wife, still a handsome woman, and evidently of 
 higher breeding than himself, though now al- 
 most wasted to a skeleton with despairing 
 anxiety. Next was his daughter, a pretty 
 Highland girl, the same who appeared with 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 122 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 such distracted passion on the day of the trial, 
 and now in a worse state, if possible, than her 
 mother — with the son, who originally taught 
 Hector the broad-sword exercise, now burning 
 with impatience for a last trial for his father, 
 and busy in exerting himself to the utmost 
 to support the sinking spirits of the rest. Be- 
 sides these, there were two younger girls, who by 
 their sobs and afflicting language added to the 
 effect of the whole scene, and gave Hector a 
 fearful impression of the sufferings of a family 
 whose parent was doomed to public immolation. 
 They crowded round him on his entrance, and 
 embracing him, some even on their knees, in- 
 voked Heaven in his favour as their only hope ; 
 and, knowing also that the attempt they were 
 now ready for, if unsuccessful, would be likely 
 to add the son, and present staff of the family, 
 to the destruction already prepared for the fa- 
 ther, the parting from him on this important 
 night, formed altogether a scene which may well 
 be spared the reader.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 123 
 
 Having torn themselves from the family, 
 when the two young men came to the front of 
 the prison, they perceived with concern that the 
 guard without had been doubled, and that there 
 was every symptom of unusual vigilance on the 
 part of the military, as if some such attempt as 
 their own was already expected. They stood 
 some minutes in the shade of the rugged but- 
 tress of an ancient building, which then nearly 
 faced the prison, and consulted together as to 
 what they should do, in consequence of the ad- 
 ditional difficulties presented by this circum- 
 stance. They had little time for talk, however, 
 for the hour of changing the turnkeys for the 
 night was fast approaching ; and upon the ad- 
 vantage to be taken of that moment depended 
 all their hopes of success. 
 
 " Are you sure," said Hector to his young 
 friend, " that Donald has got inside ?" 
 
 " I am confident he must/' replied Farquhar, 
 " else we should have found him here. God 
 grant that he and others were well outside again ! 
 
 G 2
 
 124 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 But who can that be in the cocked hat and great 
 coat, peering about under the corner ?" 
 
 " Confound it !'' exclaimed Hector, after 
 looking t)ut for a moment, " it is that long lean 
 officer that I had the tussle witbat the skirmish 
 when your father was taken. If he has the com- 
 mand for the night, as seems to be the case, our 
 exploit is almost desperate." 
 
 " Surely," said Farquhar bitterly, '* I am 
 the very plaything of ill-luck ! for had I sus- 
 pected this, I could as easily have had half-a- 
 dozen stout fellows at the corner of the street 
 to assist us, as my tongue could have spoken the 
 word.'^ 
 
 " Hush, in that strain !" said Hector boldly ; 
 '' fear is a coward born, and we must know nei- 
 ther this night. Stand close where you are — 
 keep your weapon ready for the hand, and your 
 eyes fixed on that black door. Now bid me God 
 speed 1" 
 
 Hector, who, in his civilian dress, and known 
 as the doer' of the burgess, had, through his
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 125 
 
 master's interest, obtained the unquestioned 
 entree to the prisoner, was admitted without 
 difficulty ; but this evening, his person was sub- 
 jected to a search, more strict than he had ever 
 known it. Having passed this ordeal, as he 
 now followed one of the low functionaries of 
 punishment through the crooked passages, grop- 
 ing every where about for an expected object, 
 his hand lighted among the thick hair of a bushy 
 head, which he gladly recognized as that of the 
 trusty Donald, Glenmore's servant, and the 
 same who had originally acted his part so well 
 in the care of the burgess's shop, crouched 
 down in one of the darkest nooks of the irre- 
 gular corridor. Catching a handful of the 
 man's coarse hair as he passed. Hector gave it 
 a pull, to show his confidence. In return for 
 this freedom, however, he received from the 
 Highlander such a squeeze in the thick of the 
 leg with the mountainous sinewy hand, as almost 
 endangered the whole adventure, by the diffi- 
 culty he found in preventing himself from 
 screaming out with the pain.
 
 126 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 At length they emerged into the small inner 
 court, out of which opened a low door, by which 
 admission was gained to the condemned cell, 
 and in front of which a sentinel was posted. 
 As the key was turning in the lock, Hector 
 thought he observed the watchful red-coat glare 
 upon him with a suspicious look. He, however, 
 took no notice, and in another instant found 
 himself in the presence of the object of his ad- 
 venture. 
 
 " Are we not to be left alone, friend .^^ said 
 the unfortunate man to the turnkey functionary, 
 who still stood with his hand on the lock of the 
 inner door. 
 
 " No," said the man, " it's the orders that I 
 wait inside." 
 
 A look was now exchanged between Hector 
 and the Cearnach ; when the latter, taking the 
 youth in his arms and putting his mouth to his 
 ear, a few earnest words of whispering conversa- 
 tion passed between them ; after which, giving 
 him a gentle push against the turnkey, he 
 shook his leg to sliow that in that respect he
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 127 
 
 was already free, and in another instant, by a 
 sudden effort, the keys were wrested from the 
 hands of the paralyzed servant of the law, and 
 the bold mountaineer was already on the outside 
 of the first door. 
 
 " Dinna kill a puir body, and just keep her 
 nain counsel," whispered the man hastily to 
 Hector, as he found himself in the youth's 
 grasp. " Do you think her nainsel has ony 
 pleasure in seeing his honour hangit? Lock 
 her in, ye deevil, and take care o' the red 
 sodger/'* 
 
 Scarcely were the words spoken ere the man 
 was enclosed in the cell ; next the second door 
 was opened, and in another instant the sentinel 
 who stood without, was pounced upon by the 
 athletic Cearnach, While Hector opened the 
 other doors in the passage, the active High- 
 lander continued to grapple with the English- 
 man, who seemed extremely unwilling to part 
 with the musket which M'Naughton endea- 
 voured to wrest out of hand. The shout which
 
 128 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 the surprised sentinel set up while thus engaged, 
 aroused the attention of the other functionaries 
 to what was going forward ; but as they ran to 
 their posts, on finding Hector engaged in open- 
 ing the doors, out sprung from his concealment 
 the bear-like Donald, and catching one of them 
 in his arms, while Hector now made a dart at 
 the other, who held the keys of the outer door, 
 all became engaged in a furious encounter; 
 though entirely without weapons, save the 
 heavy keys and a single bayonet now in the 
 hands of the Cearnach. In a few minutes they 
 had mastered, as well the functionaries as 
 several hangers on who lounged in the outer 
 lobby, and the last door being opened by 
 Hector, they attempted to get out into the 
 street. 
 
 By this time, however, the unusual noise 
 having reached the ears of the sentinels, their 
 pieces were presented at the breast of those who 
 would have issued from the prison, while, as the 
 latter undauntedly sprang upon the muskets,
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 129 
 
 the astounding cry of '* Guard, turn out !" gave 
 a note of startling alarm down the silent street, 
 and struck to their hearts with the chilling 
 dread that all might yet be lost by this hated 
 interference. Fortunately at this instant, the 
 presence of mind of the younger M'Naugh- 
 ton, who had been watching behind the buttress, 
 created an unexpected diversion in favour of 
 the adventurers ; for, running across the street 
 towards the guard-liouse, he feigned to attack 
 the sentinel placed near the door of the old 
 building where the red soldiers rested. By 
 this timely movement, he diverted for some time 
 the attention of those who were called out by 
 the cry for the guard, and they crowded round 
 him, instead of flying to where his father and 
 friends grappled with the others. He thus 
 gave the adventurers time to strike down every 
 one who opposed them ; and to get off clear, 
 even amidst the group of townsmen, who, by 
 this time, were fast assembling on the spot. 
 The tall officer in the coat, however, was the 
 
 G 5
 
 130 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 first to perceive the trick, and running forward, 
 was just in time to encounter Hector, who, from 
 circumstances, was the last to make his way 
 after the others. With a triumphant exclama- 
 tion of recognition, the subaltern made a spring 
 upon our youth ; but, knowing the danger of 
 any further tumult, and the prudence of a clean 
 pair of heels after being so far successful, 
 Hector, by a jerk of wrestling strength, effected 
 his freedom from the partial grasp of the Eng- 
 lishman, and was off in an instant down the 
 main street of Perth. 
 
 As the mountaineer and his son, now fore- 
 most, turned down a narrow street to avoid 
 the publicity which they were gradually ob- 
 taining, a scream of joy was set up by several 
 females who had been watching for them; 
 among which, the loud blessings and prayers of 
 his wife and daughter, uttered in Gaelic, struck 
 Hector's ear as he passed out of the Water 
 Gate, and, crossing the long bridge of Perth, 
 in a few minutes the whole, starting off the com-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 131 
 
 mon road, found their feet on the soft sod of 
 the rich carse of Strathmore. 
 
 When the joyful little party had left behind 
 them the hoary turrets of the ancient palace of 
 Scone, which M'Naughton himself almost looked 
 upon with regret, as reminding him of a dynasty 
 of Scottish kings, now banished perhaps for ever 
 from their own realms, he thought of the sad 
 end from which he had just been rescued ; and, 
 stopping to look back on the distant steeples of 
 Perth, now hardly seen by the starlight, he em- 
 braced first his son, and then Hector, and that 
 not without tears ; pouring out upon the latter 
 every blessing for his deliverance, which his gra- 
 titude could suggest, or the warm heart of a 
 Highlander find expression for. 
 
 " And och," said he, " my braw young man, 
 if you would but just come with us to the 
 hills, where the black cock breeds, instead of 
 spending your life in a smoky town, over the 
 carking cares o' the Lowlandcr— if there's a clean 
 firelock in a' Breadalbane, to bring down the
 
 132 TPIE I5LACK WATCH. 
 
 deer on the mountains, it shall be yours ; and 
 if there's a sharp blade to be had ye shall wear 
 it on your thigh. Then come with us, my lad ! 
 — come and see me hame ; and if there's a gude 
 bit or sip to be had on the hills, it shall be 
 offered you ; or a warm corner in Duncan 
 M'Naughton's hallan, there ye shall sleep when 
 ye come wearied frae the mountains; for the 
 repentant Cearnach will ne'er forget them that 
 saved him frae the woodie." 
 
 Though Hector covdd not but feel serious at 
 the thoughts of leaving entirely the good bur- 
 gess of Perth, yet, considering that he had 
 been fully recognized as " actor, art and part,'' 
 in the adventures of this night, the danger of 
 return left him no alternative ; although also he 
 could have wished to commence any new career 
 in better company, yet, like most youths, he 
 went forth now again, very much on chance, to 
 see what further turns of fortune time would 
 open out.
 
 133 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Long ere the dawn^ by devious ways 
 O'er hillsj thro' woods, o'er dreary wastes they sought 
 The upland muirs, where rivers, there but brooks. 
 Dispart to different seas. 
 
 In solitudes like these. 
 Thy persecuted children, Scotia, foiled 
 
 A tyrant's and a bigot's bloody laws. 
 
 Grahame. 
 
 Travelling in the dark, even over ground 
 where our adventurers had neither road nor 
 path to follow, and where the partial twinkle 
 of the dim stars above was often obscured by 
 the hazy atmosphere of the north, was neither 
 novelty nor hardship to Hector, young as he 
 was, far less was it so to a hardy cateran flying 
 for his life from the dreaded fangs of the law. 
 Proceeding for a space along the banks of the 
 Almond, they had no other way of getting
 
 134« THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 across it, but by plunging into its black waters, 
 at a ford beneath the towers of Methven castle, 
 and passing in the dark the grounds of Logie- 
 Almond, midnight was not long past until they 
 found themselves in the great valley of Glen- 
 shee. By the time, however, that they got into 
 the celebrated Birnam Forest, to the south of 
 Dunkeld, they fairly lost all knowledge of the 
 way they ought to pursue, among the irregular 
 hills of Strathbran, and Hector's limbs begin- 
 ning to weary, they agreed to indulge them- 
 selves with an hour's rest in a tempting nook 
 that presented itself in the lee of the mountain. 
 
 No untoward accident disturbing their slum- 
 bers, the cheering light of a new day early 
 found them again pushing on their way through 
 the winding valley of the Braan, and striking 
 down to the left for fear of any danger of pur- 
 suit, passing the small lake of Loch Frenchie, 
 and climbing hills, and winding through passes 
 and corries, before the evening had lengthened 
 the shadows of the hills, their sight was glad- 
 dened with a near view of the noble Benlawers,
 
 THK BLACK WATCH. 135 
 
 with the long sweep of Loch Tay winding at 
 its foot. In this journey, Highland hospitality 
 procured the travellers ready support ; and on 
 the day following, crossing the Dochart at the 
 head of the lake, through the then secluded 
 hamlet of Killin, the Cearnach ultimately 
 sought effectual concealment, as well as his 
 home and his people, by plunging into the im- 
 pressive wilds of northern Breadalbane. 
 
 The sensations of Hector throughout this 
 mountain journey — through some of the noblest 
 scenery of Scotland — were often such as lan- 
 guage does not compass the idea of, but which 
 imaginative youth feels when first introduced 
 into the presence of nature''s sublimest scenes ; 
 and which sometimes makes even age itself al- 
 most drunk with the contemplation of grandeur 
 and of beauty. Green glens winding deep 
 among the mountains, whose towering peaks 
 made the eye giddy to look upon them — thick 
 woods of the dark Scots firs, or the larch and 
 the sycamore, scattering themselves in pictu-
 
 136 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 resque masses over the broken declivities and 
 wild irregularities which constitute a Highland 
 forest, and into whose unknown recesses the 
 young imagination shoots with a pleasing terror 
 — rumbling cascades and boiling caldrons, into 
 which the enthusiast himself almost fears to 
 look ; with clear lins of the mountain pools, so 
 limpid that the clouds of heaven seemed to have 
 come down into, and to linger in their still 
 waters. Occasionally, also, our travellers en- 
 countered broad lakes in the hollows, so smooth 
 and so silent, that the whisper of poetry which 
 they excited, seemed to retire into the heart, 
 and echo herself appeared to have fled away 
 into caves unseen, and to speak only among the 
 stooping rocks over the waterfall. Such scenes 
 as these, with a plentiful mixture of bald hills, 
 conveying no image but that of storm and 
 sterility, and long flats of blue heath, out of 
 which fancy itself could extract nothing cheer- 
 ing, and whose dreary solitude the wild cry 
 of the brooding curlew could hardly make more
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 137 
 
 melancholy, formed an impressive variety on 
 this interesting journey. 
 
 At length the pace of our travellers became 
 less rapid, and the thoughts of the Cearnach 
 less anxious; and as they drew near to the 
 scenes which the latter knew so well, the whole 
 frequently rested to give Hector time to enjoy 
 the surrounding prospect. 
 
 " Glories and praises ! what a pleasurement 
 it 'll be, to find the smell o' her nain hills again," 
 said shockheaded Donald, snuffing up the east 
 wind like a mountain goat, as they seated 
 themselves on the soft heath of a hill, whose 
 surmounted ridge had just opened to them the 
 lakes and woods around. " I wonder what wad 
 tempt her again to put her brogued feet on the 
 hard stanes o' the Lowlands, for naething ava 
 but to get her head in a trouble, or her neck in 
 a rape." 
 
 " I would commend you to take care of your 
 own neck, my friend, and never to speak of auld 
 tales in the hills,"' said young M'Naiighton, not
 
 138 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 at all pleased at this allusion to the misfortune 
 of his father. 
 
 " Oigh she needna be sae short, I'm thinking 
 for a' her cevil joke," said the Highlander, " if 
 the auld law were here, wi' spectacles on her 
 nose, she would maybe see mair faerlies on the 
 braes o' Breadalbane, than she would on the 
 four cornered plainstanes o' Perth." 
 
 " I would just like to see either beagle or 
 baillie, read his parchment law among the black 
 faced wedders on this hill-side," said the Cear- 
 nach, " he would maybe need as many red sol- 
 diers as would man the wa's o' Fort William, to 
 fetch him back again to Tayside, wi' a hale skin.'' 
 
 " If there's not the seidar dearag to keep up 
 the law," said his son, " ther'll be the seidar 
 dhii to do the whig^s bidding, and that'll be 
 little better." 
 
 " What mean you, boy ? " 
 
 " Ou just the Black Watch. Have ye not 
 heard that they hae been trysted to a great ga- 
 thering in Glenlyon, or about the ballach o'
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 139 
 
 Loch Tay, and a' the best lads and duenewasles 
 in Breadalbane hae joined them. So the hail 
 country's to be scoured frae Kilsyth to Kild- 
 rummy, and no Cearnach chield need try to 
 row the tail o' a stot, that has ever cropped a 
 mouthfu' grass in the Lowlands."' 
 
 " So much the better, Farquhar," said the 
 elder man demurely, as Hector listened atten- 
 tively to this conversation. " Though I dinna 
 like the law that takes from the poor to heap on 
 the rich, and fill the pouches o' the lawyers, 
 yet I ken I hae been doing wrong mysel, in 
 many a deed ; and now, as I have by God's 
 forbearance gotten a loose leg, and my feet 
 once more on the hills o' Breadalbane, if the law 
 only lets me alane to dig my ain peats in bonny 
 Glendochart, I'll keep my word to the auld 
 Lord wi' the tippet, that condemned me to the 
 tow in the court-house o' Perth, and stirke nor 
 steer, stot nor gelding, shall I ever drive again 
 frae another man's hill." 
 
 " Say you so. Father ! say you so ! God be
 
 140 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 thanked!" exclaimed the son, starting to his 
 feet, and the embrace that followed between 
 father and son, formed in the observing eyes of 
 Hector, an impressive testimony to the happiness 
 derived from virtuous resolutions. 
 
 " Whether shall we make first for Evan 
 M'E van's castle," rejoined the youth, "or shall 
 we proceed on to our own home in Glen- 
 dochart ?" 
 
 " I for one," said Hector, " am anxious to 
 see the noble chief that invited me so kindly to 
 his castle in the Highlands.''' 
 
 " Surely the shentlemans duinhewassels," 
 said Dougald, now striking in, " will not gae by 
 the door o^ the great Evan M'Evan, for a puir 
 ten mile, after she's come sae far. If she offered 
 to put upon his honour the laird sic an affront, 
 wha kens but he would take the duinhewassels 
 up, and hang them for a treason at liis own 
 door-cheek, just to learn her manners, after slie 
 helped her sae weel out o' the woodie in the 
 Lowlands. ''"'"'
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 141 
 
 Both M'Naughton and his son saw the pro- 
 priety of attending to this suggestion, and 
 Hector strongly seconding the proposition, our 
 travellers were about to rise and proceed, when 
 their attention was arrested by the loud report 
 of a musket, quite near, and seeming to pro- 
 ceed from a clump of brushwood which skirted 
 the side of the hill on which they sat, and was 
 then pleasantly repeated in many echoes, 
 away among the recesses of the neighbouring 
 mountains. 
 
 Starting forward to see what company was so 
 near. Hector soon perceived, proceeding from 
 behind the brushwood, two tall young High, 
 landmen of no common appearance, each carry- 
 ing a long Spanish gun, and followed by a gilly 
 attendant, descending the hill towards them. 
 
 A shout of joyful recognition was set up by 
 the strangers on observing M'Naughton ; and 
 as both parties embraced, soon after, with all 
 the warmth of mountaineer friendship, the in- 
 voluntary cry of " The M'Pherson^! the
 
 142 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 M'Phersons ^ set up by their own gilly, Do- 
 nald, while running forward, gave Hector 
 intimation of the names of those new acquaint- 
 ances. 
 
 " And how is this ?" said M'Naughton, 
 after the preliminary greetings had passed, as 
 he surveyed the persons of the youthful stran- 
 gers ; " gun and pistol, biodag and skenocle, as 
 if General Wade had ne'er come from the 
 south, to take from us the arms that our fathers 
 wore ! Here we are in the heart o' the High- 
 lands, and yet you are armed to the teeth, as if 
 Charlie himsel had set up his standard on the 
 hills o** Breadalbane." 
 
 The brothers looked at each other as if 
 some secret were between them, which they 
 were ashamed to reveal to the sturdy Cearnach. 
 At last, one of them, as if disdaining the idea 
 of any concealment, boldly said, 
 
 " You know, Duncan M'Naughton, that 
 weVe neither Whisrs to a southland laird nor 
 
 o 
 
 traitors to our auld king, if he were here, and
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 143 
 
 able to keep his chair ; but it does not do for 
 young men to linger idle on the hills^ nor for 
 men of peace to stand in the face of the laws — 
 if only a few of them were made for our good ; 
 nor can we bear to part with the arms which it 
 is our pride to wield ; so as times have changed 
 and bid us to follow, we have just given our 
 promise to the gallant Lochnell to take king 
 George's money, and do his bidding, (on our 
 ain hills and no farther,) as gentlemen cor- 
 porals in the Black Watch— for that is our 
 highest commission until promoted to a bet- 
 ter." 
 
 "" Then my resolve is a good one, and times 
 have changed indeed,'*'' said the old man, " and 
 all I can say is, if the new Black Watch is 
 to be made up of such men as you, it will be 
 a braw sight to see it ranged out on the 
 carse of Strathmore." 
 
 Our hero being now introduced, and various 
 explanations taking place among all, the in- 
 terest these young men took in their new acquain-
 
 H4 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 tance, as well as the remarkable escape of their 
 old friend, the Cearnach, would on no account 
 allow the farther proceeding of the travellers, 
 without first turning aside to taste the hospi- 
 tality of Corrie-vrin, the neighbouring residence 
 of the M'Phersons. Hector also foreseeing some 
 intimacy hereafter between himself and these 
 engaging strangers, the whole now descending 
 the hill in high spirits, were soon in sight of 
 the pleasant hollow beneath the mountains 
 which had been pointed out under the appel- 
 lation of Corrie-vrin. 
 
 As Hector drew near, so as to have a full 
 view of the indicated spot, the appearance of 
 the whole, particularly the house, or rather 
 ruined tower, or castle, inhabited by the 
 young strangers, might well surprise him, as 
 the residence of men who condescended to act 
 as corporals in the Black Watch, ignorant, as 
 he then was, that almost the whole, even of 
 the rank and file of that famous regiment, was 
 originally composed of men who, among their
 
 THE BLACK ^VATCH. 145 
 
 own people at least, held the rank of gentle- 
 men, and that many were even the scions of the 
 most ancient families, wliich the wayward 
 chances of internal broil or mistaken patriotism 
 were fast bringing to poverty or extinction. 
 The situation of Corrie-vrin was as peculiar as 
 its character. It was a level hollow of bril- 
 liant verdure, contrasted with the bleak moun - 
 tains which rose wild and sterile beyond it. 
 Bounded regularly on each side, this secluded 
 flat took the form of an elongated angle, or 
 round-bottomed pyramid laid on its side, the 
 wide and circular end rising from the bottom of 
 the hollow in rocky terraces, which wound like 
 belts round the dell, and the narrow outlet 
 sweeping away out till it terminated in a broken 
 streamlet, which, bubbling among rocks and 
 steep-sinking banks without, where the wild cat 
 and the badger were often hunted with success, 
 gathered itself into a delicious pool or lake of 
 clear fishing water, about a mile below the 
 ancient building. 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 146 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Descending into the hollow, by playfully 
 springing down the terraces, with the wild 
 pride, in their agility, and hilarious enthu- 
 siasm, of mountaineers, the company, now all 
 together numbering eight persons, including the 
 gilly, soon got their feet on the verdure be- 
 neath, and proceeded on in front of the ancient 
 habitation of Corrie-vrin. 
 
 The building itself, as Hector could now see 
 it, presented that mixed semblance of the cas- 
 tellated and the lowly, which so well corre- 
 sponded with the simple Highland character. A 
 round tower of square shapen stone, evidently of 
 great antiquity, and probably of Danish origin, 
 formed its most prominent object ; and though 
 at present but little used by the inmates, ex- 
 cepting as a sort of outer hall or upper retiring 
 place, gave at least a picturesque effect to the 
 meaner buildings beneath, which it both 
 adorned and overlooked. A small platform 
 below, in front of the tower, terminating in a 
 Tude gate of massive elm-tree, showed a quaint
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 147 
 
 attempt at minor magnificence, in the castellated 
 taste ; and a few stunted fruit-trees and pointed 
 larches in the rear, rising out of an ample plot 
 of Scots green kail, supplied the place of the 
 more substantial corn-stacks of the south, and 
 illustrated as well the poverty as the habits of 
 the inmates. 
 
 A hale and handsome matron received her sons 
 and their friends at the door of the tower, which 
 formed the entrance, and conducted them kindly 
 to an inner apartment. " How are you, Duncan 
 M'Naughton .?" said she, shaking hands with 
 the Cearnach. " I am blythe to see you 
 again at Corrie-vrin, though I fear you have 
 hitherto been sadly your own enemy. But 
 times have changed since our fathers' days : and 
 surely the law is not so ill as it is thought 
 here in the glens, or it would never hae let you 
 sae soon back to your ain wife and bairns in 
 Glendochart.^'' 
 
 Great was her surprise, however, when the 
 Cearnach narrated the stor}^ of his trial and es- 
 
 h2
 
 148 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 cape, garnishing his tale as well with strong 
 invectives against the law, as with the praises of 
 Hector, who, he said, had enabled him so suc- 
 cessfully to elude his punishment; and whom 
 he strongly commended to Mrs. M'Pherson's 
 favour. " But where is your daughter ?" he 
 said, interrupting the woman's partial speech 
 and warm invitations to our youth ; *' it is fit 
 she should add the beauty of her countenance 
 to this happy meeting.'" 
 
 " She is just putting on her kirtle, and will 
 be here in a trice,"*"* said the matron. " Young 
 women, ye ken, Duncan," she added, looking at 
 Hectof and the Cearnach's son, " must not be 
 seen in their worst suit, or their worst looks, 
 before such visitors as these ; but here she is." 
 
 The female that now entered from the inner 
 room, was well worthy of the interest which the 
 Cearnach had expressed for her, as well as of 
 the evident feeling of the junior M'Naughton, 
 whose sentiments were discovered, at least to our 
 hero, by the modest reddening of his face, when,
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 149 
 
 after saluting his father, the girl with simple 
 modesty, yet mountaineer warmth, took him 
 also kindly by the hand. With a mother and 
 brother such as Pheane M'Pherson had, it was 
 not possible but she must have been interesting; 
 and the old-fashioned gown of damask stuff, 
 which she had just put on, and only wore on 
 particular occasions, in these inner recesses of 
 the hills, gave more evidence of her simplicity 
 of heart than of her maiden vanity ; and would 
 have positively detracted from her beauty, or 
 at least her shape, but that no art can destroy 
 the actual effect of a pretty face. 
 
 As the M'Phersons and their guests continued 
 to converse, the women that hastened backwards 
 and forwards in the apartment, and the gillies 
 that assisted, began to be particularly busy ; 
 and the board being soon after covered with the 
 wholesome game of the mountains, all sat down 
 with excellent appetites to the provided cheer, 
 which, in due time, was sweetened with mucli 
 warm Scottish feeling, and, at least when the
 
 150 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 whiskey appeared, became seasoned with a good 
 spice of racy Highland wit. 
 
 An evening ramble down the glen, towards 
 the lake, delightfully diversified the afternoon's 
 employment ; and the guests, having consented 
 to tarry for the night, accepting of such accom- 
 modation as could be provided at Corrie-vrin, 
 tales and songs round the cheerful peat fire 
 closed the homely pleasures of an evening, such 
 as Hector had often imagined in the house of 
 the burgess of Perth, but seldom before had 
 opportunity of enjoying.
 
 151 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 From Merab's eyes fierce and quick lightning's came. 
 
 From Michol's the sun's mild, yet active, flame ; 
 
 Merab's long hair was glossy chesnut brown, 
 
 Tresses of palest gold did Michol crown. 
 
 Such was their outward form, and one might find 
 
 A difference not unlike it in the mind. 
 
 Cowley. 
 
 A PLEASANT morning, the summer sun-beams 
 shining on their romantic hills, and one of 
 those hearty Highland breakfasts, which are 
 so keenly relished by the grateful traveller who 
 ventures himself into parts so remote, gave ex- 
 cellent preparation to our youth and his friends, 
 for a continuation of their delightful journey. 
 
 In no haste to separate, the morning was 
 somewhat advanced ere they rose; and Far- 
 quhar, being the last to issue from the old
 
 152 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 building, for reasons which need not be ex- 
 plained, the whole soon mounted again the ter- 
 ' raced slopes, and set forth over the hills on their 
 way to Glenmore, the M'Phersons, according 
 to the Highland fashion, insisting upon being 
 convoy to their friends a part of the way ; and 
 half a dozen miles, more or less, being no object 
 whatever to athletic Highlanders, the party went 
 all on together for several hours in high conver- 
 sation about the new circumstances of these parts, 
 and the raising of the Black Watch ; their talk 
 greatly helping to enlighten Hector upon various 
 matters with which he longed to be acquainted. 
 Commended as Hector was to the friendship 
 of the M'Phersons, he could not help feeling a 
 high admiration of the spirit and sentiments of 
 those interesting youths ; notwithstanding a 
 simplicity of thinking with reference to the 
 world, which, however natural to mere denizens 
 of the hills, was sometimes amusing even to our 
 youth himself. In the course of their journey, 
 Samuel, the younger of the two, edging himself 
 into separate conversation with Hector, began
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 153 
 
 to make such circuitous inquiries respecting 
 what he had seen of Margaret M'Naughton, as 
 well confirmed the inference that he drew from 
 the conversation at Corrie-vrin. When Hector 
 narrated to him the whole tale of the escape, and 
 in particular the impressive and passionate con- 
 duct of the Cearnach's daughter, at her father*'s 
 trial, and the scream of joy that he heard 
 burst from her on that anxious night of escape, 
 when she saw him pass her in the dark street of 
 Perth, our youth thought himself well repaid 
 for all he had done, by the gleams of pleasure 
 that shot from the young man'^s eyes, and the 
 convulsive grasp of his hand, with which his 
 gratitude was indicated. 
 
 By other speeches and inquiries, in the course 
 of this journey, Hector perceived that Malcolm, 
 the elder of the M'Phersons, had aspired to the 
 love of a daughter of the chief whom he was 
 now about to visit, which accounted for the 
 pleasure he took in approaching the spot where 
 she dwelt ; and, in short, that he was now about 
 
 II 5
 
 154 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 to be domiciled in a neighbourhood where, 
 ■0 among these secluded Highlanders, a strong at- 
 tachment to their own mountains was only ex- 
 ceeded by romantic love for the maidens who 
 dwelt in the glens between them. At length, 
 their convoy agreed to return, and our travellers 
 proceeded cheerily on their way. 
 
 It was beyond high noon of the fourth day 
 after leaving the town of Perth, ere, mounting 
 to the ridge of a toilsome hill, the heavy turrets 
 of Glenmore castle first rose into view. It 
 was a full hour more, during which they had by 
 no means been idle, ere they began to mount the 
 slope on the top of which that venerable mass 
 of turreted irregularity now appeared amidst 
 a garde dlionneiir of old oaks and Scotch firs, 
 with a heavy stateliness that was almost majes- 
 tic. Much, however, of this imposing effect 
 arose from the peculiar character of tlie sur- 
 rounding scenery. Round and undulating, yet 
 irregularly disposed on every side, the hills were 
 low at hand and loftv in the distance ; so that
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 155 
 
 the prospect was extensive and amphitheatrical, 
 even though the glens which receded away into 
 far-ofF wilds had been less diversified in their 
 several characters ; and though a sweeping lake 
 barely to be seen in the distance, now reflecting 
 brilliantly the afternoon's sun, had been a less 
 conspicuous object in one part of the back- 
 ground. This latter portion of the landscape, 
 however, and its interesting adjuncts, though 
 comparatively but a peep, was read in the far 
 distance, like a charming passage of pure ro- 
 - mance, upon which the imagination of our 
 youthful traveller lingered, as he paused with 
 eager pleasure, although he could distinguish 
 nothing but clouds beyond it. 
 
 When our party drew near to the entrance of 
 the stately fabric, which well deserved to be called 
 a castle. Hector's attention was attracted by a 
 sudden exclamation of the elder M'Naugh ton. 
 
 " There's something to do here ! Do you 
 see that, Farquhar?" he added, pointing to 
 several groups of persons who straggled near
 
 153 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 the entrance. " Faith, I think there may be folks 
 here that I should not see, or that should not see 
 me, and I just come out of the woodie at Perth.*" 
 
 Hector now observed several rude vehicles 
 near the principal door of the building, as also 
 half a dozen of those low shaggy horses, called 
 shelties, which run wild on these hills, standing 
 at the gable of the castle, linked together by 
 their thong-bridles — some of them, indeed, 
 liaving onl}^ ropes, or halters, made of twisted 
 hair, which, however, in the practised hands of 
 their kilted riders, as they trotted over these 
 wild mountains, did wondrous well in place of 
 bit and bridle. With all this, he observed be- 
 yond the beeches which straggled behind the 
 castle, several bare-legged gillies, stretched 
 under the trees, like Indians, who seemed watch- 
 ing the sun in the blue heavens above them, 
 and enjoying the ])leasing luxury of unusual 
 warmth and delightful Highland laziness. 
 
 " I dare not be seen here just yet," said 
 M'Naughton, drawing back behind the bushes.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 157 
 
 " It is right, however, Farquhar, that you 
 should go in, and inform the lairds o' the news. 
 And while you introduce this brave young man, 
 do not forget to tell my friend, Glenmore, how 
 much I am indebted to him for life and liberty, 
 and that I will see you both in two days hence 
 if you come to the pass of Glendearg. Fare- 
 well for the present. I go to wait for your 
 mother and sisters, whom God send safe to a 
 happy meeting with me in Glendochart." 
 Thus saying, the Cearnach dashed down the 
 bushy side of the hill, and was soon out of 
 sight, while the remaining three made for the 
 entrance of the building. 
 
 Nothing could be more genuine than the joy 
 and pleasure with which the warm-hearted chief 
 welcomed Farquhar and our hero, as he read 
 in their looks their success in regard to his old 
 acquaintance. 
 
 " I knew, young man,"' said he, repeatedly 
 shaking Hector by the hand, " that it would 
 not be long until I should see you on the hills ;
 
 158 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 and I could have well predicted all the bravery 
 which Farquhar attributes to you. But, let 
 us not linger here ; there's routli and plenty 
 shall be in my house this day ; for here are all 
 the friends nearly that I ever knew, and some 
 too that I don't know overly well, come to eat 
 a collop with me at Glen more. And, hark ye, 
 young man," he added to Hector, " if they talk 
 of politics, have you long ears and closed lips. 
 You would not, I am sure, tell at the cross of 
 Perth what you might hear in a Highland hal- 
 lan ; especially when the drink gets in to drive 
 out the wit ; nor would you, for a thoughtless 
 blab of the tongue, sell the life of any honest 
 man, that just has a liking for auldfriends, and a 
 true fealty for auld masters. But come along." 
 
 With this the chief led Hector inside, and 
 introduced him to one or two of the younger 
 guests as a youth who, lie was pleased to say, 
 was likely to do honour to any acquaintance he 
 might make on the hills. 
 
 The castle of Glenmore, however venerable
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 159 
 
 or imposing at a distance, was as unaccountable 
 a remnant of feudal inconvenience, as any mo- 
 dern tourist, in quest of the barbarous, could 
 easily discover in the wilds of the North. Those 
 parts of it, which, on the approach of a stranger, 
 looked most picturesque, were in the upper in- 
 terior at least the merest holes, or the most 
 tiresome stair-screws ; or they consisted of ruin- 
 ous battlements, which seemed nothing more 
 than an empty gutter of decayed masonry 
 above, and a great vaulted stone hall below, 
 where the laird and his people were wont to 
 feast "for evermore." Still the whole fabric 
 was in the interior peculiarly ill fitted for that 
 series of formalities which we, who live in the 
 midst of refined vexations, call the entertain- 
 ment of company ; and so the ladies, who had 
 to conduct the confusion, found it on the pre- 
 sent occasion. Fortunately, however, with 
 Highland feasting is not usually associated the 
 idea of scientific gourmanderic, or perfect ele- 
 gance ; nor is Highland hospitality confined, as
 
 160 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 much as with us in the south, to the display 
 of a lavish waste of money which gives no satis- 
 faction. Accordingly, during the morning, with 
 those that tarried at the castle, there was great 
 hilarity amidst a Babel of confusion : in the 
 afternoon, at the dinner, there was great plenty 
 and little elbow-room — with unconscionable ap- 
 petites and most heterodox cookery ; and in the 
 evening, the clatter of Gaelic tongues was tre- 
 mendous, and the music "a rank ringing storm.'' 
 With all this, however, there was honest friend- 
 ship expressed, and as honest reproach ; and 
 withal, great warmth of feeling and extra- 
 ordinary enjoyment. The politics discussed, 
 however— the Black Watch gathering, secret 
 rumours, and secret epistles, " Charlie, and 
 Jamie, and Geordie, and a' '' — we choose to re- 
 serve for a more convenient season. 
 
 Until a regular " clearing out *" took place of 
 this Babel of Highland delight, no time was 
 afforded for our young hero to make his obser- 
 vations on that part of the family which is
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 161 
 
 most likely to interest young men, namely, the 
 ladies_, which as yet he could say little about, 
 notwithstanding all the toasts that had been 
 drank to their health, and all the speeches 
 which had been raved in their praise. When 
 on the morrow, however, the small windows 
 were thrown open, and the snell breezes of 
 Breadalbane had dissipated the fumes of High- 
 land jollification from the arched apartments 
 of the castle, the ladies came forth with looks 
 of rural health, and Hector was called to a 
 more particular introduction. 
 
 "A young friend from the good city of 
 Perth," said the chief, handing Hector forward, 
 " Hector Monro by name, and a great en- 
 thusiast for the free life of the Highlands. He 
 has come, by my invitation, to learn to hunt the 
 badger, and to play the broadsword with our 
 lads of the glens. I rede you, my dame, to give 
 him good favour. This next is my daughter 
 Kate, whom you may see, by the red on her 
 cheek, and the darkness of her eye, is imbued 
 with the true spirit of the hills. And this too
 
 162 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 is my little daughter Marion, whom you may 
 also see by the paleness of her face, and the 
 light blue of her eye, that she has rather too 
 much of the timid spirit of the Lowlands. 
 Look up, and do not blush, Minny, my child ; 
 the youth is but a bird of passage, coming to 
 perch his season among the mountains. By hea- 
 vens I" he added, half mentally, " but he makes 
 a bow as graceful as a courtier, and looks as if he 
 already felt himself as good as his company."" 
 
 The latter observation of the laird was the 
 effect of one of those sudden flashes of penetra- 
 tion, by which from small circumstances a whole 
 character is sometimes seen ; for, in fact. Hec- 
 tor seemed at once to feel himself in his own 
 proper level, and the ladies did not fail to 
 respect him accordingly. Indeed, the dame, a 
 handsome, good-humoured woman, approaching 
 to forty, and dressed with somewhat of the stiff 
 richness of the time, conceived at once a par- 
 tiality for the interesting stripling; and, what- 
 ever danger she might have seen in such a youth 
 being admitted to some intimacy with her
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 163 
 
 daughters, was obviated or lulled by the said 
 womanish partiality, which a fair exterior alone 
 can account for, aided by her own good-natured 
 indolence of character, and warranted by the 
 simplicity of manners prevailing among the hills. 
 The few words the laird had spoken regard- 
 ing his daughters, gave Hector a ready key to 
 their several characters, and well seconded the 
 impression their looks could not fail to convey. 
 Full-formed and striking, both in person and 
 countenance, the eldest was a feminine per- 
 sonation of her father, with all a woman's 
 gracefulness of manner, and all a mountaineer's 
 loftiness of spirit. The character of her younger 
 sister, both as it respected her mind and her 
 person, was not so much a contrast as a modifi- 
 cation of these qualities, with the addition of 
 some other traits, which, without rendering the 
 difference very obvious in common, caused 
 them, under certain circumstances, remarkably 
 to differ. What that difference consisted of, is 
 not at present material to our story.
 
 164 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Who spurns an oath of fealty to the power 
 Of ruler's chosen by a tyrant's nod. 
 
 Gbahame. 
 
 Evan M'Evan, the laird of Glenmore, more 
 resembled the genuine Highland gentleman of 
 the old school, than that extravagant compound 
 of chivalry and barbarity, ruffianism and ge- 
 nerosity, which make an effective poetical 
 character ; and with which it is the fashion lo 
 invest all Highland chieftains, in common with 
 the romantic fighting knights of the middle 
 ages. As little was he that mixture of lu- 
 dicrous pride, poverty, and choler, which forms 
 a caricature of another sort. Of chivalrous 
 sentiment he was certainly far from destitute ;
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 165 
 
 for that belongs to a people whose education is 
 an education of sentiments, aided by impres- 
 sions from the bald features of nature around 
 them. 
 
 But this generous chivalry, though often 
 bordering on romance, was, as well as the other 
 sentiments which generally accompany it, tem- 
 pered and directed by that plain good sense 
 and mother- wit philosophy, which is well known 
 to be no rarity on the north side of the Tweed. 
 That he felt strongly on all subjects is true ; 
 for feeling, and a sort of sentimentality of con- 
 stitution, if not of intellect, is very much the 
 distinctive attribute of the Scotch character. 
 Though this attribute, together with his ne- 
 cessary ignorance of artificial life and govern- 
 ment, became the cause of some prejudices, by 
 leading him to exaggerate the wrongs of his 
 country, as well as his own individual import- 
 ance ; and, in intercourse with his equals, 
 making him ready of impression of kindness or 
 off^^nce ; made him as ready to second them by
 
 166 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Avord or deed, as the free and fiery spirit of a 
 warlike people also made customary ; yet was 
 this attribute the foundation, in brief, of all his 
 virtues ; as it ever will be when united to na- 
 tural generosity of disposition, and guided by 
 experience — while virtue shall be considered 
 any thing more than a negative quality. 
 
 Though M'Evan had seen more of artificial 
 life than very many of his brother lairds of the 
 hills, his comparative ignorance of the world, 
 still acting upon that simplicity of character 
 which belongs to manly natures, made him, 
 when in contact even with the burghers of the 
 Lowlands, appear occasionally in a light that 
 was almost ludicrous. But had he been trained 
 to imbibe more of this sort of knowledge, it 
 would have doubtless been at the expense of 
 half his virtues, and perhaps more than half of 
 his happiness. For, one great brancli of the 
 latter was, that deriving most of his enjoyments 
 from mere nature, and personal activity on the 
 hills, he did not feel his own poverty — and
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 167 
 
 highly relished a species of fare, which, to men 
 habituated to luxury, would have been quite pi- 
 tiable. Indeed, the poverty of the Highlander 
 of that day, from chief to cotter, when collated 
 with their personal pride and poetry of character, 
 has been the subject of endless ridicule to their 
 southland neighbours. For this ridicule, no 
 doubt, the bare massy walls, undulating floors, 
 grotesque cupboards, and hard seats and beds, 
 within Glen more castle, would certainly have 
 afforded excellent materials, even to the Scotch- 
 man of modern times, as vv^ell as no bad illus- 
 tration of the character of their owner. But 
 this pleasant sneering would only show that ig- 
 norance of what human happiness really con- 
 sists, as well as of what constitutes the sound 
 materials of a thoroughly manly character, 
 which is the besetting sin of the superficial 
 lauders of discontented luxury and care-worn 
 improvement. 
 
 That the laird of Glenmore should have 
 been prejudiced against the law, and its opera-
 
 168 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 tion in the Highlands, particularly in crimi- 
 nal cases, was neither remarkable at the 
 time, nor inconsistent with his character and 
 information. Having, in the course of his own 
 experience, seen its effects almost exclusively 
 confined to cases of that sort of cruelty or o}> 
 pression which grows out of the severe appli- 
 cation of general rules, that takes no notice of 
 circumstances, which may yet weigh strongly 
 upon a feeling and considerate mind, he was 
 disposed to view it much more as one of those 
 inventions by which the powerful contrive to 
 oppress the weak and to fetter the free, than 
 any system of general justice. It was this that, 
 stimulated by his natural generosity, made him 
 go so far in the case of M'Naughton. But the 
 interfering of a chief to get off a clansman by 
 force or intimidation, in spite of the law, was 
 then far from uncommon ; and that in cases 
 much less justifiable than the one alluded to. 
 The chief's penetration into character, as well 
 as his good feeling, was well justified by the
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 169 
 
 subsequent conduct of the Cearnach, as we shall 
 hereafter have occasion to see. 
 
 The life that Hector now led for many 
 months in the bosom of the impressive soli- 
 tudes of Bread albane, may be left to some- 
 thing else than a wordy description. Sometimes 
 he lived in the homely hallan of the reformed 
 Cearnach, in the wild seclusion of Glendochart ; 
 again, he spent days together in the romantic 
 valley of Corrie-vrin, with the two handsome 
 brothers, to whom he could not help becoming 
 .greatly attached ; but generally his domicile 
 was at Glenmore castle, from which the laird 
 would on no account suffer him to depart, 
 until at least he should learn to know tho- 
 roughly, the peculiar life of the mountains, 
 and to be accomplished in all the manly sports 
 and exercises which, in their perfection, are so 
 highly admired by a simple but romantic 
 people. 
 
 In the following spring the gathering of the 
 Black Watch taking place in Glenlyon, Hector 
 
 VOL. 1. I
 
 170 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 was deprived of the society of the gallant bro- 
 thers. Katherine M'Evan also much missed 
 the occasional, though stolen, visits of a lover, 
 whose noble spirit and handsome exterior might 
 well excuse the partiality of a Highland maiden, 
 and, in common with her father, she could not 
 help lamenting the reduced situation and poor 
 prospects of the widow's sons. As for the 
 Cearnach, he now lived quiet and domestic at 
 Glendochart, and to testify his repentance for 
 former offences, as well as in the hopes of a par- 
 don from the government, at length consented 
 to allow his son also to join the Black Watch, 
 and to swear fealty even to King George of 
 Hanover. He was further induced to this step 
 by hopes of speedy promotion for the youth 
 in this gallant corps, the number of the cadets 
 of good families who had taken a place in 
 the ranks, reconciling both to the present in- 
 feriority of the station. 
 
 The particulars regarding tliat celebrated 
 regiment will come in their due place; mean-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 171 
 
 time the cry of the first parting, and putting 
 themselves into bondage, of so many picked 
 men, as now from all quarters gathered to- 
 wards Glenlyon, ran up through the glens with 
 pathos and with poetry, and stirred up our 
 youth's spirit with a new and almost painful 
 ambition. At length the brothers, as well as 
 M'Naughton, taking an affectionate leave of 
 Hector, as well as of their respective friends 
 and sweethearts, took their departure from the 
 hills of Breadalbane. Had all parties known 
 what was ultimately ordained, it would have 
 been a more pathetic, yea a more solemn 
 parting.
 
 172 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 The spirit which I think is within me, begins to 
 mutiny against this servitude : I will no longer endure 
 it, though yet I know no wise remedy how to avoid it. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 A CHANGE was now fast coming over the spirit 
 of Hector's life. It might be only that change 
 which seems to belong to certain stages of it, 
 and to mark certain epochs in our transient 
 existence. It might he no more than the na- 
 tural transition from the dreamy and inquisitive 
 uncertainties of youth, as its years and its fan- 
 cies fade away, and there comes gradually 
 upon the absorbing mind, the rational percep- 
 tion, the firmness, and the confidence of ripen- 
 ing manhood. 
 
 But in Hector's case there was something
 
 THE BLACK WATCH, 173 
 
 more than even this. The mind of man is a 
 kingdom, whose extent its owner is by no means 
 aware of, and which he seldom finds himself 
 well able either to survey or to rule. From 
 the solitudes of the mountains, from the heaven 
 above and the earth beneath, he had drank in 
 much of the deep spirit of nature, and appro- 
 priated the whole, as it were, into the extending 
 realms of his own mind. From conversation 
 with himself in his solitary rambles, he had 
 begun to know something of the graspings of 
 his own understanding, and the furniture of his 
 fancy. From the few books which, up to this 
 period, had fallen in his way, he began to see, 
 not without inward repining, how much there 
 was to know, and from the slight taste he had 
 had at Glenmore, of the elegances of a superior 
 style of life, he could not help inferring how 
 much in this fair world there was to enjoy. It 
 was only in his moments of melancholy that the 
 hopeful spirit of youth would allow him to 
 conceive, or to think upon, how much there
 
 174 THE BLACK WATCH. * 
 
 might be to svffer. With every succeeding 
 day, however, there came upon him, more and 
 more, the idea of how much in the world there 
 might be to do. 
 
 It is thus that thoughtless youth merges 
 into anxious manhood, and thus is laid in the 
 mind the great foundations of future good and 
 evil. But if Hector thus obtained, within the 
 recesses of his own breast, a more definite ambi- 
 tion and more rational aims, these were of 
 course bottomed, after all, upon the great 
 mover of human purposes, and handmaid of 
 the mind's perceptions, discontent^ which, like 
 the changing phantom of the hypochondriac, 
 seems to be the haunting companion of man. 
 Yet, if this omnipresent Mephistopheles of the 
 world be the spoiler of many pleasures, and the 
 everlasting evil eye that glares with a lurid 
 light on man's possessions, it is also well-known 
 to be the goad to all his exertions, and, in some 
 respects, the germ of all his greatness. 
 
 While Hector's mind worked like yeast with
 
 . THE BLACK WATCH. 175 
 
 his own secret thoughts, he received with joy 
 an unexpected invitation. It came from the 
 chief himself, who, interrupting him one day in 
 one of his reveries, requested his company as 
 far as Balloch castle, at Taymouth, the ancient 
 princely seat of the Earl of Breadalbane. 
 
 " And what may be our errand, sir?" said 
 Hector, with unconscious curiosity. 
 
 " It cannot be supposed, young man, that 
 you should understand politics, or rather High- 
 land politics," said the chief, with a shrewd 
 bend of his brow ; " but this new German 
 king, this second George, is not just so secure 
 in his seat, even yet, as the Provost of Perth 
 may be in his, though the power of the good 
 citizen lasts but for a year. His majesty, 
 therefore, wants to make all the friends he can 
 beyond the Grampians, as well as among the 
 black-skulled Whigs of the west, or the snivel- 
 ling psalm-singers of the Lowlands. So, as the 
 earl behoves to be his friend, as well as my 
 puissant southland neighbour, it will be ex-
 
 176 THE BLACK WATCH.% 
 
 pected tliat I should show face, and look as 
 loyal as is now the fashion, though, God knows, 
 between you and I, it is neither with good will 
 nor a good conscience." 
 
 " Then you are not exactly," inquired Hec- 
 tor, " a sincere friend to this king that reigns 
 over us here in Scotland, and yet lives half the 
 year in England and half in Hanover, as I 
 hear tell." 
 
 " Upon my word, Hector," said the chief 
 condescendingly, " that is a question that older 
 men than you would not venture to ask me. In 
 truth, my affection for this present man cannot 
 be expected to be very violent, all things con- 
 sidered," he added, laying liis hand mechani- 
 cally on the side where his basket-hilted sword 
 should have hung ; " and it will depend very 
 much on his own behaviour whether I shall 
 hereafter pay my vows to him in the way he 
 or my neighbour Breadalbane \vould wish. 
 His father was, perhaps, not a bad sort of body, 
 for all that was said about his pinging stingi-
 
 4 
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 177 
 
 ness and his German mistresses, and this man 
 is quiet enough, unless when in a passion, and 
 has long been very much what his wife, that 
 is called Queen Caroline, and Robert Walpole, 
 have made him. But these are things you 
 don't understand as yet, so get yourself ready 
 in the best you have, make your sword shine 
 like an Andre xTerrara, but do not carry it 
 yourself for fear of question, and I will try to 
 show you off as well as I can to the earl. It''s 
 a pity that the like of you should be left alto- 
 gether to linger here an idler." 
 
 A warm expression of gratitude broke from 
 Hector, on hearing this friendly sentiment, at 
 the end of M'Evan's speech, mingled, as it was, 
 with a considerate allusion to his brooding un- 
 
 o 
 
 easiness when he contemplated the future. 
 
 " Pooh, man ! explain it not to me,"" said 
 the chief, " I know what you are thinking of in 
 these fits that I have seen you in of late, aswell as 
 if I saw the inside of your musings. But no more 
 of this. Young folks are impatient and angry at 
 
 I 5
 
 178 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 fortune, before they know what the blind lady 
 is, or aught of her real history ; and as for this 
 trip to Balloch, it is hardly likely that it will 
 do you much benefit, excepting what your 
 young eyes may see, or your ears hear, before 
 you return thither again ; but whatever may 
 happen, you shall stay long at Glenmore ere I 
 wish you away/' 
 
 On the following morning early, Hector, on 
 opening the patched window of his little dor- 
 mitory, was reminded of the subject of the above 
 conversation, by seeing a crowd of Highlanders 
 already assembled on the green in front of the 
 castle. On descending, he found the chief already 
 on the ground, separating and selecting the men 
 whom he intended to follow him, en suit, to 
 Taymouth, or, in other words, to form that 
 limited tail of state attendance to which pru- 
 dence and the circumstances of the times com- 
 pelled him to submit. Sore were the murmurs, 
 and sulky the looks — not directed against the 
 laird, but agoinst " tlie foreigner king" — of
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 179 
 
 those who found themselves excluded from the 
 wonted post of honour on the present occa- 
 sion. Still more bitter, and loudly expressed, 
 were the murmurs of the elect few, whom the 
 laird permitted to follow him, that they should 
 go forth " after his honour the chief, without 
 pistol or fusee, mair than as many Dunfermlin 
 weavers, and neither a powder nor a lead, as 
 mickle as would fright a capercailzie on their 
 road, and no a blade dauring to ornament their 
 hip, as lang as worn in the belt of an Aberdeen 
 flesher." 
 
 Yet, for all this, not one of them was without 
 a sharp skenocle, or half knife, half dirk, stuck 
 snugly under their left arm, and not a few had 
 gillies or trusty dependants, who ran a train, 
 (after the train,) and made little secret of bear- 
 ing both hard steel, pistol, and powder, for the 
 use of those who, they truly said, " could do 
 deevilish ill without them." 
 
 " It's a poor set out this," said the chief, as 
 he put himself at the head of this small and un-
 
 180 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 armed train ; " I wonder what auld Evan 
 Dearag would say, if he could look out of his 
 grave at Cairncree, and see me going to visit the 
 Earl of Breadalbane in this plight. But auld 
 times are not new times, and we must e'*en sub- 
 mit ;'' and so, with no other consolation but a 
 " skirling skreid" from the laird's professional 
 piper, away this proud party set forth on their 
 journey. 
 
 They had not gone farther than the " house- 
 end,"" however, when changing his mind as to 
 the order of march, the laird determined to 
 send on his few men before, instructing them to 
 wait for him at the Balloch of Glenlyon ; he 
 proposed to perform his journey on horseback, 
 accompanied only by Hector, and two personal 
 attendants. 
 
 Mounted now upon a pair of Highland shel- 
 ties, the tallest of the shaggy animals of tlie 
 horse species, that, like the quagas of the African 
 wilderness, ran wild on the hills of Breadalbane, 
 our hero and the chief at last actually set out
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 181 
 
 upon their journey. The two athletic High- 
 landers, who, in the quality of servants, now 
 formed the only retinue of the gallant laird and 
 his friend, were not mounted in the proud style 
 of their masters, but giving the preference them- 
 selves to that primitive sort of conveyance, 
 familiarly called shanks mare, and having great 
 freedom of limb, from their nether parts not 
 being " locked " in inconvenient restraints on 
 the houghs, which in those days of simple 
 phraseology went by the name of breeches, 
 they ran after the tails of their masters' shelties, 
 with as much docility and more spirit, than do 
 the domestic negro of the West Indies, or the 
 ► swarthy sepoy of the East, at this present day. 
 One of these obsequious Gibeonites was no other 
 than the laird's favourite henchman, Donald 
 Downie, who has had the reader's distant ac- 
 quaintance from the period of his mounting 
 watch over the " jigs and jags " whicli lay in 
 the shop of the good burgess of Perth ; and 
 who, still following Hector with as much prefer-
 
 182 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 ence as his instinctive attachment to the chief 
 would allow, was, by the youth's request, ap- 
 pointed his ""squire on the present occasion. 
 
 From several circumstances, as well as from 
 the fact of the laird''s having doffed, at this set- 
 ting forth, those finely-mounted long-barrelled 
 pistols, which, when Hector first saw him, he 
 wore under the lap of his plaid with such im- 
 posing effect; and his having parted with 
 that personal god, his horn-handled dirk, the 
 youth suspected that the desire to meet the 
 earl was only part of the business of this jour- 
 ney ; for M'Evan was not of a temper to make 
 all this parade of obedience to the hated dis- 
 arming act, did no reasons sway him, such as he " 
 was not likely to explain to one of Hector's 
 years. Sufficient rumours, of secret commu- 
 nications from the court of St. Germains, 
 and proposed meetings of the chiefs in the 
 hills, and grievous complaints against the 
 House of Brunswick, and sailing of fleets from 
 the Frencl coast, &c., had reached Hector
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 183 
 
 even in the wilds of Breadalbane, to account 
 for the present caution of the chief, as well as 
 to rouse his curiosity on the present occasion. 
 
 As they trotted along, mounting heights and 
 descending the hollows which lay in their way, 
 the journey seemed to Hector to become un- 
 usually tedious. This feeling arose in part 
 from the lowering aspect of the day ; and the 
 sterile appearance of the blue heavy hills 
 around, the dark wilderness of the woody 
 ravines, on the edge of which they often clam- 
 bered, with the weary flats of dull heath over 
 which they passed, which, seeming equally ob- 
 jectless and endless, at length disposed our 
 youth to reflections of a character unusually 
 painful if not melancholy. These were .chiefly 
 concerning his own condition and prospects, 
 which, orphan as he was, and unsettled to any 
 spot or pursuit, while yet a st'-ong feeling of 
 independence and a stronger of ambition, had 
 of late worked incessantly in his mind, seemed 
 to him peculiarly perplexing and serious.
 
 184 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 " What are you brooding on?" inquired the 
 chief, unwilling to allow the youth to fall into 
 one of his abstracted moods. " Tell me your 
 thought, and I will help it out if I can.'** 
 
 " I am thinking selfishly," said Hector, 
 " about what I shall do, should nothing hap- 
 pen on this expedition to give me hopes for the 
 future — that is to say, where I shall go, when I 
 leave the earFs castle." 
 
 " And what is your determination, suppose 
 it should be against returning with me to Glen- 
 more .'^" 
 
 " To return to my old friend the burgess of 
 Perth. The affair that took me from him 
 must now be blown over, and he would at least 
 give me judicious advice— for he knows me 
 well.'' 
 
 " Advice is no rarity in the world, Hector, 
 though but a small portion is either good or ap- 
 plicable. Nevertheless, your reason is good, 
 for without the knowledge of the character to 
 whom advice is addressed, it might be worse
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 185 
 
 than useless. The deacon is a worthy man, 
 but he can only advise you with reference to 
 trade, and trade, let me tell you, ought never to 
 be engaged in by one of the disposition which 
 I know you possess." 
 
 The truth of this observation struck home 
 to Hector's experience. " What then can I do, 
 sir," said he, " situated as I am ? I cannot 
 linger all my life an idler on your hospitality. 
 I have just been thinking — " 
 
 " A foolish thought, I have no doubt, about 
 your own position, of which you can be expect- 
 ed to know nothing," interrupted the laird. 
 " But I will give you my thought. Man on the 
 earth, is like a ball on the surface of a billiard- 
 table. His original position is not only deter- 
 mined by a hand higher than his own, but he 
 is afterwards driven about by the collision or 
 concussion of other balls, or beings, with whom 
 he may be forced into contact. The compari- 
 son is not very complete ; but the evil I appre- 
 hend is, that, as far as I have yet observed, we
 
 186 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 are forced to be so passive as we are, and that 
 the strong hand of circumstances, so often 
 renders abortive all activity or energy, which 
 may be thought of by the individual, or em- 
 ployed to place himself in the position congenial 
 to his disposition, even when he has found out 
 precisely what that disposition is." 
 
 " And what would you have me to do, sir.?'' 
 said Hector, opening his eyes at the unexpected 
 philosophy of this speech. ^' What can I do, 
 but return to my old employment with the 
 burgess of Perth .?" 
 
 " It would be better for you to think of be- 
 coming a common volunteer in the Black 
 Watch, as many a good man's son has done," 
 said the chief, '* than to prostrate your spirit 
 to the ledger and the ell-wand in the chapman's 
 shop. But no," he added, pausing, " I cannot, 
 on consideration, advise you to join with Whigs 
 and Hanoverians, while our lawful king is a 
 fugitive in a foreign land. I do hope, that if 
 there are those whom I expect to see at Balloch
 
 THE BLACK WATCH, 18T 
 
 castle, you will not require to speak of such 
 plans, if I have either influence or interest." 
 
 " I have no words to express,''^ said Hector 
 with animation, " the gratitude I feel for all 
 you have done for me." 
 
 " Felt, Hector — not done," said the chief, 
 interrupting him with a benevolent nod of his 
 head. " But let me caution you against unne- 
 cessarily multiplying the disappointments of 
 life, by flattering yourself beforehand much 
 respecting any event. Should the earl, or any 
 else I may now meet, not think fit to become 
 your friend, (and that is quite probable,) I 
 really do not know what advice to give you, 
 since times forbid me being materially useful to 
 you myself. Your situation seems strange, 
 and your life may yet be stranger. I am no 
 great master of the moralities of wisdom, but 
 I have observed in my time, that man is a tree 
 that never grows strong and flourishing in the 
 world until he has fairly taken root ; so that, 
 striking his suckers deep, and taking hold even
 
 188 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 of the stony places of the earth, he may be 
 able to brave the blasts to which every twig in 
 the forest is subject. You are evidently a seed 
 of some noble tree, whom the random wind of 
 fortune is likely to toss about for a season. It 
 is just such as you, therefore, that may look 
 for vicissitude, until you fairly find the soil for 
 which the constitution of your mind has fitted 
 you. But whenever you find that, and dis- 
 position is satisfied, there rest your purposes 
 and perseverance, in spite of all discourage- 
 ments ; for there you will grow, and there only 
 you will flourish, and no doubt prepare a soil 
 for those who may come after you, that they at 
 least may have a less fugitive fortune." 
 
 The tone of this discourse took Hector by 
 surprise, he never before having heard the chief 
 so philosophical. " Fray go on, sir," he said, 
 ' and give me fully your thoughts. I feel 
 sensibly the want of a few aphorisms of expe- 
 rience, as a nucleus to my own crude medi 
 tations upon that world of which I as yet know 
 so little."
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 189 
 
 " The world is a strange gathering, which 
 I but little understand myself," continued the 
 laird, " and man an animal more difficult to 
 describe than any other of the more uniform 
 productions of nature. But this you will find, 
 that though none of nature's productions re- 
 quire the exercise of sympathy, or the energies 
 of mutual support, so much as man, none exer- 
 cise the feeling so little, or so often turn it 
 strangely against those to whom it would be 
 most valuable." 
 
 " I suppose that is true, sir,'' said Hector as 
 the chief paused : '* but pray go on.'' 
 
 " To proceed with my allegory, then," Glen- 
 more continued ; " while the oak of the wood 
 suffers itself to be twined about by many sap- 
 lings, which it seems proud to support, and 
 which add grace to its trunk, the reverse of this 
 holds true in the world ; for the strong oak 
 among men, who is himself rooted firm and can 
 defy the blast, surrounds himself with a circle 
 of exclusion, which poisons or crushes the feeble
 
 190 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 plant that intrudes under his shadow, giving 
 his support only to oaks like himself, who need 
 it not ; while it is the bending willow, or the 
 sensitive plant of society, which are most ready 
 to add their own feeble strength to the tender 
 twigs of misfortune, that require sympathy or 
 need support. But I begin to moralize, because 
 I am myself suffering somewhat from the world. 
 If fortune favours your ambition, Hector, try 
 to differ from the common character of man- 
 kind.^' 
 
 A long interval of silence followed this 
 speech, and in this manner, with occasional 
 starts of talk of a lighter sort, the time passed 
 over until the brightening summer's evening 
 brought them within sight of the great valley 
 of Glenlyon.
 
 191 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Ha! boys — I see a party appearing — wha's yon? 
 Methinks it's the captain of Bewcastle, and Jephtha's 
 John. 
 
 Fray of Suport. 
 
 It was yet . early on the following morning, 
 after they had risen and again set forth, when 
 their course still continuing among the passes 
 of tlie hills, their ears were saluted with a plea- 
 sant strain, which, as yet thin and distant like 
 the shepherd's reed, broke softly the perfect 
 silence of the morning. The very shelties on 
 wliich they rode began to cock their ears, and 
 to move them backwards and forwards " on the 
 pivot of their sculls," as Wordsworth would 
 say, and, putting up their noses, seemed to 
 snuff the music, as if it had been a morning
 
 192 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 refreshment ; and the scarcely less tawted gillies, 
 who clomb the hill in the rear, first stopped 
 stone still, and then began to run, as if struck 
 with a sudden enthusiasm. 
 
 " I'll wager a gill o' the best usquebaugh 
 that's to be had in the change-house o' Kin- 
 more," cried Donald, running forward, " that 
 that's the piobrach o' the Black Watch already 
 coming up wi' a sough frae the bughts o' Glen- 
 lyon. Oigh ! maister ! maister — shentlemans ! 
 will her honours no just turn up the beasties, 
 and gie a glint o'er the crown o' the hill to see 
 what the lads '11 be doing .^" 
 
 Putting their beasts to the trot, the chief and 
 our youth soon surmounted the crown of the 
 hill, and certainly the sight that burst upon 
 them was well calculated to stir up lively emo- 
 tions in a mind like Hector's. Besides the 
 imposing effect of the dark hills of Dull, which 
 rose abrupt and lofty opposite to where our 
 travellers were, there was the long sweep of tlie 
 glen beneath, widening upwards towards the
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 193 
 
 western mountains, with the rapid river of the 
 same name rushing over rocks, and sometimes 
 roaring like a lion, or rolling dark and deep at 
 the bottom of the glen. In a broad green field 
 near the mouth of the \a\ley, which stretched 
 for a considerable way by the banks of the 
 Lyon, the whole line of the Black Watch, now 
 above eight hundred strong, were ah-eady 
 stretched out on their morning's parade, and 
 the martial appearance of so large a body of 
 men in the midst of such scenery — their bright 
 scarlet coats, with which they had just been 
 supplied, in place of their former dark tartan 
 dresses, from which they took their name, their 
 arms glittering in the sun, and their picturesque 
 evolutions on the field, to the sound of drum 
 and bagpipe — all formed a sight that was highly 
 exhilarating, while it filled our hero with senti- 
 ments almost amounting to env3^ 
 
 Descending the hill rapidly, M'Evan and 
 himself were enabled to obtain a nearer view of 
 the dress and accoutrements of a corps which 
 
 VOL. 1. K
 
 194 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 were regarded in the Highlands with so much 
 interest. Instead of the short-tailed coat now 
 in use, the soldiers of the Watch wore scarlet 
 jackets and waistcoats, with buff facings and 
 white lace ; and instead of the heavy bonnet of 
 black feathers now worn, a smaller bonnet, with 
 the diced border, of different colours, resem- 
 bling the fess cheque in the arms of the family 
 of Stewart, and this, in some cases, set off by a 
 plume of cocks'* or eagles' feathers, and in others 
 by a small bushy piece of black bearVskin. 
 The belted plaid, of twelve yai-ds length, so 
 called from being kept tiglTt round the body by 
 a belt, was worn in the usual manner, partly 
 placed round the middle, and the upper part 
 fixed on the left shoulder ready to be tlirown 
 loose, and wrapped round the shoulders and 
 firelock in rainy weather, or to serve on the 
 march the purposes of a blanket. Besides the 
 belt which fixed the plaid, and in which were 
 stuck, in most cases, pistols and a dirk, in ad- 
 dition to the regular arms, another broad black
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 195 
 
 'belt, fixed in front by a large buckle of brass 
 or silver, served to support the basket-hilted 
 sword, which, along with the musket and 
 bayonet, v/ere furnished b}^ government ; and 
 round the middle was a third belt of blacl; 
 leather, which served to support tlie cartouch- 
 box, then worn in front. With all this weight 
 of arms, in the wearing of which this regiment 
 of gentlemen were permitted a certain ad libi- 
 tpm irregularity, which v/ould be surprising 
 in the present day, when officers have a very 
 different sort of men to deal with ; many were 
 also permitted to wear targets, after the old 
 fashion of their country, which, appearing 
 thickly in the ranks, had a very peculiar effect. 
 Nor did this custom, soon or easily, give way 
 to time, and the habits of the infantry, among 
 whom the Highland regiments mixed, any 
 more than the other dearly-loved customs of 
 their fathers ; for, seven years after, as the ce- 
 lebrated Captain Grose relates, he saw them 
 
 k2
 
 196 , THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Still worn by the men of this regiment, then on 
 service in Flanders. 
 
 This appeared to be a morning of some im- 
 portant parade, for the forty-third, as this 
 regiment was then named, were in full dress ; 
 and Sir Robert Munro himself, then lieutenant- 
 colonel, — a veteran who had bought his experi- 
 ence well in the old German wars, — galloping 
 about the field on a tall grey charger, gave the 
 command in a voice that was heard above the 
 deep roll of the drum, and was obeyed with 
 alacrity by the proud-spirited Highlanders. 
 Round the park waited numbers of gillies, at- 
 tendants both of officers, and rank and file, — 
 for a great portion even of the latter were 
 thus waited on, — no small number of the gillies 
 holding horses by the bridle, which had carried 
 those who lived at a distance to the exercising 
 ground, and with some of whom Donald 
 Dqwnie, through the ready medium of his snuff 
 mull, was now fast making up a temporary 
 friendship.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 19T 
 
 "And wha may your maister be, friend?" 
 said he, reciprocating nosology with a gentle- 
 man's gentleman, and a " master of the horse " 
 to at least the one that carried his master, and 
 over which horse the man now exercised a 
 wholesome measure of temporary tyranny. 
 
 " What rank is my maister, do you say ?" 
 said the man ; " ye may see him in the ranks 
 there, if your een be clear enough, wi' the 
 feather bobbing aboon his lug ; and in the 
 best rank, too. for he's in the best front o' Loch- 
 nelFs company, and stands beside the officer 
 next in command — that's Corporal M'Pherson, 
 my troth !" 
 
 " An honourable station in the army, my 
 friend," said the honourable Donald Downie, 
 with paukey seriousness. " And wha owns the 
 horse that ye chaff sae at the mouth, as if ye 
 had ne'er handled a bridle before ? Let the 
 beast alone, man, it's a quiet enough brute." 
 
 *' It's a canker'd creature when it gets the 
 cauld iron for a gumstick," replied the man.
 
 198 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 "and requires to be exerceesed and civileezed, 
 as well as the other shentlemans' o' the Black 
 Watch, — and wha's would it be but Farlan 
 MTarlan's, my maister ? How else would his 
 honour be able to ride twa lang miles and a bit- 
 tock, to the parawding place, an't 'twarna for 
 the beast ? — and wha would carry his honour's 
 guns and firelocks, gin I didna rin wi"* them, 
 fit for fit, after the mare's tail ? But wha'll be 
 your ain maister, since ye'll please to be a cha- 
 tekeese?*" 
 
 Donald, with the proper flourish of supe- 
 riority, announced the style and titles of the 
 chief of Glenmore. 
 
 " Hough !"" grunted the gilly ; " I see by 
 your maister's look, that he would be a proud 
 man if he could get to be a private gentleman 
 in the Black Watch, like my maister's honour ; 
 but that's no the fortune o' every man that 
 envies it, I jalouse." 
 
 This instructive communion of congenial spi- 
 rits was interrupted, however, by the mandate
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 199 
 
 of the laird, who, notwithstanding the secret 
 wish of Hector to get a few words' speech of 
 the brothers, or M'Naughton, thought fit to 
 trot off the ground, from the wish to be at 
 Balloch castle early in the day ; and telling our 
 youth that there would be plenty of opportuni- 
 ties of meeting his friends in the watch, at least 
 on their return from his visit to the earl, away 
 they proceeded towards the rich valley of Tay- 
 mouth. What Hector's thoughts in regard to 
 himself were, as he looked back over his shoulder 
 at the imposing array of the Watch, and heard 
 the scream of their warlike music echo through 
 the valley, we cannot here stop to describe. 
 
 At last our travellers arrived at Taybridge, 
 where, meeting the few followers which the 
 laird called his tail, and crossing the Tay, 
 they soon found themselves at the earl's gate, 
 which flew open to admit them into the princely 
 park of the noble proprietor of the demesne.
 
 200 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Come, come, no more of this unprofitable chat. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 As our small company marched up to Balloch 
 castle, under the lofty trees of the great avenue, 
 Hector found his pride, both in himself and the 
 laird his patron, ooze out of him sensibly, from 
 the effect of what he observed, like the boasted 
 valour of a well-known character. When at 
 length he stood under the lofty turrets of the 
 ancient building, upon the site of which stands 
 the present more convenient castle of Tay mouth, 
 he could not help being conscious of an unplea-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 201 
 
 sant degree of awe and personal humiliation. 
 In addition to the imposing appearance of the 
 then castle of Balloch, — at that time inconve- 
 niently, though magnificently, habitable, and 
 t)ne of the finest relics of feudal grandeur in 
 Scotland, — the mansion was at the moment 
 crowded with company. There were now in it, 
 lords from the Lowlands, and chieftains from 
 the Isles ; Whig lairds from Argyleshire, and 
 high visitors all the wav from London city ; — so 
 that, as our escort marched up in front of the 
 towers, and halted opposite to the ancient 
 arched entrance, numerous heads appeared at 
 sundry gothic windows above ; and there wei-e 
 even ladies, to watch them, looking out of tlie 
 lower battlements, where they stood enjoying 
 the fine prospect around. 
 
 " It was true what the laird told me,'" said 
 Hector to himself,—" that here I should at 
 least see and hear something wliich I sliould 
 afterwards remember. But will Glenmore really 
 bring me in among all these lords and gentles.? 
 
 K 5
 
 202 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 If SO, this day opens up the avenue of my for- 
 tune." 
 
 These high anticipations, however, were woe- 
 fully damped, not only by his own reception 
 wh^n it came, but by that of the laird himself, 
 who was suffered to stand a considerable time 
 in the doubtful region of the old entrance, and 
 that in the view of his own men, to whom he 
 had always hitherto appeared the greatest man 
 in the universe, — ere the governor of the castle 
 sent a powdered man to give him admittance. 
 But Hector's mortification was complete, when, 
 after cooling his own heels along with the com- 
 mon men of the laird's tail, for a quarter of an 
 hour, without any notice being taken of him or 
 his companions, — saving indeed the occasional 
 gibe or saucy sneer of the pampered menials of 
 the great visitors of tlie earl, as they idled past 
 them,— he and the rest were ordered roimd to 
 the rear of the buildings, where, guided in by a 
 low door, they were all huddled indiscrimi- 
 nately into a stone apartment, evidently that
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 203 
 
 appropriated for the common servitors of the 
 place. 
 
 Hector could not help being amused, how- 
 ever, at the looks of stiff pride and high-toned 
 Highland gravity, which his Breadalbane com- 
 panions shot under their dark brows at the 
 powdered idlers, who, in Lowland dresses, 
 loitered about the passages, or encumbered the 
 stone benches of the hall. 
 
 " Is this to be my entertainment in this great 
 man''s house?" said Hector internally, as he 
 hastily surveyed the clumsy flagons of malt 
 broust, and the piles of bones and braxey, or 
 whatever else the cold hashes consisted of, which 
 seemed to have been prepared for the ordinary 
 attendants of the lordlings now at the castle ; 
 and which, flanked by coarse loaves of wheaten 
 bread, was, with small ceremony, placed before 
 him and his hungry companions. 
 
 '* You do not eat, Maister Fair-face,'' said a 
 thickset fellow in a mono^rcl Highland and
 
 204 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Lowland dress, who stood making his observa- 
 tions in the corner opposite Hector. " You do 
 not eat, I say !" 
 
 " I do as I please, with your leave," said 
 Hector^ scornfully; all his pride now aroused, 
 as he threw on the questioner an angry glance. 
 
 " As long as you can, Sir Impudence," re- 
 torted the man, drawing down a heavy pair of 
 brows, and nodding his head with impudent 
 familiarity. " You are a pretty Jack-pudding, 
 that answers my civil observe with your een 
 glancing like candles, and a voice as peremptor 
 as you were my lord himself," 
 
 " You ought not to speak so peremptor, 
 young man, to a shentleman like Maister Mag- 
 iashan," struck in a thin-voiced servitor, who 
 stood by, happy to recommend himself, by a 
 little seasonable injustice, to the favour and 
 friendship of a gentleman of Maister Mag- 
 lashan's power among the lower powers in 
 Balloch castle. '^ It's not for beardless cal-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 205 
 
 lants to set up their gab to the like o' Maister 
 Maglashan, although ye be a stranger, and the 
 laird o' Glenmore's best gilly, maybe." 
 
 " Maister Hector is no gilly," exclaimed one 
 of the Breadalbane men, now taking their 
 young friend's part ; " he is the laird's friend, 
 that sits at his ain table; he is — that is — I'll 
 not see him put upon." 
 
 " And what is he ? what may he be ? since 
 ye are sae proud," said Maglashan ; " does 
 he belang to Breadalbane, or is he an oe of 
 Glenmore's, that he looks sae fierce, and will 
 ^- neither eat or drink where good men are set ? 
 Na, dinna look sae blate, but up wi't, you that 
 kens. Wha's the youngster's father ? and wha's 
 his mother? and what's his kith? and wha's 
 his kin ? that he sits here in the earl's ha', 
 and sets up his crokets at Dougal Mag- 
 lashan?" 
 
 This examination was becominij: too close 
 and too particular for such information about 
 Hector as was patent even at Glenmore ; so the
 
 206 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Highlanders, bending down their heads and 
 plying vigorously at their trenchers, sagaciously 
 left the youth to answer for himself. 
 
 All present, however, were disappointed 
 when our hero made no reply whatever, but 
 merely continued to regard the querist with a 
 smile of contempt. 
 
 " It's a shame and a sin to put sic a provoca- 
 tion on an honest lad," said one of the laird's 
 tail, clearing his mouth. " 111 warrant him o' 
 as gentle bluid as the best o' us, although he 
 was but a merchant chopkeeper in the Low- 
 lands, and nae disparagement." 
 
 " A merchant ! a shopkeeper in the Low- 
 lands ! a pedlar wi' a pack ! maybe a tailor or 
 a stay maker — ha, ha, ha!" screamed Maglashan, 
 in an ecstacy. *' Lord, if I dinna deserve to be 
 pricked in the hurdies wi' one of his ain needles 
 for offering a civility to such a bit of proud 
 buckram ! But here," he added, filling up a 
 cup of the thin liquor that stood before him, 
 • it becomes a shentleman o"* gude bluid like me
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 207 
 
 to bear no ill-will, so if the shopkeeper callant 
 just toasts my health and drinks a cup of this 
 broust, for a friendship, and for the honour o' 
 the Earl of Breadalbane's cheer, I'll forget and 
 forgive all that's past, and gie him a snufF out 
 o* my ain mull to souther the bargain ;" saying 
 which, he held the cup most peremptorily up 
 to Hector's face. " Will she no tak it ? — will 
 her no tak it yet, and drink to my health and 
 marriage day, just for a flag of truce, young 
 man ?" cried the impetuous Highlander, as 
 Hector drew himself back in refusal of the 
 proffer, but, though burning with indignation 
 ai this Highland freedom, still preserved a 
 dogged silence. 
 
 " Haud off' your hand, friend," said one of 
 the Breadalbane men, again interfering. " It''s 
 a shame to provoke the brave young chield, 
 when ye see he''ll neither pick nor dab wi' you, 
 as the henwife said to the cadger. Lord, will 
 ye raise a quarrel already in the laird's ha' ?" 
 
 By this time Hector had sprung to his feet,
 
 208 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 and plucking the cup out of Maglashan's hand, 
 threw it and its contents at his head with a 
 force, that, had it taken effect, would have done 
 no small damage to the hardest skull. Fortu- 
 nately, however, by stooping suddenly, the 
 wary Highlander avoided the blow, only re- 
 ceiving part of the liquor ; and now springing 
 towards our hero, was only withheld from flying 
 at hi? throat by the hasty interference of the 
 bystanders. 
 
 " Here's a brulzie !" cried several voices, 
 rushing into the hall, as a Highland quarrel 
 was now fairly a-foot, and sides began to be 
 taken, and a Babel of Gaelic confusion already 
 prevailed in the motley assembly. 
 
 " Deevil confound General Wade, and auld 
 King George, and every southron son of them,'" 
 exclaimed the Breadalbane man, feeling in vain 
 for his wonted side-arms, " that doesna leave a 
 puir fallow a decent blade to help him to keep 
 peace and quietness in an honest shentleman's 
 house ! It's a rank scandal to you, ]\Iaistcr
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 209 
 
 Maglashan, to stop the vera meat in our wezons 
 wi' setting up a quarrel about naething ava but 
 a coup o' sour broust, whilk the brave boy had 
 mickle better no filHiis wame wi'." 
 
 " Will / be spoken to by a merchant Low- 
 lander," cried the fierce champion of the ser- 
 vants' hall, now foaming with fury, " that has 
 not as mickle beard on his lip as the cat could 
 lick off wi' her tongue ? Na, do not draw your 
 skenocles at me, men — Dougal Maglashan 
 doesna fight like an Italian stabber. But if / 
 be a living man, the Earl of Breadalbane shall 
 know of this brulzie ; and this saucy boy shall 
 beg a forgiveness at my feet before he leaves 
 Balloch castle." 
 
 In the midst of the latter part of the con- 
 fusion, Hector suffered liimself to be persuaded 
 to leave the hall, and passing out of the small 
 postern at the rear of th^ building, he gladly 
 found an opportunity of brooding alone over 
 the mortified feelings by which he was now over- 
 powered.
 
 210 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 " I see plainly and evidently what my life 
 is to be," he said, in the bitterness of his spirit, 
 and with all the confidence of youthful igno- 
 rance and passion, as he paced hastily on under 
 the trees of the lawn without. " Born a beggar, 
 and too proud to be a tradesman, I must for- 
 sooth aim at being a gentleman, while in reality 
 but an eleemosynary dependant on a puir 
 Highland laird. And thus, whenever I go 
 abroad, I am liable to all the insults which be- 
 long to the questionable shape in which I come. 
 What should I do ? and whither shall I betake 
 me, where I may be able to stand up with 
 common confidence, and look every one fear- 
 lessly in the face ? Would to heaven, I could 
 even enlist as a gentleman private in the Black 
 Watch ! I should then at least have my six- 
 pence a day independent, and care for no one/' 
 
 Thus our proud youth indulged his boyish 
 rage, with more reflections on his condition and 
 prospects than need be repeated ; but when he 
 lifted up his eyes, and looking round, con-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 211 
 
 trasted the heavenly scenery now in his view, 
 and the serene expression of all nature around 
 him, with the boihng bitterness of his own 
 spirit, aroused, as it was, by a sense of shame 
 for himself, he came home to his consciousness. 
 Continuing to muse, as he gazed down the 
 sweet valley of the Tay, he felt a soothing 
 tranquillity steal over his heart, his secret 
 mortifications melt away, and giving place to 
 that involuntary elevation which belongs to the 
 ennobling influence of nature. 
 
 He had now mounted to the top of one of 
 those picturesque knolls which diversify the 
 scenic undulations of the princely park of Tay- 
 mouth. The whole scene, stretched out around 
 him, might well sooth a spirit less easily moved, 
 and less aspiring than his own. All the pro- 
 fanation of wandering tourists and cicerone 
 guide-books, in our own days, will not take en- 
 tirely away either its poetry or its romance from 
 the noble valley of Balloch, in the midst of 
 which Hector now sat. On his left, lay smooth
 
 212 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 and glassy to the evening sun, the long Loch 
 Tay, stretching in quiet beauty along the green 
 and woody foot of the " bold Ben-Lawers,'^ — 
 which, rising four thousand feet above its level, 
 at once assumes the form and attitude of the 
 foreground giant of the hills. 
 
 Beneath, on the glassy bosom of the lake, 
 a pretty tuft of rich green seems to sit like 
 the fairy isle of the water's expanse, and still 
 known by the name of Holy Woman's Isle ; its 
 ruined priory not at that time dilapidated, as 
 nearly a century more has made it, but even 
 then almost hidden under its trees ; and the 
 sanctity of the whole, neither yet impaired by 
 time, nor its picturesque beauty profaned by 
 improvement. Nearer to the feet of our con- 
 templative hero, the clear and deep Tay, issuing 
 slowly forth from the Loch, like a staid child 
 from the bosom of its parent, wanders in broad 
 and imposing beauty along the margin of those 
 pleasure-grounds, in the midst of which he was 
 seated. Following the stream from this point.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 213 
 
 away she floats past the imaginative spectator, 
 like the soft and graceful daughter of nature, 
 until the rapid Lyon, issuing from the mouth 
 of a dark but noble glen, which she passes, 
 marries himself to her like an impatient lover ; 
 and impetuously running away with his bride, 
 under the dark hills of Weem, and the braes of 
 Ballechin, only seems to become a really sober 
 mari^ when meandering down the meads of the 
 rich carse of Strathmore. 
 
 But with the very intoxication under which 
 the poetic mind reels in the contemplation of 
 nature's beauty, is often mingled a sigh of bit- 
 ter pungency at the thought of the meditative 
 individual, that for his use that beauty does 
 not exist; but as a syren temptation to which 
 he must not give way, and which, therefore, 
 only serves to make the mind unhappy, by a 
 painful envy, as strong as the desire itself, for 
 this or any other portion of earth's good, and 
 yet as inevitable as the common feelings of man. 
 "Thus," thought he, "in the Hesperides' gardens
 
 214 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 of this fair world, fruits do hang in golden 
 clusters that we must not taste ; and in the busy 
 mart of society, or the saloons of which I have 
 read, eyes do shoot their lightning into our 
 souls, and make our hearts beat quick with 
 emotion, which, notwithstanding, we must not 
 look upon with hope ; the pleasure they are 
 designed to give being not for us. Thank 
 heaven, however, that the regrets that trouble 
 me at this moment are not deepened by such 
 vain desires as these." 
 
 He was interrupted in the midst of this unwont- 
 ed sentimentality by the soft whisper of female 
 voices almost behind him ; and as he listened, 
 he thought he heard the light and hearty laugh 
 of girlish youth, which soon became more dis- 
 tinct. A musical feminine tongue next talked 
 near him, with warm enthusiasm of the beauty 
 of the scene, and even, he fancied, with the 
 joyous volubility of a happy and a light heart. 
 
 Unwilling to incur the suspicion of sitting 
 silently as an unknmvn listener, he rose to move
 
 THE BLACK WATCIL 215 
 
 downwards, when, turning round, he perceived, 
 a little above him, a handsome gentlewoman, 
 about thirty, as if talking to some one whom he 
 could not tlien see. In another instant, after he 
 had turned his head, the slight figure of a 
 young lady rushed laughingly down the hill, 
 quite near him, and playfully catching at the 
 bushes in her descent, never, however, stopped, 
 until she was quite at the bottom of the knoll, 
 and in the giddiness of her spirits had nearly 
 fallen, in her haste, among the thick grass of 
 the park. Turning round, and looking up- 
 wards, towards where the elder lady still stood, 
 her-eyes fell upon Hector, whose look of sudden 
 admiration was at once rivetted upon her. 
 Blushing slightly as she looked upwards, she 
 seemed to hesitate in some intended speech. 
 
 " Come straight down, Madame Teenie," she 
 at length said, with playful freedom. " 'Tis a 
 delightful run, and the grass is as soft as a 
 carpet. If your high-heeled shoes are ready to
 
 216 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 topple you over, hold well by the bushes in 
 your way, and I will up and help you." 
 
 A sudden thought struck Hector. Takino- 
 two or three steps upwards, to where the hesi- 
 sating lady stood, he presented himself before 
 her, and pulling off his bonnet, begged the 
 favour of being allowed to assist her in her 
 descent. 
 
 The gentlewoman smiled condescendingly as 
 she cast her eye over Hector''s person, and re- 
 fused the proffer. But the repeated thanks and 
 smiling looks with which the refusal was qua- 
 lified, convinced him that his offer was at least 
 no offence ; and seeing her attempt timorously 
 to descend alone, high heels and all, he boldly 
 pressed his suit, received her hand tacitly, and 
 the gallant ease, and even graceful freedom, 
 with which he brought her to the bottom of tlie 
 hill, was received by the lady with that evident 
 pleasure, with which the attention of a well- 
 looking youth of any rank is always received
 
 THE BLACK WATCH, 217 
 
 by a good-hearted woman. When he had led 
 her to level ground, she turned round and 
 thanked him, with a smile and curtsey as re- 
 spectful — as he said to himself afterwards — as 
 if he had been a lord ; and, to his astonishment, 
 even the young lady who had first fixed his 
 admiration, gave a blushing smile as he came 
 forward, and took madam by the arm, as if, 
 (though he would not allow himself to think it,) 
 she almost could have wished that the transient 
 gallantry had been shown to herself. 
 
 Those who still remember with pleasure the 
 delight which, in the first freshness of youth, 
 they have received from similar incidents, can 
 conceive the rapture with which Hector fol- 
 lowed with his eyes the forms of the ladies, as 
 they receded away among the picturesque 
 clumps of the noble lawn of Tay mouth. The 
 face of the younger was charming, beyond anj^- 
 thing he had yet seen in a female; and lier 
 manner, as far as he had just witnessed it, was 
 as playfully simple, as if she had been but a 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 218 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 lowly maiden of his own hills. His fancy being 
 now fully awakened to the beauties of the fe- . 
 male form, he thought, as he still stood rivetted 
 to the spot, that he had never seen an air so 
 noble, and yet so graceful, as he now contem- 
 plated ; as, hanging on the arm of her com- 
 panion, and talking and laughing as she went, 
 this pretty stranger tripped on over the smooth 
 lawn towards the mansion. Starting forward, 
 he watched them at a distance, every step they 
 went — and he even felt no slight twinge of a 
 new species of pain as he perceived a gentleman 
 issue from another walk, and, with many bows 
 and some familarity, take the arm of the object 
 of his admiration, and conduct both ladies round 
 the w^estern tower, towards the front entrance of 
 the castle.
 
 219 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Ladies, a,general welcome from his grace 
 Salutes ye all. This night he dedicates 
 To fair content, and you : none here, he hopes 
 In all this noble bevy, has brought with her 
 One care abroad ; he would have all as merry 
 As first-good company, good wine, good welcome. 
 Can make good people. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 Im the morning Hector arose fresh and cheerful. 
 As he wandered, alone, through the extensive 
 pleasure grounds that surrounded the castle, 
 many a look he cast around among the clumps 
 of the park, to see if he could catch a glance 
 of her whose face and form had been tlie 
 means of so exciting his fancy. But no in- 
 dication appea red of such good fortune ; and, 
 beginning to feel that exhaustion of spirits that 
 always follows a ferment of the mind, he was 
 
 L 2
 
 220 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 returning to the castle, when coming round to- 
 wards the front, just as his eye fell on the prin- 
 cipal entrance, a gay crowd began to issue 
 forth. Gentlemen appeared with hat in hand, 
 according to the formal manners of the time, 
 leading out ladies by the tips of the long-gloved 
 fingers, each bowing to the other as they went, 
 like the antique figures which are represented 
 in tjie old pictures of a promenade in the Mall 
 of St. James's Park in Garrick's days, that is, 
 shortly after this very time. All were in full 
 dress for a ceremonious walk before dinner, and 
 Hector, never having before seen so much of 
 English manners and high company, gazed 
 upon the full, round-skirted coats, wide sleeves, 
 dollar-sized buttons, and high-heeled shoes, of 
 the men, with amused curiosity, from the strong 
 contrast which their stiff and wigged figures, 
 and the gaudy colour of their dresses, formed 
 with the free manly costume of the few High- 
 land gentlemen who mixed among them. 
 
 But the full disguise, and the successful mis-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 221 
 
 shaping of nature, seemed still more perfect in 
 the making up of the ladies, who now graced 
 this high-day promenade. This being the first 
 time that Hector had ever seen the true effect 
 of a hoop, or witnessed a regular built head- 
 dress of the haut ton of the time, he contem- 
 plated both, as the dames sailed towards him, 
 with that mixture of astonishment and ques- 
 tioning, with which we vainly try to look with 
 admiration upon some indications of the wis- 
 dom of our ancestors. Could these " mortal 
 shapes," he thought, who appeared to be almost 
 cut into two in the middle, and to have no 
 limbs, " be formed in the same mould with the 
 full-formed maidens of the hills ?'''' Pope speaks 
 of the difficulty of compelling the high dames 
 of those days to acknowledge the shapes which 
 nature had given them, and proposes to the 
 painters of the day to make their Helens from 
 <he handmaidens who waited upon the others. 
 Probably this is the best rule even in our own 
 times,but toHectorthe subject appeared invested
 
 222 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 with a mystery, which was like the mystery of 
 that comparative greatness, which had cost him 
 such envy on the previous day, and of that dif- 
 ference between one man and another in the 
 usages of the world, which is the most difficult 
 of all the lessons that youth has to learn. 
 
 Placing himself behind a tree that he might 
 not be observed. Hector watched the passing of 
 this elegant company. The avenue into which 
 they had now entered was broad and magnifi- 
 cent, falsifying in its noble character the asser- 
 tion of the cynical traveller, who was said to 
 have traversed Scotland, and left it without ever 
 having seen a tree. The whole bread tli of a 
 gravelled way, about as wide as those in the 
 Dutch-planned gardens at Hampton Court, was 
 taken up by three couples, walking abreast, the 
 lioops of the elaborately dressed dames keeping 
 the men at a good arm's length on each side. 
 Nevertheless, the whole, as they came forward^ 
 formed a goodly and imposing show ; for the 
 dresses, if deficient in grace, were well calculated
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 223 
 
 for grandeur of effect, and spoke well for the 
 hospitality as well as the spirit of the noble 
 owner of this magnificent demesne. Enter- 
 tained, though humbled, by the sight of so 
 much grandeur. Hector yet strained his eyes to 
 obtain a view of one who had made so deep an 
 impression on his mind. In the third row of the 
 party, and fortunately on the side next himself, 
 he observed her slender and graceful figure, 
 more elaborately furnished forth than on the 
 day previous ; and though not yet deformed by 
 a hoop, still, so metamorphosed by the enormity 
 of full dress, that nothing but the sharp eyes 
 of love, which had seen her in an apparel more 
 consistent to nature, could possibly have recog- 
 nized her. Holding up a large fan in her hand, 
 which it seems was prescribed by her quality, 
 her arms covered with large elbow gloves, and 
 a blown rose placed above her stomacher, while 
 the want of a hoop was all but made up by tlie 
 numerous tucks and flounces of a rich thickly- 
 flowered damask gown, such as our grandmo- 
 thers wore, she carried herself with all the
 
 224 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 grace of her age, yet with all the dignity of a 
 lady of sixty ; and, had her face not told for 
 her a better tale, looked like those stiff portraits 
 of young females of the Dutch school, wherein 
 the eye seems almost disappointed that the anti- 
 quated dress is not borne out by starch and 
 wrinkles. 
 
 But one glance at the fair youthful counte- 
 nance, and the large laughing intelligent eyes, 
 convinced our Cimon behind the tree, that no 
 art can destroy the irresistible fascination of 
 beauty, and her very motion and manner, as she 
 walked and talked occasionally to the happy 
 o-entleman who escorted her, and which our 
 youth watched with the intensest interest, was 
 such as, in spite of her costume, to deepen all 
 the impressions which the Iprief interview of the 
 previous day had given him concerning her. 
 Of this company, however, his own patron, 
 Glenmore, did not seem great enough to make 
 one ; for certainly he was not present, and an 
 unbidden })ang of the humiliating melancholy 
 of the previous day shot through Hector's
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 225 
 
 heart, as, unknown and unnoticed, he saw these 
 grandees pass, and watched the gay company 
 as it receded away in the long sweep of the 
 avenue. 
 
 What a strange sentiment is pride, in con- 
 nexion with such a being as man ! How rooted 
 it seems to be in the blood of some natures ! 
 How, in that case, it flies in the teeth of cir- 
 cumstance itself, with which only, in the estima- 
 tion of the world, it has aught to do ! Of how 
 many virtues is it not the parent, for all that 
 is said against it! Yet, of how much suffer-, 
 ing is it not the cause, in all situations of 
 life, more or less resembling those in which our 
 youthful hero now found himself ! But when, 
 to the perception of, and the disposition to, the 
 great and the noble in human position and feel- 
 ing, is added also an intense perception of the 
 elegant and the pleasurable, what havoc does 
 it not make in the sensitive mind ! Of wliat 
 bitter murmurings against blind fortune, and 
 even human existence, is it not the origin! 
 
 l5
 
 226 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 What food for reflection is connected with it, 
 and with the nature of society which so madly 
 juggles with it, is afforded in the common 
 occurrences and obvious remarks to be made 
 about a great man's house ! 
 
 All day Hector wandered about Taymouth 
 valley, delighted as far as nature could sooth 
 his senses, but miserable as far as art excluded 
 him from the pale of her pleasures. In truth, 
 notwithstanding the profusion and waste that 
 he saw scattered around him, he was actually 
 in danger of being starved ; for he was too low 
 to be noticed by those who banqueted above, 
 and too proud to mess in the servants' hall. 
 Thus his own pride may be said to have eaten 
 him up, and yet it was the only precious thing 
 upon which he could feed in secret satisfaction. 
 What the laird's business could be with the 
 earl he knew not, but since his first arrival at 
 Taymouth he scarcely had seen him. He had 
 no one at hand to whom he cared to express the 
 thoughts which oppressed him. Around him
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 227 
 
 all were gay, and all seemed happy, but his 
 neglected self. Thus he fed in secret on hoped- 
 for happiness, and the triumphant pride of bet- 
 ter days to come, while yet he almost perished 
 for a mouthful of bread. 
 
 As far as he could see all day, every servant 
 had been in a bustle at the castle, and as even- 
 ing drew on, every thing seemed prepared for a 
 grand entertainment. Carriages were seen 
 bowling down the avenue with additional com- 
 pany. A band of musicians had arrived all the 
 way from Edinburgh ; the great hall above was 
 hung with festoons of flowers and green boughs. 
 Hector's inquiries for the chief, or any one he 
 could speak to, made of the servants who 
 bustled without or in the passages, were spoken 
 in vain, during the exciting confusion; for, in 
 the cry of '' The company ! the company ! the 
 earl, and the earl's friends !"" every voice was 
 drowned, and in their wants and their service 
 every thought was absorbed. 
 
 " Surely," said Hector to himself, as lie
 
 228 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 lingered cold and exhausted without, -' man is 
 a wretched animal, who knows nothing of self- 
 respect, and less of justice to others. His na- 
 ture seems a compound of the spaniel and the 
 tiger ; for he seldom can comport himself as the 
 equal of his species, but must have one to ty- 
 rannize over, and another to worship. And yet 
 he is an extraordinary being,"' he continued, as 
 the roar of Highland merriment began to rise 
 on his ear from the banqueting hall above, 
 " to invent such enjoyments out of the simple 
 furnishings of the earth, and so to fence himself 
 round by laws and opinions, that he shall be 
 enabled to gratify the worst propensities of his 
 nature, if he pleases, and to gorge himself be- 
 yond what that nature can bear, while thou- 
 sands around him are looking on at his excesses, 
 with the sunken eyes of over-laboured want, and 
 with the voluntary yearnings of an unsuppres- 
 sible conviction of personal injustice." 
 
 Anon, the long windows of the hall began to 
 be lit up ; forms appeared casting their sha-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 229 
 
 dows across the light of the windows — the 
 painted 'scutcheons on the ceiling, and the 
 gilded corbells which protruded from the anti- 
 quated carving of the roof, began to be seen by 
 the solitary admirer below; and a preluding 
 flourish of horns and clarionets, and the heavy 
 thrum of viols, sounding through the apart- 
 ment, showed that the company were preparing 
 for the dance. There are sounds and sights, 
 which at certain moments we cannot bear. 
 Hector turned away, and walked a space down 
 the long avenue. 
 
 A sweet and solitary half moon was begin- 
 ning to peep, shadowy and white, over the 
 double-peaked summit of Ben-More, as Hec- 
 tor, now out of hearing of the music that sound- 
 ed at the banquet, bethought of again return- 
 ing to the castle. It was few romances he had 
 read on the hills; but romance and poetry 
 e.vist in the mind, and he thought he now saw 
 a romantic sight. What would we have of an 
 ancient Highland castle, and a great shadowy
 
 230 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 park by moonlight ! But this is not the way 
 that certain men talk, or that certain minds re- 
 ceive and cherish their impressions. 
 
 Built about 1550, by Sir Colin Campbell, 
 called Knight of Lochaw, " ane great justicier 
 all his time," old Balloch castle, on the site of 
 which the present Taymouth stands, was of 
 that character of feudal buildings which might 
 well impress a mind like Hector's, as it now ap- 
 peared by the moonlight, amidst the scenery 
 we have alluded to. Between two round and 
 lofty towers, standing at gome distance from 
 each other on the summit of a pleasant slope, 
 towards the Tay, ran an irregular screen of 
 inner buildings, containing almost every variety 
 of bastion and buttress, h^ 'Hiefly occupied, 
 near the western angle, b^ tft^ state rooms of 
 the castle, from whose long gothic windows 
 the light now streamed towards the sward be- 
 low, mixing pleasantly with the mellow beams 
 of the moonlight. Above, a variety of pinna- 
 cles and battlements rose from different parts
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 of the building, with that sort of effect peculiar 
 to gothic irregularity, that, seen from some 
 points, they looked like a heavy mass of gloom 
 and feudal strength, while from others they had 
 that air of the bold picturesque, which, on an 
 occasion like the present, was singularly effec- 
 tive. On all the protruding horns or pinnacles 
 of the battlements above, or the buttresses be- 
 low, hoary as they now were with time, and in 
 some parts particularly dilapidated, the beams 
 of the moon now rested with striking effect ; 
 and, together with the festive echo of the music 
 from within, as Hector again drew near, seemed 
 to him like what he had fancied of absolute en- 
 chantment. -I, 
 
 By the tinn ^^again stood under the long 
 windows of tho banqueting room, every lady 
 and lordling then in the castle seemed to have 
 joined the gay company, and were now in the 
 high zenith of the dance. All within was light, 
 grandeur, beauty, and festivity. The hall rang 
 and echoed with a species of music, imported
 
 232 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 from the favourite land of Orpheus, and now 
 executed with the scientific compounds of har- 
 monious effect, such as was altogether new to 
 the enchanted listener, and came upon his un- 
 practised ears as he stood below in the moon- 
 light, like the rushing melody of a fairy dream. 
 And then, forms and figures went and came as 
 he watched, and plumes nodded, waving their 
 dark shadows on the windows of the hall, and 
 time was beat by light feet and lighter hearts, 
 as lords and ladies swam in the dance, and as 
 the Italian music rose and fell— and some one 
 was there whom he would give worlds to look 
 upon at this moment; and tlie emotions that 
 began to rise in his soul made his head swim 
 with sensations new and incommunicable. 
 
 " What pleasures must not life furnish, and 
 the great enjoy ! " he said to himself in the 
 fulness of his fresh feelings, " when scenes 
 which I can only see and hear, thus imper- 
 fectly, and at a distance, nil one with such con- 
 ceptions of grandeur and deliglit ! What have
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 233 
 
 I yet known, or yet enjoyed, wandering an ig- 
 norant Celt on the hills, to what I may yet 
 experience in that great world, upon which I 
 have not even entered ; where art uniting with 
 beauty and intelligence, seems to have provided 
 such pleasures. Yet, alas !" he added, a pang 
 of hunger and exhaustion coming over him at 
 the moment, while a snell night blast from off 
 Ben Aw seemed to unite with the cold ray of 
 the moonlight to chill him through — " how dif- 
 ferent is the condition and the enjoyments of 
 man ! How sadly does the sumptuous banquet- 
 ing and gay pleasure of this house of joy, con- 
 trast with the wan melancholy of solitary misery, 
 existing at this instant in so many places !*" 
 
 But this stinging thought, which it is long 
 before the sympathetic mind learns to check 
 and stifle, by the stern tuition of artificial sel- 
 fishness, in Hector, served, after a few moments 
 of melancholy reflection, but to enhance his 
 conception of the pleasures now enjoyed by this 
 gay assembly. Pauses and changes now occurred
 
 234 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 in the music, and half forms appeared dimly 
 at the windows, which the enchained youth 
 would have given what he did not possess to 
 have seen more closely. Then there was one 
 whose image dwelt on his fancy. Could he but 
 see her at this instant, and who it was she 
 danced with, and how she looked among so 
 many other beauties, which adorned and charmed 
 this hilarious company ! Was there no way of 
 getting up nearer the windows, among the old 
 irrregular angles and balconies which the moon- 
 light tipped with such romantic effect ? The 
 temptation was too great for him to stand longer 
 shivering where he was, §nd " for heaven," he 
 would try. 
 
 Stepping up to the dark shade of the nar- 
 rowest but highest tower, he found the low door 
 half open, and ascending the screw-stair within, 
 was enabled to get out by one of those narrow- 
 doors so common in old buildings, upon a sort 
 of stripe of ornamented balcony, which ran 
 along the building immediately under the lofty
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 235 
 
 windows of the banqueting room. Here he 
 Imd a perfect view through the uncurtained win- 
 dows of the interior of the hall, and the splendid 
 assembly within ; and here the indistinct shap- 
 ings of his fancy, of that which he had never 
 before witnessed, seemed more than realized by 
 the whole scene before him. Let not him who 
 has lived all his Hfe in the glare of splendid 
 dissipation attempt to conceive its first effect 
 upon an imaginative mind, hitherto buried in 
 bbscurity. Let not him who has been pamper- 
 ed all his life, think to conceive the zest and the 
 thankfulness with which the uncloyed heart 
 lifts up the eyes in secret gratitude over the first 
 feast. Neither let them try to imagine the 
 rapture with which our simple youth now gazed 
 on all he heard and saw. What ideas do the 
 lowly first conceive of the great, when seen un- 
 der circumstances such as Hector now saw this 
 company ! To the great themselves, pearls and 
 diamonds, beauty and magnificence, are but 
 subjects for criticism, or objects of envy or con-
 
 236 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 tempt : to Hector all these were now objects 
 of unmingled admiration. From the stiff and 
 misshapen figures which had been presented to 
 him in the morning, he could not have con- 
 ceived that high-born woman, dressed now in 
 fancy dresses of velvet and brocade, and na- 
 ture left much to herself, could have appeared 
 objects of such perfect fascination. When, as 
 with bared necks and arms, their eyes more 
 brilliant than the pearls they wore, some (and 
 particularly one whom he now could see dis- 
 tinctly) turned their elegant forms in the mazes 
 of the dance ; or, as handed ceremoniously by 
 their partners, they went and came towards the 
 window, at which he by stealth contemplated 
 all this, his heart throbbed in his bosom, with 
 that mingled feeling of delight and melancholy, 
 with which we witness pleasures and contem- 
 plate grandeur, which have been laboriously in- 
 vented for the enjoyment only of those with 
 whom we are permitted no fellowship. 
 
 But, however noble and lofty appeared the
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 237 
 
 antique hall in his view, with its picturesque 
 tapestry of many figures, and its massive carv- 
 ings of many devices ; and however splendid 
 the show of beauty and of dress floating 
 through the apartment, where silver and gold 
 were not wanting, Hector felt, that to stand 
 longer where he was, within the shadow of a 
 buttress, the clandestine spectator of all this, 
 was neither dignified nor becoming, however 
 humble he might rate himself, compared with 
 this lordly company. But she whose name he 
 yet knew not, the youngest and the loveliest of 
 all within, was now actively engaged in the 
 dance, and he could not tear his eyes from her. 
 But when, in the exercise of manly self-denial, 
 he attempted to do so, and turned away his 
 face towards where the evening landscape lay 
 quiet and dim beneath him, if he looked be- 
 tween the long shadows of the clumps, her 
 Terpsichore form seemed still, like a fairy, to 
 " trip along the green ;" or, if he looked up- 
 wards towards the serene vault of night, she
 
 238 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 seemed like a vision to float between his eyes 
 and the clear face of the moon. 
 
 " What have / to do with these fancies?'"' 
 he at length said impatiently, as he started out 
 of his hiding-place — " What is she to me, or 
 why should I attempt to think of any one of 
 her rank ? But, after all, this is no place for 
 me;" and stealing hastily along, a sense of the 
 necessity of concealment from the view of those 
 within, obliged him to make his way towards 
 the further end of the balcony. 
 
 Setting his back towards the rugged mould- 
 ing of some decayed gothic tracery, that orna- 
 mented the outer angle of that part of the 
 building, as he turned his face abstractedly 
 towards the surrounding landscape, that painful 
 mingling of ardour and regret, so common in 
 youth, began to steal over his exhausted spirits 
 with an unwelcome and humiliating melancholy. 
 " Would that I could leave this place!" said 
 he internally — if we may be permitted to trans- 
 late the reflections of a high-minded youth —
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 239 
 
 '' if I Stay longer, I shall be wretched. To be 
 the spectator of pleasures which one cannot 
 taste — to be tantalized by the sight of gran- 
 deur which mocks the honest pride of nature, 
 and turns our self-love into bitter and un- 
 natural humility — to contemplate a paradise 
 which to me is like the heaven which the man 
 in the parable only saw afar off, but which was 
 never to receive him within its portals — all this 
 is not good. I feel that it is already laying 
 within me the foundation of the basest pas- 
 sions — envy and discontent. There is the music 
 again ! how charming it sounds from within 
 these halls ! and seems to echo from these noble 
 groves. I shall leave this to-morrow, else every 
 manly purpose will be lost in the entrance- 
 ments of others' luxury !""* 
 
 The light glare of the moon in his eyes had 
 prevented him from noticing a small door un- 
 closed at the end of the terrace that separated 
 the buildings; and, to his surprise, the very 
 form of her whose beauty had so haunted him,
 
 240 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 stepped slowly forth in the shadow, and soon 
 stood on the light balcony quite near him. He 
 gazed upon her, breathless with astonishment 
 at the romance of the incident, and his own 
 good fortune. Her countenance seemed to ex- 
 press some powerful emotion. He still looked, 
 spell-bound. He saw her lean herself passively 
 against the wall, then covering her eyes with 
 her taper fingers, a sob rose in her bosom, that 
 seemed almost to choke her, until she got relief 
 by a passionate burst of tears. 
 
 " Good Heavens !" said Hector within him- 
 self, as the lady sobbed and wept by his side, 
 '• do tears mingle with pleasures like these, and 
 sorrow grow out of the house of feasting and 
 of grandeur .?" 
 
 Feeling all the indelicacy of his situation, as 
 he still stood concealed by the shadow, while 
 the young lady, recovering from her fit of 
 weeping, now began to contemplate with seem- 
 ing delight, the tranquil scene beneath her — he 
 at once determined to relieve himself from all
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 241 
 
 embarrassment, which might arise from his 
 being found where he was, by addressing her. 
 Stepping out, therefore, into the moonlight, 
 and pulling off his bonnet, he modestly begged 
 pardon for being unwittingly in a spot where 
 she might suppose herself quite alone, at a 
 moment when any thing like intrusion could not 
 but be peculiarly painful to her feelings. 
 
 A slight start of surprise, and a look of some 
 alarm, was the first effect of this speech upon 
 the young lady : she seemed to hesitate, but still 
 was silent. 
 
 " I am most unfortunate in having offended 
 you, madam," he again said ; " but, believe 
 me, the intrusion was by no means intentional." 
 " I know not whether I am the intruder 
 here, or you, sir," she at length said; *' but 
 assuredly I cannot presume to be offended with 
 you, and yet there seems something strange in 
 this ;" and she threw a glance around her, as 
 if momentarily perplexed by the unexpected in- 
 cident. 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 242 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 " Suffer me to explain, madam," said Hector, 
 drawing near her. "It was no mean motive, 
 such as I might be ashamed of, that brought 
 me up to this spot. A follower only of a 
 Highland gentleman, at present a visitor at this 
 castle, and not, of course, entitled to mix with 
 the company at the ball, can you blame a 
 humble denizen of the hills, if the sound of 
 music such as is never heard in these glens, 
 should have caused him to linger under the 
 walls of the banqueting rooms ; and the sight 
 of grandeur and festivity, to which he has 
 hitherto been a stranger, should have enticed 
 him to seek a distant glimpse even from these 
 windows, of gaieties which halls and saloons only 
 contain, and of pleasures to which it is not for 
 him to aspire.*' 
 
 " And was it to see the dancers, through the 
 windows only, that caused you to mount up to 
 this balcony .?" said the young lady with evident 
 interest. 
 * " Assuredly from none other motive, madam,"
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 243 
 
 replied Hector, " unless the moon, who debars 
 no eye, however humble, from looking up in 
 her sweet face, might have helped to solicit my 
 solitary sacrifice to her fame, to divide my ad- 
 miration with the beauty and grace within these 
 halls/' 
 
 " Then you had no invitation to the ban- 
 quet, young sir P" said the lady, casting a quick 
 glance over Hector'^s person. 
 
 " No, madam, it is not for the earthen pot 
 to come in the way of the brass pot, as I have 
 read in the fable. The one is apt to be in that 
 case the destruction of the other." 
 
 " And you have been making yourself me- 
 lancholy by the contemplation, through a win- 
 dow, of pleasures of which you are pleased to 
 think so highly ?" 
 
 " Assuredly, lady, it is so ; and whether dis- 
 tance and difficulty, as some say, make things 
 more desired, I know not, but, cold and some- 
 what sad as I have been, standing here with- 
 out, I have this night seen and heard that 
 
 m2
 
 244 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 which will never be effaced from my me- 
 mory." 
 
 The young lady smiled slightly, and replied 
 not, but lifting her eyelids slowly, she regarded 
 the youth with a look of interested curiosity. 
 
 " I see you are surprised, lady," he con- 
 tinued, encouraged to boldness by the soft ex- 
 pression of her face, "but it is not for you to 
 know, the inward thoughts of conscious infe- 
 riority of condition, when contemplating beau- 
 teous and noble forms, tripping in the dance, 
 within halls like these. You are pleased to 
 listen to my bursting confession. Can you 
 know aught of feelings such as mine — where 
 pride, instead of, perhaps, becoming humility, 
 gnaws at the heart, and where a susceptibility 
 for pleasures unknown on these bald hills, 
 makes even this music, that now rings in our 
 ears, dance in the ill-suppressed emotions, and 
 stir up the still disappointed fancy, which, 
 when it looks upon eyes such as yours, be- 
 comes almost mad with the strength of its own
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 245 
 
 fires ; and when the whole has fled from the 
 cognizance of the senses, turns the solitary 
 thoughts into gall and wormwood." 
 
 " I can conceive something, sir," she said, 
 momentarily catching the tone of his enthu- 
 siasm, " of the pains of a brave spirit, whose 
 desires for activity are suppressed by his cir- 
 cumstances, and whose purposes of ambition are 
 constantly hindered by his condition. But I 
 must not tarry here. Accept of my good 
 wishes, sir; and as for what you have said, 
 surely to the ardent and the brave fortune has 
 in store greater things, than, in a moment of 
 melancholy, such as you have now been in- 
 dulging, may occur to the fancy." 
 
 " A thousand blessings on you, lady, for 
 this condescension. But one word more. I 
 have stood on this terrace, watching your move- 
 ments within the hall, till my heart was ready 
 to burst with the intensity of my own reflec- 
 tions. Little did I then anticipate that this 
 night would give me the joy and relief of utter-
 
 246 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 ing some of those reflections in your own gentle 
 ears. We have met by chance. I know I am 
 your inferior, and yet you have listened to me 
 like heaven's angel of pity, come down to re- 
 ceive from my lips, confessions which I dare 
 hardly utter to myself." 
 
 ^ Good night, sir,'"* she said, smiling, yet 
 almost alarmed at his warmth ; " and yet," she 
 added, turning suddenly back, " I ought not, 
 perhaps, to go without saying something in 
 reply to reasonings so fully confessed, and 
 which, in truth, interest me because I hear 
 them with surprise. I fear, young sir, in con- 
 templating with such imaginative desire the 
 imposing scenes which that saloon may have 
 furnished, you have looked only on one side of 
 the picture. Can you not conceive, that, within 
 halls such as these, amidst apparent gaiety and 
 festivity, there may be some feelings suppressed 
 and others excited, which the wretched indivi- 
 dual is ashamed to own, and which change al- 
 most into hideousness the heart, which is the
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 247 
 
 subject of them, making a real torment in the 
 midst of banqueting and festivity ? While you 
 seem to envy that, of which you only know the 
 exterior, can you not suppose it possible that 
 there may be heart-burnings suffered within 
 halls such as these, so consuming and so in- 
 tolerable, that the subject of them would at 
 times gladly exchange situations with the me- 
 nial that stands behind his chair, and would 
 give all the artificial enjoyment of this banquet 
 for one bound of the free and light heart, 
 upon these wild yet noble hills that surround 
 us ?'' 
 
 " Lady," said he, catching the strain of her 
 feeling, '' did not I see you yourself this night 
 in tears, even on this spot ?" 
 
 " I confess it, if that may illustrate my 
 meaning. You, sir, have drawn one picture ; 
 let me draw another. Take one of the youngest 
 ladies in that hall ; let her heart be warm, and 
 her feelings ready to respond to every noble 
 sentiment ; but let the maxims of the world.
 
 248 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 adopted by a beloved parent, and a sense of 
 duty never to be set aside, place her in circum- 
 stances with relation to one in that apartment, 
 whom, the more she knows the more his pre- 
 sence repels every sentiment of her mind, and 
 every preference of her taste. Let him haunt 
 her with an eye of jealousy, and a selfishness 
 of passion, that knows neither delicacy nor 
 sentiment, until its tyranny grows into rude- 
 ness, and its grossness into an insult. May 
 there not, then, occurrences grow out of a case 
 like this, which well may cause tears to flow 
 in secret, and even be an enjoyment ; where 
 music rings in the ears without bringing plea- 
 sure, and grandeur floats before the eyes with- 
 out affecting the oonsciousness or removing 
 bitterness from the heart .? Now I have drawn 
 you another picture from your own. Think of 
 it, sir, and let it help you to greater content- 
 ment with your condition : and so good 
 night." 
 
 " Madam,'' said he, highly interested by her
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 249 
 
 speech, " I am unable to give expression to 
 what you make me feel at this moment ; could 
 I believe that *" 
 
 " I have already said, perhaps, too much, 
 sir," she continued, interrupting him ; " I will 
 say good night, for I must not remain here." 
 
 " Good night a thousand times ;" and be- 
 coming bolder, he took the hand that she waved, 
 and pressed it to his lips. 
 
 " Now, sir, pray, not a step farther," she 
 added, holding up ber arm authoritatively, and 
 gliding backwards down the shaded terrace, 
 and mounting the steps which led to the door, 
 in a moment after she had vanished from his 
 sight. 
 
 He just saw the little door opened stealthily 
 in the distance, and closed behind the fair 
 vision. He looked around, and saw the terrace 
 a dark blank of emptiness as before, and the 
 moon above shining calm and cold on the sha- 
 dowy landscape beneath him. He could scarce 
 believe that he had been awake, when, with a 
 
 :m 5
 
 250 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 tumult of strange emotion, he again threw bacjc 
 his thoughts on the scene that had come so 
 unexpectedly before his senses, and had now 
 vanished like a dream.
 
 251 
 
 CHAPTER XVT. 
 
 Nothing remains, but that I kindle the boy thither, 
 which now I'll go about. 
 
 Shakspeake. 
 
 From the excitement of the foregoing scene, 
 together with his long fast. Hector, on de- 
 scending from the balcony, found a feeling of 
 exhaustion come over his spirits that obliged 
 him to enter the mansion, with the view of ob- 
 taining a morsel of food. The bustle of the 
 early part of the evening was now subsided; 
 the elder part of the guests at the castle were 
 leisurely taking in vinous intoxication above, 
 while the younger were still enjoying the dance,
 
 252 
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 and the servants having by this time also 
 " taken in their malt," in no stinted measure, 
 were lounging about the passages looking for 
 adventures, or dancing Scotch reels among 
 themselves in the lower apartments. 
 
 Of these, Mr. Andrew Trotter, the chief 
 butler and key-carrier at Balloch castle, an 
 elderly Lowland- spoken man, with a square- 
 cut head, tastefully whitened with powder, was 
 of course the greatest man in the establish- 
 ment, and far more to be honoured than the 
 earl himself. Besides, the old man being shrewd 
 and confidential, was allowed to be in waiting 
 among the company above, when all the ordi- 
 nary " clanjamfrey of flunkeys,"' as he called 
 them, were driven out of the room ; so that he 
 had frequent opportunity of hearing all the 
 conversation, and many of the family matters 
 of the ancient house of Breadalbane ; and being 
 a man who kept his ears always ready cocked, 
 and never opened his mouth but when it pleased 
 himself, he was held in great respect and con-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 253 
 
 fidentiality both above stairs and below; be- 
 sides being a walking repository of the family 
 concerns, of which he contrived always to ap- 
 pear to know a great deal more than he really 
 did. 
 
 All these advantages over the higher and 
 lower powers of the establishment, might by the 
 cruelty of fortune, have been turned some day 
 against Mr. Trotter, and he be hurled from his 
 high estate, but for one qualification he had, 
 .which might be recommended to the imitation 
 of still greater men. This was merely, the see- 
 ing and appreciating a proper distinction be- 
 tween what was done or said by " the quality,'' 
 and by other people. Having been in the 
 habit of waiting on '* gentlemen " at all times 
 and seasons, and in particular of putting him- 
 self in their way when their tongues were loos- 
 ened by drink, and they talked things which 
 ladies ought not to hear; and which, as he 
 said himself, there was no necessity for tell- 
 ing to the minister, he had formed a code of
 
 254 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 morality of his own, which exactly suited " the 
 gentry,'' and is to be found more or less pure in 
 all the liveried fraternity even unto this day. 
 Considering it not to be controverted, that " the 
 quality " were a distinct species of the human 
 race, who were made to be served and wor- 
 shipped by all those whom they condescended 
 to rule over, Mr. Trotter believed, on his soul, 
 that a nobleman's vices were more to be honour- 
 ed and attended to, than another man's virtues ; 
 so that the old man was, as usual, more valued 
 for his doctrine than his practice ; for the 
 former being known to be sound, a few slips in 
 the latter were not to be spoken of, and were 
 even all the better for the love that was borne 
 him for his doctrine's sake. 
 
 It was not to be expected, that so great and 
 so "wise a personage should take any notice of 
 such as Hector, coming as he did without any 
 particular marks of gentry upon him, except 
 perhaps his looks and his bearing, and what 
 might have been indicated by his conversation.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 255 
 
 all of which are of course nothing at all, as the 
 world goes. Mere negligence on the part of 
 M'Evan having consigned our hero to the un- 
 certain chances of a great house ; to be neg- 
 lected by his superiors was a sufficient reason 
 why he should be sent to the wall by those 
 whose business it was to imitate, in a small way, 
 all that they did. But circumstances had oc- 
 curred in Hector's absence this day, which 
 began to change all this. 
 
 • " Hoo do ye do, sir ?" said Mr. Trotter, 
 nodding condescendingly as he met Hector in 
 an aristocratic part of the passage. 
 
 " How do you do ?" responded H^tor, 
 cuckooing a species of address not then very 
 common in the north. 
 
 '* I Ve been looking for you, sir, this whole 
 evening," said the major-domo, with a respect 
 which naturally astonished our youth. " You 
 were not here about the dinner-bell, I trow."" 
 
 " No, Mr. Trotter, will you please to order 
 me some refreshment now ?''
 
 256 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 " That I will, sir, with the greatest of plea- 
 sure. Just step in here, and I will see about 
 the eatables mysel, and serve the drinkables wi' 
 my ain hand." 
 
 " What can all this flattery mean ?*" said 
 Hector mentally, when the old man was gone. 
 " If it bodes no good ultimately, it promises at 
 least a good supper in the mean time, and that 
 is something." 
 
 " A couple of servants, (the same who had 
 on the former day helped to insult him in the 
 common hall,) soon entered, their faces " in a 
 bleeze""' of drunken good-humour, and bowing 
 polif^ly, absolutely, surrounded our hero with 
 dishes, most of which had come untouched from 
 the great banquet above. Anon entered Mr. 
 Trotter himself, followed by his servant, bear- 
 ing a tray, which jingled with glasses and 
 bottles of red brandy and white Hollands, be- 
 sides a silver tankard with a springing deer on 
 the lid, which bore between its horns the agree- 
 able label of claret
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 257 
 
 " Am I the same person I was yesterday ?'"* 
 said Hector internally, as he surveyed all this, 
 " or is this but a trick such as the proud lord in 
 the English playbook is said to have put upon 
 Christopher Sly, only to make me feel after 
 insult more deeply ?" 
 
 " Noo, if there isn't enough here to stay your 
 stomach, young maister, say my name is not 
 Andrew Trotter," said the functionary, arrang- 
 ing the dishes before him in a scientific manner. 
 " Lordsake, man ! when I see you at the light, 
 ye look as pale anoth the gills, as ye hadna 
 tasted green nor grey since the morning."" 
 
 " Neither have I," said Hector simply, taking 
 up the implements of assistance to the mouth. 
 
 " Ea ! God keep us frae cleanness o' teeth, as 
 the minister said to the mealman. What fore do 
 you no fa' to, then, and here's a drap o' kill- 
 deevil when ye're done. It maun be pleasant 
 wark on the hills, that could keep you out 
 starving all day, and the quality aboon speering 
 after you."
 
 258 THE BLACK WATCPI. 
 
 " Asking for me ?" said Hector, hastily swal- 
 lowing his mouthful. 
 
 " Yes, speering for you up and down, and 
 the laird of Glenmore, your friend, blasting 
 and blawing about you to the earl himsel. But 
 stop your mouth wi"* your meat, young gentle- 
 man, for deevil a word mair will I tell you till 
 ye hae eaten twa meals in ane, and your supper 
 on the top o'*t, forbye a tass o' this cogniac to 
 put smeddum in you. But I'll drink your 
 health in the meantime ; using that freedom 
 with you, in respect that though your fortune 
 may be gude and your sun on the rise, ye're no 
 just come to your estate yet. Here's your 
 health, Mr. Monro. Ye see I only take half a 
 glass at a time, for I'm aye getting bits o' drib- 
 bles an' drabbles, up stairs and down stairs ; 
 but thae blackguards o' the ha"*, that I maun 
 keep in order, they're a' bleezing drunk already. ' 
 
 " Then it is no trick after all, but plain 
 enough,'* thought Hector, yet not taking time 
 to speak. The conversation, however, suffered
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 259 
 
 no lack from his own forbearance ; for he being 
 just then supposed to be in the condition to be 
 patronized by such as Mr. Andrew Trotter, the 
 gracious functionary was pleased to extend to 
 him his benevolence, besides making him sen- 
 sible how great a man he himself was with the 
 ancient family of Breadalbane. 
 
 " Noo just use your freedom, and say the 
 grace when ye're done, Mr. Monro. What 
 need ye be picking like a maiden at thae poor 
 pigeons, whilk are as dry and fushionless as a 
 skin. Plunge your fork into the paste o' this 
 pie. There's something anoth it, that'll gust 
 your gab. Come, I'll take this lang-legged 
 chuckie out o' your way. She's hardly worth 
 the trouble o' your 'natamizing, just eenow ; 
 for as the border baillie used to say, a hen's a 
 hungry feast, but a pudding's a rare degiest, 
 I canna mind the rest o't ; but just lay your 
 lugs in that pie ; ye'll maybe find need o't again 
 the morn." 
 
 " How," said Hector, " what of to-mor- 
 row?"
 
 260 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 " Just be putting into you, and I ll tell you 
 when ye 're done," said the resolute major- 
 domo ; " and dinna be in the least hurry ; so, 
 wi' your leave, I'll take a seat to rest my 
 shanks, and wait wi' patience till ye take your 
 bit and your drap, as the minister says to the 
 kirk folk, on hally Sunday." 
 
 The curiosity of Hector to know what was 
 coming, and the real cause of this extraordinary 
 kindness, certainly induced him to use all pos- 
 sible dispatch ; and soon laying down his knife 
 and fork, he asked for a draught of ale to wash 
 down the eatables, and to show that he had 
 finished his meal. 
 
 " The deevil ae drap o' broust ye''ll get out 
 o' my hand the night, Mr. Monro," said the 
 man of keys, in rather a peremptory key. 
 " There would be sma' sagacity in my betting 
 a wager on the head o"* gentle or simple, that 
 would call for yill, when there's brandy and 
 Geneva before him, forbye red claret in the 
 njagnum, as clear as a lawmore bead."
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 261 
 
 " Betting on my head, Mr. Trotter. Is that 
 what you say.^'' 
 
 '' To be sure. What's the use of fighting or 
 fencing, if there's no a bit canny bet on the 
 head o' the favourite o"* the day, ^nd so ye think 
 I canna birl a guinea at a wager — aye, or ten 
 either, as weel's ony laird in the ha"? But, 
 faith, as I said before, I'll ne'er risk my siller 
 on ony man that would bag himsel wi' sour 
 swats, as lang as he could lie his lips after red 
 claret. That's my creed." 
 
 " Fill up, then, good Mr. Trotter," said Hec- 
 tor, thrusting forward one of the long grenadier 
 glasses then in use, "I will do any thing in rea« 
 son, so that you will tell me the meaning of all 
 this exordium." 
 
 " Weel, sir, as I was waiting upon the qua- 
 lity aboon, they had their cracks about the news 
 o' the time, and about king George up at 
 Lunon ; and how that, though his majesty is 
 a passionate body, and when he's in an anger
 
 262 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 flytes like a kailwife, and kicks his hat and 
 wig about the floor o' the auld palace at Saint 
 James'*s; and then he'll swear, they say, like a 
 German porter ; yet in family affairs, at least, 
 he''s an exemplary man, and lives costily and 
 cannily wi' his ain wife, and as for ony bye 
 blows — that is, concerning certain court ladies 
 that are said to be his mistresses — why the 
 gray mare, after all, is weel kenn'd to be the 
 better " 
 
 " Dear me, Mr. Trotter, how does this gossip 
 about his majesty relate to me?" interrupted 
 Hector. " I hope you will remember the point 
 in hand — '"* 
 
 " Noo, young gentleman," said the chief of 
 the butlers, with all the energy of drink, added 
 to the habit of inferior rule, " I warn you to 
 beware how you break my thread. I'm just 
 like a loch-leach, if you let me stick, I'll stick; 
 but if you take me aff*, the deevil a bit ye'U get 
 me on again."
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 263 
 
 " Well, Mr. Trotter, just go on in your own 
 way.'^ 
 
 " Noo, that I call sense. Weel, about king 
 George and his mistresses, and his father's mis- 
 tresses, and a' their mistresses, and various 
 matters o' court scandal, which it's the part u 
 the quality to know and understand ; they 
 cracked above-stair the most pleasant and con- 
 descending jokes, which it's time enough for 
 you to hear, young gentleman, when your beard 
 graws langer than your teeth, and does not be- 
 come me to rehearse. But at length the talk 
 came a little hand-awa-hame, and it was allowed 
 that his majesty and the Lunon folk, whatever 
 were the blessings enjoyed under the protestant 
 succession, did not pay that attention to Scot- 
 land, that her importance in the realm deserved. 
 Weel, from that the conversation diverged to 
 the contankerous and canstrary state of the 
 Highlands, and how that the laws could not be 
 executed, and malefactorers could not be ex- 
 ecuted in decency and quietness, and how that a
 
 264 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 Strange fallow they ca'ed M'Naughton that was 
 ta'en up for cattle-lifting and hamesucken, had 
 been fished out of Perth Tolbooth nobody 
 could tell how, and was now living in some 
 glen in Breadalbane, and setting the puissant 
 law, and the whole lords o"* justiciary, and the 
 lords o** session, and the Lord Breadalbane, iny 
 master himsel, and every other lord at black 
 defiance ; and so, never looking o'er his shouther 
 at one of them, the auld reiver lived there as if 
 he had never heard o' the hangman. Then 
 came talk about the Black Watch, and how 
 they were sure to take care o** the hills, and how 
 there was naething but gentlemen to be the 
 common men, and how that twa gentlemen lads 
 of the name of M'Pherson, whilk were the 
 brag of a' Breadalbane, had joined them. And 
 how that they were such clever fellows at hand- 
 ling the broadsword — and so came a conver- 
 sation about the cleverness of the Highland 
 lads, and ilka ane behoved to brag about 
 wha was the best swordsman that he knew ; and
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 265 
 
 at length and lang, the laird of Glenmore, 
 being a wee thought dizzy wi' the drink sup, 
 nae doubt, swears in the face of my earl, that 
 he'll produce a youth hardly nineteen, that'll 
 beat at that weapon any grown man within the 
 laird's ha'. Then up gets the earl wi' a thump 
 o' his faulded neeve on the table ; and he swears 
 an oath, as a nobleman ought, that he'll pit 
 young Saundy Crombie, that's the Honourable 
 Mr. Crombie, as he's called, the son of Lord 
 , Libberton, against ony swordsman that can be 
 produced by ony gentleman at the table. And 
 so the braggadocia went round, and you were 
 praised by the laird of Glenmore to no allow- 
 ance, and asked for all over the castle, and the 
 Honourable Saundy Crombie, as we call him, 
 cominff in at the time — for he had o-otten the 
 begunck frae some lady at the dance — he took 
 up the talk, and swore and blasted that he 
 would fight ony man at the broadsword frae 
 Kilsyth to Killdrummy ; and then it was made 
 up, that you and he were to fight a sham fight 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 266 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 to the drawing of blood, or the showing of 
 swordsmanship, to-morrow, at two hours after 
 noon ; and the laird has been seeking you all 
 over the castle to tell you the matter. What 
 do you look sae dour for noo, Maister Monro ?'' 
 
 " This is a strange tale, Mr. Trotter." 
 
 " It's a very good tale, sir, and very much to 
 your credit," said the functionary with a confi- 
 dent consciousness of drunken good sense, "and 
 ye need not fauld your arms across your brisket 
 like an Angusshire piper. I ken what I'm 
 saying." 
 
 " I do not doubt your word, Mr. Trotter ; 
 but I think they might have consulted me be- 
 fore they appointed me to a show of this kind. 
 I do not choose to be made an exhibition of for 
 the pleasure of any set of men over their cups." 
 
 " Then if that is the way you talk of the 
 equality, Mr. JMonro," said the major-domo, 
 starting to his feet, " I have no hopes of you. 
 I tell you what, sir, I've lived nearly threescore 
 years in the world, and never knew a man pros-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 267 
 
 per who crossed the will o* the quality o' the 
 land, or spoke against the kirk or the minister." 
 
 " I am bound to pay respect to your experi- 
 ence, Mr. Trotter, but I cannot help my feel- 
 ings, on being thus made the subject of under- 
 takings in which my own consent has never been 
 asked." 
 
 '^ Then ye'll no fight, Mr. Monro, is that 
 it?" 
 
 " I did not say that ; but I think there might 
 have been that respect paid to me before the 
 paction was made as to^ " 
 
 " Hoogh ! if it's naething but a bit flaught o' 
 Highland pride," said the shrewd servitor, re- 
 suming his seat, " it'll blaw bye, and ye'll win 
 honour and renown yet, afore the ladies, and 
 I'll win my ten gold guineas." 
 
 " Before the ladies, Mr. Trotter ? is that also 
 in the bond ?" 
 
 " For certain it is. Do ye think there 
 could be a flourishing o' swurds, and a showing 
 aff o' bodily cleverness by young men on the 
 
 n2
 
 268 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 greensward without the ladies being to see it ? 
 And there's ane o' them, a bit young thing o 
 the quality, the sweetest creature — ooh man ! — 
 her vera een, when she looks at you anoth the 
 bonny hassock o' hair that twirls round her 
 brow, would turn an auld man'*s heart young 
 again. But yeVe seen her, and she has seen 
 you too, lad. I hae an ee in my neck." 
 
 " What can you mean ? who has seen me ? 
 You surprise me more and more, Mr. Trotter." 
 
 " Ooh to be sure, yell be surprised, as if ye 
 didna ken what I was speaking about. But 
 Vm an auld sneck-drawer, and hae lang lugs ; 
 and so ye see, when I was up stairs yesterday, 
 poutering at a bit stain on the tapestry on the 
 wrang side, wha should come whisking through 
 but Madam Teenie, as she's called, and Miss 
 Helen Ruthven ; and the young thing joked 
 madame about how a Highland youth had helped 
 her down some hill in the park, high-heeled shoon 
 and a', — meaning you, Mr. Monro,— as featly 
 as if ye had been a lord ; and the lady cackled
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 269 
 
 like a clocking hen at the thoughts of your flat- 
 tering Highland gallantry, and praised you up, 
 nae doubt ; but the young ane was a wee 
 thought jealous, I could see that. And then, 
 after that, Jenny, the bit primped-up lassie 
 that dresses the ladies in the morning, she be- 
 hoved to cast herself in my way this forenoon, 
 after the quality had gaen out to the promenade, 
 and she began speering sly questions at me, and 
 came round about, and round about, until she 
 .began to inquire about you, and what was your 
 name, and where ye came from, and every thing. 
 I kend it was just to tell her lady, and I said 
 so to her, and the young baggage turned red 
 in the face. O thae women ! thae women ! I 
 hae been lang used to their tricks." 
 
 Hector could not help smiling, but almost 
 turned " red in the face" himself, on hearing of 
 this flattering interest taken concerning him ' 
 although, as he considered a little, his brow 
 again darkened down at the idea of all this his 
 present freedom and confidence, even with the
 
 270 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 chief butler in the house of Pharaoh. But the 
 occasion was too tempting for the gratification 
 .of his curiosity by means of the talkative old 
 man, and he determined to go on. 
 
 " Then / will not go round about and round 
 about, as you say," said Hector; "but straight 
 forward ask you to oblige me by telling me all 
 you can of this young lady. I confess I have 
 noticed her; and if she has gained your ad- 
 miration so highly, it is nought remarkable 
 that she should have also gained mine." 
 
 " Odd, it's little that I can tell you,'' said the 
 man, " but that she is an only daughter, and, 
 I believe connected with gentry of high quality ; 
 and ye may admire her as ye like, but it maun 
 be at a distance, much as I do mysel ; for it is 
 roundly said, that she is trysted by her father 
 to marry the very gentle that has undertaken 
 to fight you wi' the broadsword the morn. How 
 his honour, young Crombie, has learned to be 
 sic a champion, I know not ; for though he has 
 great lands in the Highlands, by riglit of his
 
 THE BLACK WATCTT. 271 
 
 mother, who was a Campbell, his life has been 
 mostly spent in the Lowlands, where he was 
 born, and where, no doubt, the breadth and 
 width of his father's estates, besides the title, 
 he being the eldest son, is the chief foundation 
 to the lady's father to encoul-age this match ; 
 for well I wot, Crombie himself is no great 
 bargain to tempt a bonnie young lassie, either 
 for his outward man or his inner. But that's 
 nae ferlie, for ye ken the quality marry aye for 
 siller and titles, whilk is perfectly right, just to 
 keep the breed up, as the horse coupers say? 
 and the estates thegither. But I forgot to tell 
 you, that the bonnie creature hersel is not the 
 least taen wi' this braggadocia lordling ; for 
 he's rough and uncouth for a' his quality, be- 
 sides having big knoity knees o' his ain, and 
 calves to his legs like an Edinburgh caudy : 
 and the night at the ball, he would dance wi' 
 her, right or wrang, and did dance wi' her, 
 by her ain good-nature ; but the fool overshot 
 the mark, in his roughness, as I hear tell — and
 
 272 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 so she gied him the begunck, as I said before, 
 and slipped afF frae the ball no one could tell 
 whither ; and that was the time his honour 
 came bleezing into the sober company that were 
 drinking wi** the earl, and me waiting by. And 
 so he came swaggering in, as I said, wi' a brow 
 as black as night; and, being affronted wi' the 
 ladies, he began to brag and blast about his 
 swordsmanship ; and the earl behoved to take 
 his part against Glcnmore and you, in respect 
 he was of quality ; and so ye maun draw blood 
 o' him the morn, or faith, my brave youth, 
 though ye were e'er so gentle, your time's up 
 here in auld Balloch."' 
 
 "I fear nought, as the motto has it," said 
 Hector ; '' and I thank you, Mr. Trotter, for 
 the information you have given me. So, as it 
 is time that I should retire, I had better move 
 to my own quarters.^' 
 
 " Would ye really," said the major-domo in 
 alarm, — " would ye really rise, and sae mickle 
 gude drink before you, when ye know what ye
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 273 
 
 hae to do the morn ? If ye dinna drink to put 
 strength in you, after fasting all day, where do 
 you think ye'll be when ye come before the 
 ladies ; and what'll I do for my ten guineas ? 
 Odd, if ye just drink another caupful like that, 
 I'll wager five red guineas more on your head — 
 for it would gravel me to the bottom o' my 
 stomach, to see that knoity-kneed Crombie win 
 the day, although he be of quality. And ye 
 needna be a bit disdainfu' to take your glass 
 beside me, for the auld earl himsel often speaks 
 to me like a perfect brither, and whyles he and 
 I crack our crack thegither, like pen guns. But 
 faith here's something to do without, and I 
 maun rin. Deevil's in thae blackguards o' 
 mine ! the bells may ring till the tongues fa' 
 out o' them, afore they answer ane o' them. 
 After this time o' night the scoundrels o' the 
 ha' nae mair mind the quality tlian I would as 
 mony Kilsyth kailwives." 
 
 With this the old man, making a professional 
 congte, and putting liis face into the true form 
 
 n5
 
 274 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 of a good barking jowler, set ofF, with a true 
 waiter trot, up the long passage. 
 
 Thus left to himself. Hector had the desired 
 opportunity, which he soon availed himself of, 
 of slipping off, to meditate on the events of the 
 day, and the probabilities of the morrow, v/ithin 
 the solitude of his own apartment.
 
 275 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Now in the valley he stands ; thro 's youthful face 
 Wrath checks the beauty, and sheds manly grace. 
 Both in his looks so join'd, that they might move 
 Fear even in friends, and from an enemy love. 
 
 Cowley. 
 
 Celia. I would I were invisible, to catch the strong 
 fellow by the leg. 
 
 Rosalind. O excellent young man ! 
 
 Celia. If I had a thunderbolt in mine eye, I can 
 tell who should down. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 When great events — for events are great only 
 by our conception of them — when great events 
 have just past, or are just at hand — and by 
 both of these was Hector now encompassed — 
 how can men be expected to sleep ? Accord- 
 ingly, our youth lay tossing and tumbling in 
 the little ill-furnished cell, which in those days
 
 276 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 served for a dormitory in such old-fashioned 
 buildings as Balloch castle, for a long time, but 
 sleep he could get none. 
 
 The moonbeam that at first shone clear in at 
 the loop-hole window of his little hole in the 
 tower, gradually became fainter, and moved 
 farther round the wall of the apartment; and 
 at last its light seemed suddenly to go out, like 
 the departure of the frail spirit of man, — as if 
 the good queen of night, weary with watching, 
 had at once taken the resolution of retiring 
 hastily to her rest. 
 
 He watched, as he still lay sleepless — the 
 sound of music in the hall, and then the distant 
 boom of merriment farther off, die away on the 
 listening ear ; and all below subside into that 
 sentimental sort of silence, which we experience 
 when lying awake in a great country mansion : 
 — in such circumstances, the scenery with which 
 we are conscious of being surrounded, seems to 
 mix with the idea of silence itself; and that im- 
 pressive voice of nature never appears broken, 
 or divested of its solemnitv, even bv the occa-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 277 
 
 sional moan of the midnight air, that, like the 
 mysterious spirit of darkness, seems to sigh 
 away among the distant hills, and at the same 
 instant to breathe an undefined whisper at the 
 very window of the imaginative watcher. 
 
 What the thoughts were that kept Hector 
 awake, the events themselves will fully explain, 
 at least as such events would be viewed in the 
 fanciful days of youth, when every thing that 
 happens appears of importance, to an ardent 
 and ambitious mind. If the scene, however, on 
 the balcony, to him so romantic and unexpect- 
 ed, was tlie subject of the most minute and de- 
 licious meditation, the events of the morrow 
 were looked forward to, and imagined in all 
 their bearings and with all their chances, with 
 a natural and feverish anxiety. Not that he 
 feared for himself, or wanted courage to face 
 any event ; but when he reflected upon the 
 many things, that, after all, may turn the fortune 
 of a trial like this, in spite of the best skill and 
 effort, and contemplated the bare possibility of 
 a failure before so many witnesses, and in the
 
 278 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 presence of one for whose admiration lie would 
 wage war with the world, the nervous feeling, 
 engendered by a clear perception of conse- 
 quences, sometimes struck home to his heart, 
 with that same sort of impatient solicitude 
 that so often disturbs the tranquillity of the 
 busy years of manhood. 
 
 From that know-nothing state, however, 
 into which he ultimately fell, and which has so 
 often been compared to the condition of the 
 dead, he was, late in the morning, gradually 
 aroused by several hearty shakes by the shoul- 
 der, and, looking up, perceived the tall portly 
 figure of M'Evan himself. 
 
 " Up, my good youth — up, and to battle, as 
 the song has it,"" said the chief. '' By my faith, 
 thou sleepest soundly on a morning like this. 
 Yet I like this refreshing tranquillity of nature, 
 when there is so much before thee : it bespeaks 
 confidence, and bodes good for the issue of the 
 day; for Mr. Trotter, I understand, has told 
 you of what passed regarding you last night, 
 and what depends upon your skill and courage
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 279 
 
 this blessed day. Lord, Hector, if you gain the 
 victory, 'twill be the first and most difficult 
 step gained up the ladder of fortune. If you 
 lose the day, 'twill be a sad affront to me, that 
 at least I may tell you.""* 
 
 " I am ready and confident, sir," said Hec- 
 tor, starting up, and yet speaking solemnly. 
 " And I have not been without thought of what 
 I have to lose, should fortune turn against me 
 on this trial. So, although I have not the ad- 
 vantage of years and tough sinews, yet in the 
 words of Finlarig, the son of Phadric in our 
 Gaelic song, sharp v/ill be his bright blade, and 
 steady his eye, who shall win the victory from 
 me this day." 
 
 " Now that, my brave fellow, is both cou- 
 rageous and poetic, and just like yourself," said 
 the admiring chief, extending to Hector his 
 ample hand ; "so now dress yourself with care, 
 and leave not your best looks behind you ; for if 
 I mistake not, there will be more eyes upon you 
 to-day than those of the rough carls of the Brea- 
 dalbane hills."
 
 280 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 When our youth had made his toilet, with 
 an instinctive persuasion of the importance of 
 personal appearance on a day like this, he de- 
 scended with more confidence than usual to 
 breakfast, which he expected would be pro- 
 vided for him in circumstances at which his 
 pride should, not as formerly, revolt. He found, 
 however, the mansion and its inmates in a tole- 
 rable pickle of Highland confusion, from the 
 effects of the dissipation of the preceding night. 
 Of the men, it was only the hard-headed High- 
 landers, or the more seasoned drinkers, that 
 were yet out of bed. The ladies were still, " to 
 a man," in the downy arms of Morpheus. All 
 the doors stood wide open as Hector past, ami 
 the ill-aroused servants, who were attaches of the 
 place, unaccustomed to late hours and certain 
 kindsof drink,went aboutyawning andscratching 
 their towsy heads, in a manner that, as the major- 
 domo said, was nae doubt national and natural 
 enough for a wheen lurdans that couldna keep 
 their hands frae their heads the night afore, but 
 was a rank disrespect to the quality.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 281 
 
 To add to the confusion that seemed to reign 
 in the lower regions of the old mansion, there 
 had already arrived a whole legion of inferior 
 retainers, or under-tenants of the earl, as well 
 as numerous thirty-third cousins of every ser- 
 vant there employed ; who, hearing of the 
 grand " feast" of the previous night, came to 
 make interest with their several relations then 
 in power at the castle, for the various fragments 
 and " lickings of plates," which were likely 
 'to be given away on so benign an occasion. Be- 
 sides this locust visitation of servants — servants 
 of all sorts, who on various pretences had come 
 at least to drink drams with their " gude 
 friends" in place, and success to the noble 
 house of Breadalbane, there soon was added 
 to them the whole tail of the laird, Hec- 
 tor's friend, now provided for at the neigh- 
 bouring village of Ken more, for want of room 
 at the castle ; who, hearing of the trial of skill 
 that day to take place, had already swarmed 
 down from their quarters on so good an excuse,
 
 282 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 to help off with the fragments of the feast, and 
 increase the multitude. 
 
 Above all, this "disrespectful" din of dogs 
 and men, which already had taken place about 
 the rearward precincts of the old building, the 
 loud barking of Mr. Trotter's voice, as adju- 
 tant-general of the establishment, was distinctly 
 heard, boasting away the most irreverent and 
 tatterdemalion claimants, in language strictly 
 appropriate to the occasion ; for he being a man 
 who hated confusion, out of respect to the qua- 
 lity, contrived to increase it himself in an emi- 
 nent degree, by the means he took in his puis- 
 sant officiousness to restore order, and to quell 
 this unnatural rebellion of the kitchen popula- 
 tion. " Deevil blast you V said he to some of 
 the discharged claimants — for he was apt to 
 speak unguardedly ; " if I wouldna rather satisfy 
 a leash o' hungry hounds, than I would stand 
 here to redde the quarrels of a set o' ill-bred ra- 
 biautors. My life is iiot worth the living, if 
 I'm to be pestered this way within and without.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 283 
 
 And here is a perfect crowd come round us this 
 morning, as if the dear-meal times were come 
 again, and this body's friend, and the tither 
 body's oe, laying the auld castle o"" Balloch 
 under a perfect siege ; while our ain quality are 
 standing within, kicking their heels to keep them 
 warm, and whistling a norland tune for lack o' 
 their breakfast." 
 
 It was quite true what the old man said ; for 
 on passing through, our hero found Glenmore 
 liimself and another Highland laird wearying 
 their morning away in an empty room, and 
 whistling aloud to keep their courage up, while 
 they could get no satisfaction out of a fitful 
 Babel of Highland gabble, which they heard 
 occasionally from the various outposts of the 
 inner citadel of the larder. There beinsr 
 nothing in this, however, particularly new to 
 them at their several homes, the gentlemen 
 took the matter exceedingly patiently, and Hec- 
 tor was welcomed by Glenmore with liis usual 
 kindness; and being formally introduced to
 
 28i THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 the laird of AVhinhills, and received by that 
 dignitary with much Highland state, all be- 
 gan now to think of " their morning"*' with 
 some anxiety. At length they heard in the pas- 
 sage a welcome rattling of dishes, and shortly 
 after the short pattering trot of Mr. Trotter 
 seemed to pass the door of their apartment. 
 
 " Whaur are ye jingling to ?" they heard him 
 say to the man without, " wandering about 
 there, as confused in the head as a dizzy guse- 
 Didna I tell you to take in the cauld haggis, 
 forebye the pasty and the aqua-vitae, to the gen- 
 tlemen in the yellow room, and keep the wheat- 
 bread and the moor-hens to the ladies. — But 
 come this way, ye fule ! since ye are on the road. 
 Your servant, gentlemen,**' he said, following his 
 inferior Gibeonite into the room. " Here's a 
 mouthfu' o' breakfast at last- I maun make free 
 to apologeese for the way I have kept you fast- 
 ing here ; but, to attend to the quality, as they 
 ought to be attended, is not in the power o' na- 
 ture, especially after such a night as last."
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 285 
 
 " I am sure you have a heavy charge, Mr. 
 Trotter," said M'Evan, with a wink to his 
 black-visaged friend, as he began " their morn- 
 ing" by filling up good bumpers of the aqua- 
 vitse ; " I really wonder how you can carry the 
 whole weight of this establishment on your 
 shoulders." 
 
 " Charge, laird, indeed ! if s a charge, as 
 ye say, that would put any other man but my- 
 vsel perfectly demented. There's now, since last 
 -night, some wi' meat and some wi"* drink, and 
 some wi' natural-born stupidity, there's no one 
 frae the scullion to the valet, who is worth kick- 
 ing out of one's road ; and so, as ye say, the 
 whole weight of Balloch castle is on my puir 
 shoulders. Nae wonder I'm brusten, keeping 
 the blackguards in order." 
 
 Before our small company had quite finished 
 their breakfast, and their conversation, however, 
 the honest major-domo seemed in better humour, 
 and entered again with a whole budget of news 
 about what the earl above had just commu-
 
 286 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 nicated to him concerning the arrangements 
 which he meant should take place for the con- 
 venient accommodation of the noble and honour- 
 able spectators of this interesting trial of skill. 
 particularly in one so young as Hector was de- 
 scribed to be. 
 
 These arrangements will appear in the sequel, 
 but in the mean time the gates of Balloch policies 
 being thrown open, crowds began to arrive to 
 witness a scene in which Highlanders, high and 
 low, take such an interest ; and Hector was ad- 
 vised not to make his appearance publicly with- 
 out, until the hour should arrive when the as- 
 sembled company should be waiting for him. 
 
 During the few hours that elapsed before the 
 minute appointed, or rather indeed from the 
 previous night when Mr. Trotter gave it wind, 
 the news had reached into the great valley of 
 Glenlyon, had run along the northern side of 
 Loch Tay, as far even as Finlarig castle, and 
 up among the houses that studded the strath 
 beneath Drummond hill, as far as Castle Men-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 287 
 
 zies' Hermitage, and the old town of Aberfeldy, 
 so every body would go to see so braw a show. 
 " By the memory of Fingal and the shade of 
 Cathulin, the auld spirit o' the hills has not yet 
 departed from us, although they have taken 
 the swords from us that our fathers wore," said 
 the poetic Highlanders of Strath Tay, as they 
 hid each a dirk under the drapery of their 
 plaids, and set off to see this unexpected dis- 
 play. 
 
 . " It's a braw day and a hopeful time, after 
 all," said others, " when the Earl o' Breadalbane 
 himsel patronizes the play o' the broadsword — 
 by which we have won so many battles, and 
 our forbears so much renown — by a fair trial 
 of skill and manhood beneath the venerable 
 walls o' the auld castle o' Bealach, whare the 
 great knight o"" Lochaw once held his court. 
 And then, they say, that there's a routh of lords 
 and ladies frae the south, that are feasting and 
 banqueting there. Come awa, lads, and make 
 haste, for nae doubt it '11 be a braw sight."
 
 288 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 With such exclamations of cherished enthu- 
 siasm and feudal attachment, not only did a 
 number of the gentlemen and their tenants, 
 scattered up the long valley of the Tay, set off 
 to the gathering, but many Highland ladies, 
 their dames or daughters, hearing talk of nought 
 but fine young men of gentle blood, upon whose 
 skill the Earl of Breadalbane had laid his wager, 
 dressed themselves hastily in kirtle and calash, 
 and away they would go to see the tournay. 
 Besides this, the men of the Black Watch, of- 
 ficers, and rank and file, (for they were but 
 little distinguished on their own hills,) taking 
 an immediate interest in a trial like this, flocked 
 in hundreds down the valley of Glenlyon, and 
 the earl himself was really astonished when he 
 observed the bands of the Gael who crowded 
 the long avenues of the delightful pleasure- 
 grounds of Taymouth. 
 
 The appointed hour now drew nigh, and a 
 crowd already waited at the place named, such 
 as never before had been seen under the hoary
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 283 
 
 walls of Ballocb castle. The spot chosen was 
 a green hollow^ nearly circular ; for overlooking 
 it was a series of those gradual undulations 
 which makes the grounds of Taymouth valley 
 so picturesque ; and on the opposite side rose a 
 low crescent- shaped knoll, on the top of which 
 the earl had erected a large old-fashioned marque 
 tent, which Mr. Trotter had unrolled from 
 some of the lumber-rooms of the castle, and 
 which, with a flag flying at the top, and many 
 ,poles and props to keep it in form, now made 
 quite a picturesque and showy object. Within 
 the ample area of this erection, seats were placed, 
 as Mr. Trotter said, for the accommodation and 
 comfort of the quality — the ladies being in- 
 tended to sit in front ; and the major-domo, 
 in his though tfulness, had caused also tables to 
 be placed within, and several other comforts to 
 be in readiness, which, when set before those for 
 whom they were intended, were very much cal- 
 culated to set mouths a-watering, and to in- 
 crease that envy as well as admiration, with which 
 VOL. I. o
 
 290 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 the rich and great are naturally regarded by 
 
 their inferiors. 
 
 Numbers were yet flocking down the avenues 
 to join the crowd already assembled round the 
 spot, when a splendid array was seen to issue 
 from the great entrance of the castle. The 
 same enormity of hoop and head-dress which 
 had excited Hector's wonder on the day before, 
 now excited the same in many a breast, who 
 
 witnessed for the first time so much personal 
 grandeur. The aristocratic assemblage was 
 now much larger than it had been on the day 
 before. On the present occasion every one, ex- 
 cept those we have afterwards to mention, who 
 at the time were entertained at the castle, 
 walked in the train of the Lowland lords, and 
 others who were near the person of the earl 
 himself, and who paid their ceremonious gal- 
 lantries to the ladies. Among the train ap- 
 peared, with little good taste, the challenging 
 combatant, the Hon. M'Crombie himself, who, 
 with mucli of that arrogant roughness of man-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 291 
 
 ner, so often the effect of a senseless confidence 
 in mere birth, chose to play the champion and 
 the hero of the day before the ladies, and ulti- 
 mately to show himself to the spectators, pre- 
 vious to the arrival of his opponent, in a way 
 which, while it certainly procured him some 
 backers among the men, by no means prepos- 
 sessed the better, or the female, part of the au- 
 dience in his favour. 
 
 By way, however, of recommending himself, 
 by the appropriateness of his costume, M'Crom- 
 bie had arrayed himself in the dress of the 
 hills — short tartan coat, philebeg and all, and 
 strode about on the sward, with his broadsword 
 under his arm, very much at least to his own 
 satisfaction. In spite, however, of the encomiums 
 that have been passed upon the Gaelic costume, 
 it is not to be denied that upon some men 
 it does look abominably ill. The Hon. M'Crom- 
 bie was a short, broad-made figure, whose pei-- 
 son, though ill-formed and bony, bore the in- 
 dication of great strength, and his face had the 
 
 o2
 
 292 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 appearance of good Highland determination. 
 But his broad black features, and the aged ex- 
 pression of his countenance, although he was 
 not more than five-and-twenty, looked peculiarly 
 ill under the flat Highland bonnet ; the green 
 tartan of his short-tailed, long-bodied coat, sat 
 as ungracefully as possible upon his squat 
 square figure, and his large knees, however 
 brawny, and now of course left in puris natu- 
 ralibus, to be more appropriate with the usual 
 furnishing on the skin of a very dark man, ap- 
 peared beneath his thick- plaited kilt, with an 
 eftect which, even in the eyes of the mountain 
 ladies, was far from either pleasant or delicate. 
 A feeling of coolness, if not of disappoint- 
 ment, ran through the crowd on the appearance 
 in the area of this doughty challenger, and 
 many of the tall handsome Highlanders of the 
 Black Watch, standing around on the knolls, 
 could hardly suppress their sneering remarks, 
 as he strutted about, waiting for his adversary, 
 " as proud and pricked up as a piper's cock,"
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 293 
 
 as they said, and certainly looking in all the 
 faces round with conscious bravery, and as con- 
 scious gentility. 
 
 "Is that your champion?" said a lady, en- 
 thusiastic for Gaelic bravery, to her husband 
 in the crowd. " He may be of gentry, 
 or he maybe no; but I would just like to see 
 him trysted here wi' sergeant M^Leod o' the 
 Black Watch. If the sergeant wadna tirl 
 the rings off his gentle fingers, or at least 
 gar him look less like a peacock in June, I'm 
 sair mistaen," 
 
 " And so ye are mistaen, Jannet,'' replied 
 the husband of the lady, in the proper spirit of 
 matrimonial contradiction ; " so are ye mistaen, 
 for, besides his great strength, which any one 
 might see but a silly woman, isna the fame of 
 Lord Libberton's son weel known, far and near, 
 for a swordsman that's not to be equalled, may- 
 be frae Banff to Breadalbane .? Hold your 
 tongue, woman, and dinna gie your haveral
 
 294 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 opinion upon what you know nothing about. 
 But here's the tother ane.'' 
 
 A buz among the crowd announced the ap- 
 proach of those who now began to be 
 impatiently looked for, and an opening being 
 made, a small party, in front of which the 
 portly persons of Glen more and the laird of 
 Whinhills were most conspicuous, between 
 whom walked a youthful figure, whose dress 
 indicated his important station, at least in the 
 events of the morning. These personages were 
 followed by a considerable body of Breadal- 
 bane and Athol men, who formed the tails of 
 the chiefs, in whose train they now, as in duty 
 bound, walked to the trial. 
 
 When Hector stepped into the area appoint- 
 ed for the combat, a buz of surprise, in all, 
 mingled with admiration in some, and doubt in 
 others, made him at once an object of the highest 
 interest to the multitude, even independent of 
 the task in which he was about to engage. A
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 295 
 
 mere stripling compared to the other, though 
 tall and even athletic for his years, his fine 
 youthful face, comparatively slim figure, and 
 graceful, if not gallant bearing, formed a con- 
 trast as strong as well could be conceived, 
 between himself and his thick, sturdy, swag- 
 gering opponent. This was made still more 
 apparent, as, led forward between Glenmore and 
 the other laird, our youth was introduced for 
 the first time to the Honourable M'Crombie ; 
 for when they stood opposite to each other, and, 
 moving off his bonnet, our youth gracefully sa- 
 luted him whom he was about to engage, his 
 handsome prominent features, bold sparkling 
 eyes, and the thick-curled locks of shining au- 
 burn, which this action displayed, made the 
 other's dark, haughty, elderly look — his black 
 broad features, and square Lowland wig, 
 which the fashion of the time compelled his 
 honour to wear, but upon which the Highland 
 bonnet sat with an effect that was positively vile 
 — to form altogether, an opposite to our hero,
 
 296 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 as complete as if it had been a matter of pains- 
 taking invention. 
 
 The attention to appearances, of the import- 
 ance of which Hector was not insensible, and in 
 which he was eagerly seconded in the interval 
 by the servants within the castle, had certainly 
 not been thrown away on the present occasion. 
 Since the time of his original entrance into 
 Perth, he had never worn the kilt, and delicacy, 
 as well as habit, forbade the adoption of it on a 
 day like this. The trews, therefore, or rather 
 barred and diced trowsers, of the red and white 
 tartan, clothed his limbs ; which, with white 
 silk hose and small buckles in his shoes, looked 
 exceedingly handsome on a well-formed youth. 
 His waistcoat was of scarlet cloth, edged with 
 yellowjhe having positively rejected embroidery ; 
 and, modestly considering the uncertainty of 
 his birth, it was with some difficulty that Glen- 
 more could even get him to assume the double 
 cock's feather in his bonnet, by the argument 
 that he could not stand before such an opponent
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 297 
 
 without wearing the assumed badge of a gen- 
 tleman. 
 
 But it was upon his upper garment — which, 
 in some respects, might be merely styled a jac- 
 ket — that, the picturesque distinction of Hec- 
 tor's costume chiefly depended. Formed of 
 light blue cloth, and fitted close to his shape, 
 yet trimmed all round with a variegated edging 
 of otter-skin fur, it seemed to bear a medium 
 between the Highland and Lowland styles of 
 costume; but the sleeves being slashed or divided 
 a considerable way up, and inside the arms, the 
 sides of the open parts thickly ornamented with 
 bell buttons, and the open interval filled up 
 with pink satin, and hooked across by antique 
 shaped clasps, — gave it the appearance of a 
 compound of the Polish jerkin and the English 
 slashed doublet of the olden time. 
 
 How this garment had been made to assume 
 so picturesque an appearance, it is unimportant 
 to tell, excepting to hint, that for several of its 
 more elaborate ornaments, as well as, probably, 
 
 o5
 
 298 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 its general style, he was mainly indebted to a 
 certain damsel of the castle having got her 
 hands over it — namely, she whom Mr. Trotter 
 had designated as " the forward primped-up 
 lassie," who waited in an especial manner upon 
 the Lady Helen Ruthven. In truth, previous 
 to the jerkin being carried by Trotter, to whom 
 it was originally entrusted, to Mary Morrison, 
 the damsel in question, a conversation respecting 
 our youth had taken place between herself and 
 her mistress, in which, although it consisted only 
 of a few delicately expressed inquiries, the 
 young lady let out more sentiments of interest 
 concerning him and the forthcoming combat 
 than she had intended ; and while the girl was, 
 of course, no way surprised at a feeling so na- 
 tural towards one of Hector's appearance, it 
 afforded her a cue to do whatever she could to 
 make that appearance as interesting as possible 
 in her lady's eyes. 
 
 This handsome garment, however, surmount- 
 ed by a sash or belt of dark green silk, which
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 299 
 
 crossed his breast from his shoulder, in place 
 of the more cumbrous plaid, and into which 
 his broadsword was fixed, together with the 
 trews on his limbs, and a wide crowned bonnet 
 set smartly on his curled hair, a few streams of 
 ribbon hanging over his exposed ear, made him 
 altogether a figure at which all present ex- 
 pressed their highest admiration. In this sen- 
 timent even those concurred who, from various 
 indications of strength and years, &c., were 
 quite decided in anticipating the victory for his 
 opponent. But of all the assembled multitude 
 who now gazed upon the youthful competitor 
 for fame, there was one heart among the aristo- 
 cratic company within the tent, which leaped 
 in admiration on the first buz of the crowd at 
 his appearance, and which, partly from an in- 
 voluntary partiality, (at least for the moment,) 
 and partly from a disgusted feeling towards his 
 adversary, now trembled with anxiety for the 
 event of the day. We had almost forgotten to 
 mention, besides his other accoutrements, our
 
 300 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 youth carried on his left arm, as well as his op- 
 ponent, a small round target made of hard wood 
 and covered with strong bulFs hide, which being 
 studded round the edges and in the centre with 
 antique ornaments of polished brass, had a war- 
 like as well as gay appearance. 
 
 But the chief admiration and interest which 
 Hector's appearance and bearing had already 
 procured for him, was among the quality com- 
 pany within the marque, and the ladies in par- 
 ticular, — always the best judges of what is taste- 
 ful in the exterior, and the most ready in per- 
 ceiving indications of intelligence, and among 
 whom, moreover, the honourable gentleman had 
 as yet made few friends, — were loud in their 
 praises of our young hero ; but, to the involun- 
 tary concern of one eager listener, they seemed 
 far more anxious for, than sanguine of, his suc- 
 cess against so powerful an antagonist. The 
 lords and gentlemen, taken quite by surprise by 
 the appearance of a stranger, of whose presence 
 in the castle they had hitherto taken no notice.
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 301 
 
 were yet, to the dismay of Helen, from their 
 knowledge of Crombie's swordsmanship, still 
 more decided in their opinions in the latter's 
 favour. To show, however, his respect for our 
 youth, as well as testify his interest in the trial, 
 the earl himself rose, and descending into the 
 area beneath, addressed a few words to Glen- 
 more, who, along with another Highland gen- 
 tleman, whom his lordship called from the tent, 
 was appointed umpire of the trial combat. All 
 being now considered ready, no other ceremony 
 was thought necessary, than that, in default of 
 trumpets to sound the charge, the earFs piper, 
 then in attendance, joined with another from the 
 Black Watch, also on the ground, should set 
 their instruments in order, and blow up a 
 short and a pithy blast befitting the occasion. 
 
 At the first *' skreed" of their popular mu- 
 sic, which sounded over the heads of the people 
 from the knoll where the marque stood, and 
 whose loud echo was sent back upon the car 
 from the ancient walls of old Balloch, the whole
 
 302 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 people of the assembly began to cock their ears 
 in Highland enthusiasm, and every man present 
 who had a clymore by his side, seemed ready 
 himself to spring into the arena. 
 
 " Hell do yet ! he'll do yet ! " cried the thin 
 voice of the major-domo, to another half-gen- 
 tleman like himself, as, standing under tlie tent, 
 he watched the kindling of Hector's eye. " Iv'e 
 wager'd ten gowd guineas on his head ! and I 
 see hell do yet. It's no that I'm fear'd for the 
 penny siller, but it would spite me to the bone, 
 to see that bonnie young lad, that the lady 
 has fa'en in love wi', o'ercome and affronted wi' 
 that haughty Lowlander. Deevil a bit but his 
 honour is an ugly creature, although he be of 
 quality. If it wasna that he's of gentles' bluid, 
 and the born son of a Lowland lord, auld Nanze 
 Mowat, the tinkler's widow, has a son that is a 
 perfect prince to him." 
 
 With regard to Hector, who now stood ready 
 for the trial, it is not to be denied, that all this 
 preparation, and the solemnity of the presence
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 303 
 
 of such a multitude, to witness efforts of skill 
 which never before had been shown in public, 
 had their effect both upon his nerves and his 
 native modesty, to increase his own anxiety as 
 to the result of the contest. Had Glenmore 
 considered well what human nature was, he 
 would have paused before he put the feelings 
 and presence of mind of so mere a youth to a 
 test so severe, as risking his reputation and 
 perhaps his whole after fortune, upon a trial, 
 where so many eyes were upon him, that their 
 very number and the importance of the opinions 
 of his witnesses, with the solicitude he must 
 feel in consequence, might unnerve his arm 
 and take the quickness from his eye, and be 
 productive of nought but defeat and misfor- 
 tune. That Glenmore himself felt this, when 
 it was too late, was evident from the anxiety 
 with which he watched the countenance of Hec- 
 tor, and the eagerness with which he conveyed 
 to him his instructions and exhortations. Had 
 he known what was passing in the youth's bo-
 
 304 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 som, in reference in particular to one who 
 watched his bearing with the most intense so- 
 licitude, he would have perhaps felt still greater 
 anxiety as to the result of the day"'s trial. 
 
 The last blast of the stirring piobrachd was 
 now nearly blown. The two youths stood 
 eagerly eyeing each other. The ladies within the 
 tent participated more than any in the general 
 interest for Hector, and while the pipes were 
 playing, a gentleman behind wove a bushy crown 
 of laurel, which it was arranged should be 
 placed on the head of the victor, by the youngest 
 lady present. Who that lady was, we need 
 hardly tell ; and when the arrangement was an- 
 nounced by the noble earl to the young beauty 
 of the circle, Helen Ruthven almost fainted 
 from unexpected agitation, at the additional 
 concern this gave her in the coming event. 
 
 At length the bagpipes ceased and the earl 
 giving a sign, the two young men stepped into 
 the centre of the arena. There was a firmness in 
 the manner, and a confidence in the look of
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 305 
 
 both, which was exceedingly gratifying to the 
 opposing parties, who had formed their expecta- 
 tions of victory for the combatants respectively, 
 A profound silence now reigned over the whole 
 assemblage, as the swords of the young men 
 crossed each other, and eye began to watch eye 
 with that intensity of perception, and quickness 
 of inference and effort, that makes the skill, and 
 gives the success, in a trial like the present. 
 
 Two minutes or less of this preliminary play, 
 -served to show the skilful among those who 
 witnessed it, tliat the style of combat of the two 
 youths was materially different ; and as both 
 styles had their defenders among the Highland 
 swordsmen around, this circumstance added 
 much to the interest of the occasion. To it, 
 however, they went, with an earnestness every 
 instant increasing ; and now the swords flashed 
 in the afternoon's sun, their targets rung more 
 loudly with tlie short skilful strokes, and the 
 youths more frequently changed their positions 
 in the circle.
 
 306 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 It now began to he perceived more distinctly 
 in what the respective superiority of the comba- 
 tants consisted ; and, to the further consterna- 
 tion of her who, with breathless anxiety, watch- 
 ed every motion of both, while she held the 
 laurel crown for the head of the victor, she 
 heard it generally agreed by those within hear- 
 ing, that Crombie's mode of fighting, aided 
 by his great strength of muscle, would ulti- 
 mately be successful. Yet how they could con- 
 clude this, she could not conceive; for every 
 motion of Hector's bespoke such self-possession, 
 and such command of his weapon, and withal, 
 such a watchful perception of his adversary's 
 intentions, that she and the ladies around her 
 anticipated nothing for him but certain victory. 
 But the handsome face and figure of Hector, 
 and the necessary partiality that they created, 
 had entirely carried away what judgment they 
 could have on such a matter, while, by the men 
 near, who deceived themselves with no such 
 feelings, his style was considered too highly sci-
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 307 
 
 entific, too playful, and even too elegant, for the 
 forward braggadocia, but imposing manner and 
 heavy swinging blows of his sturdy opponent. 
 
 The parties had now tacitly stopped a few 
 moments to rest, and they stood in the centre, 
 leaning slightly on their swords, and anxiously 
 eyeing each other and the company, as if 
 taking breath for a more serious and a more 
 decisive onset ; for so well did they seem to be 
 matched, after all, that the last heat had arisen 
 in intensity towards its close, like the rapid 
 risings of bravura music, without either party 
 having gained apparently the slightest advan- 
 tage. From the loud acclamations, however, in 
 commendation of Hector, from every part of the 
 crowd, not only for his appearance, but for the 
 unexpected science he had displayed, it was evi- 
 dent that our hero had greatly gained ground 
 in the opinion of the audience. Another scream 
 of the bagpipes seconded the impatience of the 
 people, and to it our combatants went for the 
 ultimate trial, as if determined to end the con-
 
 308 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 test with little loss of time. Crombie went in 
 upon our youth with looks of vengeance, and 
 obvious evidence of secret mortification at the 
 unexpected skill and agility that he found in 
 his opponent; while Hector held him at bay, 
 with the same coolness as formerly, and with an 
 evident increase of manly confidence. 
 
 The general scene of this encounter now pre- 
 sented to the admiring audience in the tent 
 a perfect picture. The opposite declivities, 
 thronged to a considerable distance with High- 
 landers of various ranks, with a thin sprinkling 
 of women intermixed, and a few vehicles and 
 horses on the exterior flanks, presented an im- 
 posing and amphitheatrical appearance ; for 
 those in the front having seated themselves on 
 the sward, to allow of the others seeing over 
 their heads, the whole, notwithstanding their ea- 
 ger interest in what was going forward, stood per- 
 fectly at rest, and thus the arena was kept clear 
 without the slightest confusion. But it was the 
 active combatants who struffsled within tlie
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 309 
 
 circle, upon whom every eye was intensely fixed, 
 and who, contrasted as they were in figure and 
 costume, presented of course the most interest- 
 ing part of the picture. Animated as he was in 
 the eagerness of the encounter, of Hector it was 
 remarked, particularly by the females, that, 
 merely in the artless freedom of nature, his 
 stripling figure uniformly presented attitudes of 
 the most perfect grace, and occasionally some 
 which would have charmed a sculptor, even 
 still more, perhaps, than they did the aristocratic 
 personages within the marque. 
 
 But the struggle was now becoming rapidly 
 too serious even for remarks like these ; for, the 
 object being to cut off with the sword some slight 
 portion of the dress, or at most to touch lightly 
 some part of the body, to show by inference a 
 reserved power over life itself, and every attempt 
 of this sort being skilfully met by the sword and 
 shield of Hector, Crombie's dark eyes began to 
 flash with a malignant scowl of disappointment ; 
 provocation upon provocation seemed to have
 
 310 THE BLACK WATCH 
 
 turned the trial of skill to a serious combat, 
 and strokes began to be given and lunges to be 
 made, which looked extremely like a mutual 
 effort for life or death. The assembled com- 
 pany were so taken by surprise by this change, 
 that no one had the power to utter an exclama- 
 tion, until a sudden spring of Crombie, and an 
 attempt to grapple, obliged Hector to avoid 
 a mortal thrust by quickly dropping on one 
 knee. 
 
 A wild shout now burst from the people, un- 
 able to interpret the meaning of this movement 
 in any other way than as victory for " the phile- 
 beg," and the cry that was raised throughout 
 the multitude, smote to the heart of the fair 
 spectatress in the tent, with the painful mean- 
 ing, that he whom she watched so intently had 
 suffered a defeat. When she saw him spring 
 to his feet, however, and, turning his face to the 
 earl and his friends, hold up his sword in the 
 air, as if appealing to liis noble audience, while 
 shouts of " False play !" and " The brave youth
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 311 
 
 in the trews ! " drowned the first mistaken mur- 
 mur ; her blood returned with so sudden a re- 
 vulsion, of such delight and admiration, that 
 she was hardly able to support herself on her 
 seat. 
 
 "Again, again! spare him not!" shouted 
 the crowd, and without waiting for a word from 
 the astonished umpires, Hector, now in earnest, 
 sprang upon his adversary. A few passes more 
 showed the mastery that our hero was obtain- 
 ing, both over the weapon and the spirit of his 
 adversary. Crombie now fought with a wild 
 malignity that became quite reckless, but his 
 despairing energy being still unsuccessful, he 
 found himself after a few vigorous efforts, oblig- 
 ed to assume the defensive, whicJi was by no 
 means his forte, and Hector now pressed him 
 round the arena in a style which elicited loud, 
 almost tumultuous shouts of applause. While 
 doing this, the animated eye of Hector seemed 
 frequently to glance to a large cockade of scar- 
 let ribbon, which, with consistent taste, the
 
 312 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 honourable young man had stuck on the side of 
 his bonnet, just over his right ear. While 
 Crombie's arm was now extended in almost 
 powerless defence. Hector, watching his oppor- 
 tunity, with a clean stroke, cut this ornament 
 from its place, upon which a shout was set up 
 that the contest was gained ; but Crombie, with 
 glaring eyes and clenched teeth, still continuing 
 his efforts for one cut at his adversary, a cry 
 from several voices of " Let him have it ! give 
 him the steel !" emboldened Hector to another 
 aim, and avoiding a blow of the exasperated 
 young man, he returned its intention by a dexter- 
 ous touch of his point at the inside joint of 
 Crombie's shoulder. This was the last thrust 
 he was required to make. The sword fell power- 
 less from the hand of him of the philebeg, while 
 shouts of victory deafened the ears of the by- 
 standers. 
 
 During these latter efforts, the anxiety of 
 Helen was wound up to sucli a pitch that the 
 sight left her eyes, and her ears were insensible
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 313 
 
 to whom the shout of victory really applied. 
 When she saw, however, our youth of the 
 doublet and trews come forward, sword in hand, 
 between the portly figures of Glenmore and the 
 other Highland gentlemen, who had now entered 
 the arena, and bowing gracefully to the com- 
 pany in the tent, draw near to herself, the film 
 left her eyes, a tumult of emotion raised the 
 blood into her cheeks, and by the time he had 
 knelt before her, the graceful tact and presence 
 of mind, inseparable from the high-bred female 
 character, when called to play a conspicuous 
 part, came fully to her aid. 
 
 The feelings of pride and triumph which 
 shone in Hector's eyes, as he looked up in the 
 blushing face of the noble maiden, and which 
 also swelled in her bosom, as she placed the 
 laurel crown on his head, need not be made a 
 matter of verbal description. The scene was so 
 new to the simple people of the hills, and was 
 in reality so accordant to their constitutional 
 admiration of bravery and beauty, that they 
 
 VOL. J. p
 
 314 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 caught its spirit with characteristic enthusiasm, 
 and the crowning act of this interesting day, 
 taking place in such dignified and respected pre- 
 sence, was followed by such shouts of exulting 
 applause, as made the whole valley ring from 
 Kinniore to Finlarig. 
 
 The piper of Balloch, or of Glenlyon, or of 
 any other spot on these hills, never being the 
 last man on any occasion, soon proclaimed his 
 own presence, as well as the recent victory, by 
 the deafening skirl of pipe and drone, in which 
 he was instantly joined by several others from 
 the Black Watch, who, blowing the wind into 
 their bags, blew up such a blast, while " the 
 quality '"* began to move from the field, as made 
 old Balloch castle almost dance with the din, or 
 at least caused it to sing — if prolonged and 
 picturesque echoes, which turned the bagpipe 
 skirl into real music, might be considered poe- 
 tically vocal. A proud man was Glenmore this 
 day. A merry Andrew was Andrew Trotter, 
 the chief butler, provider, general manager,
 
 Tnr: black watch. 315 
 
 and ten-guinea winner on this solemn occasion. 
 " Such a day,"' he said, **• had never been seen 
 in Taymouth valley, since the one that the 
 auld earl came of age, when thirteen hunder 
 Highlandmen played the sword and eat the 
 feast beneath the walls, and the red wine ran in 
 the very gutters of Balloch castle.''** 
 
 It was with feelings, such as youth, and 
 love, and the sense of native ambition, and 
 pride hitherto humbled, and hopes hitherto de- 
 pressed, only can know, that Hector Monro, 
 wearing a crown of classic laurel, and by this 
 one act elevated to the companionship of those 
 by whom he had never before been noticed, 
 joined the gay company ; and proceeding on 
 with it, amidst the gaze of hundreds, and the 
 general buz of admiration, entered with the 
 earl and his guests the front portals of the 
 castle. Bowing to the high dames, who now 
 were delighted to return their condescending 
 courtesies to the stripling victor, with what 
 pride our hero ascended the front stair of tl)e 
 
 p 2
 
 316 THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 mansion — even then called great — but which 
 has since been replaced in the modern castle, by 
 a staircase which is justly the admiration of all 
 that part of Scotland. 
 
 What a gratifying thing is honour, when it 
 comes after humiliation ! What a marvellous 
 thing is position, which at once changes a man 
 into another being, or, like the metempsichosis 
 of the east, transmigrates into the body a new- 
 soul, which it never knew before ! When our 
 hero reached the drawing-room — we give the 
 apartment a modern name to make ourselves 
 understood — although modestly removing the 
 bays from his head, he drew himself up to a 
 lieight which nature never before had given 
 him, and seemed to breathe an air, which at 
 the moment he thought congenial to him, be- 
 cause exclusively reserved for the respiration of 
 aristocracy. 
 
 It is the way of the w^orld always to delight 
 to honour, or delight to contemn. Hector was 
 now (he deserved it, it is true, in some degree)
 
 THE BLACK WATCH. 317 
 
 in the position of the man whom the world de- 
 iighteth to honour. Honour now poured upon 
 him, for it was the fashion of the hour, and 
 condescension exceeded condescension. And he 
 was grateful — like a youthful simpleton, to be 
 grateful to people for pleasing themselves — and 
 poured out his acknowledgments in good set 
 terms ; and the listeners were gratified, because 
 men delight to be praised for virtues to which 
 they have no claim ; and the world seemed a 
 new world to him, as in reality it was at the 
 moment. But time, that pleases some, tries 
 all, and so he found it. 
 
 There was one heart, however, that could 
 reciprocate his feelings, erroneous as might be 
 the origin of them, in this hour of elevation, and 
 whose eye, although he did not know it, kindled 
 to his, as they sat at meat, and as the major- 
 domo himself waited behind both, and thought 
 himself a great man " even for that same." 
 But " the forms of society," that excellent 
 artifice for spoiling human nature, kept them,
 
 SIS THE BLACK WATCH. 
 
 still more than ever, distant and distinct ; and 
 after a night of dissipation, to which he was 
 little accustomed, and which in reality he did 
 not enjoy, our hero laid his head at last 
 on his pillow, with a confused feeling of mixed 
 triumph and regret, which referred him rather 
 to to-morrow than to-day, for that happiness 
 which still seems to elude the pursuer. 
 
 END OF VOL. r, 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 ITiOTSON ANIJ J'aLMEU, I'RIMF.riS, SAVOY STREFT, STRAND.
 
 4
 
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 UNrvERsmr of illinois-urbana 
 
 3 0112 070600173 
 
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