"It is a cause," muttered the Lord Keeper, "which has emerged since the effect has taken place; for, if it exists at all, I am sure she knew nothing of it when her letter to Ravenswood was written."
"It is the first time that I have heard of this," said the Marquis; "but, since your ladyship has tabled a subject so delicate, permit me to say, that my kinsman"s birth and connexions ent.i.tled him to a patient hearing, and at least a civil refusal, even in case of his being so ambitious as to raise his eyes to the daughter of Sir William Ashton."
"You will recollect, my lord, of what blood Miss Lucy Ashton is come by the mother"s side," said the lady.
"I do remember your descent-from a younger branch of the house of Angus," said the Marquis; "and your ladyship-forgive me, lady-ought not to forget that the Ravenswoods have thrice intermarried with the main stem. Come, madam, I know how matters stand-old and long-fostered prejudices are difficult to get over, I make every allowance for them; I ought not, and I would not, otherwise have suffered my kinsman to depart alone, expelled, in a manner, from this house, but I had hopes of being a mediator. I am still unwilling to leave you in anger, and shall not set forward till after noon, as I rejoin the Master of Ravenswood upon the road a few miles from hence. Let us talk over this matter more coolly."
"It is what I anxiously desire, my lord," said Sir William Ashton, eagerly. "Lady Ashton, we will not permit my Lord of A-- to leave us in displeasure. We must compel him to tarry dinner at the castle."
"The castle," said the lady, "and all that it contains, are at the command of the Marquis, so long as he chooses to honour it with his residence; but touching the farther discussion of this disagreeable topic--"
"Pardon me, good madam," said the Marquis; "but I cannot allow you to express any hasty resolution on a subject so important. I see that more company is arriving; and, since I have the good fortune to renew my former acquaintance with Lady Ashton, I hope she will give me leave to avoid perilling what I prize so highly upon any disagreeable subject of discussion-at least till we have talked over more pleasant topics."
The lady smiled, courtesied, and gave her hand to the Marquis, by whom, with all the formal gallantry of the time, which did not permit the guest to tuck the lady of the house under the arm, as a rustic does his sweetheart at a wake, she was ushered to the eating-room.
Here they were joined by Bucklaw, Craigengelt, and other neighbours, whom the Lord Keeper had previously invited to meet the Marquis of A--. An apology, founded upon a slight indisposition, was alleged as an excuse for the absence of Miss Ashton, whose seat appeared unoccupied. The entertainment was splendid to profusion, and was protracted till a late hour.
CHAPTER XXIII.
Such was our fallen father"s fate, Yet better than mine own; He shared his exile with his mate, I"m banish"d forth alone.
WALLER I WILL not attempt to describe the mixture of indignation and regret with which Ravenswood left the seat which had belonged to his ancestors. The terms in which Lady Ashton"s billet was couched rendered it impossible for him, without being deficient in that spirit of which he perhaps had too much, to remain an instant longer within its walls. The Marquis, who had his share in the affront, was, nevertheless, still willing to make some efforts at conciliation. He therefore suffered his kinsman to depart alone, making him promise, however, that he would wait for him at the small inn called the Tod"s Hole, situated, as our readers may be pleased to recollect, half-way betwixt Ravenswood Castle and Wolf"s Crag, and about five Scottish miles distant from each. Here the Marquis proposed to join the Master of Ravenswood, either that night or the next morning. His own feelings would have induced him to have left the castle directly, but he was loth to forfeit, without at least one effort, the advantages which he had proposed from his visit to the Lord Keeper; and the Master of Ravenswood was, even in the very heat of his resentment, unwilling to foreclose any chance of reconciliation which might arise out of the partiality which Sir William Ashton had shown towards him, as well as the intercessory arguments of his n.o.ble kinsman. He himself departed without a moment"s delay, farther than was necessary to make this arrangement.
At first he spurred his horse at a quick pace through an avenue of the park, as if, by rapidity of motion, he could stupify the confusion of feelings with which he was a.s.sailed. But as the road grew wilder and more sequestered, and when the trees had hidden the turrets of the castle, he gradually slackened his pace, as if to indulge the painful reflections which he had in vain endeavoured to repress. The path in which he found himself led him to the Mermaiden"s Fountain, and to the cottage of Alice; and the fatal influence which superst.i.tious belief attached to the former spot, as well as the admonitions which had been in vain offered to him by the inhabitant of the latter, forced themselves upon his memory. "Old saws speak truth," he said to himself, "and the Mermaiden"s Well has indeed witnessed the last act of rashness of the heir of Ravenswood. Alice spoke well," he continued, "and I am in the situation which she foretold; or rather, I am more deeply dishonoured-not the dependant and ally of the destroyer of my father"s house, as the old sibyl presaged, but the degraded wretch who has aspired to hold that subordinate character, and has been rejected with disdain."
We are bound to tell the tale as we have received it; and, considering the distance of the time, and propensity of those through whose mouths it has pa.s.sed to the marvellous, this could not be called a Scottish story unless it manifested a tinge of Scottish superst.i.tion. As Ravenswood approached the solitary fountain, he is said to have met with the following singular adventure: His horse, which was moving slowly forward, suddenly interrupted its steady and composed pace, snorted, reared, and, though urged by the spur, refused to proceed, as if some object of terror had suddenly presented itself. On looking to the fountain, Ravenswood discerned a female figure, dressed in a white, or rather greyish, mantle, placed on the very spot on which Lucy Ashton had reclined while listening to the fatal tale of love. His immediate impression was that she had conjectured by which path he would traverse the park on his departure, and placed herself at this well-known and sequestered place of rendezvous, to indulge her own sorrow and his parting interview. In this belief he jumped from his horse, and, making its bridle fast to a tree, walked hastily towards the fountain, p.r.o.nouncing eagerly, yet under his breath, the words, "Miss Ashton!-Lucy!"
The figure turned as he addressed it, and displayed to his wondering eyes the features, not of Lucy Ashton, but of old blind Alice. The singularity of her dress, which rather resembled a shroud than the garment of a living woman; the appearance of her person, larger, as it struck him, than it usually seemed to be; above all, the strange circ.u.mstance of a blind, infirm, and decrepit person being found alone and at a distance from her habitation (considerable, if her infirmities be taken into account), combined to impress him with a feeling of wonder approaching to fear. As he approached, she arose slowly from her seat, held her shrivelled hand up as if to prevent his coming more near, and her withered lips moved fast, although no sound issued from them. Ravenswood stopped; and as, after a moment"s pause, he again advanced towards her, Alice, or her apparition, moved or glided backwards towards the thicket, still keeping her face turned towards him. The trees soon hid the form from his sight; and, yielding to the strong and terrific impression that the being which he had seen was not of this world, the Master of Ravenswood remained rooted to the ground whereon he had stood when he caught his last view of her. At length, summoning up his courage, he advanced to the spot on which the figure had seemed to be seated; but neither was there pressure of the gra.s.s nor any other circ.u.mstance to induce him to believe that what he had seen was real and substantial.
Full of those strange thoughts and confused apprehensions which awake in the bosom of one who conceives he has witnessed some preternatural appearance, the Master of Ravenswood walked back towards his horse, frequently, however, looking behind him, not without apprehension, as if expecting that the vision would reappear. But the apparition, whether it was real or whether it was the creation of a heated and agitated imagination, returned not again; and he found his horse sweating and terrified, as if experiencing that agony of fear with which the presence of a supernatural being is supposed to agitate the brute creation. The Master mounted, and rode slowly forward, soothing his steed from time to time, while the animal seemed internally to shrink and shudder, as if expecting some new object of fear at the opening of every glade. The rider, after a moment"s consideration, resolved to investigate the matter further. "Can my eyes have deceived me," he said, "and deceived me for such a s.p.a.ce of time? Or are this woman"s infirmities but feigned, in order to excite compa.s.sion? And even then, her motion resembled not that of a living and existing person. Must I adopt the popular creed, and think that the unhappy being has formed a league with the powers of darkness? I am determined to be resolved; I will not brook imposition even from my own eyes."
In this uncertainty he rode up to the little wicket of Alice"s garden. Her seat beneath the birch-tree was vacant, though the day was pleasant and the sun was high. He approached the hut, and heard from within the sobs and wailing of a female. No answer was returned when he knocked, so that, after a moment"s pause, he lifted the latch and entered. It was indeed a house of solitude and sorrow. Stretched upon her miserable pallet lay the corpse of the last retainer of the house of Ravenswood who still abode on their paternal domains! Life had but shortly departed; and the little girl by whom she had been attended in her last moments was wringing her hands and sobbing, betwixt childish fear and sorrow, over the body of her mistress.
The Master of Ravenswood had some difficulty to compose the terrors of the poor child, whom his unexpected appearance had at first rather appalled than comforted; and when he succeeded, the first expression which the girl used intimated that "he had come too late." Upon inquiring the meaning of this expression, he learned that the deceased, upon the first attack of the mortal agony, had sent a peasant to the castle to beseech an interview of the Master of Ravenswood, and had expressed the utmost impatience for his return. But the messengers of the poor are tardy and negligent: the fellow had not reached the castle, as was afterwards learned, until Ravenswood had left it, and had then found too much amus.e.m.e.nt among the retinue of the strangers to return in any haste to the cottage of Alice. Meantime her anxiety of mind seemed to increase with the agony of her body; and, to use the phrase of Babie, her only attendant, "she prayed powerfully that she might see her master"s son once more, and renew her warning." She died just as the clock in the distant village tolled one; and Ravenswood remembered, with internal shuddering, that he had heard the chime sound through the wood just before he had seen what he was now much disposed to consider as the spectre of the deceased.
It was necessary, as well from his respect to the departed as in common humanity to her terrified attendant, that he should take some measures to relieve the girl from her distressing situation. The deceased, he understood, had expressed a desire to be buried in a solitary churchyard, near the little inn of the Tod"s Hole, called the Hermitage, or more commonly Armitage, in which lay interred some of the Ravenswood family, and many of their followers. Ravenswood conceived it his duty to gratify this predilection, commonly found to exist among the Scottish peasantry, and despatched Babie to the neighbouring village to procure the a.s.sistance of some females, a.s.suring her that, in the mean while, he would himself remain with the dead body, which, as in Thessaly of old, it is accounted highly unfit to leave without a watch.
Thus, in the course of a quarter of an hour or little more, he found himself sitting a solitary guard over the inanimate corpse of her whose dismissed spirit, unless his eyes had strangely deceived him, had so recently manifested itself before him. Notwithstanding his natural courage, the Master was considerably affected by a concurrence of circ.u.mstances so extraordinary. "She died expressing her eager desire to see me. Can it be, then," was his natural course of reflection-"can strong and earnest wishes, formed during the last agony of nature, survive its catastrophe, surmount the awful bounds of the spiritual world, and place before us its inhabitants in the hues and colouring of life? And why was that manifested to the eye which could not unfold its tale to the ear? and wherefore should a breach be made in the laws of nature, yet its purpose remain unknown? Vain questions, which only death, when it shall make me like the pale and withered form before me, can ever resolve."
He laid a cloth, as he spoke, over the lifeless face, upon whose features he felt unwilling any longer to dwell. He then took his place in an old carved oaken chair, ornamented with his own armorial bearings, which Alice had contrived to appropriate to her own use in the pillage which took place among creditors, officers, domestics, and messengers of the law when his father left Ravenswood Castle for the last time. Thus seated, he banished, as much as he could, the superst.i.tious feelings which the late incident naturally inspired. His own were sad enough, without the exaggeration of supernatural terror, since he found himself transferred from the situation of a successful lover of Lucy Ashton, and an honoured and respected friend of her father, into the melancholy and solitary guardian of the abandoned and forsaken corpse of a common pauper.
He was relieved, however, from his sad office sooner that he could reasonably have expected, considering the distance betwixt the hut of the deceased and the village, and the age and infirmities of three old women who came from thence, in military phrase, to relieve guard upon the body of the defunct. On any other occasion the speed of these reverend sibyls would have been much more moderate, for the first was eighty years of age and upwards, the second was paralytic, and the third lame of a leg from some accident. But the burial duties rendered to the deceased are, to the Scottish peasant of either s.e.x, a labour of love. I know not whether it is from the temper of the people, grave and enthusiastic as it certainly is, or from the recollection of the ancient Catholic opinions, when the funeral rites were always considered as a period of festival to the living; but feasting, good cheer, and even inebriety, were, and are, the frequent accompaniments of a Scottish old-fashioned burial. What the funeral feast, or "dirgie," as it is called, was to the men, the gloomy preparations of the dead body for the coffin were to the women. To straight the contorted limbs upon a board used for that melancholy purpose, to array the corpse in clean linen, and over that in its woollen shroad, were operations committed always to the old matrons of the village, and in which they found a singular and gloomy delight.
The old women paid the Master their salutations with a ghastly smile, which reminded him of the meeting betwixt Macbeth and the witches on the blasted heath of Forres. He gave them some money, and recommended to them the charge of the dead body of their contemporary, an office which they willingly undertook; intimating to him at the same time that he must leave the hut, in order that they might begin their mournful duties. Ravenswood readily agreed to depart, only tarrying to recommend to them due attention to the body, and to receive information where he was to find the s.e.xton, or beadle, who had in charge the deserted churchyard of the Armitage, in order to prepare matters for the reception of Old Alice in the place of repose which she had selected for herself.
"Ye"ll no be pinched to find out Johnie Mortsheugh," said the elder sibyl, and still her withered cheek bore a grisly smile; "he dwells near the Tod"s Hole, an house of entertainment where there has been mony a blythe birling, for death and drink-draining are near neighbours to ane anither."
"Ay! and that"s e"en true, c.u.mmer," said the lame hag, propping herself with a crutch which supported the shortness of her left leg, "for I mind when the father of this Master of Ravenswood that is now standing before us sticked young Blackhall with his whinger, for a wrang word said ower their wine, or brandy, or what not: he gaed in as light as a lark, and he came out wi" his feet foremost. I was at the winding of the corpse; and when the bluid was washed off, he was a bonny bouk of man"s body." It may be easily believed that this ill-timed anecdote hastened the Master"s purpose of quitting a company so evil-omened and so odious. Yet, while walking to the tree to which his horse was tied, and busying himself with adjusting the girths of the saddle, he could not avoid hearing, through the hedge of the little garden, a conversation respecting himself, betwixt the lame woman and the octogenarian sibyl. The pair had hobbled into the garden to gather rosemary, southernwood, rue, and other plants proper to be strewed upon the body, and burned by way of fumigation in the chimney of the cottage. The paralytic wretch, almost exhausted by the journey, was left guard upon the corpse, lest witches or fiends might play their sport with it.
The following law, croaking dialogue was necessarily overheard by the Master of Ravenswood: "That"s a fresh and full-grown hemlock, Annie Winnie; mony a c.u.mmer lang syne wad hae sought nae better horse to flee over hill and how, through mist and moonlight, and light down in the King of France"s cellar."
"Ay, c.u.mmer! but the very deil has turned as hard-hearted now as the Lord Keeper and the grit folk, that hae b.r.e.a.s.t.s like whinstane. They p.r.i.c.k us and they pine us, and they pit us on the pinnywinkles for witches; and, if I say my prayers backwards ten times ower, Satan will never gie me amends o" them."
"Did ye ever see the foul thief?" asked her neighbour.
"Na!" replied the other spokeswoman; "but I trow I hae dreamed of him mony a time, and I think the day will come they will burn me for"t. But ne"er mind, c.u.mmer! we hae this dollar of the Master"s, and we"ll send doun for bread and for yill, and tobacco, and a drap brandy to burn, and a wee pickle saft sugar; and be there deil, or nae deil, la.s.s, we"ll hae a merry night o"t."
Here her leathern chops uttered a sort of cackling, ghastly laugh, resembling, to a certain degree, the cry of the screech-owl.
"He"s a frank man, and a free-handed man, the Master," said Annie Winnie, "and a comely personage-broad in the shouthers, and narrow around the lunyies. He wad mak a bonny corpse; I wad like to hae the streiking and winding o" him."
"It is written on his brow, Annie Winnie," returned the octogenarian, her companion, "that hand of woman, or of man either, will never straught him: dead-deal will never be laid on his back, make you your market of that, for I hae it frae a sure hand."
"Will it be his lot to die on the battle-ground then, Ailsie Gourlay? Will he die by the sword or the ball, as his forbears had dune before him, mony ane o" them?" "Ask nae mair questions about it-he"ll no be graced sae far," replied the sage.
"I ken ye are wiser than ither folk, Aislie Gourlay. But wha tell"d ye this?" "Fashna your thumb about that, Annie Winnie," answered the sibyl, "I hae it frae a hand sure eneugh."
"But ye said ye never saw the foul thief," reiterated her inquisitive companion.
"I hae it frae as sure a hand," said Ailsie, "and frae them that spaed his fortune before the sark gaed ower his head."
"Hark! I hear his horse"s feet riding aff," said the other; "they dinna sound as if good luck was wi" them."
"Mak haste, sirs," cried the paralytic hag from the cottage, "and let us do what is needfu", and say what is fitting; for, if the dead corpse binna straughted, it will girn and thraw, and that will fear the best o" us."
Ravenswood was now out of hearing. He despised most of the ordinary prejudices about witchcraft, omens, and vaticination, to which his age and country still gave such implicit credit that to express a doubt of them was accounted a crime equal to the unbelief of Jews or Saracens; he knew also that the prevailing belief, concerning witches, operating upon the hypochondriac habits of those whom age, infirmity, and poverty rendered liable to suspicion, and enforced by the fear of death and the pangs of the most cruel tortures, often extorted those confessions which enc.u.mber and disgrace the criminal records of Scotland during the 17th century. But the vision of that morning, whether real or imaginary, had impressed his mind with a superst.i.tious feeling which he in vain endeavoured to shake off. The nature of the business which awaited him at the little inn, called Tod"s Hole, where he soon after arrived, was not of a kind to restore his spirits.
It was necessary he should see Mortsheugh, the s.e.xton of the old burial-ground at Armitage, to arrange matters for the funeral of Alice; and, as the man dwelt near the place of her late residence, the Master, after a slight refreshment, walked towards the place where the body of Alice was to be deposited. It was situated in the nook formed by the eddying sweep of a stream, which issued from the adjoining hills. A rude cavern in an adjacent rock, which, in the interior, was cut into the shape of a cross, formed the hermitage, where some Saxon saint had in ancient times done penance, and given name to the place. The rich Abbey of Coldinghame had, in latter days, established a chapel in the neighbourhood, of which no vestige was now visible, though the churchyard which surrounded it was still, as upon the present occasion, used for the interment of particular persons. One or two shattered yew-trees still grew within the precincts of that which had once been holy ground. Warriors and barons had been buried there of old, but their names were forgotten, and their monuments demolished. The only sepulchral memorials which remained were the upright headstones which mark the graves of persons of inferior rank. The abode of the s.e.xton was a solitary cottage adjacent to the ruined wall of the cemetery, but so low that, with its thatch, which nearly reached the ground, covered with a thick crop of gra.s.s, fog, and house-leeks, it resembled an overgrown grave. On inquiry, however, Ravenswood found that the man of the last mattock was absent at a bridal, being fiddler as well as grave-digger to the vicinity. He therefore retired to the little inn, leaving a message that early next morning he would again call for the person whose double occupation connected him at once with the house of mourning and the house of feasting.
An outrider of the Marquis arrived at Tod"s Hole shortly after, with a message, intimating that his master would join Ravenswood at that place on the following morning; and the Master, who would otherwise have proceeded to his old retreat at Wolf"s Crag, remained there accordingly to give meeting to his n.o.ble kinsman.
CHAPTER XXIV.
Hamlet: Has this fellow no feeling of his business? he sings at grave making.
Horatio: Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness.
Hamlet: "Tis e"en so: the hand of little employment hath the daintier sense.
Hamlet, Act V. Scene 1.
THE sleep of Ravenswood was broken by ghastly and agitating visions, and his waking intervals disturbed by melancholy reflections on the past and painful antic.i.p.ations of the future. He was perhaps the only traveller who ever slept in that miserable kennel without complaining of his lodgings, or feeling inconvenience from their deficiencies. It is when "the mind is free the body"s delicate." Morning, however, found the Master an early riser, in hopes that the fresh air of the dawn might afford the refreshment which night had refused him. He took his way towards the solitary burial-ground, which lay about half a mile from the inn.
The thin blue smoke, which already began to curl upward, and to distinguish the cottage of the living from the habitation of the dead, apprised him that its inmate had returned and was stirring. Accordingly, on entering the little churchyard, he saw the old man labouring in a half-made grave. "My destiny," thought Ravenswood, "seems to lead me to scenes of fate and of death; but these are childish thoughts, and they shall not master me. I will not again suffer my imagination to beguile my senses." The old man rested on his spade as the Master approached him, as if to receive his commands; and as he did not immediately speak, the s.e.xton opened the discourse in his own way.
"Ye will be a wedding customer, sir, I"se warrant?"
"What makes you think so, friend?" replied the Master.
"I live by twa trades, sir," replied the blythe old man-"fiddle, sir, and spade; filling the world, and emptying of it; and I suld ken baith cast of customers by head-mark in thirty years" practice."
"You are mistaken, however, this morning," replied Ravenswood.
"Am I?" said the old man, looking keenly at him, "troth and it may be; since, for as brent as your brow is, there is something sitting upon it this day that is as near akin to death as to wedlock. Weel-weel; the pick and shovel are as ready to your order as bow and fiddle."
"I wish you," said Ravenswood, "to look after the descent interment of an old woman, Alice Gray, who lived at the Graigfoot in Ravenswood Park."
"Alice Gray!-blind Alice!" said the s.e.xton; "and is she gane at last? that"s another jow of the bell to bid me be ready. I mind when Habbie Gray brought her down to this land; a likely la.s.s she was then, and looked ower her southland nose at us a". I trow her pride got a downcome. And is she e"en gane?"
"She died yesterday," said Ravenswood; "and desired to be buried here beside her husband; you know where he lies, no doubt?"
"Ken where he lies!" answered the s.e.xton, with national indirection of response. "I ken whar a"body lies, that lies here. But ye were speaking o" her grave? Lord help us, it"s no an ordinar grave that will haud her in, if a"s true that folk said of Alice in her auld days; and if I gae to six feet deep-and a warlock"s grave shouldna be an inch mair ebb, or her ain witch c.u.mmers would soon whirl her out of her shroud for a" their auld acquaintance-and be"t six feet, or be"t three, wha"s to pay the making o"t, I pray ye?"
"I will pay that, my friend, and all other reasonable charges."
"Reasonable charges!" said the s.e.xton; "ou, there"s grundmail-and bell-siller, though the bell"s broken, nae doubt-and the kist-and my day"s wark-and my bit fee-and some brandy and yill to the dirgie, I am no thinking that you can inter her, to ca" decently, under saxteen pund Scots."
"There is the money, my friend," said Ravenswood, "and something over. Be sure you know the grave."
"Ye"ll be ane o" her English relations, I"se warrant," said the h.o.a.ry man of skulls; "I hae heard she married far below her station. It was very right to let her bite on the bridle when she was living, and it"s very right to gie her a decent burial now she"s dead, for that"s a matter o" credit to yoursell rather than to her. Folk may let their kindred shift for themsells when they are alive, and can bear the burden of their ain misdoings; but it"s an unnatural thing to let them be buried like dogs, when a" the discredit gangs to the kindred. What kens the dead corpse about it?"
"You would not have people neglect their relations on a bridal occasion neither?" said Ravenswood, who was amused with the professional limitation of the grave-digger"s philanthropy.
The old man cast up his sharp grey eyes with a shrewd smile, as if he understood the jest, but instantly continued, with his former gravity: "Bridals-wha wad neglect bridals that had ony regard for plenishing the earth? To be sure, they suld be celebrated with all manner of good cheer, and meeting of friends, and musical instruments-harp, sackbut, and psaltery; or gude fiddle and pipes, when these auld-warld instruments of melody are hard to be compa.s.sed."
"The presence of the fiddle, I dare say," replied Ravenswood, "would atone for the absence of all the others."
The s.e.xton again looked sharply up at him, as he answered. "Nae doubt-nae doubt, if it were weel played; but yonder," he said, as if to change the discourse, "is Halbert Gray"s lang hame, that ye were speering after, just the third bourock beyond the muckle through-stane that stands on sax legs yonder, abune some ane of the Ravenswoods; for there is mony of their kin and followers here, deil lift them! though it isna just their main burial-place."
"They are no favourites, then, of yours, these Ravenswoods?" said the Master, no much pleased with the pa.s.sing benediction which was thus bestowed on his family and name.
"I kenna wha should favour them," said the grave-digger; "when they had lands and power, they were ill guides of them baith, and now their head"s down, there"s few care how lang they may be of lifting it again."
"Indeed!" said Ravenswood; "I never heard that this unhappy family deserved ill-will at the hands of their country. I grant their poverty, if that renders them contemptible."
"It will gang a far way till"t" said the s.e.xton of Hermitage, "ye may tak my word for that; at least, I ken naething else that suld mak myself contemptible, and folk are far frae respecting me as they wad do if I lived in a twa-lofted sclated house. But as for the Ravenswoods, I hae seen three generations of them, and deil ane to mend other."
"I thought they had enjoyed a fair character in the country," said their descendant.
"Character! Ou, ye see, sir," said the s.e.xton, "as for the auld gudesire body of a lord, I lived on his land when I was a sw.a.n.king young chield, and could hae blawn the trumpet wi" ony body, for I had wind eneugh then; and touching this trumpeter Marine that I have heard play afore the lords of the circuit, I wad hae made nae mair o" him than of a bairn and a bawbee whistle. I defy him to hae played "Boot and saddle," or "Horse and away," or "Gallants, come trot," with me; he hadna the tones."
"But what is all this to old Lord Ravenswood, my friend?" said the Master, who, with an anxiety not unnatural in his circ.u.mstances, was desirous of prosecuting the musician"s first topic-"what had his memory to do with the degeneracy of the trumpet music?"
"Just this, sir," answered the s.e.xton, "that I lost my wind in his service. Ye see I was trumpeter at the castle, and had allowance for blawing at break of day, and at dinner time, and other whiles when there was company about, and it pleased my lord; and when he raised his militia to caper awa" to Bothwell Brig against the wrang-headed westland Whigs, I behoved, reason or name, to munt a horse and caper awa" wi" them."
"And very reasonable," said Ravenswood; "you were his servant and va.s.sal."
"Servitor, say ye?" replied the s.e.xton, "and so I was; but it was to blaw folk to their warm dinner, or at the warst to a decent kirkyard, and no to skirl them awa" to a bluidy braeside, where there was deil a bedral but the hooded craw. But bide ye, ye shall hear what cam o"t, and how far I am bund to be bedesman to the Ravenswoods. Till"t, ye see, we gaed on a braw simmer morning, twenty-fourth of June, saxteen hundred and se"enty-nine, of a" the days of the month and year-drums beat, guns rattled, horses kicked and trampled. Hackstoun of Rathillet keepit the brig wi" mustket and carabine and pike, sword and scythe for what I ken, and we hors.e.m.e.n were ordered down to cross at the ford,-I hate fords at a" times, let abee when there"s thousands of armed men on the other side. There was auld Ravenswood brandishing his Andrew Ferrara at the head, and crying to us to come and buckle to, as if we had been gaun to a fair; there was Caleb Balderstone, that is living yet, flourishing in the rear, and swearing Gog and Magog, he would put steel through the gus of ony man that turned bridle; there was young Allan Ravenswood, that was then Master, wi" a bended pistol in his hand-it was a mercy it gaed na aff!-crying to me, that had scarce as much wind left as serve the necessary purpose of my ain lungs, "Sound, you poltroon!-sound, you d.a.m.ned cowardly villain, or I will blow your brains out!" and, to be sure, I blew sic points of war that the scraugh of a clockin-hen was music to them."
"Well, sir, cut all this short," said Ravenswood.
"Short! I had like to hae been cut short mysell, in the flower of my youth, as Scripture says; and that"s the very thing that I compleen o". Weel! in to the water we behoved a" to splash, heels ower head, sit or fa"-ae horse driving on anither, as is the way of brute beasts, and riders that hae as little sense; the very bushes on the ither side were a-bleeze wi" the flashes of the Whig guns; and my horse had just taen the grund, when a blackavised westland carle-I wad mind the face o" him a hundred years yet-an ee like a wild falcon"s, and a beard as broad as my shovel-clapped the end o" his lang black gun within a quarter"s length of my lug! By the grace o" Mercy, the horse swarved round, and I fell aff at the tae side as the ball whistled by at the t.i.ther, and the fell auld lord took the Whig such a swauk wi" his broadsword that he made twa pieces o" his head, and down fell the lurdance wi" a" his bouk abune me."
"You were rather obliged to the old lord, I think," said Ravenswood.
"Was I? my sartie! first for bringing me into jeopardy, would I nould I, and then for whomling a chield on the tap o" me that dang the very wind out of my body? I hae been short-breathed ever since, and canna gang twenty yards without peghing like a miller"s aiver."
"You lost, then, your place as trumpeter?" said Ravenswood.
"Lost it! to be sure I lost it," replied the s.e.xton, "for I couldna hae played pew upon a dry hemlock; but I might hae dune weel eneugh, for I keepit the wage and the free house, and little to do but play on the fiddle to them, but for Allan, last Lord Ravenswood, that was far waur than ever his father was."
"What," said the Master, "did my father-I mean, did his father"s son-this last Lord Ravenswood, deprive you of what the bounty of his father allowed you?"
"Ay, troth did he," answered the old man; "for he loot his affairs gang to the dogs, and let in this Sir William Ashton on us, that will gie naething for naething, and just removed me and a" the puir creatures that had bite and soup at the castle, and a hole to put our heads in, when things were in the auld way."
"If Lord Ravenswood protected his people, my friend, while he had the means of doing so, I think they might spare his memory," replied the Master.
"Ye are welcome to your ain opinion, sir," said the s.e.xton; "but ye winna persuade me that he did his duty, either to himsell or to huz puir dependent creatures, in guiding us the gate he has done; he might hae gien us life-rent tacks of our bits o" houses and yards; and me, that"s an auld man, living in you miserable cabin, that"s fitter for the dead than the quick, and killed wi" rheumatise, and John Smith in my dainty bit mailing, and his window glazen, and a" because Ravenswood guided his gear like a fule!"
"It is but too true," said Ravenswood, conscience-struck; "the penalties of extravagance extend far beyond the prodigal"s own sufferings." "However," said the s.e.xton, "this young man Edgar is like to avenge my wrangs on the haill of his kindred." "Indeed?" said Ravenswood; "why should you suppose so?"
"They say he is about to marry the daughter of Leddy Ashton; and let her leddyship get his head ance under her oxter, and see you if she winna gie his neck a thraw. Sorra a bit, if I were him! Let her alane for hauding a"thing in het water that draws near her. Sae the warst wish I shall wish the lad is, that he may take his ain creditable gate o"t, and ally himsell wi" his father"s enemies, that have taken his broad lands and my bonny kail-yard from the lawful owners thereof."
Cervantes acutely remarks, that flattery is pleasing even from the mouth of a madman; and censure, as well as praise, often affects us, while we despise the opinions and motives on which it is founded and expressed. Ravenswood, abruptly reiterating his command that Alice"s funeral should be attended to, flung away from the s.e.xton, under the painful impression that the great as well as the small vulgar would think of his engagement with Lucy like this ignorant and selfish peasant.