the hill.
_Page 237._]
Lillyard's great beauty was well known throughout the district. "Fair
Maid Lillyard" had been the sobriquet ever since she had been a child.
There was something almost dazzling in her aspect to-day, as she stood
for a moment in the glory of the golden sunshine, and gazed across
towards where the sounds of clashing swords and the booming of guns told
her that the battle was raging; and then, with her light broadsword in
her hand, she made a forward dash, and was soon in full sight of the
fiercely fought fight.
The apparition of this fair girl, who was instantly recognised for her
beauty and peculiarly lofty bearing, dressed as a soldier, and with a
sword in her hand, evoked a yell of enthusiasm and joy from the whole of
the Scotch ranks. It seemed to the men almost as though some angelic
being had come down to their aid.
"Maid Lillyard! Maid Lillyard!" was the shout that went up; and when she
set herself in their ranks, and went charging down the hill to meet the
advance of the enemy, the fury of that charge was something so
tremendous, that the ranks of the English were split into a score of
scattered bodies, each flying back to the main body for safety, whilst
the victorious Scotch pursued them with shouts almost to their own camp.
Who can remember or describe the fierce joy, the fearful peril, the wild
exaltation of hand-to-hand fighting? Lillyard was in the thick of the
most furious onslaughts, on whatever part of the field they took place.
Attached to no company, under no authority, she seemed like a spirit of
the battle, free, and with a charmed life, as she hurried hither and
thither. All men saw her. A hundred voices testified to the prodigies
of valour she performed; but it was only after she had seen the dead
body of Alan Gordon lifted from beneath a pile of English corpses--men
that he had slain--that that Berserker fury fell upon Lillyard, which
has given her name to posterity, and caused the very name of the battle
of Ancram Moor to be more generally known as the battle of Lillyard's
Edge.
Was it her hand which slew the English leader, Evers, who perished on
that field? Many declared it was so; but whether or no this was the
case, there is no manner of doubt that Lillyard's strong right arm and
dauntless heart carried her through the fierce fight, and that she
inflicted her full share of death and wounds upon her country's foes.
As the tide of battle set in favour of the Scotch arms, numbers of those
who had borne the Red Cross, and had fought in the English ranks, tore
off their badges and went boldly over to the other side, seeing now
greater safety there than in the ranks of the alien conqueror.
Of these time-servers were Duncan and Gregory. The latter had little of
the soldier-nature in him, and had kept, as far as possible, out of the
thick of the fight; but when he saw the Scotch arms victorious all over
the field, he eagerly snatched off his badge, and made a dash for his
countrymen. He was hotly pursued by half a dozen enraged English
soldiers, but being fleet of foot, he might have escaped them had he not
caught his foot in what was nothing more nor less than a heap of slain
and wounded, and come heavily to the ground, yelling aloud in his
terror.
Suddenly he was aware of a great tumult close about him. He raised his
head and looked up. What strange vision was it that his eyes rested
upon?
A young lad, as it seemed to him for a moment, had raised himself
partially from the heap of dead and dying on which he lay. He seemed to
be too terribly wounded to stand; and yet, with his swinging sword, he
was keeping at bay the English soldiers who were in pursuit of Gregory;
and there was something so strange and unearthly in his aspect that the
men cried one to another:
"It is no human thing! It is some demon of the battle! I have heard that
a spirit is abroad in the Scotch camp to-day. Let us leave it and be
gone!"
They turned and fled, and the strange fighter, parting the mass of hair,
partly clotted with blood, that hid its face, looked full into Gregory's
eyes, whilst he shrank away, crying out in fear:
"It is Lillyard!--it is Lillyard!--or her wraith!"
She bent her clear, strange gaze upon him steadfastly.
"Not her wraith--yet, Gregory. Lillyard herself." The voice, though
quite steady, was very weak. "It is not always the woman who fears the
stress of the battle. Where wert thou when the fight was raging so
fiercely?"
She looked him over from head to foot, and half-unconsciously glanced
downwards at herself. The contrast was so marked that a glow of shame
flamed in Gregory's face. He cried eagerly:
"I have pulled off my Red Cross, Lillyard. I will fight now beside thee.
Thou shalt show me how to be brave!"
She gave him a long glance; a faint smile flickered over her face; then
her eyes grew dim, and a ghastly pallor overspread her face.
"I shall fight no more," she said, in labouring gasps. "Lay me beside
Alan. The battle-field was our marriage feast. Let our bridal bed be the
quiet graveyard."
With that she fell prone upon the heap of corpses where he had found
her, whence she had risen, though so mortally wounded, to beat off the
pursuing foes who else would have slain her brother.
She and Alan Gordon were laid side by side, and every honour of war was
paid to them.
MARGARET WILSON
It was ill work living in "the killing time"--as it was significantly
called--for those whose consciences would not let them conform to the
laws laid down by Charles II. and his advisers for the regulation of
public worship in Scotland.
Religious toleration was no longer to be permitted. The Episcopal form
of worship was to be made compulsory, and that amongst persons who hated
and abhorred it, looked upon it as something emanating more or less
directly from the Evil One, and who clung all the more closely to their
own barer forms of worship and narrow purity of doctrine for the very
opposition they had to encounter.
The Solemn League and Covenant had been formed for the protection of the
Presbyterian form of worship, and Covenanters was the name given to
those who continued to meet in the forbidden assemblies; and these were
often held in the open air, in some wild and lonely spot, the men
carrying weapons which were piled conveniently for instant use should an
alarm be issued by the scouts set to watch, the women seated nearest to
the preacher, and their horses picketed only a short distance off, so
that flight should be quick and easy if there were danger of
interruption from soldiers in the King's pay.
In those days it was no uncommon thing for houses and families to be
strangely and pitifully split up and divided into hostile camps; but
perhaps there were few instances so strange as that presented by the
Wilson family, of Wigton.
Wilson was a prosperous farmer, a Presbyterian by tradition, though no
theologian; but when the edicts went forth against the existing forms of
worship, and attendance at the parish church was enjoined, both he and
his wife made no trouble about conforming to the new regulations, though
whether this conformity came from liberality of mind or from fear of
consequences cannot now be determined.
But, to their great astonishment and dismay, their two little girls,
Margaret and Agnes, at that time quite children, could not be induced to
accompany their parents to the church. What they had heard against
Episcopal forms in old days seemed to have sunk so deeply into their
hearts and consciences that there was no way of eradicating it; and
great fear fell upon the parents, for the thing became known somewhat
far and wide, and began to excite comment and question.
"Where are the bairns?" asked the farmer, coming in one day, with a look
of anxiety upon his face.
"Nay, I know not," answered his wife. "They did their tasks, and then
they both slipped away. I have not seen them this two hours. Like enough
they have gone across to see Margaret M'Lauchlan. They are for ever
running in and out of her house, say and do what I will!"
"A pestilent woman! Covenanter to the backbone! She will bring herself
and our bairns to ruin if something be not done! Why do you not keep
them at home with you?"
"Why, husband, how can I be in three or four places at once? I give them
their tasks, but they do them with a will, and are gone ere I have time
to turn round."
"Ay, and are off to some Conventicle, I'll be bound. That woman
M'Lauchlan is in the thick of all the Covenanters' secrets; and it's
from her the bairns learn all those notions that will be their ruin one
of these days. The Bible bids children obey their parents, but not a
word will they hear from us! Or, rather, they listen, but will not
heed."
"Alack!--and so said I to them but the other day! and Margaret turned
upon me and answered: ''Ay, mither, children are bidden to obey their
parents in the Lord; but the Lord bids us not to sully our conscience by
doing what is wrong, or bowing the knee to Baal.' They get taught by
those who are good folks enough, but terrible stubborn, and wae's me,
but I can say nought, and so they get the last word every time;" and the
mother shook her head, for in her secret heart she was in far more
sympathy with her bairns than was the father, who was seriously
disturbed and anxious.
"They shall either learn to obey, or they must be sent away out of reach
of that pestilent woman!" he cried, storming up and down. "If they stay
here they will bring themselves to prison and death, and us into, I know
not what trouble! I'll be bound they are off to some preaching now! I
hear there is to be one somewhere hard by. But this shall be the last.
If they will not promise to attend church with us they must be sent
elsewhere. All the town begins to talk of it. Soon it will come to the
magistrate's ears, and then----"
The mother clasped her hands, and the tears started to her eyes.
"They are but bairns; they are not near sixteen yet--not even Margaret.
What could they do to them?"
"They will make them feel the hand of the law; ay, and us too, as thou
wilt plainly see! They talk about sixteen; but have not babes and
sucklings been slaughtered ere this by the ruthless soldiers?"
The mother wept, and the father stormed; but the hours passed on, and
the girls did not return. It was almost dark ere they entered the house;
and upon the fair face of the elder was a strange wrapt expression,
that her mother had noted there many times of late, and which always
filled her with a sense of awe.
She stood quietly beneath the storm of her father's anger; her deep blue
eyes seeming to see away beyond him. Agnes, a slighter dark-eyed child,
shrank away towards her mother, who could not repulse her; but Margaret
was calm and serene.
"Dear father, thou dost not understand," she said very softly at last,
when the storm had well-nigh spent itself; "perchance some day thine
eyes will be opened to see even as we do. But----"
The sentence was not destined to be finished; a breathless messenger
burst into the house, white-faced and wild-eyed. It was a tall lad, well
known to the Wilsons, and his name was Archie Scott.
"The magistrate is coming--fly!--fly!" he cried. "He is coming to seize
Margaret and Agnes. It has been told him how that they never come to
church; and to-day one brought word that they and others have been seen
at a forbidden gathering. The soldiers and officers are already started
forth to make a raid on all suspected houses. The girls must fly!--must
fly at once! I have come to take them to a place where others are hiding
for the moment. They have been preparing for this. They will not be
taken altogether unawares. But there is not a moment to lose!"
The mother had clasped Agnes in her arms, and her tears were streaming
down. The farmer was storming up and down in a tempest of fear and
anger--anger at the girls, at the law, at the barbarity of punishing
mere children--at everything and everybody. Margaret alone was calm; her
countenance had not changed.
"Let them come," she answered quietly, "men can only hurt our bodies.
None can touch our true selves. Why should we be afraid? Why should we
fly?"
But the mother rose and thrust the trembling Agnes into her sister's
arms.
"Save her! save her!" she sobbed. "It is thine example that hath led her
to this. To thee do I look to save her from the peril which now besets
her. If thou hast no thought or care for thine own life, save that of
thy sister!"
Margaret looked down at the little white tearful, and yet courageous,
face of her sister and companion, and the dreamy look passed from her
eyes, whilst her mouth grew resolute.
"Yes, yes," she cried, in a low voice, "they shall not touch Agnes! She
shall be saved. Lead on Archie, lead on! We will follow you to the
hiding place of which you spoke."
The youth was only too ready to obey; his own agitation was great.
Although not himself of the same way of thinking as the Covenanters, he
had the greatest reverence for their firmness and strong faith, and for
Margaret he entertained feelings which, as yet, were scarcely understood
by him, only it somehow seemed as though were he to lose her, life would
be changed for him.
Margaret was but fourteen years of age at this time, and Archie was not
twenty; but the girl had that within her and in her aspect, which made
it impossible to regard her as a child. When stories were told of the
virgin saints and martyrs of old, it was always Margaret's calm, sweet,
young face that rose up before the eyes of the lad, and her resolution
and courage in face of a threatened and fearful danger intensified this
impression.
As he hurried the girls along towards the place which he knew would be a
safe shelter for them and for others, and enable them to join with a
party of fugitives whose arrangements were all made, he strove to change
the purpose of Margaret, and to seek to win her promise to conform to
the laws of the land.
But she shook her head, and the glow in her eyes made them shine like
stars in the dusk.
"Nay, Archie, thou must not seek to turn me from the straight and narrow
way, even though it be a thorny one to tread! I ask not of thee to
follow it. If thou canst serve God and the King too, with a free heart
and conscience, then thank God for it, and dwell in peace and safety!
For myself I cannot. The Spirit hath shown me a more excellent way, and
I needs must follow at all cost. What are the trials and troubles and
sufferings of this present life when an eternity of glory lies beyond?
'To him that overcometh will I give----'"
She did not finish the sentence; her mind seemed to travel too swiftly
for words. Archie looked at her; and Agnes raised her white,
tear-stained face, and both felt that they were looking upon the face of
an angel.
* * * * *
The King was dead! The news had reached the north; and for a brief
moment the hand of the law was stayed. Persecution of Covenanters was
temporarily abandoned till the mind of the new monarch should be known.
There were those who shrewdly suspected that where Charles had chastised
with whips, James would chastise with scorpions; but for the moment the
country breathed again, and many hunted exiles and wanderers crept back
to their former homes, to visit their friends and see how they fared,
even if they did not mean to remain long.
Archie Scott was returning home from his work one evening, when he met
an acquaintance of his, a man for whom he entertained a feeling of deep
dislike and distrust, one Patrick Stuart, who seemed always remarkably
well informed as to what was in the wind, and to trim his sails
accordingly.
"Have ye seen them?" he asked of Archie, with a look of mystery on his
sly face.
"Seen whom, man?" asked the other impatiently.
"Why, those two girls of the Wilsons, who went into hiding four years
back--just escaping by the skin of their teeth! I saw the pair of them
not an hour since, down there with old Margaret M'Lauchlan! I peeped in
at the window, and saw them plain. A rare, fine girl Margaret has grown
too--such hair--such eyes! But she needn't think that her beauty will
save her, once the bloodhounds get on her track!" and an evil light
sprang into the man's shifty eyes, whilst Archie felt his fingers
tingling to be at his throat!
Patrick passed on, and the other looked after him; his heart was beating
high with excitement and a strange foreboding. He almost followed the
retreating figure, yet he knew not what to say. He had a premonition
that Patrick meant ill in some way, but he had nothing on which to base
his suspicions. And his heart felt suddenly hungry for Margaret. He
turned his back on the vanishing figure, and strode rapidly away towards
the lonely little house on the outskirts of the town where the old woman
lived.
The girl met him with the same calm sweetness of aspect. She had a
sister-like greeting for him; but he could scarcely stammer out the
words of welcome and greeting that he had been rehearsing so eloquently
all the while. There was something in her beauty, her purity of
expression, her deep dreamy eyes and steadfast glance that stirred his
heart to its depths, and yet left him tongue-tied before her.
She asked him if he thought their parents would receive them, and could
do so without peril to themselves. Archie replied that when their flight
four years ago had been discovered, the officers had forbidden the
parents upon pain of death ever to shelter or hold any communication
with their children again, and had, moreover, warned them that they must
instantly lodge information with the authorities, should they ever
discover their whereabouts.
"Poor mother!" said Margaret gently, when she heard these words. "How
she must have suffered! Now I understand why we never had news from her!
She was afraid of learning where we might be. Yet I would fain look upon
her face again!"
"Have a care, Margaret--have a care!" cried Archie entreatingly, "the
laws are yet unrepealed. There is nothing changed, and this breathing
space may not last long."
"I will not run into needless peril," answered Margaret; "yet why should
I so greatly fear? Is not God strong enough to protect His own, if it be
His will?--but if He desire to prove our love by something endured for
Him, shall we shrink back in the hour of temptation?"
When Archie came again the next evening, Margaret was not in the
cottage, and Agnes's face wore a frightened look.
"Archie, I am glad thou hast come! I have been so unhappy. Patrick
Stuart has been here. Tell me, is he one that we may safely trust? He
spoke like one full of sympathy with us and our sufferings and
wanderings; but at the last he pledged Margaret, and bid her drink to
the new King's health. When she would not, there crept an evil and
crafty look into his eyes. I have been so frightened since!"
Archie was frightened too, and asked where Margaret was.
"She has slipped out to take one look at mother and the old home, and,
perchance, to get speech of mother too. Old Margaret was to go and
whisper something to her, and perhaps--perhaps; but they would not let
me go; and something seems to tell me that danger is near. Oh, I wish
Margaret had not gone away! I am never frightened when I am with her;
but alone I am."
Archie was frightened himself. He felt perfectly certain that Patrick
had set a trap for the girls, and that already he might be on his way to
warn the authorities.
"Agnes," he said, "I would you had never come back. I would that you
would fly the place again. Ye are too well known here. Anywhere else
would be safer. I will remain with you till Margaret gets back; I will
tell her my fears. Then I would beg her to lose no time, but to fly this
very night to some place of greater safety."
But, alas!--already it was too late. Soon their straining ears caught
the sound of measured tramping. Agnes gave a faint cry, Archie sprang to
the door, and an oath leapt to his lips.
"They have got Margaret, and the old woman too! God in heaven have
mercy!--they are coming hither for thee, Agnes. Fly!--fly by yonder door
into the coppice behind! I will detain them by any story I can invent.
Fly ere it be too late!"
But the news of her sister's capture seemed suddenly to brace the nerves
of the younger girl. She darted out of the open door and flung herself
upon Margaret's neck--Margaret, who was being led along by the officers,
her hands bound behind her, though upon her beautiful face there was an
expression of almost ecstatic exaltation of spirit.
"Here is the third of them!" cried the men, as Agnes appeared; and,
ignoring Archie's indignant reproaches of cowardice and cruelty, they
bound her hands, and set her beside her sister, and drove them on
towards the Gaol of Wigton, as men drive cattle into market.
"Margaret! Margaret!" cried Archie, in an agony; but she turned and gave
him one of her deep spiritual glances.
"Pray for us, Archie, that our faith fail not; and remember that we are
bidden not to fear those who can hurt the body alone, but only him who
can destroy the soul. Fare you well!"
When next Archie saw again the fair face of Margaret Wilson, it was
when, after a very harsh and cruel captivity, that had left traces upon
her body, though none upon her courageous spirit, she was brought,
together with Agnes and the old woman, M'Lauchlan, before the
magistrates to answer to the charges laid against her and them.
They had refused attendance at church, it was alleged, had attended
forbidden meetings, had been amongst the rebels at the battle of
Bothwell Bridge; and the old woman had harboured fugitive Covenanters.
A faint smile played over Margaret's face as she heard some of the
indictment. She had been twelve years old and Agnes eight at the time of
the battle. They had been staying with relatives in the vicinity at that
date; but to be accounted as rebels!
For the rest she had nothing to say. She received instruction from those
who preached the pure word of God, and had followed the example of the
Lord, who, when threatened in one place, had quitted it for another, and
had addressed His followers in the open air or in secret assemblies, as
His followers of all centuries had been forced at times to do.
But there was no mercy in the faces of the men who sat in judgment, and
in whose hands were such terrible powers. The three women were
pronounced guilty, and were sentenced to death. And this was the doom
allotted to them: "To be tied to stakes fixed within the floodmark in
the water of Blednoch, near Wigton, where the sea flows at high water,
there to be drowned."
Margaret heard these words with a strange smile upon her lips, and a
great light came into her eyes. She stood for a moment as one who has a
vision of some unspeakable glory, vouchsafed to no eyes but her own. In
the dead hush of the court all glances were bent upon her, and suddenly
a storm of sobbing arose from the women present.
Margaret started from her dream, and looked round at the faces, some of
which had been familiar to her from childhood. Her lips moved, as though
she would have spoken; but she was hurried away to the rigors of prison;
whilst the whole town was thrown into a ferment of indignation and
distress, though none dared to raise a protest.
No fear was in Margaret's heart as those bright days of May sped by; and
she upheld the courage of her sister by her own tenderness and strength.
But the poor old woman, alone and broken in spirit, was induced to
promise that if her life were spared, she would abjure the principles of
the Covenant and attend the parish church in future.
When Margaret was told this, and that, if she would join in a similar
promise, her submission together with the strenuous efforts being made
by her father and friends, might avail to save her life, her face took a
grave and almost stern expression.
"Get thee behind me, Satan!" she exclaimed; and, clasping Agnes to her
breast, she cried: "My sister and I will lay down our lives for the
truth; but we will never, never consent to live by and for a lie!"
"Then your blood be upon your own heads!" cried the angry officer, as he
banged the door behind him.
The morning of the appointed day arrived. The sisters were calm and
strong in their resolution. Suddenly the door of their prison opened.
Was it the men come to lead them to the stakes in the stream? Agnes gave
a little cry of joy and amaze as she saw the white, worn face of her
father.