large amount of these is a possession to be boasted of. I know of a
linnet's nest, says one--and I of a robin's, says another--I of
shilfa's, says a third; but a fourth party comes in with his mavis, and
all competition is at an end. The mavis is indeed a Scottish
nightingale; he sings so mellow, and so varied--his brown spreckled
breast turned up to the rising or the setting sun, he pours o'er the
woodland a whole concert of harmony; and then he awakens into
competition the blackbird, with his AEolian whistle; the green and grey
linnet, with their sharp and sweet tweedle-twee; the goldfinch, with his
scarlet hood and song of flame; and the lark on the far-off fell, with
his minstrelsy of heaven's border. But what to a boy, a boy of eight or
nine, is all this song and sunshine, in comparison with the fact--"I
know of five birds' nests!" Why, this annunciation is enough to settle
your doom--you may almost apprehend assassination, so much must you be
envied. But true it is, and of verity; I once knew five birds'
nests--all containing eggs or young. Oh, I remember them as it were only
of yesterday. Time has only engraved, with a tool of adamant, the
impression deeper and deeper. There was the snug and pendulous abode of
the little kitty-wren. It was beneath the brow of the burn, covered over
from winds and rains by the incumbent bank and brushwood. It was a
plum-pudding, with a hole made by your thumb on one side; a stationary
football, composed of all things soft and comfortable, covered on the
outside with fog or moss, and in the inside lined with the down of
feathers; and there were from sixteen to twenty little blue _peas_ in
it; and the little hen sat on them daily, and opposed her little bill
vigorously to my intrusive finger. She was not afraid--not she! she
fought manfully, "_pro aris et focis_;" if not, as the Romans say,
"_manibus pedibusque_;" nor, as the savage Saxons say, "tooth and nail,"
nor, as the shepherd of Ettrick says, "knees and elbows an' a',"--still
she fought with the instruments with which nature had endowed her, with
her bill and her little claws, and she fought it most vigorously. O
Nature! thou art a fearful mystery of wisdom--thou makest the meekest
and most timid natures bold as lions when their progeny are concerned.
Look at the hen--poor chucky, that scrapes her pittance from the doorway
or dunghill, whom the veriest whelp which can bark and tumble over will
scare into wing and screech--put the hen on eggs, give her an infant
brood, show her danger from dog, man, bear, or lion--who's afraid? Not
she at least; she will dance on the nose of the mastiff, she will fly in
the face of humanity, whether in the shape of man, woman, boy, or child.
The warrior looks fierce in his regimentals and armour; but what cares
she for guns, bayonets, swords, and pistols? Not a peppercorn! Her young
ones are behind her, and she will meet the armed monster, with foot,
bill, wing, and with a fearful intonation of terrifying sounds. No
Highland regiment, even at Prestonpans, ever set up a more alarming
battle shout. She is never conquered--like Achilles, she is
"invincible;" but so soon as her progeny need no more her care or her
protection--so soon as they have been pecked into estrangement, and sent
to scrape and provide for themselves--she resumes all her mild and
feminine qualities--she is plain "chucky" again! The linnet's nest is
covered with scales of a silky whiteness--the fine thin _laminae_ which
cover the bark of the oak, of that very tree in the cleft of whose
branches her nursery is fixed. Inside of this little nicely-proportioned
cup, there are five beautifully-spotted eggs--a white ground with a grey
spot, flung over the whole shell with a most charming regularity. And
there is a nest in that stone wall which surrounds the plantation--it is
that of the stone-chatter--filthy, unsonsy bird, fit companion for the
yellow yeldring, which conceals her treasure 'neath a tuft of grass on
the bent, and is trodden under foot. They are both deserving of all
detestation; the one for drinking every May morning of the
devil's-blood, and the other for many an impertinent jest and chatter.
Let them perish in one day--let their eggs be blown, and hung up as
ornaments in strings along the brow of the household looking-glass, or
smashed to atoms by the stroke of an urchin previously blinded.
"For he ne'er would be true, she averred,
That would rob a poor bird."
It was whilst engaged in robbery of this kind, that I was first checked
by the tears and entreaties of Mary--of my dear cousin, Mary Morison.
Alas! poor Mary! thou wast mild, beautiful, kind, merciful; yet thy days
have been numbered, and thou art gone--
"Unde negant redire quenquam;"
and I, a lubber fiend in comparison with thy beauty and gentleness--I, a
personification of cruelty and horror in comparison with thee--I am
still alive, and thinking of thee--whilst thou art not even
_dust_--"_etiam periere ruinae_." Forty-five years confound even dust,
and reduce to a fearful nonentity all that smiled, and charmed, and
inspired. But of this enough--this way madness lies.
That was a terrible conflagration at Miramichi. I think I hear it
crashing, thundering, crackling on; before it the wild beasts, the
serpents, the cattle--man! poor, houseless, helpless, smoke-enveloped,
and perishing man. The reason why I can conceive so vividly of this
awful and comparatively recent visitation is this--I was accustomed to
"set muirburn" when a boy of nine or ten. The primeval heath of our
mountains was strong, bushy; and, when dry in spring, exceedingly
inflammable. I was a mountain child; for, on one side of my dwelling the
heather withered and bloomed up to the door; and when one thinks of the
"bonny blooming heather," it is quite refreshing; it blooms when all
things around it are withering, during the later months of harvest; but
then, oh, then, it puts on such a russet robe of beauty--a dark evening
cloud tipped and tinged with red--a mantle of black velvet spangled with
gold; and its fragrance is honey steeped in myrrh. Yet when withered in
March and April, it is an object of aversion to the sheep farmer, who
prefers green grass and tender sward; and he issues to impatient boyhood
the sentence of destruction. Peat follows peat, kindled at one end, and
held by the other; the hillside or the level muir swarm with matches;
carefully is the ignition communicated to the dry and widespread heath;
from spot to spot--in lines and in circles--it extends and unites--the
wind is up, and one continuous blaze is the almost immediate
consequence. It is night, dark night--the clouds above catch and reflect
the uncertain gleam. The heathfowl wing their terrified flight--through,
above, and beneath the rolling and outspreading smoke. The flame gathers
into a point; and, at the more advanced part of the curvature, the force
and blaze is terrible. A thousand tongues of fire shoot up into the
density, and immediately disappear. Who now so venturous as to dash
headlong through the hottest flame, and to recover from beneath the
choking night his former position? There goes--a hat--a cap--a bonnet!
They have taken up their position in the pathway of the devouring flood
of fire--and who so brave, so daring, as to extricate his own property
from instant destruction? Hurrah! hurrah! from a score of throats, mixes
with the thunder, the crackle, the roll--all is power, novelty, ecstasy;
bare heads and bare feet dance and show conspicuously upon the still
smoking turf. Here an adder is seen writhing and twisting in the agonies
of death. There a half-burned hat evinces the fun and the folly of its
owner. But, oh, horrible! what is that on the edge of vision, in the dim
and hazy distance; it comes forward, bounding, turning, and bellowing,
fearful and paralysing; it is the bull himself escaped from his fold,
and maddened by the smoke and blazing atmosphere. He comes down upon the
charge, tail erect, and head down, tossing all that is solid under his
feet, and looking through the scattered earth with eyes glaring as well
as reflecting fire. Achilles, Hector, Agamemnon, Wallace, Wellington,
never entered a field of battle with such a terrific presence. He seems
as if he had just escaped from a Roman or Spanish arena. He is
desperately infuriated; and woe be to him who shall be overtaken by this
muscular tornado in his weakness and his fears! We are off!
_diffugimus_! We are nowhere to be found. One has made for a distant
wall surrounding the heather park, and is in the act of climbing it. The
bull is in full chase, armed with two short but powerful horns. The
fugitive has just laid hold of an upper stone to assist his ascent; but
the faithless help has given way; stone and he are lying alongside of
the dyke. The bull is in full scent. The noise has directed him. He
nears--he nears--he nears! My God! the urchin's life is not worth two
minutes' purchase.
"Now, do thy speedy, Arnot Wull--
'Twill take it all to clear the bull!"
Bravo! the summit is gained; the feet of the pursued are seen flying in
mid air; he has sprung from the summit at least twenty feet; but the
whole weight of the pursuing brute is upon the crazy structure; it gives
way with a crash, and down rush stones over stones, and the poor maimed,
bruised brute over all. What! Mr. Bull! are you satisfied?--why not
continue the sport? But the game is up; Will has regained his mother's
dwelling, and now lives to record this wonderful, this all but
miraculous escape. Catch me setting muirburn again!
I was very unwilling, at the age of nine, to be sent to school--I had
formed for myself a home society with which I was perfectly satisfied;
but the decree had gone forth, and to school I must go, to learn Latin,
conducted by a scholar of some standing. I had three miles to walk, but
I would have wished them ten. Shakspeare shows the characters with whom
time gallops, and, amongst others, with a thief who is to be hanged on a
certain day--he might have mentioned a schoolboy, with shiny morning
face, going unwillingly to school. When I came within sight of the
large, many-windowed building, my heart beat sorely with alarm. All was
new to me--the boys, the masters, the house, the grounds around it; in
fact, I was about to pass into a new state of being. I was bursting the
shell, and coming forth into real life. Hitherto I had seen nobody but
the herd-callan, the Gibson family, my mother and _her_ aunts. I was
exceeding smart and mischievous, no doubt; but my sphere of operations
was confined; now it was about to be enlarged--I must face three hundred
boys and girls in the park or school play-ground of Wallacehall. All
eyes would be turned upon me; my very dress would undergo a scrutiny;
nor would I easily escape the seasoning welcome, a hearty drubbing: all
this I anticipated, and all this and more I soon experienced. When I
set up my face in the play-ground about half-past eight (nine being the
school hour), all was commotion. Alas! how many are now motionless who
were then active--_still_, who were then vociferous--_cold_, whose
hearts were then beating warm and buoyant! When the disk of my
countenance appeared at the entrance into the park or play-ground, I was
immediately smoked. One fellow came up with the most affected
good-nature, and hoped my _mither_ was with me. I would be in great
danger, he said, without her. A second one bid me tie my shoe, and,
whilst I was stooping, hauled me heels over head. I had not fairly
recovered my natural position, when I was hit on the side of my head
with a ball, till my eyes glanced fire; anon, the drive, the crowd, the
scramble carried me along with it completely off my feet. I was pelted,
bruised, buffeted, and even kicked. Human nature could stand it no
longer--my spirit, even that of the Devil, was awakened within me--I
struck out around me with all my might, and at random--somebody's nose
happened to come in the way of my knuckles, and it bled; he struck back
again, and the blood sprang from my lips. A ring was formed--to it we
went--I, running in upon him head and shoulders, "knees and elbows an'
a'," laid him flat; unfair play was proclaimed--my antagonist was
raised; but he was pale and breathless; he said he was _hearted_, and
had almost fainted; so I got a cheap victory, and eternal glory! I took
my place amongst the boys, unmolested and respected in future. I would
twaddle through a pretty decent volume, about public and private
education, and everybody but my bookseller would think I was speaking
sense; but I will spare my reader and myself, and only add, in one
sentence, that a public seminary, well conducted, is the best of all
schools _for the world_--preparation for the buffetings, kickings, and
jostlings of life.
THE SUICIDE'S GRAVE.
The suicide's grave--where is it? It is at the meeting or crossing of
three public roads; the body has been thrust down, under the darkness of
night, into a coffinless grave. The breast, formerly torn and lacerated
by passions, has lately been mangled into horrid deformity by the
pointed stake; and the traveller, as he walks, rides, or drives along,
regards the spot with an eye of suspicion, and blesses his stars that he
is a living man. The suicide's grave--where is it? On the bare and cold
top of that mountain which divides Lanark from Dumfriesshire. There you
may see congregated the hoody craw, and the grey gled, and the
eagle--but they are not congregated in peace and in friendship; they are
fearful rivals, and terrible notes do they utter as they contend over
the body of her who was fair, and innocent, and happy. Alas, for Alice
Lorimer! Her story is a sad one, and it would require the pen of a
Sterne or a Wilson to do it justice. But the circumstances are of
themselves so full of mournful interest, that, even though stated in the
most simple language, they cannot fail, I should think, to
interest--nay, I will say it at once, to excite sympathy and pity; for
why should we not pity the unhappy and unfortunate? They are pitied in
poverty, in obscurity, in sickness, in death. Why should not we even
pity the guilty and abandoned? They are pitied in prison, on the day of
trial, and, most of all, in the hour of execution. There--even there--on
that platform, the murderer himself obtains that sympathy which we
refuse to the suicide. He who has only ruined, destroyed himself, is
held in greater abhorrence than the man who has ruined innocence, and
even murdered the unhappy mother and unborn babe. Away with such unjust
and ungenerous distinctions! Away, and to the highway and to the
mountain top, and to the raven, and the falcon, and the eagle, with the
seducer and the murderer; and let the poor suicide's grave, in future,
be in consecrated ground, where remembrance may soon overlook his woes
and his very existence. Let him sleep unknowing and unknown in the
churchyard of his fathers. Alice Lorimer, I myself knew--I was
intimately acquainted with her--I was a companion and a favourite. In
frosty weather we have frequented the same slides, and, when Alice was
in danger of falling, I have caught her in my arms; we have hopped
together for hours, playing at beds, and I even made Alice privy to all
my birds' nests. Hers was indeed a playful, but a gentle nature. Her
heart was light, her voice clear and cheerful, and her whole affections
were engrossed by an only surviving parent, a widowed father. Alice was
his first-born and his last. Her mother had given her life at the
expense of her own; and her father, a shoemaker in the village of
Croalchapel, devoted his whole spare time to the education of Alice.
Often have I seen him, with the shoe on the last, and the elshun in his
hand, pursuing his daily labours; but listening attentively all the
while to Aly's readings. It was thus the child was taught to read the
Bible, to say her prayers, and ultimately to make her father's dinner
and her own. Their cottage stood at what was termed the "_head_ of the
town," on a sunny eminence looking to the west; behind it were the shade
and the shelter of many trees, of the widespread oak, the tall ash, and
the sweetly-scented birch. On Sabbath afternoons, John Lorimer might be
seen with his beloved child, clean and neatly dressed, ascending to the
top of the Bormoors braes; and, from the green summit of the eminence,
looking abroad over a landscape, certainly not surpassed by any which
has yet come under the writer's observation. On his one hand lay the
worn and silver-clasped Bible, from which portions of the gospels were
occasionally read, and on the other reposed Poodle, a little wire-haired
dog of uncommon natural parts, which had been greatly improved by
education. Poodle could bark, and do all manner of things. His eyes
would "glisten in friendship, or beam in reply." His nose was a
platform, from which many little pieces of bread had been tossed up into
the air, and afterwards snapped. He was all obedience to little Alice in
particular; and, at her bidding, would do anything but swim--he had,
somehow or other, contracted an aversion for the water, probably
referable to some mischievous boys having one day thrown him into
Closeburn Loch.
Alice and I went to school together. Her father's cottage lay directly
in my way, and I called daily for the sweet girl. The other boys laughed
at me, and made a fool of me, and asked me if I had seen Alice this
morning. I could not stand this; for I reverenced the little innocent
lamb--so I hit the Mr. Impertinence a blow in the stomach, which sent
him reeling over several benches. I was no more taunted about Alice
Lorimer. There were a number of older and less feminine girls at the
school at this time. At play-hours these congregated by themselves
behind the school, whilst the boys occupied the play-ground in front.
Alice was one day severely handled by a neighbour's daughter, who had
fixed a quarrel on her, and then beat her severely, calling her all
manner of names, and, amongst others, honouring her with my own. I found
the poor child--for I was a few years older--in tears, as we met in the
Castle-wood on our way home. It was with difficulty that I drew, bit by
bit, the whole truth from her; and I resolved to punish, in one way or
other, the rude and ill-hearted aggressor in this matter. I could not
think of punishing her myself; but I got Jean Watson, the servant-maid
of the factor's clerk--a kind of haverel, who sometimes threw me an
apple over the hedge in passing--I got her to catch the culprit after
dark, and to chastise her in her own way. I know not how it was
effected, but it produced loud screams, and much merriment to me; for I
was lying all the while _perdu_ on the other side of the hedge. Tibby
Murdoch was a most revengeful person--quite the antipodes to sweet Alice
Lorimer. She was the daughter of a quarryman, who had come, only a few
years before, to reside in the place, and work at the Laird of
Closeburn's lime-works. How difficult it is for poor blind mortals to
see the consequences of their actions! Had I then fully perceived what
this act of retaliation was to lead to--what dismal consequences were to
follow--I would rather have sunk at once into perdition than have been
concerned in the affair. Tibby Murdoch's father was a brutal and a
passionate man; and, understanding from his daughter how matters stood,
and that poor Alice Lorimer had been the cause of his daughter's
disaster, he left his work at mid-day, and, taking a horse-whip in his
hand, entered the shoemaker's shop, and not finding Alice, without more
ado, he proceeded to apply it to John Lorimer's shoulders. John Lorimer
was a little, but a strong and well-made man, and, though the other was
tall, bull-headed, and extremely athletic, John immediately threw aside
his instruments of labour, which he felt it was dangerous to use on the
occasion, and closed at once with the enemy. The struggle was severe;
but John Lorimer, having got a hold of Murdoch about the middle, fairly
lifted him off his feet, and dashed him down on the floor. Murdoch's
strength, however, was superior to John's; and he contrived to roll over
upon his enemy, and at last to thrust his head immediately under a
grate, which stood in a corner of the shop, containing live coals for
melting some rosin which was about to be used. The crucible, with the
melted and boiling rosin was upturned; and, unfortunately, the whole
contents were spread over John Lorimer's face. He was dreadfully burned;
but, what was worst of all, he lost the sight of one eye by the
accident, and was very materially injured in the other. On an
investigation by the proper authorities, Murdoch was convicted of the
assault, and imprisoned for twelve calendar months. During his
imprisonment, revenge upon poor Lorimer was his constant theme; and,
when the time expired, he removed to the parish of Keir, and found
employment in a lime-work belonging to Dr. Hunter of Barjarg. He was
still, unfortunately, within an hour's walk of Croalchapel, and lay,
like a cat in a corner, watching his prey. In the meantime, John
Lorimer, though greatly deformed in his countenance, recovered the use
of one eye, and pursued his quiet and useful labour as formerly. As his
daughter Alice advanced in years, she grew in loveliness and virtue. At
twelve years of age she became her father's housekeeper; and conducted
herself in that capacity with surprising sense and prudence. It was at
this time that I left school for college; and I spent the last night
with Alice Lorimer. I was then a lad of sixteen, and she, as I have
said, was twelve. What had I to do in the Castle-wood, by moonlight, and
late after her father had gone to rest, with Alice Lorimer! Gentle
reader, have a little patience, and exercise a little Christian charity,
and, upon my honour, I will tell you all! But, in the first place, I
must know your sex, and whether or not you have ever been sixteen years
old. If your sex corresponds with my own, and your information on the
other subject is equal to my own, then you will understand the thing
completely. I was then as innocent as it is possible for a youth of
sixteen to be; nay, I was absolutely shy and bashful to a great degree,
and would have shrunk from any advances, even to innocent familiarity,
with the other sex. But I was not in love with Alice Lorimer. True, she
preferred my company to that of any other person, save her
dearly-beloved father; true, she sat on my knee, as she did on that of
her parent, unconscious of any different feeling in the two positions;
but we never talked of love; I would as soon have thought of talking of
our being king and queen; and as to Alice, her friendship for me was as
pure as the love of angels. She could not think of parting with me--of
perhaps (and she burst into tears) never seeing me again. I must write
to her--and I must come back and see her, and talk funnily to her
father, who liked a joke--and I must--I forget how many "musts" there
were; but they lasted till half-past one o'clock. I parted with her at
her father's door. I never saw her again!