THE DAFT DAYS
We came back to Scotland in July, 1786, and one day, late in the month,
Nancy came in to tell me that she intended having a birthday party that
same evening.
"Whose?" said I.
"Mine," she answered.
"It's all very well, but your birthday is not in July----"
"I never fancied March to be born in," she replied imperturbably, "and
I've changed it."
"And who are you going to bid to the feast of your adopted birthday?"
"You," she said, "and Sandy, and Jamie Henderlin, for he's back from
Germany, and I want to hear him play."[3]
[3] After Jamie Henderlin became famous for his violin playing it
was noised abroad that I alone was his patron. But the truth of
the matter is that Sandy shared with me the expense of his German
studies.
It is altogether hopeless to set in cold words the charm of her as she
stood before me that morning in her white frock, her hair in a bunch of
curls on top of her head and some posies in her hand. I have seen many
pretty women in my time, some few handsome ones, but Nancy Stair is the
only one I ever saw who deserved to be described as beautiful. The
fashion-prints of the day were full of her, and I have one account
before me, printed at the very time of which I write, 1786:
"Miss Stair," it reads, "is just back from London, where for two years
she has studied her voice with Trebillini.
"Her beauty is bewildering; her gowns the acme of elegance and feminine
grace; her wit, her eyes, her lips, the toast of the town. Her songs, a
second printing of which is being clamored for, are being read over the
Three Kingdoms, with a letter from his Royal Majesty, George III, on
the fly-leaf commending them. When it is known that she is to attend
service at St. Giles the clubs are emptied and half the beaux of the
town may be found on their knees where they can have a view of her. The
greatest statesmen and lawyers of the day are her intimate friends, and
the crowds follow her in admiration when she drives through the
streets."
A good picture, but scant, for there is not a word in it of her heart,
the kindest and bravest that ever beat in woman's breast, nor her great
love and tenderness to all created things.
On the afternoon of this dinner I fixed my mind definitely upon a
matter upon which I had been pondering for some time. Coming in from
the bank about five, I called Nancy to me, and handed her the box I
carried.
"Is it a present for me?" she asked, her face aglow.
"A present for you, Little Flower, from the proudest father in the
world."
As I spoke she opened the casket and her eyes fell on the gems of which
I have already written--the ornaments of the ladies of Stair for
hundreds of years gone by--but for none, save one, so fair as she. I
would have sold Stair itself, if need be, to give her such joy. The
emerald necklace, which had been a year in the making, a brooch of the
same stones, with diamonds glittering in flower clusters, I found, were
the ones she liked the best, and she brought a mirror to sit beside me
as she tried them all, one by one, upon her hair, her neck, and arms,
demanding that Dame Dickenson and Huey be brought to look at her.
And a curious thing fell, that, as she was engaged with the jewels, a
note was brought from Mr. Pitcairn, which she read without interest,
saying after;
"Does he think I care anything about 'Lorimer _vs._ The Crown' with a
necklace like this?" and I fell to wondering, with some dismay, what
Hugh would think concerning her masculine mind if he had heard the
speech.
We were awaiting a summons to the meal that evening when Nancy entered;
a new Nancy, and one so wondrous to behold that Sandy and I started at
the sight of her. She wore a gown of yellow crêpe embroidered in gold,
low and sleeveless, with a fold in the back, after the fashion of the
ladies of Watteau, and a long train falling far behind. Her hair was
gathered high and dressed with jewels which sparkled as well upon her
throat and hands. The thing that marked her most, an alluring
touchableness, was doubly present as she came toward us, laughing, with
a profound courtesy.
"My Lord Stair and Mr. Carmichael, you who have had the raising of me,
how do you like the work of your hands?"
"Ye can not throw us off our guard by braw clothes, Lady," Sandy
responded, with a laugh, "for we know you only too well, and to our
distress of mind and pocket. Ye're a spoiled bit, in spite of the
severe discipline your father and I have reared ye by. Here's a thing I
got from a peddler-body for ye," he ended.
She opened the morocco case which he handed her, to find a necklet of
pearls with diamonds clasping them, and the tears came into her eyes as
she kissed him for the gift.
"I can not thank ye enough!--never, in all my life--for all ye've done
for me, Sandy. I love you," she says, "and well you know it; and with
that we'll go to dinner. I go with Jamie," she added, slipping her arm
through his, "for ye must learn that genius ever goes before wealth and
titles," and with a laugh she and Jamie Henderlin went out before us.
After dinner we sat outside for a while, Sandy and I smoking, as Nancy
and Jamie talked of the outer world and the celebrities of London and
Paris. The lamps from the little settlement on the burn twinkled
through the trees, while farther off the lights from the town of
Edinburgh shone soft and silvery beneath the glimmering moon. We could
hear the bleating of the sheep and the lowing of the cows in the long
lane down by the Holm and the bells of the old Tron deaving our ears by
striking the hour of eight.
There is little use, with Jamie playing to the greatest people of the
world at the moment of my writing, for me to tell the surprise and
delight we had in his music; or the new joy that Sandy felt in Nancy's
singing, it being the first time he had heard her voice for over two
years.
"Do you want to hear some of my own verses?" she asked him at length.
"Mr. Thomson has been kind enough to set some of them to music." And
then she sang, for the first time to my hearing, those two songs of
hers which were afterward whistled, sung, hummed, or shouted by every
one in Scotland, from the judge on the bench to the caddie on the
streets:
Soutar Sandy,
Wed wi' Mandy
On a Monday morning,
and the set of three double verses, since published in the Glasgow
Sentinel, "The Maid wi' the Wistfu' Eye,"[4] which, as I hope for
Heaven, Rab Burns told me one night at Creech's he envied her for
having written.
[4] Poems by Nancy Stair, Pailey Edition, pages 44, 67.
Suddenly, as she was looking over the music, she began to hum, and Dame
Dickenson and I exchanged a look of strange remembrance, as, with no
accompaniment whatever, and as though the thought had just seized her,
she poured forth her soul and her voice together in that old gipsy
tune--Marian's song, as I have always called it:
"Love that is life
Love that is death,
Love that is mine--"
changed at the last into:
"Love that is wrong,
Love that is strong,
Love that is death--"
and as we listened, taken out of ourselves by her beauty and the
tragedy of her voice, a figure came from the gloom into the light of
the doorway, and a gay voice cried:
"Shall I be arrested for trespass, Lord Stair?" and to our amazement
Danvers Carmichael stood before us.
I had never seen the lad since the day it was determined to make an
Oxford man of him, instead of following out his father's wishes and
fetching him home to our own University, and the surprise I felt at
sight of him, a grown man and a monstrous fine one, gave me something
of a jolt in my mind at the rapid passing of the years.
He was tall and handsome, with bright, brave ways, a distinguished
carriage, and a delightful speaking voice. His face was clean shaven,
showing a chin heavy but with fine lines, and lips which curved back
complacently over teeth of singular whiteness. His mouth denoted pride
as well as obstinacy, which, taken with the brooding look in the eye,
gave me the impression of a nature both jealous and passionate. One of
his greatest charms, and I felt it on the instant of our meeting, was a
gay but unassertive manner, possible only to those who have had a
secured position from birth. I noted as well a fine sense in his
relation to others, and believe that if he had come a-begging we would
have known him to be gently born. He wore high boots, a broad hat, and
a handsome riding suit of light cloth, with a cloak hanging from one
shoulder. He carried himself with jauntiness and surety; gave one's
hand a hearty grip, and, to sum it all up, was one of the finest men I
have ever seen, and a son of whom even Sandy Carmichael had a right to
be proud, in spite of the fact that he was a man of fashion and
something of a dandy. He had as well a certain romantic appearance and
a glance which made young girls drop their eyes before him and set old
ladies to talking of their first loves.
"When Dand Carmichael goes up High Street I never saw a woman looking
down it," Bob Blake said of him once, which sums it all up very well.
Upon being asked by his father as to the suddenness of his appearance
among us, he said with a laugh:
"I came with some men to Leith, and the Leith fly set me down at the
door of The Star and Garter by the Tron church about an hour ago. I
asked mine host of the inn if I could get a horse from him to ride to
Arran House; upon which he told me that there would be no use in my
going to Arran as Mr. Carmichael was from home, being bid to dinner at
Lord Stair's; that it was the eighteenth birthday of Mistress Nancy
Stair, and that Jamie Henderlin had come from Germany with his violin
the week before and was to play at Stair House after the dinner; that
the Lord Stair, who was a fond father, had but this afternoon given the
family jewels to Mistress Nancy, and that one ruby alone would buy the
inn; that Mr. Carmichael had brought a present for her of a pearl
necklace with diamonds in it of great value; that Mistress Nancy Stair,
who was the handsomest girl in three kingdoms, had a yellow gown, a
great deal of which lay on the floor, the stuff of which he understood
had come from France; that Dame Dickenson had made a birthday cake, and
there was a salmon for the dinner with egg sauce, and that eggs were
uncommon high and the tax on whisky a thing not to be borne. There were
some other trifling details he mentioned," he said with a wave of his
hand and a laugh, "which have unfortunately escaped my memory."
There was much real humor in his relation of the inn gossip, and the
brightness of his presence caused a gayer air to our small festivity.
Our talk brought Nancy to the door, where she stood in a shaft of light
looking down at us.
"What are you laughing about?" she cried.
At the sound of her voice Danvers sprang to his feet and went toward
her with outstretched hand, but at the sight of her beauty or her
jewels, I know not which, he changed his mind and made a sweeping bow
instead.
"And this," he said, "is the Miss Nancy of whom I have heard so
much----"
"Sandy's apt to mention me," she answered demurely.
"He never did you justice," he responded, with a smile toward his
father. "In all but this he's the best parent in the world, but he's
fallen short in the matter of letting me know about you."
"If ye'd stayed in ye're own country ye'd have known," retorted Sandy,
from behind his pipe.
"I have been away too long," Dand answered him, but the look was at
Nancy.
"Do you stay now?" she asked.
"I had intended to go back at the end of the week, but I have changed
my mind. With my father's leave, I'll spend the summer----"
"It does not take you long to change your mind," Nancy returned with a
smile.
"No," he said, and here he leaned forward, took her hand and kissed it.
"No! It took me just one second."
I knew that she was not to be moved by any admiration which happened to
come by. She paid a gracious attention to Danvers Carmichael, it is
true, insisting, though he stoutly affirmed to the contrary, that she
knew him to be hungry, that one could not _dine_ at The Star and
Garter, ordering a small table with some cold fowl and a bottle of wine
for him, all as though it were the thing nearest her heart. I, who knew
her, understood that if it had been a tramp body from the lowlands who
had come upon us she would have given the same thought to him and
forgotten him by morning; but to a man, London bred and unaware as yet
with whom his dealings lay, her solicitude for him might readily be
interpreted as having something more purely personal in its nature.
And this day was to be marked by another event than the home-coming of
Danvers; an event which, if it had occurred six weeks later, might have
changed the destiny of many lives, and given England another Premier
than William Pitt. Before we parted for the night, Danvers took from
his pocket a book, which he handed to Nancy with a bow.
"It's not family jewels; nor yet a trifling necklace of pearls; nor can
I honestly affirm it was intended as a gift, but if you will accept it
from me as a birthday token it will make me very glad," and he handed
the volume to her.
"Poetry," she said with a pleased smile, "and in the Scot. Robert
Burns! Is he a new man?"
"He's a plowman in Ayr, somewhere, and I have it that his verses are
something fine. I've not read them myself, and the thought comes to me
a little late that they may not be the fittest reading for a young
lady, but your father will judge of it for you."
Sandy and I laughed aloud at this.
"The reason these ill-natured gentlemen laughed at you as they did was
because of the lax way they have brought me up," Nancy explained.
"They've let me 'gang my ain gate' since I was five. I've had no right
raising," she said, and the very sweetness of her as she said it would
have made any man keen for the rearing which produced her. "So,
considering my superior knowledge of evil, I'll look the book over
myself and see if it is the kind of reading I should like to put in the
hands of Sandy and Jock."
Danvers Carmichael's eyes glowed with humor as he joined in the laugh
with us.
"Under your careful bringing up they should be fine fellows, these
fathers of ours," he laughed.
"I've done the best I could by them," Nancy answered demurely; "but on
the whole, Mr. Carmichael, I think I have succeeded better with Jamie
Henderlin."
When Nancy withdrew, Danvers went with her to the foot of the stairs,
holding her in talk for a few minutes, with looks of passionate
approval in his eyes.
Before we went to our rooms, for I insisted that they should remain all
night at Stair, the talk turned upon marriage in some way, and Sandy
rallied his son upon his bachelorhood.
"Twenty-four years old," he said, "and a bachelor still! Why, I was a
father at that time. Never mind," he continued, "never mind, my lad.
Your time is coming!"
"In truth, I think it has come," Danvers returned, simply, and the
glance that went with the words was not toward his father, but toward
me.
I was lying in my bed with eyes staring wide at the ceiling, recalling
Nancy's real birthday more than eighteen years gone by; thinking of
Marian; wondering if she knew the beauty of the child we had; demanding
from the Great Father of all that she should know--should remember
Nancy and me; that she, the mother and wife, might, in some way unknown
to us, still be a part of our earthly living; recalling Danvers with
approval, dreaming perhaps that Nancy and he, at no far date, might
marry and so cement a friendship between two middle-aged gentlemen who
had foregathered with each other many years before, when I heard a
light tap at my door.
"Who is it?" I cried.
"It's Nancy," answered the voice. "May I come in?"
She pushed the door ajar and entered in a long white dressing-gown,
carrying in one hand a branch of candles and in the other a book, with
her finger marking the place.
It is exceedingly hard for me to describe the beauty of her, the
uplifted look on her face and the shine of her eye, for this beauty
seemed kindled by a fire from within, and she had with it an excitement
as of one who had heard pleasant news or to whom great treasures have
just been given.
"Jock," she asked, "have you been sleeping?"
"No," said I.
"Oh, listen then," she cried, "for indeed it was not possible that I
should sleep without telling you what's come to me. It's this Burns
man," she went on; "no one, not even Shakespeare, has spoken so. It's
as though he taught a new religion. It's kindness all through, and
charity and love; with rhymes upon rhymes, as if it were child's play
for him to make verses. It's raised me out of myself. It's what I've
always known was true. It's the liberty, equality, and fraternity of
France. It's the 'all men were born free and equal' of the colonies.
It's all, and more, that I've tried to work out on the burn-side. It's
like a great voice calling. Oh," she cried, "Ramsay's nothing to him,
and Fergusson but a gusty child."
"Nancy, darling," I said, "have ye risen in the middle of the night to
tear down the idols of your childhood? Let me see the book," I cried,
for a bit of rhyme was a choicer draught to me than a glass of an old
vintage.
"Let me read ye this," she said--I can remember now the slant white
light of a late moon coming in through the casement, the honeysuckle's
breath, and her face, half in light, half in shadow, as she read the
Epistle to Davie. As I listened I sat upright, more engrossed, wider
eyed; and when she came to those two stanzas, the greatest of their
kind ever penned, I was off my feet with her, and on my oath we sat
till the purpling flush came in the east, in an ecstasy of appreciation
of him "who walked in glory and in joy behind his plow upon the
mountain-side":
"What tho', like commoners of air,
We wander out, we know not where,
_But_ either house or hall _without_
Yet nature's charms, the hills and woods,
The sweeping vales, an' foaming floods
Are free alike to all
In days when daisies deck the ground,
And blackbirds whistle clear,
With honest joy our hearts will bound,
To see the coming year:
On _braes_ when we please then, _heights_.
We'll sit an' _sowth_ a tune; _whistle softly_
_Syne_ rhyme till't, we'll
time _till't_, _afterwards. to it._
An' sing't when we hae done."
"Oh, Jock," she says, "I've done it often; haven't you?"
"It's no in titles nor in rank;
It's no in wealth like Lon'non bank.
To purchase peace and rest;
It's no in makin' muckle mair
It's no in books, it's no in _lear_ _learning_
To make us truly blest:
If happiness hae not her seat
An' centre in the breast,
We may be wise, or rich, or great,
But never can be blest;
Nae treasures nor pleasures
Could make us happy lang;
The heart ay's the part ay
That makes us right or wrang."
--BURNS, 1785.
"It's just grand," I said, "Nancy; and there're no two ways of it."
"There's about all there is of life in this little book, and it's made
my rhyming-ware cheap. Do you think," she says, coming over to kiss me
before I sent her off to bed, "do you think I can ever meet wi' Mr.
Burns?"
"If you want it, you shall," I said; "unless the man himself objects.
We'll have him up to Stair; and now forget him and get some rest,
Little Flower."
She went away and left me, and I turned to sleep with that great
couplet going over and over in my head like the clatter of horses'
hoofs:
"The heart ay's the part ay
That makes us right or wrong."