overthrew the falconer into the cistern in which water was kept for
the benefit of the hawks. Up started Adam Woodcock, his wrath no way
appeased by the cold immersion, and seizing on a truncheon which stood
by, would have soon requited the injury he had received, had not Roland
laid his hand on his poniard, and sworn by all that was sacred, that
if he offered a stroke towards him, he would sheath the blade in his
bowels. The noise was now so great, that more than one of the household
came in, and amongst others the major-domo, a grave personage, already
mentioned, whose gold chain and white wand intimated his authority.
At the appearance of this dignitary, the strife was for the present
appeased. He embraced, however, so favourable an opportunity, to read
Roland Graeme a shrewd lecture on the impropriety of his deportment to
his fellow-menials, and to assure him, that, should he communicate this
fray to his master, (who, though now on one of his frequent expeditions,
was speedily expected to return,) which but for respect to his Lady he
would most certainly do, the residence of the culprit in the Castle of
Avenel would be but of brief duration. “But, however,” added the prudent
master of the household, “I will report the matter first to my Lady.”
“Very just, very right, Master Wingate,” exclaimed several voices
together; “my Lady will consider if daggers, are to be drawn on us for
every idle word, and whether we are to live in a well-ordered household,
where there is the fear of God, or amidst drawn dirks and sharp knives.”
The object of this general resentment darted an angry glance around him,
and suppressing with difficulty the desire which urged him to reply
in furious or in contemptuous language, returned his dagger into his
scabbard, looked disdainfully around upon the assembled menials, turned
short upon his heel, and pushing aside those who stood betwixt him and
the door, left the apartment.
“This will be no tree for my nest,” said the falconer, “if this
cock-sparrow is to crow over us as he seems to do.”
“He struck me with his switch yesterday,” said one of the grooms,
“because the tail of his worship's gelding was not trimmed altogether so
as suited his humour.”
“And I promise you,” said the laundress, “my young master will stick
nothing to call an honest woman slut and quean, if there be but a speck
of soot upon his band-collar.”
“If Master Wingate do not his errand to my Lady,” was the general
result, “there will be no tarrying in the same house with Roland
Graeme.”
The master of the household heard them all for some time, and then,
motioning for universal silence, he addressed them with all the
dignity of Malvolio himself.--“My masters,--not forgetting you, my
mistresses,--do not think the worse of me that I proceed with as much
care as haste in this matter. Our master is a gallant knight, and will
have his sway at home and abroad, in wood and field, in hall and bower,
as the saying is. Our Lady, my benison upon her, is also a noble person
of long descent, and rightful heir of this place and barony, and she
also loves her will; as for that matter, show me the woman who doth
not. Now, she hath favoured, doth favour, and will favour, this
jack-an-ape,--for what good part about him I know not, save that as one
noble lady will love a messan dog, and another a screaming popinjay,
and a third a Barbary ape, so doth it please our noble dame to set her
affections upon this stray elf of a page, for nought that I can think
of, save that she--was the cause of his being saved (the more's the
pity) from drowning.” And here Master Wingate made a pause.
“I would have been his caution for a gray groat against salt water or
fresh,” said Roland's adversary, the falconer; “marry, if he crack not a
rope for stabbing or for snatching, I will be content never to hood hawk
again.”
“Peace, Adam Woodcock,” said Wingate, waving his hand; “I prithee, peace
man--Now, my Lady liking this springald, as aforesaid, differs therein
from my Lord, who loves never a bone in his skin. Now, is it for me to
stir up strife betwixt them, and put as'twere my finger betwixt the bark
and the tree, on account of a pragmatical youngster, whom, nevertheless,
I would willingly see whipped forth of the barony? Have patience, and
this boil will break without our meddling. I have been in service since
I wore a beard on my chin, till now that that beard is turned gray, and
I have seldom known any one better themselves, even by taking the lady's
part against the lord's; but never one who did not dirk himself, if he
took the lord's against the lady's.”
“And so,” said Lilias, “we are to be crowed over, every one of us, men
and women, cock and hen, by this little upstart?--I will try titles with
him first, I promise you.--I fancy, Master Wingate, for as wise as you
look, you will be pleased to tell what you have seen to-day, if my lady
commands you?”
“To speak the truth when my lady commands me,” answered the prudential
major-domo, “is in some measure my duty, Mistress Lilias; always
providing for and excepting those cases in which it cannot be
spoken without breeding mischief and inconvenience to myself or my
fellow-servants; for the tongue of a tale-bearer breaketh bones as well
as Jeddart-staff.” [Footnote: A species of battle-axe, so called as
being in especial use in that ancient burgh, whose armorial bearing
still represent an armed horseman brandishing such a weapon.]
“But this imp of Satan is none of your friends or fellow-servants,” said
Lilias; “and I trust you mean not to stand up for him against the whole
family besides?”
“Credit me, Mrs. Lilias,” replied the senior, “should I see the time
fitting, I would, with right good-will give him a lick with the rough
side of my tongue.”
“Enough said, Master Wingate,” answered Lilias; “then trust me his song
shall soon be laid. If my mistress does not ask me what is the matter
below stairs before she be ten minutes of time older, she is no born
woman, and my name is not Lilias Bradbourne.”
In pursuance of her plan, Mistress Lilias failed not to present herself
before her mistress with all the exterior of one who is possessed of
an important secret,--that is, she had the corners of her mouth turned
down, her eyes raised up, her lips pressed as fast together as if they
had been sewed up, to prevent her babbling, and an air of prim mystical
importance diffused over her whole person and demeanour, which seemed to
intimate, “I know something which I am resolved not to tell you!”
Lilias had rightly read her mistress's temper, who, wise and good as
she was, was yet a daughter of grandame Eve, and could not witness this
mysterious bearing on the part of her waiting-woman without longing to
ascertain the secret cause. For a space, Mrs. Lilias was obdurate to all
inquiries, sighed, turned her eyes up higher yet to heaven, hoped for
the best, but had nothing particular to communicate. All this, as was
most natural and proper, only stimulated the Lady's curiosity;
neither was her importunity to be parried with,--“Thank God, I am no
makebate--no tale-bearer,--thank God, I never envied any one's favour,
or was anxious to propale their misdemeanour-only, thank God, there has
been no bloodshed and murder in the house--that is all.”
“Bloodshed and murder!” exclaimed the Lady, “what does the quean
mean?--if you speak not plain out, you shall have something you will
scarce be thankful for.”
“Nay, my Lady,” answered Lilias, eager to disburden her mind, or, in,
Chaucer's phrase, to “unbuckle her mail,” “if you bid me speak out
the truth, you must not be moved with what might displease you--Roland
Graeme has dirked Adam Woodstock--that is all.”
“Good Heaven!” said the Lady, turning pale as ashes, “is the man slain?”
“No, madam,” replied Lilias, “but slain he would have been, if there
had not been ready help; but may be, it is your Ladyship's pleasure that
this young esquire shall poniard the servants, as well as switch and
baton them.”
“Go to, minion,” said the Lady, “you are saucy-tell the master of the
household to attend me instantly.”
Lilias hastened to seek out Mr. Wingate, and hurry him to his lady's
presence, speaking as a word in season to him on the way, “I have set
the stone a-trowling, look that you do not let it stand still.”
The steward, too prudential a person to commit himself otherwise,
answered by a sly look and a nod of intelligence, and presently after
stood in the presence of the Lady of Avenel, with a look of great
respect for his lady, partly real, partly affected, and an air of great
sagacity, which inferred no ordinary conceit of himself.
“How is this, Wingate,” said the Lady, “and what rule do you keep in the
castle, that the domestics of Sir Halbert Glendinning draw the dagger on
each other, as in a cavern of thieves and murderers?--is the wounded man
much hurt? and what--what hath become of the unhappy boy?”
“There is no one wounded as yet, madam,” replied he of the golden chain;
“it passes my poor skill to say how many may be wounded before Pasche,
[Footnote: Easter.] if some rule be not taken with this youth--not but
the youth is a fair youth,” he added, correcting himself, “and able at
his exercise; but somewhat too ready with the ends of his fingers, the
butt of his riding-switch, and the point of his dagger.”
“And whose fault is that,” said the Lady, “but yours, who should have
taught him better discipline, than to brawl or to draw his dagger.”
“If it please your Ladyship so to impose the blame on me,” answered the
steward, “it is my part, doubtless, to bear it--only I submit to your
consideration, that unless I nailed his weapon to the scabbard, I could
no more keep it still, than I could fix quicksilver, which defied even
the skill of Raymond Lullius.”
“Tell me not of Raymond Lullius,” said the Lady, losing patience, “but
send me the chaplain hither. You grow all of you too wise for me, during
your lord's long and repeated absences. I would to God his affairs would
permit him to remain at home and rule his own household, for it passes
my wit and skill!”
“God forbid, my Lady!” said the old domestic, “that you should sincerely
think what you are now pleased to say: your old servants might well
hope, that after so many years' duty, you would do their service more
justice than to distrust their gray hairs, because they cannot rule the
peevish humour of a green head, which the owner carries, it may be, a
brace of inches higher than becomes him.”
“Leave me,” said the Lady; “Sir Halbert's return must now be expected
daily, and he will look into these matters himself--leave me, I say,
Wingate, without saying more of it. I know you are honest, and I believe
the boy is petulant; and yet I think it is my favour which hath set all
of you against him.”
The steward bowed and retired, after having been silenced in a second
attempt to explain the motives on which he acted.
The chaplain arrived; but neither from him did the Lady receive much
comfort. On the contrary, she found him disposed, in plain terms, to
lay to the door of her indulgence all the disturbances which the fiery
temper of Roland Graeme had already occasioned, or might hereafter
occasion, in the family. “I would,” he said, “honoured Lady, that you
had deigned to be ruled by me in the outset of this matter, sith it is
easy to stem evil in the fountain, but hard to struggle against it in
the stream. You, honoured madam, (a word which I do not use according to
the vain forms of this world, but because I have ever loved and honoured
you as an honourable and elect lady,)--you, I say, madam, have been
pleased, contrary to my poor but earnest counsel, to raise this boy from
his station, into one approaching to your own.”
“What mean you, reverend sir?” said the Lady; “I have made this youth
a page--is there aught in my doing so that does not become my character
and quality?”
“I dispute not, madam,” said the pertinacious preacher, “your benevolent
purpose in taking charge of this youth, or your title to give him this
idle character of page, if such was your pleasure; though what the
education of a boy in the train of a female can tend to, save to ingraft
foppery and effeminacy on conceit and arrogance, it passes my knowledge
to discover. But I blame you more directly for having taken little care
to guard him against the perils of his condition, or to tame and humble
a spirit naturally haughty, overbearing, and impatient. You have brought
into your bower a lion's cub; delighted with the beauty of his fur, and
the grace of his gambols, you have bound him with no fetters befitting
the fierceness of his disposition. You have let him grow up as unawed as
if he had been still a tenant of the forest, and now you are surprised,
and call out for assistance, when he begins to ramp, rend, and tear,
according to his proper nature.”
“Mr. Warden,” said the Lady, considerably offended, “you are my
husband's ancient friend, and I believe your love sincere to him and
to his household. Yet let me say, that when I asked you for counsel,
I expected not this asperity of rebuke. If I have done wrong in loving
this poor orphan lad more than others of his class, I scarce think
the error merited such severe censure; and if stricter discipline were
required to keep his fiery temper in order, it ought, I think, to be
considered, that I am a woman, and that if I have erred in this matter,
it becomes a friend's part rather to aid than to rebuke me. I would
these evils were taken order with before my lord's return. He loves not
domestic discord or domestic brawls; and I would not willingly that he
thought such could arise from one whom I favoured--What do you counsel
me to do?”
“Dismiss this youth from your service, madam,” replied the preacher.
“You cannot bid me do so,” said the Lady; “you cannot, as a Christian
and a man of humanity, bid me turn away an unprotected creature against
whom my favour, my injudicious favour if you will, has reared up so many
enemies.”
“It is not necessary you should altogether abandon him, though you
dismiss him to another service, or to a calling better suiting his
station and character,” said the preacher; “elsewhere he maybe an useful
and profitable member of the commonweal--here he is but a makebate, and
a stumbling-block of offence. The youth has snatches of sense and of
intelligence, though he lacks industry. I will myself give him letters
commendatory to Olearius Schinderhausen, a learned professor at the
famous university of Leyden, where they lack an under-janitor--where,
besides gratis instruction, if God give him the grace to seek it, he
will enjoy five merks by the year, and the professor's cast-off suit,
which he disparts with biennially.”
“This will never do, good Mr. Warden,” said the Lady, scarce able to
suppress a smile; “we will think more at large upon this matter. In the
meanwhile, I trust to your remonstrances with this wild boy and with the
family, for restraining these violent and unseemly jealousies and bursts
of passion; and I entreat you to press on him and them their duty in
this respect towards God, and towards their master.”
“You shall be obeyed, madam,” said Warden. “On the next Thursday I
exhort the family, and will, with God's blessing, so wrestle with the
demon of wrath and violence, which hath entered into my little flock,
that I trust to hound the wolf out of the fold, as if he were chased
away with bandogs.”
This was the part of the conference from which Mr. Warden derived the
greatest pleasure. The pulpit was at that time the same powerful engine
for affecting popular feeling which the press has since become, and he
had been no unsuccessful preacher, as we have already seen. It followed
as a natural consequence, that he rather over-estimated the powers of
his own oratory, and, like some of his brethren about the period, was
glad of an opportunity to handle any matters of importance, whether
public or private, the discussion of which could be dragged into his
discourse. In that rude age the delicacy was unknown which prescribed
time and place to personal exhortations; and as the court-preacher often
addressed the King individually, and dictated to him the conduct he
ought to observe in matters of state, so the nobleman himself, or any of
his retainers, were, in the chapel of the feudal castle, often incensed
or appalled, as the case might be, by the discussion of their private
faults in the evening exercise, and by spiritual censures directed
against them, specifically, personally, and by name. The sermon, by
means of which Henry Warden purposed to restore concord and good order
to the Castle of Avenel, bore for text the well-known words, “_He who
striketh with the sword shall perish by the sword,_” and was a singular
mixture of good sense and powerful oratory with pedantry and bad taste.
He enlarged a good deal on the word striketh, which he assured his
hearers comprehended blows given with the point as well as with
the edge, and more generally, shooting with hand-gun, cross-bow, or
long-bow, thrusting with a lance, or doing any thing whatever by which
death might be occasioned to the adversary. In the same manner,
he proved satisfactorily, that the word sword comprehended all
descriptions, whether backsword or basket-hilt, cut-and-thrust or
rapier, falchion, or scimitar. “But if,” he continued, with still
greater animation, “the text includeth in its anathema those who strike
with any of those weapons which man hath devised for the exercise of his
open hostility, still more doth it comprehend such as from their form
and size are devised rather for the gratification of privy malice by
treachery, than for the destruction of an enemy prepared and standing
upon his defence. Such,” he proceeded, looking sternly at the place
where the page was seated on a cushion at the feet of his mistress, and
wearing in his crimson belt a gay dagger with a gilded hilt,--“such,
more especially, I hold to be those implements of death, which, in
our modern and fantastic times, are worn not only by thieves and
cut-throats, to whom they most properly belong, but even by those who
attend upon women, and wait in the chambers of honourable ladies. Yes,
my friends,--every species of this unhappy weapon, framed for all evil
and for no good, is comprehended under this deadly denunciation, whether
it be a stillet, which we have borrowed from the treacherous Italian, or
a dirk, which is borne by the savage Highlandman, or a whinger, which is
carried by our own Border thieves and cut-throats, or a dudgeon-dagger,
all are alike engines invented by the devil himself, for ready
implements of deadly wrath, sudden to execute, and difficult to be
parried. Even the common sword-and-buckler brawler despises the use of
such a treacherous and malignant instrument, which is therefore fit to
be used, not by men or soldiers, but by those who, trained under female
discipline, become themselves effeminate hermaphrodites, having female
spite and female cowardice added to the infirmities and evil passions of
their masculine nature.”
The effect which this oration produced upon the assembled congregation
of Avenel cannot very easily be described. The lady seemed at once
embarrassed and offended; the menials could hardly contain, under
an affectation of deep attention, the joy with which they heard the
chaplain launch his thunders at the head of the unpopular favourite, and
the weapon which they considered as a badge of affectation and finery.
Mrs. Lilias crested and drew up her head with all the deep-felt pride of
gratified resentment; while the steward, observing a strict neutrality
of aspect, fixed his eyes upon an old scutcheon on the opposite side
of the wall, which he seemed to examine with the utmost accuracy, more
willing, perhaps, to incur the censure of being inattentive to the
sermon, than that of seeming to listen with marked approbation to what
appeared so distasteful to his mistress.
The unfortunate subject of the harangue, whom nature had endowed with
passions which had hitherto found no effectual restraint, could not
disguise the resentment which he felt at being thus directly held up to
the scorn, as well as the censure, of the assembled inhabitants of the
little world in which he lived. His brow grew red, his lip grew pale, he
set his teeth, he clenched his hand, and then with mechanical readiness
grasped the weapon of which the clergyman had given so hideous a
character; and at length, as the preacher heightened the colouring of
his invective, he felt his rage become so ungovernable, that, fearful
of being hurried into some deed of desperate violence, he rose up,
traversed the chapel with hasty steps, and left the congregation.
The preacher was surprised into a sudden pause, while the fiery youth
shot across him like a flash of lightning, regarding him as he passed,
as if he had wished to dart from his eyes the same power of blighting
and of consuming. But no sooner had he crossed the chapel, and shut
with violence behind him the door of the vaulted entrance by which
it communicated with the castle, than the impropriety of his conduct
supplied Warden with one of those happier subjects for eloquence, of
which he knew how to take advantage for making a suitable impression on
his hearers. He paused for an instant, and then pronounced, in a slow
and solemn voice, the deep anathema: “He hath gone out from us because
he was not of us--the sick man hath been offended at the wholesome
bitter of the medicine--the wounded patient hath flinched from the
friendly knife of the surgeon--the sheep hath fled from the sheepfold
and delivered himself to the wolf, because he could not assume the
quiet and humble conduct demanded of us by the great Shepherd. Ah! my
brethren, beware of wrath--beware of pride--beware of the deadly and
destroying sin which so often shows itself to our frail eyes in
the garments of light! What is our earthly honour? Pride, and pride
only--What our earthly gifts and graces? Pride and vanity. Voyagers
speak of Indian men who deck themselves with shells, and anoint
themselves with pigments, and boast of their attire as we do of our
miserable carnal advantages--Pride could draw down the morning-star from
Heaven even to the verge of the pit--Pride and self-opinion kindled the
flaming sword which waves us off from Paradise--Pride made Adam mortal,
and a weary wanderer on the face of the earth, which he had else been at
this day the immortal lord of--Pride brought amongst us sin, and doubles
every sin it has brought. It is the outpost which the devil and the
flesh most stubbornly maintain against the assaults of grace; and until
it be subdued, and its barriers levelled with the very earth, there is
more hope of a fool than of the sinner. Rend, then, from your bosoms
this accursed shoot of the fatal apple; tear it up by the roots, though
it be twisted with the chords of your life. Profit by the example of the
miserable sinner that has passed from us, and embrace the means of
grace while it is called to-day 'ere your conscience is seared as with
a fire-brand, and your ears deafened like those of the adder, and
your heart hardened like the nether mill-stone. Up, then, and be
doing--wrestle and overcome; resist, and the enemy shall flee from
you--Watch and pray, lest ye fall into temptation, and let the stumbling
of others be your warning and your example. Above all, rely not on
yourselves, for such self-confidence is even the worst symptom of the
disorder itself. The Pharisee, perhaps, deemed himself humble while he
stooped in the Temple, and thanked God that he was not as other men, and
even as the publican. But while his knees touched the marble pavement,
his head was as high as the topmost pinnacle of the Temple. Do not,
therefore, deceive yourselves, and offer false coin, where the purest
you can present is but as dross--think not that such--will pass the
assay of Omnipotent Wisdom. Yet shrink not from the task, because, as
is my bounden duty, I do not disguise from you its difficulties.
Self-searching can do much--Meditation can do much--Grace can do all.”
And he concluded with a touching and animating exhortation to his
hearers to seek divine grace, which is perfected in human wakness.