JAMBE DE BOIS.
"Now, Master Abraham, if you try that trick again, I will make free
with this mopstick, and break your head. Why, look here, cook, if he
has not been teaching the child to chew tobacco! I suppose they will
be asking Mr Weevil to serve him out his allowance of grog next."
It was Lennox who had spoken. Lanyard rung the bell. "What's the
matter now, steward?"
"Oh, sir, they are massacring that poor little fellow, and teaching him
all manner of abominations. But it's all in kindness, sir; so one
really cannot be so angry with them, as"----
"Never mind then, get breakfast. What sort of morning is it?"
"Quite calm, sir."
"And the frigate?"
"About a mile to the northward of us, sir. The boat that was sent on
board with Mr Donovan this morning, and to bring hay for the sheep, is
now coming back again, sir."
Presently I heard the splash of the oars, then the noise and rumble of
their being laid in; and the crew having got on board, she was hoisted
up. By this time I was on deck; it was about seven o'clock in the
morning, and, as the steward had reported, quite calm. "Heigh, ho!
another roasting day, Mr Marline," said I, as I swept the horizon with
the glass, round every part of which the junction of sea and sky was
obliterated by a hot quivering blue haze, through which the frigate
twinkled, her white streak glimmering like a ribbon streaming in the
wind, and her hull trembling, as it were, in every atom: while her
masts appeared to twist like snakes, the small wavy motion beginning at
the deck, and flowing upwards towards the mastheads.
"Yes, sir," said the midshipman, "every appearance of a broiling day,
indeed."
"Well, get the awning up, as quick as you can," said the lieutenant,
who had followed me. And I set myself to play with Dicky Phantom,
until breakfast was ready.
We ate our meal on deck; after it was ended I went below, and took a
book to while away the time in the least wearisome manner possible; but
being a dull dog I had got hold of, I soon tired; and, as I stretched
myself on the locker, I saw Lennox, in his small pantry of a place
behind the companion ladder, busy writing. When I first noticed him,
he seemed very serious and melancholy. I could see a tear stand in his
eye now and then, and he would blow his nose in a very pathetic and
interesting manner; but as he went on, he once or twice laid down his
pen, and laughed to himself, rubbing his hands in ecstasy. He again
plied his task for some time quietly, until the laughing fit once more
overtook him, when he threw himself back on the small _settle_ or block
on which he sat, with such vehemence, that he cracked the back of his
skull against the ladder very sharply, and uttered an involuntary "Oh!"
In the confusion which this lapse threw him into, he upset the ink on
his paper. Out of pure wickedness, I called out, "Lennox!"
"Coming, sir,"--while he bustled to gather up the ink, a precious
article on board, with his pen, and to shovel it into the bottle again;
but he did not come great speed this way, so he next tried a tea-spoon.
"Lennox!"
"Coming, sir."
"Coming? why, do come, man, and give me a glass of water, will you?"
"This instant, sir--beg pardon, sir--but--but"--
By this he had got his papers stowed away, and made his appearance with
his trowsers covered with ink. I looked at him; he was blushing to the
eyes.
"Why, what _have_ you been after? You have spilled all my ink, I
see--writing love-letters, I suppose?"--In his bashfulness he here drew
his hand across his face, and thereby transferred a good dash of the
"best Japan" to his nose and cheeks, the effect of which was so absurd
that I could not help laughing outright.--"You are an author, perhaps?"
He blushed still deeper, and seeing I waited for an answer, rapped out,
"I am, sir, in a small way."
"The deuce!" said I, rather surprised that I should have hit the right
nail on the head thus unexpectedly; "and pray, what works have you
produced--what walk in literature have you especially followed out?"
"The novel line, lately, sir, but"----
"The novel line! A _novel_ line, certainly, for a corporal of
marines," said I, interrupting him rather sneeringly.--"Pray, who and
what were you before you joined Gazelle, Lennox; that is, if you have
no objections to tell?"
He did not make me a direct answer.
"You have been very kind to me, sir," said the poor fellow, "and have
more than once stood my friend, when, Heaven knows, I was desolate
enough; indeed, if it had not been for you, Mr Brail, I would have gone
overboard, some dark night, with a cold shot at my feet; for the Devil,
who is always busy with desperate men, has been near getting the upper
hand aftener than I will stay the noo to tell. But as I was
saying,"--and here a large tear rolled down his face, through ink and
all,--"I am bound to you, sir, and if you have any desire to know who I
am, or what I have been, I am ready to tell you."
I was a little moved at this, as I had no idea that any little service
I had rendered the poor fellow should have been so gratefully
remembered. "Why, Lennox, I have done no more to you, nor for you,
than I hope every right-hearted man would have done to an inferior; but
I will not deny that I have such a desire."
He put into my hands a dirty roll of paper.
"Your honour has been very patient with me; but I hope I know my place
better than to weary you with a long story; so, referring you to the
manuscript, which you may read or not as you please, I will, with your
permission--go and kill the pig, and then help the cook to scrape
potatoes in the galley."
He withdrew--I looked after him, and then took a short turn on deck,
where every thing was going on much as usual; I then returned to the
cabin, and having stretched myself along the locker, and seen the
windsail comfortably drawing down the small skylight? I unrolled the
manuscript, which was entitled
"THE SORROWS OF SAUNDERS SKELP."
Poor Dominie Skelp! his sorrows were amusing enough, here and there,
melancholy as his story was in the main. Some parts of the narrative
were powerful, although unequally written, as if the mind of the writer
had originally been calm and clear as a polished mirror, until
shattered by the rude blows of misfortune into dust and rubbish, but
still intermingled here and there with bright and sparkling fragments.
His father, a respectable tradesman in a small country town, had
cramped himself in every way to give his son a good education, and he
had actually attained the barren dignity of a licentiate in the
Scottish Kirk. After this he became the schoolmaster of the parish,
and was even in the habit of occasionally preaching for Mr Bland, the
clergyman, or minister thereof, as he called him. At length he fell in
love with a beautiful and innocent girl; after which it was all the old
story,--
"The course of true love never did run smooth."
And the loves of Saunders Skelp and Jessy Miller were no exception to
the rule; the young laird, Mr Adderfang, having seduced the girl, and
contrived, by a very mean and cruel _ruse_, not only to blast the
happiness of both, but even to cast the blame of the transaction on the
young probationer for a season. "But let the dominie tell his own
story, Master Benjie."
"With all my heart, my boy. So here it is; mind it don't try your
patience, however."
"EPISODE OF THE STICK LEG.
"And Adam fell by Eve: from womankind
All evil was derived; had the male race
But grown like turnips, man had never sinned.
_Dominie Skelp's Illustrations of Byron, MS._
"My great-grandfather, grandfather, and immediate progenitor, were all
_ministers' men_ in the landward parish of Lincumdodie.
"My father had added to his more immediate vocation, that of a
shoemaker; and being a good tradesman, we were the easiest in our
circumstances of any family in the village, until my stepmother
suddenly took to drinking, and thereby nearly broke my father down in
mind, body, and estate.
"I can call it nothing else but a disease; for hitherto she had always
been a discreet body, and a kind to me, considering I was an only
bairn, and therefore sure to be fashious, and nane of her ain flesh and
blood forby.
"My father focht lang with her, strapping her respectably at ae time,
and fleeching and praying with her at anither; syne he would get the
minister himsell to speak till her, but a' wad not do, for the puir
body just grat and listened, and gat fou again; and grat and listened
and gat fou, until at length the auld man crossed his arms in downricht
despair, _and let her at it_.
"The issue wasna long in doubt, for she was fairly _speerited_ awa
between and that day three months.
"Young as I was, my surprise was great, and so was that of the haill
village, at the way my father took on when she died. 'She was ill to
hersell, and no that guid till you, Saunders,' said the minister to him
one day, by way of comforting him. 'And I can scrimp deny that same,
minister, but for mony a day she was a leal and gude wife to me, before
she fell away intil that evil propensity; and although it whiles
surprises me mysell that I should miss an auld drucken wife sae muckle,
yet lang custom, minister, makes ane even miss the very middenstead
before the door, ye ken; at ony rate, I canna think o' her just yet,
without a fullness at my heart, that I confess I am a wee bit ashamed
o'."
"When the steek in my father's purse, let down by my mother's spiritual
propensities, was taken up once more by her death, we again began to
float up into respectability and comparative riches; so that we
gradually resumed the status in the small village from which we had
declined.
"I was at this time about twelve years of age, and my father sent me
back to the school which my mother had drank me out of; and in the
course of three years, I believe I may with a safe conscience say, that
I knew as much as the master himself did; of whom the young laird, Mr
Adderfang, used to say,--'He would be a clever chiel wha kenn'd _all
the master didna_.'
"About this time, old Durie Squake, the precentor, met with an accident
which gave me temporary promotion in the kirk; for, coming into it one
dark forenoon in the winter-time, after having oiled his chanter with a
drap drink, he did not notice that the door of his wee poopit had been
altered, so as to swing the contrary way to what it did before; and as
it stood wide open, fronting him edgeways, it was as clean and
invisible as if it had been the blade of a knife; so that although the
blind body had as usual his twa paws extended and stuck out before him,
one holding his Bible and the other his pitchpipe, he ran smack up
against the edge, clipping the leaf of the door with an outspread arm
on each side of it, and thereby received such a _devel_, that his nose
was bashed, and the sneck sank into his forehead, as if he had been
struck with a butcher's hatchet. Down fell auld Durie Squake, with a
grunt and a squelch, on his back. 'Losh preserve me! I aye kenned I
had a lang nose, but surely it's langer this blessed Sabbath than
common!'
"He was helped up and hame by two o' the elders, and being a
thick-skulled creature, he was soon repaired by the farrier in the
village, so as to be maist as gude as new, no being muckle worth at his
best, and he was at his wark again in no time; but although his skull
was sound, his voice was a wee cracked for ever after; and now the
question came, what was to be done for a precentor that blessed day? A
neighbouring minister, the excellent Mr Clour, of the parish of
Thistledoup, was to preach, and by this time in the poopit, and he
could sing none, I kenned; as for auld Mr Bland, our ain pastor, he was
as empty of music as a toom bagpipe; so baith the ministers and their
hearers sat glowering at each other for a guid space, until the uproar
was over, and the bum had subsided, and I was just wondering what was
to be done, when I found something kittle-kittling the crown of my
head. I sat, it must be known, in a wee bit back jam of a pew, just
before the minister's seat, and my father aside me. I looked round--it
was the auld minister--'Saunders,' says he, 'your father tells me ye
can sing fine--gae awa wi' ye, my bonny man, into the precentor's
seat.' I was in an awful taking; the blood rushed to my face, and the
sweat dropped from the point of my nose; nevertheless, I screwed up my
courage, and, like a callant louping into the water to bathe in a cauld
day, I dashed into the Psalm with great bir and success; but the speed
I came puffed up my vanity until it burst, and I had a sair downcome
that day. For finding that the precentor line was no sae difficult as
I expected, I thought I would shine a bit, and at a solemn pause in the
music aff I went, up and away, intil some fine tirlie-wirlies, which I
could not cannily get out of again. By and by, the congregation
dropped off one by one, as I ascended, until I was left alone in my
glory. I started 'even at the sound myself had made,' and looked up to
the roof, at the auld carved wark, above what had been the altar-piece
when the Catholics had the kirk, singing all the while--but a nervous
thought came over me, and suddenly I felt as if I had got screwed in
amongst the roses and ornaments of the auld cornice, without the power
of extricating myself; and how to get home again into the _Bangor_,
that I had left so recklessly, I could not divine. At length, as my
variations were nearly exhausted, Willie Johnston's auld colley, Snap,
deliberately walked up the aisle, and cocking himself on end, raised
his voice and joined in chorus. This speedily brought me to a
stand-still, for Balaam could not have been more amazed when his ass
spoke than I was; besides, I saw the folk were all laughing, until some
one of them took advantage of the pause to skirl up the original tune
once more, and faith but I was glad to join them.
"It was the fashion in our parish, at this time of the year, to give
two sermons at one sitting, but auld Mr Clour had only brought one, and
our ain minister being as hoarse as a raven, there was nothing for it
but that Mr Clour should split his in two. Indeed, I heard him say, as
they walked into the kirkyard together--'Well, friend Bland, if I maun
preach twa sermons, while I hae only yin in my pouch, and nane in my
head, they must just be of the shortest, for I can manage no other way
than by halving it; however, I'll gie them a gude bit screed of a psalm
to sough awa at after the first half, and that will help us 'ayont the
twall,' as Burns says, before we begin to the second.
"The first sermon passed over, and when he gave out the Psalm that was
to be the resting-place, the half-way house between the wings of his
discourse, what was my dismay, to find that he, with all the coolness
in life, read out six long verses! My mouth was dry enough, and my
throat husky enough with my previous discomfiture, Heaven knows; but I
whistled away until I got to the line about 'a dry parched land,
wherein no waters be,' when my voice fairly failed me a'thegither. I
made a desperate struggle, but there was nae mair sound in me than in a
clarionet without the reed, or a child's bawbee whistle blawn dumb on
the first day of the fair. So I waited for a while, and again set to,
but my screech was this time a mixture of the cry of the corncraik and
the hissing of a goose; besides, I had lost the tune, and nane of the
congregation could find it, so I squeeled and sweltered about, until
the haill kirk and pews, and the folk in them, danced before my eyes,
and I could not tell whether I was on my head or my heels. At length I
croaked out, '_Vox faucibus hæsit, domine--Vox faucibus hæsit_. As
sure's death, I can sing nane until somebody gives me a drink of
water.' At this moment I felt a slap on the cheek, which made me start
and turn round, and there was the auld minister leaning ower the front
of his pulpit, and girning at me like Auld Nick himsell. 'Deevil's in
the callant; has he lost the _fang_[1] already, wi' skirling up the
Psalm but for yae half hour?' This drave me demented altogether, so
making a rush from the precentor's desk, I stumbled down into my
father's seat, who was lying with his head on his blue bonnet, peching
and perspiring with utter shame and vexation. _I never tried the
precentor line again_.
[1] A pump is said to have _lost the fang_ in Scotland, when the sucker
won't draw.
"Mv father's circumstances continued to improve, and at last he found
himself in a condition to send me to Edinburgh itsell, to study for the
kirk; and there I continued for three years more, during session
time;--after which I returned home a licentiate of the Church of
Scotland no less, but with the immediate purpose of succeeding the old
schoolmaster of Lincomdodie, who had about this period been gathered to
his fathers.
"When I arrived, a proud man was my father of me and my acquirements;
and from that time forth, he had morning and evening service every day
in his family--a thing he never had before, except on Sunday.
"And, oh! there was one that welcomed me back, with a smile and a tear,
and a trembling of the tongue, and a heaving of her beautiful bosom,
that was dearer, far dearer to me than father or friends, although I
had a warm heart for them too. It was Jessy Miller, the only daughter
of Rob Miller the carrier's widow, a tall fair-skinned lassie, with
raven locks, and dark hazel eyes, and a face and figure with which none
of the village girls could compare.
"'Ye are welcome home again, Saunders--heartily welcome; and you'll be
glad to hear that the young leddies at the hall--the laird's sisters,
ye ken--have been very kind to me and my mother baith, and that I go up
there every day to work for them; and they have made me many a handsome
present, as you see, Saunders, and many a good book have they sent me;
and the young laird, Mr Adderfang, has come hame, ye will have
heard,'--I started, for I had not heard it,--'and he is really very
civil to us also.' We were speaking in a little bit green, at the
western-most end of the village. There was a clump of horse chestnuts
behind us, through which the breeze was rushing with a rustling sough,
but it was neither strong enough nor loud enough to drown the buzzing,
or rather moaning noise of the numberless bees that were gathering
honey from its blossoms, for it was in June; or the rushing murmur of
the clear sparkling burnie, that wimpled past at our feet, with a bit
crazy wooden brig across it, beyond which a field of hay, ready for the
scythe, was waving in the breeze, with the shadows of the shreds of
summer clouds sailing along its green undulations, as they racked
across the face of the sun.
"At the moment when the mention of the young laird's name by Jessy
Miller, for he was known to be a wild graceless slip, had sent the
blood back to my heart with a chill--a larger cloud than any that had
gone before threw its black shadow over where we sat, while all around
was blithe breeze and merry sunshine. It appeared to linger--I took
Jessy's hand, and pointed upwards. I thought she shrank, and that her
fingers were cold and clammy. She tried to smile, but it ended in a
faint hysterical laugh, as she said,--'Saunders, man, ye're again at
your vagaries, and omens, and nonsense; what for do ye look that gate
at me, man?'
"'I canna help it, Jessy--no, for the soul of me, I cannot--why does
the heaven frown on you and me only, when it smiles on all things
beside?'
"'Hoot, it's but a summer cloud, and ye're a fule; and there--there
it's gane, ye see--there, see if it hasna sailed away over the breezy
hay field, beyond the dyke there--come and help me ower it,
man--come,'--and once more I looked in her bright eyes undoubtingly,
and as I lifted her over the grey stones, I pressed her to my heart, in
the blessed belief and consciousness that she was my ain Jessy Miller
still.
"All the summer I officiated as helper to the excellent Mr Bland, our
parish minister--his nephew, who was appointed to fill the situation
permanently, being still on the continent as tutor in a nobleman's
family, nor did he return until the autumn.
"Although I never expected to have a kirk of my own, yet preaching was
at this time a pleasure to me--for my intellect was strong and clear,
health good, and spirits buoyant; my heart being at ease, and Jessy
Miller loving and faithful.
"And was it not a proud thing for a parritch-fed laddie like me, to get
the argument a' to mysell for a hail forenoon, and to lay down the law
to all the gentry of the country, and maybe a lord among them; and to
gie them their kail through the reek, and cry 'anathema maranatha'
against the vices of the rich--the temptations whereto, if the truth
maun be told, I never kenned; while nane o' them dared so much as open
his mouth to reply to me?
"But I had ae redeeming virtue in their eyes, for, although whiles
dogmatic, I was never so downright indiscreet as to inflict lang
sermons on them--a thing great folk canna thole--a half-hour till the
preachment, and a quarter till the prayer, being my maximum; never
forgetting, that a good practical sermon should be like a jigot o' wee
blackfaced Highland mutton, short in the shank, and pithy, and
nutritious, which every body can digest something o', frae the fistling
restless callant, wi' a clue in his breeks, till the auld staid elder,
wha hears ye oot as steadily--teuch as ben-leather though you may
be--as if his tail were Tam Clink's anvil. So, putting the shortness
o' the screed against the bitterness o' the flyte, my popularity on the
whole greatly increased.--Thus mollified by success, I grew sae bland
and gentle in my disposition, that I could never even skelp ony o' my
wee scholars without a tear in my eye; so that I verily believe if I
could have shoved the dull creatures on by applying the tause to my
ain--loof instead of theirs, I would have willingly done so.
"But soon a wee bit cloud cam o'er me; for I began about this time to
be sair fashed with a great income."
[I laid down the manuscript--"sair fashed with an income--I say,
Lennox"--I saw the marine in his steward-room at the moment--"Why,
Lennox, construe me this, if you please--'sair fashed with an
income,'--that is more than ever I have been, if I take you up rightly;
but explain, if you please--was your income so _very_ great?"
"Indeed, sir, it was large enough to lame me for six months!"
I stared--"An income so large that it lamed you for six months--oh, you
lived high--gout, I suppose?"
"Na, na, sir--I had never any title to gout, nor any of my forbears;
but it was not the size of the tumor that was the worst of it; for it
contracted the sinews and muscles of my left leg to such a degree,
that, after I had hobbled on crutches for six weeks, I was at last
fairly driven to stump it on a stick leg, although, Heaven be thanked,
I recovered entirely in a year's time."
The poor fellow saw I was laughing; and apparently uncertain as to
whether I comprehended him or not, he said--"An income is a tumour,
sir; and mine was a very bad ane."
"Oh, I see, I see; but tell me this, Lennox--You speak very good
English; and, from all I can hear, you write it correctly--how came
you, therefore, to have indited your sorrows in your north country
Doric?"
"Mair graphic, sir--I had an eye to publish, sir."
"Now, I understand--thank you"--and I resumed my study of the
manuscript.]
"But I had my ain misgivings that Jessy would flee aff frae me, after
all, now that I was a lameter, and I watched my opportunity to ask her
frankly and fairly, 'whether we were to hold to our plighted troth,
that we should be man and wife whenever I had laid by an hundred pounds
from the school (I had already fifty), or that the calamity which had
come over me'----I could scarcely speak here, for something rose up in
my full breast, like a cork in a bottle that you are filling with
water, and stuck in my thrapple like to choke me--; or that the
calamity that had come over me, was to snap our vows in twain--and,
Jessy Miller, I here declare, in the presence of our Maker, if it has
wrought such change in you, I release you freely--freely--although it
should break my heart, I release you.'
"The poor girl's hand, as I spoke, grew colder and colder, and her
cheek paler and paler, until she fairly sank on her knees on the auld
grey moss-grown stone that covered the muirland grave of the
Covenanters, situated about a mile from Lincomdodie, where we happened
to be at the time. It was now the gloaming the setting sun was flaming
up in the red west, and his last ray fell on the beautifully rounded
form of the fair lassie, and sparkled on the tear that stole down her
cheek, as she held up one hand to Heaven, and grasped mine with the
other.
"'Saunders Skelp, wi' ae leg or twa, or without a leg of ony kind--if
ever I prove faithless to you--may'----
"'Hillo, Dominie--Dominie Skelp--you're a nice young man, I _don't_
know.'
"I started--Jessy shrieked, and rising, threw herself into my arms--and
as I turned round, who should be ascending the hill, and now within a
few yards of us, but the young laird himself--as handsome and buirdly a
chiel as you would see in ten thousand!
"'Did that cloud come ower us at the side of the hay-field that day for
naething, Jessy?' She could not answer me. The sun set, and one or
two heavy drops of rain fell, and the lift darkened--ay, and something
darker and drearier stole across my brain than the shadows which now
began to settle down on the fair face of external nature. My heart
fluttered for a moment, then made long irregular throbs, and finally I
became dizzy and faint, and almost fell to the ground with Jessy in my
arms. 'Was I, in very truth, in the presence of an evil spirit?' said
I to myself.
"'Why,' said the young gentleman, 'what has come over you, Saunders? I
won't tell, man--so keep your own secret, and nobody will be a whit the
wiser.'
"'Secret, sir!' said I, deeply stung; 'secret--I have nane,
sir--nane--that I love the lassie, the haill parish kens, and I am not
ashamed of it; but if you--ay, you, sir, or _any_ man, dares'----
"'Heyday--dares! What do you mean by that, Master Skelp?--Dares!'
"My recollection and self-possession returned at this moment.
"'I beg pardon, sir; I have been taken by surprise, and in my anxiety
to vindicate Jessy from all suspicion, I have been very uncivil to you.
I am sorry for it.'
"The abjectness of this apology caused me to blush to the eyes, but it
was made, as I thought, to serve my heart-dear girl, and gulping down
my chagrin and wounded pride, I turned to go away.
"'Well, well, Dominie, I forgive you, man, and I _believe_ there is
nothing wrong between you two after all. I only spoke in jest, man,
and am in turn sorry to have given you pain; so gie's your
hand--there--and I must have a kiss from Miss Miller, the darling, or I
never shall believe that you have both really and truly forgiven me.'
"We returned together to the village. I would willingly have shaken
off the youngster, but he insisted on seeing Jessy home, and as I had
no plea to prevent him, I submitted in great bitterness of spirit.
"The next day he departed for London, to my great solace, and we heard
nothing of him for several months, so I once more buckled to my
schoolmaster's labours with a light heart; and if my friends did not
flatter me, I also greatly improved in my preaching.
"At first, before I had confidence in my ain power and presence of
mind, I slavishly wrote down all my sermons, and read them still more
servilely, never trusting my finger neb off the manuscript, as if I had
been frichtened it would have ta'en wing and flown away from under my
nose; but I gradually began to trust mysell away in a wee bit flicht
now and then, like a half-fledged shillfa[2] with the puddock-hair on,
hopping about its nest, but always ready to drop into it again, as I
was into the written discourse.
[2] Chaffinch.
"I soon found that the parts of my preachments that were maist liked
were generally the very bits thus struck off _extempore_; so in time I
took heart of grace, and only wrote down the _heads_. Before autumn I
even gave this up, and began to preach even on and boldly, without
scrap or note of any kind or description whatever.
"That there are many eloquent men who cannot trust their memories, and
have all their lives to preach written sermons, is most true; but where
a man of talent _can_ preach _extempore_, rely upon it, he will be more
eloquent and impressive than if he had undergone the drudgery of
inditing the discourse before hand.
"And so it was with me, even me Saunders Skelp; for, from the very
first, when per force I had to write down my sermons, still even then I
found my genius cribbed and confined, and held down in its soarings and
highest aspirations by the written _thread_ of my discourse, like a
string round the leg of a tame pyot; or if, in a moment of inspiration,
I did break away, it was at the peril of getting into another vein of
thocht a'thegither, which I aften found cruel kittle to dovetail
cleverly into the plain jog-trot of what lay beneath my nose on the
pulpit cushion; so, finding I made but a botched business of it so long
as I halted between the two opinions, I resolutely determined to write
nae mair for ever.
"But in the pride of my heart at my early success, I will not conceal
that I grew about this time rather overly energetic, and my feelings
whiles outran my discretion; but I had a good friend and excellent
Mentor in auld Earl M----, the principal heritor in the parish.
"Seeing his lordship in his pew--for he didna come to the kirk every
Sabbath--one fine clear day, when I was to preach, I thought I would
astonish him a wee bit; but, as it turned out, I was mysell the maist
astonished of the twa. It was a beautiful summer's day. I had
scarcely ever seen the outline of the mountain that overhung the
village so hard and clear and sharply defined, as it hove up and out,
high into the cold pure blue of the cloudless sky. The misty cap that
usually concealed the bald peak, had blown off before the fresh breeze
that rustled cheerily among the twittering leaves; disclosing the grey
scalp, the haunt of the gled and the eagle, with the glittering streaks
of unmelted but not unsunned snow filling the wrinkle-like storm rifts,
whose ice-fed streamlets loomed in the distance, still and fixed like
frozen gouts of pure sea foam, but lower down sparkled in the sun,
flowing with a perceptible motion, as if the hoary giant had been
shedding glad tears of dropping diamonds.
"Still nearer, the silver chainlets of their many rills were welded
into one small waterfall, that leapt from its rocky ledge, white as the
wreaths that fed it; bending and wavering in the breeze, and gradually
thinning as it fell, until it blew off in smoke like the Grey Mare's
Tail, and vanished altogether, scarcely moistening the black and
moss-grown stones of the shallow basin beneath. Below this, and
skirting the dry region of shingle, the paired moorfowl, for the
cheepers hadna taken wing yet, were whirring amang the purple heather,
that glowed under the bright sunlight, as if the mountain had been
girdled in with a ruby zone; while farther down, the sheep bleating to
their lambs powdered the whole green hillside, like pearls sprinkled on
a velvet mantle.
"The kine were lowing in the valley, as they stood kneedeep in the cool
burn, whisking away the flies, under the vocal shadow of the
overhanging _saughs_. The grey heron was floating above the spung from
spring to spring, from one dark green tuft of rushes to another, so
ghostlike, that you could not tell it from its shadow; the birds were
singing among the trees; the very crackling of the furze pods in the
sun had an exhilarating and joyous sound; and the drowsy and moaning
hum of the myriads of bees, that floated into the wee auld kirk through
the open window from the plane-trees that overshadowed it, dangerous as
the sound wad hae been to a prosy preacher on a sultry Sabbath, was, in
my vainglory, but a soothing melody to me: for in my vainglory I said
to mysell, there _shall_ be nae sleeping here this day. There was
happiness in the very cawing of the rooks in the auld trees of the
kirkyard, as they peered down at us with eyes askance, as much as to
say, 'ay, freens, there's nae gun amang ye the day.'
"The farmers came along cracking blithely as they looked over the sea
of waving grain, now in ear, and fast bronzing under the genial sun,
that covered the whole strath; the trouts were glancing and louping at
the grey flies, and the ducks of the villagers were flaffing and
squattering in the burn where the lassies were washing their feet,
glancing like silver amang the sparkling wimples of the clear yet
moss-browned water, and putting on their shoes and stockings,
preparatory to their entering the sanctuary, therein differing from the
heathen, who cast off their slippers at the threshold. Auld Widow
Miller hersell, sober sedate body, was _heckling_ with Tam Clink the
blacksmith, as she came along by the holly hedge; even the hard-worked
carrier's horses, with their galled backs and shoulders, and the very
banes sticking through their flanks, were frisking awkwardly with their
iron joints (like so many of their wooden scaffold-supporting namesakes
bewitched), in clumsy imitation of the beautiful filly there, and
neighing on the other side of the hedge from you, speaking as plain as
Balaam's ass that the Sabbath was for them also; ay, when the very
Spirit of God himself seemed visibly abroad on the smiling face of the
glad earth, I could not help exclaiming--'Surely, my friends, we cannot
err greatly, if we veil our faces and retreat in such a day as this
from before the thunders, and darkness, and earthquake of Sinai, the
Mountain of the Lord, and wander away out of the bitterness and acrid
atmosphere of the desert, 'where the Heaven over our heads is brass,
and the earth under our feet iron, and the rain of the land powder and
dust,' into the quiet and fertile valleys and pure skies of Canaan; and
there, amongst the loveliness and freshness of nature, with hearts
swelling with gratitude to _Him_, and love to our brethren of mankind,
dwell on _His_ attributes of goodness and mercy, with mixed adoration
and trembling, and endeavour to sing his praises in the spirit, and
with the glorious imagery of David.--Shall all the beasts of the
field,' I continued, warming with my subject,--'shall all the beasts of
the field, and fowls of the air, and fishes, yea, shall all creatures,
animate and inanimate, praise the Lord for his goodness, with one
universal burst of joy; and shall man alone, while he worships with
fear and trembling, not mingle with the groan of his just humiliation a
shout of heartwarm and heartfelt gratitude to the Almighty Dispenser of
all this happiness around him?'
"For a quarter of an hour after this I carried on fine, and was
delighted to spy the auld earl's looks, of approval with the corner of
my ee, the joy whereof drave me off my guard; for at a well-turned
period, when I intended to bring my right hand down thump on the open
Bible, I missed it, and smote the new elastic pulpit cushion instead,
with such vehemence, that the old brazen-clasped Psalm-book spanged up,
and out over into the air. 'Kep!' cried I; whereupon auld Durie
Squake, the precentor, upturned his face, and thereby caught such a
bash on the nose, that baith the lozens were dang out of his barnacles.
'Oh Lord, my sair nose!' (it had not recovered the blow against the
door, as already related), 'oh Lord! my sair nose is clean demolished
now--I maun get legs to my specs--for the brig's brak, and flattened in
on my face like a pancake!' I tried to get back into my discourse, but
I was awfully flurried, and as, not knowing what I did, I let fly
another whack on the desk, his lordship, who, I could observe, even in
the swelter of my confusion, was laughing to himsell, turned up his
gaisened pheesiognomy, and _girned_ out--'I say, my lad, if ye break
it, ye'll pay for't.' This put me daft--clean wud a'thegether--and I
drave along at so furious a rate, and stamped with my stick-leg on the
stool that I stood on with such vehemence, that in my confusion down I
slipped; and the bottom of the pulpit being auld and frush, the wooden
tram flew crash through, and I vanished, the iron-shod end striking
Durie Squake, the devoted precentor, such a crack on the tap of the
head, that I thought I had felled him clean. 'Oh dear! oh dear!'
roared Squake; 'the callant has first bashed my neb as saft as pap' (he
was a wabster to his trade), 'and broken my spectacles, and noo he has
fractured my skull with his d--d stick-leg.' I struggled to extricate
the tram, but it stuck fast, until Tam Clink, the blacksmith, gave the
end of it, as it protruded into Durie Squake's desk, such a bang with
his great heavy hand, as if it had been his forehammer, that he shot me
up with a jerk like a 'Jack in the box,' into the sight of the
astonished congregation again.
"I sat down utterly discomfited, and, covering my face with my hands,
wept bitterly.
"A murmur ran through the kirk, and I could hear whispers of 'Puir
callant, gie him time to collect his thochts--gie him time--he's a
clever lad Saunders--he'll be a' richt presently.' I took heart of
grace at this demonstration of good and kindly feeling amongst my
fellow-parishioners, and making a strong effort, yet with a face like
crimson--my lugs were burning like red-hot iron--I finished my
discourse, and dismissed the congregation. As I passed out of the
churchyard gate, I found the old lord there; it was a warm day, and he
was sitting on a tombstone under the shade of the auld elm-tree, with
his hat off, and wiping his forehead with his handkerchief, apparently
waiting for his carriage to drive up. 'Ca' canny, man,' said he, as I
approached--'Ca' canny, Saunders--dinna _rive_ folk alang the road to
heaven at that rate, man.'
"'My lord, I was seduced intil that exuberance to-day against my better
judgment. It was the vanity of making an appearance before you, my
lord, when I ought to have been thinking only of my Maker and the
Gospel, and I have determined to humble my pride by making this
acknowledgment; but I have had a sair downcome, my lord, as you saw
this morning, and I deserved it.'
"'Well, well, Saunders; but Durie Squake had the worst of the
_downcome_, I'm thinking. However, let it be a lesson to you never to
prostrate yourself so abjectly before a fellow-creature again, even if
he should be a lord, Saunders; but as you are a lad of talent, and I
have a regard for you, you must get over this mortification speedily,
lest it rankle and spoil your usefulness, for I see you are a sensitive
creature. So I'll gang down to the manse and rest my sell, and come
back in the afternoon, when I will ask Mr Bland to let you preach
again. So awa' wi' ye, Saunders; ca' in yere scattered thochts,
Saunders--and tell Moses, as you pass Lucky Mutchkin's public, to put
up the horses again. Awa' wi' ye, Saunders Skelp.'
"'Na, na, my lord--you are very kind, and I am greatly beholden to your
lordship; but I canna--I canna hand up my head in the poopit again, so
soon after my signal dis'----
"'Haud yere tongue, Saunders--ye're a fule. Gang till your room and
cogitate, for preach you must and shall, this very day, and be d--d
till ye. The dominie's gane mad a'thegither, I declare.'
"I took my excellent patron's advice, and although unco blate at first,
I gained courage as I warmed with my subject, so that by the time I cam
till the blessing, I was myself again; and having thus got over my
mortification, I never afterwards sae far forgot myself as I had done
that blessed morning."
But the humour of the following extract, which explains itself,
surpasses either of the former in my estimation:--
"Next morning was the annual examination of my school, at which three
ministers, one of them the celebrated Dr Soorock, were to be present,
and the same passed over creditably to myself and scholars; and the
doctor was very kind and condescending to the whole of us. He was the
means of my being invited this day to dinner by Mr Bland. After the
examination, we had walked a mile into the country together, enjoying
the delight of the schoolboys, who had gotten a half holiday on the
occasion, and were now rampaging about, like young colts broke loose,
some jumping, some playing at football, others at shinty, while several
were fishing in the burn, that twinkled past as clear as crystal; and
we were returning home to the manse, when Earl M----'s equipage
appeared, coming along the small bridge that crossed a bend of the
stream beyond the village. Presently it was hid by the trees round the
manse, and then glanced on this side of them, until the houses again
concealed it. In another moment it rattled sharply round the corner,
when the old earl desired his postilions to walk their horses until he
met us. The moment Doctor Soorock saw the carriage go slow, he
accelerated _his_ motion, and stepped out and away before Mr Bland and
Mr Clour, salaaming with his hat in one hand, and his gold-headed cane
in the other, in rather too abject a style, in my estimation, for _one
who had a kirk already_. His lordship was still at pistol-shot
distance, and the doctor was striding on, uncovered, with his eyes
riveted on the carriage, when his foot caught on the projecting steps
of the schoolhouse door, and away he went, his stick flying through the
window, smashing the glass down in a tinkling shower--his hat into the
neighbouring pigsty, and his wig into the burn that ran by the
road-side.
"'Run, boys, run,' said I, as I helped him up,--'run and catch the
doctor's wig,' as it floated away down the stream, like a hedgehog
covered with meal.
"'Geordie,' cried one little fellow, 'hook the wig with your fly,
man--hook the wig with your fly.'
"'Allan is fishing with bait, his hooks are bigger,' quoth Geordie.
"'Fling, Allan, man, fling--one gude cast, and you have it.'
"They both missed, and the wig continued floating down until it swam
amongst a flock of village ducks, who instantly squattered away from
it, as if it had been an otter.
"'Cast a stane intil't, or it will soom to Berwick before nicht,' said
wee Tam.
"'Cast a stane intil't, Allan, man; you mark weel,' roared Geordie
again.
"Flash--one stone pitched into the burn, close to it, and half filled
the wig with water. It was pretty well saturated before, so that when
another flew with better aim right into it, it instantly sank, and
disappeared in the Dominie's Hole, as the pool was called. What was to
be done? There was a spate had suddenly come down the water, and there
was no seeing into the bottom of the pool; besides, there was not a
creepy in the village, so the doctor gave his wig up for lost, as well
he might, and had to cover the nakedness of the land for that day with
one of Mr Eland's Kilmarnock nightcaps. He bore his misfortune, I will
say, with great equanimity; and in the evening we all once more
resorted to the schoolhouse, to hear the boys sing, led by auld Durie
Squake.
"We had taken our seats, a number of the villagers in their best; auld
Durie had sounded his pitch-pipe, and the bits of callants were
watching him with open mouth, all ready to open in full cry, like a
pack of young hounds waiting for old Jowler's deep tongue, when the
candle at his desk was suddenly blown out, and I called out in Latin,
seeing that some of the bigger boys were close to it, '_Quid hac rei?_'
Wee Tam Stump at this louped off his seat with great energy, fearing he
was about to be blamed: 'Ventus played puff, Dominie, ex that broken
window, et extinxit the candle.' We had all a good laugh at this, and
nothing more happened to disturb the harmony of the evening, until
Allan Harden came running up the stairs, with a salmon lister in one
hand, and a great dripping divot-looking thing on the top of it.
"'What kept ye so late?' said I; 'you are seldom late, Allan.'
"'I hae been dabbing with the lister the haill evening for Doctor
Soorock's wig, sir; but I have speared it at last--_ecce signum_!
Dominie.'
"A tiny buzz ran amongst the boys; auld Clour keckled audibly, and Mr
Bland could scarcely keep his gravity, as Dr Soorock stirred the soaked
mass that Allan had cast on the floor with the end of his cane,
exclaiming--'My wig--my wig, did the callant say? It canna be my wig.'
"'Indeed it is yours, sir; there's nae wale o' wigs here,' said the
handsome boy, blushing deeply--'if you but try it on, sir, ye'll find
it sae.'
"The wig was finally turned over to the auld barber at the village, who
dried it, but the doctor had to go home in the Kilmarnock on the
following day, as the scratch was ruined for ever."
Now, a small touch at the Dominie in the "melting mood," and we bear up
again on our cruise. He had returned to the parish, after having
completed his education, such as it was.
"Months passed away without any thing worth notice occurring. I met
Jessy often, and although some doubts and misgivings as to the state of
her heart did come over me, and shake mine sometimes, still my anxiety
to acquire the plighted hundred pounds diverted my mind from allowing
the doubt to fester, by confining my attention chiefly to the school.
Besides, the young laird, who was now studying the law in Edinburgh,
came seldomer down to the auld castle than was his wont; so that
altogether I began to attribute any little apparent coldness in Jessy's
demeanour, either to my own fancy, or to being piqued by the unjustness
of my former suspicions. Thus I struggled on, in the hope that the sum
might be made up during the next summer at latest, until which time my
pride counselled me to be silent.
"The long dreary winter drew on apace. The leaves became sere, and
fell, and were whirled in rustling eddies along the hollows of the
small woodland paths about the village,--and the bleak north howled on
the hill-side, and moaned and soughed through the trees, and round the
house,--and the herds began to fold their flocks in the evenings. One
night, in particular, was marked in my memory indelibly by what
occurred the morning after it. It was late in November, and the
weather for several days previous had been rough and boisterous, but on
this particular evening it had cleared. The full moon shone brightly
as I returned from the county town, with a wallet of wee books for my
youngest class, which I had bought there that afternoon. It was eleven
at night as I got to the bridge across the stream which ran past the
village; I was glouring down over the little parapet wall into the
glancing water, that rushed and murmured through below the arch, and
listening to the melancholy bleating of the sheep on the hill above me,
and to the low bark of the colleys, and the distant shout of the herds,
as the last of the stragglers were got within the circular folds, far
up on the moor. Again I would look towards the village, where scarce a
light twinkled, except in Tam Clink the blacksmith's shop, where every
now and then a primrose-coloured jet of flame puffed up, and flashed on
the blacksmith's begrimed face and hairy chest, and naked arms, and on
wee Pate Clink's bit dirty face and curly pow, as the callant worked at
the bellows; but the fire suddenly gaed out, and the sparks flew from a
red-hot bar in all directions, under the powerful stroke of the
blacksmith himsell, until the hissing iron became of a dull red, and
gradually disappeared from my eye altogether. Presently the strokes
ceased--the groaning and asthmatic wheezing of the bellows
subsided--and the noise of the man locking the door of his small shop
showed that the last of the villagers had finished the labours of the
day; and I had time to notice that snow was beginning to fall.
"I got home, and let myself in without disturbing my auld father, and
slept soundly till daylight next morning.
"There was none of the villagers asteer when I got up. A sprinkling of
snow, as already mentioned, had fallen during the night, which had been
so calm, that the white veil which covered the dying face of nature was
unsoiled and without a rent, over all the level country; and the road
through the village was one unbroken sheet of the purest white,
unpolluted as yet by a single footstep--what do I say? there was _one_
footprint there, the recollection of which is indelible from my brain,
as the mark on Cain's forehead.
"As I opened the door to step forth, I noticed the mark of a man's
foot, as if some one had come down the small lane, that ran at right
angles with the road, and past the end of the house, towards the little
projecting steps in front of the door. 'Well,' thought I--'well--it
may have been my father's, or some one of the villagers may have been
earlier up than I apprehended;' and I stepped on, wondering in my own
mind what made me notice the steps at all. 'But I am a fool, for one
does notice the footprints after the first fall of snow of the season
with an interest that we cannot always account for,' said I to myself,
as I stepped into the path that led to the school, where I was going to
light the fire. I again started as I looked down, for I now noticed,
to my surprise, that the footprints exactly resembled my own, with the
round mark of the ring at the end of my stick-leg distinct in the snow.
'Why, I did not come this way home, did I?' again communed I with
myself; 'certainly I did not; and there was no snow when I came from
the school, before I set out for the town. How came these footprints
here?--what can it mean?' and mechanically I traced them as far as I
could, until the mark of the wooden leg suddenly vanished, and was
replaced by the print of a boot or shoe, for a few paces farther; when
the marks disappeared altogether, as if the person had turned off
suddenly through a gap in the hedge. I was a good deal startled at all
this--Could I have been walking in my sleep?--This was scarcely
credible; I had never done so, and if I had, which I could not believe,
how came my shrunk leg to be miraculously straightened on the instant?
For whatever it was, man or spirit, it must have stumped along for
fifty yards on a leg of flesh, and a tram of wood, and then suddenly
have dropped the agency of the latter, and turned sharp into the fields
on two feet, such us everyday men wear; besides, the person, whoever he
was, wore iron-heeled square-toed boots or shoes; and I saw no mark of
my own tackets, or round _brogue_-like toes.
"I walked on until I came to the steps of the schoolroom, in a brown
study, with the crisp new-fallen snow crunching beneath my tread, and I
had nearly given a second edition of Doctor Soorock's downfall before I
fairly awoke to the routine of this sublunary world, and betook myself
to the unromantic occupation of lighting the fire. I sat down and took
up the bellows, but it seemed I had forgotten to make use of them; for
there I had been cowering by the ingle-cheek near an hour, pondering in
my own mind what the footprints could mean, and quite unconscious all
this time that the morning, in place of getting lighter, had settled
down very dark. The wind had also suddenly risen, and the branches of
the auld elm that overshadowed the schoolhouse were groaning and
rasping on the ridge of the roof; and Betty Mutchkin's sign, that hung
on the opposite side of the road from a long projecting beam, as if it
had been a flag, was swinging and creaking on its rusty hinges before
the angry gusts, as they tore down the small valley. At length I was
startled by the fury with which a hail shower dashed against the window
at my lug, utterly demolishing in a minute the sheet of brown paper
with which, until the village glazier sobered, and got a pane from
Edinburgh, I had _battered_ up the fracture occasioned by Dr Soorock's
cane, when he was humbling himself, and bowing down before the golden
coronet on auld Earl M----'s carriage.
"'Dear me,' said I, 'what a day! It's but gloomy without, and I'm no
sure that it's very cheery within; for there's a weight that has been
lang accumulating at my heart, and now it has grown heavy, heavy. The
lift will clear, and the spring will come again, and all nature, as if
risen from the grave, as we puir deevils hope to do, will resume its
primeval beauty; but a seared heart, a blighted soul,'--and I gave a
heavy sigh, while the very bellows on my knees seemed suddenly to
collapse of themselves, as if in sympathy, and to puff out an echo to
my groan.
"I felt a rough shake on the shoulder. 'What _are_ you sitting
groaning at there, Dominie?' said my father, who had entered unseen and
unheard--'what are you grunting and graning at the fireside on such a
morning as this for, Saunders, when you should have had a bit cheery
fire in the ingle for the drookit school-callants to dry themselves at,
instead of dreaming with the bellows on your knee, and the fire black
out?'
"I looked, and it was even so. 'I dinna ken, father, I am ill at ease;
but if I am spared'----
"'Nonsense!' quoth the hasty old sutor; 'get up, Saunders, and clap a
fresh spunk to the fire, whether you're spared or no, or I'll tak ye
siccan a clamhewit with my stick,'----The good old man the next moment,
however, saw how it was with me, and relenting said--'but come awa hame
like a decent callant, and tak yere breakfast, man; and you will have
scrimp time to eat it, let me tell you, for see,'--pulling out an old
turnip-shaped horologe, with great steel hands--'it is within the
twenty minutes of school-time already.'
"I made an effort, lighted the fire again, and rousing myself, went
forth with him towards our dwelling. The snow was fast disappearing
under the pelting of a heavy shower of sleet, that had succeeded the
hailstorm, and a loud clap of thunder shook the firmament as we arrived
at home. I started--'It's no common to hear thunder at this time o'
year, father.'
"'Come in and tak your breakfast, sir--the deevil's in the gaumerell,
that I should say sae.' I did so in silence, and returned to the
school, where I found myself without my hat, my hair wet and dripping,
and the back of my neck chilled, from the lodging of the hail within
the cape of my coat.
"One of my dreamy fits had again come over me, which, however, I
struggled hard to overcome; so I sat down at my small desk, and
unlocked my drawer, from whence I took out the tawse and laid them on
the closed Bible, as a terror to evil-doers; and placing my watch
beside them, I waited the entry of my scholars. First one wee drooked
chiel came in, and syne another, but most of them were beyond the time,
for the day was bad, and after they had all taken their places, there
was a perfect volley of hoasting. I could not skelp any of them for
being late that morning.--About half an hour had elapsed, and I had set
the boys to some task; there was a loud hum in the school, from their
murmuring voices, and I was looking out towards the road, at the
swollen stream, that I saw but last night sparkling and tinkling over
its more than half-dry channel, in a tiny stream that I could have
stepped across, but that now surged along brimful, in a red discoloured
torrent, tearing the trees and pailings, and whatever else it could
reach on its banks away, and rolling them down with such fury, that I
expected to see the arch of the small bridge sink and disappear, like a
wall going down before the strokes of a battering-ram. A group of the
villagers on the opposite side from where I stood were fishing out the
floating timber for firewood; but my attention was soon attracted to
the carrier's cart from town, that was coming along the road, with auld
Hempy himself--that was the man's name that had succeeded poor Jemmy
Miller in his vocation--and his wee son Andrew, cocked up in the front
of the cart. The river continued to rise, and covered a bend of the
road, which the cart was now approaching; it entered the water, which
the horse was making flash up in all directions, until it reached the
axle, but it gradually shoaled again, and the vehicle was on the point
of reaching the dry part of the road, when, like a shot, man and boy,
and horse and cart, disappeared amidst the roaring eddies.
"I ran out; the villagers had noticed the accident also; we all hurried
to the spot. The horse was struggling and snorting, and standing on
his hind legs, between the trams, in a vain attempt to get free from
the cart that was dragging him down the stream, but auld Hempy had
disappeared.
"'What's that? There's the callant, there's the callant--see his bit
head sooming down the stream like an otter'----
"I saw it, threw off my coat, and plunged in; but the upshot was, that
although Tam Clink the blacksmith saved the _child_, the _dominie_ was
near drowned; for I found to my cost that a stick-leg wasna canny to
soom with, the buoyancy thereof producing a corresponding and very
dangerous depression of the caput.
"We saved the boy; but the horse and cart, and Hempy himsell, were all
drowned; it was the first time, I mind, that I had ever seen a dead
corpse. The puir auld chiel was a stout buirdly man--he might have
weighed sixteen stone; but when we gat him that forenoon, after the
river had cast him ashore, stark and stiff, and carried him, and laid
him out in the kirk aisle, it was fearful to observe how he had shrunk
in bulk after the water had ran oot o' him; it wasna aften he took
muckle o' that same in, so it was a sure sign he was dead; his stomach
having fallen, had left the arch of his deep chest in fearful relief,
and then the pinching of his blue features and the death-girn on his
upper lip, that showed his twa buck teeth as if in anger--It was a
maist awfu' sicht.
"'What! are you frichtened, Saunders?' said a voice close to me--'are
you frichtened to look on a dead man, dominie? If you had been in
Paris with me last summer, man, you would have seen a dozen lying every
morning in the Morgue--ay, as nice and caller as if they had been
haddies in a fishmonger's shop.'
"I looked up at the heartless creature. 'He was the father of a
family, Mr Adderfang, and that drooked and shivering callant, that's
greeting there at the head of the corp, is his son; and mair forby, he
was a tenant o' yeer ain, sir, and'----
"He turned fiercely--'Keep your sentimentality for your next sermon,
sir;' and he looked at me with a withering scowl that sent a chill to
my heart. I felt a blighting of the soul that I would not willingly
have acknowledged--a sort of crushing consciousness, that the person
before me was in very deed my evil genius; but the _consciousness_ of
such a feeling drove me in the present instance to return his savage
look as haughtily as it was given; and I made a sudden motion with my
hand, which made him start back, and grasp the sma' end of his long
hammer-headed hunting whip.--'I say, dominie, I do not _quite_
understand you this morning; but, by G--, sir, if you give me an
opportunity I will read you a lesson that is not in your primer.'--And
he raised his whip threateningly. He was, as I have before mentioned,
a tall well-put-together man, as we say in Lincumdodie, and far more
than a match for me, at my best, when I had twa legs, and therefore
incomparably my superior in bodily strength and activity, maimed as I
now was. However, I took no time to consider of all this, but making a
sudden spring, I wrenched his whip from him, and as he swerved from me,
he fell over the trestle whereon the body of the carrier lay, and upset
it, to the great horror of the bystanders; and there lay, side by side,
the living scoffer and the dead corpse. A murmur of something that
hovered between applause and disapprobation buzzed amongst the group of
villagers; and the wee callant cried loud and bitterly, when, as the
laird was in the act of gathering himself up, Mr Bland himsell entered
the kirk, and with more sternness in his countenance than I had ever
seen there before.
"'Mr Adderfang,' said he to the young man, 'what is the meaning of all
this?--Is it becoming in a gentleman of your rank to desecrate the
House of God by heartless and ill-timed levity, first of all; for I
have heard the story from one of my elders; and then to threaten an
unoffending schoolmaster--ay, sir,'--for here Adderfang seemed on the
point of contradicting the minister--'ay, sir, and, to the credit of
your discretion be it said, a maimed man, too? Was this decent? was it
gentlemanly?'
"Here the poor wife of the carrier, with her clothes dripping with
water, and splashed with red clay stains from the miry road, without
her mutch, her grey haffits clotted with rain and perspiration over her
blue and shrunken features, and with her lip quivering, rushed into the
church.
"'Whar is he--whar is he--whar is my Willie?' The instant her eye
rested on the body she gave a long loud shriek, that echoed along the
roof, and fell down on it senseless. We had the poor woman removed,
and by that time Mr Adderfang had disappeared."
* * * * *
But the plot was fast thickening both with the dominie and poor Jessy
Miller.
Widow Miller's humble domicile was divided from the house where our
friend the dominie reposed, by a narrow lane. It stood three or four
yards back from the frontage of the neighbouring cottages, which
afforded space for a small parterre of flowers, at one time the pride
of poor Jessy's heart, and watered with her own hands; but many a hot
tear had lately trickled on their leaves, down the poor girl's pale and
faded countenance, and strange rumours had become rife in the secluded
village of the flower of the whole strath having been tainted by the
blight of some scoundrel. Her anxious and altered appearance, and the
evident misery of the poor widow her mother, were melancholy proofs of
the correctness of the surmise.
_Gradually the sough settled down on Saunders Skelp_--for who so likely
to be the cause as the avowed lover of the girl, and, as people
thought, her betrothed husband?
The report of Jessy's misfortune soon reached the person whom it most
concerned. At first it fairly stunned him, and then such crushing
misery overwhelmed the poor fellow's whole soul, when he became
convinced of its truth, that it nearly drove him mad altogether.
The morning after he had been made acquainted with the heart-breaking
fact, the dominie was sitting dejectedly at the breakfast-table (with
his elbow planted quite unconcernedly in the very middle of the plate
_among the het parritch_), opposite the auld _betherel_,[3] who was
munching his food in silence, and eyeing his son every now and then
with a most vinegar aspect. At length he broke out--"Braw wark,
dominie--braw wark ye have made o't atween ye." (The poor fellow
raised his disconsolate visage, and looked innocently in his parent's
face.) "Ay, you may look surprised Saunders, but that sham sheep face
will no deceive me; for--God forgie me, but I wonder the sicht did not
turn me intil stane--I marked you come out o' Jessy Miller's window
this blessed morning at grey daylicht, stick-leg and grey coat, just as
you sit there, as plain as I see ye the noo."
[3] Betherel, or minister's man. _Anglice_, beadle.
The poor fellow was roused almost to madness at this unjust and most
cruel aspersion, and denied most vehemently that he had been out of the
house that morning at all. But the old man _threeped_ that he saw him
bodily stump through the wee garden, and disappear round the corner,
where he had no doubt he had stolen in by the window of his room that
fronted that way, but which he could not see from where he stood.
"It couldna be me, father; as I sall answer to God it wasna me. My
wraith it may have been."
"If it was _your_ wraith, Saunders, it wasna the wraith o' a
_timmer-leg_? for there are the prints of ane to be seen till this
blessed moment, amang the flowers o' the garden and the glawr of the
lane. Tam Clink will vouch for this as well as me, for he saw you too."
Saunders, half crazy at this damning tissue of circumstantial, although
false, evidence, rose and went out to satisfy himself. After
inspecting the foot-marks, for there they were, sure enough, he
returned to the house, and the first thing he did now was to gobble up
his food, scalding hot as it was, as if he had been perishing of
hunger. He then rose, and was rushing down stairs distractedly--when
lo! who should enter but Mr Bland the minister?
Here there was a new scene of crimination; and the poor creature was
like to have made an end of himself in his despair, for when he seized
the big "ha' Bible," and was about making oath upon it to his
innocence, the minister took it forcibly from him.
"Not in my presence, young man--not before me shall you imprecate the
curse of the Almighty on the head of a perjurer."
"Minister, minister, wad you hae my death--the death maybe of sowl and
body--lie at your door? Send for Jessy Miller--lost creature as she
is--send for her. She will not--she cannot condemn me."
"Jessy Miller, sir!--the oath of a limmer like her is no worth a
wunnlestrae."
At this he sprang forth like a wild-beast when the goad is struck into
him, and out to the hill-side, nor did he venture home that night.
Listen.
"The snow had fallen about the dawning, and, benumbed with cold, I was
returning from my night-lair on the damp hill-side towards the village,
with a determination to flee the bounds thereof, after once more trying
to undeceive my auld father; for it was a dreary thocht to travel forth
burdened with my ain misery, and the heavy load of a father's curse
forby. As I came down the small lane, and got my first glimpse of
Widow Miller's house, I stopped to take a last look at the bit bourock
that sheltered her for whom, only twa days gane, I would have shed my
reddest heart's-blood rather than sin or sorrow should have scathed
her, or come near her dwelling. It was as yet scrimp daylight, naebody
was stirring. The only indication of life (barring the twittering of
the birdies in the trees, and the crowing of the cocks) was a thread of
blue peat smoke rising from a cottage in the village, here and there;
but the east was fast reddening, when lo! I saw the window of Jessy's
room open gently, and, _what shall I say--what did I see_--but a
wooden-leg, so sure as I was a sinful man, protrude therefrom! I went
blin'--I went blin';--as I saw mysell, grey frock, timmer-tram and all,
jump into the wee garden, open the small wicker-gate, and stump away in
the direction of the manse.
"I was petrified with astonishment, frozen to the spot, until my
wraith, for assuredly I considered it nothing else, arrived at the gate
leading into the minister's garden, when it turned; and then, as if in
great alarm, suddenly rushed through the small gate and disappeared. I
was roused, and now started off in pursuit at the very top of my speed,
but reached the gate only in time to see the figure clear the holly
hedge that screened the front of the manse, at a bound, with the
wooden-leg unstrapped and flourishing in its hand, and vanish beyond
it. I had then to make a small detour to get through the wicket in the
fence; but before I got round, whatever it might have been, it was
nowhere to be seen.
"I ran up to the door in breathless haste, and, early as it was, began
to knock furiously for admittance, without well thinking what I was
about. No one answered, and an open window on the ground-floor now
attracted my attention. I looked in--and who should I see snoring on
'the bred of his back,' in his wee fold-down pallet, but young Moses
Bland, the helper, with--I went frantic at the sight--the ghost of my
ain wooden leg lying across the body!
"'Now I have run the fox to earth,' said I.
"'And wha makes such an indecent uproar at the door, at such an
untimeous season?' quoth the _auld minister_, from an upper window.
"'It is me, sir--I Saunders Skelp, wha ye hae sae unjustly maligned,
minister. Gude forgie me that I should say so.'
"'Off with you, ye scoonrel,' quoth the usually mild minister--'off
with you, sir, or I'll make you repent it.'
"'Na, minister, when you are cool, you will yoursell repent your
conduct to me. Here, sir, tak your cloak about you, and come down
_here_--you'll soon see that the evildoer is nearer a-kin to you than
Saunders Skelp.'"
The minister came down, and now there was the devil to pay between him
and his helper; but the latter protested his innocence so vehemently,
that at length the dominie was unceremoniously ejected, with the
additional accusation sticking to him, of having in cold blood, and for
purposes of deceit, actually made a duplicate of his wooden-leg, in
order to cast the blame on young Mr Bland. He was thus on the eve of
getting set deeper and faster in the mire than ever, when in came the
betherel and Tam Clink, who, being on the watch, had seen Saunders
pursue his own _double_ towards the manse, so that Moses Bland once
more became the subject of suspicion.
The affair was largely canvassed that forenoon at a meeting of the
elders, and the injurious surmises were gaining strength against poor
Moses, notwithstanding: his frantic protestations that he "kenn'd na
whether Jessy Miller was man or woman." But Saunders, when he brought
his sober judgment to bear on the matter, was the first to acquit him,
for his kind heart would not allow him to believe that his tried friend
and old schoolfellow, the helper, could be guilty of such atrocious
conduct; while something whispered him that his evil genius, William
Adderfang, was the villain; however little appearances in the mean time
might tend to such a conclusion.
During that day, the mysterious transaction of the _double_ got wind in
the village, and every ingle cheek was filled with the sound of keen
disputation. The fact of the apparition was unquestionably proved by
Tam Clink and the betherel, putting Saunders' own evidence out of the
question; but whether it was the deil himsell, or a dweller on this
earth, afforded large scope for doubt and argument. Tam Clink was
inclined to believe in the mortality of the duplicate Saunders, "as he
had weel examined the counterfeit tram, and it was sound maple, with
nae smell of fire ava, let abee brimstane," and Tam was a judge. It
happened to be a holiday at the small school, so the poor fellow again
stole away to commune with himself on the hill-side, and to escape the
gaze of his humble acquaintances.
It was a most beautiful breezy forenoon, and from the spot where he had
planted himself, he had a bird's-eye view of the _duke's_ hounds, on
the opposite swell of the river-divided valley, and the whole field of
gallant sportsmen. It was the last day of the season, and in the cover
they were drawing, that was alive with red coats and white hounds (the
latter diminished by distance to a handful of hailstones pattering and
glancing among the dark bushes), the whips, and three _scoonrel
chields_ were busy digging out a litter of cub foxes from one of the
earths, amidst a chorus of merry voices and loud laughter. Presently
the old bitch broke cover from another mouth, when the whole pack
opened most musically, and away went the jovial party as hard as they
could split, their tallyho's making the whole strath ring again.
At first, the fresh air and quiet loveliness of nature had gradually
stolen over his soul in spite of himself, and stilled its troubled
heavings, like oil calming the stormy waters of the sea; and now the
exhilaration of the scene, like the flowing tide lifting a stranded
vessel off the rocks, was imperceptibly lightening that more perilous
stuff, the duller load of misery that pressed closer and more
suffocatingly on the poor fellow's heart--when lo! just as the
foxhounds disappeared from the river, the wasted form of poor Jessy
Miller was seen slowly and painfully crawling up the hill towards where
the dominie sat, leaning on her staff, and feeble as an infant.
He saw her from the first, but could not move--something nailed him to
the spot. She approached, but for a minute was so breathless and
exhausted, that she could not speak--"Saunders Skelp!"--at length
moaned the poor broken-hearted girl--"Saunders!--ye are going to tak
the sacrament the morn," she paused, and leant, "_peching_ on her
staff," as the MS. hath it--"Ay, Saunders, ye are going to commemorate
our Saviour's death, and--and--I am gaun to dee, Saunders."
"The tears ran down her cheeks, and I was like to be worried mysell,
for greet I couldna.
"'Saunders. Is it no written, that if thou hast ought against thy
brother, thou shalt leave thy gift before the altar, and first go and
be reconciled unto thy brother?'
"'Even sae--sae is it even written, Jessy.'
"'Time _has_ been when you aften said I was dearer till you than mony
sisters--but that's past and gane--gane like the last winter's snaw;
yet is Saunders Skelp's hate sae deadly that he refuses to tak off
Jessy Miller's parting and sin-clogged soul, the grievous weight of his
own bitter, bitter curse.' She waited lang for an answer, but I gied
her nane--'I cam to ask yere forgiveness, Saunders--_and I hae asked
it_'--here she grat as if her heart was bursting--'and--and--oh God,
whom I have offended, cast me not off in this my utmost need--_and I
have been refused_--one struggle more, and my task is ended,
Saunders'--and she caught my hand in baith of hers whether I would or
no--they were cauld, cauld as lead--'I hae deserved this; but hand my
heart, _I didna expect it_--Saunders, I have only now to say God bless
you, and to bid you fareweel for ever.' She sank down on the
whin-stane at my feet--the fiend had seared my heart harder than it,
and I never even offered to help her up.
"I thought she was _awa_ awthegither; at last, gathering strength, she
spak the last words I ever heard her utter.
"'I am come to clear Moses Bland, and to richt you, Saunders.'
"Oh, the sweet low music of that mournful voice!
"'The young laird--Mr Adderfang'--she _gasped_, it could nae langer be
called speaking--'that _serpent_, William Adderfang, has been the ruin
o' me--ruin here, and--and--condemnation in the world to come.'
"She bent her head, and hid her face with her wasted fingers, through
which the hot tears fell fast as the rain-drops in the breeze from the
shower-bedashed tree above us--when the sound of hound and horn once
more swelled in the gale; and first the fox came over the wall above
us, then the whole pack, tumbling tumultuously one over another down
the face of the rocky precipice, twinkling hither and thither, and
dropping from stone to cliff like the breeze-scattered foam of a
cataract, _then one solitary cavalier, who was dashed, horse and man,
to the ground, close to us where we sat_, the rider falling senseless,
and the blood flowing from his mouth and ears. The gallant horse,
however, struggled to get on his legs again, until he reached the brink
of the old quarry close beneath us, over which he rolled, dragging the
wounded man along with him by the stirrup, and disappeared, rattling
and rasping among the loose stones and bushes. Jessy was roused in an
instant; she had caught a glimpse of the wounded man's face as he was
dragged past her, and giving a loud shriek, as if her heart had split
in twain, dashed herself down the precipice after him, and vanished for
ever from my eyes amongst the furze--_it was William Adderfang!_"
The issue of all this complicated misery was the unfortunate girl being
carried home, and that night prematurely confined of a dead child--_she
never saw the sun rise again_.
As for the poor Dominie, although his character was cleared both by
Jessy Miller on her death-bed, and ultimately by Adderfang himself, his
heart was nearly broken; indeed, the blow was heavy enough to "drive
his wits a wee bit ajee," as he phrased it, ever after. In this half
crazy, half desperate condition, he suddenly left friends, and house,
and home, and wandered about the country, until his means of
subsistence failing, he enlisted into the militia; and afterwards, as
related by Serjeant Lorimer, into the marines, on the reduction of the
former.
Enough and to spare of the Sorrows of Dominie Skelp; those who desire
more must wait until he publishes them: but the Midge is but a little
vessel, and a heavy episode would swamp her. So--
"Here, Mr Peak," struck in Dick Lanyard, who was standing close beside
the small open skylight,--"clap on that purchase, and take a small pull
of the main-halyards, before we keep away, do you hear? Belay all
that. Now, Dogvane, put the helm up--so. Let draw the foresheet
there."
"Ay, ay, sir."
And once more the wicked little Midge buzzes along free.