Next morning Clavers, with fifty dragoons, arrived at Chapelhope, where
they alighted on the green; and putting their horses to forage, he and
Sir Thomas Livingston, Captain Bruce, and Mr Adam Copland, before
mentioned, a gentleman of Clavers' own troop, went straight into the
kitchen. Walter was absent at the hill. The goodwife was sitting lonely
in the east room, brooding over her trials and woes in this life, and
devising means to get rid of her daughter, and with her of all the
devouring spirits that haunted Chapelhope; consequently the first and
only person whom the gentlemen found in the kitchen was old Nanny.
Clavers, who entered first, kept a shy and sullen distance, for he never
was familiar with any one; but Bruce, who was a jocular Irish
gentleman, and well versed in harassing and inveigling the ignorant
country people to their destruction, made two low bows (almost to the
ground) to the astonished dame, and accosted her as follows: "How are
you to-day, mistress?--I hope you are very well?"
"Thank ye kindly, sir," said Nanny, curtseying in return; "deed I'm no
sae weel as I hae been; I hae e'en seen better days; but I keep aye the
heart aboon, although the achings and the stitches hae been sair on me
the year."
"Lack-a-day! I am so very sorry for that!--Where do they seize you?
about the heart, I suppose?--Oh, dear soul! to be sure you do not know
how sorry I am for your case--it must be so terribly bad! You should
have the goodness to consult your physician, and get blood let."
"Dear bairn, I hae nae blude to spare--an' as for doctors, I haena
muckle to lippen to them. To be sure, they are whiles the means, under
Providence"----
"Oho!" said he, putting his finger to his nose, and turning to his
associates with a wry face,--"Oho! the means under Providence!--a d--d
whig, by ----. Tell me, my dear and beautiful Mistress Stitchaback, do
you really believe in that blessed thing, Providence?"
"Do I believe in Providence!--Did ever ony body hear sic a question as
that? Gae away, ye muckle gouk--d'ye think to make a fool of a puir
body?"
So saying, she gave him a hearty slap on the cheek; at which his
companions laughing, Bruce became somewhat nettled, and, drawing out his
sword, he pointed at the recent stains of blood upon it. "Be so good as
to look here, my good lady," said he, "and take very good note of all
that I say, and more; for harkee, you must either renounce Providence,
and all that I bid you renounce,--and you must, beside that, answer all
the questions that I shall ever be after asking,--or, do you see, I am a
great doctor--this is my very elegant lance--and I'll draw the blood
that shall soon ease you of all your stitches and pains."
"I dinna like your fleem ava, man--'tis rather ower grit for an auld
body's veins. But ye're surely some silly skemp of a fallow, to draw out
your sword on a puir auld woman. Dinna think, howanabee, that I care for
outher you or it. I'll let ye see how little I mind ye; for weel I ken
your comrades wadna let ye fash me, e'en though ye were sae silly as to
offer. Na, na; d'ye ever think that little bonny demure-looking lad
there wad suffer ye to hurt a woman?--I wat wad he no! He has mair
discreation in his little finger than you hae i' your hale bouk.--Now
try me, master doctor--I'll nouther renounce ae thing that ye bid me,
nor answer ae question that ye speer at me."
"In the first place, then, my good hearty dame, do you acknowledge or
renounce the Covenant?"
"Aha! he's wise wha wats that, an' as daft that speers."
"Ay, or no, in a moment--No juggling with me, old Mrs Skinflint."
"I'll tell ye what ye do, master--if ony body speer at ye, gin auld
Nanny i' the Chapelhope renounces the Covenant, shake your head an' say
ye dinna ken."
"And pray, my very beautiful girl, what do you keep this old tattered
book for?"
"For a fancy to gar fools speer, an' ye're the first--Come on now, sir,
wi' your catechis--Wally-dye man! gin ye be nae better a fighter than
ye're an examiner, ye may gie up the craft."
Bruce here bit his lip, and looked so stern that Nanny, with a
hysterical laugh, ran away from him, and took shelter behind Clavers.
"You are a d--d fool, Bruce," said he, "and constantly blundering.--Our
business here, mistress, is to discover, if possible, who were the
murderers of an honest curate, and some of our own soldiers that were
slain in this neighbourhood while discharging their duty; if you can
give us any information on that subject, you shall be well rewarded."
"Ye'll hear about the curate, sir--ye'll hear about him--he was found
out to be a warlock, and shot dead.--But ah, dear bairn! nane alive can
gie you information about the soldiers!--It was nae human hand did that
deed, and there was nae e'e out o' heaven saw it done--There wasna a man
that day in a' the Hope up an' down--that deed will never be fund out,
unless a spirit rise frae the dead an' tell o't--Muckle fear, an' muckle
grief it has been the cause o' here!--But the men war a' decently
buried; what mair could be done?"
"Do you say that my men were all decently buried?"
"Ay, troth, I wat weel, worthy sir, and wi' the burial-service too.--My
master and mistress are strong king's folk."
"So you are not the mistress of this house?"
"A bonny like mistress I wad be, forsooth--Na, na, my mistress is sittin
be hersel ben the house there." With that, Nanny fell a working and
singing full loud--
"Little wats she wha's coming,
Little wats she wha's coming,
Strath and Correy's ta'en the bent,
An' Ferriden an' a's coming;
Knock and Craigen Sha's coming,
Keppoch an' Macraw's coming,
Clan-Mackinnon's ower the Kyle,
An' Donald Gun an' a's coming."
Anxious now to explore the rest of the house, they left Nanny singing
her song, and entered the little parlour hastily, where, finding no one,
and dreading that some escape might be effected, Clavers and Livingston
burst into the Old Room, and Bruce and Copland into the other. In the
Old Room they found the beautiful witch Katharine, with the train of her
snow-white joup drawn over her head, who looked as if taken in some evil
act by surprise, and greatly confounded when she saw two gentlemen
enter her sanctuary in splendid uniforms. As they approached, she made a
slight curtsey, to which they deigned no return; but going straight up
to her, Clavers seized her by both wrists. "And is it, indeed, true,"
said he, "my beautiful shepherdess, that we have caught you at your
prayers so early this morning?"
"And what if you have, sir?" returned she.
"Why, nothing at all, save that I earnestly desire, and long exceedingly
to join with you in your devotional exercises," laying hold of her in
the rudest manner.
Katharine screamed so loud that in an instant old Nanny was at their
side, with revenge gleaming from her half-shaded eyes, and heaving over
her shoulder a large green-kale gully, with which she would doubtless
have silenced the renowned Dundee for ever, had not Livingston sprung
forward with the utmost celerity, and caught her arm just as the stroke
was descending. But Nanny did not spare her voice; she lifted it up
with shouts on high, and never suffered one yell to lose hearing of
another.
Walter, having just then returned from the hill, and hearing the hideous
uproar in the Old Room, rushed into it forthwith to see what was the
matter. Katharine was just sinking, when her father entered, within the
grasp of the gentle and virtuous Clavers. The backs of both the knights
were towards Walter as he came in, and they were so engaged amid bustle
and din that neither of them perceived him, until he was close at their
backs. He was at least a foot taller than any of them, and nearly as
wide round the chest as them both. In one moment his immense fingers
grasped both their slender necks, almost meeting behind each of their
windpipes. They were rendered powerless at once--they attempted no more
struggling with the women, for so completely had Walter's gripes
unnerved them, that they could scarcely lift their arms from their
sides; neither could they articulate a word, or utter any other sound
than a kind of choaked gasping for breath. Walter wheeled them about to
the light, and looked alternately at each of them, without quitting or
even slackening his hold.
"Callants, wha ir ye ava?--or what's the meanin' o' a' this unmencefu'
rampaging?"
Sir Thomas gave his name in a hoarse and broken voice; but Clavers,
whose nape Walter's right hand embraced, and whose rudeness to his
daughter had set his mountain-blood a-boiling, could not answer a word.
Walter, slackening his hold somewhat, waited for an answer, but none
coming--
"Wha ir ye, I say, ye bit useless weazel-blawn like urf that ye're?"
The haughty and insolent Clavers was stung with rage; but seeing no
immediate redress was to be had, he endeavoured to pronounce his dreaded
name, but it was in a whisper scarcely audible, and stuck in his
throat--"Jo--o--o Graham," said he.
"Jock Graham do they ca' ye?--Ye're but an unmannerly whalp, man. And
ye're baith king's officers too!--Weel, I'll tell ye what it is, my
denty clever callants; if it warna for the blood that's i' your master's
veins, I wad nite your twa bits o' pows thegither."
He then threw them from him; the one the one way, and the other the
other, and lifting his huge oak staff, he strode out at the door,
saying, as he left them,--"Hech! are free men to be guidit this
gate--I'll step down to the green to your commander, an' tell him what
kind o' chaps he keeps about him to send into fock's houses.--Dirty
unmensefu' things!"
Clavers soon recovering his breath, and being ready to burst with rage
and indignation, fell a cursing and fuming most violently; but Sir T.
Livingston could scarcely refrain from breaking out into a convulsion
of laughter. Clavers had already determined upon ample revenge, for the
violation of all the tender ties of nature was his delight, and wherever
there was wealth to be obtained, or a private pique to be revenged,
there never was wanting sufficient pretext in those days for cutting off
individuals, or whole families, as it suited. On the very day previous
to that, the Earl of Traquair had complained, in company with Clavers
and his officers, of a tenant of his, in a place called Bald, who would
neither cultivate his farm nor give it up. Captain Bruce asked if he
prayed in his family? The Earl answered jocularly, that he believed he
did nothing else. Bruce said that was enough; and the matter passed over
without any farther notice. But next morning, Bruce went out with four
dragoons, and shot the farmer as he was going out to his work. Instances
of this kind are numerous, if either history or tradition can be in
aught believed; but in all the annals of that age, there is scarcely a
single instance recorded of any redress having been granted to the
harassed country people for injuries received. At this time, the word of
Argyle's rising had already spread, and Clavers actually traversed the
country more like an exterminating angel, than a commander of a
civilized army.
Such were the men with whom Walter had to do; and the worst thing of
all, he was not aware of it. He had heard of such things, but he did not
believe them; for he loved his king and country, and there was nothing
that vexed him more than hearing of aught to their disparagement; but
unluckily his notions of freedom and justice were far above what the
subjects of that reign could count upon.
When Clavers and Livingstone entered the Old Room, it will be remembered
that Bruce and Copland penetrated into the other. There they found the
goodwife of Chapelhope, neatly dressed in her old-fashioned style, and
reading on her Bible, an exercise in which she gloried, and of which she
was very proud.
Bruce instantly desired her "to lay that very comely and precious book
on the hottest place of all the beautiful fire, that was burning so
pleasantly with long crackling peat; and that then he would converse
with her about things that were, to be sure, of far greater and mightier
importance."
"Hout, dear sir, ye ken that's no consistent wi' natural reason--Can any
thing be o' greater importance than the tidings o' grace an' salvation,
an' the joys o' heaven?"
"Oho!" cried Bruce, and straddled around the room with his face turned
to the joists.--"My dear Copland, did you ever hear such a thing in all
the days that ever you have to live? Upon my soul, the old woman is
talking of grace, and salvation, and the joys of heaven too, by Saint
G--! My dearest honey and darling, will you be so kind as stand up upon
the soles of your feet, and let me see what kind of a figure you will be
in heaven. Now, by the cross of Saint Patrick, I would take a journey
there to see you go swimming through Heaven in that same form, with
your long waist, and plaitted quoif, and that same charming face of
yours. Och! och! me! what a vile she whig we have got in this here
corner!--Copland, my dear soul, I foresee that all the ewes and kine of
Chapelhope will soon be rouped at the cross of Selkirk, and then what
blessed lawings we shall have! Now my dear mistress Grace, you must be
after renouncing the joys of heaven immediately; for upon my honour, the
very sight of your face would spoil the joys of any place whatever, and
the first thing you must do is to lay that delightful old book with the
beautiful margin along the side of it, on the coals; but before you do
that we shall sing to his praise and glory from the 7th verse of the
149th psalm."
He then laid aside his helmet and sung the psalm, giving out each line
with a whine that was truly ludicrous, after which he put the Bible into
the goodwife's hand, and desired her, in a serious tone, instantly to
lay it on the fire. The captain's speech to his companions about the
ewes and kine of Chapelhope was not altogether lost on the conscience of
Maron Linton. It was not, as she afterwards said, like water spilt upon
the ground, which cannot be gathered up again. "Why, dear sir," said
she, "ye ken, after a', that the beuk's naething but paper an' ink, an'
three shillings an' aughtpence will buy as gude a ane frae Geordy
Dabson, the morn, an' if there be ony sin in't, it will lye at your
door, an' no at mine. I'll ne'er haigel wi' my king's officer about
three and aughtpence."
So saying, Maron laid the Bible on the fire, which soon consumed it to
ashes.
"Now, may the devil take me," said Bruce, "if I do not believe that you
are a true woman after all, and if so, my purse is lighter by one half
than it was; but, my dear honey, you have the very individual and
genuine seeds of whiggism in your constitution--You have, I will swear,
been at many a harmless and innocent conventicle."
"Ye ken little about me, sir.--Gude forbid that ever I countenanced sic
traitors to the kirk and state!"
"Amen! say I; but I prophecy and say unto thee, that the first
field-meeting into which thou goest in the beauty of holiness, thou
shalt be established for ever with thy one foot in Dan and the other in
Beersheba, and shalt return to thy respective place of abode as rank a
whig as ever swung in the Grass-Market."
A long dialogue next ensued, in which the murder of the priest, Mass
John Binram, was discussed at full length, and by which Bruce and
Copland discerned, that superstitious as Maron was, she told them what
she deemed to be the truth, though in a strange round-about way. Just as
they were beginning to talk over the mysterious murder of the soldiers,
Claverhouse and Sir Thomas joined them, and Bruce, turning round to
them, said, "My lord, this very honest woman assures me, that she
believes the two principal murderers of the curate are lying concealed
in a linn not far hence, and there seems to be little doubt but that
they must likewise have been concerned in the murder of our soldiers."
Clavers, the horrors of whose execrations are yet fresh in the memory of
our peasants, burst out as follows, to the astonishment of Bruce, who
was not aware of his chagrin, or of aught having befallen him.
"May the devil confound and d--n them to hell!--May he make a brander of
their ribs to roast their souls on!"
Maron Linton, hearing herself called a good woman, and finding that she
was approven of, could not refrain from interfering here.
"Dear sir, my lord, ye sudna swear that gate, for it's unco ill-faur'd
ye ken--an' at ony rate, the deil canna damn naebody--if ye will swear,
swear sense."
The rage of the general, and the simplicity of the goodwife, was such an
amusing contrast, that the three attendants laughed aloud. Clavers
turned his deep grey eye upon them, which more than the eye of any human
being resembled that of a serpent--offence gleamed in it.
"Gentlemen," said he, "do you consider where you are, and what you are
about? Sacre! am I always to be trysted with boys and fools?"
He then began and examined the goodwife with much feigned deference and
civility, which so pleased her that she told him every thing with great
readiness. She was just beginning to relate the terrible, but
unfortunate story of the Brownie of Bodsbeck, and his train of officious
spirits; of the meat which they devoured, and in all probability would
have ended the relation with the woeful connection between the Brownie
and her daughter, and the part that she had taken in the murder of the
soldiers, when Walter entered the room with a discomposed mien, and gave
a new turn to the conversation. But that eventful scene must be left to
the next chapter.