THE ENGLISH BOAT.
"St Abb, St. Helen, and St. Bey,
All built kirks near unto the sea;
St. Abb's upon the Nabs, and St. Helen's on the Lea,
But St. Bey's upon Dunbar sands is nearest to sea!"--_Old Rhyme._
Meanwhile, the worthy messenger of the worthy knight, Sir Patrick
Gray, captain of Broughty, was riding hard towards the east. To
avoid question by the gateward, who kept the bridge and toll of
Musselburgh, he swam his horse through the river, near the church of
St. Michael the Archangel, and dashed through Pinkie-woods, over
Tranentmuir and Hoprigmains, and never drew his bridle until King
David's royal burgh of Dunbar and the massive towers of that noble
fortress, which was then considered the key of East Lothian, rose
before him; and from the higher ground, as he approached the bare and
sea-beaten promontory on which they stand, he could perceive five
English vessels cruising in the offing, or deep water, and almost
becalmed between the mainland and the May.
Three of these were indeed the vessels of Howard, who, when on his
homeward voyage, had been joined off Holy Island by two large armed
vessels, under Miles Furnival, sent by Henry VII. from the Thames,
with orders to pillage the coast of Scotland, and (in fulfilment of
the old and invariable policy of the English kings) to take every
advantage of the intestine broils of Scotland to distress and harass
the people, that they might the more willingly listen to his
proposals, when the project of the prince's marriage with Margaret
Tudor was revived--a foolish and mistaken policy, as the Scots were
ever the last people in the world to be wooed by cold steel and
gunpowder.
Feeling appetised after his long ride, Sir Patrick's messenger reined
up his foam-flecked charger at the _Dunbar Arms_, an hostel in the
Highgate, where he ordered a cup of Malvoisie, a pair of roasted
plovers, and a quail, with sweet sack, for he felt able to devour a
horse, after his long ride near the seacoast; and he resolved, that
though the evening was drawing on, affairs of state should wait his
pleasure.
"How happy are the rich," thought he, with a sigh of enjoyment, after
he had drained the last of his sack, and picked the last bone of the
quail; "how often have I fed my hopes when I had little wherewith to
feed my stomach," he added, clinking the English gold pieces, with
which his purse was now so well lined, and which went current in
Scotland, as Scottish coins did in England, for then the coin of all
nations was circulated everywhere; "but this country will grow too
hot for me ere long, so I must e'en turn spy on Henry, and win in
England the lyons, louis, and angels of the new king, James
IV.--ugh!" and he smiled a ferocious smile, "he owes his crown to
_me_! But now to reach these devilish ships anent that damsel, who I
would with all my soul was sleeping with her fathers."
He now went on foot to the harbour, where, though the sea was calm,
there was considerable agitation in the water, for Dunbar is the most
bleak and stormy headland on the coast; but he found that no money
would tempt the fishermen to put him on board of any of those English
vessels, which were lying, almost becalmed, about two miles off; and
he soon ceased to ask them, as their suspicions were readily excited,
and there were not a few who threatened to drag him before the
provost, that he might be forced to "declare what manner of business
he, a Scot, had on board these hostile craft."
This threat made him tremble, for now he had three tenements in
Stirling, with a remarkably well-lined purse; and if "the sudden
possession of gold will make a brave man cautious," how much more so
will it render timid a dastardly regicide?
Hastily leaving the fishermen, he walked for nearly a mile along the
sands, on which the surf was rolling with considerable force, and
gazed anxiously at the English ships, which were all within two miles
of each other, with their high lumbering poops, their carved and
gilded quarter-galleries, and the muzzles of their brass cannon
shining in the last rays of the sunlight that lingered in the west;
and Borthwick stamped his feet with anger, for he supposed that
Wood's ships must, by this time, have dropped far down the river, and
that shots would soon be exchanged.
Upon the level shore, close to the seamark, there stood in those days
the chapel of St. Bey, who was daughter of a certain Saxon king.
This princess, according to local tradition, had emigrated among the
Scots with her two sisters, St. Abb and St. Helen, who, being meek,
gentle, and pious, were disgusted with the world and the barbaric
pomp of their father's petty court, and resolved to spend their
dowers in the erection of churches, and their lives in devotion. All
these three votaresses having a curious predilection for salt water,
endeavoured to find sites as near the sea as possible. St. Helen
built her oratory on a plain, near the beach, and St. Abb raised hers
on that high rock which overhangs the German Ocean, while St. Bey
succeeded in founding her fane so close to the floodmark that at
every full tide the waves washed its massive walls; and hence arose
the Lothian rhyme prefixed to this chapter.
Thinking little of St. Abb, St. Helen, or St. Bey, Hew Borthwick, on
passing the chapel of the latter, suddenly found himself seized by a
party of seamen, whom, by the fashion of their gabardines, and the
sound of their voices, he knew at once to be English; and close by
was a large boat, well laden with several sacks of flour, three
sheep, and a quantity of vegetables, all taken from an adjacent farm;
for this foraging party were numerous and well armed.
"Yoho, brother; whom seek ye?" demanded one, who grasped Borthwick by
the throat--yet the craven dared not to draw his sword.
"I seek some one who will take me on board the _Harry_, for I have an
urgent message to the captain."
"Concerning the damosel aboard, I have little doubt," replied the
seaman, who was no other than Dick Selby, the gunner; "I ever said
little luck would come to Eddy Howard by having this painted galley
in tow."
"Nay, Dick," said another, "she be no galley, but a noble lady."
"A Scots one, though. Well, and what want ye with the captain, eh?"
"How can the Scot answer thee, Dick," interfered another, "when
thou'st twisted his mouth all to starboard; why, 'tis all on one
side, like the ballast-port of a timber-ship."
"Teach thy grannum to make sackwhey! I warrant thee I'll make the
Scot find his tongue. Speak!" roared the gunner, giving Borthwick a
furious shake.
"I have an urgent message for your captain, which none must know but
he," gasped Borthwick, in a half-strangled voice; "look at me,
sirs--some of you must have seen me on board before now?"
"Tarry a minute, gunner Dick," said a soldier who was in half mail,
and had but one eye; "I _have_ seen this man before, methinks."
"Off Taymouth--at night," said Borthwick.
"I remember me now," said the soldier, who was Anthony Arblaster;
"unhand him, Dick, ere worse come of it, for the captain's temper
hath been truly devilish of late."
"We have had a long spell on this here shore," growled the gunner, as
he released the throat of Borthwick, whose lace doublet was no way
improved by the application of such a hard and tarry hand as Dick's;
"we have turned our best barge into a bumboat, as ye may see, so come
aboard and let us shove off, before some of your furious Scots come
after their flour-sacks. I would to St. George they were all, for
the trouble they give us, steering in the latitude of purgatory!"
"Or a warmer latitude still," added Anthony Arblaster, rubbing his
blind eye.
"Avast," said an old sailor, "and remember there is a Scot here, and
that he be but one among many."
But the said Scot, though boiling with rage at his treatment, cared
little for national reflections; yet, had these honest English hearts
known the actual character of the wretch they had on board, they
would have flung him into the sea, lest they should never more have
fortune on its waters.
"Ship your oars, my hearts," said the gunner; "and harkee, Arblaster,
bear a-hand, old dead-eye, and belay these here quadrupeds to the
thwarts, or we may lose them in the surf."
The boat was bluffly built, and being full of men, and moreover
heavily laden, she laboured through the breakers which roll for ever
on those sands, and shipped a great quantity of spray before her head
was fairly turned towards the _Harry_, which was astern of all the
other vessels, all of which were lying with their heads towards the
river. The uneasiness manifested by Borthwick, as the spray flew
over his rich cloak and doublet, afforded extreme gratification to
the hardy seamen who had nothing to spoil, and whose oars bent almost
to breaking, as they strained between the tholing-pins, and shot the
heavy barge from one long roller to another.
After they had pulled a mile from the shore, and saw the Castle of
Dunbar rising with all its strong red towers and crenellated ramparts
in many a frowning row, bristling with cannon and black loop-holes,
the one-eyed archer, who was seated in the stern, uttered a shout of
astonishment:--
"Hilloah, old Buff," said the gunner; "what is the matter?"
"There are two large ships standing down the river!"
"Sir Andrew Wood, for a thousand rose nobles!" said the gunner,
slapping his thigh; "thou hast the true eye of an English archer,
Tony, thof thou'st but one; well, I thought we should not make out
two days of a quiet cruise here. Give way, my hearts--give way! odds
firkin, they are bringing down both wind and tide with
them--yare--yare--stretch out!"
"It _is_ the Admiral Wood," said Borthwick, with gloomy spite, "and
my message to your captain concerns him."
"They are hull down as yet, though," said the gunner, as he stood up
and shaded his weather-beaten visage with his thick knotty hand;
"well--odds my life, bold as he is--and a better seamen never spliced
a rope, Scot though he be, I do not think Sir Andrew, with only two
ships, will venture to attack us; and we'll see him haul his wind ere
another half-glass is run."
The ships of Wood were about nine miles off, being abreast of North
Berwick, and they loomed large through the haze of the summer
gloaming, which, however, was rising from the water as the moon,
which was round and full, soared into the clear blue sky, above the
hills of East Lothian. The Ness of Fife was not visible in the haze,
for at this extreme point the noble Forth is more than twenty miles
broad.