So the red Indian, by Ontario's side,
Nursed hardy on the brindled panther's hide,
As fades his swarthy race, with anguish sees
The white man's cottage rise beneath the trees;
He leaves the shelter of his native wood,
He leaves the murmur of Ohio's flood,
And forward rushing in indignant grief,
Where never foot has trod the fallen leaf,
He bends his course where twilight reigns sublime.
O'er forests silent since the birth of time.
SCENES OF INFANCY.
In tracing the rise and progress of the Scottish Maroon war, we must
not omit to mention that years had rolled on, and that little Harry
Bertram, one of the hardiest and most lively children that ever made a
sword and grenadier's cap of rushes, now approached his fifth revolving
birthday. A hardihood of disposition, which early developed itself,
made him already a little wanderer; he was well acquainted with every
patch of lea ground and dingle around Ellangowan, and could tell in his
broken language upon what baulks grew the bonniest flowers, and what
copse had the ripest nuts. He repeatedly terrified his attendants by
clambering about the ruins of the old castle, and had more than once
made a stolen excursion as far as the gipsy hamlet.
On these occasions he was generally brought back by Meg Merrilies, who,
though she could not be prevailed upon to enter the Place of Ellangowan
after her nephew had been given up to the press-gang, did not
apparently extend her resentment to the child. On the contrary, she
often contrived to waylay him in his walks, sing him a gipsy song, give
him a ride upon her jackass, and thrust into his pocket a piece of
gingerbread or a red-cheeked apple. This woman's ancient attachment to
the family, repelled and checked in every other direction, seemed to
rejoice in having some object on which it could yet repose and expand
itself. She prophesied a hundred times, 'that young Mr. Harry would be
the pride o' the family, and there hadna been sic a sprout frae the
auld aik since the death of Arthur Mac-Dingawaie, that was killed in
the battle o' the Bloody Bay; as for the present stick, it was good for
nothing but fire-wood.' On one occasion, when the child was ill, she
lay all night below the window, chanting a rhyme which she believed
sovereign as a febrifuge, and could neither be prevailed upon to enter
the house nor to leave the station she had chosen till she was informed
that the crisis was over.
The affection of this woman became matter of suspicion, not indeed to
the Laird, who was never hasty in suspecting evil, but to his wife, who
had indifferent health and poor spirits. She was now far advanced in a
second pregnancy, and, as she could not walk abroad herself, and the
woman who attended upon Harry was young and thoughtless, she prayed
Dominie Sampson to undertake the task of watching the boy in his
rambles, when he should not be otherwise accompanied. The Dominie loved
his young charge, and was enraptured with his own success in having
already brought him so far in his learning as to spell words of three
syllables. The idea of this early prodigy of erudition being carried
off by the gipsies, like a second Adam Smith,[Footnote: The father of
Economical Philosophy was, when a child, actually carried off by
gipsies, and remained some hours in their possession.] was not to be
tolerated; and accordingly, though the charge was contrary to all his
habits of life, he readily undertook it, and might be seen stalking
about with a mathematical problem in his head, and his eye upon a child
of five years old, whose rambles led him into a hundred awkward
situations. Twice was the Dominie chased by a cross-grained cow, once
he fell into the brook crossing at the stepping-stones, and another
time was bogged up to the middle in the slough of Lochend, in
attempting to gather a water-lily for the young Laird. It was the
opinion of the village matrons who relieved Sampson on the latter
occasion, 'that the Laird might as weel trust the care o' his bairn to
a potatoe bogle'; but the good Dominie bore all his disasters with
gravity and serenity equally imperturbable. 'Pro-di-gi-ous!' was the
only ejaculation they ever extorted from the much-enduring man.
The Laird had by this time determined to make root-and-branch work with
the Maroons of Derncleugh. The old servants shook their heads at his
proposal, and even Dominie Sampson ventured upon an indirect
remonstrance. As, however, it was couched in the oracular phrase, 'Ne
moveas Camerinam,' neither the allusion, nor the language in which it
was expressed, were calculated for Mr. Bertram's edification, and
matters proceeded against the gipsies in form of law. Every door in the
hamlet was chalked by the ground-officer, in token of a formal warning
to remove at next term. Still, however, they showed no symptoms either
of submission or of compliance. At length the term-day, the fatal
Martinmas, arrived, and violent measures of ejection were resorted to.
A strong posse of peace-officers, sufficient to render all resistance
vain, charged the inhabitants to depart by noon; and, as they did not
obey, the officers, in terms of their warrant, proceeded to unroof the
cottages, and pull down the wretched doors and windows--a summary and
effectual mode of ejection still practised in some remote parts of
Scotland when a tenant proves refractory. The gipsies for a time beheld
the work of destruction in sullen silence and inactivity; then set
about saddling and loading their asses, and making preparations for
their departure. These were soon accomplished, where all had the habits
of wandering Tartars; and they set forth on their journey to seek new
settlements, where their patrons should neither be of the quorum nor
custos rotulorum.
Certain qualms of feeling had deterred Ellangowan from attending in
person to see his tenants expelled. He left the executive part of the
business to the officers of the law, under the immediate direction of
Frank Kennedy, a supervisor, or riding-officer, belonging to the
excise, who had of late become intimate at the Place, and of whom we
shall have more to say in the next chapter. Mr. Bertram himself chose
that day to make a visit to a friend at some distance. But it so
happened, notwithstanding his precautions, that he could not avoid
meeting his late tenants during their retreat from his property.
It was in a hollow way, near the top of a steep ascent, upon the verge
of the Ellangowan estate, that Mr. Bertram met the gipsy procession.
Four or five men formed the advanced guard, wrapped in long loose
great-coats that hid their tall slender figures, as the large slouched
hats, drawn over their brows, concealed their wild features, dark eyes,
and swarthy faces. Two of them carried long fowling-pieces, one wore a
broadsword without a sheath, and all had the Highland dirk, though they
did not wear that weapon openly or ostentatiously. Behind them followed
the train of laden asses, and small carts or TUMBLERS, as they were
called in that country, on which were laid the decrepit and the
helpless, the aged and infant part of the exiled community. The women
in their red cloaks and straw hats, the elder children with bare heads
and bare feet, and almost naked bodies, had the immediate care of the
little caravan. The road was narrow, running between two broken banks
of sand, and Mr. Bertram's servant rode forward, smacking his whip with
an air of authority, and motioning to the drivers to allow free passage
to their betters. His signal was unattended to. He then called to the
men who lounged idly on before, 'Stand to your beasts' heads, and make
room for the Laird to pass.'
'He shall have his share of the road,' answered a male gipsy from under
his slouched and large-brimmed hat, and without raising his face, 'and
he shall have nae mair; the highway is as free to our cuddies as to his
gelding.'
The tone of the man being sulky, and even menacing, Mr. Bertram thought
it best to put his dignity in his pocket, and pass by the procession
quietly, on such space as they chose to leave for his accommodation,
which was narrow enough. To cover with an appearance of indifference
his feeling of the want of respect with which he was treated, he
addressed one of the men, as he passed him without any show of
greeting, salute, or recognition--'Giles Baillie,' he said, 'have you
heard that your son Gabriel is well?' (The question respected the young
man who had been pressed.)
'If I had heard otherwise,' said the old man, looking up with a stern
and menacing countenance, 'you should have heard of it too.' And he
plodded on his way, tarrying no further question. [Footnote: This
anecdote is a literal fact.] When the Laird had pressed on with
difficulty among a crowd of familiar faces, which had on all former
occasions marked his approach with the reverence due to that of a
superior being, but in which he now only read hatred and contempt, and
had got clear of the throng, he could not help turning his horse, and
looking back to mark the progress of their march. The group would have
been an excellent subject for the pencil of Calotte. The van had
already reached a small and stunted thicket, which was at the bottom of
the hill, and which gradually hid the line of march until the last
stragglers disappeared.
His sensations were bitter enough. The race, it is true, which he had
thus summarily dismissed from their ancient place of refuge, was idle
and vicious; but had he endeavoured to render them otherwise? They were
not more irregular characters now than they had been while they were
admitted to consider themselves as a sort of subordinate dependents of
his family; and ought the mere circumstance of his becoming a
magistrate to have made at once such a change in his conduct towards
them? Some means of reformation ought at least to have been tried
before sending seven families at once upon the wide world, and
depriving them of a degree of countenance which withheld them at least
from atrocious guilt. There was also a natural yearning of heart on
parting with so many known and familiar faces; and to this feeling
Godfrey Bertram was peculiarly accessible, from the limited qualities
of his mind, which sought its principal amusements among the petty
objects around him. As he was about to turn his horse's head to pursue
his journey, Meg Merrilies, who had lagged behind the troop,
unexpectedly presented herself.
She was standing upon one of those high precipitous banks which, as we
before noticed, overhung the road, so that she was placed considerably
higher than Ellangowan, even though he was on horseback; and her tall
figure, relieved against the clear blue sky, seemed almost of
supernatural stature. We have noticed that there was in her general
attire, or rather in her mode of adjusting it, somewhat of a foreign
costume, artfully adopted perhaps for the purpose of adding to the
effect of her spells and predictions, or perhaps from some traditional
notions respecting the dress of her ancestors. On this occasion she had
a large piece of red cotton cloth rolled about her head in the form of
a turban, from beneath which her dark eyes flashed with uncommon
lustre. Her long and tangled black hair fell in elf-locks from the
folds of this singular head-gear. Her attitude was that of a sibyl in
frenzy, and she stretched out in her right hand a sapling bough which
seemed just pulled.
'I'll be d--d,' said the groom, 'if she has not been cutting the young
ashes in the dukit park!' The Laird made no answer, but continued to
look at the figure which was thus perched above his path.
'Ride your ways,' said the gipsy, 'ride your ways, Laird of Ellangowan;
ride your ways, Godfrey Bertram! This day have ye quenched seven
smoking hearths; see if the fire in your ain parlour burn the blyther
for that. Ye have riven the thack off seven cottar houses; look if your
ain roof-tree stand the faster. Ye may stable your stirks in the
shealings at Derncleugh; see that the hare does not couch on the
hearthstane at Ellangowan. Ride your ways, Godfrey Bertram; what do ye
glower after our folk for? There's thirty hearts there that wad hae
wanted bread ere ye had wanted sunkets, and spent their life-blood ere
ye had scratched your finger. Yes; there's thirty yonder, from the auld
wife of an hundred to the babe that was born last week, that ye have
turned out o' their bits o' bields, to sleep with the tod and the
blackcock in the muirs! Ride your ways, Ellangowan. Our bairns are
hinging at our weary backs; look that your braw cradle at hame be the
fairer spread up; not that I am wishing ill to little Harry, or to the
babe that's yet to be born--God forbid--and make them kind to the poor,
and better folk than their father! And now, ride e'en your ways; for
these are the last words ye'll ever hear Meg Merrilies speak, and this
is the last reise that I'll ever cut in the bonny woods of Ellangowan.'
So saying, she broke the sapling she held in her hand, and flung it
into the road. Margaret of Anjou, bestowing on her triumphant foes her
keen-edged malediction, could not have turned from them with a gesture
more proudly contemptuous. The Laird was clearing his voice to speak,
and thrusting his hand in his pocket to find a half-crown; the gipsy
waited neither for his reply nor his donation, but strode down the hill
to overtake the caravan.
Ellangowan rode pensively home; and it was remarkable that he did not
mention this interview to any of his family. The groom was not so
reserved; he told the story at great length to a full audience in the
kitchen, and concluded by swearing, that 'if ever the devil spoke by
the mouth of a woman, he had spoken by that of Meg Merrilies that
blessed day.'