AN UNEXPECTED EMBARRASSMENT
When the battle was over, and all things coming into order, the Baron
of Bradwardine, returning from the duty of the day, and having disposed
those under his command in their proper stations, sought the Chieftain
of Glennaquoich and his friend Edward Waverley. He found the former
busied in determining disputes among his clansmen about points of
precedence and deeds of valour, besides sundry high and doubtful
questions concerning plunder. The most important of the last respected
the property of a gold watch, which had once belonged to some
unfortunate English officer. The party against whom judgment was
awarded consoled himself by observing, 'She (i.e. the watch, which he
took for a living animal) died the very night Vich lan Vohr gave her to
Murdoch'; the machine, having, in fact, stopped for want of winding up.
It was just when this important question was decided that the Baron of
Bradwardine, with a careful and yet important expression of
countenance, joined the two young men. He descended from his reeking
charger, the care of which he recommended to one of his grooms. 'I
seldom ban, sir,' said he to the man; 'but if you play any of your
hound's-foot tricks, and leave puir Berwick before he's sorted, to rin
after spuilzie, deil be wi' me if I do not give your craig a thraw.' He
then stroked with great complacency the animal which had borne him
through the fatigues of the day, and having taken a tender leave of
him--' Weel, my good young friends, a glorious and decisive victory,'
said he; 'but these loons of troopers fled ower soon. I should have
liked to have shown you the true points of the pralium equestre, or
equestrian combat, whilk their cowardice has postponed, and which I
hold to be the pride and terror of warfare. Weel--I have fought once
more in this old quarrel, though I admit I could not be so far BEN as
you lads, being that it was my point of duty to keep together our
handful of horse. And no cavalier ought in any wise to begrudge honour
that befalls his companions, even though they are ordered upon thrice
his danger, whilk, another time, by the blessing of God, may be his own
case. But, Glennaquoich, and you, Mr. Waverley, I pray ye to give me
your best advice on a matter of mickle weight, and which deeply affects
the honour of the house of Bradwardine. I crave your pardon, Ensign
Maccombich, and yours, Inveraughlin, and yours, Edderalshendrach, and
yours, sir.'
The last person he addressed was Ballenkeiroch, who, remembering the
death of his son, loured on him with a look of savage defiance. The
Baron, quick as lightning at taking umbrage, had already bent his brow
when Glennaquoich dragged his major from the spot, and remonstrated
with him, in the authoritative tone of a chieftain, on the madness of
reviving a quarrel in such a moment.
'The ground is cumbered with carcasses,' said the old mountaineer,
turning sullenly away; 'ONE MORE would hardly have been kenn'dupon it;
and if it wasna for yoursell, Vich lan Vohr, that one should be
Bradwardine's or mine.'
The Chief soothed while he hurried him away; and then returned to the
Baron. 'It is Ballenkeiroch,' he said, in an under and confidential
voice, 'father of the young man who fell eight years since in the
unlucky affair at the mains.'
'Ah!' said the Baron, instantly relaxing the doubtful sternness of his
features, 'I can take naickle frae a man to whom I have unhappily
rendered sic a displeasure as that. Ye were right to apprise me,
Glennaquoich; he may look as black as midnight at Martinmas ere Cosmo
Comyne Bradwardine shall say he does him wrang. Ah! I have nae male
lineage, and I should bear with one I have made childless, though you
are aware the blood-wit was made up to your ain satisfaction by
assythment, and that I have since expedited letters of slains. Weel, as
I have said, I have no male issue, and yet it is needful that I
maintain the honour of my house; and it is on that score I prayed ye
for your peculiar and private attention.'
The two young men awaited to hear him, in anxious curiosity.
'I doubt na, lads,' he proceeded, 'but your education has been sae seen
to that ye understand the true nature of the feudal tenures?'
Fergus, afraid of an endless dissertation, answered, 'Intimately,
Baron,' and touched Waverley as a signal to express no ignorance.
'And ye are aware, I doubt not, that the holding of the barony of
Bradwardine is of a nature alike honourable and peculiar, being blanch
(which Craig opines ought to be Latinated blancum, or rather francum, a
free holding) pro sermtio detrahendi, seu exuendi, caligas regis post
battalliam.' Here Fergus turned his falcon eye upon Edward, with an
almost imperceptible rise of his eyebrow, to which his shoulders
corresponded in the same degree of elevation. 'Now, twa points of
dubitation occur to me upon this topic. First, whether this service, or
feudal homage, be at any event due to the person of the Prince, the
words being, per expressum, caligas REGIS, the boots of the king
himself; and I pray your opinion anent that particular before we
proceed farther.'
'Why, he is Prince Regent,' answered Mac-Ivor, with laudable composure
of countenance; 'and in the court of France all the honours are
rendered to the person of the Regent which are due to that of the King.
Besides, were I to pull off either of their boots, I would render that
service to the young Chevalier ten times more willingly than to his
father.'
' Ay, but I talk not of personal predilections. However, your authority
is of great weight as to the usages of the court of France; and
doubtless the Prince, as alter ego, may have a right to claim the
homagium of the great tenants of the crown, since all faithful subjects
are commanded, in the commission of regency, to respect him as the
King's own person. Far, therefore, be it from me to diminish the lustre
of his authority by withholding this act of homage, so peculiarly
calculated to give it splendour; for I question if the Emperor of
Germany hath his boots taken off by a free baron of the empire. But
here lieth the second difficulty--the Prince wears no boots, but simply
brogues and trews.'
This last dilemma had almost disturbed Fergus's gravity.
'Why,' said he, 'you know, Baron, the proverb tells us, "It's ill
taking the breeks off a Highlandman," and the boots are here in the
same predicament.'
'The word caligce, however,' continued the Baron, 'though I admit that,
by family tradition, and even in our ancient evidents, it is explained
"lie-boots," means, in its primitive sense, rather sandals; and Caius
Caesar, the nephew and successor of Caius Tiberius, received the
agnomen of Caligula, a caligulis sine caligis levioribus, quibus
adolescentior usus fuerat in exercitu Germanici patris sui. And the
caligce were also proper to the monastic bodies; for we read in an
ancient glossarium upon the rule of Saint Benedict, in the Abbey of
Saint Amand, that caligae were tied with latchets.'
'That will apply to the brogues,' said Fergus.
'It will so, my dear Glennaquoich, and the words are express: Caligae,
dicta sunt quia ligantur; nam socci non ligantur, sed tantum
intromittuntur; that is, caligae are denominated from the ligatures
wherewith they are bound; whereas socci, which may be analogous to our
mules, whilk the English denominate slippers, are only slipped upon the
feet. The words of the charter are also alternative, exuere seu
detrahere; that is, to undo, as in the case of sandals or brogues, and
to pull of, as we say vernacularly concerning boots. Yet I would we had
more light; but I fear there is little chance of finding hereabout any
erudite author de re vestiaria.'
'I should doubt it very much,' said the Chieftain, looking around on
the straggling Highlanders, who were returning loaded with spoils of
the slain,'though the res vestiaria itself seems to be in some request
at present.'
This remark coming within the Baron's idea of jocularity, he honoured
it with a smile, but immediately resumed what to him appeared very
serious business.
'Bailie Macwheeble indeed holds an opinion that this honorary service
is due, from its very nature, si petatur tantum; only if his Royal
Highness shall require of the great tenant of the crown to perform that
personal duty; and indeed he pointed out the case in Dirleton's Doubts
and Queries, Grippit versus Spicer, anent the eviction of an estate ob
non solutum canonem; that is, for non-payment of a feu-duty of three
pepper-corns a year, whilk were taxt to be worth seven-eighths of a
penny Scots, in whilk the defender was assoilzied. But I deem it
safest, wi' your good favour, to place myself in the way of rendering
the Prince this service, and to proffer performance thereof; and I
shall cause the Bailie to attend with a schedule of a protest, whilk he
has here prepared (taking out a paper), intimating, that if it shall be
his Royal Highness's pleasure to accept of other assistance at pulling
off his caligae (whether the same shall be rendered boots or brogues)
save that of the said Baron of Bradwardine, who is in presence ready
and willing to perform the same, it shall in no wise impinge upon or
prejudice the right of the said Cosmo Comyne Bradwardine to perform the
said service in future; nor shall it give any esquire, valet of the
chamber, squire, or page, whose assistance it may please his Royal
Highness to employ, any right, title, or ground for evicting from the
said Cosmo Comyne Bradwardine the estate and barony of Bradwardine, and
others held as aforesaid, by the due and faithful performance thereof.'
Fergus highly applauded this arrangement; and the Baron took a friendly
leave of them, with a smile of contented importance upon his visage.
'Long live our dear friend the Baron,' exclaimed the Chief, as soon as
he was out of hearing, 'for the most absurd original that exists north
of the Tweed! I wish to heaven I had recommended him to attend the
circle this evening with a boot-ketch under his arm. I think he might
have adopted the suggestion if it had been made with suitable gravity.'
'And how can you take pleasure in making a man of his worth so
ridiculous?'
'Begging pardon, my dear Waverley, you are as ridiculous as he. Why, do
you not see that the man's whole mind is wrapped up in this ceremony?
He has heard and thought of it since infancy as the most august
privilege and ceremony in the world; and I doubt not but the expected
pleasure of performing it was a principal motive with him for taking up
arms. Depend upon it, had I endeavoured to divert him from exposing
himself he would have treated me as an ignorant, conceited coxcomb, or
perhaps might have taken a fancy to cut my throat; a pleasure which he
once proposed to himself upon some point of etiquette not half so
important, in his eyes, as this matter of boots or brogues, or whatever
the caliga shall finally be pronounced by the learned. But I must go to
headquarters, to prepare the Prince for this extraordinary scene. My
information will be well taken, for it will give him a hearty laugh at
present, and put him on his guard against laughing when it might be
very mal-a-propos. So, au revoir, my dear Waverley.'