deal was no doubt done in those lonely hills of Northumberland and
Roxburgh and the other Border counties. There they had wealth of fuel,
abundance of water, and a plentiful choice of solitary places admirably
adapted to their purpose; it was easy to rig up a bothy, or hut of turf
thatched with heather, in some secluded spot far from the haunts of
inconvenient revenue officers, and a Still that would turn out excellent
spirit was not difficult to construct. With reasonable care the thing
might be done almost with impunity--though there was never wanting, of
course, the not entirely unpleasurable excitement of knowing that you
were breaking the law, that somebody _might_ have turned informer, and
that at any moment a raid might be made. Every unknown face necessarily
meant danger, each stranger was a person to be looked on with suspicion
till proved harmless. Even the friends and well-wishers of the illicit
distiller did not always act in the way most conducive to his comfort
and well-being, for if his still turned out a whisky that was extra
seductive, he speedily became so popular, so run after, and the list of
his acquaintances so extended, that sooner or later tidings of his
whereabouts leaked round to the ears of the gaugers, and arrest, or a
hasty midnight flitting, was the outcome. Besides, such popularity
became a severe tax on the pocket of the distiller, for the better the
whisky the greater the number of those who desired to sample it, and the
oftener they sampled it, the more they yearned to repeat the process.
Nor was it safe to make a charge for the liquor thus consumed, lest it
might chance that some one of those who partook of it might, out of
revenge for being charged, lay an information.
About the end of the eighteenth century there lived in a remote glen on
Cheviot a Highlander, one Donald M'Donald, who was famous for the
softness and flavour of the spirit he distilled. Whether it was a
peculiar quality imparted to his whisky by some secret process known
only to Donald himself, a knowledge and skill perhaps handed down from
father to son from generation to generation, like the secret of the
brewing of heather ale that died with the last of the Picts, one cannot
say. Only the fact remains that, like the heather ale of old, Donald's
whisky was held in high esteem, its effects on the visitors who began in
numbers to seek the seclusion of his bothy, as "blessed" as were ever
those of that earlier mysterious beverage beloved of our Pictish
ancestors:
"From the bonny bells of heather
They brewed a drink long-syne,
Was sweeter far than honey,
Was stronger far than wine.
They brewed it, and they drank it,
And lay in a blessed swound
For days and days together
In their dwellings underground."
Donald M'Donald had formerly been a smuggler, but he had wearied of that
too active life, and he had longed for an occupation more sedentary and
less strenuous. Distilling suited his temperament to a nicety. It was
what he had been used to see as a boy when his parents were alive, for
his father before him had been a "skeely" man in that line. So Donald
built to himself a kind of hut in a wild, unfrequented glen. A little
burn, clear and brown, ran chattering past his door; on the knolls
amongst the heather grouse cocks crowed merrily in the sunny August
mornings, and the wail of curlews smote sadly on the ear through the
long-drawn summer twilights. Seldom did human foot tread the heather of
that glen in the days before Donald took up his abode there; to the
raven and the mountain-fox, the muir-fowl and the whaup, alone belonged
that kingdom.
From afar you might perhaps smell the peat reek as he worked his
primitive Still, but unless the smoke of his fire betrayed him, or you
knew the secret of his whereabouts, it had been hard to detect the
existence of Donald's hut, so skilfully was it constructed, so gently
did it blend into the surrounding landscape. Even if it were
accidentally come upon, there was nothing immediately visible which
could excite suspicion. At a bend in the stream, where the banks were
steep, and the burn tumbled noisily over a little linn, dashing past the
rowan trees that clung there amongst its rocks, and plunging headlong
into a deep black pool, stood Donald's hut. Little better than a
"lean-to" against a huge rock, it seemed; at one end a rude doorway,
filled by a crazy door that stood ajar, walls of turf, windowless and
heather-thatched, innocent of chimney, but with an opening that allowed
the smoke of his fires to steal up the face of the rock before it
dispersed into the air. That was all that might be seen at first
glance--that and a stack of peat near the door. Inside, there were a
couple of rough tables, made of boards, one or two even rougher seats, a
quantity of heather in a corner, tops upper-most, to serve as a bed;
farther "ben," some bulky things more than half hidden in the deep gloom
of that part of the hut that was farthest from the door and from the
light of the fire. And over and through everything an all-pervading reek
of peat that brought water to the eyes of those not inured to such an
atmosphere, and caused them to cough grievously. To the Highlander it
was nothing; he had been born in such an atmosphere, and had lived in
it most of his days. But to visitors it was trying, till Donald's Dew of
Cheviot rendered them indifferent to the minor ills of life.
One day, as Donald was busily engaged with his Still, a charge for which
he was just about starting, there came to the door of his hut a man
leading a horse from which he had just dismounted. This man did not wait
for an invitation to enter, but, having made fast his reins to the
branch of a neighbouring rowan tree, walked in and sat down, with a mere
"Good day."
"A ferry goot tay," politely replied Donald. But he was not altogether
happy over the advent of this stranger; there was a something in the
manner of the man that roused suspicion. However, there he was. It
remained only to make the best of it, and to be careful not to show that
he suspected anything. Perhaps the man was harmless after all; and, in
any case, it might be just as well to pretend that he was not possessed
of any great knowledge of English. There was nothing to be gained by
talking.
"Have ye not such a thing as a drop of spirits in the house?" inquired
the stranger. "I'm tired with my ride."
Donald "wasna aaltogether sure. Mebbes perhaps there micht pe a wee
drappie left in ta bottle." But there was no dearth of fluid in the
bottle that, with Highland hospitality, he set before the strange man,
along with cheese and oatcake. Donald took a liberal "sup" himself, and
sat down, purposely near the door, just in case of any possible coming
trouble, and out of the corner of his eye he kept a wary gaze on his
uninvited guest, who had also helped himself liberally to the whisky,
and was already making a great onslaught on the cheese and oatcake.
"Aye, capital whisky; cap-i-tal whisky," said the stranger graciously.
"And I daresay there's more where that came from, if the truth were
kenned."
But that was a suggestion which Donald found it convenient to ignore. He
had "ferry little English," he said.
"And I daresay, now," pursued the stranger, in tones if anything perhaps
a trifle over-hearty, "I daresay, now, the devil a drop of it will ever
have helped to line the King's pocket? Eh?"
But here, again, Donald's knowledge of English was at fault; he "wad no
pe kennin' fhat his honour's sel' wad pe sayin'."
"And what might your name be?" presently inquired this over-inquisitive
guest.
"Ach, it micht joost pe Tonal," said the Highlander.
"Donald? Aye, and what more than Donald?"
"Ooh, there wull pe no muckle mair. They will joost be calling me Tonal
M'Tonal."
"Donald M'Donald? Aye, aye. I thought so. Well, Donald, I'm an excise
officer, and you've been distilling whisky contrary to the law. I'll
just overhaul your premises, and then you'll be coming with me as a
prisoner. And you'd best come quietly."
"Preesoner?--_Preesoner_? Her honour will no be thinkin' o' sic a thing.
There micht aiblins pe a thing or twa in ta hoose tat his honour wad pe
likin' to tak' away, but it iss no possible tat he can do onything wi'
her nainsel'."
"It's no use talking, my mannie. Duty's duty. You must come wi' me."
"Ochon! Ochon! Tuty wull pe a pad thing when it's a wee pit pisness sic
as this. Yer honour wull joost be takin' the pits o' things in ta bothy,
an' her nainsel' wull gang awa' an' no say naething aboot it at aal."
"I'm not here to argue with you," cried the exciseman, getting
impatient. "You're my prisoner. I confiscate everything here. If there's
any resistance, I can summon help whenever I please. You'd best come
quietly."
"Oh, 'teed tat's ferry hard; surely to cootness very hard indeet. But
she wull no pe thinkin' aaltogether tat she wull pe driven joost like a
muckle prute beast either. Her nainsel' wull mebbes hef a wheen freends
tat could gie her help if she was wantin't. Could ye told me if there
wud pe ony o' them tat wad pe seem' yer honour comin' in here?"
"Not one of _your_ friends, my mannie. Nor nobody else."
"Then, by Gott, there wull pe nopody tat wull pe seem' ye go oot,"
shouted Donald in an excited, high-pitched scream, as he snatched a
heavy horse-pistol from behind the door, and cocked it. "If ye finger
either your swort or your pistol, your plood wull pe on your ain head.
She wull pe plowin' your prains oot."
A very different man this from the submissive, almost cringing, creature
of a few minutes back! Now, there stood a man with set mouth and eyes
that blazed evilly; the pistol that covered the gauger was steady as a
rock, and a dirk in the Highlander's left hand gleamed ominously as it
reflected the glow from the fire in the middle of the room.
The exciseman had jumped to his feet at Donald's first outburst. But he
had underrated his man, and now it was too late. To attempt to draw a
pistol now would be fatal--that was a movement with which he should have
opened the affair. The exciseman was disposed to try bluster; but
bluster does not always win a trick in the game, more especially when
the ace of trumps, in the shape of a pistol, is held by the adversary.
In this instance, after a long glance at the Highlander, the gauger's
eyes wavered and fell; he swallowed hard in his throat once or twice,
and lost colour; and finally he sat down in the seat from which a
minute ago he had sprung full of fight. Then slowly, and almost as it
seemed, against his own volition, his hand went out and closed on the
whisky bottle. He helped himself largely, drank copiously, without
diluting too much with water, but still said never a word. Now his
colour came back a little, and he nibbled at the oatcake and cheese.
Then more whisky. Gradually the man became talkative--even laughed now
and then a trifle unsteadily. And all the time Donald kept on him a
watchful eye, and had him covered, giving him no opportunity to turn the
tables. For here the Highlander saw his chance. He had no wish to murder
the gauger, but, at any price, he was not going to be taken. If,
however, he kept the man a little longer in his present frame of mind,
it was very evident that presently the exciseman would be too tipsy to
do anything but go to sleep. And so it proved. From being merely
merry--in a fashion somewhat tempered by the ugly, threatening muzzle of
a pistol, he became almost friendly; from friendly he became aggrieved,
moaning over the insult that a breekless Highlander had put on him; then
the sentimental mood seized him, and he wept maudlin tears over the
ingratitude and neglect shown to him by his superior officers; finally,
in the attempt to sing a most dolorous song, he rolled off his seat and
lay on his back, snorting.
As soon as he had satisfied himself that the enemy was genuinely
helpless and not shamming, Donald promptly set about saving his own
property. The exciseman's horse still stood where his master had left
him, hitched to a rowan tree a few yards from the door. Him Donald
impressed into his service, and long before morning everything in the
hut had been removed to a safe hiding-place, and scarcely a trace was
left to show that the law had ever been broken here, or that illicit
whisky had been distilled.
Before daylight came, however, the exciseman had awakened in torment--a
racking headache, deadly thirst, a mouth suggestive of a bird-cage, all,
in fact, that a man might expect who had partaken too freely of raw and
fiery whisky. He felt, indeed, extremely and overpoweringly unwell, as,
with an infinity of trouble, he groped his devious way to the open air,
and to the burn that went singing by. Here, after drinking copiously, he
lay till grey dawn, groaning, the thundering of the linn incessantly
jarring his splitting head. Then, when there was light enough, the
unhappy man rose on unsteady feet, and started looking for his horse. A
fruitless search; no sign of a horse could be seen, beyond the trampled
space where he had stood the previous night, and a few hoof-prints in
the soft, peaty soil elsewhere. There was no help for it; he must tramp;
and with throbbing temples he pursued a tottering and uncertain course
homewards. Next day he returned, full of schemes of revenge, and with
help sufficient to overcome any resistance that Donald and his friends
could possibly make, even if they thought it wise to attempt any
resistance whatever, which was unlikely.
It was a crestfallen gauger that reached Donald's bothy on this second
visit. He found his horse, it is true, pinched and miserable, and with
staring coat, and without saddle or bridle. But of Donald or of the
Still, or the products of that Still, not a sign--only a few taunting,
ill-spelled words traced in chalk, with evident care and much painful
toil, on the knocked-out head of an old cask.
In another part of this volume mention has already been made of Frank
Stokoe, who, after being "out" in the '15 with Lord Derwentwater, died
in great poverty. His family never again rose to anything like
affluence, nor even to a status much above that of the ordinary
labouring classes, but his descendants were always big, powerful men,
perhaps slow of brain, but ready with their hands, and there was at
least one of them who was afterwards well known in Northumberland. This
was Jack Stokoe, a noted and very daring smuggler.
Jack lived in a curious kind of a den of a house far up one of the wild
glens that are to be found in that moorland country which lies between
the North and the South Tyne. It could scarcely be claimed that he was a
farmer--indeed, in those days there was nothing to farm away up among
those desolate hills--and therefore Stokoe made no attempt to pose as
anything in the bucolic line; it was a pretty open secret that his real
occupation was neither more nor less than smuggling. But he had never
yet been caught while engaged in running a contraband cargo, and,
whatever reason there may have been for suspicion, no revenue officer
had ever had courage to make a raid on his house. There came, however,
to that district a new officer, one plagued with an abnormally strong
sense of duty, a "new broom," in fact, an altogether too energetic
enthusiast who could by no means let well alone, but must ever be poking
into other people's affairs in a way that began at length to create
extreme annoyance in the minds of those honest gentlemen, the smugglers.
Now it chanced that this officious person had lately received sure
information of the safe landing of an unusually valuable cargo, large
part of which was reported to be stowed somewhere on Stokoe's premises,
and he resolved to pay Jack a surprise visit. Accordingly, the
Preventive man went to the nearest magistrate, demanding a warrant to
search. The magistrate hummed and hawed. "Did the officer think it
necessary to disturb Stokoe, who was really a very honest, douce lad?
Well, well, if he must, he must, and there was an end of it! He should
have the warrant. But Jack Stokoe was a man, he'd heard say, who had no
liking to have his private affairs too closely inquired into, and if
ill came of it--well, the officer must not forget that he had been
cautioned. A nod was as good as a wink."
Notwithstanding these well-meant hints, the gauger made his way across
the hills to Stokoe's house. He was alone, but then he was a powerful
man, well armed and brave enough, and never in all his experience had a
bold front, backed by the majesty of the law, failed to effect its end.
If he found anything contraband there was no doubt in his mind as to the
result. Stokoe should accompany him back as a prisoner.
There was no one at Stokoe's when the officer arrived, except Jack
himself and a little girl, and when the gauger showed his warrant and
began his search, Stokoe made no remark whatever, merely sat where he
was, smoking. The gauger's search was very thorough; everything was
topsy-turvy before many minutes had passed, but nothing could he find.
There remained the loft, to which access was given by a ladder somewhat
frail and dilapidated. Up went the gauger, and began tossing down into
the room below the hay with which the place was filled. Quite a good
place in which to hide contraband articles, thought he. And still Stokoe
said never a word. Then, when all the hay was on the floor below and the
loft bare, and still nothing compromising had been found, down came the
gauger, preparing to depart.
"Hey! lassie," at length then came the deep voice of Stokoe; "gie me
Broon Janet."
The little girl slipped behind the big box-bed, and handed out a very
formidable black-thorn stick. Up then jumped Stokoe.
"Ye d----d scoundrel, ye've turned an honest man's hoose upside doon. Set
to, and leave it as ye fand it. Stow that hay where it was when ye cam'
here; and be quick aboot it, or I'll break every bane in your d----d
body."
The gauger backed towards the door, and drew a pistol. But he was just a
fraction of a second too late; "crack" came Stokoe's cudgel and the
pistol flew out of his hand, exploding harmlessly as it fell, and before
he could draw another he was at Stokoe's mercy. There was no choice for
the man; Stokoe took away all his arms, and then compelled him to set to
and put back everything as he had found it. There was nothing to be
gained by obstinately refusing. Stokoe was a man of sixteen or seventeen
stone, a giant in every way, and as brave as he was big--a combination
that is not always found. He could, literally, have broken every bone in
the gauger's body, and the chances in this case were strongly in favour
of his doing it if his adversary chose to turn rusty. Truly "the de'il
was awa' wi' the exciseman."
So for hours the unhappy Preventive officer toiled up and down that
rickety ladder, carrying to the loft again all the hay he had so lately
thrown down, and putting the whole house as far as possible again in
the state in which it had been when he began his search. And all the
while Stokoe sat comfortably smoking in his big chair by the fire,
saying never a word.
At length the task was ended, and the gauger stood dripping with
perspiration and weary to the sole of his foot and the foot of his soul,
for all this unwonted work came on top of an already long day's duty.
Then:
"Sit doon!" commanded Stokoe, an order that the poor man obeyed with
alacrity and thankfulness. Stokoe slipped behind the box-bed, was absent
a few minutes, and then returned, bringing with him a keg of brandy.
Setting that upon the table, he was not long in drawing from it in a
"rummer" a quantity of spirit that four fingers would never half
conceal. "Now, drink that," he said, handing the raw spirit to his
involuntary guest. Then when the liquor had all disappeared, said he:
"You are the first that has ever searched my house. See you be the last!
Ye're a stranger i' thae parts, so we'll say nae mair aboot it this
nicht. But mind you this--if ever ye come again, see that ye be measured
for your coffin before ye start."
Tradition has no record of Jack Stokoe having ever again been
disturbed.
SALMON AND SALMON-POACHERS IN THE BORDER
What is it that causes a salmon to be so irresistible a temptation to
the average Borderer? He knows that it is illegal to take "a fish" from
the water at certain seasons, and at other times except under certain
circumstances. Yet at any season and under any circumstances the sight
of a fish in river or burn draws him like a magnet, and take it he must,
if by any means it may be done outside the ken of the Tweed
Commissioners and their minions. Even if he be a rigid observer of the
law, a disciplinarian of Puritan fervour, in his heart he takes that
salmon, and his pulse goes many beats faster as, standing on the bank,
he watches the "bow wave" made by a moving fish in thin water, or sees
it struggle up a cauld.
One can remember the case of a middle-aged gentleman, the most strict of
Presbyterians, a church-goer almost fanatical in his attendance, one who
would have suffered martyrdom rather than be compelled to forego long
family prayers morning and evening; a man ordinarily rigid in his
observance of the law to its last letter, unforgiving of those who even
in the mildest manner stepped an inch beyond the line. Yet that old
man, returning after long years to the scenes of his boyhood from a far
land, where like Jacob of old he had "increased exceedingly, and had
much cattle," when in remote Border waters one day he was tempted by the
Evil One with a salmon, fell almost without a struggle. To secure that
salmon the old gentleman must needs get exceeding wet; moreover, it was
close time. There was no shadow of excuse. But he was a boy again; fifty
years had slipped off his shoulders. And I know not what came of the
salmon, but it left the water; nor do I know what the watcher said who
came over the hill inopportunely. Maybe the trouser-pocket where the old
gentleman kept his silver was a good deal lighter, and that of the
watcher a good deal heavier, when the twain parted. And therein the old
gentleman sinned doubly; for himself he broke the law, and he put
temptation in the way of the watcher, and caused him also to sin and to
be guilty of grave dereliction of duty. Yet there it was! The most rigid
of his kind in pursuit of virtue and in observance of the law, saw "a
fish"--and straightway, irresistibly the old Adam moved within him. Nay!
Under certain circumstances hardly would one trust even a black-coated
Border minister if a salmon provoked him too sorely.
In former days, many were the ways whereby a fish might be induced to
quit his native element. Now, it is different; though even now possibly
his end might not in every case endure too close scrutiny. But in the
days when our grandsires and great-grandsires were young, salmon were
regarded as of small value; they sold possibly at _2d._ the pound, and
servants in Tweedside homes were wont to bargain that they should not be
forced to eat salmon every day of the week. Then, practically no method
of capture was illegal; you might take him almost when, where, and how
you pleased. Indeed, one reads that at St. Boswells in 1794 the
neighbourhood was "seldom at a loss for a small salmon, which proves a
great conveniency to families." It was not as if such a thing as a close
season had never been known. Five hundred years before the date above
mentioned there were laws in existence regulating the capture of salmon,
and in the reign of James I of Scotland the law was most stringent. In
1424 it was enacted that "Quha sa ever be convict of Slauchter of
Salmonde in tyme forbidden be the Law, he shall pay fourtie shillings
for the unlaw, and at the third tyme gif he be convict of sik Trespasse
he shall tyne his life." But the law had fallen into disuse--was, in
fact, a dead letter; practically there was no "tyme forbidden," or at
least the close season was as much honoured in the breach as in the
observance, and, especially in the upper waters of Tweed and her
tributaries, countless numbers of spawning fish were annually
destroyed.