possessor, even when it is combined with that goodness that ought to
guard the children of virtue from the evils of life; and this was to
some extent verified by almost the first of the acts of our younger
heroine's intercourse with the world; for she secured the heart of a
lover even against her own will, and, with the unsought-for boon, got
unwittingly the envy, and deep but concealed hatred, of her earliest
friend and companion. The son of the farmer of the Mains of Inverleith,
a property in the neighbourhood, George Wallace, had for some time been
paying his addresses to Margaret Grierson, the daughter of the occupant
of one of the small cottages of Broughton; and his success was in
proportion to the attractions of a fine manly figure, and considerable
power of that species of conversation which, with love ever on its
wings, finds a ready access to the hearts of women. Though his passion
had not been declared, it had, by the anticipative selfishness of the
sex, been assumed and claimed by the object of his attentions; and Menie
had been so far made a confidant of her companion, as to be intrusted
with the secret of a love which had as yet been declared only on one
side. The communication was sufficient to prevent the simple friend,
even if there had been in her disposition any spirit of rivalship--a
feeling which found no place in her breast--from presenting even an
opportunity for Wallace discovering in her qualities with which her
companion could not have competed; and she uniformly maintained, in the
presence of the lovers, a quiet reserve, which afforded pleasure to the
one, but, perhaps, only tended to quicken in the other a comparison that
operated in a manner contrary to the wishes of the confidant. Time, and
the frequent meetings and wanderings by the banks of the Leith--then
comparatively a sweet and rural stream, especially about the low grounds
of Warriston and Inverleith--soon elicited the merits of the two
companions; and Wallace was not slow to perceive that, fair and
interesting as his first object had appeared to him, she was eclipsed in
all the finest attributes of woman by her who had never taken the
trouble to display her estimable properties. The reserve of the one--the
result of a natural modesty, and of a strict training according to the
rules of the wisest of men--set off the freedom of the other as little
better than forwardness; while her excellent sense, and an inborn
susceptibility of the finest and purest feelings of the sex, whether
stirred by the flowers of the field arrayed in their simple beauties, or
the heaven-born genius of virtue working its pleasant ways in the hearts
of man, brought out, by a contrast dangerous to her friend, the defects
of a character that Wallace, in his first blindness, had taken for
perfections. The result might have been anticipated by all but the
unwitting possessor herself of virtues of which she was unconscious; and
it was with no affected surprise that, one night, when walking by the
moonlight along the brattling Leith, she heard poured into her ear a
strain of impassioned sentiments that ought to have been reserved for
another, who had a prior and a better right to them.
The startled girl flew home to her mother, and narrated, as nearly as
she could recollect, the high-flown expressions of Wallace's changed
love; not forgetting to add, that the young man had declared upon his
honour that he had never declared any affection for her companion.
Overpowered with sorrow for her friend, the tear glistened in her eye as
she sat and told her simple tale to her mother, who lifted up her face
from the open book, to observe in the delicate workings of a
well-trained heart the fruits of her maternal care.
"Your sorrow for Margaret Grierson, child," she said, "is a scented
offering to auld friendships; but 'when thou wilt do good, know to whom
thou doest it, so shalt thou be thanked for thy benefits.' I like not
the bearing and manners o' yer companion, for I hae seen in her the
office o' whisperer, and the fascinations o' the singer, wha would
kindle love by her smiles, and unholy discord by her wiles. Her vanity,
like the gaudy streamers o' her head-gear, winnows wi' every wind but
that which comes frae the airth, whar God's chastening tribulations hae
their holy birth. Ye may be surprised to hear me speak thus o' ane wha
has sae lang enjoyed the first place in your young affections; but my
auld een hae a quick turn in them when vanity rideth abroad. She has
other lovers than George Wallace, and other places and other
trystin-trees than the banks o' Leith, or the auld willow that grows by
the horse's pool, at the foot o' the bonny brae o' Warriston. Sorrows
she for George Wallace, think ye, when she sits amang the ruins o' the
hospital o' Greenside, and hears the love tale o' vanities frae the lips
o' secret lovers?"
"A' that's new to me, mother," answered the daughter. "I never dreamed
that Peggy had ony ither than George. Wha are they, and how cam ye by
the knowledge?"
"Never mind, Menie," said the mother, "how I cam by the knowledge.
Though my eyes, like Jeremiah's, are auld, and do fail with tears, I hae
neither the blindness o' the mole nor the deafness o' the adder. But let
thae things alone; we hae nae right to pry into the secrets o' our
neighbours' ways, albeit they may savour o' the vanities o' Baal. It is
enough for me that I warn ye against the 'lamps o' fire' that scorch as
well as light. George Wallace is a rich and an honest man's son; and if,
as I believe, he has plighted nae troth with the follower o' vanities
and double-loves, ye're no bound to reject his affections. Can your
heart receive him, Menie?"
"Ou ay," replied the maiden, as she held down her head, and seemed
afraid of the strange sounds of her own words. "I hae seen nae man yet
like George Wallace, and I hae chided my puir heart for sometimes
envying Peggy o' his affections. But are we not told to change not a
freend for the gold of Ophir?"
"Surely, child," responded the mother--"a true freend o' God's election
is better than fine gold; but she who seeketh vanity understands not the
name o' freendship, and her kisses are as those o' the serpent. Seek nae
mair the society o' Margaret Grierson; leave her to her secret thoughts
and secret lovers, and turn your heart to him wha has routh o' means to
support ye, and whase love is the love o' the heart that kens nae
guile."
The counsel of her parent was ever a law to the daughter; but there was
something in the advice she now gave that exercised an influence over
Menie's heart, or rather there was something in the heart itself, of a
nature hitherto unknown to its possessor, that acknowledged and
recognised the influence as more congenial to her feelings than any
authority of spoken wisdom (though founded on the words of the son of
Sirach) she had yet submitted to. The secret of this feeling lay in the
well-springs of an affection that had been pent up by her sense of
honour; but now, when she found that she was justified in giving her
heart its natural freedom to love the choice of her judgment, she lent
in aid of its operations the creations of a young and glowing fancy,
which soon pictured so many exquisite forms of beauty, both of mind and
person, in the object of her rising affection, that, before another
morning had dawned on her, she had become versant in the secret and
sweet mystery of sighs and throbbings, hopes, fears, and aspirations, of
experienced lovers. She now wished as ardently for another meeting with
Wallace, as she had done for a separation on the occasion of their last
interview. Nor did she wish in vain; for he, with a passion roused into
a warmer flame by her resisting coyness and startled apprehension,
sought her anxiously, to renew his suit, and remove all the scruples of
conscience that lay in the way of a passion to be, as he hoped,
returned. He little knew that part of the work had been already done to
his hand by a mother's cherished counsel; and his joy may be more easily
conceived than expressed, even by the electric words of love's inspired
power, when he found that Menie not only loved him, but conceived she
had a good title to repay him with a warmth of affection equal to that
of his own. He was now a frequent visiter at her mother's house; and
though he knew that all his motions were watched by her whom he had thus
abruptly, though, perhaps, not without just cause, forsaken, he kept
steady in his new attachment, and avowed openly a love of which the best
man of his station in Scotland might have been proud.
The affection that is hallowed by the blessing of such a parent as
Menie's possessed a good title to be excepted from the ordinary
proverbial fate of the loves of the humble; but, unfortunately, the
adverse circumstances, that, like harpies, follow the victims of the
tender passion, acknowledged no limit to the sources from which they
spring. The rejected maiden pursued her successful rival with all the
bitterness of disappointment and envy; odious calumnies were fabricated,
given to the tongue of inveterate scandal, and found their way to the
sensitive ear of her whom they were intended to ruin. Unacquainted with
the ways of a bad world, every individual in which she judged by the
test of her own pure feeling--the universal error of young and
unchilled hearts--her pain was equalled by her surprise, and she sought
consolation on the breast of her lover, as they reclined upon the
sloping and wood-covered banks of Inverleith.
"I hae bought ye dearly," said she, as she looked up in his face through
her tears, "when, for your love, I paid the peace o' mind that was never
troubled with the breath o' a dishonourable suspicion. The hail o'
Broughton rings with the report that I betrayed my freend to secure your
affections, and that I am unworthy o' them, as being a follower o'
unlawful loves. My eyes hae never been dry since my heart was struck
with the false charge. I hae looked to heaven, and found nae relief. My
mother has tried to comfort me, by telling me o' the waes o' Ane higher
than mortal man, wha was pursued to the death by envy and malice, and
wha yet triumphed. You, George, hae alane the power to comfort me. Tell
me that ye heed them not, and I will yet try to hold up my head among
the honest daughters o' men."
"If ye heed them as little's I heed them, Menie," replied he, "there
will be sma skaith though muckle scorn. Dry up your tears, love, and
tell me if it is true" (and he laughed in playful mockery of her fears)
"that you keep the weekly tryst, by the elm in Leith Loan, with the
notorious Mike M'Intyre, the city guardsman?"
"George, George!--Oh man, how can ye mak light o' the sorrows o' yer ain
Menie?" said the girl, as she heard the calumny come from the lips of
her lover. "That is Margaret Grierson's charge against me; and, if ye
knew that every word o' the falsehood gaes to my heart like the tongue
o' the deaf adder--ay, even though they come on the wings o' yer playfu
laugh--ye wad rather gie me the tears o' your pity than the consolation
o' your mirth."
"And what better way, Menie, could I tak to prove my faith in my love's
honesty," said he, as he clasped her in his arms, "than by dispersing
the poisoned lie by the breath o' a hearty laugh. Nae mair o't--nae mair
o't, Menie--I believe it not; and that ye may hae some faith in my
statement, I'll put a question to ye. Will ye answer me fairly, wi' the
truth and sincerity that your mother draws frae the fountain o' a'
guidness--her auld Bible--and pours into yer heart in the dreary hour o'
late, even as ye retire into the keepin o' Him who looks down on
sleepin' innocence with the eye of love?"
"Ay will I, George," answered the maiden, "with the openness and
sincerity with which I lay my sins on the footstool o' Heaven's mercy."
"Will ye consent to be George Wallace's wife on Fastern's E'en, and
leave the city guardsman to your rival?"
"I am already yours, George," answered she, as she buried her head in
his bosom, to conceal her blushes--"I am already yours, by a plighted
faith that never will be broken; and it may be even as you say; but I
wish nae ill to my enemies, and will spae nae waur fortune to Margaret
Grierson, wha has injured me, than that she may get as guid a husband as
you will, I trust, be to me."
"Kind, guid creature!" responded Wallace. "If the first part o' yer
answer maks ye mine for life, the ither proves that ye are worthy o' me;
for she wha wishes nae ill to her enemies will never do wrang by her
freends. Gae and report to your mother what I hae said. The time is yet
distant: but hope gies light wings to the hours o' lovers."
The two parted; and Menie, seeking the nearest way to her home, hurried
along, her heart beating high with unutterable emotions, and with all
the pain she had felt from the evil reports of her rival drowned in the
intoxicating pleasure of being the betrothed of the man she loved. The
moon, which had been throwing her silver light o'er the dark foliage
that overhung the Leith, and catching a look of her own face in the
waters through the opening branches, was now half-concealed behind a
cloud; and as the maiden passed along by the side of the stream, she
required to restrain the flutter of her spirits, to enable her to thread
her way by the narrow footpath. The ecstatic emotions of her novel
situation, and the hurry of her progress, made her breathless, and she
paused to recover herself, when she observed two individuals sitting by
the side of the water. A loud laugh struck her ear; and she did not
require to speculate as to the individuals from whom it came--for a
voice she too well knew followed, with words of reproach that shook her
to the heart. It was that of her former companion; and a glance
satisfied her that she was in the society of that very individual,
M'Intyre, the city guardsman, with whose name her own had been so
cruelly and invidiously connected. In an instant the notorious
individual was by her side.
"I've waited for ye, Menie," he began, "till the mune has waned and sunk
behind the Pentlands. How hae ye been sae lang, woman, when ye ken sae
weel the impatience o' a true lover, and that I maun be on the city
watch on the morrow, and canna meet ye? Mak amends, and let us roam a
wee amang the birken woods, whar the absence o' the mune will be nae
hindrance to our loves."
And before she could reply, he had his arms round her neck, and was
pulling her away among the trees. The apparition of the very individual
of whom she had been conversing with Wallace, and whose name was a
terror to her, with the fearful consciousness of the pollution of his
embrace, took away from her all power of resistance; her knees trembled;
she tried to reply to him, but could not; and a weak scream, that almost
died in her throat, was the only show of ineffectual resistance she
could oppose to his efforts. A few minutes enabled her to rally her
powers; and she had turned to wrest herself from his arms, when she saw
Wallace standing at a little distance among the trees. He had that very
instant come up; and there was something in the cool, piercing look he
threw at her, that repressed the inchoate scream for relief that she
struggled to utter; and the hands she held out to him imploring his
succour fell nerveless within the grasp of the man who held her. Upon
the point of fainting, she would have sunk to the ground, had she not
been upheld by the force of her tormentor; and, in turning her eyes
again in the direction of Wallace, she observed he had vanished. The
scream, no longer restrained, burst forth; but it came too late; for, if
Wallace heard it in his retreat, he might justly attribute it to his own
appearance at a time when he might suppose himself an unwelcome
intruder. At that moment two men came in sight; and the city guardsman,
probably afraid of being recognised, released her from his grasp, and
retreated to the position he had left by the side of her who sat
awaiting in laughter for his arrival.
The instant she was liberated, the frightened maiden flew with the speed
of terror homewards--all her energies wound up in the mere effort to
increase her irregular progress, and without the capability of feeling
the true and fearful circumstances of her position. Arrived at her
mother's house, she sprang forward in a state bordering on despair, and
threw herself on a chair by the side of the fire, opposite to her
parent, who was engaged in her usual evening exercise of searching the
inspired volume for the balm of the consolation of age and poverty.
"What is this, Menie?" cried the mother, as she saw her daughter
trembling under the influence of nervous terror. "Has yer enemy been at
her auld wark again? and have a' yer mother's injunctions failed to get
ye to rest on the sure foundation o' conscious innocence? It canna be
that George Wallace has listened to the poisoned breath o' scandal and
envy. Speak, child; and frae this book shall ye get the support that no
son or daughter of Adam can lend to the children o' sorrow."
"Let me think, mother--let me collect mysel!" responded the girl, as she
raised her hand to her head, and threw back her locks. "Whar am I? what
spell is on me? Am I to be a bride on Fastern's E'en, or a disowned and
heart-broken maiden? Why did he no speak to me--or why did I no speak to
him? I will to him yet, and explain a', and the men will speak for me;
but wha were they? Ah, they were strangers! and there's nane to warrant
the words o' truth."
And rising, she made again towards the door, apparently with the
confused intention of hurrying to Inverleith Mains; but her mother rose
and restrained her, and she again sat down to collect her thoughts. It
was some time before she could give so connected an account of the
strange circumstances that had occurred within the space of a short
hour, as to be understood by the mother; but, by questioning and
cross-questioning, the latter came to the truth--and a truth of
dangerous import she soon observed it to be. She had already, in her own
person, suffered from the blighting effects of prejudice, and she
trembled as she surveyed the difficulties that lay in the way of a
proper explanation. The poison of a false conviction had too certainly
already entered the breast of Wallace, and she knew that its workings
might be made only the more inveterate, the greater the efforts resorted
to for eradicating it. In all her trials, however, her refuge was the
book that supported her fathers in the mountain glens, when the storm of
persecution raged over a struggling land; and, enjoining her daughter to
offer up with her their prayers to the throne of grace, she sought from
the true fountain the means of relieving them from the danger which
threatened innocence and poverty. The night passed, and the morning
came, when it was resolved that they both together should repair to the
residence of Wallace, and openly declare to him the truth of the
perplexed appearances which had too evidently operated on his mind to
their disadvantage; but a little farther consideration showed them the
inexpediency of thus assuming that the conduct of Menie required
explanation; and the resolution that at last prevailed was, to wait for
some time to ascertain what might be the intentions and motions of
Wallace, whom they expected to call at the house, according to his wont,
as he passed to the city. The day passed away, but there was no
appearance of him; and, on the day following, it was ascertained, from
one of his father's servants, who was passing with grain to the market,
that he had gone to the borders of England to bury a relation, where, it
was expected, he would remain for a considerable time, to arrange the
affairs of the deceased, to whom his father was nearest heir-at-law.
This intelligence made it only more certain that the prejudice had taken
root; because, otherwise, both duty and inclination would have forced
him to pay a visit to his betrothed before his departure, however sudden
or unexpected that might have been.
A month passed, and Wallace had not yet returned; but Fastern's Even was
still a month distant, and every day brought the hope of a letter, at
least, to explain the cause of his conduct, and point out his future
proceedings, whether "for feid or favour." But no letter came; and all
their inquiries ended in the intelligence that his relative's affairs
were not yet wound up, and that some weeks yet would elapse before he
could return. The situation, meanwhile, of the victim of prejudice was
painful, and gradually becoming hopeless. Her prior sufferings from the
stings of calumny were alleviated by the expectation that the generous
mind of Wallace would scorn the schemes of her enemy, and her marriage
would refute the aspersions, and place her beyond the reach of their
poison; but now her relief was not only apparently cut off, but
changed, by some adverse fate, into a proof--a confirmation of what had
been alleged against her character. Every day found her a mourner; and
it was only after nightfall that she could summon up resolution to go
abroad on the small messages that domestic wants rendered necessary.
Involved in mystery as were both mother and daughter, and pained as the
latter was beyond endurance, there yet hung over them a still darker
cloud of misfortune, equally mysteriously and fortuitously collected and
formed, and equally cruel in its unmerited discharge on the heads of
innocent victims. Misery of the deepest and most complicated kind seems
often to be evolved from the most trifling causes, as if to show the
proud sons of men, by a lesson that pains while it mocks them, the utter
darkness of that blindness which they mistake for the light of a
concealed reason. One evening, Menie had occasion to proceed to the
small village of Canonmills, on a message to a friend; and, as usual,
she waited till nightfall, to avoid the gaze of the neighbours, whom her
fevered fancy exhibited to her (to a great extent untruly) as
participators in the circulation of the calumnies under which she
suffered. Wrapped up in a cloak, she hurried out, and proceeded down the
narrow loan that then led to the village she intended to visit. Her step
was stealthy, and her eye filled with secret shame, even among the
shades of night. She reached the house, where she staid for a short
time, and then set out on return, which she was inclined to accomplish
as quickly and stealthily as she had done her progress forth; but she
had not proceeded many paces from the village, when she observed a small
wicker corban or basket lying by the side of a hedgerow that then ran
along the lower part of the loan. There appeared to be no one near it;
and, impelled by a natural curiosity, she proceeded forward and
inspected it. There was on it, she observed, a bundle, so carefully
pinned up, that, though she applied her fingers hastily to it, she
could not penetrate its folds. On lifting up the strange deposit, she
found that it felt heavy. She stood irresolute, and again looked around
her, but saw no one. She was flurried; and her desire to get home urged
her to take it up, and proceed hurriedly along the road, with the view
of taking it to the house with her, to examine it leisurely, and restore
it to the owner, in the event of his casting up. She obeyed the natural
impulse; and, as she ran home with the unknown charge, she repeatedly
cast her eyes about, to see if any one appeared to claim it; but she
still saw no one; and, in the space of a few minutes, she reached the
door of the house, and hurried in. She placed the burden upon the
floor--telling her mother, at the same time, that she had found it on
the road, and brought it home to see what it contained, as the bundle
was so carefully tied up that she could not unfold it on the highway.
Her mother put on her spectacles; and, bending down, proceeded, with the
aid of Menie, to undo the cloth, when, to their surprise, they evolved
from the many foldings of an envelope the dead body (still warm) of a
new-born babe. Menie fainted at the grim spectacle, and the mother ran
for hartshorn, to recover her daughter. In a little time she revived,
but it was only to shudder again at the strange sight; while the
sagacious mind of Euphan was busy with the divinations of a sad
experience, that pointed to some new calamity to result from this new
turn of their adverse fate. She saw, at once, that if she called in her
envious neighbours, that had been already busy with the character of her
daughter, the unlikely story of the finding and bringing home of a dead
child would be scorned and laughed at, while the circumstance of the
child being found in the house would be laid hold of as a handle for
corroborating and confirming the already circulated calumnies, if,
indeed, it might not form a subject for judicial examination and
exposure, that might end in the ruin of one already too much
persecuted. These cogitations led to a sudden resolution. Rolling up the
body hastily in the envelope--
"Hie ye quickly, Menie," she said, "to the place whar ye fand this
dangerous burden, and lay it in the precise position in which ye first
saw it. The shafts o' envy are already thick round innocence, and we
need not for sorrow to prick our own eyes that tears may fall. There is
a knowledge that is for guid, and ane that is for evil; but 'the work of
all flesh is before Him, and nothing can be hid from his eyes,' so shall
this shame be made manifest in his own way. Haste, child, and obey the
behest o' your mother."