seizing her by the arm. "The Whitadder leads nae mair certainly to the
Tweed, than will the story o' yer danger lead to the discovery o' him ye
are ashamed to acknowledge as a lover. Darkness waukens the owl, and yer
mystery will open the eyes o' Lady Rollo. Let the bird sleep, or its
scream will mak the wood ring."
Matilda saw, so far as she herself was concerned, the prudence of
secresy, and was about to take leave of Bertha for the night, when Lady
Rollo entered, and informed her daughter that Sir George Douglas of
Haughhead had arrived to pay his addresses to her, and that she behoved
to be in a proper state for meeting him in the morning at the first
meal. Having delivered her command, the proud dame retired, leaving her
daughter to the many distracting reflections suggested by all the
conflicting and painful events of the evening. She retired to her couch,
where she was to resign herself to the domination of that rapt fancy
that had so long led the train of her thoughts, and regulated the
affections of her heart. Sleep forsook her pillow, or came only for
short intervals, with the Genius of Dreams in his train. Waking or
slumbering, the image of the unknown youth, who had made such an
impression upon her heart, by the extraordinary deputed power of an
imagination ever active in painting in bright colours all his
perfections, was before her eyes. The higher these perfections and the
brighter the beauties, the greater was the pain and the deeper the sobs
of anguish that were wrung from her heart, by the conviction that her
love was destined only to similate the cankerworm, that eats into the
heart of the flower, and makes it perish.
Next day, she was compelled, with her hazel eyes still dimmed with
tears, to meet Sir George Douglas, a man she had every reason to hate,
as well from his proud assumption of a right to her affections, as from
the mean and inconsistent mode of mediation he resorted to, and which
she had learned from her mother that morning--by bribing her parents
with large promises of a tempting dowery.
With her feelings never kindly affected towards him, her heart burning
with the thoughts of another, and her prejudices excited by the
information she received from her mother, she conducted herself towards
the knight with a _hauteur_ that called forth his hurt pride and the
indignation of her parents. After breakfast, she retired to her
apartment, to feast her eyes with the vision of her bower--to her now
enchanted--while her angry parents closeted themselves for a conference
on the subject of Sir George's splendid offer, and the conduct of their
daughter. Wrought up to a pitch of excitement by the united feelings of
anger and ambition, they came to the critical determination of
submitting her entirely to the power and discretion of Douglas, who, if
he chose to wed her upon the sanction of their consent, might, if he
chose, dispense with that of the principal party interested. The project
was instantly submitted to Douglas, a hard and unfeeling man, who,
determined to possess Matilda upon any terms, closed readily with the
offer, and a day was fixed at the end of a month for the marriage.
These preliminaries settled, Lady Rollo repaired to Matilda's apartment,
where she found her with her head resting on her hand, and her eyes
fixed on the wood-bower, where she had conjured up the image of her
unknown lover.
"Thy conduct this day, Matilda," she began, "towards one of the gayest
and richest knights of our land, the confidant of King James, and our
especial friend and favourite, requireth the chastisement of the reproof
of parental authority; but we have witnessed too long this pride of
beauty in thee (which disdaineth the loves of mortals, and seduceth thee
and thy heart into the airy regions of profitless romance), to remain
contented now with mere words of argument, persuasion, or reproach. The
day of these is by, with the hopes of the many lovers thou hast turned
away from the gates of Roseallan; and the time for action--maugre thy
wishes or thy prejudices--hath approached. Sir George Douglas is
destined to be thy husband, and the day after the next feast of our
Church is thy appointed bridal-day, whereunto thou hadst best prepare
thyself with as much grace and favour as thou mayest be able to call up
into thy fair face."
Saying these words, Lady Rollo retired hurriedly, as if with the view of
avoiding a reply, or witnessing the sudden effects of her announcement.
The words had fallen upon her daughter's heart like the announcement of
a doom, and closed up the fountains of her tears. She sat riveted to the
chair, incapable of speech, or even of thought. On partially recovering
her senses, she found Bertha standing before her. Rising into a
paroxysm of struggling emotion, she flung her arms round the neck of the
old nurse, and burst into a fit of hysterical weeping. The choking sobs
seemed to come from the inmost recesses of her heart, and the burning
tears, forcing the closed issues of their fountains, flowed down her
cheeks, and dropped on the neck of her confidant. Bertha heard the
intelligence, as it was communicated in detached syllables, in silence;
and, having placed the unhappy maiden on her chair, sank into a train of
thinking, which her young friend attributed to a sympathetic sorrow for
her sufferings. The voice of Lady Rollo prevented the expected
consolation, and obeying the command of her mistress, Bertha left the
apartment, promising to return soon again. The day passed, and Matilda,
unable to join the company in the western wing of the castle, remained
in her apartment, sunk in despondency, and at times verging on the bleak
province of despair.
Heedless of the gloom that overhung the minds of mortals, the bright
moon rose again in the evening with undiminished splendour, throwing her
silver beams over the tear-bedewed face of the sorrowful maiden, whose
weeping was increased by the contrast of nature's loveliness. She sat
again at the casement; her eyes wandered heavily over the scene that lay
like a fair painting spread before her; the long, dark shadows of the
wood, lying by the side of bright, moonlit plots of greensward, with
their spangles of dew glittering like diamonds, reminded her of the
chequered scenes of life, into the depth of one of the gloomiest of
which she was now sunk; and her pain was increased as she felt herself,
by the power of fate, contemplating again her wood-bower, which stood
fair in the broad light of the moon. A sound struck her ears and called
forth her attention. It was that of a lute, and came in dying notes from
a distance in the wood. Gradually increasing in distinctness, it seemed
to come nearer and nearer; and now she recognised the air that was sung
by her preserver on that night when she discovered him. The sound ceased
suddenly, and she saw the figure of her preserver emerge from a thick
part of the wood and pass into her bower. The same plaintive air was
again raised, and spread around in soft mellifluous strains, suggesting
the union, by some process unknown to metaphysical analysis, of light
and sound--so connected and blended were the feelings produced by the
soft beams of the moon and the sounds of the lute. The blessed sensation
passed over her racked nerves like the odorous incense of the altar on
the excited sensibility of the bleeding victim; her eyes and ears were
versant with heaven, while her thoughts were claimed by the evil
workings of bad angels; her heart swelled with the conflicting emotions,
and a fresh burst of tears afforded her a temporary relief. Her paroxysm
over, the soft sounds fell again upon her ear. Retaining her breath to
drink deeper of the draught, she heard the notes gradually diminishing,
as if the performer were retiring in the wood. He had left the bower
unobserved; and the silence that now reigned around announced that he
was gone.
For seven successive nights the music in the wood-bower had assuaged the
sufferings of the respective days; but for three nights there had been
nothing heard but the cry of the screech-owl, and the moon had been
illuminating other lands. The period of her sacrifice was drawing nearer
and nearer, and the cloud of her sorrow was gradually becoming deeper
and darker.
"'Tis now three nights since he was in the wood," she said to Bertha.
"My silence and inattention have but ill repaid his services and his
passion. The sound of his lute has been to me the voice of hope breaking
through the clouds of despair. O Bertha! my sense of duty to my parents
and the honour of the old house of Roseallan has so nearly perished
amidst this persecution, that I could now feel it no crime to throw
myself into his arms, and seek in humble worth the protection I cannot
procure in the Castle of Roseallan's master."
"Wisely spoken, my bonny bairn," replied Bertha. "My auld blood boils
wi' the passion o' youth, and drives frae my heart the gratitude I owe
to the proud master and mistress o' Roseallan, as I witness this
persecution o' the bonniest and the best o' Scotland's daughters. The
arms o' George Templeton, the archer, the son o' the widow of Mosscairn,
can send an arrow beyond the cast o' the best archer o' the Borders; and
may weel defend (were he again in health) her for whom the proudest o'
Scotland's knights would send the last shaft into the heart o' his
rival."
"Is that the name of my preserver, Bertha?" ejaculated Matilda, in
surprise. "How came you by your knowledge? Speak, and relieve me, that I
may be certain that I know to whom I owe my life or my honour; and to
whom I--unworthy, thankless, ungrateful being that I am!--have not yet
vouchsafed one solitary look or word of thanks or gratitude. But what
said you of his health? He was wounded for me--ha! Has adverse fate
another evil in store for a daughter of affliction?"
"For your sake, my bairn, I traced out this man," replied the old nurse;
"but, oh, that I should hae to add anither sorrow to the wo-worn child
o' my early affection! He is ill. A wound he received in the wood has
become, by ill treatment and exposure, the heart o' a fever that has
eaten into the seat o' life."
"And he will die for me--killed by the second and severest wound, of
ingratitude!" cried Matilda, starting up in violent emotion. "With death
on him, received in my defence, has he nightly visited the bower of his
ungrateful mistress, who never, even by the movement of her evening
lamp, showed that she heard his strains, or understood their meaning.
That countenance, streaming with blood, yet beautiful through his
life's stream flowing for me, will haunt me through the short span that
misery may allow me. Would to God that I had returned one token as a
mark of my gratitude, if not of my love! Bertha, I must see this man,
who holds in his hands the issues of my destiny."
"And ye will, guid child," answered the nurse; "but, should death
deprive ye o' this refuge, we may think o' some ither means o' savin ye
frae this forced match wi' this high Catholic knight o' Haughhead, wha
persecuted the reformers as muckle as he does his lovers. Sir Thomas
Courtney--whom your father has banned frae Roseallan--shows as muckle
mercy to the Catholics as he does fair-seeming love to his lass-lemans.
But are you able to wander to Mosscairn, child?"
"A bleeding head did not keep him from my wood-bower," replied
Matilda--"a bleeding heart shall not prevent me from seeing him before
he dies."
This resolution on the part of Matilda, though it did not meet with the
entire approbation of Bertha, was adhered to; but no opportunity
occurred for putting it into execution. Every hour, in the meantime,
added to her unhappiness. Sir George Douglas had returned to Edinburgh,
to make preparations for the marriage; her mother watched her, to detect
what she termed the trick of simulated illness; and her father, who was
led by her mother, seemed determined to carry their cruel scheme into
execution. Tortured throughout the day, the moon, now late in rising,
afforded her no solace at night; the scene from the castle was changed
from lightness to darkness; the screeching of night birds came, in the
fitful blasts, in place of the melody of her lover's lute; and the
dreary view called up by the power of association the picture of her
lover lying on a death-bed, paying, by the torture of death, the
dreadful penalty of having dared to love one above his degree.
After a suitable inspection, her mother had, as she thought, discovered
that there existed no illness about her to prevent her from taking her
usual airing, and Bertha, who had apparently some purpose in view, came
and urged her to walk as far as the Monks' Mound, a green hillock that
stood on the borders of the property of Roseallan. They accordingly set
out. The day was not propitious; lazy clouds lay sleeping on the sides
of the hills, and wreaths of mist floated along like shadows, assuming
grotesque forms, and suggesting resemblances to aerial beings in the act
of superintending the operations of mortals; the wind was hushed to the
gentlest zephyr; and the sun, obscured by the masses of sleeping clouds,
was not able even to indicate the part of the heavens where he was.
Nature, "dowie and wae," seemed to have shrouded herself in the pall of
mourning, and the feathered tribes, overcome by the instinctive
sympathy, were mute, and cowered among the branches of the trees, as if
they had borrowed the habits of the wingless, tuneless reptiles that
crawled among the rank grass that covered the ground of the wood. The
couple wandered along slowly, Matilda resting on the arm of the nurse.
They came to the Monks' Mound, and sat down. The burying-ground of the
monastery of Dominicans lay on their right hand, and they could see the
tombstones rearing their grey, moss-covered heads over the turf-dyke
that surrounded the consecrated ground.
"See ye the little thatched house at the foot o' Lincleugh Hill yonder?"
said Bertha, after some moments of solemn silence, and holding out her
shrivelled hand. "The smoke frae its auld lum is curling among the
mist-clouds; but there's a darker mist within, and nae sun to send a
flaught through it."
"I see it well," replied Matilda, in a melancholy voice; "and, humble as
it is, and gloomy as it may be in its interior, I could even seek there
the peace I cannot find in the proud towers of Roseallan. There are no
forced marriages under roofs of thatch."
"Ay, but there is death, in the cottage as well as in the bonniest ha',"
muttered Bertha, ominously.
Matilda looked into the face of her nurse, who continued to gaze in the
direction of the cottage of Lincleugh.
"The mist blinds my auld een," she continued, as she passed her hand
over her eyes. "The hour is come, and there should be tokens o'
gathering there--yet I see naething."
Matilda looked again inquiringly into her face.
"Young een are sharp," said she again, "and now the mist is rowing awa
frae the side o' Lincleugh, and breaking into wreaths in the valley.
Look again, Matilda, and tell me what ye see."
"The removal of the mist," replied Matilda, directing her eyes to the
cottage, "has revealed a cluster of people dressed in black standing
round the door of the cottage."
"Ay, I'm right," replied Bertha, straining her eyes to see the mourners;
"the hour is near; and see the sextons stand there in Death's Croft,
like twa ghouls, looking into the grave they have this moment finished."
Matilda intuitively turned her eyes to the burying-ground that went
under the name of Death's Croft.
"You seem to know something more of this funeral than we of the castle
generally learn of the fate of the distant cottagers," said she.
"They're lifting," said the nurse, overlooking Matilda's remark, "and
the train moves to Death's Croft.
'Round and round
The unseen hand
Turns the fate
O' mortal man:
A screich at birth,
A grane at even--
The flesh to earth,
The soul to heav'n.'"
"Who is dead?" asked Matilda, as she fixed her eyes on the procession.
Bertha was silent. The procession reached Death's Croft, and, in a short
time, the rattling of the stones and earth on the coffin-lid was
distinctly heard. Matilda shuddered as the hollow sounds met her ear,
and Bertha crooned the lines of poetry she had already repeated. The
rattling sound ceased, and the loud clap of the spade indicated the
approaching termination of the work. The mourners gradually departed,
and the sextons, having finished their work, returned to the monastery.
"Come, come, now," said Bertha, "we've seen aneugh--the flesh to earth,
the soul to heaven. A's dune--let us return to Roseallan."
"The inhabitant of that narrow cell has the advantage of me," muttered
Matilda, sadly, as she rose to return home. "The marriage with the
Redeemer is not forced, and the union endureth for ever."
Bertha, who remained silent, hastened home, and, old as she was, several
times outwalked her weak and melancholy companion. When they arrived,
they went direct to the apartment of Matilda, where they were met by
Lady Rollo, who congratulated her daughter upon her increasing ability
to go through, with the necessary decorum, the ceremony of the marriage.
As soon as she retired, Matilda flung herself on her couch, and burst
into tears.
"There is only one individual who can save me from this dreadful fate,"
she cried. "Bertha, it is borne in upon my mind, that I cannot endure
this trial. Death or madness will be the alternative doom of the forced
bride of the knight of Haughhead. What of George Templeton? Did you not
promise to assist me to inquire for his health? Were we not to visit him
when my strength permitted? Tell me, tell me--have you heard how he is?"
"He is weel, my bairn," replied Bertha; "better than either you or me."
"Bless you! bless you, dear Bertha!" cried Matilda, rising and flinging
her arms round the neck of the old woman; "then there is some chance
left for me. I may yet be saved from that dreadful doom. I would trust
to the honour of that man who has already saved it with my life. Ah, if
he is well, I may expect again to hear these dulcet sounds which thrill
through my frame, and soften, by their sweet tones, the grief that sits
like a relentless tyrant on my heart. When, Bertha, shall we visit him?"
"We hae already visited him," replied the nurse, with a strange meaning
in her eye. "Did ye no see him this day, bairn, laid by the side o' his
faither amang the saft mould o' Death's Croft?"
"What mean you, Bertha?" replied Matilda. "There is a strange light in
your eye; I never before saw your face wear that expression. Ah! another
doom impends over me--I see the opening cloud from which the thunder is
to burst on my poor head. Why look thus upon me, nurse? is there a
humour on your seriousness?--for you laugh not. Read the doom backwards,
and do not incur from your Matilda the imputation of inflicting a cruel
torture on her who has hung at your breast."
"It was to save pain to my beloved Matilda," replied the nurse, with a
peculiar tone, "that I had ye hame before I told ye that the corpse ye
this day saw laid in the grave, in Death's Croft, was that o' George
Templeton."
Conscious of the effect that would be produced by this announcement, the
old woman held out her arms to receive the falling maiden. With a loud
scream she fainted, and forcing her way through the arms of the nurse,
fell on the floor with a loud crash. The sound brought up her mother.
As Matilda recovered, she looked about her wildly; her eyes recoiling
from the face of her mother, on which was depicted a smile of
incredulity, and seeking Bertha's, on which she found an expression
equally painful. There was no refuge on either side; and, as the image
of her dead lover rose on her fancy, she felt, in the consciousness of
the utter ruin of all her hopes, the stinging reproof of a tender
conscience, that charged her with cruelty to the devoted being who, in
defending her honour, lost his life.
"All this will not impose upon me, Matilda," said her mother. "Thou wert
well to-day, when thou didst walk forth; and this well-acted fit is
intended to remove the impression I entertain of your perfect ability to
perform the engagement your father and I have made for your benefit.
Mark me, maiden!--I will not heed thee more, if thy simulation were as
well acted as that of the wise King of Utica." And, saying these words,
she abruptly departed, leaving Matilda still scarcely sensible of what
was going on around her. The cruel dame called the nurse after her, and
the miserable girl was left to wrestle with her secret and divulged
griefs with the unaided powers of a mind broken down by her accumulated
misfortunes. She lay extended on her couch; and fancy, deriving new
energies from the impulse of feeling, became busy in the portrayment of
the form of her lover, whom she had, as she was satisfied, killed. She
recurred to the scene in the bower, with his manly countenance streaming
with blood; his visits to her bower afterwards--when he must have been
suffering the first approaches of that disease that proved fatal to him;
and, above all, her heartless conduct in not even condescending to
notice this tribute of devotion in one who had saved her life.