Mr. Macpherson. They were not long gone, and when they did return, our
young friend appeared leading in the Dominie, clad in a short-gown, and
a blue flannel petticoat, both belonging to our hostess. The Scottish
garment called the short-gown, is a sort of loose jacket, covering
one half the person only, and when tied tight round the waist, it is
admirably calculated to show off the mould of a handsome woman to the
best advantage. On the present occasion, it was with some difficulty
confined round the bulky Dominie, by a red cotton handkerchief, so
as fully to display his shape; and as the petticoat reached but a
little way below his knees, it exhibited the full proportions of his
Herculean legs, enlarged as they were by a pair of the thickest grey
worsted hose, and brogues of enormous size, accidentally left there
by a Highland drover. Over his head was placed one of Mrs. Shaw's
tartan shawls, which Clifford had recommended to be tied under his
chin, as a precaution against toothache, to which he declared himself
to be frequently a martyr. Such a woman, as the Dominie appeared to
make, is never to be seen on the face of this earth, except in some
exaggerated specimen of those marine, or rather amphibious animals,
to be found on the sea-coasts of Britain, and which are called bathing
women. We were all so much taken by surprise with his appearance,
that to control our laughter was a matter of utter impossibility.
Clifford.--Gentlemen, allow me to introduce to you the great Princess
Rustifusti.
Dominie--(striding in like a Grenadier.)--Truly, gentlemen, I am
ashamed to appear among you in this unbecoming disguise. But my worthy
and kind friend Mr. Clifford is so careful of me--mercy on me, what
would my boys say if they beheld me?
Grant.--They would be astonished, no doubt, Mr. Macpherson. But come,
sit down--here is something comfortable for you to eat. I am sure
you must require food by this time.
Dominie.--I must honestly confess to you that I am downright ravenous.
Clifford.--Nay, now, do not disgrace the delicate feminine character
which you are at present supporting, by eating like a masculine
creature.
Dominie.--Masculine, feminine, or neuter, I am so famished, that
I must eat liker, I fear, unto a male wolf, than a delicate leddy,
such as fortune has this night forced me to represent.
Clifford.--Nay, then, if that be your way, I must cease to be your
chaperon. So do you take charge of your own delicate self, and go on,
if you must do so, to disgrace the lovely sex to which you now belong,
by your immoderate eating and drinking, whilst I call upon Serjeant
Archy Stewart to proceed with his narrative.
THE LEGEND OF CHARLEY STEWART TÀILLEAR-CRUBACH
CONTINUED.
Although the jealous dreamings of King James had led him rather to
desire the absence of Sir Walter Stewart from his court, whilst the
Knight was yet a bachelor, he was no sooner fairly married, than all
such fancies were dissipated from the royal mind. The renewed enjoyment
in Sir Walter's society, which the monarch had experienced, previous
to the departure of the newly married pair for Stradawn, only served to
render the after absence of his favourite the more insufferable, and he
soon began to weary for the return of so accomplished a companion. Sir
Walter had sufficient opportunity of being rendered sensible of the
satisfactory alteration in the King's manner towards him, before
he left the court; but, notwithstanding all this, he was in no small
degree surprised, as well as delighted, with the arrival of the special
messenger, who was the bearer of the royal command for him, to attend
his Majesty at the tournament, which reached him the very day after
Cochran had left him. Sir Walter being one of the best equestrians
of his time, he was naturally extremely fond of horses. His great
passion was to possess himself of the most beautiful steeds that could
possibly be procured, and he spared neither pains nor expense in the
gratification of this knight-like fancy. Some time before the period we
are now speaking of, he chanced to have acquired some piebald horses,
which were of a white colour, marked in a very extraordinary manner
with large patches of a sort of bluish tinge. This circumstance led
him to indulge the whim of collecting more of the same description,
and having, from time to time, procured individual animals, from all
quarters, and a considerable addition to their numbers having recently
arrived, he now at length found himself enabled to mount a large troop
of his attendants on creatures of a similar description, and of the
most exquisite symmetry of form. Prepared as he thus happened to be,
the news of the tournament gave him particular gratification. His
heart exulted, and his mind was all agog, at the prospect of such an
opportunity of making so marvellous a display, before a more numerous,
as well as more experienced, collection of eyes, than his own glens
could afford him. Accordingly, he began to busy himself, without loss
of time, in making those arrangements, which were necessary to enable
him to appear with that degree of splendour, which he always wished to
exhibit on such occasions. Mr. Jonathan Junkins, and all the tailors
for many miles round, were put in requisition to make rich housings,
and footmantles of scarlet cloth for the saddles, and everything
else was got up in a proportionable style of splendour. But let us
not imagine that this, his so minute attention to such fopperies,
should lower Sir Walter Stewart in our opinion, for we must remember,
that all such trifles, being integral parts of chivalry, assumed the
greatest importance in the eyes of every knight. For many reasons,
Sir Walter Stewart felt no great desire to take his wife with him to
court, but he could find no good plea for leaving her behind. Amongst
other preparations, therefore, the lady's horse litter required to
be new furbished up, seeing that she was now in a condition that
made riding somewhat dangerous; but so great was the expedition used
by all hands, that by the day previous to that fixed for departure,
all the horses were duly trained, and all their equipments, as well
as those for the men-at-arms, and all other things necessary for his
expedition, were in the highest order.
Sir Walter Stewart retired to rest that night with the intention
of being up with the earliest dawn, that he might himself see that
nothing had been forgotten. Upon reaching his lady's apartment,
he found no one with her but her page, English Tomkins, as he was
familiarly called. This was a boy of great beauty of countenance,
and of an intelligence of eye very superior to that which his years
might have promised. He had followed the lady from England, and he
was so strongly attached to his mistress, that, if he was at all deep
in her confidence, he had prudence enough to keep all that he knew,
strictly secret from every one with whom his situation brought him
into contact. To all, except to her, he was reserved and distant,
to an extent much beyond that, which might have been looked for
from the natural carelessness and ingenuousness of youth, and even
the good-humoured freedom which Sir Walter used with him, was never
successful in breaking through the parchment case in which he seemed
to wrap himself up. He was a most impenetrable youth, and no long
time elapsed after the Knight's marriage, before Sir Walter began
to look upon the boy with a certain jealousy, and dislike, which he
could neither account for nor overcome.
"Do it thine own way," said the lady to him with so great earnestness
in her communication with him, that she perceived not Sir Walter's
entrance. "Do it thine own way, I tell thee, boy; but see that it
be done, and that surely, and secretly too--for I could have no will
to leave Drummin, and no heart to enjoy the pleasures of the Court,
unless I knew that this was done ere I went."
"What may this be, upon which so much of thy happiness
depends?" demanded Sir Walter Stewart, advancing.
"Holy Virgin, what a start you gave me!" cried the lady; "such puerile
tricks are hardly worthy of thee."
"What tricks?" asked the Knight, with utter simplicity.
"Such boyish tricks, I tell thee," said the lady, smoothing her
angry countenance, and throwing over it a playful smile, and at the
same time gently tapping his cheek, as if in the most perfect good
humour. "I mean such boyish tricks as that which thou hast now used,
by stealing thus to my chamber, and secreting thyself, that thou
mightest startle me for thine idle amusement."
"Credit me, I am no such idle boy as thou wouldst suppose," said Sir
Walter, gravely; "I have been guilty of no such silly conduct. I came,
as I am ever wont to do, without either the intent or the thought
of surprising thee. Nay, I knew not that I had done so, until thou
didst utter that scream of surprise."
"Well, well, I believe thee," said the lady; "and if thou hadst
stolen upon my privacy, thou couldst have gained nothing that would
have amounted to treason, seeing that I was but cautioning Tomkins
here, as to how he should execute a small deed of charity for me,
ere we go to-morrow, which I could ill brook the neglect of. Now,
boy, thou may'st go," continued the lady; "And see that thou doest
my bidding to the very letter."
"Your commands shall be strictly obeyed, lady," said the boy, bowing
as he retired.
The apartment in which the Knight and his lady slept had a window
in it which looked down the vale, formed by the combined waters of
the Aven and the Livat. A faint but glowing red light shot through
this window towards morning, and falling upon Sir Walter Stewart's
eyes, gradually unsealed their lids from the deep sleep in which
they were closed. He started up at this appearance of approaching
sunrise--hurried on his clothes, and hastened down stairs to the
court-yard. There he found the men-at-arms, who had the watch, all
at their posts; but none of the grooms, or the others whom he had
expected to have found already busied with their preparations, were as
yet astir. Having expressed his surprise at their laziness, he learned
from those on guard, that it yet wanted two good hours of day. Being
unwilling to retire again to his chamber, he walked forth beyond the
walls, to the terrace on which the castle stands; and he had no sooner
got there, than the cause of this his premature disturbance was made
sufficiently manifest to him, for his eyes were immediately caught,
and his attention fearfully arrested, by a column of fire that shot
up from the cottage of Alice Asher, and inflamed the very clouds above.
Giving one loud shout of alarm to the people within the castle walls,
he staid not for them, but rushed franticly down the green slope,
and crossing a rustic foot-bridge that spanned the river Livat,
immediately under the fortalice, he flew towards the wooded hill,
too accurately guided through the obscurity of the night, by the
conflagration, the light from which blazed in his eyes. But whilst it
thus served to direct him towards its object, it had also the effect
of dazzling his vision; so that, in the furious precipitation of his
speed, he ran against some living being that was coming hurriedly
in the opposite direction. Whatever it might be, his force was so
tremendous, that he drove it aside from the path, like a ball from
a bat, and then rolling forwards on the ground himself, and over and
over, he lay for some moments senseless upon the grass. But, having
soon afterwards recovered himself, he sprang again to his legs, and,
his whole thoughts being absorbed at the moment by his agonizing
anxiety for Alice Asher's safety, he stopped not to enquire what had
become of the individual who had produced his accident, but rushed
on again towards the burning house, on which he still kept his eyes
fixed. Long ere he gained the foot of the hill on which it stood,
a momentary depression of the flame, followed by an equally sudden
and very great increase of it, told him that the roof had fallen in,
and that, if the inmates had not already fled for safety, they must
now be beyond all reach of assistance. Yet still he paused not; but,
doubling his speed, he rushed breathless up through the wood on the
side of the hill, and at length arrived at the cottage.
What a sad spectacle did it now present! The walls alone were
standing, like a huge grate, in which the inflammable materials of the
heather-thatched roof, and the furniture, and interior wood-work, were
rapidly consuming. The roses and woodbines that crept over the walls,
or trailed in rude luxuriance over the porch, were now shrivelled
up and scorched by the intense heat within, nay, even the shrubs and
flowers that grew around, were dried up and killed by it.
"Oh, Holy Virgin Mother, she is gone! she is gone!" cried Sir Walter,
giving way to a paroxysm of grief.
And now people came running together from the nearest cottages. Eagerly
did he enquire of all he met for some information, regarding Alice
Asher; but no one could tell him aught of her. The men from the Castle
came crowding up the hill, bearing buckets of water. These were now
useless. But still Sir Walter called on those who carried them to
exert themselves, and, urged by his commands, they ran to and from
a neighbouring pool, bearing water, and pouring it over the sinking
flames, till they were finally extinguished, at least so far, that
they were enabled to rake amid the red-hot embers with long poles,
without danger to themselves. With what torturing anxiety did Sir
Walter Stewart stand, in the hope that no human remains would be found,
by which circumstance he expected to satisfy himself that Alice Asher
had escaped. But, alas! they had not searched far, when they found
a body, or rather a half-consumed skeleton, in so fearful a state of
mutilation, that although its size left no doubt that it was that of
a woman, it was quite impossible to guess at the person. Sir Walter
was frantic. But still hope lingered within his bosom. Alice had a
servant maid in the house. This skeleton was nearer, as he thought,
to the size of the woman, than to that of the mistress. Besides,
these remains were found in a part of the house which this attendant
inhabited. No doubt was left that they were hers; and Sir Walter's
heart expanded with the temporary relief which it experienced.
But the search went on. And now Sir Walter Stewart's heart again
fluttered betwixt torturing hope and fear,--till,--oh, wretched
and bitterly afflicting sight! in that part of the cottage which
Alice Asher more particularly occupied, another half-consumed body
was found. This was also that of a woman; and, as it corresponded
accurately to the size of her about whose fate he was so unhappily
interested, every spark of hope was at once extinguished within
him. His brain whirled in strange and bewildering confusion. He
gasped for breath, and seemed to swallow down liquid fire; all
consciousness left him for a time; and he sank down on an adjacent
bank in a temporary fainting fit.
I shall not attempt to describe the flood of strong and resistless
feeling to which Sir Walter Stewart, resolute as he might be, was
compelled to give way, when his senses fully returned to him. Those who
were around him respected them in silence. The sun soon afterwards
arose upon the melancholy scene; and then it was that the brave
Knight's countenance was observed by all, to bear powerfully-written
testimony of the deep grief that had been at work upon it. Making a
strong and manly effort to subdue his affliction, he gave orders to
his people to see that the remains, now so revolting to look upon,
should be properly attended to; and, despatching a confidential person
to the priest who had acted as father-confessor to Alice Asher, he
besought him to do all that might be requisite to ensure that the
last sad duties should be decently and reverentially paid, and every
religious rite duly performed to her, whose life of contrition, and
penitence, for a sin which he felt to have been his alone, had so
fair a prospect of reconciling her to her Maker. And, having made
these arrangements, he slowly and silently, and with a sorrowful,
heavy, and lacerated heart, bent his steps back to Drummin.
When Sir Walter Stewart, and those who were with him, had reached
the place where he had been so unaccountably thrown down, he was
surprised to see a human figure lying a few yards off the footpath,
with the head and shoulders crammed into a thicket. On approaching
it, the dress at once informed him that it was his lady's page,
English Tomkins. Having ordered some of his people to pull him forth
from the bushes in which he was half hid, and to raise him up, he
was discovered to be quite dead;--and his death was at once seen to
have been occasioned, by his head having come against the thick and
knotty trunk of an oak, which grew up from amidst the black thorns
and honeysuckles, so that his skull had been dreadfully fractured,
and instant extermination of life had ensued.
"Jesus have mercy on me!" cried Sir Walter, with great feeling. "I have
been the innocent cause of this poor boy's death, by running against
him in the dark;" and having said so, he proceeded to explain to his
people the circumstances which had produced and attended the accident.
"Methinks he hardly merits to be much wailed for, Sir Knight, unless
thou canst say that these strange articles can have been innocently
carried by him," said one of the attendants, pulling, at the same
time, from the bosom of the corpse, a small bundle of matches, and a
tinder-box, with a flint and steel.--"Marry, these would seem to say,
that he had been better employed had he been in his bed."
"What do I see?" cried Sir Walter Stewart, filled with horror, and
greatly agitated.--"What! was it murder then?--murder of the most
horrible description? Oh, holy Mother of God, can there be such
villainy upon earth?"
"What shall we do with this wretched carcass?" demanded one of
the people.
"Oh, most unlucky accident!" cried Sir Walter, without heeding
him.--"Would that I had but caught him in life! But, alas! strong as
suspicion is against him, his secret has died with him! We cannot now
wrench forth the truth from him either by spring or by screw. He is
gone to his account, before that Judge, at whose tribunal all secrets
must appear. Yet, bear him along with you, and see that you take
especial care to preserve those dumb instances of his hellish art,
till I may require thee to produce them."
Sir Walter Stewart now left his people to carry the body at their
own leisure, and shot away ahead of them, at a pace so furious, as to
correspond with the violence of those various stormy feelings which
then agitated him. On reaching Drummin, he hurried directly to his
lady's chamber, where he found her putting the last finish to her
travelling dress.
"Madam!" said he to her bower-woman, in a voice which sufficiently
betrayed the disturbed state of his mind; "my lady will dispense with
thine attendance for a brief space--we would be private."
"What strange conduct is this, Sir Walter?" demanded the lady after
her attendant was gone, whilst her voice and manner might have led
any one to believe, that she too was not altogether well at ease. "Why
shouldst thou have thus sent Jane so rudely forth, when she hath yet
so much to pack and to prepare?"
"Because I would fain have some private converse with thee, lady," said
the Knight solemnly.--"Dost thou usually send forth thy page Tomkins
on errands of charity so very early as several hours before sunrise?"
"No!--No!" replied the lady in a voice of hesitation. "Such are not
indeed,--no, they are not his usual hours to be sent on such errands;
but--but--the boy had some distance to go. And then--and--and--and
then he hath so much to do ere we depart, that--that--But I wonder
much that he is not returning by this time!"
"He is returning now!" said Sir Walter, looking hard and somewhat
sternly at her.--"But canst thou tell me what he did with a tinder-box,
flint, and steel, and matches, concealed in his bosom?"
"Flint--flint--flint and steel saidst thou?" cried the lady,
considerably agitated. "How can I say aught about it? Boys are ever
full of tricks, and so, I doubt not, is Tomkins. But what hath he
told thee himself? Didst thou not question him?"
"As yet he hath told us nothing," replied the Knight, ambiguously.
"Then all is yet right!" cried the lady, from an energetic impulse
of satisfaction, which she could not control.
"What is right?" demanded Sir Walter, sternly.
"I would say that--that--that if the boy hath confessed no evil, then
'tis most likely that no evil hath been done."
"Yea," replied Sir Walter, gravely, and with deep feeling, "but the
direst evil hath been done--a deed which is hardly to be matched
in cruelty--the firing of the house, and the burning to death of an
innocent lady and her woman!"
"An innocent lady!" exclaimed his wife, again forgetting herself for
a moment. "But thou canst not suspect this boy of having done so foul
a deed?"
"Most strongly do I suspect him," replied Sir Walter.
"Nay, nay, 'tis impossible," said the lady. "What could prompt him
to so horrible an act?"
"What could prompt him!" exclaimed Sir Walter, "nothing, methinks, in
his own bosom; but canst thou not guess who could have prompted him?"
"Nay, nay, how could I guess?" said the lady, in great trepidation.
"Lady!" said Sir Walter, with great solemnity, after having seated
her in one chair, and drawn one for himself close to her, where he
sat for some moments looking steadily into her pallid and agitated
countenance. "Lady! are these the charitable errands on which thou
art wont to send this boy?"
"What mean ye, Sir Walter?" demanded the lady, in a state of trembling
and alarm which she could not conceal. "The boy hath not basely
accused me of aught."
"Sir Walter, your pardon!" said Jane, the lady's bower woman, bursting
at that moment most inopportunely into the room, "Ronald would fain
know what you would have done with the corpse of poor Tomkins?"
"The corpse of Tomkins!" cried the lady, starting up, and clapping her
hands together, in an ecstacy of joy, which she could not hide. "Then
the boy is no longer alive!"
"He was found dead, it seems, my lady," said the maid, "and his corpse
hath this moment been brought in by Ronald and the rest. 'Tis fearsome
to look upon him. He hath got a deadly contusion and gash on his head."
"Alas, poor boy!" cried the lady, wiping her dry eyes with her pocket
handkerchief, and mustering up all the symptoms of sorrow she could
command. "Who can have murdered him? I shall never again meet with
so faithful a page!"
"Faithful, indeed, madam," said Sir Walter, after showing the maid
again out of the room, "faithful, indeed, readily to execute those
most wicked and murderous orders with which thou didst charge him."
"Nay, nay, this is too much, Sir Walter," replied the lady, now
gaining full boldness and command of herself, from having been thus
unexpectedly certified that her page was dead, and that he could now
tell no tales; "how canst thou dare to insinuate any thing against me?"
"Madam," said Sir Walter, in a hollow tone, and with considerable
agitation of manner, "would it were so that thou couldst with truth
speak thus boldly. But, alas! the words I heard thee utter last night
to the page--the horrible catastrophe of this morning--the place
where it pleased Providence that he should meet with his accidental
death--the direction in which he was running when he received it,
and the implements of destruction which were found in his bosom,
can leave no rational doubt in my mind as to the person who conceived
and directed this most cruel tragedy; and though evidence may be yet
lacking to bring the crime fully home to thee, yet, convinced and
satisfied as I am of the justice of this charge against thee, I can
no longer suffer the head of so foul a murderess to rest upon this
bosom. I leave thee to the stings of thine own conscience, and to that
repentance which they may produce, believing that God, in his own good
time, will make the truth appear, so that thou mayst be made to expiate
thy guilt," and so saying, Sir Walter Stewart left the apartment.