Towards the afternoon I found myself among the solitudes of the
Renfrewshire moors. Save at times the melancholious note of the
peese-weep, neither the sound nor the voice of any living thing was
heard there. Being then wearied in all my limbs, and willingly disposed
to sleep, I laid myself down on a green hollow on the banks of the
Gryffe, where the sun shone with a pleasing warmth for so late a period
of the year. I was not, however, many minutes stretched on the grass
when I heard a shrill whistle of some one nigh at hand, and presently
also the barking of a dog. From the kindly experience I had received of
Sir George Maxwell's care this occasioned at first no alarm; but on
looking up I beheld at some distance three soldiers with a dog, on the
other side of the river.
Near the spot where I lay there was a cloven rock overspread with
brambles and slae-bushes. It seemed to me as if the cleft had been
prepared on purpose by Providence for a hiding-place. I crept into it,
and forgetting Him by whom I was protected, I trembled with a base fear.
But in that very moment He at once rebuked my infirmity, and gave me a
singular assurance of His holy wardenship, by causing an adder to come
towards me from the roots of the bushes, as if to force me to flee into
the view of the pursuers. Just, however, as in my horror I was on the
point of doing so, the reptile looked at me with its glittering eyes,
and then suddenly leapt away into the brake;--at the same moment a hare
was raised by the dog, and the soldiers following it with shouts and
halloes, were soon carried, by the impetuosity of the natural incitement
which man has for the chase, far from the spot, and out of sight.
This adventure had for a time the effect of rousing me from out the
weariness with which I had been oppressed, and I rose and continued my
course westward, over the hills, till I came in sight of the
Shaw's-water,--the stream of which I followed for more than a mile with
a beating heart; for the valley through which it flows is bare and open,
and had any of the persecutors been then on the neighbouring hills, I
must have soon been seen; but gradually my thoughts became more
composed, and the terrors of the poor hunted creature again became
changed into confidence and hope.
In this renewed spirit I slackened my pace, and seeing, at a short
distance down the stream, before me a tree laid across a bridge, I was
comforted with the persuasion that some farm-town could not be far off,
so I resolved to linger about till the gloaming, and then to follow the
path which led over the bridge. For, not knowing how the inhabitants in
those parts stood inclined in their consciences, I was doubtful to trust
myself in their power until I had made some espionage. Accordingly, as
the sun was still above the hills, I kept the hollowest track by the
river's brink, and went down its course for some little time, till I
arrived where the hills come forward into the valley; then I climbed up
a steep hazel bank, and sat down to rest myself on an open green plot on
the brow, where a gentle west wind shook the boughs around me, as if the
silent spirits of the solitude were slowly passing by.
In this place I had not been long when I heard, as if it were not far
off, a sullen roar of falling waters rising hoarsely with the breeze,
and listening again another sound came solemnly mingled with it, which I
had soon the delight to discover was the holy harmony of worship, and to
my ears it was as the first sound of the rushing water which Moses
brought from the rock to those of the thirsty Israelites, and I was for
some time so ravished with joy that I could not move from the spot where
I was sitting.
At last the sweet melody of the psalm died away, and I arose and went
towards the airt from which it had come; but as I advanced, the noise of
the roaring waters grew louder and deeper, till they were as the
breaking of the summer waves along the Ardrossan shore, and presently I
found myself on the brink of a cliff, over which the river tumbled into
a rugged chasm, where the rocks were skirted with leafless brambles and
hazel, and garmented with ivy.
On a green sloping bank, at a short distance below the waterfall,
screened by the rocks and trees on the one side, and by the rising
ground on the other, about thirty of the Lord's flock, old and young,
were seated around the feet of an aged grey-haired man, who was
preaching to them,--his left hand resting on his staff,--his right was
raised in exhortation,--and a Bible lay on the ground beside him.
I stood for the space of a minute looking at the mournful yet edifying
sight,--mournful it was, to think how God's people were so afflicted,
that they durst not do their Heavenly King homage but in secrecy,--and
edifying, that their constancy was of such an enduring nature that
persecution served but to test it, as fire does the purity of gold.
As I was so standing on the rock above the linn, the preacher happened
to lift his eyes towards me, and the hearers who were looking at him,
turned round, and hastily rising, began to scatter and flee away. I
attempted to cry to them not to be afraid, but the sound of the cataract
drowned my voice. I then ran as swiftly as I could towards the spot of
worship, and reached the top of the sloping bank just as a young man was
assisting Mr Swinton to mount a horse which stood ready saddled, tied to
a tree; for the preacher was no other than that godly man; but the
courteous reader must from his own kind heart supply what passed at our
meeting.
Fain he was at that time to have gone no farther on with the exercise,
and to have asked many questions of me concerning the expedition to the
Pentlands; but I importuned him to continue his blessed work, for I
longed to taste the sweet waters of life once more from so hallowed a
fountain; and, moreover, there was a woman with a baby at her bosom,
which she had brought to be baptized from a neighbouring farm, called
the Killochenn,--and a young couple of a composed and sober aspect, from
the Back-o'-the-world, waiting to be joined together, with his blessing,
in marriage.
When he had closed his sermon and done these things, I went with him,
walking at the side of his horse, discoursing of our many grievous
anxieties; and he told me that, after being taken to Glasgow and
confined in prison there like a malefactor for thirteen days, he had
been examined by the Bishop's court, and through the mediation of one of
the magistrates, a friend of his own, who had a soft word to say with
the Bishop, he was set free with only a menace, and an admonishment not
to go within twenty miles of his own parish, under pain of being dealt
with according to the edict.
Conversing in this manner, and followed by divers of those who had been
solaced with his preaching, for the most part pious folk belonging to
the town of Inverkip, we came to a bridge over the river.
"Here, Ringan," said he, "we must part for the present, for it is not
meet to create suspicion. There are many of the faithful, no doubt, in
thir parts, but it's no to be denied that there are likewise goats
among the sheep. The Lady of Dunrod, where I am now going, is, without
question, a precious vessel free of crack or flaw, but the Laird is of a
courtly compliancy, and their neighbour, Carswell, she tells me, is a
man of the dourest idolatry, his mother having been a papistical woman,
and his father, through all the time of the First King Charles, an
eydent ettler for preferment."
So we then parted, he going his way to Dunrod Castle, and one of the
hearers, a farmer hard by, offering me shelter for the night, I went
with him.