that the wood, which in those days encompassed every baronial residence,
had been, to a certain extent, cleared away, to allow the daisy-covered
lawn to rejoice in the beams of the generally excluded sun. But, at a
little distance, the empire of the forest was again resumed, on the
condition exacted by nature, of allowing the winding Kirtle to enjoy her
grassy bank, covered with the wild rose and the eglantine; and to roll
playfully along her pebbly bed, unimpeded by the neighbouring trees,
which, as if in amatory dalliance, sent down their straggling lips to
kiss her as she went. The wood bower--in early times a species of rural
retreat in much greater fashion than now-a-days--was, in repetition of
itself, seen rearing its ornamented walls, round which the native
parasite plants were entwined in close embrace in various parts of the
shady retreat. Some of these had been carefully looked to by the lady of
Kirconnel herself, who, anxious to confirm her husband's resolution
against engaging in the wars of the times, left no energy unemployed to
render their residence, not only within the walls of the house, but in
the bowers and gardens, as pleasant to the eye as the fruits of her
heart and mind were delightful to the rational and loving soul of her
appreciating and grateful lord. As Sir Owain says:--
"Fair were her erbers with flowers--
Rose and lili divers colours,
Primrol and parvink;
Mint, feverfoy, and eglantine,
Colimbin, and mo there were,
Than ani man mocht think."
True; the Graces had, as yet, but small influence in Scotland; but the
Genius of Chivalry, a cognate spirit, was busy in effecting a great
revolution in the minds of the inhabitants; and though there was little
to humanise, there was much to elevate and beautify. Traces of this
power might already be seen about the bowers and shades of Kirconnel,
where some rude figures of knights in various positions--one rescuing a
damsel from her enemies--one in the combat at outrance--one striking the
palisades of an armed city--placed, as they were, in the retreats of
peace and domestic happiness by a former warlike possessor of the
property, served the purpose of ornamenting the sequestered walks, and
supplying to the peaceful and happy inhabitants a contrast between the
pursuits of war and the pleasures of home, and home's blessed
enjoyments.
At a little distance from the mansion or castle--for every house, in
those days, had a castellated character--was, and still is, the
burying-ground of Kirconnel; a spot which, from the peculiarity of its
situation, as well as from its own mournful associations, impressed the
mind of the visiter with feelings which startled him, as much from their
novelty as from their intensity. There is a small stone there, that
would, if deciphered and communicated to our readers, anticipate our
story, and claim the ready tear before our own sympathies are relieved
by our recital. We pass it by at present, to give some idea of the
extraordinary spot where it lies. This ground of the dead, or "Death's
Mailing," as it has sometimes been called, is invested with all the
_charms_ of a sublimed melancholy, which contemplates nature as a whole,
and looks to those high purposes of her great author in visiting poor
mortals with their heart-chastening woes. At the time of which we speak,
this place of the dead was entirely surrounded with high oaks and
spreading elms, except where the silvery Kirtle embraced the hallowed
spot, as she rolled slowly along--more slowly, it might almost appear,
at this spot than elsewhere--and murmured a soft threnody in the ears of
the guardian spirits, that there tended the clay forms which they once
animated. A few very rude stones, whose rudeness was their greatest
recommendation to the sentimental mind, told, in the quaint "old Inglis"
of that day, their simple tale. "Here lyethe the race of ye sons of
Kirconnelle," might have been seen on a rude freestone that has long
since disappeared. "Terraughtie did choose to lie her," appeared upon
another old relic; and some exhibited more simple tokens--still pointing
out nothing more than name and surname, yet more eloquent in that
brevity than the most "storied urn." "Jon Kirkpatrycke," "Andrew
Welles," "Heln Johnston," "Mary of the Le'," without one word more to
say what they were, where they lived, when they visited this scene of
sorrow, and when they departed from it, possessed an eloquence in their
simple brevity that moved the heart of the visiter with a power now
little felt and less appreciated. The swelling green tumuli, with these
simple-speaking, grey-headed stones, standing, yet leaning to a side, as
if themselves bent by the hands of time, how humbly might they appear,
encircled as they were, with the proud monarch of the wood, the primeval
oak, that had seen the sires and grandsires of the lowly inhabitants of
"Death's Mailing" rise and fall, and become dust, as man contemplates
the day-fly wing forth in the morning, live out its day, and die. Such
was the romantic burying-place of Kirconnel at the time of which we
speak; and even now, when the oak has fallen before the axe of
civilisation, and Fame's trump has sounded even over the tomb, the place
has a hallowed and romantic character (the Kirtle is still there) not
exhibited by other burying-grounds in Scotland.
In those retreats, the members of the family of Kirconnel passed the
greater part of their time. Helen, though a lover of home, was fond of
gratifying a fancy pregnant of beautiful images, and a taste for what is
lovely in nature, by sitting by the banks of the Kirtle, and supplying
her mind with the pabulum of the old Scottish romances. "Raf Coilyear
and his Cross-bow," and "Gilbert with the White Hand," though soon
superseded by the continental romances, were then the legitimate
fountains of amusement to the fair maids of Scotland; and those who
aimed at sublimer flights, might have had recourse to "Fyn Maccowl," or
"Gret Gow Macmorne;" but there was in none of the works as yet
circulated in Scotland, what might gratify the intense yearnings of the
female heart for those poetical images which subsequently sprang up with
the more mature growth of chivalry. The loves of warriors are not the
loves of everyday life, far less the loves of the inspired poet; and
Helen, as she read these old legendary romances, might find in them the
amusement that afforded a relaxing alternative to her own poetical
communings with the oldest bard of all--Nature; but for the inspiration
of love itself she required the talisman--man--in that high aspect she
had prefigured of the noblest of God's creatures, to rouse her heart
from nature to the lover's dream.
As yet the Maid of Kirconnel had not seen any one that realised the idea
she had formed, by the banks of the Kirtle, of the individual who could
call up in her young bosom those extraordinary emotions which constitute
"love's young dream." The secluded mode of life adopted by her parents
was unfavourable to a choice of the talismanic objects; and it even
appeared to be her father and mother's wish that such choice should be
excluded, that her heart might, in the absence of many forms, learn to
be pleased with the man whom their love or policy might point out to her
adoption. A second cousin of her own, Walter Bell of Blacket House, had
a free passport to the hall of Kirconnel, as well as to the bowers that
were enshrined in Kirconnel woods. The laird saw in the young man his
nearest heir, in the event of his Helen being taken from him by fate;
and the lady could detect, as she thought, in Bell's quiet and sombre
manner, some assimilation to her own love of retirement and ease, and a
consequent disrelish of the warlike and sanguinary customs of the times.
Yet it was known that the young laird of Blacket House had been engaged
in secret frays between the Johnstones and Crightons; while, for some
purpose not generally known, though, from what we have said, not
difficult to be surmised, he had fought in disguise, and disclaimed the
glory of having hewn off the heads of many Johnstones, whose deaths
might have brought him renown, if not wealth. He had fought from a
spirit of animosity and a thirst of blood that lay deep buried in his
heart, but which, along with its noisome fruits, he had striven to
conceal, from the knowledge he possessed of the pacific disposition of
his friends the Kirconnels, whose good-will he had a motive to cultivate
more powerful than that of wealth or glory. He wished to recommend
himself to the fair Helen, by acquiring the love and esteem of her
father and mother; and he doubted not that, by his own personal
accomplishments--neither few nor unimportant--aided by the advice or
power of parental love and authority, he would succeed in changing in
her the old habitual feelings of ordinary friendship into the higher and
purer sentiments of affection.
And sure it was that no one who ever aimed to acquire a "ladye's love,"
made his attempt with more advantages on his side than Walter Bell of
Blacket House. The gay lover in the old romance, who cried that, with
the advantage of making love in a wood, and by the side of a silver
stream, he would gain the heart of the fairest woman of Christendom,
though his face were as black as the coal slave's, and his lineage no
better than the knave-child's, spoke more of human nature than he
himself perhaps knew. But he spoke of women in the aggregate; and it is
not unlikely that such a woman as fair Helen of Kirconnel had never come
under the trial of his skill. The truth of the statement fell to be
tested by one who, besides the advantages stated by the gay knight,
could boast the consent of a father, old friendship, and a face and a
lineage against which no exception could be taken by the admirers of
graces and genealogy. Bell was aware of the advantages he possessed; but
he could calculate the strength of these better than he could fathom the
mysteries of woman's heart. Although the greater part of his time was
passed at Kirconnel, where he took every opportunity of threading the
mazes of the oak woods, or sitting by the side of the Kirtle, with the
object of his affections, it is doubtful if he ever ascertained, by the
passing indications she exhibited, that her thoughts and feelings were
pitched much beyond the grade of those which nature had awarded to
himself. She saw and felt beauties in the scenery of Kirconnel, which to
her lover were but as the "sear leaf." Every object in nature--from the
planet to the plant, from the shining levin of heaven to the phosphoric
beam on the margin of the Kirtle--had some intelligence for her
inquiring eye. Every power in operation around her--from the general
sympathy of nature's highest elements, to the loves of the little forest
birds that sung their love-song in her bower--had some charm to elevate
her thoughts and sublime her sentiments. She, therefore, who could
search for intelligence where others saw nothing but inert matter, or,
at least, the uninteresting indications of everyday nature, might
probably have been an unfortunate object on whom our said romantic
knight might try the effect of his extraneous charms of wood and water.
Nor was she at all fitted for being acted upon by the love intrigues of
her cousin of Blacket House, who, coming far short of a knowledge of the
elevated sentiments by which she was inspired, could neither yield her
that sympathy which she required as a _sine qua non_ of affection, nor
stand the investigation of the shrewd wisdom or the high philosophy of
the heart of an elevated woman. While he simply sued and used the
ordinary words of love, she analysed, and found that, where she never
could be understood, she never could dispose of her affections.
The mind of Helen had long been made up on the question of her cousin's
suit. It had begun early; and the innumerable walks he had enjoyed with
her along the banks of the Kirtle had afforded him a thousand
opportunities of declaring his feelings. By the natural tact of women,
she had always contrived to evade the question, and contented herself,
even in the midst of extravagant declarations, with negative indications
of her inability to return his passion. These he understood not; and,
unfortunately, he acted upon the principle that has driven many a fond
lover to despair--that the mistress who appears to listen without
displeasure is presumed to give a tacit consent. They know little of the
heart of woman who trust their happiness or their lives to the frail
bark of such a fond and dangerous delusion. A woman will seldom put an
end to the adulation that supports her pride; but the Maid of Kirconnel,
who had no pride to gratify, acted as many a single-hearted female has
done and will do, who receives without a frown that her nature detests,
but without a satisfaction that her honesty will not allow her to
assume, the fond speeches of an old friend, couched in terms of an
admiration which is only her due. The native sensibility of her soul
shrank at the thought of first construing harshly her relative's
professions of affection, and then telling him that he was not the
individual who was qualified to win her heart. Yet, in justice to her,
it requires to be stated, that she often communed with herself, in her
solitary walks, on the necessity of checking her cousin's fond and
unfortunate delusion, lest evil might come out of gentleness so nearly
allied to good.
This unfortunate connection between Blacket House and his fair cousin,
fated as it was to continue, assumed daily a more critical aspect. The
young man, overwhelmed by a passion that was daily and hourly fed by the
contemplation of a beauty and qualities seldom before witnessed in a
Scottish maiden, was not only intoxicated by the violence of his love,
but satisfied that his cousin, in return loved him with an affection
only more chastely expressed, though, of course, not less powerful than
his own. Her parents, too, who had lent a fond and willing ear to his
statements of their daughter's love for him, had made up their minds
upon a point which presented all the appearances of being sealed and
settled by her who had the greatest interest in its truth. She was
always to be found by him in her solitary walks among Kirconnel woods.
Their meetings were favoured by their parents; their walks were
uninterrupted; the current of his passion flowed without check, and his
expressions only varied in becoming more animated. The absence of a
_harsh denial_ filled the measure of a deluding, blending hope; and
while the courses of their two minds were in directions entirely
opposite--his along the rose-strewed valley of a requited affection;
hers in a channel that led to objects too brilliant for his dull eye to
scan, and too sublime for his unfledged fancy to reach--he conceived
that a mutual sympathy of congenial feeling animated both their hearts.
It was at this extraordinary state of the domestic affairs of Kirconnel
that an extraneous cause gave a new current to the feelings of the young
maiden, without having the effect of changing that of her lover, or of
opening the eyes of her father and mother to the true fact, that she
could not love the man they intended as her husband. A gallant,
high-spirited youth, one of the Flemings of Kirkpatrick, had followed a
doe up to within a very short space of Kirconnel House. The timid
creature had taken to the water, and, springing on the opposite bank,
fled past a bower in which Helen was at the time sitting reading "Sir
Tristam," then in the hands of every young lady in Scotland and England.
She started as the creature shot past her, and, putting her head timidly
forward, to get a better view of the fleet inhabitant of the forest, saw
before her, with cap in hand, bowing, in knightly guise, Adam Fleming of
Kirkpatrick. Neither of the two had before seen the other; but the fame
of the one's noble mien, high mind, and martial virtues, and of the
other's incomparable beauty and elevation of sentiment, had reached
reciprocally their willing ears.
"That a Fleming of Kirkpatrick," said the youth, still bowing humbly,
and smiling, "should have had the boldness to interpose the image of his
worthless person between the fancy and the heaven of the meditations of
fair Helen of Kirconnel, doth, by my sword, require an apology. Shall I
be still bolder in asking a pardon?"
The effect produced on Helen's mind by the noble figure of the youth,
and the romantic and playful turn he had given to his intrusion, was
quick and heartfelt. It was, besides, simultaneous with the memory of
his spread fame; and in an instant her face was in a glow of mixed shame
and confusion, the causes of which, perhaps, lay deeper than the
influence of a mere feeling of surprise or interruption.
"You have my full forgiveness, sir," she replied, while her face glowed
deeper, in spite of her efforts to appear unaffected.
Her soft musical voice fell on the ear of the youth; but his keen, dark
eye was busy with the examination of charms with which his ear had been
long familiar. The blush of a woman is a man's triumph; whatever may be
its secret cause, the man will construe it favourably to himself, in the
face of a denial of his power; and so far at least he has the right,
that nature herself evidences in his favour, by an acknowledgment that
he has touched the fountains of the heart. Fleming was not different
from other men; and, though he might have been wrong in his construction
of the secret moving impulse which called up the mantling adornment of
beauty that was almost beyond the power of increase, he felt the full
influence of the effect he thought he had produced, and, conceiving
himself favourably received, laid in his heart the germs of an affection
that was to govern his destiny. The forms of breeding, more punctilious
in those days of chivalry than even now, forbade farther communication
at that time, and, bowing gracefully as he drank up the rays of her
blushing beauty, he bounded away after his dogs, that had kept their
course in pursuit of the flying doe.
This was the first time that ever Helen had seen a stranger huntsman
cross Kirconnel Lee in pursuit of his game; but it was soon to appear
that roes and does, when pursued by the gallant Fleming, seemed to think
that in the recesses of Kirconnel they might find that safety which was
denied them in other coverts; at least it became certain that more of
that kind of game fled before the hunter over Kirconnel Lee, after the
meeting we have described, than ever were seen before by man or maiden.
Meanwhile the image of the noble youth, with his clear, intelligent eye,
his rising and expanded forehead, from which his black hair was shaded
to a side, and mixed with the long flowing locks that reached down to
his shoulders; his intellectual expression of countenance, where beauty
sat enshrined among the virtues, his breeding, his modesty, his voice
and general bearing--were all busy with the fancy of the Maid of
Kirconnel. Nature's talisman had been applied, and the charm had wrought
in its highest and most mysterious power. Nor less had been the effect
of that first meeting on the mind of the youthful heir of Kirkpatrick.
They loved; and the does which afterwards brushed over Kirconnel Lee
were only the scouts of the hunting lover, who, while he could not help
the choice of the flying wilding in taking that direction, could not, of
a consequence, avoid a repeated _intrusion_ on the wood-bower privacy of
her who longed to see him with a heart that palpitated at his coming as
strongly as did that of the flying deer. The rules of breeding direct
all their force against a first interview; against a second, though
brought about in the same way as the first, they have no efficacy; and
love, which defies the whole code, soon reconciled differences which he
despised. A few meetings revealed to each other the fact--which, somehow
or other, is discovered by nobody but lovers--that one person has been
intended from the beginning of the world to be formed for another. The
heir of Kirkpatrick and the Maid of Kirconnel exhibited to each other
such a similarity of thought, feeling, and sentiment, that love seemed
to have nothing more to do than to tie those threads which nature had
not only spun, but hung forth with a predisposed reciprocity of
communication. The discovery that their thoughts had taken the same
range, and reached an equal altitude of elevation, carried with it that
pleasant surprise that is always favourable to the progress of the
tender passion; and the delight of a new-born sympathy in sentiments
that had long gratified only the heart in which they were conceived, but
which now were seen glowing in the eyes of another, was only another
form of that passion itself.
Though Helen had seen many indications that might have satisfied her (if
her mind had been directed to the subject) that her father and mother
were bent upon a match between her cousin of Blacket House and her, she
had never, either from a want of courage or steady serious thought on
the subject, put it to herself what was her precise predicament or
condition, on the supposition of such circumstance being in itself true
and irremediable. She had hitherto had no great need for secresy,
because she did not love another; and her father, mother, and lover,
having taken it for granted that she was favourable to her cousin's
suit, nothing of a definite nature had ever transpired to call for a
demonstration on her part, as an alternative of dishonesty and
double-dealing. Her situation was now changed. She now loved, and loved
ardently, another; and the necessity she felt of meeting the heir of
Kirkpatrick in secret, brought out in full relief her inmost sense of
what were the views and purposes of her father and mother, and all the
responsibility of her negative conduct, as regarded the suit of him she
could never love. But, strange as it may seem, if she felt a difficulty
in correcting her cousin and disobeying her parents before the accession
of her love, she felt that difficulty rise to an impossibility after
that important event of her life. She trembled at the thought of her
love being crossed: one word of her rejection of the suit of her cousin
would reach the ears of her parents; dissension would be thrown into the
temple of peace; her love would be discovered; her lover, a man famous
in arms, and an aider of the Johnstones, the opponents of Blacket House,
traced, rejected, and banished: and her heart finally torn and broken by
the antagonist powers of love and duty. She felt her own weakness, and
trembled at it, without coming to a resolution to make a disclosure;
while her overwhelming love carried her, on the moonlight nights, over
Kirconnel Lee, to meet her faithful Heir of Kirkpatrick in the romantic
burying-ground already described. This extraordinary place was that
fixed upon by the lovers for their night meetings; for in any other part
of the domains of Kirconnel they could not have escaped the eye of
Blacket House; who, though he had no suspicion of a rival, was so often
in search of the object of his engrossing passion, that she seldom went
out without being observed by the ever-waking and vigilant surveillance
of love.