miss our track?"
"Tush, Harry, with thine evil croak. There will be time enough to
discourse with danger when it comes. Besides, I would know it
blindfold, and the night doth bear no token of either distemper or
disquiet."
"Thou art passing careless of our jeopardy. It were better, even now,
that we follow the track by the coast. My counsel was set at naught,
or we had gone forward by Cartmel, and missed this perilous pathway of
the sea."
"And with it met the enemy at my gate; or, peradventure, having passed
on thither before us, we should have found them in quiet possession of
our good fortalice yonder. Truly it were a precious entertainment! We
should have Lenten fare, I trow, where they be lords o' the feast."
"Our steeds, I think, would have outstripped them, even by way of the
forest and the bridges, but"----
"Thou reckonest not for delay by the hill-paths and the morass, let
alone the weary miles that we should have to ride. Tut, man, they
fancy not of our crossing this little brooklet here, because I misled
them ere we departed; and they are now mightily sure of cutting off
our retreat, and getting at the tower before us. How the knaves will
slink back when they find the gate barred in their teeth. Forward, Sir
Harry, and let the Cumberland wolves take the hindmost!"
They dashed down the slope into the heavy mud by the beach, and soon
the little band might have been seen moving like dark specks on the
sandy waste, even though night had come on, so clear and unsullied was
the atmosphere.
The wind, which through the day had blown light, but piercing, from
the north, seemed all at once to become more bland and genial. A
pause was felt; then a veering to and fro, like the flapping sail, ere
the big canvas comes bellying before the wind; a pause, created by one
of those occult and uncomprehended operations of nature, to be
understood only in the secret recesses of her power, where all the
germs of being are elaborated, but whither the most daring and exalted
of human capacities never penetrated.
It was near the turn of the tide, and the wind, obeying her spell, as
though at the call of that mighty wizard, was gradually veering
towards the sea, and shortly would ride on with the rolling billows,
driving forward, like some proud charioteer, the dark waters of the
Atlantic in its progress.
The travellers were pricking on their way discreetly, the channel of
the river just before them, rippling pleasantly over some quiet star,
that seemed to sink deep within its bosom.
To their right was the voice of the restless and mystic ocean, obeying
the fiat of Him who hath fixed its bounds--at too great a distance now
to excite other feelings than those of their own impotence, and the
immensity by which they were surrounded. I know of no sound to be
compared to it. There is nought in the wide range of our intelligence
that can produce the dread, the almost terrific expansion which it
seems to create in the mind, save it be the dizzy view over some dark
and unfathomable abyss--an impression that comes over us like the
dread unutterable anticipations of eternity!
Suddenly a thin white vapour was seen obscuring the brightness in the
west. Then came a cloud-like haze, scudding on the very surface of the
stream, wherein the plash of horses' feet announced their entrance.
They rode slowly on, but the channel was deep, and it seemed as though
some sleight and witchery was about them, for the mist became so dense
that the clouds seemed to have dropped down to encompass and enfold
them. The stream gradually became deeper, until the foremost horse was
wading to the belly, labouring and snorting from the chillness and
oppression upon his chest.
"'Tis an unlucky and an embarrassing escort that we are favoured
with," said the rider. "The wind, too, whiffles about strangely. 'Tis
on my face, now, and verily I think the stream will ne'er be crossed.
I trust we are not wading it down towards the sea."
"Troth but we be, though," hastily replied his friend, after looking
down, bending as low as possible to observe his horse's feet, where
he could just discern the gouts of foam as they ran right before,
instead of passing them from left to right.
"Put back--put back, and soon!" he cried, in great alarm; for the mist
bewildered them strangely. They did put back, but instead of all
obeying the same impulse, some of the party, finding themselves on
opposite sides of the stream, were plunging and replunging into it, to
rejoin their comrades, every one calling out for his neighbour to
follow; so that, in the end, the whole party were so confused that, on
being gathered together once more on the sand, they really knew not on
which side of the stream they stood, nor which way to move. They
seemed like persons discoursing in a dream, and the mist hung about
them so closely that they could not, even by dismounting, see the
marks of their own footsteps. They felt that they were standing on a
bank of sand, which they knew must inevitably, and ere long, be
covered by the raging tide, even then, perhaps, on its way to
overwhelm and devour them. But this was the utmost of their knowlege,
for the direction in which to proceed, or the bearing of either shore,
was beyond their knowledge or apprehension. They would now have been
glad to retrace their steps, but this, alas! they knew not how to
accomplish. To remain would be certain destruction; to go on, might
only be hastening to meet it. But move they must, as the only chance
of escape; yet opinions were as various as the points of the compass.
One was for going to the right, another to the left, another straight
forward; so that, what with arguing and wrangling, they became more
bewilderd and uncertain than ever.
"I do verily believe we have not yet crossed the river," said one.
"Not come across!" replied another; "why we've been through and
through, to my own certainty, at least thrice."
"Thrice in thy teeth!" said his angry opponent; "and so I'll go
forward."
"And I'll go back," was the reply. But the precise idea they had
formed of these opposite and important determinations was more than
either of them could explain; even though they had been ever so
certain upon these points, to proceed in a straight line in any
direction was impossible, without some object by which to direct their
course. Ever and anon was heard a heavy plunge into the stream, but
even this token had ceased to avail them, for its course could not be
ascertained. The tide was now arresting its progress, and the water
moved to and fro in every direction, according to the various impulses
it received. The wind, too, was light and treacherous; its breath
seemed to come and go, without any fixed point by which they could
feel either its arrival or departure. In this dilemma, and without any
clue to their extrication, harassed and confounded, they were like men
bereft of their senses, and almost at their wits' end. Still they
clung instinctively about each other, but their conduct had now taken
the opposite extreme. Before, all was bustle and activity, everybody
giving directions, hallooing, shouting, and so forth. Now, they were
silent, and almost stationary, stupefied, distracted. There is a
fascination in danger. I have known those who never could look down a
precipice without a horrible impulse to leap over the brink. Like the
scared bird, almost within the gripe of its destroyer, yet unable to
flee, so had they lost, apparently, all power of escape. It was a
silence more awful even than the yellings of despair. Its horrid gripe
was on every heart; every bosom withered beneath its touch. The nature
of the most courageous appeared to change; trembling and perplexity
shook the stoutest frame; yet suddenly and unexpectedly was the
silence broken, and the spell that bound them dissolved.
"Hark!" said every voice together; "a bell, by the blessed Virgin!"
The sound roused them from their stupor. Hope again visited the
prison-house of the spirit.
"On, on!" said their leader.
"On, on!" was re-echoed on every side; but they were still attempting
to escape in different directions. Scarcely two of them were agreed as
to the place whence the sound proceeded. Yet it came on, at stated
intervals, a long, deep, melancholy knell, almost terrific in their
present condition. Another council was attended with the same
results--opinions being as varied as ever. Still that warning toll had
some connection with their fellow-men, some link, which, however
remote, united them to those who were now slumbering in happiness and
security. Yet of their true course and bearing they were as ignorant
as ever.
"Now, by'r lady," said one, "there's either witch or wizard at the
tail o' this. Haven't I passed this very place to and fro, man and
boy, these twenty years, and never went away by a yard's space, right
or left. Now"----
"Right well, Humphry Braithwaite, should I know it too, and yet we
might be in a wilderness for aught I can distinguish, either land-mark
or sea-mark. Hush, I'm sure that bell is from the right."
"Nay, I hear it yonder, to the left, if I'm not witched."
"Thee'rt gone daft, man, 'tis----Well, if the sound binna from both
sides, right and left! I hear it behind me now."
"We must be moving," said the leader. There's no chance for us here.
We can but meet the enemy at the worst, and there are three chances of
escaping for one of drowning, which way soever we take, at a blind
venture. Then let us away together; and may the Virgin and St Bees be
our helper!"
But there were some who would rather trust to their own guidance; and
what with the indecision of one, the obstinacy of another, and the
timidity of a third, he soon found himself with only one companion,
besides his good grey steed, when he flung the reins to his control,
and spurred forward.
Reckless, almost driven to desperation, he committed his way to the
beast's better discretion, as he thought, goading on the jaded animal
incessantly, his fellow-traveller still keeping behind, but at no
great distance. They halted after a space; but how long it is
impossible to say. Hours and minutes, in seasons of pain or
excitement, are, in the mind's duration, arbitrary and conventional.
To measure time by the state of our feelings would be as futile as an
attempt to measure space by the slowness or impetuosity of our
movements. Hours dwindle into minutes, and minutes are exaggerated
into hours, according to the circumstances under which the mind moves
on. We are conscious of existence only by the succession of our
feelings. We are conscious of time only by its lapse. Hence we are apt
to make the same measure serve for both; and, as our own dispositions
predicate, so doth time run fast or slow. True it is that time cannot
measure thought. The mind notes but the current and passage of its own
feelings; they only are the measure of existence and the medium of
identity.
"Halt, Lord Monteagle!" cried his companion from behind; "I hear the
sea before us. Hush, and use thine own senses, if they be worth the
trial."
The other listened, but it was only for one moment; the next saw him
wheel round, urging on his flight in the opposite direction, for he
knew, or his senses were rendered deceptive through terror, the sound
of the coming tide.
"Halt, Lord Monteagle!" again cried the horseman from behind; "for
the water is deeper at every plunge. Halt, I say, for the love
of"----The sound died on the speaker's lip, for he was overwhelmed and
sickening with the dread anticipation of death.
"On one side or the other, then, I care not which," cried the foremost
rider.
"To the right, and Heaven grant us a safe deliverance!"
Away went the panting steeds; but the waters increased; yet were they
powerful animals, and they swam boldly on amid the roar and dash of
the rising waves. Still it was with difficulty they could breast the
torrent. The courageous beasts braced every sinew to the
work--instinctively grappling with danger--every effort was directed
to their escape. Suddenly a loud shout was heard, and something dark
rose up before them. It might be the hull of some vessel, that was
approaching an ark of safety. This thought was the first that crossed
them. But they felt a sudden shock and a vibration, as though their
steeds had struck the land.
They saw, or it was a deception produced by agitation or excitement,
the dark outline of the beach, and men hurrying to and fro with
lighted torches. They galloped on through the waves, and a few moments
brought them safely upon the hard, loose pebbles of the shore.
Joyful was the recognition; for those who had come to their succour
were the party from whom they had separated, who had luckily gained
the shore before them. But what was their surprise when they found
they had been galloping to and fro almost within a stone's throw of
the beach opposite the place of their destination! Yet such was their
state of bewilderment that it was an even hand but they had put about
on the other side, and attempted to return across the channel. In that
case no human help could have rescued them from destruction, for the
tide already had overtaken them, and it was only their close proximity
unto the shore which enabled the horses to regain their footing, and
bear them safely to land.
It seems that their pursuers were still outdone, for their stronghold
was open to receive them; and the enemy, foiled in their expectations,
returned with all speed into Cumberland, lest during their absence
some more dangerous foe from the Borders should lay waste their
possessions.
[Illustration: THE RING AND THE CLIFF]
THE RING AND THE CLIFF.
"And still I tried each fickle art,[ii]
Importunate and vain;
And while his passion touched my heart,
I triumphed in his pain."
--GOLDSMITH.
Having in vain attempted to ascertain the locality of the
following tradition, we suspect that it may have strayed
originally from another county, though it has taken root in our
own.
The only place that could by any possibility answer the
description which marks the catastrophe is the high ridge above
Broughton, in Furness; and even here it would be difficult to
point out any single spot which would exactly correspond in
every particular.
The Lancashire coast, with here and there an exception, is one
low bank or ridge of sand, loosely drifted into hillocks of but
mean height and appearance; only preserving their consistency
by reason of the creeping roots of the bent or sea-mat weed
(_Arundo arenaria_)[16] which bind the loose sands together,
and prevent them from being dispersed over the adjoining
grounds. On the opposite coast fancy might often recognise
those very cliffs to which our story alludes; perpendicular,
bare, and almost inaccessible, with rents and chasms, where
little difficulty would be found in pointing out the exact
features represented in this tradition.
On the sea-coast, where a wild bare promontory stretches out amidst
the waves of the Irish Channel, is a small hamlet or fishing station.
Its site is in the cleft of a deep ravine, through which a small
stream lazily trickles amid sand and sea-slime to the little estuary
formed by the sea at its mouth. Between almost perpendicular cliffs
the village lies like a solitary enclosure, where the inhabitants are
separate and alone--aloof from the busy world--their horizon confined
to a mere segment of vision. The same ever-rolling sea hath swung to
and fro for ages in the same narrow creek, at the sides of which rise
a cluster of huts, dignified with the appellation of village--some of
these ornamented about and upon the roofs with round patches of the
yellow stone-crop and house-leek, that never-failing protection
against lightning and tempest, according to indubitable testimony set
forth by Master Nicholas Culpepper in his _Herbal_.
The strong marine odour, so well known to all lovers of sea-side
enjoyments, may here be sensibly appreciated; for the pent-up effluvia
from the curing of fish, marine algae, and other products of the coast,
abundantly strengthen the reminiscences connected with this solitary
and secluded spot.
It was on a cold, grey morning in October that two individuals were
loitering up a narrow path from the hamlet which led to the high main
road, passing from village to village along the coast; branches from
which, at irregular intervals, penetrated the cliffs to the different
fishing stations along the beach. The road, on rising from the
village, runs along the summit, a considerable height above the sea;
terrific bursts through some rocky cleft reveal the wide ocean rolling
on from the dim horizon to the shore. Here and there may be seen the
white sail, or the hull of some distant bark, gliding on so smooth and
silently as to suggest the idea of volition obeyed without any visible
effort. Rising from the ravine, the road passes diagonally up the
steep. At the period of which we speak, ere it reached the main line
of communication through the country, a reft or chasm in the steep
wall towards the sea--a nearly perpendicular rent--left the mountain
path without protection, save by a slender paling for the space of a
few yards only. Nothing could be more dreary and terrific. Through
this dizzy cleft--the sides bare and abrupt, without ledge or
projection--the walls, like gigantic buttresses, presenting their
inaccessible barriers to the deep--the distant horizon, raised to an
unusual height by the point of sight and position of the spectator,
seemed to mingle so softly and imperceptibly with the sky that it
appeared one wide sea of cloud stretching to the foot of the cliff.
From that fearful summit the billows were but as the waving of a
summer cloud, undulating on the quiet atmosphere. The fishing bark,
with its dun, squat, picturesque sail, looked as though floating in
the sky--a fairy boat poised on the calm ether.
As we before noticed, two persons were loitering up this path. They
paused at the brink of the chasm. It might be for the purpose of
gazing on the scene we have just described; but the lover's gaze was
on his mistress, and the maiden's eye was bent on the ground.
"'Tis even so, Adeline. We must part. And yet the time may come,
when----But thou art chill, Adeline. The words freeze ere they pass my
lips, even as thine own; for I never yet could melt the frost-work
from thy soul. Still silent? Well. I know thy heart is not another's;
and yet thou dost hesitate, and linger, and turn away thy cold grey
eyes when I would fain kindle them from mine. Nay, Adeline; I know
thou lovest me. Ay! draw back so proudly, and offer up thine and thy
true lover's happiness for ever on the altar of thy pride."
"Since thou knowest this heart so well," retorted the haughty maiden,
"methinks it were a bootless wish to wear it on thy sleeve, save for
the purpose of admiring thine own skill and bravery in the
achievement."
"Thou wrongest me, Adeline; 'tis not my wish. Say thou art mine; we
are then safe. No earthly power shall part us. But I warn thee,
maiden, that long years of misery and anguish will be our portion
should we separate while our troth is yet unplighted. This ring," said
he, drawing off his glove, "is indifferently well set. The bauble was
made by a skilful and cunning workman. The pearls have the true orient
tinge, and this opal hath an eye like the hue of the morning,
changeable as--woman's favour. How bright at times!--warm and radiant
with gladness, now dull, cold, hazy, and"----unfeeling, he would have
said, but he leaned on the slender barrier as he spoke, and his eye
wandered away over the dim and distant wave, across which he was about
to depart. Whether he saw it, or his eye was too intently fixed on the
dark and appalling future, we presume not to determine.
"A woman's favour, like thy similes, Mortimer, hath its colour by
reflection. Thou seest but thine own beam in't; the hue and temper of
thy spirit. We have no form nor feeling of our own, forsooth; we but
give back the irradiation we receive."
"Thou canst jest, Adeline. Thy chillness comes upon my spirit like the
keen ice-wind; it freezes while it withers."
The maiden turned aside her head, perhaps to hide a gleam of
tenderness that belied her speech.
"Adeline, dark hours of sorrow are before thee! Think not to escape."
He seized her hand.
"Shouldst thou wed another, a doom is thine--a doom from which even
thought recoils."
He looked steadfastly upon her, but the maiden spoke not; a tear
quivered through her drooping eyelashes, and her lip grew pale.
"But I must away," continued Mortimer. "Yonder bark awaits me," and he
drew her gently towards the brink. "It will part us, perhaps for ever!
No, no, not for ever. Thou wilt wed--it may be--and when I
return--Horror!"
He started back, as from a spectre which his imagination had created.
"That ring--take it. Let it be thy monitor; and should another seek
thy love, look on it; for it shall warn thee. It shall be a silent
witness of thy thoughts--one that will watch over thee in my stead;
for the genii of that ring," said he, playfully, "are my slaves."
But she returned the pledge.
"I cannot. Do not wind the links around me thus, lest they gall my
spirit; lest I feel the fetters, and wish them broken!"
"Then I swear," said Mortimer, vehemently, "no hand but thine shall
wear it!"
He raised his arm, and the next moment the ring would have been
hurled into the gulf, but ere it fell he cast another glance at his
mistress. Her heart was full. The emotion she sought to quell quivered
convulsively on her lip. He seized her hand; but when he looked again
upon the ring it was broken!
By what a strange and mysterious link are the finest and most subtle
feelings connected with external forms and appearances! By what unseen
process are they wrought out and developed; their hidden sources, the
secret avenues of thought and emotion, discovered--called forth by
circumstances the most trivial and unimportant! Adeline turned pale;
and Mortimer himself shuddered as he beheld the omen. But another
train of feelings had taken possession of her bosom; or rather her
thoughts had acquired a new tendency by this apparently casual
circumstance; and true to the bent and disposition of our nature, now
that the slighted good was in danger of being withdrawn, she became
anxious for its possession. She received the token. A slight crack
upon its rim was visible, but this fracture did not prevent its being
retained on the hand.
After this brief development their walk was concluded. They breathed
no vows. Mortimer would not again urge her. A lock of hair only was
exchanged; and shortly the last adieu was on their lips, and the broad
deck of the vessel beneath his feet, whence he saw the tall cliff sink
down into the ocean, and with it his hopes, that seemed to sink for
ever into the same gulf!
Some few years afterwards, on a still evening, about the same time of
the year, a boat was lowered from a distant vessel in the offing.
Three men pulled ashore as the broad full moon rose up, red and dim,
from the mist that hung upon the sea. The roll of the ocean alone
betokened its approach. Its melancholy murmur alone broke the
universal stillness. The lights came out one by one from the village
casements. The cattle were housed, and the curs had crept to the
hearth, save some of the younger sort, who at intervals worried
themselves, fidgeting about, and making a mighty show of activity and
watchfulness.
One of the passengers stepped hastily on shore. He spoke a few words
to the rowers, who threw their oars into the boat, fastening her to
the rocks. Afterwards they betook themselves to a tavern newly
trimmed, where, swinging from a rude pole, hung the "_sign_" of a
ship--for _sign_ it could only be called--painted long ago by some
self-initiated and village-immortalised artist, whose production had
once been the wonder of the whole neighbourhood.
A roaring blaze revealed the whole interior, where pewter cups and
well-scoured trenchers threw their bright glances upon all who wooed
these dangerous allurements at "The Ship."