THE WHITE HORSE CELLAR.
To eat cran, pertick, swan, and pliver,
And everie fisch that swyms in river;
To drink with us the newe fresch wyne,
That grew vpon the River Ryne;
Fresch fragrant Clarets of France,
Of Angiers, and of Orliance,
With comforts of grit daintie.
DUMBAR TO JAMES V.
It was now the autumn of 1688.
The evil genius of James VII., and the influence of his advisers,
were fast hastening him and his House to destruction. His measures
for the re-establishment of the Catholic faith, in all its pristine
power and ancient grandeur, exasperated the whole nation, and the
Episcopalians in the south, and the sourer Presbyterians in the
north, joined in one united voice against him.
Many powerful nobles of both kingdoms were in exile. With these, and
with the intermeddling Prince of Orange, a close correspondence was
maintained by the friends of the intended Revolution. Even the
Scottish and English forces, on whose valour and fidelity the unhappy
King too much relied, were foes to his religion; and certain
obnoxious measures, in his military administration, tended to
alienate from his cause all but the most romantic and devoted of his
subjects.
It was evident that a great crisis was at hand. The King, in the
month of September, sent an express to the Privy Council, requiring
them to place the country on the war establishment. The standing
army was increased, the militia embodied, the garrisons put in a
state of defence, the Highland clans, ever loyal and ever true, were
ordered to assemble in arms, and beacons were erected on Arthur's
Seat and other mountains, to alarm the country. Similar preparations
to repel William of Orange were made by the English government, whose
forces, thirty thousand strong, under the Earl of Feversham, were
concentrated about London. But James's measures in the south ruined
his influence everywhere, and the cheers of the English troops, on
the acquittal of the Bishops being known in the camp at Hounslow,
proved that he had lost their sympathy for ever, and could rely on
their support no more.
The regular forces of Scotland were cantoned in and around the
capital, ready at an hour's notice to march for England, a measure
which was vigorously and wisely opposed in council by Colin, Earl of
Balcarris, the Lord High Treasurer. Malcontents were secretly
flocking to Edinburgh from all quarters; and Master Magnus Prince,
the sycophantic Provost, with his bench of baillies, sent a dutiful
letter to James VII., assuring him "of their most hearty devotion to
his service, and being ready with their lives and fortunes to stand
by his sacred person upon all occasions, and praying for the
continuation of his princely goodness and love towards his ancient
city."
The presbyterians conducted themselves with more than their ordinary
boldness, and in the streets openly chanted Psalms and _Lillibulero
bullen a la_; the Government and its friends were full of anxiety,
and remained on the alert. The whigs spoke boldly, and the cavaliers
with somewhat less confidence, of the great preparations of the Dutch
for the invasion of Great Britain--of the frigates, fireships,
transports, horse, foot, and artillery assembled at Nimguen, and of
the Scottish and English noblesse who in exile crowded beneath the
unfurled banner of the Stadtholder. Thus,
"While great events were on the gale,
And each hour brought a varying tale;"
none were more loyal in drinking His Majesty's health in Hugh Blair's
best Burgundy, and the Hocheim of the White Horse, than Walter Fenton
and his cavalier comrades of the Scots' Musqueteers; none squeezed
the orange more emphatically, and none handled so roughly those
luckless wights whom they found chaunting _Lillibulero_, and none
drained their vast bumpers more earnestly to the undamning and double
damning of the pumpkin-headed and twenty-breeched Dutch.
It was the afternoon of a September day; the last detachment of
Dunbarton's Foot had marched into Edinburgh, from the famous
expedition against the Macdonalds of Keppoch, in attacking whom they
had been co-operating with a battalion of the Guards, and the
horsemen of the celebrated Captain Crichton, whose memoirs were
edited by Dean Swift; and now to enjoy a complete military re-union,
all the cavalier officers of the ancient corps sat down to a banquet
in the great dining hall of the White Horse Cellar.
The long apartment was lighted by several windows that faced the
Calton hill, which towered away to the north and westward, covered
with whin and broom, where the fox, the hare, and the weazel yet made
their lairs unheeded and unhunted. The hall was spacious, elegant,
and hung with arras, and a great painting by Jameson, our Scottish
Vandyke, the pupil of Rubens, hung over the yawning fire-place. It
was a fanciful representation of the fair Mary, on that favourite
white palfrey, which a hundred and fifty years before had given a
name to the hostel, when the range of stabling below it had been
occupied as a mews of the Scottish kings. Beneath this, hung the
battered headpiece and Jedwood axe which Gibbie Runlet had
wielded--and wielded well as the king's rebels knew to their cost--in
the wars of the glorious Montrose.
The sturdy legs of the old oak beauffet appeared to bend under the
load of glittering crystal, shining plate, and various good things
piled upon its shelves, while underneath in columns dark and close,
were ranged in deep array the flasks of good old wine, from the cool
vaults of the White Horse cellar, and covered with the undisturbed
dust and cobwebs of years of long repose.
Clad in their rich military dresses, bright steel, and spotless
scarlet, glittering with jewels and gold lace, the row of cavalier
guests on each side of that long and festive board, presented a very
gay and striking appearance, as the setting sun shone full upon them,
and caused the whole vista of the dinner table to glitter with
sparkling objects, and the curling steam of the smoking banquet.
In a great chair, with high back and stuffed arms, rough with carving
and rich with nails and scarlet leather sat the portly master,
Gilbert Runlet (that host of immortal memory), with a vast red face,
that seemed like the harvest-moon rising at one end of the table;
while the great rotund form spreading out below it, a yard in
diameter, loomed like a mountain, closing the long perspective of the
board.
Gibbie had been for twenty years the most substantial burgess of the
Canongate; and as a stanch and irascible Royalist, had long "ruled
the roast" at the council board of that ancient burgh. The beau
ideal of a jovial host, he laughed and talked, and helped on all
sides incessantly, yet never appeared to be behind any one in
emptying his own plate or tankard, which were replenished and emptied
with wonderful celerity.
But the dinner! A flourish of trumpets announced it; and well it
deserved the compliment of such a preliminary. A huge sirloin, which
balanced a baron of beef, was undergoing a rapid process of
diminution under Gibbie's long carving whinger; six collared pigs,
bristling with cloves, and having flowers stuck in their nostrils,
stood erect on great platters. Around them were hares, turkies,
geese, ducks, and chickens, roasted, stewed, fricasseed, and boiled.
There was a vast silver salt-foot at each end, two grand epergnes of
flowers and peacocks' feathers, two great salads, two hundred little
manchets, venison, hams, salmon, flounders, crabs, and Crail
capons,--all placed pell-mell without order of courses, among tarts,
trifles, confections, pyramids of jelly and plumbdames, puddings and
fruit of every description, disposed in ornamental figures of trees,
birds, &c.
But, far above all this wilderness of viands towered a great edifice,
representing a fortress; the towers were of pie-crust, with ramparts
of wax; the cannon and sentinels were sugar-paste; the bullets were
little bon-bons; the moat was filled with wine, and from the keep
hung a flag with St. Andrew's silver saltire. This erection elicited
great admiration from the guests, by whom it was unanimously named
the Castle of Tangier, beneath the towers of which so many of their
brave comrades had found a soldier's grave.
The feast proceeded in gallant style, amid unrestrained hilarity and
bursts of military merriment. All did justice to the good things
before them; while the servants, or ecuyers trenchant, were kept on
the alert pouring forth Rhenish, Gascony, Muscadel, port and sherry,
and the rich and luscious wine of Frontiniac, as if there had been a
conflagration in the stomach of every guest.
On the right of the host sat the regimental minister, the Reverend
Doctor Jonadab Joram (who by the courtesy of the Scottish service had
the rank of Major), a bluff and jovial personage, whose merry eyes
twinkled on each side of a bottle-nose, and who could stride and
swagger, drink and play with any man--one who winked knowingly at
landladies, kissed their daughters, and, if he chose, could have
out-bullied a Mohock. He was brimful of jocularity, which had cost
him a duel or two in Flanders, and was known to be "up to" a great
many things not very consonant to the dignity of his cloth.
On the left of the host sat the Chevalier Laird of Drumquhasel, a
tall, stark, and sunburned soldier, on whose breast sparkled several
French orders; and near him was the chirurgeon, who was the very
counterpart of the divine, a laughing, bullet-headed, merry-faced
little man, about sixty years of age. Like his clerical brother, he
was in the habit of averring that he had been broiled at Tangier,
half-drowned at Bergen-op-zoom, and wholly frozen in the Zuider Zee;
blown up in Flanders, and trod down in Alsace, for he always charged
in the line-of-battle, and consequently neglected his professional
duties; or, like many sons of the healing god, was wont to introduce
its topics at unseasonable times; and he was then, in the style of a
lecturer of the old College of Physic at the Cowgate Port, employed
in tracing the spinal marrow of a hare, for his own amusement and the
edification of Jerry Smith, a gay fellow, with a curly perriwig and
thick mustache, the same who afterwards entered the English service
and became so famous for his gallantries at Halifax in Yorkshire.
There were present many handsome young sparks, whose first fields had
been Sedgemoor in the south, or Muirdykes in the north; and their
smooth chins and fair faces contrasted well with those war-worn
cavaliers, whose service included the Scottish battles of Dunbar and
Inverkeithing, the sack of Dundee, and the fight at Kerbister, and
whose sparkling stars and crosses attested the good deeds they had
performed under Henri d'Avergne, le Mareschal Turenne, and the great
Condé of glorious memory, especially old Drumquhasel.
When the Duc d'Enghien charged the Mareschal de l'Hôpital so
successfully that the Spanish infantry, till then deemed the finest
in the world, were swept before the victorious French, there was not
a chevalier of St. Louis who distinguished himself more than old John
of Drumquhasel, who with his own hand cut down the famous Count de
Fuentes, for which he was thanked by Monsieur of France at
Versailles, and had a chaplet placed upon his head by Mademoiselle la
Fleur, the reigning favourite of the time.
Douglas was joyous and gay; but Walter was somewhat reserved and
abstracted; he foresaw that this great military reunion would
interfere with his evening visit to the Napiers, and he was bored by
the gaiety of the young, as much as by the prosing of the older
soldiers around him.
"Hector Gavin, harkee," said the divine to a tall officer whose
looped doublet and black corslet announced him Lieutenant of the
Grenadiers, a species of force introduced about ten years
before,--"Master Gibbie, our right honourable host informs me that
there are some excellent pigeons in the casemates of that same castle
of Tangier before you; and if you will so far favour me----"
"With pleasure, Joram. By my faith, I should know something of the
mode of attacking the place! It wants the lower cavalier, with its
thirty brass culverins, that swept the gorge of that avant-fosse.
Ha! I have breached the upper parapet," said Gavin laughing, as he
cut down the pastry.
"Ay, Hector, odsbodikins!" replied the divine. "I saw thee push on
at the head of our pikemen, like a true Scottish cavalier, when the
old Tangier regiment of England were thrown into confusion by the
shower of petards. Demme! Hector, the recollection of that hot work
makes me thirsty as dry sand."
"Is the sack tankard empty, Doctor?" asked Douglas.
"Drained to the lowest peg, laird."
"Tush, Joram; mayest thou be turned into a gaping oyster, as the
play-book saith, and drink nothing but salt water all the days of thy
life! You were talking of a shower of petards, Doctor: I remember
when we marched with Condé into Tranche Compte with displayed
banners, we beleaguered the castle of a certain seigneur, which
resembled one of our Scottish peel-houses; and therein a brave
cavalier of Spain commanded a corps of tall Irish pikemen. For three
days they abode the salvoes of the demi-cannon, which battered their
outer ravelins, and breached the great barbican. I led a hundred of
our Scottish lads and sixteen German reformadoes to the assault, with
pike and pistol bent. By my faith, Doctor, the loons fought like so
many peers of Charlemagne. Each man flung a petard as we advanced.
Crush me! a shower of petards. Pho! my fellows were blown to
ribbons--their very entrails were twisted round the trees and
ramparts; but Condé took the place at push of pike--put all the
Irishry to the sword, and placed in the châtelet a garrison of the
Compté de Bulliones Scottish pikemen, and the good old Regiment de
Picardie."
"Doctor Joram," said Walter, "I have heard much of your famous duel
with a chevalier of that regiment, but never the particulars. About
some fair damoiselle was it not?"
"You were never more mistaken in your life, Master Fenton. We
measured swords in the purest spirit of _esprit du corps_. I will
tell you how it was. We were with the army that invested Doesburg,
where the famous Adjutant Martinet was killed by a cannon-ball within
a pike's length of me. We had long been at feud with that Regiment
de Picardie, anent certain points of precedence and posts of honour,
which was a state of matters not to be borne by us, who represent les
Gardes-Ecossais of the sainted Louis, while the Battalion de Picardie
was but one of the mere _vieux corps_ of Charles the Ninth's time.
The Sieur de Guichet, their captain-lieutenant, and I came to high
words about it, in a certain house ---- of ---- of ----."
"Ay, ay, Doctor, we all know the place," said two or three cavaliers,
amid loud laughter. "Madame Papillotes' little château on the banks
of the Issel: she always accompanied the army. A nice billet for
your reverence truly."
"De Guichet quarrelled with me about precedence and right of
_entrée_, though, as Chaplain of the Scots Royals, in the line of
battle I rode next to Dunbarton himself. 'Tush, monsieur,' said I,
laying hand on my sword, 'remember I am a Scottish cavalier, and
Chaplain to the Guards of Pontius Pilate.' '_Nombril de Beelzebub!_'
said the irreverend rascal, 'I believe you rightly name yourselves
the Guards of Monseigneur Pilate, for had the old _routiers_ of the
Regiment de Picardie kept guard on the Holy Sepulchre, they would not
have slept on their posts as the Scots Musqueteers must have done.'
'This to a clergyman?' I exclaimed. 'Have at thee, d----d runnion!'
and attacking him, sword in hand, I disarmed him at the third pass;
and ever afterwards Messieurs the Regiment de Picardie cocked their
beavers the other way when passing us in the breach or on the
Boulevards."
"'Tis a brave old band," said Gavin of that ilk. "I saw them on the
plains of Nordlingien. You remember how gallantly they repulsed a
charge of the Count de Merci's steel-clad Lancers. We had just
formed square, with Sweyns' feathers in front, to repel their onfall,
when Monsieur de Martinet (whom all the world knows of), Adjutant of
the Regiment du Roi, galloped up, rapier in hand, with an order from
Monseigneur le Duc d'Enghien to form line in battalion with the horse
and dragoons on the wings; but my Lord of Dunbarton was too old a
soldier to hear him amid the roar of such a battle; and luckily a
cannon-ball took Martinet's charger in the crupper, on which he
scrambled away. But only conceive, sirs, to form line in face of a
horse brigade! By my sooth, wild Hielandmen would have known better,
and I marvel that Monseigneur d'Enghien and Monsieur de Martinet so
greatly forgot their boasted _tactiques de guerre_; but, as I said to
my Lord Dunbarton," _et cetera_, and so forth.
Such was the tiresome small talk with which those "hunger and cold
beaten soldiers" (to use a camp phrase of the day) maintained a
cross-fire at table, and it differed very little from what one may
hear in a similarly constituted party of the present day. The
younger members of the company, whose whole experience of war had
been confined to repelling a foray on the Highland frontier, a brawl
in a whig district, or a review on the links of Leith before Sir
Thomas Dalyel, his grace the Lord High Commissioner, and the ladies
of his mimic court, were somewhat more peaceable in the tenor of
their conversation, which went not beyond a duel at St. Anne's Yard
or in Hugh Blairs, the Leith races (where yesterday the long pending
match between Jack Holster's horse and Clermistonlee's mare had ended
in the defeat of the latter), of Reid the mountebank, and the feats
of his famous "tumbling lassie" at the Tennis Court Theatre, where
they had all been the preceding night to behold "The Soldier's
Fortune" by the celebrated Otway, for whom they had a fellow-feeling,
as he had lately been a cornet of dragoons in Flanders. The merits
of the new-fashioned iron hat-piece covered with velvet, which the
English were now substituting for the old helmet, were warmly
discussed. Mistress Annie Laurie, Jean Gordon, Lady Dunbarton, and
other fair belles, new tawny beavers, silver-hilted swords, horses
and wines, and various frivolities were all descanted upon, while the
bright wine flowed and the laughter increased apace.
Dinner was over, and the vast wilderness of viands had undergone a
great and melancholy change; the collared pigs were minus heads and
legs; the great platters of turkeys, geese, and ducks, stewed hares
and fricasseed rabbits, the lordly baron and the knightly sirloin,
and everything else were in the same plight; while the noble Castle
of Tangier had been completely sacked, demolished, and its garrison
of baked and spiced cardinals, capuchins, and fan tails given up to
the conquerors. The servants cleared the polished tables, and one
placed before Gibbie, the host, a great chased silver tankard, the
pride of his heart, for it was the production of George Heriot. It
was mantling with purple port, and Gibbie (whose orb-like visage, by
eating and drinking, was flushed like the setting October sun), laid
his hand upon the cup, and looked round the board with his great
saucer eyes to see that every guest's horn was filled; for the toast
he was about to propose was,
"The health of His Sacred Majesty James VII., with peace at home, and
war and confusion to his enemies abroad."
Gibbie, we say, with a rubicund visage beaming with loyalty and
hospitality, had just upheaved his ponderous bulk for this purpose,
when the rapid and ominous clatter of hoofs in the inn-yard attracted
the attention of all; and the reverend Doctor Joram exclaimed,
"Egad, here comes my Lord Dunbarton and the young Laird of
Holsterlee! Gentlemen, the old game must be afoot--but what can be
in the wind now?"
"A rising among those crop-eared curs in the west, I warrant,"
replied the Laird of Drumquhasel. "Men say that false villain
Clelland, the covenanting colonel, and Dyckvelt the Hollander, have
been in the land of the whigamores, blowing the trumpet of sedition,
and preparing the way for southern invasion and northern rebellion."
The earl hurriedly dismounted, and abstractedly threw the reins of
his horse to Holsterlee his gentleman-in-waiting, who exclaimed,
"'Sdeath, Dunbarton, you forget that a cavalier of the Guard is not
like one of Douglas' Red Troopers or Dunmore's Grey Dragoons."
The earl asked pardon, and laughed as he ascended the flight of steps
that led to the inn-door; while Jack vociferously summoned the
_peddies_ or horse-boys, and tossing to them the reins of the
chargers, jerked his long bilbo under his arm, and sprung up the
steps, three at a time, after the general.
"Place for the most noble lord the Earl of Dunbarton--place for the
general commanding!" exclaimed a servant ushering in the noble
visitor, and all present arose at his entrance. His dark and
handsome features were slightly flushed, and not without a marked
expression of anxiety, while the saucy face of Jack Holster was
extremely animated, and he displayed rather more than usual of his
jovial and reckless swagger.
"Gentlemen," said the earl; "the old banner that waved so often and
ever victoriously in the vanguard of Condé and Turenne is again to be
unfurled before a foe."
"South or west?" asked a dozen of eager voices.
"In the land of our ancient enemies."
"By my soul I rejoice at that," said Douglas. "I have no fancy for
bending our fire on ranks that speak our mother tongue, and wear the
broad blue bonnet."
"Well said, my true Douglas!" exclaimed Drumquhasel. "I knew this
muster of force aimed at the recapture of Berwick. Dags and pistols
there is the hand (and he struck it clenched on the table), that will
pull their d----d red cross from the ramparts when the time comes."
"Ye mistake, gentlemen, and you in particular Chevalier Major; but
know that the time hath come which shall prove who among us are true
cavaliers, and who false-hearted whigs. Wilt credit me, that the
insolent Dutch prince William of Orange has at last put his great
armament in motion, and that a hundred sail of the line, frigates,
fireships, and four hundred transports have unrolled their canvass to
the wind? Herbert leads the van, Evertzen the rear, and William the
centre. He has with him fifteen thousand good soldiers," continued
the earl, consulting a royal dispatch from Whitehall: "some of these
are the hireling dogs of the Scottish Brigade, who are led by Hugh
Mackay, laird of Scoury, and carry a red banner."
"Scoury?" exclaimed Douglas; "how--the old rascal who deserted from
us in Holland."
"The same. Why, my dear fellow, this man is a mere Swiss, and prick
his ears whenever drums beat without caring a rush which side wins if
the rix-dollars are sure. The Prince's Guards and Brandenburgers
under Count Solmes, Knight of the Teutonic Order, and Grand Commander
of the Bailiewick of Utrecht, march with a white standard."
"Bravo! we will know all the rogues by head-mark."
"The Dutch and French Protestant refugees, under Velt Mareschal
Frederick Duc de Schomberg, carry a little blue banner," continued
the Earl, still consulting his dispatch. "Mynheer Goderdt van Baron
de Ginckel, on whom the would-be usurper hath bestowed the Earldom of
Athlone, commands the cavalry; Mynheer Bein Tenk, who expects the
Dukedom of Portland; and Arnold Joost van Keppel, the Earldom of
Albemarle; Massue de Rouvigny, who is to be Earl of Galway; General
le Baron de Sainte Hippolite; d'Auverquerque, Zuylestein, and
Caillemote, with all our banished Lords, Argyle, Shrewsbury,
Macclesfield, Dunblane, and the devil knows how many more runaways
and wild soldiers of fortune, the riddlings of rapine and scum of
European wars, all crowd beneath his banner as to a bridal!"
"They are welcome!" exclaimed Finland, with enthusiasm. "Up,
gallants, all for God and King James!" and drawing his sword he
flourished it aloft, and drained his wine-horn to the bottom. Every
man followed his example, save Gibbie Runlet, who, having no rapier
to draw, contented himself by draining his wine tankard, which he did
without once removing his large saucer eyes from the face of the
Earl, to whose muster-roll of hard-named invaders he listened with
the aspect of one astounded.
"Our dogs of citizens have already caught the rumour, that their
Dutch Saviour is coming with his fireships and Swart Ruyters," said
Holsterlee; "and in anticipation of their great political millennium
are chanting the _Lillibulero_ with might and main; yea, under our
very beards, as we rode down the Canongate. By the horns of Mahoud!
we have tough work before us gentlemen. Fifteen thousand Hollanders
under baton, said you, my lord?"
"Pooh!" said Doctor Joram; "King James's English troops alone are
enough to eat them up."
"Will they be inclined to do so, reverend sir?" replied the earl. "I
fear me greatly."
"Then God help Church and King!" ejaculated the minister, gulping
down a sigh and his sack together.
"Gentlemen," said Dunbarton, looking around him with sparkling eyes,
"the great, the terrible crisis to which our leaders and our
statesmen have so long looked forward, has come at last; and to the
hearts and swords of his faithful soldiers, King James can alone
trust the fortunes of his House. I have received most urgent
dispatches, written by himself, from Whitehall, and all our available
force must, to-morrow, march for England; Hounslow is the rendezvous;
Church and King our _cri de guerre_! The Privy Council meets
secretly in the gallery at Holyrood; they will sit in ten minutes.
Farewell, my good friends and gallant comrades," continued the Earl,
bowing with a heaviness of heart that was apparent to all; "I will
see you at daybreak, when the _générale_ beats. For the palace,
ho! come Hosterlee."
"Away, gallants, to your fair ladies and gay lemans," exclaimed the
latter, with a tragi-comic air; "away, to dance a merry couranto, and
have one last daffin with the belles of the Cap-and-Feather close; a
last horn at Hugh Blair's; a last dish of oysters and a game at
shovelboard in Bess Wynd; a last camisadoe with the students and city
watch, for we march to-morrow, and when the Guards and the Royals go,
well may our ladies rend their silken tresses, and exclaim 'Ichabod,
Ichabod, Auld Reekie, for thy glory hath departed!'"
In a few minutes the jovial party was completely broken up; many of
them had taken leave, hurriedly, on those very missions Mr. Holster
had enumerated; some to bid farewell to mothers, wives, and
sweethearts; some to have a last horn of wine with old familiar
friends; others to prepare for their sudden departure; while those
happy spirits, who had neither preparations to make, nor friends to
leave behind them, clustered round the appalled landlord, and pushed
the wine-cup more briskly than ever.
But Gibbie's spirit and vivacity had evaporated; he looked forward to
blood and blows, trooping and free-billeting, with no small horror,
and on the departure of his military patrons, beheld a gloomy
perspective of fines, persecutions, and annoyance from the whig
enemies of the Government, who would undoubtedly usurp place and
power in absence of that armed force, on the presence of which the
authority of James VII., in Scotland, alone depended.
The moment the earl retired, Walter had thrown himself on horseback,
and galloped away by the base of Saint John's Hill, and skirting the
village of the Pleasance, dashed along the banks of the Burghloch, a
place "then shaded by many venerable oaks," and reached the house of
Bruntisfield just as the sun began to dip behind the wooded summit of
Corstorphine.