The little town of Anstruther stands on the side of the Firth,
stretching its lines of grey red-roofed houses closely along the margin
of the water. Sailing past its little quiet home-like harbour, you see
one or two red sloops peacefully lying at anchor beside the pier. These
sloops are always there. If one comes and another goes, the passing
spectator knows it not. On that bright clear water, tinged with every
tint of the rocky bed below—which, in this glistening autumn day, with
only wind enough to ruffle it faintly now and then, looks like some
beautiful jasper curiously veined and polished, with streaks of salt
sea-green, and sober brown, and brilliant blue, distinct and pure below
the sun—these little vessels lie continually, as much a part of the
scene as that grey pier itself, or the houses yonder of the twin towns.
Twin towns there must be, as you learn from those two churches which
elevate their little spires above the congregated roofs. The spires
themselves look as if, up to a certain stage of their progress, they had
contemplated being towers, but, changing their mind when the square
erection had attained the form of a box, suddenly inclined their sides
towards each other, and became abrupt little steeples, whispering to you
recollections of the Revolution Settlement, and the prosaic days of
William and Mary. In one of them—or rather in its predecessor—the gentle
James Melvill once preached the Gospel he loved so well; and peacefully
for two hundred years have they looked out over the Firth, to hail the
boats coming and going to the sea-harvest; peacefully through their
small windows the light has fallen on little children, having the name
named over them which is above all names; and now with a homely
reverence they watch their dead.
A row of houses, straggling here and there into corners, turn their
faces to the harbour. This is called the Shore. And when you follow the
line of rugged pavement nearly to its end, you come upon boats, in every
stage of progress, being mended—here with a great patch in the
side—there resplendent in a new coat of pitch, which now is drying in
the sun. The boats are well enough, and so are the glistering spoils of
the “herring drave;” but quite otherwise is the odour of dried and cured
fish which salutes you in modern Anstruther. Let us say no evil of it—it
is villanous, but it is the life of the town.
Straggling streets and narrow wynds climb a little brae from the shore.
Thrifty are the townsfolk, whose to-morrow, for generations, is but a
counterpart of yesterday. Nevertheless, there have been great people
here—Maggie Lauder, Professor Tennant, Dr Chalmers. The world has heard
of the quiet burghs of East and West Anster.
A mile to the westward, on the same sea-margin, lies Pittenweem, another
sister of the family. Turn along the high-road there, though you must
very soon retrace your steps. Here is this full magnificent Firth,
coming softly in with a friendly ripple, over these low, dark, jutting
rocks. Were you out in a boat yonder, you would perceive how the folds
of its great garment (for in this calm you cannot call them waves) were
marked and shaded. But here that shining vestment of sea-water has one
wonderful prevailing tint of blue; and between it and the sky, lingers
yonder the full snowy sails of a passing ship;—here some red specks of
fishing-boats straying down towards the mouth of the Firth, beyond yon
high rock—home of sea-mews—the lighthouse Isle of May. Far over, close
upon the opposite shore, lies a mass of something grey and shapeless,
resting like a great shell upon the water—that is the Bass; and behind
it there is a shadow on the coast, which you can dimly see, but cannot
define—that is Tantallon, the stronghold of the stout Douglases; and
westward rises the abrupt cone of North Berwick Law, with a great calm
bay stretching in from its feet, and a fair green country retreats
beyond, from the water-side to the horizon line.
Turn now to the other hand, cross the high-road, and take this footpath
through the fields. Gentle Kellie Law yonder stands quietly under the
sunshine, watching his peaceful dominions. Yellow stubble-fields
stretch, bare and dry, over these slopes; for no late acre now yields a
handful of ears to be gleaned or garnered. But in other fields the
harvest work goes on. Here is one full of work-people—quieter than the
wheat harvest, not less cheery—out of the rich dark fragrant soil
gathering the ripe potato, then in a fresh youthful stage of its
history, full of health and vigour; and ploughs are pacing through other
fields; and on this fresh breeze, slightly chilled with coming winter,
although brightened still by a fervent autumnal sun, there comes to you
at every corner the odour of the fertile fruitful earth.
Follow this burn;—it is the same important stream which forms the
boundary between Anstruther Easter and Wester; and when it has led you a
circuit through some half-dozen fields, you come upon a little cluster
of buildings gathered on its side. Already, before you reach them, that
rustling sound tells you of the mill; and now you have only to cross the
wooden bridge, (it is but two planks, though the water foams under it,)
and you have reached the miller’s door.
That little humble cot-house, standing respectfully apart, with the
miller’s idle cart immediately in front of it, is the dwelling-place of
Robert Moulter, the miller’s man; but the miller’s own habitation is
more ambitious. In the strip of garden before the door there are some
rose-bushes, some “apple-ringie,” and long plumes of gardener’s garters;
and there is a pointed window in the roof, bearing witness that this is
a two-storied house of superior accommodation: the thatch itself is
fresh and new—very different from that mossy dilapidated one of the
cottar’s house; and above the porch flourishes a superb “fouat.” The
door, as usual, is hospitably open, and you see that within all are
prepared for going abroad; for there is a penny wedding in the town,
which already has roused all Anster.
Who is this, standing by the window, cloaked and hooded, young, but a
matron, and with that beautiful happy light upon her face? Under her
hood, young as she is, appears the white edge of lace, which proves her
to have assumed already, over the soft brown shining hair which crosses
her forehead, the close cap of the wife; but nothing remains of the old
shy sad look, to tell you that this is Isabell Stewart. Nor is it. Mrs
Stewart there, in her crimson plaid and velvet hood, who is at present
delivering a lecture on household economics, to which her daughter
listens with a happy smile, would be the first to set you right if you
spoke that old name. Not Isabell Stewart—Leddy Kilbrachmont!—a landed
woman, head of a plentiful household, and the crown and honour of the
thrifty mother, whose training has fitted her for such a lofty destiny,
whose counsels help her to fill it so well.
Janet, equipped like the rest, goes about the apartment, busily setting
everything “out of the road.” The room is very much like the family room
in Kellie Mill: domestic architecture of this homely class is not
capable of much variety; and hastily Janet thrusts the same pretty wheel
into a corner, and her mother locks the glistening doors of the oak
aumrie. Without stands Philip Landale, speaking of his crops to the
miller; and a good-looking young sailor, _fiancée_ of the coquettish
Janet, lingers at the door, waiting for her.
But there is another person in the background, draping the black lace
which adorns her new cloak gracefully over her arm, throwing back her
shoulders with a slightly ostentatious, disdainful movement, and holding
up her head like Lady Anne. Ah, Katie! simple among the great people,
but very anxious to look like a grand lady among the small! Very willing
are you in your heart to have the unsophisticated fun of this penny
wedding to which you are bound, but with a dignified reluctance are you
preparing to go; and though Isabell smiles, and Janet pretends to laugh,
Janet’s betrothed is awed, and thinks there is something very
magnificent about Lady Anne Erskine’s friend. They make quite a
procession as they cross the burn, and wind along the pathway towards
the town;—Janet and her companion hurrying on first; young Kilbrachmont
following, very proud of the wife who holds his arm, and looking with
smiling admiration on the little pretty sister at his other hand; while
the miller and his wife bring up the rear.
“Weel, I wouldna be a boaster,” said Mrs Stewart; “it would ill set us,
wi’ sae muckle reason as we have to be thankful. But just look at that
bairn. It’s my fear she’ll be getting a man o’ anither rank than ours,
the little cuttie! I wouldna say but she looks down on Kilbrachmont his
ain very sel.”
“She’s no blate to do onything o’ the kind,” said the miller.
“And how’s the like o’ you to ken?” retorted his wife. “It’s my ain
blame, nae doubt, for speaking to ye. Ye’re a’ very weel with your
happer and your meal, John Stewart; but what should you ken about young
womenfolk?”
“Weel, weel, sae be it, Isabell,” said John. “It’s a mercy ye think ye
understand yoursels, for to simple folk ye’re faddomless, like the auld
enemy. I pretend to nae discernment amang ye.”
“There winna be ane like her in the haill Town House,” said Mrs Stewart
to herself; “no Isabell even, let alane Janet; and the bit pridefu’
look—the little cuttie!—as if _she_ was ony better than her neighbours.”
The Town House of West Anster is a low-roofed, small-windowed room,
looking out to the churchyard on one side, and to a very quiet street on
the other; for West Anster is a suburban and rural place, in comparison
with its more active brother on the other side of the burn, by whom it
is correspondingly despised. Climbing up a narrow staircase, the party
entered the room, in which at present there was very little space for
locomotion, as two long tables, flanked by a double row of forms, and
spread for a dinner, at which it was evident the article guest would be
a most plentiful one, occupied almost the whole of the apartment. The
company had just begun to assemble; and Katie, now daintily
condescending to accept her brother-in-law’s arm, returned with him to
the foot of the stair, there to await the return of the marriage
procession from the manse, at which just now the ceremony was being
performed.
The street is overshadowed by great trees—which, leaning over the
churchyard wall on one side, and surrounding the manse, which is only a
few yards further down, on the other—darken the little street, and let
in the sunshine picturesquely, in bars and streaks, through the thinning
yellow foliage. There is a sound of approaching music; a brisk fiddle,
performing “Fy let us a’ to the bridal,” in its most animated style; and
gradually the procession becomes visible, ascending from the dark gates
of the manse. The bridegroom is an Anster fisherman. They have all the
breath of salt water about them, these blue-jacketed sturdy fellows who
form his retinue, with their white wedding favours. And creditable to
the mother town are those manly sons of hers, trained to danger from the
cradle. The bride is the daughter of a Kilbrachmont cottar—was a servant
in Kilbrachmont’s house; and it is the kindly connection between the
employer and the employed which brings the whole family of Landales and
Stewarts to the penny wedding. She is pretty and young, this bride; and
the sun glances in her hair, as she droops her uncovered head, and fixes
her shy eyes on the ground. A long train of attendant maidens follow
her; and nothing but the natural tresses, snooded with silken ribbons,
adorn the young heads over which these bright lines of sunshine glisten
as the procession passes on.
With her little cloak hanging back upon her shoulders, and her small
head elevated, looking down, or rather looking up, (for this humble
bride is undeniably taller than little Katie Stewart,) and smiling a
smile which she intends to be patronising, but which by no means
succeeds in being so, Katie stands back to let the bride pass; and the
bride does pass, drooping her blushing face lower and lower, as her
master wishes her joy, and shakes her bashful reluctant hand. But the
bridesmaid, a simple fisherman’s daughter, struck with admiration of the
little magnificent Katie, abruptly halts before her, and whispers to the
young fisherman who escorts her, that Kilbrachmont and the little belle
must enter first. Katie is pleased: the girl’s admiration strikes her
more than the gaping glances of ever so many rustic wooers; and with
such a little bow as Lady Anne might have given, and a rapid flush
mounting to her forehead, in spite of all her pretended self-possession,
she stepped into the procession, and entered the room after the bride.
Who is this so busy and popular among the youthful company already
assembled? You can see him from the door, though he is at the further
end of the room, overtopping all his neighbours like a youthful Saul.
And handsomely the sailor’s jacket sits on his active, well-formed
figure; and he stoops slightly, as though he had some fear of this low
dingy roof. He has a fine face too, browned with warm suns, and gales;
for William Morison has sailed in the Mediterranean, and is to be mate,
this next voyage, of the gay Levant schooner, which now lies loading in
Leith harbour. Willie Morison! Only the brother of Janet’s betrothed,
little Katie; so you are prepared to be good to him, and to patronise
your future brother-in-law.
His attention was fully occupied just now. But suddenly his popularity
fails in that corner, and gibes take the place of approbation. What ails
him? What has happened to him? But he does not answer; he only changes
his place, creeping gradually nearer, nearer, looking—alas, for human
presumption!—at you, little Katie Stewart—magnificent, dignified you!
It is a somewhat rude, plentiful dinner; and there is a perfect crowd of
guests. William Wood, the Elie joiner, in the dark corner yonder, counts
the heads with an inward chuckle, and congratulates himself that, when
all these have paid their half-crowns, he shall carry a heavy pocketful
home with him, in payment of the homely furniture he has made; and the
young couple have the price of their plenishing cleared at once. But the
scene is rather a confused noisy scene, till the dinner is over.
Now clear away these long encumbering tables, and tune your doleful
fiddles quickly, ye musical men, that the dancers may not wait. Katie
tries to think of the stately minuets which she saw and danced in
Edinburgh; but it will not do: it is impossible to resist the magic of
those inspiriting reels; and now Willie Morison is bending his high head
down to her, and asking her to dance.
Surely—yes—she will dance with him—kindly and condescendingly, as with a
connection. No fear palpitates at little Katie’s heart—not a single
throb of that tremor with which she saw Sir Alexander approach the
window-seat in Lady Colville’s drawing-room; and shy and quiet looks
Willie Morison, as she draws on that graceful lace glove of hers, and
gives him her hand.
Strangely his great fingers close over it, and Katie, looking up with a
little wonder, catches just his retreating, shrinking eye. It makes her
curious, and she begins to watch—begins to notice how he looks at her
stealthily, and does not meet her eye with frankness as other people do.
Katie draws herself up, and again becomes haughty, but again it will not
do. Kindly looks meet her on all sides, friendly admiration,
approbation, praise; and the mother watching her proudly yonder, and
those lingering shy looks at her side. She plays with her glove in the
intervals of the dance—draws it up on her white arm, and pulls it down;
but it is impossible to fold the wings of her heart and keep it still,
and it begins to flutter with vague terror, let her do what she will to
calm its beating down.