Why flames yon far summit—why shoot to the blast
Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast?
’Tis the fire-shower of ruin, all dreadfully driven
From thine eyrie, that beacons the darkness of Heaven.
CAMPBELL.
The circumstances announced in the conclusion of the last chapter will
account for the ready and cheerful reception of the Marquis of A—— and
the Master of Ravenswood in the village of Wolf’s Hope. In fact, Caleb
had no sooner announced the conflagration of the tower than the whole
hamlet were upon foot to hasten to extinguish the flames. And although
that zealous adherent diverted their zeal by intimating the formidable
contents of the subterranean apartments, yet the check only turned
their assiduity into another direction. Never had there been such
slaughtering of capons, and fat geese, and barndoor fowls; never such
boiling of _reested_ hams; never such making of car-cakes and sweet
scones, Selkirk bannocks, cookies, and petticoat-tails—delicacies
little known to the present generation. Never had there been such a
tapping of barrels, and such uncorking of greybeards, in the village of
Wolf’s Hope. All the inferior houses were thrown open for the reception
of the Marquis’s dependants, who came, it was thought, as precursors of
the shower of preferment which hereafter was to leave the rest of
Scotland dry, in order to distil its rich dews on the village of Wolf’s
Hope under Lammermoor. The minister put in his claim to have the guests
of distinction lodged at the manse, having his eye, it was thought,
upon a neighbouring preferment, where the incumbent was sickly; but Mr.
Balderstone destined that honour to the cooper, his wife, and wife’s
mother, who danced for joy at the preferences thus assigned them.
Many a beck and many a bow welcomed these noble guests to as good
entertainment as persons of such rank could set before such visitors;
and the old dame, who had formerly lived in Ravenswood Castle, and
knew, as she said, the ways of the nobility, was in no whit wanting in
arranging matters, as well as circumstances permitted, according to the
etiquette of the times. The cooper’s house was so roomy that each guest
had his separate retiring-room, to which they were ushered with all due
ceremony, while the plentiful supper was in the act of being placed
upon the table.
Ravenswood no sooner found himself alone than, impelled by a thousand
feelings, he left the apartment, the house, and the village, and
hastily retraced his steps to the brow of the hill, which rose betwixt
the village and screened it from the tower, in order to view the final
fall of the house of his fathers. Some idle boys from the hamlet had
taken the same direction out of curiosity, having first witnessed the
arrival of the coach and six and its attendants. As they ran one by one
past the Master, calling to each other to “Come and see the auld tower
blaw up in the lift like the peelings of an ingan,” he could not but
feel himself moved with indignation. “And these are the sons of my
father’s vassals,” he said—“of men bound, both by law and gratitude, to
follow our steps through battle, and fire, and flood; and now the
destruction of their liege lord’s house is but a holiday’s sight to
them.”
These exasperating reflections were partly expressed in the acrimony
with which he exclaimed, on feeling himself pulled by the cloak: “What
do you want, you dog?”
“I am a dog, and an auld dog too,” answered Caleb, for it was he who
had taken the freedom, “and I am like to get a dog’s wages; but it does
not signification a pinch of sneesing, for I am ower auld a dog to
learn new tricks, or to follow a new master.”
As he spoke, Ravenswood attained the ridge of the hill from which
Wolf’s Crag was visible; the flames had entirely sunk down, and, to his
great surprise, there was only a dusky reddening upon the clouds
immediately over the castle, which seemed the reflection of the embers
of the sunken fire.
“The place cannot have blown up,” said the Master; “we must have heard
the report: if a quarter of the gunpowder was there you tell me of, it
would have been heard twenty miles off.”
“It’ve very like it wad,” said Balderstone, composedly.
“Then the fire cannot have reached the vaults?”
“It’s like no,” answered Caleb, with the same impenetrable gravity.
“Hark ye, Caleb,” said his master, “this grows a little too much for my
patience. I must go and examine how matters stand at Wolf’s Crag
myself.”
“Your honour is ganging to gang nae sic gate,” said Caleb, firmly.
“And why not?” said Ravenswood, sharply; “who or what shall prevent
me?”
“Even I mysell,” said Caleb, with the same determination.
“You, Balderstone!” replied the Master; “you are forgetting yourself, I
think.”
“But I think no,” said Balderstone; “for I can just tell ye a’ about
the castle on this knowe-head as weel as if ye were at it. Only dinna
pit yoursell into a kippage, and expose yoursell before the weans, or
before the Marquis, when ye gang down-bye.”
“Speak out, you old fool,” replied his master, “and let me know the
best and the worst at once.”
“Ou, the best and the warst is, just that the tower is standing hail
and feir, as safe and as empty as when ye left it.”
“Indeed! and the fire?” said Ravenswood.
“Not a gleed of fire, then, except the bit kindling peat, and maybe a
spunk in Mysie’s cutty-pipe,” replied Caleb.
“But the flame?” demanded Ravenswood—“the broad blaze which might have
been seen ten miles off—what occasioned that?”
“Hout awa’! it’s an auld saying and a true—
Little’s the light
Will be seen far in a mirk night.
A wheen fern and horse little that I fired in the courtyard, after
sending back the loon of a footman; and, to speak Heaven’s truth, the
next time that ye send or bring ony body here, let them ge gentles
allenarly, without ony fremd servants, like that chield Lockhard, to be
gledging and gleeing about, and looking upon the wrang side of ane’s
housekeeping, to the discredit of the family, and forcing ane to damn
their souls wi’ telling ae lee after another faster than I can count
them: I wad rather set fire to the tower in gude earnest, and burn it
ower my ain head into the bargain, or I see the family dishonoured in
the sort.”
“Upon my word, I am infinitely obliged by the proposal, Caleb,” said
his master, scarce able to restrain his laughter, though rather angry
at the same time. “But the gunpowder—is there such a thing in the
tower? The Marquis seemed to know of it.”
“The pouther, ha! ha! ha!—the Marquis, ha! ha! ha!” replied Caleb,—“if
your honour were to brain me, I behooved to laugh,—the Marquis—the
pouther! Was it there? Ay, it was there. Did he ken o’t? My certie! the
Marquis kenn’d o’t, and it was the best o’ the game; for, when I
couldna pacify your honour wi’ a’ that I could say, I aye threw out a
word mair about the gunpouther, and garr’d the Marquis tak the job in
his ain hand.”
“But you have not answered my question,” said the Master, impatiently;
“how came the powder there, and where is it now?”
“Ou, it came there, an ye maun needs ken,” said Caleb, looking
mysteriously, and whispering, “when there was like to be a wee bit
rising here; and the Marquis, and a’ the great lords of the north, were
a’ in it, and mony a gudely gun and broadsword were ferried ower frae
Dunkirk forbye the pouther. Awfu’ work we had getting them into the
tower under cloud o’ night, for ye maun think it wasna everybody could
be trusted wi’ sic kittle jobs. But if ye will gae hame to your supper,
I will tell you a’ about it as ye gang down.”
“And these wretched boys,” said Ravenswood, “is it your pleasure they
are to sit there all night, to wait for the blowing up of a tower that
is not even on fire?”
“Surely not, if it is your honour’s pleasure that they suld gang hame;
although,” added Caleb, “it wanda do them a grain’s damage: they wad
screigh less the next day, and sleep the sounder at e’en. But just as
your honour likes.”
Stepping accordingly towards the urchins who manned the knolls near
which they stood, Caleb informed them, in an authoritative tone, that
their honours Lord Ravenswood and the Marquis of A—— had given orders
that the tower was not to be blow up till next day at noon. The boys
dispersed upon this comfortable assurance. One or two, however,
followed Caleb for more information, particularly the urchin whom he
had cheated while officiating as turnspit, who screamed, “Mr.
Balderstone!—Mr. Balderstone! then the castle’s gane out like an auld
wife’s spunk?”
“To be sure it is, callant,” said the butler; “do ye think the castle
of as great a lord as Lord Ravenswood wad continue in a bleeze, and him
standing looking on wi’ his ain very een? It’s aye right,” continued
Caleb, shaking off his ragged page, and closing in to his Master, “to
train up weans, as the wise man says, in the way they should go, and,
aboon a’, to teach them respect to their superiors.”
“But all this while, Caleb, you have never told me what became of the
arms and powder,” said Ravenswood.
“Why, as for the arms,” said Caleb, “it was just like the bairn’s
rhyme—
Some gaed east and some gaed west,
And some gaed to the craw’s nest.
And for the pouther, I e’en changed it, as occasion served, with the
skippers o’ Dutch luggers and French vessels, for gin and brandy, and
is served the house mony a year—a gude swap too, between what cheereth
the soul of man and that which hingeth it clean out of his body;
forbye, I keepit a wheen pounds of it for yoursell when ye wanted to
take the pleasure o’ shooting: whiles, in these latter days, I wad
hardly hae kenn’d else whar to get pouther for your pleasure. And now
that your anger is ower, sir, wasna that weel managed o’ me, and arena
ye far better sorted doun yonder than ye could hae been in your ain
auld ruins up-bye yonder, as the case stands wi’ us now? the mair’s the
pity!”
“I believe you may be right, Caleb; but, before burning down my castle,
either in jest or in earnest,” said Ravenswood, “I think I had a right
to be in the secret.”
“Fie for shame, your honour!” replied Caleb; “it fits an auld carle
like me weel eneugh to tell lees for the credit of the family, but it
wanda beseem the like o’ your honour’s sell; besides, young folk are no
judicious: they cannot make the maist of a bit figment. Now this
fire—for a fire it sall be, if I suld burn the auld stable to make it
mair feasible—this fire, besides that it will be an excuse for asking
ony thing we want through the country, or doun at the haven—this fire
will settle mony things on an honourable footing for the family’s
credit, that cost me telling twenty daily lees to a wheen idle chaps
and queans, and, what’s waur, without gaining credence.”
“That was hard indeed, Caleb; but I do not see how this fire should
help your veracity or your credit.”
“There it is now?” said Caleb; “wasna I saying that young folk had a
green judgment? How suld it help me, quotha? It will be a creditable
apology for the honour of the family for this score of years to come,
if it is weel guided. ‘Where’s the family pictures?’ says ae meddling
body. ‘The great fire at Wolf’s Crag,’ answers I. ‘Where’s the family
plate?’ says another. ‘The great fire,’ says I; ‘wha was to think of
plate, when life and limb were in danger?’ ‘Where’s the wardrobe and
the linens?—where’s the tapestries and the decorements?—beds of state,
twilts, pands and testors, napery and broidered wark?’ ‘The fire—the
fire—the fire.’ Guide the fire weel, and it will serve ye for a’ that
ye suld have and have not; and, in some sort, a gude excuse is better
than the things themselves; for they maun crack and wear out, and be
consumed by time, whereas a gude offcome, prudently and creditably
handled, may serve a nobleman and his family, Lord kens how lang!”
Ravenswood was too well acquainted with his butler’s pertinacity and
self-opinion to dispute the point with him any farther. Leaving Caleb,
therefore, to the enjoyment of his own successful ingenuity, he
returned to the hamlet, where he found the Marquis and the good women
of the mansion under some anxiety—the former on account of his absence,
the others for the discredit their cookery might sustain by the delay
of the supper. All were now at ease, and heard with pleasure that the
fire at the castle had burned out of itself without reaching the
vaults, which was the only information that Ravenswood thought it
proper to give in public concerning the event of his butler’s
strategem.
They sat down to an excellent supper. No invitation could prevail on
Mr. and Mrs. Girder, even in their own house, to sit down at table with
guests of such high quality. They remained standing in the apartment,
and acted the part of respectful and careful attendants on the company.
Such were the manners of the time. The elder dame, confident through
her age and connexion with the Ravenswood family, was less scrupulously
ceremonious. She played a mixed part betwixt that of the hostess of an
inn and the mistress of a private house, who receives guests above her
own degree. She recommended, and even pressed, what she thought best,
and was herself easily entreated to take a moderate share of the good
cheer, in order to encourage her guests by her own example. Often she
interrupted herself, to express her regret that “my lord did not eat;
that the Master was pyking a bare bane; that, to be sure, there was
naething there fit to set before their honours; that Lord Allan, rest
his saul, used to like a pouthered guse, and said it was Latin for a
tass o’ brandy; that the brandy came frae France direct; for, for a’
the English laws and gaugers, the Wolf’s Hope brigs handa forgotten the
gate to Dunkirk.”
Here the cooper admonished his mother-in-law with his elbow, which
procured him the following special notice in the progress of her
speech:
“Ye needna be dunshin that gate, John,” continued the old lady;
“naebody says that _ye_ ken whar the brandy comes frae; and it wanda be
fitting ye should, and you the Queen’s cooper; and what signifies’t,”
continued she, addressing Lord Ravenswood, “to king, queen, or kaiser
whar an auld wife like me buys her pickle sneeshin, or her drap
brandy-wine, to haud her heart up?”
Having thus extricated herself from her supposed false step, Dame
Loup-the-Dyke proceeded, during the rest of the evening, to supply,
with great animation, and very little assistance from her guests, the
funds necessary for the support of the conversation, until, declining
any further circulation of their glass, her guests requested her
permission to retire to their apartments.
The Marquis occupied the chamber of dais, which, in every house above
the rank of a mere cottage, was kept sacred for such high occasions as
the present. The modern finishing with plaster was then unknown, and
tapestry was confined to the houses of the nobility and superior
gentry. The cooper, therefore, who was a man of some vanity, as well as
some wealth, had imitated the fashion observed by the inferior
landholders and clergy, who usually ornamented their state apartments
with hangings of a sort of stamped leather, manufactured in the
Netherlands, garnished with trees and animals executed in copper foil,
and with many a pithy sentence of morality, which, although couched in
Low Dutch, were perhaps as much attended to in practice as if written
in broad Scotch. The whole had somewhat of a gloomy aspect; but the
fire, composed of old pitch-barrel staves, blazed merrily up the
chimney; the bed was decorated with linen of most fresh and dazzling
whiteness, which had never before been used, and might, perhaps, have
never been used at all, but for this high occasion. On the toilette
beside, stood an old-fashioned mirror, in a fillagree frame, part of
the dispersed finery of the neighbouring castle. It was flanked by a
long-necked bottle of Florence wine, by which stood a glass nearly as
tall, resembling in shape that which Teniers usually places in the
hands of his own portrait, when he paints himself as mingling in the
revels of a country village. To counterbalance those foreign sentinels,
there mounted guard on the other side of the mirror two stout warders
of Scottish lineage; a jug, namely, of double ale, which held a Scotch
pint, and a quaigh, or bicker, of ivory and ebony, hooped with silver,
the work of John Girder’s own hands, and the pride of his heart.
Besides these preparations against thirst, there was a goodly
diet-loaf, or sweet cake; so that, with such auxiliaries, the apartment
seemed victualled against a siege of two or three days.
It only remains to say, that the Marquis’s valet was in attendance,
displaying his master’s brocaded nightgown, and richly embroidered
velvet cap, lined and faced with Brussels lace, upon a huge leathern
easy-chair, wheeled round so as to have the full advantage of the
comfortable fire which we have already mentioned. We therefore commit
that eminent person to his night’s repose, trusting he profited by the
ample preparations made for his accommodation—preparations which we
have mentioned in detail, as illustrative of ancient Scottish manners.
It is not necessary we should be equally minute in describing the
sleeping apartment of the Master of Ravenswood, which was that usually
occupied by the goodman and goodwife themselves. It was comfortably
hung with a sort of warm-coloured worsted, manufactured in Scotland,
approaching in texture to what is now called shalloon. A staring
picture of John [Gibbie] Girder himself ornamented this dormitory,
painted by a starving Frenchman, who had, God knows how or why,
strolled over from Flushing or Dunkirk to Wolf’s Hope in a smuggling
dogger. The features were, indeed, those of the stubborn, opinionative,
yet sensible artisan, but Monsieur had contrived to throw a French
grace into the look and manner, so utterly inconsistent with the dogged
gravity of the original, that it was impossible to look at it without
laughing. John and his family, however, piqued themselves not a little
upon this picture, and were proportionably censured by the
neighbourhood, who pronounced that the cooper, in sitting for the same,
and yet more in presuming to hang it up in his bedchamber, had exceeded
his privilege as the richest man of the village; at once stept beyond
the bounds of his own rank, and encroached upon those of the superior
orders; and, in fine, had been guilty of a very overweening act of
vanity and presumption. Respect for the memory of my deceased friend,
Mr. Richard Tinto, has obliged me to treat this matter at some length;
but I spare the reader his prolix though curious observations, as well
upon the character of the French school as upon the state of painting
in Scotland at the beginning of the 18th century.
The other preparations of the Master’s sleeping apartment were similar
to those in the chamber of dais.
At the usual early hour of that period, the Marquis of A—— and his
kinsman prepared to resume their journey. This could not be done
without an ample breakfast, in which cold meat and hot meat, and
oatmeal flummery, wine and spirits, and milk varied by every possible
mode of preparation, evinced the same desire to do honour to their
guests which had been shown by the hospitable owners of the mansion
upon the evening before. All the bustle of preparation for departure
now resounded through Wolf’s Hope. There was paying of bills and
shaking of hands, and saddling of horses, and harnessing of carriages,
and distributing of drink-money. The Marquis left a broad piece for the
gratification of John Girder’s household, which he, the said John, was
for some time disposed to convert to his own use; Dingwall, the writer,
assuring him he was justified in so doing, seeing he was the disburser
of those expenses which were the occasion of the gratification. But,
notwithstanding this legal authority, John could not find in his heart
to dim the splendour of his late hospitality by picketing anything in
the nature of a gratuity. He only assured his menials he would consider
them as a damned ungrateful pack if they bought a gill of brandy
elsewhere than out of his own stores; and as the drink-money was likely
to go to its legitimate use, he comforted himself that, in this manner,
the Marquis’s donative would, without any impeachment of credit and
character, come ultimately into his own exclusive possession.
While arrangements were making for departure, Ravenswood made blythe
the heart of his ancient butler by informing him, cautiously however
(for he knew Caleb’s warmth of imagination), of the probable change
which was about to take place in his fortunes. He deposited with
Balderstone, at the same time, the greater part of his slender funds,
with an assurance, which he was obliged to reiterate more than once,
that he himself had sufficient supplies in certain prospect. He
therefore enjoined Caleb, as he valued his favour, to desist from all
farther maneouvres against the inhabitants of Wolf’s Hope, their
cellars, poultry-yards, and substance whatsoever. In this prohibition,
the old domestic acquiesced more readily than his master expected.
“It was doubtless,” he said, “a shame, a discredit, and a sin to harry
the puir creatures, when the family were in circumstances to live
honourably on their ain means; and there might be wisdom,” he added,
“in giving them a while’s breathing-time at any rate, that they might
be the more readily brought forward upon his honour’s future
occasions.”
This matter being settled, and having taken an affectionate farewell of
his old domestic, the Master rejoined his noble relative, who was now
ready to enter his carriage. The two landladies, old and young, having
received in all kindly greeting a kiss from each of their noble guests,
stood simpering at the door of their house, as the coach and six,
followed by its train of clattering horsemen, thundered out of the
village. John Girder also stood upon his threshold, now looking at his
honoured right hand, which had been so lately shaken by a marquis and a
lord, and now giving a glance into the interior of his mansion, which
manifested all the disarray of the late revel, as if balancing the
distinction which he had attained with the expenses of the
entertainment.
At length he opened his oracular jaws. “Let every man and woman here
set about their ain business, as if there was nae sic thing as marquis
or master, duke or drake, laird or lord, in this world. Let the house
be redd up, the broken meat set bye, and if there is ony thing totally
uneatable, let it be gien to the puir folk; and, gude mother and wife,
I hae just ae thing to entreat ye, that ye will never speak to me a
single word, good or bad, anent a’ this nonsense wark, but keep a’ your
cracks about it to yoursells and your kimmers, for my head is weel-nigh
dung donnart wi’ it already.”
As John’s authority was tolerably absolute, all departed to their usual
occupations, leaving him to build castles in the air, if he had a mind,
upon the court favour which he had acquired by the expenditure of his
worldly substance.