A woman wails for justice at the gate,
A widow’d woman, wan and desolate.
Bertha.
The council room of Perth presented a singular spectacle. In a gloomy
apartment, ill and inconveniently lighted by two windows of different
form and of unequal size, were assembled, around a large oaken table,
a group of men, of whom those who occupied the higher seats were
merchants, that is, guild brethren, or shopkeepers, arrayed in decent
dresses becoming their station, but most of them bearing, like, the
Regent York, “signs of war around their aged necks”--gorgets, namely,
and baldricks, which sustained their weapons. The lower places around
the table were occupied by mechanics and artisans, the presidents, or
deacons, as they were termed, of the working classes, in their ordinary
clothes, somewhat better arranged than usual. These, too, wore pieces
of armour of various descriptions. Some had the blackjack, or doublets
covered with small plates of iron of a lozenge shape, which, secured
through the upper angle, hung in rows above each [other], and which,
swaying with the motion of the wearer’s person, formed a secure defence
to the body. Others had buff coats, which, as already mentioned, could
resist the blow of a sword, and even a lance’s point, unless propelled
with great force. At the bottom of the table, surrounded as it was
with this varied assembly, sat Sir Louis Lundin; no military man, but
a priest and parson of St. John’s, arrayed in his canonical dress, and
having his pen and ink before him. He was town clerk of the burgh,
and, like all the priests of the period (who were called from that
circumstance the Pope’s knights), received the honourable title of
Dominus, contracted into Dom, or Dan, or translated into Sir, the title
of reverence due to the secular chivalry.
On an elevated seat at the head of the council board was placed Sir
Patrick Charteris, in complete armour brightly burnished--a singular
contrast to the motley mixture of warlike and peaceful attire exhibited
by the burghers, who were only called to arms occasionally. The bearing
of the provost, while it completely admitted the intimate connexion
which mutual interests had created betwixt himself, the burgh, and the
magistracy, was at the same time calculated to assert the superiority
which, in virtue of gentle blood and chivalrous rank, the opinions of
the age assigned to him over the members of the assembly in which he
presided. Two squires stood behind him, one of them holding the knight’s
pennon, and another his shield, bearing his armorial distinctions, being
a hand holding a dagger, or short sword, with the proud motto, “This is
my charter.” A handsome page displayed the long sword of his master, and
another bore his lance; all which chivalrous emblems and appurtenances
were the more scrupulously exhibited, that the dignitary to whom they
belonged was engaged in discharging the office of a burgh magistrate.
In his own person the Knight of Kinfauns appeared to affect something
of state and stiffness which did not naturally pertain to his frank and
jovial character.
“So you are come at length, Henry Smith and Simon Glover,” said the
provost. “Know that you have kept us waiting for your attendance. Should
it so chance again while we occupy this place, we will lay such a
fine on you as you will have small pleasure in paying. Enough--make
no excuses. They are not asked now, and another time they will not
be admitted. Know, sirs, that our reverend clerk hath taken down in
writing, and at full length, what I will tell you in brief, that you may
see what is to be required of you, Henry Smith, in particular. Our
late fellow citizen, Oliver Proudfute, hath been found dead in the High
Street, close by the entrance into the wynd. It seemeth he was slain by
a heavy blow with a short axe, dealt from behind and at unawares;
and the act by which he fell can only be termed a deed of foul and
forethought murder. So much for the crime. The criminal can only be
indicated by circumstances. It is recorded in the protocol of the
Reverend Sir Louis Lundin, that divers well reported witnesses saw our
deceased citizen, Oliver Proudfute, till a late period accompanying the
entry of the morrice dancers, of whom he was one, as far as the house of
Simon Glover, in Curfew Street, where they again played their pageant.
It is also manifested that at this place he separated from the rest
of the band, after some discourse with Simon Glover, and made an
appointment to meet with the others of his company at the sign of the
Griffin, there to conclude the holiday. Now, Simon, I demand of you
whether this be truly stated, so far as you know? and further, what was
the purport of the defunct Oliver Proudfute’s discourse with you?”
“My Lord Provost and very worshipful Sir Patrick,” answered Simon
Glover, “you and this honourable council shall know that, touching
certain reports which had been made of the conduct of Henry Smith, some
quarrel had arisen between myself and another of my family and the said
Smith here present. Now, this our poor fellow citizen, Oliver Proudfute,
having been active in spreading these reports, as indeed his element lay
in such gossipred, some words passed betwixt him and me on the subject;
and, as I think, he left me with the purpose of visiting Henry Smith,
for he broke off from the morrice dancers, promising, as it seems, to
meet them, as your honour has said, at the sign of the Griffin, in order
to conclude the evening. But what he actually did, I know not, as I
never again saw him in life.”
“It is enough,” said Sir Patrick, “and agrees with all that we have
heard. Now, worthy sirs, we next find our poor fellow citizen environed
by a set of revellers and maskers who had assembled in the High Street,
by whom he was shamefully ill treated, being compelled to kneel down
in the street, and there to quaff huge quantities of liquor against
his inclination, until at length he escaped from them by flight.
This violence was accomplished with drawn swords, loud shouts, and
imprecations, so as to attract the attention of several persons, who,
alarmed by the tumult, looked out from their windows, as well as of one
or two passengers, who, keeping aloof from the light of the torches,
lest they also had been maltreated, beheld the usage which our fellow
citizen received in the High Street of the burgh. And although these
revellers were disguised, and used vizards, yet their disguises were
well known, being a set of quaint masking habits prepared some weeks
ago by command of Sir John Ramorny, Master of the Horse to his Royal
Highness the Duke of Rothsay, Prince Royal of Scotland.”
A low groan went through the assembly.
“Yes, so it is, brave burghers,” continued Sir Patrick; “our inquiries
have led us into conclusions both melancholy and terrible. But as no one
can regret the point at which they seem likely to arrive more than I do,
so no man living can dread its consequences less. It is even so, various
artisans employed upon the articles have described the dresses prepared
for Sir John Ramorny’s mask as being exactly similar to those of the
men by whom Oliver Proudfute was observed to be maltreated. And one
mechanic, being Wingfield the feather dresser, who saw the revellers
when they had our fellow citizen within their hands, remarked that they
wore the cinctures and coronals of painted feathers which he himself had
made by the order of the Prince’s master of horse.
“After the moment of his escape from these revellers, we lose all trace
of Oliver’ but we can prove that the maskers went to Sir John Ramorny’s,
where they were admitted, after some show of delay. It is rumoured that
thou, Henry Smith, sawest our unhappy fellow citizen after he had been
in the hands of these revellers. What is the truth of the matter?”
“He came to my house in the wynd,” said Henry, “about half an hour
before midnight; and I admitted him, something unwillingly, as he had
been keeping carnival while I remained at home; and ‘There is ill talk,’
says the proverb, ‘betwixt a full man and a fasting.’”
“And in which plight seemed he when thou didst admit him?” said the
provost.
“He seemed,” answered the smith, “out of breath, and talked repeatedly
of having been endangered by revellers. I paid but small regard, for he
was ever a timorous, chicken spirited, though well meaning, man, and
I held that he was speaking more from fancy than reality. But I shall
always account it for foul offence in myself that I did not give him my
company, which he requested; and if I live, I will found masses for his
soul, in expiation of my guilt.”
“Did he describe those from whom he received the injury?” said the
provost.
“Revellers in masking habits,” replied Henry.
“And did he intimate his fear of having to do with them on his return?”
again demanded Sir Patrick.
“He alluded particularly to his being waylaid, which I treated as
visionary, having been able to see no one in the lane.”
“Had he then no help from thee of any kind whatsoever?” said the
provost.
“Yes, worshipful,” replied the smith; “he exchanged his morrice dress
for my head piece, buff coat, and target, which I hear were found upon
his body; and I have at home his morrice cap and bells, with the jerkin
and other things pertaining. He was to return my garb of fence, and get
back his own masking suit this day, had the saints so permitted.”
“You saw him not then afterwards?”
“Never, my lord.”
“One word more,” said the provost. “Have you any reason to think that
the blow which slew Oliver Proudfute was meant for another man?”
“I have,” answered the smith; “but it is doubtful, and may be dangerous
to add such a conjecture, which is besides only a supposition.”
“Speak it out, on your burgher faith and oath. For whom, think you, was
the blow meant?”
“If I must speak,” replied Henry, “I believe Oliver Proudfute received
the fate which was designed for myself; the rather that, in his folly,
Oliver spoke of trying to assume my manner of walking, as well as my
dress.”
“Have you feud with any one, that you form such an idea?” said Sir
Patrick Charteris.
“To my shame and sin be it spoken, I have feud with Highland and
Lowland, English and Scot, Perth and Angus. I do not believe poor
Oliver had feud with a new hatched chicken. Alas! he was the more fully
prepared for a sudden call!”
“Hark ye, smith,” said the provost, “answer me distinctly: Is there
cause of feud between the household of Sir John Ramorny and yourself?”
“To a certainty, my lord, there is. It is now generally said that Black
Quentin, who went over Tay to Fife some days since, was the owner of the
hand which was found in Couvrefew Street upon the eve of St. Valentine.
It was I who struck off that hand with a blow of my broadsword. As this
Black Quentin was a chamberlain of Sir John, and much trusted, it is
like there must be feud between me and his master’s dependants.”
“It bears a likely front, smith,” said Sir Patrick Charteris. “And now,
good brothers and wise magistrates, there are two suppositions, each of
which leads to the same conclusion. The maskers who seized our fellow
citizen, and misused him in a manner of which his body retains some
slight marks, may have met with their former prisoner as he returned
homewards, and finished their ill usage by taking his life. He himself
expressed to Henry Gow fears that this would be the case. If this be
really true, one or more of Sir John Ramorny’s attendants must have
been the assassins. But I think it more likely that one or two of the
revellers may have remained on the field, or returned to it, having
changed perhaps their disguise, and that to those men (for Oliver
Proudfute, in his own personal appearance, would only have been a
subject of sport) his apparition in the dress, and assuming, as he
proposed to do, the manner, of Henry Smith, was matter of deep hatred;
and that, seeing him alone, they had taken, as they thought, a certain
and safe mode to rid themselves of an enemy so dangerous as all men know
Henry Wynd is accounted by those that are his unfriends. The same train
of reasoning, again, rests the guilt with the household of Sir John
Ramorny. How think you, sirs? Are we not free to charge the crime upon
them?”
The magistrates whispered together for several minutes, and then replied
by the voice of Bailie Craigdallie: “Noble knight, and our worthy
provost, we agree entirely in what your wisdom has spoken concerning
this dark and bloody matter; nor do we doubt your sagacity in tracing to
the fellowship and the company of John Ramorny of that ilk the villainy
which hath been done to our deceased fellow citizen, whether in his own
character and capacity or as mistaking him for our brave townsman, Henry
of the Wynd. But Sir John, in his own behalf, and as the Prince’s master
of the horse, maintains an extensive household; and as, of course, the
charge will be rebutted by a denial, we would ask how we shall proceed
in that case. It is true, could we find law for firing the lodging, and
putting all within it to the sword; the old proverb of ‘Short rede,
good rede,’ might here apply; for a fouler household of defiers of God,
destroyers of men, and debauchers of women are nowhere sheltered than
are in Ramorny’s band. But I doubt that this summary mode of execution
would scarce be borne out by the laws; and no tittle of evidence which
I have heard will tend to fix the crime on any single individual or
individuals.”
Before the provost could reply, the town clerk arose, and, stroking
his venerable beard, craved permission to speak, which was instantly
granted.
“Brethren,” he said, “as well in our fathers’ time as ours; hath God, on
being rightly appealed to, condescended to make manifest the crimes of
the guilty and the innocence of those who may have been rashly accused.
Let us demand from our sovereign lord, King Robert, who, when the wicked
do not interfere to pervert his good intentions, is as just and clement
a prince as our annals can show in their long line, in the name of the
Fair City, and of all the commons in Scotland, that he give us, after
the fashion of our ancestors, the means of appealing to Heaven for light
upon this dark murder, we will demand the proof by ‘bier right,’ often
granted in the days of our sovereign’s ancestors, approved of by bulls
and decretals, and administered by the great Emperor Charlemagne in
France, by King Arthur in Britain, and by Gregory the Great, and the
mighty Achaius, in this our land of Scotland.”
“I have heard of the bier right, Sir Louis,” quoth the provost, “and I
know we have it in our charters of the Fair City; but I am something
ill learned in the ancient laws, and would pray you to inform us more
distinctly of its nature.”
“We will demand of the King,” said Sir Louis Lundin, “my advice being
taken, that the body of our murdered fellow citizen be transported into
the High Church of St. John, and suitable masses said for the benefit
of his soul and for the discovery of his foul murder. Meantime, we shall
obtain an order that Sir John Ramorny give up a list of such of his
household as were in Perth in the course of the night between Fastern’s
Even and this Ash Wednesday, and become bound to present them on a
certain day and hour, to be early named, in the High Church of St. John,
there one by one to pass before the bier of our murdered fellow citizen,
and in the form prescribed to call upon God and His saints to bear
witness that he is innocent of the acting, art or part, of the murder.
And credit me, as has been indeed proved by numerous instances, that, if
the murderer shall endeavour to shroud himself by making such an appeal,
the antipathy which subsists between the dead body and the hand which
dealt the fatal blow that divorced it from the soul will awaken some
imperfect life, under the influence of which the veins of the dead man
will pour forth at the fatal wounds the blood which has been so long
stagnant in the veins. Or, to speak more certainly, it is the pleasure
of Heaven, by some hidden agency which we cannot comprehend, to leave
open this mode of discovering the wickedness of him who has defaced the
image of his Creator.”
“I have heard this law talked of,” said Sir Patrick, “and it was
enforced in the Bruce’s time. This surely is no unfit period to seek, by
such a mystic mode of inquiry, the truth to which no ordinary means can
give us access, seeing that a general accusation of Sir John’s household
would full surely be met by a general denial. Yet I must crave farther
of Sir Louis, our reverend town clerk, how we shall prevent the guilty
person from escaping in the interim?”
“The burghers will maintain a strict watch upon the wall, drawbridges
shall be raised and portcullises lowered, from sunset to sunrise, and
strong patrols maintained through the night. This guard the burghers
will willingly maintain, to secure against the escape of the murderer of
their townsman.”
The rest of the counsellors acquiesced, by word, sign, and look, in this
proposal.
“Again,” said the provost, “what if any one of the suspected household
refuse to submit to the ordeal of bier right?”
“He may appeal to that of combat,” said the reverend city scribe, “with
an opponent of equal rank; because the accused person must have his
choice, in the appeal to the judgment of God, by what ordeal he will
be tried. But if he refuses both, he must be held as guilty, and so
punished.”
The sages of the council unanimously agreed with the opinion of their
provost and town clerk, and resolved, in all formality, to petition
the King, as a matter of right, that the murder of their fellow citizen
should be inquired into according to this ancient form, which was held
to manifest the truth, and received as matter of evidence in case of
murder so late as towards the end of the 17th century. But before the
meeting dissolved, Bailie Craigdallie thought it meet to inquire who
was to be the champion of Maudie, or Magdalen, Proudfute and her two
children.
“There need be little inquiry about that,” said Sir Patrick Charteris;
“we are men, and wear swords, which should be broken over the head
of any one amongst us who will not draw it in behalf of the widow and
orphans of our murdered fellow citizen, and in brave revenge of his
death. If Sir John Ramorny shall personally resent the inquiry, Patrick
Charteris of Kinfauns will do battle with him to the outrance, whilst
horse and man may stand, or spear and blade hold together. But in case
the challenger be of yeomanly degree, well wot I that Magdalen Proudfute
may choose her own champion among the bravest burghers of Perth, and
shame and dishonour were it to the Fair City for ever could she light
upon one who were traitor and coward enough to say her nay! Bring her
hither, that she may make her election.”
Henry Smith heard this with a melancholy anticipation that the poor
woman’s choice would light upon him, and that his recent reconciliation
with his mistress would be again dissolved, by his being engaged in a
fresh quarrel, from which there lay no honourable means of escape, and
which, in any other circumstances, he would have welcomed as a glorious
opportunity of distinguishing himself, both in sight of the court and
of the city. He was aware that, under the tuition of Father Clement,
Catharine viewed the ordeal of battle rather as an insult to religion
than an appeal to the Deity, and did not consider it as reasonable that
superior strength of arm or skill of weapon should be resorted to as the
proof of moral guilt or innocence. He had, therefore, much to fear from
her peculiar opinions in this particular, refined as they were beyond
those of the age she lived in.
While he thus suffered under these contending feelings, Magdalen,
the widow of the slaughtered man, entered the court, wrapt in a deep
mourning veil, and followed and supported by five or six women of good
(that is, of respectability) dressed in the same melancholy attire. One
of her attendants held an infant in her arms, the last pledge of poor
Oliver’s nuptial affections. Another led a little tottering creature of
two years, or thereabouts, which looked with wonder and fear, sometimes
on the black dress in which they had muffled him, and sometimes on the
scene around him.
The assembly rose to receive the melancholy group, and saluted them with
an expression of the deepest sympathy, which Magdalen, though the mate
of poor Oliver, returned with an air of dignity, which she borrowed,
perhaps, from the extremity of her distress. Sir Patrick Charteris then
stepped forward, and with the courtesy of a knight to a female, and of a
protector to an oppressed and injured widow, took the poor woman’s hand,
and explained to her briefly by what course the city had resolved to
follow out the vengeance due for her husband’s slaughter.
Having, with a softness and gentleness which did not belong to his
general manner, ascertained that the unfortunate woman perfectly
understood what was meant, he said aloud to the assembly: “Good citizens
of Perth, and freeborn men of guild and craft, attend to what is
about to pass, for it concerns your rights and privileges. Here stands
Magdalen Proudfute, desirous to follow forth the revenge due for the
death of her husband, foully murdered, as she sayeth, by Sir John
Ramorny, Knight, of that Ilk, and which she offers to prove, by the
evidence of bier right, or by the body of a man. Therefore, I, Patrick
Charteris, being a belted knight and freeborn gentleman, offer myself to
do battle in her just quarrel, whilst man and horse may endure, if any
one of my degree shall lift my glove. How say you, Magdalen Proudfute,
will you accept me for your champion?”
The widow answered with difficulty: “I can desire none nobler.”
Sir Patrick then took her right hand in his, and, kissing her forehead,
for such was the ceremony, said solemnly: “So may God and St. John
prosper me at my need, as I will do my devoir as your champion,
knightly, truly, and manfully. Go now, Magdalen, and choose at your will
among the burgesses of the Fair City, present or absent, any one upon
whom you desire to rest your challenge, if he against whom you bring
plaint shall prove to be beneath my degree.”
All eyes were turned to Henry Smith, whom the general voice had already
pointed out as in every respect the fittest to act as champion on the
occasion. But the widow waited not for the general prompting of their
looks. As soon as Sir Patrick had spoken, she crossed the floor to the
place where, near the bottom of the table, the armourer stood among the
men of his degree, and took him by the hand.
“Henry Gow, or Smith,” she said, “good burgher and draftsman, my--my--”
“Husband,” she would have said, but the word would not come forth: she
was obliged to change the expression.
“He who is gone, loved and prized you over all men; therefore meet it is
that thou shouldst follow out the quarrel of his widow and orphans.”
If there had been a possibility, which in that age there was not, of
Henry’s rejecting or escaping from a trust for which all men seemed to
destine him, every wish and idea of retreat was cut off when the widow
began to address him; and a command from Heaven could hardly have made a
stronger impression than did the appeal of the unfortunate Magdalen. Her
allusion to his intimacy with the deceased moved him to the soul. During
Oliver’s life, doubtless, there had been a strain of absurdity in his
excessive predilection for Henry, which, considering how very different
they were in character, had in it something ludicrous. But all this
was now forgotten, and Henry, giving way to his natural ardour, only
remembered that Oliver had been his friend and intimate--a man who had
loved and honoured him as much as he was capable of entertaining such
sentiments for any one, and, above all, that there was much reason to
suspect that the deceased had fallen victim to a blow meant for Henry
himself.
It was, therefore, with an alacrity which, the minute before, he could
scarce have commanded, and which seemed to express a stern pleasure,
that, having pressed his lips to the cold brow of the unhappy Magdalen,
the armourer replied:
“I, Henry the Smith, dwelling in the Wynd of Perth, good man and true,
and freely born, accept the office of champion to this widow Magdalen
and these orphans, and will do battle in their quarrel to the death,
with any man whomsoever of my own degree, and that so long as I shall
draw breath. So help me at my need God and good St. John!”
There arose from the audience a half suppressed cry, expressing the
interest which the persons present took in the prosecution of the
quarrel, and their confidence in the issue.
Sir Patrick Charteris then took measures for repairing to the King’s
presence, and demanding leave to proceed with inquiry into the murder
of Oliver Proudfute, according to the custom of bier right, and, if
necessary, by combat.
He performed this duty after the town council had dissolved, in a
private interview between himself and the King, who heard of this new
trouble with much vexation, and appointed next morning, after mass,
for Sir Patrick and the parties interested to attend his pleasure in
council. In the mean time, a royal pursuivant was despatched to the
Constable’s lodgings, to call over the roll of Sir John Ramorny’s
attendants, and charge him, with his whole retinue, under high
penalties, to abide within Perth until the King’s pleasure should be
farther known.