When fainting Nature call'd for aid,
And hovering Death prepared the blow,
His vigorous remedy display'd
The power of art without the show;
In Misery's darkest caverns known,
His useful care was ever nigh,
Where hopeless Anguish pour'd his groan,
And lonely Want retired to die;
No summons mock'd by cold delay,
No petty gains disclaim'd by pride,
The modest wants of every day
The toil of every day supplied.
SAMUEL JOHNSON.
The exquisitely beautiful portrait which the Rambler has painted of
his friend Levett, well describes Gideon Gray, and many other village
doctors, from whom Scotland reaps more benefit, and to whom she is
perhaps more ungrateful than to any other class of men, excepting her
schoolmasters.
Such a rural man of medicine is usually the inhabitant of some pretty
borough or village, which forms the central point of his practice. But,
besides attending to such cases as the village may afford, he is day and
night at the service of every one who may command his assistance within
a circle of forty miles in diameter, untraversed by roads in many
directions, and including moors, mountains, rivers, and lakes. For late
and dangerous journeys through an inaccessible country for services of
the most essential kind, rendered at the expense, or risk at least, of
his own health and life, the Scottish village doctor receives at best
a very moderate recompense, often one which is totally inadequate, and
very frequently none whatever. He has none of the ample resources proper
to the brothers of the profession in an English town. The burgesses of
a Scottish borough are rendered, by their limited means of luxury,
inaccessible to gout, surfeits, and all the comfortable chronic diseases
which are attendant on wealth and indolence. Four years, or so, of
abstemiousness, enable them to stand an election dinner; and there is no
hope of broken heads among a score or two of quiet electors, who settle
the business over a table. There the mothers of the state never make
a point of pouring, in the course of every revolving year, a certain
quantity of doctor's stuff through the bowels of their beloved children.
Every old woman, from the Townhead to the Townfit, can prescribe a dose
of salts, or spread a plaster; and it is only when a fever or a palsy
renders matters serious, that the assistance of the doctor is invoked by
his neighbours in the borough.
But still the man of science cannot complain of inactivity or want
of practice. If he does not find patients at his door, he seeks them
through a wide circle. Like the ghostly lover of Burger's Leonora, he
mounts at midnight and traverses in darkness, paths which, to those less
accustomed to them, seem formidable in daylight, through straits where
the slightest aberration would plunge him into a morass, or throw him
over a precipice, on to cabins which his horse might ride over without
knowing they lay in his way, unless he happened to fall through the
roofs. When he arrives at such a stately termination of his journey,
where his services are required, either to bring a wretch into the
world, or prevent one from leaving it, the scene of misery is often
such, that, far from touching the hard-saved shillings which are
gratefully offered to him, he bestows his medicines as well as his
attendance--for charity. I have heard the celebrated traveller Mungo
Park, who had experienced both courses of life, rather give the
preference to travelling as a discoverer in Africa, than to wandering by
night and day the wilds of his native land in the capacity of a country
medical practitioner. He mentioned having once upon a time rode forty
miles, sat up all night, and successfully assisted a woman under
influence of the primitive curse, for which his sole remuneration was
a roasted potato and a draught of buttermilk. But his was not the heart
which grudged the labour that relieved human misery. In short, there is
no creature in Scotland that works harder and is more poorly requited
than the country doctor, unless perhaps it may be his horse. Yet the
horse is, and indeed must be, hardy, active, and indefatigable, in spite
of a rough coat and indifferent condition; and so you will often find in
his master, under an unpromising and blunt exterior, professional skill
and enthusiasm, intelligence, humanity, courage, and science.
Mr. Gideon Gray, surgeon in the village of Middlemas, situated in one
of the midland counties of Scotland, led the rough, active, and
ill-rewarded course of life which we have endeavoured to describe. He
was a man between forty and fifty, devoted to his profession, and of
such reputation in the medical world, that he had been more than once,
as opportunities occurred, advised to exchange Middlemas and its meagre
circle of practice, for some of the larger towns in Scotland, or for
Edinburgh itself. This advice he had always declined. He was a plain
blunt man, who did not love restraint, and was unwilling to subject
himself to that which was exacted in polite society. He had not himself
found out, nor had any friend hinted to him, that a slight touch of the
cynic, in manner and habits, gives the physician, to the common eye,
an air of authority which greatly tends to enlarge his reputation. Mr.
Gray, or, as the country people called him, Doctor Gray, (he might hold
the title by diploma for what I know, though he only claimed the rank
of Master of Arts,) had few wants, and these were amply supplied by
a professional income which generally approached two hundred pounds a
year, for which, upon an average, he travelled about five thousand miles
on horseback in the course of the twelve months. Nay, so liberally did
this revenue support himself and his ponies, called Pestle and Mortar,
which he exercised alternately, that he took a damsel to share it, Jean
Watson, namely, the cherry-cheeked daughter of an honest farmer, who
being herself one of twelve children who had been brought up on an
income of fourscore pounds a year, never thought there could be poverty
in more than double the sum; and looked on Gray, though now termed
by irreverent youth the Old Doctor, as a very advantageous match. For
several years they had no children, and it seemed as if Doctor Gray, who
had so often assisted the efforts of the goddess Lucina, was never to
invoke her in his own behalf. Yet his domestic roof was, on a remarkable
occasion, decreed to be the scene where the goddess's art was required.
Late of an autumn evening three old women might be observed plying their
aged limbs through the single street of the village at Middlemas towards
the honoured door, which, fenced off from the vulgar causeway, was
defended by a broken paling, enclosing two slips of ground, half arable,
half overrun with an abortive attempt at shrubbery. The door itself was
blazoned with the name of Gideon Gray, M. A. Surgeon, &c. &c. Some of
the idle young fellows, who had been a minute or two before loitering
at the other end of the street before the door of the alehouse, (for the
pretended inn deserved no better name,) now accompanied the old dames
with shouts of laughter, excited by their unwonted agility; and with
bets on the winner, as loudly expressed as if they had been laid at
the starting post of Middlemas races. “Half a mutchkin on Luckie
Simson!”--“Auld Peg Tamson against the field!”--“Mair speed, Alison
Jaup, ye'll tak the wind out of them yet!”--“Canny against the hill,
lasses, or we may have a burstern auld earline amang ye!” These, and a
thousand such gibes, rent the air, without being noticed, or even heard,
by the anxious racers, whose object of contention seemed to be, which
should first reach the Doctor's door.
“Guide us, Doctor, what can be the matter now?” said Mrs. Gray, whose
character was that of a good-natured simpleton; “Here's Peg Tamson, Jean
Simson, and Alison Jaup, running a race on the hie street of the burgh!”
The Doctor, who had but the moment before hung his wet great-coat before
the fire, (for he was just dismounted from a long journey,) hastened
down stairs, arguing some new occasion for his services, and happy,
that, from, the character of the messengers, it was likely to be within
burgh, and not landward.
He had just reached the door as Luckie Simson, one of the racers,
arrived in the little area before it. She had got the start, and kept
it, but at the expense, for the time, of her power of utterance; for
when she came in presence of the Doctor, she stood blowing like a
grampus, her loose toy flying back from her face, making the most
violent effort to speak, but without the power of uttering a single
intelligible word. Peg Thompson whipped in before her.
“The leddy, sir, the leddy!”
“Instant help, instant help!”--screeched rather than uttered, Alison
Jaup; while Luckie Simson, who had certainly won the race, found words
to claim the prize which had set them all in motion.
“And I hope, sir, you will recommend me to be the sick-nurse; I was here
to bring you the tidings lang before ony o' thae lazy queans.”
Loud were the counter-protestations of the two competitors, and loud the
laugh of the idle _loons_ who listened at a little distance.
“Hold your tongue, ye flyting fools,” said the Doctor; “and you, ye idle
rascals, if I come out among you.” So saying, he smacked his long-lashed
whip with great emphasis, producing much the effect of the celebrated
_Quos ego_ of Neptune in the first AEneid.--“And now,” said the Doctor,
“where, or who, is this lady?”
The question was scarce necessary; for a plain carriage, with four
horses, came at a foot's pace towards the door of the Doctor's
house, and the old women, now more at their ease, gave the Doctor to
understand, that the gentleman thought the accommodation of the Swan
Inn totally unfit for his lady's rank and condition, and had, by their
advice, (each claiming the merit of the suggestion,) brought her here,
to experience the hospitality of the _west room;_--a spare apartment, in
which Doctor Gray occasionally accommodated such patients, as he desired
to keep for a space of time under his own eye.
There were two persons only in the vehicle. The one, a gentleman in
a riding dress, sprung out, and having received from the Doctor an
assurance that the lady would receive tolerable accommodation in his
house, he lent assistance to his companion to leave the carriage, and
with great apparent satisfaction, saw her safely deposited in a decent
sleeping apartment, and under the respectable charge of the Doctor and
his lady, who assured him once more of every species of attention. To
bind their promise more firmly, the stranger slipped a purse of twenty
guineas (for this story chanced in the golden age) into the hand of the
Doctor, as an earnest of the most liberal recompense, and requested he
would spare no expense in providing all that was necessary or desirable
for a person in the lady's condition, and for the helpless being to whom
she might immediately be expected to give birth. He then said he would
retire to the inn, where he begged a message might instantly acquaint
him with the expected change in the lady's situation.
“She is of rank,” he said, “and a foreigner; let no expense be spared.
We designed to have reached Edinburgh, but were forced to turn off the
road by an accident.” Once more he said, “Let no expense be spared, and
manage that she may travel as soon as possible.”
“That,” said the Doctor, “is past my control. Nature must not be
hurried, and she avenges herself of every attempt to do so.”
“But art,” said the stranger, “can do much,” and he proffered a second
purse, which seemed as heavy as the first.
“Art,” said the Doctor, “may be recompensed, but cannot be purchased.
You have already paid me more than enough to take the utmost care I
can of your lady; should I accept more money, it could only be for
promising, by implication at least, what is beyond my power to perform.
Every possible care shall be taken of your lady, and that affords the
best chance of her being speedily able to travel. Now, go you to the
inn, sir, for I may be instantly wanted, and we have not yet provided
either an attendant for the lady, or a nurse for the child; but both
shall be presently done.”
“Yet a moment, Doctor--what languages do you understand?”
“Latin and French I can speak indifferently, and so as to be understood;
and I read a little Italian.”
“But no Portuguese or Spanish?” continued the stranger.
“No, sir.”
“That is unlucky. But you may make her understand you by means
of French. Take notice, you are to comply with her request in
everything--if you want means to do so, you may apply to me.”
“May I ask, sir, by what name the lady is to be”--
“It is totally indifferent,” said the stranger, interrupting the
question; “You shall know it at more leisure.”
So saying, he threw his ample cloak about him, turning himself half
round to assist the operation, with an air which the Doctor would have
found it difficult to imitate, and walked down the street to the little
inn. Here he paid and dismissed the postilions, and shut himself up
in an apartment, ordering no one to be admitted till the Doctor should
call.
The Doctor, when he returned to his patient's apartment, found his wife
in great surprise, which, as is usual with persons of her character, was
not unmixed with fear and anxiety.
“She cannot speak a word like a Christian being,” said Mrs. Gray.
“I know it,” said the Doctor.
“But she threeps to keep on a black fause-face, and skirls if we offer
to take it away.”
“Well then, let her wear it--What harm will it do?”
“Harm, Doctor!” Was ever honest woman brought to bed with a fause-face
on?”
“Seldom, perhaps. But, Jean, my dear, those who are not quite honest
must be brought to bed all the same as those who are, and we are not to
endanger the poor thing's life by contradicting her whims at present.”
Approaching the sick woman's bed, he observed that she indeed wore a
thin silk mask, of the kind which do such uncommon service in the elder
comedy; such as women of rank still wore in travelling, but certainly
never in the situation of this poor lady. It would seem she had
sustained importunity on the subject, for when she saw the Doctor,
she put her hand to her face, as if she was afraid he would insist on
pulling off the vizard.
He hastened to say, in tolerable French, that her will should be a law
to them in every respect, and that she was at perfect liberty to wear
the mask till it was her pleasure to lay it aside. She understood him;
for she replied, by a very imperfect attempt, in the same language, to
express her gratitude for the permission, as she seemed to regard it, of
retaining her disguise.
The Doctor proceeded to other arrangements; and, for the satisfaction
of those readers who may love minute information, we record, that Luckie
Simson, the first in the race, carried as a prize the situation of
sick-nurse beside the delicate patient; that Peg Thomson was permitted
the privilege of recommending her good-daughter, Bet Jamieson, to be
wet-nurse; and an _oe_, or grandchild, of Luckie Jaup was hired to
assist in the increased drudgery of the family; the Doctor thus, like a
practised minister, dividing among his trusty adherents such good things
as fortune placed at his disposal.
About one in the morning the Doctor made his appearance at the Swan Inn,
and acquainted the stranger gentleman, that he wished him joy of being
the father of a healthy boy, and that the mother was, in the usual
phrase, as well as could be expected.
The stranger heard the news with seeming satisfaction, and then
exclaimed, “He must be christened, Doctor! he must be christened
instantly!”
“There can be no hurry for that,” said the Doctor.
“_We_ think otherwise,” said the stranger, cutting his argument short.
“I am a Catholic, Doctor, and as I may be obliged to leave this place
before the lady is able to travel, I desire to see my child received
into the pale of the Church. There is, I understand, a Catholic priest
in this wretched place?”
“There is a Catholic gentleman, sir, Mr. Goodriche, who is reported to
be in orders.”
“I commend your caution, Doctor,” said the stranger; “it is dangerous to
be too positive on any subject. I will bring that same Mr. Goodriche to
your house to-morrow.”
Gray hesitated for a moment. “I am a Presbyterian Protestant, sir,” he
said, “a friend to the constitution as established in Church and State,
as I have a good right, having drawn his Majesty's pay, God bless him,
for four years, as surgeon's mate in the Cameronian regiment, as my
regimental Bible and commission can testify. But although I be bound
especially to abhor all trafficking or trinketing with Papists, yet I
will not stand in the way of a tender conscience. Sir, you may call with
Mr. Goodriche, when you please, at my house; and undoubtedly, you being,
as I suppose, the father of the child, you will arrange matters as you
please; only, I do not desire to be though an abettor or countenancer of
any part of the Popish ritual.”
“Enough, sir,” said the stranger haughtily, “we understand each other.”
The next day he appeared at the Doctor's house with Mr. Goodriche, and
two persons understood to belong to that reverend gentleman's communion.
The party were shut up in an apartment with the infant, and it may
be presumed that the solemnity of baptism was administered to the
unconscious being, thus strangely launched upon the world. When the
priest and witnesses had retired, the strange gentleman informed Mr.
Gray, that, as the lady had been pronounced unfit for travelling for
several days, he was himself about to leave the neighbourhood, but
would return thither in the space of ten days, when he hoped to find his
companion able to leave it.
“And by what name are we to call the child and mother?”
“The infant's name is Richard.”
“But it must have some sirname--so must the lady--She cannot reside in
my house, yet be without a name.”
“Call them by the name of your town here--Middlemas, I think it is?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, Mrs. Middlemas is the name of the mother, and Richard Middlemas
of the child--and I am Matthew Middlemas, at your service. This,” he
continued, “will provide Mrs. Middlemas in every thing she may wish to
possess--or assist her in case of accidents.” With that he placed
L100 in Mr. Gray's hand, who rather scrupled receiving it, saying, “He
supposed the lady was qualified to be her own purse-bearer.”
“The worst in the world, I assure you, Doctor,” replied the stranger.
“If she wished to change that piece of paper, she would scarce know how
many guineas she should receive for it. No, Mr. Gray, I assure you you
will find Mrs. Middleton--Middlemas--what did I call her--as ignorant of
the affairs of this world as any one you have met with in your practice:
So you will please to be her treasurer and administrator for the time,
as for a patient that is incapable to look after her own affairs.”
This was spoke, as it struck Dr. Gray, in rather a haughty and
supercilious manner. The words intimated nothing in themselves, more
than the same desire of preserving incognito, which might be gathered
from all the rest of the stranger's conduct; but the manner seemed to
say, “I am not a person to be questioned by any one--what I say must
be received without comment, how little soever you may believe or
understand it.” It strengthened Gray in his opinion, that he had before
him a case either of seduction, or of private marriage, betwixt persons
of the very highest rank; and the whole bearing, both of the lady and
the gentleman, confirmed his suspicions. It was not in his nature to be
troublesome or inquisitive, but he could not fail to see that the lady
wore no marriage-ring; and her deep sorrow, and perpetual tremor, seemed
to indicate an unhappy creature, who had lost the protection of parents,
without acquiring a legitimate right to that of a husband. He was
therefore somewhat anxious when Mr. Middlemas, after a private
conference of some length with the lady, bade him farewell. It is true,
he assured him of his return within ten days, being the very shortest
space which Gray could be prevailed upon to assign for any prospect of
the lady being moved with safety.
“I trust in Heaven that he will return,” said Gray to himself, “but
there is too much mystery about all this, for the matter being a plain
and well-meaning transaction. If he intends to treat this poor thing, as
many a poor girl has been used before, I hope that my house will not be
the scene in which he chooses to desert her. The leaving the money has
somewhat a suspicious aspect, and looks as if my friend were in the act
of making some compromise with his conscience. Well--I must hope the
best. Meantime, my path plainly is to do what I can for the poor lady's
benefit.”
Mr. Gray visited his patient shortly after Mr. Middlemas's departure--as
soon, indeed, as he could be admitted. He found her in violent
agitation. Gray's experience dictated the best mode of relief and
tranquillity. He caused her infant to be brought to her. She wept over
it for a long time, and the violence of her agitation subsided under the
influence of parental feelings, which, from her appearance of extreme
youth, she must have experienced for the first time.
The observant physician could, after this paroxysm, remark that his
patient's mind was chiefly occupied in computing the passage of the
time, and anticipating the period when the return of her husband--if
husband he was--might be expected. She consulted almanacks, enquired
concerning distances, though so cautiously as to make it evident she
desired to give no indication of the direction of her companion's
journey, and repeatedly compared, her watch with those of others;
exercising, it was evident, all that delusive species of mental
arithmetic by which mortals attempt to accelerate the passage of Time
while they calculate his progress. At other times she wept anew over her
child, which was by all judges pronounced as goodly an infant as needed
to be seen; and Gray sometimes observed that she murmured sentences
to the unconscious infant, not only the words, but the very sound and
accents of which were strange to him, and which, in particular, he knew
not to be Portuguese.
Mr. Goodriche, the Catholic priest, demanded access to her upon one
occasion. She at first declined his visit, but afterwards received it,
under the idea, perhaps, that he might have news from Mr. Middlemas, as
he called himself. The interview was a very short one, and the priest
left the lady's apartment in displeasure, which his prudence could
scarce disguise from Mr. Gray. He never returned, although the lady's
condition would have made his attentions and consolations necessary, had
she been a member of the Catholic Church.
Our Doctor began at length to suspect his fair guest was a Jewess, who
had yielded up her person and affections to one of a different religion;
and the peculiar style of her beautiful countenance went to enforce this
opinion. The circumstance made no difference to Gray, who saw only her
distress and desolation, and endeavoured to remedy both to the utmost
of his power. He was, however, desirous to conceal it from his wife,
and the others around the sick person, whose prudence and liberality
of thinking might be more justly doubted. He therefore so regulated her
diet, that she could not be either offended, or brought under suspicion,
by any of the articles forbidden by the Mosaic law being presented to
her. In other respects than what concerned her health or convenience, he
had but little intercourse with her.
The space passed within which the stranger's return to the borough had
been so anxiously expected by his female companion. The disappointment
occasioned by his non-arrival was manifested in the convalescent by
inquietude, which was at first mingled with peevishness, and afterwards
with doubt and fear. When two or three days had passed without message
or letter of any kind, Gray himself became anxious, both on his own
account and the poor lady's, lest the stranger should have actually
entertained the idea of deserting this defenceless and probably injured
woman. He longed to have some communication with her, which might enable
him to judge what enquiries could be made, or what else was most fitting
to be done. But so imperfect was the poor young woman's knowledge of the
French language, and perhaps so unwilling she herself to throw any light
on her situation, that every attempt of this kind proved abortive. When
Gray asked questions concerning any subject which appeared to approach
to explanation, he observed she usually answered him by shaking her
head, in token of not understanding what he said; at other times by
silence and with tears, and sometimes referring him to _Monsieur_.
For _Monsieur's_ arrival, then, Gray began to become very impatient, as
that which alone could put an end to a disagreeable species of mystery,
which the good company of the borough began now to make the principal
subject of their gossip; some blaming Gray for taking foreign
_landloupers_ [Footnote: Strollers.] into his house, on the subject
of whose morals the most serious doubts might be entertained; others
envying the “bonny hand” the doctor was like to make of it, by having
disposal of the wealthy stranger's travelling funds; a circumstance
which could not be well concealed from the public, when the honest
man's expenditure for trifling articles of luxury came far to exceed its
ordinary bounds.
The conscious probity of the honest Doctor enabled him to despise this
sort of tittle-tattle, though the secret knowledge of its existence
could not be agreeable to him. He went his usual rounds with his usual
perseverance, and waited with patience until time should throw light on
the subject and history of his lodger. It was now the fourth week after
her confinement, and the recovery of the stranger might be considered
as perfect, when Gray, returning from one of his ten-mile visits, saw
a post-chaise and four horses at the door. “This man has returned,” he
said, “and my suspicions have done him less than justice.” With that
he spurred his horse, a signal which the trusty steed obeyed the more
readily, as its progress was in the direction of the stable door. But
when, dismounting, the Doctor hurried into his own house, it seemed to
him, that the departure as well as the arrival of this distressed lady
was destined to bring confusion to his peaceful dwelling. Several idlers
had assembled about his door, and two or three had impudently thrust
themselves forward almost into the passage, to listen to a confused
altercation which was heard from within.
The Doctor hastened forward, the foremost of the intruders retreating
in confusion on his approach, while he caught the tones of his wife's
voice, raised to a pitch which he knew, by experience, boded no good;
for Mrs. Gray, good-humoured and tractable in general, could sometimes
perform the high part in a matrimonial duet. Having much more confidence
in his wife's good intentions than her prudence, he lost no time in
pushing into the parlour, to take the matter into his own hands. Here he
found his helpmate at the head of the whole militia of the sick lady's
apartment, that is, wet nurse, and sick nurse, and girl of all
work, engaged in violent dispute with two strangers. The one was a
dark-featured elderly man, with an eye of much sharpness and severity of
expression, which now seemed partly quenched by a mixture of grief and
mortification. The other, who appeared actively sustaining the dispute
with Mrs. Gray, was a stout, bold-looking, hard-faced person, armed
with pistols, of which he made rather an unnecessary and ostentatious
display.
“Here is my husband, sir,” said Mrs. Gray, in a tone of triumph, for
she had the grace to believe the Doctor one of the greatest men
living,--“Here is the Doctor--let us see what you will say now.”
“Why just what I said before, ma'am,” answered the man, “which is, that
my warrant must be obeyed. It is regular, ma'am, regular.”
So saying, he struck the forefinger of his right hand against a paper
which he held towards Mrs. Gray with his left.
“Address yourself to me, if you please, sir,” said the Doctor, seeing
that he ought to lose no time in removing the cause into the proper
court. “I am the master of this house, sir, and I wish to know the cause
of this visit.”
“My business is soon told,” said the man. “I am a king's messenger, and
this lady has treated me as if I was a baron-bailie's officer.”
“That is not the question, sir,” replied the Doctor. “If you are a
king's messenger, where is your warrant, and what do you propose to
do here?” At the same time he whispered the little wench to call Mr.
Lawford, the town-clerk, to come thither as fast as he possibly could.
The good-daughter of Peg Thomson started off with an activity worthy of
her mother-in-law.
“There is my warrant,” said the official, “and you may satisfy
yourself.”
“The shameless loon dare not tell the Doctor his errand,” said Mrs. Gray
exultingly.
“A bonny errand it is,” said old Lucky Simson, “to carry away a lying-in
woman as a gled [Footnote: Or Kite.] would do a clocking-hen.”
“A woman no a month delivered”--echoed the nurse Jamieson.
“Twenty-four days eight hours and seven minutes to a second,” said Mrs.
Gray.
The Doctor having looked over the warrant, which was regular, began to
be afraid that the females of his family, in their zeal for defending
the character of their sex, might be stirred up into some sudden fit of
mutiny, and therefore commanded them to be silent.
“This,” he said, “is a warrant for arresting the bodies of Richard
Tresham, and of Zilia de Moncada on account of high treason. Sir, I
have served his Majesty, and this is not a house in which traitors are
harboured. I know nothing of any of these two persons, nor have I ever
heard even their names.”
“But the lady whom you have received into your family,” said the
messenger, “is Zilia de Moncada, and here stands her father, Matthias de
Moncada, who will make oath to it.”
“If this be true,” said Mr. Gray, looking towards the alleged officer,
“you have taken a singular duty on you. It is neither my habit to deny
my own actions, nor to oppose the laws of the land. There is a lady in
this house slowly recovering from confinement, having become under this
roof the mother of a healthy child. If she be the person described in
this warrant, and this gentleman's daughter, I must surrender her to the
laws of the country.”
Here the Esculapian militia were once more in motion.
“Surrender, Dr. Gray! It's a shame to hear you speak, and you that
lives by women and weans, abune your other means!” so exclaimed his fair
better part.
“I wonder to hear the Doctor!” said the younger nurse; “there's no a
wife in the town would believe it o' him.”
“I aye thought the Doctor was a man till this moment,” said Luckie
Simson; “but I believe him now to be an auld wife, little baulder than
mysell; and I dinna wonder that poor Mrs. Gray”--
“Hold your peace, you foolish woman,” said the Doctor. “Do you think
this business is not bad enough already, that you are making it worse
with your senseless claver? [Footnote: Tattling.]--Gentlemen, this is
a very sad case. Here is a warrant for a high crime against a poor
creature, who is little fit to be removed from one house to another,
much more dragged to a prison. I tell you plainly, that I think the
execution of this arrest may cause her death. It is your business, sir,
if you be really her father, to consider what you can do to soften this
matter, rather than drive it on.”
“Better death than dishonour,” replied the stern-looking old man, with a
voice as harsh as his aspect; “and you, messenger,” he continued, “look
what you do, and execute the warrant at your peril.”
“You hear,” said the man, appealing to the Doctor himself, “I must have
immediate access to the lady.”
“In a lucky time,” said Mr. Gray, “here comes the town-clerk.--You are
very welcome, Mr. Lawford. Your opinion here is much wanted as a man of
law, as well as of sense and humanity. I was never more glad to see you
in all my life.”
He then rapidly stated the case; and the messenger, understanding the
new-comer to be a man of some authority, again exhibited his warrant.
“This is a very sufficient and valid warrant, Dr. Gray,” replied the man
of law. “Nevertheless, if you are disposed to make oath, that instant
removal would be unfavourable to the lady's health, unquestionably she
must remain here, suitably guarded.”
“It is not so much the mere act of locomotion which I am afraid of,”
said the surgeon; “but I am free to depone, on soul and conscience, that
the shame and fear of her father's anger, and the sense of the affront
of such an arrest, with terror for its consequences, may occasion
violent and dangerous illness--even death itself.”
“The father must see the daughter, though they may have quarrelled,”
said Mr. Lawford; “the officer of justice must execute his warrant
though it should frighten the criminal to death; these evils are only
contingent, not direct and immediate consequences. You must give up the
lady, Mr. Gray, though your hesitation is very natural.”
“At least, Mr. Lawford, I ought to be certain that the person in my
house is the party they search for.”
“Admit me to her apartment,” replied the man whom the messenger termed
Moncada.
The messenger, whom the presence of Lawford had made something more
placid, began to become impudent once more. He hoped, he said, by
means of his female prisoner, to acquire the information necessary to
apprehend the more guilty person. If more delays were thrown in his way,
that information might come too late, and he would make all who were
accessary to such delay responsible for the consequences.
“And I,” said Mr. Gray, “though I were to be brought to the gallows for
it, protest, that this course may be the murder of my patient.--Can bail
not be taken, Mr. Lawford?”
“Not in cases of high treason,” said the official person; and then
continued in a confidential tone, “Come, Mr. Gray, we all know you to
be a person well affected to our Royal Sovereign King George and the
Government; but you must not push this too far, lest you bring yourself
into trouble, which every body in Middlemas would be sorry for. The
forty-five has not been so far gone by, but we can remember enough of
warrants of high treason--ay, and ladies of quality committed upon such
charges. But they were all favourably dealt with--Lady Ogilvy, Lady
Macintosh, Flora Macdonald, and all. No doubt this gentleman knows what
he is doing, and has assurances of the young lady's safety--So you must
jouk and let the jaw gae by, as we say.”
“Follow me, then, gentleman,” said Gideon, “and you shall see the
young lady;” and then, his strong features working with emotion at
anticipation of the distress which he was about to inflict, he led the
way up the small staircase, and opening the door, said to Moncada, who
had followed him, “This is your daughter's only place of refuge, in
which I am, alas! too weak to be her protector. Enter, sir, if your
conscience will permit you.”
The stranger turned on him a scowl, into which it seemed as if he would
willingly have thrown the power of the fabled basilisk. Then stepping
proudly forward, he stalked into the room. He was followed by Lawford
and Gray at a little distance. The messenger remained in the doorway.
The unhappy young woman had heard the disturbance, and guessed the cause
too truly. It is possible she might even have seen the strangers on
their descent from the carriage. When they entered the room, she was
on her knees, beside an easy chair, her face in a silk wrapper that
was hung over it. The man called Moncada uttered a single word; by the
accent it might have been something equivalent to _wretch;_ but none
knew its import. The female gave a convulsive shudder, such as that by
which a half-dying soldier is affected on receiving a second wound. But,
without minding her emotion, Moncada seized her by the arm, and with
little gentleness raised her to her feet, on which she seemed to stand
only because she was supported by his strong grasp. He then pulled from
her face the mask which she had hitherto worn. The poor creature still
endeavoured to shroud her face, by covering it with her left hand, as
the manner in which she was held prevented her from using the aid of
the right. With little effort her father secured that hand also, which
indeed was of itself far too little to serve the purpose of concealment,
and showed her beautiful face, burning with blushes and covered with
tears.
“You, Alcalde, and you, Surgeon,” he said to Lawford and Gray, with a
foreign action and accent, “this woman is my daughter, the same Zilia
Moncada who is signal'd in that protocol. Make way, and let me carry her
where her crimes may be atoned for.”
“Are you that person's daughter?” said Lawford to the lady.
“She understands no English,” said Gray; and addressing his patient in
French, conjured her to let him know whether she was that man's daughter
or not, assuring her of protection if the fact were otherwise. The
answer was murmured faintly, but was too distinctly intelligible--“He
was her father.”
All farther title of interference seemed now ended. The messenger
arrested his prisoner, and, with some delicacy, required the assistance
of the females to get her conveyed to the carriage in waiting.
Gray again interfered.--“You will not,” he said, “separate the mother
and the infant?”
Zilia de Moncada heard the question, (which, being addressed to the
father, Gray had inconsiderately uttered in French,) and it seemed as if
it recalled to her recollection the existence of the helpless creature
to which she had given birth, forgotten for a moment amongst the
accumulated horrors of her father's presence. She uttered a shriek,
expressing poignant grief, and turned her eyes on her father with the
most intense supplication.
“To the parish with the bastard!”--said Moncada; while the helpless
mother sunk lifeless into the arms of the females, who had now gathered
round her.
“That will not pass, sir,” said Gideon.--“If you are father to that
lady, you must be grandfather to the helpless child; and you must settle
in some manner for its future provision, or refer us to some responsible
person.”
Moncada looked towards Lawford, who expressed himself satisfied of the
propriety of what Gray said.
“I object not to pay for whatever the wretched child may require,” said
he; “and if you, sir,” addressing Gray, “choose to take charge of him,
and breed him up, you shall have what will better your living.”
The Doctor was about to refuse a charge so uncivilly offered; but after
a moment's reflection, he replied, “I think so indifferently of the
proceedings I have witnessed, and of those concerned in them, that if
the mother desires that I should retain the charge of this child, I will
not refuse to do so.”
Moncada spoke to his daughter, who was just beginning to recover from
her swoon, in the same language in which he had at first addressed her.
The proposition which he made seemed highly acceptable, as she started
from the arms of the females, and, advancing to Gray, seized his hand,
kissed it, bathed it in her tears, and seemed reconciled, even in
parting with her child, by the consideration, that the infant was to
remain under his guardianship.
“Good, kind man,” she said in her indifferent French, “you have saved
both mother and child.”
The father, meanwhile, with mercantile deliberation, placed in Mr.
Lawford's hands notes and bills to the amount of a thousand pounds,
which he stated was to be vested for the child's use, and advanced in
such portions as his board and education might require. In the event of
any correspondence on his account being necessary, as in case of death
or the like, he directed that communication should be made to Signor
Matthias Moncada, under cover to a certain banking house in London.
“But beware,” he said to Gray, “how you trouble me about these concerns,
unless in case of absolute necessity.”
“You need not fear, sir,” replied Gray; “I have seen nothing to-day
which can induce me to desire a more intimate correspondence with you
than may be indispensable.”
While Lawford drew up a proper minute of this transaction, by which he
himself and Gray were named trustees for the child, Mr. Gray attempted
to restore to the lady the balance of the considerable sum of money
which Tresham (if such was his real name) had formally deposited with
him. With every species of gesture, by which hands, eyes, and even
feet, could express rejection, as well as in her own broken French, she
repelled the reimbursement, while she entreated that Gray would consider
the money as his own property; and at the same time forced upon him a
ring set with brilliants, which seemed of considerable value. The father
then spoke to her a few stern words, which she heard with an air of
mingled agony and submission.
“I have given her a few minutes to see and weep over the miserable being
which has been the seal of her dishonour,” said the stern father. “Let
us retire and leave her alone.--You,” to the messenger, “watch the door
of the room on the outside.”
Gray, Lawford, and Moncada, retired to the parlour accordingly, where
they waited in silence, each busied with his own reflections, till,
within the space of half an hour, they received information that the
lady was ready to depart.
“It is well,” replied Moncada; “I am glad she has yet sense enough left
to submit to that which needs must be.”
So saying, he ascended the stair, and returned leading down his
daughter, now again masked and veiled. As she passed Gray, she uttered
the words--“My child, my child!” in a tone of unutterable anguish; then
entered the carriage, which was drawn up as close to the door of the
doctor's house as the little enclosure would permit. The messenger,
mounted on a led horse, and accompanied by a servant and assistant,
followed the carriage, which drove rapidly off, taking the road which
leads to Edinburgh. All who had witnessed this strange scene, now
departed to make their conjectures, and some to count their gains; for
money had been distributed among the females who had attended on the
lady, with so much liberality, as considerably to reconcile them to the
breach of the rights of womanhood inflicted by the precipitate removal
of the patient.