THE SEVEN BULLETS.
Now came the rifle-shooting, which deserves an entire chapter to
itself. The first prize was no less than a hundred sovereigns; the
second was fifty.
Laura Everingham and Fanny Clavering had constituted themselves the
patronesses of this feat of skill; but though the purses, on the
acquisition of which the whole energies of Callum and myself were
devoted--in no spirit of vain-glory, as I have said, but goaded on by
the spur of sheer adversity--was made up by them and their female
friends; yet Fanny by her air and bearing, her energy, in short by
the very noise she made, assumed the supreme direction of affairs;
thus the gentler Laura, in her little white crape bonnet and lace
shawl, seemed a mere appendage to her beautiful, brilliant, and 'Di
Vernon' looking friend.
Fanny was a free and dashing girl, with whom _you_ must have fallen
in love, my bachelor friend, for she was one who made herself
everywhere as much at home as the fly in your sugar-basin. She wore
a broad hat and feather, which gave a piquancy to her fine eyes and
expressive features. She had on a dark green riding-habit, with
yellow gauntlets, and carried a gold-headed switch. She was a showy
girl--the pet of the Household Brigade, and the counterpart of her
brother the Guardsman, only a little more merry, and much more
wilful. She was a good horsewoman, and rode hurdle-races and
steeple-chases; a good hand at whist, rather a sharp stroke at
billiards, and would deliberately sweep up the pool with the
prettiest white hands in the world. She waltzed divinely, was
considered glorious in a two-handed flirtation, or private
theatricals, where she shone to admiration as 'Di Vernon,' or the
'Rough Diamond.' Fanny could make up a good book on the Oaks, and
had always a shrewd guess as to the winner of the Derby; she had the
Army List and the Peerage at her taper finger-ends, and knew all the
last novels and music as if they had been her own composition. Once
upon a time she was nearly riding herself for the Chester Cup; and
those who peddled and punted at mere county races, she despised as
heartily as if she belonged to the Hussars or the Oxford Blues. In
short, Fanny knew everything from the Deluge to the deux-temps, and
from the misfortunes in the Crimea to the mystery of
crochet--moreover, a word in your ear, my dear reader, our charming
friend had some thousand pounds per annum in her own right, and
'expectations' without end.
She had urged the more timid and retiring Laura to club their prize
for the rifle-shooting; and now she appeared on the ground with a
smart grooved rifle in her hands, to compete with all comers, on the
part of herself and of the shrinking Laura, who had never laid her
little hand upon a fire-arm in her life, and begged to be excused
doing so now.
About thirty Highlanders, armed with rifles, crowded near her, but
respectfully waited until Mr. Snaggs, whom she had requested to
assist her, called over their names as they stood on the list, and to
each as he stepped forward, the factor somewhat ostentatiously handed
a--religious tract.
Meanwhile, Captain Clavering, Mr. Snobleigh (who wore a green
sporting-coat with bronze buttons, on each of which was a fox's
head), Callum Dhu, Ewen Oig, a few more privileged persons, and I,
remained by her side, and now all the spectators pressed forward with
interest to witness the shooting.
Callum and I were wont to shoot deer running, at four hundred yards,
and to pierce a potato when tossed into the air, using spherical
rifle-balls; thus we had little doubt of our success; but we meant to
challenge the holiday huntsmen of the Lowlands to a trial of skill
they little thought of.
The shooting proceeded with great spirit and rapidity, and it was
admirable, for all the competitors were expert sportsmen. The
targets were of iron, placed against the wall of the ruined tower, in
a place which was sheltered from the wind, and afforded a long and
level range. We shot at five hundred yards, and though the average
was six balls out of twelve, put into a six-foot target, Callum,
whose hands shook after tossing the caber, struck the nail on the
head at two hundred yards; and Ewen Oig, I, and other Highlanders,
easily put each, eight consecutive sphero-conical balls into the
target, at an average of four inches from the bull's-eye; and at one
hundred and eighty yards broke every quart-bottle that was placed
before us.
There was a deliberation in the air of Callum Dhu that confounded the
competitors. After squibbing his rifle, he carefully measured the
charge of powder, poured it slowly down the barrel which he held
straight and upright; then he moistened the wadding, poised the
bullet thereon, setting it fairly in with his forefinger and thumb,
and then he drove it firmly home. Then he capped, cocked, and
placing the butt-plate square against the top-arm muscle, levelled
surely and firmly to prevent the rifle from 'kicking.' A moment his
keen bright hazel eye glanced along the sites, and while, impressed
by these grave preparations, all held their breath, he fired with a
deadly precision that none could surpass.
Clavering struck the bull's-eye thrice in succession at two hundred
yards: but his shooting was not to be compared to ours; and we were
greeted by bursts of applause in which he joined loudly, for he was a
fine, frank and honest-hearted fellow.
'This beats everything I have met with, Miss Everingham,' said he,
with great delight; 'I have seen the Cockneys shooting at Chalk
Farm--the Chasseurs at Vincennes and the Jagers at Frankfort, where
ten targets were shot as fast as the markers could work; but these
Highland marksmen beat them hollow, and this is in a land where the
game-laws say the tenant shall not have a gun. Old Leather-stocking,
with his boasted Killdeer, could do nothing like this.'
'All skill and practice, my dear sir,' suggested Mr. Snaggs, who had
repeatedly been solacing himself by quiet sneers at Highlanders in
general, and myself in particular; 'to allow tenants the use of guns
would only lead to poaching and vice, "which," sayeth the trite
Quarles, "is its own punishment."'
It was unanimously agreed that Callum and I were the victors of that
day's shooting. Elated by the prospect of winning the prize, and
feeling happy that I would thereby be honestly enabled to relieve, to
a certain extent, the troubles of a sick and aged parent, after a
moment's conference with Callum, I turned to Captain Clavering,
saying,
'We have shot at your targets placed at five hundred yards, and were
ready to have done so, had they been placed at a thousand yards, if
our rifles had been furnished with telescope sights. We will now
challenge _you_ to a trial of skill, which may be new to you--with
seven solid sugar-loaf balls shot from thirty-six inch rifled
barrels.'
'Agreed,' said the Captain: 'I have shot a deer running at nearly
five hundred yards, and have no fear.'
'Ewen Oig, bring our targets and hang one over the battlement of the
tower,' said I to the young piper, who was the son of Gillespie
Ruadh, and was lithe, nimble, and active. He took one of the small
white targets we had brought with us from Glen Ora, and which
measured about three feet square, and bore, in black line upon it,
the figure of a cross. With this he scrambled to the summit of the
ruined tower, a daring feat, as it was more than seventy feet in
height, and there he fixed it firmly by means of a hammer, nails, and
holdfasts. We now approached within two hundred yards, and
challenged the competitors two and two, to put _seven_ bullets
successively into the lines of the cross which measured two feet one
way by one the other.
The impatient Mr. Snobleigh fired and missed. 'You keep your head
too high, sir,' said Callum; 'thus, in firing, your line of vision
does not follow the line of the barrel, and yours is rather more than
thirty-six inches in length.'
Clavering fired twice, and twice splintered the edge of the target.
All their other bullets were flattened like lichens on the castle
wall, and he and Snobleigh drew back, muttering something about the
unusual height and range.
Fanny now came forward with her smart rifle, which was decorated by
ribbons, and which Snobleigh had loaded for her; she, and some one
else, fired seven bullets between them, and one only struck the lower
verge of the little target.
'Now, sirs,' said she to Callum and me; 'it is your turn'--but Callum
lowered his rifle and drew back, 'What is the matter, sir?'
'I cannot contend with a lady,' said he, doffing his bonnet, 'and
more than all, with one who is among the fairest in the land.'
'Shoot, shoot, I command you!' said Fanny, while her dark eyes
flashed with girlish triumph at Callum's honest admiration of her
great beauty.
'Your will is a law to me, madam. My chief and I will fire by
turn--he, four balls, and I, three; and here I must give place to
him. Had your hand been as powerful as your eye, Miss Clavering, we
had but little chance of victory to-day.'
'I told you he was a love of a man, Laura,' whispered Fanny to her
friend, the charm of whose presence was for ever in my mind, and I
was fired by an ambition to outshine the perfumed Snobleigh--he who
owned a park and hall in Yorkshire, a house "in town," another in
Paris; a stud at Tattersall's, a yacht at Cowes, a shooting-box on
the Grampians, and a commission in the Foot Guards--while I--what did
I own? only my father's name, with the poor inheritance of Highland
pride, and the dreams of other days.
'We shall see if these boasting Celts can perform this fine feat
themselves,' sneered Mr. Snaggs, as he adjusted his spectacles and
came fussily forward.
'Factor,' whispered Callum in his deep voice, 'the breast of the
villain who thought to outrage my Minnie is smaller than that target,
yet my ball may reach it some day, _on the lone hillside, at a
thousand yards_!'
Snaggs grew pale, as if the death-shot was ringing in his ears. As I
levelled my rifle, the betting began. I fired and placed the ball in
the black line at the very head of the cross. Then Callum stepped
forward.
'Fifty to one, he hits the black line,' said Clavering.
'Aw--done--I take you--cool hundred if you like,' drawled Snobleigh,
betting-book in hand!
'It is done, by Jove; right through the target!'
'Lend me the telescope.'
'I could hit the medal on your breast at half the distance, Captain
Clavering,' said Callum, as he fired again.
'Thank you, my fine fellow; I would rather you found another mark.
Bravo! in the very centre of the cross!' continued Clavering, who was
looking at the target through his telescope.
Then I fired again, and lodged my bullet in the black line, a little
lower down, and so we discharged our seven bullets, planting them all
fairly until the cruciform arrangement was complete, thus--
*
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Then Ewen Oig, wild with excitement, sprang again to the summit of
the tower, wrenched away the target, and it was carried round the
field, with the pipes playing before it, while we, by three hearty
bursts of applause, were hailed the victors of the shooting-butts.
'By Jove,' exclaimed Clavering, 'I wish I could do this!'
'So you might, Captain, easily, if your bullets had been cast in the
same mould.'
'How--what do you mean?'
'In the mould of old Mhari's father, the forester of Coille-tor.'
'The deuce! you don't mean to say they are charmed,' said the
Captain, laughing; 'enchanted--bewitched?'
'Perhaps they are, and perhaps they are not. I say nothing; but I
wounded the white stag with one.'
'Ha, ha, ha! capital--I like this!' exclaimed Clavering.
'Der Freischutz in the North--a second Hans Rudner,' said Laura
Everingham; 'but the prizes are undoubtedly theirs.'
'By Jove, how a few such fellows would have picked off the Russians
from the rifle-pits!'
'And this victor is our quiet-looking Allan Mac Innon,' said Laura,
her eyes beaming with a pleasure that intoxicated me.
'He is a regular trump!' added the Captain, with manly honesty,
although he had been beaten.
'He looks so calm and demure,' continued Miss Everingham, 'no one
would have thought it was--it was----'
'It was in him,' suggested Clavering, squibbing off his rifle; 'why
don't you become a soldier, Mac Innon--there is good stuff in
you--'pon my soul, I like you immensely! don't _you_, Miss
Everingham?'
At this absurd question, Laura coloured to her temples, and grew pale
again.
'Well--aw,' began Mr. Snobleigh, who looked irritated and
discomfited; 'I aw--nevaw saw such shooting certainly--beats
Jerningham of ours, and he as the world knows, was
matched--aw--aw--twenty-five pigeons--aw--against you, Clavering, for
fifty sovereigns a-side; but I'll back these 'Ighland fellows against
all England--aw.'
Now came the most exciting and, to me, humiliating part of the
proceedings--the distribution of the first and second prizes for
shooting.
Though poor, crushed and bruised by biting poverty, I could not,
without an emotion of shame, accept the hundred sovereigns from the
hand of Laura Everingham, and decline the more suitable gift of a
silver cup, which was the alternative, in the case of a gentleman
being the victorious competitor! Now in my inmost heart I felt that
a poor and proud gentleman was the most miserable of all God's
creatures. Clavering's words, 'why don't you become a soldier?' were
ever in my ears; but the thought of my old and dying parent, of whom
I was the only prop and stay, stifled the more fiery energy that rose
within me; and as we drew near the little covered platform, where the
_élite_ of the spectators were grouped around that beautiful but
stony-hearted Duchess, the canting Marquis, the two Countesses, Sir
Horace and others of their privileged order, I felt my spirit sink as
if I was a very slave.
Here also stood Mr. Ephraim Snaggs, bearing on a silver salver two
purses beautifully embroidered. One was by the hands of Miss
Everingham, and contained the hundred sovereigns; the other was by
her friend, and contained the fifty.
While crimsoned by mortification, I heard my name pronounced, and
found myself before Sir Horace, who, as the newspapers said, "in a
choice, neat, and appropriate speech," duly emphasised in the true
Oxford fashion, announced that I was _the_ victor of _the_
shooting-match, and entitled to _the_ first prize--my companion to
_the_ second.
To accept this money seemed to me, educated as I had been by my proud
and haughty mother, the very acme of shame and humiliation; but, at
that bitter moment, I saw her in fancy stretched on her bed of
sickness, wan with illness and with age, and about to be forcibly
evicted at the stern behest of the very donor of this wretched
coin--the curse of men, and cause of all their crime and misery. But
for her sake I would gladly have scattered the money among the poor
Celts who crowded round us, with exultation in their eyes, "that Mac
Innon himself and no Sassenagh," was the victor; but I mastered my
emotion; the Lowlander's proverb, _he yat tholis overcomes_, flashed
upon my memory, and while my cheek burned with a fever heat, I
received the purse from the hand of Laura Everingham, and again her
soft touch gave me a thrill that went straight to my swollen heart.
With all a woman's quickness she divined the source of my emotion,
and said tremulously,
'Mr. Mac Innon, you have, I think, some reluctance in accepting this
prize; if you would prefer the silver cup, I am sure that dear
papa----'
'No, no, madam; a thousand thanks for your generous delicacy;
but--but the money----'
'Will be more acceptable,' added Mr. Snaggs, spitefully. 'We have a
proverb among us in Scotland, my dear Miss Everingham, anent "leaving
a legacy to Mac Gregor." Mr. Mac Innon is a Highlander, and
possesses, I have no doubt, an accurate idea of the value of the
current coin of these kingdoms.'
'Aw--aw,' drawled the vacant Snobleigh, taking his cue from the
factor, and whom I heard though he spoke in a whisper, for my sense
of hearing was painfully acute, 'I always thought this young fellow
wondawfully well behaved for a Scotsman, but aw--aw--with all his
cussed pwide and politeness he has taken your tin, Laura.'
My breast heaved--I felt the fire flashing in my eyes, and I glared
at Snaggs with fury, while the impulse to dirk or shoot him rose
within me.
'Ephraim Snaggs--liar, coward, and hypocrite, utter but another taunt
or jeer, and I will strangle you like the dog you are!' I exclaimed
in a voice so hoarse with passion, that Laura shrunk from me in
terror, while I emptied the hundred sovereigns from the purse into my
right hand, and flung them in a golden shower among the crowd, a
startling and unexpected manoeuvre, which was immediately imitated by
Callum, who tossed his fifty into the air; and thus in a moment we
were as poor and as desperate as when the shooting began.
While the crowd scrambled for the money among the grass, a murmur--a
cry of astonishment had risen, on all sides, and then silence
succeeded.
'What the devil do you mean, fellow, by refusing the money?' asked
Sir Horace, who seemed highly irritated that Callum should presume to
imitate his master.
'Because I did not come here for money.'
'For what then?'
'Honour--like my chief and fosterer Mac Innon.'
'Honour?' reiterated the incredulous baronet, coolly surveying
through his glass the erect figure of the tattered huntsman, from his
bonnet to his brogues. 'Oho, of course you have a pedigree like a
Welshman, beginning with Adam and ending with yourself.'
'In that case it might be no better than your own; but I am come of a
long line of brave men, whose shoes, the son of a Manchester baronet,
rich though he be, is not worthy to tie.'
The claret-reddened cheeks of Sir Horace grew pale at this fierce
hit, while the stately duchess, the two _passé_ countesses, and all
the Highland tabbies of 'good family,' exchanged significant and
self-satisfied smiles. The baronet was about to make an impetuous
rejoinder, when Clavering said,--
'Sir Horace do, I beg of you, respect the feelings of these people,
whose peculiar temper and ideas you cannot understand.'
'Papa, papa!' urged his startled daughter.
'You speak English well--devilish well, indeed, for a Highlander,'
said Sir Horace loftily, gulping down his anger; 'how is this?'
'I am all unused to answer questions that are asked in such tones,
yet I will satisfy you.'
'Do, for never did I meet an ignorant gilly who spoke so proudly to
me.'
'A gilly I am, but _not_ an ignorant one, Sir Horace. Thanks be to
God, and to good Father Hamish Cameron, who now sleeps in his grave
in the Scottish church at Valladolid, I can read and write, and do a
little more. I am thus unlike the poor people round me, who are
oppressed and destroyed, without knowing why and wherefore the land
of their fathers, so dear to their hearts, is made a hunting-field
for the dissipated and the idle of the south country, while they are
driven from starvation to exile--we, the Gael, who since the Union
have led the van of Britain's bloodiest battles. But I know that our
enthusiasm, our traditions, and our ties of clanship seem mere trash
and absurdity to such as you, Sir Horace--a cold-blooded
conventionalist and man of the world. I have learned to be aware
that the game-laws, the loss of the kelp trade, misgovernment, and
centralization are the curses of the Highlands--all this I know,
though I am but a half-lettered gilly! I know a black-hearted
villain when I see one, Mr. Snaggs, and I know a pampered tyrant when
I speak to one, Sir Horace, and so _failte air an duinnewassal!_ let
us go Mac Innon.'
Sir Horace gave us a glance full of spite and anger; he felt that a
peasant had dared to lecture him before a multitude; but now we
marched off with our pipes playing, leaving the crowd of fashionables
staring after us in astonishment, while the more ignoble mob still
hunted for the scattered gold among the grass.
'We have done right and well, Callum Dhu,' said I; 'but think of my
poor mother and of the eviction notices?'
'Your mother--ay, poor lady--there the dirk enters my heart.'
'If moved, she dies.'
'Nothing but the prediction of the Red Priest can save her now,' said
Callum, lowering his voice, 'unless we defend the house by
musket-shot, for if she passes its walls, she will die like the wife
of Angus and your great-grandmother, the wife of Lachlan Mohr.'