The Queer Folk of Fife:
Tales from the Kingdom
BY
DAVID PRYDE, M.A., LL.D.
AUTHOR OF "PLEASANT MEMORIES OF A BUSY LIFE"
"THE HIGHWAYS OF LITERATURE"
"GREAT MEN IN EUROPEAN HISTORY," ETC.
GLASGOW
MORISON BROTHERS
52 RENFIELD STREET
1897
CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION.
Fifty years ago, the little burgh-town of Sandyriggs was a sleepy place. The inhabitants led, what they themselves called, "an easy-osy life." So little stir was there in the life of the small shopkeeper or tradesman, that he might be said to "vegetate." He grew and flourished where he had been born, and among his own schoolmates and his parents' cronies, who still called him by the fond familiar name of his boyhood, "Johnny," or "Jamie," or "Robby," as the case might be. His place of business was part of his home; and during the day he oscillated comfortably between the front shop and the back parlour. There was little competition, and very little anxiety about his trade. His customers were his friends, and he could rely implicitly on their support. It happened, therefore, that even in what he called his busiest time, he had many intervals of leisure during which he was at a loss what to do.
Of a similar complexion was the life of the small farmers who abounded in the neighbourhood. The farmer, or "gudeman," as he was called, toiled, it is true, in the fields by the side of his own servants; but he had little of the endless anxiety of the husbandmen of the present time. In those halcyon days of Protection, he was the especial care of the Lords and Commons of Great Britain and Ireland. They were his guardian angels. What did it matter to him though the drought burned up his turnips, and the drenching rains blackened his barley? The prices rose at once to guard him against loss. Consequently, after his day's "darg," and when he had exchanged his muddy boots for slippers, and taken his "four hours" of tea and buttered scones, he could sit down, snuff-box in hand and free from care, and take his ease by the side of the blazing kitchen fire. Thus the peasantry, like the townsfolk, had their intervals of leisure, during which they were open for any entertainment that might come before them.
Now, the important question came to be, How were these intervals of leisure to be filled up? There were no daily papers, few magazines, and few books to satisfy their craving for knowledge. Their minds were, therefore, obliged to feed upon the gossip of the country side; and so it came about that the gift of story-telling was cultivated, and that there were men and women who were recognised as the chroniclers of the district. These were the public entertainers, and were constantly called upon to use their gifts, especially for the delight of the young.
Two of these chroniclers, a couple of the name of Steedman, I chanced to know. Better samples of "auld-farrant Scotch bodies" could not be imagined. In no other habitat than a quaint burgh like Sandyriggs could they have grown up. For many years they had "gathered gear" in a grocer's "shoppie," and had then retired on a competence. They now lived in a cottage, crooked, grey, and time-worn like themselves. A favourite niece waited upon them, for they preferred, after the patriarchal fashion, to be served by their own kith and kin, and not by the frem'd. Their religion, too, was of the olden type. They were Original Seceders, would not enter an Established Church, travelled miles to attend a Dissenting Chapel, believed every iota of the Bible and the Confession of Faith, kept the Sabbath strictly, abhorred novels as "parcels o' lees," and looked upon food that had not been consecrated by a long grace as absolute poison. Yet their religion, straight-laced though it might be called, did for them what more fashionable religions sometimes fail to do for their adherents. It made them far more cheerful, and far more appreciative of the blessings of life. The snow of winter was on their head, but the warmth of summer was in their heart. A brighter, cantier, and cosier pair could not be seen. They delighted in all their surroundings: their work, their religious exercises, their pipe of tobacco, and their nightly glass of toddy. They were particularly fond of recalling the scenes and incidents of the Past, and as I was an appreciative listener, I was always a welcome guest, and in fact was invited to drop in upon them as often as I could.
As I write, the old couple are before me, one on each side of the hearth—he, in a brown suit with a cloth cap covering his grey hair, and with a most intelligent countenance—she, a tidy little body, with clean-cut features and with coloured ribbons in her cap—he, recalling with unction some bygone event—she, interpolating occasionally to add some little detail to complete the narrative—and both radiant with pleasure, as if the light of other days were warming their hearts and brightening their faces.
"What a blessing," he would say, "is a good memory—one of the most precious gifts of God."
After the fashion of old people, they often repeated the stories which they had told me on former occasions; but I did not object, as I was thus enabled to realise them more thoroughly.
Some of the scenes and incidents which I acquired in this way, I now proceed to give as truthfully and clearly as I can.
After a long dearth of news, an event happened to revive the interest of the gossips of Sandyriggs. That snug, substantial villa, Townhead Lodge, which stood within a garden, large and sloping to the south, had got at last a tenant, a Mr Callendar, whose family consisted of a wife, a son, and two daughters. And what was most interesting, there was a mystery about them all! Where they had come from, what was the source of their income, and why they kept themselves apart, no one knew.
The father drove a gig of his own and was often from home. The mother was a recluse, and rarely ventured beyond her own walls. But the one who attracted the most notice was the elder daughter, who was frequently seen in the streets of the town attended by her brother. She was a mere girl of sixteen or seventeen, but she was exceedingly beautiful. Regarding her special charms, I never could learn much, except that she had a straight and lissome figure, dark hair, clear blue eyes, and a modest and winning expression, and above all that she had a sort of glamour about her which bewitched everyone who looked at her. The family altogether seemed so distinguished, and at the same so mysterious, that the gossips of the town were all agog to know more about them. But how was this knowledge to be got? The newcomers were evidently bent on keeping themselves aloof, and having as little to do as possible with the natives. There was difficulty even in approaching them.
The one who overcame this difficulty was the late minister's sister, Miss MacGuffog, or, as she was familiarly called, "Miss Phemie." During the lifetime of her brother, who was a bachelor, she had taken a motherly interest in all the parishioners, and went out and in among them like a blood relation. After her brother's death, she kept up the practice. Uncharitable people sneered at her as a busybody; but they might have spared their sneers. They might have known that a busybody is not necessarily bad. It was not selfish curiosity, but kindly interest that was her motive. She was not a scandalmonger, but a sympathetic friend. Having a high idea of everything connected with her brother's parish, she was prepared to find good everywhere, and generally found it. As a matter of course, it had been her custom to call upon strangers in order to give them a hearty welcome. In this way she came to know all that was to be known about the Callendars; and as she held it to be selfish and unneighbourly to keep anything to herself, she freely communicated her information to the town gossips who met over afternoon tea.
The information which she had gathered was as follows:—Mr Callendar was a partner in a firm of English merchants who did a large business all over the kingdom, and he had come to Scotland to establish a connection in Fife. Mrs Callendar was somewhat of an invalid, and passed the most of her time in reading. The elder daughter, Phoebe, was evidently the pride of her life. "Isn't she handsome and graceful," the mother had said as she fondly watched her going out of the room, "and would she not look at home in the highest mansion in the land?" It was evident that they expected her to make a great marriage.
Meanwhile Miss Callendar's transcendent loveliness was seriously affecting the male population of the village. What was afterwards called "the Callendar fever" broke out among the bachelors, both old and young. And during their fits of delirium they behaved most absurdly. One began laboriously to train a moustache; another shaved off his beard to show the fine lines of his face; another allowed his hair to grow till it fell in ringlets on his shoulders; while gouty Major Mustard (half-pay) dyed the tuft on his chin, and, looking into his mirror, said, "Begad! I don't think that she can refuse an officer of the British Army."
But the one who had the epidemic in the most aggravated form was Charles Raeburn, the town lawyer, and the laird of the small estate of Cowslip Brae. Charles was nothing if not poetical; and his ravings about Miss Callendar took the form of quotations from his favourite bards. He compared her to Spenser's Una, to Shakespeare's Portia drawing suitors from the four quarters of the world, to Virgil's Venus descending upon earth to fascinate mankind. One day (oh, ecstasy!) she came into his office to make some inquiries for the information of her father; but (oh, horror!) he lost his head, and gave the information in such an incoherent manner that she had some difficulty in understanding him. He wished to appear to her as a man of genius; but he had conducted himself like an idiot. All that he could do after this, was to wander round her house on moonlight nights, like a silly moth (as someone said) fluttering round a wax candle, or like a forlorn planet (as he himself said) circling round a central luminary. At length, his cousin, Dr Raeburn, thought to bring him to his senses by rating him soundly and telling him plainly that he was "carrying on like a lunatic." And, to the doctor's utter astonishment, Charles agreed with him.
"Yes," said the poor fool, "you are quite right. I am a lunatic—a monomaniac. I'm haunted by one idea, one image. It appears in my dreams. It fills my waking hours. Position, friends, relations, are dross compared with her. I would rather have her than the largest estate, than a whole county, than a continent, than a bright new planet all to myself."
But it was in the church on Sunday where the hopeless infatuation of the young men of the town was noticed. During the whole of the service, their eyes were fixed upon this young girl. Her pew was the pulpit, and she herself was both the preacher and the sermon. And one Sunday a strange phenomenon happened. The church, which was dingy and dark even at midsummer, appeared to be lighted up in some mysterious way. How came this to pass? On the previous Sunday, one of the many rivals, in order to attract the eyes of his goddess, had appeared in white waistcoat and white necktie; and all the others had lost no time in following suit.
How did Miss Callendar conduct herself under all this idolatry? Most modestly. When she appeared on the streets with her little brother by her side, she saluted everybody with a good-natured smile. She smiled on Major Mustard, and set his well-worn heart palpitating. She also smiled on Peter Samuel the mercer's apprentice, when coming into the shop unexpectedly she asked to see some gloves; and when Peter shook all over while he was showing her the gloves, and answered confusedly, she smiled still more sweetly.
"Bright as the sun her eyes all gazers strike,
And like the sun they shine on all alike."
One Sunday there appeared in the church a stranger, like a being from another sphere. That he was an aristocrat was evident. He had an elegant figure, clean-cut features, and easy manners; and, as Peter Samuel remarked, "was dressed up to the nines, and looked as if he had come out of a bandbox." In fact, he was a regular London-made exquisite, "a dandy," "a swell." Nor was there any mistake about the object of his visit. All during the service his eyes were fixed on Phoebe Callendar, the village beauty. That evening, too, in the Orchard Lane he was seen walking with her. Her little brother, indeed, was there. But the exquisite, with that ease which high society gives, and which local beaux can never acquire, was looking into her face and talking, while she blushed and held down her head. In a few days she disappeared. Had she eloped? Sandyriggs was in a ferment.
At last Miss Phemie MacGuffog solved the mystery. Miss Callendar's young lover was the heir to a dukedom. Her parents, alarmed at the intimacy, and thoroughly disapproving of it, had sent her to a boarding-school in England; and she was never seen again in Sandyriggs. In a few months the family gave up their house and departed southwards.
The one who was most affected by Miss Callendar's departure was Charles Raeburn. He grew melancholy, lost his appetite and his sleep, and wandered about like a ghost. He was like the traveller, when the moon, which has lightened and beautified his path over hill and dale, suddenly goes down and leaves him to stumble on in the dark. In a short time he vanished; and when months elapsed without bringing any intelligence regarding him, his neighbours gave him up for lost.
A few years passed, and the inhabitants had almost forgotten the Callendars, when they were startled by a short paragraph in the county newspaper, to the effect that Miss Phoebe Callendar was about to bring an action for breach of promise of marriage against the Duke of——. Here was an interesting subject to talk about! A breach of promise against a duke by a former inhabitant of Sandyriggs, a girl whom they all knew! The whole district was in a flutter of excitement. When the trial came on in London, the editor of the County Chronicle employed a special correspondent to give a report of it; and when the newspaper containing the account of the trial arrived, it was devoured with breathless interest, and handed about from house to house.
After describing the appearance of the Court, and naming the famous barristers and attorneys employed on both sides, the reporter went on to say that the plaintiff, seated in a prominent place beside her legal advisers, was "the cynosure of every eye," and her exquisite beauty, and modest but melancholy expression, captivated at once not only the ordinary onlookers, but even the gentlemen of the jury themselves.
"The Attorney-General stated her case with all that romantic and touching eloquence for which he is famous. 'The plaintiff,' he said, 'was a young lady of the greatest personal attractions. When first she drew the attention of the defendant, she was living in retirement at the small town of Sandyriggs in Fife. She was a mere girl, attending to her lessons under the watchful care of her mother, and thinking of nothing but her daily duties and her innocent amusements. She was, indeed, the life of her parents' hearts, the idol of her young companions, and the delight and pride of the whole village. But this golden age was not to last long; into this innocent paradise the serpent was soon to find his way. The defendant, then the Honourable Algernon Colenutt, an Oxford student, happened to be spending his vacation at a mansion in the neighbourhood. He heard of this charming young creature—this beauty of Sandyriggs, as she was called,—and he resolved to see her. It was no mere idle curiosity. He was one of those golden youths who think that everything is made for their amusement, that women especially are but toys that may be played with for a time, and then cast aside for ever.'
"'On a particular Sunday this gay Lothario attended the Sandyriggs church. His presence there was noticed by most of the congregation; and it was particularly remarked that his eyes were upon Miss Callendar during the whole service, and that, in fact, he was completely spellbound. Then in the evening he was seen talking to her in a lane near her own house. He had waylaid her, and it was then, it seems, that he gained her affections. By such a lover—young, handsome, aristocratic, elegant in dress and manners, polished in speech and adroit in flattery—was it surprising that the simple country maiden was won? Ere they parted she plighted her troth to him; and, proud of her conquest, the poor girl lost no time in making her mother her confidante.'
"'Now, Gentlemen of the Jury, you will very likely be told by my learned brother, the counsel for the defence, that Miss Callendar's parents were artful schemers, using every device to entrap an unwary nobleman. But what did they do as soon as they heard of this courtship? They immediately sent their daughter away to a boarding-school in England, and afterwards to France, to be out of the way of this aristocratic wooer. They were too sensible not to see that such a connection would be unequal, and likely to prove dangerous to the happiness of both parties. But their precautions were unavailing. The defendant was not to be denied. He contrived to find out where his beloved was, and to continue the correspondence; and after he had succeeded to the dukedom, and after the Callendars had settled down in England, at Woodhurst, about sixty miles from his ducal castle, his attentions became more assiduous. He visited her at her father's house, and sent many letters,—some of which I now produce,—and all of which are full of the warmest protestations and the most endearing terms of affection. At length the wedding was fixed for July, and Miss Callendar and her mother set themselves to make all the necessary preparations. Up to this time, there had not been the slightest hitch, the slightest misunderstanding, and the happiness of the young couple seemed to be assured. But ere the appointed day arrived, what was the consternation of the Callendars to read in the newspaper the announcement that the Duke of —— had been married to Miss Fortescue Devlin. At first they could not believe the statement; but after inquiry they found that it was only too true. And, Gentlemen of the Jury, I can only leave you to imagine what a disastrous effect this sudden perfidy has had on my client. Her loving heart has been broken, and her fair young life has been for ever blighted.'
"'I believe that my learned brother is to take up the bold and desperate position that these facts are not true, and that the written correspondence is a forgery. What! a young, timid, and unsophisticated girl sitting down deliberately to forge, not one letter, but a whole bundle of letters, and doing it so accurately that she has deceived those who are best acquainted with the defendant's handwriting! Why, Gentlemen, the idea is preposterous, it is inconceivable, it is wholly and absolutely ridiculous!' (Derisive laughter, which was immediately suppressed.)
"The Attorney-General then proceeded to call witnesses in order to prove his statements. The sister of the plaintiff told that she had seen the defendant several times at her father's house, and in the company of her sister, and mentioned one occasion particularly, the 20th of May, which she had good cause to remember, because it was the fair day at the neighbouring village of Woodhurst, and the defendant presented her with a sovereign as a fairing. The mother gave evidence as to the receiving of the defendant's letters, and about her daughter's letters in reply being posted. An old clergyman, who had been the defendant's tutor, swore that the handwriting of the letters was that of his former pupil. These witnesses were severely cross-examined, but their evidence on the whole remained unshaken.
"Then Mr Ridley, the counsel for the Duke, arose. He was famous as a defender of abandoned criminals, and generally as a cunning handler of the most desperate cases. It was no uncommon thing for him to bully witnesses, and browbeat even the judge himself. Everybody, therefore, expected strong statements from him, but few were prepared for the merciless terms which he now used. Standing up, and looking round with a confident, triumphant air, he began his speech. 'The Attorney-General,' he said, 'in referring to the ground which was to be taken up for the defence, had scouted the idea of such a young and delicate creature perpetrating forgery. But my learned friend ought to know that in the history of crime there have been young girls as delicate and as refined as the plaintiff, who have been guilty of this heinous offence. I have only to refer to the cases of Elizabeth Canning and Mary Glen. In spite, therefore, of what the learned Attorney-General has said, I now assert, and am prepared to prove, that the plaintiff, guileless and modest as she looks, has perpetrated one of the most daring and elaborate forgeries in the whole of our criminal history.'
"At this assertion, uttered in a slow, distinct, and severe tone, Miss Callendar burst into tears, and was so completely overcome that she had to leave the Court. Cries of 'Shame, shame,' were hurled at the head of the counsel. But he, nothing abashed, looked round defiantly, and repeated the phrase with greater incisiveness; and went on in the same remorseless way to maintain that his client had scarcely ever seen Miss Callendar, had scarcely ever spoken to her, had scarcely ever written to her, and had certainly never made any promise of marriage. The audience glanced occasionally at the Attorney-General to see what effect this flat denial of all his assertions would have upon him; but he remained quite calm, just as if nothing unusual had been said.
"Mr Ridley then proceeded to examine his witnesses in the same peremptory style; and ever as he drew from them some important bit of evidence, he gave a triumphant look at the jury, as much as to say, 'What do you think of that? Wasn't what I told you true?' One was made to confess that the defendant had never seen Miss Callendar since his accession to the title; another, that the letters which had been read swarmed with ridiculous errors as to matter of fact; and another, that the handwriting was totally unlike that of the defendant. These witnesses were cross-examined, but took care not to contradict themselves. At all this, Miss Callendar's partisans, of whom there were many amongst the audience, were puzzled and even confounded; but an audible whisper, 'they are all relatives, and have got up the story,' restored their confidence. It was evident, too, that the Attorney-General felt that something was wrong; because he turned round to talk with the agent. But the audience was again perplexed by what followed.
"An innkeeper from Welldon, fifty miles from Woodhurst, was put into the box. In answer to examination, he said, 'that he knew the Duke of ——; that on the 20th of May, the day of Woodhurst Fair, and the day when he was said to have been at the house of the plaintiff, the Duke arrived in a post-chaise on his way to Market Bruton; that there could be no mistake about this, for here were the receipts for the post horses.' And these receipts were handed to the jury to examine.
"But the most startling bit of evidence was yet to come. A young lady entered the witness-box, kissed the Book, and was subjected to the following questioning:—(Q.) You are Miss Ironside? (A.) Yes. (Q.) You live at Woodhurst? (A.) I do. (Q.) You know the plaintiff? (A.) I do. (Q.) You remember a ball taking place at Lyndcaster? (A.) I do. (Q.) What was the date? (A.) Last year, in the month of April. (Q.) Who went with you to the ball? (A.) Miss Phoebe Callendar. (Q.) How was she dressed? (A.) In white, with one red rose in her hair. (Q.) Was there any person that she wished particularly to see at the ball? (A.) The Duke of ——. (Q.) How did you know that? (A.) She told me. (Q.) Look at that letter. Do you know the handwriting? (A.) Yes. (Q.) Whose is it? (A.) Miss Callendar's. (Q.) You are sure? (A.) Quite sure. Then Mr Ridley, turning to the jury, said he would read the letter, which was as follows:—
"'April 18.
"'My dear Lord Duke,—I hope that you will excuse a stranger giving you a bit of information which may be for your advantage. You are, I understand, going to the public ball at Lyndcaster. Well, you will see there a young lady to whom you lost your heart some years ago, and who has remained constant to you ever since. She is more graceful and beautiful than ever, and fit to be the bride of a prince. You will recognise her at once, for she will be dressed in white, with a red rose stuck in her raven hair.—I am, my dear Lord Duke, your sincere well-wisher.
C'
"This letter fell upon the audience like a bombshell, and created the greatest excitement and consternation. But it was evident from the whispers of 'got up,' and 'bribed by the relations,' that the audience had not even yet given up Miss Callendar. And they were very much relieved when they saw the Attorney-General rise. He was evidently going to put a stop to this wholesale slander and forgery. Alas, however, for their hopes! Instead of hearing him expose the evidence that was being given, they heard him make an admission that has very seldom been made in a court of law. In a perfectly calm voice and manner he said that this letter had come upon them as a surprise, that they had neither the time nor the means of throwing any light upon it, and that, therefore, with the concurrence of his learned friends, the attorneys for the plaintiff, he now begged leave to withdraw from the contest. Under these circumstances the plaintiff would be non-suited. Accordingly the case was dismissed; the letter was impounded in order that Miss Callendar might be indicted for conspiracy; and the audience dispersed amid murmurs of astonishment. But it was noted that while the elder members of the crowd muttered their detestation of Miss Callendar's shameless forgery, the young men were louder than ever in their admiration."
"What a fascinating girl she must be," said one, "to be able to take in the sharpest attorneys and the most learned counsel at the bar! what a clever little witch!"
"By Jove," cried another, in a strong Irish accent, "she's too good for a duke's wife. She ought to be a queen. She is a queen, the queen of love and beauty, and should be classed with Helen of Troy, Cleopatra, and Mary Queen of Scots; and, bedad, it's meself that should loike to be Paris or Antony or Bothwell."
Next morning a note appeared in one of the London newspapers stating that Miss Callendar had been apprehended on a charge of forgery; but it was not true. She had vanished, and no one knew where she was.
Imagine the excitement now in Sandyriggs after this report had been read! The town became a fermenting vat of scandal. Whispers swarmed as fast as gnats in August, and, like gnats, they flew abroad and buzzed in the ears of the public. The case was discussed at every shop-counter, at every tea-table, at every street corner, in every public-house, on every turnip field. People who had never spoken to each other before, exclaimed as they passed each other, "Isn't this a dreadful affair?" And it was astonishing to find that everyone had foreseen, nay, had hinted such a catastrophe. So many people pose as true prophets after the fact!
Even Miss Phemie MacGuffog was forced to forego her usual charitable views, and to confess that the poor unfortunate girl had been ruined by her training. Every circumstance, she said, was against her. Her father was a worldly man, engrossed with money-making, and seldom at home. Her mother, a silly woman, was abandoned to romance reading, and neglected her everyday duties, and lived in a world of unreality. The poor girl herself got no solid education. She had no need, her mother told her, to be clever or accomplished. She was lovely, which was far better, and would undoubtedly make a grand match and be a titled lady. To look handsome, and graceful, and fascinating, therefore, was all that she required to do. And the despatching of her to a boarding-school, and then to the Continent, in order to escape her aristocratic admirer, was a mere device. She was sent to a boarding establishment near Oxford because he was a student there, and she afterwards went to France to continue her education because he had gone there. And Miss Phemie was told that the education which she received at both these places was of the flimsiest kind, being limited to the singing of one or two songs, the hammering out on the piano of one or two classical pieces, and the copying of one or two drawings. The most of the pupils' time and attention was devoted to talking about fine dresses, equipages, balls, and aristocratic admirers. "In fact," concluded Miss Phemie, "they were evidently taught to look upon the world, not as a sphere of duty and labour, but as a big cookie shine."
The worthy people of Sandyriggs were still discussing this strange catastrophe, when a new surprise claimed their notice. Intelligence came regarding the long-lost Charles Raeburn. His cousin, the doctor, received a letter from him, bearing the postmark of a town in Spain, and empowering him to sell Cowslip Brae and transmit the price. Before the gossips had ceased to puzzle their brains over this extraordinary sacrifice, another letter arrived and explained the whole mystery. In the frankest and most straight-forward language, Charles Raeburn told his cousin the following romantic tale:—
"I felt that I could not remain in Sandyriggs after the object of my adoration had gone. So I followed her to Oxford and to France, and back again to England, and was present at the trial. From my professional experience I very soon saw how judgment was likely to go, and what a terrible fate was hanging over the head of the unfortunate girl. So, when stung by Ridley's merciless language, she left the Court abruptly, I followed her, and in presence of her mother told her that the verdict was almost certain to be against her, and that, if it were so, she would be apprehended for forgery. While she stood aghast and dumb at this intelligence, I offered my assistance, and they accepted it. I went with them at once to their hotel, paid their bill, packed their luggage, and had everything ready for flight. As soon as the result which I had anticipated was announced, we were off, and by next morning were on the Continent. I took rooms for them in this town, and a lodging for myself not far off, and here we remained till we could see what ought to be done.
"One morning, Miss Callendar sent to say that she wanted to see me. When I went to her, she told me with tears in her lovely eyes that her mother must go back to her husband in England, but that she herself must remain abroad; and what could she do to earn her bread? Would I, the only friend she now had, advise her? What could I do but offer, as her husband, to protect and cherish her for the rest of her life. She started back in horror, declared that she was a criminal, a felon, a forger who ought to be in prison, and utterly unworthy to be the wife of an honest man, and that she would not bring disgrace on one whom she esteemed so much, whom—and here she gave way and cried most bitterly. Then there flashed through my brain and heart Spenser's exquisite lines:—
"'Nought is there under heav'n's wide hollownesse
That moves more deare compassion of mind
Than beautie brought t' unworthy wretchednesse
Through envy's snares, or fortune's freaks unkind.
I, whether lately through her brightnesse blind,
Or through alleageance and fast fealtie,
Which I do owe unto all womankind,
Feele my hart perst with so great agony,
When such I see, that all for pity I could die.'
"These were the very feelings that were thrilling through me. I lost control of myself. Dropping down on my knees and seizing her hand, I poured out my whole soul. What I said I cannot recall; but at last she reluctantly consented to marry me, on condition that I would do my very best to teach her to be a good woman and a dutiful wife. Poor broken-hearted darling, she was more sinned against than sinning. The persons really to blame were her mercenary father and her novel-reading mother, who neglected her education, and that hollow-hearted aristocrat who trifled with her innocence. And most touching it is to see how humble and yet how loving she is, and how her face is still 'combating with tears and smiles.' If she is not to be forgiven, there can be no such thing as forgiveness on earth. I am sure that I have done what is right. Away from her, I would have been in outer darkness. Beside her, I am in Paradise."
The narrative which I am about to give was a prime favourite at the winter firesides of the parish. Its chief incident is so extraordinary, that it has often been scouted as an improbability. But it is literally true, as may be ascertained by those who will take the trouble to investigate the chronicles of the period.
In the early years of the present century, the principal baker in Sandyriggs was Alister Gow. He had one son, Donald, and five daughters. The four elder girls, Flora, Ellen, Marjory, and Nora, were good-looking, with bright complexions and red cheeks; the youngest, Mysie, was plain, with irregular features and dingy colour. The four soon found husbands, thriving tradesmen in the place, who gave them what was called "a good setting down"; but no one came to court Mysie, and she remained at home to attend to the comfort of her parents, and specially to take charge of the shop.
"And when are you gaun aff, Mysie," said old Wull Spears, the most impudent man in the parish, "when are you gaun to be knocked doon to the highest bidder?"
"Oh!" said Mysie, in the bright manner peculiar to her, "I'm no in the market; there's nae demand for gudes like me."
"I wadna wonder," continued Wull, "that ye're gaun to be an auld maid."
"And what for no?" replied Mysie. "Maids, like Scotch whisky, improve by growin' auld."
The years rolled by and brought changes. While Mysie's married sisters, harassed by the ceaseless worries of housekeeping and child-rearing, became more and more careworn, Mysie herself, able and willing for all her duties, grew cantier and cantier every day. While they began to lose their good looks, she began to lose her plainness. The truth is, that she was, though probably she did not know it, a practical philosopher; and in a business-like manner she weighed the advantages and disadvantages of her lot.
"What have I kept," she said to herself, "by remaining single? Good health, good spirits, home comforts, congenial employment, pleasant friends and neighbours. And what have I lost? A husband! And what is a husband? A pig in a poke, a lottery ticket that may take a prize but is far more likely to get a blank. If I'm not happy now, I never deserve to be."
So she resolved to keep a contented mind, to dwell on the blessings she had, and not on those which she had not, to make the most of her life, and to find something good in everything. She was cheerful under all circumstances, and had a smile and a kind word for all her fellow-creatures. As the old people expressed it, "she was everybody's body." However dull and cheerless the weather might be in the streets of the town, there was always sunshine in the baker's shop at the corner of Water Lane. And this genial, kindly disposition soon began to tell upon her own appearance. It actually cleared her complexion, brightened her eyes, and made her look (as an old woman remarked) "halesome, wicelike, and bonny." She became a walking proof of the truth of the proverb that "a kindly disposition is the best cosmetic." And thus it happened, that not only old people and children were attracted by her, but even wooers; and among them came (wonderful to relate) the dandy draper, the woman-killer, the gay Lothario of the town.
This was Bob Dallas. The worship of his mother and sisters had convinced him that he was an Adonis; and the bright smiles of the village maidens had confirmed this belief. "A' the lasses," his sisters would remark to a friend, "are in love wi' oor Bob;" and his mother, in her strong idiomatic Scotch, would add—"Toots, ye ken, they'll no lie aff 'im." Accordingly, he wore on his countenance a constant smirk of satisfaction, and he entered a company as if to the tune, "See the Conquering Hero comes." He sought female society to captivate, not to sue, to receive admiration, not to give it. A pretty girl was a plaything to be taken up for a short time, and then changed for something else. Some people called this conduct cruelty; but he thought it kindness. A smile from him, he believed, was a favour which every woman would prize.
It was this notorious flirt that now fixed his eye upon Mysie. She was different from the pink-and-white damsels with whom he had been accustomed to trifle; but it was this very difference that fascinated him. He began to "show her attention" at every opportunity, to walk home with her from church, and to go frequently to her shop in the evening. At first, Mysie was surprised and not a little amused. She joked with him, telling him that if he was often seen with her his many admirers would hate her, and, what would be more dreadful, his reputation as a judge of female beauty would be gone. And when, one evening after the shop was closed, he actually went the length of asking her to be his wife, she laughed outright in his face, and told him that he didn't know his own mind, that he would tire of her plain features in a fortnight, and that she could never be any more to him than a sincere well-wisher.
But when, like a spoilt child unaccustomed to be balked, he sulked and mooned about the streets with a pale and miserable face, and at the end of a few weeks sent her a frenzied letter, vowing that if he could not win her he would drown himself in the loch, she relented. She was too charitable to believe that he was not in dead earnest, and what could she do but ask him to call upon her? And when, dropping on his knees, he shed tears and vowed that she was the only one he had ever loved, the only one he would ever love, she yielded and promised to be his wife.
Mysie was now happier than ever. Though she had been quite content to remain single, she was delighted to have gained the exclusive devotion of a man. Though well able by herself to fight the battle of life, she felt that her happiness would be made more sure by having constantly by her side one whom she could call her own, her other self. There was also a special éclat in having won the prize which so many had in vain competed for.
"My certie," said Mrs Patullo, the minister's wife, when she looked in at the shop, along with her husband and her son Tom, to congratulate her, "my certie! it's something to have killed the Lady-killer."
"Yes! Mysie," said the minister, "you have caught and tamed the roving zebra of the desert, who has hitherto been thought untamable."
"Ay," added Master Tom, who had contracted the abominable habit of punning, "and you are now going to lead him to the halter."
Mysie set about preparing for her marriage in a business-like way. Very little time was spent in billing and cooing. An early day was fixed for the ceremony. A small house was taken, and suitable furniture ordered. And that she might have her trousseau ready in time, she called in her cousin, Bessie Gayley, to assist her. Bessie was a good-looking, bright damsel, ready with her tongue, with her wits, and with her hands,—up to anything, equal to any emergency. She made herself generally useful and agreeable, helped in the house and in the shop, and when Mysie was specially occupied of an evening, entertained Bob with her chit-chat.
It was just two days before the date fixed for the wedding. Mysie had closed the shop, and was sitting in the back parlour. She was alone, for her father and mother were in the kitchen, and Bessie and Bob had gone out on some errand of their own. She felt rather depressed,—a state which was very unusual with her, and which she could not account for. In a short time she heard Bob and Bessie come in. Then there occurred a few awful moments which she never forgot for the rest of her life, and which made her heart throb. First, there was an earnest whispering in the passage, then a strange silence, and at last the door opened. She rose instinctively to her feet, for she saw by their faces that some calamity had happened.
"What is it?" she exclaimed. "Why don't you tell me?"
Bessie looked at Bob as if urging him to speak, and Bob, blushing and stammering, said, "I'm very sorry, Mysie; but I can't help it. I like you very much, but I don't feel towards you as a husband should do. The fact is that Bessie and I have discovered that we were made for each other."
Mysie stared at them for a moment, thinking that it might possibly be a joke; but their guilty looks showed that it was a stern reality. Clutching the back of her chair, and mustering all her natural strength of character, she said, in a voice preternaturally calm:
"So, Mr Dallas, you have found out that you can't give me the affection of a husband! Well, I'll manage to do without it; and at any rate I'm glad that you have told me in time. As for you, you serpent in the form of a woman, I'll leave you to the punishment of your own conscience. And if you have not got such an article, as seems very likely, it will be punishment enough to be tethered for life to that fickle fool that stands beside you." So saying, she passed out of the room, leaving the pair standing with guilt-stricken countenances.
It is well known that the lower animals often attack and even torment one of their own kind when he is sick or wounded. A good deal of this bestial habit still lingers among men. When distress falls upon us, our friends often aggravate that distress. They do not know, perhaps, that they are doing it, but still they do it. Had Mysie been left to herself, her own good sense and courage would have buoyed her up, and enabled her to trample her sorrow under foot. But when she went abroad, people would not allow her to forget that sorrow. Those who were her friends condoled with her. Those who were not her friends stared at her. She felt that the town was in a buzz about her affairs. And at home the tormenting process was even worse. Her mother bemoaned the slight that had fallen on the family. Her brother breathed forth threatenings against the features and limbs of the culprit. Her father talked incessantly about raising an action for breach of promise. In vain she told her mother and brother that they would best keep up the family honour, not by bewailings and threatenings, but by looking as if they thought the rupture of the engagement a blessed release. In vain she told her father that legal proceedings were not to be thought of, and that while they might be a punishment to Dallas, they would be a far greater punishment to herself. Morning, noon, and night, the worrying went on.
At length her highly-strung nervous system, which had buoyed her up above all her other troubles, fairly broke down. She lost the power of sleeping. She lost her appetite. A strange nausea took possession of her, and everything grew distasteful, and life itself became an intolerable burden. From having been the embodiment of happy good-nature, she changed into a woe-begone hypochondriac. And people unknowingly aggravated her disease by expressing astonishment at her altered appearance, by telling her that she looked very ill, and by bursting forth afresh into recriminations against the man that had jilted her. Then there came a morning when her room was found empty, and a note upon the dressing-table told her parents that she could bear the atmosphere of Sandyriggs no longer, and that she was off to a place where no one knew her, and where she would have perfect peace.
Blank consternation fell upon the family. When they recovered a little, the brother swore that he would go and smash Dallas, the author of all their woe; and the mother's impulse was to run abroad and get sympathy and advice from her neighbours. But the father, with far more tact and knowledge of the world, insisted that the first thing to be done at all hazards, was to prevent any scandal. They must not of their own accord say anything about the matter, and if any question should be asked, they must answer that she had gone to a friend's for a complete rest. Meanwhile they must try to find her.
This was no easy task. The very fact that they could not talk about it prevented them from getting any assistance from the outside world. For two or three days the brother, Donald, under pretence of paying ceremonious calls, made the round of all their intimate friends and relatives in the neighbouring farm towns and villages; but every night he returned worn-out, and with a despairing shake of the head intimated that he had got no trace of the lost one.
Then there flashed into the father's mind the thought that she would likely be in Edinburgh; and he wondered that it had never occurred to him before. Why, a large town was the very place where a person, sick of being stared at and worried by inquisitive neighbours, would find rest; and they had a cousin there in whose house she would very likely get a lodging. Accordingly, the father and son set out at once, crossed the Firth in the ferry-boat from Pettycur to Leith, and then walked up Leith Walk to Edinburgh. They went to the cousin's address in Broughton Street, but found that she had moved at the last term, and none of the neighbours could tell where she had gone. Wearied out and disheartened, they put up at a hotel at Greenside, where they both passed an anxious and a restless night.
Next morning, for want of a better plan, they resolved to look for Mysie in the thoroughfares, the father taking the New Town and the brother taking the Old Town. The unhappy old man spent most of the day in wandering up and down the streets, looking in vain amid the throng of strange and unsympathetic faces for those familiar kindly eyes that had been the light of his home. Jaded and perplexed, he had returned to his hotel in the early afternoon, when the landlord, whom he had taken into his confidence the night before, laid the advertisement sheet of a newspaper before him, and pointed to a paragraph headed "Found Drowned." He glanced rapidly over it, and to his horror saw that it was a description of his lost daughter. There could be no mistake. The age, the complexion, the features, the hair, all corresponded.
Like one stunned by a heavy blow on the head, the old man sat still for a moment. Then, driven by a feeling made up of hope and fear, he hurried to the police office in the High Street, all unconscious of the traffic that rumbled and buzzed around him. In a short time he found himself in the death-chamber, in presence of a prostrate and shrouded form, lying so terribly still and quiet; and in another second the facecloth was removed, and his worst fears were realised. Yes! in the stiff waxen mask he recognised that countenance which had so lately been the joy of everyone who looked upon it. He stood gazing at it like a man in a trance, till his pent-up feelings found vent in tears. Then it was that there occurred a most extraordinary circumstance—what would be deemed incredible, were it not vouched for by the chroniclers of the time. The door opened, and, in company with his son, there appeared the very woman whose fate he was bewailing and whose dead form he was gazing upon. She came forward, and her face took on a look of intense surprise at what she saw.
"Father!" she exclaimed, "what's wrang wi' ye? And what's this? mercy! what's this? can it be me? No! and yet it's awfu' like, but, no! no! Father, that's no' me! this is me." And she took both his hands and kissed him, and in this way convinced him that she was his own daughter.
And who was this dead woman that was Mysie's double? The question was never answered. She went to a pauper's grave unclaimed by anyone.
And how had Mysie chanced to arrive just at the critical moment? This was explained by the brother. On returning to the hotel, Donald had seen the advertisement, and had surmised where his father had gone. Hurrying up the North Bridge, he saw his sister, whom he had been picturing as a corpse lying at the police office, coming to meet him in her usual dress and manner. For an instant he felt like one in a dream. Could it really be she? His next thought was that she had been in some way brought back to life, and was hurrying down to relieve their fears; and when he heard that she had never been in the police office, he told her about the advertisement, and the two together made all haste to see their father.
Mysie stood for some time gazing at the dead face, and feeling for that poor young creature, who was so like her, a sort of kinship. And as she gazed, she read herself a severe lesson. What was her own trouble, she thought, contrasted with the terrible fate that had befallen this unknown one? A small trouble indeed! To be cast off by a man who had proved himself unworthy of her! Not a trouble at all, but a blessed relief! And as these thoughts passed through her mind, her spirit rose with a sudden impulse and threw off the incubus of melancholy that had so long weighed it down; and she came away, leaving, as it were, her dead self behind her. And when, after staying for a month with her cousin, till the sensation caused by "the wonderful case of mistaken identity" subsided, she returned home and resumed her duties, she had recovered her health and good spirits. Taking her place in the shop, she devoted herself to the helping of her parents and the serving of their customers. And when any of the more inveterate gossips referred to her late painful experiences, she would stop them short with a good-natured smile, and the remark—"that's an auld sang noo, and it's no' worth the mindin'." Everybody was delighted to see that she was her old self again.
"Why," said old Mrs Raeburn, the doctor's mother, "the toon wasna like itsel withoot ye."
One day the Rev. Mr Patullo, with his wife and son, called in, to welcome her on her return. "You see," said the minister, "I could not want you, Mysie. You are my best specimen of a cheerful practical Christian. You are as good as a sermon."
"My certie," said Mrs Patullo, "far more interesting than the most of sermons."
"Though rather floury," added Tom, pointing to her hands.
But the best proof that Mysie's good-natured equanimity was restored, was her treatment of her faithless lover, Bob Dallas. His scandalous treatment of her had brought him into disgrace. Many of his friends had cut his acquaintance. Even his betrothed, Bessie Gayley, ashamed of herself and ashamed of him, had refused in the end to marry him. He was now completely humiliated, and when he met Mysie in the street soon after her return, he could not look her in the face. But Mysie was too good-natured and sensible to keep up any ill-feeling towards this weak creature. So, the next time that she saw him she said, "Good morning"; and by and by she got into the habit of stopping to have a chat with him. At the same time, she took care to keep his familiarity within proper bounds. When, encouraged by her frankness and deluded by his own conceit, he imagined that she was still in love with him, and actually had the infatuation to refer to past times, she caught him up at once.
"Mr Dallas! remember we are friends, nothing more. And as a friend let me give you this advice: Don't think of marrying in this country. One wife would not be enough for you. Go out to the Salt Lake City, and there, as soon as you are tired of one spouse, you will be able to take another. Or perhaps, you as well as myself are doomed to remain single. I am too ugly to be married; you are too good-looking. It would be selfish in anyone to monopolise a man who gives so much pleasure to all the girls in the place."
At the end of many years, Bob Dallas and Mysie Gow were respectively an old bachelor and an old maid.
Bob winced keenly under the marring finger of Time, and, by means of wig, paint, powder, and a jaunty manner, tried to hide its ravages and to make the people believe that he was still young. He did not convince the people; but it is said that, sometimes at least, he managed to convince himself. On one occasion, while talking about his infant nephew, he said, "he's a fine little fellow," and running his fingers through his luxuriant artificial locks, he added, "with a head of hair as thick and as black as my own." Consequently he was seen at every gay gathering, bearing himself like an Adonis, and paying assiduous attention to the young ladies; and when they, fooling him to the top of his bent, gathered round him and bandied compliments with him, he put on a youthful air and silently congratulated himself that he was still "Bob Dallas, the Invincible."
"An auld donnert eediot," said the indignant Mrs Chatteris, the town-clerk's widow, "deckin' himsel up like an antic for the lasses to giggle at."
"You're too hard upon him," said her son Joe. "He's more useful than that. He's an old battered figurehead, used by the girls as a butt for practising their arrows on."
Mysie, on the other hand, received the first touches of age in the most cheerful spirit, and wore her grey hair like a becoming ornament, and made her wrinkles shine with good humour; and, as her years grew fewer, she tried more and more to fill them, with grateful feelings towards her Maker and kind words and deeds towards her fellow-creatures.
Many years ago a new class of preachers started suddenly up in the country. They were called the sensational school, and were not unlike a certain section of the clergy in the present day. Their motto seemed to be: "Catch the public, by dignified means if you can, but by all means catch the public." Their rules for doing this were these: "Choose as the subject of your sermon some prevalent vice; denounce it in the plainest and strongest language; threaten those who practise it, or even encourage it, with all the misery of this world and all the eternal woes of the next; draw your illustrations hot from ordinary life; if they are vulgar or grotesque, and excite a titter, never mind; one great end is gained if by any means they arouse the interest of the audience."
The most promising member of this school was the Rev. Jeremiah MacGuffog, the new parish minister at Sandyriggs. He took the most solemn view of his office. He was placed there, he felt, as an ambassador of the Most High to denounce the iniquities that were lifting their heads on every side. It was no time for smooth words. Like the martyred prophets and reformers of old, he must boldly face the transgressors, tell them of their sins in the most direct language, and warn them of the terrible doom that awaits them.
While he was a student in Glasgow, he had often heard that the most productive root of immorality in the rural districts was the Bothy System. Everyone seemed to condemn it, and not one word had been said in its defence. It was clearly his duty, therefore, to strike it down without delay. Accordingly, one Sunday not long after his settlement, he wound up his afternoon sermon with a most merciless attack upon the farmers.
"The farmers," he said, "are a most respectable class of men, and I am deeply grieved to be compelled to say anything to wound their feelings; but I am here to tell them that they are responsible for what I call the running sore, which is draining the life-blood of morality and religion in the rural districts. I refer to the Bothy System. You, my brethren, are really treating your fellow-men like your cattle. You lodge them in a dirty and uncomfortable outhouse, and leave them there to corrupt each other. Did I say that you treated them like your cattle? I should have said worse than your cattle. For you do not prepare food for them, you do not tie them up, you do not lock them in and prevent them from roaming abroad at night and falling into mischief. I am sorry that I am obliged to use strong language, but in the faithful discharge of my duty I am called upon to say that these bothies are nurseries of the infernal pit, and that you who keep them up are, though you may not know it, really serving the devil."
It would be impossible to describe the volcano of feeling which this onslaught roused within the souls of the farming population. They could scarcely keep their seats till the service was over; then, when they went out of church and took their way homewards in the grey winter dusk, the turmoil within them was almost too strong for expression; and for a time they could only vent it in such explosive epithets, as "nurseries o' the infernal pit!" "servants o' the deevil!" "ill-tongued cratur!" "empty-headed puppy!" "set him up!" "my certie!" But by the time they reached the foot of the Long Dykes, where the road divided into three, a group of them, both men and women, stood still to compare notes.
"Sic a desecration o' the poopit!" said Mrs Dowie of Seggie Den; "instead o' preachin' the gospel, misca'in honest folk."
"Eh, woman!" exclaimed Mrs Caw of Blawearie, "ye may say that. Him to turn up his nose at bothies, that was brocht up, they tell me, in a one-roomed hoose in the wynds o' Glesky. My word, it doesna set a soo to wear a saddle."
"Low-born smaik," said Mrs Proud of the Hill, "to scandaleese his betters!"
"I dinna ken," said Tam Bluff of Cuddiesknowes, "what they teach them at college, but it's evidently no' mainners."
"Settin' servants against their maisters," said Stables, the horse doctor, a Tory of the old school.
"What could ye expect," asked Ure, the innkeeper at Blawearie Yetts, "from a teetotaller? Did ye hear hoo he blackguarded onybody that had onything to dae wi' makin' or sellin' an honest drap o' drink. Haith! it's my opinion that when the Maister comes to the warld a second time, they'll steek in His face the door o' His ain kirk, because He ance turned water into wine."
Then Manson of the Hole, who had been standing by, red with rage, now began to splutter forth his resentment. He was a cantankerous old bachelor, greedy, miserly, and wealthy. If any bothy in the neighbourhood deserved to be tabooed, it was his. That was the reason for his feeling the most aggrieved. "By the Lord Hairy," he said, "I'll astonish the dirty cratur. I'll hae a ring in his nose before he's a week aulder. I'll ceet him before the Presbytery, and if that wunna dae, before the Synod and the General Assembly; and if I canna get Justice there, I'll gang to the Law. Don't ye think I'm richt, Gilbert Strang?"
The man who was thus addressed, and who now came up, was evidently somewhat inferior in station to the rest of the group. In fact, at first sight he looked shabby. His hat was weather-stained, his clothes were threadbare and even darned in some places, and his boots were rough and clumsy. But his well-developed figure, his clean-cut and healthy features, and his big blue eyes, gave him, in spite of his mean apparel, a look of superiority. Nay, the neat patches on his coat seemed, in some odd way, to be badges of respectability. He was the son of a small laird; but his father had recently died, a heartbroken bankrupt; the property had been sold; he had been left the sole support of his widowed mother, and had been obliged to hire himself out as an ordinary ploughman; and it was understood that he was now pinching himself to save money, in order, if possible, to redeem the little family inheritance.
Gilbert Strang, in fact, was one of those hardy human plants that can grow and flourish mentally and morally in any soil. He had been but a few years under the village teacher. The school in which he had learnt most was the world, where the lessons are undoubtedly very difficult, but, if once mastered, are most salutary. In the few books which he had, in the weekly sermons to which he listened, in the ever-varying shows of earth and sky, and in the rustic gatherings and merrymakings, he got abundant food both for mind and heart. Then, during the long quiet days when he was guiding the plough in the meadow, he found a favourite opportunity for thinking over what he had seen and read, and for forming his notions of men and things. In this way, he had made up his mind on most of the subjects that crop up in rural life, and was able to express his views, not only in the broad vernacular, but also, when occasion called, in good English. Altogether, he was a fair specimen of a man of Nature's own training, or what pious people used to call "one of God Almighty's own scholars."
"Don't you think I wad be richt, Gilbert Strang, to ceet him before the Presbytery, and if I canna get redress there to try the Law?"
"Ye wad be just playin' into his haunds, Mr Manson."
"In what way, Gilbert?"
"Ye wad mak him staund oot before the public as a martyr, and that's what a' thae kind want to be. What I would advise wad be, to gie him rope."
"What dae ye mean, Gilbert?"
"He kens the bothies only by hearsay; and he has spoken a lot o' nonsense aboot them. Let him alane. He'll gang deeper and deeper into the mess. Then he'll find himsel in a habble and be obleeged to apologeese."
"Apologeese!" cried Manson, "catch a minister apologeese! Dod man! they're never wrang. At the time o' the Reformation, they jist shifted the doctrine o' infallibility from the Pope's shouthers on to their ain; and now, instead o' ane, we hae thousands o' Popes."
"That may be," replied Strang, "only ca' canny. Look before ye loup. Mind the proverb, 'Haste maks waste.'"
"Dod that's true," replied Manson. "But eh man! I wad gie a gude roond sum to see the gabbie body obleeged to tak back and swallow a' the nonsense he's been talkin'."
"Weel!" said Gilbert, "ye'll soon see it."
Two days after this conversation on the road, winter weather had come, in all its severity. It was seven o'clock at night. Outside the farm-house of Pitlour, the cold round moon looked down upon snow-clad roofs and stacks, icicles hanging from the eaves, the pump in the barnyard sheathed in straw, and the ploughs hard bound in the meadow by the frost. But inside in the bothy, which was attached to the house, all was bright and warm. A fire made of wood and coals blazed in the chimney; an old-fashioned oil lamp called a cruisie, hung from the mantelpiece; and the combined light of these two fell upon three well-fed, well-conditioned, rustic faces. On one side of the chimney was Gilbert Strang, deeply interested in the weekly newspaper; on the other side was his fellow-ploughman, Sandy Downie, laboriously scraping out of his fiddle the tune of "Auld Lang Syne"; and in front of the blaze was Jim Lochty, the cattle boy, with a copy of Burns in his hand, crooning over the words of a familiar song. In the background, two bedsteads made of rough wood, but with white pillows and sheets, looked snug and comfortable. The occupants were interrupted by a knock at the door, and who should walk in but the Rev. Jeremiah MacGuffog. He apologised for what might be called "a surprise visit." But he said he held the opinion that the minister was the friend of everyone in the parish, and that he should be able to drop in upon his parishioners unceremoniously at any time, and take them as he found them. Strang said that they were glad to see him, and asked him to take a seat.
Sitting down and scanning the place carefully, the minister said: "You heard from my sermon on Sabbath that I am deeply interested in the bothy question; and I want to be thoroughly acquainted with it."
Strang smiled and said to himself: "Jeddart Justice. He condemned and executed us on Sunday, and now he is going to try us."
"I must confess," said the minister, "that I am surprised to see your place look so tidy and comfortable. You heard, I suppose, that I was coming."
"No," said Strang. "The good wife, Mrs Wedderspoon, looks upon this as part of her own house, and is just as particular about it as she is about the rooms where her two sons sleep. No place could be cleaner or more comfortable."
"But your food?" asked the minister. "Is it not rather coarse?"
"Well, sir!" replied Strang, "it would be coarse to the like of you. But for hard working, healthy, country folk, out in the open air, could anything be better than well-boiled porridge and sweet milk for breakfast and supper, and kail and meat and potatoes for dinner? And looking at us, you would say that our food agrees with us."
"Then," said the minister, after a thoughtful pause, "I am sorry to see that you have no means of improving your mind. You seem to have no books."
"Oh yes," said Strang, opening the door of a cupboard, "we have a few. Look! here are Brown's 'Dictionary of the Bible,' 'Shakespeare,' some of Sir Walter Scott's works; and Jim has 'Burns' in his hand. Anyone who masters all these is better educated than most people."
"I'm surprised," remarked the minister gravely, "that you read 'Burns.' He has some very objectionable passages."
"He's a mixture of good and bad," replied Strang, "just like every other author. If we read no author that is not absolutely pure, we shall read none at all. He's a poor creature that can't pick out the good and throw away the bad."
"I suppose," remarked the minister, "that there is a good deal of whisky consumed here sometimes?"
"For months," said Strang, "we never taste it."
"When you see," said the minister, "so many of your fellow-creatures abuse it, why not set them a good example and abstain from it altogether?"
"Well, sir," replied Strang, "I've thought of that, and I have also thought that if I were to abstain from everything that is abused, I would soon, like the Irishman's horse, come to the last straw and die of starvation."
"Of course," said the minister, "you have none of the salutary influences of a home?"
"Oh yes, sir," answered Strang, "we go down to the kitchen every night, and have a crack and snuff with the goodman, a gossip with the goodwife, and a game at 'catch the ten' with the sons, and finish up with family worship. To all intents and purposes we are members of the family."
"I am told," said the minister, "that there is a good deal of loose talk in bothies, and that one bad man often corrupts the whole lot."
"I fear, sir," replied Strang, "that that's the fault, not of bothies, but of human nature itself. In almost every company objectionable persons will be found. They are to be met with in the most select society, and even, I am told, in the rooms of divinity students. You'll correct me if I am wrong. There was Mr Joram's son of Kilbaigie, a divinity student, rusticated last year for being tipsy and uproarious at a gathering in his own lodgings."
Then after a little, Mr MacGuffog said—"this bothy of yours seems to be an exception. Is it not?"
"No," said Strang, "all in this neighbourhood are very much alike."
"Then I'm afraid," said the minister, looking very uncomfortable, "I've done the farmers injustice."
"Indeed you have, sir," replied Strang earnestly, "and they feel it very keenly. The country folk are talking of leaving your church in a body. 'Nurseries of hell' and 'servants of the devil' are uncommonly strong terms."
"But such terms," said the minister, "if I am rightly informed, must apply to the system as it exists elsewhere."
"Not so far as I am aware," said Strang. "Besides, your remarks referred to this neighbourhood."
Then after a long pause the minister said in a tone of great embarrassment, "What am I to do?"
"Well, sir," replied Strang, "I think you know better than I do. But what seems to me the only straight-forward plan is this: if you have been wrong, confess it frankly. If you have done injustice to the people, apologise."
"Well," said the minister, "I shall first visit the other bothies in the parish, and I shall be guided by what I see there." Then after a pause he said—"But how do you account for the great outcry that has been raised against bothies?"
"Partly in this way, sir," said Strang. "There are some ministers (you will excuse me for saying it) that are like our sporting lairds. They must have the excitement of the chase. If they start a heresy case, that's their highest game and gives them their best sport. But not always lighting upon that, they have no difficulty in finding what they consider some social evil. Then they give the view halloo, and are after it in full cry through thick and thin."
"Ah!" said the minister, rising, "you are hard upon us poor clergy; but there may be a little truth in what you say. Good night." And away he went.
Next Sunday morning there was a great gathering of country folk at the church. They were discussing the rumour, that the minister was going to apologise. Some believed it, while others thought that it was too good to be true. Among the latter was old Manson.
"Apologeese," he sneered, "no, no. A black coat never surrenders. When he has been steekit in by the bethal, he can say what he likes, and no' ane daur utter a cheep. Na, na, the poopit has been ower lang the seat o' an oracle. It's no' gaun to become the stule o' repentance."
But old Manson was wrong. Towards the end of the sermon, which was on the text, "Bear ye one another's burdens," the minister came to a dead pause. There was a terrible stillness all over the church. Every ear was on the alert to catch what was coming, and nervous people held down their heads. Then the minister, looking ghastly pale, and speaking with slow deliberation, said:
"Brethren, my great desire is to find out what your burdens are, and to help you to bear them; but last Sabbath I must admit that I failed. I had always heard that the Bothy System was one of the curses of this country; and I had never heard a word said in its defence. Very naturally, in calling upon the people of this neighbourhood to put away the evil thing from among them, I used very strong language. Brethren, I have since discovered that, as far as this parish is concerned, I was wrong; and I now apologise to the farming people in particular and the congregation in general. May this be a warning to us all—to you as well as me—not to be too hasty in forming judgments regarding our fellow-creatures."
Here was an event altogether unprecedented! No one had ever heard of a minister confessing from the pulpit that he had made a mistake. It was the result of the purest Christian candour; but had it proceeded from policy it would have been a master-stroke. With one sentence the minister turned the hearts of the people from the fiercest indignation right round to an enthusiastic love. The women-folk especially were loud in his praises.
"Oh!" they exclaimed, "wasn't it like a real Christian to own that he was wrang; and didn't he look rale bonny when he was daein' it?" And they all agreed that it was Gilbert Strang, who by his wonderful cleverness had opened the minister's eyes, and made him see that it was his duty to confess.
On the Monday afterwards, Gilbert was ploughing the Five-Acre Lea. To one fond of rustic associations it was a pleasant picture; the pair of horses sleek and well-fed, bending their heads over their strong chests, lifting their legs leisurely and together, and pulling the plough slowly through the stiff loam; the knife-like coulter evenly cutting a narrow strip of the green turf; the shining share turning it over and forming another long ridge of fresh earth; the man holding steadily the plough-tails and looking contented and happy; and over all, the sombre sky of a winter afternoon gradually darkening towards the dusk. As he was turning the plough at the headrig, he heard himself hailed in a cheery voice. He looked round, and there was Manson of the Hole, with his face in a broad grin of delight.
Shaking the ploughman's hand, and then slapping him vehemently on the shoulder, he roared out, "Eh, man, ye're an awfu' billy. This is an age o' novelties, and ye've brocht aboot ane o' the greatest o' them a'. A minister standin' in the poopit and confessin' to his folk that he had been wrang! Wha ever heard the like? It's an event in the history o' the kirk. And the man that had the head and the tongue to manage a' this—here he is, wastin' himsel on wark that the stupidest clod-happer could dae. By the Lord Hairy! it's no' richt! You should hae been a minister yersel, settin' them a lesson o' straightforwardness; and as sure as I am a livin' sinner they require it. Man! I'll tell ye what I'll dae. I'm no' a rich man, but I'll lend ye twa hunder pounds to gang to the college; and ye can pay it back whenever it suits ye. Ye needna hurry."
Strang was taken aback; and for about a minute was silent, fascinated evidently by the prospect which had thus suddenly been called up before him. At last he said:
"Mr Manson! dae ye really mean that? It's awfu' generous; and I'm half inclined to tak yer offer. But no, the kirk is no' my trade; the harness wadna sit easy. Nor yet the schule; my nerves wadna stand a' the tear and wear that's required to stir up a' kinds o' young brains. Besides, I canna gie up an open air country life. It has nearly a' the advantages I care aboot. We get the great natural medicines—fresh air, sunlight, pure water, perfect quiet, and sound sleep. We hae the best food; for what could be mair nourishin' than milk, eggs, and oatmeal, all fresh and unadulterated? And we hae the best opportunities (if we only hae the gumption to tak them) of improvin' oor minds, for we live in the workshop o' nature, and see the coontless wonders which she is producin' a' the year roond."
"But dae ye no' think it richt," asked Manson, "to raise yersel as sae mony hae dune, to a higher position in society?"
"Weel," replied Strang slowly, "I'm no' jist sure aboot that. It seems to me a kind o' selfishness. Should we no' think o' raisin' others? We owe a duty to oorsels, nae doot, but also to those wha hae produced us and brocht us up. That's the true way in which the masses are to be raised—not by being patronised by their superiors, but by being led onwards and upwards by men of their own class. Not that I think I could ever lead them; but I could assist them that are really able to lead them."
"Weel," said Manson, going away, "my offer is still afore ye, whenever ye like to tak it."
Year after year passed away, and Gilbert Strang continued most religiously to save every penny that he could. When his hoardings amounted to a handsome sum, he looked for some way of laying them out at interest. Now, there was in Mr MacGuffog's congregation a Mr Melville, a lawyer and banker of unquestionable respectability, a prominent elder in the kirk, and the brother of a celebrated D.D. To many of the church members he had become the guide, philosopher, and friend. Besides giving them his advice, he took charge of their spare cash and got an investment for it. To this gentleman Strang had no hesitation in committing his hard-earned money, with the injunction, that the interest when it fell due was to be added to the principal, and the aggregate sum in this way allowed to accumulate. At the end of five years, his affairs had prospered so well that he saw a prospect of buying back his inheritance. He would borrow a sum from Manson, giving him in return a bond upon the property; and that sum added to his savings would make up the purchase money. He had got Manson's hearty consent, he had instructed Mr Melville to realise his investments, and he had written to his mother to tell her the joyful tidings, and to say that he would be over at her house on Saturday evening to discuss the whole matter.
It was a beautiful day at the end of June, and Strang was busy among the haymakers in the Bog. The occasion was important; and all the inmates of the farm—master and servants, old and young, men and women, and even the dogs—were engaged. Amidst a perpetual ripple of gossip, joke, and laughter, they merrily turned over the tanned grass, put it up in cocks (or, as it was called in that district, coles), and carefully raking the cleared space, made the field look tidy and fresh. The sight of the abundant and well-conditioned crop; the delightful scent that arose from it; the twitter of the swallows that wheeled around; and above all the glorious weather, exhilarated every soul. And when the cart, driven by Jim Lochty and containing the dinner, appeared at the gate of the field, they laughed aloud in their joy; for what can be more delightful to a hungry human creature than the prospect of being seated on a heap of fragrant hay with a large bap in one hand and a tankard of nut-brown ale in the other. But what was the matter with Jim? He was all excitement. He had evidently something startling to tell; and, like your ordinary bearer of sensational news, even when it is bad, he had a sort of grim pleasure in delivering it. Before he came up he cried out:—
"Gilbert Strang, yer banker, Mr Melville, has cut his throat and has left a letter to say that he has made awa wi' a' the folks' siller."
Strang was stunned, and for some time could do nothing but stare at Jim, wondering if he were telling the truth.
At last he said: "I don't believe it. Mr Melville o' a' folk! Somebody has been hoaxing ye."
"Na," said Jim, "it's perfectly true. It was the polisman that tellt me; and he had seen him quite stiff and had read the letter. A' the folk were talkin' aboot it. Look! there's Mr Proud o' the Hill passin'. Gang and speir at him."
Mr Proud had stopped his gig and was beckoning to Strang; and when Strang went over to him, it was only to hear a confirmation of the terrible report. But that was not all. Misfortune seems to take a savage delight not only in knocking her victim down, but in trampling upon him after he is down. Mr Proud had another sad calamity to tell, namely, that Mr Manson had been found that morning dead in bed.
Here was the end of all Strang's labour. This double loss dispelled at once the dream which had lighted up all his future—the hope of regaining the inheritance of his ancestors, that white two-storeyed house, with the sunny garden in front, and the snug farm buildings behind, on whose walls the history of the family seemed to be written, and where the associations of his own happy boyhood, like the bright and fresh dewdrops of a summer morning, hung upon every bush and tree. A cloud of despondency fell upon him; and, seen through it, the sunny landscape and the merry faces of the haymakers seemed incongruous and almost unbearable.
His spirit, however, was too robust to be long weighed down. Towards evening he threw off his load, and asked himself if he had, on the whole, any good reason for complaining? He had, indeed, lost the opportunity of realising a happiness which was chiefly made up of sentiment; but, on the other hand, what blessings were still spared to him? Health, strength, congenial employment, wholesome food, sound sleep, fresh air, the glories of the universe, appreciative friends, and a kind Providence. He who could mope and mourn in the face of all these advantages was not a man at all, but a cowardly cur.
Then the thought of his mother arose in his mind. How would she bear it? Beneath the double blow of her husband's bankruptcy and death, the poor body's courage had given way. Thoroughly demoralised, she considered herself a victim, and expected restitution, not only from her friends and the public at large, but even from Providence. She had, therefore, staked her whole happiness upon the recovery of the pleasant steading and fields at Sunnybrae. And now that the recovery was impossible, most bitter would be her disappointment, and endless would be her grumbling against society at large and even against Providence.
Strang's mother lived at Cauldale, a solitary place four miles north of Pitlour. It stood far apart from other dwellings, on the side of an uncultivated hill. It had once been a row of thatched cottages; but with the exception of the one at the east end, they had been allowed to fall into decay, and now stood roofless and empty. The hearths which had once been lit up by warm household fires, and the still warmer smiles of family affection, were now covered with rubbish and overgrown with weeds. In the one which was still habitable, Mrs Strang had been allowed by the Laird to take up her abode; and by the aid of her son and some kind friends she had managed to get the means of making a scanty living. A cow grazing on the braes, a pig fed on the refuse of the garden, a row of bee-hives and a flock of poultry, gave her a supply of milk, butter, cheese, pork, honey, and eggs—part of which she devoted to her own use, but the most of which she carried into the nearest town and sold for hard cash. She even utilised the crops that grew beyond the range of cultivation. In early summer she culled the young nettles to make kail. In autumn she gathered the brambleberries to make jam for her afternoon tea; and a bed of wormwood growing on the hillside in front of her house supplied her with all the medicine she ever took.
On the Saturday evening when she expected her son's visit, she was seated with her knitting on a chair in front of her cottage. She was in high spirits, and anticipated with great pleasure the discussing with Gilbert all the details of taking possession of Sunnybrae. Soon she saw him in the distance coming striding through the pasture land. Still working at her stocking, she went down the face of the hill to meet him. But when he drew near, instead of that jubilant smile which she had expected to see on his face, there was a look of depression.
"Gilbert," she exclaimed, "what's wrang? Something has happened. Ye canna hide it from yer mither. Tell me at ance."
He told her; and with a cry of lamentation she dropped on the ground and sat there, wringing her hands and bemoaning her fate: "what hae I dune, what hae I dune, to be afflickit in this way—blow after blow—blow after blow—and after slavin' and starvin' and savin'. But that man (what's his name?) canna hae swallowed the siller. He maun hae spent it on some folk. They should be socht oot and made to pay it back."
Strang thought it best not to answer his mother, but to allow her to give vent to her feelings. Then raising her gently up, taking her by the arm, and telling her that she must come and give him a cup of tea, as he was ready to faint, he led her into her cottage. It was a poor place, but the care which had been taken to make it comfortable in honour of his coming touched his heart. A clear fire was burning behind the two iron bars that served for a grate. The cracked hearthstone and rough earthen floor had been swept and whitened. The most was made of the scanty bits of furniture, the wreck of her former household; and everything was clean and in its proper place. A snowy cloth covered the frail round table; the marriage china was arranged in order; his favourite brambleberry jam was in a glass dish; his favourite buttered toast simmered before the fire; and the only armchair in the house was placed for him in his favourite chimney-corner.
Wiping her eyes occasionally, and moaning "Oh dear," she poured out a cup of tea for him; but refused to take any herself, and sat rocking herself to and fro. Then came another outburst, "Why did ye ever trust that man? I'm sure I tellt ye weel aboot 'im."
"Mother, mother," he said in a deprecating tone, "hoo can ye say so? Ye never did."
"That I did," she moaned out. "But ye never listen to what I say. Nae wonder ye forget."
Strang saw that reasoning would do no good; and so he sat silent while she continued to give vent to her feelings. And to his great relief, a knock came to the door, and a gentleman, well-dressed and well-mannered, entered.
"Mr Strang, I presume," he said. "I must beg your pardon for intruding. I called at Pitlour, and they sent me on here."
Catching fresh alarm, and seeing in this visit a continuation of the coil of troubles in which they had got involved, the mother cried out, "Oh sir! what are ye gaun to dae wi' 'im?"
The gentleman, with a kindly smile, said, "There's nothing to cause alarm; quite the reverse. I am Mr Kemp, Mr Manson's lawyer."
And then in a calm manner, as if it was the sort of thing that occurred every day, he told that Mr Manson had left his money and other belongings to Gilbert Strang.
Mrs Strang burst into a rapture of delight: "Eh, dae ye hear that! It's an answer to my prayers. I aye said that Providence wad mak up to us what He had made us suffer."
But Strang himself was strangely silent. At length he said, "I don't see how I can take it, sir."
"No' tak it!" screamed his mother. "Are ye mad?"
"No, mother!" said Strang, quietly, "this money should have been given to Mr Manson's relatives."
"He has got no relatives," said Mr Kemp, "and he expressly says that he leaves it to you as the man whom he most respects, and who will "guide the money best"; and if you don't take it, why, it must go to the Queen; and in the ocean of her wealth it will be a mere drop, and will do good to nobody."
"Dae ye hear that!" said the mother. "The Queen indeed; set her up! She's got ower muckle already. She would tak everything."
"Then," said Gilbert, "if I maun tak it, I canna spend it on mysel. I'll pay my father's debts, and wipe off the family disgrace."
"Gilbert Strang!" said his mother, "are ye mad? Sir! ye'll no' allow him to dae this. The money wasna left for this."
"Mother," he said, quietly, "my father's memory is ane o' oor dearest possessions. There's a blot on it, the blot o' bankruptcy. I want to rub that aff, so that you and me may hae nae cause to blush when his name is mentioned."
Utterly foiled, the poor woman collapsed, saying in a tone of resignation, "Weel, weel, gang yer ain gait, and leave me here to slave, and starve, and dee. Ye'll maybe wipe yer faither's debts aff yer conscience, but ye'll sune hae yer mither's death in their place."
Gilbert now rose to go back with Mr Kemp. His mother refused to shake hands with him; but he clapped her on the back, and said, "Courage, mother! there may be some siller left, after payin' a' the debts, to buy Sunnybrae yet."
When they were outside, Mr Kemp said, "if you carry out this Quixotic plan of yours, you'll have nothing left."
"I can't help that," returned Strang; "I must do what's right."
Strang lost no time in carrying out his resolve. Ere a few weeks had passed, his father's creditors, very much to their astonishment, were paid the full amount of what was owing them, along with interest. On the next Sunday morning, as he put on his old and faithful Sunday clothes, he felt a satisfaction which he had never experienced before. The stain on his father's memory—a memory otherwise bright—was removed, and he almost felt that his deceased parent was near, smiling approval of what had been done.
His appearance among the loungers at the church door created quite a stir. Every eye was upon him. The farmers and their wives pressed forward to shake him cordially by the hand. They said nothing, for their limited vocabulary contained no form of words suitable for such an extraordinary occasion; but their looks expressed their feelings. Though they would not very likely, if placed in his circumstances, have done what he had done; yet they could not help admiring him. As he stood before them in his well-worn attire, he looked like a hero of the antique type; and the patches on his coat appeared more than ever like badges of honour.
Meanwhile his mother, on the lonely slopes of Cauldale, moped and grumbled. She felt herself a poor, forlorn wretch, deserted not only by her son but by Providence also; and she took a morbid pleasure in thinking that no one had ever been so ill used as she. But one afternoon, as she sat at her solitary "four-hours," her son burst in, with every feature beaming. She was then quite prepared for the good news that he brought. The creditors were so delighted with his unexpected conduct, that they had met and agreed to return to him half the money. With that, and the remainder of Manson's legacy, he had bought back Sunnybrae.
"So by next Martinmas," he said, "ye'll be in yer ain auld house, mither."
Bright glowed the ben-end, or parlour, of Sunnybrae on the evening of the 12th November. Bright, also, were the occupants, Gilbert Strang and his mother. They had come in on the forenoon of the 11th, and had been hard at work "pittin' things to richts." Mrs Strang had complained bitterly about the state in which everything had been left; but she had at last arranged things so that they could now sit down with some degree of comfort.
"Looking round," she said, "on a' the auld things in their auld places, I feel as if I had been dreamin' aboot livin' in a strange country, and that I had waukened up to find mysel at hame. There is only ae great want,—the presence o' yer faither. But I canna help thinkin' that he is here in spirit, and shares in our joy. And oh, Gilbert! glad he maun be that a' his debts are paid, and that naebody can say that they hae lost onything by him. You were richt, and I was wrang."
John Fairgrieve, better known as Hillend, the name of his farm, had been born with a strong appetite for knowledge. Had his education been attended to in his youth, he would very likely have been a great reader. But as he had never got into the way of using books with facility, he was driven to seek his mental food in the actual world around him; and this he did with the greatest assiduity. In plain language, he was a notorious newsmonger, a collector of all the "clashes" of the neighbourhood. In bright summer weather, before the hay harvest came on, and when "there was naething pushin'," it was his delight to stand at his farm gate, under the large plane tree, with his snuff-box in his hand, and exchange news with all the passers-by. It did not matter who they were. The farmer in his gig, the ploughman on his cart, the baker driving his van, the beggarwife with her brats and her wallets, were all obliged to "stand and deliver." In fact, Hillend was a sort of informal turnpike man, levying mental toll on the king's highway.
Very like him in this inveterate love for tittle-tattle were his two sisters, Lizzie and Grizzie, who kept house for him. They were seldom seen separate. They hunted in couples. And their prey was generally some country laddie that came into the farmyard for milk or butter. They took complete possession of the unlucky urchin. He had no more chance of escape than a gooseberry which has fallen before two greedy hens. The one examined him, and then the other cross-examined him, or (to use the old Scotch phraseology) the one speired and the other back-speired, until the poor child was turned inside out, or, as Geordie Faw, the cattleman, expressed it, "fairly flypeit."
It was eight o'clock on a wild October night. Outside, in the farmyard, were darkness and a fierce gale that rattled at the windows and howled at the chimney tops, and swirled round the stacks and into every hole and corner. Inside, in the farm kitchen, were light and warmth and bright dishes on the walls, and still brighter faces grouped round the blazing fire. With the exception of Collie the dog and Mottie the cat, all were busy in their own different ways. Miss Lizzie was at the churn, and Miss Grizzie at the spinning-wheel. Willie Foster and Pate Mackie, the two ploughmen, were playing at draughts, or, as they called it, "the dam-brod." Geordie Faw was cobbling his shoes. The itinerant tailor, John Glen, seated cross-legged on a chair, was mending the farmer's coat. And Hillend himself, what was he doing? Occupying the place of honour at the left side of the fire, and, with the usual snuff-box in his hand, he was keeping up the conversation, or, in other words, "ca'in the crack." As the corn and the potatoes were safely gathered in, he was in capital spirits, and bent upon making both himself and the others happy.
You would have thought that there was very little entertainment to be got in that quiet homely scene; but you would have been mistaken. First of all, there was Glen, the tailor, with a tongue as sharp and slick as his own shears, and with odds and ends of scandal as many and varied as his own clippings. Then in came Sandy Livingstone, fresh from a visit to the smithy, and bursting with all the "clavers" of the parish—who was dead, who was going to be married, who had failed, who had been fou last July fair, who had been up before the Session, how Grangemire Mary had got her leave, and Geordie Clephane had lost his watch at Kirkcaldy market. And while they were still enjoying these tit-bits, and rolling them like sweet morsels under their tongue, who should appear but a mysterious stranger, foot-sore and tired with travel. All grew quiet to look at him. This was no ordinary tramp.
His clothes were fashionably cut, though threadbare and soiled; and his features and hands were thin and delicate, though tanned by the weather. The company were prepared to hear that he had once seen better days; but they broke into a murmur of astonishment when he told them that he had been an Oxford man and a man about town, and that he had tramped all the way from London. "An Oxford swell!" "A London man!" "Tramped all the way!" Hillend's face glowed with the anticipation of hearing a wonderful story, and in his excitement he took four or five snuffs consecutively. Miss Lizzie and Miss Grizzie stopped their work, rose to their feet, drew near to the stranger, devouring him with their eyes, and eager to "speir and back-speir." They, indeed, set him down to a supper of bread and cheese and milk; but they began at the same time to question him about himself and his adventures. However, he said that if they would kindly wait till he had refreshed and strengthened himself with the meal they had placed before him, he would give them a full and true account of his strange career. They were therefore obliged, meanwhile, to satisfy their curiosity by watching him while he stowed away the viands with wonderful celerity. At length his ravenous appetite was appeased; and, wiping his mouth with his coat sleeve, and begging pardon for doing so, and giving as an excuse that he hadn't a pocket-handkerchief, he began the story of his adventures. In after days it was often repeated, first by himself and then by others, so that I am able to give it for the most part in his own words.
"My father was rich, but I am almost ashamed to confess that he did not make his money in a very nice way. He was, you see, a pawnbroker in the High Street of Edinburgh. When I was a boy I used often to be in the shop on a Saturday night, and, upon my soul, I used to pity the poor quivering wretches that came in, raising money on their furniture, their very bed, and even the family Bible. I have seen a poor woman, half-stripped herself, take off the clothes from a puny child in her arms, and pawn them. All kinds of scenes went on, haggling and arguing, and cursing and swearing. The words of one customer, especially, I can never forget. He was a broken-down author, puffy and shaky. He was angry because he had not got enough upon his silver watch.
"'You cursed old Jew,' he said to my father, 'I'll tell you what you are. You're a wrecker. You wait for those who are cast ashore by the waves of misfortune, and rob them of the remnants of their property.'
"'No, no,' said my father, 'I accommodate them with money to keep them alive, and in return take only the things they can spare.'
"My father himself did not like the trade, for he gave it up, and went to live in a villa at Eskbank. He continued, however, to lend money in private; but it was on a large scale. Young gentlemen, regular swells, used to call at the house and be closeted with him, and had difficulty in coming to an agreement. I heard one say as he was leaving, 'one hundred per cent. is tremendous.' 'So is the risk,' was all my father's answer.
"My mother was of an easy-going disposition, had no head for figures, and left the management of all money matters to her husband. Her whole care was devoted to me, her only child. I was the apple of her eye. Dear old mother! how I wish that I had appreciated her more!
"As we sat at the fire on a winter evening, she would say, 'Ben! my lad, we must give you the best education. I would like to see you a gentleman before I die.'
"'Nonsense!' my father would say, 'I'll not waste any money upon Latin and Greek, and rubbish of that kind. The training I got will be good enough for him.'
"However, to our great astonishment, he came round to mother's view. You see, he intended that I should carry on the money-lending business, and he thought that if I were sent to a high-class school, I would form a wide connection among young aristocratic spendthrifts, which would be of great service to me. So the question came to be discussed, 'to what school should I be sent?' and to settle this question our next door neighbour assisted us.
"This man was Captain Beaumont, but was popularly called 'the Earl.' He was, as he told everybody, 'a real gentleman that had taken a thousand years to be produced, not a shoddy one that can be turned out nowadays in a few weeks.' He was tall, grey, and scraggy, with a backbone as stiff as a walking-stick, and with a head that was uncommonly small, but that was 'large enough,' as our minister remarked, 'for all the ideas he had got to put into it.' His house was, like himself, cheerless but pretentious. He called it Dunmore, which, you must know, was the name of the castle where his ancestors had lived, heaven knows how long ago. He had a doited old serving-man, who was dressed in the family livery, and waited at table, and served the thin broth and scraggy mutton on the family silver. There was also above the dining-room mantelpiece his genealogical tree, with many branches and leaves, and each leaf had on it the name of one of his forefathers, and on the topmost leaf was written his own name, 'Reginald Algernon Beaumont, the present earl.'
"For some time the Earl was very haughty towards us, throwing us a word occasionally, just as he would throw it to a neighbour's dog. But by and by he made an excuse for calling on us; and in a few weeks he came in regularly every night to have a game of draughts at our fireside. 'His hungry nose,' my father said, 'had scented the havannas and the Glenlivet.' In the first part of the evening he was silent and grumpy, as if he looked down upon our society, and was half angry with himself for being in it. But when the whisky and cigars were placed on the table, he brightened up and grew pleasant and sociable, and would talk for hours about his ancestors, and would tell that he was the lineal descendant of Reginald de Beaumont, who came into Scotland in the reign of David the First, and that he was, therefore, the Earl of Abernethy; and then he would blackguard the House of Lords for not acknowledging his title, and would call them 'Brummagem peers, mostly made out of lucky lawyers, brewers, and cotton-spinners.' On one of these occasions, my mother took courage to talk about me, saying that she wished to make me a gentleman, and asked his advice as to what should be done. He was startled, and, screwing up his nose, said:—
"My dear Madam, you can't make your son a gentleman. You can't put blue blood into his veins and give him a pedigree a thousand years long. But you may give him a gentlemanly education, and make him as good a gentleman as ninety-nine out of every hundred who assume the name. Send him to a high-class English school and then to Oxford. There he will get up the classics, the only branch worthy of a gentleman.'
"So by the Earl's advice I was sent to Vere de Vere College, in Yorkshire: Principal, the Rev. Augustus Caesar, LL.D. The doctor, as he was called, received me in a very friendly manner. So did the pupils, after their own way; rather a rollicking kind of way, however. They were healthy, riotous, and as full of mischief as monkeys. Surrounding me, staring at me, and pulling me about, they plied me with all sorts of questions—what was my governor? had he lots of tin? was Scotland such a wild place? how did I feel in trousers? had I brought my kilt with me? Then they began 'to make me at home,' as they called it. One borrowed a sixpence from me; another, learning that I could not box, showed me the way and gave me a bloody nose; and all of them joined in crying out, that, as a new boy, I must pay my footing and stand them a jolly spread of pies and tarts and rum-shrub.
"For the first few days I had rather a lively time. As I was a new boy, they thought it only right to practise all their tricks upon me, such as putting a bunch of thistles in my bed, filling my boots with hot water, and putting cobbler's wax upon my seat, which held me fast when the doctor called me to get up. They also exercised their ingenuity in inventing nick-names for me, and I was addressed as 'Scotty,' 'Haggis,' 'Jew,' and 'Balls' (for they had ferreted out that my father had been a pawnbroker). But at length Lord Gulpington, who was the trump card of the college, being the heir to a marquisate, claimed me as his fag, and would allow no one to torment me except himself. He slept in the same room with me, and generally awoke me in the morning by throwing his slipper at my head. Then I got up, and, after dressing hurriedly, went down for his boots and his hot water. During the day I did anything that he required, and at night I often had to smuggle in 'grub and lush,' as he called it. We got on well together. I was quite delighted to be connected in any way with a lord; and after a while he said that next to his bull dog, Griffin, which he kept at the butcher's in the village, he liked me best of any creature about the place.
"As far as the body was concerned, the pupils got on very well. They had capital appetites, which they constantly attended to; and they were not content with the abundance that was placed before them, but they were constantly devouring apples, oranges, hardbake, and ginger-beer. Most hearty were they also in taking physical exercise. They played cricket and football, and talked about them incessantly, as if they had been the chief end of man; and they ran at hounds and hares as if they had been hunting a fortune, and not a dirty little boy with a bag of paper scraps.
"The physical training, indeed, was splendid, but I can't say as much for the mental training. With the exception of a little Greek, the thing that we always seemed to be grinding at was Latin. Our grammar book was in Latin. Our reading book was in Latin. The very grace said at table was in Latin. I tried to fix Latin in my head, but it came out again as fast as I put it in. They endeavoured to improve my memory by giving me several hundred verses to commit, but that only made me worse. In despair, one day I told the doctor that I would never be able to learn Latin. He told me that I must learn it, if I wished to be educated. I then had the presumption to ask him what was the use of it.
"'Oh,' he said, 'it is the best instrument for training the faculties. Besides, it is the "open sesame" into good society.'
"Had I been the only backward pupil, I might have thought that the fault lay in my stupidity. But with the exception of two or three, the other pupils were nearly as bad as myself, and detested their lessons. If a knowledge of Latin was to be the 'open sesame' into good society, I'm afraid they would never get in.
"At the end of four years my course at school was finished; and before proceeding to Oxford I spent a few weeks at home. One evening my father, in his business-like way, asked me to make up an account of the items I had got in return for the money he had laid out,—in other words, to tell him distinctly how much I had learnt.
"Afraid to go into details, I said, 'Well, at least, I've learnt the ways and manners of a gentleman.'
"'Ah,' replied my father, 'to be sure, that's worth all the book knowledge. You'll be better able to do business with gentlemen.'
"In this way I had staved off an ugly question; but in my own room, before going to bed that night, I ran over in my mind what I had learnt and what I had not learnt at school. I had learnt to play cricket and football, to run, to leap, to box, to smoke, to drink beer, and make bets. I had not learnt to write a good hand, to spell correctly, to count correctly, and to know something of the history and geography of my native country.
"My mother came to have some notion of the true state of matters. She had asked me to write to the minister, inviting him to our house on a certain night to meet some friends, and unfortunately I had spelt meet with an a. The minister was a great humorist, and this was an occasion for a joke which he could not neglect. Consequently, he called next morning, with my letter in his hand, to ask what kind of meat he would bring—beef, or mutton, or pork. My mother, when she understood the mistake, felt it keenly. So, one evening at the fireside, while the Earl and my father were having their game of draughts, she said:
"'Well, Ben, I hope you will get on at Oxford, and correct all your deficiencies, and come out a perfect scholar.'
"'My dear madam,' said the Earl, 'if any place can make him a scholar Oxford is that place. It has got all the means; it has the most money, the best teachers, and the greatest reputation.'
"My mother, however, although she knew it not, was cruelly deceived. To men who were in love with learning, Oxford gave every facility for maturing their scholarship. But to those who had no such love she could do nothing. Into this latter class I was unfortunate enough to fall. Lord Gulpington was there before me, and introduced me to his set, which consisted of the sons of the aristocratic and the wealthy. These youths, though passing through the curriculum of the University, were students merely in name. They did almost everything but study. Bless you! how could you expect them to do otherwise? What charms could they find in musty, out-of-date Latin and Greek works? They were young, healthy, spirited, and rich; and the bright and breathing world lay around them. Everything within them and without them called upon them to enjoy themselves. They, indeed, went through the farce of attending chapel in the morning, and lectures in the forenoon. But everyone, their teachers as well as themselves, knew it to be a farce. As soon as they went back to their rooms, they tossed their gowns aside, donned their sporting habiliments, and were off to the river, or the road, or the hunting-field, or the racecourse. Then back they came in the evening with a keen relish for other kinds of enjoyment. They feasted, they caroused, they gamboled, they sang jovial glees and choruses, and in fact rattled on as if life were to be a perpetual feast, without any such thing as duty, or trial, or suffering. In all these frolics I mingled. The jolly fellows, though they knew my origin, and called me by no other name than 'Balls,' were free and easy with me, played practical jokes upon me, borrowed my money, smoked my cigars, drank my wine, and even used my rooms for their parties.
"But all things come to an end; and the time arrived when the most of these devotees of pleasure had to lay aside their frivolities, and, in order to please the old folks at home, had to go in for their degree, or, as they called it, 'their smalls.' Many of them were, as it is called, 'plucked,' and no wonder! Their feathers were not home-grown, but were borrowed plumes stuck on with infinite labour and skill by tutors, and, therefore, came off easily. On me they would not even stick, and so I could not go up for the degree, and had not even the honour of being plucked.
"My poor parents were spared the chagrin of seeing the failure of their efforts to make me a gentleman. Before my Oxford career was finished, they died, both in the same week, the victims of the terrible Asiatic cholera, during its first visit to this country in 1832. As I now came into a considerable fortune, I saw no necessity for adopting a profession, or doing any useful work. To enjoy myself was, I thought, to be my only business; and the proper place for enjoyment was London, the centre of all that is pleasant and grand. So, as soon as I had wound up affairs in Edinburgh, I hastened to the metropolis.
"I put up at the Golden Cross, and proceeded, as it is called, 'to do the sights of London.' I visited picture galleries, museums, theatres, concert rooms, until I was tired out and disgusted. Then came on the most terrible feeling I ever experienced, a feeling which you busy and healthy people never had. I did not know what to do. I did not care to stroll about the streets, for the everlasting din and endless throng grew intolerable. I could not sit all day in the coffee-room of the hotel, staring at everyone that entered, and pretending to read the newspaper. When I got up in the morning, it seemed as if I would never manage to get through the day. Time was my great enemy. It loaded the present, and blocked up the future. How was I to kill it? To do this I would have been inclined to try almost anything. I now understood how men committed suicide through sheer weariness. I also felt the truth of the saying that idleness is the cause of nearly every crime, and that the idle man does not wait to be tempted, but of his own accord tempts the devil. My devil soon appeared.
"I had noticed among the inmates of the hotel a middle-aged, stout, and grey-headed gentleman, whom the waiters addressed as Colonel. He seemed to me to be round and oily with health, good nature, and jollity. One day, when he appeared to be idle, he sat down and had a talk with me. Without telling me much about himself, except that he been an officer in the Spanish service, he managed to extract from me a good deal about myself; and when he heard me complain about feeling dull, he at once placed his services at my disposal.
"'London dull!' he said, 'why, it's a paradise, a garden full of flowers, and I, like a bee, or rather a bumble-bee, have visited all of them.'
"And certainly no idle man could have a pleasanter companion than the Colonel. He was stimulating and enlivening, like the morning sunshine. His animal spirits and relish for life never flagged, and he was always ready, when the occasion turned up, to joke, to laugh, to eat, or to drink. Every day he had some novelty to offer. 'Now,' he would say, 'I'll give you a treat that you never had before;' and then he would drive me to a racecourse or some other resort of fashion, or he would take me to some famous old chop-house in the recesses of the city, or some new and gorgeous hotel in one of the fashionable thoroughfares; and, while we sat down to what he called, 'a nice little dinner,' he would introduce some new dish, or some new blend of whisky, or some new brand of wine; and while we discussed it he would smack his lips, rub his hands, and look at me as much as to say, 'Did I not tell you so?' His enjoyment of the pleasures of the great city never seemed to fail. The only thing, in fact, that ever failed with him was money. He sometimes had no change, or had forgotten his purse; but I was only too glad to pay his expenses in return for his company. I could not do without him. He had made life like a dream, a little feverish perhaps, but exceedingly pleasant.
"One night after the theatre, he took me to a house in the Haymarket, where, he said, we could sup cosily together. As soon as we had entered, to his great surprise, he found two old friends who had just arrived from the Continent. They were middle-aged, fashionably dressed, and well-mannered, and were introduced to me as Captain Spurr and Count Lago. At my invitation they joined us in a private room, where we supped on lobster and champagne, and all grew as sociable and as pleasant as you like. A game of whist was proposed, and the Colonel and I played against the other two for small stakes. We had astonishing luck, and won game after game; and at the end of several hours, rose the winners of a considerable sum of money. Of course, we continued the practice of meeting and playing there, and night after night the same results happened. The Colonel and I always won. Such a thing had never been known before. They all attributed it to me; and even the landlord and the waiters complimented me, and wondered that I did not back my luck sufficiently. This was pleasant so far; but I did not like the idea of winning so much money, and feared that we might completely clean out our opponents, and I frankly told the Colonel my feelings on the matter, and suggested that we should stop.
"'Stop!' he exclaimed, 'we can't stop; we must give them their revenge. Oh, don't be afraid that you'll beggar them; they have plenty of the needful.'
"So on we drove in our career of victory, until our winnings amounted to a large sum. Then fortune changed, and, strange to say, went on as steadily against us as it had done for us, until our opponents had not only regained all they had lost, but had won some of our money.
"While on our way home that night I said to the Colonel—'As our opponents have recouped themselves, we must now stop.'
"'Hang it!' said the Colonel, 'not just yet if you please. I can't afford to lose any money if you can. Let us adopt this method. We are so much money out of pocket. On our first game to-night, let us stake the double of that. If we lose, let us double it again; and let us go on doing this; and whenever the luck turns, and, hang it! you know, it must turn very soon, we shall, at one go, have won all our money back, and then we can cry quits.'
"This seemed a dangerous plan, but I felt that we must follow it. So on we went, night after night losing our games, and always piling up the money, till the stake had become something tremendous, and I became almost mad with excitement. To provide funds, I kept selling out my investments and lodging the money in a London bank; and to keep up my nerve I drank champagne incessantly—and then the crash came!
"I woke up one day with a head a mass of pain, a mouth as dry as a lime-kiln, and a confused memory of exciting scenes, to find myself in a bed in our nightly resort. On summoning the waiter, I learnt from him that I had been very tipsy, and that the Colonel and his friends had had some difficulty in managing me, and getting me to bed. I lost no time in going to the Golden Cross Hotel to see the Colonel, but to my horror I was told that the Colonel had left that morning with all his luggage. I understood now the hellish plot which had been devised for my ruin; but I thanked God that I had still ten thousand pounds in the bank. I hurried to the bank to make sure; but there I was met with the intelligence that a gentleman, that morning, had presented my cheque for the whole amount, and that all my money had been paid to him. I asked to see the cheque, thinking that it must have been forged; but no, there was my undoubted signature! I had been drugged, and while in a stupor made to sign my name; and my whole fortune was gone. The Colonel, who, it seems, was notorious as a most accomplished blackleg, was advertised for, but was never caught.
"I had now to give up my rooms in the hotel, and all my refined habits, take lodgings in a street near Drury Lane, and seek for some way of earning my bread. Surely, I thought, I can't starve: in this immense community there must be many thousands of vacant situations. But I did not take into account, that for every single vacancy there must be at least ten applicants. And I very soon found that the education which I had got at school and at the university, and which had cost so much, was practically useless. In fact, it was now the great stumbling-block in my way. It had not fitted me for the higher situations, for I could not even spell correctly; and it had unfitted me for the lower situations, for no one would engage an Oxford scholar for a menial office. I could not even compete with the ragged street boys in running on an errand, holding a horse, or sweeping a crossing. Their education, picked up amid the mud and jostle of the streets, had been far more practical and effective than mine. Instead, therefore, of living by my labour, I was obliged to subsist by pawning my valuables, and bit after bit of my finery, like the plumes of a moulting peacock, dropped from me, till I was left almost bare. Then I was obliged to give up my lodgings, and go out on the streets.
"I was now an outcast in London. It seemed strange that in the midst of so many thousand houses, I should be without a corner to lay my head in,—that in the midst of millions of people I should not have a single one to help me, or take an interest in me. Such was my condition on a night of August last. I had a few shillings in my pocket, but as I did not see any way by which I could earn money, it was necessary to be rigidly economical. I applied for a night's shelter at a cheap lodging-house in the Borough, but it was so crowded with shabby, dirty, and noisy lodgers that I turned sick, and was obliged to leave. I then tried the casual ward in one of the infirmaries, but it was even more disgusting. Quite at a loss to know what to do, I wandered aimlessly up and down till I found myself on London Bridge, when the steeples were pealing out the hour of midnight. Footsore and weary, I threw myself down on the hard stone seat in one of the recesses; but shortly, a poor, slouching tatterdemalion squatted down beside me, actually laying his unkempt head upon my legs. In disgust, I started up, and crawled away into the city. Hour after hour I dragged my weary limbs along the solitary, interminable streets, looking for some covered doorway where I might lay me down and sleep. Twice I had found a suitable spot; but before I could take possession of it, a policeman's lantern was seen approaching, and I was obliged to move on. When morning began to break I found myself close to Regent's Park, and the soft green sward appeared a temptation which I could not resist. Climbing the fence with some difficulty, I made for a large beech tree, and pillowing my head on one of its extended roots, and stretching out my legs on the soft delightful grass, I fell at once into a deep slumber.
"After several hours of absolute unconsciousness, I had a dream, and thought I was back again in Scotland, in our garden at Eskbank, and heard somebody calling to me. I gradually came to myself, and opened my eyes; and there was a working-man standing over me, and, in an accent unmistakably Scotch, calling me by name, and asking why I was there. I cannot describe the gush of delight that ran through me when I heard the kindly tones of my native land, and realised that here at least was a man who took an interest in me. Raising myself up, I asked him how he came to know me? He told me that he belonged to Eskbank, that he used to know me by sight, that he was on his way to his work in Regent Park Gardens, and that he was astonished to see me lying like an outcast there. What could I do but tell him my sad story? He said that it might be a long time before I could get any suitable berth in London, and that my best plan would be to go home at once, and that he would lend me five shillings—all that he had on him—to help me on my way. My heart bounded with delight at the suggestion, and I wondered that I had never thought of it before. So, taking his offered loan, and along with it his address, and promising to repay him as soon as I was able, I shook hands with my humble friend, and set off at once to prepare for my journey. Not having enough money to pay the fare either by coach or boat, I resolved to go on foot, and hoped that by taking every precaution, I would not find it too much for me, and that I might be able to get some odd jobs by the road, which would assist my expenses. So I packed up all my effects in a napkin, and bravely set my face to the north.
"When, from the top of Highgate, I had taken my last look of the smoky wilderness called London, and when I turned to go forward through the rich autumn landscape, I felt really happy. After my bitter experience of the endless rows of brick houses, and the everlasting stone pavement, I enjoyed the long lines of leafy trees and hedges, and the soft, fragrant wayside grass. The very thought that every step was taking me nearer home was a delight in itself. That the distance was four hundred miles did not seem to matter much. Our school's sports, especially that of hounds and hare, had taught me to hold in, and not expend all my resources at once. So I moved along at a steady, regular pace, taking care not to strain my muscles. When my feet grew hot, I refreshed them by walking into a brook. When faintness came on, I did not seek the ale-house; but I bought a penny loaf, and sitting down by a wayside well, found that plain bread and water were both palatable and invigorating. For dessert, I sometimes had a young Swedish turnip, which I found more sweet and juicy than any pine-apple I ever tasted. At night, as the weather continued remarkably dry and warm, I preferred the open air to the tramp's lodging-house; and under the newly-cut corn sheaves, or in the recess of a haystack, I slept soundly till I was wakened by the rising sun.
"With all my economy, however, my little stock of money melted fast away; and I soon saw that if I wished to be saved from the degradation of begging I must earn something. I therefore hit upon a plan which I thought would be sure to get me some employment. This was to call upon the clergymen through whose parishes I passed, to tell them frankly the cause of my degradation, and to ask them in the name of Christian charity to allow me to do some work for them, by which I could earn a meal or a small sum of money. But, unfortunately, this patent plan of mine failed. Without exception, the parish priests listened to my story with an incredulous look, shook their heads, and shut their doors in my face. At length I ventured to ask one why he disbelieved me?
"'My good man,' he said, 'I can't help it. I have been so often taken in by people like you. The more plausible your story is, the more likely it is to be false.'
"'You look upon poverty, then,' said I, 'as a crime?'
"'No,' he replied, 'not exactly, but as one of the marks of a criminal. I may be wrong, but I can't help it.'
"I saw, too, that my fellow-tramps had the same opinion about me. One evening, at a sudden turn of the road, I found myself face to face with one of a most villainous type. There was no mistaking him. He was a real London-made rough, spawned in the gutter, bred in the slums, moulded in the jostle of the streets, with plunder in his look and blasphemy on his tongue.
"Planting himself right before me, and devouring me with his rat-like eyes, he croaked out, 'Well, my bloomin' cove! what lay are you on?'
"I told him that I was a gentleman who had been unfortunate in London, and was now on my way back to my native country.
"'Oh! a gent are you?' he said, with a sneer; 'then, by ——, fork out like a gent;' and he seized me by the coat collar.
"And now, for the first time, I found I had been taught at school something that was useful. Throwing off his hand, I leapt back, and put myself in a boxing attitude; and, as he made a furious assault upon me, I parried his blows, and letting go my left straight from the shoulder, landed on his jaw a crashing blow which sent him to the grass; and there he lay half-stunned, and looking like a heap of filthy clothes. I asked him if he would have any more, and getting nothing but a terrible imprecation in reply, I left him, and went on my way.
"By this time I had passed Newark, and I was in a sorry plight. I was without shoes and without a waistcoat, and my hat was crushed and battered out of all shape. With bleeding feet and empty stomach, I was limping along painfully, when I came to a farmer superintending his reapers near the roadside. Touching my forehead, I asked him if he could not give a starving man a job by which he could earn a bite of bread.
"'No lad,' he said, 'but if ye had coomed when the taters were young I could have given you a job. I might have employed you as a scarecrow.'
"Thereupon all the workers laughed, especially the women, who sent up a loud skirl of delight. So I had to crawl on, foot-sore, and also heart-sore at the cruelty of my fellow-creatures.
"But relief was at hand. I had not gone far, when, turning a corner of the road, I came upon a strange sight: a fat little man, with a red coat, and a red face, both discoloured by the weather, sitting at the edge of a wood, eating his dinner, with his little dog in front of him, and his properties—a Punch and Judy show, a big drum, and Pandean pipes—indistinctly seen in the foliage behind him. He was eating bread and cheese, which he cut with a clasp-knife, and Toby was eyeing him greedily, ready to snap his occasional bit. Everything about the man was so hearty, and so suggestive of sunshine and country roads, that he seemed to warm up the landscape.
"As soon as he caught sight of me he called out, 'Hallo, mate! you seem done up. Come and peck a bit. Sit down.' And he handed me a big hunk of bread and another of cheese, looking on beamingly when I devoured it; and when at length I could eat no more, he produced a flask.
"'Here is some of the right sort; take a good swig of it; it will oil your digestion works. Man! it does me good to see you enjoy your grub. I feel as if I were eating a second dinner. Now for your yarn.' Then he lit his pipe and smoked while I gave an account of myself.
"'Ah,' he said, knocking out the ashes, 'my case is not altogether unlike yours. I, too, got a good education, or what was intended to be a good education. But I could never settle in any place. By nature I was a rolling stone, or rather a rolling ball of fat; and Fortune, mistaking me for a football, began to kick me about, and has been playing with me ever since. But thanks to my fat, I always fall soft and always rebound. Ha! ha!' and he laughed till his face puckered up and showed his eyes like two small steel beads.
"While he was talking, I had taken up the Pandean pipes, and I now played a tune on them.