[BOOK I. ]
[ I.]
[ II., ] [ III., ] [ IV., ] [ V., ] [ VI., ] [ VII., ] [ VIII., ] [ IX., ] [ X. ]
[BOOK II. ]
[ I., ] [ II., ] [ III., ] [ IV., ] [ V., ] [ VI., ] [ VII., ] [ VIII., ] [ IX., ] [ X., ] [ XI., ] [ XII., ] [ XIII., ] [ XIV., ] [ XV., ] [ XVI., ] [ XVII., ] [ XVIII., ] [ XIX. ]
[BOOK III. ]
[ I., ] [ II., ] [ III., ] [ IV., ] [ V., ] [ VI., ] [ VII., ] [ VIII., ] [ IX., ] [ X., ] [ XI., ] [ XII., ] [ XIII., ] [ XIV., ] [ XV., ] [ XVI. ]

MEMOIRS AND RESOLUTIONS
OF
A D A M G R A E M E
OF MOSSGRAY.

INCLUDING SOME CHRONICLES OF THE BOROUGH OF FENDIE
BY THE AUTHOR OF
“PASSAGES IN THE LIFE OF MRS MARGARET MAITLAND,” “LILLIESLEAF,” “THE DAYS OF MY LIFE,” ETC.

“So he bore without abuse
The grand old name of gentleman.”—Tennyson.

LONDON:
HURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS,
SUCCESSORS TO HENRY COLBURN,
13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.
1859.
JOHN CHILDS AND SON, PRINTERS.

BOOK I.
THE HISTORY OF ADAM GRAEME.

.... To some kind of men
Their graces serve them but as enemies.
.... Your virtues, gentle Master,
Are sanctified and holy traitors to you.
As You like It.

ADAM GRAEME OF MOSSGRAY.

CHAPTER I.

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting,
The soul that rises with us, our Life’s star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar;
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home.—Wordsworth.

The first thing which I can record concerning myself is, that I was born.

That I was born! I who now sit in this remote and solitary study, of whose mysteries my good neighbours speak reverently with doubt and wonder, encompassed with things immortal!—the everlasting elements without, the stream, the hills, the fruitful earth, which has been and shall be until the end of time; within with things of life, instinct and inherent, fated perchance to live longer than this present world, the books of men—the Book of God—that out of darkness and sleep and unconsciousness, I was born!

These are wonderful words. This life, to which neither time nor eternity can bring diminution—this everlasting living soul, began. My mind loses itself in these depths. Strangely significant and solemn are the commonest phrases of our humanity; the words which veil the constant marvels of our miraculous life!

But this of “he was born” is greater in my eyes, than that other of “he died.” Say you, He died? say rather, He has changed his garments, has put off a fading robe, which by and by—perchance a time as short in Heaven’s account as are these fleeting days to us—he shall put on again, to wear for ever. But in yonder anxious house, in yonder dim room, with life’s plaintive music rising on his unconscious ear, in wailing and tears, its natural utterance, this wonderful soul began. Be solemn in your rejoicing, ye new mothers, ye glad attendant friends; for this that hath come into the world shall abide for ever, this new existence is beyond the breath or touch of death, a thing immortal, a presence which shall outlive the world.

I was born sadly, in gloom which none broke by the voice of thanksgiving, for the two greatest things of human life met in my birth-hour. I entered the world, a fit entrance for my long, clouded course; and solemnly, in pain and grief, my mother went forth to the other country. My young, fair, gentle mother, of whom I think now as of some beautiful dream that crossed me in my youth.

My father was a hard man, who loved the world; but I used to hear long ago that this moved him. Most deeply all my life has it moved me, who never knew the girl who was my mother. She has been a vision hovering about me all my days; saintly and mother-like when I was young, but now, in her pale beauty resembling more a dead child of the old man who is her son.

I dwell upon this perhaps too often, when I am sad—and I am truly sad too often, for I am alone; but it is surely well and blessed to preserve in the safe keeping of death this holy fragrance of youth. The years that have mossed her grave, and made the blood thin and chill in my old veins, have brought no change to her—she is young for ever.

My father was a Graeme of Mossgray. In our own Southland district we are chief of the name; but he did not esteem the traditional honour that belonged to the title—it was mere idle breath to him. The principal part of his life was spent in a distant city. He laboured without ceasing, for I know not what reason. I fancy there had been some ambition in him to accumulate one of those fairy fortunes, which very prosaic and ordinary men do achieve sometimes, though what end he proposed to himself in attaining this, I cannot tell, for he himself was becoming old, and I was nothing to him; even as the heir of his name he bestowed no regard on me; for the name itself was indifferent. He would have thrown it into the scale with any piece of merchandise, and known himself nothing the poorer.

But a spell was upon this fortune of his, so constantly pursued. His prosperity never passed a certain limit. It was as though some malicious spirit had the guiding of his fate in this respect, in vengeance of better blessings unused and slighted. He always began with success and good fortune; the delusive promise lasted long enough to lure him deeper and deeper into the snare, and then the tide began to swell and turn, and on its rising waves his hopes went bitterly out into the blank and cheerless sea. It was a sad fate, and had his objects been worthier, a fate to be deeply sympathised with; but the man was a hard man (I scarcely knew him, though he was my father); and was susceptible to no grief but this. That discipline, wise as it must be, most hard as it is always, which strikes us through our dearest things, could not touch him except in those outward matters of wealth and mercantile credit, which to him were all in all; and on these accordingly the stroke fell.

So heavily it came at last, that in his wilful selfishness he resolved to sell Mossgray. There was no one living to plead for me, a child then, scarcely daring to lift up my eyes in his presence, and for my right to this inheritance, descended from many upright fathers to whom its very name and local place were dearer than fortune. But death stepped in again to save for me a home—a home which has been to me a blessed inheritance, a solace in the midst of some evils—from other some a refuge and a shelter.

I was a solitary child, allowed in this lonely house of Mossgray to grow up, neglected and uncared for, as I best could. My childish memories are rich in dreams and spiritual presences, and overshadowed universally by that vague sadness, which, dumb as it is, and quiet, is so pitiful in children. I remember how the leaves were wont to fall from the old elms and alders by the waterside, with their eerie and plaintive sound. I remember the low sweeping cadence of the water—the disconsolate autumn breeze—and then comes upon me again the blank childish heaviness—the cloud of childish melancholy, that knew not how it was made sad, nor why.

Mossgray had been a peelhouse—one of those fortified places which the exigencies of Border warfare, predatory and otherwise, made so necessary in our district. A high, square tower occupies the centre, with narrow windows, and arrow slits piercing its massy wall, which has been of old strong in all needful capabilities of defence, and could yet be a notable hold, if our peaceful Cumberland neighbours took up their warlike trade again.

About the tower cling irregular offshoots, added by many Lairds of Mossgray since peace became paramount on the Border; in which, it is impossible to deny, my good ancestors have studied convenience more than elegance. Yet the group of buildings high and low, angled and rounded, with the dark and rugged tower rising in the midst, have a charm upon them, greater, as I think, than the fascination of regular beauty. Patches of moss and yellow lichen are on the walls and roof—the grey, thick walls, and sombre slated roof, which look themselves like some natural growth of the earth, firmly rooted in kindly soil. Our doors are many now, and broad and easy of access—for the successive Graemes, who have increased the accommodations of Mossgray, have added entrance to entrance, with a prodigality by no means pleasant when those searching winds are abroad; but we still preserve the harsh and lowering portal, and the heavy iron door, which of old frowned upon unwelcome southern visitors in sullen defiance.

I confess that I have a pleasure in looking upon these—it pleases me to trace historic changes in the aspect of my patrimonial house; that this belongs of natural right to the rugged and sturdy times of Border warfare—that from that gloomy turret with its spiral stair, the golden shield of Scotland was gloomily taken down by one who had fought in her cause, when Mary crossed the Firth on her last fatal journey to trust the false courtesies of England. That in this dark chamber, a godly Lady Mossgray sheltered the persecuted hinds and shepherds, whose faith has added them to the ranks of our truest chivalry in Scotland. That this enlarged and decorated hall in the basement of the tower bears witness to the peace of the third William’s reign. That these gradually accumulating walls carry on the chronicle through the less eventful times of modern history—that here we have been dwelling, through all vicissitudes prosperous and adverse, in our own land and among our own people for five hundred certain years. There remembrances I acknowledge are dear to me. I lose my own individuality when I leave Mossgray.

And in a vague mist of dreamy romance and childish reverie, these histories hung incumbent on my mind when my dim days began. They lived with me, a host of mingled times and shapes, more real, as I fancy yet, than the common every-day things I saw around. The chill of cold-heartedness, the absence of truth, strike with a strange, blank, unexpressed pain, upon the heart of a child—and from these I turned to dwell, where warriors and Border maidens had dwelt before me, among the true knights and fair ladies of a yearning fancy, whose indefinite pageants and minstrelsies had yet more truth of nature in them than the hollow external forms of the life that men called real.—

“Blank misgivings of a creature
Moving about in worlds not realized,”

oppressed me on all sides then—but I had no misgivings as to the beautiful olden times—they were past, and they were true!

At our feet in this Mossgray runs a water, of some importance as we flatter ourselves. Flowing downward placid and calm from the hills, it has attained a considerable breadth and volume before it passes our old walls. And, by what chance I know not, our stream has been kept in its native pride of woodland and green banks safe from encroachments of cultivation. We have glades whose grassy undulations and noble solitary trees might match with any park in England, and we have thickly-wooded deans, closing in arched foliage over our river, with fretting rocks and waterfalls peculiarly our own. Scattered cot-houses to whom this water is a dear companion—quaint and dewy villages lying under the trees, with glimmerings of softened light about them, from the sky above and the stream below. Mills picturesque in their mossy homeliness throwing the drowsy stir of rural labour across the placid water—these are our friends and neighbours at Mossgray.

Nor do we lack, in our quiet country, inhabitants more distinguished. If I pursue my walk southward for a mile, I come upon a brave stone bridge, spanning with its stately arches the pleasant river; and across the bridge appear the many-coloured roofs of the town of Fendie in their varieties of thatch and slate, and homely red tiles, congregated happily together for mutual friendship and traffic. A very tranquil rural town, along whose streets the sunbeam slants drowsily in summer, with scarce a passing figure to break its brightness; but withal a busy borough, alive with many interests, and esteeming itself in innocent vanity and self-complacence, very far in advance of the simple “country” over which it sways its little sceptre, in all the arts and luxuries of life.

Withal, our water carries ships, and where it pours itself into the Firth, has wealthy fisheries upon its margin, and beholds long ranks of guileful nets, in which its receding waters help the fishermen to snare the glistening grilse and lordly salmon, born by the hundred in its silent caves. Our vessels are of no great burden, and boast but homely names—“Williams” and “Janets,” “Johns” and “Marys”—for our ship-owners name their cherished boats after their still more cherished children; but all of them proudly bear the emblazoned name of Fendie. To all of them the Waterfoot is a delicious haven, fragrant with the breath of home.

The grey walls of Mossgray have at all times been home to me—although a quiet and sad one often, to the man no less than to the solitary child they sheltered long ago. I remember well the pensive childish musings of that time; the dreamy gladness with which I wandered on those bright summer mornings by the pleasant water, my sole friend and playmate then, as it is my best companion now; and that unspeakable loneliness and desolation which came to me on the drooping wing of the plaintive autumn breeze. It is all indefinite and vague now as it was then. The little moralist of ten twelvemonths beginning to think how swiftly those waves of his young life glided by—the meditative, pensive boy looking on while his compeers in years pursued their sports, with his bashful wish to join them, and his sorrowful dreamy thoughts about their unthinking mirth. I recall these as a succession of dim pictures—the history of a beginning life, forlorn as only childhood can be.

CHAPTER II.

Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy;
But he beholds the light and whence it flows—
He sees it in his joy.

I do not quite agree with Wordsworth.

I grant you that there is much in the earlier childhood, indefinite always and vague as twilight dreams, which proclaims the spiritual and infinite to be nearer to these unconscious dawning souls than it is to us. There is the instinct of wonder, which in its eager whys and wherefores strikes out intuitions of strange wisdom sometimes, concerning those common mysteries about us, with which, in the invulnerable might of their simplicity, philosophers dare not meddle—

“The obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things;”

the “visionary gleam” which this new inmate of the world throws about unawares from its own strangely luminous soul. I grant you all these in early childhood, but for your boy!

Your healthful boy is given to no manner of musing. He has begun to come in contact with the materialisms of the world, and battles with them lustily, with right good will and daring joyousness. It does not occur to him to tell you of the beauty of this water, but you shall find him eloquent on the subject of his anglings or swimmings—his feats upon it in boats—his miraculous slides—his inevitable fallings in. The delicate spiritual presence within him has forgotten how, a while ago, it seemed well nigh to touch, in dreamy awe and reverence, those other spiritual presences with which its teeming fancy had peopled the indefinite air everywhere. The warm blood is bounding in his veins in all its first exuberant impulse of life and motion. To construct—to destroy—to fight—to labour—to bend all these material obstructions under the absolute dominion of his strong young human will. To pour forth in boisterous glee, by shout and whoop, by leap and wrestle, by all that is joyous, and wild, and loud enough, the overflowing energy of his youthful powers. Your true boy does not pause in his manifold undertakings to consider natural joys and sunshine. If you would understand his enjoyment of these, you must see him breast the current as he swims across the river, and swing high up on perilous branches in the wood. His hands are full—let them talk or muse who will—his vocation is other than this.

The boy’s hero is the material man—the one single unapproachable Crusoe whom Genius has created for him—the many sailor-men of ruder flesh and blood, militant upon the sea—the hunter of unknown forests—the adventurous traveller of dangerous countries—there are the glorious ideals of the boy. He thirsts to throw the lasso with the fiery sportsman of Mexico, he burns with vain longing to have been one of the olden crew who were shipwrecked with the Byron of the sea. He clenches his hands and sets his teeth in burning indignation, when he reads how the gentle Cook fell in yon southern island far away, and knows by the valiant blood rising hot to his heart, that had he been there it had chanced otherwise. And if he returns to olden times, it is to fight by the side of Wallace, to row the forlorn boat of the Bruce, to do battle on the muirs for the Covenant, to guide Prince Charles through mountain pass and cavern. When he dreams, it is of the world without—the stirring, fighting, opposing world, which is to be quelled, and put down, and tamed into obedience to the young conqueror’s will. The sun sheds grateful light upon him, and the moon looks down from her broad skies in vain. If he could fight for her, she might enlist his youthful chivalry, as the Queen of old times, the hapless Mary, like her in lofty beauty, as in disastrous wading through stormy clouds, might have done: but to dream of her—to think of her serene pale smile—alas, no! he has other work in hand.

I remember I was fishing or appearing to fish one bright morning, in a link of our water, which was a kind of hermitage to me,—I might be twelve years old then—when my father suddenly approached me, leading in his hand a boy of my own years—a boy so differently endowed, so superior to myself as I felt at once in my shy consciousness.

My father visited Mossgray seldom: at this time we had received no intimation of his coming, and the timid constraint and awkward diffidence, which were always upon me in his presence, were heightened into exceeding pain by this sudden appearance.

“Adam,” said my father, “this is your cousin Charles. He is to stay with you in future at Mossgray.”

My father’s own name was Charles; he looked with favour on his namesake, as he watched our greeting. I so shy and rustic, and Charlie Graeme so bold and manly—I felt how disadvantageous was the comparison.

But when my father left us, and we became acquainted, as we did soon, for my cousin was as frank as I was shy, then the glorious new life of genuine boyhood which burst upon Mossgray and upon me! How I lavished upon Charlie the unsunned treasures of my solitary child’s heart; how I awoke out of my dreamy loneliness, to find myself enriched beyond all wealth in his companionship. How I discovered a new charm and attraction in my own beloved water and noble woods, from the wild shout of mirth with which Charlie plunged into riotous enjoyment of them. How the old walls and doorways that had been disturbed by few sounds louder than my pensive stealings out and in, resounded now with the ringing speed of boyish footsteps, and the blythe din of boyish laughter. It is pleasant to look back upon that time, when from a childish hermit I became a boy!

There was for me after that era no more solitary watching of the sports of others. The “haill water” ere long knew Charlie Graeme as the adventurous leader of every troop of juvenile mischief-makers, and I was by no means a slow or backward pupil. The complete revolution in my life which this produced gave these vigorous enjoyments a still greater zest to me, albeit I sometimes felt the pleasure of compassionate benevolence towards these strong fellows, my seniors in years, whose unthinking mirth of mood was so much younger than mine. I liked the sports for their sake, and they gave me some casual place in their regard for sake of the games in which I shared—we were different so far—but the lingerings of my recluse spirit did by no means operate disadvantageously upon my physical activities. I had emerged into a new existence. I had entered the second stage of life.

Charlie was the son of my father’s only brother. I had never seen, and scarcely ever heard of, my uncle; but at his death, which took place a short time before his son’s arrival at Mossgray, Charlie, with the very slender inheritance that remained to him, had been committed to my father’s care, as his only near relative and guardian. To keep us together at Mossgray was the cheapest and easiest way of getting rid of us, and accordingly we were despatched together to the academy of Fendie.

A somewhat famous school in our district, which in its day has sent forth men into the world—men of stature and nobleness, some few, albeit it has filled up its quota with perhaps a greater than usual commodity of packmen; but a school of high standing and character withal, to which the neighbouring gentry, and the smaller fry of “genteel families” in Fendie, could send their sons without derogation. We made the usual progress, as I fancy, in those routine affairs which were called our studies. We learnt lessons with as much painstaking industry as we could summon up in the morning, and forgot them with the most praiseworthy ease at night. We were conscientious enough to play truant seldom—we had no more than our average of accidents. Charlie only twice fell into the water, and only once broke his arm. My nautical mischances had all some connection with the mill-lead at the Dean, my favourite nook. On the whole we got through admirably. Never boys on the Border were blyther than we.

Young Fendie of the mount was at an English boarding-school. Our sturdy home academy was not good enough for the young laird of that ilk. What storms of ridicule we poured upon him—he knapped English, he had a holy horror of torn breeks, he never climbed a tree in his life; and, crowning shame of all, it was whispered among us in the utmost scorn and derision, that his dainty cambric handkerchief was perfumed like a lady’s! We looked at the indefinite looking things in our own miscellaneous pockets, and echoed it with a storm of laughter. “He has scent on his napkin!” It was the very climax of derision: we could go no further.

Hew Murray, of Murrayshaugh, was our warmest friend. We met sometimes, when out-of-door amusements were impracticable, in the vaulted room in Mossgray Tower, where lay in state various remnants of ancestral mail, and which we called the armoury—to compare notes as to the changes which must have happened in the fortunes of Scotland, had we three chanced to fight at Falkirk with Wallace, or with James at Flodden. But whereas Hew Murray and I were chivalrously engrossed with considerations of what we could have done for Scotland, it always happened, as I recollect, that Charlie rose in glorious anticipation of knighthoods and earldoms and broad lands to be won by his sword and by his bow. Innocent chevaliers errant were we, not without a weakness for beautiful disconsolate princesses, and imprisoned ladies to be set free by our valour and fidelity, but the dazzling chances of war had greater fascination for Charlie. Our hero contented himself with freeing the lady, and reducing the castle—his, took possession of the conquered stronghold and reigned in the stead of his enemy.

But our friends were not all of our own degree. A mile or two on the other side of Fendie lay a pretty house, which made up in its snug and comfortable proportions for its entire want of all the antiquities which clustered in hoary grace about Mossgray. Pertaining to it was a small farm, which sufficed to give its proprietor the much-esteemed territorial designation. The name of the place was Greenshaw, its owner’s Johnstone. People said that he had driven a homely enough trade in former days; but never man on the northern side of Skiddaw had seen any vestige of the pack on the broad shoulders of Mr Johnstone of Greenshaw. Besides, we do rather hold the “wanderer’s” trade in good repute in our country, so the rumour did the comfortable man no harm.

His son Walter was one of our sworn brethren. Walter Johnstone surpassed us all in daring; but the greatest heat of boyish excitement could scarcely bring any additional glow to his cheek, or throw the slightest tremor into his hand. Walter could calculate his time to a moment; he was never late, he was never hurried. Prompt and bold, cool and acute, he was the regulator and time-keeper of our obstreperous band.

Then there was Edward Maxwell, the widow’s son at the Watch-brae. He was the detrimental of our joyous parties. He always became weary at unseasonable times; he continually shirked his share of the work, and evaded the perilous parts of our excursions; but he had good looks in his favour, and a winning, ingratiating, caressing manner, which overcame our reproaches. It always happened, too, that Maxwell’s weakness brought him prominently forward among us. Speculations as to what he would do next, when he would fail in a fatigue, how he would glide out of a danger, with what new expedients he would excuse himself, kept our conversation full of him, and he felt the distinction, such as it was.

Other companions we had, greater and smaller as it chanced, for we were perfectly republican. Many kindly ties I have from that school-time with men of all classes, in all places and quarters of the earth: Australian settlers in the bush, merchants in London and Liverpool, distinguished men of literature, poor subalterns in India, humble shopkeepers in Fendie, small farmer-lairds in my own county; these pleasant threads of old connection are spun out far and near. I like it—there is a kindly universality of brotherhood in this, that seems to me as much better, as it is wider and further reaching than any mere friendships of one especial class, isolated, and standing upon the bare platform of their position.

CHAPTER III.

The youth who daily further from the East
Must travel, still is Nature’s priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended.

Yes! it is in youth, properly so called, that the true age of poetry is.

The priesthood of nature, the mood that can hold communion with her in her every place and time—these come only when the boy’s material age is past, and the childish dreams come back, mightier now and clearer, to clothe with their rare grace the expanding, growing soul. Is it well that this radiance should by and by fade into the light of common day? let us be content—the old man is of kin to the youth—perchance if the harsher meridian time did not intervene, it would scarcely be so.

But now the vision splendid travels with him everywhere. There is a glory about the hills and on the sky; there is music, all the more dear that it is inarticulate, in every running stream; there is, highest of all, a wonderful light of truth, and love, and nobleness, over all human things. Motives grand and sublime, labour generous and great, worthy of the marvellous position held by this mortal race. The whole universe vibrates to his ear, with heroic marches and noble chimes of music, to which his soul thrills, and his step keeps time. True indeed there are falsehood and selfishness and change here, or whence these tales of sorrow, and this generous indignation that swells within him, against the wrong which is to be conquered; but these are not near him. In his own especial atmosphere there is perfect truth open at all points to the eye of day. His ideal covers and veils all meaner faults in the objects of his chivalrous affection; and he pities men who are smarting under neglect or inconsistency, or worldliness of friends, as those pity who feel their own blessedness made all the greater by the contrast.

Before I had reached this stage, my father had been for some time dead. Mr Murray of Murrayshaugh, the father of our friend Hew, a surly old gentleman of very ancient family, and very meagre estate, was my guardian; and we boys, having fairly concluded our academy course, began to form plans for our future life, not without much magniloquence of speech. Maxwell wavered long between the two grave professions of medicine and the Church. The latter was at first decidedly the favourite, for Johnstone, with malicious glee, drew so exquisite a picture of an adoring congregation, and ministering angels, in the form of ladies, old and young, that the gentle Edward was overpowered with modest delight. But the Widow Maxwell in her cottage, on the Watch-brae, had no manner of influence in the Church, while she had the shadow of a promise from some patron of her husband’s to procure for Edward a situation like his father’s, that of an assistant army surgeon. So Maxwell’s fate was determined. He was immediately to commence his studies as a medical student.

Johnstone at once and promptly decided for the law, in some one of its occult branches, I scarcely recollect which; but he had not the gift of utterance, and therefore was disqualified from entering the highest and most showy class of the profession.

Charlie’s destination was less easily fixed. He was eager to grow rich—he aspired to be famous—he liked all the good things of this world so well, that he was undecided which to grasp at. He thought of India, and his eyes sparkled; but some indefinite feeling, which was not home-love, made him determine to remain in Scotland. I used to wonder at this; for Charlie, with his frank fascination of manners, and his adventurous spirit, was the very man to travel—the very man, as I fancied in honest boyish admiration, to succeed brilliantly wherever he went; but he resolved to remain at home. Then he thought of business—of becoming a great merchant—for youthful calculators have a happy knack of leaping over all the initiatory steps—but for that the capital was wanting. He had nothing—I not very much, and while I would joyfully have shared my utmost farthing with Charlie, that gruff old Murrayshaugh growled forth his veto—“There’s enough tint with merchandise for one generation of ye!” so we relinquished that.

But the gift that Johnstone wanted, Charlie had in perfection. He was a natural orator; and the momentous decision was made at last. Charlie decided upon being a great lawyer—the most brilliant pleader in Scotland—perhaps Lord Advocate eventually—certainly a Member of Parliament—Member for Edinburgh! Charlie rose from his low carved chair by the fire as that crowning glory burst upon him—the grandeur of it was overpowering—Member for Edinburgh!

Murrayshaugh was an impoverished and poor estate. Its possessor had been “wild” in his youth, and now resented and avenged upon his children the poverty himself had made. Lucy Murray grew up in forlorn and lonely seclusion, acquainted from her youth with many cares. Hew was designed for a civil appointment in India, where his father ordained his industry should redeem the fortunes of the family. The harsh old man was a despot—there was no appeal against his arbitrary will.

But Murrayshaugh withal was a gentleman and a scholar; as anxious that his son should be fully and carefully fitted for the position he was to occupy as determined that in this way, and no other, should Hew’s life be spent. So Hew also was to join our little band of students in Edinburgh, and to have the advantage of two or three sessions’ training there, before he departed to his far-away labour. I could not part with them—Charlie and Hew especially were my sworn brethren; and after a long siege Murrayshaugh yielded to my very reasonable wish of accompanying them, and gave to Charlie and myself the necessary funds, commenting bitterly,—

“Your father, Adam, gave me no charge of furnishing two lads for the college. An it be your silly pleasure to spend your means on your cousin, the way is to deny yourself, my man—not to think you are a pink of generosity when it costs you nothing. But take it—take it—I wish ye much gratitude. If ye get but the common share, ye will be well repaid.”

“Never mind my father, Adam,” said Lucy, as I emerged indignantly from the dreary library of Murrayshaugh into the luxuriant garden, with its mossy terraces sloping to the river-side. “Simon says true, his bark is worse than his bite—and I think, though he would not say it, that he is sad about you all going away, and only looks angry because he thinks shame.”

“Are we to go, Adam?” said Charlie, eagerly. He had come to Murrayshaugh with me, and had waited on the terrace with Hew and Lucy while I bearded the lion within.

“Yes,” said I, with some heat—for there is nothing that one resents so warmly in one’s first youth as any prophecy of ingratitude on the part of those whom we delight to honour. “Yes, we’re to go. I would like to know why old people continually think young ones fools.”

I was nearly eighteen—I drew myself up.

“Perhaps because they are often, Adam,” suggested Lucy gently.

I could not be angry at Lucy Murray. I was too full of boyish chivalry, having reëntered the age of imagination, to be anything but gentle and deferential to a girl.

“How you do speak,” exclaimed my cousin, “you think us fools, do you, Lucy?—very well—you’ll see that by and by.”

“When you read the honourable Member for Edinburgh’s great speech,” said Hew, with his frank and pleasant laugh, “about—what will it be about, Charlie?”

“And I would like to know,” continued Charlie, angrily, “what we have done that we should be thought so very foolish. We have only been at home all our lives, no doubt—people get so much more culture in Yorkshire!”

Lucy turned away.

“Never heed him, Lucy,” said Hew, “he shows the cloven foot. It’s all about poor Dick Fendie. Why, man, Charlie, to be jealous of him!”

Charlie was past eighteen. He had some time since thrown his handkerchief on Lucy Murray, and regularly engrossed her society; by no means to her own satisfaction at first, but she had become accustomed to it. He had wounded her feelings now. He saw it himself, and was maliciously pleased. I saw it as she wandered along the terrace towards the water-side, and could almost have thrown him over the wall in spite of our brotherhood.

“What is the matter?” said I. “Quarrel with Hew or me as you like, Charlie, but what has Lucy done?”

Charlie twisted the graceful curl by the side of his cap, and swung round on his heel to follow Lucy without answering me. He was very handsome, and had a frank manliness in every look and gesture which disarmed one’s reproofs. At present, too, the conscious smile of power was on his face—he felt himself so sure of immediate forgiveness—so perfectly able to restore the smiles of Lucy Murray.

Hew and I stood watching him, as he went along the terrace after her. Our eyes met—we exclaimed in chorus, “He does not mean anything—Charlie would not hurt any one’s feelings for the world.”

“It was Lucy’s own fault, talking so much of Dick Fendie,” said Hew. “Mamma’s good boy has come home, Adam—have you seen him yet? And Lucy would defend him; but I suppose it’s all over now. By the by, Adam, how does it come about that you and I never quarrel with Lucy?”

“You and I—why, is she not your sister, Hew? and almost mine, too—Charlie you know—Charlie is different.”

Hew became thoughtful for a moment, and ended with a laugh. “Ay, that’s because Mrs Mense at Mossgray says they were made for each other. But I say, Adam, do Lilie Johnstone and you battle at each other like these two?”

I blushed a tremulous blush—it was desecration to name this sacred name so lightly. The two things were altogether different—how or wherefore I did not stay to analyse—but my reverent boyish adoration, and Charlie’s bold demands upon the constant patience and sole regard of Lucy Murray, had no resemblance to each other. I shrank back—I would have had Lilias Johnstone distinguished by the reverent respect of all men, and to hear her name thus profanely conjoined with mine!

“Are you nearly ready, Hew?” I asked hastily, “and when are we to start?”

The starting time was decided on that night, and shortly after we set out, the whole rejoicing band of us, upon a bracing frosty morning, late in October, on the top of the coach for Edinburgh. Maxwell managed to get up a few tears for his mother’s especial benefit. I had nearly joined him myself, I recollect, when I saw her pale anxious face lifted up so tenderly to the high perch where we were crowded together. Never human face had worn that look for me, and my heart warmed the more to the son of this sad mother, even while I almost envied him.

All the rest of us were motherless; but even the gruff “Good-bye, boys,” of Murrayshaugh had some feeling in it this morning; and Lucy Murray’s eyes were too heavy to be raised to us, as she stood by her father’s side. Then there was a small white hand waving a handkerchief from within the high holly hedge of Greenshaw as we passed. It perhaps was not all for her brother. I appropriated, with trembling, some share of the farewell.

In a very short time we had settled down to our respective studies. It is comparatively unusual in Scotland to give youths the benefit of college education except for some special profession; so that, put the learned faculties aside, and you leave but a small residuum to represent what forms the larger proportion of students in England. It is perhaps for this reason that we are more practical than our neighbours; that those niceties of profound classical learning which form the glory on the head of English universities—those painful researches into the nature of the Greek verb, and folio disputations on contested words, do scarcely exist among us. But that by the way. We were very frank, very unsophisticated, very innocent, we Fendie lads; and even, as I fancy, very little less so when we left than when we entered Edinburgh. It has its abundant temptations, no doubt, as all other towns have, but, so far as I myself saw, we came through them with tolerable safety. Faults of mind, and temper, and spirit, we had many, but I think we, in a great degree, escaped that round of petty vices, the assumed manliness of which leads so many foolish lads astray.

CHAPTER IV.

I walk as ere I walked forlorn
When all our path was fresh with dew
And all the bugle breezes blew
Reveillée to the breaking morn.—In Memoriam.

I am looking out from the deep window of my study, through the sharp air of a frosty, clear November night. There are lights gleaming in some cottage windows, so far down under the bare trees by the water-side, that you would think them glow-worms on the grass; and silvery mists are floating about the sky, and yonder lie some great distant mountain clouds, with stars embayed in creeks and inlets at their feet, like lights of anchored ships.

The face of the beautiful night before me brings back another time. I fancy I am leaning again over the grey wall, which bounds the sloping road on yonder Calton, looking down with rapt and dreamy eyes upon that wonderful scene below. Hew Murray’s arm is in mine; we have the visionary reverence of youth upon us, and when we speak, we speak low, and with few words. Yonder noble hill with its proud crest, and its visible darkness—yonder faint towers, far below, of storied Holyrood—that grand rugged line from the dim valley of the palace to the bluff front of the castle, with its graceful hovering crown of St Giles lying so fitly upon the stately head of our royal city—the gleaming lights, halfway between the dim sky and the dimmer earth—the confused hum ascending up in softened dreamy murmurs. So near the life and din of a great city; so near the wonderful gloom and silence of the everlasting hills. There is a jarring sound below. I start and open my eyes—and I am looking forth upon the placid water of Fendie, the low cottage lights below, and the steady stars above—an old man and alone!

After our third session together at college, Hew Murray went to his distant destination. Murrayshaugh himself came to Edinburgh to superintend his son’s outfit, and to my very great grief, and the regret of the whole band of us, slightly mingled with envy, Hew set sail in a Leith smack—we had no steamers in those days—for London, from whence he was to proceed to Portsmouth, where his ship lay.

Hew was not of the cosmopolitan class; he was one of those—happily still existing, and I hope increasing in these days—whom the very name of home and country stirred like a trumpet. After the greatest motive of all—and I fear that in our youthful time that had but little comparative weight with us, as it had little place in the teachings of those who had the guiding of our unformed minds—the honour of his name and of his native land roused the warm spirit of my dear friend, Hew, as no other causes could. “For poor auld Scotland’s sake”—in some degree we all shared the intense and loving loyalty which took this as its centre, but it was a ruling principle with Hew Murray; and he felt his banishment most painfully, though he submitted to the necessity like a man—for Hew had not any very brilliant hopes.

“There is little chance that I will be able to return till I am old, Adam,” he said to me, sadly, as we lingered on our favourite walk for the last time, looking down on the Old Town through the balmy dim spring night; “and if I should come home as rich as old Major Wardlaw of the Elms, what then? One would scarcely like to look forward to such an end of one’s labours. His gouty chair, and his hot unwholesome room, and his solitude, and his grumbling, and his spiceries, and his inflammable temper. Man, Adam! to think that I must leave home, and part with Lucy and with all of you, and toil through my whole life where I shall never hear a Scotch tongue, for such an end as that!”

“You will hear many Scotch tongues in Bombay, Hew,” said I, “and then you are sure to marry somebody’s daughter, and come home immediately.”

Hew’s frank happy laugh rang into the dim air pleasantly; its sound always cheered me, but the remembrance that I might not hear it again for years fell upon me in blank pain. We made a great many hysterical attempts after that to be merry, but failed so woefully in every case, that we turned at last in silence round the brow of the hill, and looked out upon the sea: the noble Firth spreading its silvery lengths far away in the distance, with its dark islands and steady lights, and the broad line of its princely highway leading forth into the foreign world!

The cold, strange, alien world where home was not, nor friends. Hew Murray’s hand grasped my arm for a moment with a convulsive pressure, and there were tears under our eyelids,—tears which we were not ashamed to shed under cover of the gentle night.

The next day I watched a white sail gliding smoothly over the peaceful Firth, until I lost it on the horizon far away—and my dearest friend was gone.

For Charlie Graeme, brother-like as we were, was less closely joined to me than Hew. It is a vulgar notion that the warmest friendship requires a contrast of minds. Charlie and I had very distinct individualizations. Hew resembled me closely—I had almost said, that in matters of the mind and heart Hew Murray and I had all things common. In things physical there was the same connection between my cousin and myself; but heartily as I liked Charlie, there were many points on which I certainly knew that we could by no possibility agree; there were many matters of feeling and thought which I shrank from bringing under his keen glance—that glance which pierced through my bashful sentimentalities with so little pity.

Maxwell got on delicately with those medical studies of his. He was a great favourite everywhere, his weakness, as usual, bringing him in for much more than his average share of consideration. Charlie and Walter toiled manfully at the dry initiatory necessities of their profession. They were “clever lads” of good parts and promise, both, and both too well endowed with stout common sense and the natural self-interest and ambition, to be, except in rare outbursts, loiterers or idlers. For my desultory self, I dabbled in all scientific crafts; was a metaphysician for one fit, and a chemist for another, and an antiquarian for a third; I dipped into Charlie’s dreary quartos, and lingered at the threshold of the dissecting-room with Edward, and for my own hand got through heaps of reading, systematic and unsystematic, not always drawn from the venerable shelves of the college library. It formed a pile of strange rubbish altogether, built up as it was with the crude philosophies peculiar to my years.

But sauntering along the Calton Hill now, alone, to dream over the Old Town, in its antique grace and beauty, made me sick at heart. Hew Murray was one of those rare friends whom one does not need to be continually talking to. A stranger who observed our few words might have taken us for very indifferent companions, but this was above all, the sign of our closest brotherhood. When Charlie was with us, we were talkative enough, for then a foreign element was introduced, but we were too much one when we were alone to have any such constraint upon us. And when from these silent walks we emerged into the bustle and light of the street below, and throwing off the charm, began to be as loud as our neighbours, we felt, both of us, that the chain of our regard was drawn closer by these communings. Never friend in this world did I appropriate and feel mine so entirely as Hew, and the dim hill-side where my silence was unshared, where there was none to dream beside me as I dreamt, or to feel as I felt, became painful to my solitary eyes. I did not return to Edinburgh after Hew went away. It had lost its charm for me. I remained alone at Mossgray.

I was then a man. I had nearly reached my majority, and having perhaps exaggerated notions of what became my place and position in respect to the tenants and cottages around me, I began to bestir myself to ascertain how I could do some work in this brief district, allotted to me by Providence. I have always been inclined to the contemplative, but I am not idle, and with all the proud hopes and ambitions of youth to buoy me up, I laboured and deliberated “for the good of the people,” with much enjoyment of the philanthropy.

Lucy Murray had grown into a young woman; graceful and grave, with lines of thought upon her forehead, printed perhaps too deeply for one so young. That slender ring upon her finger was Charlie’s gift, and contains in its small enclosure one of those circlets of his sunny hair, which cling so lovingly about his temples and become them so well; for their engagement is a grave matter now, acknowledged and known. And yet I fancy them scarcely like each other yet, for Lucy has dwelt long with her own thoughts silently, and in solitude, and Charlie, with his whole soul, has embarked on the busy sea of life; but the contrast gives them singular grace when they are together, and Lucy is more than ever a sister to me.

The bright face at Greenshaw, which, with all its happy changes, has been the angel of my boyish dreams for years, is brighter now in the grace of early womanhood than ever before. I fancy her the inmate of some pure and holy atmosphere, the star of some loftier sky. I forget when I am near Greenshaw that there is sin in the world—I become heterodox in my very faith—for evil has no share in Lilias.

The name echoes in my ear with a ring of silvery music. The beautiful and pure of all ages shed their glory about her, and claim my devouter homage. The Rachel of yonder plains of Syria, the Mary, blessed among women, the Una, the Desdemona of our own land. Their shadow is upon her in all places; the very neighbours, common-place as they are, speak low, I fancy, when they speak of “Lillie,” and I forgive them the familiarity for the sake of the gracious name; for the stately flower in its royal purity symbolizes my ideal well, and my garden at Mossgray grows white with snowy lilies, and I wander among them dreamily, in a mist of indefinite hopes, and fancied future gladnesses, too bright to tell.

The beautiful time! when every foundation stood fast, and all that was, was true and constant, and of kin to the pure heavens.

Yet Lilias was only the daughter of Mr Johnstone of Greenshaw, who had little honour or standing beyond the bounds of Fendie. Murrayshaugh would have growled the utmost thunder of his anathema upon Lucy, had he known that in her sisterly kindness she had accompanied me to the comfortable plebeian parlour where shone my star, and electrified good Mr Johnstone into hopes of future friendships with those adjacent landed families, who had not hitherto condescended to notice him. But Lilias was shy of Lucy, and seemed, to my chagrin, indifferent to her visit; so I had to console myself with a transitory belief that Lilias felt proudly the injustice of those artificial barriers of society, and was sensible of wrong done to her native dignity by the false rule which made the Laird’s daughter of Murrayshaugh a greater person than she, and by Lucy’s quiet smile and gentle word of consolation. “By and by, Adam—we will be better friends, by and by.”

Yes—there was no landed family of them all which could boast a line so long and so unbroken as that of Mossgray. The encumbrances on the estate had gradually melted away during my frugal minority. I was able to maintain appropriately the position I had inherited. Only this one external matter of rank did Lilias want, and I had it, to lay it at her feet—the name itself acquired new honour and dignity, when my heart beat to anticipate the advent of a new lady of Mossgray, who should eclipse all who went before.

I greatly affected Mr Johnstone’s company then. He was a shrewd man, if not a refined one; and albeit he did not possess that fearful command of words which strikes one with utter panic when one comes to the beginning of a speech of his fellow-craftsman the “Wanderer” of Wordsworth, he yet could manage to keep up a conversation tolerably well, by help of an occasional monosyllable from the other interlocutor—we became great friends. He gave me counsel about the management of my lands; he told me that Matthew Irving of Friarsford, whose tack was nearly out, had been holding his farm for some years past nearly rent free, so greatly had the land increased in value, since his father got the lease. He talked to me of foreign wars and home politics—I listened in happy unconsciousness, feeling only that I was conciliating the goodwill of the father of Lilias, and advancing slowly to my aim.

Mr Johnstone was too shrewd a man not to perceive by and by what brought me so often, bashful and absorbed, into that corner of his parlour. The good man evidently believed at first that I sought the benefit and enlightenment of his conversation; but through a flood of random answers, and unhappy lack of comprehension on my part, of arguments which I never heard, his eyes were opened. He was by no means displeased, I fancied. I was “Mossgray” already, my income was good, my prospects better. I was altogether eligible for a son-in-law.

And by and by, I thought I discovered that the Fendie young ladies, who bore Lilias company sometimes, looked at her with wicked secret laughs and whisperings when I entered the room. Could Lilias guess herself? Alas, I could not tell! I was too self-conscious to be at ease with her, and she had always been shy to me.

And matters remained in this uncertain state for a considerable time. I became of age. Murrayshaugh gruffly resigned, as he had gruffly undertaken, the guardianship of myself and my possessions. His house grew more and more desolate as I fancied, and Lucy paler and more thoughtful every day. She was quite alone, and we used to walk together sometimes on the old terrace in silent sympathy, thinking of Hew. He had reached his destination safely, and entered with cheerfulness (as he told us) into the duties of his office; but the loss of him cast a sad shadow over the house of his fathers. Perhaps it might be only that—perhaps there was something more; but a sadder decay seemed to be gathering over it every time I visited Murrayshaugh.

CHAPTER V.

I leaned my back unto an aik,
I thought it was a trusty tree;
But first it bowed, and syne it brake,
And sae did my true love to me.—Old Song.

Our three students, Charlie, Walter, and Edward, at length completed their studies, and entered upon the duties of their respective professions. Charlie got his first brief from an old friend of the family, and there actually was a report of his speech on the case, by no means an important one, but greatly interesting and very momentous to us, in one of the Edinburgh papers. It was something about a quarry, I think, though what about it, I cannot very well remember. I hurried up to Murrayshaugh with the paper. It was a bright day of early summer, and Charlie himself was to be with us in a week; a visit to which we had long looked forward, and of which Lucy and I had more than once spoken.

I found Lucy in her own little parlour, at the low window which opened to the terrace. The willows were sweeping their long branches over the sighing water, and in spite of the May sunshine over all, and the universal joy without, there was a look of sadness here. I involuntarily restrained my quick step as I reached the window, and Lucy looked up from her habitual work with her usual kindly and gentle smile.

“Look here, Lucy! I have brought you news,” said I, “news worth seeing. Come, don’t read them in a dull room this May-day. Come out into the sunshine and read them here.”

Lucy rose eagerly.

“What is it? is it about Hew, Adam, or—” She paused; a wavering painful colour came upon her cheek, and her fingers played nervously with the work she had laid down.

“Lucy, you do not think I could bring you anything but good news to-day. Come out and read Charlie’s first speech. His pleadings on his first brief, you know—you heard all about that.”

I fancied I saw a slight shiver of her frame. She had not heard it! but in a moment after Lucy stept out upon the terrace and took the paper and read. I thought her figure seemed taller and more distinct against the shadowy background of willows, as she stood there before me with the paper in her hand. There was something in it of firm pride and endurance which struck me as new—some greater emotion than I had ever known.

“Did Charlie send you this, Adam?” she asked, as she gave it back to me.

“Yes, Lucy,” said I humbly, feeling myself guilty of giving her great pain when I had expected to bring her pleasure; “it came last night.”

There was a slight, almost imperceptible shiver again, and a wandering of the fingers towards each other, as though they would fain be clasped together in the instinctive gesture of grief.

“Wait for me a moment, Adam,” said Lucy; “I have something to say to you.”

I waited upon the terrace while she went in. What could this portend? I believed, and so did all the countryside, that their marriage was delayed only until Charlie had a prospect of success in his profession. He had told me so himself; it was an understood thing; yet Lucy had not been told of his first brief.

She joined me almost immediately, having only gone in, as it appeared, to throw the light plaid she usually wore, over her shoulders and head, and I waited in anxious silence for her first words.

We had reached the water-side, and paused there together, the long willow-boughs sweeping over us sadly, before she spoke,—

“Adam,” she said then, “have you had any conversation with my father lately? Has he ever spoken to you about—about his own affairs?”

“No, Lucy,” said I.

“Adam, I may speak to you,” said Lucy. “There is some new calamity hanging over us. I have seen my father receive letters of late—letters that I could perceive were from lawyers—which have brought to his face that white look of despair which you never saw. I mentioned Walter Johnstone’s name to him once—when you told us he had gone into partnership with some one in Edinburgh—because he was Hew’s companion, and—and yours—and my father broke out into a curse upon him, immediately adding, however,—‘Not him—why should I swear at a packman’s son? but my own miserable fortune, that am doomed to be tortured to death by these hired hounds of lawyers!’ I dared ask nothing then, but I have been ready to catch at every word since; and my father has vaguely intimated to me some intention that we should go to France—at least,” said Lucy, hastily, with an indignant blush burning on her face, and a painful heaving of her breast, “that he would go—and, of course, I will not leave him.”

“But the cause, Lucy?” said I. “He can have no cause.”

“Alas, Adam, I cannot tell!” said Lucy, sadly, “for he never has taken me into his confidence; but I think it must be some responsibility—some—Adam, I do not need to hesitate—you know well that we have always been poor.”

I did not know how to answer her; I leaned upon the old mossy wall by Lucy’s side, eager to speak of herself—of Charlie, and yet afraid.

“Is there anything that I can do!” I said. “You can trust me, Lucy; is there anything that I can do?”

“No, no, Adam! I do not mean that; no one must interfere with my father or his purposes, you know; but I only desired to tell you that you might understand as much as I do of why we went, if we do go away, and—I only wished to tell you, Adam.”

Lucy turned her head away; one or two tears, so large that one could see by what bitter force they had been restrained, fell softly on the moss of the wall, but she thought I did not see them.

“Lucy, Lucy, this must not be!” said I; “tell me what I can do; I will venture anything rather than that this should come upon us! If Hew were only here—if you would but plead for me, Lucy, that your father may remember that what I have is yours—yours with my whole heart.”

I saw her shake and tremble in the strong effort to restrain herself, but it would not do. She pressed her hand across her eyes, and again the tears fell singly upon the moss—a few large bitter tears, as if they had been gathered long—an essence of intense pain too powerful to spend itself in much weeping—deliberate drops wrung from her very heart.

“I thank you, Adam,” she said at last, “and yet I do not need to say, I thank you—you know that—but this cannot be; you must do nothing; none of us can do anything except submit. It was only a selfish desire to pain you, I am afraid, which made me tell you this; for it will indeed be very hard to leave Murrayshaugh!”

I could say nothing in return. Alas! there are harder trials than even bidding farewell to one’s home. All was not well in this beautiful world; there were other things among us than those I had dreamed of, and my heart sickened as I tried to reassure myself.

By and by, Lucy turned along a quiet sheltered way, close by the water-side, and I went with her—perhaps I should have left her there, but I followed in spite of myself. We began to speak of Hew.

“Do you think we shall ever meet all together again, Adam?” said Lucy.

“Surely—I hope so,” said I, hastily. “We are all young, Lucy; we may be changed externally perhaps, but that will be all.”

“If we are ever together again, we shall be changed in every way, Adam.”

“Nay, nay, Lucy,” said I, “I cannot let you take up that gloomy notion. Why should we change? We know each other far too well to alter our old likings. We will be the same, Lucy, when we are grey-headed.”

“Will you, Adam?—will all of us?—or are we indeed what we think we are?—are we not clothing ourselves and others with some ideal of our own, which hides the natural spirit from us?”

“Lucy!”

“Suppose one had done that,” said Lucy, hurriedly, turning her head away, and speaking more, as I thought, to herself than to me. “Suppose one had clothed another in an ideal so beautiful, so noble, that one almost trembled at one’s own wondrous gladness beholding it; and suppose that suddenly a blast came, and rent the glorious tissue here and there, and revealed a hidden thing of clay below; and one came to know that this noble spirit had never been at all, save in the fancy that created it. I dreamt of such a thing the other night; and dreams come true sometimes. Adam, we all change—not one, but all of us.”

I could not speak then, nor did I try to answer her. What could I say? it was the first check put upon my joyous confidence in all whom I called friends.

“Has your father told Hew, Lucy, that he thinks of leaving Murrayshaugh?” I inquired at last, eager to change the subject.

“I think not. I hope it is only possible, Adam; I know nothing more than that; my father does not trust me; but we must know soon.”

I left Murrayshaugh sadly that day. When I had nearly reached Mossgray, I met Lilias with some of her companions, driving her father’s little four-wheeled equipage. They paused a moment to receive my eager bashful salutations, and then drove on. The sunshine of that young face dispersed the cloud of doubt and unhappiness that hung about me; for anything false, anything sad, could not come near Lilias—

“I trow that countenance cannot lie
Whose thoughts are legible in the eie,”

I said to myself joyously as I went on. I repented me of my suspicions of Charlie. Lucy must be mistaken. His conduct could be explained. The bright mist fell again over the world, and I forgot my fears and anxieties; they all fled before the smile of Lilias.

I did not see Lucy Murray again before Charlie himself arrived. He reached Mossgray on the afternoon of another brilliant May-day. He was very full of his prospects, and considerably elated with the successful beginning. He even told me the particulars of this first case, I recollect, in natural excitement and exultation, and very humdrum as they were, they interested me too, for his sake.

He had been nearly an hour in the house. Mrs Mense, the housekeeper, was preparing a magnificent dinner in honour of Mr Charlie, the great advocate; and there he sat, lounging half out of the open window, talking himself out of breath. I am nervous when I have any cause of anxiety. I began to change my position, to walk about the room, to take up and throw down everything within my reach. Charlie made no sign—he lounged and talked and laughed; he discussed the things which he would do, and which I should. I could bear it no longer.

“Charlie,” said I, “you intend to go to Murrayshaugh I suppose before dinner. You should set out at once, and make haste, for Mrs Mense will not forgive you if you spoil her trout to-day.”

“Trout!” said Charlie, “are we to have trout to-day? Mrs Mense is a sensible woman, Adam. I would not endanger Fendie trout for the world.”

“You are illogical, Charlie,” said I, “you forget that the governing clause in my sentence concerned Murrayshaugh, and not the fish.”

“Pooh—Murrayshaugh’s a bore,” said Charlie, hastily. “Do you angle yet, Adam, yourself? you lucky fellow, who have nothing to do, and can choose your own solacements!”

“But, Charlie,” said I, anxiously; “of course you intend to go some time this evening. I will undertake to make your peace with Nancy. There now, away with you, like a good fellow.”

“It’s ill talking between a fou man and a fasting,” said Charlie, with a forced laugh. “Come, Adam, let’s have dinner first—you forget my journey.”

He went off to his own room immediately, and I could say no more. I trembled for him. I feared to see the glorious tissue rent, as Lucy Murray said, and some other alien spirit appear below, which was not my friend and brother—which was not the true and generous Charlie Graeme.

We dined alone, and there was a certain constraint upon our conversation. Charlie, it is true, still spoke much, but he seemed, as I fancied, to speak against time. How he lingered at table—how he spun out his stories, and deliberated over every little change, and laboured to fasten arguments upon me, as though endeavouring to shut my eyes to the progress of those slowly darkening hours. I bore it as long as I could, and I bore it in intense pain—I had never known so great a trial.

“Charlie,” said I at last, “how we waste our time here. Come, I will walk up with you to Murrayshaugh.”

Charlie muttered something between his teeth. I only heard “Murrayshaugh,” but there was a syllable before which I blushed to guess at. “Ah, don’t weary me out,” he said aloud. “You don’t think I am made of cast-iron like your Herculean rustics. It’s too late now, Adam.”

I turned round and looked at him earnestly. He started to his feet with the quick anger of one who knows himself in the wrong.

“Well, what do you mean, Adam?”

“What do I mean, Charlie? It is I who should ask that question. You mean something by this—what is it?”

“By what?—come, come, Adam, this won’t do. Don’t assume the head of the family, I beg. I can manage my own affairs without any interference from you.”

I thought of Lucy Murray standing alone upon yon mossy terrace, without one in the world who could know, or could lighten her grief, aware that he was here, and looking for his coming in vain, and in the warmth of my youthful feelings I was overcome.

“Charlie,” said I, “you will grieve Lucy sadly if you do not go till to-morrow. Lucy is alone.”

“Well, I will save her the infliction,” said Charlie, with affected boldness. “It is well I had arranged it so before. I return to Edinburgh to-morrow.”

“Do you want to break her heart?” I exclaimed.

“I am not answerable to any one for what I intend to do,” said Charlie, sullenly.

“Yes, Charlie,” said I, “you are answerable—to one higher than we—to Hew had he been here—even to me. What is this, Charlie? You do not mean it—it is some passing quarrel which a few words will set right.”

“So!” said Charlie, with a sneer, “Miss Lucy has been complaining to you!”

My mood changed in a moment; from the utmost sorrow it became the most passionate anger. I had been labouring to prevent this inevitable rupture—now I was only eager that it should be completed.

“No,” I exclaimed, “you have never known Lucy Murray. I, who have been with you so long, only begin to know you now. You—you will never know Lucy—it is well you feel yourself unworthy of her—it is fit indeed that her true heart should not be wasted upon you.”

My own heart ached as I turned away from him. I had lost my friend. I began to grope in a world of shadows where truth was not; and not even the smile of Lilias could have woven again those fair ideal garments about Charlie Graeme.

We were mutually silent and sullen after that. Charlie was the first to speak.

“Adam,” he said, “I don’t want to quarrel with you, but I will answer to no man for my conduct; my motives and purposes are my own—and there has been quite enough of this. Walter Johnstone came out with me from Edinburgh to-day. Will you go over with me to Greenshaw to see him?”

I shrank from him—that he, unveiled and disenchanted as he was, should breathe the air which Lilias made holy—that her smile should fall upon him! I could hardly restrain myself, but for my old affection’s sake, and for Lucy’s sake, I did.

“I will follow you,” I answered, “at present I cannot go.”

He left the room, and, in a few minutes, the house, and I saw him go down the water whistling a merry tune, and pausing now and then to look round upon those peaceful home scenes, which his presence now desecrated to me. Murrayshaugh was in the opposite direction. I hurried along towards it under the trees, with an instinctive desire to see Lucy, and, unseen myself, to carry at least one sympathetic heart to her vicinity. It was a superstition of its kind. I had no thought of that—it was an instinct with me.

And there she certainly was upon the terrace, with her soft light plaid about her head, and her figure gliding strangely through shadows of the trees, and of the quaint, fantastic gables of the house, which the light of a young moon threw faintly on the ground at her feet. I saw her threading the maze of these, as she moved like a spirit upon the mossy garden path, and I began to fancy in the bitterness of my heart that it was thus with us all; that those shadowy unreal forms of ours were but wandering blindly through a shadowy world of pains and sorrows, which if it were not all false, was yet involved in a miserable twilight, where one knew not what was false and what was true.

The old decaying house, with its marks of gradual downfal and lingering sorrowful pride, and the one faint light in the window of the library where sat its aged possessor struggling with a young man’s strength of haughty resistance against the slow ruin that was gliding upon him like a thundercloud. The low cadence of those rustling willows, wooing the answering murmur of the water—the silence of the waning evening, made sadder and more spirit-like by the wan young moon, which gave to its dimness a spectral light and shadow—and Lucy Murray in her early youth, with not one heart that could or dared stand by her in her need, wandering among those shades, with the dark sky above, in the dim world, alone! I hurried away again. I could not look upon her.

CHAPTER VI.

Alas!
I do confess I thought all hearts were true,
As I did see the whole bright world—how fair!
For linked in happy fancies were the twain—
This beautiful—that pure—
And like the mountains of this noble land
Did Love and Faith and Honour stedfastly
Lift their high heads to the bright sun that crowned them,
As I thought, in my sight.
I do confess me—if it was a sin,
Behold these tears—for bitterly awaking,
I found I had but dreamed.

The parlour of Greenshaw was exceedingly bright when I entered it that night—brighter in reality, for they were rejoicing over Walter’s return—and brighter still in contrast with the scene I had left.

“Here he is at last,” cried Walter Johnstone, starting up to shake hands with me as I entered. “Why, have you been seeing ghosts, Adam? One would think that we were the rustics and he the townsman, Charlie.”

“You were always a contemplative man, Mossgray,” said Edward Maxwell, greeting me warmly; “but take care—if you do not tremble for the consequences of a prescription from me, I do, I can tell you.”

Edward’s manner was more manly than usual. In my yearning for something to make up for the fatal loss I had sustained, I caught at this eagerly. Perhaps I had neglected him hitherto. I resolved to do so no longer.

I tried to seat myself so as to shut out Charlie from the light of that countenance, which made me forget even his unworthiness. I grudged him the slightest word from Lilias—I fancied how the pure soul within her would withdraw itself in lofty indignation, did she know him as I did.

“Mossgray,” said Walter, “have you any message for your friend Hew Murray? Maxwell is going to follow his example, do you know.”

“How?” I asked.

“Oh, that famous appointment we have heard so much of has come at last,” said Edward. “The —— regiment are to have the benefit of my learned services, and they are lying at some heathenish place not far from Hew’s head-quarters. The name I have learned to write after a day’s practice—but the pronunciation—come now, Walter, be merciful—don’t make me desperate by forcing these dislocated syllables over my lips—at least not in Miss Johnstone’s presence.”

“Oh, never mind Miss Johnstone—Lilie is not such an epicure in sounds,” said Walter. “Come along, Mixy. After all, man, I believe you don’t know the true secret so well as I do. A professed lady’s man should never be ladylike himself. What do you say, Mossgray? Do you hear me, Charlie—am I not right?”

Mixy was our familiar contraction of Edward’s respectable surname—we were rather proud of our ingenuity in manufacturing a diminutive which suited name and profession alike so well; and he took it with wonderful good humour. To-night however he seemed displeased a little. I did not wonder; for who could endure to be exposed to ridicule in the presence of Lilias?

“You’re right in the abstract, Wat,” answered Charlie, with perfect coolness: “but wrong in this particular instance. To think of giving counsel to Mixy in such matters—why, Mixy’s irresistible!”

Edward coloured and laughed.

“There now, Charlie, that will do. Don’t believe them, I beg, Miss Johnstone; it’s mere malice, I assure you.”

“Take care, Lilie,” said Walter, “he wants to put you off your guard. Ask Mossgray, if you don’t believe me.”

I coloured more deeply than Edward—this was carrying the joke too far—that Lilias, in her unapproachable purity and loftiness, should be so addressed was a kind of sacrilege. I started in jealous eagerness to save her name from the careless badinage which was profanity to me.

“All this has nothing to do with Hew Murray,” I said hastily, and I felt my cheek burn as I turned away from Charlie. “Are you to be in Bombay, Edward?—are you to be near Hew?”

“Yes, Bombay is my first destination,” said Edward. “I shall seek him out of course—and I suppose I must go in a month or two, so you may prepare your remembrances, Adam.”

“And will you be long away, Mr Maxwell?” said Lilias, softly.

I bent forward at the sound of her voice. I always did—but this night, for the first time, I felt myself grow hot and angry when I saw Edward’s head also inclined towards the speaker, and his face brighten to answer her.

“Many years, I fear, Miss Johnstone—many sad years—if I ever do see Fendie again.”

I thought the low fall of his voice was affectation. Then I repented me—I was exquisitely uncomfortable; doing them all injustice except herself and Charlie—my pure and beautiful star whom no imperfection could cast a shadow on, and the untrue, detected man whom I had called my friend. To these, in their extremes of honour and humiliation, I could not fail to do perfect justice.

“Come, don’t be sentimental,” said Johnstone. “You’ll come home, Mixy—not the least fear of you—and build a thing with pagodas, and a verandah, and call it by an outlandish name, and end your history like a fairy tale. Hew, poor fellow—I am afraid his chance of seeing Fendie again is worse than yours.”

“How is that?” I exclaimed. “Has anything happened, Walter? Have you heard of anything adverse to the Murrays?”

“The poor old man has ruined himself,” said Walter. “I am afraid he must lose everything—but to be sure that is not a thing to be discussed so publicly.”

I turned round and looked Charlie Graeme in the face. He lifted his coward eyes to me for a moment in quick self-consciousness, but they fell before mine. This then was the pitiful reason—I turned indignantly away. I could scarcely bear to look at him again.

We all rose to leave Greenshaw together. Walter accompanied us to Fendie. I put my arm through his hurriedly, and kept him behind, while Charlie and Edward went on before us. I was eager to question him about Murrayshaugh, and eager to escape from the society of my cousin.

“If it is no breach of confidence, Walter,” I said, “I would be glad if you could tell me, what this is that seems to threaten Murrayshaugh?”

“It is no breach of confidence now,” said Johnstone, “for I fear it must very soon be public enough. Murrayshaugh undertook a heavy responsibility long ago for some old friend, Adam; and many years since this friend died, and the whole burden of the debt fell upon Mr Murray, so that only the unusual forbearance of the creditor kept him from being ruined. But now the original creditor, who knew the circumstances, is also dead, and his heir will have no mercy, so that the old man I fear must give up everything. I am afraid, Adam, they will think of me very unfavourably—but that my partner happened, before I joined him, to be their creditor’s agent, is of course no fault of mine. It annoys me though, often; I wish you would just mention that when you write to Hew—not that any sensible person would blame me of course—but only there’s an uncomfortable feeling.”

“Hew will understand,” said I, “but of course I will do what you ask me, Walter; and Murrayshaugh will lose all—did you say all?—and can nothing be done to help him?”

“Nothing but paying the money,” said the man of business by my side, “and it’s a very heavy sum, what with costs and interest, and other such devourers of impoverished means—and besides, Murrayshaugh is too proud to receive a favour, Adam, even from you. He would rather lose everything, you know. I confess, harsh and repulsive as he has always been, there will be something wanting in the countryside if that proud old man does not decay peacefully here, like any other ruined tower—but he would take assistance as an insult—you know he would.”

I did know it, and went on sadly, thinking of the desolate household, and scarcely remembering my companion’s presence.

“And by the by, Mossgray,” said Walter abruptly, “you might mention that—about my partner being this man’s agent—to Miss Murray; not that she will care of course—but just—one does not like to be unjustly blamed.”

“Lucy does not know,” said I, “but I will tell her, Walter, since you wish it. Poor Lucy!—I mean,” I added, as I saw his keen eye shoot from me to Charlie, who walked before us, with an intelligent glance, “I mean it will be so great a trial to her to leave Murrayshaugh.”

Johnstone did not speak. I felt that this was not known to me only, and I remembered bitterly then, that on her the scorn would lie, the stigma of being slighted and deserted; and that scarcely either man or woman would think the worse of him—him, the faithless coward who had thus failed in need.

I scarcely recollect how Charlie and I managed our brief intercourse after that, but it was a very great relief to me when he departed next day. For the first time since we knew each other, Charlie went into Fendie to take his departure alone, with no one to bid him farewell. I believe he felt in some degree the emphasis of the broken custom. I almost believe he would have been glad then to undo what he had done—but the die was cast—it was too late.

A few days after, I went to Murrayshaugh, anxious, if I could manage it indirectly, to see Lucy, and yet afraid to meet her. It was a chill day for summer, with a clouded sky and a loud boisterous breeze tossing the long willow boughs into a sort of fantastic unearthly mirth, which moved me, much as the unseemly merry-making of a mourner might have done. Lucy was sitting in a favourite corner of hers, at the end of the terrace, reading—at least she had a book in her hand. As I approached the stile, and little bridge, over the Murrayshaugh burn, under cover of the eldritch willow branches, she perceived me, and observing that I hesitated to enter, beckoned me to her. I obeyed at once.

I do not think she was paler that day than she had always been, but there was a grave composure about her face which made her seem so. Whatever struggle there had been it was over—and I remember a consciousness of something clear and chill about her, such as one feels in the air after a storm—an atmosphere in which everything stands out in bold relief, disclosing all its points and angles against the distinct far-distant sky. Yet Lucy was no less benign—no less gentle than she had always been.

“I wanted to see you, Adam,” she said. “I will write to Hew to-day—have you anything to say to him?”

“No,” said I, stammering and hesitating, for I felt painfully the great event, the era in our lives which had become known to me since I saw her last. “No, Lucy—except what Hew does not need to be told, I hope—that I constantly think of him as of my most dear friend, and that scarcely anything in the world would delight me so much as to see him again.”

“I will tell him,” said Lucy; “one likes to hear such things sometimes, Adam, even when one is in no doubt of them—and I will tell him any other pleasant thing you know, to make amends for the sad news I must send him—for I am afraid that is certain now, Adam, which I said before was only possible—we must leave Murrayshaugh.”

“Is there no way of averting this calamity?” I exclaimed.

“You know my father, Adam,” said Lucy, “he does not trust me as he might do; but I have almost been acting as a spy these few days, and there is no hope I see; for one of the few trials that can really shake his iron nature is this of leaving home, and if there was any hope of averting it, he would try all means before he yielded.”

“Lucy,” said I, “help me to present my petition to your father—beg him to remember how greatly I am indebted to you all, and entreat him to consider me thus far as his son. If what I have will do, why should he not take it, Lucy? I am a young man—I am ashamed of my own indolence—I will go and seek my fortune like Hew, and will be far happier so than as I am. Lucy—”

“Hush, Adam,” said Lucy, stopping me, as I eagerly pleaded with her, “you must not think of this. I cannot suffer you to say another word, and you know my father with his harsh pride would not be indebted even to his own son for such assistance. No, no, he will bear his own burden alone, and so must I—that it is not easy or light is a lesser matter—we must bear our own lot; but, Adam, I am glad you have said this—I am glad,” said Lucy slowly, a gush of sudden tears coming to her eyes, which seemed to flow back again, and did not fall. “I am glad you would have done it, Adam. I will mind it when I am heavy again, and sinking—and I will tell Hew.”

“But, Lucy, listen to me,” I exclaimed. “May I not speak to Murrayshaugh? may I not ask your father?”

“Not unless you wish to make him desperate, Adam. Nay, do not look impatient. To satisfy you, I will mention it to him myself, and even urge it if I can. I know what the issue will be, but I will do you this justice, Adam—are you content?”

I was compelled to be so. I hardly could have dared myself, under any circumstances, to offer pecuniary assistance to Murrayshaugh.

We parted very soon. Lucy did not make the slightest allusion to Charlie—there was not even a hint or inference which I could fancy pointed to him. She was very composed—so much so, as to make it evident to me, who knew her well, that there had indeed been some grievous troubling of those quiet waters, before so dead a stillness fell upon them—but no one who knew her or observed her less could have seen any trace of a crisis past, or a great struggle completed, in the grave composure of her manner. Whatever memorials of the storm there might be within, there were none without.

I thought when I left her of an ascending road leading westward from Fendie, which, when you look along its line at night, seems to go off so abrupt and chill into the clear cold sky beyond, that its solitary wayfarers mysteriously disappear there, into the luminous blank of heaven, and you watch them with a feeling of desolate loneliness, as they glide in silence away. I thought of Lucy on that road alone—since then, whenever I recall her memory, I have fancied I saw her slight figure there, travelling away steadily into the cold horizon, unwavering and alone.

CHAPTER VII.

He speired at her mother, he speired at her father,
He speired at a’ her kin,
But he speiredna the bonnie lass hersel,
Nor did her favour win.—Katherine Janfarie.

Walter Johnstone remained nearly a month at Fendie. During this time he made two or three visits to Edinburgh, but as a new beginner, he was not yet very much cumbered with business. He was the brother of Lilias—I became interested in all his pursuits, and indulgent of all his foibles. We were seldom separate; for if I was abroad with Walter almost all the day, I sat in my especial corner in the Greenshaw parlour all the evening, and that privilege was cheaply purchased by any fatigue or inconvenience. I fancied I began to make some silent gradual progress. I fancied Lilias was scarcely so shy as she used to be in my presence, and I myself began to be a little more rational in my adoration. To the devout homage of the age of chivalry, I endeavoured to add a little of that more ordinary and slighter thing, which is called “paying attention.” I adopted as much of it as the shyness of my deeper feeling would permit, and almost envied, while I was offended by, the fluent ease of Maxwell, who like myself was a frequent visitor at Greenshaw, but who, unlike me, could be quite at ease with Lilias, and ventured to treat her like any ordinary girl. Ordinary girl! what do I say? there was no such being in existence to me. Unapproachable, above all others, was my own queen and lady, but the light of her presence shed a reflection upon them. I owed them all a reverence for her sake.

Maxwell was preparing to go away, he said. I wished him in India with all my heart, and wondered audibly why he delayed so long. Not that I was what is vulgarly called jealous; but while I did feel envious of any sharer in my sunshine, I grudged that it should fall on one to whom it was merely common light. I was angry because he did “pay attention” to Lilias, and I thought meanly of him because, admitted as he was to her society, he could be content with “paying attention.” Altogether his presence irritated me. I heartily wished him away.

Walter Johnstone was a pleasant companion—even forgetting, had that been possible, whose brother he was: we became great friends. He was too acute not to perceive how matters stood, and I fancied he had no desire to discourage me. We were out together on the last day of his stay at Greenshaw: he had become very confidential, he told me his circumstances with his partner, his anticipated income, his intention of taking a house in York Place; and finally, the last and greatest of all, his prospect of getting a mistress to the house. I listened with the greatest interest, and congratulated with the utmost warmth—it was impossible for any brother to have been more sympathetic than I—and then, with sudden boldness, I poured out into his ear my own great secret. When the first barrier was removed, the flood poured forth too strongly for any diffidence to check it. I spoke very fervently, as I felt. I fancy it must have been with some sort of natural eloquence too, for Walter’s hand trembled when he grasped mine, and promised me his help.

Before I recollected myself, while we were still in a kind of cloud of excited earnestness, I found myself in Mr Johnstone’s presence; and then, as there is no boldness like the nervous boldness of your shy man when he reaches the needful heat, I made speedy conquest of him. Then I was ushered into the well-known parlour, with its forenoon look of quietness and new arrangement, to wait for Lilias.

The slow sunbeams stealing through the blinds, the chairs standing formally in their places, the closed piano, the books replaced in their shelves, the work-table withdrawn in its corner; how vividly I remember all these homely usual things, and how solemn they made my waiting. She came at last—and then I remember in a mist how the full tide of my eloquence poured forth again, and how I was successful. Yes, successful! I left Greenshaw triumphantly, the proud possessor of the plighted troth of Lilias.

I returned home in happy unconsciousness of how or where I went. On the way I met Maxwell, I recollect, and was too much elevated above all ordinary things to do more than speak the briefest words of recognition to him, overflowing though I was with the universal benevolence of a light heart; and yet, withal, I remember how some faint ghost of consciousness haunted me that I was not happy enough—that Lilias’s consent was sadly mechanical, that it lacked—but no! I was not so profane as that; I could see nothing lacking in Lilias.

I was not to see her again that night—she was engaged at some Fendie party—and so I wandered the evening out by the water-side, flying from less ethereal society. I had half an idea of going to tell Lucy, but, like a miser, I chose to exult over my secret treasure a little longer before I shared the joy of it with any one.

And I remember well what wondrous dreams glided before my eyes, in bright processions, peopling yonder far-away glades and noble trees with groups of fairy figures, more beautiful than ever dreamer saw before. I saw her pass over the threshold of Mossgray with her bridal grace upon her. I saw her dwell there in her gracious, growing womanhood, drawing all pleasant things towards her as flowers turn to the sun; and though my heart did indeed beat high with proud gladness, when I remembered that it was my name she shed so sweet a lustre on, and that it was I who stood beside her in all the shifting groups of my fancy—even that stood aside, as selfish rejoicings must always do, in presence of the supreme joy I had in herself. That she was—that in our dim world there shone this one especial star, as true, as pure, as gracious as the heavens—whose constant outcoming must be beneficence and love; whose constant meed—too poor a one for her lofty deservings—must be blessings and honour. I could not fathom the depths of my own happiness—I could but float upon its sunny stream.

The next morning rose brightly in all the brilliant joy of June, and as early as I could venture, I set out for Greenshaw. The slight morning traffic of those quiet Fendie streets—the cottage wives, upon its outskirts, going about their cheerful household labour—the domestic sounds that came pleasantly from the wayside houses—I remember them with the sunshine of my own joy over all, giving harmony and finest keeping to the homely picture. At last I approached the well-known holly hedge. A woman stood at the gate looking down the lane; the parlour-blinds were closed; there was a look of excitement about the house, as if something unusual had happened. I hurried on, noticing that in my haste, but too pleasantly expectant to think of it.

The woman at the door was Mr Johnstone’s factotum—a sensible, matronly person, who exercised the more laborious duties of housekeeper, for which Lilias was too inexperienced and young.

“Good morning, Margaret,” I said, as I came up and was about to pass in.

Margaret stretched out her hand to stop me.

“Oh, Mossgray!”

There was evident distress and trouble on her face. A slight tremor of alarm came over me.

“Has anything happened?” I said. “What is the matter, Margaret?”

“Ower muckle—ower muckle,” said the housekeeper of Greenshaw, lifting her apron to her eyes; “oh, for onysake dinna gang in!—and yet he maun ken—there’s nae use trying to keep it frae him.”

The last part of the sentence was spoken under her breath; I became very much agitated.

“What is it, Margaret? Is Lilias ill? What has happened?”

“I’ll tell ye, Mossgray,” said Margaret, quickly, the arm which she had extended to bar my entrance falling to her side. “It wad be dearly telling her, she had been ill this day. She’ll live yet to ken, that the sorest fever that ever chained a mortal to a sick bed wad hae been a blessed tether o’ her wilful feet this woefu’ morning. Dinna think o’ her, Maister Adam. I ken it’s hard, but ye maun try; dinna think o’ her—she’s no wurdy o’t.”

I clutched the woman’s arm, angry and eager. I could not speak.

“Weel then, she’s gane—she’s away—her that was the light o’ our e’en—that we couldna see ill in—that I’ve heard ye even to the very angels, Mossgray. She’s gane—fled out from her father’s house with yon young haverel o’ a doctor, that has neither wealth to keep, nor wit to fend for her. Oh, guid forgie me, Mr Adam! what have I dune?”

My face alarmed her, I fancy. I pressed blindly in—Walter Johnstone stood before me. I was close upon him before I was aware of his presence; I looked in his face.

He turned from me with a burst of emotion, which seemed to wake me from some terrible nightmared sleep.

“Mossgray, I did not know it—I had no suspicion of this. Believe me, Adam, believe me, that I am blameless! She has deceived us all!”

I felt a hoarse contradiction struggling from my dry lips—still I could not hear her blamed. Then I turned away; I could hold no further parley with any one; I hurried into the sheltering solitude of my own lonely house.

The bright world without mocked and scorned me—the passers-by looked wonderingly at my stricken face. I could not linger by the water-side now, in the first shock of my vanished and ruined dreams. I fled into this solitary room, within the silent walls of which so many slow years have passed since then, and threw myself into my chair, and pressed my throbbing head between my hands. It was only then that I realized what had come upon me.

I am an old man now, and these passionate struggles of youth have faded in the far distance, veiled in the gentler mists of memory. Yet I do remember them—I do remember me of minute and trifling things—the open book lying there upon this floor—the solitary lily drooping in its vase—the snowy leaf that had fallen upon the window-ledge below; and how the pale and fierce light of my calamity fixed the image of them for ever on the tablets of my heart. I remember—it is not such seasons that men can forget.

I had lost her for ever—alas! that was not all—she had never been. The conviction forced itself upon me till I grew well nigh mad. I dashed my clenched hands into the air; I could not restrain the wild fit of passion, the irrational frenzy that possessed me. I was alone! the things which I had worshipped and made my idols were things of air—mists of my early morning, melting away before the stern and sober light—and I was left here desolate, forlorn, and solitary, and there was nothing true under the sun.

It is a bitter and a sorrowful thing to mourn for the dead—to lament over those who have gone away out of this shadowy land into the brighter country, where they yet are, and shall be, all the more sure in their wonderful existence that we see them not. But to mourn for those who have never been—to behold stars fall from your horizon, the glory of whose shining was but a phantasm of your brain, a creation of your own soul; to awake suddenly from your contemplation of some noble and beautiful spirit, the fairest that ever gladdened mortal vision, and to find that it is not, and was not, and that the place, which in your dream was illuminated by its glorious presence, is filled by a shadowy thing of unknown nature, which you never saw before—this is the bitterest of griefs. If there is sorrow more hard than this, I bow my head to it in fear and reverence; but this is my woe, and prince of woes.

Drifting from false anchorage, surrounded by spectral ships and ghostly receding shores, hopelessly driven over the treacherous sea; with no light but an indefinite twilight, sickening the faint heart with visions of shadowy haven and harbour, and false security. A world of mists—a universe of uncertain, unknown existences, which are not as you have dreamed, and among whom you must go forth alone, no longer devoutly to believe and warmly to love, but to grope darkling in the brightest noonday, to walk warily, shutting up the yearning heart within you, in jealous fear. It is hard to make this second beginning—hard to fight and struggle blindly against this sad necessity—yet the poor heart yields at last; either to put on the self-wounding mail of doubt and suspicion, or to live in dim and mournful patience, a hermit all its days.

CHAPTER VIII.

Oh! wherefore should I busk my heid?
Oh! wherefore should I kame my hair?
When my true love has me forsook,
And says he’ll never loe me mair.
Oh, Mart’mas wind! when wilt thou blaw
And shake the dead leaves aff the tree?
Oh, gentle death! when wilt thou come
And take a life that wearies me?—Old Ballad.

I took little note of how months or weeks went after that era. I lost that summer time. It has fallen entirely from the reckoning of my life, leaving only some vestiges of what looks now like incipient madness behind; for I was entirely alone; shut out as much from that ordinary communication with the world, which painfully and beneficially compels the suppression of one’s agony, as I was from all human sympathy, all kindness, all compassion. I had lost all; my dreams of a brighter home—my friends—all were gone. Hew Murray far away in India, and his sad sister Lucy alone in Murrayshaugh—to no others in the wide world could I look for any of those gentle offices which belong to friendship; and the one was thousands of miles away—the other was no less solitary, no less stricken than I.

I did not see her during the whole of that summer. Had there been no cloud overshadowing her own lot, I believe I might have sought the balm of Lucy’s pity, and perhaps been in some degree comforted; but as it was I never sought to see her—I saw no one—I shut myself up through those scorching summer days—I remember yet how their unpitying sunshine sickened me to the very soul—in this solitary room. I wandered ghost-like on the water-side at night; I neglected everything that I had formerly attended to. I held no communication even with the servants of my lonely household, which I could possibly avoid. It was little wonder that they should think me crazed; the belief shot in upon my own brain sometimes like an arrow—almost the consciousness that I was mad.

I might have been—how soon I know not—but that I was mercifully snatched from the edge of the precipice.

The summer was over, the autumn days were darkening and growing chill, and the wan water of Fendie carried showers of faded leaves upon its bosom, and grew husky and dark with frequent floods. The transition from the fierce summer sunlight soothed me. These six terrible months had done on me the work of years. I was young—almost a lad still—but I had always been older than my years, and pain brings with it unenviable maturity. In my solitude I felt untimely age come upon me; I carried in my youth’s frame a man’s worn-out heart.

My housekeeper, Nancy Mense, suffered no one to come near me but herself; and her own services were rendered in silence, with something of that compassionating awe, which we hear is paid to the victims of mental malady in the East. I had never observed this until the day of which I am about to speak.

It was a dim, cloudy October day, overcast with showers, and I was subdued and softened; the drooping, disconsolate sky and damp air seemed to hush the fiery pains within me. Mrs Mense entered my apartment, and, without speaking, laid a letter upon the table. I noticed a painful solicitude in her face, as she looked at me before she left the room; I took up the letter—it was from Lucy Murray.

“We shall be far away before you receive this, Adam. I write, because hereafter you might think I did you wrong in sending you no farewell. Of our own affairs I can tell you little, even if now you cared to hear of them. I can guess that my father gives up almost all he has; all the land, everything but a bare pittance that will merely maintain us—and the house. He has not parted with Murrayshaugh itself. He vows he never will—but utterly reduced in means as we must be, we must leave it now—perhaps—perhaps sometime, if good days ever come, to return home again.

“I dare not tell you where we are going; indeed, I do not even know. You know my father’s harsh and haughty pride; he says no one shall see our poverty who has ever heard our name before. He might have lingered longer, I believe, had I not told him of your generous offer; he took it, as I fancied he would, with hard and bitter anger as a humiliation. Yet thank you again, Adam, for thus cheering me, when the world indeed was black enough around us.

“For yourself, what can I say, Adam Graeme? that you are not alone; but alas! that is small consolation. Who can tell the appointed place which this trial has in the lives of each of us, the appointed purpose for which it has been sent? Adam, let us not look upon those wrecks of the vain dreams we fancied true; all is not untrue, though these are; all is not dark because these lights have failed. The feverish flashing of these meteors is gone for ever; but there remains the sober, stedfast, healthful light of day, the sunshine of heaven over all.

“Adam, let us awake; let us think no longer of those who have done us wrong, but of Him who took so grievous wrong upon Himself for our deliverance. It is not meet that the lives for which he paid so wonderful a price should go down ignobly to the grave; do I need to say more to you? do I need to do more than bid you arise, Adam, for His sake, and do the devoir of a man, whether He send sunshine or gloom, a dark day or a bright.

“I have only one word to say more; be careful, Adam: look well to your words and deeds, lest the tempter take advantage of them to bring more sin among us. I cannot venture to speak more plainly, but as you would have others—others whom both of us have held very dear—preserved from a deadly snare and sin, look heedfully to yourself, and let this wild grief engross you no more.

“Write to Hew; and remember us all if we never meet again. Farewell, Adam, and farewell.

“Lucy Murray.”

I was roused by Lucy’s letter, roused in some degree to remember my manhood, and to think how I wasted it; but one struggle does not overcome a grief like this. So I fell into a bitterly selfish mood, contrasting her lot with mine—her cold womanlike submission with my self-torture—and while I thought of the conclusion of her letter, with a certain degree of idle languid wonder, I hugged my calamity closer to my heart. No one had fallen from so bright a heaven into so blank an earth as I; no one had ever equalled my misfortune, and who but myself could comprehend my grief.

The wailing breeze suited me; I opened the window and leaned out, resting my brow upon my hands. Heavy raindrops fell from the eaves upon my unsheltered head—I did not heed them.

The sound of voices below arrested my attention; I remember wondering that they did. No later than the day before they would have made me shrink into myself jealously, in fear of contact with the speakers; now I only remained still and listened.

“My good woman, I want to see Mr Graeme,” said a strange voice; “I assure you I will take no denial from you, so it is needless to keep me here on the damp soil—my feet are quite wet enough already.”

“Your feet are nae concern o’ mine,” said Mrs Mense, with some ill-humour in her tone; “nae doubt ye can change them when ye gang hame, like other folk. But my maister’s no heeding about seeing strangers; and sae I tell ye—no meaning ony disrespect—once for a’.”

“But your master does not choose to let you answer for him, I presume,” said the stranger. “You can surely ask him at least.”

“And wha has as guid a right to answer for him, puir lad!” said Mrs Mense, her voice sinking to an under-tone, “as me, that have fended for him a’ his days? I tell ye there’s nae need for asking, Sir; I ken weel enough he’ll no see onybody.”

“This is insufferable!” said the applicant for admission. “Here, my good girl, do you go and tell your master that I want particularly to speak with him—I, Doctor Pulvers of Edinburgh.”

“Eh, I daurna for my life!” exclaimed the shriller voice of Janet, Mrs Mense’s niece; “I wadna face Mossgray for—”