VALE UNIVERSUY LIBRARY 3 9002 06794 7045 t^mmWT YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY FROM THE COLLECTION MADE BY CHARLES SHELDON B.A. 1890 OF BOOKS ON NATURAL HISTORY EXPLORATION • HUNTING & FISHING GIFT OF FRANCIS P. GARVAN B.A. 1897 WANDERINGS THE HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. IL LONDON : n. CL.iY, PKINTEK, BREAD STREET HILL. WANDERINGS HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS Siftettfies taifeen on tift S»tottfs5 23orirer ; BEING A SEQUEL TO "WILD SPORTS OF THE WEST." W. H. MAXWELL, ESQ. ACTHOR OF "stories OF WATERLOO," ETC. 'For the loud bugle, pealing high, The blackbird whistles down the vale, And sunk in ivied ruins lie The banner'd towers of Evandale." — Scott. IN TWO VOLUMES.— VOL. II. LONDON : A. H. BAILY & CO. CORNHILL. 1844. z. d e CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGE Embarkation for Scotland — Mister Brophy — Off the Goodwins — Fleet of Colliers — Farne Islands — Pennant's Visit — St. Cuth- bert's Ducks — Wreck of the Forfarshire — Grace Darling — Bamhorough Castle — Holy Island — Berwick-upon-Tweed 1 CHAPTER II. Berwick as a Fortress — Halidon Hill — Defeat of the Scotch — Personal Encounter — Similar occurrence at Castalla — Old Stuart — Piscatorial Essay — A primitive Establishment — Fish the Whitadder Ifi CHAPTER III. CornhiU — Bridge of Coulson — - Beautiful Pool — A Sporting Salmon — Hymeneal Statistics — Angling Incident — The Bo- mont — Black-headed Gulls — Border Melodies — A Rent day Dinner, and Deep Potation 26 CHAPTER IV. Flodden — James of Scotland — Scan. Mag. — Saint Cuthbert's Banner — Civil Campaigning — Position of the Scotch Army — Previous Occurrences — Battle of Flodden Field- — Scott's De scription — Sad Consequences — Historic Doubt — A Dangerous Locality — Twisel Castle — Making Cutties 4C CHAPTER V. Norham Castle — Former Strength and Extent — Ancient Appear ance — Recent Demolition — Modern Improvements — Passage at Arms — The Tweed — Evening in Norham — Confluence of the Till — A pet Pool — Howking a Water-rat — Safely landed . 5f VI CONTENTS. CHAPTER VI. PAGE Notions of the Picturesque — The Source of Tweed— Its Course and Debouchement — Foreign Travel — Pius the Second — His Adventure on the Border— Sea Fishing— The Ey— Burn- mouth— Eymouth— Guns-Green — Fish and Children— Affect ing Incident 68 CHAPTER VII. The Whitadder— The Swallow— The Silver White— Difference in Trouts — The Shepherd's Dog— My Dog Philip— Irish Duck Shooting — Death of Philip — Anecdote of Poisoning — • Animal Attachment — Story of Jim Crow — A Temperance Man.... , 83 CHAPTER VIII. The Scottish Sabbath — Difference and Effects of Forms and Faith — The Cuttie-stool — Anecdote — Hutton-Hall — The Beauties of the Border — Fatal Accident — Romantic Occurrence — Border Insecurity — A Peninsular Veteran — ^The Lady's Cove — A Love-Dream , 99 CHAPTER IX. A Blind Comrade — ^War of the Kirk — A Minibus — Run down the Firth— Tantallan Castle — The Bass Rock — Solan Geese — Dunbar Castle — Adjacent Battle-Fields — Defeat of Leslie — Coldingham — Enormous Halibuts — Berwick Harbour — An Irish Ruse 112 CHAPTER X. The King's Arras— A Wet Sunday— Legs and Buskins — Fuller's History — The Picturesque, Gallows included — Dark Nights, closed Gates, and au Irish Sentry — A Non-Believer — Man ners and Customs— Horn Spoons— Matrimonial Statistics — An Auspicious Union — A Hint on Hymeneals — Cow-House and Kitchen — An Advertisement 126 CONTENTS. vii CHAPTER XI. PAGE Apology for Romance— Melrose Abbey — Variety of Embellish ment — Ancrum Moor— Jedburgh — A Ghost Slory— Jedard Justice — Abbot Kennock — The Church Militant— Border Law — Severe upon the Clergy 141 CHAPTER XII. Roxburgh Castle — Death of James II. — Irish Volunteers— An Official Despatch — Kelso and Dryburgh— Statue of Wallace — The Leister — Sunning Salmon — Burning — Raking — The Wizard of the North — Smailholme Tower — " Smailholme's Lady gay" — Scott's Ballad— Memorial ofa double Fratricide... 154 CHAPTER XIII. Visit to Holy Island — St. Cuthbert — Necrologic Reminiscences — A Gentleman who lived a pleasant Life — Philosophy and Music — A Disturbed Bagman — Public Reform — Passage to Holy Island — Accidents frequent — Lindisfarn — Marmion and Miss Beverley — Castle on Holy Island — Its Seizure — ^The Erringtons — Death ofthe Elder 168 CHAPTER XIV. Return to Berwick — Epistle in Reply — Anecdote — No Justice for Ireland — Letter from the Stout Gentleman — Farewell to the Borders — A Lowland Mansion — A Scottish Landlord — Routes to Inverary — Rest, and be Thankful— Angling in Glencroe — Carrick Castle — Journey to Loch Awe — Anecdote 186 CHAPTER XV. Drive to Oban — Ben Cruachan — Inn of Taynuilt — Castle of Dunstaffnage — The Stone of Scone — The Ruined Chapel — DunoUy — ^A Saintly Visitation — Legend of Castle Duart — Murder of Glencoe — Fort William — Ben Nevis — Inverlochy — Valley of Arkaig — An ancient Camarado — My Visit to Arkaig — Military Retirement — Hibernian Symposia.... 198 CHAPTER XVI. Life, as it was, in Ireland 211 vm CONTENTS. CHAPTER XVII. PAGE Fort Augustus— Military Roads— Fall of Foyers— Road to Dores —Inverness— Civic Anecdotes— Rate of Living, auld lang syne— Life olim in Inverness— Culloden— Mistake in accept ing Battle— Defeat of the Highland Army - 229 CHAPTER XVIII. Departure for Wick — Intermediate Country — Beauly Salmon — An Hour too late— Herring Fishing in the Far West— Caith ness Fisheries — Fish Curing — Process of Evisceration — A Peninsular Fair one— A Column in " a fix " — An Irish Interpreter— General Reflections upon Matrimony 248 CHAPTER XIX. Wick in the Herring Season — Scotch Fisheries — ^Herrings, pro and con. — Visit to Sinclair Bay — Castles of Girnigoe and Sinclair — Legend of its Dungeon — Preserved Birds — Thurso — A new Acquaintance- — Mr. Robertson 259 CHAPTER XX. The Story of Mr. Robertson— Cross the Pentland Firth — Island of Hoj' — -The Dwarfie Stone — Stroraness — Stones of Stennis — Matrimony and Divorce 271 CHAPTER XXI. An Orcadian Haven — The Sailor's Retreat— -A Wanderer's Domicile — Winter Preparations — The Host's Sanctum — Evening Excursion — Skerries — Sporting Incident — A Stand of Plover — Wild-fowl Shooting — Sea-fishing — Return to the Main 286 CHAPTER XXII. Orcadian Fowling Season — Incubation — The Skua — Eider Duck — Departure from Kirkwall — Conclusion 301 Appendix 309 CHAPTER I. EMBARKATION FOR SCOTLAND MISTER BROPHY — OFF THE GOOD WINS FLEET OF COLLIERS — FARNE ISLANDS PENNANt's VISIT — ST. cuthbert's DUCKS WRECK OF THE FORFARSHIRE GRACE DARLING BAMBOHOUGH CASTLE HOLY ISLAND — BER WICK-UPON-TWEED. " Once more upon the waters; yea, once more," WHICH meaneth I am snug on board the Ber wick steamer, and in the centre of a tier of smokers. There is a lighter along side, from which a whole cargo has to be taken in — a creak ing winch is busily at work, which, like the fastenings of Willy of Westburnflats' hall-door, " sairly wants creeshin ; " and as we start — D.V. — at 3 A.M., so soon as the winch is quiet, the engine will of course commence operations. Pleasant look out for " balmy sleep," with these harmonic accompaniments, after being incased in a coffin, y'cleped a berth, — length five feet nine — extreme breadth, some fifteen inches and a half. VOL. II. B 2 EMBARKATION FOR SCOTLAND. We were deported from "the Hermitage stairs." — Conceive, Jack, a " Hermit hoar, in solemn cell. Wearing out life's evening grey," in a central locality between Puddle-dock and Petticoat-lane ! Ora pro nobis .'—not, he of Wapping, but any and every saint in the calendar besides. * * * * The passengers come on board. Two or three bagmen — you know them easily — they have sundry brass-bound boxes, with leathern straps, as an additional security to Chubb's patent — a carpet bag and a portfeuille complete the bag gage. They are gone to select a coffin each, (the steward calls them berths,) — and down come an other couple. They are very young, very good- looking, with a very light kit, and a very bothered general appearance. The lady is delivered to the stewardess — the gentleman, remarkably fidgetty, inquires whether " the vessel sails punctually," and is gratified at hearing that there is no mistake about it — the tide not permitting liberties to be taken. He secures a berth, but declines being coffined at present, flitting occasionally to the door of the cabin which contains his " lady gay." Is she his wife ? No, faith ! were that the case, he would allow the honest gentlewoman to go peaceably to sleep if she could, and himself blow MISTER BROPHY. 3 a cloud on deck in comfort. His sister ? not at all, — she too would be permitted to take her snooze. No matter, time may tell. No use turning in — that cursed crib and creaking winch would murder sleep effectually as the slitting of Duncan's thrapple destroyed the slumbers of the Thane of Cawdor. One of a dozen clocks strikes twelve — I mount, not " the peopled " but the lumbered deck. The I cargo is on board, and the crew gone below to celebrate the same in gin and " heavy." A hail from shore — to which I return a responsive "hallo!" "Arrah, what ship am I goin' in?" inquired the stranger in the pure Doric spoken in the immediate vicinity of Mullingar. " Upon my soul, I can't tell ye — pray do ye know yourself?" was the response. " Sorra one of me can mind the name, but which of them is goin' to Scotland ?" " They're all going there," I replied. " Oh ! then I'm fairly bothered," observed my loving countryman ; " Could ye tell us which of them's called after the town they make the cloth in ?" " May be it's ' The Manchester' ye mean ?" " Arrah ! be gogstay ! I'm in luck yet, where is she, would ye be pleased to tell me ?" " Here she is." b2 4 MISTER BROPHY. "Ah! then, I'm right after all. Maybe, Captain, jewel, yourself 's the mate ?" « No — in case of accident, blessed be God ! I'm only a passenger." "The Lord stand between us and harm!" responded my friend ; " but that same's a com fort." " There's a boat at the stairs if you want to come on board." " Faith ! and it's myself that would, only I forgot the coat and bundle." " And how did ye manage that, my friend ?" " Oh ! feaks, asy enough — ye see, when I was just thinkin' of goin' back for them to the lodgin', who the devil should I fall upon in the street, but two cousins and a nabor's daughter — and as they knew I was for goin' to saa, we stept into a public- house to drink 'luck,' before we parted — and faith, one way or other, between the courtin' and the drink, the bundle went clane out of my head. Maybe I'll have time to cut back for it ?" " Why then, Pat astore ! that will depend upon the distance." "And how the dickens did you know my name was Pat Brophy?" " Arrah ! what should hinder me, sure I knew ye'r father before ye !" " Deth and naagers ! ould Peter Brophy of Mullaghmore." OFF THE GOODWINS. 5 " The very same, and a dacent ould man he is." " Only he's dead these five years, come hollan- tide," observed his affectionate son. " Well, won't it be a comfort to have a friend on boord ? But I must cut off for the bundle to the lodgin'." " And Where's that ?" " Only a wee bit the other side of Pimhco, — I'd know the street if I saw it, but I disremember the name. Divil a long I'll be goin' ;" and away went Mister Brophy. Whether my worthy countryman dropped on his cousins a second time in the street, and began to drink "luck" anew, or unfortunately en countered the "nabor's daughter," and recom menced "the courtin'," certain it is that the vessel " called after the place where they make the cloth" proceeded on her voyage without him. Finding that the winch had rested from its labours, I seized the opportunity of snatching an hour's sleep, and stretched myself on a cabin sofa. After a due poking of fires, the steam was got up, we slipped our moorings, and I awoke not until off some " swash " in the Goodwins. We then and there went to breakfast. The bagmen showed manfully ; the lover was sick, the lady invisible; for my own part I can undergo im mense fatigue at sea, as far as eating and drink- FLEET OF COLLIERS. ing are concerned — consequently I played a respectable knife and fork, and then ascended the deck to enjoy the sublime and beautiful. The wind was north-east, and blew a spanking breeze directly in our teeth, but right astern of innumerable colliers, which were making the best of it to reach the river. They passed with wind and tide by fifties. What enormous quantities of coal they must burn in London ! or one might fancy, that a few trips of this countless fleet would warm the metropolis for a twelvemonth. Thus far the voyage prospered, but, as evening fell, and we approached Yarmouth roads, the weather thickened, the colliers multiplied, and to avoid a collision in the fog, we were obliged to let go an anchor, and remain stationary for the night. It is an accursed nuisance to be " hung up " for want of wind in a sailing vessel, or forced in a steamer, with moving power at free command, to come to anchor, lest some indus trious navigator, with studding sails on either side, a sleepy boy at the helm, and the crew snug a-bed below, runs into you first, and then politely d — ns your person generally for not keeping out of his way. Another day — another night — the third sun rose — and my servant announced that we were off the Farne Islands. I rose, dressed^ and went on deck, and found myself abreast of that " lonely FARNE ISLANDS. 7 Pharos" where Grace Darling had spent her dreary days. Nothing can be more desolate than a hght-house keeper's life, unless the building, hke the Foreland, be situated on terra jirma. Yet even misery is comparative ; lonely, insulated, and exposed as the Farne light-houses must be, compared with the Bell-Rock or the Eddystone, they would feel as Cheltenham to Connemara. In summer, the Fames are visited by parties from the Northumbrian or Scottish coast ; and throughout the year are accessible in moderate weather. Still it must be spirit-sinking, day after day, week after week, to see hundreds of vessels flitting past, hurrying from one busy haunt of mankind to another, while you, cribbed to an acre or two of barren rock, and circled by an ocean boundary, may well indeed exclaim, " This, this is solitude 1 " The Farne islands for centuries have been deeply respected by the devout as holy ground. So long back as the year six hundred and four, St. Cuthbert stamped a religious fashion on them, by retiring to the largest of these rocks after re signing the rich Abbey of Lindisfarn, on Holy Island. On one of them, the saint built an ora tory, and dying there two years afterwards in the full odour of holiness, he confirmed its sanctity for ever. Other ascetics, from time to time, followed the example of the defunct bishop —and when 8 ST. cuthbert's ducks. " Bluff Harry" demolished monks and monasteries at one fell swoop, there were two chapels on the island— one dedicated to Cuthbert himself, and the other to the Blessed Virgin. They are now but shapeless ruins ; and a square building ori ginally designed for the accommodation of the religieux stationed on the island, was converted in after days to a much more useful purpose. A lantern was placed in the top, and " Mary's shrine" made a residence for the light-keeper. New buildings, however, have been subsequently erected, the light has been removed, and these monastic ruins are hurrying rapidly to decay. It is unnecessary to remark that these holy associations have rendered the Farne Islands valuable in the sight of the antiquarian, and that they have been frequently visited by men of science and research in olden time.* Mr. Pen nant was among the number — and generally, the description he gave at the period of his visit, will be found in every main point accurate now. " The nearest isle to the shore lies exactly one mile sixty-eight chains from the coast ; the most distant is about seven or eight miles. They * " There ly certain isles adjoiningto Farne island, bigger than Fame itself; but in them is no habitation. Certen bigge foules caulled S. Cuthbute's byrdes, brede in them, and pufiinsbyrdes, less than dukkes, having grey fethers like dukkes, but without painted fethers, and a ring about the nek, be found breeding there in the cliffy rocks." Lellius, Itin. vol. iv. pennant's ACCOUNT. 9 are rented for 16/. per annum. Their produce is kelp, some few feathers, and seals, which the tenant watches and shoots for the sake of the oil and skins. Some of them yield a little grass, and serve to feed a cow or two, which the people are desperate enough to transport over in their little boats. We visited these islands in a coble, a safe, but seemingly hazardous species of boat, long, narrow, and flat-bottomed, which is capable of going through a high sea, dancing like a cork on the summits of the waves. Touched at the rock called Meg, whitened with the dung of cor- vorants, which almost covered it ; their nests were large, made of tang, and excessively foetid. Rowed near the Pinnacles, an island in the farthest group, so called from the vast columnar rocks, at the south end, even at their sides, and flat at their tops, and entirely covered with guille mots and shags. The fowlers pass from one to the other of these columns by means ofa narrow board, which they place from top to top, forming a narrow bridge over such a horrid gap, that the very sight of it strikes one with terror. Landed at a small island, where we found the female eider-ducks at that time sitting ; the lower part of their nests was made of sea plants ; the upper part was formed of the down which they pull off their own breasts, in which the eggs were sur rounded and warmly bedded ; in some were 10 pennant's account. three, in others five eggs, of a large size, and pale oHve colour, as smooth and glossy as if varnished over. The nests are built over the beach, among the loose pebbles, not far from the water. The ducks sit very close, nor will they rise till you almost tread on them. The drakes separate themselves from the females during the breeding season. We robbed a few of their nests of the down. After carefully separating it from the tang, found that the down of one nest weighed only three quarters of an ounce, but was so elastic, as to fill the crown of the largest hat. The people of this country call these St. Cuth bert's ducks, from the saint ofthe islands. Besides these kinds, I observed the following : puffins, called here tomnoddies, — auks, here skouts ; guillemots, black guillemots, little auks, shiel auks, shags, corvorants, black and white gulls, brown and white gulls, herring gulls, which, I was told, sometimes fed on eggs of other birds ; common gulls, here annets ; kittiwakes or tar rock, pewit gulls, great terns, sea-pies, sea- larks, here brockets ; jack-daws, which breed in rabbit-holes, rich pigeons, rock-larks. The terns were so numerous, that in some places it was difficult to tread without crushing some of the eggs. At the north end of the House-island, is a deep chasm from the top to the bottom of the rock, communicating to the sea, through wreck OF THE FORFARSHIRE. 11 which, in tempestuous weather, the water is forced with vast violence and noise ; and forms a fine jet d'eau of sixty feet high ; it is called by the inhabitants of the opposite coast, the churn." Much as these rocky isles have been objects of interest to the devotee, the naturalist, and the antiquary, they were fated, a few years since, to obtain a more melancholy celebrity. From time to time vessels have been lost among these dan gerous reefs, and more frequently before the present excellent lights afforded protection to the mariner. More than a century since, a large Dutch frigate was here cast away, and of the numerous crew not a soul was saved. But in the fresh sorrow attendant on a recent Calamity, the memory of one which took place so long back is now but slightly regarded, and seldom has a more melancholy disaster occurred than the wreck of the steamer Forfarshire.* " It appears that shortly after she left the Humber, her boilers began to leak, but not to such an extent as to excite any apprehen sions ; and she continued on her voyage. The weather, however, became very tempestuous, and on the morning of the fatal day, she passed the Fames on her way northwards, in a very high sea, which rendered it necessary for the crew to * Appendix, No. 1. 12 WRECK OF THE FORFARSHIRE. keep the pumps constantly at work. At this time they became aware of the alarming fact that the boilers were becoming more and more leaky as they proceeded. At length, when she had advanced as far as St. Abb's Head, the wind having increased to a hurricane from N N. E., the engineer reported the appalling fact that the machinery would work no longer. Dismay seized all on board ; nothing now remained but to set the sails fore and aft, and let her drift before the wind. Under these circumstances she was carried southwards, till about a quarter to four o'clock on Friday morning, when the foam became distinctly visible breaking upon the fearful rock a-head. Captain Humble vainly attempted to avert the appalling catastrophe by running her between the islands and the main land ; she would not answer her helm, and was impelled to and fro by a furious sea. In a few minutes more, she struck with her bows fore most on the rock ; (its ruggedness is such, that at periods when it is dry, it is scarcely possible for a person to stand erect upon it, and the edge which met the Forfarshire's timbers de scends sheer down a hundred fathoms deep, or more.) The scene on board became heart rending. A moment after the first shock, another tremendous wave struck her on the quarter, by which she was buoyed for a moment GRACE DARLING. ]3 high off the rock. Falling, as this wave re ceded, she came down upon the sharp edge with a force so tremendous, as to break her fairly in two pieces, about midships, when, dreadful to relate, the whole of the after part of the ship, containing the principal cabin, filled with pas sengers, sinking backwards, was swept into the deep sea ; and thus was every soul on that part of the vessel instantaneously engulphed in one vast and terrible grave of waters !"* HappUy the portion of the wreck which had settled on the reef remained firmly fixed, and afforded a place of refuge to the unfortunate survivors. At day-light they were discovered firom the Longstone, and Grace Darling and her father launched a boat, and succeeded in remov ing them from their dangerous position to the lighthouse. The heroism of this brave girl was justly appreciated and rewarded at the time — a large sum of money was collected for her — and many valuable presents were forwarded to " the Icnely isle." Poor thing ! she did not long enjoy the praises or rewards which had been bestowed upon her courage and humanity ; a rapid consumption brought her to the grave — and her remains rest in a churchyard upon the main, in sight of that wild rock, on which she earned a well-merited celebrity. • Memoir of Grace Darling. 14 HOLY ISLAND. Opposite the Farne rocks, and on the coast of Northumberland, the fine old castle of Bam horough stands boldly on a height. Being kept in perfect repair, it offers to the traveller an excellent specimen of an ancient place of strength. It is inhabited in rotation by one of the trustees of the late Lord Crew — and its "donjon keep" no longer immures the wretched victims of feudal tyranny, but opens its hos pitable gates to welcome the shipwrecked mari ner. Among many philanthropic bequests, this humane bishop tumed particular attention to the succour and preservation of the seamen, who navigate this, then a most dangerous coast. A life-boat is kept in readiness — clothing pre pared to replace the wet garments of the cast away — in thick weather a bell is tolled, and guns occasionally fired to apprise the mariner of his position — while, in winter, a horseman patrols the shore all night, to apprise the shipwrecked sailor that, in his hour of need, Bamhorough for him has food, and raiment, and a welcome. Passing Holy Isle, its castle and ruins at once decided me on visiting them ere long. The tide was favourable — the wind fair — that ancient and "debateable" city, Berwick-upon-Tweed, showed its confused-looking buildings, and half the en ceinte of its crumbling works. Landing at the wharf, I passed. through the water-gate, where BERWICK-UPON-TWEED. 15 many a monarch, English and Scotch, had been rudely refused admission, and in a few minutes was taking " mine ease in my inn." I have been located in my time. Jack, in many a place of arms — I have tenanted a con vent in San Sebastian, and a bomb proof in Spike Island — but, after three days and nights at sea — remember I am a man of humble wishes- give me " the King's Arms," in Berwick-upon- Tweed. CHAPTER II. BERWICK AS A FORTRESS— HALIDON HILL DEFEAT OF THE SCOTCH — PERSONAL ENCOUNTER — SIMILAR OCCURRENCE AT CASTALLA OLD STUART PISCATORIAL ESSAY A PRIMITIVE ESTABLISH MENT FISH THE WHITADDER. Berwick, with every fault which is found in ancient fortresses, was regular in its defences ; the citadel (the castle) lies without the present enceinte of the place, and in many points the works are so vulnerable, that, were they in pristine repair and attacked by modern means, it must, now-a-days, be carried in an hour. To the mili tary antiquarian it wants interest — and he only wonders that' it held the important position for merly that it did. But things must be judged by contemporaneous circumstances; and in 1312, Bervdck was possibly considered as formidable, and its possession as consequential, as three centuries afterwards were Badajoz and Ciudad Rodrigo. The site of a celebrated battle field is in the immediate vicinity, for Hahdon Hill rises to the HALIDON HILL. 17 westward, two miles distant fi-om the town. In 1338, it was the scene of a bloody and a blood less victory ; the victors sustaining a loss in ridi culous proportion to the vanquished. Indeed, the return of casualties is absurd. No doubt that on the English part they were marvellously light, while on the Scottish side the slaughter was enormous, but the historical returns are utterly beyond credibihty. This memorable battle was fought upon the 19th of July, to reheve Berwick, which had conditionally surrendered, unless " two hundred men at arms" were thrown into the place on or before the 20th — Edward, in the mean time, occupying Halidon Hill, which overlooks the town and its approaches. On the evening of the 18th, Douglas, who commanded the Scottish army, crossed the Tweed, and bivouaced at Dunspark — and at noon next day, in four columns, assailed the English position — Edward forming his infantry into as many divisions to receive the attack. The great error committed by Douglas, and one that entailed upon the beaten army the bloody defeat that it sustained, was the dismount ing of his cavalry. Instead of holding his men at arms in reserve, their horses were committed to " pages and valets," and " the riders advanced to the combat on foot." Loaded as a horseman was VOL. II. ^ 18 DEFEAT OF THE SCOTCH. at that period with defensive armour, to mount a steep eminence pari passu with light troops, ren dered him, when came " the tug of war," totally unserviceable. The English archers, ever fatally superior to the Scotch, were ably posted on all the commanding points of the position, and, as the enemy mounted in close column, every arrow told. Breathless and broken, their assault on fresh troops and in perfect formation, could be nothing other than it proved. The attack was easily repulsed — and Edward, who had kept his cavalry in hand, with a chosen body of mounted archers and Irish auxiliaries, charged the disor dered columns, and completed their destruction. I stood upon the ground where Douglas was killed by a pikeman, and which still retains his name, and fancied that I looked upon the rout. From this commanding eminence the country all round was visible, and in imagination it was covered with the flying enemy. The fiery king was raging in their rear, and group after group were cut down, feebly resisting. The coward grooms had ridden from the bottom of the hill on witnessing the first repulse, and to their masters, cased in mail, escape was thus impossible. No wonder a pursuit continued for five miles pro duced a fearful slaughter;* and that many a * The losses assigned by English chroniclers to the Scotch, were;— eight earls, ninety knights, four hundred esquires, and PERSONAL ENCOUNTER. 19 coronach was cried beyond the Tweed, when the tidings of " bloody Halidon " were carried across the border. It was said that Edward sullied his brilliant success by subsequent barbarity, and putting to death many of his prisoners of rank the morning after the battle. The statement is made by Bcece — but for the sake of common humanity and the character of the English king, it is to be hoped that the old chronicler was mistaken. Indeed a circumstance falsifies the charge — several persons of note returned by the monk " defunct," figured afterwards in the stirring records of these troubled times. The ancient system of warfare was favourable to displays of personal heroism and strength, and few battles are recorded without allusions being made to the prowess or gallantry of individuals. Ridpath, in his ' Border History," relates the following event, which marked with evil auguiy the commencement of the action on Halidon Hill, and thus goes the story : — " When both sides were ready to engage, the shock of battle was a while suspended by the appearance of a Scotchman of gigantic stature, who had acquired the name of TurnbuU, on tUrly-five thousand rank and file. The Scotch admitted the latter, to have been ten thousand. The English casualties were ridicu lously underrated ; their killed being set down at a knight, au esquire, and thirteen privates ! c 2 20 OCCURRENCE AT CASTALLA. account of a brave exploit he had performed, in saving King Robert Bruce from being gored to death by a wild bull, which had overthrown him while he was hunting. Attended by a great mastiff, TurnbuU approached the Enghsh army, and challenged any person in it to come forth, and fight a single combat with him. After a short pause of astonishment, the challenge was accepted by Sir Robert Benhale, a young Norfolk knight, inferior to the Scot in stature, but of great bodily strength, and yielding to none in mihtary address. The mastiff flying out against Benhale, the brave knight brought a heavy blow upon his loins, and separated its hinder legs from the rest of its body ; and, encountering immedi ately with TurnbuU, he eluded by his address and agility the blows aimed at him, and first cut off the left arm, and then the head of his adversary.'' Now, my dear Jack, although, in our days, personal encounters are not common, still they occasionally take place, and one which occurred at Castalla, in Suchet's action with Murray, appears only to want the dog, to render it a perfect pendant to the passage of arms between the Scottish giant and the Norfolk knight. Suchet having attacked the left of the allied position, "when the main body came upon the second battalion of the 27th, there was a terrible crash ; for the ground having an abrupt declina- OLD STUART. 21 tion near the top, enabled the French to form a line under cover, close to the British, who were lying down waiting for orders to charge; and while the former were unfolding their masses, a grenadier officer, advancing alone, challenged the captain of the 27th Grenadiers to single combat. Waldron, an agile vigorous Irishman, and of boihng courage, instantly sprang forward ; the hostile lines looked on without firing a shot, the swords of the champions glittered in the sun, the Frenchman's head was cleft in twain, and the next moment the 27th, jumping up with a deafen ing shout, fired a deadly volley, at half pistol shot distance, and then charged with such a shock, that maugre their bravery and numbers, the enemy's soldiers were overthrown, and the side of the Sierra was covered with the killed and wounded."* In speaking of Berwick, (its antiquity and past importance considered) as a place now of httle interest, I should not omit to mention that it possesses one singular curiosity. On my arrival, I encountered a remarkable old man ; his costume was that of a mendicant, and as he carried a fiddle in his hand, I had no difficulty in discovering that he was one of the " wandering Willie tribe," who are still occasion ally met with on the borders. Little did I then * Napier's History. 22 OLD STUART. imagine that a veritable descendant of the house of Stuart was about to receive from my hand a trifling donative— or, that the eye, dulled with age, that was turned upon mine, had witnessed the triumph of the young adventurer at Preston, and viewed his last struggle for a lost throne, and the downfal of Highland influence, on the red moor of Culloden, Did one wish to crowd with incident a hfe protracted far beyond the customary limits assigned to mortality, he need but tell this old man's history. Born in 1728, and consequently one hundred and fifteen years of age, James Stuart is the son of a general officer, and a near relative to the exiled king. His father fell in action in America, and his grandmother also obtained a melancholy celebrity, being the Lady Ogilvie slain by the Campbells, when "the bonnie house of Airlie" was burned by Argyle. At fifteen, James Stuart ran away from school, and was present at Preston, witnessing the death of Gardiner, and the deroute of Cope's army. In Edinburgh, he drank wine with the Chevalier — and rejoining the Highland clans, after their retreat from the south, he saw the fatal blow delivered by the Duke of Cumberland at Culloden, that at the same time crushed Jacobite intrigue and Charlie's dreams of royalty. At twenty. OLD SlUART. 23 Stuart enhsted in the Highland Watch, remained in the 42d seven yeai-s, and obtained in that corps an ensigncy. In 1759, he fought on the heights of Abraham, and witnessed the death of Wolfe. On the revolt of the colonists — having sold his commission at the end of the former war — he re-entered the army as private, and was present at the skirmish at Lexington, and the first action between the royalist and repubhcan forces fought on Bunker's-hill. For some unex plained reason he left the army ; entered the navy, continued in the latter service sixteen years, and was present in Rodney's action with De Grasse, in which he was severely wounded. His next change of life made him sailor in a merchant man ; his last, a wandering fiddler. In the latter character I heard him execute a Jacobite air — and of all the unhappy sons fathered on that unhappy god, Apollo, poor Jamie was I think the most inharmonious. Stuart was himself the youngest of sixteen children, and the father of twenty-seven. What would Harriet Martineau say to that ? Of his sons, ten fell in the united services of the country — five in India, two at Trafalgar, two at Algiers, and one at Waterloo. It may be easily conceived, that one who has reached such lengthened days, possessed no common frame. The old man, even in what 24 PISCATORIAL ESSAY. would be ordinarily termed with the common race of mankind, old age, was endowed with such physical power as to obtain for him the sobriquet of " Jamie Strong." He would lift a heavy table by his teeth, raise a large man upon his hand, take up eighteen half-hundred-weights united by a rod of iron, and — greatest trial of all — at eighty- five ! he raised a cart loaded with hay, and carried it several yards from where he lifted it. One feat more of Jamie remains to be recorded. Five times he visited the hymeneal altar. The fifth lady is still living, and the junior of her husband by seventy-five years ! The only decay of nature which the old man complains of is failing vision. He regrets it, be cause it prevents him from reading the Scriptures, and obliges him to be beholden to his wife. His memory is perfectly unimpaired — and he can repeat whole chapters from the Scriptures with remarkable correctness. * * * * I have made my first piscatorial essay ; and, by the shade of Walton, a dead failure ! After driving a dozen miles and reaching the scene of action, the morning, hitherto dark and cloudy, changed most provokingly into a noon so blue and beautiful, that even an Italian would have praised it. I did commence however, the hopeless task of thrashing the sunny surface A PRIMITIVE ESTABLISHMENT. 25 of the Tweed with a couple of approved salmon flies ; but in half an hour I gave the labour up. The borderers are, commonly, a plain-spoken people, and I had scarcely began, when an Auld-Robin-Grey-looking carle, with a broad bonnet on his head, and a plaid twisted round his neck, stopped where I was disturbing the water, and in vain. " Hae ye ony thing till do, honest man ?" he inquired drily. " Not much, you may swear," I answered, " or you would not find me here." " Weel, I guessed as muckle," returned the Scot. " Gin ye had ony bisnis to occupy ye'er time, I wad counsil ye to gang hame an' attend till it ; for if ye keep skiting the Tweed till sun set, ye'll never turn a tail," and off he toddled, with his " twa doggies" at his heels to look after the sheep. The auld carle was right. A man looks excessively ridiculous stuck upon the bank of a silver stream, in a dead calm and ardent sunshine. I coiled my casting-line round my hat, dis mounted my rod, and leisurely wended my way to a road-side public-house, whither I had for warded my baggage, and which I had selected for my head-quarters for a day or two. 5^ 5i& 'S* * This is, indeed, a primitive establishment. I 26 A PRIMITIVE ESTABLISHMENT. sleep in a small closet within a large chamber, in which two " hurricane houses," as Hawser Trun nion would call the fixed bedsteads pecuhar to the borders, are erected. One is held in joint- tenancy by the landlady and her daughter — the other is occupied by " the lassie," as they call " the maid of all work" — and a very pretty sunny- haired, blue-eyed girl, the lassie is. The bolt is on my side of the door ; and were I a somnambulist, the outer chamber would be open to invasion. Here is confidence in lovely woman. I — a very stranger — put in possession of the citadel itself. How loudly the hostess snores ! By Saint Paul ! a marvellous heavy sleeper to hold that high re sponsibility, which, in a Turkish harem, they confide to " the mother of the maids !" If the outpost duty is entrusted to the stout gen tlewoman whom I am listening to, and Irish anglers are occasionally accommodated for the night, I would conscientiously recommend the bolt to be placed on the other side of the door. Thank God ! I am no sleep-walker. No matter, therefore, what side the fastening is on so far as I'm concerned. * * * •» Another day has passed. 1 have fished the Whitadder most successfully, and returned to " mine inn " at seven o'clock, with a full pannier of beautiful red trouts. Dinner had been some A PRIMITIVE ESTABLISHMENT. 27 time waiting, and the blue-eyed lassie paraded a clean and comfortable repast. How much it predisposes a man to make himself comfortable in the evening, when he returns from moor or river with a well-filled bag or weighty creel ! I poked the fire — for the nights are chilly on the border — the whisky was excellent — the water critically boiled — and for myself, I put no more faith in Father Mathew than I do in Harriet Martineau. I know not wherefore, but I never required so much attendance — and the blue-eyed lassie does " her spiriting so gently !" How pretty and how modest ! — and she is so perfectly unconscious of her beauty, that on the gazer she has a double claim. Lord! how soundly the old woman snored last night — while that sweet girl, no doubt, slept calmly as an infant, within a halbert's length, and the bolt on my side ! " Hallo ! Colonel O'Shaughnessey !" and dame Prudence gave me a jog — " Arrah ! what's this you're talking about ? Are you, at your time of life, going to make a Judy Fitzsummon's mother of yourself ? Take a friend's advice, and be off in the morning— but give Mistress Macsneeish a whisper before you go, and tell her to change the fastening, and put it on the other side." CHAPTER III. CORNHILL " BRIDGE OF COULSON BEAUTIFUL POOL A SPORTING SALMON HYMENEAL STATISTICS ANGLING INCIDENT THE BOMONT BLACK-HEADED GULLS — BORDER MELODIES A RENT- DAY DINNER, AND DEEP POTATION. I AM located in one of the best inns to be found upon the borders — that at Cornhill. Read and wrote all day — excellent dinner — and to pass an hour, have set out for a short stroll into Scot land. The Tweed, which separates the kingdoms, is not a mile from the hotel, and, over the noble bridge of Coulson, I proceeded into the ancient town of Coldstream, where General Monk raised the household regiment before the Restoration, which still retains the name of what may be termed its birth-place. From the battlements of the bridge, at either side, the view is fine — to the artist, pretty and picturesque ; but, to the angler, a prospect of surpassing interest. Above, the river makes a graceful sweep, exhibiting a broad BEAUTIFUL POOL. 29 expanse of unbroken water, which, gliding quietly under the arches, falls a dozen feet over a curtain of stone-work extending right across, with one open passage on the English side to enable the salmon to come up. Last night was rainy — and as on the sabbath all im pediments are removed, no doubt, profiting by the spaight* and a free passage, hundreds availed themselves of the opportunity and ascended their native stream. Over the large basin above the bridge a myriad of tiny trouts are springing, carrying on a " hit and miss " sort of warfare against the flies ; while their larger companions, avoiding unnecessary trouble and display, slightly break the water as they suck the victim in. I was amusing myself in mental cal culations as to the respective sizes of the fish which starred the surface of the pool, when suddenly, a noble salmon, fresh from the sea, who had used his Sunday licence and passed the barriers which for six days would have been opposed to him, celebrated his advent by a clean somerset of three full feet ! Great was the splash thereof! — the water went curling over the pool, effacing in a moment the minuter circles made by the lesser tenants of the stream. A minute after this saltation had been performed the ripple eddied to the bank, as you may have noticed * Spaight — Anglice, a fresh. 30 A SPORTING SALMON. the wavy swell following the transit of some large steamer, break under the bay window of the Crown and Sceptre, while the white-bait is in culinary progress, and Cockneys who have dined already, sigh at the memory of past plea sure, and wish they had not dined. I never saw a finer fish than " the saltador." I hooked him next day in the belly fin, and off he went, carrying my casting-line away with him easily as if it had been made of single hair. He was taken four days afterwards in a draught net ; my fly and casting-line proved the identity ; and at scale he turned eighteen pounds ! I am somewhat digressive, — all great men digress, — myself, Byron, Joe Hume, and others. I was also oblivious that I was withholding from you information that might be of more importance than the private history of every salmon in the Tweed. Immediately abutting on this exqui site pool — in fact its left flank resting on the river— the first house you encounter on the Scot tish side is an unpretending edifice, one story high and roofed with tiles. Humble as its ex terior may be, pass it with reverence — for that is the temple of Hymen, and there his chief-priest resides. I know, my dear Jack, that you are no fortune-hunter — but still, should it please the Lord to promiscuously (as they call it in Ireland) throw some lady of Miss Angela Coutts's calibre HYMENE.\L STATISTICS. 31 in your way, why, I suppose, the lady's charms would overcome all other objections, and you would take her with all encumbrances. Strand and Stratton Place inclusive. In such case, avoid Gretna- — it's common-place — and let Coldstream be your destination. First house right hand out of England, mind that ; priest of the order of St. Crispin, tacks soles together in the morning, and souls " i'th' afternoon;" ordinary charge, ten shillings ; time, five minutes ; certificate printed, making the thing genteel, and conveying an idea of correct hymeneals to the irritated family of your lady vrife, when some forty-second cousin ventures to breathe your name with proper caution, lest the mother should become hysterical, or the papa apoplectic. By the way, there is another estabhshment up the town, on the cheap and nasty system, like an Old Bailey beef-shop : fee only half-a-crown ; but whisky expected for the wit nesses ; in short, like the stipend of a minister, it's money and malt combined. No dependence in the artist ; occasionally too drunk to articulate ; unable to affix his sign manual ; and the thing comes off lamely. For these valuable statistics, I am indebted to the landlady next door. A public (as they call it here) is a valuable appendage. Should either party shy, nothing like alcohol, " naked or in company," to overcome maiden modesty, or screw to the sticking-place the 32 ANGLING INCIDENT. courage of a gentleman, half-inclined to bolt before the indissoluble knot is tied. Fancy not, my dear Jack, that fugitive apph- cants for hymeneal rights are confined to " the gay licentious throng." Far graver personages have here submitted to this silken bondage. I cannot name any at present on the bench of bishops who have recently committed matrimony at Coulson Bridge, but what think ye of three chancellors* deserting the woolsack to be tacked by the disciple of St. Crispin ! It only proves that the highest authorities of the land admit the veracity of old saws, and that, after all, " there is nothing like leather ! " I have been elaborately descriptive of Coulson Brig, anent its northern end, where stands the dwelhng of the priest of Hymen. To me, sinner that I am, in declining that sublimation of human bliss appertaining to comfortable housekeeping, to wit, the placens uxof, the English extremity of the bridge is more seductive. There, the open ing in the weir allows ingress to salmon passing up the stream, and, after forcing their way up the fall, the fish, as if resting from their labour, make a temporary halt, and at times this favoured pool probably contains a hundred. Their general fixture is immediately in front of the fall ; and out of ten hooked, nine, on feeling the hook, fly ' Lords Brougham, Erskine, and Eldon. THE BOMONT. 33 off directly through the broken water, carrying out some sixty or seventy yards of line. The angler is landed, follows his fish, plays him below the fall, and there kills him without difficulty. But to a tyro, the first rush is generally fatal ; and many a casting-line is carried away, and the owner left lamenting. " Non sine pulvere pal mam ; " and here many a confiding gentleman, dreaming nought of evil, has been swept uncere moniously over the fall into the water, not deep enough to drown, but sufficient to drench him effectually. The wind was westerly — the best point for casting from beneath the arch of the bridge — and on the third essay, a salmon rose, took the fly sportingly, discovered the mistake, and then went off clear over the breast of the weir, taking fifty yards of line away quick as the wheel could deliver it. The moment that the fish was struck, the boatmen pulled the coble to the shore, and, jumping on the bank, I reached the still water at the bottom of the fall, found my tackle safe, and my fish hooked securely. He cost me twenty minutes work ; for, fresh firom the sea, and full of life and activity, he fought it gallantly to the last. I have killed much larger salmon, but never engaged a stouter one ; he barely turned twelve pounds, but I have seen VOL. II. D 34 THE BOMONT. fish of twenty that would have been despatched with half the trouble. To-morrow I shall try the Bomont or the Till — and both at proper times are reputed to be excellent. * * * * The Bomont,* of its kind, is very excellent. Like every water closely dependant on a moun tain source, and fed by a hundred hill-side tribu taries, it rises and falls with extraordinary celerity, and, as the Irish ballad prescribes how ladies are best won, the Bomont must be taken by the angler, when, like lovely woman, " she's in the humour." Indeed, I have no reason to tax " the nymph or naiad " or whomsoever else regulates the conduct of the stream. The pools were low> the water, excepting where a bank or cloud in tervened, nearly pellucid. On such a day and in such a water, if Isaac himself, like a stale actor who years before has bade the stage fareweh, were permitted to re-appear on an English river, he would not have turned a tail over. By a little "artful dodging" — that word must have been coined by a fly-fisher, though Dickens gets the credit ofit — and the assistance of midge-flies and favourable bendings in the stream, where the river seemed to have turned sulky and resolved * Appendix, No. II. THE BOMONT. 35 to return to the place from whence it came, I did manage to fill half my basket. Few of the trout I killed averaged more than a herring's size, but they were remarkably short and well-proportioned. After a spaight there are some fine fish caught occasionally — all prime red trouts, one, two, three, and even four pounds weight ; the latter, of course, " few and far be tween." These are probably Tweed trout. The Bomont, like the Blackadder,* changes its title, and becomes the Till, the Till steals into the Tweed, and hence, the means of ingress. That the Bomont higher up than where I fished it would not be worth an angler's pilgrimage, I can well imagine. The little town of Yetholm, half colonized by gipsies, stands on its brink, and hence it is miserably poached. * * * * I strolled out this morning, and found myself, after an hour's walk, at St. Palhnsburn, the seat of Sir Henry Eskew. Bounded on one side by the high road, fi-om which in many places it * "Blackadder, or BlacJcader, a tributary stream of the Whit adder, in the district of the Merse, Berwickshire. It rises in some mossy ground in the Lammermoor district, and runs in an easterly direction, past Greenlaw, through the centre of the Merse, tin it falls into the Whitadder below AUanbank. It is an excellent trouting stream, but, from its impregnation of mossy matter, it is unsuitable to the existence of salmon. The name is a corruption of Blackwater, whieh it receives from its dark colour ; a hue ex tending, it may be remarked, to the trouts." — Chambers. d2 36 BLACK-HEADED GULLS. is not a dozen yards removed, there is a small piece of shallow water, with rushy banks and divers islets ; and every spot of the latter upon which a bird could find space to rest, was occu pied by black-headed gulls, seated on their eggs, or forming nests to lay in.* This operation was confined to the rude settlement of a few straws — but the greater portion of the birds had deposited their eggs on the bare surface of the bank, with out the least appearance of having made any artificial preparation for incubation. Hundreds, probably the males, were on wing, gyrating noisily over the nests occupied by their mates; while on the adjacent grass-fields thousands of these birds were grouped together, resting on the sward, and preserving a dignified silence. The proprietor of the water thus singularly tenanted, affords full protection to these wild visitors, who return every spring, and occupy the same place where they first broke the shell, or ushered their progeny into life. They appear in March and retire in August, to pass the intervening months, heaven knows where. On leaving the water at Pallinsburn, the body politic separate by mutual consent ; — in winter this species of the gull tribe are always met dispersedly, and the instinctive regularity of their return, the thorough confidence of safety and protection which they * Appendix, No. III. BORDER MELODIES. 37 evince, by remaining by the hundred within a dozen yards of a stranger, who, at another season would not be permitted to approach within musquet range, is one of the anomalies which are puzzling to the naturalist. Contrary to the habits of more timid birds who desert a nest which they suspect has been discovered, the confidence of the black-heads remains unshaken, — and even after their eggs have been removed, the process of incubation is resumed, for, as the grey-headed carl observed, — " They dinna tak offence at it seemingly — for the mair they'r harried, the mair they'l lay." What obhging birds the black-heads are ! * * * * It is marvellous how men mistake their gifts — and of all monomanias, I firmly believe that the musical is most incurable. On the border, they are confoundedly melodious when they have " a drappy in the ee," and whatever besides they may forget, it will not be a verse of the song. There is a party of cattle-jobbers in the next room — and though, as I hear them say, "the beasties brought low prices," and the owners consequently should be dull as ditch water, they have been singing hke throstles for an hour, and bid fair to run Bums through, before they "crack cry " and return to their loving spouses. And then every song has a cursed chorus — and I'll 38 A RENT-DAY DINNER. take my corporal oath there's not a pair of bad bellows in the company. Would to heaven ye were all calmly slumbering beside the virtuous gentlewomen that own ye! — There they go again ! — "Auld Lang Syne ;" well, if the ceihng stands that, all I say is that the stucco is superior. " Auld Acquaintance !" I wish, gen^ tlemen, that I could drop yours ! * * * * Although generally of temperate habits, the borderers at times drink awfully. There was a rent dinner here last week ; for it is the custom in Scotland, and one calculated to promote kindly relations between landlord and tenant, to entertain the tenantry upon the occasion. The business commenced at twelve, dinner at four, and the whole affair, monetary and jovial, was over by sharp nine. Mine host assured me that one of the party had, in that brief interval, consumed six and twenty glasses of grog and toddy, and that the mean allowance of the party, eighteen in number, taken on the whole, was seven tumblers each. " There was a little loud talk," continued the host, "but all good- humoured, and every man was able to mount his horse and ride hame. The man that drank the six-and-twenty tumblers had come " frae a distance, and sleepit in the hoose." But he was up at cock-crow the next morning, bolted a glass A DEEP POTATION. 39 of whisky before starting, declaring on the word of a christian man, that " there wasna a heed-ack in a hogshead of sich stuff," and then rode off, in as calm and respectable a tem perament, as if he had taken the pledge a month before, and been ever since on a visit to Father Mathew. CHAPTER IV. FLODDEN ^JAMES OF SCOTLAND SCAN. MAG. SAINT CUTHBERt's BANNER CIVIL CAMPAIGNING — POSITION OF THE SCOTCH ARMY PREVIOUS OCCURRENCES — BATTLE OF FLODDEN FIELD SCOTt's DESCRIPTION SAD CONSEQUENCES HISTORIC DOUBT A DAN GEROUS LOCALITY — TWISEL CASTLE MAKING CUTTIES. I HAVE killed a creel of trouts I might almost say upon the field of Flodden; and may not some Cockney, in " letters to his kinsfolk," dated five hundred years hence, notify to his London correspondent, that he has bagged six brace of red-legged partridges, upon that of Waterloo ! The river was in excellent order, and it would have been an easy task to have doubled the number of the scaly spoil, but, sooth to say, my attention was more engrossed by the historic recollections this battle-field brought fresh to memory, than in regulating the evolutions of tail-fly and droppers. All the border conflicts are, more or less, embued with romantic incident ; but Flodden, both in causes and effects, is both curiously and fatally distinguished. The Scotch monarch appears to have been a very silly gentleman, to whom, like all that tribe, the JAMES OF SCOTLAND. 41 ladies proved, as they generally do, confoundedly troublesome. Indeed, James was a gay deceiver, on the most extensive scale — for not contented with leaving " his own queen Margaret," " in Lithgow's bower," as Scott will have it, to cry her eyes out, he must forsooth bring Dame Heron to court; a lady, as every body there admitted, " not a bit better than she ought to be." Great was the indignation of every maid of honour turned of forty-five, at a proceeding on the king's part, so much calculated to give rise to scan. mag. It is true, that even in these primitive times, family arrangements were occasionally found convenient as in our own ; " Sir Hugh the Heron" — whose name by the way was WiUiam — as a prisoner of war, should have been in durance vile ; but the good-natured king accepted his spouse as locum tenens; and though the "ladies winked aside," to the monarch and the knight the exchange was perfectly satisfactory. Had the mischief ended there, aU would have been weU. James took the field, and crossed the border on the 2 2d of August. Reducing the castles of Wark and Etall,* he invested that of Norham, carried the outworks by assault, and obhged the governor to enter into a conditional engagement to capitulate on a certain day, pro vided he should not be previously relieved by » Appendix, No. IV. 42 SCAN. MAG. the advance of an Enghsh army. Alas ! it was fated that " the champion of the dames," should never become master of that " castled steep," from his having unfortunately neglected to leave Dame Heron, where she ought to have been — with the rest of the baggage in the rear. Instead of following up a first success and pressing his advantage by a rapid advance into England, the amorous monarch dallied on the border, and taking up his residence in the castle of Sir Hugh the Heron, consumed days which should have found him in the tented field, in philandering with my lady Ford. While Surrey, as he advanced, hourly gained strength, the Scottish army as rapidly disbanded. Bad weather, an exhausted country, immense plunder, all these induced irregular troops hke them, to forsake their colours and retum to their homes. Blind to the ruin that was impending, and fascinated by "lady Heron's witching eyes," James per mitted the English army to approach, unchecked, and unopposed — and to him. Ford Castle* proved fatal as the bower of Armida. In sooth, it was a dangerous residence for any tender-hearted gentleman to pop into, for even the sanctity of Holy Church was no security against seduction. While my lady Heron bothered, as they say in Ireland, the unfortunate king — " Oh ! sin and * Appendix, No. V. ST. cuthbert's BANNER. 43 shame!" the demoiselle her daughter, regularly bedevilled the archbishop of St. Andrews. * In the mean while Surrey was cautiously ap proaching, and, as the fancy say, " to make all safe," in passing Durham he borrowed from the prior the blessed banner of St. Cuthbert. History does not state what security the Enghsh com mander gave for the safe return of this most important article ; yet they were times when credit was indifferent, — " the word was pitch and pay " — and even a king could not borrow a couple of battering cannon, without leaving a few courtiers in pledge for re-delivery .f Probably, the blessed banner being a jewel above price, the abbot considering that the whole peerage would not be an equivalent, thought it better to lend it upon honour. Indeed, had James now-a-days offered similar pledges for a siege train, I question whether he would have been successful. He might have tendered a dozen nobles to the Carron Company in vain, and on * Drummond says, that " the captivity of lady Ford and her daughter, was a snare contrived by Surrey, in which the Scottish king, and his natural son, the archbishop of St. Andrews, were both entrapped." t When James V. in 1527,besiegedTantallan,heborrowedfroni the castle of Dunbar, " two great cannons, ' Thrawn-mouthed Mow and her Marrow,' also 'two great botcards, and two moyans, two double falcons, and four quarter falcons ; ' for the return of which, according to Piscottie, he left three lords in pawn." 44 CIVIL CAMPAIGNING, their united security not have obtained the loan of a pateraro. There was a candid and civil mode of cam paigning in these good old times, which has un happily fallen into desuetude. On Sunday, the 4th of September, Surrey sent his compliments to the Scotch monarch by Rouge Croix, to intimate that he would fight him on the following Friday ; and his son Thomas (the Admiral) clapped a rider on the message, to say that he, Tom, would be in the van of battle, and neither give nor expect quarter. James, in return, assured Surrey that all he wanted was " a clear stage and no favour," politely con cluding with a wish " that the best man might win." But all through, Surrey was too deep for the Scottish monarch ; his system was evidently not to give a chance away, and all means were un scrupulously employed, from the banner of St. Cuthbert to the charms of lady Heron. One would have supposed that his grace of St. Andrews would have been more than a match for the earl in holy preparations ; but, engrossed in his flirta tion with Miss Ford, he neglected to neutralize the effect St. Cuthbert's banner was certain to produce. A bag or two of blessed bones would probably have set matters right — but, though there were plenty in the neighbourhood, the amorous archbishop neglected to ask a loan. SCOTCH POSITION. 45 James's position was excellent, had he not allowed himself to be out-manoeuvred. On the last swelling ground connected with the Cheviots, mounted by a long acclivity, a morass on one flank, and the deep water of the Till flowing northerly along his front, the Scottish monarch had formed his array. Of course, battle ground tedious of approach, and on which it would be difficult to deploy, was not to Surrey's fancy ; and he sent a herald with a modest request, that James would waive all advantage in the ground and meet him on Milfield plain ! 'Tis said that the simple monarch would have given a Quixotic consent ; but his nobles, already disgusted at the king's folly, insisted that he would retreat at once — or, should he unwisely risk a battle, that it should be received on a favourable field. The close of this romantic tragedy is known as common history. Failing in his effort upon James's chivalric weakness, from scarcity of pro visions, Surrey was obliged to force an action on. He passed the TiU accordingly, moved over a difficult country unopposed, and bivouacked that night two miles in front of the Scottish army at Barmoor wood. Early next morning — still marching in a north-westerly direction — with one division and his artiUery he crossed the Till at Twiselbridge — and, with a second, forded the river higher up, thus carrying his army round the 46 BATTLE OF FLODDEN. left flank of James's army, and cutting off his communications with Scotland.* A battle was now inevitable. Surrey, in three divisions, and under the fire of his artillery, advanced against the Scotch position ; and James, anxious to secure a strong eminence called Brankstone, on which he had decided to meet the shock of the English army, fired his camp on Flodden ridge, and moved down under cover of the smoke to meet the assailants. The conflict opened with doubtful success — " Wide raged the battle on the plain ; Spears shook, and'falchions flashed amain ; Fell England's arrow-iiight hke rain ; Crests rose, and stooped, and rose again. Wild and disorderly." In the centre, fortune smiled upon the gaUant * It is very remarkable, no matter how dissimilar in everything besides, that in incidental occurrence, many similarities may be traced in modern and ancient warfare. The same movement of his army effected by Surrey in face of James, Wellington, on his retreat from Burgos, accomplished with equal boldness aud success in the presence ofa superior army. Perceiving that Souham was manoeuvring to cut him off from Rodrigo, Lord Wellington, " suddenly casting his army into three columns, crossed the Zurguan , and then covering his left flank with his cavalry and guns, defiled in order of battle before the enemy at little more than cannon- shot. With a wonderful boldness and facility, and good fortune also, for there was a thick fog and heavy rain, which rendered the bye-ways and fields, by which the enemy moved, nearly impass able, while the allies had the use of the high-roads, he carried his whole army in one mass quite round the French left. Thus he gained the Valmusa river, where he halted for the night, in the rear of those who had been threatening him in front, only a few hours before." scott's description. 47 king ; but on the left, the Highlanders were dis persed by Stanley's cavalry; and, attacked in flank and front together, the whole army became irre trievably disordered, the wings routed and driven from the field, and the centre furiously assailed by triple numbers. The close "of Flodden's fatal field,' as sung by Scott, is so remarkable for graphic power and poetic beauty, that had he never written a line beside, on that one pas sage he might have laid a claim to immortality — " More desperate grew the strife of death — The English shafts in voUies hailed. In headlong charge their horse assailed ; Front, flank, and rear, the squadrons sweep, To break the Scottish circle deep. That fought around their king. But yet, though thick the shafts as snow, Though charging knights like whirlwinds go, Though biU-men ply the ghastly blow, Unbroken was the ring ; The stubborn spearmen still made good, Their dark impenetrable wood. Each stepping where his comrade stood, The instant that he fell. No thought was there of dastard flight — Linked in the serried phalanx tight, Groom fought like noble, squire, like knight. As fearlessly and weU ; TUl utter darkness closed her wing O'er their thin host and wounded king."* Of aU the border battles, that of Flodden was most fatal. Beside ten thousand common men, * Marmion. Canto vi. 34. 48 SAD CONSEQUENCES. the flower of the Scotch nobility* perished. The tidings of that terrible defeat, placed the whole land of cakes in mourning, and " even to this day, the battle is never mentioned in Scotland, with out creating a sensation of terror and distress." One, even now, can scarcely look back upon the misery which the madness of that rash monarch inflicted on a land, without feeling in dignation at its author — while the enduring loyalty with which the Scottish nobles "hedged" with their own bodies that guilty king, elicits enthusiastic admiration. There is no instance in history that parallels the devotion exhibited at Flodden. How fatally its visitations upon the noblest families subsequently proved, (several became totally extinct) may be collected from a single instance. The Maxwells lost the heads of their house — for the lord and his three brothers were found amid the gallant dead, who " true to the tomb," perished sword in hand, encircling their hapless monarch. Doubts were for a long time entertained as to * In the fatal Ust, according to Abercrombie, are included Miss Ford's friend, the Archbishop, vrith a necrological remark, " that he was a youth of great promise." Queer notions they had in old times, of what constituted a promising prelate ! " Three other eminent churchmen," (as WiUiam said, when Walker's death at the Boyne was announced, " What the devil brought them there?") twelve earls, fourteen lords, five masters, seventeen knights, and twenty-five gentlemen, all heads of leading famUies — a fearful list indeed ! historic DOUBT. 49 the fact of the king having actually died upon the field, and many reports were circulated, some asserting that he had been assassinated after the battle, and others declaring that he had exchanged the crown for the cowl, and repaired to the Holy Land, to wear out the remainder of his hfe in prayer and penance. An extract of a letter from Queen Catharine tb Henry,* then in France, seems to put the death of James beyond the existence of a doubt, and establish the identity of the body found on Flodden, as being that of the iU-fated monarch.f * * * * It is useless to try either the Tweed or its tributaries, until a fall of rain has freshened the water and set the torpid fish once more in motion. What is to be done ? Idleness is, as every body says, the mother of mischief; and to remain in this dangerous locahty, waiting for the * " My husband, for hastynesse, wt. Rogecrosse I coude not sende your Grace the pece of the King of Scotts cote wMche John Glyn now bringeth. In this your Grace shal see how I can kepe my premys, sending you for your baners a kings cote. I thought to sende hymself unto you, but our Englishemens herts would not sufire it. It shuld have been better for hym to have been in peax than have this rewarde. AU that God sendeth is for the iest. My Lord of Surrey, my Henry, would fayne knowe your pleasur in the buryeng of the King of Scotts body, for he hath writen to me soo. 1 sende your Grace herein a bUle, founde in a Scottishemans purse, of suche things as the Frenshe King sent to the said King of Scotts to make warre against you." t Appendix, No. IV. VOL. II. E 50 A DANGEROUS LOCALITY. clouds to discharge themselves, with nothing to do, and within pistol shot of the head quarters of Hymen! Egad, I might be tempted to pay a visit to the wrong side of Coulson bridge, and commit matrimony to give me temporary em ployment. No wonder that every body on the border, at one time or other, is caught and becomes a Benedict. The thing's done in the springing of a ramrod — and a man is manacled for life, before he hears the chain give a solitary jangle. In England, a man has fair warning of impending danger; and the whole parish are invited by the pursy parson, to "declare the match off," if they can show cause or impediment. But here, people become "one flesh" before they have time to bless themselves ; and, instead of lengthened wooing — instead of singing, " will you come to the bower," you have simply to say, " will you come to the bar ?" * I will make a pilgrimage to Holy Island. That is safe ground — no man had a greater antipathy to hymeneals than honest Cuthbert ; Saint Se- nanus was not a more inveterate woman-hater than him of Lindisfarn, and under his holy sur veillance I may consider myself proof against temptation. * Most of the toll-bars on the border are placed on the boun dary of the kingdoms, and afford equal facUity to the gentieman who wishes to marry or get drunk. TWISEL CASTLE. 51 I mounted the Kelso coach ; there was but another passenger on the roof — a little, smoke- dried-looking original, quaint, shrewd, and in teUigent, and very communicative into the bar gain. As we drove along, he amused me with the causticity of his remarks and the peculiarity of his dialect. At a very romantic turn of the road, a most singular looking building forces itself upon the traveller's attention — a ruin of modern erection — a pile, smooth from the chisel, and consigned, incompleted, to a premature decay. Twisel Castle was erected by the owner of the noble house which confronts it — and from extent and elevation* it must have entailed a heavy expen diture on the designer. As an architectural object, it is an abomination — and what its interior arrangements were to have been, will soon be a question for the antiquary. It is really a pain ful object. Costly and beautiful stone-work, staring you from an imposing hUl, a very monu ment of human eccentricity. Were it regularly ruined, from TiUmouth House, Twisel Castle would be a picturesque feature — a very dear one, certainly, but still a striking one. But, as it stands, it is a mere excrescence on the landscape, — a memorial of the extent to which human fancy • It has been computed that every course of stone work cost a thousand pounds. E 2 52 MAKING CUTTIES. or foUy, (they are nearly synonymous,) will run. " How very strange," I said, " that a building on which such such an immense outlay must have been undergone, should be permitted to remain incomplete." " It's na very wonderful, after a'," returned the little traveller beside me ; " it's nae every ane, ye ken, that can make a pipe, but there's unco few that canna mak a cuttie." " Pipes and cutties ! " I replied, " what the deuce have they to say to the finishing of Twisel Castle?" " Weel, I'll explain that," retured the smoke- dried gentleman, " if ye dinna mind list'nin' to an auld story." I assured my companion that I was all atten tion, and after he had refreshed himself with an extensive pinch of high toast, he thus con tinued : — " Weel," said the old lowlander, " I'U teU ye how the sayin' cam about. There was a wright ance in Kelso, and he had but one son. The boy was but a weakly body, and the fey ther thought he would bring him up till a trade, easier to work at than his ain, and sae he made his mind up to bind him to a tailor. Weel, Jock was bound, but, at the end of a year, the taUor sent him hame ; he was war than useless, for what he MAKING CUTTIES. 53 sewed, anither apprentice had to rip out. ' What will we do with the bairn ? ' said the feyther. ' Each ! I can hardly, guess,' answered the gudewife, ' I fear sair that we'll make naethin' o' him, after a'.' ' Na,' replied the gudeman, ' it was the trade itsell'; tailorin', ye ken, cramps the legs, and maybe, it crampit Jock's ganius ; the boy disna want heed.' ' Heed, he has eneugh,' said the auld woman, ' it's the biggest in the toun, but there's naethin' in that, ye ken.' Well, to shorten the story, master Jock was next en trusted to a shoemaker, but alas ! to use the old Scotchman's words, ' if he was ill at stichin claith, he was waur far at yerking leather,' and after a short probation, like Bob Acres' 'unmentionables,' Jock was declared ' incapable,' and returned, for the second time, to his affectionate parents. What was to be done now ? For the fine arts, the son of the worthy wright had evidently no fancy, for his efforts at constructing breeches or Bluchers had turned out equally unsuccessful. At last, the gudewife remembered she had a far- off cousin, a pipe-maker, in Carlisle. That would be just the trade — there could be surely neither labour nor ingenuity required in fabricating a tobacco-pipe. Accordingly, the man of clay was applied to — and he having consented to receive his kinswoman's son, of whose talents and amiabihty a flattering description had been 54 MAKING CUTTIES. given, Jock, for the third time, left his paternal roof-tree. " Six months passed-^and anxious to ascertain what progress the young pipe-maker had made, the old wright crossed the border, and proceeded to ' merrie Carlisle.' " Why that ancient city had obtained that pleasant sobriquet appeared paradoxical, if the other residences of the inhabitants were cir cumstanced like that of the pipe-maker. Within, there was every thing but hilarity ; for, on the arrival of the wright, he found the man of clay belabouring his heir apparent, who, in return, was shouting murder lustily. The floor was covered with a basket-full of shattered pipes; and from the attitude and cause of action of the master and disciple, it was quite apparent at a glance, that Jock was the origo mali. " * What the de'U's the matter?' said the wright, " ' The matter,' responded the artist in pipe clay, ' keek upon the flure, and ye need na speer the cause, mon.' " ' Each ! it was, nae dout, an axident.* " ' Axident,— what the deevil satisfaction's that? The stupid loon has smashed mair pipes in a minute, than I can mak in a week.' " ' Weel, weel, Jock must be the busier — and where he mad one pipe before, he maun now mak twa.' MAKING CUTTIES. 55 " * Mak pipes,' exclaimed the man of clay, ' he'll never mak one till atarnity,' " ' And can he na mak a pipe ? ' inquired the incredulous carpenter. " ' Na,' returned the irritated artist, vrith a bitter giin, as he picked a dozen shankless ones from the floor, ' but I'U gie ye a crum o' com fort, mon. Search the hail country aist and west, an I'm damned — Lord pardon me for swarin' — if ye find sic a han as your son's for makin cutties!'" How true that homely adage ! I have seen a patrimony, old as the conquest, pass into the stranger's possession ; an heiress in the work house ; a gem that had once glittered in the bridal trousseau of a countess, sparkling on the tawny neck ofthe helpmate of an Israelite; studs under hammer at " the corner ;" fox-hounds dispersed ; and, upon inquiry, though the owners never could make pipes, like honest Jock, they were superior hands — at making cutties! CHAPTER V. NORHAM CASTLE FORMER STRENGTH AND EXTENT ANTIENT APPEARANCE — RECENT DEMOLITION MODERN IMPROVEMENTS PASSAGE AT ARMS THE TWEED — EVENING IN NORHAM CONFLUENCE OP THE TILL A PET POOL HOOKING A WATER- RAT SAFELY LANDED. From a distance on the Kelso road, I had seen " Norham's castled steep," but by happy associ ations, evening was closing, and literally, " The donjon tower, the battled keep. The loop-holed grates, where captives weep. The flanking waUs that round them sweep, In yeUow lustre shone" as I approached a mass of mortar and heap of nameless ruins, the sole remnants of one of the strongest holds of feudal power. The intelligent gentleman who was to drive back the gig, had previously informed me that she (the castle) was " a bra' place, lang syne, for hangin' cattle-lifters, and keepin' Crismas merry." Pleasant idea of a merry Christmas ! Sheep and sheep-stealers FORMER STRENGTH AND EXTENT. 57 hanging, as heralds would call it, " parti par pale." When approaching the Keep of Norham, the outhne of " the massy more " showed in full effect. I entered a ruined archway in the exten sive outworks, which formed the enceinte of the stronghold, and had once occupied a consider able space. It is impossible to trace, with any attempt at accuracy, what Norham has been, and all you can ascertain is, that it was one of the most powerful and extensive baronial fort resses. Enormous masses of fallen masonry are long since covered with a sward of grass, giving a volcano-hke appearance to a court, once sufficiently large and level for the purposes of the military exercises practised in ancient chivalry. Camden describes Norham Castle, in his time, " to be situated on the top of a high steep rock, and fortified with a trench. The outward wall, of great circuit, was guarded by several turrets, in a canton towards the river, in which, another wall, much stronger, encircled the keep or tower, of great height." This de scription furnishes a perfect idea of the figure of this fortress, after it had received repairs by Bishop Tunstal. Towards the river, the ruins now hang upon the very verge of the precipice ; part of which, by the washing of the stream, has given way, and carried with it the superstruc- 58 ANTIENT APPEARANCE. tures on that side ; which, v^ith the decay inci dent to the length of time, has occasioned a wide breach in the outward wall, spoken of by Cam den. The turrets, as he was pleased to call them, appear to be no other than demi-bastions, a mode of fortification generally followed, in which the chief strength of this castle was constructed. " The wall of Norham Castle, which stretched from the water on the south side, was guarded with a gateway and tower above it, having square turrets on each hand : the ascent from thence was steep, the way bending towards the east ; and through the wall, the entrance was by another gateway of superior dimensions, fortified by two heavy round flanking towers, the remains of which are still considerable. This appears to have been the chief entrance, and fronts to a plain of considerable extent. It was defended by a drawbridge over a very wide moat, which began near to this gateway, and was extended round the Castle on the land side, inclosing a spacious area or balliura, fortified with a very strong wall, garnished with demi-bastions at intervals." " To defend the keep or main tower, a strong wall incloses a narrow area or interior ballium, which is entered by a gateway guarded on each hand by square towers. The keep is a very heavy square building, vaulted underneath, like RECENT DEMOLITION. 59 most structures of this sort. Part of the vaults or prisons remain entire, but all the interior parts of the tower above, are laid open and ruined. The remains of an exploratory turret appear on one corner of the keep ; it may be presumed it was uniform with similar turrets on the other corners. The height of the great tower is about seventy feet, containing four stories, or ranges of apartments. The whole building is constructed of red freestone, of a soft nature, and subject to decay : there is not the least ornament about it ; the whole aspect is miserably gloomy : it wears the countenance of the time of King Stephen, without any of the embellishments of the age in which Bishop Tunstal lived." " The outworks, of late years, have been much demolished, particularly near to the western gate ; the ashlar stones of the facing of the wall are all removed; and only the rubble and cement, or nm-hme, with which the inner part of the wall was filled, remain, which has a very rugged and ruinous appearance."* I have generaUy decried love as being a very • This gothic actwas perpetrated by a Vandal into whose tem porary possession the Castle fell; and he completed the destruction of this noble pUe to obtain stones to buUd a farm-steading. As I viewed " the ruin he had vnrought," I could not but imprecate the Poet's curse : — " O ! be his tomb as lead to lead Upon the dull destroyer's head !" 60 MODERN IMPROVEMENTS. troublesome amusement; and the more I hear and read upon the subject, the more am I con vinced that I have come to a correct conclusion. Certainly, the mode in which the thing is now carried on may be included among modern im provements ; gentlewomen are not so unreason able and exacting as they were in former days ; and a man may now, I am told, and on good authority, intimate to a lady, after two quadrilles and avalse, that she has been regularly the death of him, without, as a matter of course, strapping himself to a guitar for a long winter's night, or, like Packwood the razor-maker, being required to " hire a poet" to sonnetize the fair one's eyebrow. In olden time, ladies were so ingenious in con trivances to get their admirers into trouble, that one would fancy the tasks imposed were post- hymeneal, and not anti-connubial ones — and that having gone through the ranks of maid and wife, they were anxious for promotion into widowhood. In noticing Norham, old Leland records the following pleasant fancy of " nature's master piece," as Burns will have her to be. " About this tyme there was a great feste madeyn Lincolnshire, to which came many gentil- menand ladies; and amonge them one lady brought a healme for a man of were, with a very riche creste of gold, to WiUiam Marmion, knight, with a letter of commendement of her lady, that he PASSAGE AT ARMS. 61 should go into the most daungerest place in England, and then to let the heaulme be seene and known as famous. So he went to Norham ; whither within four days of cumming cam Philip Moubray, guardian of Berwicke, having yn his bande forty men of armes, the very flower of men of the Scottish marches. " Thomas Gray, Capitayne of Norham, seynge this, brought his garison afore the barriers of the castel ; behind whom, cam William, richly arrayed, as al glittering in gold, and wearing the heaulme, his lady's present. " Then said Thomas Gray to Marmion, ' Sir knight, ye be cum hither to fame your helmet : mount upon yowr horse, and ryde lyke a valiant man to yowr foes even here at hand, and I forsake God if I rescue not thy body deade or alyve ; or I myself wyl dye for it.' " Whereupon he toke his corse, and rode among the throng of ennemyes ; the which layed sore stripes on hym, and pulled hym at the last out of his sadel to the grounde. " Then Thomas Gray, with all the whole garrison, lette prick yn among the Scottes, and so Wondid them and their horses, that they were dverthrowan ; and Marmion, sore beten, was horsid agayn, and, with Gray, persewed the Scottes yn chase. There were taken fifty horse 62 THE TWEED. of price ; and the women of Norham brought them to the foote men to follow the chase." The day was particularly fine, sunny and cloudless, and the crystal water of the Tweed every thing but what an angler wishes it. What ar splendid river it is ! View it from Kelso, at its confluence with the Teviot — Norham, where it sweeps under the castled steep of that once proud place of arms, now tenanted only by rook and martin — and at every bend, it opens up some new beauty to the eye, and every step the pilgrim takes along its classic banks, historic recollections or wild tradition crowd upon his excited fancy, and warn him that he is treading the land of romance. I dined at the quiet and comfortable hostelrie in which anglers establish their head- quarters. The usual borderfare — salmon and mutton cutlets — but then, both are gotten in perfection. That salmon but one brief hour since had been laving his silvery scales in the bright waters of the Tweed, and on the blue Cheviots which form a back-ground to the castle, this exquisite black face was pastured. Salmon, as eaten here, passeth the comprehension of the Cockney. He opineth, unhappy man! that Apicius frequented the Crown and Sceptre, and LucuUus patronized the Ship — and that perch from the docks, and flounders EVENING IN NORHAM. 63 from the river, crowned, as a maximum bonum, with whitebait, constitute a fish dinner. The delusion is too settled to be removed ; but, if he would go to the grave a wiser man, let him come to the Tweed, eat salmon cutlets, and then — die as soon as he can arrange his affairs and manage it conveniently.- I strolled out at sunset to take my customary walk — or, if there be aught to interest, my lounge. I entered the ruined castle, Marmion my com panion, and seated myself on a fallen bastion which overlooks the river. On the glassy surface of the fine sweep of water at my feet, a thousand trouts were springing merrily at the small moths which were now beginning to get upon the wing — and in the holes of the upper story of the ruined keep, where erstwhile the rafters of the floor had rested, jackdaws and wild pigeons had formed their nests, in full security that man could not disturb them ; and the hoarse cawing of the one, contrasted with the melancholy cooing of the other, were sounds that harmonised well with the hour and the place. Elderly gentlemen get dreamy — I am no exception — and, before I had long sate on 'the faUen masonry I was wandering in a visionary world. Lord Marmion's advent was announced, and great was the bustle in the fortress. While the guard " was turning out," the 64 CONFLUENCE OF THE TILL. Captain of the Hold was ordering supper — the guns upon the battery were manned, and " Forty yeomen tall. The iron-studded gates unbarred, Raised the portcuUis' ponderous guard, The lofty paUisade unsparred. And let the drawbridge faU ;" while under the dark archway rode in the Lord of Lutterworth on his "red-roan charger ;" " And such a clang. As then through aU his turrets rang. Old Norham never heard." At this interesting moment, a shepherd's dog laid his cold nose upon my hand — I looked up, his master, a fine, venerable, white-headed man, was standing at my back, and the whole " tableaux vivans" of Marmion's grand entre, " vanished into empty air." ***** I have started this morning under favourable omens. It is a grey day, the breeze is strong, but a point too much to eastward. I never heard of a downright, genuiNE — mind you accent the last syllable correctly — out-and-out-good-fishing- day in my life. Either the water is too high, too low, too dark, too bright, or too something else, that plays the devil. Well, all considered, this day's sport is very passable — and commencing at the debouchement of the TiU, I fished home to A PET POOL. 65 " Norham's tower and town," Nothing could surpass the quiet beauty of the wooded banks which in fast variety present themselves ; and, as to the creel, I only fancy a Hampton- Court artist in peaceable possession of a moiety of the contents, — the shock would be fatal to him ! In the course of our walk, we reached one ofthe nicest pools I ever fished. The stream, parted by an islet, rushed rapidly for fifty yards through a narrow chasm of rugged rock completely over hung with spreading alders, until issuing from beneath their leafy canopy, it rolled its boiling waters into a long deep basin, banked up at the farther extremity, to form what is called "a mill- head." It was a piece of water by which Isaac Walton would have sworn, and appearances were not deceptive. For twenty yards, the rushing waters forced an impetuous passage through the centre of the sleeping pool, marking its channel on either side by a long line of circling eddies ; and one glance would assure the angler, that these would afford the trout a favourite resting-place. Before the flies had touched the surface for a second, two scaly victims were hooked securely and landed on the bank ; at every succeeding cast trouts rose by twos and threes ; and in as many minutes, half a dozen were safely basketed. It would be an immense convenience to him if an angler had an eye behind. On 1 went, casting VOL. IL F 66 HOOKING A WATER-RAT. and killing, when suddenly, my murderous career was interdicted, for, curse upon alder trees ! — and on this sweet stream their name is legion — by one I was brought regularly up, and hopelessly entangled in a topmost bough, which nothing, as my countryman. Sir Boyle, would say, "barring a bird" could reach. I contrived, however, to save the casting line with the loss of the tail-fly ; and, while replacing it, my young companion, (a neophite of promise) pointing to a water-rat which was crossing the neck of the stream, told me a curious piscatorial adventure that had here befallen himself It was early in June — a heavy spaight had swelled the river — the eel-fry had come up the stream — and, like Cockneys in whitebait season, the trouts, great and small, rejected fly and worm, and would stand nothing short of the new delicacy just introduced by the last fresh. Peter, of course, obliged to accommodate him self to the prevailing taste of the river, was angling with a diminutive eel, when, lo ! the bait was taken, and away went the foot- line slowly towards the opposite bank. Peter's gear was stout, and he pulled accordingly, as the hooked-one headed towards the roots of an alder, which, projecting into the water, many a time had saved a stricken trout, and left the fisherman lamenting. The movement of the SAFELY LANDED. 67 victim was very singular. It was not the arrowy transit of the trout, glancing from bank to bank, or shooting wUdly down the pool, as if deter mined to burst away from every thing which could enthral his freedom. At last Peter brought his victim to the surface — and, behold, it was a water-rat ! A Highland terrier that had followed him, saw and took part in the pro ceedings ; the rat dived, was again and again brought up, and finally killed by the dog, just as he would have achieved his deliverance by cutting the foot-line through. f2 CHAPTER VI. NOTIONS OF THE PICTURESQUE THE SOURCE OF TWEED ITS COURSE AND DEBOUCHEMENT FOREIGN TRAVEL PIUS THE SECOND HIS ADVENTURE ON THE BORDER — -SEA FISHING THE EY BUBNMOUTH EYMOUTH — GUNS-GREEN — FISH AND CHILDREN AFFECTING INCIDENT. Every body, barring a Kentucky man, has some idea how the picturesque will affect the fancy ; but to these half-alligators, natural beauty con sists in corduroy roads and a disencumbered surface. To the Genevese, his own sweet lake is ever an object of admiration — the Irishman looks at the broad surface of the Shannon, and almost persuades himself that its waters are holy as the Jordan's — the Celt reposes on the bank of some rushing stream among his dark blue hills, and fancies its sparkling rapids are clearer than all besides — the islander sees loveliness in the ocean that imprisons him — and even a Hull skipper admitted that woman was the fairest thing in creation, with the exception of a dead whale. THE SOURCE OF TWEED. 69 When all find beauty in the objects that sur round and interest them, no wonder that the Borderer looks upon his native river with delight. The Tweed is certainly, divested of romantic and historic associations, one of the finest rivers in the world ; and for those huge outlets which debouche the waters of inland seas, miscalled lakes, some other name should be invented, I cannot fancy aught a river whose banks are not commanded by the eye ; and it must have its sullen pools and noisy rapids ; its busy mill, and high-arched bridge ; all these are wanted, in my sight, to constitute a river. To a bound less expanse of black water, I won't allow the name. The sweet and classic Tweed rises in a Scottish height, which might be termed the father of many waters : and no mountain should be prouder of its progeny than this prolific hill of Tweedale ; for within a mile, the sources of the Annan, Clyde, and Tweed spring from its sur face, the former taking a southern course, whUe the Clyde and Tweed run west and east respec tively. For some distance the Tweed is a mere rivulet, in summer scarcely traceable by the feeble thread of crystal water it presents. A quarter of a mile from its source it sensibly enlarges, and there assumes the name of Tweedshaws. 70 COURSE AND DEBOUCHEMENT.' Instead of keeping an eastern course, it suddenly inchnes north-west, circling the base of the parent hill, and hence acquiring the apposite title of Tweedhoop. Thence, running south east for three miles, it receives its first respect able tributary, the Core ; and, during a further progress of eight miles, at least some twenty mountain streams increase it with their waters. Leaving its native county, it runs through Selkirkshire and Roxburgh, at every mile receiv ing some stream or river, including the Ettrick, the Leader, and the Teviot. Next, entering Berwickshire, it is joined by the Eden and the Till. Lastly, about two miles from its debouche ment, one of the most delightful streams the angler ever swore by, rolls in its tributary waters, and — fit emblem of mortality ! — in all the fulness of its pride, " Tweed's fair river, broad and deep," finds an ocean grave, beneath the decaying walls of Berwick. I have, my dear Jack, but lined the course of the river out, to enable you to follow me in my wanderings hereafter. Shame do I take to myself, that now — anno cetatis, forty — fill the odd number in as charitably as you can — for the first time I have made myself familiar with the beauties of the Border. I, who have spent summers, moving from one Cockney watering- place to another, or abiding at some French FOREIGN TRAVEL. 71 seaport, in a locality of stinking streets, with a community of runaway wives and broken-down gamblers. Alas ! that Englishmen will shut their eyes to the endless beauties which Britain has within her sea-girt boundaries, and which, with every facility of safe and rapid transport, and the luxury of comfortable inns, they can visit with so much ease. No, the sight must be foreign, or it is not worth the outlay of a five- franc piece ; and for this they will trundle over rough causeways, in a carriage with springs that have no spring ; be poisoned over night by that " thing of shreds and patches," a French supper ; and roused at cock-crow by a fellow "bearded like a pard," that filthy foreign substitution for a chambermaid. Faugh ! I sicken at the very thought ; a dirty, jabbering, he-feUow, polluting the sanctuary of one's bed-chamber ! I never correctly estimated my sufferings in Continental inns, untU I contrasted them with the comfort that awaits the traveUer, who, with taste and judgment, prefers his own beautiful Tweed to both the Rhone and Rhine together. By the by, talking of Border traveUing, way farers in the year of gi'ace 1448 did not find accommodation on the banks of Tweed so facile and agreeable as they do at present. A very curious account is given of a journey of the Roman legate to the court of Scotland, ^Eneas 72 PIUS THE SECOND. Sylvius, afterwards Pius the Second, and it pre sents such a striking picture of this rude and troublous age, that I could not avoid abridging it for your edification. " A certain river, namely the Tweed, falling from a high mountain, parts the two kingdoms, over which ^Eneas ferried; and coming to a large village about sun-set, he alighted at a countryman's house, where he supped with the curate of the place, and his host. The table was plentifully furnished with pottage, hens, and geese ; but nothing of either bread or wine ap peared." In the meantime, " all the men and women of the town" flocked to see ^Eneas, anxious to ascertain " were he a Christian man or no ?" What a Border barbarism ! Question the orthodoxy of the successor of Saint Peter ! ^neas proved no fool in his generation. The Border, for honesty and good cheer, bore but an indiffereflt reputation ; and the future Pope, aware of the scarcity he should encounter in his route, had been accommodated at a monastery " with a rundlet of red wine, and some loaves of bread," On these delicacies being paraded, the effect was most astonishing ; the rumour flew directly, and every lady in the village, who happened to be " as ladies wish to be," " came to the table side, and, handling the bread, and smelling to the wine, begged a taste, so that there was no HIS ADVENTURE ON THE BORDER. 73 avoiding dealing of the whole among them. After they had sate at supper till two hours within night, the curate and the landlord, (with the children and all the men,) left ^Eneas, and rubbed off in haste. They said they were going to shelter themselves in a certain town at a good distance, for fear of the Scots, who (at low water) used to cross the river in the night for plunder. They would by no means be persuaded to take ^neas along with them, though he very impor tunately entreated them to do it. Neither carried they off any of the women, though several of them, both wives and maids, were very hand some." The next paragraph insinuates that the Border ladies were very gay, and the Border gentlemen excessively indulgent in overlooking their pecca dilloes. What a delicate position for a pope elect ! " ^Eneas was thus left alone amongst a hundred women, who, sitting in a ring, with a fire in the middle of them, spent the night sleepless in dressing of hemp, and chatting with the interpreter." When the night was well ad vanced, "dogs barked, geese cackled," and the ladies ran away ; but the pope prudentiy kept close to his quarters (a stable), and there re mained, " lest running out, he should be robbed by the first man he met." 74 SEA FISHING. In my Tweed wanderings. Jack, I shall not "begin with the beginning" — but, by an in verted arrangement, commence with the close. Much as Border angling may and shall be lauded, believe me the sea fishing immediately about the debouchement of the Tweed is also highly interesting. The day was when I could have entered into this sport with heart and vigour, but I am now " too slow." Flushings, fishing- boots, sou-westers, and pea-jackets, are unfitted for "us youth," who have come to "patent angolas " underneath, and, under some specious pretext, slip on a Mackintosh " i' th' evening." Still the sea-fishing, for those who fancy it, is admirable ; and as I have made a littoral excur sion, right and left of the Tweed's debouchement, I shall give you an idea of what it is, before I carry you up the stream, and bring you possibly to the very bank where a pope passed the night in company with a hundred ladies, and, if his own word may be taken, the majority of them, not Lucretias. A stream, that in other vicinage would hold a high reputation indeed, runs within eight miles of Berwick, to wit, the Ey ; and the Tweed and Whitadder being out of order from a fall of rain, in the hope that the Ey, from its inferior size, would sooner recover from " the spaight," I proceeded to a little village called Ayton, BURNMOUTH. 75 through which it runs to Eymouth, three miles farther, and there debouches in the sea. I was seated on the coach-box, and a couple of mUes from Ayton, the driver pointed out the little fishing viUage called Burnmouth, placed at the base of some lofty cliffs, on which a revenue- preventive station holds a striking position, and forces itself upon the traveller's eye with its white-washed cottages and jaunty flag-staff. Probably it is from the evil reputation acquired in former days, that the honest fishers of Burn- mouth are placed under the immediate surveil lance of the water-guard ; for on this coast smug gling is now totally done up — and the evasion of revenue restrictions is rarely attempted. Look ing down from the heights which domineer it, Burnmouth presents a number of cottages packed together close as a bee-hive — and a more limited superficial space of tile-work does not within wide Britain cover a denser population. Could Har- riette Martineau but see Burnmouth on a Sunday! But why should I wish her evil? the honest gentle woman has done nothing to me, that I should desire to send her broken-hearted to the grave. Fifty years since, a couple of families settled themselves in this lonely cove, nominally to fish — but virtually to smuggle — and if to " increase and multiply" be a blessing, Heaven has abund antly encouraged them. 76 EYMOUTH. But a still more anti-Malthusian population is that of Eymouth. Had the place been properly laid out, it would have made a very pretty fish ing and bathing place ; but the closeness and irregularity with which the houses are heaped together, must in the summer months render it almost intolerable. Indeed, though my visit was in cool weather, I felt at every turn "a most ancient and fish-like smell," with striking evidences that scavengers were considered un necessary. From what I saw, and at a time when the fish-curing was confined to cod-fish, I should say that in the herring season the place must almost be pestilential. Eymouth was once defended by some field works, traces of which are still discernible on a rising ground beyond the river which commands the entrance of the harbour. At its base a large and gloomy-looking building forces itself upon the eye. I think it was the remark of the fifth James, on passing a border peel-house, perched upon a crag, and from the peculiarity of its situation evidently intended for concealment and defence, that the proprietor must of neces sity have been a thief. By the same rule, the builder of Guns-green was indubitably a smug gler. A most suspicious-looking sea-gate opens beneath the house upon the water, and, as it is said, communicates with subterraneous passages GUNS-GREEN. 77 reaching to God knows where. It was built nearly a century since, by two persons who had supplied the gentlemen of Berwickshire with claret free of duty ; and as it would appear, in building Guns-green, the honest traders made an injudicious outlay. The fact of a couple of smugglers being enabled from contraband profits to erect this house, elicited a parlimentary inquiry — and measures were adopted for sup pressing illicit trade, which eventually resulted in ruining the ambitious but imprudent contra bandists. The harbour of Eymouth is easy of access and safe, but confined within its pier. Immense quantities of white fish and herrings are annually taken, sold, cured, and exported. Like other articles of traffic, the price of fish is, at the pre sent time, heavily depreciated — the fishers only receiving from the merchants five pence each for the finest cods ; and should a fish be short by a finger's breadth of twenty-two inches, a second is thrown in, and both are reckoned and paid for as a single one, thus making the average price at something about a farthing by the pound. Turbot, hallibut, and other flat fish are cheap and plenti ful; but the place has an air of poverty and distress about it — for low prices, and a bad herring-fishery have reduced the inhabitants sadly. But in other matters abundance reigneth ; 78 FISH AND CHILDREN. and if the man be happy whose quiver is liberally filled, the ladies of Eymouth have quahfied their liege lords to talk boldly with the enemy in the gate. I never saw such swarms of children as the door of every domicile presented. They were crawling in and out of boats, or creeping on the quay or jetty, and, as I foolishly imagined, in momentary risk of drowning. " Do children frequently drop in ?" I inquired, in a paroxysm of alarm, of the jolly hostess. " Ay, ay, — the fule things, they often fa' ower yon pier," she answered, cooly. " God bless me ! — Lost, of course ?" " Na, na," returned the landlady; "noo an then, to be sure, a bairn's drooned — but there's maistly some idle body in the way till fish them oot, the deevils." Egad, though the worthy hostess spoke cooly on the subject, I thought it rather a risk, to allow two-year-olds to tumble into twenty-feet water, depending on there being " maistly some idle body in the way till fish them oot." * * * * I have been joined on the pier by an unex pected auxiliary. His story forms an episode ; and turning from the statistics of cod-fish and drowned chUdren, I must tell you what really appeared to me an affecting incident in humble life ; — and the best of it — it's true ! AFFECTING INCIDENT. 79 During our tedious passage to the north, I remarked among the steerage passengers, a man who seemed to keep himself apart from the rest. He wore the uniform of the Foot artiUery, and sported a corporal's stripes. In the course of the afternoon, I stepped before the funnel and entered into conversation with him, learned that he had been invalided and sent home from Canada, had passed the Board in London, obtained a pension of a shilling a day, and was returning to a Border village where he had been bom, to ascertain whether any of a family were living, from whom he had been separated for nineteen years. He casually admitted, that during this long interval he had held no communication with his relations ; and I set him down accordingly as some wild scapegrace, who had stolen from a home, whose happiness his follies had compro mised too often. He showed me his discharge — the character was excellent — but it only went to prove, how much men's conduct wUl depend upon the circumstances under which they act. He had been nineteen years a soldier — a man " under authority " — one obedient to another's will, subservient to strict discipline, with scarcely a free-agency himself, and yet, during that long probation he had been a useful member of the body politic, sustained a fair reputation, and, as he admitted himself, been a contented and a 80 AFFECTING INCIDENT. happy man. He returned home his own master, and older by twenty years. Alas ! it was a fatal free agency for him, for time had not brought wisdom. The steward told me, that he had ran riot while his means allowed it, had missed a passage twice, and had on the preceding evening come on board, when not a shilling remained to waste in drunken dissipation. I desired that the poor roue should be supplied with some little comforts during the voyage — and when we landed at Berwick, I gave him a trifling sum to assist him to reach his native viUage, where he had obtained vague intelligence that some aged members of his family might stUl be found. A few evenings afterwards, I was sitting in the parlour of one ofthe many little inns I visited while rambling-^n the banks of Tweed, when the waitress informed me that " a sodger was spearin' after the Colonel." He was directed to attend the presence — and my fellow voyager, the artilleryman, en tered the chamber, and made his military salaam. " I thought you were now at Jedburgh." " I went there, Sir, but there has not been any of my family for many a year residing in the place. I met an old packman on the road, and he tells me there are some persons in this viUage of my name. I came here to make inquiries, and hearing that your honour was in the house, I made bold enough to ask for you," AFFECTING INCIDENT. 81 " Have you walked over ?" " Yes, Sir." " 'Tis a long walk. Go down and get some supper before you commence inquiries." The soldier bowed and left the room, and presentiy the host entered to give me directions for a route among the Cheviots, which I had contemplated to take the following day. I men tioned the soldier's errand. " Sure enough," returned the host, " there are an auld decent couple of the name here. What is the sodger caUed?" " WiUiam," I replied ; for by that name his discharge and pension bill were fiUed up. " I'll shp across the street to the auld folk," said Boniface, " and ask them a few questions." The episode of humble life that followed was afterwards thus described to me by mine host. He found the ancient couple seated at the fire — the old man reading a chapter in the Bible, as was his custom always before he and his aged partner retired for the night to rest. The landlord explained the object of the soldier's visit, and inquired if any of their children answered the description of the wanderer. " It is our Jock ! " exclaimed the old woman passionately, "and the puir neer-do-weel has cam hame at last to close his mither's eyes." VOL. II. G 82 AFFECTING INCIDENT. " Na," said the landlord, " the man's name is WoUy." " Then he's nae our bairn," returned the old man with a heavy sigh. " Weel, weel — His wUl be done !" said his helpmate, turning her blue and faded eyes to heaven ; " I thought the prayer I sae often made wud yet be granted, and Jock wud come hame and get my blessin' ere I died." " He has ! he has !" exclaimed a broken voice ; and the soldier, who had foUowed the landlord unperceived, and Hstened at the cottage door, rushed into the room, and dropped kneeling at his mother's feet. For a moment she turned her eyes with a fixed and glassy stare upon the returning wanderer. Her hand was laid upon his head — her lips parted as if about to pronounce the promised blessing — but no sounds issued, and she slowly leaned forward on the bosom of the long-lost prodigal who clasped her in his arms. " Mither ! mither ! speak and bless me ! " Alas ! the power df speech was gone for ever. Joy, like grief, is often fatal to a worn-out frame. The spirit had calmly passed — the parent had hved to see and bless her lost one, and expire in the arms of one, who, with all his faults, appeared to have been her earthly favourite. CHAPTER VII. THE WHITADDER — THE SWALLOW — THE SILVER WHITE DIFFER ENCE IN TROUTS THE SHEPHERd's DOG MY DOG PHILIP IRISH DUCK SHOOTING — DEATH OP PHILIP ANECDOTE OF POISONING ANIMAL ATTACHMENT STORY OF JIM CROW A TEMPERANCE MAN. The best and pleasantest river that I have as yet found upon the Border, is the Whitadder. Were I learned in etymology, I should pronounce it, as well as its prolongatory stream, the Blackadder, to be both simple corruptions of waters, white and black. I have fished this river with the uncertain success that awaits every other, but always with the comfort that attends clean angling. "This favoured water," as George Robins would describe it in one of those " leather and prunella" things he calls announcements, is disencumbered of all that disturbs an almost Socratic temperament. No brushwood abuts upon the stream— and when in fuU innocence of impending evil, you are making a scientific projection to lav your dropper near yonder g2 84 the WHITADDER. stone, which any respectable trout might rest beside — you are not treacherously arrested, a posteriori, by the tail -fly — and a general ne exeat served upon the casting-line, from the top branch of an alder that is too tough to break down, and will support nothing of more corporeal substan tiality than a crow. A man does not come here armed with weed-cutting tools like a hedger ; nor will you meet a landing net for a fortnight, unless, to be sure, you encounter some London gentle man, who, as a matter of course, will have a hun dred weight of apparatus on his person, and be mistaken in consequence, for the travelhng agent of Mr. Cheek, of the Golden Perch, Fleet-street. Seriously, the Whitadder is a clean, comfortable stream. When you can kill in any river on the Border, here you will be quite secure — and, on one head, you may lay unction to your soul — whether you bring them to basket or not, the trouts are there. The supply is unlimited — I believe illimitable ; and in one of this river's beautiful runs, under Hutton Hall, (there are fifty others equaUy good,) when I have not hooked three trouts, I have raised an hundred. On that fine stream, and the pool in which it loses itself, I killed, one evening, a dozen trouts in as many minutes ; once, in that time, bringing a brace on shore — and again landing three safely off the same casting line ! THE SWALLOW. 85 A little lower down, and immediately above the old miU of Hutton, there is a curve in the river, formed by a precipitous ledge of sand stone, called "the swallow," and there some beautiful angling will in ordinary weather be met with. It is a bending of the stream which the angler will eulogise, as ardently as the fox hunter will load it with maledictions ; and, indeed, both wUl bless and ban with ample reason. Beneath that towering precipice, often has the angler's creel been filled even to the overflow— and over its treacherous ridge, the quarry and the pursuer have found a common grave. It would seem that the demon who " vexes " fox hounds, abideth within the bosom of that rock. A year ago, a hound of superior exceUence was killed from the precipice, while Lord Elcho's pack were hunting in its dangerous neighbour hood. But the great calamity I have alluded to occurred some twenty years since — and strange enough, the person who was my first attendant at the stream and pool below "the swallow," witnessed the unfortunate occurrence. Hay of had drawn a cover near his own kennel— found the "red gentleman" at home, and obtained a gallant run. Whether the fox was tired, or ignorant of the country, 'tis hard to say, but, on being closely pressed, he headed directly for "the swaUow," and went over the sheer 86 THE SILVER WHITE. descent, taking after him eleven couple and half of hounds, of whom seventeen dogs were killed. Strange enough, three couple, and the "red rascal" who occasioned the misfortune, escaped without a broken bone ! ***** There is a curious variety of the trout found in the Tweed and most of its tributaries, com monly called, from its pellucid hue, the silver white. I have killed three in a day, but generaUy they are scarce — for after uniting the contents of our baskets this evening, my host — a capital angler — and I, out of eight dozen, can only dis cern one of these pretty nondescripts. They are not of the sea-trout tribe, their exterior marking and make being totally different ; nor are they young salmon, as some have carelessly set them down. They want the general charac teristics of that fish — particularly the rapid growth,* for " the silver white" is seldom taken larger than a herring — and, clear and silvery as they are, the fish cuts red as a salmon, the flavour being exceedingly delicate. By the way, how is it that in flavour, fish inhabiting streams in union with each other and apparently pre cisely similar in their general circumstances ; a mountain rise, a sea-debouchment, swelhng and faUing at the same time and from the same • Appendix, No. VII. DIFFERENCE IN TROUTS. 87 causes — how is it, that one is delicate, the other only fit to undergo the mystifications of experi mental cookery, such as enabled the French marshal's chef de cuisine to produce a state din ner, with all its entres and removes, from the leg of a horse ? I had a brace of Tweed .trouts brought to table ; they were most insipid, and certainly fish upon which the most conscientious catholic might mortify the flesh. I tried a couple of Whitadders the next evening ; positively so de licious were they, that had LucuUus been in the neighbourhood, I should have sent him the remainder of the creel-full. ^p •!? vlT vp ip I have had frequent occasion in the Northern Highlands, to admire the extraordinary training and sagacity of the sheep dog, and really at times his inteUigence appeared reason and not instinct. I have myself had setters and re trievers of admirable inteUigence, but in tact and abUity no dog approaches the shepherd's. On returning from my evening fishing, I stepped into the kitchen to have the produce of my basket told and weighed, and there found four Cheviot drovers returning to their hiUs, after having disposed of their respective flocks at Berwick fair. Each had a taU, shght, long- ribbed coUey seated beside him, looking as 88 THE shepherd's DOG. wisely as if they perfectly understood " the ups and downs'' in prices, which their masters the moment were discussing. As I examined the faces of these sapient quadrupeds, I recalled to memory departed favourites. Black York — every sportsman has had the best setter in the world; but I do believe, verily, that he, the peerless one, fell to my lot— he, in fancy, sate with his head upon my knee, with his gentle eye turned affec tionately on mine, while his rival in my canine love, was cutting many a caper on the floor under the influence of whisky. Many years ago I had a retriever of the poodle species. He was a middle-sized, active dog — a first-rate waterman — with a nose so particularly sensitive, that no object, however minute, could escape its " delicate investigation." Philip was the hardiest animal in the world — no sea would prevent him from carrying a dead bird through its boiling breakers — and I have seen him follow and secure a wounded mallard, although in the attempt his legs were painfully scarified in break ing through a field of ice scarcely the thickness of a crown. Philip, though of French extraction, had decidedly Irish partialities. He delighted in a glass of grog — and no matter with what labour and constancy he had retrieved a too slightly wounded diver, a stoup of whisky-and-water, (and Philip, with sound discretion, preferred MY DOG PHILIP. 89 poteine to parliament,) made him the happiest dog alive. And then it affected him so funnily — he would play all sorts of antics, and twirl round after his own tail, until from sheer giddiness he rolled over drunk upon the carpet ; and he was so good-humoured in his cups, that he would even tolerate a strange cat, and submit to every thing but indignity. I received a letter from an old comrade, to invite me to his annual ball ; and there was a postscript from the fair dame, " his bed-fellow," hinting, that game or wild fowl, either, or both, would be " thankfully received.'' I shot a re spectable basket of woodcocks for the lady — and, as the weather was severe, despatched at night fall one of the shooting tribe who infest the banks of every western water, with an old musket, a full bottle " to keep his heart up," — and, un fortunately, added to both, the services of my dog Philip. Having put such a quantum of powder and lead into his harquebuss, as an Irish duck- shooter would alone condescend to discharge; and which is entirely regulated according to the fancy of the artist, from the piano, that merely blackens the shoulder, to the forte which lays him on his back, with the occasional addition of a fractured jaw-bone, Andy buoy* took up * YeUow Andy. 90 IRISH DUCK SHOOTING. a position on a river bank connecting two neighbouring locks, and which was always con sidered to be an excellent pass wherein to inter cept water-fowl in their flights from lake to lake. Presently, the cackling of wild ducks was heard, accompanied by that whistling sound the move ment of many wings produces. Andy buoy cocked and prepared for action — and, in another minute, on came the flight, not twenty yards above the moss-hags where the gunner was en sconced in ambuscade. Levelling — after a prayer to the Virgin — right into the centre of the dusky flock, Andy pulled the trigger, received in return a thundering kick, but while his jaw ached under the recoil, his ear tingled with delight, to hear several sullen flops upon the water in quick succession, which gave him full assurance that his gunnery had been good. Philip was already in the river — and, bird after bird recovered, five dead ducks were laid at the shooter's feet. Of course, the triumph of success called promptly for a pull from the bottle ; and, at this moment, honest Phihp returned with a mallard still struggling in his hold.- Thinking the dog was chilled and tired, Andy with more good-nature than good discretion, resolved to share what he esteemed a universal panacea with his faithful ally — and applying the flask to Philip's mouth, poured the spirits down. Now, though Philip DEATH OF PHILIP. 91 loved a glass, his taste was gentlemanly, and he always diluted his alcohol. The ardent spirit bhstered the poor dog's tongue — howling he quitted the duck-shooter, and ran home — and from that night Phihp renounced whisky for his natural life, and died at an advanced age, — a steady teetotaller. Poor Philip ! I lost him unhappily at last — and my faithful friend deserved a better fate than what was reserved for him. A scoundrel, who claimed a patch of barren heather which joined Lord 's shooting grounds, had taken umbrage at the keepers, and out of revenge, laid poison on the mearing. Ignorant of this malig nant act — for on the paltry extent of stunted heather the fellow owned there was not a head of game — I hunted too close to the dangerous boundary, and two dogs — poor Philip was one — fell victims to this act of vulgar malice. Apropos of beasts and poison. When in the hills above Flodden, I met a brother angler on the bank of a mountain stream. We sate down, had a friendly stoup, and a long chat de omnibus rebus — as fishers will when they foregather — and he told me the following curious incident of poisoning : — A farmer in the Cheviots was fishing on the bank of one of the small rivers which rise in that mountain range. Perceiving a weasel 92 ANECDOTE OF POISONING. approach the water with something in her mouth, he laid his rod aside to watch her movements. The little animal entered the river fearlessly, and swam over to the side where the angler stood ; and, on her landing, he discovered that it was a young weasel fhat she had carried in her mouth across the stream. Upon his giving chase and shouting loudly, the old one took alarm, dropped her burden, and ran away. The fisher lifted it — it was very young, still blind, and when taken home was easily reared and domesticated. For months it was playful as a whelp, and would follow the people of the house about the place; but, with its growth, its natural ferocity increased, until it became a dangerous favourite to tamper with, and was finally obliged to be caged up, as it killed the poultry and bit severely any per son who incautiously meddled with it. At this time rats began to appear about the farm stead — and it became necessary to employ speedy and effectual means to arrest their rapid increase. Poison was accordingly laid — and quantities of dead vermin were found daily round a horse-pond, whither, in dying agonies, they had crawled to drink. " One morning a lassie came screaming down stairs to say that a huge rat had made its way into the house, and was concealed in one of the upper chambers. The farmer determined to have ANIMAL ATTACHMENT. 93 a set-to between the weasel and the intruder — and the former was uncaged and let loose in the apartment, where the rat had taken shelter. In an instant the weasel discovered his enemy — and his onset was made with such desperate ferocity, that in a few seconds the rat was killed. Al though instantly removed, the weasel had drawn and tasted his victim's blood — and no doubt, the rat had sought the dwelling-house under the in fluence of poison — for, in a few hours, the weasel died — the victor and the victim perishing by the same malignant agency." I have experienced animal attachment, and can boast that I have been personally well-beloved by beast and bird. I had a raven, when a boy, who foUowed me like a setter — was inconsolable when I went to school, and overjoyed on my return. But the most remarkable instance of feathered love for man which ever came within my know- ledge never equalled that of a common rook ; and really his history is so dramatic, that, crow as he was, I cannot but detail it. In a viUage, or, to coin a word, a townlel, from the formality of its construction, immediately opposite the pier of Berwick, called Spittal, there is a most comfortable hostelrie intitulated " the Ship," and thither I used to repair occasionally to indulge in a stoup of toddy, and a chat with the worthy landlord. But to the bird. 94 STORY OF JIM CROW. The first appearance of Jim Crow was in the street, where he was tied by the leg to a stick, while a pack of inhuman boys were gathering stones to pelt him to death, when Mrs. W., the landlady, kindly interposed and saved the devoted victim. He rapidly tamed, and in a few days exhibited both intelligence and amusement to his protectors. Upon the landlord, from first sight, he appeared to have centered his affections — and the ardour of the poor bird's attachment almost exceeds belief. He watched for his master in the morning, followed him through the day, was always at his elbow when he dined, and if he afterwards in the evening joined a jovial party — as landlords are wont to do — Jim Crow was sure to be upon his shoulder, or on the table, if permitted to make one ofthe "merrie companie." If any person pretended to beat the host, the rook attacked him furiously — and, as if he knew that a razor was a lethal instrument and the carotid in dangerous conti guity, before the barber dare commence opera tions, Jim Crow had to be secured in another room, to secure the shaver from maltreatment. It might be imagined that the poor rook could reason. The communication over the Tweed, between Spittal and Berwick, is kept up by dimi nutive steamers which cross the river repeatedly within the hour. If his favourite were missing, Jim Crow would fly down to the pier and ascer-. MttiM STORY OF JIM CROW. 95 tain if the lost one was on board ; and in that event, the rook would cross the river, and no matter where his owner went he would be found flying by his side, or settled on his shoulder. Of course this personal attendance was occasion aUy to be dispensed with — but it required no little ingenuity, by turning a corner or getting down an entry, to enable his master to blink his too faithful friend and companion. If he suc ceeded, the bird would fly up and down the street — look anxiously around — and if he could pop on his lost proprietor, his joy would be unbounded, and lest another separation should occur he would stick to him for the remainder of the day close as his own shadow. If, however, Mr. W. managed to get off — a feat not always to be effected — after a sharp search, Jim Crow would wing his way across the Tweed, return home, and there anxiously await a reunion with his lost protector. I said that the rook was fond of convivial meetings ; and there he was an active auxiliary. Were there a dozen persons at the table, Jim would hop regularly round, receive the scores from the guests respectively, pouch the money beneath his tongue, return to his master, insert the black and horny biU into the clenched hand of mine host, and honestly deposit there every coin he had coUected. A stiU more curious 96 STORY OF JIM CROW. anecdote of the bird remains ; I know it to be true ; and, upon my life ! it goes far beyond my phUosophy. The first movement in the morning in the landlord's chamber — the first cough or creak of the shoe which announced that his master was a-foot — was hailed by this singular bird with loud and exulting cawings. The landlord was a wag — his marriage bed had not been blessed by a family — and opening the room-door he would remonstrate with his noisy favourite. " What the de'il are ye at, mon ? Hauld ye'r tongue, or ye'll wauken the bairns ! " In a moment the loud and clamorous caw was changed to one so piano and subdued, that had Rubini been his preceptor, Jim Crow's descending scale could not have been more rapid, or more euphonous. , I know you are in love with the crow. I am — and I half regret that I commenced his biography. The end is tragical, and I never felt the force of Moore's sweet lines* until I heard the history of the luckless rook. I believe all talented things are vain after their kind, and the rook was no exception. A scarlet comb had been artificially attached to him, and * " I never nursed a dear gazeUe, To glad me with its large dark eye ; But when it came to know me well. And love me, it was sure to die !" Fire Worshippers. STORY OF JIM CROW. 97 the same colour which is said to prove fatal to the peace of ladies, was equally disastrous to poor Jim. Flattered at his jaunty appearance, the ill- starred bird enlarged his accustomed flight, and, believing himself " the admired of all admirers," settled down upon a garden fence in front of the domicile of a tailor. That " misbegotten knave" unfortunately discerned him, seized a loaded gun, approached his unsuspecting victim, who " cawed, and cawed, and cawed again,'' and, when distant but a dozen paces, the stupid scoundrel fired at and demohshed poor Jim Crow. Had I been on the jury, monomania, attested by sixteen madder fools, who, fortified by the addition of an M. D., pretend to classify insanity, and give a carte blanche for wholesale murder ; all that these asses could say or swear, should not have saved that fraction of humanity from the treadmUl. " I'll never think well of a fat man," quoth Mrs. Page, after Sir John had " essayed her virtue," — and since the assassination of Jim Crow, I have bestowed my abomination upon the whole fraternity of tailors. ***** It is bed-time. The drovers and their dogs are off after a doch-an-duris of pure alcohol. One of the four eschewed the stirrup-cup — and although no doctor, I'll take my corporal oath that he required two inches of "whisky undiluted" VOL. II. H 198 A TEMPERANCE MAN. more than either of the other three. There was, I believe, among the Jumpers, a graduated scale of grace ; and this abstemious cattle-dealer has taken to thin potations, and writes himself down " a temperance man," although he carries off beer by the barrel. WeU — no matter. Every man has a right to poison himself as he pleases. Saturday night! — I must not keep the blue- eyed lassie longer out of bed ; so I'll e'en ring for my candle, and be off, incontinently. CHAPTER VIII. THE SCOTTISH SABBATH-^DIFFERENCE AND EFFECTS OF FORMS AND FAITH THE CUTTIE-STOOL ANECDOTE HUTTON-HALL THE BEAUTIES OF THE BORDER FATAL ACCIDENT ROMANTIC OCCURRENCE BORDER INSECURITY A PENINSULAR VETERAN THE lady's COVE A LOVE-DREAM. It is Sunday — and here, indeed, the seventh day is kept a sabbath — all rest from their labour, " Long, loud, and deep the beU has tolled. Which summons sinful man to pray ;" the call has been attended to, and the hall and the cottage are equally deserted to fill the house of God. Would one test forms and faith by their effects, I would assign to the Scottish church a decided superiority over every other. Take them " all in all," there is no people upon earth so orderly and moral— and even in the manners of the peasantry, you can trace an honesty of thought and purpose, germane to the rough and uncompromising character of their simple form of worship. Popery, of all creeds, has the greatest effect upon the fancy, and the least h2 100 DIFFERENCE AND EFFECTS OF upon the life. Nothing can be more imposing than its ceremonial — that is, if like a play of Shakspere, it is perfectly got up. To hear mass, ,go to Italy, or Paris, or even to the ambassadors' chapels in London, during the opera season. The manipulation — for there is an elegance in serving mass — is striking — the music superb. Then go to Ireland, and particularly to the districts where Romanism most prevails, and the contrast appears as startling fully, as to see Hamlet in a barn after coming fresh from Drury Lane. Forms and ceremonies, designed to make an impression upon the imagination, must be enacted with a suitable spendour and effect. The aisled nave, the life-like altar piece, the peal ing organ, the fragrant censer, the stoled priest and mitred prelate — choirman and acolyte — all are indispensable to render the holy tableaux perfect, and strike deeply on the fancy of him who sees the sacred pageant. I remember taking the catholics of a regiment to mass when "a jolly sub." It was in a remote county town — the chapel a rough unfinished buUding — the altar covered with delft figures representing, and most uncouthly, passages of sacred history, pre cisely similar to those found upon the chimney- pieces of an ale-house. The old priest was an octogenarian, and mumbled a ritual in a tongue totally unknown to his auditory, and in a way FORMS AND FAITH. 101 too, that I, a Latinist, could not even remotely comprehend it. The curate {Hibernice — the coadjutor) preached — if preaching means a ram bling tirade about a coming election, with mysti fied allusions to certain " delicate affairs," which the " Morning Post " would describe as requiring the intervention of " gentlemen of the long robe." To these, a hst of lost cattle, with personal descriptions, were added — and somebody re ceived an intimation, that " his wife would not be churched" unless satisfaction were made for fees withheld, and absence from confession. Conceive the impression this strange clerical medley would make upon a man who, like me, on the preceding Sunday, had heard high mass in Notre Dame ! In one thing, my own church, I think, holds a high vantage ground It generally inhibits crime — but, very properly, it particularizes no moral delinquency The Church of England is, in that respect, wiser in its practice The sinner is generaUy denounced, but he is neither named, degraded, nor forced to effect a compromise with the clergy. Who that knows Ireland will not tell you, that "cursing from the altar" is now-a-days a brutum fulmen — a mere blank- cartridge — and even if the whole formula pre scribed in Tristram Shandy were faithfuUy gone through, from heel to head inclusive. 102 THE CUTTIE STOOL. would any but an idiot imagine that the ac cursed, maigre malediction, would not remain in statu quo? It is true that, fifty years ago, a priest's efficiency was valued according to the estimated power of his malediction ; but these days are wearing fast away ; and the idle fallacy, that human power can perpetuate or absolve human offendings, is only credited by the canaille. In one great error, the churches of Scotland and Rome moved pari passu for two centuries — a public exposure of crime and immorality. The minister rebuked — the priest anathematized — and hours which might have been more usefully employed in edifying the good, and confirming the unsteady, were wasted in making some bad man worse, and forcing a knowledge upon innocence that crime existed, who knew not before the offending even by its name ! An old Highland gentleman told me, that in his younger days, the cuttie-stool* was in full operation, and that a Sunday seldom passed without its being tenanted, and sometimes by divers male factors. In describing to me the comparative estimate of crime among the Highlanders, it would appear that the abstraction of cattle was * The cuttie-stool was a bench in a conspicuous place in old churches, on which deUnquents were seated whUe pubUcly re buked by the minister. ANECDOTE. 103 considered a very venial offence. On one oc casion he found the bench where " sinners sate " occupied by an Irish gentleman, who had de stroyed the domestic felicity of the village black smith, by estranging the affections of his truant spouse, and hence had drawn upon himself the awful displeasure of the kirk. Presently another offender, attended by an old woman, modestly advanced and deposited his person on the cuttie- stool. The minister had not yet appeared, and the old lady, who turned out to be the mother of the second delinquent, felt a womanly curiosity to ascertain who might be the fellow-sinner who had made a settlement upon the bench with Master Jock. " Hegh, mon ! am sorry till see ye here," said the gudewife, opening the conversation. " Then, upon my sowl," responded the gay deceiver, " I'm sorrier to see myself here." " An' what might ye hae done, young mon, to bring ye tiU this place o' shame ?" " Arrah, the divil a thing I did," returned the Irishman, " that should cause me to be stuck here on an ould stool, and made a world's wonder of, but just show a httle civility to a blacksmith's wife when her husband was from home." " Och, och !" groaned the old lady, " I com prehend it a'. You unfortunit mon, ye have breckit the seventh command. Gude guide us ! 104 HUTTON HALL. but the deevU maun hae been busy wi' ye. I wadna hurt ye'r feelins for a' that, if I could help it ; but — sit a wee bit farther up — when the minister's rebukin' ye, some folk might think it was my Jock he was spaken at — and he, pure innicent lad, is only on the stool for simple sheep- stealin." * * * * I strolled out to visit what is ever to me an object of engrossing interest — the ruins of an ancient house. Hutton Ha', as the country people call it, is hurrying rapidly to decay ; part of the roof has fallen in ; the chimneys are par tially dilapidated, and the casements are rotten and unglazed. Like most of the fallen mansions, " lang-syne " associations are connected with this ruined hall ; and its sad story is the too common history of many a Highland and a Border roof- tree. From the initials still traceable of a half-obli terated inscription on one of the stones, it appears to have been erected, some three cen turies since, by one of the ancient family of Hume. From them it passed into the possession ofthe Johnstons — and within the last few years it has again changed owners. Like every ancient house, Hutton HaU was celebrated for its hospi tality ; but it had a stUl higher celebrity attached to it — it was the home of beauty ; for the THE BEAUTIES OP THE BORDER. 105 " bonnie lassies of Hutton Ha'," were called in their day, " the beauties of the Border." The house stands on a high bank which domi neers the Whitadder, and, from the drawing- room windows, the whole sweep of that fine river is visible for a mile. I stood in the moul dering casement, looking down on the bright and placid stream, which curved gracefully through the green valley below me ; and, from the same spot, and nearly a century before, one of the fair daughters of the house of Johnston witnessed a melancholy catastrophe, which her own charms had unintentionally occasioned. A Highland gentleman had sighed, and sued, and been accepted, and to complete the nuptial preparations and claim his beautiful bride, the young lover had set out for Hutton Hall. The season was far advanced ; heavy rains had fallen in the western hills, and, like all rivers dependent upon mountain tributaries, the Whitadder was swoln and the ford impassable. The lover ap peared upon the opposite bank, and the lady despatched four servants to ferry him across the angry water in a small boat used for the pur pose. The men were unskilful boatmen, and had scarcely launched themselves upon the flooded water when the punt was swamped, and all were hurried down the stream and drowned. From the scarcity of bridges in those days, such acci- 106 FATAL ACCIDENT. dents were frequent in attempts to cross the Border rivers ; and there are few fords on Tweed or Till with which some melancholy loss of life is not associated. Another tragic and romantic occurrence is connected with one of this ancient name — John ston of Hilton. Like most of the Border pro prietors of those wild times, this personage is represented to have been a man of loose morals and ungovernable temper. The minister of Hil ton, named Daniel Douglas, a bold and uncom promising divine, regardless of consequences, discharged the duties of his office fearlessly. On one occasion, and in the church of Hilton, Johnston took offence at something which the minister had said ; and, regardless of the sanctity of place and person, gave way to the fury of his temper, tore Douglas from the pulpit, and struck him in the aisle with his cane. The insulted churchman poured out anathemas on the guilty laird, and concluded his malison with the singular assurance, that " on the very spot where the deed of violence was committed, the dogs should lick the blood of the offender." Time passed — and, with other company, John ston was invited to the house of Lord Hume by a younger brother of the noble owner. The party had a deep carouse — play was introduced — and Hume lost a heavy sum to HUton. A quar- ROMANTIC OCCURRENCE. 107 rei ensued, but they separated, and Johnston retired and went to bed. It appears that Hume, brooding over his recent loss, repaired to Hilton's chamber, and challenged him to get up and fight, which Johnston agreed to; but, in the act of rising, Hume treacherously assailed his oppo nent, and, taking him at advantage, stabbed him to the heart. The assassin fled the country, to which he never returaed afterwards. The family and friends of the unfortunate man repaired to the scene of murder, placed the body in a shell, and proceeded with the corpse towards Hutton churchyard, the ancient burial-place of the Johnstons. On their road thither, and while passing Hilton church, a violent snow-storm came suddenly on, and obliged the mourners to seek a temporary shelter ; and, taking the corpse along with them, they entered the old kirk, rested the body in the aisle, and, by strange accident, on the very spot where the dead man had committed the daring outrage upon God's minister. It seemed, the movement of the body had occasioned the blood to flow from the wound anew ; for several gouts trickled from the coffin, and dropped upon the pavement. A shepherd's dog, unperceived, had followed his master into the church, scented the blood upon the pave ment, and, to the horror of the company, began to lick the gouts away. The fearful malediction 108 BORDER INSECURITY. of the minister upon the deceased man was clearly recoUected ; and all who witnessed the disgusting occurrence admitted that the ana thema of Daniel Douglas had been awfully and completely fuUfiUed. In Hutton Hall there may be seen a memento to prove the insecurity of the times when the old building was erected.* In the huge kitchen- chimney, and at the height of six feet from the arch of the fire-place, a large recess, intended for concealment, is formed in the funnel. This place of refuge is cunningly enough selected for the purpose, yet I should fancy that, however safe, the occupant would be any thing but com fortable. Pleasant times they must have been, when a gentleman was obliged to fly up his own chimney at short notice, and obtain a temporary security at the expense of being smoke-dried for a night ! At some distance from the hall, a small hollow in the bank is pointed out, termed, by the peasantry, " the lady's cove." It was the favourite bower of one of the Border beauties; and thither I was conducted by one who had been frequently the fair Katharine's attendant. Was he in olden time my lady's page ? No, faith — he was to me a far more interesting personage—a Peninsular veteran of sixty-five, * Appendix, No. VIII. A PENINSULAR VETERAN. 109 enjoying, in frosty age, his " otium cum dignitate," — an empty sleeve, and one shiUing per diem on the pension hst. Accident occasioned the old man and I to swear an eternal friendship ; ay, and in my lady's bower too. " I began," said the old man, " soldiering at sixteen — went to the Low Countries wi' the Duke o' York — then, through the Irish RebeUion — was at Copenhagen wi' Lord Cathcart, and in the retrate wi' Sir John Moore." " What regiment ?" I asked, carelessly. " The ," rephed the veteran. " What company ?" " The Light." " Then you served under my kinsman ; you remember Captain 1" The old man seized my hand in his — " Ye dinna say ye were cousin to my captain ?" " Indeed, I do.' " Then ye were kinsman to one I loved dearly as I do my ain bairn!" And away went the veteran at score. He had been my cousin's ser vant; and need I say that, before we parted, John and I fought every action, a second time, from Corunna to Toulouse. " When I cam hame, after I lost the arm, ye ken, I was awkward for a while — but the colonel always made out something I could do — and 110 THE LADY S COVE. many a basket-full of earth I have carried down this rock to nourish the honeysuckles and wUd flowers that Miss Katharine planted here i — Och hone ! — the auld name — and the bonnie leddies, they're a' gane ! There was the leddy's seat; and there stood her wee-bit table; and mony an hour she would read and write here ! Her bukes and writin'-desk remained here the hale year, for nane would daur to touch them. Bide a wee here — I'm gawin' up to the farm- hoose, and I'll ca' for ye'r honour comin' back." And was this rude fissure in the rock once the bower of beauty ? Had the Border flower sate where I was sitting ? I saw her, in fancy, at " the wee-bit table" which the old man had described. She was writing — What ? Some missive that bade the lover live, or quenched his hopes for ever! How often, perhaps, in this "neglected bower" have memorials of despairing passion met her eye — the secret incense offered by some nameless swain at the altar of a love proscribed to him. And yet that humble worship was not displeasing— the wild-flowers were not refused. and the flush upon the cheek, as she placed the little bouquet in her bosom, told that the secret homage made to beauty had not been paid in vain. How long I might have continued in this dreamy mood is doubtful. The old man's return A LOVE-DREAM. Ill recalled me to the realities of life, and I left " the lady's cove," and returned to the hostelrie. I know not wherefore, but throughout the evening the ruined hall and the extinct family often re turned to my memory ; and when I went to sleep, the forsaken bower was recalled in the visions of the night, and I dreamed that I was actuaUy making red-hot love to the fair Katha rine, and requesting permission to apply, in form, next morning to her papa, and make her — Mrs. O'Flagherty. CHAPTER IX, A BLIND COMRADE WAR OF THE KIRK A MINIBUS — HUN DOWN THE FIRTH TANTALLAN CASTLE THE BASS ROCK SOLAN GEESE DUNBAR CASTLE ADJACENT BATTLE-FIELDS DEFEAT OF LESLIE COLDINGHAM — ENORMOUS HALIBUTS BERWICK HARBOUR AN IRISH EUSE. Another week of rain has interrupted all pisca torial operations. The rod rests idly in the corner, the fisher's net is swept in vain ; and the only consolation left is, that good may arise from evil, and the flood induce every salmon who had intended an excursion to the Tweed, to seize the opportunity and come up. I have a long- promised visit to make to an old companion, once a stout and stalwart leader as ever " set a squadron in the field," but for years, alas ! hke another Lear, left to mourn over a lost daughter and total blindness. Poor ! It wUl be a melancholy visit for me ; I, who knew thee in lusty manhood, the boldest swordsman of the gallant " rough and ready" — in honoured age, " father of a fair daughter" — and oh ! what was WAR OF THE KIRK. 113 her beauty to her worth? — Gone! — gone for ever! — and thou left blind and desolate! * * * * It is over — the debt is paid ; — my visit gave the "blind old man" some pleasure, — but, God knows, to me it was a painful duty. At times old recollections amused him for a moment, and made him forget his wretchedness. Surely then, among my well-spent days — " few and far be tween" — I may look back upon those while sojourning with Colonel at . I find I can vary my journey from Auld Reekie to Berwick, by steaming it along the coast — a thing comfortably effected between breakfast- hour and dinner. I am glad of it. The whole black brigade of Scotland are here — "in arms and eager for the fray." Loud is the wordy war. Greek meets Greek — argument between learned Thebans, who can, on ordinary subjects, give you a screed an hour and half long, and never crack cry ! If I timidly approach a table, some exclaim "intrusion," and others "non-intrusion," whUe I modestly observe, a la Paul Pry, " Gentlemen, I hope I don't intrude at all ?" — I shall be off in the morning. 'to' I started from the Black Bull at a quarter to eight, in a sort of sentry-box on wheels, called by the boots a " minibus ;" reached Granton Pier — VOL. II. I 114 RUN DOWN THE FIRTH. "touch and go" — and, as a matter of course, had a fight with the gentleman that drove me down. The captain's assessment was precisely one-half the fare demanded, and the fellow, with the most easy assurance in the world, when the warps were cast off, kissed his hand from the pier, and communicated to the skipper and myself as we stood together on the paddle-box, the in teresting fact, " that he had done us oot of sax- pence after a'. " We left upon the larboard hand a pretty rocky islet, crowned by a light-house, called Inch Keith ; and on the shore, a number of fishing-villages which fringe the coast, and almost connect " Long Kirkaldy" — so termed from the one interminable street which forms the town — with Edinburgh. Running with wind and tide we went rapidly down the Firth ; and one of the fine features of this most interesting coast. North Berwick Law, stood out in bold relief. Presently we passed GuUan Point, and the little island of Frida, with its natural arch, and ruined hermitage ; left the quiet-looking town of North Berwick, and all that remains of its once-extensive monastery, on our starboard quarter ; and, in less than half an hour, found ourselves between two most inte resting objects — the Bass rock, and ruins of Tantallan. This celebrated stronghold, the scene of one TANTALLAN CASTLE. 115 of the most striking incidents in Scott's romantic poem (Marmion), is thus described by Chambers : " The position of TantaUan is one excellently chosen for the site of a warlike strength. On the south the land is flat and undulating, and is now laid out in corn-fields. The castle is seated on a piece of ground which is almost an island, by the intersection of a rivulet running through a ravine toward the east. On the north brink of this defile there has been a very strong wall, termi nating in circular turrets, and enclosing a spacious court-yard. Betwixt the north side of this open space, or the fortalice, there has been another ravine, now partly filled up. Drawbridges crossed both of the hollows. The fabric of the castle is of an oblong shape, and is evidently composed of buildings put together at different times. The semicircular Saxon arched doorways prevail. The outward structure is almost entire, and will remain so for centuries. The thickness of the walls is enormous, and there are very few holes for outlook or windows. The length of the front and back is a hundred and twenty paces. Behind there is a pleasant open court, simUar to that in front, which might be rendered a beautiful garden, and on its outer sides it has been also bounded by thick waUs and some outhouses. In all proba biUty this has been the stableyard of the keep. The ground on which the buildings and their out- I 2 116 TANTALLAN CASTLE. works stand is encompassed on the west, north, and east, especially the two latter, by the sea, which frets and fumes on a rocky shore, at a depth at which it makes one dizzy to look down. In the case of storms proceeding from the north east, when the weight of the German ocean is pressed on the waters of the firth, and urged forward by the winds, the waves are struck against the rocks with terrific fury, and the spray from the cliffs is dashed in clouds to the summit of the castle. The interior of the edifice exhibits a labyrinth of inaccessible broken vaulted cham bers, staircases, and passages. Within the last fifty years a progress through the house has become impossible, unless by the aid of ladders. A few years back the lower vaults were the resort of a band of smugglers, and the depot of cargoes of contraband gin, brought from the coast of Holland — and the rooting out of such despe radoes led to the discovery of some subterranean dungeons. The most dismal of these is one on the outside of the house, at the south-west angle. It may have been the dungeon-keep of the guard house. In the present day the edifice is in some measure secured from further dilapidation by a retaining wall and iron gate, and the neighbour ing farmer, at Castleton, is appointed its keeper by the proprietor." Directly opposite this ruined fortalice, in lonely THE BASS ROCK. 117 grandeur the Bass springs from the ocean, and towers five hundred feet above the level of the sea that washes its rocky base. In troublous times, and in the immediate vicinity of repeated scenes of violence and warfare, the isolated strength of this lonely rock would not be over looked; and in strange succession it contained the saint, the prisoner, and the pirate. When Baldred introduced Christianity to the wild com munity which then peopled the eastern coast of Scotland between the Tweed and Tay, he chose this rocky isle as fitting place wherein to keep "holy communings with Heaven." Frequently, in after times, those who offended against kirk or king expiated their crimes here in solitary cap tivity ; and frequently, desperate men, whom Border feuds, or a disputed dynasty, had loosed upon the world, found in "lonely Bass" a meet abiding place for those whose heritage was the sword ; and, like Allan a Dale, " with no furrow for turning," laid sea and land under requisition for the maintenance of a wUd and uncertain hfe. The occupants of the Bass are now a more peaceful community. Enormous numbers of solan geese frequent its lofty crags, and here, with slight disturbance, their annual incubation is performed. Down the sheer rock every spot that can offer a sufficient surface for a bird to 118 SOLAN GEESE. rest upon, is dotted by one of these snow-white visitors. Aware of their local security, to the ordi nary approach of the fisher's boat they pay little attention ; but, as we passed, some domestic brawl appeared to have disturbed the feathered com munity. Ten thousand in one moment were on the wing, screaming and circling round the apex of the rock, and, whatever might have been the cause, the uproar among the feathered tribe continued while we remained in hearing, and the steamer bore us from the scene of strife, still leaving the multitudinous commonwealth upon the Bass " in most admired disorder." * The place which called our attention from the winged inhabitants of the Bass, was the royal burgh, Dunbar ; a town that, like many besides, owed its pristine importance to the stronghold connected with it. Dunbar Castle is of great antiquity, for it is mentioned so long back as 858, when it was * " Like Ailsa Craig, the Bass is peopled by inconceivable myriads of sea-fowl, especially solan geese, which are produced in no other part of Scotland, except in the isle just mentioned. This is a large white bird, remarkable for pro&ucing only a single egg, (which it hatches on the bare rock,) whence, it is supposed, the word solan is derived. Its flesh is lUced by some old-fashioned Scottish tastes, though it has too fishy a flavour to be agreeable to general palates. King Charles II. to whom one was presented at table, when he was in Scotland, is said to have remarked after tasting it, that there were just two things he did not Uke in Scot land — a solan goose, and the solemn league and covenant." — Chambers. DUNBAR CASTLE. 119 destroyed by Kenneth of Scotland. In 1333, it was dismantled, but subsequently repaired ; but the most interesting epoch in its varied history was its gallant and successful defence, when {Dux fcemina!) " Black Agnes," wife of the Earl of March, repelled the Enghsh besiegers under the command of Salisbury. Mortified that his first attempt upon a place of arms should be foiled by the bold resistance of a woman, the English leader, with more de termination than gallantry, pressed the siege, and had recourse to all the means then em ployed in war, to frighten the black Countess into a surrender. As, in a future age, Cromwell treated the Lady Jeffries — Salisbury raised a clumsy engine, called, in the military parlance of the times, " a sowe ;" but the black gentlewoman would not permit " a breach in her battlements," but, by a shower of stones, demolished engine and assailants, making the sowe, as she plea santly observed, " to cast her pigs." Treachery was resorted to, and gold freely disbursed ; but the wary Countess outmanoeuvred the English leader, and very nearly caught him in his own trap. Famine next was tried, and the castle in vested so closely by land as to preclude the possi bihty of supplies being received by the besieged ; but by night forty men, with provisions and military stores, were thrown into the place by sea. 120 ADJACENT BATTLE-FIELDS. The garrison, thus reinforced, sallied, surprised the guard that held the trenches, and executed an effective sortie. At last, finding that force and stratagem were used in vain against a lady ever on the alert, Salisbury raised the siege, after being nineteen weeks before a castle, where he not only lost his " sowe and pigs," but also no small share of military reputation. Twice did the old castle of Dunbar afford a temporary shelter to the fair and erring Mary ; but it was finally dismantled by the regent Murray, and its ordnance transferred to Edin burgh. What man commenced, time completed : its once formidable defences crumbled away before his withering touch, and Dunbar became a heap of shapeless ruins, which now merely serve to mark its site to the passing voyager. In the immediate vicinity of this ancient city, and with the long interval of nearly four centu ries, two celebrated battles were fought, each disastrous to the Scottish arms, and followed by important consequences. The first, when Baliol was overcome by the English Edward ; the second, when, on his retreat from Edinburgh, Cromwell's good fortune saved him not only from defeat, but gave him a crowning victory. Pressed by the Scottish army under Leshe, the Protector took up an entrenched position near the old church of Dunbar, while the Presbyte- DEFEAT OF LESLIE. 121 rians halted on the hill of Doon. Completely cut off from supplies, an immediate surrender appeared to the English officers to be almost an inevitable consequence, and all required by Leslie to ensure it, was merely to hold his ground. Trusting to superior numbers, and stimulated by their clergy, who had more reli gious zeal than military discretion, the Scots imprudently resolved to give the Roundheads battle, and in loose and disorderly array de scended from the heights they occupied. Crom well marked this unsoldierlike advance. " The Lord hath delivered mine enemies unto me !" exclaimed the fanatic general, with all the assu rance of coming success — and the total defeat he subsequently inflicted attested the truth of his prediction. We skirted a bold and rock-bound coast, and passed, at a short distance inland, the viUage of Coldingham, with the ruins of its magnificent priory. Only a gable and a few fragments of that haughty edifice remain, which once, in both opulence and importance, was second to no monastic establishment in the kingdom. It would be tedious to trace the varied fortunes of Coldingham, from the zenith of its prosperity untU its total downfal ; and its history would be only a detail of crime and violence. Its very possession appears to have entaUed misfortune 122 COLDINGHAM. on those who obtained it ; and the fate of three will instance this sufficiently. Not long before the fatal field of Flodden, the archbishop of St. Andrews, with his other dignities, obtained this unfortunate preferment. He fell in battle. The next successor was a brother of Lord Home : he was assassinated by one of the Hepburns. The third, named Blackadder, was murdered by Sir David Home. At last, in 1545, it was burned by the English ; and its noble revenues, alien ated from their original uses, were held in coni- mendam by royal favourites, or seized upon by turbulent nobles, who had might, not right, to justify the usurpation. The bold and romantic headland, called St. Abb's, — the name contracted from that of Ebba, a very pious gentlewoman in her day, — next presented itself. It looks a bifurcated and rocky height, almost severed by a deep ravine from the mainland. The cliffs are wild and romantic, broken into deep fissures with rugged pinnacles, and literally swarming with sea-birds. As we ran close alongside, the captain, to prove the number of the feathered occupants which throng this foreland, discharged a carronade. The effect exceeded all that I could have fancied. The reverberation of the gun, loudly and frequently repeated, started from their secret resting-places a cloud of sea- ST. abb's HEAD. 123 fowl. They issued from cliff and cave in count less numbers ; and, in two minutes after the gun had been discharged, I believe half a miUion birds of every species, — gull and corvorant, auk and tam — young and old — were on the wing, flocked in separate thousands, and sweeping in wider or narrower circles round the steamer, as we left rapidly the foreland, where our "un- shotted gun" had occasioned such marvellous alarm. We had on board a fish-curer from Eymouth ; and, in conversation, the immense size of the halibut was casually alluded to. He mentioned the extraordinary fact of having, some years before, caught one of the astonishing length of six feet two inches. " It cam' up," he said, in his own colloquial way, " like a deed horse — heavy — heavy — heavy, but offered no resistance. When he reached the surface, I mad the lads lean over, and givin' the boat a heel, grappit him under the gill — then, wi' a yerk, I got his heed over the gunnel. The lads listed the boatie to the ither side — I held on for the bare life, and we fairly hitched him in ! Ma certie ! had the crater not been a coward, and merely used his tail, he would have beaten the boat's bottom out!" He mentioned another personal affair with a gigantic halibut ; but in that he came off indif- 124 BERWICK HARBOUR. ferently, having gotten his arm sprained from the shoulder, " and losing the fish after a'." It is seldom that Berwick harbour cannot be taken ; the bar is short, and a steamer will clear it on a single sea. Sometimes, however, it has been necessary to run on and seek shelter under the lee of the greater Farne ; and on one of these visitations the skipper had been obliged to seek it with sixty passengers on board, — pantry and cellar being equally exhausted. Morning came, and the gale was unabated ; but inside the Farne the sea was comparatively smooth, and every passenger, sea-sick or sea-hardy as they might have been, awoke with a craving appe tite. Some called for " brandy and soda-water ;" some demanded tea, and others required coffee ; "but none did come, though they did call for them." What was to be done ? The new buildings on the Farne were in course of erec tion, and the captain pulled ashore, properly considering that the workmen would be amply provisioned. He stated his distress; observed that he had on board a bailie of Glasgow, a town- counsellor from Aberdeen, the coroner and town-clerk of Berwick, while thirteen ladies with seven-and-twenty children were flung in as a make-weight ; but " the mechanical knaves" were immoveable, and swore they would not part with a potatoe. The skipper was about to return AN IRISH RUSE. 125 unassisted as he came, when luckily an Irish seaman " made all right." "Arrah, the divU a thing's for it," said the Hibernian navigator, " but landin' the eight-and- thirty rapers — them divUs from Connemara. It's true, that they havn't a skultogue among them ; but if iver I saw such a set of beautiful black thorns in my life — and the sorra taste of mate or dhrink has passed their lips since we left Granton Pier ! " " Oh, thunder and turf!" exclaimed an Eme- ralder, who was on the Farne as hodman, — and, probably, had the scene been Kamschatka, an Irish gentleman would as certainly have turned up, — " Oh, for the sake of ye'r own hves, and the Blessed Virgin, give them all they want ! Eight- and-thirty ! — every man a bolteeine in his fist, — and nothing to ate for thirty hours ! Och, if ye iver vrish to see ye'r wives and families again — keep the divils where they are ! " The appeal was successful ; the necessary subsidy was dealt out, and paid for ; the hungry passengers were fed ; the sea moderated ; the Morning Star reached her destination ; and Farne escaped the visitation of eight-and-thirty men — in buckram — conjured up for the occasion, by their shrewd but poetic countryman. CHAPTER X. THE king's arms A WEI SUNDAY LEGS AND BUSKINS FUL- LEr's history THE PICTURESQUE, GALLOWS INCLUDED DARK NIGHTS, CLOSED GATES, AND AN IRISH SENTRY A NON- BELIEVER MANNERS AND CUSTOMS HORN SPOONS MATRI MONIAL STATISTICS AN AUSPICIOUS UNION A HINT ON HYMENEALS COW-HOUSE AND KITCHEN AN ADVERTISEMENT. I HAVE been absent for a week, fishing every stream of piscatorial celebrity from the Coquet to the Till, and after six days' delightful rambling, find myself at my comfortable head-quarters, and located at the King's Arms once more. I have returned in the nick of time — the weather, threatening all yesterday, broke during the night, and the sabbath is ushered in with rain and storm. No matter — ^here I am in snug canton ments, and it being a day of rest, " I'll take mine ease in mine inn." Plash, plash, plash ! the big drops fall upon the pavement in quick succession — and an eternity of umbrellas, brown, blue, and green — gingham, silk, and cotton — pass along the flagged causeway LEGS AND BUSKINS. 127 opposite my window, en route to kirk and meeting-house. How chary the ladies seem to be, lest a stray speck should sully the hem of their garments, and what a latitude of leg they sport in Berwick on a wet Sunday ! There goes a stout gentlewoman. I wonder has she a sus picion of the rash clutch with which she has seized hold of her nether habUaments ? Egad, were she regularly kilted, she could not exhibit a more extensive display of her supporters than she does ! Whatever they lack in symmetry, certes, they make up in size ; and see, saints and sinners ! what a pair of ankles follow ! That cream-coloured buskin is a study for a painter! Confound the green umbrella — no getting a peep at her — and surely nothing but a face, positively pretty, could be proprietrix of that foot and ankle. Were I a ladies'-shoe- maker, I would accept a contract at half price, and, to ensure a correct fit, always take the measure in person. " Colonel O'Flagherty, recollect you are at the wrong side of forty-five ; and what have you to do with " correct fits " and "cream-coloured bus kins ?" Settle your fly-book, or read the History of Berwick — and, if you will be advised by me, dame Prudence, leave ladies and their legs alone." * * * * 128 fuller's history. A strange history that of Berwick is — the scope of the Doctor's* researches appears illimitable, and Kitchener was not more discursive. It is an olio for every palate — and, in as many pages, you have useful information on war, commerce, politics, police, and puerperal fever. After giving a very valuable, but we fear a too costly recipe for the construction of an agriculturist,f the author pro ceeds with a descripton of the town — and no thing can be more impartial. The streets he pronounces irregular, intolerably ill-paved, and shamefully cramped at the bottom — but, pre sently, he gets in better temper with his native town, and declares it " London in miniature," with a modest supplication, that it may rival London aforesaid, " in extent, population, trade, and com merce ;" and that he, the Doctor, " may live to see it!" Anon he touches on the picturesque : — and here he is at home, although his ideas of landscape beauty are not strictly artistical. * John FuUer, M.D. t " The husbandman ought to go into the schools, and, taking up the pen and compasses, make himself master of the elements of mathematics, with their application to mechanics ; he must afterwards resort to the cheirdcal elaboratory, where, plying diligently until he acquires a thorough knowledge of the most essential doctrines of chemistry, let him attend the academical chair on agriculture in the University of Edinburgh ; after all which, he wUl return to the culture ofthe earth furnished with a stock" — of what, gentle reader? long horns or short ones — • cheviots or south-downs? Oh, no, " of geometrical aiid chemical information !" THE PICTURESaUE. 129 He classifies it under four heads. The first consists in the Tweed kicking up a row with the German Ocean ; the second, in boats drafting salmon ; the third, " the perpetual hurry and bustle on the quay in loading and unloading smacks ;" and the fourth, of" the richest prospects which Berwick has to boast " is the buUding of a Tweedmouth trader.* AU " these fascinating views " were nearly too much for the Doctor, as he gazed on them from the top of the town- haU, where he acknowledges he was " almost lost in admiration, at the numerous captivating objects which presented themselves." Nor are his historic notices less valuable. In describing a thunder-storm which destroyed " a pubhc edifice," as he gently names the gallows! he continues : " Such have been the exemplary morals of the inhabitants, that there has been no occasion to build a new one." The old people liked to place pleasing objects in proper situa tions, and the Berwick gallows was perched on " an eminence beside the castle, on the Fowlden- road." How would the traveller have been de lighted, who, on meeting with a gibbet, blessed God that he was in a civilized country again — how would his sinking spirits have been cheered, * The Doctor says, p. 378, that " the largest vessel ever built in Berwick was launched at Tweedmouth," a feat far beyond the ubiquity of Sir Boyle's bird. VOL. IL K 130 DARK NIGHTS. when, on approaching Berwick, his eye first caught sight of that interesting erection! The deficiency of lamp-light was in the Doctor's day a serious inconvenience, for he being in " the lady's line," was liable to continual alarms, and many a tumble no doubt he had, when groping his way through Cimmerian darkness to some house, where Juno Lucina had been ardently invoked. If to a lady's doctor, accustomed as he must have been to midnight promenades, the streets were difficult, how dangerous must they have been to a stranger ! One accident occurred in 1798, and the escape from destruction was miraculous.* But it was not dark nights and bad trottoirs alone, which gave annoyance to the historian of Berwick. The confounded habit of closing gates in a garrison, cut off his communications with the country until cock-crow. It is true, that he was a privileged man — as an obstetric * A traveller on horseback entering Berwick after dark, mis took the road, and in place of riding down the High-street, turned to his left in the suburb, outside the gate. The lights beyond the river he fancied were those in the windows of the town, and in a false and fatal security he pushed forward to the bank of the Tweed, and went over the precipice, a part of which is a sheer descent of more than a hundred feet. The horse was kUled, but the rider escaped uninjured. Being a thoughtful traveUer, he pro bably considered that although nobody would steal a dead horse, stiU there might be persons who would take a fancy to the accoutrements. Accordingly he removed them from the defunct animal, and made his way to the inn with tlie saddle on his back. CLOSED GATES. 131 practitioner he had a right allowed of egress and ingress — but much depended on the temper of the guard ; the Doctor might be expedited or detained ; and while he was discussing his identity with a surly sentinel. Heaven only knows what damage the patient might sustain ! Here is his own account of it. " If a person, on his first coming to the gate, quarrels with the guard, the greatest impor tunities afterwards for admission wili more than likely be of no avail ; and even medical people returning from the country, and exhausted by fatigue and want of sleep, are sometimes detained for a long time at the gates. On some such occasions, the sentry insists that the person is using a fictitious name, and the fellow won't even look at person or passport." But the worst is to come. " It sometimes happens, when they grant this indulgence in a rage, or in a state of in toxication," (oh ! fie, Doctor ! men drunk on guard ! what a libel on the garrison !) " that they let go the great wooden bar of the gate, the con sequence of which may be either the death of the rider or the horse." To point the extent of this professional incon venience, the Doctor narrates an affecting anec dote. A lady " in the straw " despatched a couple of young girls for " the author;" — and instead of expediting the fair messengers, the soldiers K 2 132 AN IRISH SENTRY. commenced, what is in modern parlance termed "larking" with the lasses, and detained them half-an-hour " sometimes opening the wicket and again shutting it against them." What was the consequence ? By this mischievous opening and shutting of the wicket, the country possibly lost a staunch defender, and the author "a stout male child." I can fancy poor Fuller's persecutions, and freely sympathize with him. He is rung out of a sound sleep, barely aUowed time to put on his toggery, then hurried to the gate as if a man were hanging there, and waiting for the Doctor to cut him down. The sentry, a sulky Celt, lets " the great wooden bar" drop upon his toe — and the fiery messenger will hardly aUow him time to enter a protest against the injury. He reaches the fair patient — his skill is crowned with success — the lady left as well as can be expected — and the Doctor sets out to resume his interrupted slumbers. In the meantime the sentry has been relieved — and the new one, an Irish recruit and not a true believer — because he'll believe nothing. The Doctor approaches the gate, and the foUowing dialogue ensues. " Who goes there ?" " A friend." " Advance, friend, and give the countersign." " I am Doctor Fuller." A NON-BELIEVER. 133 " Then, Doctor FuUer, you're on the right side to run away. Be off wid ye ! " " Let me in, I say, I have the governor's per mission." " Arrah, go to Bath ! Ye have been out on the ran-tan, I suppose — and faith, ye'll stick where ye are till morning." " I tell ye, feUow ! I am Doctor FuUer." " Arrah, go to glory ! you a doctor !" (strong emphasis on you,) " Be off, I tell ye." " I am," loquitur the Doctor with dignity, " a licentiate of St. Andrews, and also an A.M. of Aberdeen," " So was my mother ! Arrah, give your rags a gallop, young man. The devil an in here ye'll come th' night ; — you a doctor ! " Shade of Esculapius ! ghost of Galen ! was there ever such an inroad made on the patience of a practitioner ! — Question the identity of John FuUer, and fancy him not indeed the real " Simon Pure!" But worst of all, for that sceptic scoundrel of an Irish sentinel, to moot the very respectability of his qualifications ! " Doubt thou, the stars are fire ; Doubt that the sun doth move. Doubt truth to be a Uar;" but what were these, to a doubt being cast upon John Fuller's diploma ! No wonder afterwards 134 manners and customs. that the honest Doctor poured out the phials of his wrath upon gates and garrisons ! With a summary of John Fuller's description of " Manners and Customs," we will take leave of the worthy author. " In genuine politeness and easy manner, Berwick is not inferior to any borough in the island of the same size and extent." " The young ladies are graceful and affable, remarkable for humane and generous dispositions, and on many occasions dance to relieve the distrest." Item, " at balls and assemblies they dress elegantly, and in the fashion." " The burgesses were formerly shy to strangers, but that is now no longer the case." " Tradesmen and artificers here are as sober and industrious as in most other places." This, all through, is " damning with faint praise," and the Doctor winds up with a sly hit at the servant maids.* In point of arrangement, the Doctor's work is open to criticism : " An encysted abscess, situated on the left lobe of the liver of a woman," occupies five pages — and Section Three, * "There is no class of people in domestic society so es sentially useful as servant-women; and, when they discharge their duty faithfully, they are highly deserving of encouragement. That there are many such in Berwick we entertain no doubt. Then comes a confounded " but — when they ape their superiors in dress, they never fail to excite the indignation and contempt of not only those whom they imitate, but also of those in situa tions below them." — P. 444. HORN SPOONS. 135 of Agriculture, three lines.* A very valuable article, however, on horn spoons, admirably redeems this oversight, and cannot be over looked. " Within these fifteen years," quoth the Doctor, " they," the spoons, " have doubled their price ; this is principally owing to the great dearth of horns." What an encouragement for married men to reside permanently in Berwick ! By the way, under the head of " manufactures," the Doctor includes red herrings. In truth, we have not done the learned Doctor the justice he deserved. Like other critics, we but superficially overlooked the book — and from a general dislike to physic, even from infancy, passed the nosological division altogether, which appeared to be a history of everything but Berwick. Indeed, anybody who has an anti pathy to "galenicals," as Doctor OUapod calls them, would naturally take alarm — every page for forty, presenting fearful combinations ! " Tranquillity of mind," " headach, sickness, and nausea," "sugar of lead," "the illustrious Boer haave," " ladies who drop into declines," " thin * " The manures generally employed here, are stable, cow, and street dung, together vrith Ume. Soot also is used, and is very effective." Had the Doctor lived in 1649, when, at the " GuUd's desire, the man which tryeth the witches in Scotland was sent for," at the expense of the Corporation, he, the doctor, would have been burned for a wizard — and no mistake. 136 matrimonial statistics. gruel and copious phlebotomy," " defamation and drastic purgatives!" The author, alas, has followed many a patient to the narrow house, and Johnson's epitaph might fairly be engraven on his tomb ! In his general statistics, the Doctor entirely omits the matrimonial — and whatever interesting occurrences may have taken place before the gates of the town, much more curious ones have been enacted at those of the toll-houses. Indeed, the facility with which marriage is contracted and dissolved upon the borders, is, in a religious and moral point of view, equally mischievous and disgusting. Alliances are entered into under the idlest pretexts — and out of ten of these disgrace ful marriages, nine, at least, are formed in boyhood, dotage, or drunkenness. The consequences may be easily conceived. Among the lower orders this mockery of a sacred rite is merely considered binding while fancypleases — and deserted women, with clnldren who " never knew a father's care," are met too frequently upon the Tweed. The difficulty which Enghsh law most wisely places in the way of effecting irregular marriage, generally acts as a preventive to it altogether. Time is necessary to go through preliminary forms, during which the most thoughtless have leisure for reflection, while, probably, a discovery of the intention, enables friends or guardians to an auspicious union. 137 use persuasion or authority, and thus prevent imprudent unions. But here, the mischief is no sooner imagined than it is completed — the happy pair hurry to the next Scotch turnpike — and one of a dozen drunken scoundrels is found in five minutes, and ties the indissoluble knot. In the village where I slept last night there was one of these disgusting pseudo-ceremonials. A fellow had been unexpectedly left a sm.all sum of money by a distant relation, and, since he obtained the bequest, had never been sober for a day. In this state of sublimated happiness, he still felt "a craving void left aching in his breast," for he had no gentle consort to imprint " a kiss upon the cup," and nectarize his toddy. Yesterday afternoon — being too drunk to carry out the treaty in person — ^he accredited an am bassador, and despatched him to Berwick to offer his hand and fortune to the maid-of-all- work at the " JoUy SaUor" — and, should she smile upon his suit, the envoy was directed to bring the bride out forthwith, with " a holy man to make two lovers happy." The embassy was successful — and at eleven o'clock, bride, priest, and envoy, arrived in a hackney chaise. The rites of Hymen were duly performed, — he vowed eternal love, and she inviolable con stancy ; the company " drank pottle-deep " to the future fehcity of a union contracted under 138 A HINT ON HYMENEALS. such flattering auspices, and when my host — he had given the bride away — came off, " all went merry as a marriage bell." How, into such a scene of mortal felicity, the demon of discord could find entrance afterwards, is wrapped in mystery : but, unhappily, a difference of opinion led, to what is termed in Ireland, a rookawn, or general row— the priest of Hymen, who it appears was par ticularly pugnacious, being kicked out — ^but the ejection not effected, until, with the placens uxor, whom he had already conferred upon the happy host, he had superadded the compliment of a black eye. It appears that " confiding woman " has been occasionally deceived, by being married at the wrong side of the gate. The kitchen is on Scottish ground, and if the job is done there, it's " right as a trivet;" but if it "comes off'' in the " coo- hoose," the thing's " no go," having been effected on the wrong side ofthe Border. For this valu able information I was indebted to my one-armed friend, the pensioner. " I mind. Colonel, having a wee-bit spree at Lamberton, before I lost the arm, and I'll tell ye how it was. I cam home on leave, and as I had sax-weeks allowed, I thought I would be the better of a wife, and as it was fair time in Berwick, I went into the High-street to see if I could match mysel. Hegh ! before I was long on the COW-HOUSE AND KITCHEN. 139 '. look out, I faUs in wi' a strappin lassie, ' Wod ye be for a husban ?' says I ; 'I wud na matter it,' says she — so in we goes, drank a noggin o' whisky, and then we set out for the bar to get spliced. At the Scotch gate I meets a comrade, ' Whar are ye goin, Jock ?' says he. ' To be married to that lassie in the red shawl,' says I. ' I know her weel,' says he, ' a smart girl. Egad, I didna think she was back agen, for she went off only a fortnight ago, wi' a cart-maker.' That was rather agen her, ye ken — sae I thought it wad be as weel to marry in the coo-hoose as the kitchen — for then if I did na like the bargain I could draw the splice. When we cam to the bar, I called the fellow out that was waiting there to marry folk, and tauld him the job must be don ben * the hoose. ' That's vara expensiv,' says he, ' and it wiU be anither half-croon.' ' No matter, I'll pay the differ,' says I — and in we goes to bring out the bride, ' Where till are ye gaen ?' says she. ' Am rather bashful,' says I, ' and there's ower muckle folk here, so we' el hae it quietly done ootside.' 'Is it in the coo-hoose?' says she. *Jist so,' says I. 'Ah, then, young man,' says she, * ye maun get anither jo, I guess. None of ye'r coo-hoose marriages for me — I was don that way this time twalmonth, and I'll no be taken in a second time in the coo-hoose, I promise ye.' So," said John, " Colonel, we jist cam * Outside the house. 140 AN ADVERTISEMENT. back as we went, ye ken — she wud na marry in the coo-hoose, and I wud na marry in the kitchen." It would appear that among the drunken scoundrels who exist by making fools super latively miserable, there is a sharp competition for business. The following advertisement shows that " couple begging," as the Irish call it, is here considered a profession. Scotch Marriages. — Robert Luggat, Teacher, head of Wea- therly Square, Berwick, most respectfully announces to his friends and the pubUc, that {as ihe above marriages are lawful and heritable) he has been induced, through the urgent solicitations of a nume rous circle of friends and acquaintances, to commence celebrating the same at the foUowing toUs, viz. Lamberton, Mordington, Paxton, Chain-bridge, and in private houses on the borders. And it being of the utmost importance that a correct register should be kept and preserved, and in some instances secrecy enjoined, combined with punctuality and despatch, R.L. pledges himself, that parties may rely on him with the utmost confidence in that respect. N. B. — Gentlemen in town or country may make an appoint ment by letter post-paid, addressed Robert Luggat, head of Weatherly Square, Bervrick-on-Tweed. *,* Any person recommending a party will be remunerated. There, Jack — when you make up your mind for mischief, you have merely to tip Mr. Luggat a line, announce your advent, and he'll be ready for you at Lamberton or elsewhere. Remember that you put a miniature likeness of our lady the Queen upon the corner of your letter — and also apprise the worthy gentleman who will sanctify your union with his benison, that the recommend ation fee is due to me. CHAPTER XI. APOLOGY FOR ROMANCE — MELROSE ABBEY VARIETY O^ EMBEL LISHMENT ANCRUM MOOR JEDBURGH A GHOST STORY JEDARD JUSTICE ABBOT KENNOCK THE CHURCH MILITANT BORDER LAW — SEVERE UPON THE CLERGY. You laugh at my romance, Jack, and take care to mention the year of my nativity. What cursed memories people always have about things that it were pleasanter should be forgotten ! Touching the years of your commoner acquaint ance, you could hardly hazard a guess ; but because I am, unhappily, a bachelor, you can tell the day that I was swaddled, ay, and the very hour of the christening. God help me ! I wonder is every middle-aged gentleman tor mented as T am ? I can't peep over the window- blind at a pretty ankle on a wet Sunday, but Prudence punches my ribs, and whispers ' " Denis, you're forty-five !" And now, because : I carry Scott in my portmanteau, and view his 142 APOLOGY FOR ROMANCE. originals with delight, you treat me as a lunatic, and affectionately entreat me, " during the conti nuation of my present mental excitement," to be particularly guarded against pretty barmaids and damp sheets. / — who slept many a night with the " ould Rangers," under a wet hedge — when you were handsomely birched, as you deserved, for false translations of Tityrce tu patulce. " Go to, boy !" Every body, but the spouse of the stout gen tlewoman " who kept the Black Boy," in Athlone, — and he was constructed of different materials to those used in the fabrication of mankind generally * — all, in their way, are enthusiasts. The sailor arrests you while passing a building- slip, points to a mass of timber, shapeless to your eye, and then bursts into an ecstatic eulogy upon a " fine entrance," and " clean counter," all being caviare to you. A stuffed bird puts a natu ralist into convulsions ; and a soldier — I have done it myself — will walk out of his way three streets to accompany "the relief" to the Horse Guards. Who, then, but a man of dauber could visit the scenes that I have done unmoved — Scott in his pocket, and the Border beneath his foot? * Glauber, in Irish — and, I believe, in Scotch — means the soft slime which remains on a road after rain. Hence, an Irish land lady, who was mated to a Jerry Sneak, used to declare, that " if aU men were made of clay, her's was only made of clauber." MELROSE ABBEY. 143 Of all the monastic ruins I ever visited, I think those of " fair Melrose," both in beauty and interest, surpassing all besides. Founded three centuries after the destruction of old Melrose, a Cistercian community was introduced from Reivalle by that pattern for pious kings, David L — a monarch feelingly described by a successor he had impoverished, as " a bra saunt (saint) for the kirk, but a sair saunt for the croon" (crown); I am no phrenologist, and therefore am in blessed ignorance whether the human skull is furnished with a church-building protuberance. If it be, what a " parlous bump " there must have been on the cranium of honest David! Well, if he did labour under a stone and mortar monomania, at all events he exhibited exquisite good taste ; and in Melrose, one scarcely knows which most commands admiration — the site, the masonry, or the embeUishment, On the right bank of classic Tweed, and at the foot of the Eildon hills,* the ancient abbey was erected; and, before it became the busy haunt of men, that lovely valley must have been the scene of holy and secluded quiet, so happily adapted for the residence of those who, eschewing earthly vanities — "the world forgetting, by the world forgot,"— had sought the lone cloister for prayer and penance, and solitary communings with God. * Appendix, No. IX. 144 STYLE OF ARCHITECTURE. In style of architecture, Melrose affords a fine specimen of the rich Gothic ; and " the strength of its masonry, the boldness of its sculpture, the exquisite finish of its most minute embellish ments, and that majestic beauty so impressive in a sacred edifice, are unsurpassed — we might say unequaUed — by any existing remnant of its class and character." * The buttresses, richly carved and fretted, contained niches filled with saints, and "the scrolls that teach us to live and to die" — ¦ while the arches which supported the vaulted roof, resting on pillars, " lofty, and light, and small," exhibit carvings of exquisite delicacy. " The mouldings of these arches are composed of running flowers and foliage ; and over them is a beautiful frieze, in square compartments, each representing a cluster of some plant, flower, or other figure, among which are lilies, ferns, grapes, house-leeks, oak leaves, with acorns, palm, holly, fir-cones, scallops, quatrefoUs, &c. * * * An arched doorway, leading from the cloisters at the angle formed by the transept, is exqui sitely carved. The foliage upon the capitals of the pilastres, on each side, is so nicely chiselled, that a straw can be made to penetrate through the interstices between the leaves and stalks." f In the embellishment of Melrose, two circum- * Beattie's Illustrated Scotland. t View of Monastic Abbeys in Teviotdale. VARIETY OF EMBELLISHMENT. 145 stances wiU strike the visitor—the variety of its ornament, and, occasionaUy, the quaintness of the device. Here a Peter or a Paul presents himself in exquisite carving ; and beside the saint a corbeUle rests on the back of a gro tesque-looking dwarf, who seems almost broken- backed by the weight of the pillar he is supporting. Near the summit of the choir, a Virgin and chUd form a beautiful entablature, while, immediately above them, the water is carried fi-om the roof by stone spouts, one repre senting, in very comical carving, the outre device of a pig playing on the bagpipes. The variety of the embellishment, its unequal execution, the grave and gay character of its devices — all these have led some antiquarians to believe that the work was performed by many hands, and that the monks themselves were the chief artists. If this were the case, the honest community could do more than " Make good kail On Fridays, when they fasted ;" and, like their brethren of Kelso,* they were not altogether the drones which the reformers have described them. # * * * I started early to-day for Jedburgh, taking a route by Ancrum, a pretty village seated on the * Appendix, No. X. VOL. n. L 146 ANCRUM MOOR. banks of the Ale, near its confluence with the Teviot. In 1554, its vicinity was the scene of a sanguinary engagement between the rival nations, in which the English army was bloodUy defeated by the Scottish border clans com manded by the Earl of Arran. " What will not woman when she loves ?" A beautiful girl fol lowed her sweetheart to the field — saw him fall — and died beside him. A broken stone points out the spot where Love's fair votary expired ; and, if tradition can be trusted. Miss LUlyard to the tenderness of a turtle united the courage of an Amazon. The obliterated inscrip tion set forth that though among "the hght weights," she was "nothing but a good un"* — and in honour of her prowess, the battle is called that of Lillyard's Edge. The Lothian pillar erected on a neighbouring height, (Penelheugh,) commands a beautiful and most extensive pro spect, as no fewer than nine counties are visible from its summit.f It was evening when I reached the ancient town of Jedburgh. I confess my disappointment * "Fair maiden Lillyard lies under this stane, -' Little was her stature, but great was her fame ; Upon the English louns she laid many thumps. And when her legs were smitten off, she fought upon her stumps." f This pUlar was erected by the late Marquis of Lothian, in honour of the Iron Duke. The design is elegant — the height above one hundred feet. JEDBURGH ABBEY. 147 on viewing its abbey ; but then I saw it after "fair Melrose." Much of it is sadly dilapidated, a part turned into a parish church, and the great tower alone in tolerable preservation. Jed burgh was one of that " sair saunt's " establish ments ;* and, from the magnificent endowment he made upon the monastery, if ever monks prayed double tides for a benefactor. King David should have been the man. By the way, there is a tolerably good ghost story mixed up with the history of the abbey. Alexander the Third chose Jedburgh as the place where his hymeneals should be solemnized with a daughter of the Count of Dreux. She came, * " The munificent founder of this institution, which may be esteemed among the chief of the kind in Scotland, conferred on the abbot and monks various lands and numerous privUeges. They were granted ' the lands of Melrose, Eldun, and Dernevie, the lands and wood of Gattonside, with the fishings of the Tw«ed along the whole extent of those lands, with the right of pasturage and pannage in the king's forests of Selkirk, Traquair, and in the forest lying between the Gala and the Leader, and also the pri vUege of taking wood for building and burning from the same forests.' " — Chart. Mel. * * * * " With regard to the revenues of the abbey at the epoch of the reformation, it is recorded that they consisted of 1758/. Scots; wheat 19 chalders 9 boUs ; bear 77 chalders 3 bolls: oats, 47 chalders I boll 2 firlots; meal 14 chalders; with 8 chalders of salt; 105 stones of butter; 10 dozen of capons; 26 dozen of poultry ; 376 muir-fowl ; 360 loads of peats ; and 500 carriages. Out of this large revenue, there were assigned 20 merks to each of eleven monks, and three portioners ; also 4 bolls of wheat, I chalder of bear and 2 chalders of meal, Teviotdale measure. No bad living in that abbey ! l2 148 A GHOST STORY. nobly attended — the chivalry of France and Scotland were collected — " And now had the bridal been blessed by the priest — The revelry just had begun ;"— the banquet proceeded — the masque came on — the pageant was splendid — but " the procession was closed by an unexpected figure, whose mys terious and singular appearance startled the be holders ; for, like a shadow, it seemed to glide rather than walk." No wonder the company looked sharp : a swell-mob man at a horticultural show could not create a greater sensation. Finding himself, however, regularly blown, the ghost " moved on " before he could be given in charge ; but the best proof that he had quitted his quarters below, and had not figured in the masque for nothing, was given on the nineteenth of the ensuing March — for on that day the king's horse stumbled, and Alexander broke his neck. In former times, although not precisely in conformity with the provisions of Magna Charta, the law here was efiiciently enforced. "Jedard justice" — on which "Lynch law" is but a modern improvement — consisted in hanging the man first, and examining the evidence after wards. Many an industrious moss-trooper here offered up his last " oramus ; " and after a visit to Jedburgh, the boldest borderer would hardly venture to look a sheep in the face. JEDARD JUSTICE. 149 In the queen's wars, the town declared against Mary, and took part with James — and thus involved the citizens with the Kers. " This daring feud," says Chambers, " was accompanied with some ludicrous, but fully as many tragical circumstances. When a pursuivant, under the authority of the queen, and countenanced by Ferniehirst, was sent to proclaim that everything was null which had been done against her during her confinement in Lochleven, the provost com manded him to descend from the cross, and, says Bannatyne the journalist, ' caused him eat his letters, and thereafter loosed down his points, and gave him his wages on his bare buttocks with a bridle, threatening him that if he ever came again he should lose his life.' In revenge of this insult, and of other points of quarrel, Ferniehirst, having made prisoners ten of the citizens of Jedburgh, hanged them, and destroyed with fire the whole stock of provisions which had been laid up for winter." Jedburgh, when entire, must have been one of the most splendid of the monastic establishments north of Tweed. To judge from the mixed order of its architecture, in which by turns the Gothic, the Saxon, and the Norman prevail, the abbey was built at different times, and with different tastes ; and much as it has been dUapidated, enough of its ruined outhne remains 150 ABBOT KENNOCK. to point out to the antiquarian its original extent. In the annals of Jedburgh, very honourable mention is made of an Abbot Kennock, who, not entering into the spirit of the times, preached peace and harmony — then an unfashionable doc trine — and actually kept the English and Scot tish monarchs quiet for ten years, when both were dying for a row. In the wreck of time, the patronymic of this holy pacificator has been unfortunately lost, or at this moment we would recommend him — he being regularly canonized — for the especial example of the Irish clergy, a body at present pugnaciously disposed, and in clined, of St. Peter's accoutrements, rather to put faith in the sword than the keys. Indeed, this peaceful churchman appears to have been a rara avis in his day ; and, while other gentlemen of the cloth, like Sir Hudibras, " Rode forth a coloneling," he kept close to the duties of the cell and the confessional. I suppose churchmen prayed, as I have known penance performed in Ireland, by proxy ; for the clergy of these troublesome times occupied themselves with other matters than spiritualities. The Church then was a Church militant ; and there was rarely a battle in which a bishop did not figure in the despatch, while priors and abbots were honourably in- THE CHURCH MILITANT. 151 eluded in the return of the kiUed and wounded- At Neville's Cross, (17th October, 1346,) where the Scots were totally defeated, and their king, David Bruce, made prisoner, one division of the English army was commanded by the archbishop of York, another by the bishop of Lincoln ; and " the brave" bishop of Carlisle — brave des braves — very properly had a brigade of " the fighting third!" And yet what changes in habits and opinions an age or two will cause ! How Wel lington would have stared, when Picton returned to England on sick-leave, if the next packet had brought out the bishop of Lincoln in full pontificals, to take charge of the vacant division ! I fancy I hear the Iron Duke on the field, order ing the bishop of London to " refuse his right," and pivot his left flank on that of the archbishop of Canterbury. Even the Gazette would read strangely enough, when announcing that the dean of Durham had succeeded to the command of the Connaught Rangers, " vice the archdeacon of Armagh, kiUed in action." Nor were bishops, priests, and deacons in those pleasant days, simply belligerent. The turf was in mere infancy, the ring not yet in fashion ; but still, in the sporting annals of the times, the clergy occupied a prominent position, I re member hearing a ballad in my boyhood, which mentioned among fox-hunters of the day, a 152 BORDER LAW. " Father Frank of Abbotstown," as a " regular out-and-outer." Indeed, his fancy for field-sports appears to have rendered it rather dangerous for impatient lovers to entrust him with their hyme neals ; for instead of billing and cooing, after receiving permission of the Church, they might have been left frequently to put in the forenoon at their prayers.* " These jolly monks," as the old ballad calls them, were also occasionally " traders and chap men ;" and a bishop of St. Andrews (Kennedy) was the most extensive ship-owner of the day. " Among other monuments of his magnificence, he built a ship of uncommon size and strength, to which he gave the name of the ' Salvator.'" Now it would have been better had the honest bishop amused himself in building churches instead of ships ; for having chartered the " Salvator" to some Scotch merchants, she was lost on the coast of Northumberland, and the crew, who had taken to their boat, were captured and confined in Bamhorough Castle — the speculation turning out a losing concern to all engaged in it. Many and great as the privileges of mother * " If a couple come to wed, Frank slips the surpUce o'er his head; But should the huntsman wind his horn. To tell a fox was found — ' Stay there,' says Frank, ' till I come back From riding to the hound.' " SEVERE UPON THE CLERGY. 153 'Church were in these, the days of her power — ! still holy men resident on the debateable land had one cause of grievance to complain of. Accord ing to the twelfth article of Border-law, property in goods stolen was only provable by single combat — a dangerous and disagreeable oideal, from which even the clergy themselves were not exempt. The equity of the enactment appears very equivocal ; for, bad as it might have been now and again to lose a horse, it seems harder still, that the unhappy owner should be obliged to fight the horse-stealer afterwards. It is true that the clergy were permitted to find a substi tute, if they were not of the order of Friar Tuck, and, hke the holy clerk of Copmanhurst, expert at " the carnal weapon." But this was a dan gerous alternative. In the event of his man being " polished off," the unhappy priest, who fought by proxy, paid the penality of his man's defeat — and, as it would appear, at times the for feiture was capital, and the penalty rigorously enforced.* * Appendix, No. XI. CHAPTER XII. ROXBURGH CASTLE DEATH OF JAMES II. IRISH VOLUNTEERS AN OFFICIAL DESPATCH KELSO AND DRYBURGH STATUE OF WALLACE THE LEISTER SUNNING SALMON BURNING BAKING IHE WIZARD OF THE NORTH SMAILHOLME TOWER S.WAILHOLMe's lady GAY SCOTt's BALLAD MEMORIAL OP A DOUBLE FRATRICIDE. In retracing my steps to Melrose, I took the circuitous route by Fleurs and Kelso, and visited the only remnant of a once royal residence which time has not destroyed — the site of Rox burgh Castle. While engaged in the good work of " building churches," David, of pious memory, made this fortress his abiding place, and, on a later emergency, it was delivered over to the English, as part of the ransom of a captured king (William the Lion). Like all the border strongholds, Roxburgh occasionally changed owners — was carried by assault or siege — now ruined, and again repaired. After the battle of Pinkie,* it was evacuted by the English garrison, " Appendix, No. XII. DEATH OF JAMES IL 155 and rapidly sank into decay, untU its final ruin was completed. Probably the most important incident in its varied history was the death of James II. Having sate down before Roxburgh, he appears to have been so determined upon the reduction of the place, as to personaUy oversee the practice of the siege artUlery — a proceeding, on his part, that old Piscottie considers as infra dignitatem, although, according to the apocryphal narrative of La Costa, Napoleon, at Waterloo, graciously condescended to correct the position of a battery. Be that as it may, James underwent the penalty of unskilful gunnery, and was " Hoist with his own petar'," * thereby conveying a salutary lesson to future kings, that they should not stand too close to a battery, when open, without ascertaining that the guns had previously gone through the ordeal of " Tower proof." I remember seeing the official report of an artillery casualty, conveyed to head-quarters in more satisfactory than scientific terms. During the era of the Volunteers, when every body in * " But whUe this prince, more curious than became him, or the majesty of a king, did stand nearhand the gunners, when the artUlery was discharged, his thigh-bone was dung in two with a piece ofa misframed gun that brake in shooting; by. the which he was stricken to the ground, and died hasiily."— Piscottie. 156 IRISH VOLUNTEERS. Ireland, from fifteen to fifty, were playing at soldiers, and every village had its horse, foot, and artillery on war establishment, the Earl of Charlemont presented a couple of four-pounders to a favourite corps, which present had nearly proved as fatal to the receivers, as the " tour- quoise ring" which brought on the " fight of Flodden," It is true that the said four-pounders never boomed upon a battle-field ; but, like the pistols of Hudibras, they were employed to effect " writ and exigent." The executive de partment was under the control of the gaoler of A ; and one fine morning, in obedience to a mandate from the sheriff, he proceeded with his guns to eject, vi et armis, an honest gentleman, who, sick of " the law's delay," had taken pos session of a house and farm, more Hibernico, without waiting for the chancellor's decree. On arriving at the scene of action, the sheriff summoned the garrison to surrender, to which the captain of the hold irreligiously responded that he " would see him d — d first ;" and, on this contumacious refusal, the king's representa tive directed the gaoler to open his artillery. The order was obeyed ; the first shot went over the house ; the second knocked down the chimney. Well, if ten ounces of gunpowder would tumble a chimney, twenty should demolish a house, and, accordingly, the worthy gaoler, for AN OFFICIAL DESPATCH. 157 the next essay, doubled the former quantity of " villanous saltpetre." The result, however, did not realize the expectation. The house with stood the discharge — the gun did not. It burst, and put the bombardiers into such awful conster nation, that more than one vow was registered in heaven, that, during natural life, the penitent gunner would not be guilty of setting fire to a squib. In his official despatch, the gaoler announced the surrender of the cabin, with the loss of a gun. "She brust (burst), my lord," said the chief engineer in his report, " because, though she was thick enough in the back, she was over thin in the belly!" Never w'as accident more satisfactorily accounted for. * * * * In tura, I visited Kelso* and Dryburgh ; one the handiwork of " the sair saunt," the other erected by his constable, Hugo de MorvUle. Both abbeys are in the Saxon style, but the central arches of Kelso are Gothic, and remarkable both for their * This establishment was first settled at Selkirk, but the monks not being pleased with the situation of that place, and appreciating the beauties of the sunny vale of the Tweed, long before consecrated by the erection of the abbey of Melrose, in duced David to remove their house to Kelso, a locality much nearer the royal residence at Roxburgh. The abbey of Kelso, agreeably to this arrangement, was finished in 1128, and dedi cated to the Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist. 158 STATUE OF WALLACE. beauty and their strength. Of the former, more of the building remains ; and the central tower is nearly perfect ; while of Dryburgh little beyond the abbot's parlour and the chapter-room are now in tolerable preservation. The church is in a very dilapidated state ; but, ruinous though it be, so long as one stone shall stand above another the ground will be considered doubly hallowed for the sake of him who now sleeps in death within its crumbling walls." Here Sir Walter Scott is buried ; and if ever fitting grave was formed for a poet's resting-place, Dryburgh was intended for the bard. From the ruined abbey I proceeded to view the colossal statue erected to " Wallace wight," with Grecian temple dedicated to the softer memory of "gentle Jamie;"* and thence bent my course towards the earhest scene of Scott's romantic musings — Smailholme Tower. One of the most beautiful bendings in the course of the romantic Tweed lies between Melrose and Dryburgh. The road overlooks the site of that "ancient chapelrie," which merged into the more extensive abbey— and throughout wide Britain, a sweeter retreat could :not have been chosen for holy men than the monastery of Old Melrose. There appears httle beyond tradition to mark a place of former * Thomson, the poet. THE LEISTER. 159 monastic celebrity ; and a spot where " the bells were rang, and the mass was sung," is now a lovely and wooded vale, encircled by a broad sweep of the river. It was a day of bright sunshine ; the stream was low ; the water clear and pellucid, and every pebble beneath "fair Tweed" was visible. On such a day, surely, that scaly visit ant, the salmon, might have considered himself secure, and set the angler at defiance. The finest gut, the fly of cunning device, the fisher's skill — all combined could not deceive. But, alas, in modes of mischief, what can surpass human ingenuity ! — and while resting in false security on the pebbled sand, like the sword of Damocles, over the devoted salmon the fatal leister* was impending. In my sight, spearing salmon is abominable. In Ireland no one thinks of torch and fish-spear but a poacher. No neatness, no skill is requi site ; a little practice, and you may murder fish ad libitum. In a sporting light, compared with fly-fishing, it is donkey-racing to the Derby. The place where the leister can be used is gene rally distant from the sea, in shallow pools or fords ; and, of a dozen salmon speared, eleven of them will be foul, and probably half as many more will be wounded, escape, and left to die at leisure. » Appendix, No. XIIL 160 SUNNING SALMON. In the romantic curving of the Tweed, I have just described, I observed a fellow, in the parlance ofthe border, sunning* salmon. Had I not de tested the act he was engaged in, I should have looked with pleasure on the picturesque appear ance which himself and tiny boat, shadowed in the clear and glassy stream, presented. As I gazed, the blow was struck, and a salmon raised to the surface, writhing„on the prongs. The fish had been lanced unskilftiUy — too near the tail — and his struggles at the surface freed him from the leister he was impaled upon. I was gratified at the escape — not that the fish was saved, but the poacher disappointed. " Go on !" I said to my driver ; " I would feel more pleasure at an eight o'clock exhibition at the Old BaUey ; for there the man is choked with more humanity, than the unhappy fish is butchered." I lament to say, that Tweed fishers, like poli ticians generally, consider that the end jus tifies the means ; and, provided the salmon is taken, care little what the mode may be by which he is secured. I look upon sunning and burning^ as the acts of privileged poachers — the capture of some unclean fish — the maiming and destruc tion of more. I hold it to be as unfisherly — that's a new word — in an angler to assassinate a sick salmon, as I would term it detestable in a hunter * Appendix, No. XIV. t Appendix, No. XV. RAKING. 161 to lay hounds on an enceinte vixen, or beagles on a wounded hare. But, as nemo fuit repente turpissimus, which, as the Irish translation ren ders it, will signify that a seven-years' appren ticeship is required to turn out an attorney, so a crowning villany is necessary to complete a finished poacher, and that is " raking." * I re member once seeing it practised from the bridge of Galway, when the river was low, and the sky cloudless, and I am moraUy convinced, that, for one fish taken, twenty were pricked. I really looked on with disgust, and meditated putting in a protest in form ; but having seen, at the pre ceding election, half-a-dozen freeholders, with a horse and jaunting-car, popped over the battle ments for dissenting from the mob politically, and fearing that a piscatorial difference of opinion might induce the pleasant people around me to commit my person to the water, and " rake" me afterwards out, I put my protest in my pocket, and left them to the iniquity of their ways. Nothing can be pleaded in extenuation by apologists for leister and rake-hook. What, though the salmon is a fish of passage,f are you to take him, in and out of condition, and, to secure one, probably inflict injury on three ? If * Appendix, No. XVI. t " AU this, to the southem ear, sounds like poaching of the most flagitious description ; but a salmon is a fish of passage, and if you do not get him to-day he will be gone to-morrow."— *c?-o;)«. VOL. II. M 162 THE WIZARD OF THE NORTH. he leaves you for a season, will he not faithfully return to his native stream ? He is now a dwarf, he will come back a giant.* Every con sideration — honour — interest — should secure protection for the wanderer. On many a fair place, fated for ages " to blush unseen," the painter has conferred celebrity ; but how cold the pencil's touch compared with the glowing imagery which the bard and novehst evoke, when heated fancy runs riot amid scenes teeming with romantic associations! To un derstand this, read Byron, and go to Greece ; or read Scott, and visit the Border, Auld Reekie, and the Highlands. Every body knows, if he know anything of Scottish history, that the wild and lovely district which the poesy and prose of the " Wizard of the North" has immor talized, scarcely fifty years ago, was, even to the curious, a sort of terra incognita; and that scenes, now visited by thousands, were only known at that not distant day, to the shepherd, the smug gler, and the outlaw. To those who have wan dered over that fairy region where Scott received his brightest inspirations, it would be idle to observe, that, its existence once ascertained, the admiration of every worshipper of nature must follow. But it is to objects of inferior interest that the preceding remarks apply ; and of their * Appendix, No. XVII. SMAILHOLME TOWER. 163 truth the ramble of this morning gave ample evidence. A lonely peel-house on the northern extremity of Roxburgh, built on a rocky knoll which crowns a high-ground, presents itself in bold relief against the sky, on every side by which the traveUer ap proaches. Gloomy and desolate, it still exhibits the appearance of being better preserved than these small and isolated fortalices have been gene rally. With the union of the crowns they ceased to be regarded ; useless as strongholds, comfort less as dweUings, they were abandoned, and went rapidly to decay ; and beyond the Border, with occasional exceptions, nothing beyond a shapeless ruin now remains, to mark the site where stood the once lofty tower of the moss-trooper. Of these exceptions, Smailholme fortunately is one. I visited it this morning, and the visit amply re compensed the walk. It is an edifice of the common construction — a square tower, four stories high, with outer buildings attached to it — the latter ruinous. The lower floor and roof — both stone arches — are tole rably perfect, as is the winding stair by which the bartizans on the top of the tower may be gained. The lower chamber is merely a vault, lighted by a narrow shot-hole, and used, most likely, as a store-room. The state apartment was on the floor above. On three sides it is lighted M 2 164 smailholme's lady gay. by windows of tolerable size, with stone benches on either side ; and a huge chimney occupies the fourth. Two apartments were over head. The floors are fallen, but still there are appearances which would indicate that these might have been the chambers of a lady; and internal arrange ments lead to the inference, that Smailholme had within it some simple comforts required for the residence of the fairer sex. With his usual tact, Scott selected it as the fitting abode of Border beauty — "Smailholme's lady gay'' — and the scene of one of his most exquisite ballads. I mounted the southern bartizan by traversing the wall on which the fallen floor had rested, and a noble and expansive panoramic scene burst upon the view,* and well repaid the risk of crossing the giddy height ; small, indeed, from the * Each window commands " a distinct landscape, remarkable both for beauty and extent. From that looking to the south, one beholds a lovely and well-cultivated country, finely wooded, and watered by the Tweed and Teviot, and bounded by a beautiful range of the Cheviot mountains. Going to the eastern window, one thence looks along the Vale of Tweed, down the banks of which rises, above the trees, the smoke of the fair town of Kelso, and then roams over the rich Merse, stretching, in aU its homely beauty and high ciUtivation, away to the German Ocean. On the left, stand at some distance, in bold relief against the sky, the majestic ruins of Hume Castle, the ancient seat of the once powerful family of the Homes. * * * The view to the west is equaUy exten sive and varied. High above a crowd of humbler eminences rise the famous EUdon Hills, that witnessed of old the magical exploits of Michael Scott, and form an important, peculiar, and romantic feature in the scenery ofthe Tweed." scott's ballad. 165 enormous thickness of the building. An end less expanse of landscape was around, but on more immediate objects my eye was turned : I looked — " down the rocky way That leads to Broth erstone ; " by which the jealous baron departed from his lonely tower, to take a husband's vengeance on his too-successful rival. And there was the rugged knoll, where " My lady each night, sought the lonely light. That burned on the wild, watchfold," to hold her secret interview with that " gay deceiver," the gaUant knight of Coldinghame. And here, where I sate, and after the completion of a deed of blood, the vindictive baron con fronted the fair and erring dame : " He passed the court-gate, and he ope'd the tower-gate. And he mounted the narrow stair, To the bartizan-seat, where, with the maids that on her wait, He found his lady fair." The visit of the murdered knight, the boldness with which " love master'd fear," and the terrible evidence given by the dead gaUant, " that lawless love is guilt above," is given in Scott's happiest style. By the way, the incident is not new, and has been probably taken from the celebrated " tale of terror," said to have occurred in the Beresford family :* * Appendix, No. XVIII. 166 scott's ballad. " He laid his left palm on an oaken beam. His right upon her hand ; The lady shrunk, and fainting sunk. For it scorched like a fiery brand. " The sable score of fingers four Remains on that board impress 'd ; And for evermore, that lady wore A covering on her wrist. " There is a nun in Dryburgh bower. Ne'er looks upon the sun, — There is a monk in Melrose tower, He speaketh word to none. " That nun, who ne'er beholds the day. That monk who speaks to none — That nun was Smaylho'me's lady gay, That monk, the bold baron." The oaken beam which bore the fiery imprint of the spectre's hand, like the frailer wrist of the frail lady, has mouldered into dust ; and of Smailholme Tower, stone and iron alone have stood the assault of time. The stone work is tolerably perfect and has been recently repaired — lauded be the hand that did it ! — and an iron grating of an upper window looking on the Eil don Hills, is still complete. The huge stanchions on which the hinges of the lower grate pivoted are perfect, and sufficiently prove, from their massive dimensions, that the door which they supported was constructed at a period, when un bidden visitors made midnight calls, and " Oft the Tynedal snatchers knocked At the lone door, and proved it locked." A DOUBLE FRATRICIDE. 167 Beside " the eiry beacon hiU," on the oppo site heights of SmaUholme, two tall and upright stones attract the eye, and excite the traveller's inquiry. If tradition may be trusted, they stand there as sad memorials of human crime, and record a double fratricide. Two brothers are said to have perished by each other's hand, and these stones mark the place where the un natural deed was done. With Smailholme there are other and in teresting recollections. It was a spot where Scott, in boyhood, indulged in many a romantic dream, which his magic painting afterwards em bodied — and this rocky tower is said to be the original of the castle of Avenel — a supposition not borne out by appearances, as between the real and imaginary buildings and localities not the remotest resemblance can be traced. CHAPTER XIIL visit to holy island ST. CUTHBERT NECROLOGIC REMINI SCENCES A GENTLEMAN WHO LIVED A PLEASANT LIFE PHILOSOPHY AND MUSIC A DISTURBED BAGMAN PUBLIC REFORM PASSAGE TO HOLY ISLAND ACCIDENTS FREQUENT LINDISFARN MARMION AND MISS BEVERLEY CASTLE ON HOLY ISLAND ITS SEIZURE THE ERRINGTONS DEATH OF THE ELDER. I HAVE at last carried my good intention of visiting Holy Island into effect, and Pande monium has an abated debt to me for its pave ment.* I have chosen a fitting season for the excursion. The tide answers for entering "the saint's domain;" and a night and day of con tinuous rain, falling not by the drop but by the bucket-full, will cause such a kick-up in the Bor der rivers, that for a week to come, the angler's " occupation's gone." I looked over the bridge before I quitted Berwick, and " silver Tweed " had changed its characteristic, and become one of the most copper-coloured streams imagin able. I will allow the perturbed river to recover * Churchmen aver that hell is " paved with good intentions." ST. CUTHBERT. 169 its good looks again, and in the interim, pay a visit to the favourite island of the woman-hating bishop. Scott (I think) happUy describes St. Cuthbert as one of the most unsettled saints in the calendar. In life, he was often on the move, and passed his time, if churchmen may be cre dited, in high excitement — one night cheered by holy visitations, and the next not permitted to close an eye by demoniac temptations. One would have naturally imagined that when he reached " that resting place, the grave," he would have been regularly tired out ; but even there he ap pears to have taken out a roving commission, and could not find "snug lying in any abbey," to which for a couple of centuries, in quick succes sion, his followers transported the sainted carcase. When the frequent descents of the northern rovers obliged the holy community to abandon Lindisfarn, they carried off the dead bishop. Divers cemeteries were tried, but Cuthbert objected to the accommodation ; and when the poor monks fancied that they had him safely sodded, the unconscionable saint was pre paring to bundle off again. His last excursion was down the Tweed in a stone boat ; and as no more is heard of future migrations, it is possible that he had fairly tired out his * Appendix, No. XIX. 170 NECROLOGIC REMINISCENCES. friends and admirers, and, reluctantly obliged to quit earth, as the Irish ballad says, he " Went to heaven by water." As we drove along, my border Phaeton, who was " the discreetest of whips,'' favoured me with the names of the places that we passed, generallyaccompanied with a characteristic sketch of the proprietor. His necrologic, however, were always much more interesting than his living notices. It might be that the past were a pleasanter generation than the present — or that, reversing the old saw, which inhibited all disclo sures touching defunct gentlemen, except those that would be complimentary to their memory, honest jarvey properly considered, that a person is beyond moral and physical damage after he has been for twenty years under a ton weight of freestone. " Ye see yon big red hoose ?" he said. " Ay, that bleak, brick building on the hill." " Jist so," he returned ; " that was auld Archie Macsomebody's," (I forget what the addendum to the Mac was, but the loss is not important ;) " Weel, he died unco rich, and feth ! no wonder ; for he half-starved himself, and whole-starved the servants. He always bought the wickedest bull that could be found within the Lothians to pit upon his waterside parks, and scare the boys NECROLOGIC REMINISCENSES. 171 away, for fear they would after a spaight, catch a few troots in the burn for their supper ; and he kept the crossest mastiff in the country, to prevent the lasses coortin' awhee after he went to bed himsel, and that would be as soon after sunset as he could, to save the grease that was burnt in the cresset. Jist think, sir, of a puir lassie obliged to sit shivrin' in the dark, or gang off tUl her lonely bed, and she kennin weel there was a lover in the lane, afeard to cross the palins, lest a furious brute that was bellowin' like a bull, should tare the claithes from off his back, and lave him bare as a scarecrow. They say the auld deevil walks." * " And so he should," I returned. " Were I on the court-martial of the antiquated sinner, he should do duty in the outlying picket of a regi ment of ghosts, for a century and a half — fifty years for the bull and boys, and a hundred on account of the mastiff and the maid-servants. Who lives in yonder house, whose chimneys barely top the trees ?" " Nobody," replied the driver, " but a hind or two — it's gone to decay these twelve years. He was a quare body that lived in it last, and he could say the night he died what naebody could say but himsel." " And what was that, my friend ?" * Haunts some place. 172 A GENTLEMAN " Why, that fbr three and twenty years he had never been sober but the eveniii' he mad his will ; and then, honest man, he could na keep long enough frae the liquor till sign it properly." " What a pity ! after mis-spending a day in sobriety." " Augh — but he was a sair chiel ! He cam, ye see, unexpected into the estate ; and frae the day he got possession an' got drunk for joy, he never afterwards was sober. He was nae a bad scratch upon the fiddle, when he was no too drunk to grip the bow ; and a' he cared for in this world was music and hot toddy." "And that house I am looking at was therefore, the very temple of Bacchus and Apollo." " Of who, sir ?" inquired honest jarvey with a stare. " I mean, it was the place that witnessed, for three and twenty years, an eternal scraping upon catgut, and consumption of whisky punch." " Na, na," observed the driver, " he niver lived at home above a week in the twalmonth. The hoosekeeper used to scold the dairymaid, and as the laird was a lover of harmony and peace, he always went for quiet to an inn." " A devihsh out-o'-the-way place, my friend, for a man to look for quiet." " Weel, he was a grand customer, only the fiddle was a desperate drawback, ye ken. He WHO LIVED A PLEASANT LIFE. 173 niver went to bed himsel ; an' if any deevil would sit up, he would gie him as much drink as he could pit doon his thrapple, and inair music, may be, than his lug would like." " Ay, but it was quite discretionary with the guest how long he would stand the thing ; he had only to balance the lug against the thrapple ; and if the fiddle had the best of it, he could bolt, you know, at last." " Ah, na — but that was nat all. Ither people sleepit in the hoose, ye ken, an' they did na like to have their rest broken wi' fiddling an' fule sangs ; so th6 landlord had just one choice left — whether he would keep the laird or the travellers. It's true the laird was a grand customer, — ye might score any thing ye pleased against him, and he would na, an' could na object to the account : but, gude as he was, many a hoose was glad to get quit of him." I began, ut mos est, to moralize. What an anacreontic life the ex-proprietor of the house among the trees had led ! An unbroken span of nearly a quarter of a century, passed in swilling toddy, and " discoursing most eloquent music ! " How perfect, too, was the laird's philosophy ! His housekeeper was a shrew, the dairymaid, no doubt, what Cockneys term " wary aggrawating." Why should the honest laird compromise one hour of his jovial existence ? " what was Hecuba 174 PHILOSOPHY to him?" — and why permit his punch to cool, or his bow to rest upon the catgut, while he listened to an antiquated besom vituperating a bucolical* assistant. Like a man of sense, he left these viragos to themselves, and sought a home where he was certain, if Shenstone can be credited, to receive " the warmest welcome." Alas, for the restricted happiness of humanity! that boasted welcome after all was but conditional. " The landlord tauld the laird, he might drink till he was black in the face, gin he wud let the fiddle bide." Let the fiddle bide ! what a gothic pro position ! a soul attuned to harmony like his, forego an instrument on which, like another Orpheus, he could all but " Soften rocks, and bend the knotted oak." Was there a night on which his minstrelsy did not prove his power ? Did he commence " Roy's wife," a terrific peal upon the bell summoned the startled waiter to the dormitory of some in furiated bagman, to receive from him a regular notification that with daylight he would quit the premises for ever. No rapturous encore rewarded his most brilliant fantasia ; but possibly, a message from the mother of a sick chUd deprecated its repetition, vrith an assurance that the last aria, * A genteel term, by which Sir Percy Shafton designated ladies attached to the dairy. AND MUSIC. 175 had thrown the hopes of her house into strong convulsions. And how many are there in this whirligig world, although unfitted for " stratagems and murders," who do not care one brass button for " the concord of sweet sounds !" Fancy some unhappy manufacturer reaching the inn which the laird had made his temporary abiding place. He, the traveller, had set out probably from Leeds or Bradford, to try what effect personal remon strance might have on dilatory correspondents. He has had a weary drive, over bad roads, in stormy weather. In one town he discovered, that a gentleman, who had taught him book keeping extensively, had levanted with a neigh bour's wife ; in the next, he heard that another, chronicled also deeply in his ledger, had suddenly emigrated to America, and from excessive sen sibility, had shpped away under cover of the night, to save his numerous admirers the agony of a parting. Well, he arrives late at the hostelrie, a sadder but not a richer man, than when he had, two days before, kissed his wife and desired her to look sharp after the ap prentices. He sups, swallows a hot tumbler;* possibly, adds a second to restore animal warmth, and re-establish mental tranquillity. Boots has * This phrase is an Hibemicism, — and means that the traveller did not swaUow the glass, but merely the glass-full. 176 A DISTURBED BAGMAN. removed his shoes, and " continuations " — the chambermaid inducted him to his dormitory, — he is speedily ensconced below the blankets — and wisely resolving, that bad roads and bad debts shall not rob him of his rest, he incon tinently becomes fast as a watchman. Blessed visions gild his slumbers. He dreams that one fugitive has made " all right," by returning his neighbour's wife, and resuming his pristine business ; and fancies that the American levanter had offered ten shUlings in the pound. Alas! these pleasing phantasies are rudely dispelled. Sounds invade his ear which may be imagined as proceeding from the sharpening of a saw, or a cat in violent hysterics. It is the laird's Cre mona — he has mistaken the traveller's for the barmaid's door — and, apposite enough, the tune he has selected for his serenade, is " Hey, Johnny Cope, are ye waukin yet ?" — Of course the bell-rope is torn down, the melodist con signed to the devil; and a vow piously registered in heaven, that he, the disturbed one, will never again darken the door of the Black Bull, while his name is Peter Robinson. Would that the mischief that the laird in^ flicted were only fated to fall upon " Bezo- nians," like bagmen, and other lookers after bad debts. Might not the patriotic visions of " some viUage Hampden " be dispelled by that PUBLIC REFORM. 177 infernal instrument — or Joe Hume bothered in monetary calculations, if he were taking his snooze in the Black Bull. One may imagine the ex-member for Kilkenny wending his way "cannily" to toun, before the supplies were voted. Well, the Black Bull being what the Cocknies call a " cheap and nasty" establishment, there honest Joseph would hang out. Alive to the distress of the country, and indignant at the profligate ex travagance of ministers — Whig or Tory, all the same — whUe others sleep, he is concocting mea sures for military retrenchment. He has estab lished by mental calculation, and beyond a doubt, that by a sweeping reform in barrack brooms, the public will be benefited 15/. 13*. ll^d.; while the abolition of lace upon drummers' jackets would produce a further saving of the tottle is almost reached, when the cursed laird strikes up " TuUichgorum " underneath, and early associa tions, setting Joe's nervous system in a jig, annihilate the whole concatenation anent brooms and drummers accordingly. For three miles "the Saint's domain" was visible, and we reached the estuary which severs it from the main at dead low water. It is necessary for the traveller who visits Holy Island to be correct in calculating the state of tide — " For, with the flow and ebb, its style Varies from continent to isle ; VOL. II. N 178 PASSAGE TO HOLY ISLAND. Dry-shod, o'er sands, twice every day. The pUgrims to the shrine find way ; Twice every day, the waves efface Of staves and sandaled feet the trace.'' By a proper regard to the time, ingress to the island is secure at all seasons ; although the " dry-shod " portion of the passage must have the advantage of poetical license extended to it. Carelessness, however, and thick weather, have produced frequent loss of life — and from the recklessness with which people tarry in the island and on the main, or foolishly attempt shorter cuts across the estuary, so many hair-breadth escapes have occurred, that the wonder is, that human life has not been more frequently and more extensively sacrificed. According to island tradition, many serious calamities have fallen out. One (I fancy it apo cryphal) mentions the loss of a carriage and four, in which all, passengers, postillions, and horses, were swept to sea, and there their history closed, for neither body nor wreck was ever found. Within late years several individuals have perished ; and not long since, the escape of a gentleman's family was miraculous. They had visited the island for a day, and im prudently remained too long. On their return, the tide was rising — and, although the flood advanced like a river, they madly persevered. The water rose to the horses' knees — the post- ACCIDENTS FREQUENT. 179 boy's boots — at last it entered the carriage ! The order was given to return, but that order nearly came too late, for the next moment the horses lost their footing, and the carriage was filled to the seat. Fortunately, the tide swept the horses round, and they caught the sand again ; the main land was regained ; and the ladies declared "upon honour," that nothing but an interchange of nuptial vows at the shrine of St. Cuthbert, should ever tempt them to visit his " domain " again. Some care has been taken to mark the track which the wayfarer should follow, and small pUes of stones, with an occasional post, here and there fixed in the sands, will sufficiently indicate it. An hour brought us safe across — and we stopped at a comfortable inn, close to the ruins of the once proud pUe of Lindisfarn. Although, with the exception of the body and chancel of the ancient church, the monastery, like Norham castle, is merely a confused heap of ruins, enough of the " solemn, huge, and dark red pile" remains, to enable the visitor, with a httle exercise of the imagination, to fancy that, in its palmy days, Lindisfarn held a high place among the monastic estabhshments of the times. The area over which its various offices extend, is traceable by many a heap of ruined masonry, and gives sUent proof of its former importance. Happy as Scott has been in colouring the " castied n2 180 lindisfarn. steep" of Norham, with the "faery tinting of romance," he has been even more successful, in giving to the " ancient monastery's halls " a dramatic and engrossing interest. I am never half so romantic as after dinner — and let Father Mathew preach what he pleases, nothing subhmates the imagination, and sends it towering above sublunary considerations, like genuine whisky — of course, the same being judiciously diluted. I strolled to the further point of the green knoll on whose northern extremity Lindisfarn stood — and, on the ruin of a wall, that formed once a place of arms with a small square tower in the centre, I seated myself, with " Marmion " for my companion. If Melrose should be visited by " pale moon-light," Lindisfarn must be viewed when the sun, " with disk, like battle -target red," is sinking in the distant horizon. While gazing on the venerable pile, fancy flew back to days gone by, and though " The wasting sea-breeze keen Had worn the pUlar's carving quaint — And mouldered in his niche the saint — And rounded, with consuming power. The pointed angles of each tower" — I could not see the abbey as it was, but as it had been, and in my mind's eye witnessed the arrival of " Whitby's lofty dame," to sit in judg ment on that victim of man's falsehood — the fair and erring " sister professed of Fontevraud." Ah, MARMION AND MISS BEVERLEY. 181 my Lord Marmion, though you could moralize very prettily* after the mischief was done, you were no better than Captain Smith, of wicked memory — you treated Miss Constance Beverley most abominably — and could you expect better luck at Flodden than you had ? From the conical form of the rock and castle, its appearance is more grotesque than command ing, and it wants the dignity and air which, generally, old fortresses possess. No doubt, in olden time it was considered an important hold, as it stands upon a precipitous rock, impracticable on every side but the southern. On that side, and in the face of the cliff, a traverse was scarped out by which the summit could be gained ; and on its narrow crown, the batteries and buildings forming the defences, were erected. The guns of the castle looked principally upon the water ; but • " Alas ! " he thought, " how changed that mien. How changed those timid looks have been, Since years of guilt and of disguise Have steeled her brow, and armed her eyes ! No more of virgin terror speaks The blood that mantles in her cheeks ; Fierce and unfeminine, are there. Frenzy for joy — for grief, despair: And I the cause — for whom were given. Her peace on earth, her hopes in heaven ! Would," thought he, as the picture grows, " I on its stalk had left the rose ! Oh why should man's success remove The very charms that wake his love ! " Marmion, Canto III. p. 15L 182 CASTLE ON HOLY ISLAND. like all strongholds which trusted to a plunging fire, their offensive means were very ineffective. Before the invention of that villanous com position, gunpowder, places of arms prided themselves less on their power of annoyance than their capability of resistance. Even to the middle of the last century, mihtary projectiles were imperfectly understood, and clumsily em ployed. The Chevalier marched from Edin burgh to meet Sir John Cope, with one iron gun dismounted on a cart ; and that its calibre could not have been extensive, may be collected from the fact, that the whole apparatus — cart, gun, with all its munitions of war — were drawn by a Highland j)ony ! If the pare of an array in the field was on such an unpretending establishment, the siege-trains of the times, no doubt, were on a proportionate scale. Hence, any place perched upon high ground, had little to dread but escalade or famine ; and fortresses, which then were con sidered of such importance as to arrest the progress of an army, would, in modern times, be abandoned at the appearance of an advanced guard. The antiquity of the castle of Holy Isle is ascer tained — but its former value is confirmed by its having been placed on the military establishment of Elizabeth, with a salary to the governor of 362/. ]7«. 6d. for life. Its worthlessness (last ITS SURPRISE. 183 scene in its eventful history !) may be collected from the singular fact, that it was seized and might have been secured for the Pretender by two men, — the skipper of a trading vessel, and his nephew. The foUowing very curious account of this transaction is copied from the " History and Antiquities of Durham,"* a work of extraordinary research. " One Lancelot Errington, a man of an ancient and respectable famUy in Northumberland, and of a bold and enterprising spirit, entered into a conspiracy for seizing this castle for the Pre tender; in which, it is said, he was promised assistance, not only by Mr. Forster, the rebel general, then in arms, but also by the masters of several French privateers. At this time the garrison consisted of a Serjeant, a corporal, and ten or twelve men only. In order to put this scheme in execution, being well known in that country, he went to the castle, and after some discourse with the Serjeant, invited him and the rest of the men, who were not immediately on duty, to partake of a treat on board of the ship of which he was master, then lying in the harbour ; this being unsuspectedly accepted of, he so well plied his guests with brandy, that they were soon incapable of any opposition. These • By WUliam Hutchinson, F.A.S. 184 THE ERRINGTONS. men being thus secured, he made some pretence for going on shore, and with Mark Errington, his nephew, returning again to the castle, they knocked down the sentinel, surprised and turned out an old gunner, the corporal, and two other soldiers, being the remainder of the garrison, and shutting the gates hoisted the Pretender's colours as a signal of their success ; anxiously expecting the promised succours. No reinforcement coming, but, on the contrary, a party of the king's troops arriving from Berwick, they were obliged to retreat over the walls of thecastle among the rocks, hoping to conceal themselves under the sea-weeds tUl it was dark, and then by swimming to the mainland, to make their escape ; but the tide rising, they were obliged to swim, when the soldiers firing at Lancelot, as he was climbing up a rock, wounded him in the thigh. Thus disabled, he and his nephew were taken and conveyed to Berwick gaol, where they continued till his wound was cured. During this time he had digged a burrow quite under the foundations of the prison, depositing the earth taken out in an old oven. Through this burrow he and his nephew, and divers other prisoners escaped ; but most of the latter were soon after taken. The two Erringtons, however, had the good fortune to make their way to the Tweedside, where they found the custom house boat ; they rowed themselves over, and DEATH OF THE ELDER. 155 afterwards turned it adrift. From thence they pursued their journey to Bambrough castle, near which they were concealed nine days in a pea- stack ; a relation who resided in the castle supply ing them with provision. At length, travelling in the night by secret paths, they reached Gates- head-house, near Newcastle, where they were secreted, till they procured a passage from Sunderland to France. A reward of 500Z. was now offered to any one who would apprehend them ; notwithstanding which, Lancelot was so daring as soon after to come into England, and even to visit some of his friends in Newgate. After the suppression of the rebellion, he and his nephew took the benefit of the general pardon, and returned to Newcastle, where he died about the year 1746 ; as is said, of grief at the victory of CuUoden." CHAPTER XIV. RETURN TO BERWICK EPISTLE IN REPLY — ANECDOTE — NO JUS TICE FOR IRELAND LETTER FROM THE STOUT GENTLEMAN FAREWELL TO THE BORDERS A LOWLAND MANSION A SCOTTISH LANDLORD ROUTES TO INVERARY REST, AND BE THANKFUL ANGLING IN GLENCROE CARRICK CASTLE JOURNEY TO LOCH AWE — ANECDOTE. I RECEIVED, my dear Jack, a packet on my return to head-quarters — the King's Arms — after, by the especial protection ofthe sainted Cuthbert, effect ing a safe passage from Holy Island ; and among several letters, recognised one superscribed in the well-known handwriting of my esteemed kinsman, thyself. By the way, as Tony Lumpkin says, " a d — d crabbed piece of penmanship " it was ; but you're too old now to reform your cacography. And so, some playful neighbour slipped a bullet through the new tenant's cota more ! * WeU, it was only serving him with a plain '" notice to quit," and also in strict accordance with the simple practice recommended by those learned pundits who legislate in Daniel's new •' Great coat. ANECDOTE. 187 court of equity — the martyred magistrates. And you affect surprise and displeasure ! Now, Jack, take care that your own conduct will pass muster, not in Heaven's chancery, but on the Corn Exchange. Have you played off no Sassenach tricks ? Are you guiltless of Saxon tyranny ? Have you not remonstrated against waste of land, or trespass upon turbary 1 Or — climax of oppression ! — have you driven some refractory bog-trotter, who, declining to pay rent, and still continue, like his enslaved father, " a here ditary bondsman," nobly struck for freedom, and made himself, Hibernice, " a freeholder ?" If you have put this honest gentleman's cattle in the pound, why the sooner you slip across St. George's Channel the better. Remain, and, as Jack Falstaff says, " By the Lord, you're past praying for !" In the long catalogue of Irish grievances — and their name is legion — one crying insult put upon the " first gem of the earth " has, by a strange oversight, escaped the loyal Repeal Association. I shall tell it to you. I happened to be in " the far West " when the news of King William's death arrived ; and the servant waiting at table, overheard me read the announcement from an English newspaper. The window was open, and when the chief butler left the room, he hurried to the yard to 188 NO JUSTICE FOR IRELAND. communicate the demise of royalty to the stable man, who was at the time throwing litter into a cart. The out-door gentleman listened to the sad tidings, grounded his pitchfork, and cogitated for a moment ; then, slapping his thigh, exultingly exclaimed — " Death a nagers ! isn't that great news ? Mona sin diaoul! if Dan's not made up for life !" The butler looked surprised. " Arrah, how do ye make that out, Phil ?" " Make it out!" replied he of the pitchfork. " What would hinder me ? Why, ye see, he'll jist cut over to Englan' — and marry the widda." " Be Gogstay, and it's truth ye're spakin'. But maybe she wouldn't take him ?" " Is it not take Dan ? Troth an she'd jump at him. Snug and warm he'd keep her all her days — and a dacent king he would be." The butler shook his head. " No, no !" he muttered, with a heavy sigh. " As Father Luke Devlin said in his sarmin last Sunday — ' Dear Catthalics,' says he, ' af I talked myself black in the face, I could only come to what I said at the startin' — there's no justice for Irelan' — an ye see, Phil, that's what will dish Dan. That ould, cantankerous divU, Welltown, that the gintlemen shout about every night when they get hearty, as if they were drinkin' to Doctor Machale — WeU, the ould fella, ye see, can't NO JUSTICE FOR IRELAND. 189 abide the sight of the Counsellor, good nor bad, and as he'll be what they call the exaciter to the wiU, he'll put a spoke in Dan's wheel, as sure as my name is Peter Canavan." " Arrah, besides, Peter avourneeine, may-be they wouldn't like him nather, because he's of the ould religion ?" " Oh ! an the divU a wink's on ye, PhU. The bastes, that nivir think of keepin' Friday ! What could ye expect from them? My heavy curse upon them all!" " Amen !" responded he of the pitchfork. " That's the pariour beU ! Oh, murder, Phil Bradley! — Is'n't it rig'lar murder? No justice for Irelan ! Och hone ! Och hone ! " exclaimed the butler, as he ran away. Phil Bradley made a furious lounge at a sheaf of straw ; and a groan, deep as low C from a bassoon, which was emitted after the exertion of carting it, told silently that he felt the necessity of cutting all connexion with a country, which would not accommodate the Liberator with a wife, and refuse that poor act of atoning justice to a most interesting and ill-treated island. * * * * It appears that my despatches are dated from the corners of the earth — to wit — Connaught and the Orcades. I have a letter from the Stout Gentleman, obtesting my return to Shetland, by 190 LETTER FROM THE STOUT GENTLEMAN. every tie of friendship, and tumbler of toddy that we consumed in former wanderings. The wish shall be obeyed ; and a new route open to me a Highland tour, which I am assured abounds in scenic and traditionary interest. Much as the wild and savage grandeur of the Scottish coast may strike the eye of the visitor, they tell me that the scenery of interior-lakes and purple hiUs far exceeds in quiet beauty and picturesque effect, the bold and rough-hewn features of headland and promontory that I have seen already. Nous verrons: I commence my journey to-morrow. To say that I quit the Border with regret, would be but a cold expression of my feelings : for everywhere I went, and with everything I saw, I was by turns pleased and excited. He who wanders from the debouche to the source of Classic Tweed, will be dull as him who journeyed from Dan to Beersheba, if he complain that " all is barren." If, leaving the graceful bendings of the Border's boasted river, he follow through their native valleys the numerous tributaries which " Roll their bright waters to the Tweed" — how many scenes, rich in soft and varied beauty, will arrest the pilgrim's feet, while the finger of Romance points to the ruined tower, which once could tell " How sUver-sweet sound lovers' tongues by night;" FAREWELL TO THE BORDERS. 191 or, " startled at the bugle-horn" of some return ing moss-trooper, seeking safety in the lonely peel-house, after driving " his prey from Cum berland." * * * » My journey westward had nothing more to give it interest, than will be found in the accus tomed process of roofing a stage coach to Edin burgh, railing to Glasgow afterwards, and steam ing it finally to Loch , where I purpose stopping a few days at the mansion of a gentle man located on the very threshold of the High lands. * * * * In my desultory despatches, I sketched for you the domicile of a Highland Dunnewassail, and the dwelling of a Shetland Udaller.* I must draw you another portrait — the mansion of a Lowland gentleman. I shall not be too parti cular in marking the spot upon the map— but merely intimate, that, standing at the gorge of one of the most picturesque valleys which open from the many romantic sea-lochs which branch from the Clyde, it is now as approachable from every " point i' the shipman's card," as, a century back, it was rather too convenient to Rob Roy, a gentleman who differed with Mr. O'Connell on " fixity of tenure," as far as cattle went. Arcades * Appendix, No. XX. 192 A LOWLAND MANSION. amho — both traded in " Black-maU" — Rob — God be good to him ! — putting his faith in the claymore, whUe Daniel trusted to that safer tool, the begging-box. They lived, died, or will die — Rob, game to the last — and Dan, a capital Christian, denouncing breaches of the law and Saxon usurpation to the last ; and munificently bequeathing his all — five-and-forty young O's — a present to the country. Politics will be the spoil of me, and when I touch upon them, I become as oblivious as Dominie Sampson. I told you, I was the guest of a Lowland gen tleman. He is one of the many to be found in this land of commerce, who, by well-directed enterprise and success, has acquired a noble fortune ; and of the few also, who know how to employ well-won wealth, usefully as regards the community, and creditably to themselves. As the steamer passes the beautiful retirement, in which my valued friend is " wearing out life's evening grey," the traveller — unless he be a Kentucky man — will be delighted and surprised to see an imposing mansion in a domain of richly cultivated land, encircled with hanging woods, and half-concealed by trees the growth of generations ; the whole in picturesque lone liness, standing in a mountain gorge, and in the very midst of savage highlands. He will be told that, but half a century since, this glen was A SCOTTISH LANDLORD. 193 " barren all ;" those wooded heights were then without a bush ; and the verdant lawn and luxuriant corn-fields, were swampy moors and stunted heather. If he be — as I have often been — a guest, he will find within the mansion, all the elegancies of polished life, united to that hospi- tahty which comes warm from the heart, and gives inestimable value to a Highland welcome. If he look abroad — he will see a contented peasantry, constantly and usefully employed ; and in the comfortable cottage and well-clad family, read in strong though sUent characters, the invaluable blessings which a wealthy and liberal landlord disseminates over those, whose prosperity and happiness social order has rendered so depen dent on a superior. And has the laird his reward? Yes, and an abundant one. He does not meet, like you. Jack, sullen looks or slavering adu lation. If the bonnet be touched, he knows that token of respect is offered in true sincerity. The chUd smUes as he passes by, for it has been taught to regard him as its benefactor. Hedged round by happy homes, his own enjoys the blessed security which a moral land and educated com munity afford. With his own, he does what he pleases — and none presume to question his free agency. He lives respected and beloved — he dies, and his tenantry lament him as a common father. Mark the contrast which the different VOL. II. o 194 ROUTE TO INVERARY. relations existing between a kind landlord and a contented tenantry offer to your position, with that ruthless rabble who call you master ! I fancy I hear you whisper, "No more of that." Well — we'll not touch upon it. I bade a reluctant farewell to my most kind host and his " gentle ladie," and was ferried out to one of the numerous steamers which on the Clyde seem to "annihilate time and space." Two routes present an equal inducement to the traveUer who visits Inverary ; one by the waters of Loch GoU, the other by the picturesque valley of Glencroe. The latter, entered through a wild but pastoral gorge walled in by lofty high lands, is called Glenkinlass ; the road, a military one, commenced in 1748, and repaired twenty years after by the Welsh Fusileers. On the summit a stone commemorates the termination of what must have been a most laborious under taking. It bears the apposite inscription, " Rest, and be thankful," with the date of its first formation, and subsequent repairs by the twenty-third regiment, in 1768. The views occasionaUy presented, are, as may be imagined, grand and varied ; and if the wandering angler would fish a Highland lake rich in its native grandeur, let him step into the postman's gig at Arrochar, who will pick him up three hours after, when returning. If he be an adept in ANGLING IN GLENCROE. 195 " the gentle art," he will come back, generally, with a laden creel; and even should the mountain trouts, like a spoiled beauty, show the sullens, he will have traversed glens wild, picturesque, and lonely, as any by which the Western cateran drove off his Lowland plunder. I said that my route was by the lake. After entering Loch Goil, we passed the gloomy tower which gives a title to the Argyle family, as its hereditary keepers. Carrick, tradition says, was once inhabited by royalty ; if it were, a gloomier or ugher pile of masonry was never selected by a monarch of most accommodating taste. An hour's drive brought us from Loch Goil- head to the ferry of St. Catherine's, the route being through a glen, wUd, and occasionally beautiful, as Highland glens are always. It was toilsome work creeping up, for the vehicle, 'yclept coach, was full inside and out, and top pling with an enormous quantity of baggage. We managed, however, at last to crown the ridge — every passenger whose toes were "un- plagued with corns," toUing on foot to the summit. Hence, entering " the leathern con veniency," we proved the truth of Ensign Evan Dhu Maccombich's assertion, that " a haggis, God save her ! can charge down a hill." The coach run away with the horses, and embarked us in a steamer of such unsubstantial proportions, o 2 196 JOURNEY TO LOCH AWE. that one would fancy it had been built to order of Charon, and, designed for river navigation below, had only been intended to ferry those light-bodied gentry who, Shakspere says, are seen when unable to pay the fare, " waiting on Styx for waftage." I slept at "the George"— and early next morning, in a jaunting car, continued my journey to the North. A mountain road, of no great interest, led me to the ferry which crosses Loch Awe, and as the day was fine, I saw a portion of this extensive water to advantage. If there ever was lake which the poet-angler would haunt, it is this one, hallowed as it is by its scenic and romantic associations.* I might add piscatorial to the list. Midway across, a Lowland gentleman was fly fishing—and just as we came abreast of his boat, one of those fine trouts for which Loch Awe is celebrated, rose and was hooked securely. I would have willingly paid a smart consideration to the Highland ferryman to permit me to witness the contest and its close ; for the fish was power ful, and the angler evidently an artist. Some vile Bezonians, 'yclept cattle-drovers, however, declared themselves dissentient; — men, without a sporting sympathy, who would shoot a grey hen on the nest, or, in broad sunshine and * Appendix, No. XXI. ANECDOTE. 197 the face of day, assassinate a sleeping salmon : they had stots, gimmers, kyloes, and divers cattle, under sundry outlandish names, waiting their arrival — " an what was a troot at the end of a tow to them?" I cast many a longing, lingering look behind, as we pulled to the shore ; and from the attitude of the angler, and the motionless position of his skiff, I inferred that the contest was not concluded when we landed. The stranger remarked the interest I had evinced in the transaction, and before I resumed my journey, favoured me, en his return to the inn, with an inspection of his prize. A more splendid trout I never looked at — short, healthy, broad-shouldered, and seven pounds, honest weight—" Think of that. Master Ford." One word before I depart for Oban. If ever you have a sufficiency of taste to induce you to wander from that land of Goshen, to wit — the county of , and visit sober Scotland, put in three or four days at Loch Awe. Should a bright calm day inhibit anghng, row to Fraoch Elan,* an' ye love me ; and should the day be wet — nothing very remarkable in the Highlands — send to the village for some Octogenarian, and inquire from him the secret history of Loch Awe.f * The Isle of Heath. t Appendix, No. XXII. CHAPTER XV. DRIVE TO OBAN BEN CRUACHAN INN OF TAYNUILT CASTLE OF DUNSTAFFNAGE THE STONE OF SCONE THE RUINED CHAPEL DUNOLLY A SAINTLY VISITATION LEGEND OF CASTLE DUART ¦ MURDER OF GLENCOE FORT WILLIAM BEN NEVIS INVER LOCHY VALLEY OF ARKAIG AN ANCIENT CAMARADO — MY VISIT TO ARKAIG MILITARY RETIREMENT — HIBERNIAN SYMPOSIA. The drive from the hostelrie of Kilcrenan to Oban by Loch Etive is, in my opinion, one of the most interesting the traveller will find. The character of the scenery is wild and magnificent ; and the savage grandeur of the back-grounds particularly imposing. The surface here is regu larly highland ; and one of the noblest views imaginable can be had, in favourable weather, from either of the double summits of that mass of mountains, Ben Cruachan. The enormous proportions of this Alpine giant render it the prominent feature of the country it domineers. Rising, in sheer height, four thousand feet, with a base nearly twenty miles in circumference, it overlooks land and sea, lake and islet — far as the BEN CRUACHAN. 199 eye wiU range.* Here and there, portions of the ascent are crowned with natural wood — heath and mosses mark another section of the moun tain — towards the summit vegetation ends, and the double pinnacle which crowns it, presents an irregular surface of broken granite. Although I devoted a day to the ascent, it was not one "albo lapide notari." A mist, portending heat, ob scured all distant objects ; and, for what I might have seen, I must depend upon the guide's word entirely — these interesting islands, and heath-clad hiUs, like the Spanish Armada in the " Critic," being invisible for the best reason in the world. I slept at the vUlage inn of Taynuilt, and by wild and wooded passes reached Loch Etive, an arm of the sea, irregular in breadth, and rather * " The tourist looks down its red and farrowed sides into the upper part of Loch Etive, and over a magnificent group of moun tains, as far as Appin and Glenco, and has opened upon his sight the whole of the continental highlands from Rannoch as far as Ben Lawers and Ben Lomond, and beyond them to lands which only cease to be visible, because they at length blend with the sky. So marked also are their characters, so rocky and precipi tous their summits, and so varied their forins, that this ocean of hills excels, in variety as in picturesque character, aU other land scapes of mere mountains, excepting perhaps that from Ben Lair, in Ross-shire. The view on the open country is also very inviting. WhUe it looks down on the sinuosities of Loch Awe, and over the irregular lands of Lorn, bright with its numerous lakes, it displays all the splendid bay of Oban and the I/innhe Loch, with Jura, Isla, and all the other islands of the coast as far as Tiree and Coll, toge ther with the rude mountains of Mull, and the faint blue hills of Rum and Skye." — Chambers, 200 CASTLE OF DUNSTAFFNAGE. remarkable for its loneliness than beauty. Where its waters debouche into Loch Linne, opposite the island of Lismore, stand the ruins of one of the most celebrated places of strength in Scotland — the Castle of Dunstaffnage. The site of this interesting building is singularly commanding and romantic; and, from the bold position of the rock it occupies, forms a fine feature from whatever point it can be viewed. Its origin is lost in its antiquity — some dating it back to the invasion of the Romans, and making it coeval with the Tower of London. Here, some of the earlier of the royal race lived and died; and here, until removed to Scone, by Kenneth the Second, the sacred stone on which monarchs have been crowned for thirteen centuries, was deposited. Even the holy carcass of that uneasy churchman, the saint of Lindisfarn, did not make so many and extensive migrations as this sacred fragment of sandstone. Of course, tradition always speaks truth; and it gives the following circumstantial account of this invaluable appendage to royalty. It appears to be of Hebrew extraction— Jacob having made it his "pillow" in the plains of Luz. Gethelus, son-in-law to Pharaoh, next brought it into Egypt, and, being a cautious personage, acting from a hint from Moses, he determined to avoid the plague, and set out upon his travels, rather in heavy marching order for an THE STONE OF SCONE. 201 adventurer, he being encumbered, not only with his lady, but also with the hardest and holiest pillow upon record. After a short sojourn in Spain, Gethelus set out for Ireland, depositing the stone on Tara Hill; but, as history is silent on the subject, it is suspected he played truant to his spouse — married into one ofthe om/c? famUies, and left behind him a numerous progeny. The next moves made by this " rolling stone of for tune" was first to Dunstaffnage, and afterwards to Scone — and if adage may be trusted, this interest ing relic would never gather moss. Edward, that " ruthless -king," carried it off as a trophy of his success, and deposited it in the abbey, where it now remains. By subsequent treaty, its return to " the land of cakes" was guaranteed— but the promise remains still to be fulfilled. In West minster there seems to be a confounded " fixity of tenure" — and the stone of Scone seems to be as regularly planted there as the Irish Parliament. The double restoration will probably take place upon the same day ; and when the latter recom mences business in College Green, there is httle doubt the other will be stuck upon the top of Tara. Would not that be a great day for Ire land, Jack? Imagine the gracious Daniel re posing the nether portion of his person on the Scottish palladium, and receiving the first ad dress of the Irish Commons — as Penruddock 202 THE RUINED CHAPEL. conversed with the attorney — " in the open air !" Close to the castle are the ruins of the chapel of Dunstaffnage. Although roofless and dilapi dated, it still exhibits a rare memorial of the architectural beauty of other days. Once the resting-place of royalty alone, it has long been used for the purposes of general interment. What an impressive moral does it point, that " all is vanity!" Here the monarch and the hind fill kindred graves — and the dust the travel ler treads on may have belonged to the hand that wielded the sceptre or the sickle ! If a man would study Hamlet, let him put the volume in his pocket, and read it on a tomb-stone in Dun staffnage.* On reaching Oban, while dinner was being prepared, I visited the ruins of DunoUy, once the residence of the Lords of Lorn. Situated close to the town, its position renders it a very picturesque and interesting feature. The mound it crowns is elevated, commanding fine views of the beautiful bay it domineers, and the islands of * " Clarke remarks that a curious species of theft has been practised of late years by the poor in these parts, which is likely to create no smaU degree of confusion among the antiquaries of future ages. They frequently purloin the sculptured stones from the tombs of IcolmkUl, to place over the grave of a deceased rela tion, so that a shepherd or a fisherman may perhaps be found lying under the hieroglyphics, the heraldry, and the effigies of Caledonian kings." DUNOLLY. 203 Kerrera and Lismore. Its history is that of an hundred ruined strongholds — a changeful story of forfeitures and restorations — prosperity and reverse. In one point it has been more fortunate than many an Highland rooftree — it still remains in the possession of a descendant of the haughty family who erected it, although the potent chief has sunk into the private gentleman. I embarked in one of the steamers which navi gate the chain of lakes connected by the Caledo nian canal — passed the rugged island of Kerrera, and saw the dark town of Gylen, frowning from the rocky pinnacle it crowns. If it were in this desolate edifice that Alexander the Second re ceived an unexpected call from a couple of as ill-visaged saints as any in the calendar, no wonder the visitation was the death of him. Tradition thus describes the interview. " As his majesty lay in his bed, there appeared to him three men ; one of them dressed in royal garments, with a red face, squinting eyes, and a terrible aspect ; the second being very young and beautiful, with a costly dress; and a third, pf a larger stature than either, and of a still fiercer countenance than the first. The last personage demanded of him whether he meant to subdue the islands, and on receiving his assent, advised him to return home ; which warning he having neglected, died. The three persons were sup- 204 LEGEND OF CASTLE DUART. posed to be St. Olave, St. Magnus, and St. Columba. Indeed, whoever the pope was who canonized Olave and Columba, he might as well have added Bardolph to the bead-roll ; for if the poor king can be believed, an uglier pair of red-nosed Chris tians never obtained Catholic promotion. Among the many ruins studding the chffs and promontories which fringe the shores of Mull and classic Morven, one was pointed out with which a startling legend is connected, that Joanna Baillie has dramatized with some success — I mean, the lonely walls of Duart Castle, overlooking the entrance to the sound of Mull. It was a stronghold of the Macleans ; and, from the massive ruins of its huge keep, is supposed to have been originally constructed by northern rovers. Whoever might have been the builder, his successor appears to have had very loose notions of civil law ; and in his pro ceedings to obtain divorce, his method to effect a connubial separation was not exactly that practised in the Consistorial Court at present. He had married a sister of the Argyle of that day ; and, to settle domestic differences which arose, had recourse to a simple remedy. At low water, the lady was placed on an isolated rock which at high water was overflowed, and there left to perish. Fortunately, a passing boat MURDER OF GLENCOE. 205 rescued the devoted victim ; she was secretly restored to her family ; while, in full assurance of her death, this Highland Bluebeard honoured her with a fictitious funeral. In false security, and a belief that the murder was both committed and unsuspected, the savage chief boldly repaired to the capital. That visit terminated a ruthless career ; for in the street he was stabbed to the heart by Campbell of Calder, a brother of the ill-used lady. The views presented, as we steamed along, were beautiful and varied. The wooded heights of Appin ; the romantic opening of Lochs Creran and Leven, on the right ; the distant mountains — all, in turn, were seen to great advantage. Among the frowning hills, stretching from the Leven to Ballachulish, runs a wUd glen of singu lar interest and beauty. Many rivulets fall into it from the hills, and one stream intersects it — the Cona, so often mentioned in Ossian's song — on whose banks, as tradition asserts, the bard himself was born. Another and a more lamentable event has given this romantic glen a sad celebrity — the ruthless murder of the Macdonalds in 1691, forming probably the most blood-stained page in British history. The scene where the massacre of Glencoe was per petrated is still pointed out to the traveller, and a malediction upon its authors invariably bursts 206 FORT WILLIAM. from the herdsman's lips as he tells the tale of slaughter. I disembarked at Fort WUham, and spent the evening hour after dinner in examining a place of no small importance, forming as it did " lang syne" one of the old keys of the Highlands. It was first erected by General Monk, during the Protectorate, and named after the ancient castle in its immediate neighbourhood, " the gar rison of Inverlochy." It appears to have been a rude and ill-designed work, and hastily thrown up by military labour, and so extensive as to require two thousand men to form its garrison. After the accession of King William it was dis mantled and rebuilt, the scale being judiciously contracted, and masonry substituted for earth ; and with a new formation, it also received its present name. In "the forty-five" it resisted successfully for a month the adherents of Prince Charlie ; and, indeed, from the calibre of the siege train employed, and the respectful distance at which the breaching battery was thrown up, the place might have held out for ever. A company from a Highland depot now garrisoned the place, — and the barrack Serjeant, who ciceroned me round the ramparts, admitted that " although the duty was no ower much, the rheumatism, in winter, was the deevil ! " Ben Nevis lies in seductive vicinity, but I own. BEN NEVIS. 207 with shame, that I have declined an ascent. That of Ben Cruachan was, to me, a settler — and I am not man enough to venture a second time into the clouds, with five hundred feet additional to climb. And yet, to scientific gentle men, manifold are its attractions : a bird-fancier would be gratified by the distant prospect of an eagle's eyry ; a geologist, with combinations of red granite and brown porphyry passing human understanding; an artist, if the hill were with out its night-cap, might study Highland scenery from sea to sea ; and aerial-carriage companies experimentalize from a clear precipice of five hundred feet ; and, " in transitu," obtain a cargo of unmelted snow, or a few eaglets from the fissures in descending. I proceeded next morning by a much leveller and very interesting route, passing the venerable pile of Inverlochy, and the scene of the most brilliant victory of Montrose. With the florid colouring of romance, Scott has so faithfully described the leading incidents of the action, that a despatch could scarcely give them with more accuracy. I wandered for an hour over what I fancied was the field ; saw GUlespie Grumach — shame on the chief of such a glorious clan ! — view the battle from his galley, up sail and oar, and secure inglorious safety, while land, and loch, and river were crimsoned with the best blood of the 208 INVERLOCHY. brave and too-devoted Campbells. Much as I admire the admirable picture of Argyle's defeat, there is one feature that to me has always ap peared a foul libel upon gentlemen of the sword. Mercenary devil as Dalgetty was, he never would have desecrated the honoured carcass of Gus tavus for the value of the skin. It is a blotch upon the drawing — unnatural — absurd. I have seen a dragoon cry over a dead horse, as if he had lost a brother; and I have no doubt that the gallant Rittmaster would have yielded knight hood, even though conferred upon a battle-field, to have redeemed his favourite charger. Indeed I have always considered Sir Duncan Campbell nothing better than a blunderer ; a man who would not erect a sconce upon Drumsnab, and shoot a horse instead of a Highlander ! Shade of Dick Martin ! what would you say to that ?* My route lay midway between Forts WiUiam and Augustus, where, in a sequestered valley, a mile or two from Loch Lochy, an old compa nion had committed matrimony, and exchanged the claymore for the coulter. I procured a car, and proceeded to one of the sweetest and most secluded valleys which ever a retired soldier selected for calm and comfortable retirement. Accident had disclosed the existence of my ancient camarado, and on the romantic banks * Appendix No. XXIII. VALLEY OF ARKAIG. 209 of Arkaig* I found that he had estabhshed his household gods. Evening was closing when I reached this Highland domicile. There was no occasion to inquire if the owner were at home ; for on the car entering the little enclosure in front of the mansion, a plainly-clad gentleman advanced a dozen paces from his hall-door, and bade me a courteous welcome. The long interval of five-and-twenty years had elapsed since Captain Macdougal and I had parted. Our acquaintance had commenced at the foot of the greater breach of Badajoz, where both had fallen. In the morning we were removed by the same fatigue-party ; placed in the same hospital, side by side ; recovered under similar treatment and attendance ; crawled out in company until both were convalescent ; and each joined his own corps to follow out a soldier's fortune. He was drafted to India; I, with better luck, ordered with my regiment to Bel- * " This beautiful sheet of water, though only two mUes distant from Loch Lochy, in the Great Glen, through which so many tra veUers are now almost daily passing, is scarcely known to any but the shepherds who Uve in its vicinity. It is separated from Loch Lochy (into which it pours a dark and sluggish stream) by a vaUey which is traversed longitudinally by a line of rocky knoUs, clothed vfith oak and birch trees, among which are scat tered some large and hoary trunks of ash, alder, and hawthorn. " The scenery within these knoUs is exactly of the same de scription as the Trosachs of Perthshire ; and in one part the road through them is so completely overshadowed by the branches, as to have obtained the name ofthe dark mile." — Anderson. VOL. II. P 210 AN ANCIENT CAMARADO. gium. Waterloo gave me one step ; the vomita in the West Indies obliged me with another. On the night ofthe 19th of March, 1812, he lay in the ditch, a captain of Grenadiers ; I senior ensign of the Connaught Rangers. Thirty years afterwards we met again : he, a retired captain — I, a colonel and companion of the Bath. Such are war's fortunes ! I never knew the face that the operations of a quarter of a century improved. I was totally forgotten ; and I had to tax memory hard to recal my friend Macdougal — for the stalwart and broad-shouldered Highlander, who had led the storming-party so gallantly on the bloody night of Badajoz, had changed into a thin, lathy, stooped, and white-headed sexagenarian. " You are welcome, sir," he said, with the broad emphasis of Gaelic hospitality. " Do you remember me, Macdougal?" I said, as I wrung the offered hand of my ancient camarado. " Why faith, no," returned the Highlander. " And yet I lay beside you for three weeks in the convent of Santa Catalina!" The Celt started, lowered his shaggy eye brow, and peered into my face. " It cannot be," he murmured ; " the Irish youth was but a beardless boy — and you " " Are aU that's left of Denis O'Flagherty !" MY VISIT TO ARKAIG. 211 In a moment the Highlander had locked me in his arms ; bade me a thousand welcomes ; in troduced me to his domicUe and family ; and — " You both got regularly drunk, toasting dead men's memories in an ocean of hot toddy." No, Jack ! not exactly. Highland and Hiber nian heads are enduring vessels. I'll not make oath that the cock did not era' before we separated, and that " if we were na fou', i' faith we were na fasting." I remained with the worthy Captain a full week; shot grouse throughout the day, and stormed Badajoz regularly after dinner. His father-in-law, the old minister, was a guest, and, surcharged with the engrossing question of the exercise of Church patronage, he, worthy man, seeing me in utter ignorance touching the same, would have gladly enlightened my darkness upon the subject ; but, alas ! to his erudite dis quisitions. Captain Macdougal sported deaf adder. The irreligious commander, in one fell swoop, consigned Intrusionist and Non-Intru- sionist "to the DeU" — and we retreated from Burgos, and advanced upon Vittoria, while, night after night, the minister was obliged to return to the Manse, without being enabled to explain to me his views respecting lay-patronage, free-call, and the veto. That Mass John enter tained a strong affection for his son-in-law, I do p 2 212 MILITARY RETIREMENT. not question ; but I verily believe he would have wished him for a couple of hours snug in his old quarters — the convent of Santa Catalina. " Ye're ganging early hame, feyther," I over heard the Captain's helpmate remark to the minister, as she buttoned the old man's riding- coat. " Och ! Jenny, woman, I may as weel move hameward. They're cam' this evening as far as San Sebastian, as they ca' it. They ha' only buUt their batteries in a kirk-yard yet — mair shame for them for tumbhn' the coffins oot — and before they tak' the place, an' plunder the hooses, it will be midnight at the earliest." I have never seen a gentleman of the sword more comfortably and happily cantoned " in the down-hill of life," than my friend Allan Macdougal. A comely and a canny wife, a promising family, a fair competence, plenty without, and peace within— what more could man desire ? I have taken a reluctant farewell, my host insisting on accompanying me to Fort Augustus. It wUl be a busy and a wet evening, for we have to cross the Pyrenees, and fight Orthez and Toulouse afterwards. These extensive operations will consume an extra allowance of whisky toddy, and no common doch an durris must be drunk, when we embark finally in the Garonne. Well, if I do get drunk, I have Slender's consolation. HIBERNIAN SYMPOSIA. 213 that it will be " in honest company.'' There is comfort in the thought, for before now I have seen the winding up of a jollification with an ex-captain neither safe nor satisfactory. I recollect one of these dangerous symposia, at which I officiated when quartered in the north of Ireland. The host has long since gone to his account — ^his domicile is a ruin — and, as like other pleasant gentlemen, who lead short and merry lives, his memory has passed away, I may venture to sketch a scene from life in Ireland — remember, gentle reader — as it was. CHAPTER XVI. LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. It is many a year since I was, unhappily, an inmate in an Irish domicile, of which I might faithfully aver, that " none but itself could be its parallel." The house was buried among dreary mountains, the owner a privileged madman, the servants appeared as if they had been bred wUd, and only lassoed on the morning of your arrival ; in short, everything within the house and without the house was in exceUent keeping. Invariably at breakfast, either tea, sugar, or cream was reported absent without leave— and at dinner, before the meal had half concluded, the chief butler was either saluted with a flying plate, to rouse him to a sense of duty, or more probably, kicked out of the room altogether. When you went to bed — a favour seldom granted before the use of candles, even in winter, was un necessary — if the bed did not break down, and its supply of blankets was correct, it was sure to want a sheet or two. In summer, the LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. 215 windows would not lift ; and in winter, the fire smoked awfully, although it had the full ad vantage of free ventilation, from a cat having jumped through a pane the preceding day to avoid the civility of three terriers, who followed the example, each taking the square of glass which permitted the quickest egress. Once, I was astonished to find, on reaching my dormitory, an hour before dayUght — the expiring candle having regularly expired as I crossed the threshold ofthe chamber — that when I groped my way to bed, the bed felt absolutely like other beds, and was supplied vrith the customary " napery," as they call it here ; and at this ageeable dis appointment, I rejoiced exceedingly, and slept. When I awoke, a prompt discovery " checked my pride." I had reposed within a folded table cloth, which having been deluged by the overturn of an argosy of melted butter, was " rendered in capable," until washed again, and, I presume, obliged " a double debt to pay," and take the duty of a pair of sheets. I cannot say that bed- linen is improved by melted butter ; and when I awoke, "the laast taste in life," as an Irish gentlewoman once expressed it, of Eau de Cologne would not have been rejected. It was said by some, that a good deal of the madness ofthe proprietor of this pleasant mansion was affected. A man of gigantic size and 216 LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. strength, with the wildest expression of coun tenance imaginable, R always adopted a costume calculated to set off these personal ad vantages to the most. I have encountered him on the mountains, in August, as nearly naked as decency would permit, with a beard that would excite the envy of a Jew, and a straw hat, shaped like a Spanish sombrero, and overhung with a forest of heather and bog-myrtle. Throughout the country he was looked upon as a crazy desperado, and the immunity this character obtained for him was turned to excellent ac^ count. He trespassed on preserves — crossed interdicted mountains^no peasant inquiring whither he went, and the stoutest keeper slipping into some convenient gully, to let " the mad captain" pass, unchallenged and unseen. An English militia regiment was quartered in the next garrison, R scraped an acquaint ance with the officers, and in return for mess hospitality, half a dozen of the soldiers were invited to visit Mullaghmore. In an evil hour the invitation was accepted — and I, acting as guide, accompanied them to the scene of intended fes tivity. No person who had once been an inmate of the Captain's abiding place, would bring with him a second time, a horse above the value of an oyster man's. In stable management, R 's system was one of independence ; stall and halter LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. 217 were dispensed with; and consequentiy, the ; animal was left to amuse himself a discretion, iand choose any corner he might please. Still, it was not precisely the quarters which Major Dal- igetty would have selected for the steed, named- after the immortal Gustavus. The " provant " was irregular : if there was hay, there was no corn ; and if there was corn, there was no hay. '" Marry, good air," there was, however, in abun dance ; — the last gale had removed a moiety of the roof, and the gaUant captain appeared to be in no hurry to repair damages. We reached the point at which the mountain road diverged from the maU coach one, and the distance to the Captain's domicUe was a short mile. At the union of the roads a smithy had been erected — and under pretence of having a loose shoe fastened, I deposited my quadruped with the disciple of Vulcan, who, for a promised consideration, engaged to procure a feed of corn for the charger, and instead of a horse sheet, give him the use of his cota-more. I had reason to congratulate myself on the arrangement — for the smith informed me in a whisper, that the Captain had lately added to his stud a kicking mule, which he had obtained on easy terms from a traveUing tinker, " bekase, ye see, the mule, the divU blister him I had kilt one o' the chUder, out and out." 218 LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. Passing a rascally excuse for a plantation, where the broken trees bore silent testimony that every goat in the townland had bivouacked from the moment they had been planted, we reached the mansion in good time. The worthy host received his company with a view-holla— the cavalry were despatched to the stables — and in half an hour the banquet was announced. At this remote period, I can only generally remember, that the dinner consisted of a side of mountain mutton and three geese, seasoned with a couple of bottles of bad wine, and as much poteeine punch as would have filled a slipper bath, even to the overflow. I evaded drinking, under the plea of indis position : the Captain being spirit-proof, on him alcohol was as water; two of the guests were already on the carpet ; and the other four, in dif ferent degrees of drunkenness, announced their intention to boot, saddle, and ride home. Vain were the entreaties of the host ; and vainly did he recount a long and alarming list of broken bridges and cruel murders. Pot-valiantly, the militia-men determined to take the road ; and the gaUant Captain, finding his solicitations un availing, at last gave a reluctant consent, and went out to order the horses to the door. Some time elapsed, a doch an durris was drunk solemnly, and the cavalry were at last announced LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. 219 in waiting. Never had a few hours made a more awful alteration in a stud. Four bays and browns, in effective condition, had entered the Captain's stables ; and now, when they were brought out, it was discovered that the mule had lamed two of them for life, and the other twain had miraculously changed colour. The truth was, that the worthy host, having a predilection for greys, had subjected the quadrupeds to an innocent experiment ; for on their arrival at his mansion, he had directed a couple of the chargers to be whitewashed, without consulting the pro prietors. It is said, that under the influence of fright, men's hair has whitened in a night ; but that a horse should become grey in the course of an evening, was a mystery that the owners could never comprehend, and they departed neither satisfied with the change, nor exactly aware of the causes that had produced it. A kindlier farewell was never interchanged between host and guest. Captain R could not have expressed more anxious solicitude for the soldiers' safe arrival at the barracks — no, had they been his brothers. To ensure their security, he enumerated certain parts of the road, which in an Insurance Office would have been set down as " doubly hazardous ;" implored them to pass hedges at a canter, to frustrate a dehberate aim — observed that he practised what he preached, 220 LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. for, on the preceding Wednesday night, owing to his rapid movements, a bullet intended to form a deposit among the lower ribs, was for tunately inserted in his cloak case, three inches from the back-bone. Should any misfortune occur, he begged the survivor to apprise him of the particulars, and also name the day of the funeral. " You're pretty safe to the end of the avenue, but when you come to the plantation — in with the spurs ! " — " were the last words of Marmion." " Why the devil do you frighten the unfortu nate men ?" I said, when the strangers had cantered off. " Why, they'll ride in fear and terror until they reach the barrack-gate." " I'U bet five pounds," returned the host, "that not half their number pass the smith's forge before morning. Come, I'll just step in and bid Murty boil the kettle — for if any of them can manage to stick to the pigskin, he'll be back in ten minutes." The worthy host turned in, and I, glad to be emancipated from an atmosphere, combining in equal parts the steam of poteeine punch and vUlanous tobacco, avoided the great chamber of the lord of Mullaghmore, for the cold and more bracing air of an autumnal midnight." I had not paced the gravelled walk in front of the Captain's mansion five minutes, when a LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. 221 ishot, foUowed by three or four, rapidly deli vered, was heard in the direction of the smithy. " R !" I shouted — and the host responded to the call : " What means this firing ? " " Oh ! quite harmless, unless the scoundrels : forgot to draw the shot." "This is a very wild, and, let me add also, a very inhuman proceeding. If any accident should occur — " " It will be owing to their own bad horseman ship altogether!" " They may be thrown — and — " " Did ye ever hear of a drunken man hurt ? I have had five falls in a ten miles' ride, with two bottles of black strap and another of brandy under my belt ; and when I awoke in a wake- house, where they had laid me out beside the corps, as there was but one feather-bed in the cabin, d n me, I had neither scratch nor head-ache, and was on Tammary in time to see the fox shaken next morning, after eating three salt herrings for breakfast, and packing them with six inches of poteeine, hot from the still. — But, hush ! a horse's feet, and, by the Lord ! a rider upon him too ! I thought every devil of them would have been down." As he spoke, a man with a face whiter than the white-washed horse he rode, pulled up, dis mounted, and staggered in. He gasped like one 222 LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. in mortal agony, and while I handed him a chair, the host forced half a tumbler-full of neglected punch down his throat, which appeared to recall his recollection. " No accident, I hope," inquired the conside rate Captain ; " running races, I suppose. I always do it when I'm drunk. You're the winner, and no mistake — but where the devil are your friends ?" " Murdered !" groaned the horror-stricken lieu tenant; and he proceeded to narrate that they had been waylaid, fired at, and three vacancies, made in the — London militia. Great was the sorrow and indignation which the host exhibited. After premising that the deceased should have a " tearing wake," and all obituary honours, he declared his further inten tion to show his respect for the memory of his friends by taking a jaunting-car to Down- patrick, and thus personally attend the execution of the assassins. Then calling for hghts and blun derbusses, we proceeded to lift the honoured slain, and bring them to a place where their ob sequies should be tenderly performed. On reaching the scene of slaughter, three hats and a military cloak identified the fatal spot. Ensign Dawes lifted the latter. " That is poor Fosberry's," he muttered ; " I wonder where the corpse is ?" LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. 223 " Here !" returned a feeble voice ; and a man (Crawled through an opening in the hedge. It was the lamented lieutenant, actually in the flesh, and that too, unpierced by either slug or bullet. Ere he could receive our congratulations, a head rose cautiously from a deep gripe, and doubtfully inquired whether we were " thieves or true men ?" This second Lazarus was another of the lost ones. He had been ejected from the saddle into a quickset hedge, and what his wounds lacked in depth, they amply compensated in number. None was now unaccounted for but the commander of the party ; and after a close research. Captain Burton was returned " non est inventus." " I had no wish to resume the symposia — stole away unperceived — knocked the smith up — saddled and mounted my steed — and set off leisurely for . As I slipped the promised reward to the artist in iron, he implored me to conceal from the Captain his being accessary to my escape, " as some night, when his ho nour was riding home hearty, he would set fire to the thatch, as he did last Lammas come a twelvemonth." My fears for Captain Burton's safety were speedily removed, by overtaking some country people, who were driving cattle to a neighbour ing fair. They were endeavouring to resuscitate 224 LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. a dead sheep, which, as they informed me, had been ridden over by a madman, who, swearing he would sell his life dearly, gaUoped through them as if the devil were at his heels. On inquiring into particulars touching this wild horseman, there was a serious discrepancy in description. The fellow on the right side of the road, swore that the horse was chestnut— while he on the left, offered to make oath that the charger was white as milk. I found afterwards a solu tion to the mystery ; the artist employed to colour the horses at Mullaghmore, had been interrupted when he had only completed a moiety of his task, and having got drunk, he fell asleep, and left a side unfinished. It was well that I hastened to the town, for dire was the alarm that Captain Burton's arrival, " at headlong speed," occasioned in the barracks. Unused to deeds of blood, the gallant Londoners, horror-struck at this wholesale butchery, were in the very act of sallying forth to rescue the bodies, and take summary vengeance on the murderers, could they but be found. My assurances quelled the storm, and this hair breadth escape of their comrades was the subject of surprise and congratulation of the regiment for the next twelvemonth. The hospitable proprietor of Mullaghmore extended a general invitation to the whole corps, but, strange to say. LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. 225 none availed themselves of the civiUty. It was universally admitted that Captain R was a pleasant gentleman enough, but there were some, prejudiced in favour of roofed stables, and objecting to loose boxes, in company with kicking mules, who insinuated that Mullagh more was neither a proper quarter to train a favourite for the Derby, nor exactly the place for •a man to get drunk first, and ride home after wards. Indeed, I became a convert to the pre vailing opinion — and, satisfied with the colour of my horse, neither gave him the chance of being whitewashed, nor ran the risk of mortal injury myself, by being shot in a joke ; for, as they say in Ireland, " I never darkened the Captain's door," after the pleasant and hospitable recep tion he gave the gallant officers of the London Militia. I met the gallant Commander once after wards. Poor fellow, it was his last appearance in public! — and accident made the parting scene of a wild life additionally eclatant. You know. Jack, in Ireland, that, after an informer and the hangman, the gauger obtains the next place in popular antipathy. It was the last meeting of the Northern Rangers ; and when trying for a fox, a silly young gentle man — a dragoon officer — whose puppyism had raised the Captain's choler, let his horse's bridle VOL. IL Q 226 LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. slip accidentally, while dismounted at the cover- side. Hundreds of country-people had col lected to witness " the red rascal " make his burst. " Oh, blessed God !" exclaimed the Lord of Mullaghmore ; " will nobody stop the ganger's horse ?" Stop a ganger's horse! " Musha, bad luck to him, the thief of the world !" exclaimed fifty voices in full concert — every man flinging his caubeein at the flying charger as he passed, and adding to the terror of the frightened quadruped. The fox broke cover — away went the field — ¦ while the unhappy dragoon plodded sorrowfully back six miles, to his barracks, to raise a " hue and cry " after his missing steed. That night the Rangers gave their annual ball. Now, the Captain generally considered dancing to be a waste of time, and stuck steadily to the bottle. On this occasion, however, he departed from his general rule, and at midnight came to the determination of visiting the gay throng col lected in the ball-room. One difficulty presented itself. In his movements, the gaUant Captain adopted light-marching order — his wardrobe was confined to the habiliments upon his back — a tattered red coatee — leathers and jockey-boots — both the worse for constant service — three shirts, worn one above the other, and removed seriatim, as the wearer deemed clean linen should be sported. Well, this costume was not the one LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. 227 which fashion demanded; and the Captain re membered that the overgrown fellow who enacted chief-waiter, had figured at dinner in a suit of black. The pan tier was summoned to the pre sence; and partly by entreaty, and partly through bodily fear, was induced to accede to the request, and lend his sables for " the nonce," taking, however, a lien for safe return upon the whole of the Captain's personals — boots, breeches, saddle, bridle, and coatee. But, alas, the cos tume was incomplete !— the waiter had lent his stockings — the shops were closed — and, had they been open, it would not have mattered— the Captain dealing upon credit — a system not approved of in Dundalk. The Captain gazed sorrowfully at his black tights and brawny legs, which, like Paddy Carey's, would " make a chairman stare." " I have it !" exclaimed the commander; and "Boots" was rung for. The expedient was short and simple : the captain's legs blacked and polished; and, thus adorned, he modestly joined the fair assembly, none questioning the correctness of his cos tume. I recollect that he occasioned rather a sensation at the supper-table, by offering a bet that he would draw, roast, and eat a badger, within a given time; but none accepted the wager, and the pleasant feat was not performed. This elegant exhibition, undoubtedly intended q2 !228 LIFE, AS IT WAS, IN IRELAND. for the especial gratification of the fair sex, was not appreciated as it deserved. I heard the Captain solicit unsuccessfully several fair hands when dancing had been resumed after supper— but all recoiled, as if he had been actually a can nibal — and, instead of demolishing a badger, had proposed to devour a child. CHAPTER XVII. FORT AUGUSTUS MILITARY ROADS FALL OF FOYERS ROAD TO DORES INVERNESS CIVIC ANECDOTES RATE OF LIVING, AULD LANG SYNE LIFE OLIM, IN INVERNESS CULLODEN MISTAKE IN ACCEPTING BATTLE — DEFEAT OF THE HIGHLAND ARMY VILLAGE OF AULDEARN MONTROSe's VICTORY VISIT TO FORT GEORGE DREARINESS OF ITS SITUATION. Fort Augustus — the weakest of the Highland keys — is now dismantled, and left to the care of two or three invalids. In forty-five it was taken by the Highland army ; and, after the final defeat of the insurgents at Culloden, after wards occupied by the Duke of Cumberland, the site of whose sod-built cabin may still be traced. The unsparing severity by which the royal duke dimmed the brilliancy of success, was exercised from this, a central point for operations ; and many a Highland glen received cruel visitations from the moveable columns of the English army, while marauding from this fortress. I proceeded by an uninteresting route and hiUy road towards the celebrated cascades formed 230 MILITARY ROADS. by the waters of the river Foyers, and stopped at a small inn erected on the site of the hut occupied by General Wade,* when employed in constructing the military roads, which, by ren dering the Highlands accessible, took from these fastnesses that security which hitherto had made them safe haunts for the outlaw and the disaf fected to retire upon. The beneficial effects conferred by establishing easy communications with the Lowlands was soon evidenced, not only in the pacification but the improvement of those wild districts which they opened up ; and those who had viewed their commencement with dis trust, lived to bear testimony to their utihty. And yet in those days the Highlanders appear to have been a thankless generation — for the only laudatory notice I have seen of this impor tant undertaking, is a couplet composed by an Irish officer, who, by a curious species of deutero- scopia, perceived their value before they were made, and bequeathed his blessing to the in- ventor.f * This must be a mistake. The cantonments of Wade's corps were on the eastern bank, above the bridge of Inverfarikaig ; and it is not likely, considering the unsettled state of the country and the unpopular work he was engaged in, that the general would take up his quarters two miles distant from his camp. The hut was probably used only as a bivouac, when visiting the workmen, or inspecting the progress of distant operations. I " Had you but seen these roads before they were made. You would lift up your eyes, and bless General Wade !" FALLS OF FOYERS. 231 A heavy and continuous fall of rain imprisoned me in " the General's hut," as the hostelrie is called, where traveUers stop, not certainly for the accommodation a dirty, smoky, change- house is likely to afford, but as being a most convenient point for his visit to the Falls of Fyers, or Foyars. I saw this splendid cascade in all its glory, the river being heavily flooded, and the volume of water thrown over the falls unusually great. As I gazed upon the roaring cataract from a commanding point on the western side of the stream, whither my guide, not without some difficulty, had conducted me, I fancied that nothing in the world in picturesque beauty could be superior. The precipitous ridges through which the swollen river tumbled ; its mighty mass of discoloured water ; the light span of the airy bridge that springs from rock to rock across the angry flood ; the boiling cauldron underneath, in which the troubled waters mingle ; all seen together, and in the prismatic tinting of brilliant sunshine, was one of the most splendid spectacles upon which mortal eye could dwell. Even sound gives effect to sight. The ear is confounded by the noise of rushing water, as the eye is dizzied by its ceaseless action, while fancy adds to both ; for the solid rock on which I stood seemed actuated by some tremulous move- 232 ROAD TO DORES. ment. The measurement of the different falls, from the surface of the rock to the basin which receives the water projected from their upper ledge, is nearly five hundred feet. Taken alto gether, the FaUs of Foyers are well worth a short pilgrimage. If the river be flooded, as it was the day I visited it, the sight has an awe-inspiring magnificence about it that cannot be conceived ; but those who have viewed it under a different aspect,* pronounce it what Coleridge would term, " beautiful exceedingly." I took the road to Dores; and in its smaU and unpretending inn was accommodated with a better dinner than many a more important- looking hostelrie would have afforded. I know not when I traversed ten mUes whose scenic effect was more agreeable — and an eye lately accustomed to dwell on rude and savage gran deur, found a pleasing repose in the soft and pastoral appearance a woodland drive presented. MaccuUoch — whose graphic descriptions teem * Chambers, in his description, says : — " In times of comparative drought the water finds a wide enough channel through an orifice, nearly arched over by the worn rocks, and then quietiy spreads itself, like a long white web, over the face of the precipice. At the bottom ofthe faU is a smooth green plain, descending upon Loch Ness, ornamented by the house and shrubberies of Fyers, on which people land from the steam-boats to have a view of the cataract. A dense mist is constantly seen rising from the broken water, and the noise made may usuaUy be heard at a considerable distance." INVERNESS. 233 with the poetry of nature — thus alludes to it. Speaking of the route from the Fall of Foyers, the Doctor remarks : — " If hence to Inverness the country presents no picturesque scenery, there is one part of the road which may well redeem the whole : there is none such through out the Highlands, so that it adds novelty to beauty, — a green road of shaven turf, holding its bowery course for miles, through close groves of birch and alder, with occasional glimpses of Loch Ness and of the open country. I passed it at early dawn, when the branches were still spangled with drops of dew ; while the sun, shooting its beams through the leaves, exhaled the sweet perfume of the birch, and filled the whole air with fragrance." It was stiU early in the evening when I en tered the ancient city of Inverness, and was deposited at the Caledonian Hotel. Having made a few memoranda from Anderson's Guide book, — and a most invaluable Guide-book it is, uniting legendary lore with solid information, and leading the traveller by the hand, wherever fancy directs him in his northern wanderings, — I set out to take a hasty glance at the Highland capital. I spent a couple of hours most agreeably in istroUing through this interesting and beautiful town ; and I have returned to " mine inn," no 234 civic ANECDOTES. longer marveUing at the pride with which the Highlander directs the traveller's attention to Inverness. Everything that meets the eye indi cates good taste and burghal prosperity ; and there is not a city in the empire, where the contrast of the past and present will afford a more curious picture. In looking back a century, the change effected on the city and civic arrangements, striking as they may appear, will still fall infinitely short of those produced on the social character and habits of the burghers. In "the fifteen" (1715) the first coach was introduced by the then Lord Seaforth ; and the driver was considered a personage of such supe rior importance that every bonnet was doffed at his approach. In " forty," the town council were obliged to advertise for a resident saddler ; and in " the forty-five," the Prince and the Duke of Cumberland in turn occupied the same apart ments in Church-street — the house being the only one in Inverness which could boast a sitting- room, without a bed in it. In 1 709, the gaol had to undergo fumigation at the expense of a cart of peats, value, Scottice, 4s. 6d., to correct its villanous smell; and, in 1737, a grant to the hangman is recorded, of "an iron spade for cleaning out theTolbooth." Only thirty years ago, an arch of the stone bridge had been ingeniously RATE OF LIVING. 235 turned into a manufactory of madmen. It was admirably contrived to effect its purpose, as I should consider that as no cerebral solidity could be arch-proof, ordinary intellects must be unsettled in a night, and a stoic be insane within a fortnight. This excellent institution was unfortunately done away with, but the reasons given by Anderson are very satis factory.* At this period, and even twenty years after wards, Inverness was not only a place where a man could " drink himself rich," but also indulge in excellent living. Nowhere, would " a shilling go farther ;" as, for that considera tion, you could command a leg of mutton, a neck of veal, and a gallon of " heavy wet " to wash them down with — so that on " forty pounds a-year," Goldsmith's Village-preacher might have vied in housekeeping with a cardinal. What is a parson to a provost ? and, oh ! what a place Inverness would have been for Irish gentlemen of the school described by that pleasant chronicler, the late Sir Jonah Barrington. Thus writes Chambers : — " Provost Phineas Macpherson, a * " The grating, or air-hole, is stUl visible, whence the poor captive obtained a distant view of the hills, and of the river which roUed beneath him, whose dismal noise was only echoed by the trampling of horses and passengers over thereof of his damp aud lonely cell. It is said, that this horrible dungeon was only aban doned, after a maniac confined in it had been devoured by rats," 236 LIFE OLIM, IN INVERNESS. late dignitary, whose fine old Highland manners might have ornamented a court, used to say that in those days he lived with great hospitality and plenty, sporting claret at his table, and yet never spent more than seventy pounds sterling a-year. The vice of intemperate drinking is understood to have been carried to a great height in Inverness in these not very distant times. In the work usually called Burt's Letters, the writer gives a minute and animated account of the hospitality of the house of Culloden, in the days of the President's elder brother ; telling, among other things, that the servants would on no account permit a guest to walk to his bed, considering that an insult to the laird ; every man had to sit till he became insensible, and then they brought spokes, and carried him off, as in a sedan." I set out this morning for a long, and, as pro mised by the Guide-book, a very interesting excursion. Although, in George and Peter An derson I have hitherto found admirable directors, and consequently, put implicit faith, still, and at the very starting, I have begged leave to reject their advice, fortified even by a better authority. The worthy authors of the best work a Highland tourist can obtain, insinuate that the traveller should postpone his matitudinal meal untU he reach Fort George, (Campbeltown,) thirteen mortal mUes. Now I, agreeing entirely with CULLODEN. 237 Rittmaster Dalgetty, do opine that the garrison should be victualled before starting — and I breakfasted accordingly at the Caledonian. Rest assured that, for the honour of the Highlands, the aforesaid George and Peter should recant the heretical doctrine they have thus propounded. No man knew life in fhe rough better than the honest follower of Gustavus — and had you started him in search of the picturesque — break fast in prospective, distance four long leagues, a Finan haddie Would have had more charms for the Major than the Falls of Foyers, with Niagara in addition — whUe, with his " provent under his belt," the ochre-brown of his hereditary patrimony — the moor of Drumthwacket — would have presented a regular couleur de rose. Moral — Breakfast before you even venture a peep at Highland scenery. Contrary to established rule, I pricked my own route out, and visited direct the concluding scene of Prince Charles's gallant, chivalrous, silly, and contemptible career ; for all blend so intimately in the plaided texture of his fortunes, that it is difficult to name that which is most predominant. Som-e five miles to the eastward of Inverness, the ground of " red Culloden " stands. At the time of the action it was bare, flat, open, travers able heather, and the last position in the world on which an irregular and exhausted body should 238 MISTAKE IN ACCEPTING BATTLE. have received battle from an army regularly organized. In about equal ratio, that to the poor Highlanders the conflict was calamitous, to their leaders it was disgraceful. Had a score of kingdoms been dependent on the result, the Chevalier should have lost them all ; whUe the victor, achieving an easy triumph, sullied acci dental success by wanton and impolitic barbarity. Think what a fool the man must be, who, with out cavalry or guns, accepted battle on an open moor, and attacked an army tolerably equipped with both ! An old carl in a kilt, who resided in one of the few cabins built on the edge of the heath, pointed out the Highland position. The ground selected had little natural advantage to recommend it, — for although their right was partially protected by a stone dyke, the left, extending towards Culloden House, was formed upon open moor land. It was a common trick with the old boobies in the Peninsula, who led the Spanish armies, not to fight but to be slaughtered, to march them off their legs first, and then try conclusions in open ground with veteran troops and practised leaders, who, of course, demolished these raw and broken-hearted levies at discretion ; and Prince Charles's proceedings appear to have been pretty simUar at Culloden. Intending a DEFEAT OF THE HIGHLAND ARMY. 239 night attack on the Enghsh camp, which he found himself unable to deliver, he marched and countermarched until the clans were completely exhausted. Some were straggling in search of food — others, sleeping in the adjacent villages — all were dispirited and disunited. A large rein forcement of the Badenoch men were already within a few miles' march, when, instead of falling back upon the mountain country, where he could have fought with increased numbers and local advantage, the silly young man took ground upon Culloden, and threw his last chance away. The royal army advancing leisurely along a height, running in a north-easterly direction from Dalcross Castle,* formed unmolested in * " This buUding, which Ues two mUes north-east of the field of CuUoden, consists of two towers, joined at right angles ; the inner comer, where they meet, being covered with a projecting turret and large entrance gate. Many of the appurtenances of an old baronial residence are here stUl entire, and therefore to the anti quary the place is of considerable interest. Water is stUl raised from a deep draw-well in the front court. The windows are all stancheoned with iron. The huge oaken door, studded with large nails, and the inner iron gratings, stUl turn on their rusty hinges. The kitchen, with its enormous vaulted chimney, Uke the arch of a bridge ; the dungeons, and the hall, are quite entire. The ceUing of the latter is of fine carved oak, in part rudely painted ; but its most interesting feature is the dais, or portion of the floor raised above the rest, for the special use of the lord of the manor, his famUy, and principal guests. The roof of one of the bed-rooms was painted aU over vrith coats of arms of the principal families in the country, and those of Robert Bruce, of the Earls of Huntly, Marischal, and Stuart, are stUl quite distinct. This castle was built in 1620, by Simon, eighth Lord Lovat." — Anderson. 240 DEFEAT OF THE HIGHLAND ARMY. front of the Chevaher. The fire of the Eng lish artiUery opened— it fell heavily on the ranks of the clans; and, anxious to close, the right and centre of the Highlanders came for ward, but the latter only charged. The former were taken in flank by the Duke's cavalry, and repulsed— whUe the centre, after disordering a couple of the infantry regiments opposed to it, was driven back — and the issue of the day finally and fatally decided. Culloden was discreditable to all concerned. Lord George Murray's generalship was sadly defective. It was rank folly to fight at all ; but, if the rash experiment were tried, the only one of desperate chances that could have turned up, would have been in becoming assailant ere the slow evolutions of the times enabled the English leader to place his army in battle order. A head long charge of desperate men might possibly have been successful — but the Highlanders were not " i' the vein " for fighting — the Macdonalds were out of humour because the Camerons and Athole men were not placed on the left — and with a reserve in hand, the Prince aUowed his right wing to be cut to pieces. The whole affair was a partial and unconnected effort ; and the pity is, that the enthusiastic gallantry of a few should not have been both better directed and sustained. That part of the Highland centre fought DEFEAT OF THE HIGHLAND ARMY. 241 desperately, the fact of their breaking Munro's and Burrell's regiments will prove.* But many of the clans scarcely discharged a shot : the Frasers, with unbroken ranks, were played off the ground by their pipers ; the Prince rode away, instead of launching his reserve to support his right ; the action was idly and unskilfully fought from beginning to end — there was a par tial display of desperate courage without unity of purpose — some little to admire — but more to censure and condemn. * " AU that courage, all that despair could do, was done. They did not fight like living or reasoning creatures, but like machines under the influence of some uncontrollable principle of action. The howl of the advance, the scream of the onset, the thunders ofthe musketry, and the din ofthe trumpets and drums, confounded one sense ; whUe the flash of the fire-arms and the glitter of the brandished broadswords dazzled and bewUdered another. It was a moment of dreadful and agonizing suspense — but only a moment; for the whirlwind does not reap the forest with greater rapidity than the Highlanders cleared the line. They swept through and over that fraU barrier, almost as easily and instantaneously as the bounding cavalcade brushes through the morning labours of the gossamer which stretch across its path. Not, however, with the same unconsciousness of the event. Almost every man in their front rank, chief and gentleman, fell before the deadly weapons which they had braved ; and, although the enemy gave way, it was not till every bayonet was bent and bloody with the strife. " When the first line had been completely swept aside, the assaUants continued their impetuous advance, tUl they came near the second, when, being almost annihUated by a profuse and well- directed fire, the shattered remains of what had been but an hour before a numerous and confident force, at last submitted to des tiny, by giving way and flying. StiU a few rushed on, resolved rather to die than thus forfeit their well-acquired and dearly- estimated honour. They rushed on ; but not a man ever came in contact vpith the enemy. The last survivor perished as he reached the points of the bayonets." VOL. II. R 242 DEFEAT OF THE HIGHLAND ARMY. It was said that a very simple manoeuvre in bayonet exercise, introduced by the Duke, ren dered the Highland onset less effective than it had hitherto proved. The Celtic method of attack was to receive the point of the opponent's weapon in the target, and cut him down after wards with the claymore — the adroitness of the Highlander, at the same time, securing his own person from the lounge, and enabling him, un scathed, to close with his antagonist, and use a shorter and more destructive weapon. Before Culloden, the Duke had his infantry instructed to dechne thrusting at the man in front, but, by a diagonal lounge at the next file, find a ready entrance for the bayonet, where the side was un protected by the target. It is certain, that the whole front rank who charged, chief and duna- wassail, fell ; and it was the last time that broad sword encountered bayonet, the former giving place to the latter in military use ; and many a peninsular field wiU tell, that if the Highlander, a hundred years before, was formidable with the claymore, with pointed steel he was equally irresistible. The royal Duke gained an easy victory — and royally he should have used it — but his Highness of Cumberland was but a mere soldado: and cold, selfish, and unforgiving, he left a blood stained escutcheon behind him when he died. Hear what the Andersons say : — " The wounded VILLAGE OF AULDEARN. 213 were left three days on the field, and such as then survived were shot by the order of the Duke of Cumberland. He set fire to a barn, to which many of them had retired. In the town of Inverness, he instituted a complete military go vernment; treated the inhabitants and magis trates with contempt ; and he was afterwards obhged to sue out an act of indemnity from the British Parliament for these and other atro cities, of which it is notoriously known he was guUty." What a veneration the Scotch have for bailies and town-counsellors! Now, for my part, had his Royal Highness inserted the whole of these civic functionaries into that rat-repository for a night, where the madmen were subsequently cantoned, and restored some gallant clansmen to their native glens, where the joyous outburst of infancy to greet a returning parent would have silenced the widow's coronach— even had the provost lost a toe, I should have blessed the memory of a man, that can only be regarded now with feelings approaching to detestation. From Culloden, and at a few leagues distance, the mihtary pilgrim will find a scene which he may recall to memory with very different feel ings. I allude to that beside the viUage of Aul dearn, on the river Nairn — the battle-ground, on which the gaUant Marquis of Montrose so R 2 244 VICTORY OF MONTROSE. bloodily defeated the Covenanters under General Hurry. It is painful to observe how unjustly a soldier's fame, too frequently, is meted out. For a clumsy and accidental success, Cumberland has passed current as a hero — whUe a victory, achieved under circumstances which should ren der its memory imperishable, is scarcely remem bered now by any but the military antiquarian. In two celebrated actions under the lead ing of " GaUant Graemes," a curious departure from strategic formulae distinguishes both. Barossa, under that glorious old man. Lord Lynedoch, was fought rear rank in front — the regiments not having time to countermarch. Auldearn, under Montrose, made a still more startling departure from military rule ; and, as far as my reading goes, is the only instance upon record, where an army formed for and accepted battle, without a centre. This singular action took place on the 9th of May, 1645. The Covenanters, four thousand strong — of whom five hundred were well-ap pointed horsemen ; the royalists barely mus tering fifteen hundred infantry, whUe their cavalry strength was scarcely one-third that of their opponents. Both armies were composed of stubborn materials — Hurry's, were Parlia mentarian regulars, and obdurate Covenanters from the neighbouring counties, led by Lords VICTORY OF MONTROSE. 245 Seaforth and Sutherland. The Roundheads advanced from Nairn to give battle, while Mon trose as boldly determined to receive it on a position which he had taken up, with admirable judgment, beside the hamlet of Auldearn. The military art cannot be acquired ; Horace says, "Pacta ?iascitur ;" and I say, as far as the truth of the adage goes, that the soldier should be substituted for the poet. The formation of Montrose's followers was as decided a departure from every axiom of art, as it was a fine and daring military conception. By the display of numerous banners, and favoured by ground broken and enclosed, he masqued an imaginary centre. His right wing, honoured with the royal standard, and composed of Highlanders and Irishmen, took ground on the north of the vil lage; while the left — the Gordons and his cavalry, and stronger by the half — formed on the south. The right was commanded by Colkitto (Alaster Macdonald), the left by Montrose, in person. This bold and skilful disposition, as we say so expressively in Ireland, bothered the crop-eared Covenanter, and Hurry erroneously directed his attack against a wing, which the display of the yellow banner led him to conclude was the one commanded by the king's representative. Fa voured by a broken surface, while the enclosures confused the onset of the Covenanters, the High- 246 VISIT TO FORT GEORGE. land and Irish levies received and repulsed the attack. Fresh regiments were ordered forward to sustain it; they, too, became disordered — the ground being admirably adapted to the wild fighting of irregular soldiers, who trusted to nothing save stout hearts and sharp claymores. Montrose watched the crisis of the day, and seized it. Throwing himself upon the wavering right of the Covenanters, he completed the de- route of the enemy. In vain, their baffled General endeavoured to restore the fight, by launching his superior cavalry upon the left wing of the royalists ; the order was totally misunderstood, or badly executed, and the charge, instead of relieving the repulsed infantry, increased their disorder. A total rout ensued — Hurry escaping to Inverness, with some difficulty, after leaving half his army dead upon the field, and its whole materiel in possession of the victor. A visit to Fort George completed my mUitary pUgrimage. It is a strong and well-planned work; its enceinte, an irregular polygon — the land-front well defended — the curtains case- mated, with bomb-proof magazines, convenient store-houses, and extensive barracks ; the whole covering an area of some ten acres. The bas tions and connecting works, when fully armed, would mount some eighty guns, of various calibre. Although built on the outer point of a sandy DREARINESS OF ITS SITUATION. 247 peninsula, abutting, on its west front, into the sea. Fort George could be easily approached from the eastward, or breached from a high ground above Campbeltown, by which it is too closely domineered. I spent the day with the commandant of the depot which formed its garrison — once " mine ancient;" but now a "Major of Irishes." En gineers, in selecting sites for places of arms, are not much influenced by the fashion of the locality. I once put in two dreary winter months in Tilbury, and then set it down as the next place for mUitary punishment to Fernando Po, or the Penal settlements ; but I recant my error, and yield the palm to Fort George. Were I one of the unhappy men doomed to keep watch and ward through dull December, in this dreary and isolated garrison, all I shall say is, that, were 1 asked to spend Christmas in the BeU Eock, I should hesitate much before I refused the invitation. CHAPTER XVIII. DEPARTURE FOR WICK INTERMEDIATE COUNTRY BEAULY SALMON AN HOUR TOO LATE HERRING FISHING IN THE FAR WEST CAITHNESS FISHERIES FISH CURING PROCESS OF EVISCERATION A PENINSULAR FAIR ONE A COLUMN IN "a fix" AN IRISH INTERPRETER GENERAL REFLECTIONS UPON MATRIMONY. I HAVE had a letter this morning from the Stout Gentleman, urging a speedy performance of my promise, with a hint that the heir to his virtues and estates must remain nameless until after my arrival in Shetland. I must hasten my move ments in consequence; and shall book myself direct for the stormy north in the Thurso mail, stopping at that heaven of herring-fanciers — the port of Wick. In this long drive every variety of surface and scenery will meet the traveller's eye. He will occasionally pass through a luxuriant and finely- wooded country, exhibiting every appearance of scientific cultivation ; wend afterwards through highland-glens and mountain-passes, overlooking wild and barren moorland, where nature still BEAULY SALMON. 249 continues undisturbed. Again, for miles the road will skirt a rocky sea-coast; every creek and inlet filled with herring-busses, nets, and barrels, indicating how extensively the fertile resources of the sea add to the opulence and comfort of an island population. Every stream he crosses, he will be told, has an abundant supply of salmon, although the fish are not, generally, so accommo dating as those of Beauly;* whUe the road itself, carried along towering ridges and fearful ravines, is so perfect, so level, and so carefully maintained, that it looks rather the approach to some noble mansion, than a mountain-highway traversed by Her Majesty's mail. I hoped at Wick to have overtaken the Leith steamer — dis alitur visum — and as the royal mail entered the royal burgh, I was anything but gra tified in observing a steam- cloud, visible for the • " There is exceUent salmon- fishing in the Beauly ; and at the falls a number are caught, occasionaUy by their leaping on the dry banks, in their efforts to surmount the cataract. Noticing the fre quency of this mistake of the salmon, the last Lord Lovat once performed a curious experiment here. He made a fire on the rocky brink, and placed on it a large pot fiUed with water. Speedily a salmon, making a leap in a vvrong direction, (from the frothiness of the water), tumbled into the pot, where it was soon boiled and eaten by his lordship and attendants. This was done, that he might boast in the south of the wonders that existed in the High lands, which were then Uttie known, and to say that in his country provisions abounded so much, that if a fire was made, and a pot set to boil, on the bank of a river, the salmon would of themselves leap into the pot to be boUed." 250 AN HOUR TOO LATE, last three miles, give place to dense masses of sable smoke, announcing that the "Sovereign" was paddling out of the harbour, and I an hour too late — no infrequent occurrence in the story of a hfe. Here I am, all access to Shetland forbidden for a week; and, while the young Udaller remains without a name, how and where shall Colonel O'Flagherty find occupation ? Patience, Denis ! you have nothing for it but to study herring sta tistics through the day, and trust to Providence for throwing some Christian man across you " i' the afternoon," to save you from the sin and discomfort of drinking one hand against the other. You and I, Jack, have often witnessed the pro cess of herring-fishing in " the far west." Some dozen row-boats, stealing out at dusk, to shoot a limited extent of net-work, part too rotten to retain the fish, and part deficient in back-ropes, corks, or puckawns.* Did you ever see a well- appointed fishing-boat in Connaught ? If you * The puckawn, — Uterally, a sheep-skin — is the large buoy placed at the extremity of each herring-net. They are constructed on the same principle as Bryan O'Lynn's breeches, " the skinny side out, and the woolly .='de in," and rendered water-tight by a coating of tar and tallo' y Dog-skins are in high estimation ; and, at the approach of y'herring-season, the strictest sobriety of canine conduct if xtispensable to secure the vUlage maddogue {Anglice, dog) agau .A the charge of monomania, particularly if his casing should be sufficiently extensive for the construction ofa puckawn. HERRING FISHING IN THE FAR WEST. 251 say " Yes," — then have they, since my day, un dergone a marvellous improvement. I remember my poor uncle used to dread the herring-season — for the first sight presented from the windows of the breakfast-room, was an interesting assort ment of broken heads, varying in number from a couple to a score, according as the night-affair had been a casual turn-up, or a regular rookawn. And then came the judicial inquiry — the thing was " cause and cross-cause " — the Malleys left it on the Tooles ; and the Tooles would " take the vestment" that the first black eye should be placed to the credit of the Malleys. The beauty of the matter was, that the grandest of these naumachia was so simply and satisfactorily brought about. Last winter, at the wake of Jemmy Macgreal, Peter Casey of Slishmeen, had a quarrel with Patsy Cannavan from Muck Island. Now Peter's cousin, by the mother's side, unluckily shot his nets beside a wife's brother of Misther Cannavan. It was "idlesse all," — the boats were hanging at the tail-ropes, — and could there be a more convenient mode of killing time than discussing the causes of this interesting feud? On the merits of the Caseys and Can- navans a difference of opinion arose ; Peter gave Patsy a poltogue with an oar, which Patsy duly returned with a paving-stone. The boats grappled, and "Greek met Greek" with oar and stretcher. 252 CAITHNESS FISHERIES. In attachment to the houses of Muck Island and Slishmeen the fleet were pretty tolerably divided; and "Hurrah for the Cannavans!" was returned by " The Caseys for ever !" as crew after crew came smashing over buoy and back- rope, to take share in the general action. Long before morning, the fleet might have been seen returning dispersedly to the shore, with a cargo of damaged skulls and tattered herring-nets ; and before the former could be put to rights in the in firmary, and the latter patched by the caillaughs* at home, the fish, contented with being present at one naval action, moved north or south, leaving behind them an abundant stock of assault and battery for the sessions, and Caseys and Cannavans not richer by a scuddawn. In Caithness, they manage matters better, although, probably, not quite so pleasantly. Think of seven hundred well-appointed boats, Highland and Lowland, fishing here, as our countryman was anxious to fight, "in peace and quietness," all submissive to fishing regulations ;f * Anglic^ : caillaugh — a girl ; scuddawn — a herring. t " According to the fishery laws, regulated by Act of Par liament, and enforced by that fearless cutter, the Princess Royal, they dare not shoot their nets till after sunset, because, although a few boats by so doing might make a speedy and productive cap ture, the great body of the herrings (as is alleged) might take alarm, and, sinking down into the 'blue profound,' would thus escape the snares of all the other expectants. But, by shooting their nets just before night-fall, the herrings in their nocturnal FISH CURING. 253 and the countless multitude returning to the harbour they quitted the preceding evening, loaded to the thafts with fish, and not a cracked skull, amid "a multitudinous array of sombre- coloured sails." The arrival of the laden boats is followed by another course of active operations, which Pro fessor Wilson thus graphically describes : — " All along the inner harbour, and in every street and quay, as well as within many large enclosed yards and covered buUdings, there are numerous square wooden boxes, as big as ordi nary sized rooms ; the containing sides, however, being only two or three feet high. Into these huge troughs the herrings are carried in panniers from the boats the instant they arrive. There they are, all tumbled in, helter-skelter, pannier after pannier, in a long-continued stream of fish, until the boats are emptied or the troughs are filled. Then come troops of sturdy females, rambles do not detect the wily ' suspension and interdict ' which has been taken out against them, and is everywhere hanging around, for their destruction, in these their watery heavens. When a shoal thus meets a net under the obscure cover of the night, it cares little and fears less, and so pushing forwards, every fish, with a view to get on in life (in the midst of which they are in death), presses his snout and head through a mesh an inch square, too small to admit his shoulders, but alas ! also too smaU to per mit the withdrawal of the thoughtless head, — for the sharp edge and opening action of the gUI-covers present obstructions which the most high-minded herring struggles in vain to overcome." — Wilson's Voyage round ihe Coasts of Scotland. 254 PROCESS OF EVISCERATION. each armed with knife in hand, and range them selves around the trough, — the process of gutting commences, and is carried on with such ceaseless and untiring rapidity, that, unless we had used the freedom to request one of the cleanest and prettiest of these evisceratrixes so to moderate the rancour of her knife as to let us see what she was doing, we could scarcely have followed her manipulations with the naked eye." * Well, I never could fall in love with a lady in the herring line ; and yet a soldier, in course of service, will encounter so many of the Moll Flagon tribe, that the coarser and more mascu line character of the sex, to him, will be perfectly famiUar. I remember we had a virago attached to the grenadiers through the whole of the Peninsular war. She was in strength and stature equally remarkable ; and, though a brigand in conduct and appearance, still a corner of the heart was womanly. Amid the rolling of mus- * " This important process is effected in the following manner : The practitioner takes a herring in her left hand, its back lying in her palm, and inserts the point of her knife into the side ofthe neck. She then gives the instrument a turn, and pulling it out with an opposing pressure of the thumb, she draws forth, in the first place the gUls, stomach, and intestinal canal, and tosses them ¦into their appropriate barrel. She then inserts the knife again, and by a second twitch removes what is called the crown gut (or csecal appendages) and liver. There are thus two actions performed, each of which occupies about a second of time. We :may add, that, in the Dutch mode of cure, the crown gut is not removed." — Wilson's Voyage. A PENINSULAR FAIR ONE. 255 ketry. Big Mary would plunder the dying and the dead without compunction, while the next day she would traverse thirty nhles of country to procure a rabbit or a fowl for a wounded officer. Four liege lords she buried during the campaign — two husbands exiting on the field> and the other twain in hospital, sedulously attended night and day to the last, by this wUd, but warm-hearted personage. In every action where the colours of the gallant — th were uncased, Mary was fearlessly under fire ; and, whether advancing or rfetreating, though the ford were deep, the night dark, and the weather desperate, she was always at the head of the grenadiers. All and every peril she outlived ; and when the regiment embarked in the Ga ronne, Mary quitted France with a fine child, a fifth husband, and (as it was said and believed) more than a thousand dollars. I met her, years afterwards, the owner of a public house in the south of Ireland, and, for the fifth time, a widow. " I'll niver marry again. Major O'Flagherty !" said the mourner; "not but I have had offers from two pensioners and a police-serjeant. But me, that never even listened to a light-bob, and would'nt touch a battalion-man with the tongs ! — me, with my four slashing husbands stretched, the Lord knows where, in the Vemwshu\a, and 256 AN IRISH INTERPRETER. Tom Corrigan, the last one, snug in the church yard of KUmain ! Me marry one of the King's bad bargains, a flat-footed Militia-man, or a pig- driver of a polee ! Be this vargin hand. Major jewel, out of respect to the dead, I'll niver crook a knee before priest or parson wid the face of clay that's under six feet two — nor take a man. Major asthore, that's not able to thrash me when I desarve it." That this last matrimonial qualification would require a man of thews and sinews to effect, I inferred from having once witnessed the prowess of Big Mary. Late on a dark and rainy even ing in December, the column reached the union of three roads, the th being the leading regi ment, and Moleene More, as was her wont, at the head of the grenadiers. There were three roads ; but which would lead to the village where we were to be cantoned for the night was the puzzle. A Spaniard appeared, and was interrogated— some using English, some bad Spanish, and others a curious mixture of both. To every question a negative shake of the head was re turned, and the column remained in " a fix." Incensed at his stupidity. Big Mary figured in. " Musha, bad luck to him, the bothered baste!" she exclaimed; "sure the divil will know what he's asked, if it's put to him in plain Irish ! — Honest man — though, 'pon my sowl, you hav'n't an AN IRISH INTERPRETER. 257 honest look I — do ye know a town that I forget the name of — and will ye tell us which of these boreeins* will be the shortest cut to the place ?" An awful shake of the head intimated that the muleteer had not been indoctrinated in Celtic literature. " Ah ! then, ye ignorant thief of the world, what druv an ommadawn of ye'r kind to put yeerself in people's way, after they have lost it themselves ? Take that, ye ill-mannered gom- mogue, for not answrin' a lady, when she spakes to her infariors," The blow prostrated the unhappy muleteer ; but, whether it would have enlightened or obfus cated his bothered intellects remains a mystery ; for an assistant-commissary rode up, pointed out the right road, and relieved the column from its embarrassment. And yet, with many a man desirous of enter ing on the holy estate, the flooring of a muleteer would not be considered a matrimonial recom mendation. The fair sex are not generally ex pected to be dealers in blows and blood ; and I question whether the sanguinary, though peaceful performances of the ladies of Wick would not operate with me as an antidote against the tender passion. A "ripe red lip" may pre dispose a man to fall in love, but assuredly a » Generally, narrow and ill-made by-roads. Vol. il s 258 MATRIMONY. " red right hand " would prove a regular damper. Were I " upon compulsion " obliged to marry, with a choice of evils, although for five-and- twenty years accustomed to a hair mattress with covering containable in a bullock-trunk, rather than commit matrimony with a sea-nymph whose ablutions would " incarnadine " a horse- pond, I would, — desperate alternative though it be, — lead a Dunse lady to the altar in the dog- days ! * * " I am uncertain whether a custom that prevaUs a little north of Coldstream does not extend also to these parts. About Dunse, the fair spinsters give much of their leisure time to. the spinning of blankets for their wedding portion. On the nuptial night, the whole stock of virgin-industry is placed on the bed. A friend of mine'has, on such an occasion, counted not fewer than ten, thick and heavy. Were the Penelope who owned them forsaken by her Ulysses, she never could complain, like the Grecian spouse, ' Non ego deserto jacuissem frigida lecto !' " — Pennant's Tour in Scotland. CHAPTER XIX. WICK IN THE HERRING SEASON SCOTCH FISHERIES HERRINGS, PRO AND CON. VISIT TO SINCLAIR BAY — CASTLES OF GIRNIGOE AND SINCLAIR LEGEND OF ITS DUNGEON PRESERVED BIRDS THURSO A NEW ACQUAINTANCE MR. ROBERTSON. From this, the haven or heaven of herring- fishers, I have willingly taken my departure. Young Mirabel insinuates that soup eternally is tiresome. I wonder what he would have said of herring-diet, after passing a day or two in Wick ? Everywhere the eye turns, or the foot wanders, foul tokens of the wholesale assassina tion of this pretty emigrant — for, direct and uninjured from the net, the herring is extremely beautiful — are presented — thousands of barrels, in which myriads of the departed are entombed, — hundreds of vats and vessels, where a new succession of victims undergo, previously to being casked up, a post-mortem operation — men staggering under baskets-full, from boats just come in — and women at every corner, not s2 260 SCOTCH FISHERIES. meeting you with " nods and becks, and wreathed smiles," but " garments stained in blood," and hands so desperately ensanguined, that, like my Lady Macbeth's, they would appear to set soap and water at defiance. — If, after all that I have seen and smelt at Wick, I ever look a herring in the face again, then am I " a soused gurnet." But, to be serious. Of all the sources of British prosperity, every way considered, the herring fisheries of the north are among her steadiest and most important. Overlooking its means of commercial enterprise altogether, its local and national advantages are incalculable. From the official returns for the year 1840-41, it appears that above five hundred and fifty thousand barrels of herrings were cured in Britain, out of which enormous total, five hundred thousand were taken and salted upon the Scot tish shores. The extensive employment this mighty source of general wealth must yield, may be inferred from the fishery statistics submitted to parliament. In capturing and curing, twelve thousand five hundred boats and decked vessels were engaged, manned by fifty-four thousand seamen, and giving most lucrative occupation to two thousand three hundred coopers, twenty- seven thousand five hundred curers — four-fifths of the number women — six thousand common labourers, and nearly two thousand merchants. HERRINGS, PRO AND CON. 261 Through how many channels may not the bene ficial advantages of this important fishery be traced ? View it in all its lights — a nursery for the navy — a source of profit to the capitalist, and of employment for hands unsuited to more laborious exertions ; bringing comfort to the cottage, food to the indigent, wealth to the en terprising, and fertility to the land.* It is true that the picture is not unshaded, and the moralist may find much to regret. Balancing deteriorated habits against pecuniary advantages, he will probably express a doubt, whether this ocean- bounty brings to the population generally, a blessing or a curse. The infiux of unusual monetary means will induce bad habits ; the temperate will become tipplers ; the tippler turn drunkard ; and men, proof against the seductions of ardent spirits, will indulge in luxuries from v/hose enjoyment a want of money had hitherto inhibited them.f On the female sex, the demo ralizing effect of an unrestricted intercourse with • The intestines make exceUent manure. t From the last statistical accounts, it appears that when the fishery is successful, the daily consumption of ardent spirits exceeds five hundred gallons; whisky-houses exceed the average number found in ordinary parishes, fourfold, and those of both sexes who do not drink, indulge inordinately in tobacco; the annual consumption of -'the weed" being estimated at three thousand five hundred pounds. If ghosts could visit " this pale earth," the gentle Jamie, accompanied by Father Mathew, should visit Wick ; no place in Britain requiring more a royal " counter blast" and apostolic intervention. 262 VISIT TO SINCLAIR BAY. thousands of strangers will be readily imagined. For the first time, probably, the peasant girl finds herself mistress of her own actions, and emancipated from the rigid surveillance of pa rental vigilance ; no reproving look represses her first levity ; but the example of those already fallen, encourages her step by step, until guilt becomes familiar, and the virtuous principles of early innocence are undermined for ever. From a gentleman whose acquaintance I made subse quently at Thurso I heard some melancholy anecdotes, which led me to a conclusion, that whatever pecuniary advantages might arise from employment of the women during the herring season, an increase of cottage wealth was sadly overbalanced by a decrease of the female purity upon which the happiness of the humblest home depends. After an early dinner, I drove across a league of flat and uninteresting country, which divides Wick harbour from Sinclair bay, to visit a united pile of ruined masonry, which must be a puzzler to the antiquary — I mean the castles of Girnigoe and Sinclair. They occupy, in joint tenancy, a rocky peninsula, severed from the mainland by a deep ravine — a wet ditch filled by ocean, and a sufficient land-defence upon the southward. What works might have been erected on the neck of the peninsula may be imagined ; but. CASTLES OF GIRNIGOE AND SINCLAIR. 263 before the introduction of modern projectiles, very little skill in military engineering would have rendered the place secure. The older building (Girnigoe) abuts upon the sea-front of the rock, and crowns the precipice to the very edge. The inner, the more modern and more ruinous, shows little beyond masses of fallen masonry, and a shafted chimney. Why they were stuck within a yard of each other seems a mystery in masonry ; for along this wild and rock-bound coast, there are no scarcity of positions on which to perch a tower. In all wide Britain, I should, in criminal statis tics of the horrible, award the palm to the north. Throughout the Highlands, en route to John o' Groat's, no complaint as to barrenness in the terrible can be brought by the most fastidious traveller. Of the atrocities attendant on clan feuds— slaughterings respecting no sex, and in volving in one savage sacrifice to the infernal deity of vengeance, all, from the cradle to the crutch — the valley of Glencoe, and the sweet and romantic glen where the sacred chapelrie of Cillie Christ was desecrated by a demon's act,* vrill sufficiently evidence the savage spirit of the times ; when even the sacred salt offered no protection, and host and guest meditated murder, while the pledge of amity was being • Appendix, No. XXIV. 264 LEGEND OF ITS DUNGEON. interchanged. Still the actors had known no ties of blood ; they were men banded against each other by jealousy and ambition ; with these, " revenge was virtue " — the form was human, but the disposition so wolfish and unmitigable, that the reeking mouthful, torn by the teeth from the throat of a struggling foeman, was pro nounced the sweetest morsel a man could taste.* These were barbarous and bloody times ; still kindred had a holy claim ; and the savage warrior, who would have severed the branch by which an enemy held on in mortal agony, loved and was beloved, and justified his offendings on a prin ciple as false to honesty as true to nature — that " whoever's bairn greeted, his should laugh," But these gloomy and mouldering walls clothe crime in a fiendish garniture : — the tale shall prove it. The under-story of the keep is vaulted ; and whatever the building formerly contained can only be conjectured now, as nothing but bare walls are standing. Time, the destroyer, has however passed over a memorial of human wick edness ; and while fiagged roof, oaken floor, and stone-built stair have disappeared, a damp and solitary dungeon, lighted by a shot-hole in the wall, is still entire and approachable, which, if tradition may be believed, was once the scene • Appendix, No. XXV. legend" of its dungeon. 265 of murder — " most foul and most unnatural." Thus runs the story : — Some time about the year of grace 1575, the eldest son of the fifth Earl of Caithness, by the Sinclair line, incurred the anger of his savage parent, by wooing and winning the heiress of the lord of Reay. Most men are ambitious to achieve matrimonial aggrandizement for a son, but " the wicked Earl" being an Ul-disposed widower, determined on committing matrimony again, and obtain beauty and broad lands for himself. A rival was in the way ; and though that rival was a first-born son, the brutal father removed the obstacle to his wishes, by entombing the Master of Sinclair in that gloomy vault, that the stranger, as he looks around, contemplates with feehngs of shuddering revulsion. There the too- fortunate but ill-fated lover was confined. Months passed — the secrets of baronial mansions, like those of the grave, were untold — and the savage father repaired to court, leaving his heir apparent under the custody of (as he believed) a faithful clansman. Some touch of nature induced the keeper to relent. He planned his prisoner's escape ; but his intended kindness only fatally compromised his own safety, and hurried this domestic tragedy to a hastier close. To WiUiam— the Master's brother and next 266 LEGEND OF ITS DUNGEON. heir — the intention of the humane gaoler was communicated ; and Murdow Roy was seized and executed without undergoing even the sum mary form of a drum-head court martial. The denouement is thus told by the pleasantest of Professors : * — " After this, William went down stairs one morning to inquire for his brother, to remonstrate with him on the extreme impropriety of desiring to make his escape, and to threaten him with severe and immediate punishment if he ever attempted anything of the kind again. Upon this, the Master of Caithness, who could scarcely be expected to be in very good humour, instantly sprung, though ironed heavily, on the unsuspect ing WiUiam, and clasped him with such strength of affection in his fettered arms, that, like Gilbert Glossin in after times, he died. In a family struggle of this kind we believe it is of immense advantage to be fastened to the floor by an iron ring, because nobody can drag you out of the room, and so if you just persevere in holding on, and keep pressing your friend's throat against your own chain-cable, you bring him to an anchor soon enough. Two lads of the name of David and Inghrame Sinclair were then appointed guardians of the dungeon, but they soon availed themselves of the Earl's * Christopher North. LEGEND OF ITS DUNGEON. 267 absence, and the confusion occasioned by Lord William's unexpected death, and embezzling the money in the castle, they fled the country, leav ing their unfortunate charge to die of famine." A scene of blood is often followed up by fresh ones. One traditionary version says that the savage Earl, irritated at the loss of treasure — for to his son's fate the brute was no doubt in sensible — slaughtered the delinquent Sinclairs at a wedding party ; while another ascribes the work of vengeance to his grandson ; and cer tainly retributive justice might rather be ex pected from a son of the murdered Master, than the old scoundrel who had wrought his death. As the story runs ; a wedding offered him a happy opportunity, and the young Earl seized it to avenge his murdered sire. One of the false Sinclairs he encountered, and slew upon the road ; the other, in honour of his daughter's bridal, he discovered kicking football. Earl George spoiled both the wedding and the game, by shooting Mr. Ingram Sinclair through the head, and thus reversing the banqueting ar rangements of the court of Denmark, by turning into "funeral baked meats" viands intended to " furnish forth the marriage tables." Through a long straight road, in bad repair, without a bush of decent dimensions on which to relieve the wearied eye, and flanked on either 268 THURSO. side by indifferent crops of grain and turnips, I returned to Wick in sufficient time to request and obtain permission from a medical gentleman named Sinclair, to inspect a museum of Caithness birds, equally creditable to the taste and industry of the collector. The specimens are admirably preserved ; and, land, waders, and water-birds included, they exhibit nearly two hundred varieties of the feathered tribe. Early next morning I took the Thurso road, passed through a very uninteresting country ; nothing agreeable to the eye, and much positively offensive to the organ of smelling. Numerous carts were winding slowly inland, laden with herring-guts to manure the land ; and the enor mous quantity of animal matter I passed on the road, would prove how great the quantity of fish taken must be, to furnish the immense col lections of viscera that I saw. Thurso, the last town in Britain whither a mail-coach can convey letter-bags and tourists, is a small, uninteresting, and ill-buUt place. The church is modern — and a few houses with free-stone fronts in the suburbs, only show the old and ill-constructed streets in gloomier con trast. Built in a locality which never can be much improved, with a bad harbour and a most dangerous sea-coast, Thurso seems to be at " a fix." Had the inn not been tolerable, the A NEW ACQUAINTANCE. 269 town would not be endurable for a day ; and here I had the prospect of remaining three ; but an Irishman's luck, " thanks to the gods !" averted that dreaded visitation. I returned dolorously to MacCay's, sate down to an unexceptionable dinner — fresh salmon and black-faced mutton. In Highland inns there is generally a communion of guests ; and I had a plain, steady, modest-looking, weather-beaten man of business as a board companion. There is no country where I have travelled iri which you meet more sound information, united to simplicity of character, than in Scotland. We spoke of the topics of the day : my compa nion was a man of sense ; he told me he was no politician, and cared not a brass button whether Whig or Tory were in office. Our conversation became discursive: Spain was mentioned — he had been there. Malta and the Mediterranean came on the carpet, and with both he was per fectly at home. I slipped into South America — he had spent two years in Monte Video, and a third at Vera Cruz. A fortunate shipwreck enabled me to introduce him to Madras. Pshaw! the man had been there twice already. I tried him with Juan Fernandez — the fellow was so familiar with the place that, had he been old enough, I should have fancied I had caught hold of Robinson Crusoe. He looked far too honest 270 MR. ROBERTSON. for a Jew ; therefore he could not be that con demned cast-away, called " the Wandering." He was no common seaman ; his language was cor rect — at times classical. He loved toddy — so did I. We turned down a second tumbler ; and, the ice of formality being dissolved, I modestly inquired, " Who the devil was he ? " " A man who owes nothing to the Avorld but ten guineas," was the laconic answer. " A small liability enough. You could pay it, I suppose ?" " Yes — if the debt was demandable. My name is Robertson ; my age is forty-nine ; I was born in Orkney, and if you'll take another tumbler of toddy, I'll tell you my history at large ; and, what will make the story pleasant, I'll engage the whole detail shall not exceed ten minutes." The stranger replenished his glass, lighted a cigar, and, between puffs, favoured me with his adventures. CHAPTER XX. THE STORY OF MR. ROBERTSON. " I WAS left an orphan at an age so early, that I have no recoUection of my parents ; and me mory first awakens when I was located with a distant kinsman, who tolerated rather than pro tected me. I was told, in after life, that it required the influence of the minister to induce the miser to take me in — and, except for the humblest shelter, a light dietary, and clothes not sufficient to repel the cold, I was beholden to the old gentleman for nothing. From the hour I could lift a fishing-rod, or hold on by a rope, the ocean and the cliff enabled me to more than compensate the scanty civility of my patron. Although the supplies of food and raiment which I received at his hands were very limited, of liberty I had an exuberant allowance ; for, from the time I could crawl abroad, the absence of a week would not have provoked an inquiry ; and my worthy relative was perfectly regardless, whether I were perched upon a skerry 272 STORY OF MR. ROBERTSON. or dangling from a precipice, provided I brought home fish or feathers in the evening. No crags man risked his neck more recklessly, or exacted larger contributions from the winged tenants of the cliff; yet the old churl objected to furnish me with a decent rope — an article, which many a loving relative would cheerfully supply to the next of kin, provided himself were in next remainder. " I had turned my fourteenth year ; and, from a summary of my youthful history, you may infer that I was perfectly illiterate, and wild as Orson himself. I should, of course, have grown into a savage man — but good often springs out of evil, and accident emancipated me from the brutal ignorance in which my infancy and youth were passed. " I had paddled to some skerries a mile from the mainland to coal-fish ; and, having half-filled my frail canoe, prepared to return. The evening had been lowering when I left the shore, and, under the lee of the rocks, and occupied in kUling fish fast as the line could touch the water, I had not marked the weather changing. The sea was up ; the wind had freshened to a gale ; and, as it blew dead off shore, a single glance told me that return was more than doubtful. What was to be done ? I dare not land upon the skerry, lest the swell should stave my STORY OF MR. ROBERTSON. 273 frail boat, and leave me probably for days upon a barren rock, over which the spray was already flying, and, at high water, the sea would break, I determined to reach the land or perish, " The attempt was made, but made in vain ; for to stem a rapid current with the wind dead- an-end was hopeless. Life, however valueless, is worth a struggle — I exhausted my young strength, and barely held my own, A paddle snapped — my doom was settled — I drifted out to sea — night closed — and, as I believed, so had my history, " I flung the paddle from me in despair, and, yielding to a fate which seemed inevitable, stretched myself in the bottom of the skiff. Before I started from the shelter of the rock, I had hghtened the canoe, by throwing over board the fish which I had taken. Away I went, dancing on the boiling surface of an angry ocean. Hours passed — darkness came — and, oh ! how long and terrible was that dreary night, as I watched the stars, and, as I fancied, looked my last upon them ! Ere morning broke, nature was totally exhausted — my eyelids closed — sky and planet disappeared — I was on the brink of eternity — and yet I slept ! " I was wakened by a loud hallo. I sate up — looked wildly round — I was enclosed by moun- VOLII. T 274 STORY OF MR, ROBERTSON. tain-waves ; and nothing but a screaming gull was visible, GraduaUy, the skiff mounted up wards from the trough of the sea — and, ere it crowned the wave, a ship, as if uprising from the depths of ocean, ' laid-to ' under a close-reefed top-sail, appeared direct to leeward, I seized the remaining paddle, steered under the counter of the stranger — caught the coil of rope flung from the taffrail as I drifted by. Once the hemp was in the cragsman's hand, his safety was secure ; and in another minute I was standing on the deck of a barque, homeward bound from Norway, " Sailors are kind-hearted ; my simple story and singular preservation interested the crew and captain ; the former supplied me with cloth ing, and the latter promised to protect me, Alas ! the honest mariners in me had got another Jonah, As we steered southward, gale suc ceeded gale ; every day we lost spars and sails, until, on the fifth evening, with an unmanageable ship, we got entangled among the Farne Islands. Every effort to keep out to sea was made ; but at midnight the vessel struck. In five minutes she went to pieces ; the crew found an ocean- grave ; while I, by some miraculous agency, was carried into a cavern filled by the sea, excepting a space at its extremity, which the water did not reach, and where I managed to preserve a STORY OF MR, ROBERTSON. 275 miserable existence. What I endured during a week's horrible imprisonment in that ' autre wild,' may be only fancied. At low water, a ray of light occasionally entered the gloomy cavern. My food was limpets, with a dead fish or two I found within. The wonder is, that reason was not overthrown ; hunger, cold, darkness, soli tude, the rush or the recess of angry waters, as they lashed the rocks without, or broke into the gloomy arch within — all were enough to madden. Yet Providence sustained me amid all this isolated wretchedness, until, six days after my shipwreck, the sea having sufficiently subsided to allow a Bamhorough boat to ap proach the rock, I profited by the low-water of a spring-tide, crept from my dungeon, and was saved.* " My miraculous deliverance was bruited about, and a kind old clergyman heard the story of my double escape, and offered me a home. He proved, indeed, a father^ — and I, half a savage, was reclaimed. He not only compassionated my orphanage, but pitied my mental darkness, and offered me instruction. I, who had never known what kindness was, gratefully received the good man's admonitions, and with humble docility listened to, and stored up the information he imparted. Book succeeded book ; the store of » Appendix, No. XXVI. t2 276 STORY OF MR, ROBERTSON, knowledge rapidly increased ; and, in three years, the Orcadian savage, who had been flung upon the coast desolate, uncivihzed, unlettered, felt himself elevated into an intellectual equahty with his fellow-men. " Alas ! the protection of that kind old man was destined to last but for a season. One night I attended him, as I always did, to his chamber, assisted him to undress, listened as he offered up his evening prayer, received his blessing, and retired. When I entered his chamber next morning, he was sleeping — but it was the sleep of death ! The spirit had parted calmly — the lip smiled — the good old man had exchanged time for eternity — and, as his virtues merited, the transit from earth to heaven had been apparently un embittered by a parting throe. " I must be brief. A clerical successor arrived, and took possession of the parsonage, and a nephew, as heir-at-law, of the property. The former told me that he wanted no idler in the house, gave me some excellent advice, and also an intimation that the sooner I departed the better. The heir, however, generously handed me ten guineas — and, after seeing my benefactor consigned to the tomb, I started on the world without a hving being upon earth whom I had cause to either hate or love. " War was raging, and the field and ocean STORY OF MR. ROBERTSON. 277 alike open to an adventurer. I chose the latter — I had no military partialities ; for, in my remote abode in Orkney, a soldier was rarely seen, and the sea was the fitting element for one whose home from childhood had been the giddy cliff or swelling billow. My career, once commenced, was marked with the chequered fortunes attend ant on a sailor's life. I sailed on every ocean — I roamed under every sky — now whale-fishing in Polar seas, and again trafficking with the savages of the Pacific. I have been attached to every service, and bled under the meteor flag of Britain — one while shipped on board a gallant frigate, at another time marauding in some skulking privateer. I told you my story should be a short one. I came home — home can I call the island to which I am indebted for nothing save my birth ? — but thither I returned. Five-and- twenty years 1 had buffeted the world fearlessly, and a comfortable independency is the reward. Surely in the word " Fatherland " there is a speU. What was this wild island to me, that I should seek its bleak shores to wear away the evening of an adventurous life, beside the stormy voe where my boyish hand first held the fishing-rod and grasped the oar ? " None knew me when I came back. Even to those who have friends and kindred, the lapse of a quarter of a century will thin their acquaint- 278 STORY OF MR. ROBERTSON. ance ; but I had none to lose. By a strange chance, the farm and dwelling of the miserly old man, who had long since been gathered to his fathers, on my retum, was for sale, and I secured it. The summer I spend upon the sea ; in the winter I shoot wild fowl — or pass the long nights in reading, preparing fishing gear for the coming spring, and listening to the narratives of antiquated islanders, netting by lamp-light beside a cheerful fire, when detailing deaths of cragsmen whom I remembered when a boy, and giving the particulars of myself being blown off from a rock they still point out, and drowned, as a thing of consequence. Should I not bless that stormy evening when I was cast upon an angry ocean ? But for that fortunate event, I should have lived a savage life, died from a frayed rope parting when swinging over the crest of some beetling precipice, or found, even a more ignoble grave, at haaf-bank or herring- fishery. You, sir, like myself, have roughed it, or I am deceived. You are, I know, tired of the good town of Thurso ; my wherry is in the harbour; and should you wish to see the wild voe where my boyhood opened, and, most probably, my life's career shall close, accept a passage, and with it all the hospitality a sailor's dwelhng can afford." I embraced the offer; and, as the Pentland CROSS THE PENTLAND FIRTH. 279 tides answered at an early hour on the following morning, we breakfasted, embarked, and by eight o'clock had cleared the harbour, and launched our bark upon that firth of evil reputation among ancient mariners. Yet certainly, we experienced no particular incivility during our short and favourable transit. The wind was nearly south-west, and we had so much of it, that, under the fore-lug and mizen, we ran fully eight knots an hour. With the distracting tides which torment the inexperienced seaman, my Palinurus and his hardy islesmen seemed intimately acquainted. After rounding Dunnet Head, we fairly entered the dreaded sound, cleared it in an hour-and-a-half, and found ourselves between the " south walls," on a penin- sulated point of Hoy, and the isle of Swinna. With a flowing sheet we skirted the western shores of Flota, in former times one of the most sporting islets in the northern archipelago. Two of the rarer species of the duck tribe were com mon there, the sheldrake and the eider-duck. Why birds of such opposite character selected that islet as their abiding place, it is difficult to guess ; the one, from its wide-awake habits, ac quiring the Orcadian sobriquet of the sly-goose, while no neophyte, during his first season at Crockford's, stood plucking with greater resigna tion than the submissive dunter, who bore the 280 ISLAND OF HOY. ordeal untU perfectiy picked clean, and permitted to depart, hke a ruined gambler, without a feather. Keeping the islets of Fara and Risa to leeward, and leaving Cava on the starboard hand, at eleven we landed upon Hoy, and proceeded to make the ascent of the highest of the Orcadian hiUs. Mounting from the westward, you gain a long succession of stupendous cliffs, beetling over a restless ocean, which lashes their bases a thousand feet below the traveller's feet. " Non sine pul vere palmam" — no joke clambering into the clouds — and that any tourist will admit, if the day be hot, and himself in good condition. The sky, though sultry, was clear. Proceeding southward, and passing regions belting the summit of the loftier heights, where it is reported a botanist might live and die "in his giory," in a perfect garden of weeds with desperate names caviare to the multitude, we crowned the mountain, and enjoyed one of the most magnificent views, island and ocean, that can be fancied. The two local lions are the Old Man of Hoy and the Dwarfie stone. The former stands boldly from the neighbouring cliffs, exhibiting an insulated pillar of dark rock, springing from a base perforated with numerous arched caverns, and bearing a fanciful likeness to the human THE DWARFIE STONE. 281 figure. The latter * is more remarkable for the trouble it has inflicted on antiquarians than any thing beside. Some of these laborious gentlemen ; aver that it was formerly used for Druid worship, while others wiU have it that it was once occu pied by a giant and his lady, and afterwards, by a christian hermit. Now, what business could the ascetic have with a second bed ?f I incline to fancy, therefore, and from good authority, that the large gentleman was the former tenant. J The only antiquarian matter in which you * " This stone measures thirty-two feet in length, sixteen and a half feet in breadth, and seven feet five inches in height. Human ingenuity and perseverance, at some early period, has excavated the mass and rendered it a species of dwelling. It is entered by a smaU doorway, and is divided into three distinct apartments ; in one end there is a smaU room, and in the other there is an apart ment with a bed five feet eight inches long, and two broad ; and in the middle part there is an area, where there has been a fire place, and a hole at the top to let out the smoke. This very strange memorial of an age long since past, is the object of a variety of traditionary legends." — Barry's History. t •' At the foot of this mountain I did see a very large four- cornered free-stone, lying altogether above ground, and under it remaineth a Uttie stripe of water not a foot broad. There are no extraordinary big stones near it, neither the appearance of any quarry out of which it was digged. Yet it was so big, that, having a round hole in the upper side, I went down thereby, and found two beds hewed out with irons, and a Uttie trance betwixt them." — Mackail's Short Relation, MS. Adv. Lib. Edin. X " Magnus est et excelsus fabricatus a gigante suaque uxore. Unus lapis est cameratus in quo lectus est perquara artificiosci factus in lapide viro et uxore ; tempore camerationis fcemina gravida fuit, ut lectus testatur ; nam ea pars lecti in qua uxor cubuit efBgiem habet ventri gravidi." — Descrip. Insu. Orchad. per me Jo. Ben. an. 1529. 282 STROMNESS, would take any interest is the fact, that an animal now unknown, the white or arctic hare, was once found here abundantiy. Considering the enormous numbers of winged vermin found iu every holm and isle, from the wind-cuffer {falco tinnunculus) to the ring-tailed eagle, in cluding owls, hawks, kites, and falcons — the harrier who will disturb the hen-roost, and the yellow erne who will lift a child* — the exist ence of game at all is almost miraculous. As the Shetlander's habitation was situated at the top of some of the winding voes which every where indent these islands, on returning to the lugger, we steered for Stromness, and anchored as the sun was setting. This second capital of Orcady is not the place a Parisien would wish to winter in — for though the harbour is land-locked and secure, the town is about the worst in Britain ; streets miserably narrow, and houses turning a cold shoulder on you. I forget the inn ; but it was the inn of the town; and injustice I must acknowledge that • " There are many eagles, especially at the west end of the Main, and in Choye (Hoy), I was very well informed that an eagle did take up a swaddled chUd, a month old, which the mother had laid down until she went to the back ofthe peat-stack at Houton- head, and carried it to Choye, viz. four miles, which, being disco vered by a traveUer, who heard the lamentations of the mother, four men went presently thither in a boat, and, knowing the eagle's nest, found the child, without any prejudice done to it." — Mackaile's Relation. STONES OF STENNIS. 283 I have seldom been more agreeably disappointed — the fare was good, and the chambers very tolerable. Although " auld warld" affairs seldom lead me to the right or to the left, yet "the stones of Stennis," near as they happened to be, could not be passed unvisited. Some private affairs required my Orcadian friend's presence in Stromness, and under the guidance of a learned Theban, I pro ceeded to inspect these very singular remains. Like Stonehenge, Stennis presents a number of irregular stone shafts pitched perpendicularly into the earth, with a general circular disposition, why or wherefore antiquarians will pretend to tell, but no common observer can possibly ima gine. A Danish mound — a Pictish fort — an Irish cave — to their respective "uses" all and every are resolvable ; but wherefore, on one of the dreariest, flattest, unpicturesque corners of the earth, these tall unshapely stones were erected is a marvel. Of the whole circle, one only appears to have been worth preservation, and that one has been overturned by the plough.* * I beUeve no man admires the matchless Christopher more than myself, and when I visited Stennis, with the Professor's most pleasant volume, and sate down on a fallen stone to read, a passage came home to the heart, and made me half-womanly. I, too, thought of the " Unties " at Loch Long, " and aU that there go in and out." " Close to either side ofthe southern end of the bridge which leads across to the northern promontory, stands a great sentinel 284 MATRIMONY By poking hands through a hole in it, you could contract marriage without special hcense, or, as Lydia Languish says, "asking permission" of every butcher in the parish, to be joined " in holy wedlock." And was that all ? No, faith ! Stennis might put Doctors' Commons to the blush ; and, if a man married in a hurry, why the comfort was, he could slip the knot in double-quick. Premising that Odin marriages, hke the Border ones, were not over formal, StiU they had neither to endure "the law's delay," or the passing of an Act of Parliament to make all right again. Was ever process more simple ? Did the parties disagree, a short cere mony gave both a formal discharge — and a man, shackled vinculo matrimonii in the morning, stone, as if the remains of a gateway or barrier. On the top of one of these a beautiful pair of linnets sat twittering and preening, secure, as they thought, upon almost the loftiest elevation which the neighbourhood afforded, and of course we did nothing to scare them from their stony height. They seemed quite tame, and very cheerful, as linnets are wont to be. We could see their little sparkling eyes and sharpened beaks, and we thought of our own Unties at home, and of the door at which they hang iu suimy days, and of all that there go in and out ; and, for a time, the dread worship of the Druids, and the cruel sacrifices of the sons of Odin, and the fierce contentions of the Sea-Kings, and even the actual presence of these mystical symbols of 'the unknown God,' all faded from our view ; and we could see a low-roofed cottage, with leafy windows, and an intertwining porch, and numerous shrubs and trees, and winding walks, and many-coloured wreaths of 'bright consummate flowers,' and human hearts affectionate and true, and we blessed God for all his mercies." — Wilsons Voyage round the Coasts of Scotland. AND DIVORCE. 285 might be subject to the bachelor's tax in the afternoon, " They both came to the kirk of Steinhouse," says Dr. Henry, " and, after enter ing the kirk, the one went out at the south, and the other at the north door, by which they were holden to be legally divorced, and free to make another choice." But, Jack, I won't seduce you hither under false pretences. The stone, where lovers shook hands and were made happy, has long since been knocked into smithereens — and I fear, if married, and tired of your wife, were you to be divorced at the kirk of Stenhouse, Doctor Lush ington would raise doubts ; and when you, in the innocence of your heart, had fancied you had " shpped the langle," Doctor Adams might question the legality of the whole process, and assert that you were stiU " Benedict, the married man." CHAPTER XXI. AN ORCADIAN HAVEN— THE SAILOR's RETREAT A WANDEREr's DOMICILE WINTER PREPARATIONS- — THE HOSt's SANCTUM EVENING EXCURSION SKERRIES SPORTING INCIDENT A STAND OF PLOVER WILD-FOWL SHOOTING SEA-FISHING RETURN TO THE MAIN. The wind was light, and the main-lug, which we had dispensed with yesterday, was set this morning. I will not bore you. Jack, by telling you the voes we navigated, and the skerries we passed through, until, at the head of a wild inlet, opening directly from the sea, we slipped into a chasm in the cliffs, so steep and narrow, that the helmsman might have touched with the tiUer the rocks on either side. Within, the passage widened, and terminated in a natural basin, large enough to allow a fishing-boat to swing, and yet so completely domineered by rocks one hundred feet in height, that a hay- band would hold the lugger in a gale of wind. Iron rings were inserted into holes cut in the face of the precipice, to which the mooring ropes THE sailor's retreat. 287 were attached ; and, although the tide had ebbed when we entered, there were three fathoms water in the basin. Yet, deep as it was, through the pellucid element the bottom was distinctly visible ; the crab was seen moving over the many-coloured pebbles, and quantities of sprat- sized fishes, played through the tangle which grew from the rocky sides. Leaving the crew to moor the lugger, my host and I landed. He led the way through a fissure in the cliff which trended landwards — and, fifty yards within, we stood in front of one of the most secluded and comfortable cottages, wherein a man who had buffeted the world for forty years, could change the turmoil of adventurous life for peaceful solitude. " You are welcome. Colonel," said the Orca dian, as he paused upon the threshold, and took my hand in his. " Here, in this sheltered nook, the ocean-child will anchor in his old age. Would that every honest-hearted saUor were moored as snugly as myself! Look round. Colonel — all that you see has been my handiwork. I found here roofless walls ; yet within them my infancy was passed, and on the ruins I built the cottage where I intend the evening of my life to close in quiet. Follow me ; once more I bid you welcome." A small porch protected the entrance of the 288 A wanderer's domicile. wanderer's domicUe from the east wind, and the towering cliffs secured it against " aU the rest." Within, there was a spacious kitchen ; it was unceiled, but the spars which bound the wood work of the roof were crossed with slips of deal, affording a safe and dry depository for nets, lines, and cordage. A plentiful supply of bacon, dried ling and cod-fish, with a few smoked geese, the relics of the former winter, were also pendant from the rafters. Huge balls of spun wool hung from pegs in every corner ; while a churn, and the wooden appurtenances for making cheese and butter, showed that the retired mariner enjoyed another source of rustic comfort. An abundant supply of rough furniture and culinary utensils were placed on shelves and dressers, or were suspended over the ample fire-place. A cheerful fire, summer though it was, blazed in the hearth, and completed a picture of the domestic opulence of an Orcadian domicile. There were two attendants in this outer chamber — the elder trussing chickens, the younger knead ing flour to make bread. Wherever the eye turned, as I looked round, I saw everything that indicated comfort, present and prospective. Lamps, wicks, split rushes, and cakes of tallow, designed for making candles, or fighting with seal-oU the long and dreary nights, gave tacit proof that in that hyperborean chmate, timely winter preparations. 289 preparations should be made for " winter and cold weather;" whUe, occasionally, a string of men, women, and children passed the windows, carrying baskets on their backs, suited to the respective strengths of the bearers, and filled with hard black peats from a neighbouring moss, which a couple of the boatmen applied them selves to stack against the cliff, that on three sides walled in the little nook, in which the retired mariner had built his abiding place and fenced in a garden. As if to render the comfort of his domicile complete, the essential element, which, through the eloquent preaching of that admirer of "thin potations," Father Mathew, has even become fashionable in St. Giles's, was plentifully supphed. Through a cleft, midway up the shelf of rock, a thread of sparkling water, which a gun-barrel might have vented, issued into light, and fell into an earthen pitcher. That filled, the streamlet crept sUently away, irrigated the lawn and garden, and then added its tiny tribute to the boundless masses of the wild Atlantic. Everybody rides some hobby. Jack ; and his domicUe and domain were evidently the sailor's. I saw that he feh gratified at the interest with which I viewed his estabhshment — for, with a satisfied smUe, he invited me to enter his state apartment ; and, faith ! had it been planned by VOL. II. u 290 THE host's SANCTUM. a conclave of old bachelors, the thing could not have been more perfect. Every sight-shower, as you know, keeps his largest lion for the last, as Madame Tussaud reserves her "chamber of horrors" for the Cockney, who, when sick of waxen kings and queens, is delectated with a choice collection of heads reeking from the guillotine, and Burkers large as life, in the identical costume in which they made their parting salaam to an admiring crowd, before the Debtor's door. The effect is superb — and the visitor leaves the exhibition overpowered with pleasure and surprise, and unable to sleep for a fortnight. If, therefore, I was delighted with mine host's outer arrange ments, when inducted to his sanctum, was I not enraptured ? The first feeling was one of doubt, as to whether I were actually on sea or land — in the cabin of a ship, or a room on terra firma. To give it a specific name was impossible — it was a dining-room, a sleeping-chamber, a work-shop, and an armoury. In the centre, there was a fire place, and over it half a dozen stand of arms, from " a birding-piece " to a fen-gun, were suspended ; whUe powder-flasks, shot-belts, washing-rods, and all other appurtenances to fire-arms, studded the adjacent waUs. On the opposite side, and above the entrance from the kitchen, there hung the host's SANCTUM. 291 a variety of harpoons and fish-spears. From either end, the chamber was lighted — before one window stood a bench, with every description of carpenter's tools ; and the other was furnished with a turning-lathe. In opposite corners a berth was boxed off. These twain being intended for the accommodation of strangers, as the host pointed to a hammock rolled and traced up to the ceiling, intimating that, like Hawser Trunnion, he put no faith in standing-beds, but trusted to " clew and canvass." Every space round the fioor, not occupied by bench or berth, was fitted with a row of lockers ; some held the proprietor's wardrobe, others were partitioned to contain huge spirit-bottles, and one was fitted as a magazine, and supplied with all the munitions of feathered warfare. To all these depositories for the recep tion of miscellaneous property, add a score of canvass-bags, a dozen fishing-rods, gaffs, land ing-nets, sou-westers, pistols, cutlasses, mer- schaum pipes, a Dutch clock, a barometer, and a map of Europe, and you have a faithful in ventory of the goods and chattels of Mr. Robertson. In furnishing the preceding catalogue of effects, I have made an important omission. There were two sets of swinging shelves, capable of containing probably an hundred volumes, and both were closely packed. A glance at the u 2 292 EVENING EXCURSION. Stranger's library told me it had been chosen with good taste and judgment. It was a melange ofthe light and the instructive; and I question, had I been offered the minister's in exchange, that, for hyperborean reading, I should not have preferred the voyager's. We dined early ; bacon, chickens, and splendid fish — all the produce ofhis little farm-yard, or the spoil of net and line. The length of an autumnal evening, would, even for the Black Knight and the Clerk of Copmanhurst, have been overmuch for a jollification, and I accepted my host's invi tation to visit a group of skerries, a mile's distance from the land, where he averred we should find some sport with rod and gun. We proceeded accordingly to the harbour, launched a row-boat, and pulled off to the rocky islets, which, my Palinurus assured me, in summer afforded the best fishing on the coast, and at other seasons, (when a landing could be effected) exceUent employment for the fowler. All this I could easily imagine ; and indeed of both, before my return, I had sufficient proof. From the shore, these rocks appear a single island ; but, when you near them, you find they consist of a group of half a dozen, divided from each other by narrow sounds, some scarce a pistol-shot across, and others so narrow that an active rnan could clear them by a spring. SKERRIES. 293 Through all, especially the narrow ones, the tide runs with awful velocity ; and an intimate know ledge of landing-places and currents is required, or the greatest danger would attend the most cautious attempt to disembark. Yet these wild and perilous rocks are the favourite beat of my fearless companion ; he visits them " by day or night, or any light," and, if the risk and peril be great, truly the reward is more than propor tionate. One islet, larger and loftier .than all besides, is frequented by passing flocks of water-fowl. These skerries being also centrically situated with respect to several of the inhabited islands, when, at day-break, the birds leave off feeding on the main, they retire to the summit of this rock to enjoy security and repose. Its loneliness, however, is not the only cause which induces the wild-fowl to haunt it : on the summit, there is a basin formed by a hollow in the rock, always plentifully supplied with rain-water ; and here hundreds of the duck-tribe resort to pass the day, and, at times, the surface of the pool will be so crowded with mallards, sheldrakes, widgeons, and teal, embracing all their varieties, that my host declared a pebble could hardly be thrown in, without killing or maiming. Although shy to a proverb, the ducks are indifferent engineers, and on a more dangerous position a too-confiding 294 SPORTING INCIDENT. maUard never went to sleep. On every side, the pool is masked by rocks, taU enough to hide a stooping man ; and, wary as wild-fowl are, by approaching them from leeward, my guide rarely failed in effecting a surprise. " When I returned here," he said, " and bought the property on which I have moored myself, shooting was not among the number of my accomplishments. Reefing a top-saU is one thing ; swinging across a cliff — your sole depend ence three strands of twisted rope-yarn — another ; from early associations, my idea of fowling was perfectly Orcadian — hooping eggs from out a hole, or twisting the neck of a skoray,* or young kittiwake. Well, I had brought home with me an antiquated double gun ; its flint locks and silver mounting, valuable in my eyes ; and, anxious to learn the art of gunnery, I rowed off one morning to practise here on sand-pipers and red-shanks. As I neared the islands, a flight of wild-ducks gave a broad sweep round the summit, and dropped fearlessly into this pool, which, in lapse of years, I had forgotten. Here was a glorious opportunity — all in my favour — a fresh breeze — a smooth sea. I landed easily to leeward, threw off my shoes, ascended ledge after ledge, as the rock rose step-like from the shore. My approach was drowned by the breeze, • The name given to the young sea-guUs by the islanders. SPORTING INCIDENT. 295 while, from the pool, quackings fell upon my delighted ear in every tone, from the httle teal's to the hoarse sheldrake's. I gained the summit unperceived ; chance directed me to a fissure in the projecting rock only a few inches wide — I peeped through — I thought the pulsations of my heart would have knocked out a hole in my waistcoat — and in holding in my breath I half committed suicide. There, within a dozen yards of my ambuscade, and in perfect peace and harmony, five hundred birds were associated — golden-eye and pin-tail, sheldrake and mallard, widgeon and teal, all clattering, and quacking, and quadrilling — and I, only a few paces off, peeping slily at their innocent proceedings. Some slept in the warm sunshine, with the head beneath the wing ; others pruned their feathers with foot and bill ; and the whole duck commu nity appeared happy as the day was long. " I gazed a minute in breathless admiration, and almost hesitated to disturb felicity so perfect ; but the opportunity was too tempting, and the milk of feathered kindness gave way to truculent designs. With both barrels cocked, I sprang up suddenly, and shouted — a hundred quacks re plied, from the quaver of consternation uttered by the little teal to the loud alarum of the noisy golden-eye* — every wing flapped the water — * Anas Clangula of Linnffius. 296 SPORTING INCIDENT. sauve qui peut was the order of the day — and, helter-skelter, duck, teal, and widgeon inter mixed like troops of all arms after a rout — away went the whole. I pointed my gun at the re treating mob, and, in fancy, twenty couple were floundering on the ground already — for he would indeed have been an ingenious gunner who merely fired in the direction, and did not commit murder by wholesale. I pulled the trigger — a dull snap responded to the pressure of my finger — cock number two fell — a flash from the pan, by all the infernal deities ! It was a visita tion, as an old skipper under whom I sailed in early life would, say, that might justify a Quaker in kicking his own mother. I flung the faithless gun upon the rocks — dinged one barrel, and, I presume, d d the other one — retired in dudgeon to my boat — swore eternal war against every thing that wore a feather — em barked next week for Leith, and purchased the arms which ornament my parlour, and, better service still, supply luxurious additions to the simpler fare an Orkney table boasts. Ha ! — a stand of plover! Now, Colonel, you shall bring a few heads of game from my island preserve." The flock, some fifty in number, came on whistiing and wheeling above our heads — then, with a sudden dip, they made a low circle, and pitched upon the stony surface. A STAND OF PLOVER. 297 " They are aU this year's birds," observed the Islesman, " and we can walk up to them fear lessly at once. But no — get behind yonder rock, and I'll send them direct to you." I took my position accordingly ; whUe he, making a slight detour, fired at the plover as they ran upon the ground. They sprang, and, as he had predicted, swept directly across the rock where I was standing. Five-and-twenty paces off they curved their flight, and the wings massed upon the centre. I seized the happy moment, delivered both barrels, and picked up six couple and a-half. I hinted, passim, that " early morn " is not the only season when my adventurous host visits this lonely isle. In spring, he takes chance of a noontide surprise ; when the wind favours the attempt, it generally proves successful, less or more, as accident wUl have it ; and what gives a most sporting zest to the business, is, the perfect uncertainty of what species of the feathered race, at the time of his intrusion, may then be resting on this most interesting flash.* " I have expected," he said, " a flock of ducks, and found half a dozen swans ; I have seen, as * This expression is used frequentiy in the west of Ireland, to describe a pool of water, not sufBcientiy extensive to obtain the dignity of being termed "loch.'' 298 WILD-FOWL SHOOTING. I imagined, teal wing their flight hither, and, when I have stolen upon them, found that, in the preceding storm, the " tufted-duck " * had here sought a temporary shelter. One day last January, I patiently took my position behind the large stone I pointed out to you, as my favourite place of ambuscade ; the weather grew remark ably thick, and snow fell so fast, that, through the close flakes, you could not at twenty yards tell duck from diver. One man was left to watch the yawl we had drawn up upon the ledge of rock ; the other, with a second gun, lay crouched beside me. I left home soon after day-break, and, as you know, for several months, as far as sunlight goes here, we are always on short allowance, my stay upon the island did not exceed four hours. During that brief space of time, I fired above seventy shots ; and once, so quickly did birds present themselves, that my four barrels were all unloaded. Some of the birds fell upon the water, more dropped among the rocks. Sailor, my sagacious friend," — he tapped the head of a small-sized, brown water- spaniel, — " is a noble waterman, and excellent retriever, and that day I kept him busy. When light faUed, and prudence hinted that it was * Anas fuligula of Linnseus. This bird is not indigenous to the Orkneys, and only pays a forced visit in bad weather. When the storm abates, it immediately takes its departure. SEA FISHING, 299 time to seek the mainland, what. Colonel, was the produce of my day's work ?" " Why, I suppose you could have stocked a London poulterer." " Faith, pretty near it," returned the Isles- man. " He should have had at least a variety to exhibit to his customers — I brought seven- and-twenty couple of wUd-fowl off the rock, including nine varieties of the goose tribe, swans and brent-geese, four species of duck, widgeon and teal completing the tale. But, recollect that I secured only a portion of the spoil ; wounded birds, which dropped wide of me, of course could not be recovered, and sea-eagles and kites saved me the further trouble of looking after them. On visiting the island the following day, I could have collected feathers to have stuffed a bed, and as many cleanly-picked skeletons as would have filled a glass-case. But, come, we'll fish the sound for half an hour, and then for supper. Colonel, " with what appetite you may." I wUl not disturb your peace of mind. Jack, by entering into the particulars of our fishing. I know the effect : the old property would be instantly advertised for sale, and, without stopping to square accounts with your man-of- business, you would set out at once to hve and die here. At sunset, we glided into the basin I have described, moored the yawl, and returned 300 RETURN TO THE MAIN. to the stranger's domicile — ten couple of grey plover in a string, and a pair of square-built Orcadians groaning under a load of coal-fish, sufficient to oppress the back of a coal-whipper, and leave him lumbagoed for his life. CHAPTER XXIL ORCADIAN FOWLING SEASON INCUBATION — THE SKUA EIDER DUCK — DEPARTURE FEOM KIRKWALL CONCLUSION. After supper, our conversation turned, as might have been expected, upon matters which are ever uppermost in an Orcadian's thoughts — the fowling and fishing, which form, at the same time, the amusement and the business of his life. This hyperborean archipelago possesses an ad vantage over the other corners of Great Britain, inasmuch as it offers to the Orcadian fowler a double season — and that termed close-time in every locality. Highland and Lowland, is here the busiest of the year. While incubation is going forward, no foot, save the shepherd's or the keeper's, disturbs the deserted moor ; but here, in these wild isles, the cragsman is in full activity. My host tells me, that the rocks we visited to-day are at that time alive with myriads of terns and the smaller gulls. Every fissure in the cliff has then its feathered tenant, and even 302 THE SKUA, the flattest and barest ledges of the island are then overspread with eggs of the sea-swallow, dropped so numerously, that they may be taken up in baskets-full. But this, as a scene of nidifl- cation, is tame as the process of farm-yard incu bation, compared to that carried on in a holm some five leagues distant from the mariner's retreat. It is a small uninhabited isle, its ocean side walled by beetling cliffs, while its surface dips gradually to the west, and there presents a shore level with the water, and easy of access. The herbage is confined to a few scattered patches of short and sickly-looking grass, upon which a few miserable sheep manage to subsist them selves in summer. Throughout the broken surface of loose stones, auk and gull, guillemot and kittiwake deposit their eggs so carelessly, that the visitor can scarcely pass over without trampling upon dozens. The cliff itself is dif ferently inhabited — the lower shelves crowded with puffins, cormorants, and divers ; while removed, and in a locality less accessible, that fierce and powerful sea-rover, the skua,* builds in the full security and confidence which a strong and well-defended position warrants. From all aggression his nest is safe ; the kite and falcon observe a respectful distance, and even the lordly * Appendix, No. XXVII. DEPARTUUE FROM KIRKWALL. C03 eagle avoids a conflict with this daring enemy, whom even man assaUs not with impunity. The cormorant wUl sit stupidly upon her eggs, untU she is noosed or knocked over with a stone. The eider permits her downy nest to be harried again and again ; * but woe to bird or man that transgresses upon the bold and formidable skua. My host informs me that feathers and eggs are not the only inducements which lead the rock-fowler to the holm. The young kittiwake and skoray,— as they term the gull, — are here an esteemed article of food, and held by the islesmen to be tender as a chicken. On the respective merits of these birds — never having made experimental comparisons — I am not pre pared to offer an opinion. Early prejudice is strong — give me the chuckle f rather than the skoray — and I'll stick to the farm-yard, and leave to the islesman his favourite cliff. * * * * The week has slipped away ; in regular course the steamer is expected to-morrow at Kirkwall, and I shall bid my kind and most intelligent host a long, and probably an eternal farewell. With lovers, parting may be " sweet sorrow ;" but I know nothing more painful to the feelings than to shake a man by the hand, and say adieu * Appendix, No. XXVIII. t Anglice, chicken. 304 CONCLUSION. for ever — that is, if he be worth regretting. I have been the wanderer's guest five days ; the morning spent in manly pastime — the voe, the cliff, the skerry — all affording, in their turn, excellent occupation for rod and gun. The evening passed in social enjoyment ; his " tales of fiood " were returned by mine " of field " — to his hurricane, my rejoinder was a storm — when he carried me off privateering among the Bahamas, I brought-him back to plunder Badajoz in return ; and, after he had fried me in the torrid zone, I cooled his heels on Torres Vedras. Well, often and delightfully wUl my accidental acquaintance with the Orcadian wanderer come back to memory, when I shall be probably under another and a warmer sky. To me, the wild occurrences of rugged life are germane — I was not " nursed in the lap of luxury," as the phrase goes ; before the beard was darkened on my lip, the boy's shoulder stood beside the man's — and when a bold career, charged deep with varying adventure, closed — Time, that viUanous old scytheman, tinged me with a httle of his silver, to hint that I had "done my work." I am no " carpet-knight ; " — when others mingled in the hght frivolities of youth, I was shivering in a Pyrenean bivouac, or roasting in the Indies — to day, owner of two hundred doUars — to-morrow, the baggage-mule gone, and I left unprovided CONCLUSION. 305 with a second shirt. Into the refinements of society, my peeps, hke angel's visits, have been "few and far between." Almack's is known to me by name ; but confound me, if I can tell its locality. My acquaintance with a court has been restricted to seeing the guard trooped at St. James's ; and, beyond a country ball, the only scene of elegant festivity with which I could boast myself a partaker, was her Grace of Richmond's on the 15th of June, when mounting a guard of honour at the door. I am not indoc trinated in the mysteries of the turf — then what care I about Oaks or Derbys ? I would not step across the flag-way from the Club, though Persiani sang "Jim Crow," or Cerito threw a somerset — and whether a Prima Donna should " SoU her honour, or her new brocade," would have about as much interest for me, as the faux pas of the lady of the street-sweeper. Give me no twaddle about fashionable follies, but the details of incident in life, which a man should tell, and a man should listen to. Let me feel the horny grasp of a sailor's hand — none of your kid-skin manipulations, with an " Excuse my glove !" — or place me " i' the afternoon," toe to toe, with an old Peninsular, and, if he be scarred diagonally across the face, " the token true of battle-field," VOL. II. X 306 CONCLUSION. why, all the better. Keep your perfumed popin jays to yourself; let them expend their affairs of nothingness upon each other ; give me the man who has crowned the breach, or combated the tempest — and — " Hallo! Colonel O'Flagherty — what the deuce is the matter ?" " Nothing, Jack ! only that I part from one who, though cast upon the world without a friendly hand to support him, has elbowed his way to fortune, and proved that desolate and depressing circumstances cannot subdue the buoyant spirit of the brave ; and even the neg lected boy still may prove that " the man's the man for a' that." Confound that jangling bell ! — a blacker mass of smoke issues from the funnel, and an anti quated Orcadian waterman, — the very imper sonation of the gentleman who ferries over Styx, — intimates that the Royal Sovereign is " getting her anchor." I am seated in the stern- sheets — my traps deposited in the bow — the steamer sounds a second and a louder " alarum " — the oars fall upon the water — the Wanderer waves a last farewell from the pier-head — ^'tis done ! — I am " once more upon the deep " — and bound again for Ultima Thule. Farewell, Jack! You wiU probably expect some parting counsel. You may recollect when CONCLUSION. 307 old Dominick Daly found his route had come, like an affectionate parent, he summoned his heir-apparent to the bed-side. " Peter," says he, " I've no money to lave ye." " 'Pon my sowl, father jewel, you would have surprised me, if you tould me that ye had," returned the afflicted son. " But maybe I can give you some advice." " And that same," observed Peter, " may be usefiil." " I have lived sixty-eight years in the world," said Mr. Daly, " and I'll give ye the result of my experience. Now, mind, Peter, what I'm goin' to say — Never sit with your back to the fire, or mix ye'r liquor, and the divil himself won't put ye under the table!" To this admirable advice I particularly direct your attention, merely adding a rider to it. In the present state of that land of Goshen, where you are abiding, don't make any inquiries after rent — and be sure to " keep your powder dry ! " Once more — farewell ! APPENDIX APPENDIX. Appendix, No. I. — P. II. The Farne Islands. Since these passages were put in type, by a melancholy coincidence, another casualty has occurred — and the Pegasus has perished within a short distance of the rock which proved so fatal to the Forfarshire. The latter calamity, as far as loss of life went, was even proportionately greater than the former. The authors of both misfortunes are gone to their accounts ; and both calamities, which placed so many homes in mourn ing, are solely attributable to the ignorance or misconduct of the respective commanders of those ill-fated vessels. The Forfarshire, with a heavy sea, and disabled machinery, had a safe haven. Holy Island, to have run into, but the captain stupidly persevered — and fifty lives paid the penalty. The Pegasus, without a ripple on the water, to save some twenty minutes, was rashly carried by her commander from a clear course into a dangerous channel — and the consequences were awM. To the errors of the dead a liberal indulgence should be extended ; but when men who are arbitrarUy entrusted with life and property, whose loss may plunge hundreds into penury and wretchedness, idly experimentalize with both, no repro bation can be too severe. 312 APPENDIX. Appendix, No. II. — P. 34. The Bomont. The Bomont rises on the very top of Rowhope, a steep hill about twelve miles south of Yetholm. The Kail has its source near the head of the Coquet, about ten miles south-west of Rowhope, and after passing Chatto, Hownam, and More- battle, discharges itself into the Teviot near Eckford. At Town Yetholm there is an excellent inn, the Plough, at whieh most anglers who visit this part of the country take up their quarters. The viUage itself is an extremely pleasant place in summer, being nearly surrounded by beautiful green Mils ; and, for trout-fishing, it may be reckoned among the best stations on the border. About a mUe to the north-west, there is a small piece of water called Loch-tower, or Primside Loch, which contains both perch and pike ; but few anglers who visit Yetholm think them worth trying for. Appendix, No. III.— P. 36. The Laughing Gull {Lams ridibundus), or Black Head. This is rather a discursive species, found over a considerable extent in latitude, and also occasionally inland, though never at any very great distance from the sea. It is a light and handsome bird, formed for rapid flight, and weighing only between eight and nine ounces, though it measures fourteen and fifteen inches in length. Unlike many of our sea-birds, it is more abundant on the English shores than in the north ; and though it ranges to Orkney and Shetland, and even farther northward, in the breeding season, it finds its way to more southerly places in the winter. Its seasonal migrations thus bear some analogy to those of the marsh birds ; and though it fishes, and has other habits and also characters of the genus to which it belongs, it breeds generally, if not ex clusively, in marshy places, and sometimes at considerable distances from the sea. There it mingles freely and in har mony with the other marsh birds, and at those seasons finds APPENDIX. 313 its food in the fresh waters, on the little islands among which it nestles. Those inland habits in the breeding time have procured it a number of names similar to those of land or marsh birds. It has been called " peewit," or " lapwing gull." The inhabitants of Orkney call it the " sea-crow ;" and in some places it is called the "mire-crow." Some of its habits are, indeed, similar to those of the crow tribe, more especially of the rook ; and when ground is newly turned up, in the neigh bourhood of their breeding places, these gulls and the rooks may be found together, picking up apparently the same food in the same manner, and neither of them offering hostility to the other. The nests are found in the smaller hummucks, or troughs, in the fens or marshes, the tops of which are paddled flat by the feet of the birds, previous to the eggs being depo sited. The eggs are two or three in number, of an olive colour, with darker blotches ; but they are liable to consider able variations of colour, both when dropped and after they have been soiled by the feet of the parent bird. On the nest, the female sits quite exposed, but in such a manner as to command readily the whole horizon around her ; and thus she is as weU protected as those birds which nestle in cover. These gulls make a great deal of noise previous to changes of the weather ; and when the air softens and pro mises rain after long protracted drought, and thereby puts the lesser mire and sludge animals into motion, the gulls are all activity and clamour. They follow the habit of most birds whicli are social among each other, and with other species in the breeding season, in being tamed without- much diflSculty ; it is not likely that colonies of them could be made to settle and breed, though in that case they would be highly orna mental, and also render considerable service in clearing gardens and ornamental grounds of worms, slugs, and other earth animals. Authors have made several species out of this one, from the seasonal changes of plumage to which it is liable, as has indeed been the case with most of the seasonal birds, even though the seasonal change of place is not greater than that from the fen, or the solitary inland pool, to the nearest part of the shore. The mature birds of this species are not 314 APPENDIX. eatable, and the young are very inferior to those of the kitti wake ; but they used to be served up at feasts, more for ostentation than for use. In the breeding season, the mature birds have the feet, bill, and orbits red ; the irides hazel ; the head and nape brownish black, except a few white feathers round the eye ; rest ofthe upper part grey ; the primary quills white, the first with one black nob, the others with black spots ; the secondaries ash-colour, marked with white. In winter, the black on the head fades to white, excepting a patch in front of the eye, and another on the ear-covert. The young are mottled-brown and white, have the bill dusky, with more or less of a reddish tinge at the base, and the feet yellowish. In the second year, they more approach the colour of the mature birds ; but they have the head white in winter before it becomes dark in summer. As they are to be seen in all those states of plumage, they have been called by diff'erent names, and sometimes described as different birds. Their inland habits have caused them (the young especially, in their winter plumage) to be confounded with the common gull. Though only about two-thirds of the weight of that bird, they appear nearly as large, as, though a little shorter, they are longer in the wings. Appendix, No. IV. — P. 41. Warit Castle. Wark Castle is now so completely dilapidated, that the site only can be traced ; and, from the extent of the buUding, and its outworks, enable the traveller to fancy what it must have been when a place of strength. Appendix, No. V. — P, 42. Ford Castle. Pass near Ford Castle, now the seat of Sir John Delaval, possessed in the reign of Henry III. by Odonel de Ford ; and by the marriage of his daughter to William Heron passed into that family : from them to the Carrs ; from the Carrs to the present owner, — Pennant's Tour in Scotland, APPENDIX. 315 Appendix, No. IV. — P. 49. Death of James of Scotland, The day after the battle Lord Dacre, who knew the king, discovered his body among the slain, and it was afterwards identified by his chancellor, Sir William Scott, his serjeant- porter, Sir John Forman, and other Scottish prisoners. He had received several wounds, both from arrows and bills. There was a deep wound in his neck, and his left hand was nearly severed from the arm. The body was conveyed to Berwick, where it was embalmed and enclosed in lead, and afterwards secretly, among other things, sent to Newcastle. From Newcastle, Surrey took it with him to London, and placed it in the monastery of Sheen, near Richmond, where it was afterwards interred, by the special permission of Leo X., as James had died under sentence of excommunication, in curred ipso facto by his breaking the truce with England. Weber has printed, in his Appendix to the Battle of Flodden, the Pope's Letter to Henry, dated 29tli November, 1513, granting him permission to inter it, as requested, in St. Paul's. It, however, remained at Sheen tiU the time of Edward VI., when the monastery became the property and the residence of Henry Gray, Duke of Suffolk. In the spirit of profanation which distinguished that reign — when the dead were " un- plumbed," and monuments defaced, to afford a covering to a greedy courtier's dwelling or a pavement for his hall — the body was throvra into a waste room, among some old timber, lead, and other rubble, where it was seen by Stowe. In the reign of Elizabeth some workmen cut off the head, and one Lancelot Young, master glazier to the Queen, feeling a sweet savour to proceed from it, brought it to his house, in Wood- street, London, where he kept it for some time, but at length caused it to be buried by the sexton of St. Michael's, amongst other bones taken out of the charnel-house of that church. 316 APPENDIX. Appendix, No. VIL— P. 86. Salmon, It is extraordinary how much the flavour and quality of the salmon depend on circumstances apparently of trifling moment. A single day in the river will injure, and a flood spoil their condition ; and the difference between a fish taken in the nets, and one killed with a rod, will be easUy perceptible. Although in this water, angling may be considered as ending in September, yet, through the succeeding months till spring, the fish rise freely at a fly. But the sport is very indifferent compared with summer angling ; the salmon now has lost his energy ; he struggles laboriously to get away, but his play is different from the gallant resistance he would have offered, had you hooked him in July. I have landed and turned out again as many as nine salmon in one day, and their united exertions did not afford me half the amusement I have received from the conquest of one sprightly summer fish. Salmon appear to lose beauty and energy together. They are now reddish, dull, dark-spotted, perch-coloured fish, and seem a different species from the sparkling, silvery creature we saw them when they first left the sea ; and as an esculent, they are utterly worth less. — Wild Sports of the West. Appendix, No. VIII.— P. 108. Hutton Hall — Border Insecurity. "Then Johnnie Armstrong to Willie 'gan say, Billie, a riding then will we : England and us have been long at feud, Perhaps we may hit on some bootie. "Then they're come on toHutton-ha', They rade that proper place about ; But the Laird he was the wiser man, For he had left na geir without." Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border. These were the exploits of petty robbers ; but when princes dictated an inroad, the consequences bore a proportion to their rank. An Armstrong might drive away a few sheep ; but when an Henry directs invasion, 192 towns, towers, stedes, APPENDIX. 317 barnekyns, churches, and bastel-houses, are burnt ; 403 Scots slain, 816 taken prisoners ; 10,316 cattle, 12,492 sheep, 1296 nags and geldings, 200 goats, 200 bolls of corn, and insight geare without measure, carried of. Such were the successes during four months of the year 1544. ***** At the same time, such was the unhappy situation of the place, that the inhabitants, through fear of the thieves of Tyne- dale, were obliged nightly, in summer as well as winter, to bring their cattle aud sheep into the street, and to keep watch at the end ; and when the enemy approached, to make hue- and-cry to rouse the people to save their property. As this was a dangerous county to travel through, the tenants of every manor were bound to guard the judge through the precincts, but no farther. Lord Chief Justice North describes his at tendants with long beards, short cloaks, long basket-hilted broad swords, hanging from broad belts, and mounted on little horses, so that their legs and swords touched the ground at every tuming. His lordship also informs us, that the sheriff presented his train with arms, a dagger, knife, penknife, and fork, aU together. — Pennant's Tour in Scotland, The present state of the Highlands and Scottish Border, once celebrated as being constant scenes of wUd excesses, is singularly remarkable in exhibiting a gratifying picture of industry, morality, and peace. No country ever underwent a change so beneficial, so perfect, and so rapid. Violence and graver crimes are never heard of now ; and yet not a century has passed, since life and property were equally insecure. In Blackwood's Magazine, the following anecdotes are told, and they suflSciently evidence how wide the field for moral im provement was : — It was about this period (eighty years ago) that Mr. R 1, a gentleman of the low country of Moray, was awakened early in a moming by the unpleasant intelligence of the Highlanders having carried off the whole of his cattle from a distant hill, grazing in Brae Moray, a few miles above the junction of the 318 APPENDIX. rapid rivers Findhorn and Divie, and between both. He was an active man ; so that, after a few questions put to the breath less messenger, he lost not a moment in summoning and arm ing several servants : and, instead of taking the way to his farm, he struck at once across the country, in order to get, as speedily as possible, to a point where the rocks and woods, hanging over the deep bed of the Findhorn, flrst begin to be crowned by steep and lofty mountains, receding in long and misty perspective. This was the grand pass into the bound less wastes frequented by the robbers ; and here Mr. R ^1 forded the river to its southern bank, and took his stand with his little party, well aware that, if he could not intercept his cattle here, he might abandon all further search after them. The spot chosen for the ambuscade was a beautiful range of scenery, known by the name of the Streens. So deep is the hollow in many places, that some of the little cottages, with which its bottom is here and there sprinkled, have Gaelic ap pellations, implying that they never see the sun. There were then no houses near them ; but the party lay concealed among some huge fragments of rock, shivered by the wedging ice of the previous winter, from the summit of a lofty crag, that hung half across the narrow holm where they stood. A little way farther down the river, the passage was contracted to a rude and scrambling footpath, and behind them the glen was equally confined. Both extremities of the small amphitheatre were shaded by almost impenetrable thickets of birch, hazel, alder, and holly, whilst a few wild pines found a scanty subsistence for their roots in midway air, on the face of the crags, and were twisted and wreathed, for lack of nourishment, into a thousand fantastic and picturesque forins. The serene sun of a beautiful summer's day was declining, and half the narrow haugh was in broad and deep shadow, beautifully contrasted by the brilliant golden light that fell on the wooded bank on the other side of the river. Such was the scene where Mr. R 1 posted his party ; and they had not waited long, listening in the sUence of the evening, when they heard the distant lowing of the cattle, and the wUd shouts of the reivers, re-echoed as they approached APPENDIX. 3 1 9 by the surrounding rocks. The sounds came nearer and nearer, and, at last, the crashing of the boughs announced the appear ance of the more advanced part of the drove ; and the animals began to issue slowly from amongst the tangled wood, or to rush violently forth, as the blows or shouts of their drivers were more or less impetuous. As they came out, they col lected themselves into a group, and stood bellowing, as if un- wiUing to proceed farther. In rear of the last of the herd, Mr. R 1 saw bursting singly from different parts of the brake, a party of fourteen Highlanders, all in the full costume of the mountains, and armed with dirk, pistols, and claymore ; and two or three of them carrying antique fowling-pieces. Mr. R I's party consisted of not more than ten or eleven ; but, telling them to be firm, he drew them forth from their ambuscade, and ranged them on the green turf. With some exclamations of surprise, the robbers, at the shrill whistle of their leader, rushed forwards, and ranged themselves in front of their spoU. Mr. R 1 and his party stood their ground with determination, whUst the robbers appeared to hold a councU of war. At last their chief, a little athletic man, with long red hair curling over his shoulders, and with a pale and thin but acute visage, advanced a little way before the rest. " Mr. R 1," said he, in a loud voice, and speaking good English, though in a Highland accent, " are you for peace or war ? if for war, look to yourself ; if for peace and treaty, order your men to stand fast, and advance to meet me." " I will treat," replied Mr. R 1 : " but can I trust to your keeping faith?" " Trust to the honour of a gentleman!" rejoined the other, with an imperious air. The respective parties were ordered to stand their ground ; and the two leaders advanced ahout seventy or eighty paces each towards the middle of the space, with their loaded guns cocked and presented at each other. A certain sum was demanded for the restitution of the cattle; Mr. R 1 had not so much about him, but offered to give what money he had in his pocket, being a few pounds short of what the robber had asked. The bargain was concluded, the money paid, the guns uncocked and shouldered, and the two parties advanced to meet 320 APPENDIX. each other in perfect harmony. " And now, Mr. R 1," said the leader of the band, " you must look at your beasts to see that none of them be awanting." Mr. R 1 did so. "They are all here," said he, "but one small dun quey." " Make yourself easy about her," replied the leader : " she shall be in your pasture before daylight to-morrow morning." The treaty being thus concluded, the robbers proceeded up the glen, and were soon hid beneath its thick foliage ; whilst Mr. R I's people took charge of the cattle, and began to drive them homeward. The reiver was as good as his word. Next morning the dun quey was seen grazing with the herd. Nobody knew how she came there ; but her jaded and draggled appearance bespoke the length and the nature of the night journey she had performed. During the course of the ensuing winter, (about 1768,) Mr. R 1, who acted as factor for a nobleman in Moray shire, and who had rendered himself obnoxious to the Highland caterans, had occasion to be in Edinburgh. On his way home, he arrived late at night at Dalnacardoch, situated, as every body knows, at the southern extremity of the road leading through the savage pass of Drumouchter ; and having risen as early next morning as the light of that season would permit him, he set out through the snow for the Inn of Dalwhinnie. He was on horseback, and attended by a single servant. He had not proceeded far into the wild and rocky part ofthe pass, where high poles, painted black, erected along the edge of the road, serve as beacons to prevent the traveller from being en gulfed in the snow wreaths, when he descried a man at several hundred yards distance coming riding towards him. The man, as he approached, appeared to be of a thin, spare flgure, which was hid in a long dark-brown great-coat. He rode one of the loose-made garrons of the country, of a dirty mouse colour, having a bridle, or rather halter, made of small birch twigs, twisted into a kind of rope, and no saddle. And, what at first rather alarmed Mr. R., he carried in his hand, poised by its middle, a very long gun, of that ancient description which gave our ancestors excellent hope of kUling a wild duck half-way across a lake a mile broad. No sooner did the man observe APPENDIX. 321 Mr. R. than he pushed up his shy steed, by repeated and ardent kicks ; and when at last he succeeded in compelling him forward, to Mr. R.'s no inconsiderable relief, he recognised in him the landlord of Dalwhinnie. " Were you no to be at my house last night, Mr. R. ?" he exclaimed, in a south-country tone, and without waiting for the ordinary preliminary salu tations. " Yes," said Mr. R., " I did so intend : but the road was so much heavier than I anticipated, that I was obUged to be contented with reaching Dalnacardoch, and that at a very late hour." " It was the mercy of Providence," rejoined the landlord, " that you didna get forward : for if you had, you would have been murdered." " Murdered !" exclaimed Mr. R. " Yes, you would have been murdered, as sure as you are now sitting on your horse. In the dead o' night, when we war a' to our beds, we war alarmed by the sudden noise o' horses in the yard, and the house was instantly filled wi' about twa dozen o' armed Highlandmen wi' blackit faces : they lighted sticks of moss-fir i' the kitchen, and cam to my bedside, brandishing their pistols and dirks ; they demanded where Mr. R. slept : I protested, what was true.that you were not onlyno i' the house, but that I never expectit you. They threatened and swore at me like deevils ; and then proceeded to search ilka hole and corner o' the house and outhouses, looking even into places whar it was impossible a cat could have concealed itsel' ; and forcing me, half naked, and near dead wi' fear, along wi' them. And, when they could find neither you or your horses, they set up a furious yeU o', disappointment, and in their rage war very nearly burnin' the house, to mak sure that you werena concealed somewhere about it after a'. At length, however, their captain having sUenced them, and moderated their fury, they became more quiet ; and, after taking some bread and cheese and some whisky for themselves, and a pickle of corn for their horses, — for a' which, I maun do them the justice to say, they paid me honestly,— they mounted and rode awa. Some o' our herds say that their tracks i' the snaw lay towards Loch Ericht ; and if so, that they're darned in some of the queer hidy-holes about the rocks there, and wUl aiblins return when ever they suppose that they can do their deed ; for they maun VOL. II. Y 322 APPENDIX. surely hae gude information. Therefore, Mr. R,, ye maun on nae account think o' gaein on, but return to Blair or Dunkeld; for I beUeve you'll be safer there ; and I'U send over into Moray for some o' your ain fouk, weel armed, to convey ye through Drumouchter." The reader wUl easUy imagine that this advice was followed. The gentleman returned to Dunkeld, whence he did not ven ture to depart tUl he was joined by thirty of his own men, who noticed that their motions homewards were observed the whole way by a party who kept along the top of the hills. — Black wood's Magazme. Appendix, No. IX. — P. 143. The Eildon Hills. The view from the top of the Eildons comprehends some of the most interesting scenes described in Border history, and celebrated in Border song. " I can stand on Eildon hUl," said Sir Walter Scott to Allan Cunningham, " and point out forty-three places famous in war and verse." On the top of the eastern hill may be perceived traces of an encampment ; about two miles from which, to the westward, on Caldshiels hUl, there has been a large station, which Chalmers conceives had been originally formed by the Britons, and afterwards strengthened and enlarged by the Romans. In the vicinity of Caldshiels are vestiges of two or three other British forts. Within three mUes of the Eildon hills, to the southward, were three camps, — at Rowchester, Kippilaw Mains, and Blackchester, — which appear to have been connected by a covered way, consisting of a fosse, with a rampart of earth on each side, similar to the CatraU. The EUdon hills, according to tradition, were originally a uniform cone, but which was cleft into three peaks by the Prince of Darkness at the command of Michael Scott. " It is said, that the fiend employed in parting the mountain made very short work of it ; for, facing to the north, and fetching a sloping blow with his spade from west to east, he took off APPENDIX. 323 the top of the original hiU, thus making two eminences : what earth remained on the spade he shook off between them for the third." The base ofthe Eildon hills forms a sort of curve from south to east, the convexity of which is towards the west and north. The height of the highest peak is about 1330 feet above the level of the sea. Appendix, No. X. — P. 145. T%e Monks of Kelso. The monks of Kelso were of a more useful class than the others, being of the order of Tyronenses, who, as may be seen at large in one of our preUminary dissertations, were admitted only when instructed in some branch of science or art ; their house at this place was, therefore, a college of industrious artisans, among whom were found painters, sculptors, joiners, locksmiths, masons, vine-dressers, horticulturists, &c. who were employed over a wide district of country, and brought their earnings into one common fund for general maintenance. By the rules of the society, the members were enjoined to poverty ; but luxury and the love of ease, inherent in human nature, fostered by the endowments of pious princes, in time injured the primitive character of the association, and ulti mately tended to bring about the reformation of religion. David, the founder, gave to this house the monastery of Les- mahagow, with aU its lands and all its men ; as also the privi lege of sanctuary, which that monastery enjoyed ; and before the end of the thirteenth century, it had thirty-four parish churches, several manors, many lands, granges, farms, mills, breweries, fishings, rights of cutting turf, salt-works, and other possessions, spread over the several shires of Roxburgh, Sel kirk, Peebles, Lanark, Dumfries, Ayr, Edinburgh, Berwick, and even as far north as Aberdeenshire. David II. (1329-32) further granted to the monks the whole forfeitures of aU the rebels within Berwick, Owing to the enormous wealth they thus enjoyed, the abbot was reputed to be more opulent than most of the bishops in Scotland. ***** y2 324 APPENDIX. Notwithstanding the weU-known affability and hospitality of the people of Kelso, whose pecuUarities in this respect are by no means only of modern date, the town, by some strange fatality, is the subject of a popular proverbial expression of a contrary import. The phrase is " a Kelso convoy," which has been in use from time immemorial in the Lowlands of Scot land, to signify the circumstance of being accompanied by one's host no farther than the threshold, or rather, as it is commonly termed, " a step and a half ower the door-stane." The origin of this stigma upon the hospitality of Kelso is unknown ; but, that the reader may the better understand the extent of satire which it implies, it is necessary to inform him, that at all old Scottish mansion-houses, there was a tree at some distance from the door, called the coglin tree, (variously the covan tree,) where the landlord met his guests, and to which he always accom panied them uncovered, when they took their departure. In old society, accustomed to such punctilio, and with whom any neglect of the laws of hospitality was held more heinous than at least two of the pleas of the crown, it is easy to conceive how the coldness of a Kelso convoy would be appreciated. — Chambers. Appendix, No. XL— P. 153. Proof hy Combat. A combat of this kind on the marches was called by a par ticular name, " Aera." In a remonstrance of the clergy of England, presented to the legate Otho in 123Y, for procuring redress from the king of several encroachments on their liber ties, they complain of an abuse arising from an establishment of the kings of England and Scotland ; by which, not only simple clerks, but also abbots and priors in the diocese of Carlisle, when challenged for anything by a subject of Scot land, or reciprocally, were compelled to fight with spears and swords, a combat called Aera, on the confines of tbe two king doms (inter fores utriusque regni). So that the abbot or prior, of whatever religion or order, was obliged either to a personal combat, or to have a champion to combat for him ; and if this APPElSTDIX. 325 champion was defeated, the abbot or prior was to undergo capital punishment ; of which there had been a recent instance in the prior of Lideley. The clergy supplicated the legate to admonish, or, if admonitions could not prevail, to employ his legatine authority, to compel the kings not to suffer so detes table an abuse to be extended to ecclesiastical persons. — Border History. Appendix, No. XIL— P. 154. Roxburgh Castle, The once potent castle of Roxburgh is seated on a vast and lofty knowl, of an oblong form, suddenly rising out of the plain, near the junction of the Tweed and the Tiviot. On the north and west it had been defended by a great fosse. The south impends over the Tiviot ; some of whose waters were diverted in former times into the castle ditch, by a dam ob liquely crossing the stream, and whose remains are stiU visible. A few fragments of walls are all that exist of this mighty strength ; the whole area being filled with trees of consider able age. At the foot was once seated a town of the same name, destroyed by James II. when he undertook the siege of the castle, and probably never rebuilt .... The Scots lost this fortress in the reign of Edward III. who twice celebrated his birth-day in it. It was put into the hands of Lord Henry Percy, after the defeat and captivity of David, at the battle of Nevil's-cross. But the most dis tinguished siege was that in 1560, fatal to James II. a wise and gallant prince, who was slain by the bursting of one of his o-wa. cannons. A large holly, inclosed with a wall, marks the spot. His queen, Mary of Gueldres, carried on the attack with vigour, took, and totally demolished it. — Pennant's Tour in Scotland. Battle of Pin key. In the beginning of September, the Earl of Hertford, now Duke of Somerset, and Protector of England, entered Scotland 326 APPENDIX. at Ihe head of eighteen thousand men, and, at the same time, a fleet of sixty ships appeared on the coast to second his land forces. The Scots had for some time observed this storm gathering, and were prepared for it. Their army was almost double to that of the enemy, and posted to the greatest advan tage on a rising ground above Musselburgh, not far from the banks of the river Eske. Both these circumstances alarmed the Duke of Somerset, who saw his danger, and would wil lingly have extricated himself out of it, by a new overture of peace, on conditions extremely reasonable. But this modera tion being imputed to fear, his proposals were rejected with the scorn which the confidence of success inspires ; and if the conduct of the Regent, who commanded the Scottish army, had been in any degree equal to his confidence, the destruction of the English must have been inevitable. They were in a situation precisely similar to that of their countrymen under Oliver Cromwell in the following century. The Scots had chosen their ground so well, that it was impossible to force them to give battle ; a few days had exhausted the forage and provision of a narrow country ; the fleet could only furnish a scanty and precarious subsistence ; a retreat, therefore, was necessary ; but disgrace, and perhaps ruin, were the conse quences of retreating. On both these occasions, the national heat and impetuosity of the Scots saved the English, and precipitated their own country into the utmost danger. The undisciplined courage of the private men became impatient at the sight of an enemy. The general was afraid of nothing but that the enemy might escape from him by flight ; and, leaving his strong camp, he attacked the Duke of Somerset near Pinkey, with no better success than his rashness deserved. The Protector had drawn up his troops on a gentle eminence, and had now the advantage of ground on his side. The Scottish army consisted almost entirely of infantry, whose chief weapon was a long spear, and for that reason their files were very deep, and their ranks close. They advanced towards the enemy in three great bodies, and, as they passed the river, were considerably ex posed to the fire of the English fleet, which lay in the bay of APPENDIX. 327 Musselburgh, and had drawn near the shore. The English cavalry, flushed with an advantage which they had gained in a skirmish some days before, began the attack with more impetuosity than good conduct. A body so firm and com pact as the Scots easily resisted the impression of cavalry, broke them, and drove them off the field. The English infantry, however, advanced, and the Scots were at once exposed to a flight of arrows, to a fire in flank from four hundred foreign fusileers who served the enemy, and to their cannon, which were planted behind the infantry on the highest part of the eminence. The depth and closeness of their order making it impossible for the Scots to stand long in this situ ation, the Earl of Angus, who commanded the vanguard, endeavoured to change his ground, and to retire towards the main body. But his friends unhappily mistook his motion for a flight, and fell into confusion. At that very instant, the broken cavalry, having rallied, returned to the charge ; the foot pursued the advantage they had gained ; the prospect of victory redoubled the" ardour of both : and in a moment the rout of the Scottish anny became universal and irretrievable. The encounter in the field was not long nor bloody ; but, in the pursuit, the English discovered all the rage and fierceness which national antipathy, kindled by long emulation, and inflamed by reciprocal injuries, is apt to inspire. The pursuit was continued for five hours, and to a great distance. All the three roads by which the Scots fled were strewed with spears, and swords, and targets, and covered with the bodies of the slain. Above ten thousand men fell on this day, one of the most fatal Scotland had ever seen. A few were taken prisoners, and among these some persons of distinction. The Protector had it now in his power to become master of a kingdom, out of which, not many hours before, he was almost obliged to retire with infamy. — Robertson's History of Scotland. « • « « « " But what after I learned, specially touching their order, their armour, and their manner as well of going to offend, as of standing to defend, I have thought necessary here to utter. Hackbutters have they few or none, and appoint their fight 328 APPENDIX. most commonly always a-foot. They come to the field well furnished all with jack and skull, dagger and buckler, and swords all broad and thin, of exceeding good temper, and universally so made to slice, that as I never saw none so good, so I think it hard to devise the better. Hereto every man his pike, and a great kercher wrapped twice or thrice round his neck, not for cold, but for cutting. In their array towards joining with the enemy, they cling and thrust so near in the fore rank, shoulder and shoulder together, with their pikes in both their hands straight afore them, and their followers in that order so hard at their backs, laying their pikes over their foregoers' shoulders, that, if they do assail undiscovered, no force can well withstand them. Standing at defence, they thrust shoulders likewise so nigh together, the fore ranks well nigh to kneeling, stoop low before, their fellows behind holding their pikes with both hands, and therewith in their left their bucklers, the one end of their pike against their right foot, and the other end against the enemy breast-high ; their fol lowers crossing their pike points with them forward ; and thus each with other so nigh as space and place will suffer, through the whole ward, so thick, that as easily shall a bare finger pierce through the skin of an angry hedge-hog, as any en counter the front of their pikes." — Journal of the Protector' s Expedition into Scotland, hy W. Patten. Appendix, No. XIIL— P. 159. The Leister. I WILL not describe the salmon spear at present in use. It was formerly caUed waster ; but that term is nearly out of use, except by the old fishermen, and it is now better known by the name of leister. It resembles a trident in its general appear ance ; but has five prongs, instead of three, made of very stout iron : there is only one barb to each prong, as two would tear the fish too much in extricating them. This weapon is fastened to the end of a pole more or less long, according to APPENDIX. 329 the depth of the water in which it is intended to be used ; six teen feet is the general length, and it is not easy to see or strike a fish at a greater depth ; but in sunning I have some times tied a light rope to the top of the pole, and gone deeper than this with success, but then it was when the river was unusually clear. « * # * # If a salmon gets off your leister wounded, being weak, you may be sure he will go down the river ; and the eels will come out instantly, if it be hot weather, and follow the blood: if the fish is badly wounded, although not dead, the said eels wUl soon settle the matter, and eat out his flesh, leaving the skin alone for speculators to make mermaids with. You will see the eels by dozens hanging thick on him like the sticks in a bundle of faggots ; but they are too small to be taken with a salmon spear, and do not resemble the fine silver eels in the Kennett and some of our English streams, but are browner in colour, and have large heads. The Scotch have a strong antipathy to them, and never use them for food. But they shotUd be removed from the river, if possible, as they make great havoc in the spawning beds." — Scrape's Days and Nights of Salmon Fishing. Appendix, No. XIV.— P. 160. Sunning. Sunning, as I have told you, is a mode of taking salmon with a spear by sun light; and vast numbers are captured in this manner, particularly in the upper part of the Tweed, where flsh are more easily seen than in the lower, from the comparative shallowness of the water in which they lie. This sport does not begin till the river is quite low and clean, and useless for the fly. To succeed perfectly requires a bright and calm day. You cannot see a fish lying even at a very moderate depth, when the surface of the water is ruflled by the wind. As soon as the river is thus fairly in order, take the first good day that occurs ; you may not have many more ; and if you have, you will not mend the matter by wait- 330 APPENDIX. ing too long, as after a continuance of hot weather a green vegetable substance rises from the bottom, which lessens the transparency of the water. If you have a man sufficiently clever with the leister, let him stand in the water at the head of the stream whilst you are trying below, that he may strike the fish which endeavour to pass out of it into another cast. If you have no such man, and there are very few who can see a fish pass up a rapid gorge, you may hang a net in the stream ; but you must not bar the river by stretching it quite across, as that is illegal. If you sun a large pool where there is deep water, and various runs and eddies in it, it is advisable to place nets in such situations as are most favourable for fish to strike into when they are disturbed by the boats, and the other means in use for frightening them. The pass being thus in part secured, and all prepared, the next thing is to rout about, and endeavour to frighten the fish by every means in your power, so that they may hide themselves under the rocks and stones, or even lay, as they sometimes do, half stupified beside them, when you may strike them with the leister. To effect this, it is usual to begin by rowing your boat or boats over the pool, with some white object hanging in the water from the stern : the skulls of horses are in high repute for this service ; and I dare say a stuffed otter would be excellent, though I never tried it. When you think you have created sufficient terror by these means, you may look about for the fish, and the sport begins. You may manage your boat with the leister, as in burning by night, of which hereafter : but you do not, as in that case, necessarily work her broadside in front; and one artist is sufficient for the amusement, though more may partake of it. If the leisterer knows the water well, he puts the boat gently over the rocks and stones, where tho fish endeavour to conceal themselves. Sometimes they get under a large stone and are entirely hidden ; generally they are partially concealed under smaller stones, part of the body and tail only being seen ; so that it requires some dexterity to strike them properly, or in deed at all. Some wUl lie under the shelf of a rock, quite APPENDIX. 331 open to the view ; in which case you must be careful, when you strike, that a prong of the leister does not rest upon the ledge of a rock above, instead of on the salmon. Others I have seen lying fair and open in the bare channel ; but these will not lie to the leister so well as those in the situations I have mentioned. If you do not strike a fish near the centre of his body, you are not very sure of lifting him. — Scrape's Days and Nights of Salmon Fishing. Appendix, No. XV.— P. 160. Burning. And yet at this period they suffer most from night-fishers. This species of poaching is as difficult to detect, as it is ruinous in its consequences. It is believed that the destruction of a few breeding fish may cost the proprietor one thousand ; such being the astonishing fecundity of the pregnant salmon ! Night fishing is carried on when the river is low, and the night moonless. The poacher, with a gaff and torch, selects some gravelly ford — for there, by a law of nature, the salmon resort to form beds in the stream, wherein to deposit their ova ; and they continue working on the sand until they are discovered by the torch-light, and gaffed by the plunderer. Hundreds of the breeding fish are annually thus destroyed ; and although the greater fisheries may be tolerably protected, it is impossible to secure the mountain streams from depreda tion. If detected, the legal penalty upon poaching is trifling ; and, as appeals on very frivolous grounds are allowed from the summary convictions of magistrates, it too frequently happens that delinquents evade the punitory consequences attendant on discovery. — Wild Sports ofthe West. Appendix, No. XVL— P. 161. Raking, In the river at Galway, in Ireland, I have seen above the bridge some hundreds of salmon lying in rapid streams, and from five to ten fishermen tempting them with every variety 332 APPENDIX. of fly, but in vain." After a flsh had been thrown over a few times, and risen once or twice and refused the fly, he rarely ever took any notice of it again in that place. It was gene rally nearest the tide that fish were taken, and the place next the sea was the most successful stand, and the most coveted ; and when the water is low and clear in this river, the Galway fishermen resort to the practice of fishing with a naked hook, endeavouring to entangle it in the bodies of the fish — a most unartist-like practice. — Salmonia. Appendix, No. XVIL— P. 162. Growth of Salmon. The average size is from seven to fifteen pounds. Within thirty years, but one monster has been taken ; he weighed fifty- six pounds. Four years ago one of forty-eight pounds was caught : but of the thousands which I have seen taken, I would say, that I never saw a fish weighing more than thirty-five pounds, and not many reaching even to twenty-five pounds. The migratory habits of the salmon, and the instinct with whieh it periodically revisits its native river, are curious cir cumstances in the natural history of this fish. As the swallow returns annually to its nest, as certainly the salmon repairs to the same spot in which to deposit its ova. Many interesting experiments have established this fact. M. de la Lande fastened a copper ring round a salmon's tail, and found that for three successive seasons it returned to the same place. Dr. Bloch states, that gold and silver rings have been attached by Eastern princes to salmon, to prove that a communication existed between the Persian Gulf and the Caspian and Northern Seas, and that the experiment succeeded. Shaw, in his Zoology, mentions that a salmon of seven pounds and three- quarters was marked with scissors, on the back, fln, and tail, and turned out on the 7th of February, and that it was retaken in March of the succeeding year, and found to have increased to the amazing size of seventeen pounds and a half. This APPENDIX. 333 statement, by the by, is at variance with the theory of Dr. Bloch, who estimates the weight of a five or six year old salmon at but ten or twelve pounds. — Wild Sports of the West. Appendix, No. XVIII.— P. 165. Ghostly Visitations, The story of Lord Lyttelton revisiting the world is known to all who delight in the supernatural ; and, according to Wraxall, he received himself a significant hint that his route was on the road. Thus runs the tale : — " Lyttelton, when scarcely thirty-six, breathed his last at a country-house near Epsom, called Pit Place. Having gone down there for purposes of recreation, with a gay party of both sexes, several of whom I personally knew ; he had retired to bed, when a noise which resembled the fluttering of a dove or pigeon, heard at his window, attracted his attention. He then saw, or thought he saw, a female figure, which, approaching the foot of the bed, announced to him that, in three days pre cisely from that time, he should be caUed from this state of existence. In whatever manner the supposed intimation was conveyed, whether by sound or by impression, it is certain that Lord Lyttelton considered the circumstance as real ; that he mentioned it as such to those persons who were in the house with him ; that it deeply affected his mind, and that he died on the third night, at the predicted hour. About four years afterwards, in the year 1783, dining at Pit Place, I had the curiosity to visit the bed-chamber, where the casement window, at which, as Lord Lyttelton asserted, the dove appeared to flutter, was pointed out to me ; and at his step mother's, the Dowager Lady Lyttelton, I have frequently seen a painting, which she herself executed in 1780, expressly to commemorate the event. It hung in a conspicuous part of her drawing-room. There the dove appears at the window, while a female flgure, habited in white, stands at the bed foot, announcing to Lord Lyttelton his dissolution. Every part of tha picture was faithfully designed after the description given 334 APPENDIX. her by the valet- de-chambre who attended him, to whom his master related all the circumstances. This man assured Lady Lyttelton, that on the night indicated, Lord Lyttelton, who, notwithstanding his endeavours to surmount the impres sion, had suffered under great depression of spirits during the three preceding days,, retired to bed before twelve o'clock. Having ordered the valet to mix him some rhubarb, he sat up in the bed, apparently in health, intending to swallow the medi cine ; but, being in want of a tea-spoon, which the servant had neglected to bring, his master, with a strong expression of impatience, sent him to bring a spoon. He was not absent from the room more than the space of a minute, but when he returned. Lord Lyttelton, who had fallen baek, lay motionless in that attitude. No efforts to restore animation were attended with success. Among the females who had been the objects and the victims of his temporary attachment, was a Mrs. Dawson, whose fortune, as well as her honour and reputation, fell a sacrifice to her passion. Being soon forsaken by him, she did not long survive ; and distress of mind was known to have accelerated, if not to have produced, her death. It was her image which haunted his pillow, and was supposed by him to have announced his approaching dissolution at Pit Place." — From the " Selwyn Correspondence,'' p. 303. Lord Lyttelton. Appendix, No. XIX.— P. 169. St. Cuthbert. Satan was so provoked and hurtby the sanctity of St. Cuth bert, that he tried every means in his power to give him uneasiness, and to prevent the effects of his exhortations. Two of these attacks are thus recorded. Once upon a time, when the saint was preaching in a certain village to a crowded audience, the alarm was given, that there was one of the cot tages on fire. This drew a number of people from the sermon to extinguish it, which was just what Satan proposed ; the more water they threw on it the more fiercely it seemed to burn, and all effects to put it out proved ineffectual. The APPENDIX. 335 saint missing so many of his auditors, inquired the cause ; when leaving off his preaching, and repairing to the scene of action, he perceived it was all illusion, and ordered a few drops of holy water to be sprinkled on it ; on which the devil sneaked off, and the fire disappeared. Another time, for the same purpose, the devil took on him the likeness of a beautiful woman ; and whilst the saint was preaching, placed himself in a conspicuous place, where by the charms of his assumed form he so bewitched the whole congregation, that all their attention was diverted from the discourse ; it was in vain that Cuthbert exerted all his rhetoric ; he preached to persons whose senses were otherwise employed : at length, suspecting the cause, he heartily besprinkled the pre tended lady with holy water, by the efficacy of which the deception was destroyed, and Satan appeared to the surprised spectators in propria, persona St. Cuthbert had been dead eleven years, when the monks, opening his sepulchre in order to deposit his bones among their reliques, to their great astonishment they found his body quite entire, his joints flexible, and his face unaltered, bearing rather the semblance of sleep than death. Corrup tion had shown the same respect to his garments, which remained whole and unsullied : hereupon they placed the body in a new shrine In this account of St. Cuthbert, wonderful as it is, many miracles have been passed over : such as his entertaining angels at the monastery at Ripon ; his being fed with loaves brought him hot from heaven by an angel ; a regale of fish presented him by an eagle ; and a strange recovery of his psalm-book, which, in his voyage from Ireland to Scotland in company with his mother, he let fall overboard, when it was swallowed by a sea-calf, who politely presented him with it at his landing. — Grose's Antiq. Appendix, No. XX.— P. 191. Udaller. The Scandinavian proprietors who held their lands under feudal tenure were thus designated. 336 APPENDIX. Appendix, No. XXI. and XXIL— Pp. 196, 197- Fraoch Elan and Loch Awe. On the neighbouring isle of Fraoch Elan, " the isle of heather," the Hesperides of the land of Argyle, are still visible the castellated ruins of a hold of the Macnaughtans. It was given by Alexander III. 1276, to Gilbert Macnaughtan, the chief of his clan, on condition that he should entertain the King of Scotland whenever he passed that way ; and it is worthy of remark, that the proprietor, in 1745, influenced no doubt as warmly by loyalty to the house of Stuart as a desire to fulfil the expression of the charter, actually made private preparations for entertaining the Prince in the castle of Fraoch Elan, had he passed in this direction. On one side of this beautiful island, the rock rises almost perpendicularly from the water. The lower part of the shore is embowered in tangled shrubs and old writhing trees. Above, the broken waU and only remaining gable of the castle looks out over the boughs ; and in the south side a large ash-tree grows from the founda tions of what was once the hall, and overshadows the ruin with its branches. This, like all the other islands in Loch Awe, is the haunt of a variety of gulls and wUd fowl, which come hither, a distance of twenty-six mUes from the sea, to build nests and hatch their young. On the top of the remaining chimney of the castle, a water-eagle long took up its family residence. There is another island, caUed Inish-connel, lying amidst a cluster of other islets, on which there is also a ruin of a very strong castle, once a residence of the Argyle family. Near this lies Inish-eraith, supposed to be the place to which the traitor Eraith beguiled Duara, as recounted in one of the songs of Selma, and in which there is also a burying-ground and the ruins ofa chapel, all which relics are significant of the warlike and pious character ofthis district of Scotland, which, in reality, seems the wreck of a kingdom once inhabited by a powerful race of people. At the east end of the lake, on a rocky point projecting into the water, stand the ruins of Kil- churn Castle, built in 1440, by the lady of Sir Colin CampbeU, APPENDIX. 337 called the Black Knight of Rhodes, who, at the time, was engaged as a crusader, and was the ancestor of the Breadalbane family, by whom it was occupied as a seat. This is undoubt edly the stronghold which the novelist had in his eye in sketching the residence of the fictitious Duncan Campbell of Ardenvohr, in the tale of the Legend of Montrose. From this great seat of the clan Campbell, so distant from all other places, arose the proverb formerly used by persons of that name, in defiance of their neighbours, " It's a far cry to Loch O." The Highlanders of Argyleshire possess a curious tradition regarding the origin of Loch-awe, which has furnished a topic in one of the wild songs of Ossian. The circumstance is connected with the existence and death of a supernatural being, called by the country people Calliach Bhere, " the old woman." She is represented as having been a kind of female genie, whose residence was on the highest mountains. It is said that she could step with ease aud in a moment from one district to another ; when offended, that she could cause the floods to descend from the mountains, and lay the whole of the low ground perpetually under water. Her race is de scribed as having lived for an immemorable period near the summit of the vast mountain of Cruachan, and to have pos sessed a multitude of herds in the vale at its foot. Calliach Bhere was the last of her line, and, like that of her ancestors, her existence was blended with a fatal fountain which lay in the side of her native mountain, and had been committed to the charge of her family since its first existence. It was their duty at evening to cover the well with a large flat stone, and at morning to remove it again. This ceremony was to be performed before the setting and rising of the sun, that his last beam might not die upon the waters, and that his first ray should iUuminate their bosom. If this care was neglected a fearful and untold doom was denounced to be the punishment of the omission. When the father of Calliach Bhere died, he committed the oflSce to his daughter, and declared to her, in a solemn charge, the duty and the fatality of the sacred spring. For many years the solitary woman attended it without inter mission ; but on one unlucky evening, spent with the fatigues VOL. 11. Z 338 APPENDIX. of the chase and the ascent of the mountain, she sat down to rest beside the fountain, and wait for the setting of the sun, and, falling asleep, did not awake untU next morning. When she arose she looked abroad from the hUl : the vale had vanished beneath her, and a wide and immeasurable sheet of water was all which met her sight. The neglected well had overflowed whUe she slept ; the glen was changed into a lake ; the hiUs into islets ; and her people and her cattle had perished in the deluge. The Calliach took but one look over the ruin which she had caused : the speU which bound her existence was loosened with the waters, and she sunk and expired beside the Spring. From that day the waters remained upon the vale, and formed the lake which was afterwards called Loch Awe. — Chambers. Appendix, No. XXIII.— P. 208. Dick Martin. Many are the pleasant stories told of this eccentric gentle man. Although not particularly averse to pistol-practice at christian gentlemen, his animal attachments were so strong, that he introduced and carried through the house a very praiseworthy bill, for the protection of the brute creation. Shortly after the act had come into operation, the session closed, and " the Colonel " revisited the " happy land " of the west, where the deserter was made welcome, the debtor walked abroad, and the king's writ, — thank the gods! — was valueless as a worn-out newspaper. An election was approaching — Connemara — ut mos est — at such pleasant times in agreeable excitation. No two members of the same family interchanged a word. On the respective merits of Martins and Dalys ladies and their liege lords differed and were divorced — men recom menced practice at barn-doors — powder advanced flve-and- twenty per cent., and two surgeons — United Service H. P. — elevated brass plates, and announced it to be their intention to live ahd die in Galway. At this interesting crisis " the sympathizer " was seated at breakfast, reading, with unfeigned satisfaction, a conviction APPENDIX. 339 under his own act, in which an ill-used donkey had received ample compensation. A bare-legged mountaineer rushed into the apartment, an oak bolteeine in his fist, and his face radiant witli the self-satisfied expression which a man wears who has " done a virtuous deed." " What tlie divil do ye want ?" said the chieftain. " Jist to tell ye'r honour, that I caught James Daly's dog- breaker crossin' a corner of Crughandugh, wid two spaniels in a couple." " The scoundrel ! You kicked him off?" " No !" said the hereditary bondsman, with a grin. " And what the divil did you do ?" The fine specimen of the finest pisantry chuckled. " Be gogstay, ye'r honour — I houghed the dogs !" " Oh, you eternal villain ! — Hamstring a dumb animal, you savage!" — and, suiting the action to the word, Dick launched the poker at the offender, — " Out of my sight, you blundering scoundrel ! — Hamstring an unoffending animal ! — Ah ! you common ommadawn — why didn't you hough the man !" Appendix, No. XXIV.— P. 263. Raid of Cillie Christ. We have been the more minute in describing this little scene, as it is associated with the Raid of CUlie Christ, (Christ's Church,) one of the most sanguinary and brutal affairs that stain the annals of an age of general blood and rapine. In the early part of the seventeenth century, Angus, eldest son of Glengarry, had made a foray into the Mackenzie's country : on his way home he was intercepted by a gallant little band of Mackenzies, and slain, with a number of his followers. Some time thereafter a strong party of Glengarry's men were sent, under the command of AUan Mac RaonuiU of Lundy, to revenge his death. Allan led them into the parish of Urray, in Ross-shire, on a Sunday morning, and surprised a nume rous body of the Mackenzies, assembled at prayer within the walls of Cillie Christ, near Beauly ; for so was their little z 2 340 APPENDIX. chapel called. Placing his foUowers so as to prevent all pos sibUity of escape, Allan gave orders to set the building on fire. The miserable victims found all attempts at escape un- avaUing, and were without a single exception, — man, woman, and child, — swallowed up by the devouring element, or indis criminately massacred by the swords of the relentless Mac- donells, whilst a piper marched round the church, playing an extemporary piece of music, which has ever since been the pibroch ofthe Glengarry family. The work of death being completed, Allan deemed a speedy retreat expedient : but the incendiaries were not to escape with impunity ; for the funeral pile of their clansmen roused the Mackenzies to arms as effectually as if the flery cross had been carried through their valleys. Their force was divided into two bodies : one, commanded by Murdoch Mackenzie of Redcastle, proceeded by Inverness, with a view of following the pursuit along the southern side of Loch Ness ; whilst another, headed by Alexander Mackenzie of CouU, struck across the county, from Beauly to the northern bank of the lake, in the footsteps of another party which had fled in this direction, with their leader, Allan Mac RaonuiU. The Mac kenzies overtook these last, as they sought a brief repose in some hills near the burn of Altsigh. The Macdonells main tained an unequal confiict for some time with much spirit, but were at length forced to yield to superior numbers, and fled precipitately to the burn. Many, however, missed the ford, and, the channel being rough and rocky, were overtaken and slain by the victorious Mackenzies. Allan Mac RaonuiU made towards a spot where the burn rushed through a yawning chasm of considerable depth and breadth. Forgetting the danger of the attempt in the hurry of his flight, and the agitation of the moment, and being of an athletic frame, and at the time half naked, he vigorously strained at, and suc ceeded in clearing the desperate leap. One of the Mackenzies inconsiderately followed him, but, wanting the impulse of those powerful feelings which had put such life and mettle into AUan's heels, he had not the fortune to reach the top of the bank : grasping, however, the branch of a birch tree, he APPENDIX. 341 hung suspended over the abyss. Mac RaonuiU, observing his situation, turned back and lopped off the branch with his dirk, exclaiming, " I have left much behind me with you to-day ; take that also." Allan got considerably a-head ofhis followers ; and having gained the brink of the loch, bethought him of attempting to swim across, and, plunging in, he lustily breasted its cool and refreshing waters. Being observed from the opposite side, a boat was sent out, which picked him up. The party of the Macdonells, who fled by Inverness, were surprised by Redcastle in a public-house at Torbreck, three miles to the west of the town, where they stopped to refresh themselves : the house was set on fire, and they all, thirty- seven in number, suffered the death they had in the early part of the day so wantonly inflicted. One of these, jealous of a neighbouring chieftain, the Laird of Mackintosh, invited him and his kindred to a great banquet, disguising, under the mask of hospitality, the atrocious pur pose of slaughtering his guests unawares. The company were to be so arranged at table as that the Mackintoshes should be separated from one another, and the appearance of a boar's head was to be the signal for each Cuming to stab the stranger who sat beside him. Mackintosh discovered the plot ; never theless, he accepted the invitation, having previously informed his clansmen of the signal, and bade them anticipate their treacherous entertainers. Accordingly, when the feast waxed high, the boar's head was introduced. The Mackintoshes seized tbe moment ; and with the barbarity and decision com mon in those dark and bloody days, inflicted the most ample a nd speedy revenge on their foes. — Anderson, Appendix, No. XXV.— P. 264. Highland Ferocity. Sir Ewen encountered a very powerful English officer, an overmatch for him in strength, who, losing his sword, grappled with the chief, and got him under: but Lochiel's 342 APPENDIX. presence of mind did not forsake him ; for, grasping the Eng lishman by the collar, and darting at his extended throat with his teeth, he tore away the bloody morsel, which he used to say was the sweetest he had ever tasted. — Anderson. Appendix, No. XXVL— P. 275. Singular Preservation, The incident in the sketch is taken from the foUowing ex traordinary preservation of a shipwrecked mariner, related thus, by Anderson : — " From the great resort of shipping to Stromness, wrecks have frequently happened on this shore : but one wreck will serve to iUustrate all. In the storm which arose on Wednes day, the Sth of March, 1834, the Star, of Dundee, a schooner of seventy-eight tons, was seen, along with other vessels, standing-in on the lee-shore, which it was evident she could not weather ; and as she came directly towards the Black Craig, three miles west of Stromness, the spectators ran to the precipice with ropes, to render assistance. The violence of the storm, and the shortness of the time, prevented the crew from benefiting by the good intentions of the people on land ; for the flrst wave that bore properly upon her dashed her so powerfully on the rocks, that she was instantly con verted into countless fragments, which the water washed up into a cave at the bottom of the over-hanging cliff, or strewed along the beach ; and the spectators retired from the awful scene without the gratification of having saved even one fellow-creature. During the remainder of the week, nothing of consequence was saved, and no vestige of any of the crew was seen. On the morning of the following Sunday, however, to the ineffable astonishment of all, and the terror of the first beholders, one of the crew, who could scarcely be believed to be a human being, presented himself at the top ofthe precipice, saved by a miracle. It appeared that he was washed up into the cave, along with a considerable portion of the wreck, which afterwards remained at the mouth, checking the APPENDIX. 343 violence of the waves, so that they did not again penetrate so far as to carry away some red herrings which had been washed in along with the seaman, and which served him for food. By means of a tin can, which had been used for oil, he collected fresh water in drops, as it trickled down from the rock. Two piUows were also washed in for his comfort, one of which he made his bed, and the feathers of the other he stuffed into his boots for warmth. He did not complain of cold ; for the waves, which at high tide nearly immolated him by tlirowing in huge stones and blocking him up in his den, gave him suflBcient employment at low tide to restore things to order before the next attack. The principal inconvenience which he suffered, was from a sense of suffocation, when the waves darkened his abode by filling up its mouth, and con densed the air within, so as to give the sensation of extreme heat when the wave was in, and of cold when it retired." ***** A singular occurrence took place, some years ago, on the bold south coast of the last-named island. There is a slate quarry there, and the workmen had occasion to descend a perpendicular cliffy portion by means of a ladder. A sudden and violent storm came on in the evening which drove the labourers fi:om their work. The night was dark and tem pestuous, and a ship drove ashore close upon the quarry cliff. Had she struck elsewhere in the neighbourhood, every soul on board must have perished instantly, but no sooner did she come in terrific contact with the cliff than the grateful though astounded seamen in the rigging found a ladder ready placed, and by it they mounted, and were saved. The unfortunate wife of the captain had been previously drowned in the cabin. Next morning there was scarcely a vestige of the vessel to be seen. — Wilson's Voyage round the Coasts of Scotland. Appendix, No. XXVIL— P. 302. The Skua. {Lestris.) The birds of this genus get the name of lestris from the habit they have of robbing the gulls of the prey which they 344 APPENDIX. have swaUowed. They have sometimes been called the eagles of the sea ; and their power, their rapacity, and their daring entitle them to the name, much more than the gannets and the cormorants, which, though most voracious in their fishing, and often dashing in the performance of it, are tame and peaceable birds in other respects. The worst that one gets in the haunts of the gannet and the cormorant is a hearty scold ing ; but the cradle-castle of the skuas is not to be stormed with impunity. AU who have visited it confess there is danger, and some of the accounts add that there has been death. Those who have had the hardihood to attempt the plundering of the skuas nests, with the head unprotected, have had their skuUs fractured by the reiterated dashes of the parental beaks. Even the eagles keep aloof from the habita tions of the skuas, and they, singly, so alarm the gulls, that they disgorge their load of fish, which the skuas seizes on its fall. They are also great robbers of the nests of other birds. They have indeed many of the characteristics and some of the action of eagles. The bill has a cere to the upper man dible. It is of moderate length, hard, strong, cylindrical, compressed, very sharp in the cutting edges, and hooked at the tip of the upper mandible, and having the under one fortified by a salient angle at the middle. The legs are stout with part of the tibia naked, and the hind toe rearly rudi- mental ; but the claws are strong and much hooked. The head, neck, and body are strongly and firmly made ; there is the same power of spreading the tail as in the eagles, and the flight is by jerks, or rather dashes. They are chiefly found in the north, collecting at the breeding-grounds, seldom more to the south than Orkney and Shetland ; in the summer, ranging as far as Spitzbergen, and making prize of fishes, eggs, young birds, shelled moUusca and Crustacea on the shores, and the " brang," or carcase of whales and other large animals, in the sea. It seems to be chiefly for " holding on," while they tear the floating carcases, as seals and other animals are subject to epizooty, and float dead in thousands ; and in those cases, the skuas lend a hand in playing the vulture. Most of the species are found both in the Orkneys and in Shetland, but only on APPENDIX. 345 peculiar spots. The nests are sometimes down near the water, and, at others, at the height of several hundred feet ; and it is a curious fact, that the eggs even of the same species are always lighter in the colour when placed high than when down near the level of the sea. They disperse in winter, and range more in breadth over the ocean. There are four species of skuas known as British birds, though one of them is of rare occurrence ; and these four have not only the general appear ance, but the gradation in size, in the colours of the plumage, and in form of the birds of prey. Of the diurnal birds of prey, there is a regular gradation from the golden eagle to the merlin ; and, in the nocturnal ones, from the great-eared owl to the little owl. The skuas feed by day, and thus the tints of their plumage resemble the diurnal accipitres more than the nocturnal ones. The common skua has the same deep- brown, and the same unbroken colour as the eagle, and like that bird, it has the beak black. The others are light, and more or less marked with spots on the under part ; and as their size diminishes, their wings and tails become propor- tionaUy more produced, so that they have more the character of the hawks, possess the means of more rapid and varied flight, but without the same strength and daring. — Mudie's British Birds, Appendix, No. XXVIII.— P. 303. The Eider Duck. (^Somataria Mollisoma,) One of the most distinguishing characters of the eiders ia the base of the bUl prolonged in two flat plates on the sides of the forehead, and the mandibles diminishing in breadth toward the point. They are also among the largest of the duck tribe, soft in their appearance, and gentle in their manners. The female is much smaller than the male ; has the plates of the bill not so far produced on the forehead, and wants the pendant feathers that hang over the wings. The colour is a pale yellowish-brown, mottled with lighter and with black; the wings dusky, with rust-coloured edges, and the greater coverts and some of the secondary quUls with white 346 APPENDIX. tips; taU brownish-black; belly dusky, mottled with black. The eiders are less migratory than most others of the sea-ducks. The ice drives them to the south in the winter, but they do not move far, and those which inhabit places where the sea is never frozen, remain in the same places all the year round. They are rarely, if ever, seen on the southern shores of Eng land, though a few inhabit the Fern Islands, and also some of the islets in the Firth of Forth. They are much more numerous in the more northern and remote places : the Ork neys, the Shetlands, and some of the more distant and lonely of the Western Isles, such as Skerry, the Gannet's rock and its stack, which stand wild and lonely in the North Sea, about thirty miles to the northward of Hoy-Head, in Orkney, con tain a number of these birds ; but there their eggs and young are liable to be destroyed by the skua gulls, as they are by jackdaws on the islets farther to the south. To the people of the remote north, whose only possession, save a rock upon which to found their hut, (which is chiefly formed of materials that the sea produces or wafts,) the eiders have much of the character of domestic animals ; and they have this advantage over the domestic animals of more southern places, that they put the people to no expense for food. If the eggs are left undisturbed, the brood of the eider ducks does not exceed four ; but if the eggs are removed, she will continue to lay for several weeks. The nest is on the ground, upon one of the islets not far from the mainland, and lined with exquisitely fine down, which the bird pulls from her breast, and, as the eggs are deposited, she covers them with more of that down. The bird is so tame that she allows the people to lift her from the nest, remove the down and eggs in part, and again replace her, where she lays afresh, and puUs more down. This process is continued not only till the female can furnish no more down, but till the male also is in part denuded, as he comes to assist as soon as the supply of the female becomes exhausted. Half a pound is the average quantity obtained from one female in the course of the season, and the product is said to be greatest when the season is rainy. The down of the eider is the lightest and softest of animal covering, and perhaps the worst APPENDIX. 347 conductor of heat, and therefore the warmest clothing that is known. The prepared skins of the eider also make light and warm clothing, and their flesh is wholesome and much more palatable than that of most of the sea ducks. They are large birds : the male is about two feet three inches in length, more than three feet in the spread of the wings, and weighs six or seven pounds. In the latter part of the winter and the spring, they swim in flocks, and their motions on the water are pecu liarly graceful. Though they generally return to their haunts at night, they often make pretty long excursions during the day, and they are well adapted for such flights ; for, soft and heavy as they are, it has been ascertained that the rate of their motion on the wing is not less than eighty or ninety miles an hour. Altogether, they are among the most inter esting of our sea-birds. — Mudie's British Birds, OMITTED APPENDIX TO VOL. I. Voracity of Pikes.— 'P. 267. In alluding to the ferocity of Irish pikes, a friend of mine, who is constitutionally sceptical, hinted that in self-devouring propensities, my fish exceeded even the KUkenny cats of most pugnacious memory. Now, every body knows that pike are fish of evil reputation, while trouts bear an irreproachable character. " Justice to Ireland " obliges me to prove that a Milesian pike is not worse than his neighbours, after all. The following extracts from " Scrope's Tweed," I think, will bear me out : — "I once saw," says the learned and accompUshed Dr. GUlespie, "one of these all-devouring flsh in a curious pre dicament. In fishing, or rather strolling, within these few years, with a rod in one hand and a book in the other, so as to alternate reading and fishing, as the clouds came and went, I observed a great many June-flies, at which the fish were occasionally rising, and which at the same time were picked up by the swaUows, as they skimmed over the surface of the 348 APPENDIX. still water. It so happened that a trout from beneath, and a swallow from above, had fixed their affections upon the same yellow-winged and tempting fly. Down came the swallow, and up came the open mouth of the flsh ; into which, iu pursuit of his prey, the swallow pitched his head. The struggle was not long, but pretty severe ; and the swaUow was once or twice nearly immersed, wings and all, in the water, before he got himself disentangled from the sharp teeth of the fish." It is true that the trout had no intention of encounter ing the bird ; but every one knows that pike will pull young ducks under the water, and devour them. "The Tay trout," says John Crerar (I copy from his MS.), "lives in that river all the year round. It is a large and yellow flsh, with a great mouth, and feeds chiefly on salmon- spawn, moles, mice, frogs, &c. A curious circumstance once happened to me at Pulney Loch. One of my sons threw a live mouse into it, when a large trout took the mouse down immediately. The boy told me what had happened ; so I took my fishing rod, which was leaning against my house close to the loch, and put a fly on. At the very flrst throw I hooked a large trout, landed it, and laid it on the walk : in two seconds the mouse ran out of his mouth, and got into a hole in the wall before I could catch it." ADDITIONAL APPENDICES TO VOL. II. Chapter I. — P. 14. Holy Island, Camden mentions it, so that it is evidently as old as his time. Probably it has been the scene of but few remarkable events ; history being nearly as silent in that respect, as it is concern ing its origin. The flrst time it occurs, is in the history of the civil war, temp, Charles I. when the following account of the taking ofit by the parliamentary forces is given, p. 350, in a book called "God on the Mount; or, a Parliamentary Chro nicle," printed anno 1644, in these words : " In May 1643, leaving Barwick in a good posture of APPENDIX. 349 defence for king and parliament, and a man of war to ride before the town as they desired, we set sail for the Holy Island (six miles from Barwick) and summoned the castle there, for king and parliament ; but being denied by the captain, we let fly a broadside at it, and were answered again in our own language ; the cannons thus playing on both sides, and yet no hurt done, we running in our ships under the castle, and land ing an hundred men, they came to a parley, and yielded, upon conditions to have paid unto them a year's pay due to them from his majestic, which we promised to do, and so became masters of that impregnable castle of Holy Island (which 40 men may keep against 4000, without any blood) ; this castle we fortified with our men and some of the old soldiers, who refused to fight against us." Fast Castle. The site of Fast Castle is most romantic, wild, desolate, and inaccessible. In history it holds a prominent place, and was the locale where the Gowrie conspiracy was planned. In romance it possesses equal interest — Fast being the original of the Wolf's Crag in " The Bride of Lammermoor." Chapter XII. P. 158. Dryburgh Abhey, The abbey of Dryburgh, founded by Hugh Morville, con stable of Scotland, in the time of David I. and Beatrix de Campo Bello, his wife. There are scarce any relics of the church, but much of the convent, the refectory supported by two pillars, several vaults and other ofiices, part of the cloister walls, and a fine radiated window of stone-work. These remains are not inelegant, but are unadorned. This was inha bited by Praemontratensian monks, who styled the Irish abbeys of Druin la Croix and Woodburn, their daughters. At the reformation James VI. bestowed Dryburgh on Henry Erskine, second son of the Earl of Mar — Pennant's Tour in Scotland, ***** In a small chapel, or aisle, on the north side, and towards the eastern extremity of the church, is the grave of Sir Walter 350 APPENDIX. Scott. The aisle in which the "mighty minstrel" is interred was formerly the burying-place of the Haliburtons of New- mains, from whom Sir Walter was descended ; and two or three of their monuments, though of no great antiquity, sculp tured with their arms, and the motto, " Watch Weel," are placed against the walls. A Latin inscription on a small tablet, in the north wall, informs the reader that " This place of sepulture was granted to Walter, Thomas, and Robert Scott, by David, Earl of Buchan." The aisle is just wide enough to admit of three graves. That of Sir Walter is in the middle, where his grandfather, Mr. Robert Scott, of Sandy-know, was buried ; on his left is his grandmother's, and on his right that of Lady Scott. No monument nor inscription to the memory of Sir Walter or his lady has yet been put up. A few years ago Sir Walter inclosed his burying-place with an iron railing, which, since his death, has been extended to near the roof of the aisle, to prevent persons climbing over. A few yews and evergreen shrubs were planted round the graves in 1833, but they do not appear likely to thrive. — Rambles, Sj-c. Chapter XVIL— P. 236. Auld Lang Syne. In these days of royal visitings, the following description of the reception given by a noble to his liege lord, wUl present a curious contrast to those offered at Chatsworth and Belvoir to our sovereign lady and her consort. • ' The Earl of Athole, hearing of the king's* coming, made great provision for him in aU things pertaining to a prince, that he was as weU served and eased with aU things necessary to his estate as he had been in his own palace of Edinburgh. For I heard say, this noble earl gart make a curious palace, to the king, to his mother, and to the ambassador, where they were so honourably eased and lodged as they had been in England, France, Italy, or Spain, concerning the time and equivalent, for their hunting and pastime ; which was builded in the midst of a fair meadow, a fair palace of green timber * James V. APPENDIX. 35 1 wind with green birks, that were green both under and above, which was fashioned in four quarters, and in every quarter and nuik thereof a great round, as it had been a block-house, which Was lofted and gested the space of three house height ; the floors laid with green scarets, spreats, medivarts, and flowers, that no man knew whereon he zeid, but as he had been in a garden. Further, there were two great rounds on ilk side of the gate, and a great portcullis of tree, falling down with the manner of a barrace, with a drawbridge, and a great stank of water of sixteen foot deep, and thirty foot of breadth. And also this palace within was hung with fine tapestry and arrases of silk, and lighted with fine glass windows in all airts ; that this palace was as pleasantly decored with all necessaries per taining to a prince as it had been his own palace royal at home. " Further, this earl gart make such provision for the king and his mother, and the embassador, that they had all manner of meats, drinks, and delicates that were to be gotten at that time in all Scotland, either in burgh or land ; that is to say, all kind of drink, as also beer, wine, both white and claret, malvesy, muskadel, hippocras, and aqua-vitcB. Further, there was of meats, wheat bread, main bread, and ginge bread, with fleshes, beef, mutton, lamb, veal, venison, goose, grice, capon, coney, cran, swan, partridge, plover, duck, drake, brissel-cock, and pawnes, blackcock, muirfowl, and capercaillies ; and also the stanks that were round about the palace were full of all deli cate fishes, as salmond, trouts, pearches, pikes, eels, and all other kind of delicate fishes that could be gotten in fresh waters ; and all ready for the banket. " Syne were there proper stewards, cunning baxters, excellent cooks, and potingars, with confectioners, and drugs for their desserts ; and the halls and chambers were prepared with costly bedding, vessel, and napery, according for a king, so that he wanted none of his orders more than he had been at home in his own palace. The king remained in this wilder ness at the hunting the space of three days and three nights, and his company, as I have shewn. I heard even say it cost the Earlof Athole, every day, in expenses, a thousand pounds." —Piscottie, 352 APPENDIX. Chapter XIX. P. 259. Wick Fishery, They generaUy work together in little companies of two or three, so that whUe one is fUling a basket with her gutted fish, another carries them off to be roused, as they call it, that is, cast into vats or barrels, then sprinkled with salt, then more herrings and more salt, then a brawny arm plunged among them far above the elbow, and the whole mingled together, and so on tUl the space is filled. They may lie a longer or shorter time in this state, according to the amount of labour in hand, and the immediate necessities of gutting and rousing ; but the next usual step in the routine is for a third hand to remove those herrings from the first vats or barrels, and repack them more carefully, their under sides rather upwards, and every successive row crossing at right angles that which precedes it. They give each row a fresh sprinkling of salt, and then laying the head of the cask on loosely, they leave the contents to settle down for a day, which they do so considerably as to enable each cask to contain a few more rows before being finally closed by the cooper. Though these gutters (not a few of them) are good-look ing creatures, yet the appearance of the general mass, after they have worked an hour or two, beggars all description. Their hands, their necks, their busts, their " Dreadful faces throng'd, and fiery arms,'' their every bit about them fore and aft, are spotted and be sprinkled o'er with little scarlet clots of gills and guts, or, as Southey says of the war-horse nf Don Roderick, after the last and fatal fight, — " Their flanks incarnadined. Their poitral smear'd with blood." Now many of these awful phenomena were really handsome. So if under such outward circumstances even a comely woman, one naturaUy fair to look upon, becomes a fearful creature, what imagination can conceive, without the visible and dread reality, into what depth of plainness that female object must descend, who in her own right a most " ugly customer," even APPENDIX. 353 on the morning of a soap-abounding Sunday, has passed in week-day life through the ordeal of her order, and bloody and all-begrimmed with sUme stands up with knife in hand, or stoops her horrid head " with scaly armour bright," and, plunging her bare and brawny arms again into the trough, scatters her gills and guts as if no bowels of compassion existed any more on this terraqueous globe. It is indeed a fearful sight, abhorred by gods and men ; for we don't think that either Neptune or Asmodeus could have abided such fishy fumes. Yet strange to say, many of these artists, during after hours, are the gayest belles about the place ; for the occupa tion, while the season lasts, is extremely lucrative, and affords a temptation both to numerous females of the district, and to many more drawn thither from the remotest places of the Westem Highlands by the hope of " filthy lucre." Before beginning to work, they take off their caps and bonnets, and either cover over or exchange their outer garment for a worser, making their toilet with innocent unreserve, sub Jove, and so commence their bloody occupation. Towards evening they carefully wash their faces, arms, and legs, and slip on again their better garments. Thus they never appear, except around the gutting board, in otherwise than rather trim array. Indeed, many of the most magnificently fine females, whom we saw standing at respectable doors, or look ing out of decent windows, or going sedately about their evening occupations from shop to shop, had been assiduously engaged in gutting all day long. The cure of herrings is indeed an object of such paramount importance to the town and neighbourhood, that when an unusual take occurs, and delicate female hands are wanting for the work, a kind of requisition is sent through the town, even to the most respect able inhabitants, to allow their domestics to attend as gutters for a day or two ; and, in hiring servants, it is by no means unusual for the latter to stipulate for leave to gut during a certain number of days, as a perquisite beyond their usual termly wages. To prevent indolence or idleness all these gutters are paid by piece-work, that is, so much a cran or barrel after the fish are packed. At the rate of 4d. per barrel, A A 354 APPENDIX. each gutter, according to her skill and activity, may make from four to seven shillings a day ; and, in former times, when so high as a shilling a barrel was sometimes allowed, during a press of work and scarcity of hands, their gains were actually enormous. An expert and practised company of three can make up among them sixty-three barrels in a day, or twenty- one barrels each, so that, in the glorious times alluded to, a gutter might have kept her gig, and driven to the scene of action daily. — Wilson's Voyage round the Coasts of Scotland. the end. R. CLAf, PRINTER, BREAD STBEET HILL.