Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated - Sir Walter Scott
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Upon approaching Milnwood, Henry's knock upon the gate no longer
intimated the conscious timidity of a stripling who has been out of
bounds, but the confidence of a man in full possession of his own rights,
and master of his own actions,--bold, free, and decided. The door was
cautiously opened by his old acquaintance, Mrs Alison Wilson, who started
back when she saw the steel cap and nodding plume of the martial visitor.
"Where is my uncle, Alison?" said Morton, smiling at her alarm.
"Lordsake, Mr Harry! is this you?" returned the old lady. "In troth, ye
garr'd my heart loup to my very mouth--But it canna be your ainsell, for
ye look taller and mair manly-like than ye used to do."
"It is, however, my own self," said Henry, sighing and smiling at the
same time; "I believe this dress may make me look taller, and these
times, Ailie, make men out of boys."
"Sad times indeed!" echoed the old woman; "and O that you suld be
endangered wi'them! but wha can help it?--ye were ill eneugh guided, and,
as I tell your uncle, if ye tread on a worm it will turn."
"You were always my advocate, Ailie," said he, and the housekeeper no
longer resented the familiar epithet, "and would let no one blame me but
yourself, I am aware of that,--Where is my uncle?"
"In Edinburgh," replied Alison; "the honest man thought it was best to
gang and sit by the chimley when the reek rase--a vex'd man he's been and
a feared--but ye ken the Laird as weel as I do."
"I hope he has suffered nothing in health?" said Henry.
"Naething to speak of," answered the housekeeper, "nor in gudes
neither--we fended as weel as we could; and, though the troopers of
Tillietudlem took the red cow and auld Hackie, (ye'll mind them weel;)
yet they sauld us a gude bargain o' four they were driving to the
Castle."
"Sold you a bargain?" said Morton; "how do you mean?"
"Ou, they cam out to gather marts for the garrison," answered the
housekeeper; "but they just fell to their auld trade, and rade through
the country couping and selling a' that they gat, like sae mony
west-country drovers. My certie, Major Bellenden was laird o' the least
share o' what they lifted, though it was taen in his name."
"Then," said Morton, hastily, "the garrison must be straitened for
provisions?"
"Stressed eneugh," replied Ailie--"there's little doubt o' that."
A light instantly glanced on Morton's mind.
"Burley must have deceived me--craft as well as cruelty is permitted by
his creed." Such was his inward thought; he said aloud, "I cannot stay,
Mrs Wilson, I must go forward directly."
"But, oh! bide to eat a mouthfu'," entreated the affectionate
housekeeper, "and I'll mak it ready for you as I used to do afore thae
sad days," "It is impossible," answered Morton.--"Cuddie, get our horses
ready."
"They're just eating their corn," answered the attendant.
"Cuddie!" exclaimed Ailie; "what garr'd ye bring that ill-faur'd, unlucky
loon alang wi' ye?--It was him and his randie mother began a' the
mischief in this house."
"Tut, tut," replied Cuddie, "ye should forget and forgie, mistress.
Mither's in Glasgow wi' her tittie, and sall plague ye nae mair; and I'm
the Captain's wallie now, and I keep him tighter in thack and rape than
ever ye did;--saw ye him ever sae weel put on as he is now?"
"In troth and that's true," said the old housekeeper, looking with great
complacency at her young master, whose mien she thought much improved by
his dress. "I'm sure ye ne'er had a laced cravat like that when ye were
at Milnwood; that's nane o' my sewing."
"Na, na, mistress," replied Cuddie, "that's a cast o' my hand--that's ane
o' Lord Evandale's braws."
"Lord Evandale?" answered the old lady, "that's him that the whigs are
gaun to hang the morn, as I hear say."
"The whigs about to hang Lord Evandale?" said Morton, in the greatest
surprise.
"Ay, troth are they," said the housekeeper. "Yesterday night he made a
sally, as they ca't, (my mother's name was Sally--I wonder they gie
Christian folk's names to sic unchristian doings,)--but he made an
outbreak to get provisions, and his men were driven back and he was taen,
'an' the whig Captain Balfour garr'd set up a gallows, and swore, (or
said upon his conscience, for they winna swear,) that if the garrison was
not gien ower the morn by daybreak, he would hing up the young lord, poor
thing, as high as Haman.--These are sair times!--but folk canna help
them--sae do ye sit down and tak bread and cheese until better meat's
made ready. Ye suldna hae kend a word about it, an I had thought it was
to spoil your dinner, hinny."
"Fed, or unfed," exclaimed Morton, "saddle the horses instantly, Cuddie.
We must not rest until we get before the Castle."
And, resisting all Ailie's entreaties, they instantly resumed their
journey.
Morton failed not to halt at the dwelling of Poundtext, and summon him to
attend him to the camp. That honest divine had just resumed for an
instant his pacific habits, and was perusing an ancient theological
treatise, with a pipe in his mouth, and a small jug of ale beside him, to
assist his digestion of the argument. It was with bitter ill-will that he
relinquished these comforts (which he called his studies) in order to
recommence a hard ride upon a high-trotting horse. However, when he knew
the matter in hand, he gave up, with a deep groan, the prospect of
spending a quiet evening in his own little parlour; for he entirely
agreed with Morton, that whatever interest Burley might have in rendering
the breach between the presbyterians and the government irreconcilable,
by putting the young nobleman to death, it was by no means that of the
moderate party to permit such an act of atrocity. And it is but doing
justice to Mr Poundtext to add, that, like most of his own persuasion, he
was decidedly adverse to any such acts of unnecessary violence; besides,
that his own present feelings induced him to listen with much complacence
to the probability held out by Morton, of Lord Evandale's becoming a
mediator for the establishment of peace upon fair and moderate terms.
With this similarity of views, they hastened their journey, and arrived
about eleven o'clock at night at a small hamlet adjacent to the Castle at
Tillietudlem, where Burley had established his head-quarters.
They were challenged by the sentinel, who made his melancholy walk at the
entrance of the hamlet, and admitted upon declaring their names and
authority in the army. Another soldier kept watch before a house, which
they conjectured to be the place of Lord Evandale's confinement, for a
gibbet of such great height as to be visible from the battlements of the
Castle, was erected before it, in melancholy confirmation of the truth of
Mrs Wilson's report. [Note: The Cameronians had suffered persecution, but
it was without learning mercy. We are informed by Captain Crichton, that
they had set up in their camp a huge gibbet, or gallows, having many
hooks upon it, with a coil of new ropes lying beside it, for the
execution of such royalists as they might make prisoners. Guild, in his
Bellum Bothuellianum, describes this machine particularly.] Morton
instantly demanded to speak with Burley, and was directed to his
quarters. They found him reading the Scriptures, with his arms lying
beside him, as if ready for any sudden alarm. He started upon the
entrance of his colleagues in office.
"What has brought ye hither?" said Burley, hastily. "Is there bad news
from the army?"
"No," replied Morton; "but we understand that there are measures adopted
here in which the safety of the army is deeply concerned--Lord Evandale
is your prisoner?"
"The Lord," replied Burley, "hath delivered him into our hands."
"And you will avail yourself of that advantage, granted you by Heaven, to
dishonour our cause in the eyes of all the world, by putting a prisoner
to an ignominious death?"
"If the house of Tillietudlem be not surrendered by daybreak," replied
Burley, "God do so to me and more also, if he shall not die that death to
which his leader and patron, John Grahame of Claverhouse, hath put so
many of God's saints."
"We are in arms," replied Morton, "to put down such cruelties, and not to
imitate them, far less to avenge upon the innocent the acts of the
guilty. By what law can you justify the atrocity you would commit?"
"If thou art ignorant of it," replied Burley, "thy companion is well
aware of the law which gave the men of Jericho to the sword of Joshua,
the son of Nun."
"But we," answered the divine, "live under a better dispensation, which
instructeth us to return good for evil, and to pray for those who
despitefully use us and persecute us."
"That is to say," said Burley, "that thou wilt join thy grey hairs to his
green youth to controvert me in this matter?"
"We are," rejoined Poundtext, "two of those to whom, jointly with
thyself, authority is delegated over this host, and we will not permit
thee to hurt a hair of the prisoner's head. It may please God to make him
a means of healing these unhappy breaches in our Israel."
"I judged it would come to this," answered Burley, "when such as thou
wert called into the council of the elders."
"Such as I?" answered Poundtext,--"And who am I, that you should name me
with such scorn?--Have I not kept the flock of this sheep-fold from the
wolves for thirty years? Ay, even while thou, John Balfour, wert fighting
in the ranks of uncircumcision, a Philistine of hardened brow and bloody
hand--Who am I, say'st thou?"
"I will tell thee what thou art, since thou wouldst so fain know," said
Burley. "Thou art one of those, who would reap where thou hast not sowed,
and divide the spoil while others fight the battle--thou art one of those
that follow the gospel for the loaves and for the fishes--that love their
own manse better than the Church of God, and that would rather draw their
stipends under prelatists or heathens, than be a partaker with those
noble spirits who have cast all behind them for the sake of the
Covenant."
"And I will tell thee, John Balfour," returned Poundtext, deservedly
incensed, "I will tell thee what thou art. Thou art one of those, for
whose bloody and merciless disposition a reproach is flung upon the whole
church of this suffering kingdom, and for whose violence and
blood-guiltiness, it is to be feared, this fair attempt to recover our
civil and religious rights will never be honoured by Providence with the
desired success."
"Gentlemen," said Morton, "cease this irritating and unavailing
recrimination; and do you, Mr Balfour, inform us, whether it is your
purpose to oppose the liberation of Lord Evandale, which appears to us a
profitable measure in the present position of our affairs?"
"You are here," answered Burley, "as two voices against one; but you will
not refuse to tarry until the united council shall decide upon this
matter?"
"This," said Morton, "we would not decline, if we could trust the hands
in whom we are to leave the prisoner.--But you know well," he added,
looking sternly at Burley, "that you have already deceived me in this
matter."
"Go to," said Burley, disdainfully,--"thou art an idle inconsiderate boy,
who, for the black eyebrows of a silly girl, would barter thy own faith
and honour, and the cause of God and of thy country."
"Mr Balfour," said Morton, laying his hand on his sword, "this language
requires satisfaction."
"And thou shalt have it, stripling, when and where thou darest," said
Burley; "I plight thee my good word on it."
Poundtext, in his turn, interfered to remind them of the madness of
quarrelling, and effected with difficulty a sort of sullen
reconciliation.
"Concerning the prisoner," said Burley, "deal with him as ye think fit. I
wash my hands free from all consequences. He is my prisoner, made by my
sword and spear, while you, Mr Morton, were playing the adjutant at
drills and parades, and you, Mr Poundtext, were warping the Scriptures
into Erastianism. Take him unto you, nevertheless, and dispose of him as
ye think meet.--Dingwall," he continued, calling a sort of aid-de-camp,
who slept in the next apartment, "let the guard posted on the malignant
Evandale give up their post to those whom Captain Morton shall appoint to
relieve them.--The prisoner," he said, again addressing Poundtext and
Morton, "is now at your disposal, gentlemen. But remember, that for all
these things there will one day come a term of heavy accounting."
So saying, he turned abruptly into an inner apartment, without bidding
them good evening. His two visitors, after a moment's consideration,
agreed it would be prudent to ensure the prisoner's personal safety, by
placing over him an additional guard, chosen from their own parishioners.
A band of them happened to be stationed in the hamlet, having been
attached, for the time, to Burley's command, in order that the men might
be gratified by remaining as long as possible near to their own homes.
They were, in general, smart, active young fellows, and were usually
called by their companions, the Marksmen of Milnwood. By Morton's desire,
four of these lads readily undertook the task of sentinels, and he left
with them Headrigg, on whose fidelity he could depend, with instructions
to call him, if any thing remarkable happened.
This arrangement being made, Morton and his colleague took possession,
for the night, of such quarters as the over-crowded and miserable hamlet
could afford them. They did not, however, separate for repose till they
had drawn up a memorial of the grievances of the moderate presbyterians,
which was summed up with a request of free toleration for their religion
in future, and that they should be permitted to attend gospel ordinances
as dispensed by their own clergymen, without oppression or molestation.
Their petition proceeded to require that a free parliament should be
called for settling the affairs of church and state, and for redressing
the injuries sustained by the subject; and that all those who either now
were, or had been, in arms, for obtaining these ends, should be
indemnified. Morton could not but strongly hope that these terms, which
comprehended all that was wanted, or wished for, by the moderate party
among the insurgents, might, when thus cleared of the violence of
fanaticism, find advocates even among the royalists, as claiming only the
ordinary rights of Scottish freemen.
He had the more confidence of a favourable reception, that the Duke of
Monmouth, to whom Charles had intrusted the charge of subduing this
rebellion, was a man of gentle, moderate, and accessible disposition,
well known to be favourable to the presbyterians, and invested by the
king with full powers to take measures for quieting the disturbances in
Scotland. It seemed to Morton, that all that was necessary for
influencing him in their favour was to find a fit and sufficiently
respectable channel of communication, and such seemed to be opened
through the medium of Lord Evandale. He resolved, therefore, to visit the
prisoner early in the morning, in order to sound his dispositions to
undertake the task of mediator; but an accident happened which led him to
anticipate his purpose.
CHAPTER VII.
Gie ower your house, lady, he said,--
Gie ower your house to me.
Edom of Gordon.
Morton had finished the revisal and the making out of a fair copy of the
paper on which he and Poundtext had agreed to rest as a full statement of
the grievances of their party, and the conditions on which the greater
part of the insurgents would be contented to lay down their arms; and he
was about to betake himself to repose, when there was a knocking at the
door of his apartment.
"Enter," said Morton; and the round bullethead of Cuddie Headrigg was
thrust into the room. "Come in," said Morton, "and tell me what you want.
Is there any alarm?"
"Na, stir; but I hae brought ane to speak wi' you."
"Who is that, Cuddie?" enquired Morton.
"Ane o' your auld acquaintance," said Cuddie; and, opening the door more
fully, he half led, half dragged in a woman, whose face was muffled in
her plaid.--"Come, come, ye needna be sae bashfu' before auld
acquaintance, Jenny," said Cuddie, pulling down the veil, and discovering
to his master the well-remembered countenance of Jenny Dennison. "Tell
his honour, now--there's a braw lass--tell him what ye were wanting to
say to Lord Evandale, mistress."
"What was I wanting to say," answered Jenny, "to his honour himsell the
other morning, when I visited him in captivity, ye muckle hash?--D'ye
think that folk dinna want to see their friends in adversity, ye dour
crowdy-eater?"
This reply was made with Jenny's usual volubility; but her voice
quivered, her cheek was thin and pale, the tears stood in her eyes, her
hand trembled, her manner was fluttered, and her whole presence bore
marks of recent suffering and privation, as well as nervous and
hysterical agitation.
"What is the matter, Jenny?" said Morton, kindly. "You know how much I
owe you in many respects, and can hardly make a request that I will not
grant, if in my power."
"Many thanks, Milnwood," said the weeping damsel; "but ye were aye a kind
gentleman, though folk say ye hae become sair changed now."
"What do they say of me?" answered Morton.
"A' body says," replied Jenny, "that you and the whigs hae made a vow to
ding King Charles aff the throne, and that neither he, nor his posteriors
from generation to generation, shall sit upon it ony mair; and John
Gudyill threeps ye're to gie a' the church organs to the pipers, and burn
the Book o' Common-prayer by the hands of the common hangman, in revenge
of the Covenant that was burnt when the king cam hame."
"My friends at Tillietudlem judge too hastily and too ill of me,"
answered Morton. "I wish to have free exercise of my own religion,
without insulting any other; and as to your family, I only desire an
opportunity to show them I have the same friendship and kindness as
ever."
"Bless your kind heart for saying sae," said Jenny, bursting into a flood
of tears; "and they never needed kindness or friendship mair, for they
are famished for lack o' food."
"Good God!" replied Morton, "I have heard of scarcity, but not of famine!
It is possible?--Have the ladies and the Major"--
"They hae suffered like the lave o' us," replied Jenny; "for they shared
every bit and sup wi' the whole folk in the Castle--I'm sure my poor een
see fifty colours wi' faintness, and my head's sae dizzy wi' the
mirligoes that I canna stand my lane."
The thinness of the poor girl's cheek, and the sharpness of her features,
bore witness to the truth of what she said. Morton was greatly shocked.
"Sit down," he said, "for God's sake!" forcing her into the only chair
the apartment afforded, while he himself strode up and down the room in
horror and impatience. "I knew not of this," he exclaimed in broken
ejaculations,--"I could not know of it.--Cold-blooded, iron-hearted
fanatic--deceitful villain!--Cuddie, fetch refreshments--food--wine, if
possible--whatever you can find."
"Whisky is gude eneugh for her," muttered Cuddie; "ane wadna hae thought
that gude meal was sae scant amang them, when the quean threw sae muckle
gude kail-brose scalding het about my lugs."
Faint and miserable as Jenny seemed to be, she could not hear the
allusion to her exploit during the storm of the Castle, without bursting
into a laugh which weakness soon converted into a hysterical giggle.
Confounded at her state, and reflecting with horror on the distress which
must have been in the Castle, Morton repeated his commands to Headrigg in
a peremptory manner; and when he had departed, endeavoured to soothe his
visitor.
"You come, I suppose, by the orders of your mistress, to visit Lord
Evandale?--Tell me what she desires; her orders shall be my law."
Jenny appeared to reflect a moment, and then said, "Your honour is sae
auld a friend, I must needs trust to you, and tell the truth."
"Be assured, Jenny," said Morton, observing that she hesitated, "that you
will best serve your mistress by dealing sincerely with me."
"Weel, then, ye maun ken we're starving, as I said before, and have been
mair days than ane; and the Major has sworn that he expects relief daily,
and that he will not gie ower the house to the enemy till we have eaten
up his auld boots,--and they are unco thick in the soles, as ye may weel
mind, forby being teugh in the upper-leather. The dragoons, again, they
think they will be forced to gie up at last, and they canna bide hunger
weel, after the life they led at free quarters for this while bypast; and
since Lord Evandale's taen, there's nae guiding them; and Inglis says
he'll gie up the garrison to the whigs, and the Major and the leddies
into the bargain, if they will but let the troopers gang free themsells."
"Scoundrels!" said Morton; "why do they not make terms for all in the
Castle?"
"They are fear'd for denial o' quarter to themsells, having dune sae
muckle mischief through the country; and Burley has hanged ane or twa o'
them already--sae they want to draw their ain necks out o' the collar at
hazard o' honest folk's."
"And you were sent," continued Morton, "to carry to Lord Evandale the
unpleasant news of the men's mutiny?"
"Just e'en sae," said Jenny; "Tam Halliday took the rue, and tauld me a'
about it, and gat me out o' the Castle to tell Lord Evandale, if possibly
I could win at him."
"But how can he help you?" said Morton; "he is a prisoner."
"Well-a-day, ay," answered the afflicted damsel; "but maybe he could mak
fair terms for us--or, maybe, he could gie us some good advice--or,
maybe, he might send his orders to the dragoons to be civil--or"--
"Or, maybe," said Morton, "you were to try if it were possible to set him
at liberty?"
"If it were sae," answered Jenny with spirit, "it wadna be the first time
I hae done my best to serve a friend in captivity."
"True, Jenny," replied Morton, "I were most ungrateful to forget it. But
here comes Cuddie with refreshments--I will go and do your errand to Lord
Evandale, while you take some food and wine."
"It willna be amiss ye should ken," said Cuddie to his master, "that this
Jenny--this Mrs Dennison, was trying to cuittle favour wi' Tam Rand, the
miller's man, to win into Lord Evandale's room without ony body kennin'.
She wasna thinking, the gipsy, that I was at her elbow."
"And an unco fright ye gae me when ye cam ahint and took a grip o' me,"
said Jenny, giving him a sly twitch with her finger and her thumb--"if ye
hadna been an auld acquaintance, ye daft gomeril"--
Cuddie, somewhat relenting, grinned a smile on his artful mistress, while
Morton wrapped himself up in his cloak, took his sword under his arm, and
went straight to the place of the young nobleman's confinement. He asked
the sentinels if any thing extraordinary had occurred.
"Nothing worth notice," they said, "excepting the lass that Cuddie took
up, and two couriers that Captain Balfour had dispatched, one to the
Reverend Ephraim Macbriar, another to Kettledrummle," both of whom were
beating the drum ecclesiastic in different towns between the position of
Burley and the head-quarters of the main army near Hamilton.
"The purpose, I presume," said Morton, with an affectation of
indifference, "was to call them hither."
"So I understand," answered the sentinel, who had spoke with the
messengers.
He is summoning a triumphant majority of the council, thought Morton to
himself, for the purpose of sanctioning whatever action of atrocity he
may determine upon, and thwarting opposition by authority. I must be
speedy, or I shall lose my opportunity.
When he entered the place of Lord Evandale's confinement, he found him
ironed, and reclining on a flock bed in the wretched garret of a
miserable cottage. He was either in a slumber, or in deep meditation,
when Morton entered, and turned on him, when aroused, a countenance so
much reduced by loss of blood, want of sleep, and scarcity of food, that
no one could have recognised in it the gallant soldier who had behaved
with so much spirit at the skirmish of Loudon-hill. He displayed some
surprise at the sudden entrance of Morton.
"I am sorry to see you thus, my lord," said that youthful leader.
"I have heard you are an admirer of poetry," answered the prisoner; "in
that case, Mr Morton, you may remember these lines,--
'Stone walls do not a prison make,
Or iron bars a cage;
A free and quiet mind can take
These for a hermitage.'
But, were my imprisonment less endurable, I am given to expect to-morrow
a total enfranchisement."
"By death?" said Morton.
"Surely," answered Lord Evandale; "I have no other prospect. Your
comrade, Burley, has already dipped his hand in the blood of men whose
meanness of rank and obscurity of extraction might have saved them. I
cannot boast such a shield from his vengeance, and I expect to meet its
extremity."
"But Major Bellenden," said Morton, "may surrender, in order to preserve
your life."