by Walter Scott
CHAPTER XIV.
My hounds may a' rin masterless, My hawks may fly frae tree to tree, My lord may grip my vassal lands, For there again maun I never be! Old Ballad.
We left Morton, along with three companions in captivity, travelling inthe custody of a small body of soldiers, who formed the rear-guard of thecolumn under the command of Claverhouse, and were immediately under thecharge of Sergeant Bothwell. Their route lay towards the hills in whichthe insurgent presbyterians were reported to be in arms. They had notprosecuted their march a quarter of a mile ere Claverhouse and Evandalegalloped past them, followed by their orderly-men, in order to take theirproper places in the column which preceded them. No sooner were they pastthan Bothwell halted the body which he commanded, and disencumberedMorton of his irons.
"King's blood must keep word," said the dragoon. "I promised you shouldbe civilly treated as far as rested with me.--Here, Corporal Inglis, letthis gentleman ride alongside of the other young fellow who is prisoner;and you may permit them to converse together at their pleasure, undertheir breath, but take care they are guarded by two files with loadedcarabines. If they attempt an escape, blow their brains out.--You cannotcall that using you uncivilly," he continued, addressing himself toMorton, "it's the rules of war, you know.--And, Inglis, couple up theparson and the old woman, they are fittest company for each other, d--nme; a single file may guard them well enough. If they speak a word ofcant or fanatical nonsense, let them have a strapping with ashoulder-belt. There's some hope of choking a silenced parson; if he isnot allowed to hold forth, his own treason will burst him."
Having made this arrangement, Bothwell placed himself at the head of theparty, and Inglis, with six dragoons, brought up the rear. The whole thenset forward at a trot, with the purpose of overtaking the main body ofthe regiment.
Morton, overwhelmed with a complication of feelings, was totallyindifferent to the various arrangements made for his secure custody, andeven to the relief afforded him by his release from the fetters. Heexperienced that blank and waste of the heart which follows the hurricaneof passion, and, no longer supported by the pride and conscious rectitudewhich dictated his answers to Claverhouse, he surveyed with deepdejection the glades through which he travelled, each turning of whichhad something to remind him of past happiness and disappointed love. Theeminence which they now ascended was that from which he used first andlast to behold the ancient tower when approaching or retiring from it;and, it is needless to add, that there he was wont to pause, and gazewith a lover's delight on the battlements, which, rising at a distanceout of the lofty wood, indicated the dwelling of her, whom he eitherhoped soon to meet or had recently parted from. Instinctively he turnedhis head back to take a last look of a scene formerly so dear to him, andno less instinctively he heaved a deep sigh. It was echoed by a loudgroan from his companion in misfortune, whose eyes, moved, perchance, bysimilar reflections, had taken the same direction. This indication ofsympathy, on the part of the captive, was uttered in a tone more coarsethan sentimental; it was, however, the expression of a grieved spirit,and so far corresponded with the sigh of Morton. In turning their headstheir eyes met, and Morton recognised the stolid countenance of CuddieHeadrigg, bearing a rueful expression, in which sorrow for his own lotwas mixed with sympathy for the situation of his companion.
"Hegh, sirs!" was the expression of the ci-devant ploughman of the mainsof Tillietudlem; "it's an unco thing that decent folk should be harledthrough the country this gate, as if they were a warld's wonder."
"I am sorry to see you here, Cuddie," said Morton, who, even in his owndistress, did not lose feeling for that of others.
"And sae am I, Mr Henry," answered Cuddie, "baith for mysell and you; butneither of our sorrows will do muckle gude that I can see. To be sure,for me," continued the captive agriculturist, relieving his heart bytalking, though he well knew it was to little purpose,--"to be sure, formy part, I hae nae right to be here ava', for I never did nor said a wordagainst either king or curate; but my mither, puir body, couldna haud theauld tongue o' her, and we maun baith pay for't, it's like."
"Your mother is their prisoner likewise?" said Morton, hardly knowingwhat he said.
"In troth is she, riding ahint ye there like a bride, wi' that auld carleo' a minister that they ca' Gabriel Kettledrummle--Deil that he had beenin the inside of a drum or a kettle either, for my share o' him! Ye see,we were nae sooner chased out o' the doors o' Milnwood, and your uncleand the housekeeper banging them to and barring them ahint us, as if wehad had the plague on our bodies, that I says to my mother, What are weto do neist? for every hole and bore in the country will be steekitagainst us, now that ye hae affronted my auld leddy, and gar't thetroopers tak up young Milnwood. Sae she says to me, Binna cast doun, butgird yoursell up to the great task o' the day, and gie your testimonylike a man upon the mount o' the Covenant."
"And so I suppose you went to a conventicle?" said Morton.
"Ye sall hear," continued Cuddie.--"Aweel, I kendna muckle better what todo, sae I e'en gaed wi' her to an auld daft carline like hersell, and wegot some water-broo and bannocks; and mony a weary grace they said, andmony a psalm they sang, or they wad let me win to, for I was amaistfamished wi' vexation. Aweel, they had me up in the grey o' the morning,and I behoved to whig awa wi' them, reason or nane, to a great gatheringo' their folk at the Miry-sikes; and there this chield, GabrielKettledrummle, was blasting awa to them on the hill-side, about liftingup their testimony, nae doubt, and ganging down to the battle of RomanGilead, or some sic place. Eh, Mr Henry! but the carle gae them a screedo' doctrine! Ye might hae heard him a mile down the wind--He routed likea cow in a fremd loaning.--Weel, thinks I, there's nae place in thiscountry they ca' Roman Gilead--it will be some gate in the westmuirlands; and or we win there I'll see to slip awa wi' this mither o'mine, for I winna rin my neck into a tether for ony Kettledrummle in thecountry side--Aweel," continued Cuddie, relieving himself by detailinghis misfortunes, without being scrupulous concerning the degree ofattention which his companion bestowed on his narrative, "just as I waswearying for the tail of the preaching, cam word that the dragoons wereupon us.--Some ran, and some cried, Stand! and some cried, Down wi' thePhilistines!--I was at my mither to get her awa sting and ling or thered-coats cam up, but I might as weel hae tried to drive our auldfore-a-hand ox without the goad--deil a step wad she budge.--Weel, aftera', the cleugh we were in was strait, and the mist cam thick, and therewas good hope the dragoons wad hae missed us if we could hae held ourtongues; but, as if auld Kettledrummle himsell hadna made din eneugh towaken the very dead, they behoved a' to skirl up a psalm that ye wad haeheard as far as Lanrick!--Aweel, to mak a lang tale short, up cam myyoung Lord Evandale, skelping as fast as his horse could trot, and twentyred-coats at his back. Twa or three chields wad needs fight, wi' thepistol and the whinger in the tae hand, and the Bible in the tother, andthey got their crouns weel cloured; but there wasna muckle skaith dune,for Evandale aye cried to scatter us, but to spare life."
"And did you not resist?" said Morton, who probably felt, that, at thatmoment, he himself would have encountered Lord Evandale on much slightergrounds.
"Na, truly," answered Cuddie, "I keepit aye before the auld woman, andcried for mercy to life and limb; but twa o' the red-coats cam up, andane o' them was gaun to strike my mither wi' the side o' hisbroadsword--So I got up my kebbie at them, and said I wad gie them asgude. Weel, they turned on me, and clinked at me wi' their swords, and Igarr'd my hand keep my head as weel as I could till Lord Evandale cameup, and then I cried out I was a servant at Tillietudlem--ye kenyoursell he was aye judged to hae a look after the young leddy--and hebade me fling down my kent, and sae me and my mither yielded oursellsprisoners. I'm thinking we wad hae been letten slip awa, butKettledrummle was taen near us--for Andrew Wilson's naig that he wasriding on had been a dragooner lang syne, and the sairer Kettledrummlespurred to win awa, the readier the dour
beast ran to the dragoons whenhe saw them draw up.--Aweel, when my mother and him forgathered, theyset till the sodgers, and I think they gae them their kale through thereek! Bastards o' the hure o' Babylon was the best words in their wame.Sae then the kiln was in a bleeze again, and they brought us a' three onwi' them to mak us an example, as they ca't."
"It is most infamous and intolerable oppression!" said Morton, halfspeaking to himself; "here is a poor peaceable fellow, whose only motivefor joining the conventicle was a sense of filial piety, and he ischained up like a thief or murderer, and likely to die the death of one,but without the privilege of a formal trial, which our laws indulge tothe worst malefactor! Even to witness such tyranny, and still more tosuffer under it, is enough to make the blood of the tamest slave boilwithin him."
"To be sure," said Cuddie, hearing, and partly understanding, what hadbroken from Morton in resentment of his injuries, "it is no right tospeak evil o' dignities--my auld leddy aye said that, as nae doubt shehad a gude right to do, being in a place o' dignity hersell; and troth Ilistened to her very patiently, for she aye ordered a dram, or a sowpkale, or something to us, after she had gien us a hearing on our duties.But deil a dram, or kale, or ony thing else--no sae muckle as a cup o'cauld water--do thae lords at Edinburgh gie us; and yet they are headingand hanging amang us, and trailing us after thae blackguard troopers, andtaking our goods and gear as if we were outlaws. I canna say I tak itkind at their hands."
"It would be very strange if you did," answered Morton, with suppressedemotion.
"And what I like warst o' a'," continued poor Cuddie, "is thae rantingred-coats coming amang the lasses, and taking awa our joes. I had a sairheart o' my ain when I passed the Mains down at Tillietudlem this morningabout parritch-time, and saw the reek comin' out at my ain lum-head, andkend there was some ither body than my auld mither sitting by theingle-side. But I think my heart was e'en sairer, when I saw thathellicat trooper, Tam Halliday, kissing Jenny Dennison afore my face. Iwonder women can hae the impudence to do sic things; but they are a' forthe red-coats. Whiles I hae thought o' being a trooper mysell, when Ithought naething else wad gae down wi' Jenny--and yet I'll no blame herower muckle neither, for maybe it was a' for my sake that she loot Tamtouzle her tap-knots that gate."
"For your sake?" said Morton, unable to refrain from taking some interestin a story which seemed to bear a singular coincidence with his own.
"E'en sae, Milnwood," replied Cuddie; "for the puir quean gat leave tocome near me wi' speaking the loun fair, (d--n him, that I suld say sae!)and sae she bade me God speed, and she wanted to stap siller into myhand;--I'se warrant it was the tae half o' her fee and bountith, for shewared the ither half on pinners and pearlings to gang to see us shoot yonday at the popinjay."
"And did you take it, Cuddie?" said Morton.
"Troth did I no, Milnwood; I was sic a fule as to fling it back toher--my heart was ower grit to be behadden to her, when I had seen thatloon slavering and kissing at her. But I was a great fule for my pains;it wad hae dune my mither and me some gude, and she'll ware't a' on dudsand nonsense."
There was here a deep and long pause. Cuddie was probably engaged inregretting the rejection of his mistress's bounty, and Henry Morton inconsidering from what motives, or upon what conditions, Miss Bellendenhad succeeded in procuring the interference of Lord Evandale in hisfavour.
Was it not possible, suggested his awakening hopes, that he had construedher influence over Lord Evandale hastily and unjustly? Ought he tocensure her severely, if, submitting to dissimulation for his sake, shehad permitted the young nobleman to entertain hopes which she had nointention to realize? Or what if she had appealed to the generosity whichLord Evandale was supposed to possess, and had engaged his honour toprotect the person of a favoured rival?
Still, however, the words which he had overheard recurred ever and anonto his remembrance, with a pang which resembled the sting of an adder.
"Nothing that she could refuse him!--was it possible to make a moreunlimited declaration of predilection? The language of affection has not,within the limits of maidenly delicacy, a stronger expression. She islost to me wholly, and for ever; and nothing remains for me now, butvengeance for my own wrongs, and for those which are hourly inflicted onmy country."
Apparently, Cuddie, though with less refinement, was following out asimilar train of ideas; for he suddenly asked Morton in a lowwhisper--"Wad there be ony ill in getting out o' thae chields' hands anane could compass it?"
"None in the world," said Morton; "and if an opportunity occurs of doingso, depend on it I for one will not let it slip."
"I'm blythe to hear ye say sae," answered Cuddie. "I'm but a puir sillyfallow, but I canna think there wad be muckle ill in breaking out bystrength o' hand, if ye could mak it ony thing feasible. I am the ladthat will ne'er fear to lay on, if it were come to that; but our auldleddy wad hae ca'd that a resisting o' the king's authority."
"I will resist any authority on earth," said Morton, "that invadestyrannically my chartered rights as a freeman; and I am determined I willnot be unjustly dragged to a jail, or perhaps a gibbet, if I can possiblymake my escape from these men either by address or force."
"Weel, that's just my mind too, aye supposing we hae a feasibleopportunity o' breaking loose. But then ye speak o' a charter; now theseare things that only belang to the like o' you that are a gentleman, andit mightna bear me through that am but a husbandman."
"The charter that I speak of," said Morton, "is common to the meanestScotchman. It is that freedom from stripes and bondage which was claimed,as you may read in Scripture, by the Apostle Paul himself, and whichevery man who is free-born is called upon to defend, for his own sake andthat of his countrymen."
"Hegh, sirs!" replied Cuddie, "it wad hae been lang or my Leddy Margaret,or my mither either, wad hae fund out sic a wiselike doctrine in theBible! The tane was aye graning about giving tribute to Caesar, and thetither is as daft wi' her whiggery. I hae been clean spoilt, just wi'listening to twa blethering auld wives; but if I could get a gentlemanthat wad let me tak on to be his servant, I am confident I wad be a cleancontrary creature; and I hope your honour will think on what I am saying,if ye were ance fairly delivered out o' this house of bondage, and justtake me to be your ain wally-de-shamble."
"My valet, Cuddie?" answered Morton; "alas! that would be sorrypreferment, even if we were at liberty."
"I ken what ye're thinking--that because I am landward-bred, I wad bebringing ye to disgrace afore folk; but ye maun ken I'm gay gleg at theuptak; there was never ony thing dune wi' hand but I learned gay readily,'septing reading, writing, and ciphering; but there's no the like o' meat the fit-ba', and I can play wi' the broadsword as weel as CorporalInglis there. I hae broken his head or now, for as massy as he's ridingahint us.--And then ye'll no be gaun to stay in this country?"--said he,stopping and interrupting himself.
"Probably not," replied Morton.
"Weel, I carena a boddle. Ye see I wad get my mither bestowed wi' herauld graning tittie, auntie Meg, in the Gallowgate o' Glasgow, and then Itrust they wad neither burn her for a witch, or let her fail for fau't o'fude, or hang her up for an auld whig wife; for the provost, they say, isvery regardfu' o' sic puir bodies. And then you and me wad gang and poussour fortunes, like the folk i' the daft auld tales about Jock theGiant-killer and Valentine and Orson; and we wad come back to merryScotland, as the sang says, and I wad tak to the stilts again, and turnsic furs on the bonny rigs o' Milnwood holms, that it wad be worth a pintbut to look at them."
"I fear," said Morton, "there is very little chance, my good friendCuddie, of our getting back to our old occupation."
"Hout, stir--hout, stir," replied Cuddie, "it's aye gude to keep up ahardy heart--as broken a ship's come to land.--But what's that I hear?never stir, if my auld mither isna at the preaching again! I ken thesough o' her texts, that sound just like the wind blawing through thespence; and there's Kettledrummle setting to wark, too--Lordsake, if thesodgers anes get angry, th
ey'll murder them baith, and us for company!"
Their farther conversation was in fact interrupted by a blatant noisewhich rose behind them, in which the voice of the preacher emitted, inunison with that of the old woman, tones like the grumble of a bassooncombined with the screaking of a cracked fiddle. At first, the aged pairof sufferers had been contented to condole with each other in smotheredexpressions of complaint and indignation; but the sense of their injuriesbecame more pungently aggravated as they communicated with each other,and they became at length unable to suppress their ire.
"Woe, woe, and a threefold woe unto you, ye bloody and violentpersecutors!" exclaimed the Reverend Gabriel Kettledrummle--"Woe, andthreefold woe unto you, even to the breaking of seals, the blowing oftrumpets, and the pouring forth of vials!"
"Ay--ay--a black cast to a' their ill-fa'ur'd faces, and the outside o'the loof to them at the last day!" echoed the shrill counter-tenor ofMause, falling in like the second part of a catch.
"I tell you," continued the divine, "that your rankings and yourridings--your neighings and your prancings--your bloody, barbarous,and inhuman cruelties--your benumbing, deadening, and debauchingthe conscience of poor creatures by oaths, soul-damning andself-contradictory, have arisen from earth to Heaven like a foul andhideous outcry of perjury for hastening the wrath to come--hugh! hugh!hugh!"
"And I say," cried Mause, in the same tune, and nearly at the same time,"that wi' this auld breath o' mine, and it's sair taen down wi' theasthmatics and this rough trot"--
"Deil gin they would gallop," said Cuddie, "wad it but gar her haud hertongue!"
"--Wi' this auld and brief breath," continued Mause, "will I testifyagainst the backslidings, defections, defalcations, and declinings of theland--against the grievances and the causes of wrath!"
"Peace, I pr'ythee--Peace, good woman," said the preacher, who had justrecovered from a violent fit of coughing, and found his own anathemaborne down by Mause's better wind; "peace, and take not the word out ofthe mouth of a servant of the altar.--I say, I uplift my voice and tellyou, that before the play is played out--ay, before this very sun gaesdown, ye sall learn that neither a desperate Judas, like your prelateSharpe that's gane to his place; nor a sanctuary-breaking Holofernes,like bloody-minded Claverhouse; nor an ambitious Diotrephes, like the ladEvandale; nor a covetous and warld-following Demas, like him they ca'Sergeant Bothwell, that makes every wife's plack and her meal-ark hisain; neither your carabines, nor your pistols, nor your broadswords, noryour horses, nor your saddles, bridles, surcingles, nose-bags, normartingales, shall resist the arrows that are whetted and the bow that isbent against you!"
"That shall they never, I trow," echoed Mause; "castaways are they ilkane o' them--besoms of destruction, fit only to be flung into the firewhen they have sweepit the filth out o' the Temple--whips of small cords,knotted for the chastisement of those wha like their warldly gudes andgear better than the Cross or the Covenant, but when that wark's done,only meet to mak latchets to the deil's brogues."
"Fiend hae me," said Cuddie, addressing himself to Morton, "if I dinnathink our mither preaches as weel as the minister!--But it's a sair pityo' his hoast, for it aye comes on just when he's at the best o't, andthat lang routing he made air this morning, is sair again him too--Deilan I care if he wad roar her dumb, and then he wad hae't a' to answer forhimsell--It's lucky the road's rough, and the troopers are no takingmuckle tent to what they say, wi' the rattling o' the horse's feet; butan we were anes on saft grund, we'll hear news o' a' this."
Cuddie's conjecture were but too true. The words of the prisoners had notbeen much attended to while drowned by the clang of horses' hoofs on arough and stony road; but they now entered upon the moorlands, where thetestimony of the two zealous captives lacked this saving accompaniment.And, accordingly, no sooner had their steeds begun to tread heath andgreen sward, and Gabriel Kettledrummle had again raised his voice with,"Also I uplift my voice like that of a pelican in the wilderness"--
"And I mine," had issued from Mause, "like a sparrow on the house-tops"--
When "Hollo, ho!" cried the corporal from the rear; "rein up yourtongues, the devil blister them, or I'll clap a martingale on them."
"I will not peace at the commands of the profane," said Gabriel.
"Nor I neither," said Mause, "for the bidding of no earthly potsherd,though it be painted as red as a brick from the Tower of Babel, and ca'itsell a corporal."
"Halliday," cried the corporal, "hast got never a gag about thee,man?--We must stop their mouths before they talk us all dead."
Ere any answer could be made, or any measure taken in consequence of thecorporal's motion, a dragoon galloped towards Sergeant Bothwell, who wasconsiderably a-head of the party he commanded. On hearing the orderswhich he brought, Bothwell instantly rode back to the head of his party,ordered them to close their files, to mend their pace, and to move withsilence and precaution, as they would soon be in presence of the enemy.
