Waverley Novels — Volume 12

by Walter Scott

  CASTLE DANGEROUS.

  CHAPTER THE FIRST.

  Hosts have been known at that dread sound to yield, And, Douglas dead, his name hath won the field. JOHN HOME.

  It was at the close of an early spring day, when nature, in a coldprovince of Scotland, was reviving from her winter's sleep, and the airat least, though not the vegetation, gave promise of an abatement ofthe rigour of the season, that two travellers, whose appearance at thatearly period sufficiently announced their wandering character, which,in general, secured a free passage even through a dangerous country,were seen coming from the south-westward, within a few miles of theCastle of Douglas, and seemed to be holding their course in thedirection of the river of that name, whose dale afforded a species ofapproach to that memorable feudal fortress. The stream, small incomparison to the extent of its fame, served as a kind of drain to thecountry in its neighbourhood, and at the same time afforded the meansof a rough road to the castle and village. The high lords to whom thecastle had for ages belonged, might, had they chosen, have made thisaccess a great deal smoother and more convenient; but there had been asyet little or no exercise for those geniuses, who have taught all theworld that it is better to take the more circuitous road round the baseof a hill, than the direct course of ascending it on the one side, anddescending it directly on the other, without yielding a single step torender the passage more easy to the traveller; still less were thosemysteries dreamed of which M'Adam has of late days expounded. But,indeed, to what purpose should the ancient Douglasses have employed hisprinciples, even if they had known them in ever so much perfection?Wheel-carriages, except of the most clumsy description, and for themost simple operations of agriculture, were totally unknown. Even themost delicate female had no resource save a horse, or, in case of soreinfirmity, a litter. The men used their own sturdy limbs, or hardyhorses, to transport themselves from place to place; and travellers,females in particular, experienced no small inconvenience from therugged nature of the country. A swollen torrent sometimes crossed theirpath, and compelled them to wait until the waters had abated theirfrenzy. The bank of a small river was occasionally torn away by theeffects of a thunder-storm, a recent inundation, or the likeconvulsions of nature; and the wayfarer relied upon his knowledge ofthe district, or obtained the best local information in his power, howto direct his path so as to surmount such untoward obstacles.

  The Douglas issues from an amphitheatre of mountains which bounds thevalley to the south-west, from whose contributions, and the aid ofsudden storms, it receives its scanty supplies. The general aspect ofthe country is that of the pastoral hills of the south of Scotland,forming, as is usual, bleak and wild farms, many of which had, at nogreat length of time from the date of the story, been covered withtrees; as some of them still attest by bearing the name of _shaw_, thatis, wild natural wood. The neighbourhood of the Douglas water itselfwas flat land, capable of bearing strong crops of oats and rye,supplying the inhabitants with what they required of these productions.At no great distance from the edge of the river, a few special spotsexcepted, the soil capable of agriculture was more and more mixed withthe pastoral and woodland country, till both terminated in desolate andpartly inaccessible moorlands.

  Above all, it was war-time, and of necessity all circumstances of mereconvenience were obliged to give way to a paramount sense of danger;the inhabitants, therefore, instead of trying to amend the paths whichconnected them with other districts, were thankful that the naturaldifficulties which surrounded them rendered it unnecessary to break upor to fortify the access from more open countries. Their wants, with avery few exceptions, were completely supplied, as we have already said,by the rude and scanty produce of their own mountains and _holms_,[Footnote: Holms, or flat plains, by the sides of the brooks andrivers, termed in the south, _Ings_.] the last of which served for theexercise of their limited agriculture, while the better part of themountains and forest glens produced pasture for their herds and flocks.The recesses of the unexplored depths of these sylvan retreats beingseldom disturbed, especially since the lords of the district had laidaside, during this time of strife, their constant occupation ofhunting, the various kinds of game had increased of late veryconsiderably; so that not only in crossing the rougher parts of thehilly and desolate country we are describing, different varieties ofdeer were occasionally seen, but even the wild cattle peculiar toScotland sometimes showed themselves, and other animals, whichindicated the irregular and disordered state of the period. Thewild-cat was frequently surprised in the dark ravines or the swampythickets; and the wolf, already a stranger to the more populousdistricts of the Lothians, here maintained his ground against theencroachments of man, and was still himself a terror to those by whomhe was finally to be extirpated. In winter especially, and winter washardly yet past, these savage animals were wont to be driven toextremity for lack of food, and used to frequent, in dangerous numbers,the battle-field, the deserted churchyard--nay, sometimes the abodes ofliving men, there to watch for children, their defenceless prey, withas much familiarity as the fox now-a-days will venture to prowl nearthe mistress's [Footnote: The good dame, or wife of a respectablefarmer, is almost universally thus designated in Scotland.]poultry-yard.

  From what we have said, our readers, if they have made--as who in thesedays has not--the Scottish tour, will be able to form a tolerably justidea of the wilder and upper part of Douglas Dale, during the earlierperiod of the fourteenth century. The setting sun cast his gleams alonga moorland country, which to the westward broke into larger swells,terminating in the mountains called the Larger and Lesser Cairntable.The first of these is, as it were, the father of the hills in theneighbourhood, the source of an hundred streams, and by far the largestof the ridge, still holding in his dark bosom, and in the ravines withwhich his sides are ploughed, considerable remnants of those ancientforests with which all the high grounds of that quarter were oncecovered, and particularly the hills, in which the rivers--both thosewhich run to the east, and those which seek the west to dischargethemselves into the Solway---hide, like so many hermits, their originaland scanty sources.

  The landscape was still illuminated by the reflection of the eveningsun, sometimes thrown back from pool or stream; sometimes resting ongrey rocks, huge cumberers of the soil, which labour and agriculturehave since removed, and sometimes contenting itself with gilding thebanks of the stream, tinged, alternately grey, green, or ruddy, as theground itself consisted of rock, or grassy turf, or bare earthen mound,or looked at a distance like a rampart of dark red porphyry.Occasionally, too, the eye rested on the steep brown extent of moorlandas the sunbeam glanced back from the little tarn or mountain pool,whose lustre, like that of the eye in the human countenance, gives alife and vivacity to every feature around.

  The elder and stouter of the two travellers whom we have mentioned, wasa person well, and even showily dressed, according to the finery of thetimes, and bore at his back, as wandering minstrels were wont, a case,containing a small harp, rote or viol, or some such species of musicalinstrument for accompanying the voice. The leathern case announced somuch, although it proclaimed not the exact nature of the instrument.The colour of the traveller's doublet was blue, and that of his hoseviolet, with slashes which showed a lining of the same colour with thejerkin. A mantle ought, according to ordinary custom, to have coveredthis dress; but the heat of the sun, though the season was so early,had induced the wearer to fold up his cloak in small compass, and formit into a bundle, attached to the shoulders like the military greatcoatof the infantry soldier of the present day. The neatness with which itwas made up, argued the precision of a practised traveller, who hadbeen long accustomed to every resource which change of weatherrequired. A great profusion of narrow ribands or points, constitutingthe loops with which our ancestors connected their doublet and hose,formed a kind of cordon, composed of knots of blue or violet, whichsurrounded the traveller's person, and thus assimilated in colour withthe two garments which it was
the office of these strings to combine.The bonnet usually worn with this showy dress, was of that kind withwhich Henry the Eighth and his son, Edward the Sixth, are usuallyrepresented. It was more fitted, from the gay stuff of which it wascomposed, to appear in a public place, than to encounter a storm ofrain. It was party-coloured, being made of different stripes of blueand violet; and the wearer arrogated a certain degree of gentility tohimself, by wearing a plume of considerable dimensions of the samefavourite colours. The features over which this feather drooped were inno degree remarkable for peculiarity of expression. Yet in so desolatea country as the west of Scotland, it would, not have been easy to passthe man without more minute attention than he would have met with wherethere was more in the character of the scenery to arrest the gaze ofthe passengers.

  A quick eye, a sociable look, seeming to say, "Ay, look at me, I am aman worth noticing, and not unworthy your attention," carried with it,nevertheless, an interpretation which might be thought favourable orotherwise, according to the character of the person whom the travellermet. A knight or soldier would merely have thought that he had met amerry fellow, who could sing a wild song, or tell a wild tale, and helpto empty a flagon, with all the accomplishments necessary for a booncompanion at an hostelry, except perhaps an alacrity at defraying hisshare of the reckoning. A churchman, on the other hand, might havethought he of the blue and violet was of too loose habits, andaccustomed too little to limit himself within the boundaries ofbeseeming mirth, to be fit society for one of his sacred calling. Yetthe Man of Song had a certain steadiness of countenance, which seemedfitted to hold place in scenes of serious business as well as ofgaiety. A wayfaring passenger of wealth (not at that time a numerousclass) might have feared in him a professional robber, or one whomopportunity was very likely to convert into such; a female might havebeen apprehensive of uncivil treatment; and a youth, or timid person,might have thought of murder, or such direful doings. Unless privatelyarmed, however, the minstrel was ill-accoutred for any dangerousoccupation. His only visible weapon was a small crooked sword, likewhat we now call a hanger; and the state of the times would havejustified any man, however peaceful his intentions, in being so fararmed against the perils of the road.

  If a glance at this man had in any respect prejudiced him in theopinion of those whom he met on his journey, a look at his companionwould, so far as his character could be guessed at--for he was closelymuffled up--have passed for an apology and warrant for his associate.The younger traveller was apparently in early youth, a soft and gentleboy, whose Sclavonic gown, the appropriate dress of the pilgrim, hewore more closely drawn about him than the coldness of the weatherseemed to authorize or recommend. His features, imperfectly seen underthe hood of his pilgrim's dress, were prepossessing in a high degree;and though he wore a walking sword, it seemed rather to be incompliance with general fashion than from any violent purpose he didso. There were traces of sadness upon his brow, and of tears upon hischeeks; and his weariness was such, as even his rougher companionseemed to sympathize with, while he privately participated also in thesorrow which left its marks upon a countenance so lovely. They spoketogether, and the elder of the two, while he assumed the deferentialair proper to a man of inferior rank addressing a superior, showed intone and gesture, something that amounted to interest and affection.

  "Bertram, my friend," said the younger of the two, "how far are westill from Douglas Castle? We have already come farther than the twentymiles, which thou didst say was the distance from Cammock--or how didstthou call the last hostelry which we left by daybreak?"

  "Cummock, my dearest lady--I beg ten thousand excuses--my graciousyoung lord."

  "Call me Augustine," replied his comrade, "if you mean to speak as isfittest for the time."

  "Nay, as for that," said Bertram, "if your ladyship can condescend tolay aside your quality, my own good breeding is not so firmly sewed tome but that I can doff it, and resume it again without its losing astitch; and since your ladyship, to whom I am sworn in obedience, ispleased to command that I should treat you as my own son, shame it wereto me if I were not to show you the affection of a father, moreespecially as I may well swear my great oath, that I owe you the dutyof such, though well I wot it has, in our case, been the lot of theparent to be maintained by the kindness and liberality of the child;for when was it that I hungered or thirsted, and the _blackstock_[Footnote: The table dormant, which stood in a baron's hall, wasoften so designated.] of Berkley did not relieve my wants?"

  "I would have it so," answered the young pilgrim; "I would have it so.What use of the mountains of beef, and the oceans of beer, which theysay our domains produce, if there is a hungry heart among ourvassalage, or especially if thou, Bertram, who hast served as theminstrel of our house for more than twenty years, shouldst experiencesuch a feeling?"

  "Certes, lady," answered Bertram, "it would be like the catastrophewhich is told of the Baron of Fastenough, when his last mouse wasstarved to death in the very pantry; and if I escape this journeywithout such a calamity, I shall think myself out of reach of thirst orfamine for the whole of my life."

  "Thou hast suffered already once or twice by these attacks, my poorfriend," said the lady.

  "It is little," answered Bertram, "any thing that I have suffered; andI were ungrateful to give the inconvenience of missing a breakfast, ormaking an untimely dinner, so serious a name. But then I hardly see howyour ladyship can endure this gear much longer. You must yourself feel,that the plodding along these high lands, of which the Scots give ussuch good measure in their miles, is no jesting matter; and as forDouglas Castle, why it is still three good miles off."

  "The question then is," quoth the lady, heaving a sigh, "what we are todo when we have so far to travel, and when the castle gates must belocked long before we arrive there?"

  "For that I will pledge my word," answered Bertram. "The gates ofDouglas, under the care of Sir John de Walton, do not open so easily asthose of the buttery hatch at our own castle, when it is well oiled;and if your ladyship take my advice, you will turn southward ho! and intwo days at farthest, we shall be in a land where men's wants areprovided for, as the inns proclaim it, with the least possible delay,and the secret of this little journey shall never be known to livingmortal but ourselves, as sure as I am sworn minstrel, and man of faith."

  "I thank thee for thy advice, mine honest Bertram," said the lady, "butI cannot profit by it. Should thy knowledge of these parts possess theewith an acquaintance with any decent house, whether it belong to richor poor, I would willingly take quarters there, if I could obtain themfrom this time until to-morrow morning. The gates of Douglas Castlewill then be open to guests of so peaceful an appearance as we carrywith us, and--and--it will out--we might have time to make suchapplications to our toilet as might ensure us a good reception, bydrawing a comb through our locks, or such like foppery."

  "Ah, madam!" said Bertram, "were not Sir John de Walton in question,methinks I should venture to reply, that an unwashed brow, an unkempthead of hair, and a look far more saucy than your ladyship ever wears,or can wear, were the proper disguise to trick out that minstrel's boy,whom, you wish to represent in the present pageant."

  "Do you suffer your youthful pupils to be indeed so slovenly and sosaucy, Bertram?" answered the lady. "I for one will not imitate them inthat particular; and whether Sir John be now in the Castle of Douglasor not, I will treat the soldiers who hold so honourable a charge witha washed brow, and a head of hair somewhat ordered. As for going backwithout seeing a castle which has mingled even with my very dreams--ata word, Bertram, thou mayst go that way, but I will not."

  "And if I part with your ladyship on such terms," responded theminstrel, "now your frolic is so nearly accomplished, it shall be thefoul fiend himself, and nothing more comely or less dangerous, thatshall tear me from your side; and for lodging, there is not far fromhence the house of one Tom Dickson of Hazelside, one of the most honestfellows of the Dale, and who, although a labouring man, ranked as highas a warrior, when I
was in this country, as any noble gentleman thatrode in the band of the Douglas."

  "He is then a soldier?" said the lady.

  "When his country or his lord need his sword," replied Bertram--"and,to say the truth, they are seldom at peace; but otherwise, he is noenemy, save to the wolf which plunders his herds."

  "But forget not, my trusty guide," replied the lady, "that the blood inour veins is English, and consequently, that we are in danger from allwho call themselves foes to the ruddy Cross."

  "Do not fear this man's faith," answered Bertram. "You may trust to himas to the best knight or gentleman of the land. We may make good ourlodging by a tune or a song; and it may remember you that I undertook(provided it pleased your ladyship) to temporize a little with theScots, who, poor souls, love minstrelsy, and when they have but asilver penny, will willingly bestow it to encourage the _gayscience_--I promised you, I say, that we should be as welcome to themas if we had been born amidst their own wild hills; and for the bestthat such a house as Dickson's affords, the glee-man's son, fair lady,shall not breathe a wish in vain. And now, will you speak your mind toyour devoted friend and adopted father, or rather your sworn servantand guide, Bertram the Minstrel, what it is your pleasure to do in thismatter?"

  "O, we will certainly accept of the Scot's hospitality," said the lady,"your minstrel word being plighted that he is a true man. Tom Dickson,call you him?"

  "Yes," replied Bertram, "such is his name; and by looking on thesesheep, I am assured that we are now upon his land."

  "Indeed?" said the lady, with some surprise; "and how is your wisdomaware of that?"

  "I see the first letter of his name marked upon this flock," answeredthe guide. "Ah, learning is what carries a man through the world, aswell as if he had the ring by virtue of which old minstrels tell thatAdam understood the language of the beasts in paradise. Ah, madam!there is more wit taught in the shepherd's shieling than the ladythinks of, who sews her painted seam in her summer bower."

  "Be it so, good Bertram. And although not so deeply skilled in theknowledge of written language as you are, it is impossible for me toesteem its value more than I actually do; so hold we on the nearestroad to this Tom Dickson's, whose very sheep tell of his whereabout. Itrust we have not very far to go, although the knowledge that ourjourney is shortened by a few miles has so much recovered my fatigue,that methinks I could dance all the rest of the way."