by Walter Scott
CHAPTER XI.
Let them have meat enough, woman--half a hen; There be old rotten pilchards--put them off too; 'Tis but a little new anointing of them, And a strong onion, that confounds the savour.
Love's Pilgrimage.
THE thunderbolt, which had stunned all who were within hearing of it,had only served to awaken the bold and inventive genius of the flower ofmajors-domo. Almost before the clatter had ceased, and while there wasyet scarce an assurance whether the castle was standing or falling,Caleb exclaimed, "Heaven be praised! this comes to hand like the boul ofa pint-stoup." He then barred the kitchen door in the face of the LordKeeper's servant, whom he perceived returning from the party at thegate, and muttering, "How the deil cam he in?--but deil may care. Mysie,what are ye sitting shaking and greeting in the chimney-neuk for? Comehere--or stay where ye are, and skirl as loud as ye can; it's a' ye'regude for. I say, ye auld deevil, skirl--skirl--louder--louder, woman;gar the gentles hear ye in the ha'. I have heard ye as far off as theBass for a less matter. And stay--down wi' that crockery----"
And with a sweeping blow, he threw down from a shelf some articles ofpewter and earthenware. He exalted his voice amid the clatter, shoutingand roaring in a manner which changed Mysie's hysterical terrors of thethunder into fears that her old fellow-servant was gone distracted. "Hehas dung down a' the bits o' pigs, too--the only thing we had leftto haud a soup milk--and he has spilt the hatted hit that was for theMaster's dinner. Mercy save us, the auld man's gaen clean and clear wudwi' the thunner!"
"Haud your tongue, ye b----!" said Caleb, in the impetuous andoverbearing triumph of successful invention, "a's provided now--dinnerand a'thing; the thunner's done a' in a clap of a hand!"
"Puir man, he's muckle astray," said Mysie, looking at him with amixture of pity and alarm; "I wish he may ever come hame to himsellagain."
"Here, ye auld doited deevil," said Caleb, still exultingin his extrication from a dilemma which had seemed insurmountable;"keep the strange man out of the kitchen; swear the thunnercame down the chimney and spoiled the best dinner ye everdressed--beef--bacon--kid--lark--leveret--wild-fowl--venison, and whatnot. Lay it on thick, and never mind expenses. I'll awa' up to thela'. Make a' the confusion ye can; but be sure ye keep out the strangeservant."
With these charges to his ally, Caleb posted up to the hall, butstopping to reconnoitre through an aperture, which time, for theconvenience of many a domestic in succession, had made in the door, andperceiving the situation of Miss Ashton, he had prudence enough tomake a pause, both to avoid adding to her alarm and in order to secureattention to his account of the disastrous effects of the thunder.
But when he perceived that the lady was recovered, and heard theconversation turn upon the accommodation and refreshment which thecastle afforded, he thought it time to burst into the room in the mannerannounced in the last chapter.
"Willawins!--willawins! Such a misfortune to befa' the house ofRavenswood, and I to live to see it."
"What is the matter, Caleb?" said his master, somewhat alarmed in histurn; "has any part of the castle fallen?"
"Castle fa'an! na, but the sute's fa'an, and the thunner's come rightdown the kitchen-lum, and the things are a' lying here awa', there awa',like the Laird o' Hotchpotch's lands; and wi' brave guests of honourand quality to entertain (a low bow here to Sir William Ashton and hisdaughter), and naething left in the house fit to present for dinner, orfor supper either, for aught that I can see!"
"I very believe you, Caleb," said Ravenswood, drily. Balderstone hereturned to his master a half-upbraiding, half-imploring countenance,and edged towards him as he repeated, "It was nae great matter ofpreparation but just something added to your honour's ordinary courseof fare--petty cover, as they say at the Louvre--three courses and thefruit."
"Keep your intolerable nonsense to yourself, you old fool!" saidRavenswood, mortified at his officiousness, yet not knowing how tocontradict him, without the risk of giving rise to scenes yet moreridiculous.
Caleb saw his advantage, and resolved to improve it. But first,observing that the Lord Keeper's servant entered the apartment and spokeapart with his master, he took the same opportunity to whisper a fewwords into Ravenswood's ear: "Haud your tongue, for heaven's sake, sir;if it's my pleasure to hazard my soul in telling lees for the honourof the family, it's nae business o' yours; and if ye let me gang onquietly, I'se be moderate in my banquet; but if ye contradict me, deilbut I dress ye a dinner fit for a duke!"
Ravenswood, in fact, thought it would be best to let his officiousbutler run on, who proceeded to enumerate upon his fingers--"No muckleprovision--might hae served four persons of honour,--first course,capons in white broth--roast kid--bacon with reverence; second course,roasted leveret--butter crabs--a veal florentine; third course,blackcock--it's black eneugh now wi' the sute--plumdamas--a tart--aflam--and some nonsense sweet things, adn comfits--and that's a',"he said, seeing the impatience of his master--"that's just a' waso't--forbye the apples and pears."
Miss Ashton had by degrees gathered her spirits, so far as to pay someattention to what was going on and observing the restrained impatienceof Ravenswood, contrasted with the peculiar determination of manner withwhich Caleb detailed his imaginary banquet, the whole struck her as soridiculous that, despite every effort to the contrary, she burst into afit of incontrollable laughter, in which she was joined by her father,though with more moderation, and finally by the Master of Ravenswoodhimself, though conscious that the jest was at his own expense. Theirmirth--for a scene which we read with little emotion often appearsextremely ludicrous to the spectators--made the old vault ring again.They ceased--they renewed--they ceased--they renewed again their shoutsof laughter! Caleb, in the mean time, stood his ground with a grave,angry, and scornful dignity, which greatly enhanced the ridicule of thescene and mirth of the spectators.
At length, when the voices, and nearly the strength, of the laugherswere exhausted, he exclaimed, with very little ceremony: "The deil's inthe gentles! they breakfast sae lordly, that the loss of the best dinnerever cook pat fingers to makes them as merry as if it were the bestjeest in a' George Buchanan. If there was as little in your honours'wames as there is in Caleb Balderstone's, less caickling wad serve ye onsic a gravaminous subject."
Caleb's blunt expression of resentment again awakened the mirth of thecompany, which, by the way, he regarded not only as an aggression uponthe dignity of the family, but a special contempt of the eloquence withwhich he himself had summed up the extent of their supposed losses. "Adescription of a dinner," as he said afterwards to Mysie, "that wad haemade a fu' man hungry, and them to sit there laughing at it!"
"But," said Miss Ashton, composing her countenance as well as she could,"are all these delicacies so totally destroyed that no scrap can becollected?"
"Collected, my leddy! what wad ye collect out of the sute and the ass?Ye may gang down yoursell, and look into our kitchen--the cookmaid inthe trembling exies--the gude vivers lying a' about--beef, capons, andwhite broth--florentine and flams--bacon wi' reverence--and a' the sweetconfections and whim-whams--ye'll see them a', my leddy--that is," saidhe, correcting himself, "ye'll no see ony of them now, for the cookhas soopit them up, as was weel her part; but ye'll see the white brothwhere it was spilt. I pat my fingers in it, and it tastes as like sourmilk as ony thing else; if that isna the effect of thunner, I kenna whatis. This gentleman here couldna but hear the clash of our haill dishes,china and silver thegither?"
The Lord Keeper's domestic, though a statesman's attendant, and ofcourse trained to command his countenance upon all occasions, wassomewhat discomposed by this appeal, to which he only answered by a bow.
"I think, Mr. Butler," said the Lord Keeper, who began to be afraid lestthe prolongation of this scene should at length displease Ravenswood--"Ithink that, were you to retire with my servant Lockhard--he hastravelled, and is quite accustomed to accidents and contingencies ofevery kind, and I hope betwixt you, you may find out some mode of su
pplyat this emergency."
"His honour kens," said Caleb, who, however hopeless of himselfof accomplishing what was desirable, would, like the high-spiritedelephant, rather have died in the effort than brooked the aid of abrother in commission--"his honour kens weel I need nae counsellor, whenthe honour of the house is concerned."
"I should be unjust if I denied it, Caleb," said his master; "but yourart lies chiefly in making apologies, upon which we can no more dinethan upon the bill of fare of our thunder-blasted dinner. Now, possiblyMr. Lockhard's talent may consist in finding some substitute for thatwhich certainly is not, and has in all probability never been."
"Your honour is pleased to be facetious," said Caleb, "but I am surethat, for the warst, for a walk as far as Wolf's Hope, I could dineforty men--no that the folk there deserve your honour's custom. They haebeen ill advised in the matter of the duty eggs and butter, I winna denythat."
"Do go consult together," said the Master; "go down to the village,and do the best you can. We must not let our guests remain withoutrefreshment, to save the honour of a ruined family. And here, Caleb,take my purse; I believe that will prove your best ally."
"Purse! purse, indeed!" quoth Caleb, indignantly flinging out of theroom; "what suld I do wi' your honour's purse, on your ain grund? Itrust we are no to pay for our ain?"
The servants left the hall; and the door was no sooner shut than theLord Keeper began to apologise for the rudeness of his mirth; and Lucyto hope she had given no pain or offence to the kind-hearted faithfulold man.
"Caleb and I must both learn, madam, to undergo with good humour, or atleast with patience, the ridicule which everywhere attaches itself topoverty."
"You do yourself injustice, Master of Ravenswood, on my word of honour,"answered his elder guest. "I believe I know more of your affairs thanyou do yourself, and I hope to show you that I am interested in them;and that--in short, that your prospects are better than you apprehend.In the mean time, I can conceive nothing so respectable as the spiritwhich rises above misfortune, and prefers honourable privations to debtor dependence."
Whether from fear of offending the delicacy or awakening the pride ofthe Master, the Lord Keeper made these allusions with an appearanceof fearful and hesitating reserve, and seemed to be afraid that he wasintruding too far, in venturing to touch, however lightly, upon such atopic, even when the Master had led to it. In short, he appeared at oncepushed on by his desire of appearing friendly, and held back by the fearof intrusion. It was no wonder that the Master of Ravenswood, littleacquainted as he then was with life, should have given this consummatecourtier credit for more sincerity than was probably to be found ina score of his cast. He answered, however, with reserve, that he wasindebted to all who might think well of him; and, apologising to hisguests, he left the hall, in order to make such arrangements for theirentertainment as circumstances admitted.
Upon consulting with old Mysie, the accommodations for the night wereeasily completed, as indeed they admitted of little choice. The Mastersurrendered his apartment for the use of Miss Ashton, and Mysie, once aperson of consequence, dressed in a black satin gown which had belongedof yore to the Master's grandmother, and had figured in the court-ballsof Henrietta Maria, went to attend her as lady's-maid. He next inquiredafter Bucklaw, and understanding he was at the change-house with thehuntsmen and some companions, he desired Caleb to call there, andacquaint him how he was circumstanced at Wolf's Crag; to intimate to himthat it would be most convenient if he could find a bed in the hamlet,as the elder guest must necessarily be quartered in the secret chamber,the only spare bedroom which could be made fit to receive him. TheMaster saw no hardship in passing the night by the hall fire, wrapt inhis campaign-cloak; and to Scottish domestics of the day, even of thehighest rank, nay, to young men of family or fashion, on any pinch,clean straw, or a dry hayloft, was always held good night-quarters.
For the rest, Lockhard had his master's orders to bring some venisonfrom the inn, and Caleb was to trust to his wits for the honour of hisfamily. The Master, indeed, a second time held out his purse; but, as itwas in sight of the strange servant, the butler thought himself obligedto decline what his fingers itched to clutch. "Couldna he hae slippit itgently into my hand?" said Caleb; "but his honour will never learn howto bear himsell in siccan cases."
Mysie, in the mean time, according to a uniform custom in remote placesin Scotland, offered the strangers the produce of her little dairy,"while better meat was getting ready." And according to another custom,not yet wholly in desuetude, as the storm was now drifting off toleeward, the Master carried the Keeper to the top of his highesttower to admire a wide and waste extent of view, and to "weary for hisdinner."
