spray dash up against them in miniature waterfalls. The rocks in the immediate neighborhood of the castle are rugged in the extreme, here and there rent by a gigantic fissure reaching far inland, and up which the foaming waters gurgle continually as if in impatience of their narrow bounds, now jutting far into the sea like a Titanic staircase and thickly matted with coarse sea-weed, and again reared up on high, a sheer glistening wall, with not a cranny for the steadiest foot, and with Niagaras of spray for ever veiling its smooth, unchanging face. In wonderful hollows you will come upon pools of green water with sea-anemones, delicate sea-weed of pink, yellow or purple hue, and gem-like shells resting on a bottom of clearest sand; and while the waves are roaring on every side, and flinging their dampness into your very face, these fairy pools will lie at your feet without a breath or ripple on their surface.
The most magnificent of these rocks is one called in Gaelic “Dun-Bug” (“Yellow Rock”), the favorite haunt of the white sea-gulls. It stands alone, as if torn from the land and hurled into the tossing waves by some giant hand. Two hundred feet in height and a thousand in circumference, it forms a natural arch, being pierced from its base upward by an opening that widens as it ascends. The waves dash through it with terrific violence, and the very sight of its grim splendor conjures up a vision of shipwreck and danger. Scott has made mention of it in _The Antiquary_, and Johnson in his _Journey to the Hebrides_, recalling the grandeur of the rocky coast of Slains, has said that though he could not wish for a storm, still as storms, whether wished for or not, will sometimes happen, he would prefer to look at them from Slains Castle. These rocks and the caves that alternate with them were once famous as a smuggling rendezvous, and as such Scott has again immortalized them in his _Guy Mannering_. The Crooked Mary, a noted lugger, had many an adventure along this coast during the last century. The skipper’s arrival was eagerly looked for at certain stated times, the preconcerted signal was given by him, and the inhabitants bestirred themselves with commendable haste. All ordinary business was immediately suspended: men might be seen stealing along from house to house, or a fisher-girl, bareheaded and barefooted, would hurry to the neighboring village, and deliver a brief message which to a bystander would sound very like nonsense, but which nevertheless was well understood by the person to whom it was given. Soon after a plaid or blanket might be seen spread out, as if to dry, upon the top of a peat-stack. Other beacons, not calculated to draw general notice, but sufficiently understood by the initiated, soon made their appearance, telegraphing the news from place to place. As soon as the evening began to close in the Crooked Mary would be observed rapidly approaching the land, and occasionally giving out signals indicating the creek into which she meant to run. Both on sea and land hairbreadth escapes were the rule rather than the exception, and it is related of one of the Crooked Mary’s confederates on shore, poor Philip Kennedy, that one night, while clearing the way for the cargo just landed from the contraband trader’s hold, he was simply murdered by the excise-officers. The heavy cart laden with the cargo was yet some distance behind, and Kennedy with some dastardly companions was slowly going forward to ascertain if all was safe, when three officers of the customs suddenly made their unwelcome appearance. Brave as a lion, Kennedy attacked two of them, and actually succeeded for a time in keeping them down in his powerful grasp, while he called to his party to secure the third. They, however, thinking prudence the better part of valor, decamped ignominiously, and the enemy remained master of the brave man’s life. Anderson, the third officer, was observed to hold up his sword to the moon, as if to ascertain if he were using the edge, and then to bring it down with accurate aim and tremendous force upon the smuggler’s skull. Strange to say, Kennedy, streaming with blood, actually succeeded in reaching Kirkton of Slains, nearly a quarter of a mile away, but expired a few moments after his arrival. His last words were: “If all had been true as I was, the goods would have been safe, and I should not have been bleeding to death.” The brave fellow was buried in the churchyard of Slains, where a plain stone marks his grave, and bears the simple inscription, “To the memory of Philip Kennedy, _in Ward_, who died the 19th of December, 1798. Aged 38.”
My own earliest recollections of the grand, desolate old castle are derived, not from my first visit to it made in infancy, but from the descriptions of one whose home it was during a brief but intensely observant period of childhood. There came one day a storm such as seldom even on that coast lashes up the gray, livid ocean. The waves, as far out as sight could reach, were one mass of foam, and the ghastly lightning flashed upon the torn sails of a ship as near destruction as it well could be. Cries came up from below in the brief pauses of the storm, and above lanterns were quickly carried to and fro, while pale attendants hurriedly and silently obeyed the signals of a more collected master. The occupants of the castle hardly knew to what its chambers might be destined–whether to receive the dead or to afford rest to the saved. Beds, fires and cordials were in readiness, and strong men bore dread burdens up dizzy paths leading from beneath. The ship broke in pieces on the merciless rocks, and many a drowned sailor went down to meet the army of his fellow-victims of all times who no doubt lay sleeping in the submarine caves of Slains. Those who survived soon disappeared, full of gratitude for the timely relief offered them at the castle, but one old man remained. He was never known by any other name than “Monsieur,” and was beloved by every individual member of the household. A French _emigre_ of the old school, with the dainty, gallant ways of the _ancien regime_, he still clung to the dress of his earlier days, and wore a veritable _queue_, silk stockings and buckled shoes. For some time he remained a welcome guest in the “red chamber,” where the host’s little children would sometimes join him and play with his watch and jeweled baubles. But one day poor little “Monsieur” sickened, and the tiny feet that had made such haste to run to him, now trod the corridor softly and bore a baby-nurse to the gentle invalid. It was a high and coveted reward for the little girls to carry “Monsieur’s” medicine to his bedside, and everything that kindness and hospitality could suggest was equally lavished on him; but his feeble life, which had no doubt received a shock from the shipwreck it had barely escaped, went out peacefully like the soft flame of a lamp.
Slains Castle had many gentle and pleasant memories about it, as well as its traditional horrors, and among these were many connected with the history of the old family that owned it. In one of the corridors hangs the picture of James, Lord Hay, a fair-haired, sunny-faced boy, tall and athletic, standing with a cricket-bat in his hand. He would have been earl of Erroll had he lived, but if we follow him in his short life from classic Eton to the field of Quatre-Bras, we shall find him again, on a bright June day in 1815, lying as if asleep, as fair and noble-looking as before, but silent in death. Simple Flemish peasants stand in a group around him, awed and admiring, asking each other if this beautiful youth is an angel fallen from heaven, or only a mortal man slain for the Honor of his country. His was a noble death, and worthy of the suggestive memento of his early boyhood before which we stood just now in the corridor of Slains Castle.
A little farther down this corridor, which to all intents and purposes is a family picture-gallery, we shall be forced to stop before the portrait of a dark woman, masculine and resolute, not beautiful nor like the handsome race of the Hays, of which she was yet the last direct representative. This is the famous Countess Mary, one of the central figures of the family traditions. The Hays were hereditary lords high constable of Scotland, and also one of the few Scottish families in which titles and offices, as well as lands, are transmitted through the female line. So this Countess Mary found herself, at the death of her brother, countess of Erroll in her own right and _lord_ high constable of Scotland. In one of the two pictures of her at Slains, if I remember right, she is represented with the baton of her office, with which badge she also appeared at court before her marriage (after this it was borne by her husband in the character of her deputy). Her husband was a commoner, a Mr. Falconer of Dalgaty, whose reported history in connection with her is curious and deserves to be told, though the old tradition is moulded into so many different forms that it is very difficult to disentangle the truth from its manifold embellishments. Toward the beginning of the eighteenth century this intrepid and independent lady fell in love with Mr. Falconer, who at first did not seem eager to return or notice her affection. High-strung and chivalric by nature, she did not droop and pine under her disappointment, but vowed to herself that she would bring him to her feet. Mr. Falconer coner left the country after some time, and went to London. The Countess Mary also traveled south the same year, and no news of her was heard at Slains for some time. Meanwhile, she and Mr. Falconer met, but unknown to the latter, who about the same time became acquainted with a very dashing young cavalier, evidently a man of high birth and standing, but resolutely bent on mystifying his friends as to his origin. The two saw each other frequently, and were linked by that desultory companionship of London life which sometimes indeed ripens into friendship, but as often ends in a sudden quarrel. Such was the end of this acquaintance, and one day some trifling difference having occurred between the friends, a cartel reached Mr. Falconer couched in very haughty though perfectly courteous language. These things were every-day matters in such times, and very nonchalantly the challenged went in the early morning to the appointed place to meet the challenger. Here the versions of the story differ. Some say that Mr. Falconer and his antagonist fought, but without witnesses; that the former got the worst of the encounter, and remained at the other’s mercy; that then, _and not before_, the Countess Mary made herself known to him and gave him his choice–a thrust from her sword or a speedy marriage with herself. Others say that it was before the duel that she astonished her lover by this discovery, and that the choice she gave him was between marriage and ridicule.[A]
The fact of her marriage, and that it proved a happy one, is certain. Mr. Falconer dropped his own name to assume that of Hay. The countess was a devoted Jacobite and an earnest churchwoman. When Presbyterianism had got the upper hand in Scotland, and was repaying church persecutions with terrible interest, a Mr. Keith was appointed to the Anglican parish of Deer. This was within the Erroll jurisdiction, and it was not long before the zealous Countess Mary came to the rescue of the congregation, who had assembled for some time in an old farmhouse. In 1719 or ’20 she had the upper floor of a large granary fitted up for their accommodation, and this afforded them a grateful shelter for more than a quarter of a century. Of this same parish of Deer a curious story is told in the local annals, showing how conservative and tenacious of traditions the north of Scotland still was in 1711. The skirmish to which it relates goes by the quaint title of the “Rabbling of Deer,” and is thus reported: “Some people of Aberdeen, in conjunction with the presbytry of Deer, to the number of seventy horse or thereby, assembled on the twenty-third of March, 1711, to force in a Presbyterian teacher in opposition to the parish; but the presbytry and their satellites were soundly beat off by the people, not without blood on both sides.”
There was little of the martyr about the Scot of that warlike day, and most emphatically and literally did he show himself a “_soldier_ of the Lord.”
The aisle of the old church of Slains contains the graves of Countess Mary and her husband, with an epitaph in Latin, of which the following is a translation: “Beneath this tombstone there are buried neither gold nor silver, nor treasures of any kind, but the bodies of the most chaste wedded pair, Mary, countess of Erroll, and Alexander Hay of Dalgaty, who lived peaceably and lovingly in matrimony for twenty-seven years. They wished to be buried here beside each other, and pray that this stone may not be moved nor their remains disturbed, but that these be allowed to rest in the Lord until He shall call them to the happy resurrection of that life which they expect from the mercy of God and the merits of the Saviour and Lord Jesus Christ.”
The central figure, however, in the history of the Hays of Erroll, and that which no one who bears the name of Hay can think of without a thrill of pride, is the Lord Kilmarnock who fell, in 1746, a victim to the last unsuccessful but heroic rising in favor of the Stuarts. I have heard it whispered as an instance of “second sight” that some years before he had any reason to anticipate such a death he was once startled by the ghostly opening of a door in the apartment where he was sitting alone, and by the apparition, horribly distinct and realistic, of a bloody head rolling slowly toward him across the room; till it rested at his feet. The glassy eyes were upturned to his, and the bonny locks were clotted with blood: it was as if it had just rolled from under the axe of the executioner; and the features, plainly discerned, _were his own!_
His part in the rising of 1745 belongs to history, but his personal demeanor concerns my narrative more closely. All the contemporary accounts are loud in praise of his beauty and elegance of person, his refinement of manner, his variety of accomplishments; and Scott, in his _Tales of a Grandfather_, relates a curious circumstance concerning his fine presence at the moment of his execution. A lady of fashion who had never seen him before, and who was herself, I believe, the wife of one who had much to do with Lord Kilmarnock’s death-warrant, seeing him pass on his way to the block, formed a most violent attachment for his person, “which in a less serious affair would have, been little less than a ludicrous frenzy.”
The grace and dignity of his appearance, together with the resignation and mildness of his address, melted all the spectators to tears as they gathered round the fatal Tower prison to witness his death: the chaplain who attended him says his behavior was so humble and resigned that even the executioner burst into tears, and was obliged to use strong cordials to support him in his terrible duty. Lord Kilmarnock himself was deeply impressed by the sight of the block draped in funereal black, the plain coffin placed just beside it, the sawdust that was so disposed as speedily to suck up the bloody traces of the execution, and the sea of faces surrounding the open enclosure kept for this his last earthly ordeal. It was certainly not from fear that he recoiled, but his proud, sensitive, melancholy nature was thrilled through every nerve by this dread publicity, and we cannot wonder that, leaning heavily on the arm of a trusty friend, he should have whispered, almost with his last breath, the simple words, “Home, this is dreadful!”
One who was the lineal descendant of this earl of Kilmarnock, and whose only brother long bore the same blood-stained and laurel-wreathed title, has often told me of the strange link that bridged the chasm of four generations from 1746 to 1829, and bound her recollections to those of a living witness of the scene. She was so young as not to have any distinct impression of other events that happened at the same time, but this lived in her mind because of the importance and solemnity with which her own parents had purposely invested it in her eyes. One day, at Brighton, this little great-great-grand-daughter of the Lord Kilmarnock of 1745 was brought down from the nursery to see an old, more than octogenarian, soldier who had distinguished himself in recent wars, and reached the rank of general. This tottering old man, more than fourscore years of age, took the wee maiden of hardly four upon his knee, and told her in simple words the story she was never to forget–how he had been a tiny boy running to school on the day of the execution of the “rebel lords,” and how, seeing a vast, eager crowd all setting toward the Tower quarter, he was tempted to play truant, and flinging his satchel of books over his shoulder, had pushed his way as far as the great state prison. Then of his frantic efforts to secure a point of vantage whence to see the great death-pageant–of his childish admiration for the handsome, manly form of Lord Kilmarnock, of his enthusiasm when Lord Balmerino, the other victim, had cried in a loud voice, “Long live the king!” and of the fascination he could not resist which led his eyes from the shining axe and the draped block to the auburn locks of the prisoner, and soon after to his bleeding head laid low in the sawdust around the coffin. All this the old veteran told thrillingly, the shadow of a boy’s awed recollection mingling with his Scottish exultation as a compatriot of the victim, and even with a touch of humor as he recalled the domestic scolding which marked the truant’s return.
In the charter-room at Slains Castle, where the records, genealogies, private journals, official deeds, etc. of the family are kept, one might find ample material for curious investigation of our forefathers’ way of living. Among other papers is a kind of inventory headed, “My Ladies Petition anent the Plenissing within Logg and Slanis.” The list of things wanted for Slains speaks chiefly of brass pots, pewter pans and oil barrels, but, the “plenissing” of Logg (another residence of the Errolls), “quhilk my Ladie desyris as eftir followis, quhilk extendis skantlie (scantily) to the half,” contains an ample list of curtains of purple velvet, green serge, green-and-red drugget and other stuffs hardly translatable to the modern understanding, and shows that in those days women were not more backward than now in plaguing their liege lords about upholstery and millinery. But the most amusing and natural touch of all is in the endorsement, hardly gallant, but _very_ conjugal, made by the fair petitioner’s husband: “To my Ladyes gredie (greedy) and vnressonable (unreasonable) desyris it is answerit….” Here follows a distinct admission that the furniture of both houses, put together, is too little to furnish the half of each of them, and therefore nothing can be spared from Logie to “pleniss” Slains.
The family coat-of-arms commemorates to this day the poetical genealogy of the Hays. Its supporters are two tall, naked peasants bearing plough-yokes on their shoulders: the crest is a falcon, while the motto is also significant–“_Serva jugum._” Scottish tradition tells us that in 980, when the Danes had shamefully routed the Scots at Loncarty, a little village near Perth, and were pursuing the fugitives, an old man and his two stalwart sons, who were ploughing in a field close by, were seized with indignation, and, shouldering their plough-yokes, placed themselves resolutely in a narrow defile through which their countrymen must pass to evade a second slaughter by the victors. As the Scots came on the three patriots opposed their passage, crying shame upon them for cowards and no men, and exhorting them thus: “Why! would ye rather be certainly killed by the heathen Danes than die in arms for your own land?” Ashamed, and yet encouraged, the fugitives rallied, and with the three dauntless peasants at their head fell upon their astonished pursuers, and fought with such desperation that they turned defeat into victory. Kenneth III., the Scottish king, instantly sent for the saviors of his army, gave them a large share of the enemy’s spoils, and made them march in triumph into Perth with their bloody plough-yokes on their shoulders. More than that, he ennobled them, and gave them a fair tract of land, to be measured, according to the fashion of that day, by the flight of a falcon. From the name of this land the Hays came to be called; lords of Erroll, and it is said that the Hawk Stone at St. Madoes, Perthshire, which stands upon what is known to have been the ancient boundary of the possessions of the Hays, is the identical stone from which the lucky falcon started. It was left standing as a special memorial of the defeat of the Danes at Loncarty. Another stone famous in the Hay annals, and conspicuously placed in front of the entrance to Slains Castle, is said to be the same on which the peasant general rested after his toilsome leadership in the battle.
Our walks over the bleak moors on one side, with the heather in bloom and the blackberries in low–lying purple clusters fringing the granite rocks, were sometimes rendered more interesting, though more dangerous, by the sudden falling of a thick white mist. Slowly it would come at first, gathering little filmy clouds together as it were, and hovering over the gray sea in curling tufts, and then, growing strong and dense, would swoop down irresistibly, till what was clear five minutes before was impenetrably walled off, and one seemed to stand alone in a silent world of ghosts. Or again, our walks would take us on the other side, over the Sands of Forvie, a desolate tract where nothing grows save the coarse grass called _bent_ by the Scotch, and where the wearied eye rests on nothing but mounds of shifting sand, drearily shaped into the semblance of graves by the keen winds that blow from over the German Ocean.
This miniature desert, tradition says, was an Eden four hundred years ago, but a wicked guardian robbed the helpless orphan heiresses of it by fraud and violence, and the maidens threw a spell or _weird_ upon it in these terms:
“Yf evyr maydens malysone
Did licht upon drye lande,
Let nocht bee funde in Furvye’s glebys Bot thystl, bente and sande.”
I must not forget the “Bullers,” a natural curiosity which is the boast of the neighborhood of Slains, and is moreover connected with a feat performed by a former guest and friend of one of the lords of Erroll. We drove there in a large party, and passed through an untidy, picturesque little fishing-hamlet on our way, where the women talked to each other in Gaelic as they stood barefooted at the doors of their cabins, and where the children looked so hardy, fearless and determined that the wildest dreams of future possible achievement seemed hardly unlikely of realization in connection with any one of them.
“The Pot,” as it is locally called, is a huge rocky cavern, irregularly circular and open to the sky, into which the sea rushes through a natural archway. A narrow pathway is left quite round the basin, from which one looks down a sheer descent of more than a hundred feet; but this is so dangerous, the earth and coarse grass that carpet it so deceptive and loose, and the wind almost always so high on this spot, that only the most foolhardy or youngest of visitors would dare in broad daylight to attempt to _walk_ round it. Yet it is on record that the duke of Richmond, some sixty or seventy years ago, made a bet at Lord Erroll’s dinner-table that he would _ride round it after dark_. He accomplished the feat in safety. His picture, life-size, hangs in the dining-room to this day, and as he is represented standing in all the pride of a vigorous manhood by the side of his beautiful charger, he does not seem to belie the reputation which this incident created for him in the old district of Buchan.
The peasants of this wild and primitive neighborhood, though to some extent slightly infected by modernization, are yet very fair specimens of the hardy, trusty clansmen of Scottish history, and the present owners of Slains certainly give them every reason to keep up the old bonds of affectionate interest with every one and everything belonging to “the family.” To my own observation of the ancient seat of the Hays I owe one of the most delightful recollections of my life, that of a Christian home. Not only the outward observances, but the inner spiritual vitality of religion, were there, while unselfish devotion to all within the range of her influence or authority marked the character of her who was at the head of this little family kingdom. The present head of the house, a Hay to the backbone, has triumphantly carried on the martial traditions of his ancestry, and on the roll of England’s victorious sons at the battle of the Alma his name is to be found. He was there disabled by a wound that shattered his right arm and cut short his military career. Domestic happiness, however, is no bad substitute for a brilliant public life, and there are duties, higher yet than a soldier’s, that go far toward making up that background of rural prosperity which alone ensures the grand effect of military successes. After having done one’s duty in the field, it is to the full as noble, and perhaps more patriotic, to turn to the duties of the glebe, thereby finishing as a landlord the work begun as a soldier.
It is a touching custom, hardly yet obliterated in the district over which my reminiscences have led me, for one peasant, when coming upon another employed in his lawful calling, thus to salute him: “Guid speed the wark!” the rejoinder being, in the same broad Buchan dialect, “Thank ye: I wish ye weel.”
I can end these pages with no more fitting sentiment. As a tribute of grateful recollection to those who made my days at Slains a happiness to me, and in the first fresh sorrow of a deep bereavement offered me distractions the more alluring because the more associated with Nature’s changeless, silent grandeur, I pen these lines, crowning them with the homely Scottish wish that wherever they are and whatever they do, “Guid speed the wark!”
LADY BLANCHE MURPHY.
[Footnote A: There is another version of her courtship, and this a metrical one. This old ballad was not much known beyond the district round Slains, and the old servants and farmers on the estate were the chief depositaries of the tradition. I have failed to secure more than a very small fragment of it, which is itself only written down from memory by one of these old women. The rhyme and rhythm are both _original_:
Lady Mary Hay went to a wedding
Near the famous town of Reading:
There a gentleman she saw
That belonged to the law….
Here evidently there occurs a hiatus, during which some account is probably begun of her unreturned attachment, for a little later we find in the very primitive manuscript from which we quote these words of the countess:
I that have so many slighted,
I am at last–(unrequited?)
The story is now carried on in prose (my informant having forgotten the text of the ballad), and says that “Lady Mary wanted or challenged him to meet her in a masquerade” (probably meaning a duel in disguise), “and that his father told him to go.” Neither father nor son seems to have known the fair challenger’s rank, though the following words point to their being aware of her sex, for the elder Falconer is represented as saying,
If she is rich she will raise your fame, And if poor you are the same.
]
OUR HOME IN THE TYROL
CHAPTER III.
We were soon comfortably settled in the old Hof. The spacious rooms, always deliciously cool, were fragrant with rare and delicate blossoms–Alpine roses from the rocks, white lilies from Moidel’s special little garden-plot, grasses and nodding flowers, campanulas, veronicas, melisot, potentillas and lady’s bedstraw, which, according to Anton, no cattle would touch, whilst the roots of others were good for man or beast, their various qualities being all known to him. But soon the waving flowers bent beneath the scythe. It was the eve of St. Peter and St. Paul’s Day, a festival when all work must cease, and the Hofbauer, whose word was law, had given orders that the hay in the wood-meadow must be carried that evening. Seeing, therefore, that the more hands there were the better, the two Margarets seized each a rake and worked as hard as any woman in the field.
On we labored, the golden evening sun glinting down upon our picturesque row of haymakers, nor did we cease until the angelus sounded from the village spire. Then Anton, Jakob, Moidel, their men and maids, fell devoutly upon their knees and thanked God that Christ Jesus had been born. These humble Tyrolese remember thrice daily to praise the Lord, as David did. With a hushed, subdued look upon their honest faces, they arose, and we joining them the fresh, fragrant hay was carted triumphantly home. The hay is cut long before we should consider it ready, and is housed whilst still green and moist. The newer the hay the richer the cream, they say. The Hofbauer has three crops yearly, but his neighbors, who lie higher, have only two, and sometimes but one.
The good old Kathi stood at the door cooling a gigantic pan of buckwheat polenta, and when she had set down this dish, intended for the haymakers’ supper, she brought us each, as our pay, a couple of _krapfen_, which are oblong dough-cakes fried in butter.
Although the haymakers were worn out and weary with a long day’s work of twelve hours, still Rosenkranz sounded in the chapel like the humming of bees in lime trees. This pious custom duly impressed us, until on the very next day, as we walked up our village street on the evening of the festival, our solemn feelings received a great check. We observed that the prayer-leaders, who knelt at the open windows of each separate house, followed our every movement with their eyes, whilst their mouths mechanically repeated sonorous Ave Marias and Paternosters. Nay, there was our own pious Moidel watching us from the kitchen window, her Hail Marys mingling with her friendly greetings; but then Moidel was waiting upon us and our supper whilst her family were on their knees in the chapel. Still, we soon learnt to perceive that Rosenkranz was considered quite as efficacious if merely uttered by the tongue, whilst the mind was far away. This being a festival, and no one tired with work, the household trooped into the old pleasaunce after supper. The elders sat together in a row, whilst the younger members congregated on a second long stone bench and struck up singing, Moidel and her elder brother beginning with a duet:
Green, green is the clover
On the hills as I go,
And my maiden as fresh is
As spring water’s flow.
And the chorus joined in–
As spring water’s flow,
winding up with a jodel.
Nanni, the chief maid, next sang in a clear, flexible voice, which trembled no little when she perceived that the Herrschaft now formed part of the audience in the balcony–
A WEEK’S SORROW.
On Sunday I cried, for my heart was so sore, Like a poor little child outside the church door; On Monday I felt so afeard and alone,
And thought, Were I a swallow, I’d quickly begone: Woe’s me! were I but a swallow, were I but a swallow!
On Tuesday, and nothing could please me all day, For him that I love best is far, far away; On Wednesday whatever I did, I did ill, For when the heart’s heavy the hand has no skill; On Thursday I was weary and sleepy all day; On Friday, and one of the cows went astray; On Saturday down poured my tears like the rain, As though I should never be happy again. Woe’s me! never be happy again; woe’s me! never again.
In order to catch the meaning of the words, which were sung in strong dialect, Margaret and I had descended to the garden. The Hofbauer looked sad when he saw us approach, and quietly brushed a tear away with his shirt-sleeve. We consequently asked Moidel when we stood alone with her whether anything were troubling her father.
“It strikes me not,” she said. “I fancy that it is but the music. Father and uncle may both seem quiet and dull now, yet they have been celebrated singers; only when my mother died father left off singing, and so did uncle after Uncle Jakob’s death.”
“Ah yes!” said the aunt, who had also joined us, “they were the three handsomest, best–grown men in the parish, living happily together without an ill word, until four years ago Jakob was trampled upon by a yoke of vicious oxen, and in three days he was dead. Yes, that was a sorrow almost as cutting as the death of the Hofbauerin, so young when she died. Only married five years, and leaving four little children, not one of whom ever knew her! Yes, Moidel is a good girl, and is wearing her linen now, but she can never come up in looks to her mother. Ah ja! and now the trouble is about Jakob.”
“About Jakob?” asked we in a low, astonished voice.
“Why yes, that he has been drawn for the Landwehr. Ah, I thought you knew. It was last autumn that he was drawn. The Hofbauer would have sold his best acres to release him, but the recruiting-officer would have no nay: Jakobi was a fine, well-behaved young fellow, and such were needed in the army. He had to serve two months this spring, and with his comrades day by day had to run up the face of mountains some four thousand feet. It quite wore Jakob out, though he is so good-tempered. He declared that he was used, to be sure, at the Olm to climb up to the glaciers of the Hoch Gall after his goats, often bringing the kids in his arms down the precipices, but to have his back broken and his feet blistered in order to know how to shed human blood was what he hated. Yet he bore it so well, doing his best, that when the other recruits could return to their homes, Jakob, being so clever and well-behaved, had to stay a fortnight longer to brush, fold up and put away all the regimentals. However, the under-officer did have him to dine with him every day.”
“Yes, and Jakob will in his turn be an officer,” we replied, trying to reassure her.
“Oh, na, na, that can never be: eleven more long years must he serve, and always as a private. I thought like you, until the Hofbauer explained to me that all the officers were foreigners–Saxons, Bavarians, Wuertembergers, put in by the Austrian ministry, who are tyrants to Tyrol. Ah, if the good emperor would only interfere, for he loves Tyrol! but he leaves everything to the ministry. Austria may itself be overthrown in these unrighteous days before my Jakobi is free.” Now it was the good soul’s turn to wipe her eye with the corner of her ample blue apron.
We were venturing some fresh attempt at consolation when fortunately an event occurred which drew her thoughts from the deep shadow which we had just discovered hung over the peaceful Hof. Jodokus, the village schoolmaster in the winter, when the children had time to learn, but during the busy summer months one of the men, had challenged Jakobi to a wrestling-match. Hardly had the two antagonists encountered each other on the grass in a stout set-to, when the sound of the goatherd’s whip was heard on the hilly common above, sending forth a succession of reports like those of a pistol, becoming stronger and louder when the game and the assembled company were seen. At last the young “whipper-snapper,” as we called him, made one long final succession of cracks and reports, and springing over the wall, and casting his instrument of torture on one side, he boldly challenged Anton.
The young man, whose skill and strength were well known, smiled, half amused, half incredulous, on his antagonist. The younger athlete, a lad of thirteen, firmly built and agile, mistook the look for a sneer, and the blood ran fast and hot into his face. So, Anton accepting the challenge, they immediately began to spar. They first fearlessly regarded each other, then bowing their heads they rushed forward, butting like rams. The lad, with his head fixed firm in Anton’s chest, tried to find his adversary’s weakest point, and with his arms round his waist endeavored cunningly to make him slip; but it was soon the young champion who was tripped up, and who in playful, half-serious anger dealt blows and tugs right and left, almost managing to bring Anton sprawling to the ground. The lad, however, suddenly stopped: he had lost a little tin ring off his finger and a four-kreuzer piece from his pocket–too great a loss for a shepherd-boy. The combat therefore was speedily closed, both antagonists and their partisans hunting in the unmowed grass until the treasures were again trove.
At the same time an elderly man approached and opened the gate–a peasant evidently, although, instead of the usual long white apron and bib, he wore one of new green linen, shining as satin–a man of a strong although delicate make, the head slightly stooping forward, and a face that beamed with genuine pleasure as half a dozen voices simultaneously burst forth with a “God greet you, Alois!”
This then was Schuster (or Shoe-maker) Alois, in preparation of whose advent the good aunt had scrubbed a bed-room, and Moidel had beautified the window with pots of blooming geraniums. The room was a large chamber, set apart for the different ambulatory work-people who came to the Hof in the course of the year. The weaver, who arrived in the spring to weave the flax which the busy womankind had spun through the winter, had been the last occupant of the room, and had woven no less than two hundred and ninety-three ells of linen, which now in long symmetrical lines were carefully pegged down on the turf of the pleasaunce by Moidel, who walked over them daily with her bare feet, busily watering until the gray threads were turning snowy white.
Later on in the year the sewing-woman would appear, and then the tailor, to make the clothing for this large household, the servants, according to an old custom long since extinct in most countries, being chiefly paid in kind. Schuster Alois had now come to make the boots for Jakob and the Senner Franz preparatory to their going with the cattle to the Alpine pastures.
I greatly doubt whether the tailor or the weaver was so well waited upon as the shoemaker: I fancy they were left more to the maids. Passing the open door of the family house-place, aunt and niece might now be seen sitting hour after hour, the elder lining the soles of Jakob’s stockings with pieces of strong woolen to prevent mending on the Alp, or attending to other needs of his homely toilet; the younger at her paste-board or kneading-trough, whilst Schuster Alois sat between them in the sunny oriel window, and while he steadily plied his awl appeared to be either telling them tales or reciting poetry.
The Alp, or Olm (to use the provincial word), lay at the distance of about six hours, and the Hofbauer went up to examine the state of the pasturage before his son and the cattle finally started. In two days he returned. “The going up of the cattle must be postponed at least a week,” he said, “for snow had fallen at the huts the depth of a man; and the river had swollen to such a height that it had carried two houses away in St. Wolfgang, the highest mountain-village; and even life had been lost.”
This delay caused a respite from hard work. The next morning Alois’s arms did not move like unwearying machinery, and, the ten o’clock-dinner being over, we saw him seated at his ease on the adjoining hillside. Should we go and speak to him? He appeared different from the ordinary run of his class (though cobblers are often clever men enough), and moreover of a decidedly friendly turn of mind. We determined that we would. We joined Alois on the stony, waste hillside, crowned by two trees with a crucifix in the centre, which formed from the house, with its background of mountains, ever a melancholy, soul-touching little poem.
“You have not quite such hard work to-day, Schuster?”
He smiled and said, “Do your work betimes, and then rest; and where better than under the shadow of the cross?”
“Yes, and the crucifix which you have chosen is more pleasing than the generality which are sown broadcast over the fields of the Tyrol. Why are they made so hideous and revolting?”
We spoke out freely, because the unusually intelligent face before us evidently belonged to a thinker. Candor of speech pleased him. Nevertheless, he answered as if musing, “They appear ugly to you: well they may be. Ja, but the most who look upon them are men and women acquainted with many sorrows–sudden deaths by falls from precipices, destruction of house and home by lightning, floods, avalanches, failure of crops, and many another visitation–and it soothes their perhaps selfish natures to see these anguished features, these blood-stained limbs–signs of still greater suffering–whilst they pray that only such crosses may be laid on them as will keep them in obedience to His will. Just before you came up the hill I was thinking of a strange history connected with a crucifix–one that I read only ten days ago in the house of a Hochmair himself.”
It merely needed silence for Schuster Alois to repeat the tale, and he soon began: “It is the Tyroler Adolph Pichler who narrates it. He says that once in his rambles he came to a little chapel, over which hung a blasted larch–such a desolate wreck of a tree that he naturally asked the guide he had with him why it was not cut down. Now, the guide was an old man who knew every, tradition and legend, besides all the family histories in that part of the Tyrol. ‘That tree,’ said he, ‘is left there purposely, as the reminder of a great crime, and nobody would think of touching it. If you look into the chapel, you’ll see a Christ on the cross which has been shot through the breast. That was once a crucifix under this very tree.’ Then the guide made a remark which had often struck myself–that there are some families in which everything that is strange and dreadful happens, whilst there are others that go on for generations and are no more distinguishable than the very weeds themselves. In that valley were the Hochmairs, and they were of this prominent sort, and odd enough, as I said before, it was at a Hochmair’s house that I read this account. Well, some generations back there was a Hochmair who was a regular ruffian. He cared no more for the life of a man than that of a chamois. The government kept the game strictly on the mountains, and he was suspected of having put more than one of their keepers out of the way. In short, he had such a bad character that when he went to confession the priest would not give him absolution. This put him in a great rage, and it is remarkable that from that day his luck in hunting forsook him. He could not take aim–a sort of mist was ever before his eyes, his hand trembled. People believed that he was perpetually haunted by the ghost of a young man whom, after he had shot, he had beaten to death with his gunstock, and then flung down a crevasse. Be that as it may, he would be absent for weeks in the mountains. He did no good, and the little he possessed fell into ruin.
“His creditors were about to sell him up, stick and stone, when he put, as one may say, the finishing stroke to everything himself. It was Corpus Christi Day: the bells were ringing and the procession moving through the fields, the holy banners waving, the choir-boys singing the sanctus, when just as the priest lifted the Host in the golden monstrance, a shot was fired from the bushes in front of a crucifix. Lightning flashed from heaven, and the house of the wicked Hochmair, which was at no great distance, burst into flames. An awful cry rang from the bushes: the procession rushed forward, the priest only remaining with the Host and a few attendants. And what did they see? There was the image of the crucified Saviour pierced by a bullet, and out in the road stood the wretched Hochmair, with his hands clasped on the lock of his gun and his eyes rolling in frenzy. Everybody perceived the crime he had committed, and remained motionless, whilst he beckoned wildly to the priest, who came up in gloomy silence. After they had talked together alone for some time, the priest went into the church, where he remained all night in prayer. The wretched man, whom nobody dared to touch, disappeared into the thicket, and all trace was lost of him. In the mean while the injured image of the Saviour was removed into the church. So years went on, and then one Sunday after service the priest announced from the pulpit that the former sinner Hochmair was dead, but that after years of penitence he had received the forgiveness of the Church and of God. ‘Therefore,’ said the good man, ‘let all forgive him, and remember only their own sins, and pray Christ to be merciful to them.’ After that it was known that he had become possessed with the crazy notion that if he fired into the breast of the Saviour on Corpus Christi Day, just when the Host was being elevated and the benediction spoken, it would make his gun unerring. He fired therefore, and at the same moment the Saviour on the cross raised His head and, fixing on him His eyes full of tears, gave him a look which pierced him to the very marrow, and that terrified him far more than the lightning which, flashing from his forehead, set fire to his house, whilst the thorn-crowned countenance seemed to float before him, and he knew that this was his punishment. Such was his confession at the time to the priest who laid the penance of the Church upon him. So he went out into the world like another Cain, and God in His own time was merciful to him. Still, the wounded effigy of the Saviour and the blasted larch tree remain as witnesses on earth against him.
“And,” continued Schuster Alois, “that is only one tale amongst the hundreds which could be related concerning these crucifixes. Ah, there is many an old, bleached, weather-beaten crucifix on crag or highway-side from which the anguished face of the Saviour has both smitten and healed the sinner. Crucifixes cut deeper into most Tyrolese hearts than shrines, some way.”
“Strange,” we replied, “for these old shrines are not only quaint, but often beautiful, as, for instance, the one on the roadside turning into town.”
“Ah, I am glad you like it,” said Alois, “for there are those who would wish it pulled down and a lofty wooden cross, as a landmark, placed there instead. The Capuchins in the adjoining monastery are opposed to it, however, and no wonder. Have you ever remarked,” he continued, becoming quite aglow, “that although it is greatly injured and many of the figures lost, still there are others who look at you so calmly and seriously with their marred, dilapidated countenances that you feel a peace steal into your heart? And whoever the painter was, he must have loved his work, for Saint Gregory could never have been more dignified in real life than he looks in the shrine.”
“Are you a painter?” we asked, almost without knowing what we were saying, for it was hardly probable.
“Oh, I only touch colors now and then, when there’s a purpose in it or I can serve the Church,” he returned. He became embarrassed, and explained that it was time to return to his work.
We afterward learnt from Moidel that Alois bore in the neighborhood far and wide the reputation of an artist, although he did not consider himself such, seeing he could not paint saints and angels. It was, however, a great source of pleasure to him to paint mottoes and devices and to arrange floral decorations, especially when they could serve as a surprise for some private name-day or church festival.
One afternoon we were told that the boots were made, that Anton had brought the flour from the mill, that two hundred loaves of rye bread were baked, and, the weather being sufficiently fine and all the preparations being completed, the cattle would now start for the Olm. First, Anton and the Senner Franz set off at four o’clock in the afternoon, with the calves in advance, the young things being unable to keep up with the cattle. Then a _leiterwagen_ which had been drawn into the lower corridor and filled with sacks of flour, meal, salt and the two hundred loaves, was driven by the Hofbauer as far as Taufers, whence the supplies for the Alpine residents would be borne on men’s backs up to the huts.
In the evening Jakob came into the grand old sitting-room to bid us good-bye. He appeared in his shirt-sleeves and the indispensable white apron, and with the utmost self-possession and refinement of manner he presented us with a little bouquet of edelweiss, promising to send us down a larger supply by his brother. We talked with him about the Olm, and found him enthusiastic on the subject, his one regret being that, as he must return for several weeks of drilling on August 22d, his stay there this summer would be greatly curtailed. The Olm was very extensive, lying on a mountain-platform which was only bare of snow for about three months in the year. When, however, the snow was off, the flowers came up by thousands, the grass sprang up by magic, all the mountains were filled with the rushing and roaring sound of waters, which came down in foaming cascades, often of wonderful beauty, amongst the rocks and the pine woods which clothed the steeper mountain-sides. Nor was the life at all solitary, for various farmers were sending up their cattle to other Olms about the same time, so that no one was without neighbors, although they might be at a considerable distance apart.
Jakob spoke on until we became wild to go up to the Olm too. “Could we go thither,” we asked, “and pay him a visit?”
“That we could,” he replied, “if we did not mind sleeping in the hay. Only we had better wait for settled weather in August.”
There was now no talk of our leaving the Hof at St. Jakobi. The Hofbauer had declared that the house was at our disposal until Martinmas–longer if we wanted it. He also fell into the scheme of our visiting his Olm, where he intimated his desire to be host, saying that all the dairy produce would be at our service.
In the night, exactly at one o’clock, Jakob and Jodokus started: we heard them go, the cattle-bells ringing and the “Leben Sie wohl!” “Behuet Euch Gott!” shouted lovingly after them from the open door and the lower windows of the silent old mansion. Six and twenty head of cattle: the goats, pigs and sheep were to follow later. It was a calm and beautiful night, the three-quarters moon just dropping behind the mountains, and the stars shining out brightly from the dark cloudless sky.
CHAPTER IV.
The Alpine caravansary was hardly settled at the Olm when the air became intensely hot and oppressive. Day by day black thunder-clouds gathered on the horizon. They crested the mountains in three directions, at times appearing to repel each other, at others marching fiercely on to conflict, when, the zenith becoming pitch-dark, they flung out long spears of lightning and exploded in overwhelming thunder. Very terrible were these perpetual storms. With the first peal the church-bells along the valley began solemnly to toll. It mattered not whether by night or day, the faithful bellringer was at his post, and with rain pouring down outside and fiery, vivid lightning playing around him, he still went tolling on, for evil spirits must be driven away, and people reminded to make the sign of the cross and pray God to protect them.
At length, to use an expression of Alois’s, “Saint Florian had left off playing at skittles, and Saint Leonhard had driven his hay over the heavenly bridge.” The warring elements were still, but the earth seemed smouldering with heat, and we panted and gasped after the lofty mountain-slopes which lay on all sides. At the same time it came most opportunely to our knowledge that the Tyrol was rich in baths–primitive establishments most of them, but dotted over mountain and valley, so that each village had half a dozen to choose from, where every peasant, be he ever so poor, could at least dip and soak for an eight-days’ _sommerfrisch_. Why, then, should not the two Margarets, they being the most desirous of a change, have at least a _sommerfrisch_?
But which amongst all these baths was the one to choose? Good Kathi recommended her baths at Innichen. She herself evidently did not derive much pleasure from her yearly visits there. Still, we, being ladies, would find more people to talk to, and the bath-house, which was always full to overflowing, stood in a wood, and we liked trees. Schuster Alois–for the conversation took place before he left–said that most gentlefolks went to Maistall. There was not only _luxus_, but a great deal of life and spirit there. His Majesty Emperor Max as early as 1511 took up his quarters at Maistall during his campaign against the Venetians, and he had heard say that in the last century the visitors formed a society and made it a rule that none but the purest German should be spoken. Every fault of pronunciation cost a kreuzer to the offender: the money went to the chapel, and amounted one season to twenty-one florins six kreuzers.
But one Margaret decidedly objected to going to a place where there was the faintest chance of her _loiter wagon_ for _leiterwagen_, her _pison_ for _speisen_, her _vulgarborn_ for _wohlgeboren_, being fined by a _gazel-schaft (gesellschaft)_. Besides, these places sounded too grand: we did not want a Gastein, but a Wildbad, if one could be found that did not belie its name. So the peasant-baths of St. Vigil, Muehlbach and Scharst were named to us, and the lot fell upon Scharst, we having heard that all the school-children in town had just been taken there for a long day’s holiday, and had returned to their proud and happy parents, who waited for them in double ranks below, radiant with pleasure, waving their banners and Alpine roses.
It was accordingly arranged that on the following Sunday Anton should drive us to Reischach, where there was to be a great festival, with candles in the church as big as a man’s arm: so said a woman from Reischach. Anton was of a retiring nature, and did not like crowds, but he would gladly drive the ladies over. And at Reischach we should be sure to find some peasant returning that evening by Scharst, who could carry our belongings.
Imagine us, therefore, at Reischach, the church-bell ringing for vespers, which begin at one o’clock. We wear bouquets of carnations and rosemary, presented to us by the family at the Hof, as correct decorations for a festival. And Anton!–how to present him to you as he deserves to be presented? His truthful, guileless face is his best ornament: nevertheless, he too wears carnations and rosemary caught in the silver cord and vieing with the silver tassels of his broad-brimmed, low-crowned beaver hat. His rough jacket, made by the tailor last autumn, and therefore too new to be worn on a less special occasion, is short and loose enough to leave ample space for the display of his _rauge_, or broad leather belt of softest chamois-skin, worked in scrolls surrounding his name, with split peacock quills, no little resembling Indian handicraft. His snow-white knees appear between his short leather breeches and his bright blue knitted stockings. These Nature’s garters, when perfectly white, are regarded as a mark of great distinction amongst the dandies, and those of our Anton may be considered the very _knee plus ultra_.
A parliament of men–a few still in breeches with Hessian boots, which appeared a characteristic of Reischach, but the majority, having succumbed to modern ideas, wearing trowsers–were seated in the shadow of a comfortable house, discussing the different stages of their rye and flax crops. Their wives and daughters, following their natural impulse, were already kneeling in church, confiding their cares of kitchen and farmyard to the ever-ready ear of _Mutter Gottes_–one dense mass of simple, believing women, in broad-brimmed beaver hats, with here and there a conical woolen beehive as a contrast.
The church in itself, although it lacked the candles as big as a man’s arm, must truly have shone like the gate of heaven to peasant eyes. Many of the more substantial families had lent their private saints for the occasion. They had brought Holy Nothburgs and Saint Leonhards and Virgins, generally preserved in wardrobes at home, but now brought to participate in the festival, besides adding to its great solemnity. It was Scapulary Sunday, we were told, and although the words conveyed no clear idea to us, we were soon to learn their significance. A Tyrolese anthem having been sung by some invisible voices, in which jodels leapt up and smothered Gregorians, a middle-aged Capuchin took his stand in the pulpit, and having greeted the congregation, promised to explain to them the mystery and the advantage of the Holy Scapulary.
“My beloved,” he began, “there are some who think too little of the scapulary, and there are others who lay too great a stress on this aid to faith. Let us meditate on both these conditions. But first, how must we ourselves regard the scapulary? Now, we are told not to love the world nor the things of the world. The scapulary, with its sacred image of Mary worn next the heart, is a great shield against this love of the world. It places you under the especial protection of the Queen of Heaven: you are as much her servant as those who serve king or kaiser, and equally wear her livery. Some think too little of the scapulary. Yet what incidents can be told of its efficacy! Let one suffice. In the year 1866, when the war raged between Austria and Prussia, the Catholic soldiers of the latter country immediately before the war entered by hundreds into the Society of the Scapulary. Wearing this sacred charm upon their hearts, they went into the battle-field, and the cannons roared and the bullets whizzed thick and fast around them, and not one of them fell, for they wore the scapulary. Indeed, their miraculous preservation created so much excitement that Lutherans marveled over it, and asked the Catholics how it came that they were no whit hurt. And they answered, ‘We wear the scapulary of Mary, and she saves us.’ Then many Lutherans said, ‘Come, we will have scapularies,’ and wrote their names down in the society. And now hark ye, my brethren. There was a Catholic soldier, and there was a Lutheran, and the latter said, ‘Lend me thy scapulary for this one day only, and see, here is a thaler for thee.’ Then the foolish Catholic drew the scapulary off his neck, handed it to the Lutheran, took the thaler, went into battle: whiz went the bullets round him, and he fell.”
We could stand no more. The church, now crowded with men as well as women, reeked with perspiration, the sermon oppressed us, and thus our sense and senses drove us out into the open air. Here the fresh breeze came across from the Ziller snow-fields, health-giving as a breath from heaven. Peasant-women who were too late to squeeze into church were seated amongst the iron crosses of the graves. The more serious-minded had managed to cluster together round a side-door which, being adjacent to the pulpit, proved an advantageous spot for hearing. The less particular sat in the shade, feeling it sufficient to be in holy ground and to pass their beads through their fingers whilst they studied up our novel attire. Approaching the more attentive members, we found that the Capuchin had reached the second part of his discourse, and was dilating on those who thought too highly of the scapulary. We gathered the following fragment:
“Now, the man was nigh unto death, and it was neither for confession nor for the death-sacrament that he craved. No, it was for a scapulary. ‘A scapulary!’ he cried, ‘a scapulary!’ My brethren, you know well he should have asked for the priest and for the blessing of the Church, but it was merely for a scapulary.”
Later on we asked permission to see a scapulary. It consisted of two small squares of cloth, herring-boned round the edge, and united by a narrow ribbon of sufficient length to permit one square to rest on the breast, whilst the other hung between the shoulders. That in front bore the image of the Virgin, designed by the nuns in the convent, whilst the simpler work had been given to some poor old woman, or even man, who was past harder employment. The privilege of wearing this charmed badge entailed the payment of a small yearly subscription and the repetition of seven Paternosters daily.
The procession followed the sermon. Mary, Joseph, Saint Nothburg (once a good peasant-girl, now a saint) were paraded round the village by children, and borne back to church. Peasant-men staggered under large silk banners, which swayed and fluttered in the blustery wind, and, but for the steady grasp of the strong men who carried them, threatening at each moment to crush the pious throng. The four chief peasants of the district, wearing their robes of state, the Noah’s ark coats in which they were married, bore the baldachin over the head of the Capuchin who elevated the Host: the village priest, in white surplice and Hessian boots, swung the censer at his side. The men were in front, the women, a long, broad file, divided in the procession by the priests from their male relations, followed–a dense black mass, but relieved in color by the whiteness of their short linen sleeves.
Men and women, carefully severed in their prayers and on the very steps of the altar by Holy Church, were soon able to come together again under the spacious, hospitable roof of Herr Kappler, the wirth. Innumerable clean wooden tables, forms, and stiff, high-legged wooden chairs were ranged up stairs and down stairs and in the orchard without, for the accommodation of the scapularists and their friends.
We sat at a side-table in an upper room partaking of grilled fowl and salad, whilst _buben_ and their _dirnen_, or lads and their lasses, middle-aged couples, old men and women, poured into the house, filling every chair, bench and table. They came thither from all the country-side, and endless were the greetings amongst cousins and cousins’ cousins. The Tyrolese, like the Scotch, keep up every link of relationship, claiming the fiftieth cousin. Relationship, in fact, never does die out; and though it may become an abstract during busy seasons of ploughing and sowing, it becomes a strong reality at wakes and festivals. Thus, at Kappler’s, on this scapulary afternoon, Barthel’s brother-in-law’s cousin drank with “Cousin Barthel,” and Seppl’s sister-in-law’s niece was treated by “Onkel Seppl.” There was one square-built, good-humored old man who appeared to be the whole world’s cousin: he passed from table to table, and had to sip from fifty offered glasses.
With our delicious coffee and boiled cream we ordered the host, as a suitable person, to find us a guide to carry our valise and shawls to Bad Scharst. Probably the perpetual and loud demands for pints of wine left him but little time to make a wise selection, seeing that there soon stood before us a small man with so subtle and malignant a look that his exorbitant demand made us only too gladly dismiss him. Our confidence shaken in the landlord’s powers of discrimination, we sent word below that if Anton had returned we should be glad to speak with him. He had been in the village to visit his cousins, but was waiting our orders below. Although his native shyness made it hard for him to step forward and address ladies under the curious gaze of all the relative Seppls and Barthels, he did it with manliness, and turning round and addressing the popular old man as Hansel, asked him if his brother Joergel were below; and being answered in the affirmative, he hastened away, and returned with another compact little peasant, whom he introduced to us as Senner Franz’s brother, with an aside, that he was “a friendly mortal and Count Arlberg’s forester.”
The agreement was soon made, the sullen-looking man glowering at us from behind a stack of firewood, whilst Hansel and Anton packed a _kraxe_ or wooden frame and fixed it on Joergel’s back. As we set off, Anton drove away homeward, although the skittle-balls were just beginning to roll, and the sound of “I bin a lustiger bua” and other Tyrolese songs came floating from the windows.
MARGARET HOWITT.
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
SAINT ROMUALDO.
I give God thanks that I, a lean old man, Wrinkled, infirm, and crippled with keen pains By austere penance and continuous toil, Now rest in spirit, and possess “the peace Which passeth understanding.” Th’ end draws nigh, Though the beginning is as yesterday,
And a broad lifetime spreads ‘twixt this and that– A favored life, though outwardly the butt Of ignominy, malice and affront,
Yet lighted from within by the clear star Of a high aim, and graciously prolonged To see at last its utmost goal attained. I speak not of mine Order and my House, Here founded by my hands and filled with saints– A white society of snowy souls,
Swayed by my voice, by mine example led; For this is but the natural harvest reaped From labors such as mine when blessed by God. Though I rejoice to think my spirit still Will work my purposes, through worthy hands, After my bones are shriveled into dust, Yet have I gleaned a finer, sweeter fruit Of holy satisfaction, sure and real,
Though subtler than the tissue of the air– The power completely to detach the soul From her companion through this life, the flesh; So that in blessed privacy of peace,
Communing with high angels, she can hold, Serenely rapt, her solitary course.
Ye know, O saints of heaven, what I have borne Of discipline and scourge; the twisted lash Of knotted rope that striped my shrinking limbs; Vigils and fasts protracted, till my flesh Wasted and crumbled from mine aching bones, And the last skin, one woof of pain and sores, Thereto like yellow parchment loosely clung; Exposure to the fever and the frost,
When ‘mongst the hollows of the hills I lurked From persecution of misguided folk,
Accustoming my spirit to ignore
The burden of the cross, while picturing The bliss of disembodied souls, the grace Of holiness, the lives of sainted men,
And entertaining all exalted thoughts, That nowise touched the trouble of the hour, Until the grief and pain seemed far less real Than the creations of my brain inspired. The vision, the beatitude, were true:
The agony was but an evil dream.
I speak not now as one who hath not learned The purport of those lightly-bandied words, Evil and Fate, but rather one who knows The thunders of the terrors of the world. No mortal chance or change, no earthly shock, Can move or reach my soul, securely throned On heights of contemplation and calm prayer, Happy, serene, no less with actual joy
Of present peace than faith in joys to come.
This soft, sweet, yellow evening, how the trees Stand crisp against the clear, bright-colored sky! How the white mountain-tops distinctly shine, Taking and giving radiance, and the slopes Are purpled with rich floods of peach-hued light! Thank God, my filmy, old dislustred eyes Find the same sense of exquisite delight, My heart vibrates to the same touch of joy In scenes like this, as when my pulse danced high, And youth coursed through my veins! This the one link That binds the wan old man that now I am To the wild lad who followed up the hounds Among Ravenna’s pine-woods by the sea.
For there how oft would I lose all delight In the pursuit, the triumph or the game, To stray alone among the shadowy glades, And gaze, as one who is not satisfied
With gazing, at the large, bright, breathing sea, The forest glooms, and shifting gleams between The fine dark fringes of the fadeless trees, On gold-green turf, sweetbrier and wild pink rose! How rich that buoyant air with changing scent Of pungent pine, fresh flowers and salt cool seas! And when all echoes of the chase had died, Of horn and halloo, bells and baying hounds, How mine ears drank the ripple of the tide On that fair shore, the chirp of unseen birds, The rustling of the tangled undergrowth, And the deep lyric murmur of the pines, When through their high tops swept the sudden breeze! There was my world, there would my heart dilate, And my aspiring soul dissolve in prayer Unto that Spirit of Love whose energies Were active round me, yet whose presence, sphered In the unsearchable, unbodied air,
Made itself felt, but reigned invisible. This ere the day that from my past divides My present, and that made me what I am. Still can I see the hot, bright sky, the sea illimitably sparkling, as they showed
That morning. Though I deemed I took no note Of heaven or earth or waters, yet my mind Retains to-day the vivid portraiture
Of every line and feature of the scene. Light-hearted ‘midst the dewy lanes I fared Unto the sea, whose jocund gleam I caught Between the slim boles, when I heard the clink Of naked weapons, then a sudden thrust
Sickening to hear, and then a stifled groan; And pressing forward I beheld the sight That seared itself for ever on my brain– My kinsman, Ser Ranieri, on the turf,
Fallen upon his side, his bright young head Among the pine-spurs, and his cheek pressed close Unto the moist, chill sod: his fingers clutched A handful of loose weeds and grass and earth, Uprooted in his anguish as he fell,
And slowly from his heart the thick stream flowed, Fouling the green, leaving the fair, sweet face Ghastly, transparent, with blue, stony eyes Staring in blankness on that other one
Who triumphed over him. With hot desire Of instant vengeance I unsheathed my sword To rush upon the slayer, when he turned In his first terror of blood-guiltiness.
* * * * *
Within my heart a something snapped and brake. What was it but the chord of rapturous joy For ever stilled? I tottered and would fall, Had I not leaned against the friendly pine; For all realities of life, unmoored
From their firm anchorage, appeared to float Like hollow phantoms past my dizzy brain. The strange delusion wrought upon my soul That this had been enacted ages since.
This very horror curdled at my heart, This net of trees spread round, these iron heavens, Were closing over me when I had stood,
Unnumbered cycles back, and fronted _him,_ My father; and he felt mine eyes as now, Yet saw me not; and then, as now, that form, The one thing real, lay stretched between us both. The fancy passed, and I stood sane and strong To grasp the truth. Then I remembered all– A few fierce words between them yester eve Concerning some poor plot of pasturage, Soon silenced into courteous, frigid calm: This was the end. I could not meet him now, To curse him, to accuse him, or to save, And draw him from the red entanglement
Coiled by his own hands round his ruined life. God pardon me! My heart that moment held No drop of pity toward this wretched soul; And cowering down, as though his guilt were mine, I fled amidst the savage silences
Of that grim wood, resolved to nurse alone My boundless desolation, shame and grief.
There, in that thick-leaved twilight of high noon, The quiet of the still, suspended air,
Once more my wandering thoughts were calmly ranged, Shepherded by my will. I wept, I prayed A solemn prayer, conceived in agony,
Blessed with response instant, miraculous; For in that hour my spirit was at one
With Him who knows and satisfies her needs. The supplication and the blessing sprang From the same source, inspired divinely both. I prayed for light, self-knowledge, guidance, truth, And these like heavenly manna were rained down To feed my hungered soul. His guilt _was_ mine. What angel had been sent to stay mine arm Until the fateful moment passed away
That would have ushered an eternity Of withering remorse? I found the germs In mine own heart of every human sin,
That waited but occasion’s tempting breath To overgrow with poisoned bloom my life. What God thus far had saved me from myself? Here was the lofty truth revealed, that each Must feel himself in all, must know where’er The great soul acts or suffers or enjoys, His proper soul in kinship there is bound. Then my life-purpose dawned upon my mind, Encouraging as morning. As I lay,
Crushed by the weight of universal love, Which mine own thoughts had heaped upon myself, I heard the clear chime of a slow, sweet bell. I knew it–whence it came and what it sang. From the gray convent nigh the wood it pealed, And called the monks to prayer. Vigil and prayer, Clean lives, white days of strict austerity: Such were the offerings of these holy saints. How far might such not tend to expiate
A riotous world’s indulgence? Here my life, Doubly austere and doubly sanctified,
Might even for that other one atone, So bound to mine, till both should be forgiven.
They sheltered me, not questioning the need That led me to their cloistered solitude. How rich, how freighted with pure influence, With dear security of perfect peace,
Was the first day I passed within those walls! The holy habit of perpetual prayer,
The gentle greetings, the rare temperate speech, The chastening discipline, the atmosphere Of settled and profound tranquillity,
Were even as living waters unto one Who perisheth of thirst. Was this the world That yesterday seemed one huge battle-field For brutish passions? Could the soul of man Withdraw so easily, and erect apart
Her own fair temple for her own high ends? But this serene contentment slowly waned As I discerned the broad disparity
Betwixt the form and spirit of the laws That bound the order in strait brotherhood. Yet when I sought to gain a larger love, More rigid discipline, severer truth,
And more complete surrender of the soul Unto her God, this was to my reproach,
And scoffs and gibes beset me on all sides. In mine own cell I mortified my flesh,
I held aloof from all my brethren’s feasts To wrestle with my viewless enemies,
Till they should leave their blessing on my head; For nightly was I haunted by that face, White, bloodless, as I saw it ‘midst the ferns, Now staring out of darkness, and it held Mine eyes from slumber and my brain from rest And drove me from my straw to weep and pray. Rebellious thoughts such subtle torture wrought Upon my spirit that I lay day-long
In dumb despair, until the blessed hope Of mercy dawned again upon my soul,
As gradual as the slow gold moon that mounts The airy steps of heaven. My faith arose With sure perception that disaster, wrong, And every shadow of man’s destiny
Are merely circumstance, and cannot touch The soul’s fine essence: they exist or die Only as she affirms them or denies.
This faith sustains me even to the end: It floods my heart with peace as surely now As on that day the friars drove me forth, Urging that my asceticism, too harsh,
Endured through pride, would bring into reproach Their customs and their order. Then began My exile in the mountains, where I bode A hunted man. The elements conspired
Against me, and I was the seasons’ sport, Drenched, parched, and scorched and frozen alternately, Burned with shrewd frosts, prostrated by fierce heats, Shivering ‘neath chilling dews and gusty rains, And buffeted by all the winds of heaven. Yet was this period my time of joy:
My daily thoughts perpetual converse held With angels ministrant; mine ears were charmed With sweet accordance of celestial sounds, Song, harp and choir, clear ringing through the air. And visions were revealed unto mine eyes By night and day of Heaven’s very courts, In shadowless, undimmed magnificence.
I gave God thanks, not that He sheltered me, And fed me as He feeds the fowls of air– For had I perished, this too had been well– But for the revelation of His truth,
The glory, the beatitude vouchsafed To exalt, to heal, to quicken, to inspire; So that the pinched, lean excommunicate Was crowned with joy more solid, more secure, Than all the comfort of the vales could bring. Then the good Lord touched certain fervid hearts, Aspiring toward His love, to come to me, Timid and few at first; but as they heard From mine own lips the precious oracles, That soothed the trouble of their souls, appeased Their spiritual hunger, and disclosed
All of the God within them to themselves, They flocked about me, and they hailed me saint, And sware to follow and to serve the good Which my word published and my life declared. Thus the lone hermit of the mountain-top Descended leader of a band of saints,
And midway ‘twixt the summit and the vale I perched my convent. Yet I bated not
One whit of strict restraint and abstinence. And they who love me and who serve the truth Have learned to suffer with me, and have won The supreme joy that is not of the flesh, Foretasting the delights of Paradise.
This faith, to them imparted, will endure After my tongue hath ceased to utter it, And the great peace hath settled on my soul.
EMMA LAZARUS.
A PRINCESS OF THULE.
BY WILLIAM BLACK, AUTHOR OF “THE STRANGE ADVENTURES OF A PHAETON.”
CHAPTER VIII.
“O TERQUE QUATERQUE BEATE!”
Consider what a task this unhappy man Ingram had voluntarily undertaken! Here were two young people presumably in love. One of them was laid under suspicion by several previous love-affairs, though none of these, doubtless, had been so serious as the present. The other scarcely knew her own mind, or perhaps was afraid to question herself too closely, lest all the conflict between duty and inclination, with its fears and anxieties and troubles, should be too suddenly revealed. Moreover, this girl was the only daughter of a solitary and irascible old gentleman living in a remote island; and Ingram had not only undertaken that the love-affairs of the young folks should come all right–thus assuming a responsibility which might have appalled the bravest–but was also expected to inform the King of Borva that his daughter was about to be taken away from him.
Of course, if Sheila had been a properly brought-up young lady, nothing of this sort would have been necessary. We all know what the properly brought-up young lady does under such circumstances. She goes straight to her papa and mamma and says, “My dear papa and mamma, I have been taught by my various instructors that I ought to have no secrets from my dear parents; and I therefore hasten to lay aside any little shyness or modesty or doubt of my own wishes I might feel, for the purpose of explaining to you the extent to which I have become a victim to the tender passion, and of soliciting your advice. I also place before you these letters I have received from the gentleman in question: probably they were sent in confidence to me, but I must banish any scruples that do not coincide with my duty to you. I may say that I respect, and even admire, Mr. So-and-So; and I should be unworthy of the care bestowed upon my education by my dear parents if I were altogether insensible to the advantages of his worldly position. But beyond this point I am at a loss to define my sentiments; and so I ask you, my dear papa and mamma, for permission to study the question for some little time longer, when I may be able to furnish you with a more accurate report of my feelings. At the same time, if the interest I have in this young man is likely to conflict with the duty I owe to my dear parents, I ask to be informed of the fact; and I shall then teach myself to guard against the approach of that insidious passion which might make me indifferent to the higher calls and interests of life.” Happy the man who marries such a woman! No agonizing quarrels and delirious reconciliations, no piteous entreaties and fits of remorse and impetuous self-sacrifices await him, but a beautiful, methodical, placid life, as calm and accurate and steadily progressive as the multiplication table. His household will be a miracle of perfect arrangement. The relations between the members of it will be as strictly defined as the pattern of the paper on the walls. And how can a quarrel arise when a dissecter of the emotions is close at hand to say where the divergence of opinion or interest began? and how can a fit of jealousy be provoked in the case of a person who will split up her affections into fifteen parts, give ten-fifteenths to her children, three-fifteenths to her parents, and the remainder to her husband? Should there be any dismal fractions going about, friends and acquaintances may come in for them.
But how was Sheila to go to her father and explain to him what she could not explain to herself? She had never dreamed of marriage. She had never thought of having to leave Borva and her father’s house. But she had some vague feeling that in the future lay many terrible possibilities that she did not as yet dare to look at–until, at least, she was more satisfied as to the present. And how could she go to her father with such a chaos of unformed wishes and fears to place before him? That such a duty should have devolved upon Ingram was certainly odd enough, but it was not her doing. His knowledge of the position of these young people was not derived from her. But, having got it, he had himself asked her to leave the whole affair in his hands, with that kindness and generosity which had more than once filled her heart with an unspeakable gratitude toward him.
“Well, you _are_ a good fellow!” said Lavender to him when he heard of this decision.
“Bah!” said the other with a shrug of his shoulders. “I mean to amuse myself. I shall move you about like pieces on a chess-board, and have a pretty game with you. How to checkmate the king with a knight and a princess, in any number of moves you like–that is the problem; and my princess has a strong power over the king where she is just now.”
“It’s an uncommonly awkward business, you know, Ingram,” said Lavender ruefully.
“Well, it is. Old Mackenzie is a tough old fellow to deal with, and you’ll do no good by making a fight of it. Wait! Difficulties don’t look so formidable when you take them one by one as they turn up. If you really love the girl, and mean to take your chance of getting her, and if she cares enough for you to sacrifice a good deal for your sake, there is nothing to fear.”
“I can answer for myself, any way,” said Lavender in a tone of voice that Ingram rather liked: the young man did not always speak with the same quietness, thoughtfulness and modesty.
And how naturally and easily it came about, after all! They were back again at Borva. They had driven round and about Lewis, and had finished up with Stornoway; and, now that they had got back to the island in Loch Roag, the quaint little drawing-room had even to Lavender a homely and friendly look. The big stuffed fishes and the sponge shells were old acquaintances; and he went to hunt up Sheila’s music just as if he had known that dusky corner for years.
“Yes, yes,” called Mackenzie, “it iss the English songs we will try now.”
He had a notion that he was himself rather a good hand at a part song–just as Sheila had innocently taught him to believe that he was a brilliant whist-player when he had mastered the art of returning his partner’s lead–but fortunately at this moment he was engaged with a long pipe and a big tumbler of hot whisky and water. Ingram was similarly employed, lying back in a cane-bottomed easy-chair, and placidly watching the smoke ascending to the roof. Sometimes he cast an eye to the young folks at the other end of the room. They formed a pretty sight, he thought. Lavender was a good-looking fellow enough, and there was something pleasing in the quiet and assiduous fashion in which he waited upon Sheila, and in the almost timid way in which he spoke to her. Sheila herself sat at the piano, clad all in slate-gray silk, with a narrow band of scarlet velvet round her neck; and it was only by a chance turning of the head that Ingram caught the tender and handsome profile, broken only by the outward sweep of the long eyelashes.
Love in thine eyes for ever plays,
Sheila sang, with her father keeping time by patting his forefinger on the table.
He in thy snowy bosom strays,
sang Lavender; and then the two voices joined together:
He makes thy rosy lips his care,
And walks the mazes of thy hair.
Or were there not three voices? Surely, from the back part of the room, the musicians could hear a wandering bass come in from time to time, especially at such portions as “Ah, he never–ah, he never touched thy heart!” which old Mackenzie considered very touching. But there was something quaint and friendly and pleasant in the pathos of those English songs, which made them far more acceptable to him than Sheila’s wild and melancholy legends of the sea. He sang “Ah, he never, never touched thy heart!” with an outward expression of grief, but with much inward satisfaction. Was it the quaint phraseology of the old duets that awoke in him some faint ambition after histrionic effect? At all events, Sheila proceeded to another of his favorites, “All’s Well,” and here, amid the brisk music, the old man had an excellent opportunity of striking in at random–
The careful watch patrols the deck
To guard the ship from foes or wreck.
These two lines he had absolutely mastered, and always sang them, whatever might be the key he happened to light on, with great vigor. He soon went the length of improvising a part for himself in the closing passages, and laid down his pipe altogether as he sang–
What cheer? Brother, quickly tell!
Above! Below! Good-night! All, all’s well!
From that point, however, Sheila and her companion wandered away into fields of melody whither the King of Borva could not follow them; so he was content to resume his pipe and listen placidly to the pretty airs. He caught but bits and fragments of phrases and sentiments, but they evidently were comfortable, merry, good-natured songs for young folks to sing. There was a good deal of love-making, and rosy morns appearing, and merry zephyrs, and such odd things, which, sung briskly and gladly by two young and fresh voices, rather drew the hearts of contemplative listeners to the musicians.
“They sing very well whatever,” said Mackenzie with a critical air to Ingram when the young people were so busily engaged with their own affairs as apparently to forget the presence of the others. “Oh yes, they sing very well whatever; and what should the young folks sing about but making love and courting, and all that?”
“Natural enough,” said Ingram, looking rather wistfully at the two at the other end of the room. “I suppose Sheila will have a sweetheart some day?”
“Oh yes, Sheila will hef a sweetheart some day,” said her father good-humoredly. “Sheila is a good-looking girl: she will hef a sweetheart some day.”
“She will be marrying too, I suppose,” said Ingram cautiously.
“Oh yes, she will marry–Sheila will marry: what will be the life of a young girl if she does not marry?”
At this moment, as Ingram afterward described it, a sort of “flash of inspiration” darted in upon him, and he resolved there and then to brave the wrath of the old king, and place all the conspiracy before him, if only the music kept loud enough to prevent his being overheard.
“It will be hard on you to part with Sheila when she marries,” said Ingram, scarcely daring to look up.
“Oh, ay, it will be that,” said Mackenzie cheerfully enough. “But it iss every one will hef to do that, and no great harm comes of it. Oh no, it will not be much whatever; and Sheila, she will be very glad in a little while after, and it will be enough for me to see that she is ferry contented and happy. The young folk must marry, you will see; and what is the use of marrying if it is not when they are young? But Sheila, she will think of none of these things. It was young Mr. MacIntyre of Sutherland–you hef seen him last year in Stornoway: he hass three thousand acres of a deer forest in Sutherland–and he will be ferry glad to marry my Sheila. But I will say to him, ‘It is not for me to say yes or no to you, Mr. MacIntyre: it is Sheila herself will tell you that.’ But he wass afraid to speak to her; and Sheila herself will know nothing of why he came twice to Borva the last year.”
“It is very good of you to leave Sheila quite unbiased in her choice,” said Ingram: “many fathers would have been sorely tempted by that deer forest.”
Old Mackenzie laughed a loud laugh of derision, that fortunately did not stop Lavender’s execution of “I would that my love would silently.”
“What the teffle,” said Mackenzie, “hef I to want a deer forest for my Sheila? Sheila is no fisherman’s lass. She has plenty for herself, and she will marry just the young man she wants to marry, and no other one: that is what she will do, by Kott!”
All this was most hopeful. If Mackenzie had himself been advocating Lavender’s suit, could he have said more? But notwithstanding all these frank and generous promises, dealing with a future which the old man considered as indefinitely remote, Ingram was still afraid of the announcement he was about to make.
“Sheila is fortunately situated,” he said, “in having a father who thinks only of her happiness. But I suppose she has never yet shown a preference for any one?”
“Not for any one but yourself,” said her father with a laugh.
And Ingram laughed too, but in an embarrassed way, and his sallow face grew darker with a blush. Was there not something painful in the unintentional implication that of course Ingram could not be considered a possible lover of Sheila’s, and that the girl herself was so well aware of it that she could openly testify to her regard for him?
“And it would be a good thing for Sheila,” continued her father, more gravely, “if there wass any young man about the Lewis that she would tek a liking to; for it will be some day I can no more look after her, and it would be bad for her to be left alone all by herself in the island.”
“And you don’t think you see before you now some one who might take on him the charge of Sheila’s future?” said Ingram, looking toward Lavender.
“The English gentleman?” said Mackenzie with a smile. “No, that any way is not possible.”
“I fancy it is more than possible,” said Ingram, resolved to go straight at it. “I know for a fact that he would like to marry your daughter, and I think that Sheila, without knowing it herself almost, is well inclined toward him.”
The old man started up from his chair: “Eh? what! my Sheila?”
“Yes, papa,” said the girl, turning round at once.
She caught sight of a strange look on his face, and in an instant was by his side: “Papa, what is the matter with you?”
“Nothing, Sheila, nothing,” he said impatiently. “I am a little tired of the music, that is all. But go on with the music. Go back to the piano, Sheila, and go on with the music, and Mr. Ingram and me, we will go outside for a little while.”
Mackenzie walked out of the room, and said aloud in the hall, “Ay, are you coming, Mr. Ingram? It iss a fine night this night, and the wind is in a very good way for the weather.”
And then, as he went out to the front, he hummed aloud, so that Sheila should hear,
Who goes there? Stranger, quickly tell! A friend! The word! Good-night! All’s well! All’s well! Good-night! All’s well!
Ingram followed the old man outside, with a somewhat guilty conscience suggesting odd things to him. Would it not be possible now to shut one’s ears for the next half hour? Angry words were only little perturbations in the air. If you shut your ears till they were all over, what harm could be done? All the big facts of life would remain the same. The sea, the sky, the hills, the human beings around you, even your desire of sleep for the night and your wholesome longing for breakfast in the morning, would all remain, and the angry words would have passed away. But perhaps it was a proper punishment that he should now go out and bear all the wrath of this fierce old gentleman, whose daughter he had conspired to carry off. Mackenzie was walking up and down the path outside in the cool and silent night. There was not much moon now, but a clear and lambent twilight showed all the familiar features of Loch Roag and the southern hills, and down there in the bay you could vaguely make out the Maighdean-mhara rocking in the tiny waves that washed in on the white shore. Ingram had never looked on this pretty picture with a less feeling of delight.
“Well, you see, Mr. Mackenzie,” he was beginning, “you must make this excuse for him–”
But Mackenzie put aside Lavender at once. It was all about Sheila that he wanted to know. There was no anger in his words; only a great anxiety, and sometimes an extraordinary and pathetic effort to take a philosophical view of the situation. What had Sheila said? Was Sheila deeply interested in the young man? Would it please Sheila if he was to go in-doors and give at once his free consent to her marrying this Mr. Lavender?
“Oh, you must not think,” said Mackenzie, with a certain loftiness of air even amidst his great perturbation and anxiety–“you must not think I hef not foreseen all this. It wass some day or other Sheila will be sure to marry; and although I did not expect–no, I did not expect _that_–that she would marry a stranger and an Englishman, if it will please her that is enough. You cannot tell a young lass the one she should marry: it iss all a chance the one she likes, and if she does not marry him it is better she will not marry at all. Oh yes, I know that ferry well. And I hef known there wass a time coming when I would give away my Sheila to some young man; and there iss no use complaining of it. But you hef not told me much about this young man, or I hef forgotten: it is the same thing whatever. He has not much money, you said–he is waiting for some money. Well, this is what I will do: I will give him all my money if he will come and live in the Lewis.”
All the philosophy he had been mustering up fell away from that last sentence. It was like the cry of a drowning man who sees the last life-boat set out for shore, leaving him to his fate. And Ingram had not a word to say in reply to that piteous entreaty.
“I do not ask him to stop in Borva: no, it iss a small place for one that hass lived in a town. But the Lewis, that is quite different; and there iss ferry good houses in Stornoway.”
“But surely, sir,” said Ingram, “you need not consider all this just yet. I am sure neither of them has thought of any such thing.”
“No,” said Mackenzie, recovering himself, “perhaps not. But we hef our duties to look at the future of young folks. And you will say that Mr. Lavender hass only expectations of money?”
“Well, the expectation is almost a certainty. His aunt, I have told you, is a very rich old lady, who has no other near relations, and she is exceedingly fond of him, and would do anything for him. I am sure the allowance he has now is greatly in excess of what she spends on herself.”
“But they might quarrel, you know–they might quarrel. You hef always to look to the future: they might quarrel, and what will he do then?”
“Why, you don’t suppose he couldn’t support himself if the worst were to come to the worst? He is an amazingly clever fellow–”
“Ay, that is very good,” said Mackenzie in a cautious sort of way, “but has he ever made any money?”
“Oh, I fancy not–nothing to speak of. He has sold some pictures, but I think he has given more away.”
“Then it iss not easy, tek my word for it, Mr. Ingram, to begin a new trade if you are twenty-five years of age; and the people who will tek your pictures for nothing, will they pay for them if you wanted the money?”
It was obviously the old man’s eager wish to prove to himself that, somehow or other, Lavender might come to have no money, and be made dependent on his father-in-law. So far, indeed, from sharing the sentiments ordinarily attributed to that important relative, he would have welcomed with a heartfelt joy the information that the man who, as he expected, was about to marry his daughter was absolutely penniless. Not even all the attractions of that deer forest in Sutherlandshire–particularly fascinating as they must have been to a man of his education and surroundings–had been able to lead the old King of Borva even into hinting to his daughter that the owner of that property would like to marry her. Sheila was to choose for herself. She was not like a fisherman’s lass, bound to consider ways and means. And now that she had chosen, or at least indicated the possibility of her doing so, her father’s chief desire was that his future son-in-law should come and take and enjoy his money, so only that Sheila might not be carried away from him for ever.
“Well, I will see about it,” said Mackenzie with an affectation of cheerful and practical shrewdness. “Oh yes, I will see about it when Sheila has made up her mind. He is a very good young man, whatever–”
“He is the best-hearted fellow I know,” said Ingram warmly. “I don’t think Sheila has much to fear if she marries him. If you had known him as long as I have, you would know how considerate he is to everybody about him, how generous he is, how good-natured and cheerful, and so forth: in short, he is a thorough good fellow, that’s what I have to say about him.”
“It iss well for him he will hef such a champion,” said Mackenzie with a smile: “there is not many Sheila will pay attention to as she does to you.”
They went in-doors again, Ingram scarcely knowing how he had got so easily through the ordeal, but very glad it was over.
Sheila was still at the piano, and on their entering she said, “Papa, here is a song you must learn to sing with me.”
“And what iss it, Sheila?” he said, going over to her.
“‘Time has not thinned my flowing hair.'”
He put his hand on her head and said, “I hope it will be a long time before he will thin your hair, Sheila.”
The girl looked up surprised. Scotch folks are, as a rule, somewhat reticent in their display of affection, and it was not often that her father talked to her in that way. What was there in his face that made her glance instinctively toward Ingram. Somehow or other her hand sought her father’s hand, and she rose and went away from the piano, with her head bent down and tears beginning to tell in her eyes.
“Yes, that is a capital song,” said Ingram loudly. Sing ‘The Arethusa,’ Lavender–‘Said the saucy Arethusa.'”
Lavender, knowing what had taken place, and not daring to follow with his eyes Sheila and her father, who had gone to the other end of the room, sang the song. Never was a gallant and devil-may-care sea-song sung so hopelessly without spirit. But the piano made a noise and the verses took up time. When he had finished he almost feared to turn round, and yet there was nothing dreadful in the picture that presented itself. Sheila was sitting on her father’s knee, with her head buried in his bosom, while he was patting her head and talking in a low voice to her. The King of Borva did not look particularly fierce.
“Yes, it iss a teffle of a good song,” he said suddenly. “Now get up, Sheila, and go and tell Mairi we will have a bit of bread and cheese before going to bed. And there will be a little hot water wanted in the other room, for this room it iss too full of the smoke.”
Sheila, as she went out of the room, had her head cast down and perhaps an extra tinge of color in her young and pretty face. But surely, Lavender thought to himself as he watched her anxiously, she did not look grieved. As for her father, what should he do now? Turn suddenly round and beg Mackenzie’s pardon, and throw himself on his generosity? When he did, with much inward trembling, venture to approach the old man, he found no such explanation possible. The King of Borva was in one of his grandest moods–dignified, courteous, cautious, and yet inclined to treat everybody and everything with a sort of lofty good-humor. He spoke to Lavender in the most friendly way, but it was about the singular and startling fact that modern research had proved many of the Roman legends to be utterly untrustworthy. Mr. Mackenzie observed that the man was wanting in proper courage who feared to accept the results of such inquiries. It was better that we should know the truth, and then the kings who had really made Rome great might emerge from the fog of tradition in their proper shape. There was something quite sympathetic in the way he talked of those ill-treated sovereigns, whom the vulgar mind had clothed in mist.
Lavender was sorely beset by the rival claims of Rome and Borva upon his attention. He was inwardly inclined to curse Numa Pompilius–which would have been ineffectual–when he found that personage interfering with a wild effort to discover why Mackenzie should treat him in this way. And then it occurred to him that, as he had never said a word to Mackenzie about this affair, it was too much to expect that Sheila’s father should himself open the subject. On the contrary, Mackenzie was bent on extending a grave courtesy to his guest, so that the latter should not feel ill at ease until it suited himself to make any explanations he might choose. It was not Mackenzie’s business to ask this young man if he wanted to marry Sheila. No. The king’s daughter, if she were to be won at all, was to be won by a suitor, and it was not for her father to be in a hurry about it. So Lavender got back into the region of early Roman history, and tried to recall what he had learned in Livy, and quite coincided with everything that Niebuhr had said or proved, and with everything that Mackenzie thought Niebuhr had said or proved. He was only too glad, indeed, to find himself talking to Sheila’s father in this friendly fashion.
Then Sheila came in and told them that supper was laid in the adjoining room. At that modest meal a great good-humor prevailed. Sometimes, it is true, it occurred to Ingram that Sheila occasionally cast an anxious glance to her father, as if she were trying to discover whether he was really satisfied, or whether he were not merely pretending satisfaction to please her; but for the rest the party was a most friendly and merry one. Lavender, naturally enough, was in the highest of spirits, and nothing could exceed the lighthearted endeavors he made to amuse and interest and cheer his companions. Sheila, indeed, sat up later than usual, even although pipes were lit again, and the slate-gray silk likely to bear witness to the fact in the morning. How comfortable and homely was this sort of life in the remote stone building overlooking the sea! He began to think that he could live always in Borva if only Sheila were with him as his companion.
Was it an actual fact, then, he asked himself next morning, that he stood confessed to the small world of Borva as Sheila’s accepted lover? Not a word on the subject had passed between Mackenzie and himself, and yet he found himself assuming the position of a younger relative, and rather expecting advice from the old man. He began to take a great interest, too, in the local administration of the island: he examined the window-fastenings of Mackenzie’s house and saw that they would be useful in the winter, and expressed to Sheila’s father his confidential opinion that the girl should not be allowed to go out in the Maighdean-mhara without Duncan.
“She will know as much about boats as Duncan himself,” said her father with a smile. “But Sheila will not go out when the rough weather begins.”
“Of course you keep her in-doors then,” said the younger man, already assuming some little charge over Sheila’s comfort.
The father laughed aloud at this simplicity on the part of the Englishman: “If we wass to keep in-doors in the bad weather, it would be all the winter we would be in-doors! There iss no day at all Sheila will not be out some time or other; and she is never so well as in the hard weather, when she will be out always in the snow and the frost, and hef plenty of exercise and amusement.”
“She is not often ailing, I suppose?” said Lavender.
“She is as strong as a young pony, that is what Sheila is,” said her father proudly. “And there is no one in the island will run so fast, or walk so long without tiring, or carry things from the shore as she will–not one.”
But here he suddenly checked himself. “That is,” he said with some little expression of annoyance, “I wass saying Sheila could do that if it wass any use; but she will not do such things, like a fisherman’s lass that hass to keep in the work.”
“Oh, of course not,” said Lavender hastily. “But still, you know, it is pleasant to know she is so strong and well.”
And at this moment Sheila herself appeared, accompanied by her great deerhound, and testifying by the bright color in her face to the assurances of her health her father had been giving. She had just come up and over the hill from Borvabost, while as yet breakfast had not been served. Somehow or other, Lavender fancied she never looked so bright and bold and handsome as in the early morning, with the fresh sea-air tingling the color in her cheeks, and the sunlight shining in the clear eyes or giving from time to time a glimpse of her perfect teeth. But this morning she did not seem quite so frankly merry as usual. She patted the deerhound’s head, and rather kept her eyes away from her father and his companion. And then she took Bras away to give him his breakfast, just as Ingram appeared to bid her good-morning and ask her what she meant by being about so early.
How anxiously Lavender now began to calculate on the remaining days of their stay in Borva! They seemed so few. He got up at preposterously early hours to make each day as long as possible, but it slipped away with a fatal speed; and already he began to think of Stornoway and the Clansman and his bidding good-bye to Sheila. He had said no more to her of any pledge as regarded the future. He was content to see that she was pleased to be with him; and happy indeed were their rambles about the island, their excursions in Sheila’s boat, their visits to the White Water in search of salmon. Nor had he yet spoken to Sheila’s father. He knew that Mackenzie knew, and both seemed to take it for granted that no good could come of a formal explanation until Sheila herself should make her wishes known. That, indeed, was the only aspect of the case that apparently presented itself to the old King of Borva. He forgot altogether those precautions and investigations which are supposed to occupy the mind of a future father-in-law, and only sought to see how Sheila was affected toward the young man who was soon about to leave the island. When he saw her pleased to be walking with Lavender and talking with him of an evening, he was pleased, and would rather have a cold dinner than break in upon them to hurry them home. When he saw her disappointed because Lavender had been unfortunate in his salmon-fishing, he was ready to swear at Duncan for not having had the fish in a better temper. And the most of his conversation with Ingram consisted of an endeavor to convince himself that, after all, what had happened was for the best, and that Sheila seemed to be happy.