Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume V Part 21

The load that had for many days pressed down the treasurer's spirits gradually pa.s.sed off as the deacon proceeded, and a new light shone on his mind; his countenance brightened up.

"Deacon," he said, "the truth begins to dawn upon me, and I feel a new man. Confess at once that the whole has been a contrivance of the smugglers to run their goods, availing themselves of the real major's coach. It was a bold game, deacon, and, like all unlawful games, a losing one in the end. Still, it is strange what inducement they could have had for their cruel conduct to me on that miserable night, or how I was enabled to survive, or retained my reason. I have been often lost in fearful misery upon this subject since the fever left me; but you, my friend, have restored peace to my mind."

And they parted for the evening. The treasurer's recovery was now most rapid. In a few days, all traces of his illness were nearly obliterated, and he went about his affairs as formerly. An altered man--all his wife's influence for evil was gone for ever; calmly and dispa.s.sionately he remonstrated with her; for a few days she struggled hard to retain her abused power; tears and threatened desertion of his house were used--but he heard her unmoved, still keeping his stern resolve with a quietness of manner which her cunning soon perceived it was not in her power to shake. She ceased to endeavour to shake it. His mother was restored to her proper station, and all was henceforth peace and harmony.

Several years had rolled on. The deacons.h.i.+p was, next election, bestowed upon Treasurer Kerr. He had served with credit, and his business prospered. The adventure with the major's coach was only talked of as an event of times long pa.s.sed, when, one forenoon, an elderly person, in a seaman's dress, much soiled, entered his workshop, and, addressing him by name, requested employment. Being very much in want of men at the time, he at once said he had no objection to employ him, if he was a good hand.

"I cannot say, I am, now what I once was in this same shop," he replied.

"It is long since I forsook the craft; but, if you are willing to employ me, I will do my best."

The stranger was at once engaged, and gave satisfaction to his employer--betraying a knowledge of events that had happened to the family, and that were only traditionary to his master. His curiosity became awakened; to gratify which, he took the man home, one evening, after his day's work was over. For some time after they entered the house, the stranger became pensive and reserved--his eyes, every opportunity, wandering to the mother of his master, with a look of anxious suspense. At length, he arose from his seat, and said, in a voice tremulous with emotion--

"Mistress! my ever-revered mistress! have you entirely forgot Watty Brown, the runaway apprentice of your husband?"

"Watty Brown, the yellow-haired laddie," e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed she, "I can never forget. He was always a favourite of mine. You cannot be him; your hair is grey?"

"My good mistress, old and grey-headed as you see me," said he, "I am Watty Brown; but much has pa.s.sed over my once yellow head to bleach it white as you see. My master here was but an infant in your arms, when I left Edinburgh. Often have I rocked him in his cradle. After all that has pa.s.sed, I am here again, safe. I am sure there is no one present would bring me into trouble for what is now so long pa.s.sed."

"How time flies!" said she. "The Porteous mob is in my mind as if it had happened last week. O Watty! you were always a reckless lad. Sore, sore you have rued, I do not doubt, that night. Do tell us what has come of you since?"

"Well, mistress, you recollect there was little love between the apprentices of Edinburgh and Captain Porteous. All this might have pa.s.sed off in smart skirmishes on a king's birthday, or so; but his brutal behaviour at poor Robinson's execution, and slaughter of the townsmen, could not be forgiven by lord or tradesman. Well, as all the land knows, he was condemned, and all were satisfied; for the guilty was to suffer. But his pardon came; the bloodshedder of the innocent was to leave the jail as if he had done nothing wrong! Was this to be endured?

Murmurs and threats were in every tradesman's mouth; the feuds of the apprentices were quelled, for a time; all colours joined in hatred of the murderer. Yet no plan of operations was adopted. In this combustible frame of mind, the drums of the city beat to arms. I rushed from this very house to know the cause, and saw the trades' lads crowding towards the jail. I inquired what was their intention.

"'To execute righteous judgment!' a strange voice said, in the crowd.

"I returned to the shop; and, taking the forehammer, as the best weapon I could find, in my haste, with good will joined, and was at the door amongst the foremost of those who attempted to break it open. Numbers had torches. l.u.s.tily did I apply my hammer to its studded front. Vainly did I exert myself, until fire was put to it, when it at length gave way. As I ceased from my efforts, one of the crowd, carrying a torch, put a guinea into my hand, and said--

"'Well done, my good lad. Take this; you have wrought for it. If you are like to come to trouble for this night's work, fly to Anstruther, and you will find a friend.'

"While he spoke, those who had entered the jail were dragging Porteous down the stairs. My heart melted within me at the piteous sight. My anger left me, as his wailing voice implored mercy. I left the throng, who were hurrying him up towards the Lawnmarket, and hastened back to the workshop, where I deposited the hammer, and threw myself upon my bed; but I could not remain. The image of the wretched man, as he was dragged forth, appeared to be by my side. Partly to know the result, partly to ease my mind, I went again into the street. The crowds were stealing quietly to their homes. From some neighbour apprentices I learned the fatal catastrophe. I now became greatly alarmed for my safety, as numbers who knew me well had seen my efforts against the door of the jail. Bitterly did I now regret the active part I had taken. My immediate impulse was to fly from the city; but in what direction I knew not. Thus irresolute, I stood at the Netherbow Port, when the same person that gave me the guinea at the jail-door approached to where I stood. Embracing the opportunity, I told him the fear I was in of being informed upon, when the magistrates began to investigate and endeavour to discover those who had been active in the affair.

"'Well, my good fellow, follow me. It will not serve your purpose standing there.'

"There were about a dozen along with him. We proceeded to the beach at Fisherrow--going round Arthur's Seat, by Duddingston--and were joined by many others. Two boats lay for them, on the beach, at a distance from the harbour. We went on board and set sail for Fife, where we arrived before morning dawned. I found my new friend and acquaintance was captain and owner of a small vessel, who traded to the coast of Holland.

He scrupled not to run a cargo upon his own account, without putting the revenue officers to any trouble, either measuring or weighing it. He had been the intimate friend of Robinson, and often sailed in the same vessel. I joined his crew; and, on the following day, we sailed for Antwerp. But why should I trouble you with the various turns my fortunes have taken for the last thirty-seven years? At times, I was stationary, and wrought at my trade; at others, I was at sea. My home has princ.i.p.ally been in Rotterdam; but my heart has ever been in Auld Reekie. Many a time I joined the crew of a lugger, and clubbed my proportion of the adventure; my object being--more than the gain--to get a sight of it; for I feared to come to town--being ignorant as to how matters stood regarding my share in the Porteous riot. We heard in Holland only of the threats of the government; but I was always rejoiced to hear that no one had been convicted. Several years had pa.s.sed before it was safe for me to return; and, when it was, I could not endure the thought of returning to be a bound apprentice, to serve out the few months of my engagement that were to run when I left my master. Years pa.s.sed on. I had acc.u.mulated several hundred guilders, with the view of coming to end my days in Edinburgh, when I got acquainted with a townsman deeply engaged in the smuggling line. I unfortunately embarked my all. He had some a.s.sociates in the Cowgate, who disposed of, to great advantage, any goods he succeeded in bringing to them. His colleagues on sh.o.r.e had provided a coach and horses, with suitable dresses, to personate Major Weir's carriage, agreeably to the most approved description. The coach and horses were furnished by an innkeeper, whom they supplied with liquors at a low rate. My unfortunate adventure left the port, and I anxiously waited its return for several months; but neither s.h.i.+p nor friend made their appearance. At length he came to my lodgings in the utmost poverty--all had been lost. Of what use was complaint? He had lost ten times more than I had--everything had gone against him. His narrative was short. He reached the coast in safety, and landed his cargo in part, when he was forced to run for it, a revenue cutter coming in sight. After a long chase, he was forced to run his vessel on sh.o.r.e, near St. Andrew's, and got ash.o.r.e with only his clothes, and the little cash he had on board. He returned to where his goods were deposited--all that were saved. The coach was rigged out, and reached the Cowgate in the usual manner, when it was attacked and captured, in spite of stout resistance, by a party of citizens. What of the goods remained in the neighbourhood of Musselburgh, were detained for the loss of the horses and coach. I was now sick of Holland, and resolved to return, poor as I left it, to the haunts of my happiest recollections. To be rich, and riches still acc.u.mulating in a foreign land, the idea of what we can at any time enjoy, a return--makes it bearable. But poverty and disappointment sadden the heart of the exile; and make the toil that would be counted light at home, a burden that sinks him early in a foreign grave."

"Did your partner make no mention of carrying off one of the townsmen in the coach?" said the treasurer.

"Excuse me, master, for not mentioning it," replied Walter. "He did give me a full account of all that happened to you, and all you said; and regretted, when he heard of your illness, what, at the time, he was forced to do in self-preservation. When you fell out of the stair he meant to enter, he knew not who you were--a friend he knew you could not be, for only other two in the city had his secret. That you were a revenue officer, on the look-out for him, was his first idea. He was as much alarmed as you, until he found you were insensible. Not a moment was to be lost. The goods were hurried out, and you placed in the carriage, which was on its way from town before you showed any symptoms of returning consciousness. His first intention was to carry you on board his lugger, and convey you to Holland, then sell you to the Dutch East India Company, that you might never return to tell what you had been a witness of that night. The terror you were in, the sincerity of your confession, and belief that you were in the power of the major, saved you from the miserable fate he had fixed for you. Pity struggled against the caution and avarice which urged him to take you away. Pity triumphed--you had been both play and schoolfellows in former years. You were released--you know the rest."

The wife and mother scarce breathed, while Wattie related the danger the treasurer had been in; he himself gave a shudder--all thanked G.o.d for his escape. Wattie Brown continued in his employ, as foreman over his work, and died about the year 1789. Widow Horner did not long survive that night of intense anguish--she died of a broken heart in her son's house. It was remarked by all, that, while Thomas Kerr prospered, Walter Horner, who was at one time much the richer man, gradually sank into the most abject circ.u.mstances, and died a pensioner on his incorporation, more despised than pitied. And thus ends our tale of Major Weir's famous night airings in Edinburgh.

THE DIVINITY STUDENT.

"So fades, so perishes, grows dim, and dies, All that the world is proud of."

WORDSWORTH.

Although the revelations of a divine philosophy have taught us no more to entertain the blind notions of the Epicureans of old, that everything is the result of chance--or to agree with the Stoics, that the revolutions of the planetary system decree the fates and regulate the actions of mankind--yet the vicissitudes of human life, and the uncertainties of earthly hope, continue no less frequently to be the theme of the poet, and the regret of the philosopher. The truth is deep; nor is it ever suffered to be so long uncalled forth from our memories as to allow of its force being blunted. Striking and melancholy examples continually crowd upon us. Daily we are summoned to behold some n.o.ble aspiration blasted--to behold youth cut off in the bud--learning disappointed of its reward--worth suffering under the grip of misfortune--and industry sowing the wind to reap the whirlwind. These are dread and warning lessons to us, yet affording the surest marks of proof, that this sublunary and distempered world cannot be the final abode of man; that the seeds sown here will grow to maturity in a more genial clime; and that the events which now baffle the scrutiny of our moral reason, will yet appear to us revealed in clear and unperplexed beauty.

The story I am now about to narrate is simple in the extreme, yet affording scope for melancholy, and, it is to be hoped, not unprofitable meditation.

Robert Brown, a Scottish carrier, living in a remote district in Roxburghs.h.i.+re, contrived to bring up his family, consisting of five sons, by a course of unwearied industry and rigid economy, to an age at which the youngest had attained his sixteenth year--a time when it was thought by his friends that he might be able to take himself as a burthen from off his father's hands, and set about something towards his ultimate provision for life.

Consistently with their humble condition in the world, his brothers had all received the usual education of the Scottish peasantry--that is to say, they had been taught reading, writing, and the elements of arithmetic; and, at suitable ages, had been alternately called from school to a.s.sist in farm work. They were fortunate in obtaining employment from the neighbouring landlords; and, though the servants of different masters, none of them were above two miles distant from their father's cottage. William, the youngest, had been destined from the cradle for something superior to the rest. They looked far forward, through the vista of years, to him as the pride of their old age, and the representative who was to carry down the respectability, credit, and good name of the family, to the succeeding generation. So far from the rest being chagrined at the partiality thus openly avowed, they contributed, "each in his degree," to the furtherance of the plan chalked out by their parents; judging, with honest pride, if William was destined to move in a sphere somewhat superior to their own, that a portion of the common approbation must necessarily be reflected on themselves, his relations. Thus all were united and amiable; no selfish and grovelling feelings introduced themselves to mar the cordiality of affection, or interfere with motives so upright and so honourable.

The object of this concentrated flood of generous love was certainly not an unworthy one. Having been born some years posterior to the other members of the family, he had never been a sharer in the youthful sports of his brothers, but was remembered by them as a favourite object on their Sat.u.r.day evening meetings at their father's cottage. The frame of William was by no means so robust as that of the rest; and his dark glossy hair only set off more plainly the pale, and sometimes sallow hue of complexion. From both of these circ.u.mstances, his comparative youth, and his comparative delicacy of const.i.tution, he ran a considerable chance of being, what is commonly termed, a spoiled child. He had, of course, contracted, from indulgence, a waywardness of disposition, which, however, by his innate modesty and good sense, was kept within very excusable limits, and soon wore entirely away, as the forwardness of boyhood began to subside into the more pensive thoughtfulness of maturer years.

After having exhausted all the means of instruction which an adjacent town supplied, he was obliged to have recourse to the grammar school of a neighbouring parish, about four miles distant from his home. For two years, neither summer's heat nor winter's snow were for a day allowed to frustrate his walking thither. He never returned till late in the afternoon; sometimes the evening star was the herald of his approach; and, during the brief days, towards the end or about the commencement of the year, darkness had set in before his face glimmered by the bickering fire of his parental hearth. Habits of temperance had been familiar to him all his days. Some cheese and oaten cake, regularly deposited in his satchel, served him for dinner, during the interval of school hours, after mid-day--and these he ate, walking about or reclining on the turf; but the warm tea and toast always awaited his evening arrival, and were set before him with all a mother's mindfulness and punctuality.

He was diligent at his books; and, being endowed by nature with good parts, he made a very fair and promising progress. He had none of that intellectual cleverness which makes advances by sudden fits and starts, and then relapses into apathy and idleness; but his steady industry, his attention, and his a.s.siduity, gave omens favourable to his success, while his gentle and conciliatory manners gained him not only the love of his schoolfellows, but the esteem of his instructor.

It was now evident, that, from the pains and expense taken in regard to his education, he was destined for the pulpit--that climax of the honours and distinctions ever aimed at by a poor but respectable Scottish family. Years of rigid economy had been pa.s.sed, almost without affording any hope as to the ultimate success and attainment of their laudable end.

His destination, almost unknown to himself, having been thus early fixed, it was resolved that he should be sent to Edinburgh, to attend the college there, professedly as a student of divinity. The expense, resulting from this resolution, bore hard upon their slender circ.u.mstances; but they were determined still farther to exert themselves, indulging the fond hope, that, one day or other, they would reap the reward of their honourable endeavours in the prosperity of their son.

To the university he set off, amid the ill-concealed tears of some, and the open and hearty blessings of all--so much were they attached to one, who, till that day, had never been even more temporarily separated from them, without many a caution, perhaps little required, to guard against the evil contaminations of the capital--little thinking, in their simple minds, that the slender means allowed him were barely sufficient for necessary purposes, without indulging in any uncalled for luxury, and that gold is the only key that fits pleasure's casket.

He found himself seated in the Scottish metropolis, in a cheap but snug and comfortable lodging, and encompa.s.sed by other sights and sounds than those which he had been accustomed to. The change struck on his heart with a low deep feeling of despondency, which a little time, conjoined with the urbanity and kindness of all around him, was sufficient to dissipate. The immense ma.s.s of lofty and majestic buildings, exhibiting their roofs in widening circles around him, and stretching far away, like the broken billows of an ocean, created thoughts of tumult, discord, and perplexity, when contrasted with the serene beauty of the calm pastoral district which he had left; and, amid the nightly crowd of population which engirded him, a sense of his own individual insignificance fell, with a crus.h.i.+ng weight, on his spirit.

The deeply engrafted strength of virtue and religion, however, at length prevailed, restoring to his mind its usual buoyancy; and he began to see objects in the same degree of relative value, but with a widely enlarged scope of sensation. He set about his studies with vigour and alacrity; and, keeping in recollection the circ.u.mstances of his relatives, he determined not only to avoid all unnecessary expense, but to exercise the most rigid economy. Few hours were allowed to sleep, and almost no time allotted to exercise and recreation. The hopes his father entertained he determined should not be frustrated, nor the confidence they reposed in him be shown erroneous, by any negligence on his part; while, by persevering with a.s.siduity and ardour, he trusted, sooner than they expected, to relieve them of the burthen of his support--a burthen which, he knew, could not fail to press heavy on them all, however cheerfully supported.

In a course of the utmost economy, sobriety, and temperance, anxiously endeavouring to allow no opportunity of improvement to pa.s.s by unimproved, the winter session wore through, and left behind on his heart very few causes for self-disapprobation.

Towards the end of April, the pale student returned to the cottage of his father. Worn out by unwearied and unremitting studies, the vernal gales of the country came like a balsam to reanimate his flagging spirits; and the hopes that the object of so much exertion and care would be ultimately crowned with success, gained a strong hold on the mind it had threatened almost to forsake. In the crowd of the city he felt too deeply his own insignificance--an isolated stranger, poor and unknown of all, striving with a feverish hope, at rewards most likely to be carried away by more powerful interests. But here he felt a grain of self-importance return to elevate his fallen thoughts. The budding hawthorn, the singing birds, and the blue sky, were all delightful; and he began to lose his own bosom fears in the general exultation of nature.

The first ebullience of parental joy at his return, together with the congratulations of his affectionate brethren, having gradually subsided, few days were indeed allowed for idle recreation; and the same industrious course was persevered in.

Of the cottage, which consisted of three apartments, one of which served for kitchen, another was entirely set apart for William, that no interruptions might at any time disturb him. In the summer mornings he was up with the lark; but he closed not his book with her evening song.

His studies were carried far into the silence of the night, and the belated traveller never failed to mark the taper gleaming from the window of his apartment.

Summer mellowed into autumn, which, with its fruitage, flowers, and yellow corn fields, also pa.s.sed away; and again the h.o.a.r-frost lay whitely at morning on the wall of the little garden. Towards the end of October, our student, a second time, set out on his journey to Edinburgh.

The life of a college student is not one of incident or variety. Day after day calls him to the same routine of employment; and week is only known from week by the intervention of Sabbath repose. Suffice it, therefore, to say, that the second season pa.s.sed away like the first, in frugal living and indefatigable exertion, and left our hero, at its close, the same uncorrupted, simple-hearted, and generous-minded youth, as when he first left the shadow of his father's door. His dress and his manners were very little altered. Amid the hum and the bustle of thousands, wealthy and toiling after wealth, he was an individual apart--a hermit standing on the rock, and listening to the roar of life's billowing ocean, but launching not his bark on its dim and dangerous waters.

His delicacy made him feel acutely, that the expenses which he had necessarily incurred, must weigh heavily on those upon whose open, but necessarily circ.u.mscribed bounty, he depended. It was, therefore, agreed on, at his own suggestion, to open a school for a season, in some one of the neighbouring villages. He hoped, by this means, to be enabled to raise a small fund for future exigencies, and to be indebted to his own industry for what necessity had hitherto obliged him to be dependent for on the bounty of others. Alas! this commendable design was but the protracting of a course of study already too severe for his tender and delicate const.i.tution.

The scheme was, however, immediately acted on. A school in the village of Sauchieburn was opened, and, in a brief s.p.a.ce, everything succeeded to the utmost of his expectations--for the school-room speedily began to fill; and, by a conscientious discharge of his duty to his pupils, the affection of their parents began to flow towards him. Although the quarterly payments were small, he contrived to lay aside by much the larger half. From the natural timidity of his disposition, conjoined with the fear of making acquaintances which might lead him into expenses, he lived almost alone, spending the leisure of his afternoons in walking with his book in his hand through the fields; his evenings pa.s.sed over in solitary study.

Not long after his settlement, Mr. Allan, a farmer of some consideration in the neighbourhood, requested him to devote an hour or two daily to the tuition of his boys. In every point of view, this was a favourable circ.u.mstance for him. His labours were handsomely remunerated; and an introduction secured for him into a well-informed and rather elegant circle.

The family in whose house he lodged were little removed above the order of peasantry, but remarkable not only for their cleanliness and for the comfort of their dwelling, but for that integrity in their small concerns, and devout feeling of religious truth, still so frequently found united to narrow circ.u.mstances in the nooks and byways of Scotland, and const.i.tuting, certainly, not the least valuable gem in the coronal of her honour. Here he was regarded with looks of love; and his minutest wants attended to, with that scrupulous zeal which can only be expected from parental tenderness. He was regarded not only as a member of the family, but looked up to as something that was above them--doing honour to their dwelling. Every possible care was taken to render his situation as agreeable as possible to him; and his health was inquired after, by the kind inmates, with the most anxious and affectionate solicitude.

But the dark work was begun within, and the canker, which was to destroy the rose of health, was already committing dreadful ravages. He uttered no complaint; and, if pain was felt, its pangs were unacknowledged. A languor of the eye, an unusual paleness of the face, and the bursting forth of large drops of perspiration on the least exertion, were the only indications of declining health. The school was attended to as usual--not an hour was sacrificed to his weakness; and day succeeded day, and week followed week, without relaxation and without amendment.

This could not last. The interregnum between receding health and approaching disease is generally of short duration, and the vacant throne is either greedily seized on by the angel or the demon.