The Cruise of the Land-Yacht "Wanderer" Part 24

"Drive on, John, drive on."

All round Co'burn's path is a wild land of romance. But here is the hamlet itself.

The inn--there is but one--stands boldly by the roadside; the little village itself hides upon a wooded braeland away behind.

"Is it a large village?" I inquired.

"_No_," was the canny Scotch reply, "not so _vera_ large. It is just a middlin' bit o' a village."

So I found it when I rode round, a _very_ middling bit of a village indeed.

The sh.o.r.e is about half a mile from the road. It is bounded by tall steep cliffs, and many of these are pierced by caves. The marks of chisels are visible on their walls, and in troublous times they were doubtless the hiding-places of unfortunate families, but more recently they were used by smugglers, concerning which the hills about here, could they but speak, would tell many a strange story.

Dined and baited at Co'burn's path, and started on again. And now the rain began to come down in earnest--Scotch rain, not Scotch mist, rain in continuous streams that fell on the road with a force that caused it to rebound again, and break into a mist which lay all along the ground a good foot deep.

Nothing could touch us in our well-built caravan, however; we could afford to look at the rain with a complacency somewhat embittered with pity for the horses.

The country through which we are now pa.s.sing is beautiful, or would be on a fine day. It is a rolling land, and well-treed, but everything is a blur at present, and half hidden by the terrible rain.

When we reached Dunbar at last, we found the romantic and pretty town all astir. The yeomanry had been holding their annual races, and great was the excitement among both s.e.xes, despite the downpour.

It was an hour or two before I could find a place to stand in. I succeeded at last in getting on to the top of the west cliff, but myself and valet had to work hard for twenty minutes before we got in here. We chartered a soldier, who helped us manfully to enlarge a gap, by taking down a stone wall and levelling the footpath.

At Dunbar, on this cliff-top, from which there was a splendid view of the ever-changing sea, I lay for several days, making excursions. .h.i.ther and thither, and enjoying the sea-bathing.

[For further notes about pleasant excursions, fis.h.i.+ng streams, etc, see my "Rota Vitae; or, Cyclist's Guide to Health and Rational Enjoyment."

Price 1 s.h.i.+lling. Published by Messrs. Iliffe and Co, Fleet Street, London.]

The ancient town of Dunbar is too well-known to need description by me, although every one is ent.i.tled to talk about a place as he finds it.

Dunbar, then, let me say parenthetically, is a town of plain substantial stone, with many charming villas around it. It has at least one very wide and s.p.a.cious street, and it has the ruins of an ancient castle--no one seems to know how ancient; it has been the scene of many a b.l.o.o.d.y battle, and has a deal otherwise to boast about in a historical way.

I found the people exceedingly kind and hospitable, and frank and free as well.

English people ought to know that Dunbar is an excellent place for bathing, that it is an extremely healthy town, and could be made the headquarters for tourists wis.h.i.+ng to visit the thousand and one places of interest and romance around it.

But it was the rock scenery that threw a glamour over me. It is indescribably wild and beautiful here. These rocks are always fantastic, but like the sea that lisps around their feet in fine weather, or dashes in curling wreaths of snow-white foam high over their summits, when a nor'-east storm is blowing, they are, or seem to be, ever-changing in appearance, never quite the same. Only, one rock on the horizon is ever the same, the Ba.s.s.

When the tide is back pools are left among the rocks; here bare-legged children dabble and play and catch the strange little fishes that have been left behind.

To see those children, by the way, hanging like bees--in bunches--on the dizzy cliff-tops and close to the edge, makes one's heart at times almost stand still with fear for their safety.

There is food here for the naturalist, enjoyment for the healthy, and health itself for the invalid. I shall be happy indeed if what I write about the place shall induce tourists to visit this fine town.

On the morning of the 23rd of July we left Dunbar, after a visit from the Provost and some members of the town council. St.u.r.dy chiels, not one under six feet high, and broad and hard in proportion. An army of such men might have hurled Cromwell and all his hordes over the cliffs to feed the skate--that is, _if_ there were giants in those days.

We got out and away from the grand old town just as the park of artillery opened fire from their great guns on their red-flagged targets far out to sea. Fife-s.h.i.+re Militia these soldiers are, under command of Colonel the Hon.--Halket. Mostly miners, st.u.r.dy, strong fellows, and, like the gallant officer commanding them, soldierly in bearing.

I fear, however, that the good folks of Dunbar hardly appreciate the firing of big guns quite so close to their windows, especially when a salvo is attempted. This latter means s.h.i.+vered gla.s.s, frightened ladies, startled invalids, and maddened dogs and cats. The dogs I am told get into cupboards, and the cats bolt up the chimneys.

The first day of the firing an officer was sent to tell me that the Wanderer was not lying in quite a safe position, as sh.e.l.ls sometimes burst shortly after leaving the gun's mouth. I took my chance, however, and all went well. Alas for poor Hurricane Bob, however! I have never seen a dog before in such an abject state of s.h.i.+vering terror. The shock to his system ended in sickness of a painful and distressing character, and it was one o'clock in the morning before he recovered.

One o'clock, and what a night of gloom it was! The sky over hills and over the ocean was completely obscured, with only here and there a lurid brown rift, showing where the feeble rays of moon and stars were trying to struggle through.

The wind was moaning among the black and beetling crags; far down beneath was the white froth of the breaking waves, while ever and anon from seaward came the bright sharp flash of the summer lightning. So vivid was it that at first I took it for a gun, and listened for the report.

It was a dreary night, a night to make one s.h.i.+ver as if under the shadow of some coming evil.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

A DAY AT PRESSMANNAN--THE FIGHT FOR A POLONIE SAUSAGE--IN THE HAUGHS OF HADDINGTON--MRS CARLILE'S GRAVE--GENUINE HOSPITALITY.

"Here springs the oak, the beauty of the grove, Whose stately trunk fierce storms can scarcely move; Here grows the cedar, here the swelling vine Does round the elm its purple cl.u.s.ters twine; Here painted flowers the smiling gardens bless, Both with their fragrant scent and gaudy dress; Here the white lily in full beauty grows; Here the blue violet and the blus.h.i.+ng rose."

Blackmore.

Had a gale of wind come on to blow during our stay at Dunbar, our position on the green cliff-top would undoubtedly have been a somewhat perilous one, for the wind takes a powerful hold of the Wanderer.

Perhaps it was this fact which caused my ill.u.s.trious valet and factotum to write some verses parodying the nursery rhyme of "Hush-a-bye baby, upon the tree top." I only remember the first of these:--

"Poor weary Wanderer on the cliff-top, If the wind blows the carriage will rock, If gale should come on over she'll fall Down over the cliff, doctor and all."

Perhaps one of the most pleasant outings I had when at Dunbar was my visit to the beautiful loch of Pressmannan.

I give here a short sketch of it to show that a gentleman gipsy's life is not only confined to the places to which he can travel in his caravan. The Wanderer is quite a Pullman car, and cannot be turned on narrow roads, while its great height causes overhanging trees to form very serious obstacles indeed.

But I have my tricycle. I can go anywhere on her. Well, but if I want to take a companion with me on some short tour where the Wanderer cannot go, it is always easy to borrow a dogcart, pop Pea-blossom into the shafts, and scud away like the wind. This is what I did when I made up my mind to spend--

A Day at Pressmannan.

I would have preferred going alone on my cycle with a book and my fis.h.i.+ng-rod, but Hurricane Bob unfortunately--unlike the infant Jumbo-- is no cyclist, and a twenty-miles' run on a warm summer's day would have been too much for the n.o.ble fellow. Nor could he be left, in the caravan to be frightened out of his poor wits with thundering cannon and bursting sh.e.l.ls. Hence Pea-blossom and a light elegant phaeton, with Bob at my feet on his rugs.

We left about ten am, just before the guns began to roar.

The day was warm and somewhat hazy, a kind of heat-mist.

Soon after rattling out of Dunbar we pa.s.sed through a rural village. We bore away to the right, and now the scenery opened up and became very interesting indeed.

Away beneath us on our right--we were journeying north-west--was a broad sandy bay, on which the waves were breaking lazily in long rolling lines of foam. Far off and ahead of us the lofty and solid-looking Berwick Law could be seen, rising high over the wooded hills on the horizon with a beautiful forest land all between.

Down now through an avenue of lofty beeches and maples that makes this part of the road a sylvan tunnel. We pa.s.s the lodge-gates of Pitc.o.x, and in there is a park of lordly deer.

On our left now are immensely large rolling fields of potatoes. These supply the southern markets, and the _pomme de terre_ is even s.h.i.+pped, I believe, from this country to America. There is not a weed to be seen anywhere among the rows, all are clean and tidy and well earthed up.

No poetry about a potato field? Is that the remark you make, dear reader? You should see these even furrows of darkest green, going high up and low down among the hills; and is there any flower, I ask, moch prettier than that of the potato? But there we come to the cosy many-gabled farmhouse itself. How different it is from anything one sees in Yorks or Berks.h.i.+re, for instance! A modern house of no mean pretensions, built high up on a knoll, built of solid stone, with bay windows, with gardens, lawns, and terraces, and nicely-wooded winding avenues. About a mile farther on, and near to the rural hamlet of Stenton, we stop to gaze at and make conjectures about a strange-looking monument about ten feet high, that stands within a rude enclosure, where dank green nettles grow.

What is it, I wonder? I peep inside the door, but can make nothing of it. Is it the tomb of a saint? a battlefield memorial? the old village well? or the top of the steeple blown down in a gale of wind?

We strike off the main road here and drive away up a narrow lane with a charming hedgerow at each side, in which the crimson sweetbriar-roses mingle prettily with the dark-green of privet, and the lighter green of the holly.